*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧—chapter thirteen: the discovery

August 22, 2021
Hackett's Quarry
Upstate New York, New York

IT WAS TWO MINUTES PAST SEVEN WHEN THE FOUR OF THEM ENTER CHRIS' OFFICE. Ryan had unlocked the door and let them in. Dylan gets to charging the phones, plugging them into some phone chargers that were connected to an outlet by a coffee table and red armchair. Cassidy immediately went over to Chris' desk and started looking through everything for something. Literally everything. And the others decided it was best to not be near him while he searched the desk, in the case Cassidy felt bothered by his personal space being invaded.

"If I'm not gonna be told shit by my family," he was muttering to himself, "I might as well find out myself."

"Are you sure that's a good idea, Cass?" Sawyer questions, watching as her boyfriend walks over to Chris' desk and starts looking through the drawers.

Cassidy doesn't look up from the drawer he's currently looking in. Not finding anything, he stops momentarily to answer her question. "What?" he asks, finally looking up at her. "Searchin' around my uncle's stuff? I'm tryin' to find clues, Sawyer! Clues!"

"No, I meant, the way you were yelling at Jacob earlier. What the hell happened out there?"

He's quiet for a moment, looking away from her and instead looking over at where Dylan and Ryan were on the other side of the office, talking to each other. Then, he looks back over at Sawyer. "Nothin' happened. Everythin' is fine."

"All right, then. Have fun being Sherlock Holmes," she replies, smiling at him before going to the other side of the room to join Ryan and Dylan on their little office escapade.

Before searching the drawers again, Cassidy checks on top of the desk. Tucked into the frame of a family photo of Chris and his kids, there was a tarot card. He reaches over and grabs it, pulling it gently out of the frame, before flipping it over.

TAROT CARD FOUND
3 OF ??
THE SUN

The sun rises over the horizon, illuminating everything in a golden yellow. They made it until dawn. Anyone who was infected was cured if they were still alive. Some lives were taken during their night spent fighting for their lives. But the others made it. They survived the night. That was all that mattered.

Cassidy slips the card into his pocket and starts looking through the other drawers in the desk. A manila folder was at the bottom of one of the drawers. He takes it out, setting it on top of the desk. He opens it and looks through the papers. There were hastily scribbled notes and a list.

He decides to look at the notes and lists first. One of the notes was a yellow sticky note with words scribbled in black ink. But he recognized the handwriting, though it changed a bit over time. It was something Kaylee wrote a few years ago. The date was written very small in the top right corner.

8/14/15

Goin' to free Silas t'night.
If we take too long to get back home,
come find us, please.

~Love, K
xoxo

"Hm..." He sticks the note back in the folder before looking at some of the other notes. These other ones were just handwritten letters on lined paper. All of them have dates written in the top left corner too.

August 29, 2015

Dad and I are bringin' Kaylee, Gabriel, and Caleb along to go huntin', just this once. Probably never doin' it again. We'll be back soon. T, make sure Cassidy doesn't go anywhere he shouldn't. And make sure Chris is tied up in the attic when he says he wants to be up there. If neither of these happen, Ma's gonna be pissed.

~Bobby

January 2, 2016

Bobby, Dad, there's been some reports of attacks by a White Wolf up and down the coast, an albino child, things like that. There's no mistaking it's Silas. Silas is avoiding us on purpose. He doesn't wanna be found by us. But it seems he's found others to mess with and possibly bite. It's only been a few months since the kids and Chris were bit, but it's a few months too long. Keep searching. And make sure to kill him when you find him. We can end this for good.

~T

February 24, 2016

Someone send Caleb to collect some more chains from the scrapyard. I need extra reinforcements for the future full moons. Chris kept breaking out of the ones I tied him down with in the attic. Might have to move him back to the basement eventually. We'll see.

~T

04/06/16

As werewolves, we don't remember shit about anythin' other than the Golden Rule: Don't attack your own kind. Found out one mornin' after a moon and none of us were hurt.

