"More to come. Iarterre initiated a major, nationwide lockdown earlier this evening. Chaos is on the rise as the government of Iarterre issues a statement saying the lockdown is to fight the recent surge in PET Virus cases. Will Arittoria follow suit?..." Before the news anchor could continue, Frank changed the channel.
Static. The white noise filled the room until Frank changed the channel again.
At first, the screen showed a buffer, spinning in circles. Once loaded, Frank saw it was a music channel. The tune that played was considered amongst the more popular ones in the early 00s. Frank found himself bopping his head to the beat.
With the programme's logo on the top left corner and the time just below it, he saw it was 22:27.
Nearly two and a half hours since the lockdown began.
The streets outside were quiet. Only a police cruiser was heard through the open living room window, patrolling.
With some weariness of the lockdown, Frank took it as a chance to breathe. Just like Mark said. And while he was on edge, at the same time, he was glad to be back home. Especially after all that had happened the last few days.
Even now, whilst thinking about it, Frank found it hard to believe that what he went through was real. And the more he dwelt on it, the more he thought it was simply his mind playing tricks on him. He thought it was perhaps a lucid dream, his first time experiencing them. But when he thought of Karl and Sister Wright, he knew that whatever happened in that place was real.
He saw her body, bleeding as she took her last breath. That exact image was something he knew he wouldn't be able to simply forget. He'd carry it with him to his grave.
Being unable to help a person in need.
And as much as he wanted to blame himself, Frank knew he had to follow Maurice's advice. That what happened, happened. And, sadly, given the circumstances of their investigation, he knew there was only so much he could do.
Not long passed before the song ended. The one that followed was one of Frank's least liked tunes, prompting him to switch the channel.
Again, static.
The trend seemed to stretch across a few channels, each giving a continuous wave of crunchy white noise.
"What's going on? Need to switch damned operators. This shit is getting ridiculous. Paying them only to watch static…"
Grabbing the box of cigarettes from the table, lit up a smoke before giving it a long pull. Tapping any ash from the tip, he placed it in the ashtray as he continued his venture to find an operational television programme.
In the end, he came across a working channel, the first one in the sea of others that had no signal; however, it was also an old network. It was something they prided themselves on, and they made sure to show it. The camera quality was outdated, as was the style of shows emitted.
Currently, they are showing a reality show. A group of people, trying to co-exist with one another on a rural farm in central Veursau. And tonight was a big night, where one of the contestants, depending on the vote of the viewers, was to be eliminated.
Soon enough, though, Frank saw he had little to no interest in watching people argue over the smallest of things. He also knew that most of the dramatisation was due to the very fact that they all knew they were on TV.
Taking another pull of his cigarette, he proceeded to change the channel.
There, he seemed to have entered another wave of static. "What's with the television services tonight?..."
Finally, after a few more shifts, he came across a programme which showed movies. And the current one was a movie that Frank liked. He remembered watching it for the very first time a few years ago. It was a rom-com, a work afterparty that turned into a one-night stand between two co-workers.
Though he wanted to watch something else, he knew, when considering all the channels which didn't work, that he had little to no chance of finding another that could show something.
So, pulling the last few smokes from his cigarette, he crushed it to ash, blowing out the smoke into the air before lying back to watch the film.
But as the movie went on, Frank noticed he began to doze off. Initially trying to stay awake for as long as possible, his efforts went to waste when the remote, still in his hand, eventually fell to the ground once he fell asleep.
Hours later, with the television off and the rays of the morning sun illuminating the inside of his home, he slowly woke up. The usual noise of the bustling town was this morning replaced by silence. An unusual ambience. It took him a moment to remember where he was, what had happened. That the mandatory lockdown was still underway.
'Today and tomorrow, and that's it…' he thought to himself. But behind his glimmer of hope, a small pool of doubt swirled in the pit of his stomach. Looking around, just over the archway into the kitchen, he glanced at the clock. It was a little after nine.
Sitting up and stretching, he then stood up before walking to the window. There, a moment later, a vehicle below caught his attention. Just like the evening before, it was a police cruiser, still patrolling.
Turning on the television, the first thing he was met with was static. Switching the channels, he noticed that, unlike the night before, this morning seemed to have more channels unavailable for viewing.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" he said under his breath. Eventually ruling out that the crunchy noise of static had become annoying, he turned the TV off.
Going onto his phone, he was glad to see he still had internet.
Various articles of attacks stacked in his notifications; each seemed to stem from different parts of the federation. "The attacks are only ramping up."
But before he could read any more, his screen lit up again, showing an incoming call. It was Maurice.
Answering, he started, "Hello? Maurice?"
"Frank," he replied. "I hope I didn't wake you up, did I?"
"No, no. I woke up a few minutes ago." Frank continued a moment later, "What's up? Did you hear anything?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I did. Nothing from the Chief. However, I did get a call from the hospital about Emily."
Frank felt something pull on his chest. "What happened? Is she alright?"
"They told me that not long after we left, her condition deteriorated rapidly. They tried everything they could to stabilise her, but she only continued getting worse. She didn't make it through the night."
"Shit…"
"I know it's not the news you were hoping to hear, but I thought I should let you know anyway."
"Yeah, everything the poor woman went through. May she be at peace now."
"Yeah… Listen, I'll call you up if I hear anything else."
"Thanks, Maurice," Frank replied. "I'll be doing the same."
"Alright. Stay safe. We'll talk later then."
