III. Dive

The school day passed by slowly. There wasn't much to do as a senior during the final week of school. His parents were really excited about him graduating. Neither of his parents graduated high school. That was true for most his older relatives. Work came before school, because food came before anything. His generation, for the most part, were all making it to their high school graduation. Another weight and excitement was placed in him. Out of all of them, he would be the first to go to college. His family couldn't afford it on their own. Juan did his best to get any scholarship he could, but he still would have to take out loans in addition to that. His parents told him it was alright. They'd all find a way to pay it back together. They told him to keep aiming higher. His parents never had much money for anything, but he was glad to be born into their family. There were some situations where his older relatives lagged behind in what was proper care out of the shame they grew up with, like the situation with his cousin's eating disorder. For most things, he could rely on all of them for help. The way he saw some people treat the children in their care, like Eric and Nathan's respective guardians, baffled him. He couldn't comprehend taking in a child, one who needs care and protection to thrive, only to inflict cruelty on them. Juan didn't know which set of guardians angered him more. Eric's parents were well off and had plenty of money to take care of their son, and yet, they neglected and at the least of what he knew, verbally abused their son whenever they could. Nathan's guardian's were being paid to care for him, and neglected him anyway. He wondered how much his friend had gotten to eat growing up. Now, as they were all about to set foot into the world of adults full time, he couldn't help but think about how neither of those neglectful parents would be offering anything for that transition. Typical, he thought, that one who does so little would cut off their meager support the first moment they could be morally excused from it. He imagined Eric would be waving at Alex's parents at his college graduation as well. The thought of that saddened him, but he quickly found hope in it. If not his biological parents, Eric could be taken in by a new, better set in Alex's. Juan was amused before about his friends being into each other, but now he actively wanted them to get together, if for that hope alone. During lunch, he watched the way the two of them occupied each other's space. At a distance too close to be anything other than intimate comfort and far enough apart to keep it contained under friendship, their movements made their real desires obvious to any with close inspection. The way they looked at each other, he was a little jealous. No girl he ever dated looked at him quite like that. His own girlfriend was currently missing in the cafeteria. He saw her in the hall earlier a few times, and as before, she dissipated like mist through the forest of anxious teenagers and disgruntled teachers. When the school day ended, he searched for her again only to catch the back of her car speeding away from him. As he got in Nathan's car, he sent out a text he knew wouldn't be answered. At home, Juan looked over the ghost hunting footage again to distract himself from Maria. He didn't find anything new. Juan texted Alex to make sure everything was still on for the weekend. At lunch, they had decided on Saturday night. Alex texted him back that it was, then sent him a list of movies and TV series he was thinking about possibly watching to ask for help in deciding. Juan gave his suggestions, then teased Alex for a while. He texted him. "How's it going with Eric? Did you cuddle all night long?" Alex responded thirty seconds later. The text read "damn right I did", with a goofy selfie sent right after it. Juan laughed. He texted Alex for a while, mostly talking about Eric and joking about conspiracy theories neither believed. The conversation ended when Alex went to eat dinner. Juan joined Nathan on the couch to look for something to watch. "Talking to Maria?" Nathan asked. "No. Haven't gotten a text from her all week." Juan flipped through channels. "It was Alex." "Oh, really. What's he up to?" "Trynna get in Eric's pants." Juan couldn't finish what he was saying without laughing. Nathan chuckled. "How's that going?" "It's not, unless you consider more intense cuddling to be progress." "That's adorable." Nathan grinned and laughed again. Juan settled on the news again. One of the anchors finished up a report on a missing person, then transitioned to the next topic. The woman, expressionless and empty in tone, spoke directly at the camera. "Mental health, it's a topic that for many years was taboo to speak about openly. Georgia's own history with the care and treatment of the mentally ill is one rife with horror and shame. The monstrous, prison-like state hospitals of old have all but one long shut down in an effort to bring Georgia into the modern world. Now, rather than suffering isolation and abuse in an uncaring, cold facility, mental health treatment has taken a new form. A caring, gentle one, and it's taking place not in the asylums of