Candle Wax

“Candle Caine walks in the candle light. Can’t wear skin, it is far too tight. He makes no sound, he leaves no tracks. Candle Caine lives in the candle wax. A toast to you, this wondrous night. I hope to sate your appetite. One eye missing, one will remain. I now belong to Candle Caine.”

---

INTRODUCTION

Should I have stayed in Toronto? It’s the question I keep asking myself. If I knew what would happen when I moved to Greenwood, I’m sure I would have stayed as far away as possible. But if I had the chance to erase it all now, would I? I would be happier if I didn’t know what was out there, but it would be a lie.

Is having my eye open worth being forced to sleep with it open?

At the end of the day, it’s my job. It’s the life I chose, and I regret nothing about the life I chose. I believe that secrets, especially the darkest ones, need to be brought to light. So this is me, bringing them to light.

Journaling was a therapy thing at first, but it quickly became useful as a detective. Sorting feelings from facts, compartmentalizing, keeping things from getting personal. Its success rate varied. But in this case, it was a tool for compiling the events of last summer as I experienced them.

As of today, as I begin recounting that long waking nightmare, my birthday was three days ago. I got a t-shirt. Women’s medium. A replacement of one I lost. On my birthday last year, the only gift I got was from me to myself. That gift was moving to Greenwood, Nova Scotia. A place I had always loved, ever since visiting as a child.

I drove up there in my car on a sunny Tuesday morning. Daniels, my partner for two years in Toronto, followed me in his pick-up truck with all my furniture. I accumulated a fair few favors from the man in those two years and it was time to collect.

The air got better. The roads got worse. As I reached the first stretch of prairies, I knew I made the right choice. It was gorgeous. I drove with the windows down for hours and hours. I had made a whole new-wave pop-rock playlist for the road, but it turned out I didn’t need it. I just listened to the crashing of the wind, and I was happy. Even the smells made me smile. I’d take fresh farm manure over street pigeon shit any day.

We arrived Wednesday night and Daniels was off by Thursday morning. No emotional farewell, just a handshake and a “good luck” – and there I was. Home, in a one-bedroom basement unit of a six unit building. It was quaint, modest, and a damn sight cheaper than Toronto. Mrs. Fredricks, the sweet old landlady swung by and was about as stark opposite from my old landlord as you could get. She even offered to help me unpack.

“It’s always good to get it done right away.” She said. “First you put it off one day, then you put it off one week, then before ya know it it’s two years later and you still got these damn boxes layin’ around.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.” I replied, trying to match her friendliness to the best of my social ability.

“Do you have more stuff coming, or?” She inquired.

“No, this is it.”

“Wow. Light packer, eh?”

“Yeah... It’s easier that way, I suppose.”

“What is it you do for work, hun?”

“Oh I’m uh... I’m an RCMP Detective. Just transferred.”

Mrs. Fredricks’ eyes lit up. I might as well have said I was in the circus.

“Really? That’s fantastic! Well, I tell you what, I feel safer already.”

I expected to receive some big reactions like that. I didn’t exactly fit the rural law enforcement phenotype. But I was thoroughly charmed by her comment. She gave me a hug and told me to come see her if I needed anything. It was a warmer welcome than I could’ve asked for.

Unpacking was going to have to wait, though. As would sightseeing and all else. I got my bare essentials out and ready, and then I had to prepare for work in the morning. No rest for the wicked.

Maybe I would have savored the day more if I had known it was going to be my last happy one. Before it all went to hell. Before the case, the nightmares, the girl who wasn’t missing... before Candle Caine.

CHAPTER 1: Missing

I woke myself up two minutes before my 5 AM alarm that day. Maybe it was the nerves. I was usually better about managing that sort of thing. In any case I was glad to wake up to silence. A little nugget of peace before the work begins.

The easiest way to ease nerves is to just stick to your routine, so that’s what I did. Starting with 15 push-ups, 15 sit-ups, 15 lunges, 15 squats, and three 30 second planks. Then stretches.

The sun had just begun shining through the blinds of my bedroom, casting deep orange lines against the far wall. In a way, it made it not look quite so bare. I made a mental note to make time to unpack more as soon as I could.

I showered, I brushed my teeth, and applied a trivial amount of make-up. Concealer and some mascara mainly. I typically wouldn’t bother but first impressions are important.

I didn’t have a chance to meal prep, but I had enough foresight to unpack some granola bars and coffee. It would do for now.

I left the apartment before 7 and arrived at my new HQ 10 minutes later.

“Hello miss, how may I help you?” The receptionist greeted with a smile and a drawl. She was teetering on elderly but not quite retirement age yet.

“Hi. Daria Cole, I’ve just transferred here. I’m to speak with the Chief Inspector, I believe.”

“Oh, Miss Cole... We weren’t expecting you ‘til 8.” She responded, still sounding chipper.

“I can wait if you like.” I offered.

“Oh no, he’s not doin’ nothin’.” She turned around and began shouting, “Larry! I got Miss Cole here!”

Sure enough, out from the door in the back stepped a large man in a shirt and tie, brandishing a less enthusiastic smile then the receptionist.

“Cole! Right this way.” He said, gesturing me to follow as he held the door open.

We walked down some halls and past some cubicles. Functionally it was fairly similar to my previous employment, aesthetically it was far less so, but that was to be expected. The atmosphere was unkempt but homey. It was less clinical, less industrial, and I liked it. My first impression of my coworkers as I passed them was “lackadaisical.“

The Chief Inspector led me into his office where he sat behind his desk. He gestured for me to take a seat and I obliged.

“I’m Chief Inspector Favret, we’ve spoken on the phone. Welcome. How are you liking Greenwood so far?” He asked, somewhere between stilted pleasantry and curt.

“It’s uh- it’s great, sir. Very peaceful.” I answered with a somewhat forced smile.

“Bit different from Toronto I reckon.”

“Yes, sir. Big change.”

“Well, that’s alright. I know you’ll get used to it... It’s not all hicks here, you know.”

I forced a light chuckle in response. I couldn’t help feeling a subtle but immediate tension in the air. Either he was judging me, or he assumed I was judging him. Maybe both.

“I mean it.” He continued. “You may be the only... lady... we have here, but lots of folks come over from the big cities. You’ll find many a kindred spirit I’m sure. In fact, your new partner was a New Yorker.” He explained.

“My new partner?” I questioned, suppressing a small cringe at the way he said ‘lady’. Though, his cadence also made the words ‘New Yorker’ sound like an exotic animal.

“Oh yeah we got a spot for you, don’t worry. His recent partner quit, and he’s working a new assignment. Small stuff, easy start. So you’re gonna shadow him for a bit, and he can show you how we do things here. He’s been here a long time, so you’re in good hands.” He said with utmost assurance.

“Sounds good, sir.”

“Fantastic, I’m gonna leave the rest to Wally, you’ll find him out there. Big white guy, beard, greying a bit. You’ll know him when you see him.”

“Thank you, sir.” I said as I stood up and made my way out of the thickened air of his office.

Outside among the cubicles I saw quite a few men, standing or lounging around and chatting. Almost all of them were large white guys with beards. Favret couldn’t have been less helpful. I had to use my ears instead. He said New Yorker, that shouldn’t be too tough to suss out in rural Canada.

“No it’s not condensed milk, it’s evaporated milk. Condensed milk is sweetened-“ Not him.

“You’ve got a problem man. Two hundred dollars? What was it last time-“ Not him.

“That’s what I’m saying. No. It was overtime and he’s got the puck-” Definitely not him.

“Bro I swear to god if you call them Uggs one more time-“ That’s the guy.

I waited for him to finish his somewhat hostile conversation and then I approached.

“Uh excuse me, are you... Wally?”

The man turned his head towards me with a scowl. He was a husky man. Tall, a little overweight, but he looked sturdy. I’d compare him to a fridge. He appeared to be somewhere in the early to mid 40s range, grizzled, with a messy beard and an unkempt undercut that was greying on the sides. He had a nose that looked like it was best friends with a baseball bat, its bridge winded like a country road. His eyes were dark and piercing, with surprisingly full lashes, though I wasn’t going to tell him that.

“The fuck did you say to me?” He snapped.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m new here, the Chief Inspector told me-“

“Yeah, yeah, new girl. He was sayin’ about that. Alright first of all, it ain’t Wally. That’s not my name. It’s Detective Gray, show some respect.” He said, about as prickly as humanly possible. The New York accent wasn’t front and center, but it was definitely there underneath all the gruff.

“Sorry, Detective Gray. Daria Cole, nice to meet you.” I said attempting to remain cordial and friendly as I extended my hand.

“Psh.” He dismissed, rejecting the handshake. “You been briefed on the case, yeah?”

“Uh... I have not. Favret told me you would brief me.”

Gray chuckled and seethed, “Course he did... I’ll catch you up in the car, let’s go.”

He stood up and walked and I followed. I knew instantly he was going to be a pain in the ass to work with, but it wasn’t too dissimilar from people I’ve had to work with before.

The rugged street punk from New York turned backwoods detective vibe threw me for a loop though. Beneath the harsh unpleasantness I was feeling, I was fascinated by him. What brought a guy like him to a place like this? Was it the same thing that brought me here?

We walked to his car. It was an old tan shitbox of some variety. Looked like it was from the 70s. I hopped in the passenger seat and he hopped in the driver’s.

“Let me ask you somethin’... Cole, was it?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re young, right? You’re on that TikTok and shit?”

“I’m not on TikTok, no.”

“But you know about all that right?”

“...A little bit?”

“Well, alright, doesn’t matter, so here’s the deal. Not to disappoint you on your first day but this case ain’t shit.” Gray explained. “Mother tries to file a missing persons for her daughter, she’s been gone eight weeks, whatever, right? Turns out she ain’t missing at all because we check her, uh, “socials” and she’s in Paris on a vacation that her mom knew about the whole time.”

“Really? So, why is this a case at all then?”

“It’s not. She’s a nut. Her daughter posts these vlogs or TikToks daily – apparently she’s even got a big following – all from Paris talkin’ bout how great it is eating fucking snails or whatever. But the mother still wants to file the report anyway. She won’t let it go.”

“Interesting.” I answered.

“Annoying.” He countered. “So we’re going to see her, and hopefully put a pin in this whole thing. That’s about it. Any questions?”

I shook my head.

“Great, I wasn’t gonna answer ‘em anyway.” He quipped as we pealed off from the parking lot.

The drive was quiet and I felt the urge to ask him some basic questions. I didn’t care to be his friend, or to really know him on any level, but I needed this friction to ease up at least a little bit for my own sanity. I started with a softball.

“So, you’re not from here?”

“Ha! Detective of the year over here folks.”

Funnily enough it was that one response that gave me all I needed to know about him. He was a miserable prick, sure. But he was also a jaw-jacker. A ball-buster. I put myself in a new frame of mind: Don’t take him too seriously, don’t be afraid of him, and try not to lose your cool.

“What brought you here?” I asked.

He shook his head, “Christ, Cole. You want my life story?”

“Well if we’re going to be working together...”

He laughed, “We ain’t gonna be working together for long, trust me.”

I stopped talking. I guess he was content with the tension for now.

We arrived at a modest two story house which I could only assume belonged to the mother.

“Just hang back and don’t talk. Hopefully we put this all to bed now.” Gray said as he knocked on the front door.

The door opened to a middle aged woman. Likely late 40s or early 50s. She was well put together, despite being a bit dishevelled. A look of deep concern was written on her face.

“So?” She spoke, cutting to the chase. “Any news?”

“How are ya, Miss Lavoy?” Gray greeted, with a far less rough tone than I had experienced to this point.

Miss Lavoy walked away from the door, an unspoken invitation to let ourselves in.

“Who’s that?” She asked, pointing at me.

“New kid. Showin’ her the ropes and all.” Gray responded. Another subtle way of taking the piss I figured. I guess I had to get used to this.

“Great. I’m glad you’ve over here training people while my daughter’s missing.” Miss Lavoy admonished.

“Come on Miss Lavoy, you know I take this seriously, but you gotta give me somethin’ here. Make it make sense to me. Harmony’s in Paris. You know that. I know that. She’s not missing. You want her to come home, I get that, but what would you have me do, fly to Paris and grab her?”

“She’s NOT in Paris!” Miss Lavoy shouted.

Gray pulled out his phone, pulled up a video, and showed it to her.

“She posted this TODAY. She’s been posting all week. Look. Freaking Eiffel Tower’s in the background. Why do you think she isn’t there?”

“Well maybe she is, but she doesn’t want to be. There’s just... Something’s wrong! You don’t get it! I can’t... You’re not her mother, you don’t know her.”

“When was the last time you spoke to your daughter?” I piped in. Gray shot me a look but didn’t say anything.

“Last time we spoke on the phone was a few days ago. It’s mostly texting with her.”

My interest was piquing. In what way could she be missing if she could take phone calls, return texts, and post vlogs? It sounded crazy but this woman didn’t seem crazy. Distressed, very much so, but not crazy.

“And in these interactions, did you notice anything strange?” I prodded.

“Well every time I’ve phoned her she hasn’t been able to talk long. She always says she’s busy and she ends the call quick. I call her later and she says she’s too tired. There’s always an excuse.”

“And the texts?”

“She’s just... normal. She tells me not to worry. She brushes it off, says it’s all fine.”

“So what exactly makes you think something’s wrong?”

“I just know! This whole trip was wrong. She never mentioned it to me until a few days before she left, and even then it was by text. I talked to her friends and they said the same thing. Nobody knew about this trip. It came out of nowhere. Then ever since she left it’s like I’m not even her mother anymore. She acts like I’m just another person. She tells me about where she goes and what she does – this restaurant, that restaurant, whatever – but it’s all just... nothing.”

“You think she’s hiding something?”

“She wouldn’t hide anything from me. That’s not the kind of person she is. This isn’t her. Whoever’s in those videos isn’t her.”

Gray stepped back into the conversation, “Why don’t we try calling her now, huh? We can all hash this out.”

“Yeah! I’ll call her up now, put her on speaker.” Miss Lavoy responded, pulling out her phone and dialing.

It rang and rang and there was no answer. She frowned as we looked on expectantly.

“Hang on let me try again.”

This time after a few rings, someone picked up.

“Hey mom.” A young woman’s voice answered.

“Hey sweetheart, are you alone right now?” Miss Lavoy asked.

“Uh, yeah, but I’m actually just about to-“

“Okay I’ve got some detectives with me here, and I need you to tell us what’s going on, alright sweetie?”

“What... What are you...” The voice on the phone stammered with embarrassment.

“Hey there Harmony.” Gray spoke into the phone. “Listen, your mother’s worried about you and we just wanna make sure everything’s good over there, alright?”

“Oh my gosh...” Harmony exclaimed with irritation. “Mom I told you everything’s fine! I don’t know what you’re so worried about! I promise I’m more than okay. I know I extended the trip, but I just wasn’t ready to leave yet! I’ll be home in just a few more days.”

“Harmony, are you sure nothing’s wrong? You have nothing to tell us?” I prodded.

“I’m so sorry about this. I promise there is nothing going on. I just wanted to go on a trip and see the world. My online business kind of took off so I got some money and it just felt like the right time. I’ve never left Nova Scotia before so it was a big step... Look I’m sorry, I gotta go. Is there anything else I can help you with?”

“No, that won’t be necessary, thank you.” I answered.

“I’ll see you soon, okay mom? I love you.” Harmony said before hanging up the phone.

Gray shrugged and threw up his hands, “So... She seems perfectly alright to me. You’re worried about your kid being far away from home, I get it. But everything seems fine here. There’s nothing for us to do.”

Miss Lavoy just sighed deeply and shook her head. She was clearly trying to articulate some kind of protest but couldn’t find the words. Unfortunately for her, Gray was right. There was nothing for us to do. We left shortly after.

“What did I say about not talking?” Gray said as we walked back to the car. I had a feeling he would be sour about that.

“Sorry.” I remarked, not hiding my insincerity.

“Yeah, yeah. First day, already not taking orders. Good shit.”

“I wasn’t aware you were my superior.” I snipped. My impulses got the better of me.

Gray laughed. “Are you always this charming?”

“That depends, are you always a moody prick?” I may have overstepped.

Gray smiled through gritted teeth, “Let me let you in on a little secret, Cole. You know why you’re partnered with me? It aint cause we’re both “city folk.” It’s cause they don’t want you here. You can have your guess as to why that is, but that’s the fact. The sooner you figure that out and just quit, the better it’ll be for both of us.”

I suspected he was probably right about that. But it changed nothing.

“I’m not quitting.” I answered, getting into the passenger seat of his car.

Gray got in the driver’s seat and shot me a “we’ll see” look.

“You may want to reflect on why they thought making you someone’s partner would be the best way to make them quit.” I added.

“Oh I know why.” Gray answered. “Because I’m a moody prick.”

The rest of the day was uneventful and more than mildly unpleasant, but I felt better having had that little spat with Gray. At least we each knew where we stood. I got home to my dark basement apartment, relieved to be done with it for now.

Yet, I couldn’t stop thinking about the case. It was essentially closed after today, even though it had barely been open, but still it nagged at me. I had questions. I wanted to know more, I wanted to see more.

I unpacked my laptop and sat on my bed. I pulled up all of Harmony’s online profiles just to see if I could find anything. I wasn’t the most social media savvy person in the world, but I had to have a look.

The first thing that jumped out at me was the number of followers. Gray wasn’t kidding when he said she had a big following. She was in the high tens of thousands, encroaching upon the hundred. For a small town Canadian girl, that must have been quite impressive.

On the phone she mentioned an online business. I had a feeling of what that meant based on how awkwardly she said it in the presence of her mother. Her public profiles made no mention of it, but a minute amount of sleuthing led me to alternate profiles. Instantly adorned in racier photos. Links in the description to various Not Safe For Work subscription services. Pinned posts detailing the content she offered. Fair play to her. I wondered how she broached the subject with her mom. Her mom seems a more uptight and conservative type. It wouldn’t surprise me one bit if she kept this side of her a secret.

My new initial thought was that this Paris trip wasn’t just a vacation and it was instead some kind of collaboration. She networked with other NSFW creators, and went down there to make more content for her fans. That explains the shifty behavior, she obviously didn’t want her mother to know. That all adds up. Case closed.

But I wanted to try one more thing. Just to dot the I’s and cross the t’s. Directly compare a vlog from Paris with one made before. See if there were any discrepancies in her behavior or anything else that might indicate some kind of change. I chose the first vlog from Paris, and a random one from a month earlier with a similar thumbnail.

To my naked eye, the videos themselves looked innocuous enough. Her mood and attitude appeared the same. I moved to the descriptions and they were both formatted similarly. She replied to a few comments and spoke the same way on each. Similar verbiage, use of punctuation (she likes using double hyphens and the letter u instead of you) it all seemed to check out. Location services confirmed Paris as the location of the post, as if my eyes weren’t enough to see. It was airtight.

I went through a few more of her videos, at this point just because I had nothing better to do. It was all relatively the same. Talking to the camera. Sightseeing. Standard stuff. She spent one of the nights in Belgium, that was mildly eventful I suppose.

Videos before the trip were similarly standard. Some unboxing videos, some trends, some general vlogs. It wasn’t really my scene, but I could see why people liked it. There was a coziness to it. The crude comments gave me some insight into the ulterior appeal of it as well. She was, after all, very pretty. I was a bit envious of her blue eyes. They were very bright blue and piercing, almost hypnotic. Mine were closer to her mother’s, a dark greenish hazel.

Harmony seemed like a happy person. Always smiling, always chipper. I couldn’t help but feel it was a bit hollow. Which I can understand, it’s a social media persona. You play it up for the fans. Though there was a sincerity in her older videos that I felt was lacking in the Paris ones. Maybe the passion wasn’t there anymore, who knows.

All I knew was it was time for me to go to bed. This case was closed. It was time to empty my mind of it and prepare for the next thing Gray would drag me to.

The second day on the job in Greenwood went by monotonously. The case load in Toronto versus the case load here couldn’t have been more different. In Toronto we had plenty of local police to handle the small things so we could focus on the multitude of larger, more dangerous issues. Greenwood only had us, but also Greenwood only had about 5,000 people. Even including nearby counties like Coldbrook and Kingston which we dealt with, it didn’t come out to a fraction of downtown.

Gray wasn’t much less unpleasant this day either. He gave me shit about just about everything. I worked on remaining stoic to the best of my power. I wasn’t sure if he hated me, if it amused him trying to get a rise out of me, if he was trying to make me quit, or if it was just his personality. Either way, I would ignore it and carry on with the mundanity.

It wasn’t until the day after that something else noteworthy happened. More than noteworthy, in fact. It was still early in the morning. A call came in about a disturbance at the local soup kitchen. They said a homeless man was causing a scene. Raving and ranting, and waving a knife around. Gray and I were close, dealing with a petty larceny – far below my pay grade, but such is the job. We went to the scene.

“Blessings” was written in blue italics on a white banner hanging on the front of a rickety little building that was also painted white. There were crosses on the windows. It looked like a house or a small school that had been refurbished and repurposed. Such was the case for many places around here.

The shouting was audible from outside, as were the sounds of metal clattering. We made our way inside swiftly.

A raggedy older man stood with his back to the near corner of the cafeteria seating. He held a butcher’s knife out at arm’s length, god knows how he got it, while the terrified volunteer staff circled him from a distance with their palms out, attempting to show that they mean him no harm. His eyes were bloodshot and bugged out. He was screaming nonsense.

Gray and I took control of the room. I stepped out in front of the staff while Gray backed them off. I looked the man in his bulging eyes, attempting to decipher his words before offering my own.

“It’s in me! It’s in me! They poison me!” He screamed.

“Sir, I don’t think anyone’s poisoning you. Let’s put down the knife, okay? Let’s talk.”

“NO! They want me to do it, but I won’t do it! No more! It’s the bees stinging my brain! They all serve the queen! I won’t be their bee! They can sting and sting! They can suck the pollen out! They can eat me like a bug, but I won’t! No more poison! Burn it all! Melt it all!”

I’ve heard some insane rambling in my time but that was up there. I needed him to calm down.

“What is your name?” I shouted through his babbling.

“My... My name? You want my name!? Why!?”

“Because I want to talk. That’s all. Just talk. What’s your name?”

“It’s... It’s Melvin.”

“Okay, Melvin. My name is Daria. Now I need you to take a breath. You don’t want to hurt anybody, do you?”

“No... No... I don’t want to hurt anybody.” He said shakily. I took one slow step towards him and he allowed it without protest.

“Good. So just give me the knife, and we can figure this out. I can’t help you if you’re pointing a knife at me, you understand?”

“It’s not me... it’s them! It’s everyone! Soon it’ll be everyone! Melting in the dark! I see it! I see the horns of Satan himself, but it’s a lie!”

“Melvin, deep breath.” I instructed. “I want to help you but, see, I’m new here. I’m from the city. So I don’t know what you mean when you say these things. Can you just hand me the knife and then explain everything to me calmly?”

Melvin didn’t budge, but his hand shook and he began to sob. “You don’t understand... An eye for an eye... The window is open... The father...”

“I’m sorry?”

“And the girl... she’s not missing.”

Those words caught my attention for some reason. They were too specific. Too directed.

“The girl?” I asked.

“She’s not missing... but she’s gone.”

“Who? What do you mean?”

