Day 5 - 20:00

Light sighed as he typed in his laptop while lightly scolding Anax. "Really? All day on your first unsupervised day and you have countless pictures of a squirrel."

The drone beeped in a low tone a couple of times. "There are five species of squirrels in this region. There are, however, only three gray squirrels with black pigmentation, and only one black squirrel that is not frightened by my equipment."

The brunette let out an exasperated sigh. "State your primary objective."

"To surveillance the camp grounds, monitor oddities within equipment and dispatch drones to inconsistencies within the surveillance equipment."

Light leaned back in his chair and scowled at the drone while folding his arms over his chest. "Secondary objective."

The drone chirped before responding. "To safeguard participants of Northway by any means necessary."

"Uh huh… Where in either of those directives does it state to monitor the wildlife?"

The drone beeped a couple of times before chiming and answering the inquiry. "Sarcasm detected. Sarcastic answer selected to respond. I believe, it falls under the primary objective while maintaining and supporting the secondary."

Beyond chuckled from behind the book he was reading while laying on his claimed bed. "Got 'em!"

Light shifted Beyond a disapproving glare before dropping his face into the palm of his hand. "Let me guess, monitor the campgrounds."

"As well as safeguarding the participants of the camp. A small contingent of children was discovered unsupervised. To keep the children in a stationary place, until the counselor could locate them, the squirrel was used as a distraction."

Shifting his eyes from his own laptop screen L hummed quietly. "Anax. What time did you locate the children while they were unattended?" He pulled up the beta patrol record to compare timestamps.

The drone chimed a couple of times before responding. "Time stamp on initial contact with unattended children was 14:29."

Clicking around in the records and comparing them to Anax's flight pattern. "If I'm understanding this correctly, Light, your drone was a better counselor than Sarah Peters. I think that is her cluster or campers for the day. It also looks like your drone kept the children close to the lodge. Because, if I understand the flight pattern to its fullest extent, your drone was with the children until the meal call at 16:30. So, four hours."

Light sighed while pinching the bridge of his nose. "Okay, okay, you're off the hook, Anax. You're right. It was more important to safeguard the children that were without their counselor. On that note, I think we need to recommend Mr. Wallace on a possible disciplinary action against Miss Peters."

Beyond scoffed while closing his book and turned his bedside table lamp off. "She's a bitch. She shouldn't be around kids or other adults." He stood from his bed and stretched his whole body. "I'm going to go do some rounds, I can't just lay here anymore. I don't care if we have to help the counselors tomorrow during some big beach day bullshit, maybe it'll wear me out some."

-x-

Mr. Wallace clicked through the camera feeds that have been shared to his own computer as he stopped on one camera that was facing the mountains. A singular form stood nearing the incline accompanied by several drones. The radio gave a staticy signal before a stoic voice came over the frequency. "Light. What kind of frequency is needed for your drones to respond?"

The radio picked up nearly immediately with Light's voice. "Uh. Depends on the drone. Alpha is tuned to respond to high pitched frequency and beta is tuned for lower."

"Okay. Riddle me this: what would produce both of those frequencies? Specifically in the range that the human ear wouldn't detect?"

Mr. Wallace leaned forward in his chair, squinting at the small screen of his monitor. He could spot at least nine drones hovering around Caspian. Light's voice hesitantly spoke over the radio again. "Uh… nothing… not both frequencies at the same time. Why?"

"I need you to pull the feed for 102 up."

"Copy that. I'm also dispatching Anax."

Mr. Wallace watched the camera feed nervously while whispering to himself. "Please, just be a glitch."

-x-

Light stood up and opened the window from their room as Anax lifted itself and hovered out the window. Watching the drone lift off into the air, he padded his bare feet over to L's computer who had already pulled the feed up.

An owl-like stare fixated on the screen with a singular index finger resting on his lower lip. "Nine drones, varying types. He's right. Nothing signaled Motion One, it was a sound of some sort.

