The walk back to Colony House was done in silence. For many of them, it was the first time returning to the epicenter of the previous night's bloodbath.
When the imposing wooden structure finally came into view, stained by the lengthening shadows of late afternoon, a dry, rhythmic sound broke the quiet.
Thud. Shff. Thud. Shff.
Everyone's attention was immediately drawn to Victor.
The lanky man, dressed in his worn-out overalls, stood on the side lawn of the property.
Sweat streamed down his forehead, mixing with the dirt smeared across his face as he drove a shovel into the ground over and over again.
Donna quickened her pace, surprise flashing across her face when she noticed the seven shallow, rectangular graves already lined up in the yard.
Victor's breathing was heavy, his shoulders sagging with exhaustion, but he didn't stop.
"What are you doing?" Donna asked, confused.
He planted the shovel into the ground and paused. His glassy eyes, filled with a disturbing kind of innocence, swept over the group.
"I'm just trying to be ready this time."
She frowned. "Ready for what, exactly?"
Victor blinked slowly, wiping the dirt from his hands onto his pants. "To bury the bodies."
The statement made several residents exchange uneasy, sympathetic glances.
Fatima stepped forward, compassion evident in her expression.
"They're already buried, Victor. We just came from there."
He nodded slowly, as if that didn't invalidate what he was doing. "More people will die. Like last time."
The night before, as he ran toward his hiding place while Colony House descended into chaos, something had stirred in the back of his mind.
A memory from when he was just a boy, returning to town after hiding for hours.
When he arrived, the streets were covered in bodies.
People he knew by name, and others only by sight. What they all had in common was that they were still. Some lay on the asphalt, others on the grass. Dried blood stained their clothes.
He never knew how many holes he had dug back then.
Only that it hadn't been enough.
The grim, prophetic statement made Julie swallow hard, instinctively tightening her grip on Daniel's hand, her fingers lacing tightly with his.
Daniel observed the scene with narrowed eyes.
"Well, that definitely doesn't make my top ten list of good omens."
[I'd say this is an excellent time to update your will,]
Daniel ignored the system's optimism. "What exactly happened 'last time' for everyone to end up dead?"
Victor blinked repeatedly, as if snapping out of a trance. The veil of confusion returned to his face. "I… I don't remember." Without another word, he pulled the shovel free and went back to digging an eighth grave.
"Leave him. Let's go inside. Just grab the essentials," Donna said, massaging her temples.
Inside, Colony House reeked of cheap cleaning products mixed with the unmistakable metallic scent of dried blood.
Some stepped carefully around the dark stains soaked into the carpet as they moved down the hallway.
No one lingered. Julie hurriedly packed clothes, a toothbrush, and personal items into a duffel bag.
Leaning against the hallway wall with his arms crossed, Daniel glanced at the bag, then at her, and extended his hand without saying a word.
Julie handed it over.
He slung it over his shoulder with ease.
They headed out to the porch and sat on the wooden steps to wait for the others.
The afternoon sun hung low, casting long shadows across the yard, and Victor's holes seemed deeper as the angle of light shifted.
It didn't take long before the others began to emerge, carrying modest bags and moving with the particular urgency of people who want to leave, but don't want to look like they're running.
Before they left, Donna made one last attempt to get Victor to come with them. "Come back to town with us. You don't have to stay here alone."
He shook his head stubbornly, eyes fixed on an invisible point on the ground.
Donna sighed in defeat. "Fine. Just… be careful. Don't leave your room after dark. Do you still have the talisman I gave you earlier?"
Victor tapped his pocket twice in silent confirmation.
On the return trip, Julie's posture grew visibly tense. She chewed on her lower lip nervously.
"If you keep biting like that, you're going to take a chunk out of it," Daniel commented, walking beside her with his usual calm. "What's wrong?"
"What if they change their minds?"
Thinking it through, he had a good idea what she meant. "About you living with me?"