~Gabe

10-5-16

Hey, Dad, Uncle T said those chains I brought him awhile ago are holdin' up well. Good thing I could be of service, amirite? Just be glad it ain't silver.

~Caleb

There were other letters from every year after that up until now, but Cassidy didn't want to read them—there were way too many. He sets the notes he just read down on the desk, staring at them skeptically before returning them to the folder. So, I'm either crazy or I'm crazy... Werewolves? Are they fuckin' serious... he thinks as he quickly stuffs the notes back into the folder. Staring at the list now, he shakes his head in disbelief as he reads it.

EXTREMELY IMPORTANT!
(DO NOT LOSE THIS LIST)

(Note: I made extra copies of this list for every single person in the family excluding Cassidy.)

WEREWOLF 101

•Track it Down: If you are hunting down a werewolf, find out where it's hiding. If it has multiple hiding spots, search all of them. You never know where you might find it.

•It's Similar to the Myths: Silver kills, always. But only a weapon made of silver can kill a werewolf if it penetrates the skin and bone. Ordinary silver objects will ward it off if near.

•Pay Attention to Appearance: Since Silas has albinism, his eyes are red and his skin is white. We can assume he's the first werewolf, and that he's bigger in size and has more strength compared to the others, and is the Alpha male, in a sense.

•Werewolf Blood: A good thing would be to have werewolf blood covering any visible part of your skin if you're human—preferably your face. When the werewolf gets a whiff of that, it won't attack you. It will treat you as one of its own.

Cassidy rereads that last part a few times before setting that back in the folder too. Okay, I'm definitely not crazy. They're all crazy.

He looks back in the drawer only to find a folded newspaper from the North Kill Gazette. It was another copy of the article about the freak show fire that he and Abi had found in the cabin earlier. He hadn't read the article on the front page back at the cabin, all he had read was the headline. But now was of vital importance. He had to read it now.

He skims through it as he reads, just picking out important information from it instead of taking forever to read the entire thing. He sets it back down when he's done, a frown forming on his face.

It all made sense now. Everything he read. The notes. The list. This is what his family had been hiding from him for the past six years. What they had been trying to protect him from. His cousins and his uncle are werewolves. Jedediah and Bobby have been going out hunting this albino werewolf named Silas to reverse the effects of the curse. The basement had been used as a containment device for the four of them the first few full moons before Chris got relocated (but sometimes he'd have to get sent back back to the basement anyway). His cousins were involved in the fire that burned down Harum Scarum. They were the ones that caused it, killing everyone that had been there, including the former sheriff, Hank, and releasing Silas into the woods. The three of them were the reason they and Chris were werewolves in the first place.

"Jesus Christ... They still could've told me," he mutters, picking up the folder and placing it back in the drawer. "It's endangerin' my life more than theirs since I ain't know 'til now..."

He glances back over to the other side of the room where Sawyer, Dylan, and Ryan were currently talking amongst themselves. They hadn't bother him the entire time, as to not interrupt his concentrated searching.

Cassidy walks away from the desk and goes over to the bulletin board on one of the walls. A calendar was pinned in the top right corner. He flips through the entire calendar, taking note of each month. They were no markings on them save for the fact that a specific date was marked on each month with a big red 'X' surrounded by a big red circle. The words FULL MOON were written in small lettering beside each one.

"I feel like my searchin' should've had more suspense or somethin'. Like, someone should've been watchin' me while I do it," he says as he walks back over to the three.

"Weren't you the one who said you didn't want us to?" Ryan questions, furrowing his brows.

"Totally didn't forget I said that," Cassidy rolls his eyes playfully before grinning. "Come on, Dylan wanted to look for stuff, too, remember?"

"Oh, yeah, I did," Dylan replies, heading over to the desk. "Like this phone over here. Whoa, look at this old thing," the Lenivy boy says, picking up the black plastic telephone. He looks over at Ryan. "Hey, gimme your number, I wanna try it out."

