They arrive to a scene straight out of a horror movie.

Dark cabin in the woods.

Abandoned car.

One car, the car that belongs to the man Carol is trying to win back, is riddled with bullets. The windshield has been shot out. There's no blood though so she's pretty certain he's still alive. Somewhere.

It looks like the forest has reclaimed the cabin. It lies empty, except for the tree that has come through the windows and back door and the pine that has come through the roof. And in the middle, on display for all to see, is a trapdoor propped open that leads to a dank hole of despair.

There is, no doubt, years of proof that Sherriff Booth is the man they're looking for, but that isn't what Carol is worried about. She knows Cooper was here, she knows something has happened, and he's in trouble.

She just doesn't know where he could have possibly gone.

The cops that work under Booth are shocked by this. That his cabin is the epicenter of the evil they've been hunting. That their glorious leader had been making fools of them all.

But she doesn't have time to comfort them.

She's going to do what Ruelle couldn't. She's going to save Cooper Booth, but to do that she needs to find him, before his father kills him for what he knows. Before his father finishes what he started all those years ago.

Chief Alo is brought to her. He looks to the cabin, to the shot-out car and then to her.

He no doubt doesn't want to help her. She being the one who had made sure that Ruelle was taken from this town. But he was going to have to help if they wanted to find Cooper and because where Cooper is, she'd bet Ruelle would be.

"Cooper and Harvey are in the wind..."

"Well I doubt Cooper's in on it..." he says cutting her off before she can finish.

She obviously knows that Cooper is in on it. Or does she know that. Maybe Cooper was, but then Harvey killed Ruelle, and the two of them got into a fight over it. Maybe he didn't remember that part. Maybe he had kept quiet about what his dad had done not realizing his dad had also done it to Ruelle.

"We need to find them both, before something happens. We can't figure out what's going on until we question them both."

He stands there staring at her like he doesn't understand what she means.

"I need you to track them," she says plainly and he still just stares at her.

His thousand-yard stare is unnerving and, luckily for her, he turns his eyes to the sky.

"The Forest is going to decide his fate," he says. "It chose her for a reason. She will be the one to end this. Not you."

Carol stares at him. He underestimates her. She will be the one to end this.

She is going to save Cooper's life. Save him from Ruelle. And if she has to, she'll arrest them both to get her way.

[----]

Gunshots had kept Cooper from getting into his car.

Gunshots had been following him as he ran.

He watched branches blow up into splinters, dirt being thrown up into the air. None of the gunshots have hit him though, but there have been some pretty close calls.

The forest is moving again. The sky is dark even for the night sky. Clouds are moving, thunder rumbles, the wind is waging a war against all that stand before it.

Cooper has no idea where he's running to and he's too afraid to listen to the forest like he did before. Or maybe the forest is too angry to show him the way.

And then Errol bounds out of the bushes.

He's blood soaked but moving, so it can't be him that's bleeding. So, who bled along his side like that? Who painted him that color? Please god not Ruelle.

Another gunshot gets him moving.

He's following Errol now, as his father screams and swears behind him. He's not close but he's not far, and if he catches up with Cooper, he's dead.

What Errol leads him to is a clearing.

This large empty clearing that has the overwhelming heavy sense of death.

The trees stand in a circle and beneath each one is turned soil. As if someone had been digging and there is one, one tree where a hole sits.

Cooper realizes right away what it is.

It's an empty grave.

"The first time she showed up I came right back here."

He had caught up.

Cooper turns around to face his father. He's standing right outside the clearing the gun trained on his son again. Errol stands between them growling. But Harvey Booth shot Errol once, he'd do it again no problem.

"I had to stop for a while," he says as if it were a terrible thing to have to stop murdering people. "You were looking, the Indians were looking, so I had to stop. Next woman I took, she got out, and that's when I saw her. That maniac in the wolf costume."

Ruelle had saved someone. Saved someone from the man who had killed her. How long had his father known that she was alive? Was Cooper really the last to find out?

"I came back here and found it. The empty grave. There was no way she should have survived. I swear. But she had. I was lucky though. She never told anyone what I did."

Yes, lucky. Too lucky.

"She didn't remember," Cooper whispers. "But she remembers now. She's going to tell everyone what you did..."

"That girl is insane, no one will believe her," Harvey snaps and Cooper falls silent again. "And besides. She'll come. She'll come for you and I'll deal with her then, just like I'll deal with you. Just you wait..."

Except she can't come. She's been taken away. To a world of steel and concrete to be locked in a room where she won't be able to survive. Cooper hadn't been able to save her. Twice now.

He levels the gun again, aiming straight for Cooper's chest. There's a crack of lightning, it lights up the spaces in the trees and that's when he catches the glint of silver moving in the branches.

No. It couldn't be.

But it is.

For the second Harvey Booth goes to pull the trigger back on that shotgun of his, Ruelle drops from the branches above and onto his back.

