Seth stood at a crossroads. In one direction, the gravel road continued over the hill, winding its way through the fields and leading back to the slaughterhouse. Back to Alex and the car and salvation. But the road also forked to the right. A driveway leading around a copse of trees. And through those trees shone a hazy orange light that appeared to come from a distant porch.

He wasn’t far from the gate, and this house was on the same side of the road as the slaughterhouse. Which meant it must be a part of Harris Acres, the farm where Jess lived.

The words from her note flashed through his mind, telling him to check the floorboards by her bed. Perhaps he could finally find some answers.

Checking on Alex was the better option. The right thing to do. Still, Seth found it hard to continue down the gravel road.

The gate was gone. The guards were slain. Their escape route was all but assured. But David was still out there, and there was a chance he’d holed up at this house.

Alex and salvation in one direction, David and answers in the other.

Perhaps a part of Seth didn’t want to escape. As soon as he left this place, he would have to face what he’d seen. What he’d done. It was true that these farmers had kidnapped him, had tried to kill him. And because of that, it felt like as long as he was here, he had permission to indulge his base instincts of violence. To turn his pain and rage and disgust back on these fuckers.

With that in mind, it was no choice at all. Seth split off the road and began down the driveway.

His shoes crunched against the gravel. As he passed under the shadow of the trees, he got a better angle on the house. It had two stories and a peaked roof. A stove pipe jutted over the roofline, and clear smoke waved away from the top, only visible from the hole it cut through the fog.

The porch wrapped all the way around the front. A man sat in a rocking chair by the door. Long hair framed his face, and he wore a heavy winter coat. A rifle sat against the man’s lap. He looked back and forth, vigilant. And who wouldn’t be after the explosions and the gunshots? The fighting at the gate could have been heard from miles away.

Seth ducked down and slunk away from the road before he was seen. His shotgun pressed against his grip, begging to be used. But the distance was too great. He considered the revolver, but even that would be a difficult shot.

Which brought Seth back to his previous trick. He pulled the last stick of dynamite from his belt. After a moment to gauge the distance and line up his throw, he lit the wick. Sparks sprayed from the top, casting an orange glow into the woods.

“Hey,” the man yelled. He stood up, coat rustling as he pulled the rifle to his shoulder. “Who’s there!”

Seth answered by chucking the dynamite at him.

The porch exploded. Wooden shrapnel flew through the air. The roof overhanging the porch collapsed. The light flickered. An empty shoe lay against the rubble, the only remnant of the rifleman.

Well, there went any attempts at stealth.

Seth charged up to the porch and ducked under the sagging roof. The main door was still intact, a slab of heavy wood with hand-carved decorations and a stained glass window. Seth kicked it in, his leg snapping the thing in two as if it were a twig.

His shotgun swept across the living room. It was an open space with a white couch and an old box TV. A green rug stretched across the hardwood floor. No one was there, but the lights were on.

Seth stepped past the living room, his steps light, and he entered the kitchen. This house was much nicer than the one Earl had held him in. It was old, but it had a nice charm to it. With the polished wood countertops and carved shelves and the tall pillars reaching up to the second floor.

A woman jumped from the pantry and thrust a spear at his throat. It was a broom, with one end hacked off and sharpened. Seth stumbled back, and the spear nicked the side of his neck.

He raised his shotgun. This woman was older, wearing dirty rags and with wild hair she’d chopped short. She reminded Seth of a homeless woman who frequented the intersection outside Shelby State.

Seth shot her in the chest. Blood sprayed out her back, painting a splash of red against the cabinets. She slumped down to the hardwood.

The floorboards creaked behind him. Seth spun around, but before he could finish, a heavy metal rod cracked against his shoulder, fracturing the bone.

Seth hissed. He wheeled on his attacker, raised the shotgun, and blasted him in the gut. The boy fell back, a teenager holding a fire poker from beside the woodstove. He was short, fifteen maybe, and with his mop of brown hair and spatter of freckles, he was the mirror image of Jess. Her brother, most likely.

The boy fell back, dropped his poker to clutch at his stomach. A dark pool of blood leaked around his hands, staining his robe, a starch-white garment adorned with golden filigree.

Seth trembled. This wasn’t his fault. The boy had attacked him first. Even so, he could only stare as the boy collapsed in a heap, blood gurgling up his throat as he gasped for air. Not much later, the boy lay still. Dead.

This wasn’t his fault.

Seth shouldered his way around the corner and past the boy. His fingers shook as they levered open the shotgun, pulled out the spent shells, and shoved in two new ones from his pocket.

A staircase crawled up the back of the living room. Seth climbed them up to the second floor. A long hallway stretched before him, lined with closed doors.

Trying not to think, he kicked open the first door. He saw a flash of red. Jess’s head cracking back. A splash of blood against a white robe.

But this room was empty, a small bathroom with an old tub and a dirty shower curtain. Steeling himself, Seth checked behind the curtain. No one was there.

