In the morning they took whatever little food there was to be found and one set of spare clothes for Vine. Kat also changed into more practical combination of loose pants and a blouse instead of the plain dress she had worn during the attack. At the inquiry about a spare set she only replied that everything else she owned was in her house in the village and she really didn't want to go back there now. Which was quite understandable, considering that the place would most likely be littered with corpses or what little remained of them.

Vine took the child's hand as he started heading to the direction opposite to the port. Kat was still praying at the priest's grave. "Wrong way, kid."

He kept pulling.

"We need to go that way."

The child jerked his hand free and ran to Kat.

Vine sighed. "Now listen..."

"What if he knows something we don't?" Kat suggested. She knelt at the child's level. "Could you tell me where you want to go?"

The boy's mouth crunched up like in deep thought before he tugged at her hand.

"I guess we might as well check it out," Vine said. "I'd like to know where he got that key." He nodded to the boy. "Lead on, kid."

The child led them through the jungle in a twisting pattern, but it quickly became clear there was nothing random about it. He was going around obstacles a 4-year-old couldn't climb over or pass through - otherwise his path had a definite direction.

He must have been backtracking his earlier trek to the church.

Vine pulled both his companions to stop as they came upon an old, sturdy bunker made entirely of concrete. It had a door made of steel and something had almost torn it off its hinges.

"Has this always been here?" he asked.

"I think so," Kat nodded. "It's probably from the time of the last guerrilla war. A rebel faction tried to win independence from the mainland. They lost, though."

Vine couldn't help but see the correspondence to his own life there, but that was not important right now. The kid had grabbed his hand and was trying to pull him along. His eyes were almost...pleading.

"Have you always been mute, kid?" He could clearly understand speech, though. "Do you know any hand signals? Could you tell me what this place is about?"

The boy just shook his head and pulled harder.

Well, it wasn't the first time he'd had to face unknown danger. "Stay close to me, both of you."

At least there was still electricity in the bunker, and the lights were on. The first rooms they came across were small living quarters. They were furnished and all looked like they had been occupied recently.

Vine counted the beds as they went. At least eight people. Possibly more. So where were they now? The rooms were deserted and there were no signs of a struggle. Dream-eaters were messy hunters, so there should have been at least blood.

His attention was drawn to a picture frame on the shelf in one of the rooms. In it was a photo of a woman and a little kid that looked a lot like the one traveling with them. He took the frame and looked at the back. 'Marika + Shaye (3 years),' was written there.

He turned to look at the kid, who had climbed on one of the beds and was intently studying a small teddy bear. "Shaye!"

The boy looked at him and hopped down, the toy forgotten.

"So your name is Shaye?"

He nodded.

"Is the woman in this picture your mother?"

Another nod.

"What happened to her?"

Now Shaye looked close to tears.

"I see..." She must have died.

A sudden shrill scream caught his undivided attention. Where had Kat disappeared to?!

The demon quickly grabbed Shaye under one arm and dashed to the direction of the sound. He found Katherine frozen on the spot in the largest room this far. It was closer to 10 x 10 meters in size, with a large stone slab that looked a lot like an altar of some kind almost at exact center. Around it there was a circle Vine instantly recognized as related to demon-worshipping. Probably originally drawn in blood, but now the material had been charred to the concrete floor.

Yet those were not what had shocked the young woman so much. It was the seven corpses lying on the floor in a rough semi-circle around the altar. Five were practically torn to shreds, but two had been somehow...burned, yet it was like the flames had turned the outermost layer of their skin into glass, leaving the body a grotesque reminder of their painful end.

"They're dead," he simply said as he put Shaye back on his feet next to Kat. "They can't hurt you."

"That's not- that's-" Kat's voice broke before she could finish her sentence.

Vine gently hugged her. "Meaningless death, I know. But right now we have to focus on keeping ourselves alive." She was shaking in his arms. Innocence always had its good sides and bad. In times like these it was better not to feel much else than empty sorrow over such senseless slaughter. "Will you be alright?" he asked.

Kat nodded slowly. "I- I'll manage."

"Good." He slowly kissed her forehead in a comforting manner. "I know you're strong enough to overcome anything that comes your way."

Then he moved to inspect the pattern burned to the floor more closely. There was one spot on it that he was drawn to, very near to the center and right in front of the altar. Entwining circles around entwining circles, so many and complex that one got dizzy just trying to follow them. And in the middle was an impression of a key.

Kat had to swallow multiple times before finding her voice again. Everything felt so unreal. Other than the horrible sight, it was like her senses had disappeared completely. She could smell nothing, not as much as the stale air, let alone the stench of blood, the air was completely still and it was almost like Vine's footsteps made no sound whatsoever as he moved around the room. "What...happened here?"

Vine browsed the book lying open on the altar. "Key to the abyss, eh...I thought this book had been lost ages ago," he mused to himself. Then he looked at Kat. "They were trying to summon a powerful demon. Most likely in hopes to get a wish granted." He paused. No matter the era, those wishes remained mostly the same. "To get a loved one back."

Then he abandoned the tome and scanned the rest of the room again. The carnage was definitely the work of dream-eaters. "What they did instead was open the door to hell."

Kat was still pale, but she forced herself not to tremble. "But it's closed now, right?"

"Temporarily, yes." Vine knelt in front of Shaye. "And you got the key right there, don't you?"'

Shaye quickly clutched the black key to hide it from view.

"Listen, kid. It won't bring your mom back. Nor your dad. But it can send those things that killed him back to hell."

"Really?" Kat's voice was full of hope.

"If the instructions how to allow demons to come to this world were correct, I see little reason to doubt the accuracy of the ones how to send them back."

Shaye shook his head defiantly. Vine sighed. If he could actually touch the key, he could simply take it, but he couldn't.

The demon looked up as he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Let me talk to him," Kat offered.

"Alright," Vine said and stood up. "I'll prepare everything else."

It was for the best that neither Kat nor Shaye would read the ancient tome and learn its contents. As it was, he fully intended to burn it to cinders the moment they had sealed the dream-eaters back where they belonged.

He did not know what Kat had said to the kid, but Shaye stepped forward with a determined expression - although it did also hold some hostility towards him - when he had finished modifying the stage for the ritual and turned to look at them expectantly.

"Just place the key here," he gestured towards the tiny indentation on the floor. "I'll take care of the rest."

The boy cast him a look that almost said "you better keep your word!" and did as he was told. The whole pattern lit up with crimson light.

The door was open. Vine quickly turned to the book and started reciting the spell to pull the demons that had been called to Earth earlier back to where they belonged. They did not have much time before more would undoubtedly notice this new passageway.

Beyond that everything was a little hazy. It was like space and time themselves had bent around them. He could feel countless other lives around him, being compressed into a stream that became narrower and narrower before it was sucked into darkness at dizzying speed.