"Yes. My dad said he wants to talk when we return."
Daniel stayed quiet for a moment.
"If they change their minds," he said at last, "you're still an adult. You can make your own decisions."
Deep down, he wanted Julie to maintain a good relationship with her family to avoid unnecessary trouble, but priorities were priorities.
She didn't respond right away.
"You're not worried about it at all?"
"I think you should stop worrying about problems before they exist. If the worst-case scenario happens, we'll figure something out."
What he didn't say was that the same possibility had crossed his mind during the funeral.
As soon as they arrived, Daniel tossed Julie's bag into the motorhome, and the two crossed the yard toward the front door of the house.
The late afternoon light filtered through the gaps in the wooden boards.
Ethan was on the couch, handheld console in his hands, completely absorbed.
Surprisingly, the device had survived the earlier fall without a single scratch.
Jim and Tabitha were in the kitchen. When they heard the door, they exchanged hurried glances.
The conversation started diplomatically after everyone sat around the dining table.
Julie spent a few minutes recounting what had happened at the meeting and the version Boyd had presented to the town regarding Rick's death.
Jim listened in silence, arms crossed.
Then he asked the question everyone had been expecting.
"You said you'd explain later about the gun that appeared out of nowhere."
Ethan paused his game with that instinct children have when they sense a conversation has suddenly become interesting.
Julie shot a glance at her boyfriend, who simply nodded slightly.
Taking a deep breath, she repeated the story Daniel had told her. She vaguely explained the existence of an "invisible storage space," something peculiar that only he could access freely to store objects.
Before Jim could open his mouth to fire off skeptical questions or Tabitha could shake her head at the absurdity, Ethan's eyes widened and he dropped the console onto the couch, his imagination running wild.
"So you have magic powers?!" the boy exclaimed, running over to him. "Like a wizard? Can you show me? Please!"
His parents didn't scold him or tell him to sit down, because deep down, their own skepticism also wanted to see it with their own eyes.
Pushing himself up from the chair, Daniel picked up an empty ceramic cup from the table. "Pay attention."
In the next second, the object simply vanished. No smoke, no sound, no flickering light.
Just perfect emptiness. With another smooth movement of his fingers, the cup reappeared, materializing on the wooden surface.
He repeated the process a couple more times, at different speeds, just to make sure there was no doubt it wasn't some cheap trick.
"So you're a real magician. Can you teach me?" the boy asked, hope shining on his face.
"Unfortunately, I can't teach anyone. It's just something I know how to do." Daniel ended up dashing Ethan's hopes.
"How… how is that possible?" Tabitha whispered.
I should be the one asking how it's possible for you to reincarnate over and over and end up in this nightmare of a town in all your past lives, he thought, almost rolling his eyes.
"This doesn't make any sense..." Jim murmured, running a hand over his face as he tried to organize his thoughts. "Matter doesn't just disappear. Where did it go? This... this violates the first law of thermodynamics."
"I suggest you get used to it. The laws of physics went on vacation the moment we ran into that tree," Daniel shot back.
"Can you do that with anything?" Ethan asked, his curiosity returning after recovering from the disappointment.
"With anything I'm holding."
"Can you do it with my dad?" Ethan pointed at Jim with a mischievous idea.
The engineer blinked, stunned.
Daniel held back a laugh. "Doesn't work on living people, kid. Only objects."
"Oh… that's a shame," the boy said, earning an incredulous look from his father.
Jim shook his head, trying to clear the absurdity, and leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. "We need to know more," he said, his protective instinct clashing with the fear of the unknown.
"How did you get this? Does it have any connection to the monsters or this place?"
Daniel's relaxed posture turned serious as he met the man's suspicious gaze with honesty.
"I guarantee it has nothing to do with this place. And right now, I can't give any more information about it or about the physical changes I've gone through."
