While blood dripped from the fern, it also dripped onto the fern. He slowly looked up, following the source. High in a tangled canopy of maple, aspen, and red oak, a moose carcass sprawled. Huge chunks were missing from its flank. The hooves were gone, chewed off into red and nubby spears, beaver-like. Half the face was eaten away, leaving a bony white jaw that seemed caught in a scream. Massive bite marks scarred the animal’s hump. The belly had been sliced open, allowing intestines to hang and sway from the branches. Blood dripped down the intestinal rope like water trickling down a clogged garden hose.

See any animals, daddy?

He brushed away the thought and spit. Then he focused on the canopy, walking under the rope of intestine, careful not to get any blood on his uniform. As the wind shifted, a drop of blood splashed the back of his neck, trickling down the rolls of skin below his crew cut. He swept his hand along the rolls, smearing the blood like putrid sun tan lotion. The trunk of a maple was as good a place as any to wipe it off.

Right away, something else caught his attention. A shadow in the canopy. Another dead moose, but this carcass was an older kill. Crows fluttered into the canopy and picked at it. The crows completely avoided the fresh kill.

Officer Bertil remained quiet for several minutes, listening for a predator. A moment of officer’s intuition socked him in the belly. Not a thing to ignore. No sir. He watched the crows peck and tear at the older carcass. One of the crows jabbed the eye and beaked up the slop with repeated head bobs, then cawed. The crows never approached the fresh kill, not even once. And it seemed they didn’t even want to be near it, scooting back on an invisible line when they fluttered too close.

Bertil snapped a photo of the canopy and thumbed his radio. “Charlie one-oh-two to C-Com.”

“Go ahead, Charlie one-oh-two.”

“I need Hendricks to do a ten-twenty-five for biologist Michael Eggerts ASAP. We have a wildlife incident up on lower Julip Road.”

“Ten-four. Do you need additional units?”

“Ten-fifty-four. Also, I’m running into a ten-one.”

Static chewed apart the signal. He clipped the radio onto his chest and surveyed the woods. A rustling noise came from the bushes just over the ridge.

Go time. He palmed his firearm.

Wow mister, is that a real gun? the tourist girls would ask.

An enormous shape emerged on the crest of the ridge, loping towards him. It bellowed and huffed as branches and saplings snapped around it.

Bertil’s overburdened heart pounded as he licked away a bead of sweat from his upper lip. Then he raised his firearm. The creature emerged from shadows into daylight. A bull moose, breath steaming from its nostrils, eyes possessed by rage.

Bertil turned and dashed through the ferns.