The Silent Forest

Note: This is a story based on the author's fiction. It does not apply to any historical reference.

OCTOBER 5, 2021:

THRISSUR FOREST:

A 25-year old Anish decides to visit Thrissur, a beautiful picnic spot famous for trekking. It is situated near Peermedu in Idukki district. Visitors can avail many activities including trekking, paragliding, mountaineering and rock climbing.

In his journey, Anish's younger brother Krishna agreed to accompany him. As a professional photographer and adventure lover, Anish have travelled across several places in India, with the support of Krishna, who is pursuing his final year in Computer Applications course at PSG College of Arts and Science of Coimbatore. 

At the nearby resorts in Thrissur Forestry, there's a close friend for Anish named Nagoor Meeran. He have lots of private forest lands in Trichur. The guys startrd off their journey around 12:00 PM from Pollachi in their Toyota Yaris car. They reach the place around 2:30 PM. Meeting Nagoor in his resort, Anish embraced him and they spoke for a while.

Nagoor asked: "How was your Covid times da?"

"What to say da. Nothing much. During the lockdown, I and my brother sat in home. He attended online classes. While, I continued my job as a photographer by sitting inside the home. After one year of struggle, I am coming back." Laughing for a minute, he said: "But, what fun means, we are all still wearing masks fearing for the Corona attack." Anish then comes with the actual motive for coming to Kerala after a one year gap.

"Nagoor. I like to photograph some beautiful pictures of Thrissur forestry da. Most of these comes under your land. So, if you give me permission..."

Thinking for a while by sratching his heads, Nagoor agrees to allow him inside the forestry and gives him the key. The next day, Anish and Krishna woke up at 3:30 AM. They started off their journey to Thrissur forest range. It's a reserved forest, now under the control of some people, who have bought the land. It's been surrounded by barriers all over. They take a left turn from the main road, where Krishna notes a gateway entrance to enter inside the forest.

Krishna notices that the pin number is necessary in order to enter inside the forest. Nagoor have said the pin number to Anish already. Henceforth, Anish entered the pin number, as said by Nagoor to him. After entering inside the gate, Krishna locked the door and goes inside the mud road for four kilometers.

The car finds it difficult to move in further. Krishna said: "We can't move in further brother. So, let's park the car somewhere and travel by walk." Anish agrees to his plan and parked the car nearby a Teak tree. With lots of excitement and happiness, the duo entered into the dense forests.

The guys planned to do hiking, when they are unable to take the photos of animals and birds. In several rainforests including Amazon and Congo, there could movements of small reptiles like Lizard and Leech. However, in the forest, where Anish had been travelling doesn't hear the single sounds of a roaring lion as well as the pouncing tiger and leopards.

Krishna suspects the accuracy of Anish's information. He asked him, "Anish. You told that there are some important elephants, lion and reptiles. But, nothing is there here. Is your information correct?"

Looking back to Krishna, Anish said: "Since childhood days, I am studying a lots about Indian Wildlife and Forests. I surely know, there are some left mammals and reptiles in these reserved forest ranges."

Pausing for a while, Krishna asked: "But...."

"I know what are you going to ask me the next. There's no screaming sounds of Animals. Am I right?" As Krishna looked down, Anish said: "Don't worry. Since this have become a private forest land, the animals won't come here frequently." After travelling a few meters, the two guys noticed the photographic stand, said by Nagoor Meeran. Both of them sneaked into that stand.

They looked for the sounds of animals in the whole forest from the photographic stand since morning. However till night, the duo doesn't hear any sounds of animals or their screaming. Since there were no sounds of animals, Anish becomes frustrated. Now, the time is around 8:45 PM.

"Hey Krishna. Pack everything da. Let's get down from the place." Krishna gets down with Anish. As he is looking around the forest, Krishna asked: "Brother. Are we going back to Pollachi?"

Staring at Krishna, he replied: "We have faced lots of obstacles since one year in order to come here da. Applying e-pass, taking corona test, etc, etc. It shouldn't go waste. Let's enter deep inside the forestry da. I hope we can get some beautiful picutres in the deep forests."

6:30 PM- NEXT DAY:

The next day as they are walking inside the forest through woods after having a sleep in nearby woods, Anish looks at the clearance and notices the sounds of Athirapally waterfalls deep inside the forest. Turning to Krishna, he said by looking the Palm Oil Tree: "Krish. Let's put up a tent here and stay."

Fixing it as the campsite, they start to build the tent. After building the tent stronger, they focus the forestry from their camp site. Since, the sky was clear. Going for some distance, they captured the photos of some beautiful trees and hoped for the arrival of some animals. There is no photographic stand in that place. Hence, they choose a place and started to wait. Unfortunately, there were no animals in that place too.

Time passes. As the sun sets east slowly, Anish said to Krishna: "Ok da Krish. It's already time. Let's go back to the place, where we have set up the tent." As they go there, both the guys were terribly shocked. Since, the tent, that they have built have completely collapsed. Shocked by this, Anish assumed it's because of air winds. However, Krishna said: "No da. Today, what we had been discussing? The forest is very silent. Also, we didn't notice any animals. We didn't even heard any sounds too. In such case, how is this possible da?"

Anish feels suspicious. He questioned Krishna: "Did you build the Tent properly da?"

