Dense Macabre

Another one of those stupid lunatics, Laree thought as she slipped the letter into her leather handbag and slung it over her shoulder. She had experience with such people, psychiatry was the Nidoqueen's business; she had even a few patients from the other districts consult her in her career as a private psychiatrist. Insanity was her next best friend.

Her mate - a Typhlosion she had known for the past twelve years - was at the dinner table, in his midnight blue copper uniform and leafing through the weekly Arcana. He laid on the table his magazine and gazed casually up at Laree when she came down the stairs, smiling lightly as he did so. Laree thought he looked ready to drop anytime, with all the shit his department had been managing recently.

"What now, you've got yourself another patient?"

"A Lucario called Hallvien, he might be another one of those paranoids." Laree exhaled as she removed her taupe overcoat from the coat stand. "I'll probably be back before five today, Tylior, this should be quick enough."

"And ... I'll be waiting." Tylior rose from the chair and kissed softly Laree on her lips as she passed by him. "I love you."

"I love you too." Laree smiled back at him and opened the door. "But you should get some sleep if you're tired. Take leave or something."

Laree closed behind her the door and the tap of hollow wood echoed soon after, Tylior stood at his position for a moment, gazing through the curtains at her fading silhouette before falling back into the chair, burrowing his face into his folded arms laid on the table.

*****

15:07

Laree threw a glance at her wristwatch, and rapped gently upon the oaken door, expecting a Lucario to appear from behind its asylum. The house was cold and silent, its frame humble yet possessing an expression of uncertainty, the only sounds were the low rustle of leaves and the constant hum of the mid-October winds. I've never liked Autumn.

Mommy, why are the leaves red?

The leaves turn red in Autumn, dear. It's all part of nature's ways, the Nidoqueen smiled.

Why can't they turn pink? Red is so scary.

Like blood.

A young Lopunny emerged a while later from behind the door, everything about her elegant but her face; her expression was hung with concern. Laree recognized instantly the worry look. They always had it.

"Good afternoon, I'm doctor Laree Sameyer, I'm here -"

"You're the psychiatrist?" Laree was caught off her guard but nodded regardless in response. Before she could continue however, the Lopunny had hand-gestured for her to enter, and she did without a word.

The furniture burned deep shadows into the flooring, the only indication that it was day was the light that filtered through the drawn curtains. A large rectangular aquarium stood on a shelf across the doorway, filled and decorated with rocks and anubias anugustifolia, but no fish. At the far end of the lounge the flames snapped weakly on the large stone hearth, like a Charmander on his deathbed. Rather, Laree thought the young Lucario who was lying on a black sofa was the one who looked sick, terrified, and ready to die.

"Thanks for coming all the way here, I'm Hallvien's sister Amarin anyways. Um, that would be Hallvien, lying on the sofa."

For a strange moment Laree and the Lucario stared at each other, and for that one moment she felt like she knew this Lucario. As fast as that thought had come however it passed. We know each other, you and I.

"Okay." Laree whispered almost imperceptibly to herself and walked to Hallvien, offering her extended claw, which Hallvien shook as he propped his body upright. Alright, let's get this shit started and over with. "Hi Hallvien, I'm doctor Laree Sameyer."

"Thanks doctor, sorry I had to trouble you."

Amarin pulled tighter over her body her khaki seaman jumper as she sat on the armchair immediately beside her brother, glancing nervously between the two as they exchanged handshakes. Laree frowned as she took her seat on the armchair across him, pulling out a pen and notepad from her handbag. Hallvien seemed more or less fine, with only a hint of discomfort in his voice, unlike what his expression was conveying to her. All the better, maybe he just had some nightmares.

A voice echoed from the depths of her memories, it was what her colleague and senior always said to her. Talk to your patient about himself and understand the roots of his worries. Then can you stand in his shoes.

"Well, Hallvien ... why don't you start by telling me about yourself?"

