The vigils and custodes only reached the beach and the abandoned hut two hours after the hybrids left. In the darkness around 11:30pm, it took them another thirty minutes to find the entry of the hideout under the wrecked car. In the hideout itself, they could smell that the scents matched those found in the hideout of the Forest of Oderem. The only difference was that no belongings were left behind this time.

They searched the forest before Duica had the idea to start looking through the wooden hut again. The fact that the floorboards had uneven gaps in between and the plank walls weren't evenly constructed depicted that this shelter was not built by a professional. Perhaps it was a family project of sorts.

If there weren't any clues here that would lead them to the hybrids, maybe there was something that could tell them who this shelter belonged to. To his disappointment, there didn't seem to be any scent. This place was abandoned for a very long time. He could smell the thick dust and the rooms with closed windows and doors only smelled musty, nothing more.

He and five others ran their hands over the layers of dust of the furniture and walls, hoping to find something hidden. When Bernadette decided that she wanted more ventilation, she took heavy footsteps to the slightly-opened window. She stepped on the floorboards so hard like she was punishing the hut for their dead end, and that was when one of the boards broke and her leg went right through the hole she created, alarming her colleagues who sprinted from all corners of the hut to her as she cursed at the pain. Dominic and Duica had to break the board around her leg before carefully pulling her out as she tried not to make a big deal out of the wood splinters that went through her flesh. Dominic and Portia started helping her take those out while Duica took out the broken floorboard and ran his fingers through the cobwebs and dust that filled the space underneath. When his fingers felt something solid, he froze for a second and his heart raced before he took out the small, slender object.

After flicking away the dust, Duica found that it was a pen.

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