"Why?" Ryan asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Uh, so I can ask you out on a date. Duh."

"Mmmm... Smooth," Ryan replies, seeming interested.

"I think if I tried a cellphone number on this thing, it would just explode, though." Dylan says, putting the phone up to his ear. A look of confusion appears on his face within a few seconds. "Hello? What?"

"What? Who is it?" Ryan was a look of worry on his face.

"Uhh, hello...?" When there was no response, Dylan sets the phone back down immediately. "That's weird, I thought I heard someone."

"Hm. Maybe you should've asked them out on a date?" Ryan jokes, gesturing toward the phone.

"Dammit! I missed my shot!" Dylan replies sarcastically as he walks around to the front of the desk and picks up a framed photo.

Cassidy recognized the picture as one that Chris had taken with his kids a few years back. At the time of that photo, Kaylee had just become a camp counselor at age fourteen, Gabriel was sixteen, and Caleb was eighteen.

That photo was taken eight years ago, just shy of two years before disaster.

"Kaylee, Gabriel, and Caleb Hackett," the Lenivy boy says, studying the picture. "Weird kids, huh?"

"'Kids' is a stretch, not only 'cos they're all twenty-somethin', but because Caleb is four years away from bein' thirty," Cassidy says, grinning. "I joke about it all the time, callin' him an old man and whatnot. But, no, they're not even weird—that is an understatement. They're fuckin' idiots now."

"I like 'em," Ryan replies, frowning at the two boys' comments.

"Yeah, me too, um... They are pretty reclusive, you have to admit," Dylan replies, looking back down at the photo before setting it back down on the table.

"Ryan," Cassidy turns to face the Erzahler boy. "I still don't understand how you became best friends with them and didn't become my friend for, like, a whole two years after that. Mind you, that happened fourteen years ago, when you and I had just started attendin' camp."

"Uh..." Ryan scratches the back of his neck. "I actually don't remember?"

"Right... I'll let it slide for now."

"Can't say I know what they're like, honestly," Sawyer admits, shrugging, as she brings their attention back to the original conversation. "Never really had a proper conversation with them."

"'Cos you never been to my house," Cassidy replies. "Besides, Caleb's always at the scrapyard when it's the off-season, Gabriel's, like, never home, but now he's only allowed to leave the house every two days, and Kaylee's just... Kaylee; I literally never know where she is."

"Makes sense," she replies, nodding.

"Well, hello, what is this?" Dylan has his hands on his hips as he stares at a trapdoor embedded in the floor behind the desk. He presses his shoe against it and the wood creaks. "You hear that?" He asks them.

"Is that a trapdoor?" Ryan asks, looking over Cassidy's shoulder to see what Dylan was showing them.

"I knew that there was a secret sex dungeon around here somewhere!" Dylan jokes, grinning at Ryan.

"Dylan, it ain't a secret sex dungeon," Cassidy laughs, shaking his head. "What is wrong with you?"

"You know..." the Lenivy boy draws out, smirking at Cassidy. "I bet Mr. H is into some real kinky shit."

"Dude!"

"Uh... I doubt it."

"Weren't there a couple of counselors who never showed up?" Dylan asks, glancing toward Ryan.

"Uh, huh," Ryan answers, nodding slowly, furrowing his brows. He was trying to figure out where Dylan was going with this. "Why?"

There's only one coherent thought going through Cassidy's mind at this very moment while he's listening to the two boys talk. So, funny, story: Two months ago, my dad sedated one of 'em and I don't even know what he did to the other one to render him unconscious and then we put 'em in the back of his car and I don't know what he did to them after that 'cos he took me straight home. Those were the unspoken words that Cassidy wished he could tell them. But he couldn't. Knowing it would not only get him in trouble, but he wondered what would happen if someone found out about the crimes his father committed. Not like he actually cared.

"Secret... sex... dungeon..." Dylan sways his hips, not removing his gaze from the Erzahler boy.

