Where the wild Neds are

Cake trails and Ned tails

December 22, 2017, Columbus, Ohio

02:37. That was the time on Tyler's phone as he lay in his warm, cozy bed next to his wife, Jenna.
Tyler hadn't been able to get to sleep at all, his thoughts were completely filled with the strange discovery of the footprints and the strange smelling fur. His dreams had become plagued by the strange fluffy creature. If it wasn't for the chocolate cake scented clump if fur which he kept playing with, he would've been certain that he'd begun to lose his mind. He'd been planning a way to find the creature for a few days, but whenever he had an idea he convinced himself that it was inevitably pointless in trying. Surely the thing would've moved town by now.
Suddenly, the singer was hit with a sudden wave of inspiration. He slowly slid out of bed to avoid disturbing Jenna and went to the living room of his Columbus home. He slid off his toy story pyjamas, which Jenna had a matching pair of, and put on a pair of black jeans that were lying on the sofa. He then picked up an old, black T-shirt and put that on too. Finally, he placed the skeleton hoodie he brought downstairs with him over his head and put it on. Tyler wanted to find what created the hole in the bush a few days ago, and there's no time like the present right?
Slipping on the nearest pair of shoes, Tyler opened the front door of his house only to remember that it was night time. He wouldn't be able to see the creature if he found it, so he went back inside and found a torch. An old, dusty, abandoned torch. But a torch nonetheless. It worked too which was a bonus. Now, torch on hand, he was ready to find what he'd been obsessing over for days.
As the 5'9" man stepped out into the dreary December night he was immediately struck by the bitter cold air that stabbed at his eyes; froze his nose. The arctic winds stunned him and made his usually vibrant lips a dull, pale shade of pink.
Tyler decided it would be best for him to put his hood over his head and zip it all the way up, past his mouth, over his nose and to the top of his head. Once again he held the old torch in front of him to see where he was going and walked down his driveway onto the frosty Ohio street.
This is where he had to make his first choice. Left, and he'd be going uphill towards a sea of houses. Right, and he'd be heading towards the cluster of neon signs and food, better known as the town.
He decided that when the creature came through the bush it was probably looking for food, so he headed right towards the city.
As he made his way toward the town, Tyler started to hear the sound of people. Quiet and distant at first, but the sound grew louder as he drew nearer to the town.
"Even when it's this late people still leave their house huh?", he muttered to himself as he got closer to where he'd be starting his game of cat and mouse with a creature he still wasn't entirely sure even existed. Tyler never left the house much, so he was surprised to find the town still bustling with people and cars despite the time and absurd cold, but that's what Christmas does I guess.
As he entered the town, he clicked off the torch and realised he didn't actually have a plan. Wondering around aimlessly didn't seem like it would accomplish much, but it was all he could do, and so he decided to start roaming the edge of the town in search of clues. He began his search by scanning the various alleyways for clues, though looking for clues is difficult when you don't know what the clues are.
After searching for about 45 minutes he decided to call it quits. He was never going to see the creature again and he just had to accept this fact. Or at least, that's what was about to happen. See in reality, Tyler noticed a chunk of chocolate cake in one of the alleys.
And then another.
And a third.
The third was followed by a fourth, which in turn was followed by a fifth, and before he knew it he was walking down a mysterious alley following a cake trail. If it wasn't for his strange decision to smell the fur he would've thought nothing of the cake trail.
The alley was right next to a cake shop dumpster which made sense, that was probably where the little guy got his cake from. Tyler followed the trail, turning on his old torch to see where he was going halfway through. There aren't many lights in alleys, so having a bright beam of light to cut through the nights darkness is handy. It's so handy in fact, that when the batteries died in the dusty thing Tyler was left utterly stranded in a dark, cold alley with seemingly endless twisting, churning paths branching out all over the place like the tendrils of some alien creature. Such menacing traits would probably belong to something with a distant, otherworldly name like Azathoth.
When the batteries died, the singer froze in place. The one thing guiding him, the chocolate cake trail, was now all but visible. For a moment Tyler thought he would have to spend the rest of the night in the alley, until he caught the glint of something from the corner of his eye.

White fur.

A sliver of moonlight must have made its way down into the concrete chasm between the buildings on either side of Tyler and found its way to the fur. The same white fur that was tangled in the bush near Tyler's pool.
He sprinted over too the fur, stepping in what he hoped to be chocolate cake as he did so, and was greeted with a familiar sight. The alleyway ended a few houses to the left of Tyler's Columbus home. Streetlights, though generously spaced, provided enough light for him to see where he was going. Before going back home to thaw himself from the violent December cold, the man decided to have a quick look around him.
To the right, just 3 doors down, was his home. To the left, an uphill street dotted with houses. To the back oh him was the cake-ridden alley way. And in front of him, across the street and partially hidden in trees was a streetlamp... a streetlamp with a tail.
Peeking around from the lamppost were 2 short, stubby horns. 2 great big ears were the next thing that Tyler noticed, tufts of blue hair hanging out of each of the creatures ears. Then the man saw those glossy eyes once again. Black, expressionless eyes, dark as the inky blackness of sky above him. Light shined off the eyes like light would bounce off a polished 8ball. Following the eyes was a short pink button of a nose and a wide, welcoming smile shortly below the nose.
Tyler stood there in awe of the creature, while the creature slowly waddled around from the streetlight and stood facing Tyler on the opposite side of the road. Silence. For minutes there was silence. And then, the silence was broken.
"Who... what are you?" Tyler asked timidly.
The creature was silent. Could it talk? Tyler was about to ask again when the creature came towards him slightly. It picked up a plank of wood from in the trees and began scratching into it. Tyler stood there, unable to comprehend the situation, he was completely out of it. That was until the thing over the road slowly turned the board around.
"NED"
With that, from the black clouds of night, snow began to fall. The man stood in silent admiration as the creature, NED, headed into the tree line, turning back once to wave at the singer before disappearing into the trees while the fresh Christmas snow lightly drifted to the road.

A/N: well I hope you liked that chapter, let me know what you think in the comments