Chapter Text
Chapter 1
Oliver Bell was never a violent person
That's what his family would tell the police, at least, after they were questioned about their son. His recent involvement with a string of ritualistic murders that had swept several small towns across the nation caused attention to drift to his last known communication with his family, as well as his disappearance. His mother described his erratic behavior leading up to his disappearance, as well as his rise in paranoid activities. Mumbles of a “Man with no face”, the rotting wooden planks nailed to both sides of every window on his trailer home, and those pages covered in drawings of strange symbols, people in masks, and what is assumed to be tall pine trees with an even taller figure hidden behind them. His neighbors described him as a recluse, only ever seen when returning from work or to feed the stray cats that would swarm his trailer nightly. When police investigated his run down trailer on the edge of town, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Everything was in the same place as it was the day Oliver went missing, the same bloodstains now soaked into the floor, the same trashed bedroom with broken glass and splintered wood covering the unmade bedsheets. But two things caught the officer's attention. The walls, once just covered in peeling wallpaper, were now covered in a single symbol drawn over and over, the wallpaper crumpled against the baseboards of each wall in the home. The symbol was the same in each iteration, a circle with a cross through it. The other thing the officers found when searching the trailer was a box of tapes, split into two series. One half has the same symbol scratched into the outer shell of the tapes, while the other had a more elaborate symbol. An open four point star with a box in the center, arrows carved into the inside of each section of the star ends. The points of the arrows face the inner box, with that same circle and X symbol in the center of the box. The two are clearly connected in some way, a possible cult or organization? Any leads on Oliver Bell’s disappearance went cold, leaving his family and the small town he grew up in on edge. If an introverted nobody like him could go missing without a single trace, what could that mean for the rest of the community?
Missing posters covered every telephone pole in the mountain town of Granite Falls, an extremely rural and closed off town in the rocky mountains. The posters dated from the early 80’s to modern day, from pets to children to even elderly members of the community. The town had fallen into misfortune many times within the last several decades, giving it a reputation among the surrounding towns and cities as a place of death and mystery. But within the last week several young adults on the outskirts of town vanished, only to be found hours later with gruesome injuries that lead to their deaths. None of the victims had the same cause of death, though they all shared one common injury. A circle with an X through it carved into the palms of every single victim, though the cuts themselves range in cleanliness. The only missing person to not be found was Oliver Bell, a 20 year old college dropout who lived alone at the edge of town. He disappeared shortly after seeking psychiatric help for possible auditory and visual hallucinations. The cause of these hallucinations was never put on record, as halfway through his first and only therapy session he ran out without a word to the psychiatrist. His last known sighting was on September 12th, when a neighbor spotted his Toyota Corolla haphazardly parked in front of his trailer. After that, he vanished without a trace.
Oliver woke to find himself in a forest, his glasses shattered on the forest floor beside his head. His faded pink hair is coated with blood in the back, most likely where someone or something hit him. As he pulls himself to sit up a stinging pain shoots through his body, coming from his left hand. He hesitantly shifted his weight before lifting his hand, his blood running cold as he stared down at his palm. A circle with an X through it has been carved into his palm, the lines jagged and unprofessionally done. He scrambled to grab his glasses, the shattered lenses giving his bloody palm a spiderweb like look. As his heart raced his mind and body registered the full pain of his body. The growing pain in the back of his skull, the stabbing pain in his palm where the symbol now sits, the dull pain in his spine and legs. His mind spins as he struggles to recall what happened to him before he blacked out, though in his current state even something as simple as remembering what he ate for lunch before he vanished is a challenge. His limbs nearly give out under him as he rises to his feet, swaying before leaning on a nearby tree to steady himself. His cheek rests against the bark of the tree as he struggles to think, blinking as his eyes lock onto something nailed to the tree across from him. A page with the same symbol carved into his hand, smeared in blood and charcoal with rips all along the edges. Oliver’s brain recognizes it, recognizes his own blood and signature in the bottom corner of the page. He pauses, unknowingly holding his breath as he just stares. How is this possible? Is that really his blood on the page? How did he, or the page, end up in the middle of the forest where even the most stone hearted cops won’t investigate? Oliver’s muscles tense as the creeping feeling of fear snakes up his spine, turning his head to the left. Within the shadowed canopy of the forest stands a man, a bit older than Oliver, with a muzzle and goggles covering his face. The man stands completely still, aside from some small twitches in his hands and neck, two bloody hatchets in his hands. Oliver’s lips part, his body shifting to run as a single word escapes his mouth.
“Shit.”
His body moves before the word leaves his mouth, pushing himself off the tree while willing his legs to move as fast as they can. He barely manages to avoid a root poking through the ground, stumbling as a voice shouts from behind him.
“F-Fuck!-”, followed by a quick whistle and a grunting sound. Seconds later the sound of crunching leaves echoes through the silent forest, the man giving chase behind Oliver.
The sounds of whistles, stray curses, and grunts draw closer as the muzzled figure manages to catch up, his longer legs and seeming knowledge of the forest giving him the upper hand. Oliver’s mind panics as he drops down a small ledge, yelling as the hood of his jacket catches on a branch. He manages to slip out of it just as the masked man slides down with ease. His tan jacket hangs on the tree, abandoned as Oliver forces his legs to keep going. He pushes himself past his limit, eventually gaining a bit of distance between himself and the man after zigzagging between trees. He finds a small radio tower about a mile away from where he woke up, opening the rusted door and slipping inside before slamming it shut with as much force as possible. Oliver takes a moment to catch his breath, his bloody palm leaving behind handprints as he holds the door shut. The sound of heaving breaths fills the radio tower’s base room, as well as the distant sound of water dripping somewhere deeper within the building. He eventually turns, glancing around the room before heading towards the main broadcasting booth. He steps inside, his hands immediately moving to the power button. The booth’s broadcasting setup flashes before sputtering out, static feedback filling Oliver’s ears. He covers his ears with his hands, internally cringing at the feeling of blood on his face. He desperately grabs at the microphone, trying to reach any radio that this busted old thing could reach.
“Hello?! Can anyone hear me?! My name is Oliver Bell, I-I”m lost in the woods, I don’t know where exactly I am! There’s a man chasing me with hatchets covered in blood, I-”
Oliver’s words stop short as something makes contact with the back of his head, a loud metal “Twack!” echoing through the booth. His ears ring and his vision blurs as his body goes limp, the feeling of blood running down the back of his head and neck acutely registering in his mind. His body falls forward, a hand grabbing the back of his shirt to keep him from smashing face first into the radio setup. Whoever grabbed him lets his body fall backwards though, his skull colliding with the concrete floors. The last thing he sees are four silhouettes, each wearing a different mask or face cover. Two with white masks, one with feminine features despite the silhouette looking male and the other with black slashes around the mouth and eyes. The other two figures wear drastically different face coverings. One, a black balaclava with red eyes painted on and a frowning red mouth stitched into the fabric, And the other, a barred muzzle and yellow tinted goggles.