The Five Evolution

『"Step one: Gather info..."』

The fluorescent lights above the Janestown Medical Center buzzed loud enough to become annoying.

Ironically, Sophia hated hospitals, something she shared in common with Raj. Not because of the blood or the smell.

But because hospitals always felt like places where hope and despair fought each other in quiet corners.

And despair usually won.

To be more specific, it brought back a lot of memories related to her mom that would have loved to not remember.

The morgue sat in the lower levels of the building. It was cold, sterile, and silent as one would expect a morgue to be.

The only sound was the squeak of Ethan’s shoes against polished tile and the occasional hum from refrigeration units behind reinforced doors.

A man waited for them beside one of the examination tables.

From the gray hair and wrinkled skin, he was somewhere in his mid-fifties, with reading glasses pushed up onto his forehead, and a coffee mug attached to his left hand.

"Dr. Curtis Beaumont," he introduced himself while smoothing his white lab coat that was stained with coffee.

A cigarette dangled from his lips despite the giant NO SMOKING sign mounted directly behind him.

He took a long drag, looked at Ethan, Sophia, and Andre standing in his examination room, and exhaled slowly. "They said to expect Institute people."

"That’s us," Ethan said.

Beaumont looked them over. "Don’t you guys look too young to be doing this."

"We get that a lot," Andre said.

Beaumont sighed. "I’ve been doing this job for twenty-three years. You know how many Institute agents I’ve seen come through here?" He held up two fingers. "Two. And they looked nothing like you guys."

Sophia raised an eyebrow. "We’ve seen worse than missing hearts, Doc."

The doctor exhaled smoke through his nose. "Wonderful." He motioned toward the nearest examination table. "Come on then."

He led them to the slabs, where three bodies lay beneath sheets, and Beaumont pulled back the sheet of the first victim.

Male. Forties. The chest cavity had been opened during autopsy and stitched back. Even closed, the absence of mass where the heart should have been was visible.

"Cardiac extraction," Sophia said, moving closer. "Clean margins on the surrounding tissue."

Beaumont looked at her sideways. "Med student?"

"Yeah," she said.

"Not bad. Yeah." He took a sip of his coffee. "Whatever did this knew what it was going for. There was no hesitation or random damage. It simply went straight for the heart."

Ethan was studying the face. "Time of death?"

"Night of the second of last month." Beaumont flipped open a file. "Found on the 3rd, the next morning." He turned a page. "You want the weird part?"

"That’s why we’re here," Andre said.

Beaumont set down his coffee, picked up a pen, and carefully parted the lips of the corpse.

They all leaned in.

The teeth didn’t belong in a human mouth. They were too long and too sharp, elongated canines sticking out.

Ethan’s eyes narrowed. He reached into his jacket and produced a silver coin. Then he pressed it against the corpse’s skin.

The skin sizzled upon contact as a thin line of smoke rose from where the silver touched.

The doctor almost dropped his cigarette. "What the hell?!"

The flesh blackened instantly around the point of contact, and Sophia shoved her hands into her jacket, still not used to any of this.

"Thank you, Doctor," Ethan said.

Beaumont looked at him. "You going to tell me what that just confirmed?"

Ethan pulled back the coin and pocketed it. "Trust me. You’re better off not knowing."

Beaumont picked up his coffee again. "Fair enough. I’ve learned not to ask questions I don’t want answers to." He moved to the second body. "Same extraction. Same clean margins."

"Same dentition as the first vic?" Ethan asked.

"No. Normal teeth here, same as the rest of the victims." He took a drag. "She was found on the thirtieth of last month. Your third victim on the second of this month." He flipped a page in the file. "You notice the pattern?"

"They all died during a full moon," Sophia said.

Beaumont pointed at her. "Bodies always show up the day after. Every time." He took one final drag and stubbed out his cigarette on the edge of the table. "But this time, it just feels different."

"Different how?" Ethan asked.

"Three years ago, two bodies. Year before that, one." Beaumont shrugged. "Sheriff’s office thought it was animal attacks. Unusual ones, but animals."

"What changed this year?" Andre asked.

"Volume," Beaumont said. "Four in two months? That’s new." He pulled the sheet back over the first body. "Whatever’s out there is getting hungrier."

Sophia straightened. "Or more confident," she said quietly.

***

Raj and Naomi spent most of the afternoon working through Janestown. Working through the local townsfolk to gather information was no easy task.

The diner produced nothing useful except decent pie, which Raj considered a partial success.

The gas station attendant had heard about the missing persons but hadn’t seen anything.