Following the call, Frank made his way to the kitchen, where he began looking for what he could cook up for breakfast.
Opening up the fridge, he cursed himself for planning to go shopping today, out of all the other days of the week. At the same time, he cut himself some slack. Had he known what the next two days would have been like, he would have done a round of grocery shopping yesterday.
Out of the food he had, he chose a few select ingredients, making something simple, as opposed to the usual foods he'd have for breakfast. Quickly finishing the preparation, he set the plate on the table before he began eating.
Following the food and washing the dishes, he walked into his bedroom, where he grabbed his laptop before moving it to the living room.
Sitting back on the sofa, activating his laptop and placing it on the coffee table before him, he turned the TV back on, surfing through the channels once more. He hoped he'd be able to find an operative televising network, or at least spend his time looking for one, while he let his laptop power up.
Opening up the browser and going into his email, he saw there was nothing of importance in his inbox.
Then, going into a new tab, the bottom of the page caught his attention. Moreso, the first article his eyes gazed over.
'A Group of Hikers from Veursau Reported as Missing in an Iarterrean Forest.'
And right under it.
'The Beginning of The End. Police Say It's Official. The Cases Are Linked!'
Frank furrowed his brows. "Missing hikers?" The news came as a shock, but as the seconds passed, considering all of what he'd seen recently, the surprise quickly wore off.
Clicking into the first article and skimming through it, Frank picked up that the hikers were all friends, saying they went on a hike a few weeks ago, but never returned home. The parents of the hikers all came together and contacted the authorities in Iarterre, who opened up the ongoing investigation.
A car was found, abandoned, on a broad parking lot next to a well-known camping site. However, there were no signs of the hikers there. With the police being able to give out only so much information, there were rumours that the group went down the 'Devil's Trail'.
As Frank continued reading, the 'Devil's Trail' was described as one of the longest trails in all of Iarterre. The path was nearly 40km in length, with no one being able to reach the 10km mark, let alone get halfway through the entirety of the hike.
The trail was known for its beautiful scenery; however, it was also known for having labyrinth-like paths, frequently causing hikers to lose their sense of direction and, as a result, veer off track and get lost.
The article even covered the fact that a few years ago, authorities appealed for hikers to avoid going deep into the 'Devil's Trail' if they had little to no hiking experience. The warning wasn't just for the tricky path the trail contained; furthermore, near the end of the trail, an abandoned resort rested. One that had been left desolate for many years.
Getting to the end of the article, he saw a few more that were listed as suggested reads.
'The Belle Manor: What Really Happened…'
He clicked on it. It wasn't the title that got him to look into the article; it was the photo right above the name. An abandoned mansion in the woods, dark and lonesome.
When the article loaded in, the first thing he saw was that it was written by a freelance journalist, not a big news outlet. Jane Willows. The story wasn't out for long, its publication date stated that it had been out for just over a week. And the word that got him to read more was 'ghosts'.
Frank didn't believe in ghosts, and as he continued reading the story, he could see that neither did the writer.
The mansion in question was situated outside of a rural town in north-western Veursau. Witnesses said that they saw ghosts past the manor gates. However, 'these alone are mere speculations,' the writer wrote. No official investigation was carried out on the mansion grounds; at least, no investigation or interview on that fact was released to the public.
That was until Jane herself went to interview someone, a policeman—Officer Halloway, who was called in, following suspicious reported activity, to investigate the manor grounds.
A small piece of police tape was found on the gate, tied in a knot and weathered, suggesting that any investigation carried out was done so a long time ago. Furthermore, the remaining tape pointed toward a rushed departure of both the police officers and detectives.
The policeman said it was a late, rainy night. The downpour was the strongest he'd seen in months as he and his colleague got ready to respond to the disturbance call. Stopping in front of the gate, other than the fact that the mansion was left abandoned for quite some time, nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. That was until the police tape was seen.
'It confused us,' Halloway said in the interview. 'We thought there was another squad dispatched to the scene. But seeing how old the tape was, we figured it was left there from before. It might've been left there by accident, but it's a rarity for that to happen, especially following the examination and, finally, concluding a crime scene.'
Frank continued reading and learned that the mansion was something like a large graveyard. Bodies were found on the first floor and the cellar, showing that whatever happened in the mansion was nothing short of gruesome. Furthermore, what caught Frank's attention was that two or three of the bodies that Officer Halloway managed to uncover were scientists, denoted by still wearing their white robes, and bloodied ID badges in one of the pockets in each robe.
'I tried to help someone, seeing they were scared, sitting in the corner,' Officer Halloway said next. 'It was a child, and it turns out it was he who called for help. He went on a little investigation of his own with his brother and friend. And not long after they walked into the mansion, he told me they got separated. However, after some looking, we managed to find both his friend and brother. But only one of them was alive, and that was the boy's friend. We think that his brother died from blood loss. He had two big bite wounds, one in his neck and the other on his forearm'
Frank stopped, finding himself reading over the passage multiple times. His brows narrowed to each word; the story sounded all too similar to what he witnessed himself.
He hoped the end of the article might offer some clarity; however, it ended in a cliff-hanger, suggesting that a proper investigation of the manor must take place.
Looking back at the date on which the article was released, it made Frank think back to when he and Maurice attended the meeting in Bailestown. When they learned about all the attacks that happened in a short timeframe.
It made him wonder: out of all the 11 cases recorded, was this one of them?