“One eye missing, one eye gone. One eye open, two eyes closed, third eye open. Melting, melting, melting, melting...” He raved in manic whispers.

“Melvin...”

“Won’t be me. Won’t be me. Pluck it out. Stop the sting. Drink, drink, drink. He’s coming here, I’ll go there. He’ll walk again, but not in skin. Never skin. The holes don’t have eyes but they will. They will be his not hers. Hers will be missing but she will be gone. Gone from her skin. Lost in her eye.”

“Melvin, look at me.” I said, taking another slow step forward.

Melvin did as I asked and stared into my eyes. He took a deep breath and uttered “I now belong to Candle Caine.”

In one frantic motion, he turned the knife to his own throat and closed his eyes tight.

“Don’t!” I shouted as I sprinted towards him, but it was too late.

He plunged the knife into his throat. Instantly blood poured and belched out from the wound. I did what I could, but it was in deep. All the way to the hilt. He shook, convulsed, and gurgled. Then he was gone, and it was quiet. The worst kind of quiet.

The ambulance came and took his body. Gray and I stuck around to take care of the traumatized patrons and staff. A man came up and introduced himself as the owner, Mr. Ray Whitley. An older, gangly sort of man with a wisp of white hair. We questioned him briefly.

“Did Melvin come around here often?” Gray asked.

“Yeah... Yeah he did, he was one of our regulars. Never seen him act like... I mean... I don’t know...” Whitley said, in a somber shellshock.

“Did you know much about him? Did he have family here or anything?”

“He used to always talk about his niece, Annabelle... I don’t think she lived around here though. He didn’t like to talk about himself much. I imagine he just fell on hard times. It’s rough out there, you know?”

“Oh, that I know. For sure. I mean, shit, I wish I had a place like this back in the day.” Gray remarked, probably trying to quell the dread.

“Well... It’s just Nova Scotia hospitality I guess.” Whitley responded humbly.

“Yeah, New York hospitality is a little different... But for real, I admire what you do, lookin’ out for people. You take care now. Call if anything else comes to mind.”

Gray definitely had a way with people. A charm, and a disarming sort of charisma. So antithetical to the asshole he usually was.

We stepped outside and took in some air. The silence lingered for a while before he spoke.

“First time seeing someone die?” He asked.

“No...” I answered.

“Well... You did alright, kid. Don’t beat yourself up.”

The word ‘kid’ aside, that was by far the nicest thing he said to me thus far.

“The way he was acting... The things he said...” I thought out loud.

“Fucking nuts.”

“Yeah but... I’ve seen manic episodes, schizophrenia, delusions, bad trips... I’ve dealt with lots of those in Toronto. This felt different... And what is Candle Caine? Have you ever heard of that?”

“No idea. Sounds like a high school mascot or somethin’... Maybe he was trying to say ‘candy cane’...”

“That wouldn’t really make sense in context though...”

Gray dismissively snorted, “What fucking context, Cole? The man was out of it. He was gone. He stuck a knife in his jugular, that’s the context.”

“So that’s it? You don’t even want to look into it? You don’t wanna do your job?” I snipped.

“Oh fuck off. We’ll look into it. I’m just sayin’... You know last month there was a graverobbing over in Meadowvale. Just a random, old, unmarked grave. They still don’t know who did it or why, they don’t know dick all. Last I checked they didn’t even know who the fuck the grave belonged to. All they know is some freak dug up a skeleton.”

“Okay, why are you telling me this?”

“Because sometimes people do weird shit. Sometimes it doesn’t make sense and it never will and we just have to be okay with that. I’m not saying don’t do your job, I’m just saying be prepared to not tie it all in a fucking bow.” Gray explained.

I rolled my eyes. To me it just sounded like laziness.

“Hey.” A frail and solemn voice called out from down the sidewalk. Another scruffy looking man with an overgrown beard approached us, visibly a few years younger. “Fran told me what happened to Melvin, I was just on my way here... You’re the cops? You saw it all?”

“Yeah...” I answered. “Did you know him?”

“We... We played cribbage... Nobody else knew how to play. They call it an old person game... He won almost every time. I beat him one time, just one... He was my friend...”

“I’m sorry.”

“He wouldn’t have... He wasn’t... Ugh... He was saving up. He was gonna buy his niece a gift for her 7th birthday. I kept tellin’ him “you use that money for yourself, you idiot.” But he was so excited, he was clean, it was the first birthday of her life he could actually buy her something... He wouldn’t just...”

“He sounds like he was a good man...” I said. It was hard to stifle my heartache upon hearing that.

“He was... I’m sorry... Are you okay?”

“Me? Yeah. Yeah I’m okay.” I said, taken slightly aback by the man’s consideration. “Are you?”

The man let out a deep sigh. “Yeah... It just don’t make sense...”

He was right... it didn’t. He walked away, his head hung. I felt for him. This part is never easy. You always wish for the right sequence of words to make it a little bit better, but most of the time no such words exist. You just have to watch as peoples’ worlds crumble, and try to feel secure on the knowledge that you did all you could, even if your brain constantly tells you otherwise.

There was a constant urge to dehumanize tragedy, to make it easier to manage. It helps with the job, and it helps life in general not be so crushing. But sometimes the humanity of it all just smacks you in the face. Today was one of those days. Gray and I left shortly after, but I couldn’t get it out of my head. Any of it.

The girl isn’t missing... I couldn’t help but think of Harmony, but we already knew she wasn’t missing. We knew where she was, and I had a good idea of why she was there. There was no case. He must have meant someone else... but who? And what the hell was Candle Caine?

CHAPTER 2: In Plain Sight

I didn’t do well with uncertainty. Uncertainty was an annoying little worm and no matter how hard I tried, it continued to wriggle in the grooves of my brain. It was both a help and a hindrance to my job. It made me dedicated, but it also made me obsessive. Gray was correct though, as much as I hated to admit it: It’s a cruel fact of life that not all loose ends get tied.

I knew I wouldn’t let it go, but I had to put it down. File it away. Detach. It was my first week in Greenwood, I had to remain focused on what I could control.

Toxicology would come back the next day and determine that there were no illicit drugs or alcohol in Melvin’s system. Only traces of over-the-counter painkillers, and prescription anti-depressants. Ruling out a bad drug trip. That was the only news we got. The rest of the day went on with little to no incident.

I clocked out and spent the approaching dusk roaming the town. Something I had been meaning to do. I moved here for a reason, after all.

It was nice. It was peaceful. The first time I got to see the town without my work eyes. As the sun set, I didn’t feel fear like I did in the city. I may have had years of self defense training, mace, and a gun, but walking around downtown Toronto alone at night was still a bad idea.

The rocky roads were lined with little mom and pop shops, churches, bingo halls, and B&Bs. There was a main street with all the big stores, your Walmarts, your Burger Kings, but this here was the real town. It was everything I wanted.

I got back home after nightfall and went straight to bed. Unfortunately, however, I wouldn’t be sleeping.

As I laid comfortable as can be, ready to drift off, my phone rang. I picked up hoping it was just some telemarketer, but no such luck. It was Gray.

“Where do you live? I’m picking you up.” He asked, as to-the-point as always.

“What?... Why?” I groggily answered.

“To go bowling, dumbass, what do you think? Get ready, I’m on my way.”

“Hang on... just give me a second.” I said, slowly sitting up and wiping my eyes.

“Cole, were you sleeping? It’s fucking 8:30 at night, what’s the matter with you? Are you 65?”

“God... I’ll text you the address.” I scoffed, hanging up on him. Instantly my night was so much worse.

I waited on the curb outside my building and within 10 minutes his shitty tan car parked in front of me. I hopped in.

“See this is why I didn’t want no partner. I could’ve just done this myself, but now I gotta pick up grandma.” He jabbed.

“Just... Tell me what the hell we’re doing.” I responded wearily.

“I got a call from our friend Miss Lavoy.”

“Again? Look, I looked into everything earlier, the girl sells nudes online and she didn’t want her mom to know. That’s what the Paris trip was, that’s why she was being shady. I’d rather not be the one to have to break that information to her but I guess I’m gonna have to.”

“Well... Miss Lavoy says a friend of hers saw Harmony walking around in the woods behind town an hour ago.”

My mood immediately shifted and I got a chill. How could that be possible? There had to be a mistake. I tried hard not to jump to conclusions.

We drove to the outskirts of town and parked on the dirt driveway of a quaint little farm.

“Stay in the car.” Ordered Gray.

“No.” I answered, stepping out. Gray rolled his eyes but didn’t protest further.

Gray made an effort to stand in front of me as we walked to the rickety door of the rickety house and knocked. Dogs barked and howled from the inside.

The door opened to an older lady. Likely in her 60s with wispy grey hair. She reprimanded her dogs and eventually they quieted down.

“How are you, ma’am? Nice to see ya again.” Gray greeted. Once the woman noticed me, she stared daggers.

“Got yerself a partner, do ya?” She asked with a callousness in her voice only outmatched by her country twang.

“Brand new, from the city. But don’t mind her. You know why I’m here, Evelyn says you called her about her daughter?”

“I seen her! Just now, ‘bout two hours ago. One o’ma goats went missing this afternoon so Henry and I went out lookin’ for ‘im. We went all around, didn’t see a damn thing. We was out there a few hours and I know with Henry’s hip he shouldn’t be out there that long but we’s can’t afford to lose another goat, not in this damn economy.”

“Ain’t that the truth.” Gray jumped in. He truly felt like a different person when he was talking to locals. A real social chameleon. I hated to admit I was impressed.

“So you went out to the woods then?” Gray said, attempting to steer her back on track.

“Was the last place we looked. Don’t know why a goat would wanna be in the woods, that ain’t the place for ‘em. But we went looking ‘round there anyways, and that’s when I seen Harmony. Evelyn was telling me the past few weeks ‘bout how she went to Paris and she thinks she went missing and all this. I wasn’t sure what to make of it all but I been prayin’ for her every night either way.”

“You saw her?” Gray interjected again. “You’re sure you saw her? What was she doing?”

“Wally, I SAW her clear as day. I don’t know what the hell she was doin’ but she was butt ass naked in them trees and as soon as she saw me lookin’ at her she ran off like a bat outta Jesus. No way was I gonna catch up to her, and we don’t go too deep in them woods as it is. Too easy to get lost in there. So we came back and I called Evelyn up first thing.”

“Of course, I understand.” Gray said, seemingly ready to exit the conversation.

“Sorry ma’am, excuse me.” I interjected, moving out from behind Gray. “You said you can’t lose ANOTHER goat... How many goats have you lost?”

Gray gave me a disapproving look and the old lady’s expression dropped to one of vitriol as she looked at me.

“Three. Tonight was the third in the past month ‘er so. Ol’ Leeroy’s lost a few as well.” She said coldly and concisely. If Gray had asked, I’m sure she would’ve gone on about her theory as to why that was. With me, I knew that was all I was getting, and I was fine with that.

“Thank you for your time, Helen.” Gray said.

“She’s a good kid, that Harmony. You find her. I don’t know what all she’s gotten herself into, but you find her.” Helen commanded before shutting the door.

Gray turned to me as we walked down the path, “Why do you have to speak?”

“It was good information to know.” I countered. “Not my fault she doesn’t seem to like me.”

“I think you just like pissing me off.”

A few smarmy answers to that came to mind, but I just chose to shrug instead.

I reached the car and began opening the passenger door but Gray cut me off.

“Whoa, what are you doin’?” He asked.

“What? Want me to drive?”

“We ain’t leaving. I’m just grabbing us some flashlights.”

“Oh... You wanna do this right now?”

“Yeah why not?”

“It’s pitch black out here.”

“Hence the flashlights, genius.”

“You don’t wanna call it in or anything? We don’t even have a report filed yet.”

“And what the hell would that report say? Senile old fart who’s more cataracts than human thinks she sees a missing girl who isn’t even missing? Besides, if any of what she said is true, whether that girl was our girl or not, there’s a naked girl running around in the woods. I don’t know what your hobbies are, but people don’t generally do that for fun. Whoever she is, she’s in trouble. Every second counts with this shit, so we’re going.”

Unfortunately, I had to give it to him again. I may hate his belligerent ass but he made sense. I didn’t protest. We got out a pair of flashlights and began our trek through the field behind the farm to the woods.

“So.” I spoke up as we walked. “She called you Wally.”

“Yeah, and?”

“Is your name Wally or not?”

“To my friends it is.”

“Oh, she’s your friend then? That old lady?”

“Old ladies get a pass.”

“How do you know her?”

“Everybody knows everybody, Cole.”

“I see... So you’re Wallace Gray, or?”

“Jesus... It’s Orson.”

“Orson?” I repeated, shocked.

“Fuck you. Yeah, it’s Orson. Orson Wallace Gray. YOU can continue to call me Detective Gray.”

“Fine with me. I don’t need to get to Wally status.”

“Good cause you ain’t ever gettin’ there, Daria.” He said, making sure to enunciate my name extra New York-y.

“So did the big apple just not want you anymore and they sent you off here, is that what it is?” I asked.

Gray chuckled. “Yeah whatever. I could ask you the same thing, Toronto.”

“I’m here by choice.”

“Well then you make very shit choices.”

“Yeah? So how are you here then?”

“By choice.” He answered frankly and with deliberate timing. Surprisingly enough, I laughed.

We made our way into the woods. Gray once again made sure to step in front of me. I wasn’t sure what his intention was by doing that, but it made it hard for me to see my surroundings past his large frame so I broke off to the side.

Visibility wasn’t much better either way. Despite these woods being so close to town, once you were in the thick of it, you got no residual light. You might as well have been a thousand miles away. The flashlight’s beam helped some but the harsh, jagged shadows it cast of all the trees and foliage made it difficult to discern anything. Part of me thought it might be better to turn the light off and just let my eyes adjust to the dark, but I decided against it.

“Police! Is there anybody out here? Does anyone need help?” Gray shouted into the wall of darkness. My animal brain didn’t love the idea of calling so much attention to ourselves in this dark and strange place, but it was the right call.

“So you’re thinking it’s definitely not our girl?” Gray asked in a somewhat hushed tone.

“I can’t say definitely, but I don’t understand how it possibly could be.” I answered.

“It’s weird shit...” He commented. It almost unnerved me to hear him admit that. I expected him to continue to be dismissive, but I could tell he could sense the same thing I did. That something was off about everything that’s been happening.

We continued making our way through the slender spires. Gray called out periodically asking if anyone was out there, but there was no response. Slowly we drifted apart to cover more ground, but never far enough away that we couldn’t see the others’ light.

We were out there for about an hour and neither of us saw any sign of anything.

“Five more minutes then I’m callin’ it.” Gray shouted to me.

“Yeah.” I turned and answered.

But as soon I turned back and shined my light over to the left of me... I saw.

I noticed the hand first. Clasping around the side of one of the trees a few yards away. Then I saw the face peeking out from behind. Only half of the face was visible, it wasn’t easy to make out... but it was her. I was almost certain of it. The same hair, the same face, the same everything. She was just staring at me.

I was stunned into silence but then I called out, “Harmony?”

Her face and hand disappeared behind the tree as soon as I spoke so I began running after her.

“Harmony! Wait! We’re here to help you! We’re the police!” I shouted. I heard Gray running in my direction as well.

“Cole, you saw her!?” He yelled.

“She’s here but she ran!” I answered.

“Hey Harmony!” Gray shouted. “Your mother’s worried about you okay? We just wanna bring you home safe! You’re not in any trouble!” I could hear him huffing and puffing as he tried to catch up to me.

“Shit!” I exclaimed. “I don’t see her! I don’t know where she went!”

“Ease up, Cole! For god’s sake!”

I begrudgingly stopped running and let him catch up.

“You fuckin’ scared her off. Why’d you just run at her?” Gray scolded.

“She ran before I ran. As soon as I saw her looking at me, she ran.”

“Shit... Are you certain that it was her? It was Harmony?”

“I... I’m pretty sure.”

“You’re PRETTY sure?”

“She was far away and I only saw part of her face but... It REALLY looked like her.”

“Alright... Here’s what we’re gonna-“ Gray began to speak but cut himself off. I saw his eyes widen as he looked towards the ground.

“The fuck?” He exclaimed. I looked down to the center of his light and there laid a tiny pool of deep red liquid, sitting upon some dead leaves. I noticed more droplets next to it. Our flashlights followed the droplets and sure enough it began a trail.

“Was she bleeding?” Gray asked.

“Not that I could see.”

We followed the trail. It was a mostly straight line. After a few yards the trail stopped at a much larger pool of crimson.

As I focused on the pool, I saw Gray’s light slowly move upwards.

“Fuck.” He muttered slowly in a tone I had not yet heard from him. One of deep unease. I once again followed the beam of his light to see what he saw, and when I saw it, it felt like all of the air was sucked out of my lungs.

I suspected that we had discovered one of the old lady’s missing goats. At least, its head. It was hanging from a tree branch, severed at the neck. Strewn up by its horns.

“What the fuck is this?” Gray asked in that same uneasy and dumbfounded tone.

I had no words to speak. I could only stare in disbelief at this ungodly exhibit.

“Jesus.” Gray remarked again, now looking towards the trees. I took them in at the same time.

Carvings. On almost every tree surrounding the goat. Some recognizable symbols, some not. Various assortments and configurations of triangles, simplistic eyes, crosses. I was unfamiliar with the meaning of them... But the pentagrams, those were clear as day.

As if the sacrificial goat wasn’t enough to convince me this was satanic.

I turned my gaze back to the goat’s head. As I looked closer I only ended up noticing more things that made me deeply uncomfortable.

One of the goat’s eyes was missing. It didn’t look like it was shot out, it looked like it was removed. Why? Some kind of ritualistic significance? I couldn’t understand it. But there was one detail that was maybe even stranger.

There were odd little smears and clumps of something matted into its fur. Pale yellow-ish and opaque. Only a couple of them, but enough to notice. Some of it looked like it was dripping, but it was hardened and smooth like refrigerated butter. I got up a little bit closer and I could see what it was. I could even smell what it was, beyond the iron of the blood. But I didn’t have the faintest idea of why it would be here.

It was candle wax.

CHAPTER 3: Melting

“Get the guys down here to the woods by Greenwood.” Gray instructed into his cell phone as I leaned against his car, still unable to wrap my head around what I saw in those trees.

“Forensics. Yes... No, not a homicide... Animal cruelty, let’s start there, huh? And that pending missing persons report on Harmony Lavoy, yeah put that shit through. I want all the flight records from Halifax airport to any airport in France in the past three months... Well get fucking Gable to do it then, he don’t do nothin’. Alright. Let me know.”

Gray hung up the phone and let out a deep sigh.

“This shit ain’t good...” He remarked.

“Any theories?” I asked.

Gray chuckled, “No. I just know a fucking goat head strung up in the woods with a bunch of pentagrams is... It’s dealing in shit that I don’t want to be dealing with.”

“You superstitious?”

“Nah, but my mother was Puerto Rican, we don’t fuck with these things.”

“Have you ever seen something like this before? Has there ever been cult activity or... rituals... satanism... anything like that?”

“I’ve seen my fair share of weirdness. I could tell you things you wouldn’t believe about this place... I haven’t seen anything quite like this though.”

“Really? I didn’t think there would be much going on over here.”

“Most of the time there’s not. But if I’ve learned one thing living here 30 years, it’s that everywhere people exist, bad people exist too. Sometimes very bad people... Out here just gives them more places to hide.”

His words hung in my mind for the rest of the night. I didn’t like hearing Gray sound so serious.

The next few hours were taxing and I was losing most of my sleep. Once a couple of the guys arrived, Gray and I organized them and led them through the trees. I headed up a small search and Gray oversaw forensics dealing with the goat head. It was well after midnight by the time we were done. One hell of a day.

Beyond the scene of the head and the surrounding carvings, nothing else turned up. We would have to work on trying again in the day with more people, I thought.

“Hey grandma, come on it’s past your bedtime.” Gray beckoned to me and we got in the car and left.

I couldn’t help but look out into the endless waves of trees and wonder what else might be hiding in them. The nothingness spanned for miles behind our quaint little town. So much could be going on that we would never know about, and it could be right on our doorstep. Right behind our houses, right behind those cute little shops. The thought of it made my weary mind spin.

“I’ve been thinking...” I began as we drove down the long and endlessly dark road.

“Don’t.” Gray cut me off.

“What?”

“Don’t think. We’re off the clock, Cole. We’re done. Think tomorrow.”

“There is no clock, what do you mean? This isn’t a 9 to 5.” I countered.

“There’s always a clock. Shut up and listen to me, alright? Because I know how you are.”

That last sentence made my blood instantly boil and I snapped back, “You don’t know how I am. You don’t know anything about me.”

“When I picked you up and told you about the call, you said you had been “looking into it.” You took your free time, your time at home, to look into a case that wasn’t even a case yet.”

“And I got important information.”

“I don’t care what you got, and fuck off with the hostility... Kid, you’re going home. So BE home.”

“Do not call me kid. Ever. I’m so fucking sick of that. I’m not a kid, and I’m not a rookie, and I don’t need your advice. I’ve been doing perfectly fine before you came along.”

“Fine, asshole, you do you then. I’m just trying to keep you sane. You may not be a rookie but I still got at least 10 years on your ass and I’ve seen this shit happen. But if you wanna be arrogant and say it won’t happen to you because you think you’re special, great. Let me know how it works out for you.”

“You’re calling ME arrogant? You’ve been strutting around all damn week, undercutting me, undermining me, acting like a big shot-”

“Big shot? Me? Never. But I know more than you, and I’ve paid my dues. I just think I’m maybe owed some fucking respect around here.”

“Not from me you’re not. Fucking Rodney Dangerfield. I don’t owe you shit.”

“You’re a real peach, you know that? Just a delight. I was trying to help you. Fuck me, I guess.”

“Yeah I’m good, thanks.” I rebuked with utter venom as the car pulled up to my building. I wasted no time getting out and shutting the door behind me before he could make any more stupid comments.

My skin was hot and I was seething but I couldn’t help but laugh as I got back to my apartment. It had been awhile since anyone got a rise out of me like he did. I prided myself on unwavering and stoic professionalism. Kill them with kindness. I’ve been told I have a hard head, but I’ve never been told I have a temper. I suppose it was helpful of him to remind me that I do.

It’s not even like what he said was wrong. Hell, maybe I was angry only because he wasn’t. But it did no good to stew on that now.

As for the rest of the night, my urge was to continue working just to spite him. Come in tomorrow having cracked the code and lay it all out to his stupid face. But two things stopped me from doing that. One: I’m a professional, and that would be very childish of me. Two: I was beyond tired and I only had about four hours left to sleep. I wasn’t about to let pettiness ruin my schedule already.

I decided to watch a few more of Harmony’s vlogs as I laid in bed. Not entirely sure why. It felt like a small compromise between the part of me that itched to keep working and the part of me that needed sleep. Something still relevant, but not so in the weeds that it would prevent me from drifting off... Or maybe it was just to see a single friendly face before I went to sleep.

Harmony had tons of videos all over the spectrum, from 10 second TikToks, to 8 hour live streams, and everything in between. I always knew people did this stuff, and I knew it could be lucrative, but I never fully understood it. Why would someone want to be so public? So open? The thought made me nervous. But she owned it, and she seemed to genuinely love it. The “SFW” side anyway, I didn’t look much into the other side. I couldn’t imagine that was as jovial.