The woman at the hardware store shut the conversation down the moment they mentioned the woods. She told them to go talk to a Mabel and shooed them out of her store.

Naomi was growing increasingly irritated but Raj refused to give up. They left the store and spotted another local seated on a bench, reading a newspaper.

Raj walked up to the man and asked, "Excuse me, kind sir. We’re with the Sheriff’s office, and would like to know if you’ve witnessed any suspicious activities in Janestown."

The man lowered the newspaper and gave them a glance. "Aren’t you guys looking a little too young to be working with the sheriff’s station?"

"We get that a lot," Raj replied. "So? Witnessed any suspicious activities lately?"

The man took a moment to think. "Now that you mention it..."

"Yeah?" Raj leaned in, his eyes bright.

The local folded up the newspaper. "My wife. She’s been acting awfully suspicious lately. Buying new clothes and underwear, sneaking out of the house..."

Raj’s shoulders immediately sagged. "That’s not what I mean."

"Oh?" The man unfolded his newspaper and resumed reading it. "Then no."

Naomi pinched the bridge of her nose. She was probably about to do something terrible to that local when Raj pulled her back and gently led her to the next street.

It was in this new street, outside a local pub that a man in his sixties with a beard that had probably been growing since the 90s stopped them unprompted.

"You folks asking about the disappearances?"

"We are," Naomi said.

He looked them both up and down. "You ain’t from around here."

"No sir," Raj said. "But can I just say, sick beard."

"Most city folk don’t go around complimenting a man’s beard." The old man stroked it once and smiled. "I like you."

Then his eyes darted to the left and right before he finally spoke. "Ever since that biker gang rode in a couple weeks back, people been going missing. They call themselves the Howl pact."

Raj grabbed a notepad and began scribbling words down. "...biker... gang... Howl... pact. Got it."

The old man shifted his weight, leaning against the wall of the pub, and continued. "Now I ain’t saying they did it. I’m just saying the timeline ain’t subtle."

"Biker gang," Naomi said. "You know where they’re staying?"

"Out past the east side of the woods. Old auto shop that’s been empty since the Petersons left." He scratched his beard. "But if you really want to know what’s going on in this town, there’s someone you ought to talk to first."

"Who?" Raj asked.

"Old lady Mabel. Lives up on Cutter Road. Been here longer than anyone." He paused. "She’s the second person to tell me they’ve seen strange things at the tree line this week."

"Mabel, huh?" Naomi whispered to herself.

"First one was my neighbor." He looked toward the woods. "Poor fellow’s body was found the next day."

Raj was finally looking like they had reached a breakthrough. He had a big smile and a clenched fist. "You think this Mabel will talk to us?"

The old man shrugged. "She’ll talk to you, I think. She talks to most people who come asking the right questions."

"Thanks a lot," Raj said to the old man, then turned to Naomi. "Let’s go find and talk to this Mabel."

"Whatever," Naomi said. And they took off.

***

Mabel’s house sat back from the road, beside a garden that had been maintained with the devotion of someone who’d had decades to perfect it.

She was already on the porch when they came up the path, seated in a rocking chair, hands folded in her lap.

Her eyes found them immediately. Sharp and pale blue beneath white hair pulled back from her face. On the back of her right hand, clearly visible, was a star-shaped birth mark.

"You’re asking about the woods," she said before either of them spoke.

Raj glanced at Naomi as she sat down on the porch steps without being invited. "We are."

Mabel’s chair moved slowly. Forward and back. "The trees watch us, you know." Her voice was matter-of-fact. "Always have. Most folk don’t notice."

"What do you mean they watch?" Raj asked.

She looked at him for a moment. "What I said."

Naomi leaned forward. "A few of the locals think you’re crazy." She stared at her nails as she spoke. "They say that you’ve seen monsters. During the full moon."

"I’ve seen my fair share." The chair kept moving. "Same ones that took my daddy away. Looks like they’re back."

Raj grabbed her watering can and looked at her. She nodded, giving him a silent permission.

He moved over to the garden and began watering a tomato plant. "Who’s back?" he asked as he moved on to another plant.

Naomi watched him with interest from where she was seated, but said nothing.

Mabel stared toward the sky. "Long time ago. I was little then. He told me to run and I ran. Heard him behind me for a few seconds. Then I didn’t."

Raj stopped watering, and Naomi remained silent.

Mabel’s eyes moved toward the tree line visible from the porch. She looked at it like she could see something they couldn’t. "The woods remember everything," she said. "Always watching..."

The chair kept rocking.

Raj and Naomi exchanged a glance. Neither of them had a follow-up question.

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