Patient Name: Richie Dinklage

  Age: 21

  Date of Admission: October 28, 1998

  Admitting Diagnosis: Acute Psychosis with Dissociative Features

  Facility: New Hampshire Hospital Psychiatric Facility – Concord, NH

  Progress Note - Day 3

  Recorded by: Dr. Lisa Owens

  Summary:

  Richie exhibits periods of intense agitation, particularly at night. Staff report hearing him speaking in different tones of voice, including a guttural whisper not consistent with his usual tone. When questioned, Richie shows limited awareness, describing "a presence" that compels him to behave in ways he cannot explain. He claims something is always with him and watching him.

  Progress Note - Day 7

  Recorded by: Nurse Steven Chang

  Summary:

  Richie began self-harming today, scratching at his skin, claiming he "needs to let something out." He frequently mentions a "red man" who he says "whispers commands" into his ear. Observed pacing, mumbling incoherently, and using repetitive phrases such as "it won’t be silenced" and "it’s feeding." Efforts to calm him prove challenging; physical restraints applied for his safety.

  Psychiatric Evaluation - Week 2

  Examiner: Dr. Alan Fredrickson, Lead Psychiatrist

  Summary:

  Richie exhibits symptoms beyond standard psychotic episodes, including altered voice and facial contortions inconsistent with prior physical capabilities. He describes waking up with no memory of his actions, yet with distinct injuries. Reports feeling as though "his body is a cage." Prescribed antipsychotics prove ineffective; symptoms remain unchanged.

  Incident Report - Day 18

  Reported by: Security Staff

  Summary:

  Patient found with makeshift noose made from bed linens. He sustained severe bruising but survived. A sense of dread has affected staff working in his vicinity, with some requesting reassignment. Incident classified as a suicide attempt.

  Final Progress Note - Day 21

  Recorded by: Dr. Lisa Owens

  Summary:

  Patient Richie Dinklage found deceased in his room during routine rounds. Cause of death: heart attack. Postmortem examination reveals an unusual marking on his chest, resembling symbols but indeterminate in nature. Final recorded statement, overheard by staff shortly before his death: "He’s here."

  Patient Status: Deceased

  Disposition: Closed

  Chapter 4 ~ A Fit Of Rage

  While Otto and Lucy play detective, searching every nook and cranny of Robin State College for some sort of clue, another resident of Robin is having a fit of rage of their own.

  With just a few days left before Pumpkin Fest, The Mayor of Robin, Mrs. Shelly Strout cannot believe how incompetent her staff are. In fact, Mayor Strout is so enraged that her thin wire frame glasses fall off her face as she yells at her assistant, spewing spit on the young woman's face who sits across from her in her corner office in City Hall.

  "How can we have a Pumpkin Fest without hay bales? Hay bales are what make it cute and farmy and fun. We might as well just cancel Pumpkin Fest altogether at this point. All you had to do was make sure that all our vendors had everything together and you couldn't even do that! I should fire you, really, you incompetent twat!"

  The Mayor's assistant, Sarah Shrouder sits stunned as she endures the Mayor's harassment. Unfortunately at city hall, the HR department has been defunded not soon long after the Mayor came into power. The reason becomes more and more obvious to city hall workers every day.

  "Well, Shelly," Sarah says, standing up defiantly and crossing her arms. "I quit! Good luck having your stupid Pumpkin Fest all on your own. Maybe if you learned to appreciate your staff and your vendors a little bit better and you weren't so fucking miserable – you'd have some goddamn hay bales."

  Sarah throws up the papers she is carrying for the Mayor, letting them scatter across her office.

  "You ungrateful bitch!" the Mayor yells as she watches Sarah walk out of her office for the last time.

  Mayor Strout cannot believe it. What an ungrateful little brat! She has hired Sarah right out of college. Sure, maybe she only pays her minimum wage and maybe she might have been a little harsh, but she is preparing Sarah for the real world outside of Robin.

  Mayor Strout sits down at her desk and begins to look through her rolodex for someone who might have some hay bales to lend her. Not that she knows too many farmers or too much about how to buy hay, she leaves that up to her staff. You see, she isn't what you'd call a country girl. She has short blonde hair, perfectly cut into a bob and she always wears a Prada suit for every occasion. Even just a regular day at the office.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Mayor Strout is in her early fifties and has retired from her job on Wall Street to the quaint little community of Robin. She has never lived in New Hampshire before that, but she did grow up going to Sunapee Lake with her grandparents. Every weekend they'd make the drive up from Boston to New London and she enjoyed those summers.

  She chooses Robin only because she was talking to a man who was the owner of the Robin funeral home. Despite his profession he was quite good looking and charming. They had met when he was down in New York City on business a few years prior. When it didn't work out between the two of them, Strout decides to plant her roots in Robin, run for Mayor, and raise his property taxes. She did just that and she has been raising them ever since she got into office.

  Lucy and Otto's adventure hasn't quite turned out the way that they planned. They find what Otto believes to be nothing. Lucy finds two footprints outside of Dr. Brighton's windows that are positioned just as one would be if they were peering into someone's classroom surreptitiously. It is a men's pair of Converse that looks to be a size 14 or 15 men's.