Light lifted the radio to his face. "Perhaps different frequencies at different times?"

The voice sarcastically responded. "I just don't see a mountain using a dog whistle to summon your drones. They all arrived about the same time. I've been out here since about 18:00. They all showed up about twenty minutes ago. So whatever it was, I didn't hear it, but a bunch of these little fuckers did."

Another voice came over the frequency. "Hold position. I'm on my way. Best to check stuff out in pairs."

"Understood, Beyond."

-x-

The moon lit the clearing of the lake brightly. Mello listened to the radio and glanced up to Matt who had lit a cigarette while staring at the moon and star's reflections in the water. "Should we go too?"

The red head sighed deeply before responding. "Ah fuck… Probably. What if it's some dumb shit like a bear. Beyond and Caspian are both capable, but I also think you can't be too prepared."

The blonde quickly nodded and lifted the radio to his face and his bag over his shoulder. "Matt and I are inbound as well."

-x-

Anax floated near Caspian shining high powered LED lights in a couple different spots along the incline as small rocks rolled off of their resting places. "My sensors are picking up multiple frequencies."

Beyond walked up behind them groaning while shining his flashlight onto the side of the mountain. "The mountains are so creepy."

Caspian nodded to Beyond in acknowledgment while he folded his arms over his chest. "How many, Anax?"

The drone beeped three times. "Three separate individual frequencies."

"Nearby wildlife scan." Caspian's voice deadpanned.

The drone flashed a yellow light. "I am unable to connect to the internet, one of the higher pitched frequencies is interfering with the transference of data. Previous wildlife scans could potentially link one frequency to a mountain lion, there is a 48% match."

Matt wiped his forehead as he and Mello arrived at the scene. "So, likely not anything recorded in your codex."

Caspian groaned and pulled out a red package of cigarettes and popped one tobacco filled cylinder into his mouth. "That's a bitch. Anax, perform an aerial scan." The drone's propellers hummed at a higher frequency before lifting off, clicking and flashing its beams across the surface of the mountain.

As Anax made its way over the surface area of the mountain side, a deep growling was heard before a loud roar, causing Matt to flinch at the wildly charging beast. Matt chuckled and nervously spoke out. "Guys, I don't know about you, but I can't take a bear."

Mello sighed and walked up next to Caspian, who held his position, while loading a small gun. "Nope. But, no bear wants a flare to the face." He smirked and fired the bright red flare directly at the bear causing it to make a woofing sound and dart in a different direction away from them.

The two blonde guards smirked at each other and quietly bumped fists. "Nice."

Mello quickly snatched a cigarette out of Caspian's pack. "Never leave home without a flare gun."

Matt glanced around for Beyond and noticed he was gone. "Hey… Where is Beyond?"

They all swiveled their heads in search for the missing guard before Caspian rolled his sapphire eyes. "This man is going to get someone killed." He grumbled as he followed Beyond up the incline of the mountain. As he approached the raven he froze in his tracks when a flat outstretched palm was held in his direction.

"You hear that?"

Caspian tilted his head to the side to point his ear towards the ground as his eyes widened at the sounds. "Tunneling?"

Beyond nodded but remained focused. "Not just that, I don't know how to explain it, but if you listen closely… maybe like a scream?" A muffled screech was heard and seemed to echo through the hillside. "Either big fucking moles or a big fucking problem."

Caspian knelt down and picked up a broken piece of jewelry. "It'd be too much to ask for giant mutant moles, huh?"

Beyond snickered quietly and nodded. "We should head back and gather intel in a less exposed environment. Try to figure out what we could be dealing with. I can't say I'm super familiar with underground critters from Canada, can you?"

The blonde shook his head and lifted his radio. "Returning for information collection." Matt and Mello nodded to each other and waited for the other two to come back down to walk back together.

45 Days Remain

10 Counselors Surviving

100 Campers On Site