Shudders: Reclamation Day

Chapter 8 - The Woman

Violence Warning ⚠️
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    Today was the day Zone 12 left the university and continued on to their route. Their next stop was Pachester but by how far the small town was they'll likely have to stop somewhere in between to rest for the night.

    After a small scare of an unknown demon being inside the camp, Jules had ordered more Capturers on guard duty to prevent it from happening again. (Y/N) decided to not venture off to the edges of camp by herself anymore as well. Even though the time by herself was needed, she didn't know whether or not that demon was friendly or looking to harm her and she didn't want to risk that again.

    Those spider legs too... they surely kept her up at night.

    Based on what the GPS was telling the team, their next possible stop for the day was a church that they'll use for a camp. If it was still standing of course.

     (Y/N) sat in her bunk as she looked over a picture taken of the mark by the Scientists. She zoomed into it on her tablet as her eyes examined the dried away black blood. It couldn't be any graffiti or some demon's artwork. (Y/N)'s mind just refused to believe that. There had to be something more to it than just what Saren had deduced. She thought back to what she saw in their recently eradicated demon's memories and sighed. Even those were bugging her too. She made the rest of the team aware of what she saw and even they seemed unsettled at the idea of dozens of demons crowded around and listening to one.

     It's not a common thing for demons to work together, especially not that many. She can understand if they were all intelligent demons who see the value in group efforts but many of the ones she saw had to be animalistic in both body and mind. Those types can't even comprehend working together!

     She seriously hoped that the memories were only a dream and not something that the demon actually witnessed. Even though she can't tell the difference between memories and dreams or if she can even see dreams, to begin with.

    (Y/N) closed out from the picture and went to the database to see how many more demons were confirmed. The number went up to 10 since the last time she checked.

"(Y/N), can I ask you something?"

    The woman looked up when she heard her name but gasped when Axel plopped down onto her bunk right next to her. She was forced to scoot towards the side so the man could fit but the two of them together were still cramped. (Y/N) gestured to the free open space ahead of them. "You could've sat down anywhere else, Axel!"

"We're friends. Hush. Anyways-" Axel situated himself on the bed but had to hang one of his long legs off the side. "You've been up north, right?"

    (Y/N) raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

"When you were above ground, you said you went north. You've been up there?"

"Um-" She thought back to it. She wasn't up there for very long, unfortunately. Maybe a day at most. "Yea but I didn't get to spend too much time up there. Why?"

"Wellllllllll... I've never been north." Axel pursed his lips as he let his head fall back onto her shoulder while (Y/N) looked surprised.

"You have never been north?! For as long as you've been a Capturer-"

"I've been east, west, south, not north. I was never on the team that went in that direction so I don't know what's up there." He huffed. "I tried asking your husband. He's been up north before but not in the direction we're going."

"So why haven't you asked the other Capturers?"

     Axel pursed his lips even more. "I don't want them knowing-."