  "Those are big feet, Otto!" Lucy exclaims as they walk down Main Street. "Maybe it's a football player or a baseball player or something. But we almost certainly know that it isn't a woman – it's a man!"

  Otto rolls his eyes, "How do you know those aren't the shoes of the window washers? There's a perfectly logical explanation to this, I'm sure."

  "Or… we have a clue!" Lucy smiles as they continue to walk side by side in the lovely fall night. They are coming up on Central Square and they figure that after their hard night's detective work that they deserve some food. Burritos are whispering their names.

  They walk down the streets of Robin, the usual quaint charm now twisted by the encroaching dusk. The Pumpkin Fest preparations cast long, distorted shadows that seem to reach for passersby with gnarled fingers. Skeletal risers stand half-assembled, their metal frames like exposed bone against the darkening sky. Soon, ten thousand hollow-eyed gourds will stare out at the town, their flames flickering like trapped souls behind carved grimaces.

  When Lucy first visited Robin State College, her mother had shown her the Pumpkin Fest. Back then, she'd seen only the warm cheery glow, the festive atmosphere. As they walk through the streets of Robin, Lucy feels something else entirely. She feels off. Something just feels wrong. Otto, oblivious to the unnatural stillness in the air, is only thinking about how drunk he could get.

  "What are you going to be for Pumpkin Fest?" Otto asks, his breath forms whips of white in the cold autumn air. "Are you going to dress up?"

  Lucy nods, "I think I am going to do what I do every year."

  "And what's that?"

  "Wendy's girl," she replies.

  Otto laughs. "I think I'm gonna be Batman or Spiderman. My mom is coming down tomorrow to take me shopping."

  "That's nice of her," Lucy murmurs, her attention is drawn to the looming city hall. The brown brick building towers over them, its windows dark except for one – the Mayor's office.

  Lucy’s heart skips a beat when she notices it.

  She blinks. And then blinks again. But nothing changes.

  A figure hovers outside the window – not hovering, she realizes with rising anxiety. It’s clinging to the brick with impossibly crooked fingers, the joints bend at unnatural angles. Its skin isn't just red but it looks flayed and raw. It glistens from the glare of the light from the office. The horns that rise from its skull are not decorative but twisted growths of blackened bone, crusted with something dark that drips slowly down its temple. The wings that unfurl from its back aren't delicate but wrinkly and veined.

  It is the same creature from her bedroom, but now she can see it clearly – truly see it – and the sight makes her stomach churn with revulsion.

  "Do you see that?" she whispers, her mouth suddenly bone dry.

  Otto squints toward the building. "See what?"

  "That... thing." The word 'demon' dies in her throat, as though speaking it might summon more.

  "What thing?"

  "By the Mayor's office!" Lucy's voice cracks as she seizes Otto's hand. His skin feels unnaturally cold and damp, like touching raw meat left too long in the refrigerator.

  She drags him toward the building, her feet moving against her better judgment. Each step closer makes the air feel thicker, harder to breathe, as though they are wading through invisible miasma.

  "Lucy! What are you talking about?" Otto's voice has an edge of fear now.

  When they stop just feet from city hall, Lucy stares upward. The creature has pressed its hands against the glass, leaving smeared, oily prints.

  "Lucy, you're scaring me." Otto's voice quavers.

  "Shhh!" Lucy hisses, as they creep closer.

  The creature's body contorts at an impossible angle as it peers into the room.

  "What if it's going to hurt the Mayor?" Lucy whispers.

  Otto rolls his eyes, but his face has gone ashen. "This is so silly, Luce."

  "It's not. We have to stop it," Lucy says. She kneels and grabs a stone, her fingers trembling.

  "What are you doing?"

  "I played softball for ten years," she says, her voice steady despite the fear clawing at her chest. "I can hit it."

  "Lucy. You played junior fucking varsity. Lucy don't do it," Otto hisses.

  Lucy grips the stone, feeling its weight. Something deep inside tells her to drop it, to run, to hide – but another part, a part that has been awakened when she first saw the creature in her bedroom, knows she can't let it continue wreaking havoc.

  She winds up and throws with all her might. The stone flies true, but as it strikes the creature's head, it passes through easily like the creature is never there. The window shatters, glass exploding inward toward the Mayor's office.

  The creature's head twists around to face them, bones cracking as it moves in a way no living thing should. Its face is all wrong - one bloodshot yellow eye with a slitted pupil like a cat's, the other nothing but an empty socket oozing black. When it smiles, its jaw unhinges, stretching wider than possible, teeth crowding its mouth like broken glass. The thing doesn't just snicker - it laughs.

  Then it disappears – not into darkness, but into nothing.

  "What on earth?!" echoes a voice from inside of the building.

  "What on earth?!?!" yells a voice from inside the Mayor's office.

  Otto and Lucy look at each other and share the same expression that says RUN!

  As the Mayor walks up to the window to inspect the damage, she looks out into the darkness looking for the building's vandals. She sees nothing. Just a quiet fall night.