"Yeah, that's not funny," Ryan replies, shaking his head.

"It's really not," Sawyer agrees, glancing down toward the trapdoor.

"It kinda was," Cassidy replies.

"Don't encourage him," Ryan says, glancing toward the Hackett boy before looking back over at Dylan. "It probably just goes down to the basement or something," he explains. "Open it up."

Dylan reaches for the latch on the trapdoor and pulls it up. It opens and he peers into it. "All right, well, it looks like it's a pit of eternal darkness. So..."

"You're being dramatic."

"No, no, he's right, Ryan," Cassidy says, looking up at Ryan. "It's, like, really dark down there."

"Maybe you and Dylan should go down there, then, scaredy-cat," Sawyer replies, smirking.

"Why don't you two climb down, take a look—" Dylan says, looking up at Ryan and Sawyer. "Look, you can squeeze through there."

"You opened it," Ryan says, scoffing. "You climb down."

"Okay," Dylan replies as Ryan holds the trapdoor open for him. The Lenivy boy starts to climb down the ladder. Once he's down there, he calls out to them. "Made it down."

"What's down there?" Ryan calls, scooting over as he peers into it to let Cassidy and Sawyer try and see.

"Oh, my God, guys... you will not believe this..."

"What?" Ryan asks. "What, what, what?"

"It's nothing."

"Oh. Lame."

"Seriously, Dylan?"

"Got us excited for nothin'."

"I had you going there for a second, didn't I?"

"No," Ryan replies with a hint of annoyance. "Maybe. Shut up."

"It is, uh— pretty spooky down here, though, and it smells very unnatural, so..."

"Yeah, you're gonna wanna climb back up," Cassidy instructs.

"Yeah, okay. I'm coming back up."

Dylan starts to ascend the ladder and Ryan pulls the trapdoor wider so he can climb out. Once he's out, Ryan shut it and Cassidy checks to make sure it was latched properly.

"I didn't like that," Dylan comments, walking over to the wooden chair that sat behind the desk. He sits down in it and spins around in it. "Ooh, that's a nice chair. I could get used to this."

"You better hope Mr. H doesn't catch you takin' his baby out for a joyride."

Cassidy snorts at Ryan's response.

Dylan just shakes his head and laughs as he stops spinning in the chair, glancing up at Ryan. "Ring-a-ding-a-ding— Oh, sorry, bud, gotta take this. One second," the Lenivy boy reaches for the phone and takes it off the receiver. "Hello, Hackett's Quarry Summer Camp," he says as he puts the phone up to his ear. "What doesn't kill you will make you stronger. What can I do for you on this darn-tootin' doozie of a day?"

"Is that your impression of Mr. H?" Ryan asks, the hint of a smile on his face.

But Dylan was purposely ignoring him at the moment.

"Uh, yeah... Uh, huh, yeah... Yeah, I— You're absolutely right. He does need to be nicer to Dylan." The Lenivy boy glances up at Ryan to see the annoyed look on his face, before looking away. "And, uh, what's that? You want him to give Dylan his phone number? That's a little forward, but I can see what I can do..."

"Smooth..."

Dylan just laughs in response before setting the phone back on the receiver. He leans to the right and reaches toward one of the desk drawers, pulling the bottom one open. He pulls out a journal and sets it down on the desk, before opening the journal and flipping through the pages.

"What's that?" Cassidy asks, raising an eyebrow as he looks down at the pages.

"Just some ledgers, I think," Dylan stops on a set of pages and reads them. "Oh, Laura Kearney and Max Brinly."

"Oh, yeah, those are the ones that never showed up," Ryan comments, looking at the journal resting on the desk.

"Yeah, it's because of these goobers that we had to work extra shifts this summer," Dylan replies before putting the journal away. He closes the drawer and gets up from the chair, heading over to a wall where a shotgun was resting on a gun rack bolted to the wall. "Hey, what's the gun for?"