The more I watched, the more I could see what it was that she got out of it. It would be easy and quite cynical to say that she was vain. She loved the attention, and she loved the money. But that wasn’t it. Or if it was, she hid it well. It seemed to me that she just liked people. She liked talking to people. She liked connecting with people. A lot of folks in the chats of her streams she would talk to like they were childhood friends. Granted, these chats were certainly heavily moderated, but still... She was an extrovert and a people person in a way that couldn’t be manufactured.

It only made me more concerned and confused about the girl in the woods. I wanted to convince myself that it wasn’t her. That she was still in Paris, completely fine, not wrapped up in whatever the fuck this was. Logic and evidence told me that was the truth. But my eyes and my gut said it was her out there.

I was about ready to put the phone away, but one more video caught my eye. A live stream. Uploaded a mere week before the Paris trip. It was titled “Trying Spooky Sleepover Games.” I always had a thing for those, they were charming and cozy, even if I seldom could convince anyone to join me. I pressed play.

“Hello, my lovelies!” Harmony greeted the camera stationed on her computer desk. “Hello Fly, Dino, Shy Guy, Ders, Chugs, Monique, Happy Well, Zero, Lightbody, Huevos, Kyana... Wow, the crew is all here! Hello, hello, my super sexy friends, I pie you all, I hope you’re all having a wonderful Friday!”

I didn’t understand the pie thing. She referenced pie often. Some kind of in-joke.

“It’s a night owl stream tonight, because we’re gonna try something cool and spooky. I’ve been wanting to do something like this for a while, actually. We’re going to do a couple of those scary urban legend type games, because I love them so much. So we got ‘Bloody Mary’ obviously, I spent all day getting the supplies to play ‘Hide and Seek Alone’ so we’re gonna do that one too, and a couple others which we’ll get to. But the main reason we’re doing this today... You may have seen a couple of these videos going around, or you may not. It’s not that popular yet, but it’s super cool, there’s a brand new one circulating. Astral told me about it, and it sounds like fun. But if I get possessed, you can all blame her. It’s called The Candle Caine Game...”

I jolted to attention. What the fuck did she just say? It was a game? I skipped forward, past all the other silly rituals and the chatting, to find when she played it. I came upon a section where she sat at her desk in the dark, illuminated by a small lit candle in front of her. That had to be it.

“Okay, I think we got everything. Candle, and I got a mirror leaned against my monitor. I can see myself in it clearly, and I’m pretty sure I got the words down right... here we go...”

The set up seemed simple enough and not too dissimilar from any other game of its kind. But something deep inside me really didn’t like it.

Silently, she closed her right eye, then she drew a small circle with her finger on the mirror. Maybe she was circling something in her reflection, by the angle it was hard to tell for sure. Then she opened her eye again.

She held her hand out flat over top of the candle’s flame and took a few deep breaths, then she began to speak.

“Candle Caine walks in the candle light. Can’t wear skin, it is far too tight. He makes no sound, he leaves no tracks. Candle Caine lives in the candle wax. A toast to you, this wondrous night. I hope to sate your appetite. One eye missing, one will remain. I now belong to Candle Caine.”

A bizarre little rhyme and ceremony. I had never heard anything like it before... except for the last line. So what was it? A burgeoning internet fad, sure, but why did Melvin know what it was? A 52 year old homeless man... how would he know? He had a niece... could that be it? Did his niece find it and it just stuck with him for whatever reason? That was the most logical explanation that I could think of...

Harmony then counted aloud to 13 and blew out the candle, leaving the video dark for a few seconds. With a flick of the lighter, the candle illuminated once more. Harmony took a look around her room, and a small smirk appeared on her face.

“Okay, well, I don’t think it worked, but that’s okay... Supposedly the eye you circled in your reflection will be gone from the mirror when you re-light the candle, and then a ghostly wax hand will put out the flame... and then you... I don’t know... die, or whatever... But I think I’m good. I mean, my eye’s still here. Definitely didn’t see a wax hand... But it was fun though, right? Kinda creepy. I just love that people are still making these, you know? Haven’t had a new one in a while. We need more...”

I guess that was all there was to it. I don’t know what I expected. It was pretty par for the course, kinda creepy, kinda fun. But I couldn’t stop wondering how... How was a silly game from the internet tied into what was happening in this little Nova Scotia town? It didn’t add up.

Sleep was coming fast however, so I had to let it go for the moment. I slowly drifted from my consciousness. My hand began to tip my phone over, so I put it away and let myself fade.

The dream I had that night was unlike any I had ever had.

I was in my bedroom. Not this bedroom, but the one from my childhood. It was dark but I could still see the garish teal walls adorned with posters of pro wrestlers and movies of the time. But I noticed the door to the room began to close. I used to always be afraid someone would be hiding behind it, as the open door would perfectly conceal the darkest corner.

The door closed agonizingly slow. As it did, my fears were proven true. There was a figure hiding behind the door, in the dark. A man in a wide-brimmed hat. He began moving closer towards me and no matter how hard I tried, my body wouldn’t budge. He was just a pitch black shape. A shadow. No features.

He held a cup out to me. Some kind of ceremonial goblet, or chalice. He wanted me to drink from it, but when I looked into the cup, it was filled with blood. I saw my reflection in the blood. I was missing an eye. Then when I looked back to the man, I saw the severed goat’s head upon his shoulders.

I screamed and screamed but the sound wouldn’t come out. It got hotter and hotter in the room and I began to perspire. Then I realized it wasn’t sweat dripping off of me, it was wax. I was wax, and I was melting. My skin was liquifying, bubbling, and dripping down my body and still I couldn’t move. Nor could I take my eyes off of the goat man. It stared into me with its single eye and then the room caught fire.

I was petrified. I felt tears stream down my face, only I knew they weren’t tears. I looked down to my hands as my fingers melted away, and when I looked back once again it wasn’t the hat man or the goat man anymore... It was Harmony. She stood before me in the fire, naked and smiling the most evil grin. Her left eye was missing too.

She climbed on the bed and crawled on top of me. I felt her fingers dig into my liquid flesh as she cupped what used to be my face. Then she whispered something into what used to be my ear. But I couldn’t hear it. The fire engulfed the bed and both of us with it. I melted away in her arms.

I woke up. My heart was pounding out of my chest, and I really was dripping with sweat now. I left a whole imprint in the bed. I looked at the clock and I still had an hour left before I would have to get up, but there was no way I was going to be able to fall back to sleep. Not anymore.

I spent the morning trying to shake everything off. I felt a bit dizzy and there was a creeping, throbbing pain in my head. A pressure building, like someone stuck a pole up behind my eye. I took some painkillers, then I began my morning routine. All the same, except I gave myself a little bit of grace with the workout...

I got to HQ at 7:30 and I saw Gray’s car already parked in the lot. I almost forgot I would have to endure another day of him.

“Cole!” He called out to me in an almost cheery way. I guess he was over last night. “Ready for the fun shit?”

“What are we doing today?” I asked.

“How do you fancy looking at 50 pages of flight records this morning?” He responded, gesturing to a stack of papers on the desk.

“I thought we might organize a search party or something...”

“Workin’ on all that. But first it would be nice to prove that our missing girl is actually missing, right? As of now we only have your inconclusive testimony, and the old lady’s.”

I sat down at the desk and looked at the papers. “Why is this printed? Can’t I pull this up on the computer?”

Gray scoffed, “Gen Z... What’s wrong with paper? It’s better, it’s solid.”

“Late millennial, thank you. And if I pull up the documents online, I can just do a search for her name and it’ll take two seconds. They were sent to the drive, yeah?”

Gray rolled his eyes, “You do you.”

I hopped on the computer and got to work.

“So let me ask you then, since you’re so smart” Gray began. “How is she in two places at once? How do you explain the videos, and the location data on the videos? She have an evil twin or somethin’?”

“I think the mother would know if that were the case.” I answered, even though I knew that wasn’t a serious suggestion from him. “The location data... it IS possible to fake that if she has a VPN.” I added.

“Okay...” Gray replied. From his tone I couldn’t tell if he knew what a VPN was. “The videos themselves then?”

“...Filmed in advance?”

“Go on.”

“Maybe she went to Paris, filmed a bunch of stuff, then came back early, and has been posting it after the fact. Acting like she’s still there.”

“But why?”

“I don’t know...” I relented.

I got the records pulled up. It was time to find out.

Page by page and flight by flight I did a search for her name amongst the passengers.

Zero results, zero results, zero results. Every single time. As I got closer and closer to the end it only got more unbelievable. Then I hit the end, and my heart truly sank.

There was no flight. None departing, none returning. Harmony Lavoy was never in Paris.

CHAPTER 4: Find Her

“Well there goes your theory then.” Gray quipped, but with a twist of unease in his voice that he didn’t do well to hide.

“It doesn’t make sense. So the videos are fake? How?” I questioned.

“What about all that fuckin’ A.I. stuff I see nowadays?”

“A.I.?”

“Yeah... my nephew sends me this video the other week of this cute ass baby penguin eating out of someone’s hand, then it turns out it’s A.I. generated. But it looked totally real. Like you’d never guess.”

“I don’t know... AI can do a lot but... I don’t know if it’s THAT good yet. Usually you can still tell if you look close, or listen close. Especially when it’s a person.”

“This girl’s been posting her stuff for years though... It’s a lot of material to pull from, shall we say.”

“Yeah... I don’t know.”

Gray sat back and sighed, “It’s fuckin’ freaky. One thing that freaks me out just as much as satanic cult shit... A.I...”

“That much we agree on.”

“How ‘bout that. Broken clock’s right twice a day...” He cracked. “I’m gonna have our tech guys look into her videos. I think they have programs and shit that can detect A.I., and they can see about your VPN or whatever.”

“Good, get that going... But I still.... It still doesn’t make sense. We phoned her, we talked to her in real time. Can A.I. do that?”

“You’re askin’ me?”

“No... It just...” I stammered.

“Let’s wait for the results, alright Cole? Right now there’s only one question we need to answer.”

“What’s that?”

Gray sat back and shrugged. “Who is she?”

That really was the ultimate question. Who is Harmony Lavoy? If we answered that then maybe it could all fall into place. I got an impression of her from her videos, but that was far from enough. That was only the side of her she wanted us to see. We still didn’t even know if she was the victim here, or if she set this all up herself to hide something.

Gray and I spent the rest of the morning and the afternoon driving all around Greenwood, asking around and gathering all the information we could about her. I found that Gray was a lot more tolerable when we were in the weeds of an investigation. He still gave me shit and made his little barbs, but he took the work seriously.

The first stop was Harmony’s mother Evelyn again. She was distraught that her intuition was proven true, but grateful that she finally had someone who believed her. We tried calling Harmony again from Evelyn’s phone but she didn’t pick up.

Her mother told us a lot, just not a lot that we could use right now. Harmony was an only child. Born right here in Greenwood in the spring of 1998. Her father stuck around for the first 6 years, then went no-contact. Supposedly he lives halfway across the country and has a new family. Nevertheless, we would have to talk to him.

They were a churchgoing family, though Harmony often protested, never taking it seriously. She attended a Christian nursery school and elementary school, until fourth grade when she convinced her mother to let her go to a regular public school instead. Through school, Harmony made many friends. She was popular and outgoing, and had a keen interest in art and photography. Evelyn says she never had a boyfriend, though I wonder how true that is. It wouldn’t be the last secret she would keep.

Harmony moved out when she was 18 to attend Acadia University, maybe an hour or two drive from Greenwood. After getting a degree in journalism, she moved back to town, into a small apartment. Part-timing as a waitress.

I was correct in my assumption that Evelyn was not aware of the details of Harmony’s online business. She described it as online photography. I suppose that’s technically not wrong.

We found Harmony’s father Brad via his Facebook. By all accounts he appeared painfully ordinary, bit of an old hipster vibe. We confirmed that he lived in Alberta and had remarried with two step-sons. Our phone conversation with him was callously brief. He assured us that Harmony was not with him, and beyond that he truly did not seem to care.

Our next visit was to Harmony’s apartment. It was a small, four-unit building. We didn’t have a warrant to enter yet, but we spoke to the landlord. Harmony had not been seen there in two months... Otherwise there wasn’t much to say. She was a good tenant.

We went to the diner she worked at. The manager told us that she requested to be taken off the schedule two months ago. This request was via text. Nobody at the diner had seen her since, but her friends say she still texts them back. Having seen the most recent texts, they are consistent with Harmony’s typing style, but they are short and largely impersonal.

Gray and I decided to get lunch at the diner while we were here. It was a nice looking place, and the prices weren’t half bad.

“So, where are we going next?” I asked as we waited for our food.

“She had to have some other friends, not just work friends, right? We can keep digging.”

I shook my head, “I don’t know...”

“Got something on your mind?”

“We’re getting a lot of surface level information, and nothing is standing out... We need to go deeper. There’s a whole other life she led. Online, I mean. I’ve seen her videos, that was so much of what she did. She has nearly a hundred thousand followers. If she was going to be a target, it wouldn’t be out here. It would be there.”

“Someone found her online?”

“The way I see it, there’s three possibilities. Either she’s doing this herself for some reason, someone is doing this to her, or someone is making her do it. In any case it goes back to the internet. If someone set up this whole ruse or whatever it is, they would have to be online a lot, they would have to know her life there... I’m thinking it’s a definite possibility that’s where they found her. That’s where we have to look.”

“You thinkin’ maybe a sting?”

“A sting?”

“Yeah, if this person targeted her because she’s this sexy online model or whatever... Well... You make a profile. Fake name and all that. Do what she did. I’m not saying post nudes and do all that per se but like... Put yourself out there, few selfies, vlogs, get into her circles, see if this creep finds you.”

“Okay... There are so many reasons why that’s a bad idea.” I said with palpable judgment in my voice.

“Like what? I mean nobody knows what you look like, certainly not in this town. You’d be protected.”

“First of all, I don’t want to. Second of all, I highly doubt I would cater to the same audience that she does. Third of all, do you have any idea how many weird people are on the internet? And you think I’ll be able to I.D. one of them? Fourth... I REALLY don’t want to.”

“Alright fine. No prob. Hey, I’m just spitballin’.”

“I understand, I’d just prefer you didn’t spitball with the idea of me doing porn.”

“Easy! I didn’t fuckin’ say that. Come on. I’m a lotta things but I ain’t no creep.”

“Okay... Good. Just making sure.”

“Christ... I’m just over here trying to get some eggs benedict and now I’m in THIS conversation... Alright, so what are you gonna do then? Just search around?”

“Yeah, pretty much. You can find a lot on peoples’ socials.”

“Gonna do that on your own time?”

“Most likely.” I responded, aware of his previous lecture on the matter.

“Alright... just... Ah, whatever. Keep me posted.”

The food came, we ate, and then we left. We headed back to HQ to update our case files and report what we learned. I expected it to be slightly arduous work, especially since my headache from the morning still hadn’t gone away.

When we got inside, however, we were greeted by the tech guys. I learned their names in that moment, they were Ben and Deacon.

“You got somethin’ for us?” Gray asked.

“We got... Well... Follow us.” Answered Ben, as they led us back to their area.

“We’ve still got a lot of deeper analysis we can do but basically...” Ben explained and he sat in his desk and guided our eyes to the monitor. “We’ve run some of the tests and the results have been interesting.”

“Okay, I’m listening.” Said Gray, lurching down and squinting.

“Our A.I. detection software came back inconclusive. Which is uncommon, but it does happen sometimes, especially as the technology continues to improve. Between all the videos we’ve run, it seems to come out between a 40% and 60% probability of generative A.I. usage.” Explained Deacon.

“So... What does that mean? What does that tell us?”

“To me that says that the videos themselves are not A.I. generated, BUT they most likely have been tampered with. So they’re not entirely fake, but they’re also not genuine.”

“Can you tell which parts have been tampered with?” I asked.

“Not yet. We’ll need more time on that.” Deacon said. I was beginning to feel frustration at all these non-answers, but then he continued, “However, there is one more thing we wanted to show you... Ben?”

“Yeah so...” Ben began as he pulled up one of the videos and began scrolling through. “We’ve been skimming through, looking for any graphical weirdness or glitches. For the most part we haven’t found anything yet, but there is this one strange little moment.”

He stopped the video at 1:56 and then began going frame by frame. The video shows Harmony sitting at a café. She’s laughing and in the middle of flipping her hair back. Due to the quick motion, most of her face is smudged and blurred.

“You see she’s moving her head fast here, and this is typically when you’d get slip ups with filters and things like that... so...” He explained as he began going frame-by-frame. “There’s this one frame coming up... Here! Do you see it?”

He stopped on an image, and my heart stopped with it. My entire body pulsated with anxiety. There was no way this was really happening. My eyes widened and I couldn’t form a word.

Gray leaned in closer and then muttered in quiet and disturbed astonishment, “Her eye... Her eye is gone.”

It was clear as day. Not a shadow or a smudge or a glitch. Her left eye was an empty socket. You could see hints of the red flesh inside. In that one frame, her smile didn’t look quite so innocent anymore.

I knew what Gray was thinking. He was thinking about that goat’s head. I was thinking about so much more... The Candle Caine game... My dream... And when I saw that face in the forest that night, peeking from behind the tree, the one thing I didn’t get a chance to see was her left eye.

Gray and I didn’t talk about it for the rest of the day, we simply buried our noses in the paperwork we had to get done, but when we both left the station and headed for our cars after the sun had set, he took the chance to ask me.

“What the hell is going on here, Cole?”

I struggled to find any kind of answer to give him, so I just shrugged and said “I don’t know.”

“Yeah... I’d be worried if you did.” He replied before walking off to his car.

That still image burned into my mind and called so much into question, but it didn’t change my mission for the night. I wanted to understand her, and I wanted more information.

As I drove home on those dark, lonely roads, my mind could only spin. The pain in my head wasn’t letting up. I ended up getting drive-thru. Groceries would have to wait again.

I found that I couldn’t enjoy the peace of the night as much as I had before. The blanket of darkness only seemed to get heavier.

Something came into few in front of me. I slammed on the brakes as hard as I could and came to a screeching halt. My heart pounded and my hands briefly shook from the sudden shot of anxiety. I took in what I was seeing. It was a woman. An older woman, her back slumped, she was struggling to cross the road. Her clothes were filthy and tattered and her hair was wiry. Why was she out here?

The road I was on was straight, with a field on one side and woods on the other. No buildings for a ways in either direction. Why was she crossing here? My instinct was to get out and help her, but she shambled her way right in front of my door. Then she just... stood there.

She stared into my window with a blank expression and dark, beady eyes.

“Are you alright, ma’am?” I called out. “Do you need help?”

She didn’t respond. She just stood. I could only open my door an inch before hitting her. I wasn’t sure what to do.

“What are you doing out here this late? Do you need a ride? Do you want me to call someone?”

Still nothing. But then, without warning, she pressed her face to the glass window and began to lick it. Vigorously.

I recoiled. “What the fuck?” The words involuntarily escaped my lips.

I had to try and calm down and think rationally. Everything from these past few days was getting to me. This wasn’t what my brain was trying to make it. This was just an old woman who was probably senile and really needed help, and I had to help her. I began moving to the passenger seat to make my way outside, but then I heard her speak.

“The window is open.” She said in a craggy old voice. I turned back to her and beyond the smears of her saliva on the glass, I saw a smile stretched across her wrinkled face.

“What do you mean?”

“The window is open.” She repeated.

“No... The window isn’t open. None of the windows are open.”

“It is. And he’s climbing in.” She said, looking behind me towards the back window on the passenger side.

I knew it was closed. They were all closed. Of course they were. I didn’t have to look. No one was climbing in.

“He’s climbing innnn.” She repeated playfully, still looking behind me.

I didn’t have to look. Why did I feel like she wanted me to look? I wasn’t going to. I kept my eyes trained on her.

“Who?” I asked simply.

“He was there but now he’s here.” She answered in a sing-song. “He was out but now he’s in. Climbing, climbing, climbing in.”

“Nobody else is here.”

“Don’t you feel him? Don’t you hear him?”

Just as she said that, there was a shallow creak from the back seat. In a panic, I spun around to face the back... But there was no one.

I knew there was no one. Of course there was no one. The windows were closed.

But then a strikingly loud thud came from outside my door. I jumped in my seat, nearly jumping out of my skin, and quickly turned back to the woman.

She had violently smashed her face against my window. Then she did it again. The second smash sent a spurt of blood from her nose across the glass. The third smash cracked the glass. I jammed my foot down on the gas pedal and sped out of there down the road. I wanted no more to do with this. It may have made me a bad cop, but I was not picking this battle. I heard her twisted, throaty cackle as she descended into the depths of my rear view mirror.

“Jesus fucking Christ” I muttered to myself. What the hell was going on this town?

I got back home and practically barricaded myself inside the apartment. Mrs. Fredricks gave me a kind greeting, and I responded with all the pleasantness that I could muster, but I could not converse. Not after that.

I spent about a half hour just trying to cool down. I ate my food, did a quick work-out, and shook away the nerves. Then I sat at my computer.

Gray’s suggestion for an online sting was dumb, and I stood by my reasons for why it was dumb. Still, something inside me wanted to try it. Was it to get to know her better? Just morbid curiosity to see what that kind of life was like? Merely a distraction from all the fucked up shit that seems to keep happening? Maybe it was vanity, I don’t know. But I took about ten minutes to set up an account anyway.

I gave myself the name Brooke Stratus because it sounded very blonde even though I wasn’t. Then I ran out of ideas. I pulled up Harmony’s profile to compare.

She had a profile picture taken from a high angle with her lips pursed and cropped just enough to see moderate cleavage. It was almost scientific how she set that up. I didn’t have enough girl friends to teach me these things. Hell, I didn’t have any friends at the moment. I attempted to copy her blueprint and after about 20 pictures, I settled on one. Though, I looked more like a fish and my cleavage wasn’t extraordinary. You could also see all the boxes in the background. Not perfect.

I uploaded it and made it the pinned post, along with an uplifting sounding message that I probably copied from somewhere but I couldn’t remember where.

After looking it over for about a minute, I felt stupid. Deeply embarrassed. I didn’t like the idea of putting myself out there like that, even if it wasn’t my name. I could never do this for a living. I could barely even do it once. I could see what people were going to say and I didn’t want to give them the chance to say it. I’d rather be no one. But I left the account active for now just so I could assess the results later, for investigative purposes.

Next order of business was sleuthing Harmony’s pages, and that’s when I had an idea. She had nearly a hundred thousand fans... I should talk to them. Surely there would be some obsessives who would know more about her than she would know about herself. But I couldn’t talk to them as me... or as Brooke... I had to be one of them.

So I went undercover twice in one night. New account: Daniel R. Less creative, by design. I spent the next hour frequenting comment sections, fan pages, blog posts, and reddit threads.

I waded through hoards of ghastly hate comments and even ghastlier sexual comments. More than a few complained that she “changed” after her trip began. Many said she stopped responding to their messages. How she ever responded to that many messages in the first place was beyond me.

One reddit post caught my eye, however. An image post, featuring a screenshot from a video I didn’t recognize. It featured Harmony in a very low-cut red top, sitting on a couch looking at the camera. The text on the post read: “Waiting for her to bring back the red top from the deleted video” along with a few drooling emojis.

Harmony had over a thousand uploaded videos... What would cause her to delete one? I went to the comments. Amidst all the ones gawking at her tits, there was a comment asking which video this was. The original poster replied:

“She posted it about a week before Paris, then took it down a few days later.”