old, but in neighborhoods and community centers." The news transitioned from the anchor sitting at a desk to a prerecorded video of various people sitting around on a back porch. The anchor narrated the transition. "Locals recall the horrid abuse at the state run hospitals. Horror stories of neglect, mistreatment, and cruelty. But those memories are fading." The video shifted to people inside a hospital. "Since Georgia began closing the doors on its outdated state mental hospitals, new places of treatment have cropped up across the state. These facilities have opened up with a new focus, serving the community...all members of the community. Rather than shuttling people hours across from society, they find ways to help those in need reintegrate and manage within their local area. Rehab, group therapy, and job training are part of the many options available at these city centers and small, privately run hospitals. For those with more serious needs, longer stays are available, up to three months at a time at some facilities and longer term hospital stays for the most severe cases, but the emphasis remains on getting people out and back into their neighborhoods and workplaces." The camera now focused on the anchorwoman walking down the hallway of a hospital. "I'm here at one of those private hospitals. Moone & Wolfe has been in the business of caring for the mentally ill and involved in psychiatric and psychological research for decades. In the new world of patient care, the company has flourished and now serves most areas of the state. I'm here today with the head of the company and long time psychiatric researcher, Dr. Edith Summerfield, who recently took over the company from her equally accomplished brother, Dr. Thomas Summerfield." Juan's stomach turned at hearing the company's name. Unconsciously, he clutched tightly to the arm of the couch. The camera shifted to a young-looking woman with short hair wearing a black dress and a white coat. Her appearance was too polished to be believed. She gave the camera a tiny smile. The video cut to the newswoman and Dr. Summerfield sitting across from each other at a desk. The newswoman asked, "Dr. Summerfield, what has it been like, having been in this business as long as you have, to witness the social shift that's taken place over the last few decades?" Dr. Summerfield smiled slightly again, but her words came out devoid of emotion. "Oh, it has been amazing to me. People really don't understand how rapid this change has happened. As research marched on, that didn't always translate into action being taken at hospitals. We have always strived to work from the most up to date research available, and we ourselves have been working hard to contribute to that growing body of data." "Your father, Dr. Alexander Summerfield, made great stride in the research in the care of adolescent patients. That focus has still remained in many of the research labs your company runs. Is that correct?" The newswoman asked. "Yes. We have always had more of a focus on children and teens, because they are the most vulnerable of us all and need different care than adults do. It's a delicate process to research that, as the utmost of ethics must be adhered to when dealing with minors, but the research must be done for the betterment of children worldwide. One of our first mental hospitals was opened up specifically to care for adolescents with severe behavioral issues." Dr. Summerfield avoided making eye contact with the camera. "The work you're doing here is changing so many lives. I hear that one of the drugs your company has been tested for years will soon be available for prescription. How do you feel about that?" She asked. "I'm so overwhelmed by it. There are people out there who will do anything to push a drug through to rake in as much profit off of it as they can. We didn't set out to make a profit. Our mission has always been about helping the most vulnerable of people. We spent so many years testing and retesting Aequa until we finally, consistently, got the results we were aiming for. The drug is expected to be available next month and is completely safe for both teens and adults. We're all very excited here. I hope that our years of research will be able to save many more lives. The more options a patient has, the more likely they will find a solution that works for them." The video shifted back to the newswoman walking in the hospital hallway. "Hospitals like this can now be found throughout the state, helping those with depression, anxiety, drug addiction...get the help they deserve." The video then changed back to the people sitting around in the hospital. An elderly woman spoke to the camera. "They've changed my life. If it weren't for places like this, I'd be dead right now." Another woman came on screen, appearing to be around thirty. "It's a blessing. It really is. My mama always told me she'd put me in one of those horrible state hospitals if I acted up too much. A lot of parents made threats like that when I was young. I never thought I'd ever be in a psychiatrist's office myself, but now I can work again. I thank God every day for helping me get in here and change myself." The prerecorded video ended and