"Ah... Chris— Mr. H told me it was for— um... bears," Ryan answers, hoping Dylan believes him.

"Bears?" Dylan furrows his brows. "Here?"

Ryan goes on to explain, talking with his hands as he speaks, "Yeah, yeah. He said they don't really come around because he's got the gun to..." He trails off as his hands fall to his side.

"Yeah," Dylan chuckles, taking a step closer to the gun.

"Just leave it alone," Ryan says. "Just leave it alone."

Dylan backs up and puts his hands up in mock surrender. He drops his hands and looks back over at Ryan again. "Dude. What if we're out partying tonight, out in the woods, and we end up in a sorta 'Most Dangerous Game' situation?"

"Like when people hunt other people?"

"Yeah, yeah," Dylan places his hands on his hips as he continues explaining. "But, I mean, think about it. It's— Camp is over and hunting season has just begun."

"True..."

"What if— if, okay... bear with me here... what if what's on the menu tonight... is us!" Dylan points at all four of them in turn.

"Well," Ryan starts, "then, I guess we would need to protect ourselves."

"Exactly," Dylan replies. "That's why we'd need the gun! For protection!"

"Mm... Yeah. Not gonna happen."

Dylan falters, frowning as he looks back over at him. "What about for fun?" When Ryan doesn't respond, he continues. "No? Okay. Yep. Yep, totally."

"Well... we know where the gun is," Ryan says, taking a voluntary step back. "If we need it."

Dylan sighs. "Your call, man."

"We're definitely gonna need it," Cassidy tells them, heading over to the gun rack to grab the shotgun off of the wall. "I don't know 'bout you, but the woods are literally right by the camp. If anythin', Dylan's right, Ryan."

"So, you're gonna steal your uncle's gun?" Ryan asks, an eyebrow raised as he crosses his arms while looking at his friend.

"I'm not stealin' it," Cassidy answers as he shakes his head. "I'm borrowin' it. For safety reasons..."

"Yeah... Totally..."

"You don't believe me?"

"I didn't say that."

"You're indirectly sayin' it."

"Okay, okay. Fine. Take the gun."

"Thank you, Ryan Erzahler," Cassidy grins, taking the gun off of the rack.

"Yo, my guy, toss me the keys," Dylan says, jiggling the handle of a door to the right of the gun rack.

"Uh, so you can poke around Chris's private area?" Ryan questions.

"I- I'm sorry," Dylan says, raising an eyebrow as he turns around from the door to stare at Ryan, "is that something that only you're allowed to do?"

Ryan rolls his eyes. "Hardy har har."

"Come on, what's the harm in looking?" Dylan replies. "It's— you're not a little bit curious? I'm not gonna touch anything."

"Just like how Cass isn't gonna touch anything?"

"Very funny, Ryan. I have a reason to. Dylan doesn't."

"Fine. Don't let me regret it, you guys," Ryan says, tossing the keys to Dylan.

"Can't promise that. But..." Dylan trails off, raising his hands as Ryan tosses him the keys. He catches them, a grin on his face. "Nothin' but net," he says, spinning the keys around on his finger before putting the key for the door in the lock.

"You're using that wrong," Ryan comments.

"Oh," Dylan removes the key from the lock and tosses it back to Ryan. Then, he opens the door.

They enter a room that led to three other rooms. To the left was a small bedroom. To the right was a bathroom. In front of them was a closet.

Dylan heads to the bathroom first, looking around for a moment before opening up the medicine cabinet. "Whoa, there's some pretty heavy-duty stuff in here."

Cassidy holds onto the doorframe as he leans into the bathroom, peering up at the medicine cabinet, seeing the many bottles of painkillers and sleeping pills, a roll of bandages, three syringes, and a box of toothpaste on the shelves inside.

"Yeah, maybe let's not touch that..." comes Ryan's response from the other room.