On to the next room. He shoved his way past the door, gun raised. Another cramped room, with a bed shoved against the corner and a dresser practically leaning against it. A small desk filled the other corner, with an old laptop and a dirty lamp.

There were only two doors left, one on the side of the hall, and a larger door at the very end. The last door must be the master bedroom. Seth would save that for last.

The next room was similar to the previous, but it was slightly bigger, and floral sheets covered the bed. Women’s clothes bulged from the dresser shelves. This must be Jess’s room. What had her note said? Something about the floorboards.

Seth walked across the room, listening to the sounds of his footsteps. As he walked along the side of her bed, one of the boards rattled underfoot. Seth leaned down, dug his fingernails between the boards, and pulled up the loose one, revealing a hollow space between this floor and the ceiling of the first.

Between two of the joists lay a small wooden box. Seth pulled it out and set it beside him. Within, he found a thick journal, a lanyard with a laminated name tag, and a small vial containing a shard of a translucent rock. Some kind of crystal, maybe?

The journal was folded to the last page, which was scrawled with frantic writing.

Please read!

Whoever finds this, be sure to read through the entire journal. I started logging the strange happenings around these farms two months after the meteorite landed. Each page is dated and contains detailed accounts, as detailed as I could get. I have taken great risks to gather as much information as possible.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

WARNING!

DO NOT TRUST OWEN.

DO NOT TRUST GRACE.

DO NOT TRUST SHELBY STATE.

DO NOT TRUST TORCH LABS.

Time is of the essence, so I have provided this summary. If you have found this journal, I am probably already dead. Be sure to act quickly, arrest anyone involved with this mess, and shut down all activity on Eldridge Creek, Harris Acres, Godwin Farms, and Taylor Hill.

SUMMARY:

It all started with the Shelby Fireball. That was a strange time for us, with all the media attention. Not much happens around here, and most of the older folks did not like the attention. Especially Owen. He was a grumpy old man who mostly kept to himself and his farm. I felt bad for him with all the reporters and the scientists crawling over his fields.

A month later, the news died down and I thought that would be the end of it.

However, something changed with Owen. He started spending more time at the chapel, and he even visited my father from time to time. They would speak late into the night, mostly friendly conversation. Nothing to worry about, I thought.

Then the first of his followers arrived. You see, this is where things get strange. Owen has a way to influence people, to make them do what he wants. I do not know how it works, but he calls it a gift from God. He started bringing his followers into the farm. Mostly people from the church and nearby farms, but as time went on, more and more homeless and poor and desperate people arrived to help Owen with various construction projects.

At first, the construction was benign. They worked on things like fixing old farm equipment and renovating the Godwin house. Then they started work on a new gatehouse, an extensive mining operation, and a huge tower up on Taylor Hill.

My father tried to stay out of it. Even with Owen’s influence, he was not able to fully enslave my father like he did some of the others. I can tell by my father’s eyes. They never got the yellow cast of Owen’s other followers.

DO NOT TRUST ANYONE WITH YELLOW EYES!

Either way, Owen convinced my father to let him create the mine on his property. I do not know why, but they are trying to uncover pieces of the meteorite that have drilled deep underground. I do not know how the meteorite has sunk so far into the earth, but Owen is desperate to reach it.

By this point, I started to worry about Owen and his followers. They are up to something strange, unnatural, maybe even the work of the devil. But Owen doesn’t have complete control over all his followers. Those he can’t control with his gift, he controls with fear.

At one point, a group of his followers revolted against him. They failed. With the help of the Taylors, Owen captured all the traitors and had them hung up in the fields in a crude mockery of our Lord and Savior.

This butchery hangs over our farm like a choking fog, but it might be Owen’s undoing. Before killing them, Owen had not done anything overtly illegal. Hopefully, this evidence of his sins is enough to bring him to justice.

Anyway, I’m running out of space in this journal, so I’ll make the rest quick. Owen is building something on Taylor Hill. A tower that will supposedly amplify his powers. It is going to be in operation soon. Hopefully, he will be stopped in time, but I fear it is already too late.

Read the rest of the journal for more information.

P.S.

Alexis Booker. If you are reading this, I just wanted to say I am sorry. I should not have brought you here, but I could not trust anyone else.

Hmm. The journal was interesting, Seth supposed, but not particularly helpful. It seemed like Owen was running some sort of cult, which Seth had already assumed. What he didn’t understand was why Jess hadn’t gone to the police. She could have done something months ago, but instead, she’d stood by while her neighbor exploited, no enslaved, innocent people.

Whatever, what was done was done. Seth shoved the journal, the vial, and the lanyard into his backpack. He could read through the rest later, or better yet, leave it to the police to sort out.

Seth left Jess’s room and continued down the hall. The final door awaited him. His heart tightened as he inched closer, finger on the shotgun’s trigger. This was his last chance to find David. If that bastard waited within, Seth could finally end this.

He kicked the door down. Wood splintered inward, scattered across the king bed. No one was here. Damn it!