shifted back to the newsroom. The anchor said, "After our interview, Dr. Summerfield was generous enough to provide us with a discount offer for our viewers. For a ten percent discount on any services, go to our website and print out the coupon. This coupon is valid for one year. A coupon for Aequa can be found on the same page, for twenty percent off and reusable up to six times. Aequa is set to be available mid-June. A list of other private mental health hospitals and local low cost health centers in Georgia can also be accessed from our website." Nathan was so annoyed with the ad disguised as news that his eyes hurt from rolling them. "I bet that 'low cost' isn't all that low. Wonder what they do with people who've got nowhere to go back home to or when someone runs out of money." Juan wasn't listening to Nathan. His mind was elsewhere, recalling memories from a very long time ago. "Juan? Are you in there?" Nathan waved his hand in front of Juan's face. Juan blinked. "Huh? Sorry. I just remembered something weird." "Weird? Aliens weird or regular weird?" Nathan asked. "Uh...I don't know." Juan couldn't answer because he didn't know how to classify the experience itself. "It's about that company that was just on the news, Moone & Wolfe." "Do you know some shady medical shit about them?" Nathan asked. "No, well, what I thought of wasn't, but I have heard they do shady medical stuff too." Juan took a deep breath. "Did I ever tell you about Steven Morales?" "I don't think so. Is this some kind of urban legend?" Nathan asked. "No, Steven was a guy I knew in elementary school." Juan said. "Did you ever watch any local channels when you were a kid?" "Like PBS?" "No, think more along the lines of what low budget commercials at the local movie theater look like. You know, back when they showed those before they were bought out by some shit company with shit nachos." Juan could hear the phrase "we love you and we need you" in his head as soon as he uttered the words "local movie theater" some of the old low budget commercials were so ingrained in his head. "Oh...no. I don't think I watched anything that level of...quality when I was a kid. What's this got to do with this Steven kid?" Nathan asked. "A long time ago, there used to be a local broadcasting channel that he would watch all the time for this one kid show owned by that company. It was called Delilah's Daily Dose. He became obsessed with her." Juan recalled her appearance. Her age was indeterminable. She simultaneously looked like an adult woman and a girl. Her hair was dark, and she dressed in a childish dress that would be more appropriate for a porcelain doll than an actress in a children's show. Her voice was sweeter than honey and as bitter as unripened blackberries. The TV show was in black and white, but clearly filmed with modern cameras. The show didn't appear to feature any real children. Each episode, the hostess was joined by animal-shaped robots, the creepiest two being a giant giraffe and a tiny bear, designed to look like a ragged teddy bear. "One day, I was watching the show with him and this is really weird...the lady in the show started talking to us." "What?" Nathan stared at him strangely. "Yeah I know, weird. He told me it would happen though. I didn't believe him either, but I set up some cameras to record us watching it that my cousin got from dumpster diving. And she really did start talking to us, at three in the morning like he said she would. Then this guy showed up and took Steven away. After that day, no one knew who Steven was. Only me. His parents told me they didn't have a son named Steven. I thought I was going insane. When I checked the recording, there was nothing on it. Nothing recorded at all." Juan said. That event was one of the reasons why he became so open to strange ideas and supernatural concepts, though he was already more interested in that sort of thing and more suspicious than most around him. He had no explanation for what happened that day, or why to this day, no one could see that boy's face in any picture he showed them. He remembered Steven leaving with that strange man. He saw the man's face clearly, but it always faded in his mind when he recalled the man. The name stuck. He couldn't forget the man's name. When all that happened, he was labeled very quickly by his classmates and teachers as insane. His relatives didn't think he was crazy, but they assumed he was making it up for attention or to scare everyone for a laugh. "How do you know that was real?" Nathan asked. "He's in my yearbooks, but when I show them to people who have met him, no one can see him. The only people who can see him in the photos are people who haven't met him." Juan explained. He'd shown his other friends the pictures of Steven recently, but none of them believed his story. Alex called the whole thing "bullshit". Nathan rubbed his chin. "I'm not trying to be rude, but is it possible you might have schizophrenia?" "I don't have it." Juan said. "Have you ever seen a doctor about this?" He asked. "My parents could never afford a psychiatrist. But I don't have it." This wasn't the first time someone told him that. A few of his teachers suggested he be mentally evaluated, and