The Chasm

A hunting party of six is trailing a bear through the forest. Four of them chase the bear as to corner it while two other hunters, Edi and Alin, are staking it out in a nearby hiding place. They are brothers, but their relationship is strained. Alin has a drinking problem which he blames on the cold. Edi, the older brother, is a seasoned hunter, yet he trusts Alin to be on the lookout by himself while he leaves briefly to the call of nature. Edi hears rustling noises close to him and immediately assumes it’s the bear. He readies his gun and shoots to kill. He slowly approaches the target only to discover that it is a man clothed in a bear pelt. Edi gets frightened and runs aimlessly, but soon discovers a deep chasm in which he almost falls. He disposes of the body in the chasm. He then gets lost, it’s getting darker and darker. He shoots wildly into the air and shouts for his brother. He finally succumbs to fatigue and kneels in the muddy soil. Someone is quickly approaching him and hits him on the head with a club. He is dragged by a man wearing a bear pelt. When he fully awakes he finds himself tied to a tree near a huge bonfire. Five bear pelt wearing men are having a ritual around the fire. He is hypnotized by their dance and their music. He faints and wakes up in the same place he’d been the previous night. He thinks that what had happened had been a dream, yet he feels the bump on his head. He finds his own tracks and follows them and reaches the remains of the fire. He then finds his and his brother’s hiding place. The brother is nowhere to be seen. He hears something approaching and feels as though nature itself is rising against him. He stumbles across the chasm once again and sees that the body of his victim has been replaced by the decaying body of his brother.