Seth crept alongside the bed. An open door led to a small bathroom, also empty. The other side held a closet, and that didn’t even have a door. It was just an open nook filled with clothes and plastic bins full of junk. He checked under the bed. Nothing.

Seth sighed. David wasn’t here.

An alarm went off on his phone. Seth cursed as he fished it out of his pocket and canceled the sirens. It was the timer. Alex should be coming any minute now.

He ran to the window, which looked out to the gravel road. Wisps of fog drifted over the road, their edges limned with moonlight. There were still five minutes left on Alex’s timer, but when she arrived he’d be able to see the headlights from here. Which meant he still had time to look around.

Even so, Seth wasn’t confident she’d be able to fix the car. It would be best to go back to the slaughterhouse and check on her.

As he passed by the doorway to the master bedroom, a dangling cord caught his eye. It led to a hatch in the ceiling, the entrance to the attic. It was probably a waste of time, but…

Alex could wait.

Seth grabbed the cord and yanked it down. The hatch flipped open, and a ladder unfolded. It slammed against the floor with a heavy thud. The attic should have been dark, but orange light flickered amongst the shadows.

Someone was up there.

Keeping one hand on the shotgun, Seth inched up the ladder. Whoever was up there would be waiting for him, the perfect place for an ambush. He paused halfway up, considering. Perhaps he should pull out another stick of dynamite from his bag. No, that was too messy.

Instead, Seth unslung his backpack and threw the whole thing into the attic.

The pack landed with a thump. No one shot at it, or even reacted at all. At least, as far as Seth could hear. He waited for a moment, but when nothing happened, he charged the rest of the way up and leveled his shotgun.

Two people knelt at the end of the attic, a candle between them. They bowed over the candle, their hands pressed together as they silently chanted. Both appeared in their fifties, a man with a bushy beard and a woman with graying hair tied into a long braid. They wore white robes decorated with golden filigree, the same as the boy from downstairs. Were these Jess’s parents?

Seth rattled his shotgun. “Hey! Where is David?”

The man trembled and the woman flinched back, but they both ignored him and continued their silent prayer.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Seth said. “I just want to find David. You know who that is?”

The couple didn’t answer.

Seth lowered his shotgun. “God damn it, answer me! I’m trying to find the man that killed your daughter.”

That finally got a reaction out of the father. He opened his eyes and turned to Seth. “Jessica is dead?” His voice was a hollow whisper.

“Yes,” Seth said. “Earl killed her, and he took me and my friends hostage. I already beat Earl to death and hacked off Riles’s head. David is the only one left.”

“Aren’t you with Owen?”

Seth frowned. “No. Of course not.”

“Of course not…” The father leaned back, eyes closed. “I heard the explosions, the gunshots. What about my son?”

Seth felt the gun buck in his hands. Blood pooling against a white robe. The boy’s frown as he fell back, the fire poker bouncing off the hardwood.

That wasn’t Seth’s fault. It just wasn’t. The boy had attacked him first. Everyone in this goddamn place had attacked him first. Earl, then Riles, then Pete. The river of blood roared past his ears, growing louder by the second.

“You might not work for Owen,” the father said, “but I can see it in your eyes. They are pitch black, dark as the gates of hell. You have the devil in you, just like Owen and the rest of his followers.”

That wasn’t true. Seth just wanted to get out of here. He just wanted to go home. His arm sagged under the weight of the shotgun, and it almost slipped from his fingers.

“I have told Owen time and again that his followers are nothing but a bunch of murderers. That all he has done is encourage sin. That his gifts are a ticket straight into hell. But he ignored me, and look what he has wrought. My children are dead.”

Seth clenched his fist around the shotgun and stopped it from slipping. This man, Jess’s father, was starting to piss him off. He could complain as much as he’d like, but what had he done to stop this? Absolutely nothing. And now he had the gall to blame Seth for his children’s death?

“I’m just looking for David,” Seth said.

“Why?”

“Why?” Seth said. “Because he’s a piece of shit. Because he threatened me and my friends. Because he’s a murderer.”

“David’s a murderer.” The father’s eyes were sharp as knives. “Then what does that make you?”

“The guy with the gun.”

Seth shot the father in the chest. Blood splattered against the rafters. He fell back, a crimson star blooming across his chest. The mother screamed, eyes snapping open. Blood spattered her face, and she struggled to breathe as she scrambled back, away from the candle.

The shotgun belched a second hail of pellets, which sprayed right through her collarbone. She flipped onto her back, and dark blood fountained from the deep hole in her chest.

Seth stared at the corpses until his vision blurred. His fingers trembled, and he found it hard to breathe. Blood dripped down his face. He didn’t know whose it was, but it coated him, a starfield of droplets that slowly converged until thick rivers dripped down his skin.

He wasn’t the same as David. This wasn’t his fault. Seth just needed to get out of here. He needed to get the car and drive until Shelby was a distant memory. Once he escaped this place, everything would be fine.