one outright stated he must have schizophrenia. The rest of them called him a liar. He stopped caring about being called either. "Hmm...I don't know. I'm not a doctor. Guess it's not my place to judge. Weird shit happens all the time that people can't explain, and I wasn't there." Nathan said. "But it's not like I'd think any differently about you if you did have it." "Yeah, I know you wouldn't. But I'm positive this was real. It's not like I hallucinated this guy. I have too many memories of Steven for this to have been some kind of delusion my mind created. It'd be easier for me to pretend it wasn't real. Thinking about that day...I don't know what that was..." "From my experience, the best way to deal with things that are dark and disturbing is to ignore them. If you think about that kind of stuff too much, it'll eat you alive and destroy you. At least, that's how I manage." Nathan told him. "Actually, I'm not the only one who thinks there was something weird going on with that show. There's some things I could show you, but it's been a while since I looked into it. Like you said...the more you think about it, the more it destroys you. But maybe you'll believe me about it being real if we look into it." Juan looked over at his computer. He got up and turned it back on. "What are you doing?" Nathan followed him over to his desk. Juan didn't get online the way he normally did. "You can't find everything with Google. Really, you can't find much of anything with Google, if you think about it." "What does that mean?" Nathan asked. "Most of what exists is not easily searchable. The average person only visits a very small portion of sites available online." Juan went to a specific forum as he explained what he meant to Nathan. "Think of what most people do online involving the very tiniest top tip of a giant iceberg. I'm going a lot deeper than that. I go to this site a lot. People talk about things on this forum that you can't really talk about elsewhere, but even here sometimes people will be a little vague or talk in code words to be extra careful." "What's a forum?" Nathan asked. Juan was surprised by the question. He blinked, then laughed. "You know, usually when I tell people I post on some niche forums, people laugh and say, 'who uses forums anymore'. You're the first person who's ever asked me what a forum is. I don't know how to take that." "You know I'm not a tech person. I don't even have a phone." Nathan said. "It's like...ancient Facebook...sort of. Yeah, we'll leave it at that." Juan logged into his account. He was a little embarrassed to let anyone see his username, not because the name itself was embarrassing but because he worried about anyone seeing what he posted online. Juan only used that name on that forum, and he doubted Nathan would ever figure out how to get there anyway. All anyone would get would be the lyrics for a Selena song. "Basically, this place specializes in conspiracy theories, cover-ups, and paranormal stuff. But there's other weird stuff here too. Some of it really weird. Some of it illegal. All the content is members only." "How did you find this place?" Nathan asked. "I shall not reveal my sources. Anyway, I'm going to do a quick search for posts about Moone & Wolfe, Delilah, or any of that crap. I remember I brought up what happened with Steven a long time ago on a different forum, and I got told I was making up shit. Other than here, I've gotten the same kind of reactions from people. The thread I started didn't go on very long, from what I remember, but there were a few users who thought there was some kind of brainwashing going on in the show at the very least. My thread got deleted for being in the wrong place, but I'm sure I can find other people talking about it here again, because someone linked me to another thread back then. Everything got deleted before I actually got a chance to check out the other thread, and then I ended up getting distracted doing something for my mom." He couldn't remember why he didn't go back and look again. "What's Moone & Wolfe got to do with all this exactly? I thought they were a medical company. Why did that TV interview bring up all this?" Nathan asked. "They owned the TV show too. The guy I saw that day, he said his name was Tom Summerfield. That's who used to own the company. I found that out recently. It's a weird connection. What do you know about them?" Juan said. He didn't know until then that the company had changed hands to the man's sister. Dr. Tom Summerfield was notorious, from what he vaguely remembered from that thread years ago, for not making public appearances. It seemed his sister was not as camera shy. "I looked into them once, when I was looking if anyone offered free mental healthcare around here. They sometimes take people on for free treatment at their research labs, but I didn't meet the qualifications." Nathan said. "So much for helping the community." Juan said, mocking the earlier TV interview. Juan searched for posts mentioning "Moone & Wolfe" on the forum. It pulled up several threads. He clicked on the first one titled 'Any thoughts on Kathy Beaumont and the disappearance of Pam Archer?' and read through it. Nathan read along over his