"Hey. How many times I have done this. I have set the tent, without any single errors." Anish is more confused when he looked close to the tent. Since, the four sticks are usually bent(due to tensions). Both suspects that someone have manually removed the tent. Since, there's no other way of chance to collapse the tent other than Manual method. Anish doubts if they were careless after building the tent. However, Krishna said, "He remembered very well that, the tent had been built stronger." 

"So someone have came here and collapsed the tent, I doubt." Anish said to Krishna, who too is having the suspicion. However another question strike them. In a private forest land, who have the guts to enter inside the forest and remove the tent, that had been formed.

As this possible way of thinking seemed to be strange and fearful, the two convinced themselves that, "They had been careless when building the tent." After sometimes, they again re-built the tent and puts a camp fire with the help of some woods. Anish discussed about the whole events to Krishna, by starting with the strange incidents that happened for the past two days. Feeling tired and lousy, both of them goes to sleep. 

A few hours later, Krishna feels thirsty. Since, there's no water to drink, he goes deep inside the forest hearing the sounds of Athirapally waterfalls. Hearing his footsteps, Anish follows him and asked him, "Where is he going?" In a sudden turn of events, both the guys accidentally falls into the waterfalls and drowns deep into the water. Due to the lack of oxygen level, both of them eventually die in the waters. Seeing them both, a crocodile comes in feeling glad to see a prey and starts to eat Krishna's face.

"Ah...." Krishna wakes up from the tent and finds himself inside the tent. He have surprisingly wake up due to suffocation and lack of oxygen. He touched his face. A sort of fear was seen in his eyes. With his throat struggling in fear, he sees his water bottle behind and drinks the water. He again sleept with Anish, confirming that nothing have happened to him.

When he was about to close his eyes, Krishna hears the screaming and sound of someone around a distance of 150 meters. As Anish is sleeping peacefully, Krishna decides to confirm whether the sound is just a dream. However, the dense forest was so silent and there were no sounds. Hence, he confirmed that it's just a dream and starts to sleep again. A few hours later, the same sounds are heard and Krishna waked up a few hours later. At this point of time, Anish have already woke up. He is looking around the forests from the tent, carefully looking to the surroundings and the sound.

"What happened? What are you doing da?" Krishna asked him in a low voice.

"Hush!" Anish said by turning back to Krishna and asked him, "Are you able to hear the sounds ah da?"

Both of them started to listen. As feared by them, they hears the voice of someone, laughing louder. Thus, Krishna realizes that, "The sounds that he had heard previously was not a dream." Also this time, the sound is heard just behind the tent. (that Krishna and Anish have built.) 

Now Krishna explained to Anish that, "A few hours back, he woke up by hearing the same sounds." Anish's face sweats in fear. Hiding his fear, he said to Krishna: "I asked Nagoor, whether there are any other people inside the forest. He said, there are no one inside, except we two." Now, Anish and Krishna remained inside the tent and observed the sounds of the laughter in order to knew, to know who is that and what could be the laughter.

The one who laughed louder starts to come faster towards the tent of Anish and Krishna with evil laughter. As it comes near to the edge of their clearance. Now, both the brothers start to panic. Since, the footsteps have stopped at the edge of the clearance. 

Holding each of their hands, Anish and Krishna realized someone or something is standing just behind their tent. Now, the laughter is even more eviler and cruel by the stranger. Thankfully, Anish had a licensed gun with him. He slowly opened the tent's zip. Hearing the zip's sound, the stranger's laughter sound stopped for a second. As the laughter have stopped, Anish stopped opening the zip. He placed his hand in the zip and sits as though, he was frozen.

As Anish and Krishna were planning whether to open the zip and go out of the tent, they hear the footsteps of the stranger, running deep into the forest.

The brothers remains frozen for a while. Without making any noise, they confirm that there are no footstep sounds nor the screaming. Henceforth, they locked the zip. They sat in the same position. Since, the stranger have known very well that they are aware of his presence inside the forest.

Till the sunrise, Anish and Krishna sat in the same position, holding the gun. After the sunrise, the brothers packed their things up and ran faster towards their car with the gun. Anish quickly started his car with Krishna and reached Pollachi. After reaching home, Anish called Nagoor and said to him, "What happened when they were inside the forest."

However, he said: "There's no chance for that da Anish. Only you and Krishna were present inside the forest da. Even in the security gateway, only your entrance had been recorded. There's no records of other people's entry inside the forest." Though Nagoor says he doesn't know what's that still, Anish realized that it's a ghost. 

A few minutes later, his girlfriend Priya Darshini called him and said, "Anish. I got the approval to go for a temple, that we were longing to go for so many days. Let's go there tomorrow." Anish agreed.

A few seconds later, she asked him: "Hey Anish. I forgot to ask you da. How was your journey to Thrissur da?"

Thinking for a while, he replied: "The journey was very very silent Priya", implying that: "He had got a different experience by staying in the silent forests of Thrissur." Unable to understand what he said she scolds him and hangs the call.

At the same time, Nagoor gives the pin number of the forest gate to another person, who wanted to hunt some animals inside the forest. The person entered inside the forest along with his son and gets ready to set for the journey around 8:30 PM. While, the ghost hides somewhere deep inside the forest and gives an evil laughter.