Harvey, with Ruelle on him, tumbles into that clearing and as they hit the ground, the earth beneath them and around them starts to quake and move.

Trees groan, roots break the surface and with them comes the bones of all his victims. Years of death and destruction break through the soil. And ignoring all of this is Ruelle and Harvey who are locked in a deathly duel.

She's knocked his gun away. That leaves them both weaponless, but Harvey Booth is strong, just as strong if not stronger than her.

Cooper watches Harvey swing at her, knock his Ruelle down, and then he's moving. His first swing connects with his dad's jaw, knocking him away from her.

Then it becomes a tag team, the two of them sparring with Harvey. Trading blows. When he knocks one down the other comes back. And in between it all is Errol snapping at his legs.

How his dad is holding his own against the team is remarkable, but Cooper knows there is no way his father would have gone down easy.

Harvey isn't playing dirty. He keeps trying to get his hands on Ruelle, because if he can get a hold of her he knows he can get Cooper to back down. That's why he keeps trying to throw Cooper to the side, so he can face Ruelle on her own.

It's just not working.

Or it wasn't.

They knocked him down a little too close to the shotgun he had dropped. He had managed to throw Cooper to the ground a little way away from them and Ruelle used that distraction to kick the feet out from under Harvey.

The problem is when he stands up again, he's got that gun on her.

Ruelle stops moving, she stares at him and the gun. For a second Cooper swears he sees the same face his father saw that night.

The look of confusion on her face as she realizes that this man is a killer and she's next.

But Cooper isn't going to let this happen. He's not going to fail her this time. So as his father takes aim he jumps to his feet and he's running.

Running to save the woman he loved like he should have done back when they were eighteen.

The shot goes off and Ruelle screams.

He hears it.

For a second he thinks he's failed her. But it's not Ruelle who falls to the ground, but him.

Collapsing first to his knees and then back into her awaiting arms.

She says his name.

His real name.

Not a nickname.

Not an accolade.

Cooper!

Her slim fingers cover the hole in his chest, tears fall from her eyes. He looks up to her, his hand comes to cup her cheek leaving her blood stained and branded with his bloody finger tips.

The pain is muted but he knows that's just the shock. Soon it's going to be overwhelmingly agonizing but he doesn't want to focus on that.

He's dying again. And as dying went, this was a pretty good way to go. In the arms of the woman he loved.

Across from them comes a click. Cooper's father reloads his shotgun.

When Ruelle looks up again there is an animalistic growl on her face. Harvey Booth freezes. Maybe it's the way the trees are moving, their gnarled braces warping and weaving together making the clearing impassible. Maybe it the eyes of the wolves blinking in the shadows, or the appearance of the glowing animals.

Maybe it's just the look on Ruelle's face. All the justified rage that contorts it.

Harvey Booth freezes in front of her and that right there is his downfall.

She lets out an inhumane screech that echoes through the night. Cooper doesn't need it translated. He hears the translation echoing through his mind.

Murderer.

He raises his gun but forest shakes and he loses his footing.

The ground breaks open. Roots erupt from the soil and wrap around him holding him in one spot.

The other worldly animals approach, appearing like mist through the cracks of the branches, a large silver wolf at the lead.

Ruelle has left him.

She has gone with them, she too glows as if she's one of them, her eyes nothing but orbs of glinting silver. She opens her mouth to speak and Cooper finally understands.

She really is the voice of the forest.

The words that come out of her are not her own. Her voice is a low note under the tones of whatever is speaking through her. He knows it to be the wolf, but his mind, still foggy with pain has trouble comprehending what is happening. Each sentence a different voice. A different animal.

You have been judged.

You have been weighed.

Your actions condemn you.

Your evil will hunt no longer.

You have been found guilty.

And then the voices were one.

You have been sentenced to death.

His father tries to talk, tries to plead, argue maybe. But the forest has decided and the forest isn't going to be merciful now.

Cooper closes his eyes against the sight of the wolves as they leap in for the kill, led by Errol, but he can't close his ears to the sound of his father screaming.

When he opens his eyes again he's looking into the eyes of the woman he loves. The same grass green eyes he knew them to be. She kisses him softly on his lips and as the sun begins to rise over the mountain, the darkness takes a hold of him once more.

And the forest is once again quiet.

[----]

They say the found him in a clearing of bones and blood. Led there by a dog and an Indian Chief.

They say they found him bleeding to death again. The same shoulder torn. A death rattle the only sound echoing through the clearing of graves. The lost girls found, the lost boy dying.

They say they found his father torn to pieces, shotgun in hand, a confession in his eyes. The monster slain by the forest it hunted in.

They say that when they found him again it was not with a bear standing over him, but a girl wearing the skin of the wolf and the forest in her eyes.

A girl who vanished into the trees, like a loping wolf. Never to be seen again.