“Who uses a lantern anymore?” Clint mumbled with his mouth full, dropping his bowl next to his boots. He stood up with a long stretch, reaching for his flashlight.

“You should just leave them alone, Clint, it’s only another hiker. You always make such a fuss out of everything!” I said sternly, sitting up to watch him. He didn’t answer nor look at me, which wasn’t exactly surprising. He could never let me make him turn down an opportunity to belittle strangers.

Said stranger approached, a blank look beneath eyes as gray as stone. He was an older man who was quite too unfit to be hiking, carrying a heavy bag upon his back. No one was with him, but he appeared to be having a conversation with himself, or maybe he was singing a sea shanty that had no melody. He stopped just in front of us as if he had not noticed us until just then, slightly tilting his head. Clint held his flashlight like he would a sword.

“Do you need something?” He demanded, glaring up and down at the man. I rose to my own feet and stood beside him in case he lost his temper on this poor hiker.

“A place to sleep.” The man answered calmly.

“You went hiking and didn’t bring a tent?”

“Bears got to it last night.”

Before Clint could reply, likely with an insult telling the man to shove off, I tapped his shoulder, frowning. Regardless of any possible danger, I felt bad. He was just a stranger who still used lanterns and had experienced the wrath of bears; there were worse people we could have come across for Clint to whine about. And if he felt like chasing us, it wouldn’t exactly be hard to outrun him, anyway. Hesitant as ever, Clint finally stepped to the side, motioning the man over with a wave of his calloused hand.

“This your first time on Tabiat?” The man asked with a gravelly voice, giving an aggressive grunt as he sat down on the ground.

“Yes.” I replied, sitting myself next to Clint. “For our honeymoon.”

“You’ve got yourselves in real big danger!” He suddenly exclaimed, eliciting a flinch from us both. “This mountain is alive.”

Clint nudged his elbow against mine, looking at me from the side with an ‘I told you so’ look in his eyes. But again, this could have been worse. As the man made a wild gesture with his arm, stretching it out, there was another shift beneath us, this time scaring Clint and causing him to subconsciously grab at my sleeve.

“Alive?” I laughed awkwardly as I inched Clint’s hand off. The man got himself comfortable and thrusted his bag and his lantern to the side, leaning forward and grinning at us with an eager sparkle in his gaze.

“When we get too comfortable on Tabiat, he wakes from his slumber and makes good work of us. Just before midnight tomorrow, it’ll happen again after two hundred years, I heard him! And he ain’t a mornin’ person…”

All we could do was listen blankly and nod along with his stories.