shoulder. Juan scratched his head. "Short thread. Hounding Rain, they were originally from around here, weren't they?" Nathan said, "Don't know. I don't know much about them. That's not really my kind of music." "Don't know what the connect between that band and Moone & Wolfe is though. Weird. Let's look at the next thread." Juan clicked on a thread titled 'Moone & Wolfe Corp megathread: Delilah-Tina, Kathy-Pam, Hospitals'. Unfortunately, there wasn't much to look at. "Damn. What happened here?" Juan took note of the names mentioned. Delilah was there, but he didn't know who Tina referred to. Kathy and Pam were mentioned again, and then hospitals. How did it all relate? Why was the thread locked down? He clicked on the next thread that came up in the search. The thread title was 'Delilah's Daily Dosage of Cult Behavior'. Unlike the other threads he clicked on before, this one wasn't hit by the moderators as hard as the others. He read through it. "The fuck keeps happening here?" Nathan asked. "I've seen shit like this here before. Even on places like this, if you put out things too blatantly about the wrong people, it won't go over well. We can't see why it got locked, but if we're lucky maybe this user is still around." Juan said. He clicked on the user poodleghoul's profile. It read: Juan hadn't interacted with that user before, from what he could remember. He opened up her website in another tab. "Guess we gotta PM her." "What's that?" Nathan asked. "Private message. Here. Watch." Juan wrote her a message asking about Moone & Wolfe and Delilah's Daily Dose. "I'll get a notification if she responds. I wonder if she's still active. I recognize the name from somewhere...Let's check her history." He clicked to see what threads she most recently posted in. Juan read over the titles. Juan went to the most recent thread. Her last post in it was January 2nd, 2016. "She hasn't been active since January...Hmm..." Juan clicked on the tab he opened up. The website was for a web comic. It appeared to be about a witch and a revived poodle, clearly visually inspired by Frankenstein's monster. He looked around the site. The last news update was from February 18th, 2016. The shop portion of the website, which had no items available, listed reviews from customers. From what he could see, the site owner tended to do batches of orders once a month relatively consistently for at least a full year before all orders appeared to have stopped. The last review was from the fifteenth of February, three days before the last news update. He checked the links page. Juan got a 404 error when he clicked on it. Juan scratched his head. "Dead end. I don't know if she's going to answer us. Looks like she doesn't use any of these accounts anymore." "That Retro guy, he was in more than one of those threads. Maybe we should look at that thread asking about him." Nathan suggested. "The mental hospital thread could be related too. Do you remember what the name of the drug they mentioned on TV was?" "Damn...I forgot what it was. That's not out till next month though, right? That thread's probably not related. We'll start with the thread about this Retro guy." Juan clicked on the thread "whatever happened to retrotealdeer?". It read: "Damn...He's dead." Juan leaned back in his chair. "Sounds like this Roshi guy knows something about it, and it was something...suspicious." Nathan narrowed his eyes. "Let's keep looking. There must be something here." Juan opened up Roshi's profile page in another tab. He closed the one he had open and looked through the one about the mental hospital. Juan and Nathan stared at the last post. Nathan shook his head. "Do people always talk like this online?" "That was pretty civil, actually." Juan sighed. "Another shut down thread. Most of the content's gone." "What do you think that Sun person's goal was?" Nathan asked. "Looks like they were there to cover for the company." Juan said. "This isn't a website that's exactly easy to find. The fact that this account has been here from the start...is creepy. Like they knew they were up to some shit, and were already planting people wherever they could to shut people up about them. Wouldn't surprise me though. For really dark shit, that's pretty much what you should expect. But even here...I don't think it used to be this bad before. I don't know what was deleted, but you can get away with talking about some pretty out there stuff here normally." "I know it's fucked up, but none of that sounded out of the ordinary for most abusive medical places. Would something like that really need to be so thoroughly covered up?" Nathan asked. "No, not to this degree. Which tells me this is only the surface. There's much worse than that." Juan crossed his arms. "Given what what we read in the other threads...they've got the hospitals running, this cult TV show, the books, and something to do with Tina Tiffany. That Tom Summerfield guy shouldn't be left alone with children under any context, for sure. And Retro was likely murdered. We really need to see these tapes, but this mod, Cornus Florida, sure seems to love deleting anything worth looking at." "Yeah, they seem to be in on it too." Nathan said. "What does that person's profile