As the sky turned from a bright blue to a deep, striped orange, Felix Drover was accessing how far the church staff had come in assembling the Kids Carnival. And him, he reminded himself, he had a part to play too. He was incharge of this project after all.
The church had decided to set up the carnival in a flat field, offered to them by one of the congregation. They had outlined a general T shape for the walking area, and had managed to outline a couple of smaller walking paths coming off of the stalk of the T. At the bottom of the stalk they had assembled tables with free bite size candy, several games of skill and chance were going to be set up along the stalk, offering prizes of plush toys and larger candy bars.
And he looked, and he saw that it was good. It was a conceited thought, no doubt, but Felix thought it warranted. He still didn't fully understand why Felicity wanted a devorce, things hadn't been that bad… no, they had been that bad… well. Nothing he could do about it now. Nothing but forget about it for a while.
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Frothy water crashed against the rock faces of Lands End, a national park in California. Several hiking trails run alongside defunct train rails. And over the past three months, 8 people had disappeared from those hiking trails. The police had opened an investigation into the disappearances, but so far they hadn't discovered anything. They were looking for human traffickers, or maybe a serial killer. They weren't sure what exactly, but they were sure it was natural.
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That’s where Will Baxtor thought they were going wrong. He had flown over to California two weeks ago, under the pretence of a vacation. People around the local area had seen things around Land’s End.
“I thought It was green. Whatever I saw. It looked green.” Ed Rodgers told Will. They had sat in a crowded, beer stained bar. Ed had ordered a large rum and coke. Will ordered a class of apple juice and a packet of pork rinds.
“You said you saw it slip into the rocks?”
“Yeah-huh. Right up off of the sand and into the rocks, like an actual lizard.
“And you're sure it wasn't… an actual lizard?”
Ed choked on his drink, spitting back into his glass. “Yeah, no, man. Way too large. Must have been five feet tall. It did have a tail though.”
That was it. That was all Will needed to know. He’d spoken to three other people who had seen something by the park, but they couldn't be sure of what they saw, or, they didn't want to be.
So now he was here, on the beach, wearing a leather jacket and kevlar lined jeans, and carrying a large bag filled with picks and axes and shovels and a few… more unorthodox items.
Will dropped the bag into the sand, pulled out a pickaxe and shovel, approached the rock-face, and began to work.
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In the dense woodland that covered the lower quadrant of Asheton, a man emerged from trees, as if he had materialised out of thin air.
Carefully he stalked the inhabited edges of the town, making note of the tent park near Downtown. He would have to return to that place, if he had the time, because now something else had caught his eyes.. Well, eye.
A young couple, in love. Driving back to their apartment. He could sense their lifeforce, they were alone in asheton, no family. They would do nicely. Quietly he followed them through town, repelling any light that happened to be cast onto his form.