That had to mean something. I needed to find that video. I decided to DM the original poster. I just had to sound convincing... I spent a few minutes curating my message.

“Brooo do u know if I can find the video with the red top anywhere? She looks so fkn hot, I’m gooning rn.”

I couldn’t tell you where I learned the term gooning. I just hoped it was still in vogue and not replaced by some other strange word.

There was no immediate response. After about another hour of looking around, I decided to call it a night. I intended to catch up on a few missing hours of sleep, and hopefully I would get some results tomorrow.

“I’m sorry. It has to be you.” My eyes shot open, though I couldn’t tell if I was awake or not. I recognized the voice. I heard it in so many videos by now. It sounded like it was in my head.

My room was nearly pitch black. Only the faintest moonlight shone through the slats of my blinds. I scanned my room and saw nothing out of place, until my eyes reached the wall opposite the window.

Behind the little slivers of moonlight, something was scrawled along the wall in a dark, messy paint. My eyes adjusted and I read the words.

“FiND HER”

I wanted to leap out of my bed, I wanted to grab my gun from the night stand, but for some reason my body was unable to move. I looked down at my hand and concentrated with everything I had, but it wouldn’t even twitch.

When I looked back to the words though, they had changed. They now read:

“SaVE HER”

My mind caught up to me and I knew I was dreaming, but that didn’t stop the fear. It didn’t feel like MY dream.

A soft wooden creak from the foot of my bed. I moved my eyes to the footboard just in time to see a pale, feminine hand reach up from beneath and grasp it. A second hand followed, and then the head began to rise.

That face came peeking into view. Her face. Only it was worse now. She looked pale and almost emaciated, with darker circles around her eyes... Well, her eye. And that smile. Ordinarily so disarming but now full of dark intent. I expected her to crawl on top of me like she had last time, but now she just watched. Watched my helpless, immobile body from behind the footboard, giggling to herself.

My sliding closet door slowly opened and the shadowy man in the wide brimmed hat emerged from it, once again holding that shimmering chalice in his hands. He stalked towards me, over to the left side of the bed.

I heard a scraping sound coming from the right wall. I didn’t want to take my eyes off of the man, but I wasn’t in control. I looked to the wall and to the words. They had changed once more.

“KiLL HER”

My head turned back and the man was no longer holding the goblet, he was holding the goat’s head. Harmony’s pale hands grabbed me from the other side, forced my head back, and opened my mouth. The man held the goat’s head over top of me and a trickle of blood fell into my mouth. It tasted of both copper and rot.

I did everything I could to stop it. Everything I could to get the awful taste out. But it continued to drip. The drip grew into a steady stream, and the stream seemed to increase in pressure with every passing moment. My mouth was full of the viscous blood and I felt it trickle down my throat.

One of Harmony’s hands pinched my nose as the blood continued to pour into me. My airways were completely blocked and I began to choke. As I choked, more blood filled my throat and my lungs. My heart beat out of my chest, my veins popped, my entire body pulsated in sheer panic, my adrenaline spiked, I was drowning.

The blood did not relent. I tried to gasp, but only swallowed more. My consciousness slowly began to slip. It all went black. Then I heard her voice again.

“Behind your eye is the shore. The other side is the ocean. She is in the ocean. I am on the shore.”

I shot awake, violently coughing and gasping for air before finally finding it. My heart was practically exploding, and my head was throbbing so much worse than before. That stabbing pain behind my eye was beyond fierce and my vision was almost going cloudy. But after a few minutes I managed to ease my hyperventilation and stave off a panic attack.

Despite that, I couldn’t shake it completely no matter how hard I tried. It was hard enough to shake the last dream, but this one... I never had a dream that felt like that before. I’ve had nightmares, sure. Tons of them. I’ve seen awful things, doing what I do, and it does stick with you. But not like this.

It wasn’t even a debate in my head. It wasn’t a conversation. It wasn’t even a single word. It was just... a feeling. Deep in the recesses of my mind. One that ignored all logic and sanity. A feeling that maybe these dreams weren’t just dreams.

CHAPTER 5: Found You

I felt like hell, and once again I didn’t get the sleep I needed. When morning rose, I had to remove a few reps from my workout because my head just couldn’t take it and I felt like throwing up. The first time in years that I couldn’t complete my routine.

I checked my messages and still got nothing back yet. I checked my other account, and I had gained around 4 followers, and my photo had 2 likes. Interesting. I took and posted another selfie just to keep the game going a little while longer, despite my internal objections. I was slowly figuring out the posing. I did a little strategic maneuvering of my free hand to push my boobs together so they looked more impressive. Things you don’t learn in the police academy.

“Jesus, Cole. You look like shit.” Gray greeted as I got inside.

“Thanks.” I answered wearily, shielding my eyes from the fluorescent lights.

“You weren’t up all night doin’ your online thing were you? I told you, don’t do that shit.”

“It wasn’t all night... I just have a headache, that’s all. Didn’t get the best sleep.”

“Alright well take care of yourself for god’s sake... Did you find anything out?”

“Not much yet. Potential lead, just waiting on a response.” I answered, rubbing my brow. “Weird interaction with an old homeless lady, though.”

“Huh?”

“Just... this old lady on the road after I left last night... She licked my window...”

“She... what?”

“Licked my car window... Said some weird shit... I don’t know...”

“...The fuck?”

“That’s what I said... But anyways, what are we doing today?”

“You want me to just breeze past that?”

“I’d like to if you don’t mind.”

“Alright... Well... you’re gonna have to start looking alive, because we got the search party organized. We’re heading out for the woods in a half hour. Only about eight of us, it was all I could pull. Couldn’t risk civilian volunteers in there after what happened to that goddamn goat, so we make due.”

“Ah, shit.”

“Get some fuckin’ food in you so you don’t keel over out there, huh?”

I didn’t even realize I forgot to eat again, but I guess he could see it on my face. I stopped for a bagel at Tim’s on the way there.

I arrived at the spot outside the woods and parked amid the slim selection of cars and police cruisers. Our entry point was close to the farm like last time. The sun was viciously bright. It wasn’t ideal to do a search wearing shades, but if I didn’t my head might explode.

After a few more arrived, Gray got out in front of the small crowd and projected his voice, laying out the plan. We paired off into four groups of two and each group took a section of woods. Given the size of the area, it was highly unlikely we would be able to survey it all but it was the best we could do for now.

Gray and I paired off for where we designated Sector C, and I handled navigation as best as I could. The first half hour of the search was brutal on my headache and general tiredness, but I was able to fall into a rhythm and the next hour flew by relatively easily.

We didn’t hear many reports on the walkie from the other teams, just general status updates, no findings. This was slowly beginning to feel like a fruitless venture.

“So...” I spoke up, trying to make time go faster. “What part of New York are you from?”

Gray laughed, “That bored?”

“Little bit... So, what? Brooklyn?”

“Yonkers.” He answered.

“So what’s good in Yonkers?” I asked casually as we continued to trek.

“Ah, not much if you were me. Spent most of my time out on the streets, off my shit on drugs, gettin’ into fights. I didn’t have the prettiest experience... Food was good though.”

I decided to follow up with the question that had been on my mind for days now, “How does a street punk from Yonkers end up in Greenwood as a fed?”

“Fed... You’re a total fuckin’ narc. I pray you never have to go undercover...” He mocked. “And I could ask you somethin’ similar, because you don’t make no sense to me.”

“How do I not make sense?” I volleyed, unsure of where he was gonna go with this.

“You wanna get into this? You want me to speak freely?”

I snorted. “When have you ever not spoken freely?”

“True... Alright so you used to be a guy, yeah?” Gray said, very matter of fact. I was completely thrown off my game by his bluntness. I got so used to people skirting around it, but I should’ve known better with this guy.

“Okay that’s enough speaking freely.” I jabbed back.

“No, no, no. Hear me out, it’s not what you think. I mean I get it in general, y’know? And that’s awesome and I’m happy for people. Let’s all live our best lives. But I mean you specifically, it doesn’t make sense to me.”

“Okay...” I muttered, very suspiciously. I made a subtle gesture for him to continue. How bad was this conversation about to be?

“Like, you wanted to be a detective. You wanted to work in law enforcement. Dreamed about it since you were a kid and whatnot, right?... That shit is one of the most men-heavy hyper fuckin’ masculine careers that there is. And you could’a just gone in there and done it no problem, you had that leg up, but you were like “Nah I’d rather do this as a woman. Not only that, but a transgender woman, which is a whole other thing in society these days. Oh, and then on top of that I’ll move out to the country with all the crotchety old bible thumpers.” and I don’t get the decision making there.”

“I mean when you put it like that...” I joked. I felt a bit of relief that his thoughts weren’t too out of pocket.

“And hey I don’t mean no disrespect.” Gray added, sincerely.

“Well... I don’t know. I don’t really have an answer, because it’s not really a ‘why’ thing? I just... AM a woman. I figured that out pretty early... You said I’d suck going undercover and that’s probably true, because I was basically undercover every day and it did suck, so I fixed it... And you were right, I’ve also always wanted to be a detective so... It may not be practical but that’s the hand I’m dealt. I didn’t want to give up what I love for who I am... As for why I’m here, I just like it here. I like the sky. I like the air... That’s pretty much it.”

I was a bit surprised by my own honesty. But he seemed to be asking in earnest, so I responded in earnest.

Gray stood back, gave a silent nod, and then simply responded, “Huh... Well alright, Cole.” I guess he got it.

“You still didn’t answer my question.” I said, changing the subject.

“Hah. I’ll tell you some other time.”

“What the fuck?” I snapped, half seriously. “I just told you all this uncomfortable personal shit...”

“Yeah, well, there’s a time and a place. We’re working now, for god’s sake.” He jabbed.

“You are a real... You are something else.”

Gray smirked. “I’m a professional... But I do wanna ask one more thing.”

“Oh well I’m not fucking answering now.”

Gray ignored me and went on. “I’m just wondering, like, are you happy with it?”

“Happy with...?”

“Your whole transition thing, you’re happy with it?”

“Of course. It’s the best thing I’ve ever done.”

“Okay... good. That’s good. It’s just... you’re kind of a mopey person, so I dunno.”

“What the f-... Why are you my mother all of a sudden?”

“I’m just sayin’, you went through all that to get here and you don’t seem happy.”

I let out an exasperated chuckle, “Of course I’m not happy! I have to work with YOU, motherfucker. I’m miserable. Life is still life. Plus I’m still dealing with murderers and creeps daily. You want me to smile while we’re out here looking for more decapitated goats? What about you? Why aren’t you happy?”

“Alright, see, that’s defensiveness.”

“It’s not defensiveness, it’s a stupid ass question. You don’t see me outside of work, you don’t know my life.”

Gray threw up his hands. “Alright, if you say so.”

“...And fuck you for making me answer another personal thing.”

We continued on as the sun rose from beaming directly in front of us to hanging over us and hiding amidst some generous clouds. Finally I felt okay enough to remove my sunglasses. It didn’t help much though, we weren’t finding anything.

A muffled crackling sound shot through the walkie-talkie. At first it sounded like it might be interference, or someone hitting the button by accident. Then it happened again, but this time amidst the static sounds were sounds of screams. Gray and I shot to attention.

Gray held the walkie up and began to speak. “What’s going on out there?”

A minute of silence followed. Gray and I looked at each other with matching expressions of concern.

“Officer down! Get over here, now! Need assistance! Sector A!” The man’s voice came shouting from the walkie.

I got us our bearings and we sprinted towards Sector A. It was going to be a hell of a sprint. The throbbing in my head returned almost immediately. I wasn’t prepared for this. Gray, for his size, held up fairly well.

My mind raced. What could have happened? It could have been an animal attack, but there weren’t much in the way of top predators out here. No, it had to be our person. Whoever strung up the goat’s head. Whoever has Harmony... Or maybe it was Harmony herself.

Finally, after about 15 minutes of dead sprinting, we arrived on the scene. One officer was slumped against a tree and the other was kneeling over him, administering some kind of care. Didn’t take long to notice the blood pouring from his neck.

“Fuck!” Gray exclaimed as we both rushed over to his aid. “What happened?”

“I didn’t see it.” The kneeling officer explained. “We were fanned out. Suddenly I hear a scream and...”

I knelt closer to the man, taking notice of his name tag. Donaldson. Then I took note of his condition. Deep lacerations on the side of his neck, along with a large, red discoloration on the opposite side of his face. Maybe some kind of burn. Below it, though... dripping down from his face. Candle wax.

This time it wasn’t hardened. It was translucent and liquid. It was still hot. What did it mean? Some kind of mark? Something ritualistic?

I needed to know what he saw, but there was no way he would be able to talk to us now. The pain and fear etched into his face was something I knew I would never be able to forget. But still I looked into his eyes and made sure he looked into mine.

“You’re gonna be alright, Donaldson. We’ve got you.” I said, with every bit of assuredness that I could muster. Hoping it would give him even an ounce of the comfort and calm he would need to be able to make it through this.

That’s not the reaction I got, however. Instead his pupils dilated, and then his eyes widened. He began to flail and let out a gurgling scream. He kicked his legs and pushed at me with his limp hands. He was scared... of me.

I stood up and created some distance. Gray shot a confused look back at me, which I returned. Why on earth would he be afraid of me?

I turned back to the seemingly endless woods with that question rattling around in my brain, but it was tossed aside when I saw movement. Far off into the woods, I couldn’t see what it was. Could have been a deer for all I knew, but my gut told me it wasn’t. And my gut is what I chose to follow.

Donaldson was being taken care of. The rest were on their way, and the paramedics were called. That situation was under control. I made my choice. I chose to run.

Gray yelled after me but I didn’t listen, and I knew he wouldn’t follow.

“Cole! Get the fuck back here! Do not go out there alone!” He called out into my walkie talkie after I left shouting distance. Once again I ignored it and pulled out my gun.

My head would not stop pounding, it felt like my brain was being shaken like a martini in my skull with every stride. But I had an advantage this time. They couldn’t hide in the dark. They could only run, and I was faster than them.

I didn’t see anyone but I heard the consistent rustling of trees far ahead of me. That was all I needed to know that I was moving in the right direction. But the woods were getting denser. I felt twigs and branches slice at my face and my clothes. It became harder to stay the course and suddenly the rustling of the woods was only coming from myself.

I continued running to the best of my ability until my head refused to bear it any longer. My vision got cloudy and narrow. I tried to power through, but in the haze my leg got caught on a low branch and I tumbled forward. My face violently collided with the bark of the tree in front of me and I collapsed in a heap.

The air was knocked out of me and my chest heaved with exhaustion. I pushed myself too far. My muscles were throbbing the same as my head and they were so weak, I was unsure if I would be able to get up. I could feel blood trickling down my face.

I held my eyes closed in a wince as the pain shot through my entire body in waves, but my head was the worst by far. I felt concussed. I didn’t dare open my eyes to the unforgiving light. I needed a few minutes in darkness.

My body decided I would need more than that, however, as I began slipping in and out of consciousness. It felt like minutes but it could have been hours. All I knew was that I slowly felt the warmth of the sun go away.

I felt something on my cheek. The softest caress of a slender and feminine hand. It almost didn’t feel real. I felt it before, in my dreams. Amidst the constant throbbing pain, it was comforting and nurturing. I still didn’t have it in me to open my eyes. One of my eyes felt heavier than usual, I could only assume it was swelling from the impact.

The caresses were slowly joined by a current of steady, warm breaths against my face. I could feel a presence mere inches from me. Their breath moving from my eyes down to my mouth, like they were studying me.

Then something warm and wet touched the bottom of my chin and began to slide up my face. Curving a path around my nose and up to my forehead. It was licking the trail of blood off my face. I couldn’t keep my eyes closed anymore, I forced them open.

The sky was much darker now, only a little bit of orange left, but there she was. Harmony. The girl I’d been looking for all this time, now inches from my face. She grinned at me with my blood in her teeth. Her left eye was missing, just like in my dreams, just like in the glitched footage; and she was deeply emaciated. Her skin was nearly grey.

I knew she was going to kill me. I saw it within her smile. What happened? How did that bright, cheery girl become this?

Her hands moved gracefully around my throat and began to squeeze. I looked deep into her remaining eye, desperate to find some semblance of humanity within it. But as her eye met mine, something changed. Her smile suddenly dropped. Her grip on me weakened. She looked almost confused.

I could only think of one thing. Donaldson. Why did they both look at me like this? I couldn’t understand.

Her smile slowly reformed however, and she began to squeeze again even tighter, only to be interrupted by a sound coming from behind us.

“Cole! Cole, where are you!?” Gray called out, exasperated.

Harmony released her grip and quickly skulked off into the woods. I had no more strength to give chase.

“Here!” I yelled out in a cracked voice in between coughs. I heard him slowly make his way to me.

He stumbled and collapsed in front of me, gasping for breath. It was clear she got away before he could see her.

“Jesus Christ, I’ve been looking all over for you!” He huffed. “What the hell happened? Why would you run off like that, you stupid-”

“I’m sorry...” I croaked. “Is Donaldson okay?”

“What? Yeah, we got him outta there. He’s in the hospital now, I’d imagine.”

“Good.”

“You look like you could use a trip yourself, Cole. Fucking hell.”

I attempted to sit up, “No. Just some ice and some ibuprofen, I’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure? What the hell happened to you? Who did that to your face?”

“A tree. But listen-“

“A tree?”

“Move past it. Listen. I saw the girl. She was right here. Right in front of my face. She looked... she wasn’t herself. Gray, she was missing her left eye.”

“What?”

I extended my arm. Gray grabbed it and gingerly hoisted me up to my feet. I struggled to find my balance, the world wouldn’t stop spinning.

“Harmony isn’t the victim here. We’re not just looking for a lost girl. Something’s been done to her.” I attempted to explain.

“Okay, slow down...”

The last bit of light faded from the sky and we were left with only the pale blues of the night. The dark sent a glacial chill coursing under my skin. I lost my desire to continue explaining. Not here. Not now. I only had one thing left to say.

“We have to get out of here.”

CHAPTER 6: The Man in the Hat

Gray propped my arm over his neck to hold me straight as we walked back through the trees. My consciousness slipped a few more times, but my body continued to move on autopilot despite it.

After a few minutes, my strength returned enough for me to be able to walk unaided. I wanted to run, to get out of this place as quickly as possible, but that wasn’t an option.

Fortunately for us, our path out of the woods was relatively straightforward. We didn’t get lost, and there were no more ghastly interruptions. We made it out in about 45 minutes.

We reached our respective cars and began to split off. This day finally seemed to be over.

“Hold on, Cole.” Gray said, breaking the long silence. “I can’t let you drive like this.”

“I’m okay. Seriously.” I answered.

“Nah, you’re not. Get in the car.”

“I’m not just gonna leave my car here, Gray.”

“Your eye is nearly fucking swollen shut and you look like hell. Come on. We’ll come back for it. There’s somewhere we gotta go anyway.” He said, demanding.

“...Fine.” I relented.

We drove down the dark country road. I still fought the urge to pass out. Gray was probably right about being in no state to drive. He took a few calls, it was difficult to focus on what he was saying, but a few of them seemed to be letting people know that he found me.

After about a half hour’s drive, we pulled up to a somewhat meager local pizza joint. The name ‘914 Pizza’ laid out inelegantly on a sign at the top.

“What are we doing here?” I asked as we stepped out of the car and strolled up to the front. Gray didn’t answer, just ushering me inside.

“Yo, why are the floors so fuckin’ filthy up in here!?” Gray yelled out into the nearly empty restaurant, louder than my head could handle. “Where you at, boy!?”

Out from the kitchen stepped a pale, thin man with a long, dirty blond mess of hair and beard.

“Well ho-lee shit!” The man called out, practically hopping the counter to get to us. A broad smile plastered over his face. “Let me grab the mop for you, old man. Get to work.”

The two exchanged a firm handshake and a quick hug. It seemed like it had been a while. Then the man turned to me and offered a far more formal handshake.

“Benji. Nice to meet you.”

“Daria.” I responded with a smile, accepting the handshake. Looking at him, beyond his general dishevelment, his eyes were extremely kind and disarming.

“That looks like it hurts, god damn.” He remarked, gesturing to my eye.

“Its seen better.” I said, not noticing my own pun at first.

“She’s my new partner.” Gray jumped in. He didn’t say rookie this time.

“Shit!” Benji exclaimed, then muttered “I’m so sorry.” In mocked concern.

I snickered and gave my eyebrows a subtle raise as if to say “You have no idea.”

“Oh knock it off and grab us a slice, will ya?” Gray reprimanded.

“Yes, detective.” Benji answered with a dramatic salute before walking off. Gray and I sat in a corner booth.

“So you come here often then?” I deduced.

“You could say that.” Gray answered.

“Why did you bring me here?”

“Because neither of us have eaten all day and I’m fucking starving... And because earlier you asked why I came here from New York.”

“You came here for the pizza?” I questioned.

“Nah, I brought the pizza here. This is my place.”

“You’re kidding. You own this restaurant?”

“Well I used to. Now it’s Benji’s, he’s my protégé. But for a long time, yeah. Used to run it with my man Obi. We had a place back in Yonkers before that.”

“I’m... so confused.”

“He got me off the streets, Obi did. I was a mess, I was in all kinds of shit. 17 years old, homeless, living in the dump, high off my ass. Obi ran a pizza joint in the city. One night, I sneak in to rob the place after hours. But Obi was still there, he catches me. Coulda sent me to jail. Hell, many folks down there would’ve killed me. Instead he gave me a job. I mopped the floors and took out the trash. He let me stay in a room upstairs. I got food, I got money. He said as long as I got clean, I had a place with him. So I did. Never touched another needle.”

“Good man, Obi.”

“The best. So anyways, few years pass. He teaches me how to cook. He shows me all the recipes. It becomes, like, our thing. One day he says he wants to move to Nova Scotia because he’s got family here. So I say “Let’s go, pops.” And off we go. Open up shop, call it 914 for Yonkers. Bringin’ a little New York to Canada, it was a hit.”

“That’s... wow. I love it... How does becoming a detective fit into that?”

“Well...” Gray began to explain, but his cheery disposition faded. “It’s funny, I lived in the city all those years. I seen a lotta bad people. But it wasn’t until I got out here that I saw real evil... There was a serial killer in this town. 15 or 20 years ago now. A bad, bad man. Like you wouldn’t believe. One night Obi was... being Obi, trying to help a kid, and...”

Gray stopped for a moment and clicked his tongue before continuing, “After that, the restaurant wasn’t the same, and I wanted somethin’ different. I wanted to do what he did for me, and what he died doing. Just, help out, you know? ‘Cause I shouldn’t be alive. I’m alive ‘cause of him. So I gotta do right by him. That’s it.”

There wasn’t much else to say after that. Initially I was mad that he brought me here, under the somewhat false pretense that it would be important. But it was important in its own way. I was glad that he shared his story with me. And to be completely honest, the pizza was unbelievable.

Gray dropped me off at my place and I wobbled my way inside, ready to crash hard on my bed. But first I wanted to see the damage. I moved to the bathroom mirror to take a look at myself.

It was a bit rough. My eye was completely purple and shut by this point. There were a few scrapes and bruises. Nothing dire but I doubted I’d be able to take another selfie for the next little while.

