Calm and Calamity

Chapter 36

Day: 544

Days Left: 4936

Lives Saved: 2

Klei, Kai, and Dex stood before the remains of the cave they once lived in. Now it was just a pile of sandstone rubble that barely reached their knees.

"Wendy!" Klei yelled, rushing over to the wreckage, his hands scrambling at the rocks, throwing them aside. Dex joined him, frantically digging the debris up and calling out the wendigo's name.

Crouching down, Kai watched Reggie sniff the ground. The rottweiler circled the collapsed cave, then returned to Kai and Corinna and whimpered, his ears flopping down.

"She's not there?" Kai asked Reggie.

The dog's nose scrunched up and began sniffing around again.

Kai sighed. "You were right about that cave not lasting long," Kai said to Corinna. "It collapsed."

Corinna frowned, examining the pile of sandstone. "I don't think it collapsed naturally."

"You mean... you think Wendy did this? Or maybe another prisoner?"

"I don't know for sure, but there is definitely not enough rubble. Either someone took parts of the cave or... perhaps ate it?" Corinna looked back at Kai. "It seems she's capable of eating anything, even bricks and stones."

Kai nodded. "She eats anything nearby when she's upset... or if we don't have enough food."

"Was she getting enough food? We could increase her portion size."

"No, I think it was us," mumbled Kai as he glanced down at the ground.

Dex walked over, his clothes covered in sand and dirt. "We didn't find anything. Fortunately, she wasn't trapped under there."

"Reggie is trying to get her scent," explained Kai. "But we have nothing to give him. Wendy ate all of her belongings. The only thing that was left were parts of her bed which she never slept in."

"It also doesn't help that the wind is blowing all the sand up," added Corinna. "Any scent Reggie catches will be gone as well as any tracks she leaves."

Dex swore under his breath. "Then what are we going to do?"

"She'll be wherever she can find food," said Klei. He rose from his knees, covered in sand from the debris. His eyes looked over to the horizon, where the rolling black waves lashed up on the grey shore. "The water nymphs..."

Donning his mask, Dex transformed into the headless horseman, holding a helmet that contained his severed head under one arm. "We need to find her soon. It'll be the blood moon tomorrow."

*

With her thin and bony legs stumbling, the wendigo dragged the rest of her body over the dunes then paused as she saw a shining structure in the distance, glinting from the light. She shuffled over towards it, finding several large sheets of corrugated metal, a few lodged into the sand, standing but slightly leaning as if it would topple over at any moment. Cutting through the structure was a fallen tree, the bark charred and burnt to a blacked crisp. The rest of the bulky pieces of metal were scattered across the sand.

"Perhaps..." the wendigo pondered out loud. "I could make my own home?" She attempted to lift one of the sheets, but her bones creaked, and she gasped out in pain. Sobbing, she tore out a chunk of the metal and devoured it in anger.

"No," she sniffled. "I need to find a different home."

*

Corinna handed Kai her rucksack and spear. She then traced her finger underneath her jaw, and she transformed into the golden knight. As Corinna waded into the black water of the ocean, Dex, Klei, and Kai shouted out the wendigo's name whilst looking for signs that she had been here whilst Reggie sniffed around for her scent.