"Yeah, there's nothing fun." Dylan closes the medicine cabinet and leaves the bathroom, Cassidy following him. Dylan heads over to the closet next, looking at the clothes on the hangers. "Fashion icon!"

Ryan just shakes his head. "Mr. H knows what he likes."

"I'm sure he does." Dylan slides the clothes to the left of the rack. "Wow, there's... Yo!" As he slides the clothes to the left of the rack, he notices a door at the back of the closet.

"Hey, hey," Ryan takes a step forward, trying to divert the Lenivy boy's attention from the door. "Maybe we shouldn't..."

But Dylan had already pushed open the door.

"Wonder what this is," Cassidy says, brows furrowed as he follows after Dylan. The other two were behind him.

The room they enter was was extremely dark. Dust was floating around in the air, Cassidy could see it from the bit of light that filtered in from the other room. Dylan switches on the light and they walk further inside.

"Uh, Ryan..."

"Oh, wow..." Cassidy looks around in awe. The room they were in was a surveillance room. The monitors were on a desk on the right side. Boxes and shelves lined the other walls. A bulletin board with marked up papers pinned to it was occupying half of the wall space to the left of the door. "This is so cool and strangely weird all at once."

"Whoa..." Ryan breathes out, noticing the monitors on the far side of the room. "What the fuck...?"

"These monitors..." Dylan points to the monitors on the desk. "This is the camp."

"You think Mr. H was spying on us?" Sawyer questions, eyeing the monitors with suspicion.

"No, no," Ryan says rather quickly, making Dylan and Sawyer look at him with confusion. "I mean— No, no... he can't be..."

"No, these are just trail cams," Cassidy informs, stepping closer to the desk. "I know a trail cam when I see one."

Dylan wasn't buying it. "Uh, sure."

"Most of the cameras are pointed away from camp, so it's not like like he's spying on the kids, unless they wandered out into the woods," Ryan explains as Dylan continues staring at the monitors. "You know, these are just... They're probably just... trail cameras, like Cass said."

"What are trail cameras?" Dylan asks, looking at Ryan.

"You've... never heard of trail cameras?" Cassidy asks in surprise.

"No. Am I supposed to know what they are?" Dylan turns his head to face him, an eyebrow raised.

"What are you? Ancient?" Cassidy scoffs. "How have you never heard of trail cameras? Everyone's heard of trail cam—"

"People set them up to catch weird random shit," Ryan interjects, cutting the Hackett boy off.

"Okay, yeah?" Dylan straightens up, turning around to face the other two boys. "Like what?"

"Like... Bigfoot sightings, you know?" Ryan explains. "That kinda thing..."

"Bigfoot ain't real," Cassidy replies, rolling his eyes. "Those sightings ain't even real."

"Do you even watch the news?" Ryan questions, sending him a look.

"No? I don't even read the news, so why would I ever watch the news?"

Ryan sighs, shaking his head. "Never mind."

"So, okay," Dylan speaks up, looking between both of them, "I'm going to upgrade Mr. H from: 'super creepy pervert with a spy cam' to, you know, 'super crazy conspiracy hunter'."

"To be fair, Bigfoot's not a conspiracy..."

"Okay, fine. How about an aspiring cryptozoologist?" Dylan continues, trying to figure out which sounded better. "Hey! Maybe he likes the podcast that you listen to..."

"Sure. Yeah," Ryan wasn't convinced. "Let's go with that."

"Okay, but... why go through all the trouble of hiding this room... through a secret door in the closet?" Dylan's question was genuine.

"Ahhh... I mean, it's not exactly secret, right? Like, it's just... hidden by... stuff." Ryan says, looking at him.

"Yeah, that's what a secret is, Ryan." Dylan gives him a weird look. "It's weird. It's major league weird."

"Yeah, I don't disagree with you, but—"

"It's- It's gotta be somethin' juicy in here," the Lenivy boy interrupts, gesturing toward the monitors.

"Hey, Dylan, it's— it's none of our business," Ryan argues, "and if you really want to know, you can ask him tomorrow. I'm sure that won't be an awkward conversation, like, at all."