One more thing was nagging at me as I looked at my face. Why was Donaldson afraid of me? Why did Harmony look at me like that? Aside from being battered, I looked otherwise like myself, I thought. Fairly unremarkable.

I grabbed an ice pack and I hopped online to check things out. Eight new followers on my experimental account. Along with three comments on my most recent selfie. The first was a slur. Lovely. Saw that coming. The second was three heart eye emojis. So I had that going for me. The third one said, “Whoa I love your eyes, are they really like that or is it Photoshopped?”

I was confused. What was wrong with my eyes? I looked at the selfie I posted. The lighting was bad and it was hard to see much at first, until I looked closer. I turned my brightness all the way up and squinted at the screen.

“What the fuck?” I said out loud in my dark room.

I couldn’t believe it... My eyes were two different colors. My right eye was greenish hazel, like it had always been, but my left eye was now blue. Very blue. Was it just a trick of the light? It had to be, I thought. But then another thought crept into my mind.

I’ve seen blue eyes like that so many times these past few days. The image of Harmony’s face inches away from mine was stuck in my head. Her left eye was gone, but her right eye was still the exact same blue.

“No.” I said dismissively. It’s not. It can’t be. How would it be possible? What would that even mean?

I left that page and moved over to check my messages and it all dropped from my mind once I saw that I finally got a response about the deleted video.

“I gotchu fam. All her videos and streams are archived here.” The message read, along with a link to a channel on some bootleg YouTube clone. Unsettling, but in this case, efficient.

At first I wasn’t sure what to look for on this channel of hundreds, if not thousands of videos. Fortunately, the uploads were all chronological, so all I had to do was cross-reference these uploads with her official uploads to find which ones don’t match up. Maybe there was more than one deleted video.

I found the one in the infamous red top, and then to be thorough I combed through the rest. I managed to find two more. I began with the earliest one, dated three years ago.

“Hello my lovelies, who’s ready for some story time?” She began, with her beaming smile as she sat in front of the camera on a small leather sofa. “I got this comment from someone on an earlier video, and they were basically saying that they don’t trust medication. Meaning, like, mental health related medication. And they listed their reasons, and that’s fair enough, but it got me thinking that maybe I should talk about my own stuff. Maybe just to offer my own insight, if you’re worried about medication and how it could affect you and things like that. To add on to that, all proceeds from this video will be going to a mental health awareness charity which I’ll discuss more in a bit... But to start with my own experience, I’m actually on several medications right now, believe it or not.”

Initially the video didn’t seem to be related. I could see her deleting it due to the personal nature of the content. Maybe it hurt her brand, or maybe she just preferred to keep that side of her a secret.

She talked about her experience with anti-depressants for a few minutes. I admit I was engaged with what she was saying. I always was. She had that way about her. Nothing about the girl in the video was the same as the girl in the woods. Not a single thing.

“The other main medication I’m on is for seizures.” She explained. “I used to, and still sometimes do, get really bad seizures and really bad migraines. The anti-depressants actually also help with the migraines to an extent by the way. And this leads to the funny story of the day, because I don’t want this to be all serious.”

She took a swig of water and then searched for her story’s starting point. “You guys know I don’t believe in... like... astrology, or ghosts, or god, or premonitions or anything like that. I did have to go to Christian schools as a kid but I hated it. So anyways, I’m not saying that what I’m about to say is any of that superstitious stuff. It’s just funny... I don’t remember when the first time it happened was, but it became a thing in my family and at school as a kid where any time I would have a really bad migraine, something bad would happen, like, that day or the next day. An accident, or someone getting injured, or a pet dying, grandparent, etc. – I’m not saying it was funny at the time. God. That makes me sound like such an asshole. No, it was awful. But any time I’d be in class and I’d feel a migraine coming on, everyone would act all afraid and give me shit. They literally started talking quietly and massaging my head and neck to try and get it to stop before it started. I’d be like “I’m sorry guys, it’s happening.” And they would get all dramatic. Even the teachers started getting in on it. It was wild. I got called Carrie sometimes... But yeah, these headaches sucked. It would be like a fireplace poker right behind my eye, every time.”

Her cadence was so casual and friendly, but I couldn’t help feeling unsettled. My mind could only draw connections. The fireplace poker behind the eye. That was exactly how I’d been feeling for the past few days. Her story about the headaches being some kind of harbinger of terrible things, of course it was just a silly series of coincidences, but what if it wasn’t? And what does it mean if those headaches never go away?

I decided it was time to do some unpacking. This was all too much to keep in my head all at once, and Gray was right about one thing: Physical paper does feel better.

We had our own evidence board at the office, but there were several things I couldn’t reasonably put on there without my sanity being called into question. I hung my big cork board on the wall and dug out my simple supplies: A pack of sharpie, multiple packs of index cards, and a gargantuan tube of thumbtacks. I omitted getting a classic spool of red thread, it never seemed all that practical to me. Also I bought the thumbtacks online and they ended up being the flat, metal kind which you can’t tie thread around, so we do without.

Dreams. Left Eye. Missing Goats. Candle Caine. Headaches. Fake Videos. I wrote out the strangest pieces vaguely on index cards and hung them up. Hoping that maybe if I stared at them long enough, it would all make sense. But that didn’t seem to be happening right now, so I moved on to the second deleted video.

“Hello my lovelies, who’s ready for some story time?” Harmony greeted once again. This video was from only ten months ago, but the set up was largely the same. She began with some general life updates, before coming forth with a question.

“Have you guys ever had a reoccurring nightmare?”

I shuddered at the question... Not until very recently.

“I just had this dream last night, and it reminded me of a nightmare I used to have as a kid almost every night. There was this-“

I knew exactly what she was about to say. I mouthed her words as she said them.

“-Man in a hat.”

I paused the video and sat back in my chair. My breathing began to accelerate and my body physically shivered, but I talked myself down. No. It’s a common nightmare. The Hat Man. Lots of people talk about this phenomenon. It’s nothing.

“I would be paralyzed in my bed, and I’d see him come out of the shadows towards me. He always held out this weird looking fancy cup, or chalice, or goblet I guess you could call it... It was gold, I think.”

My slim justification went up in smoke just like that. To deny it any more would be ridiculous. It was the same dream. The same man, and the same chalice. The more she spoke, the more I knew it to be true. But it couldn’t be. This was not how the real world works. This was not reality. Those words replayed over and over in my mind like a desperate incantation. A hopeless cling to the skin of what I knew this world to be, as it spun me out of control. Not reality. Not reality. Not reality.

One video left. The one she posted right before leaving on that fake trip. After the Candle Caine game. I shuddered at the thought of what this one could be. I pressed play.

To her fans’ credit, they were right about the red top. It was stunning on her. Her wardrobe, make-up, and overall production design undeniably got more refined and sophisticated over the years. But she was still her. For now.

“Hello my lovelies, today it is our monthly unboxing video!” She beamed with excitement. “As I always say, you all NEVER have to send me anything. Seriously. But I appreciate every single one of you who sends things in, it means the world to me, and these days are my absolute favorite days of the month. So let’s get into it!”

The first five boxes or so were relatively normal. Some plushies, a signed copy of her favorite game, a coloring set, things like that. Then she came to an unmarked box. Rectangular, about a foot in length and maybe 8 inches wide and thick. She apologized for not being able to credit the gifter, and then she began to open it.

She went through several expressions as she looked inside, settling on happy but curious.

“This looks... fancy as hell. This looks expensive, who sent this?” She remarked. I felt dread consume me. I once again knew what was coming. I knew when she reached into the box what she was going to pull out. And I was right.

“Some kind of... medieval looking chalice? Oh my god, you guys... It’s heavy. This is like... real. What on earth? I feel like a queen with this thing, this is amazing. Thank you so much, whoever sent this. You better not have spent a lot on it, I would feel so bad. Please, if you’re watching, send me a private message, I want to know what the story is here.”

She giggled as she studied it in her hands. Then her brow began to furrow.

“Is this... from something? Is this from a game we played on stream? I feel like I’ve seen this. It reminds me so much of... something.”

I wanted to shout through the screen. Tell her to throw it away. Tell her to run. But I know she never did.

My hands were shaking and my head was throbbing. The chalice was real. That means the man in the hat must be real. He took her. He changed her into whatever she is now. That chalice had to be how he did it. Some kind of fucked up ritual. Who was he? What was he? Had he been planning this for her whole life? And why now does he come to me at night?

I tried my best to put it together, but it didn’t fit. How could this connect to Candle Caine? Candle Caine was an internet thing that just popped up this year, and that she happened upon at random, how could that relate to a dream from her childhood? It didn’t make sense.

I couldn’t hang on any longer. I had to go to sleep, as much as I was dreading it. As much as everything seemed to be going a mile a minute. I had to stop.

The Man in the Hat. I wrote it on one more index card and stuck it to the cork board. Then I popped a few more painkillers and some melatonin and collapsed on my bed, falling into a deep sleep almost immediately. Then the dream began.

I stood at my bathroom mirror, looking deep into my reflection. Only I didn’t see me as I am now. I saw the old me. The me I fought so hard to change. I was afraid of her. She taunted me. I didn’t want to go back. But did I deserve to stay?

I held my eyes closed, praying that when I opened them I would see the real me again. But I didn’t. It was still the other one. I tried again, and it was the same. I tried a third time, and this time it finally wasn’t her.

It... wasn’t anyone. I had no reflection anymore. I looked in the mirror and saw no one. I was no one.

I stared and stared into the lack of me, then I felt my skin begin to bubble and stretch. My body began to change. My bones popped and morphed. I felt my muscles slide up and down into place under my skin. I began to panic. I couldn’t go back.

I put my hands to my face, trying to hold everything together. To force it not to change. But my fingers slid inside my skin. Slid through the muscle and tissue. I could feel my own skull. I could feel my eyes in their sockets underneath my eyelids. I could feel the roots of my teeth underneath my gums. It was all beginning to soften. I knew I couldn’t keep it together. I knew I couldn’t stay me anymore. With a subtle brush of my fingers against my teeth roots, I could make them fall out like they were nothing.

That’s what I began to do. Dislodging my back teeth one by one. It felt uncomfortable having them there. They had to go. Then I grabbed my front teeth in a handful and dropped them all, hearing their hollow clattering into the sink. I did the same with all my bottom teeth. Every last one had to go.

I sunk my hands deeper into my face. I sunk them inside my skull. It was all soft like putty now. I played with the strings on my back of my eyeballs and watched as they popped in and out of their sockets. Eventually I grabbed them both in one hand and yanked them out. I didn’t want them anymore. I didn’t want anything anymore. I would rather be nothing. I would rather be no one. I deserved to be no one. My body was wasted on me.

I raised one of my eyeballs to face myself so I could see what I had done. I saw a face of melting wax. The holes of my eyes and mouth stretched down and became cavernous voids. But my eye holes weren’t as empty as I thought. Deep in the two black abysses, I saw new eyes. Only they weren’t my eyes.

They were the most horrible eyes I had ever seen. Like every bad thing to ever exist lived inside of them.

I woke up screaming. Those eyes seared into my vision like an old TV. Quickly my screams turned to violent sobs. It all flooded out in a torrent. I couldn’t hold the pieces together any more.

I cried about it all. I cried about things I didn’t even know I was still holding on to. It was like one domino fell and then it all came crashing down. I cried until I ran out of tears.

My head hurt even worse today, and the respite of sleep was slim to none. I skipped my workout altogether and went straight for the coffee and painkillers. I put on my sunglasses when I went out and I didn’t plan on taking them off until I was back home in the dark.

“Jesus, Cole.” Gray remarked as he picked me up from my place.

“I know.” I curtly answered.

“You look like fuckin’ roadkill.”

“We have to go see Harmony’s mother again.” I said, ignoring his probably accurate jab.

“You wanna get your car first?”

“After.”

“Okay. What for? What did you get?”

I explained what I found in the videos as we drove. I thought about fabricating the whole thing to make it seem more tangible and plausible, but I decided to keep Gray in the loop for now. I did omit certain details, such as the dreams I’ve been having. Surprisingly Gray was fairly receptive to these bizarre findings... It made me think. He said he had seen weird things in this place before. I had to wonder how weird.

“So, what, you think this man she dreamed about was real?”

“If the chalice was real, then maybe. Maybe it was some kind of repressed memory... It has to be connected somehow.”

“This is pretty flimsy, Cole. It’s pretty out-there. I’ll go with you on it, but I need you back to reality. I need you to take a step back and take care of yourself a little bit, you know?”

“Yeah.” I answered, more dismissively than I intended.

We reached Evelyn’s house and knocked on the door. She opened, and for a moment I saw myself. She looked disheveled and sleep deprived. I could tell she had been crying. But of course she had.

“How are you holdin’ up, Evelyn?” Gray asked.

“How do you think?” She answered, gesturing vaguely at the world. “Any news? Please tell me there’s news.”

“I’m afraid we’re still looking.” I interjected. “But there may be something you can help us with.”

“Of course. Anything.”

“This might sound strange... Do you remember your daughter, as a child, ever mentioning a man in a wide brimmed hat?”

“Um...” She responded, puzzled at my question.

“Even if it was just a bad dream, do you remember anything like that she may have mentioned?”

“Oh. Well yeah, she used to have a nightmare about a shadow man in a hat when she was around 6 or 8. Sure, I remember that... I think that was just because she didn’t like nursery school.”

“How’s that?”

“She was afraid of going. She didn’t like it, she never liked the religious schools. And Father Whitley, he was a priest and did a lot of early bible lessons with the kids, and he wore this hat...”

“Whitley... Ray Whitley? The guy who runs the soup kitchen? ‘Blessings’ or whatever it was called?” I asked, trying to hide my shock.

“Yeah, him. The school closed down a long time ago, but he still comes to church.”

“Okay... So Ray- Father Whitley... did he ever take a special interest in Harmony?”

“Well... I suppose, but only because he was a friend of the family. Before Harmony was even born. He was a great guy. He was always very generous and patient with Harmony... You... You think he had something to with this?”

“We’re just covering all our bases.”

Evelyn began staggering back and beginning to cry. “I didn’t know. I didn’t think he would ever... I trusted him.”

Gray reached out and placed an arm on her shoulder. “Hey. It’s okay. We’re not saying he did this. Don’t you beat yourself up now.”

“Please find her!” She pleaded through her sobs. “Please find her and bring her home!”

“I promise, Evelyn. We’ll bring her home.” Gray said. “You stay strong now, alright? Stay strong for your girl. She’s gonna need her moms.”

Gray and I both let out a long and shaky exhale when we eventually left Evelyn’s house. Any other time I would’ve been able to compose myself better, but I was worn down. My emotions were quickly becoming compromised.

“I don’t know if you should have made that promise, Gray.”

Gray shook his head. “I know. But what was I supposed to do?”

I stayed silent, as I had no answer. I wanted to promise the same thing. But I knew deep down that she wouldn’t be coming back. Not the girl she knew. Not the girl with that kind, effortless smile. Even if we got her back, even if we managed to undo whatever had been done to her, that girl would be gone.

It hurt me more than it should. More than it has in any other case, and that frustrated me. I knew better. I knew better than to get attached. You can’t do that in this job. I knew that, I recognized that, and I practiced that for years. Why was this one different? Why was SHE different?

It didn’t take long to find Ray Whitley. We knew where he worked. He lived close. It was time to pay him a visit. No time to waste.

We quickly arrived at his place. It was a very small and run down little house. Any smaller and it would be a trailer. Nothing immediately stood out as strange about it. It seemed to fit in. But for a man of his social standing, I expected a little bit more.

Imagines of the man from my dreams – our dreams – flashed through my mind. That dark and imposing figure. Was that really Ray Whitley? He was so old and gentle when I met him at the soup kitchen. He was softspoken and his words were filled with such kindness and humility. I knew not to judge books by their covers, but this was a hell of a cover.

Gray knocked on the door and it was hastily opened. As unassuming as the house was, the man was perhaps even more so. He was tall, around 6’1, and held a firm posture. His thin lips twisted into a smile of indeterminate intention.

“How may I help you?” He asked, but the way he said it made it sound like he already knew the answer. His voice was breathy with a slight regional twist, but it exuded a confidence that was... different.

“Good afternoon Mr. Whitley, we just wanted to ask you a few questions.” Gray stated with a friendly tone.

“I see. What is this regarding? Something about Melvin?”

“You knew Harmony Lavoy and her family, did you not?” I asked, cutting to the point.

“Ah, yes. They were dear friends. So terrible to hear she had gone missing.” As Ray spoke it was obvious he was hiding a smile. When he finished his deeply insincere statement, the smile returned as full as ever. It WAS him, and he wasn’t even trying. I was getting furious.

There’s a delicacy to questioning someone. It’s like a game, to try and extract information from a suspect. A social game. I don’t know what it was that compelled me to completely forego procedure. Maybe it was the fact that I knew this was the guy. Maybe it was the fact that he seemed to be enjoying the game, and that bothered me. Whatever it was, I chose to end it early.

“What did you do to her?” I asked calmly. I saw Gray out of the corner of my eye turn towards me. I could only imagine the look on his face.

Ray snickered. “What makes you think I had something to do with it?”

“I know you did. Don’t lie to me.”

Gray leaned in a muttered to me with urgency and building rage, “Cole, what the fuck are you doing?”

I ignored him and continued to press. “Tell me what you did to her.”

Ray laughed again. “It don’t matter now. What’s done is done.”

“Talk.” I insisted.

“You’re too late, kiddo.”

I hated that he called me that. I hated it so much more than when Gray said it. My voice raised.

“You think we won’t put you away for this? You think you got off scott-free?”

Ray leaned in uncomfortably close to me and smiled even wider. I saw his crooked teeth and smelled his rotten breath. “I did it. I confess. I took Harmony. Arrest me.”

I lost my temper entirely. I quickly unholstered my weapon and pointed it at his head.

“What the fuck kind of game are you playing!?” I shouted at his face.

“Hands behind your back! Get on your knees!” Gray yelled before turning to me. “Cole, step the fuck back!”

Ray dutifully put his hands behind his back and got down on his knees. I didn’t take my gun away from his head, even as Gray physically pushed me back.

“She was our lamb from the beginning.” Ray taunted to me. “She was born unto a greater purpose and now that purpose has been fulfilled.”

“What does that mean!?” I yelled. Gray began to handcuff him.

“The game was for her. It was always for her. My work is done. For the father. He will have new skin. He will have eyes.” Ray drew a long, slow sigh and closed his eyes before continuing. “My candle hath burned out.”

Gray shouted in pain and recoiled before he could get the last cuff secured. I didn’t see what happened at first, but his hand began to drip with blood almost immediately. Ray moved quickly back to his feet and I saw the glint of something metallic in his hand as he thrusted it towards Gray with immense speed.

I pulled the trigger. The shot hit Whitley in the temple and exited the other side with a firework of blood. He collapsed instantly.

Gray clutched his bleeding hand and shouted obscenities. My entire body shook with adrenaline and rage. I knew I made a mistake. I knew I did what he wanted me to do. The one person who could tell us the truth was now gone.

“Cole, what the FUCK!?” Gray snapped at me.

“He was going to kill you!” I yelled.

“Not that! Fuck him! What aren’t you telling me!?”

“What!? What do you want me to say!?”

“The truth! What the hell happened here, Cole!? Coming up here throwing accusations in his face, pulling your gun out, that’s not what we do! Not when the only evidence against the man is a little girl’s bad dream! You know more! You tell me what you know, right fucking now!”

I clenched my fists and relented. “It wasn’t just her dream! Okay? It was my dream too.”

“What? What the fuck does that even mean?”

“Fuck!” I screamed. “Alright, you wanna hear it? Fine. Ever since I took this case, I’ve been having the exact same dreams that Harmony had. The man in the hat with the chalice. As soon as I saw Ray Whitley, I knew it was him because I’ve seen him every fucking night. I’ve seen what she has seen. I’ve felt what she has felt. My headaches are her headaches.”

I ripped my sunglasses off and threw them to the ground. “Look! Look at my fucking eye. This isn’t my eye. It’s her’s. You want the truth? That’s the truth, and I don’t understand it any better than you do. And I know how I sound right now. I know. You have no idea how humiliated I feel to even have to speak these words out loud, but there they are... You can call me crazy, you can get me fired. Hell, have me committed, I don’t care. Just find the fucking girl.”

Gray just shook his head and angrily paced for a minute before finding his response.

“Listen. I don’t care how humiliated you feel, or how crazy you think you sound, I need to know this shit! I need to know everything! You are supposed to be my partner. Whether either of us likes it or not, that means something. That means trust. That means having each others’ backs. I’m not gonna get you fired. I’m not gonna have you committed. But you need to get a grip.”

I took a moment to slow my breathing and my heart rate, despite worrying that tears would follow. “Okay... You’re right, and I’m sorry... I’m not like this, Gray. I am good at what I do. This case is just... different. The shit we’re digging into, I feel it digging back into me. I can’t get a grip on reality, I don’t know what reality is anymore.”

“I know you’re good at this job.” Gray assured me. “You wouldn’t have made it this far if you weren’t. There is something about this case that’s not right, I agree with you. You think I can’t feel it, I can. I feel it in the goddamn air. So maybe I don’t need you to get a grip on reality, but I need you to get a grip on yourself.”

“I’m trying... But I need you to tell me something. Because I think you’re holding out on me too.” I accused.

“What? What the hell do you mean?”

“I mean I’m glad you’re not calling me crazy, and I’m glad you’ve been hearing me out, but why? Why do you have any faith in me? Why would you, Orson Gray, humor me on this insane bullshit without any proof?”

“What are you implying?”

“I’m not implying anything. I’m not. I just don’t understand.”

“I’m not holding out on you, Cole. I just know this place... It’s a great place to live and 99% of the people are the friendliest you’ll meet, but sometimes I felt safer on the streets of Yonkers than I do on these dirt roads... Things happen out here. You hear stories, and if you’re in our line of work, you become part of them. Eventually, when you do this as long as me, you discover that sometimes the crazy shit people say ain’t always that crazy.”

It was hard to parse how I felt upon hearing that from Gray. He was as salt of the earth as they come. A man like him wouldn’t say something like that unless he had some damn good reasons. Frankly, it scared me to death. But at the same time, I felt a level of vindication and comfort in his words. For the first time I didn’t feel completely insane or completely alone.

“Well maybe I need to hear these stories.” I responded, forcing my emotions to simmer down.

“I’ll think about it. Talk to Benji, he runs a whole goddamn website about the ‘maritime mysteries’, and I’m sure he would love if one person read it... For now, let’s call this in. It’s gonna be a long day.”

He was not wrong. It was hell. Fortunately, our brief talk with Mr. Whitley was recorded by Gray. The wound on Gray’s hand and the knife that delivered it were pretty airtight as evidence as well. Still, I didn’t imagine I would be well liked after this. The new city girl detective shooting one of the pillars of the community in the head in her first month on the job wasn’t great optics, no matter how you spun it.

I struggled with how I felt about what I did. It wasn’t the first time that I had to shoot someone, but it was the first time that I WANTED to shoot someone. I fucked our investigation, but I was happy that he was dead.

Why could I still feel it though? That dread hanging in the air. The shadow cast over myself and the entire town. I thought I might feel better, at least a little bit, but I didn’t. I felt worse. My head hadn’t stopped pounding for a second since I pulled the trigger... Something was coming. Maybe we really were too late.

