Apeirophobia

Case: 058, Part 1

The Watcher

Shen opened his eyes after a long nap. He was in the passenger seat of a white van, staring at the road in front.

He looked out the window, he was currently in the middle of a dense forest, watching as each of the trees swiftly went by. The sound of birds chirping and the engine of the van filled the air as he yawned and looked to his side, only to be greeted by a rather beautiful woman handling the wheel, driving them to their location.

She wore an indifferent expression, listening to the radio while driving the van. The woman wore a button-up shirt with a red coat, along with long jeans and beautiful snow white hair. Put simply, Shen was quite the lucky man to wake up next to such a beautiful woman.

"Are you going to continue to stare at me, Detective? You know, such an act can label you as a creep by most women." The woman spoke, not batting an eye at the detective.

Shen chuckled, adjusting his mask a bit before pulling his seat back a little to kick his legs up, leaning back in a relaxed fashion. "My dear sidekick, I am merely admiring your beauty! How could such a handsome, young man like me help but stare at the glamor of such a fine maiden?" He remarked in a smug way.

The woman's name was Ash Azhkravic, Shen's investigation partner for almost over a year now. She's a serious woman who takes her job with the utmost responsibility, and had only joined the POV a year ago. Unfortunately for her, she was grouped with who was most likely the strangest individual in the POV as a whole. Still, she took the job for reasons still unknown, and had been a great asset to the organization ever since.

"Handsomeness is subjective. Besides, hard to tell what you really look like when you cover your face with that mask...let alone you always dress in thick clothing to cover your entire body." Ash spoke while letting out a defeated sigh. Contrary to her, Shen was covered in clothing from the top down. He wore a fancy fedora, a coat and the POV's signature button shirt, gloves and boots to cover his hands and feet. He even wore a strange mask which covered his entire face, though his emotions were never really unknown despite the mask for a specific reason.

"Oh come on! Have some trust when I say I DO have a magnificent face, quite handsome and demure if I do say so myself!" The smile on his mask shifted, widenning as he turned towards Ash with intrigue.

The strange property of the mask was its ability to mimic and project the wearer's expression on its surface, but whether the mask was its own entity, or a part of Shen's body, or both, was completely unknown to Ash. Luckily she has long since gave up on finding the answers to this question. But it was undeniable the mask itself had some abnormal properties.

As they drove deeper into the forest, Ash turned on the autopilot feature and walked to the back of the van while Shen whistled in his seat. She would walk over to a drawer near the back and pull out a file with the name 'Case 058' on the front. Then she would begin to turn through the pages.

"On this investigation, we will be dealing with Case File: 058; Codename: The Watcher. Want me to read it to you as a refresher before we arrive, Detective?"

Shen lowered his feet and turned his seat towards Ash with and eager smile across the mask. "Proceed!" He excitedly said as Ash began to go through the contents.

Case: 058
"The Watcher"

Sightings:
In 2016, a group of teenagers went camping inside the forests of Peru. On one faithful night, one of the campers, Jeremy, noted smelling something foul near the riverbank. His friends initially thought it was just his imagine and continued to camp out in the wilderness while Jeremy went to investigate the smell.

Hours passed and Jeremy did not return, so the group separated into packs in search for him. One of the notable groups, consisting of Ferdinand and Bobby, walked around the forest for roughly an hour before hearing the loud and horrid cry of what sounded like an eagle, but something was off about it. The two would run back to the camp, only to find it completely destroyed. Bobby yelled out to his friends, but there was no response from the remainder of the group.

As the two grew more and more anxious, Ferdinand spotted the shadow of a large creature in the trees, staring at them. The creature would fly down towards the two, causing Ferdinand to be the first to run as he accidentally knocked Bobby over. The creature would then dig its talons into Booby's torso and fly back into the forest, leaving Bobby to scream out for help as the creature let out a hoarsed yell, sounding exactly like a human. Ferdinand would escape the creature, but his car would be found days later, crashed into a tree with no presence of his body to be found.

Entity info:
The Watcher is reported to be a large raven with bloody feathers and exposed skin. It's most notable feature being its face, which is the face of a human with a terrific smile and crooked, dirty teeth. It supposedly flashes its red eyes towards any prey in its vicinity and will stalk its prey before dragging them into the forest. The entity is noted to be at least the size of a small bus, and supposedly has unknown abilities yet to be noted. It's wings are also noted to be 'unnatural' and should be taken into account.

Threat level: (Orange)
-Locate the entity's hunting ground, avoiding it can cause the entity to abandon its prey ONLY if there are other prey nearby.
-There is still information unknown about the creature, stay vigilant

Good luck you two! Fly high, Cacaw!
- Xin Mei

End of report.

"That is all Madame Xin Mei prepared for us." Ash said while closing the file and putting it back inside the drawer.

Shen sat there, pondering to himself for a bit before nodding with a wide smile on his mask. "Sounds like a fun entity! I wonder if it has any 'bird eggs' worth eating!" Ash started at him in disgust as the van came to a stop.

In front of them was a section of the forest, sealed off with tape and 'no entry' signs. There was a thick fog in the forest, despite it being day, the inside looked almost completely dark because of the lack of sunlight covered by the thick fog around the area.

Shen bounced out of his seat, stretching slight as the doors of the van slowly opened.

"Alright my dear Ash! Gather the equipment, time for a little bird hunting!"

1171 words.