"Okay, yeah. Maybe I will."

"All right. I- I'm leaving the 'secret lair'," Ryan says as he heads to the door. "Have fun."

"Hey, you just admitted that it's a secret lair!" Dylan points out.

Ryan doesn't respond as he pulls open the door and leaves the surveillance room.

The three of them watch the door close. Sawyer walks away from the desk and heads over to the bulletin board, looking at the papers pinned to it, before glancing over at Cassidy. "Hey, Cass, what are these X's?" She asks.

"Hm?" Cassidy takes a few steps back from the desk and glances toward the bulletin to see what she was looking at, seeing the red X's on the different papers. "No idea," he answers, shrugging in response.

Dylan walks over to a set of cardboard boxes, noticing some envelopes marked with the names of Max Brinly and Laura Kearney. The box under them had Laura's name written on the label. "Huh..."

Cassidy walks back over to the desk, looking at the monitors connected to the trail cameras. There was a shadowy figure that had appeared on one of the screens, fading in and out of view like an apparition. "Hey, come check this out," Cassidy calls to them. Dylan and Sawyer meet him at the desk, watching the monitors.

"There's nothing there, Cass," Sawyer informs, crossing her arms.

"I just saw somethin' there. Looked like a ghost or somethin'," he replies, frowning. The two of them are just staring at him. "I swear I ain't lyin'. There was somethin' there."

"Okay, okay, we believe you," Dylan says, outting his hands up in surrender. "But we didn't see— Oh, shit. What was that?" Dylan asks, seeing movement on one of the screens.

"Yeah, what is that?" Sawyer asks, her brows furrowed.

It was a bit hard to see, considering it was blurry and in black and white, but Cassidy instantly recognized the person that had walked up to the camera before the signal cut out. Pappy...

"It's probably nothing," Dylan informs, walking away from the monitors. "We should go."

The three of them leave the surveillance room and head back into the other room. But as they go to leave, Cassidy heads into the bedroom on the left since none of them had checked it. And maybe there was a tarot card lying around here somewhere. You never knew unless you checked.

There was an acoustic guitar hung up on the left wall. The bed and two nightstands were against the back wall. A dresser was against the right wall.

He checks the drawers of the dresser and the drawers of the two nightstands, finding absolutely nothing in them, before checking under the bed.

That too had nothing.

"Hm..." He glances around the room for a bit before his eyes settle on the guitar. "It can't be in there, can it?"

But his suspicion was correct.

Looking between the strings and into the guitar's sound hole, he sees a tarot card lying at the bottom of the instrument. He takes the guitar off of the wall and turns it around, lightly tapping it until the card fell against the strings. He reaches between the strings and gently pulls the card out before setting the guitar back up on the wall mount. He flips the card over.

TAROT CARD FOUND
4 OF ??
THE FOOL

He was cornered. One of the werewolves was in front of him, snarling at him as saliva dripped from its mouth. He raises the gun, hands trembling. Beads of sweat run down from his forehead to his face. The creature comes closer. His finger is on the trigger. But something catches his eye, distracting him. There's a pair of undergarments drawn tight around the creature's body, stretched and torn. He recognizes the familiar black tank and black Calvin Klein boxers. Only one person he knew wore fully black clothing at all times...

He doesn't pull the trigger.

That was a mistake.

The creature is on him in an instant, teeth gnashing and claws digging into his skin as he's knocked to the floor. The gun falls from his hands and slides across the floor, stopping under the table. Now he can't defend himself. He can't fight it. He can't push it away.

The next thing he knows, he's screaming, the noise reverberating around the room as sharp teeth pierce his throat, tearing into his flesh. His screams soon cease and blood drenches the floor.

His throat was ripped out and the savage beast had torn his head from his body.