CHAPTER 7: A Pin Drops

Gray went to bat for me hard after everything that happened. I don’t know if it was because he really did believe in me, or if it was just the Partner Code that he talked about, but either way I was grateful.

Ray Whitley’s house turned up little. The wide brimmed hat sat on a shelf in his front closet. The chalice was nowhere to be found. Another thing that was conspicuous in its absence was a computer.

Everyone we spoke to who knew Whitley said he didn’t do computers, or social media. He didn’t even own a smart phone. So that left one big, fat, glaring hole in all of this. Who made the videos?

I didn’t have much time to stew on that with the mess of other shit on my plate now. I just wanted this day to end. Thankfully, after many hours, it did.

Gray drove me to my car at the end of the night. Still parked where I left it. I walked briskly over to it, not keen to spend an extra moment near these woods.

“Cole.” Gray called after me.

“Yeah?”

“You okay?”

“I’m good. Don’t you start worrying about me now, old man.”

Gray laughed. “Oh okay, she gives me hell for calling her ‘kid’ but then she calls me ‘old man’, I see how it is. And for the record, I’m 45, so knock that shit off.”

I laughed in return. “Alright. I’m fine, middle-aged man.”

“Hey I’ll take that. That’s actually pretty fuckin’ optimistic.”

“Good point, you ain’t making 90. Not the way you eat.”

“Oh god no. But hey, hate all you want, chicks dig the dad bods.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, goodnight Gray.”

“They do! I’m not sayin’ I understand it, but it’s a fact.”

“Stop speaking. See you tomorrow.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Hey get some sleep alright? Get your granny sleep, I don’t want no more walking corpse as a partner.”

I threw him a silent and half hearted thumbs up as I got in my car and drove off.

I didn’t want to go home yet though. I knew what would be waiting for me when I did. I knew I would take one look at that board on my wall and I would get back to work. I wasn’t ready for that. I needed to decompress.

It took me a few wrong turns, but eventually I found my way back to 914’s Pizza.

The place was empty this time of night, but I saw Benji behind the counter, half heartedly mopping. His eyes perked up when he saw me.

“Hey! Wally’s partner! Daria, right?” He said, cheerfully.

“Hey Benji.” I greeted.

“What can I set you up with?”

“Another pepperoni slice would be good.”

“Ha. You liked it huh?”

“It was pretty great, I can’t lie.”

“Yeah that’s all Big Obi. Never let Wally change the recipe, Wally never let me change it either.”

“Well if it works, it works.”

“There ya go. If it works, it works... One pep, comin’ right up.”

I slumped into a booth and let out a very long exhale. I was glad I came here. For a brief moment in time, I didn’t have to be me. I didn’t have to carry all the shit that came with the decisions I had made. I could just be any other girl. I could just be no one.

A few minutes passed as I daydreamed about anything other than work. The things I wanted to do once this was over. Funnily, they always seemed to be the same things, and there always seemed to be something in the way. Thankfully Benji arrived with the pizza before I could truly wallow in all that.

“You alright? Long night?” He asked.

“Oh man...” I remarked, chuckling and shaking my head.

“Ah shit, eh?” He answered, reading my non response. “Well hey, I’m not doin’ anything, you want some company?”

I thought about it for a moment. Weighing what I needed more. Peace and quiet was easier, but a friendly face was better. Being alone with my thoughts right now was ugly.

“Sure. That’d be nice.” I answered.

Benji sat across from me. Beyond the smell of pizza, I could smell a bit of weed wafting off of him. I didn’t mind it.

“So how is big man?” He asked.

“He’s... he’s Gray.”

Benji let out a short laugh. “Yeah he is... He grows on you though.”

I nodded. “He’s not so bad... Are you from New York too?”

“Oh, no, I’m from here. Wally was already working here when I met him. He kinda took me under his wing after Obi and all that happened.”

“Right, that makes sense... Can I ask you something else?”

“Yeah, go for it.”

“Do you have a website?”

Benji rolled his eyes “Oh that son of a bitch. He told you about the website?”

“He mentioned it, yeah.”

“He makes fun of me all the damn time for that website. It’s a hobby, it’s not even anything. I didn’t even make it, I took it over from my dad.”

“What is it about?” I asked.

“It’s just talking about all the, like, unsolved stuff and haunted places and whatever else that goes on in the eastern provinces. Because you never see it talked about, we’re so under the radar over here, but there’s so much good shit... You should give it a look, honestly. It’s super informative, I cite all my sources. I got it all: The Goatman of Pleasant Peak, The Willow Bay Fog, The Lady of White Point Bridge, The Bakersfield Cross, Hawthorn Woods, The Curse of Ashbrooke House, you name it.”

“Wow... I haven’t heard of any of those.”

“Really!? Oh my god, Daria, you gotta. If you’re gonna live here, you gotta know at least some of this stuff. The Elegy Murders? The Lockeport Lighthouse? No?”

“Not a clue... But I’ll tell you one thing. Once this case I’m on is all over, you’re gonna have one hell of an addition.”

Benji’s eyed widened and he leaned forward in his seat. “Really?”

“You know I can’t tell you anything... But it’s weird, is all I’m saying.”

“Shit... Well be careful out there, Daria.” He said, his tone turning to one of extreme caution.

I decided to test him. “You don’t actually believe in... all that, do you?”

“I mean... It’s tricky.” He answered. “A lot of it, probably not but... All it takes is for one of them to be real. That changes how you look at everything else.”

“And you know one of them is real?”

“...Yes.”

The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. I didn’t intend for the conversation to go this way. I guess I couldn’t escape it anywhere. He was right, though. All it takes is for one to be real, and I knew this one was real.

Benji eventually steered the conversation to a lighter note, for which I was grateful. I’m not sure I could’ve managed it myself. I was jealous of how effortlessly upbeat he was. He and Harmony were similar in that regard. It turns out that in his case a lot of it was due to a terrifying mixture of weed and caffeine. Maybe I ought to try that.

He actually tried to sell me some pot brownies on the down low before I left. He tried to sell weed to a fucking cop. I couldn’t believe it. I bought four.

I arrived back to my dark and sad apartment. The stacks of boxes and cork board taunting me as I entered. I was reluctant to get back to work. Part of my brain fought against it, but it had no chance.

I sat at my laptop and opened up a browser. I didn’t care to check on my own account. That experiment was over as far as I was concerned.

The first thing I wanted to look at was the Candle Caine game... Who else played it? Where did it come from? I found around two dozen videos of people attempting it. Not that many, all things considered. I had overestimated its popularity. Most people didn’t get any results, and a few very obviously faked it for clicks.

As for the origin, it was hard to determine. They all just said they heard about it, either from a friend or online. None of their accounts seemed suspicious, and none of them seemed to know anything more. But the curious thing... Harmony’s account followed almost all of them.

Whitley said the game was for her, I wondered if Candle Caine was what he meant, and now this confirmed it. Whoever created it and sent it out intended for Harmony to find it and play it. A fake viral trend targeting one girl, but why her? And could I believe that Ray Whitley, the 60 year old priest who didn’t own a smart phone, set all this up?

More was happening here. She was chosen for something. Raised like cattle to fulfill some purpose, but what? I had to dig deeper. There had to be more to this.

After relentless Googling leading me nowhere, I decided to type in Benji’s website. Maritime Mysteries. After all, Harmony wasn’t the only strange incident in this town.

The site was practically archaic. Web 1.0 table-based set up at its nostalgic best, full of clip art and word art and clashing colors. It felt wrong to see it without the boxy gray Windows 98 U.I. around it. I expected to see phrases like ‘cyberspace’ and ‘web surfing’ and ‘the net’. Made sense that Benji’s father was the original owner. I guess Benji never felt the desire to update it.

My mission, beyond admiring the charm of a bygone era, was simple enough. Drop some keywords in, and see if anything even remotely like this has happened here before. Maybe then I could suss out a method to the madness.

I went broad at first. I thought about the constant missing eye reoccurrences. I searched “eye” and, unsurprisingly, it turned up several results. Most of them, a mere innocuous word usage in the body of the article. “Keep an eye on blank” et cetera. There were a few mentions of eye gouging. One serial killer had a motto of surgical eye removal, in addition to organ removal and some weird shit about plants. Nothing that would indicate a connection, however.

I tried something more specific, “left eye” – this yielded no results. Neither did “Chalice” or “Hat Man.”

But I knew the words I really wanted to write. If there was anything to this, then these words would be there. “Candle Caine.”

One article popped up, but curiously, the words Candle Caine did not appear together in it. Instead, multiple separate instances of Candle and Caine. The article was titled “The Church of the Father.”

I was not a religious person, but I still did not like the sound of that. A sliver of trepidation crept through me, but I stuffed it down and clicked on the article.

“Over 50% of residents in Nova Scotia practice Christianity.” The article began. “Fraser Caine used to be one of them. He was raised in a strict, religious household in the early 1960s and attended church regularly. That was, until his parents divorced when he was at the young age of six and his father moved to a different province. Some say it was the divorce that did it - the first domino that began to knock them all down. Some say it was just mental illness. Others, however, believe it was something more sinister.”

An interesting start. Fraser Caine... Could he be our Candle Caine? I hastily continued on.

“Nevertheless, Caine would allegedly begin sleepwalking and speaking to an imaginary friend shortly thereafter. A man he would call “Father.” Initially his mother believed this to be a coping mechanism for the estrangement of his real father, but Caine would always insist that his imaginary Father was different. His behavior would change over time too, becoming cold and distant. He would throw tantrums and screaming fits any time he would be taken to church. Fraser’s mother sought the help of many professionals, but his behavior only persisted and worsened by the day. Violent outbursts became the norm. By the age of 16 he had renounced his Christianity entirely, pledging himself only to the “Father.” He would adorn his room and his school books in pentagrams and other strange satanic imagery. By the age of 25, he had officially opened his own congregation. By the age of 31, he had his own compound in Springhill and dozens of loyal followers.”

I took a long breath and rubbed my face. I hated the sound of this. With every new piece of information it became clearer that this was somehow our guy.

“Despite using common Satanist imagery in their teachings and rituals, it would be incorrect to characterize The Church of the Father as such, as they refused to ever put a name to the being they worshipped. Nor did they describe its physical traits. No horns, no hooves, just The Father. One former member would say in an interview in 1996 that The Father had no form at all. She would say “The Father is a thought. The Father is a dream. The Father lives in the wax of the melting candle.””

I shuddered at the mention of candle wax, even though I knew it was coming. Surely everyone thought at the time that these were just the ramblings of a mad, brainwashed woman. But I knew it was more than that.

“Comparing it to other cults, The Church of The Father was unremarkable in size or duration, lasting only around 6 years at the compound until reports reached police of mysterious deaths in the community. Upon investigating, the bodies of three young women were found inside an unused silo, their flesh severely burned and melted off by heavy amounts of molten wax. While their fates were initially deemed to be part of some kind of grotesque ritualistic sacrifice, Fraser Caine himself would only ever describe them as “attempts.” Caine would take his own life while evading police custody in 1995, and his body was placed in an unmarked grave. The cult would quietly disband thereafter.”

I could only think of my dream. The one where everything was on fire and my body melted into wax. In the dream I felt no pain, but I don’t imagine I could say the same for those poor girls.

Was this what was happening? Was Ray Whitley carrying on the work of a 30 year old cult? The word ‘attempts’ stuck out and made my skin crawl. Attempts at what? If those girls were attempts, then what does that make Harmony? Hell, what does that make me?

My leg was restlessly bouncing for god knows how long, I fidgeted with my nails until they were red and raw. I knew I had to snap out of it, but I didn’t want to go to bed. I wasn’t ready for what my mind would conjure up in my sleep. I chose a third option and drew myself a hot bath. It was the only way to be sure that I could relax and that I wouldn’t be tempted by my work.

The water was nearly scalding and it was perfect. I wanted to burn away all the pain. I leaned my head back and surrendered to it. It felt like melting, but a good kind of melting.

I chuckled as I took in all the bruises and scrapes all over me for the first time. All that work to get this body and here I was, fucking it up... I probably wouldn’t be thirst trapping any time soon.

I probably could’ve fallen asleep in that bath. I had found myself a small pocket of peace, despite all the insanity rapping at the door of my brain. I held it at bay, the water was my bubble, and my consciousness was waning. But then I heard a crash.

Somewhere outside the bathroom, something fell, and a loud clattering followed. It sounded like someone dropping an open box of cereal, or emptying the beads off of a bunch of Mardi Gras necklaces. I jumped out of the bath, spilling a puddle of water on the tiles. I wrapped a towel around me tightly and slowly inched towards the door.

“Shit.” I muttered to myself silently in frustration. I didn’t think to bring my gun in here. It was still sitting at my desk on the opposite side of the bedroom.

I steadied myself and opened the bathroom door a crack. I couldn’t see too well as my eyes struggled to adjust to the darkness, but I was fairly sure I didn’t see anyone out there, so I cautiously opened the door the rest of the way and stepped out.

I took three long, slow steps out into the dark bedroom, then an agonizing, sharp, stabbing pain shot through my foot and I instantly fell backwards on my ass. Confusion gave way to grim realization. Now I knew what fell. My giant tube of thumbtacks.

I pulled my foot up to take a look at it, and saw the glistening little circle of metal sticking right into the arch. With my thumb and index finger I yanked it out, letting out a short and involuntary grunt of pain as I did. It hurt like hell. So much worse than any Lego or toy car I had ever stepped on as a kid.

I slowly scrambled back to my feet, making sure to only put weight on my left foot. I surveyed the room as my eyes successfully adjusted. They were everywhere. Hundreds, all over the floor.

I did leave my window open, and there was a breeze coming in, but was the tube THAT close to the edge of my desk? Could it really have just fallen by itself? I was skeptical and I remained on alert, but first thing was first, I had to get these tacks off of my floor.

I shuffled my feet slowly without ever lifting them, and began pushing the tacks into a more manageable pile in the center. It wasn’t easy to corral them all, and I still felt the pinch of a few as they awkwardly slid and caught on the uneven floorboards, but I was managing.

I reached the foot of my bed and swept underneath it with my good foot. Surprisingly, and thankfully, there weren’t many tacks under there that I could feel. I made a mental note to move the bed later.

I turned back towards the ever-growing pile to continue my irritating work... until I felt a hand violently clasp around my left ankle. The nails dug into my skin. My adrenaline spiked and time seemed to slow. I was living everyone’s nightmare. Someone was under my bed. The hand jerked my foot backwards, either attempting to pull me under, or just make me fall on my face.

I steadied myself with my right foot and, with every bit of force I had, kicked my left foot in multiple directions. I tried slamming the hand upwards into the hard wooden footboard. After a few violent tries, the grip released. In my panic and desperation, I attempted a big leap over the pile of tacks in front of me. Only I undershot it. My foot slammed down with the weight of my entire body into the prickly mass. Instantly an incalculable amount of punctures. It felt like a thousand frostbites, but as uncomfortably invasive as a surgery.

My balance faltered as I was overcome with pain. The metal in my foot, in that moment, became an ice skate. I lost all traction and fell forward, fortunately past the larger pile, but I still hit plenty as I smacked the ground. I felt new punctures directly in my kneecaps, and more than a few in my forearms as I used them to brace my fall. The ones hitting bone hurt exponentially more.

I screamed in agony. My body couldn’t stop shaking. I didn’t want to move a muscle out of fear of more tacks sticking their way into my skin. My only lifeline was my towel, which was just thick enough to cushion my torso from deeper stabs.

I crawled up to one knee, then quickly got my second knee under me, but I could already hear heavy footsteps skulking behind. I had no time to react before that same hand ruthlessly grabbed a fistful of my hair, yanking me down and dropping me on my back. My head whiplashed off the ground. I instantly knew I was concussed. It ached so much I almost didn’t notice the fresh tacks in the back of my skull.

I finally saw him, but his identity remained hidden behind a crude, plaster goat mask. He was dressed head to toe in black, with a black hood and gloves. I got no details, except for his blue eyes.

I instinctively flipped over on my stomach, but then he was straddling me. His hands plunged into my hair again. I was staring at the pile of tacks now inches from my face, and I felt him begin to push my head towards them.

I planted my hands down in the tacks and attempted to pushed back, but he was too strong and I was in too much pain. My face got closer and closer, the metal spikes nearly touched my eyes. I flailed and I writhed, but it was no use. I did the only thing I could do. I closed my eyes.

They slid in one by one, so agonizingly slow. My nose and eyebrows took the first ones. It was even worse than falling on them. I stopped pushing back, I lost all my fight and I wanted it to at least be quick. My head slammed into the hardwood floor and picked up a dozen more tacks with it. My cheeks, my lips, my chin, all pinned up and peeled back like a butterfly in a picture frame. I couldn’t distinguish where they all were anymore. It was a blur. But he wasn’t done. He slammed my head on the floor over and over. It all went numb after the fourth time. I let my body go completely limp.

I felt him climb off of me, and I heard his footsteps move towards my desk. Then the swiping sound of him picking up my gun.

This was it. If I had anything left inside of me to fight, this was the last chance I would have to find it.

I knew one thing, just one. Those big, heavy boots of his must have picked up a lot of tacks. Meaning he was on ice skates just like I was.

I put everything I had into one kick, right at his foot. Sure enough, it slid and he lost his balance. I then grabbed a handful of the tacks and hurled them haphazardly at his face. He put his free arm up and turned his head away. I used that moment to coil myself around his gun brandishing arm and attempt to pry it free. His grip was strong and he tried to wrench me back, so I opened my mouth and brought my teeth down hard on his thumb. The coppery taste of his blood filled my mouth as I grinded and gnashed. I heard him scream in pain and eventually he slightly relinquished his grip on the gun.

I wrestled it from him the rest of the way and wasted no time pointing it back at him, getting a shot off at his head. The bullet grazed either his temple or his ear and he ran. I got a few more shots off but my aim was abysmal. He got away. I couldn’t give chase. I couldn’t do much of anything. That final burst was all I had.

I pulled my limp body across the ground to my desk and grabbed my phone. I felt myself losing consciousness so I had to act fast. I called Gray.

“Yo.” He answered.

“Get the fuck... over here...” I managed to squeeze out between long breaths.

“Cole? Shit! What happened? Are you alri-”

I dropped the phone and slumped over to my side. My eyes rolled back and I passed out.

I knew I was dreaming immediately. I found myself sitting on an old wooden bench on a sandy beach, gazing out at the sunset. It was so beautiful. I felt no pain, only a calm breeze. Maybe this wasn’t a dream, I thought. Maybe I was dead.

“It would’ve been nice.” A soft and familiar voice spoke from my left. I turned and saw Harmony sitting right beside me. Not a ghoulish or demonic visage; just her as she used to be. As she should be. She didn’t look away from the water.

“What would?” I asked.

“If we ever got to meet... Really meet.”

“Yeah... I think I would have liked that.” I agreed. “You seemed nice... The real you. Before all this.”

“I’m still here... I’m not gone.”

“Where are you then?”

“On this beach. I’m always here.”

“But this isn’t real. This is just my dream.”

“It’s not your dream, it’s mine. I left it to you, in my eye.”

I struggled with the abstract absurdity of that statement, despite the fact that it was most likely the honest truth.

“I think I’m just crazy...” I replied.

“Everything is crazy. Who cares if you are too?”

I chuckled. “I care... I have to find you... I have to solve this.”

“No... You’ve done too much... You’ve hurt too much... I don’t want to hurt you anymore. Maybe you can just let me go. I’m okay here, on the beach, behind your eye.”

“I can’t do that.” I answered plainly and honestly. It was beyond choice. I couldn’t stop if I tried.

“Why haven’t you unpacked?” Harmony asked, changing the subject.

“What?” I stammered.

“All those boxes in your apartment... Why haven’t you opened them?”

“I... I haven’t had the time.” I reasoned.

“You’ve had the time. And you still have time. But you’ll regret it if you take too long.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You exist in that new place, but you’re not living in it. You haven’t made it yours. You did this for a fresh start. You did this to be happy, but you’re not letting yourself be.” Harmony paused and sighed. “I’m sorry... I really do think we could’ve been friends... Maybe I could’ve been your person.”

“My person?”

“I gave you my eye to see me, but I see you too. I’m not the only one who’s half alive.”

I grimaced. “I don’t care about that. That doesn’t matter. I’m supposed to save you. That’s my job. That’s my only job right now.”

“I care.” She cut me off. “I would have cared. You need someone. You don’t have anyone. And I would’ve loved to be your someone... I would have pushed you on the dance floor whether you liked it or not.”

“Yeah, I don’t really dance...” I said, my hands absent-mindedly fidgeting.

“Yes you do. You dreamed of it. You dreamed of getting out there, being free, being yourself, and dancing. You thought you’d stop being afraid once you were fully you, but you’re still afraid.”

“You saw my dreams too? Is nothing private?” I asked playfully, trying to curb the uncomfortable feelings being dug up.

“No. I didn’t have to.”

I shook my head and chuckled again, “You’re talking to me like you’re not the one going through hell.”

“Well, I’d say we both are...” She responded. “And you’re all I have right now. Just you and this beach.”

“So does that make me YOUR person?” I jested.

Harmony smiled, but then her expression turned to sorrow. “I’m so sorry, Daria. I’m sorry I did this to you. I never meant for it to hurt so much. I just wanted someone to see what was happening and to find me, but I almost got you killed.”

It took her saying that for my mind to truly set. I clenched my jaw. “No you didn’t. It’s my job. I chose this. This is mine and mine alone... And I will still try to save you.”

“I don’t know...”

“I will. I will save you.” I stated with a steely determination. “And after I do, maybe I’ll let you take me dancing.”

I tried to sound confident, but I’m sure I got a little red.

Harmony laughed, finally turning away from the water to look at me. Something about that smile in the sunset made my breath falter. She brushed her hair aside and simply said, “It’s a date.”

“Cole!” I heard an echoed shout from so far in the distance. I didn’t want to leave this place, but I felt myself being pulled away.

“Wait...” Harmony said, her eyes glazed over in sudden fear. “Something happened...”

“What? What happened?” I asked.

“Cole!” The shouting came far closer and the dream began to fade. I tried desperately to remember all the details of this moment as I was being ripped from it. I wanted to stay, and I needed to remember. The intense, throbbing pain returned.

“No. Oh god no.” Tears began streaming down Harmony’s face.

“What is it!?” I yelled, but my tether to that place broke. Everything went to black. It was gone. Her expression was seared into my memory. I had hoped that it would be her smile, but instead it was her terror. For what? I had no idea.

I could only manage to force open one of my eyes. When I did, I saw Gray standing over me, his face drenched in its own horror.

“Holy shit you’re not dead, thank god. Listen, I got paramedics coming, you’re gonna be okay.” Gray said frantically.

“I... I saw...” I tried to articulate a sentence but I was overwhelmed with fatigue and agony.

“You saw? Did you see who did this to you?”

“He wore a mask... He was tall... and thin...”

“Okay. It’s okay. Don’t speak, just relax. Here, let me get you on the bed at least.” He said before hooking one arm around my back and the other under my knees. I screamed in pain as he hoisted me up. Every single movement, a painful reminder of the metal pins in my flesh.

“Shit. Sorry.” He exclaimed. “Do you want – let me get you a shirt or something. They’ll probably take it off when they pick all that shit outta you but still, I know what it’s like having a neighbour accidentally see too much of you. It’s fuckin’ awkward forever, you gotta move buildings and...” Apparently rambling was one of Gray’s coping mechanisms.

