Chapter 7 - Search Party

Alana uses a mixture of forcing herself to think she is dreaming, and closing her eyes, to block the terrifying sight from driving her insane with fear. She is very shaken, but keeps it together and swallows the shout surging in her throat...

Logan feels helpless and vulnerable, and the hopelessness of the situation impacts his mind like a tsunami wave of fear...
Gasping for air, he directs his gaze on the white strands of hair of the figure, hanging from her ghastly head like a shroud on an ancient corpse. He fixates on the details, feeling how horrific they would be to the touch... he imagines them moving, entangling him, as they glide closer and closer with Mother Ruth...

The excruciatingly long approach finally has an end. She stops near the three of you.
She raises her arms slowly, extending them towards your faces... with a sickening crackling sound, the arms elongate unnaturally, and an impossible third arm is somehow extruded from her ribcage, growing, reaching...

Three skeletal hands with slow moving, probing fingers move inexorably towards your faces!



As her features and torso start becoming less solid, semitransparent, the three hands become more real and palpable.

Eventually, with undeniable physicality, the three hands touch your faces! The long-nailed, skeletal fingers feel your features like a blind man would read a Braille inscription. The touch is icy, the smell of decay revolting.

"Logan Henry... Cody Brewster... Patterson..." she whispers chillingly.

The Sheriff dismisses everyone, saying that if any further information is required they will be in touch with you. It is past midnight by the time you leave the Station.

The Hunters succeeded in appearing as the rescuers of Davey, thus placating his Mom - which in turn, you hope, dispelled the ghost of Mother Ruth. However, Alana's and Logan's parents are less appeased, and give them some hard times. Further punishments might be on the horizon...

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Alana gets home and is relieved to see Benny sleeping peacefully in his bed.

Logan and Anna get a huge reprimand from their Mom, particularly for not giving any warning to their grandmother, making her worried sick about their long absence. Gram is also quite cross with them.

Cody gets a lift to the trailer park, and wishes his family cared enough to be upset at his absence.

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As the trio lay in their respective beds, they think of their uncanny encounters with that powerful, ghastly entity - feeling lucky to be alive, and wondering what Mother Ruth would have done to them, had she not be interrupted by the adults...

There is a lot more out there than the grownups can see. Unseen, terrifying things, that only a Monster Hunter can face...