"What I want to make clear is that I have real feelings for Julie, and I would protect her with my life if necessary. And I care about you because you're her family, so I wouldn't do anything to harm you. On the contrary."
He set aside his usual sarcasm and irony and chose to be sincere with them.
[Biological hazard alert: sentimentality levels reaching alarming proportions. Please return to being a dysfunctional sociopath immediately,] the System commented, sounding nauseated.
Daniel kept his blue eyes fixed on the man in front of him.
Seeing the sincerity in the young man's expression and words, Jim remained silent for a few moments, remembering that his family was only safe right now because of him.
"I just ask that you let us know if you have any information that could help us get out of here," Jim finally said.
"Don't worry. Finding a way out is my goal too," Daniel replied, letting out a quiet sigh as he realized his words had the desired effect.
Before anyone could say anything else, the sound of the bell the sheriff rang near nightfall began to echo in the distance.
"It was a productive conversation, but it looks like our time's up." Daniel stood and turned to Julie, who was looking at him with a fond smile.
"What is it?"
"Nothing," she replied quickly, glancing at her parents. "We'll get going then."
"Don't open the door for anyone," Tabitha instructed, then looked at Daniel. "Do you have enough food over there?"
"Don't worry, the vehicle is well stocked." He was honestly a bit surprised they hadn't even tried to protest to stop Julie from going with him.
What Daniel didn't know was that the moment Jim told Tabitha it had been the young man who killed Rick, she had gone into shock.
In her desperation as a mother, she had thought about going back on her word and finding a way to keep Julie away from him.
In her memory, before running back to town with Ethan, the scene she had witnessed was Daniel in complete control, a gun pointed at the man.
The conclusion had seemed obvious. If he had killed an unarmed man without hesitation, then he was a dangerous psychopath.
Tabitha only understood what had really happened after talking at length with Jim, who explained that Rick had turned into a monster, and that if it hadn't been for Daniel, he and Julie might not even be alive.
That was why they both agreed to honor the arrangement.
—
The moment the motorhome door shut, cutting them off from the outside world with the curtains drawn, Julie let out a relieved sigh.
"See? Everything went fine." Daniel dropped onto the couch.
"Yeah, I admit you were right this time. It went way better than I expected," she confessed, walking toward him.
An incredibly loud sound echoed through the room, cutting the mood short. It was Daniel's stomach, growling like a starving beast.
"You're already hungry? During the movie you made three huge peanut butter sandwiches! That was, what, three hours ago?"
He shrugged without a trace of shame, flexing his uninjured arm and pointing at the tensed bicep stretching the fabric of his shirt.
"What can I say? Maintaining this sculpted physique comes with a very high metabolic cost. I'm basically a furnace."
Julie laughed, shaking her head. "Last time you cooked for me. Today it's my turn. Wait here, I'll make dinner."
Daniel raised an eyebrow, lips curling with irony. "And you know how to cook anything that doesn't come in a microwave package?"
She put her hands on her hips, feigning indignation. Her eyes narrowed in clear challenge. "You deeply offend me, Mr. Black. Just wait and see. You'll be licking your fingers and asking for more."
As the smell of hot food began to fill the space, night had already swallowed the town outside with its usual punctuality.
At the improvised cemetery beside the church, where the graves were still fresh enough for the soil to remain loose, a lone figure arrived.
Jasmine walked between the newly placed wooden crosses.
She stopped with precision in front of Kevin's grave. She knew exactly where the fool rested.
Gracefully kneeling, she plunged her pale, bare hands into the dirt and began to dig, unconcerned with the soil staining her clothes.
Minutes later, her fingers brushed against the stiff neck of the corpse until they felt metal.
With a sharp tug, she tore off the necklace he was wearing.
Jasmine lifted the small pendant, resembling a polished white stone, into the moonlight. The object seemed to glow faintly for a moment.
With a satisfied smile, she pocketed the necklace and turned toward the town, ready to hunt again.
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