Gray rummaged through my closet to find a shirt. I only had about eight unpacked. “The hell is ‘Bullet Club’? Do I have to worry about you? Like, what’s next, a Punisher shirt?”

I let out an involuntary and pained snicker. “Shut up.”

“Oh well, it’s the biggest one here, it’ll cover all your stuff.” Gray handed me the shirt. “Do you need me to...?

“I got it. Thanks. Just look away.”

Gray did as I asked. I dropped my pin filled towel and slowly put the shirt on. It was a nearly impossible task. The metal shifting under my skin was unbearable and my hands had very little strength.

Gray got a call and he picked it up. I took the time to begin pulling some of the tacks out of my fingers.

“What? Yeah, no, I was driving. There was an emergency, I couldn’t pick up. What’s going on?” Gray muttered into the phone.

Now that I had some of my fingers free, I moved my hand to my closed eye. Sure enough there was a tack lodged in my top eyelid. I couldn’t even feel it amongst the rest. The skin tugged as I pulled it, but eventually it released and I could open my now bloody eye.

“What?” Gray exclaimed in a breathy tone I could only describe as utter dread. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

I looked up at him as he began to pace around the room.

“No... No that’s... Fuck... Okay... I’m with Cole right now, she... Yeah, I’ll be there, just give me some time, alright?”

Gray hung up the phone, then put his head in his hands.

“What was that?” I asked.

Gray dropped his hands and tried to play it off. “Don’t... Don’t worry about it right now. We just gotta get you taken care of first.”

“No. What happened?” I insisted.

“Cole...”

“What happened? Fucking tell me.”

Gray clicked his tongue and grimaced. “Evelyn is dead.”

CHAPTER 8: The Red Lake

The next few hours were a blur. I told Gray to leave, but he stayed until the ambulance took me. The paramedics got to work removing the tacks one by one and it was torture. I was concussed, my orbital bone was fractured, and my nose was broken. They had my head wrapped up in all kinds of bandages and supports. Gray checked up on me early the next morning.

“Remember a couple days ago when I said you looked like roadkill? Yeah I take it back.” He barbed. I let out a groan.

“How are you holdin’ up, partner?” He asked in earnest.

“They said I can be out in 48 hours. What happened to Evelyn?”

Gray’s smiling façade dropped. “It’s bad... I was on the road coming to see you when a new post showed up Harmony’s socials. It quickly got deleted, but enough people saw it and called in. We got it saved.”

“Show me.”

Gray gave an apprehensive look, but obliged. He pulled out his phone and held it out to me. “It’s two images, here’s the first.”

If I had more control of my body, I would’ve physically recoiled. A candid shot of Evelyn, laying dead on the floor of her living room. There were pools of blood. She had been stabbed countless times.

I didn’t have time to process it before Gray swiped to the second photo... Harmony. The ghoulish, emaciated, eyeless Harmony. Posed up like any of her usual selfies, brandishing a bloody kitchen knife between her teeth... My heart shattered.

“We went to the house... it’s legit.” Gray explained.

“Harmony didn’t do this, Gray.” I insisted.

“I know you don’t want to believe that but...”

“She didn’t do it.” I interrupted. “That isn’t her. That’s some fucking... thing... using her body. Fuck. That’s why the video data was inconclusive, Gray. They didn’t AI generate videos of her, they didn’t have to, they had her body. They had that thing parade around in it and pretend to be her. The only thing they had to generate was the background and a filter to fix her fucking eye.”

“Okay, slow down. Even if you’re right, that’s not gonna play in court. You know that.”

“I don’t care about that. Not right now... This is bad... This is so much worse than you know.”

“What do you mean?”

“They played this game for months. These fake videos. Fake posts. Now they’re revealing their hand. Now they’re attacking. They killed Evelyn and made it a scene. They tried to kill me. They’ll probably try to kill you... They didn’t make those videos to get away with what they’d done. They knew eventually we would figure it out. No. They made those videos to bide themselves time... And now they don’t need them anymore. Why wouldn’t they need them anymore?”

“...Because it’s done. Whatever they were doing... They finished it.” Gray deduced.

“Exactly. It’s done. Just like Whitley said. Whatever it was, we were too late to stop it. Now it doesn’t matter. It’s here. It’s happening.”

“...No.” Gray mused. “No, that’s not true. If they were truly done, if they truly completed their mission, why would they bother trying to take you out? Evelyn was a scene, Evelyn was a victory lap... but they did that at the same time they came for you. Meaning they thought you would be dead. They need you to be dead... That means it’s not over. You are still a threat to them.”

“I don’t feel like much of a threat.”

“You must be close to something. Maybe it’s your connection with that girl, I don’t know. But I think we can still stop this... I’m gonna follow up on Father Whitley and deal with Evelyn as much as I can. With this being a homicide now, we got all kinds of shit stirred up and folks coming in from everywhere, it fuckin’ sucks. I’ll come back tomorrow. You focus on what you know. Try and make sense of this. See if you remember anything about the guy who attacked you.”

As soon as he said that, it all came to me. I did remember another detail about the man who attacked me... and it all fit into place.

“Holy shit.” I exclaimed.

“What?”

“I know who it was. I saw their eyes... They had HER eyes.”

“What do you mean?”

“Harmony, she has these piercing blue eyes. Sky blue. It’s almost uncanny. But Evelyn had hazel eyes... Harmony didn’t get them from her. This man’s eyes... they were Harmony’s.”

“So, Harmony’s father? What was his name, Brad? But we confirmed he was in Alberta. Other side of the country.”

“How did we confirm that? We never took him seriously as a suspect because at the time we didn’t even know there was a suspect, we didn’t know anything. We didn’t dig. We called him once and looked at his fucking social media and we bought it, just like we bought Harmony’s. If he faked her, why wouldn’t he fake himself? No. Harmony was never in Paris, and Harmony’s father was never in Alberta.”

“Shit. Okay, you might be right. But you don’t know it was him, you’re just saying it COULD have been him.”

“It was him... It all adds up. Father Whitley, Harmony’s father, ‘The Church of the Father’. Its always been The Father. Whitley even said it: “She was our lamb from the beginning.” Harmony was born for this. She was groomed by her dad and Whitley for this purpose. She drank from the chalice at that nursery school. She was probably fucking baptized with it. Whatever they did to her was changing her. Her headaches. Her premonitions. She could see more than reality. She projected herself into my dreams. The other attempts failed because they were only human... she was becoming...”

“Whoa, slow down Cole. You’re saying a lotta shit right now that I don’t understand.”

I ignored him and continued thinking out loud. “For what? What were they preparing her for? What is she now? A host? A vessel? Is that it? Were they just... making her more habitable for some other entity? But what about the wax?”

Gray cut me off again, “Okay, okay, easy now. I know I said try and make sense of all this but remember you have serious fucking head trauma. Simmer on it, alright? Don’t boil over. Rest. You’re here for two days, alright?”

“I can’t stay here for two days. We don’t have time. We’re already too late.”

“You’re staying here. I don’t care. I got this.”

“No, Gray, I need to get out of here.” I said as I began to sit up in my bed.

“Cole if you don’t lay your pin cushion ass back down right now, I will shoot you in the face.”

“Jesus... Fine.” I said slowly laying back down.

“I’ll be back, alright? I gotta go play politician and try and not let some fancy pants from Vancouver steal this case from us and fuck everything up. I’ll be fighting for my life out there... well, so to speak. I’ll look into Harmony’s pops as well. We’ll talk soon.”

“Be careful, Gray. They might be coming for you too.”

“Oh don’t you go worryin’ about me now.” He said with a smirk before leaving.

The silence of his absence was immediately unwelcome. I hated hospitals. I hated the smells. I hated the fluorescent lights. I hated the impersonal, clinical white walls. I hated the little beeps of machinery... I spent too much time in places like this. Whether for myself or for someone else. All I could ever think was “I hope I don’t die in a place like this. Anywhere else. Anywhere else.”

I lived in my thoughts for the rest of the day. I didn’t notice much going on around me. Everything the doctors and nurses said was in one ear, out the other. I just wanted to leave... and I just wanted to sleep, but my body wouldn’t allow it. Maybe it was afraid, maybe it was right to be.

As the lights dimmed at the end of the day, sleep was beginning to win the battle. I drifted off, wondering if I would see Harmony again. What must she be going through? I had a feeling I knew what she saw at the end of the last dream...

I was back on the beach, except now it was empty. The sun had set over the horizon. It was cold, and I felt so deeply, unbearably alone.

But as I looked out to the water, I saw a figure standing in it up to their waist. I walked into the water after them. As I got closer, even though she was turned away from me, I could see it was her.

“Harmony!” I called out, to no response.

As I got within feet of her, I could hear something amongst the crashing of waves. She was whispering to herself. It didn’t seem like words at first. It sounded like someone tuning a radio.

“Harmony. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” She still didn’t move or acknowledge me.

“Kill... Kill... Someone...” Those words came through her jumbled-up whispers and repeated over and over. “Me... I... Someone Else...”

I got up close to hear her better. After a minute of the cryptic susurrate, I got the full picture.

“Kill me before I kill someone else. Kill me before I kill someone else. Kill me before I kill someone else...” I looked into her eyes and they were full of tears.

I reached out and pulled her into a tight embrace. “I’m sorry.” I pleaded. Her body still didn’t move or respond. She just looped that phrase again and again.

“I’m gonna fix this. I promise. I’m gonna bring you home.” I asserted, trying unsuccessfully not to burst into tears of my own.

“There will be no home.” She whispered. I released my embrace to look at her, but it wasn’t her anymore. It was the other her. Grinning at me the most sadistic grin. “The Father may yet have you too.”

My body went limp and I began to collapse, but she caught me just before I hit the water. Delicately, she laid my head back and dipped me down like a ballroom dance. The water wasn’t water anymore. It was warmer and thicker. As my eyes sank below the surface, I could only see red.

After a few seconds, she brought me back up. Now the sky was red too.

The twisted version of Harmony leaned in close to my ear and whispered. “Feed him.”

My eyes turned to the dark, crimson shoreline. So far away, but I could see something lurching towards the water. A naked, pale human figure. I couldn’t make out any details but it looked like it was struggling to move. More than that, it looked like it was struggling to maintain its shape.

“Don’t!” Harmony’s voice pleaded to me. I looked towards her and she had returned to her normal self. “Don’t feed it! Don’t look at it!”

“What is it!?” I cried.

“He can’t wear skin! But he needs a brain! He’s nothing now, but he will be soon! It’s all for him! It’s all for him!”

“What are you talking about!? That doesn’t make any sense!”

“The window is open, and he feeds. He’ll show you, but don’t look. Not with your eyes, not with your mind. Not with the window to our soul. I am him, he is me, but he will be more. I am an infection of his design. I serve. I obey. He feeds from me to become whole. For he has made me more than human. But my skin is only skin.”

She sounded like Melvin. She sounded like that strange old lady. I couldn’t make sense of her words, but I was suddenly distracted by a sloshing in the bloody lake, and I turned my gaze to meet it. The figure was gone from the shore. I saw only a ripple in its wake. It was under the surface. It was under me. I turned back to Harmony and she was gone. I was alone.

I heard it moving. I felt a current pass by my legs. I was begging myself to wake up but I couldn’t.

A hand roughly grabbed my ankle and pulled me down. I fell into the thick, warm crimson. Another hand grabbed my other ankle. Then two more hands grabbed each of my wrists. They began pulling in all directions while I scrambled for breath under the surface. Blood was already making it down my throat and choking me. I couldn’t see anything but deep red.

They pulled and pulled and wouldn’t stop. I felt my left shoulder pop out of socket. Then my right. My femurs struggled to remain in my hip joints. The pulling wouldn’t stop. More hands emerged from the sea of viscera and pulled at my ribcage and my jaw. Forcing my mouth open to accept the endless rush of blood, then ripping my jaw off entirely. I felt holes appear in my skin where it had been pulled and stretched too far, then a sudden and violent pop when my pelvis broke in half. Still they kept pulling. From that point on it was like a zipper being unzipped right up the middle of me. I felt my innards float away to the surface.

Finally, two more hands plunged deep into my eye sockets and pulled each way. My skull cracked in half like an egg. That one final snap was enough to wake me.

The hospital room was dark and quiet. It was still early in the night... I wanted to scream in anguish. I couldn’t take this anymore. I just wanted to sleep. Was it too much to ask to just sleep through the night? Just one night?

My body and my mind were at war with one another. My body wanted to go back to sleep, but the deep, lingering fear wouldn’t allow it. So I laid there in a nowhere state. Helpless and alone in my own personal hell.

I heard a stirring in one of the beds in the room across from me. It sounded a bit more significant than the usual creaking of the mattress springs. Any other time I wouldn’t bother looking, but I was in a permanent state of anxiety, so I slowly turned my head.

The room was dark, darker than mine, but I could see the figure of someone sitting up in their bed. I could see the faintest glint in their eyes. They were looking at me.

They turned their body towards me and hung their legs over the side of the bed. Then they stood up and began shambling towards the threshold.

I could see him better now and... I recognized him. I saw him outside the soup kitchen that first day. When this all started. He was nice to me.

As he got closer, I could see a glaze had fallen over his eyes. Along with a deep sorrow. I don’t know how I knew, but I knew he was going to kill me.

“Forgive me.” He croaked as he pulled himself to my bedside.

“Don’t do this.” I begged, but his hands had already made their way around my throat and began to squeeze. I felt the veins in my head thickening.

There was anguish in his face. He turned away while he choked me, and held his body at arms length, not being able to bear what he was doing. Fortunately, that gave me an opening.

I wrestled one of my legs between his arms and smashed his nose with my heel. He released his grip and stumbled back to the floor.

As I coughed and tried to catch my breath, I pressed every alert and knocked a bunch of shit over, making as much noise as possible. He got back to his feet, and I struggled to mine.

“Why are you doing this?” I yelled through a raspy voice.

“You have to... You have to...” He cried before rushing at me.

I didn’t have the strength to get my hands up in time and he tackled me to the ground. Now his desperation had outweighed his trepidation. He had me in a full mount and looked directly into my eyes as he squeezed the life out of me. I struggled and punched as much as I could, but I could feel myself fading fast.

The next 30 seconds were chaos. I didn’t see most of it. But I heard footsteps rushing to the door. I heard yelling. Someone pulled him off of me. More yelling, and then the loud pop of a gunshot plunged everything into silence. The man dropped right in front of me. I stared into his eyes as all life left them.

The orderlies got me back into bed and stayed close, tending to me kindly. Gray arrived at the hospital within the hour. I heard his shouting voice echo through the corridors from far away. He was heated. Eventually he arrived at my door.

“Y’know I TOLD them to beef up security, right? I told them that. I told them to get some more cops in and to keep a close eye... I mean, an attempt on the life of a detective from a perp who’s still out there, you’d think maybe they would... fuckin’ hell.”

“It’s okay. I’m fine.”

“Course you are. Right as fuckin’ rain. Look at you. Unkillable. You’re like a cockroach.”

“Thanks?”

“Yeah, alright, listen... I’m getting you outta here. Let’s go.”

“Really?”

“Yeah! Oh they’re not happy about it, but fuck ‘em. You’re not safe here, so we’re breaking you out, partnah.”

“Where are we gonna go?”

“To the car... and then we’re gonna figure it out from there. Do they still have your bullet society shirt or whatever?”

“They cut it off.”

“Ah, shit. My bad. Alright well you look fine in your little gown, just keep the back clasped up. Let me get you a wheelchair.”

“I can walk.”

“Come on. Take the wheelchair. It’s fun.” He playfully insisted.

Gray wheeled me out of the hospital and I couldn’t have been more grateful. Whether he had a plan or not, I was just happy to feel the breeze on my face and see the stars. We got into his car, and I was even happy to be back there too.

We sat there in the parking lot for a minute. Both of us, silently contemplating our next move.

“Who was that guy? Guy who attacked you?” Gray asked.

“I don’t know... We saw him before, at the soup kitchen, just in passing. He seemed nice.”

“What was he then? Indoctrinated into the cult or whatever?”

“Maybe... Maybe it’s far worse than that.”

Gray clicked his tongue. “So where do we go now? I mean I could put you up for the night.”

“No... It’s not safe... We need to end this, Gray. We need to do it tonight.”

“Woman, you need rest. You need to sleep.”

“I can’t rest. I can’t. I’ve tried. The nightmares won’t stop. THEY won’t stop. There is no sleep, there is no rest, until this is done. One way or another.”

“One way or another... And what the hell do you mean by that?”

I shot him a solemn look. “You know what I mean, Gray.”

“No I don’t. And you don’t. We’re not talking about ‘another’. There is no ‘another’. You wanna do this tonight? Let’s do it. One way.”

“One way...” I’ll admit he fired me up a bit with that.

“So, where to?” He asked.

“First I need my clothes and my gun. Then we’re going to Blessings.”

“The soup kitchen?”

“Whitley ran it... Think about it, he doses Harmony with whatever the hell was in that chalice, turning her into some kind of... feeder. Then he opens a soup kitchen. Two guys who frequented that soup kitchen go crazy and attack me... The old lady probably did too. He’s been slowly infecting all of them.”

“Okay there’s some shit you’re saying that you need to fill me in on. A chalice?”

“I’ll explain later. Did you ever get an address on Harmony’s father?”

“No, there was nothing.”

“Yeah... I bet that’s where he’s been living. Probably in the damn basement of the soup kitchen.”

“You think so?”

“Good way to keep low profile while he does his work.”

“Well then let me ask you this. If that’s the place, then why do we keep seeing Harmony out in the middle of the woods?”

“I don’t know... I mean they needed those goats for something... Their blood is probably part of the concoction. Those woods were the best place to lure them in. Their killing ground.”

Gray shook his head. “This is some gnarly shit... Okay... So what the hell is this about a chalice?”

We drove through the dark, empty roads, and I laid it all out to him as best as I could. I could tell he wanted to reject this superstitious nonsense, but he resisted the urge. I thanked him for that.

We parked outside of my building and cautiously made our way inside the crime scene of a unit. I grabbed some proper clothes, some hair pins, took some painkillers, and grabbed my gun. We were in and out in two minutes.

Before I got back in the car, I noticed a scraggly looking man on the other side of the road, illuminated in silhouette by the streetlight. He just stood and stared. I had to wonder if he was another one... Were they told to kill me, or was the idea implanted within them like a base instinct?

We got back on the road. My stomach began to knot. A sense of impending doom filled the air. This was it. The last stretch... One way.

CHAPTER 9: One Way

“So, let me see if I got this right...” Gray began as we drove down the dark road. “Cult from the 80s kills some kids with hot wax as part of an unsuccessful satanic ritual. Harmony’s pops and this priest get way into that business and wanna get it right. Dude has a kid and they make her drink goat’s blood from the fuckin’ holy grail to make her special, whatever that means. And then they have her play some kid’s game that they made up in order to turn her into some kind of demon slave so she can do the ritual properly. And she... astral... projects... herself into your dreams to try and help you stop them.”

“Or something like that.” I responded.

“Well when you put it like that it’s all very fucking rational. And you DON’T want backup?”

“This isn’t gonna be a fire fight, Gray. Backup will only complicate things. I’d go alone if I could.”

“Yeah that ain’t happening.”

“I didn’t think so. You’re far too stubborn.”

“I’m the stubborn one, okay.” Gray said with biting sarcasm.

“You are.” I asserted.

“I think I have been pretty goddamn amenable through this process, all things considered.”

“Okay, let me pick the song then.”

“It’s my car, it’s my radio. Get some headphones if it bothers you.”

“See?”

“No that’s not stubborn, that’s just the rules of the road.”

“It’s not a rule, you’re just a prick.”

“It’s a rule, ask anyone.”

“I was almost murdered, twice. I had thumbtacks in ALL of my holes... You won’t give me one song?”

“You don’t get a song. We roll in your car, you can pick the songs. That’s how it works.”

“Okay let’s roll in my car then.”

“No, your car is a piece of shit.”

“Unreal.”

We made a left and I could see the building coming into view. For a moment I almost forgot we were driving to the devil’s doorstep. Maybe that’s why a guy like Gray is good to have around.

We parked out front. The lights were off and the sign in the window said closed. “Blessings” loomed over us. The meaning of that word had corrupted.

“Know how to pick a lock?” Gray asked.

“I do actually.” I answered, producing some of the hair pins and bending them accordingly before jimmying them inside the lock. After a few moments, it clicked and the door opened easily.

“We’re probably both gonna be fired for all this.” Gray said.

“Probably... I imagine the pizza place would take you back though.”

We quietly made our way inside, guns drawn, past the small foyer and the rows of cafeteria seating. Seeing places like this so dark and empty never stops being unsettling. The absence of life where life should be.

We moved to the back area, into the kitchen. The most modern looking part of the building. We eventually came upon a door to a basement, tucked away in the very back. This was it.

The door was locked, but I made quick work of that. It opened into a dark, wooden staircase. Leading down into a blanket of blackness. I began to take a step down, but Gray stopped me.

“Hold on.” He whispered. “Let me go first.”

“Why? Why do you have to go first every time?”

“Because I can be a human shield. Someone shoots me, you have time to get away. You’d be a terrible human shield, you’re like 50 pounds. Someone shoots you, it’ll rip through you like paper and kill us both.”

“...Okay fine, whatever, go.”

Gray made his way down into the dark and I followed close behind. The steps creaked more than I wanted, but it seemed like no one was home. Or at least, no one was awake.

Gray held my shoulder as we walked into the pitch black void. I could only hear our breathing.

“Flashlight?” He whispered to me.

“Go.”

Gray clicked the flashlight on and it illuminated a dank, half furbished living space. The floor was grey concrete, and the ceiling was a patchwork of Styrofoam ceiling tiles. There was a small kitchenette, a bathroom, and a bachelor style living room/bedroom combo. It confirmed that someone did indeed live here, but at a glance it didn’t confirm much else.

Convinced that no one was here, we turned on the overhead light to get a better look and do some rummaging. For the overall grungy state of the place, whoever lived here did like to keep it tidy.

“You think Harmony’s father lives here like this?” Gray asked.

I shrugged. “I’ve lived in worse.”

“Yeah, shit, I have too. I would have killed for a place like this in my teens.”

My eyes were eventually drawn to the desktop computer set-up in the corner. The first notable detail in this room.

“Gray, take a look at this.” I said, motioning towards the desk.

“Yeah that’s not bad, huh?”

“Double monitors... and I’d wager that’s a thousand-dollar tower at least. Maybe two. Custom build.”

“Most expensive thing here, no doubt.”

I took a closer look inside the glass side of the PC. “I’m no expert, but that graphics card looks pretty monstrous... So either he’s one of those ‘PC Master Race’ guys, or he has a lot of visually intensive work to do here.”

“I mean finding a good PC in a dingy basement isn’t exactly rare. This could realistically be anyone’s nephew living here.”

I eagerly pressed enter on the keyboard and woke it up. I was faced with a basic looking lock screen, but not a familiar one. Maybe Linux. Nevertheless, it was password protected and the profile was unnamed.

I tried a few basic passwords. ‘TheFather’. ‘CandleCaine’. Harmony’s date of birth. No dice.

“Dead end then?” Gray asked.

“No... This is it. This is our guy, and this is his fucking workstation.”