say?" Juan clicked on the mod's username. Nathan raised an eyebrow. "Georgia, huh? Wait, we have cherry blossom viewings here?" "Yeah. I went to one once with Alex's family in middle school. He wanted to get some pictures of the flowers. I wanted the food they were paying for." Juan said. "Let's see...most recent threads..." "Doesn't really look out of the ordinary to me." Nathan said. "Yeah...but I didn't think there was content like this on the forum. There's a board for history and preserving old books and documents, but...flowers?" Juan scratched his chin. "Nah, that's gotta be a code word for something else." "What makes you think that?" Nathan asked. "It's just too ordinary. Why come here if you were going to talk about something you can talk about anywhere? Hmm...illegal plants maybe? Are the flowers a code for some kind of drugs? We'll look into that later." Juan left the user's profile open in a tab and looked at one of the other threads Poodle Ghoul posted in. His gut told him to click on the offsite collection one. He recalled the user mentioning in the other thread about posting things off the site and wondered if the title was a coded hint about the content to avoid detection by the mods. The thread was locked down, with the content of every post removed. He made note of the usernames present. Poodle Ghoul was there, as the one who started the thread and made most of the posts. Retro was there and Roshi. Josie and White Rabbit were there too. He opened up their profiles to look through. There were a few other users in the thread, but only contributed a post or two. Like before, the thread was locked down by Cornus Florida. "Damn." Nathan sighed. "They really don't want whatever was here out." Juan blinked. He hadn't seen anything like this in a long time, but he had seen it before when looking into something back in middle school with Alex. The name escaped him. He doubted Alex would still remember either. "Well, onto the next one." "You sure you want to keep looking?" Nathan asked. "We could be here who knows how long going from person to person." "Yeah, but I kinda like going down rabbit holes." Juan laughed and shrugged. "Besides, I really want to know more about this company. They're advertising on our local news. I want to know what they're about." Nathan shrugged. Juan clicked on White Rabbit's profile first. Juan rolled his eyes. He looked over what threads the user most recently posted in. Juan closed the tab, shaking his head. "Nothing of value in there. What a fucking weirdo. That leaves Josie and Roshi." Josie's profile read: "Nothing there either..." Juan clicked on the search bar. "I could do a more thorough check to look for all these users posts...then again, if it's like the other threads...I may not find anything actually useful. I'll send Josie a message." Juan typed up a quick message to send to Josie. He considered sending one to White Rabbit, but the user annoyed him and he didn't feel like it. He clicked over to the tab with Roshi's profile. Nathan and Juan read over it. Juan saw that the offsite upload thread that had been locked was there. He didn't see anything else related to Moone & Wolfe, but Roshi also had two threads about cults. He sent Roshi a message saying: He hoped at least one of the three people he messaged would respond, but he doubted they would. Lately, this forum was much less active than it was years ago when he first joined it. A lot of people vanished here and there without a word. He assumed most of them got bored of the site and went elsewhere, or lost interest in the topics commonly discussed. A lot of people, ironically, left when Facebook and Twitter became popular, despite the forum generally having a very privacy-focused interest. Some users only came on now and then to check up on things. He used to lurk a lot in middle school, when he would read through long threads with Alex late into the night. Alex grew bored of it easily, only interested in the ghost and monster videos posted because he treated them like short horror films. Even then, years back, the site was already past its prime. Juan himself found that as time went on, the internet as a whole was mostly boring. He didn't have any social media accounts. Only Alex and Eric regularly emailed him, and at this point, they texted far more often. Forums he used to frequent died off, either going dead from lack of activity or going down altogether. Lately, most of his time online was spent looking at maps and reviews or for paranormal videos on YouTube. He had to admit, Alex was right that those were all very clearly fake. He found more interesting stuff when he was in sixth grade than now. Juan sighed. He returned to Cornus Florida's profile to look into the threads she posted in. He was curious what all the talk about flowers was really about. He clicked on the thread "ethics debate--flower collecting". "Are we really going through the flower threads? That sounded unrelated." Nathan said. "It probably is, but I wanna know what it's about." Juan said as he waited for his computer to load the page. The internet disconnected for a moment while it was loading. As he waited on the page to load, he noticed what board the post was