Cassidy stares at the card for a good while before placing it in his pocket with the other cards he's collected so far. He turns around and starts to head for the door when the window shutters creak behind him. He dismisses it at first. The windows were most likely left open. But when he walks over to check, he realizes they were closed.

This time, the floorboards creak and he flinches, hands ready to grab the shotgun from off his back and shoot something if he really needed to.

Why was he being messed with? Why was this area of Chris' office playing tricks on him and messing with his mind? Why was he so scared of an everyday noise? His girlfriend and his friends were in the other room, so it wasn't as if he was alone.

He turns away from the window, looking toward the door as he heard another noise. The sound of it closing on it's own. "What the hell...?" he says quietly, walking over to it to reopen it. As he's turning the handle, he hears a whisper,

"Cassidy..."

A chill travels up the boy's spine at the sound of the voice that slices through the air. The voice was feminine, but much older and it made him uneasy. It was a whisper. It didn't belong to anyone he knew. He looks around frantically to find the source of the voice. But no one was there. That made him panic even more.

"H-Hello?" he calls out, glancing around nervously. Sweat was starting to form on his forehead. And it wasn't helping that his heartbeat and breathing had picked up pace.

"Cassidy..." The voice calls again, causing his breath to hitch in his throat. He knew he wasn't hearing things. There was obviously something or someone there, messing with him. Trying to get into his head and make him believe he was crazy.

"Where are you?" he says aloud, continuing to look around. He swears no one else was here but him, his friends, and his girlfriend. So why was he hearing somebody that he didn't know call his name?

Something, like air, tickles his neck and he remains still, it was probably just the air circulating through the room. But as he turns to look up at the vent, he sees an old woman standing beside him. She looked dead, her skin decaying and a sickly grey. Her dress was singed in some places and burns littered her arms. Something was reflected in her irises. It looked like burning flames.

"Silas," she whispers in his ear.

Cassidy lets out a startled scream and leaves the room immediately, his heart racing. He bumps into Sawyer on the way out, startling himself even more.

"What happened?" she questions, looking at him with worry and concern as she rests her hands on his shoulders to steady him. She can see the scared look in his eyes. She could tell something was wrong. "Are you okay?"

He doesn't respond, turning to his head to glance back toward the bedroom, before looking back at her and shaking his head.

She nods to him and they leave the room, re-entering the office.

"What happened?" Ryan asks as soon as he sees the two of them enter the office and close the door behind them.

"I don't know," Sawyer answers. "He won't tell me."

"Cass?" The Erzahler boy tries, walking over to him.

"Can we just go?" Cassidy asks quietly, not meeting either of their gazes. "I wanna get outta here..."

"Yeah," Ryan says, nodding. "Yeah, we'll go. Hey, Dylan, are the phones...?"

Dylan walks away from where he was standing by the bulletin board on the wall adjacent to the door and walks over to the rectangular table. He leans against it as he peers down at the two phones that were charging. The phones weren't dead anymore, the center of the screens lit up with green and their percentages. They were charged to a percentage that could last them a good few hours—one at 28% and the other at 32%.

"Hey. Donezo," the Lenivy boy says as he unplugs the phones and picks them up.

"Alright, cool. Let's go." Ryan says as Dylan tosses him his phone. He pulls open the door next. Dylan thanks him as he walks out.

Cassidy and Sawyer follow him and Ryan leaves after them, closing the door behind him.

author's note
this chapter is so long
but i do not care!!

yo, i remember seeing a
youtube comment on
someone's playthrough
(or it might've been on
reddit, idk) where
someone was saying
that it made more sense
that since silas is the
first werewolf, he should
be like more muscly
compared to the others.
and that makes so much
sense

also, from here on out,
i'm borrowing ideas
from youtube/reddit
comments to fill in
the game's plot holes <3

like literally the game
did not touch upon a lot
(like certain characters'
backstories and stuff like
that) and so many things
that should have happened
never happened. i still really
like the game, don't get
me wrong, but there was
so much more they could
have included in order for
these plot holes to not exist

07.26.22