NOTUM: Study Of A Nightwalker ✔️

Ring

The man with the cologne, the one who had addressed himself as Bill Grey, walked down a deserted forest path, happily humming a song.

In his hand was an old medical handbook, pages yellowing with the passage of time and cover torn beyond recognition. As he flipped feverishly through the pages, a devilish grin spread across his face. His long fingers stopped on one paper.

"Ah, there it is. Let's see what the fools have written. . ."

✴Nightwalking Syndrome (Hanslon's Syndrome)

▫A group of psychological conditions discovered in the early 1900's. The first ever recorded case was of Phillipe Hanslon, a butler in the household of Lord Saultaire and a resident of Saultaire, Germany. The condition has not been under study for decades due its rare occurrence. It could however prove to be malignant if left untreated.

"Rare condition indeed! You should be thanking whatever you pray to that it is rare. Don't worry, Levi, you'll learn all about it soon, and my enterprise would blossom in the chaos. For everything you did to Vera, you bitch, consider this my payback."

The path stopped outside a factory, where police sirens blazed the night. He meekly blended into the huge crowd assembled before the building. Just as he was about to leave, a hand grabbed his shoulder.

"Excuse me?"

A female voice asked, "Have you seen two men running into the forest?"

He gently moved her hand off his shoulder, turned around and flashed a thousand megawatt grin at her,

"I'm sorry, love, but I haven't. What is a beautiful dame such as yourself doing here in this ruckus?"

A stunned silence followed. She didn't answer and elbowed through the crowd. Bill Grey chuckled as he walked out of the commotion and disappeared into the mist.

•°*°•

It took Firenze an entire fifteen minutes to mentally prepare himself, and he decided to rerun whatever happened, in his mind.

He remembered that Helga and he were waiting for Neil. On him not returning, they went to investigate. He was seen running into the forest, and he had decided to follow him.

From that point on, his memories became muddled. Helga had clearly held his shoulder trying to stop him and he refused. He ran into the forest, and there was no denying that because he had felt the wet moss caking his shoes. And walking into a clearing was also true, or how else would've he stopped to catch his breath.

And then there was the huge werewolf thing. That can't be real, now can it? Werewolves were just figments of literary imagination.

But his neck still hurt and it felt like hot irons being pressed onto his throat.

The pain wasn't imaginary, so why would the thing that caused it be?

He sighed and concluded that his world would never be the same again.

Besides, the Earth boasts of a variety of fauna. What if it were an undiscovered species of let's say, bear? And maybe because of its shyness, it is yet to be discovered.

A faint tormented cry echoed in his head.

He listened and waited for it to end. But the cry never did, and his migraine pounded his forehead, keeping pace with the noise.

Firenze immediately felt vulnerable; there was an uninvited guest inside, who he wasn't sure to trust. He realized that feeling scared wouldn't help because it wouldn't get rid of the voice.