in. It was in the "Eclectic Interests" board. He rarely looked at threads on that part of the forum. It covered anything from grotesque porn and other disgusting things to discussions of taboo subjects and highly illegal activities. His heart stopped, unsure what to anticipate. The page finally loaded. The first image on the first post made Juan's stomach turn. Nathan's eyes widened. The image was of a pile of organs laid out on a table. Blood soaked through the checkered patterned table cloth underneath. Nathan looked away and lit a cigarette. "I take it that's human, right?" Juan swallowed hard. "I don't want it to be." "So, is this bitch a cannibal?" Nathan asked. "I don't know. People do all kinds of weird shit with body parts." Juan scrolled to read through the thread. Juan reached the end of the thread. He closed out his browser and shut his computer off. "Well, that's enough internet for today." "Should we report what we saw?" Nathan asked. "I doubt cops will do anything about it. There's a high likelihood half, if not all, of those people aren't really doing any of what they're saying they're doing. A lot of people post stuff like that to trick people into thinking its real. Some of them may be investigating themselves and pretending to be doing those things to sort out who is real." Juan rubbed his eyes. "Trust me. If any of that was real, the people who need to know about that already do. Their code words won't protect them if they're posting pictures too." "Yeah, but it doesn't really sit right with me to not tell someone about that." Nathan said. "Is that kind of stuff allowed to be posted on that forum?" "Having it removed might make things more difficult for anyone investigating, if any of it was real." Juan said. "Technically, some of what they were talking about isn't even illegal, just really disgusting. I do know some organizations I could report to, if it'd ease your mind." "Yeah, I think you should. I didn't really get what all their code words were supposed to mean, but at least one of those users sounded like they're murdering people." Nathan said. Juan took out his phone. He used to report content like that more when he was younger, but nothing ever came of it. At least, from what he saw. He hadn't reported anything in a while now, in part because he wasn't messing around on that part of the internet as much. The rest was from apathy. How quickly he became desensitized to content like that disturbed him. He submitted the information to a few organizations. Juan went over to the couch. "Well, so much for that." Juan sighed. "If we're lucky, one of the people I messaged might send me something. I don't know if I want to look any deeper right now." "Doesn't look like we can." Nathan said. He lit another cigarette. "Think I'll head to bed after I finish this." "Right. It's getting late, huh?" Juan said. He stretched and went to get ready for bed. When the lights were out, and Nathan was long already asleep, Juan stared up at the ceiling. Every sound caught his attention. The noise the old ceiling fan made drove him crazy. Juan got up to turn it off. When he got up, he noticed the window curtain was pulled back. Juan went to close it shut. As he got close to the window, he noticed it was brighter outside than usual. Juan stared up at the sky to see if there was a full moon. Clouds hid it from his sight. He heard something creaking to his left, by the back door. Juan turned to see what it was. The door knob turned. Slowly, the back door opened. A hand pushed the door all the way open. Juan looked up to see who was there. He blinked, and then he was outside in the backyard. Red rain soaked through his clothes and ate away at his skin. He felt himself melting away into the grass and clay beneath him. Juan screamed loudly. His voice was lost in the sound of another screaming, a painful voice booming across the sky from beside him. Its voice reverberated through his body. Juan looked over to see a giant jaguar's head raised out of a large hole in the ground. It bore its fangs at the sky as it cried in agony. Lightning struck between them, breaking away more of the hole. The jaguar clawed at the dirt to make the hole bigger. Juan, unable to move, watched the beast struggle while the rain burned away its fur. In its eyes, he saw his mother's face, and then his grandmother's. The face kept changing, but always felt familiar in some way. Juan reached over to the beast in the hill with what little remained of his left arm. It broke away before he could touch its fur. The bone hit against the ground. Stained with rain and clay, it soaked up the pain and writhed around until its form changed to that of a snake. The white and red snake slithered over toward the jaguar but couldn't reach it. Lightning destroyed it first. The jaguar pushed through one of its front paws to the surface. Little fur or skin remained on its head by then. He and the beast both sunk away, deep down into the red clay. Juan woke in his bed covered in sweat. He looked over at the curtain and the back door. Both were closed and the back door was locked. Nothing around the room looked any different. Juan hoped what he saw last night was all a very long dream. IV. Doctor