Chapter II: Track down thine human

For the past two weeks Anna has been tracking down Malcolm, all the leads were mainly viral internet videos of a man wearing a worn out grey hooded coat, that the coat was worn by fangs, claws and jaws from strange creatures that followed him around, some crawled out of the darkness while others pierced holes in thin air looking for him. Each site was slightly worse than the previous one, people abandoned these places in fear of confirmation for those strange creature rumors.

At every site there was also a small shrine, a small black obelisk with some silver lines located in what seemed to be the epicenter of these strange phenomena, each obelisk exactly the same as the previous one, with the same peculiar symbol in the black folder, in the same silver parallel lines with the same golden shape.

After two weeks of hunting leads Anna got to the last known location of Malcolm, a forest just before the start of Winter, the orange was long gone with the fall and the cold was marching with an unmatched force. Before entering the forest, Anna decided to look for the obelisk she assumed was enforced to warn about these situations to strangers, after two weeks of this strange horror movie stage the authorities were taking action and declared some zones beyond public access and fence the perimeter.

This obelisk was like any other, she crossed the fenced gates just pushing the handles, there had been no chains since the videos started being posted, so far no one had been reported missing and everyone kept silence, questioning the people just led them to fall under a deep state of shock requiring sedatives to deal with the hysteria. As she walked towards the small monolith she noticed an odd yet familiar detail, there were two things leaning on the obelisk, a flare gun and a file just like the one she found at her office and still kept with her through the journey. This file was different, there was just one page and the rest seemed like pages torn off a book like the ones Malcolm was keeping as a journal for dealing with the hallucinations.

The two torn pages were filled with notes and names Anna wasn’t sure how to pronounce, there was a similarity with the golden symbol in the folders, it was a strange looking creature with black bottomless holes for what she could only guess were it’s eyes and there were two notes, one she recognized as Malcolm but this other one seemed from someone else entirely. Malcolm wrote –“You leave Anna out of this!” – and the other one answered – “I'll feed off your still beating heart Malcolm and she will watch” – she looked comfort in the flask she used to carry around filled with vodka this time, a thick sip went down to soothe the nerves trying to convince herself that its just a sick man and there are no monsters, so far after two weeks of searching and turning every stone in these fenced zones there were no sings of violence, just some scratches on concrete that could have been done by human hands, the usual human lying she was used too after the second sip of her trusty flask. And so, she read:

> “The human by the name of Malcolm has been hiding for the past seven months due to the successful experimental treatment that has – as always – just delayed the inevitable outcome.
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> Two weeks ago, you left his side and the first echoes were sang. Our failure will weight heavily since these tears can only be controlled by him and neither of you know about the true nature of the Void.
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> Our sacred machine praises these efforts and has decided to allow the search of him in this forest, however the soil is tainted and life is no more. The machine entrusts you to be the vessel while we contain the tears your critter has opened by the extent of his ignorance.
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> The woods are filled with howlers, use the flare gun and support will be provided.
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> Worry not Anna, for your god watches over.”
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After the last sentence shivers ran down her spine – “In the middle of a deserted town there is just one file with my name on it, with Malcolm’s name on it. This can’t be.”- she read the sentence over and over again looking her name in there, she said out loud looking all around her - “Whoever is leaving this trail of breadcrumbs, please, I’ve followed here just looking for him, let me take him home and I swear everything will be fine. I’ll make him stop scaring people, he’s not an evil man.” – she fell to her knees as the desperation took the best of her and whispered “Please, he’s good. It’s my fault, please.”- tears flowing like the rivers she had no time to shed in the past weeks as she had been in a constant state of negation that she may never see Malcolm again and that slowly that man had been fading away towards oblivion.
She headed for the wood’s entry yet couldn’t help to look at the black slime in the ground just where gun cartridges soaked in the fluid, from the woods a muffed scream of a man tore her nerves asunder and she fall into the ground from the fear after the silence deafened the woods like the dead were stalking the night, she ran to the obelisk and took her pen to start writing a note.

> “To whoever has led me here, I need to search the woods for him.
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> I took the flare gun but I am terrified, I’m a doctor not a soldier and I have listened to the woods, I hear screams of agony like army men do in emergency rooms.
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> If those are the howlers you were talking about and this whole facade of quarantines is more than just a veil for you, I am lost and you will only find my remains.
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> I have family left, there is nowhere left to bury him for I’m all he has. Please, let them know I love them and I’m sorry.
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> Whoever you are, please come and find me, I beg to this god of yours to help me.”
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She tore the paper from her notebook and left in inside the black folder on the small monolith and with a deep breath she went forward into the woods. The air stood still with all the sounds that died in the second she stood on that puddle of black slime, near her there was a combat knife inside its leather cover with the name “Deimos711” on it. Knife in hand she went forward, beyond the sight of the monolith.