[WARNING — DISTURBING IMAGERY]
[WARNING — DISTURBING IMAGERY]
Day 211 at 6 AM. The second search mission left the water station. Members were Egon and Charlotte.
Four hours later, they reached the residential section and parked the car far from the safehouse. now that the area was narrowed down, the search should be a lot easier and faster.
The first day, they cleared eight houses. By what they've witnessed so far, seven were normal. The eighth was not. Inside, two half-melted bodies lay. Acid burns ate parts of the furniture. The walls bore marks of the same burn, shaped in a spider-web pattern. Both bodies had their heads severed and missing.
The next day, they continued searching. Midway through the day, another house caught their attention. It was well-maintained, with all colors left. Newly painted, even. No windows broken. No doors breached. And tire tracks on the dirt out front. For once, hope.
Egon scanned with his heat vision. Nothing.
Slowly, they approached the front door. It was open. They pushed it and entered the house.
Inside, blood had been smeared all over the walls. But not randomly. Symbols. Letters. Words. Fragments of a language neither of them knew. Again amd again, every room had those symbols. In the same order.
Then the bodies. They weren't lying were thy died. They were broken apart. Limbs and torsos nailed into the patterns on the walls. Faces peeled off their skulls. And At the center sat a human heart.
"This isn't a slaughter... It's something else." charlotte whispered.
Egon said nothing. He didn't need to. Indeed, this wasn't a slaughter. It was ritual.
In the sunken living room, they discovered a pile of ashes. Remains of books and papers. Charlotte crouched and picked up a half burned notebook. Pages crumbled in her hands. As she flipped through, fragments of writing were still visible. This wasn't science. It was a study of something supernatural. Experiments and knowledge acquired post-Day Zero. Most of the knowledge has become mere ashes. Yet, The size of the pile indicated significant progress.
Egon checked the house's communication log. "Congrats team leader." he said. "Objective three achieved"
"This was them," charlotte whispered, "the group we're looking for."
Thus, all of the mission goals were completed. Supplies acquired. Saunas fixed. Survivors found. Or, what's left of them.