“Then why hide it?” “Because the truth would be worse. Panic.
Armed hunters flooding the woods. More deaths, not fewer.
So someone decided silence was safer.” The voice dropped.
“It is easier to let a few people vanish every few years
than to admit something lives out there that challenges
humanity’s place at the top.” The line went dead.
Frank drove to Anna’s house that night. When he finished telling her,
she sat in silence for a long time,
staring at the framed photograph of her brother on the mantel:
Logan, grinning on a mountaintop, sunburned and happy.
“So that’s it,” she said finally. “We know the truth.
And no one will ever believe us.” “Probably not.”
“Then what was it all for?” Her voice cracked. “Nine years, Frank.
Nine years of looking.” Frank took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes.
For the first time, the stubborn old investigator looked tired and very human.
