A gray van drives along the forgotten roads of the forest around the late morning. Inside, Sercas is driving the car, while Serena is sitting at the passenger’s side, looking down at copies of the case file she has printed. Bobbleheads and other assorted knick-knacks are glued onto the dashboard. The vibrant saxophones and trumpets and the groovy piano from the jazz music playing on the radio fill the silence in the van.

“Hey, Sercas,” Serena says, breaking the silence. “Do you think Flint will be alright?”

“Flint is a tough bastard. I think he’ll be able to handle himself.” Sercas responds, focusing on the road.

“I know, reading this over again…what has he gotten himself into?” She asks herself.

Sercas lowers the jazz music’s volume playing on the radio.

“Look, we just have to stick to the plan. I’ll go in and bring him back out of there. Then we’ll have the actual difficult part of reasoning him out of it.” Sercas tells Serena, trying to reassure her.

“You’re right. We’ll get him out of there.” Serena says in agreement.

The van continues driving off down the forgotten road.

Flint pushes himself up from the rubble that he has created from his fall. He pats himself, surprised that he hasn’t sustained any serious injuries aside from some cuts and bruises. As he tries to sit himself up, he groans in pain feeling the pain from his injuries. After some moments of struggling and groaning, he stands up, using the rubble as support.

He turns on his headlight, which flickers before lighting up properly. He finds the revolver and camera on the ground, both not sustaining any serious damage. He bends down to pick them up. He reloads his revolver with the four black and white splotched bullets.

He looks up at the hole his fall created, realizing he has fallen down two floors. He takes out the floor plans in his pocket. He finds no notable details about the current floor other than two stairwells. He deduces that they are far from his current location, but it doesn’t matter. He needs to escape. He puts the floor plans away, exiting the rubble-filled room.

The hallway has more rubble scattered around than the room. He wanders around the halls, finding the floor plans unreliable whenever he refers to them. The placement of the rubble in the halls blocks off several paths, creating a disorienting labyrinth for Flint to traverse. He notices that doors in these halls are either jammed or blocked off by the large rubble.

After what feels like hours to Flint, he finds the stairwell leading up to the third floor. Wasting not even a second, Flint runs up the stairs. The adrenaline pushes him to run up the long flights of stairs, despite the injuries he has sustained.

He just needs to keep pushing himself through these flights of stairs to escape this damn facility, passing by the many talismans on the walls. He will be free from all these hellish abominations of nature and the morbid experiments of that machine. Then, he will return to his broken home, finding himself in another argument with his dear Ronlo. Where his dearest daughter, Lily, will fall victim again to their deteriorating relationship. He will never escape hell.

But he doesn’t slow down, he keeps running up the stairs. However, he comes to a dead halt, almost tripping on the steps. A barrier of energy, glowing a dark red light, blocks the door of the third floor and a flight of stairs leading upward. It pulsates and sparks in Flint’s presence. Flint notices a more intense glow coming from a symbol of a large circle with four blotched petals being placed diagonally at the barrier’s center.

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As he approaches the barrier, he winces at the surge of malevolent energy entering him from the barrier. He gets forcibly pushed back, landing on his back and groaning in agony.

He stops himself before attempting to push through again. He realizes that it would be impossible for him to break through and even if he can, the machine will likely be roaming around and looking for him.

Reluctantly, he steps back and makes a slow descent down the stairwell. His mind wanders back to that very day, he has made his oath.

“I vow to pursue and reveal the truth to all. I mustn’t waver, no matter how bitter the consequences may be. No one should live in the darkness of falsehoods nor should those who harm others hide have their sins be hidden away.”

“How would younger me react to seeing me?” He asks himself, still descending the stairs. “He’d think of me as a no-good coward. You’re running away after barely making a dent in this case Flint. Not because you’re in danger, but because you’re just a plain and simple coward.”

Flint stops at the end of the stairwell and leans against the wall.

“But, why am I still here? Am I just here to fulfill my duty or am I too stuck up in my own pride to admit defeat?” He mutters to himself.

Regardless of the matter, he continues his descent, still lost in thought. He enters the fourth floor, grimacing at the sight of the rubble-filled hallways. Since he is stuck, however, he decides to look around one more time.

He hears a thumping sound coming from the right side of the hall. After traversing the halls to the location of the noise, he finds a large piece of rubble blocking the way with a big enough gap for him to squeeze through. After awkwardly fitting himself through the gap, he manages to pass through.

He notices a door at the end of the small corridor that is behind the rubble. He approaches it with intrigue. Unlike the other doors, its sign is still up and has legible text. The sign reads Spectre Equipment. He turns the doorknob and opens the door.

Flint’s lamplight shines upon the large interior of the room. There are two large workbenches on either side, with tools and parts scattered about on top. There are also shelves surrounding the room, which are empty and shelve broken parts.

As he looks about the room, an item on a table on the other side of the room catches his attention. He approaches it to get a better examination of it.

The item is a radio. It is quite bulky and admittedly plain-looking though it has straps one will find on a back pack. Flint fiddles around with all the dials on the radio and examines the screen displays which record sound waves and frequencies. He sees two thick antennas vibrating at low frequencies. Flint inspects the rod microphone wired to the radio after taking it out from its notch. He speaks into it, seeing that the readings on the screen are unaffected.

The radio is creating crackling noises. Flint assumes it is the source of the noise. While it is peculiar, he finds it too bulky and finds little reason for him to use it.

Flint walks away from the radio, and approaches the room’s exit. As he does, he hears the radio crackle again. However, it is louder this time. While it crackles, he faintly hears something hidden behind the crackling, like a child’s voice.

He goes to the radio and adjusts the dials. The crackling becomes quieter and the voice becomes clearer.

“Who are you?” the young voice asks.

“What?” he mutters in disbelief.

“Who are you mister?” the young voice again asks.

“Where…where is that coming from?”

He turns around. He notices something standing in front of the door, jumping back in fear from the sight.

At the door is a pale transparent figure of a young boy. He has all these dark scars, burn marks, and dark bruises scattered about his pale body, down from his feet to his head. He has these empty eye sockets full of darkness staring right at Flint, with black tear trails running down from them down to his upper chest.

“Who are you, mister?” The young voice again asks.

“What…what the hell? What the hell is going on?” Flint mutters again in disbelief.

He turns back to the radio and fiddles with it.

“Where is this damn voice coming from? Where?” He asks himself again.

He then turns around, only to find the figure no longer there at the door. He also no longer hears the voice from the radio and crackles again.

“What the hell just happened?” Flint asks himself.

Flint is still bewildered by the whole incident. Who and what was that thing? He can only hope to find out more about the figure. However, one thing was sure in his mind. He needs to bring the radio with him. He grabs the radio and wears it on his back.

As he exits the room, his eyes widen to find the piece of rubble blocking the room suddenly vanished. He walks deeper into the halls and finds that the rest of the rubble has moved away, seemingly forming a path leading him to somewhere.

After traversing through the path, he finds himself at the staircase leading deeper into the facility with many talismans all over the wall.