“Look, I think you’re right... But he ain’t here, and Harmony ain’t here. It doesn’t look like any rituals were performed here either. I don’t see them conjuring Satan next to the goddamn pull out sofa.”

“Well we have to find them! We have to find them now!”

“I know, but what do you want me to do!?”

“I don’t know... Okay... we wait for him to come back, and we force him to take us to her.”

“Whitley died before giving us anything.”

“Then so be it. If he doesn’t give us anything, I’ll kill him. One less piece of shit on the board.”

“Jesus, Cole. Let’s not-“

Gray’s words were interrupted by the slow creaking of a door on the other side of the room. Both of our eyes widened, and we looked toward the sound.

There he was. Brad. Harmony’s father. Emerging from what looked like a hidden door amongst the wood paneling. He looked slightly different than the man I had seen on his social media, with a 5 o’clock shadow and cavernous dark circles under his eyes not hidden behind his thick brimmed glasses.

His expression mirrored ours. One of shock and dreadful anticipation. A tense second followed where none of us moved. I was first to draw my gun.

“Hands above your head!” I shouted. Gray followed suit and pulled his weapon. Brad, to my bewilderment, frantically raised his hands.

“Wait! Wait, wait, wait.” He said, appearing to cower. “You shouldn’t be here!”

“What is that door? Where did you come from!?” Gray demanded.

“Where’s Harmony!?” I yelled over him.

“Okay, okay, okay. Just don’t shoot. Please.” Brad uttered meekly.

“Get on the ground, and put your hands behind your back, right fucking now!” Gray said, and Brad quickly obliged. Gray cuffed him and then hoisted him to his feet.

“What’s behind that door?” Gray asked again.

“Don’t... Don’t... You shouldn’t...” He pleaded.

“Take us back there, now.” I commanded.

“I’m sorry, detective. I didn’t want this.” He said while looking directly at me. I saw the same eyes I saw behind that goat mask.

I was taken aback and pissed off beyond belief. “Are you fucking kidding me? You didn’t want this? Look at me. I still taste the metal, you son of a bitch. You didn’t want that? No, I’ll tell you what you didn’t want. You didn’t want me to still be fucking breathing. But I am. So right now, you need to start giving me some damn good reasons why I shouldn’t put a bullet in your mouth.”

“That wasn’t me!”

“Bullshit. I saw you. I saw your eyes. Don’t play dumb with me. You raised your daughter to be part of a goddamn satanic ritual.”

“I didn’t know what it was!” He whined. “Whitley... he was my friend. I didn’t know what he was doing to her. Not at first. But then he showed me things. Insane things. He told me she was special. That she was chosen. That the end was coming and she was the key to our survival. I... I believed him. So I helped him. I left everything and I moved in here. He said our work would keep her safe, and that when she was ready she would come back to us. She would resurrect The Father and he would save us from damnation.”

“Oh that’s horseshit.” Gray said.

“I know! It was all a lie! I know, because the thing that came back to us was not my daughter. It was something else... The apocalypse was bullshit, it was never about that. But it had already started. I didn’t know what to do. If I made a move, he would know. So I stayed close. Close to her. Hoping maybe I could get her back. I helped fake her videos. I helped buy time while they... prepared. I didn’t want to kill you, detective. I didn’t want to hurt anyone. But that’s what Harmony was for... That’s what they got wrong the first time.”

“What did they get wrong? Who are they?”

“The Cult of the Father. Whitley was obsessed. The cult, they... they wanted to find reality beyond reality. They believed that spiritualism was the way. All spiritualism. Religious iconography. They used satanic imagery, but they didn’t believe in Satan. They believe in... belief. They believe that if you broaden your mind, your spirit, your belief, you could open yourself up to higher beings. You could be touched. You could be visited. That’s why they used candles. Candles are used in all kinds of spiritual practices, they hold tremendous symbolic power. They spoke to their higher beings through candles. But that’s only half of the equation. They wanted more, but they didn’t know...”

“Go on...” I said sternly, not releasing my grip on the gun.

“They only thought about the spiritual side. But Whitley, he studied more. He found people who sought the same end through different means. Spiritual AND biological. Two sides of the same coin. He studied the work of Darren Barbeau. Supposedly he reached the higher reality through means of science, biology, even botany. So Whitley combined them. The Holy Father, and Mother Nature. The iconography of great holy chalices and goat’s blood, imbued with a brain altering drug cocktail, medicinally prescribed, until it could grow inside her like a seed.”

“But what was it for?”

“Everything. Once Whitley activated her with that stupid little game, the other side took hold. Her blood got added to the cocktail, and it was so much stronger than it was before. I told you I didn’t want to hurt you... but when you drink it... He only made me drink it a few times and that’s what I did, but more you take it, the longer it lingers.”

“Whitley was dead before you tried to kill me. He didn’t make you drink anything.”

“I didn’t mean Whitley... “

“...What? Who do you mean then? Who’s ‘he’?”

Brad lowered his head and held his tongue.

“Tell me. Now. I’m in no fucking mood.”

Brad let out a deep sigh and finally muttered, “Caine.”

“Caine? Fraser Caine?”

“Listen, I’ve told you everything... Please get me out of here. If he knows I talked...”

“So he’s here then.”

“That door leads to a sub-basement. Yes. He’s down there. With her. He’s feeding. It’s the only window we get. Please, we have to go. There’s nothing you can do here.”

“No. We’re going down there, and you’re coming with us. And if you’re fucking with me about all this, I promise I will kill you.”

“There’s nothing you can do! My daughter is gone! I tried! I tried so many times to reach her, but she’s not there anymore! If we go down there, he will kill us all!”

“If we leave, he will never stop coming for us. You know that. No one will ever be safe.” I rebuked.

“You’re making a mistake.”

“Let’s go. And by the way, don’t think for one second you’re innocent in all this. If what you’re selling me is true, you knew and you did nothing. You could have stopped this. You could have fought. You’re a fucking coward.”

Brad didn’t say another word, Gray held him by the arm as we opened the door and made a right to a steep, stone staircase. Orange light flickered at the bottom as we descended.

We turned another right at the bottom of the stairs and the sight before us was ungodly. A crude, stone shrine. Painstakingly carved arches in the walls, lined in gold paint. Adorned in a multitude of symbols, iconographies, and tapestries from many religions. Many of the same symbols we saw on those trees out in the woods. There was a perimeter of multiple levels of lit candles. At the back of the long, rectangular room, in the center, sat a big stone slab. An altar of some kind. What laid upon it was harder to describe.

I recognized Harmony’s ghastly form. She laid on her back on the slab, adorned in a ghostly thin white gown. Her face still twisted into that awful smile. The thing above her... I did not recognize. Human in shape, but not in detail. Its skin was pale, impossibly smooth, almost translucent and... dripping... He can’t wear human skin...

It laid atop her, and it was feeding. Its mouth pressed against her empty eye socket and... slurped. I could hear it. The sucking, wet cascade as it drank.

I thought about shooting it but... I knew deep down that it wouldn’t do a damn thing. What could I do? The moments in which we weren’t noticed were fleeting. I had to think fast.

“You have her eye...” Brad whispered. I turned to see him staring at me, jaw agape. “She’s still with us...”

I nodded in response.

Brad turned his head back towards the altar, and then back to me again. I could see gears turning. His eyes and mine locked, and I saw within them his intentions. I saw sorrow, I saw regret, and I saw a new found conviction. A hope where there hadn’t been any before. He believed that I could get her back. In his belief, I found my own.

His eyes issued me one final direction.

“Tell her I loved her...”

Before I could contemplate stopping him, he had broken from Gray’s grip and sprinted across the room towards the unholy thing. Screaming something both primal and anguished.

The thing turned its head and I saw what primitive manner of a face that it had. Just a trio of sagging, cavernous, black holes for eyes and a mouth. A permanent state of melting gloom. Brad pulled the beast off of his daughter, shouting all manner of incomprehensible garble as he entangled with it.

Gray ran after Brad and the man of wax, and I ran for Harmony. I pulled her off the stone slab and dragged her limp body to a corner, away from the chaos. Beyond that, I wasn’t sure what I would do.

She smiled at me, that same evil smile, though her body appeared completely physically drained from being fed upon.

“Harmony!” I yelled, trying somehow to break past whatever had overtaken her.

She let out a weak giggle, “Candle Caine, Candle Caine, Candle Caine.” Repeated in a playful sing-song.

I wasn’t sure if the inspiration came from myself, or from someone else in my head... but I knew in that moment what I had to do.

“It’s weak, Harmony. It’s drained. Take it back...” I said aloud, hoping the real Harmony could hear me, before producing one more hairpin from my pocket.

I heard Gray shout in agony. I quickly glanced over. He was on the ground, writhing in pain. I saw lots of red, but I couldn’t make out the extent of the damage. The thing had Brad’s skull tight in the grasp of both of its lanky primordial hands, and he was screaming. But his screams were silenced, when the thing’s mouth clasped around his left eye. I heard squelching and popping and slurping. Like what it had been doing to Harmony, but so much more violent. It was nauseating... But not as nauseating as what I had to do next.

I turned back to the twisted Harmony, and said it once more. “Take it all back.”

I pulled my left eyelid down, and plunged the hairpin underneath it, sinking it into the pink meat under my eye. The adrenaline didn’t hide the pain. The feeling of metal inside flesh never gets any less uncomfortable. I pushed the pin further inside and began to press down, using my ocular cavity like a fulcrum. My eye began to awkwardly bulge out and my vision got fuzzy.

I felt each end of the pin wrap around the string on the back of my eye. The tingling sensation of the touching and tearing of exposed nerves sent shockwaves through my body. I had to finish this fast.

With one quick push down and pull back, my eye dislodged from its home completely and dangled free against my cheek. Without any further hesitation, I snapped the cord with my fingernail and severed the link. I held the slimy, squishy, baby blue eye in my hand. Then I pried open the lids of Harmony’s empty socket, and slipped it inside cord-first.

It was a struggle to get it to hold in place, but I could feel her skull begin shifting. It was like her body was coercing it back into place. One I got the lids folded over, something began to change. She began to shake and convulse violently. Her mouth began foaming. I worried that I had just killed her. Had I just sent the last vestige of her soul to die?

I looked to the beast once more, just in time to hear a sickening crunch as Brad’s skull was compressed to pieces between its hands. All while the wax thing continued to drink. Like squeezing the last bit of juice from a juice box.

When he had gotten it all, he tossed his husk of a body aside like a rag doll. Then he came for Gray. I had to distract him. I rose to my feet.

“Caine!” I yelled. It got its attention.

“That’s who you are, isn’t it?” I continued. “Fraser Caine. It’s your bones underneath that wax. Whitley dug you up, didn’t he?”

The beast slowly stalked towards me, as I backed off at the same pace. Gray got to his feet and silently moved somewhere I couldn’t see.

“You were always the ritual, weren’t you? You wanted to bring someone back from the dead. Bring their consciousness back from the other side, so they could show you and guide you to the promised land. Well now you’ve been there and back. What can you show me?”

The thing didn’t falter. It continued to stalk at the same pace. I was quickly running out of room, but I had also talked myself into a revelation.

“You led yourself to this didn’t you? You wanted to find The Father... But you were The Father. You spoke to Whitley from the other side, but you also spoke to yourself from the other side. A place beyond time and space. You worshipped yourself. This was always the endgame... Well, was it everything you wanted?”

The thing jutted its arms out and gripped either side of my head, just like it did Brad’s. Its fingers were crude, jagged, and spindly. Somehow both solid and liquid at the same time. I stared into its black holes of eyes... and I could see the abyss staring back at me. The glimmer of something alive deep within. Deeper than physically possible. Then it raised its mouth to me, past my vision’s edge, to feed from my empty socket.

I felt the suction begin, and it was like a vacuum. Something like a long, hot, wet tongue tickled at the inside of my skull and wormed towards my brain. Those awful tingling shockwaves began again. My entire body felt like pins and needles, even more so than when it was actually full of pins and needles.

Something severed the connection. The sucking stopped, the tongue rescinded, and the grip on my head loosened. I dropped to my knees, and looked up to see what had happened.

Harmony was wrestling with the beast. She had the chalice in her hand, trying to force it to drink something. I saw that her hand was bleeding.

Gray jumped into action and tried holding the thing down. I wondered where he had gone. In a final, frustrated gasp, Harmony plunged the entire chalice into its gaping maw. Then the beast went still.

Somehow I knew what she had done. Maybe I had just attuned myself to the insanity, but I knew. She poisoned the well. It used her blood when she was corrupted to strengthen the bond to the other side, but now she was whole again. Purged of the infection. Her soul intact, and her soul was dangerous. They spent all that time making her special, and in the end she was too special.

Harmony collapsed. She had either passed out or was very close to it. I tried to pull her away towards the stairs as best as I could. Gray helped us both, though the claw marks in his chest looked horribly deep.

The creature began to stir... but more than that, it began to bubble. Its waxy flesh lost its stability and form. A torrent of blood began to rush out of its mouth and trickle form its eyes. A complete bodily rejection. But it didn’t scream. It couldn’t. It could only gurgle.

I saw its waxy form begin to flake and the texture slowly changed. Squiggles of veins began popping up. It started to wrinkle and become dotted with pores. It was growing human skin... Her blood was making it human... It can’t wear skin.

I shuffled myself and Harmony’s half-conscious body towards the exit, but Gray instead confidently stepped towards it. He brandished a bottle of olive oil. He had gone upstairs to get it.

He tossed it at the bubbling, bleeding monstrosity with enough force that it managed to shatter against the softened and pulsating waxy skin. The oil spilled, covering the ground.

I grabbed one of the lit candles and we began to move up the stairs as the thing continued to writhe and transform.

I gave the candle a soft toss into the oil, and the flames lit instantly. We hurried our way up the stairs and through the basement as fast as we could, but then I stopped.

“Get her out, I’ll be right behind you.” I called out to Gray.

“What? Fuck that, let’s go!” He protested.

“Go! I’ll be right there! I just have to get something! Go, now!”

Gray shook his head and continued helping Harmony towards the second set of stairs. I moved to Brad’s computer. I didn’t have the strength left to lug the whole thing. I just had to get the hard drive out before all the evidence went up in flames. Maybe the only chance Harmony would have.

I forced open the case and dug out the SSD, but then I saw the fire creeping in through the hidden door. With it, I saw Caine. The body still barely clinging to its human form in a painstaking effort. The skin burned away, and the wax melted off him in droves. I began to see the vestiges of muscle and tissue forming and burning at an equal rate within.

“I...” Caine attempted to speak through his gurgling. “I can... make you...”

I tried to turn away and run, but suddenly I couldn’t. I still saw those hellish eyes, deep in the recesses of his black, cavernous sockets, and they had a hold of me. There was something within them. Something beyond reality, and he was showing it to me. One last ditch effort but I couldn’t resist it.

The walls fell away. Everything fell away. Even him, and even me. All I saw was an ocean. It stretched further and wider than the earth. And it was empty. Nothing but the crashing of the waves. It was vast, but then in an instant it was tiny. It was nothing. It was a glass of water. Filled to the top.

I tipped it just a little bit and it spilled out on a concrete floor. I looked again just a little bit later and the spill had evaporated into a damp spot. I looked a third time and it had grown into a sickening mold. Within the mold were thousands of screaming faces.

The mold grew into a mossy bog. The bog grew into a dense forest. The trees muffled the screams, and suddenly it was empty again. It flooded and became an ocean once more. No sound, no life. I was alone, but I didn’t even exist anymore.

He didn’t speak to me, but his words wormed their way into me. Not in sound, but in feeling. “I can make you no one. Isn’t that what you wanted? You’re not happy. You’ll never be free. You don’t belong anywhere. So be nowhere. Be nothing. Be stardust on the other side. No one will see you. You won’t see you.”

Was he right? Was this what I wanted? Sometimes I thought it was... He was right that I wasn’t happy. But Harmony was right too. She was right about everything. I wasn’t happy... but that doesn’t mean I can’t be. I just need to unpack my boxes. I just need help. I just need someone.

I conveyed my message. I laid bare my feelings. “No. I don’t want to be no one. I just want to be me.”

I concentrated hard. Trying to will myself out of this final nightmare. I focused all of my energy on those feelings and they became a life raft in that vast ocean. I began to see myself again. The real me. And I was so relieved to see her. That is who I am. I belong. I deserve to be me.

Gray’s words echoed through the infinite sky. “One way.” This was it. The one way was to live. Live and not just survive.

The waves crashed and didn’t want to let me go, but sometimes amidst all of the deep thoughts, it’s the simplest ones that keep you going. I had one more thought, and it was the easiest and most basic of them all: Harmony’s alive. I would really like to meet her.

That was the last push. That was all it took. I was back in the basement, at the moment I left. Staring down the burning flesh. He was weak. He had no more tricks. He was dying. I turned my back to him and walked up the stairs.

In one final act, to ensure that Fraser Caine would truly be no more, I turned on the gas stoves in the kitchen and sprinted out the door.

Gray was there waiting. Harmony sat unconscious in the back seat of his car, Gray’s jacket draped over her shoulders. I briefly flashed him the SSD before making my way to the passenger side.

“How is she?” I asked.

“Seems alright, just tired... You’re fuckin’ insane, you know that?” He spoke through a pained grimace.

“Yeah. Let’s get the hell out of here, this whole place is gonna go in a few seconds.”

“Shit.” Gray muttered, quickly climbing into the car as I did the same.

We drove off and I could just barely see the glow of an enormous fireball in the rear-view mirror. With it came the biggest and most cathartic sigh of my life. I could breathe for the first time in a long time. Despite all the pain and the deep discomfort, my headache was finally gone.

Gray parked on the side of the road a few streets away, letting out a long breath of his own.

“It’s fucked up that I’m not gonna be able to tell anyone about this.” Gray remarked.

“Oh I don’t know... I think Benji would love it.”

Gray chuckled. “Yeah you’re right... Kinda don’t wanna give him the satisfaction.”

“Understandable.” I said, knowing full well that I would tell him and probably buy more weed.

“Guess I should get us all to a hospital now...” Gray said.

I scoffed. “I hate hospitals... Plus, as soon as we get in there it’s gonna be chaos. Questioning, lawyers, all three of us will most likely be arrested. It’s gonna be a nightmare trying to set all this right... Can we just... take a minute?”

Gray nodded in agreement. “Okay. Let’s take a minute. What do you wanna do with your minute, Cole?”

I thought about it for a couple seconds. “What time does that pizza place close?”

“Hah. I knew it. Couldn’t get enough, could ya?” Gray smiled, and began driving.

We arrived about ten minutes later. Gray went in to grab our slices, and I sat on the hood of the car, facing the night sky and enjoying the calm breeze.

Gray returned with three slices. “Y’know, in case she wakes up.” He explained. “If not, I can eat both.”

“How considerate of you, Gray.”

“Yeah... You know what, fuck it. Call me Wally.”

“Oh?” I raised my eyebrows and smirked.

“Yeah... I just don’t imagine I’ll be getting rid of you anytime soon so, might as well.”

“Well in that case, call me Daria.”

“D-ahh-ria.” He mocked, exaggerating his own accent. “It is fun to say, not gonna lie, I see why you picked it.”

“Jesus...” I croaked.

“So D-ahh-ria... When all this is in the rear-view... What are you gonna do?”

I smiled, simply at the notion of this all being over. It was hard to believe. Before I could think of an answer, I heard the car door open and shut behind us.

Harmony lethargically made her way towards us, holding her head like she was hungover. Gray wordlessly handed her the slice of pizza, which she accepted without question.

“I love this place.” She commented.

“No shit. You’ve been?” Gray asked.

“Been a few years but yeah... Actually, didn’t you work here?”

“Hah. Wally, nice to meet you.” Of course she gets Wally immediately. Gray turned to me. “See? I told you, everybody knows everybody.”

Harmony smiled. The first time I had seen her true smile in person, even if it was weighed down by lifetimes worth of trauma. Gray stood up and offered her his spot on the hood, which she accepted.

“Just gonna shout at Benji for a sec, I’ll be back.” Gray said, before walking into the building, leaving Harmony and I alone.

It was hard to think of what to say to her. So much rushed through my mind. Should I bring up her mother, should I bring up her father? Should I bring up anything at all?

“Guess I should say nice to meet you too.” I finally spoke.

She smiled again. For that moment it felt like all was right in the world.

“Yeah that’s true... Nice to meet you, Daria.”

We sat in that rare nice moment for a while, but it was burning me up to not say anything more...

“I’m sorry... I’m sorry I didn’t get to you sooner. I’m sorry I couldn’t save them.”

She shook her head, I could tell she was stifling her emotions to the best of her ability.

“No... No... You did so much. I can’t even begin... I’m the one who should...” She stammered as her voice cracked. “It’s just all so fucking....”

The tears slowly began to flow and they were almost instantly contagious, but I tried my best to hold strong. I could see her trying and failing to do the same.

After a moment she had to give up trying. The dam burst and her silent tears turned to exasperated and pained sobs. I clenched my jaw and placed a hand on her back. In response, she sank into me and wrapped her arms around me tightly. She clung to me for dear life while her tears soaked through my shirt.

I couldn’t hold back the tears anymore. Everything washed over me in an instant. A brutal mixture of grief, despair, pain, and relief. My arms instinctively reached out and clung to her in return. This may have been the first time I had cried in front of another human being in my entire adult life, yet I didn’t mind it so much. It was a strange feeling, to find such comfort in the arms of someone I had never met, yet someone I felt as though I had known intimately. No one else would ever know what we went through. Gray, to an extent, but I wouldn’t be caught dead crying in his shoulder.

A thought occurred to me and I began to laugh as I felt the tears stream down my face.

“How the fuck am I crying without an eye?”

Harmony’s cries turned to a snort of laughter. “I know, right? I was surprised too.”

“God it feels weird.”

“It does. It really does. I’m sorry.”

We finally pulled apart, still letting out spurts of exhausted laughter.

“Oh god.” She said, wiping my shirt. “I got tears and snot all over your shirt.”

“It’s fine, it’s not so bad. Gray... Wally... he got my favorite Bullet Club shirt cut off a few days ago, I haven’t forgiven him.”

“Bullet Club?”

“It’s not... like that. It’s a thing.” I stammered.

“Okay but still, you’re a cop, it kinda sends a message.”

“Well I don’t wear it to work! It’s not... It’s just... It’s a cool shirt, from a thing I like.”

“Alright, fair enough. Hey, I’m not judging... Sucks that you lost it.”

“Nah it’s fine. To be honest, it didn’t actually fit me that well anyway.”

Harmony just smiled at me and briefly laid her head on my shoulder. A few very peaceful moments of silence passed, and then Gray exited the store and walked towards us.

“I mainly just wanted to go in there so I could bleed all over his floor and make him mop it up. How are you ladies doin’?”

“All things considered, could be worse.” I answered. “Should probably hit the road before you bleed to death, old man.”

“Yeah I’m beginning to get a little light headed, if we crash I apologize... By the way, you never answered my question, Daria.”

“What question was that?”

“When this is all over, providing we don’t go to jail for arson and whatnot, what are you gonna do?”

I took a second to think about it. Harmony looked at me, eager to hear my response, and it was in her eyes that I found it.

“I think I’m gonna go dancing.”

RainMakerWindWaker (talk) 17:31, 14 April 2025 (UTC)