Hallvien stared quickly at the window, twiddling his thumbs as he muttered nearly to himself. "Um ... right now I'm twenty three ... I'm working part time in a store ... that sells camping gear ... uh, in the morning on weekdays ..."

He glanced again at the window, and turned back to Laree for her acknowledgement. He's probably unfamiliar with psychotherapy, doubtful of what to say and do. Common. Laree nodded approvingly at Hallvien and partially to herself as she scribbled onto her notepad. "Do continue."

"Uh ... I'm still single, um ... no girlfriend. And ... um ..."

Amarin was silent, merely observing as the conversation progressed, and before Hallvien spoke again, he looked once more towards the window. The silhouette of a small bird projected onto the cream-colored curtains, perched upon the windowsill and rustling his feathers. Hallvien nearly scream aloud when he saw it.

"Is anything wrong?"

"No, no, no ... it's okay, it's okay."

Hallvien waved off Laree, sinking slowly back into the sofa, and keeping affixed the whole time to the curtains his wide-opened eyes. Developed ornithophobia? Phasmophobia? Or just paranoia? Laree recorded onto her notepad, glancing between Hallvien and the drawn curtains, which was now vacant. She sighed and laid down on her notepad her pen.

"Well, Hallvien, do you have any fears? Ornithophobia maybe?"

Hallvien looked ready to ask what the hell ornithophobia was, then seemed to change his mind.

"No, no phobias."

"Alright ... then why don't you tell me about your problems next?"

Hallvien seemed to have been anticipating the very question; he looked eager to talk. What are your problems?

"Well ... I wake up in the middle of the night almost every night ..."

Is that supposed to be a problem? Laree looked down at her handwriting upon the notebook. "Is there anything unusual ... waking you up?"

"No ... I mean, yes, there's one thing. There's a Noctowl, on my window."

"A Noctowl?" Laree looked casually up from her filled notepad page, eyeing doubtfully at Hallvien as he gazed back at her. Laree thought there was more fear in his eyes than Laree had ever seen in her life.

"Its eyes are big ... a white Noctowl."

A white Noctowl, just looking at me.

The words echoed back to Laree as she stared straight at Hallvien, her eyes alert in surprise and unable to compose her sentence. Those exact words she had heard a month ago from another one of her patients, a female Alakazam who would wake up occasionally in the night to see a white Noctowl staring at her through the window. About a week ago, there had been in the Sherrom Tribune a small article about the same Alakazam who had disappeared from her home without any trace of ever leaving the house in the first place.

Laree was too astonished to respond, something told her that there was some sort of connection between the two of them, but she knew that she had to reply to the Lucario's troubled looks.

"Have you ever seen it before?"

"Um ... when I was a Riolu, just staring at me."

"Okay, and ..." Laree realized abruptly she had stopped writing her notes and she scribbled hastily something onto her notepad. "Have you seen it a lot?"

"Every night this week."

Slowly, Laree looked back up from her notepad, to stare at Hallvien; his face was a deadly pale, hung down more than an old man's. The way that they looked at each other frightened Amarin, if not the warped expression upon her brother's face, she herself was ready to break into tears. Hallvien stared back at the ceiling, his whole body trembling violently. It can't be the cold, it's warm enough. Laree was beginning to worry.

"Tell me about the Noctowl."

"It doesn't look like a normal Noctowl."

"No?"

"It's not a Noctowl."

"What?"

Hallvien brought his right paw up to his face, his arm shaking the way the handle of a revved chainsaw vibrates, his lips pursed so tight Laree feared he might have bitten his lips off.

"It's-not-a-Noctowl-it's-not-a-Noctowl-it's-not-not-not-Noctowl-not-"

"Hallvien, calm down."

Hallvien's jaw roared wide open, his lips folded and fangs bared, his back arched impossibly. The scream that came next was nothing like what Laree had expected. It was terrible, feral, agonized. His body was experiencing uncontrolled convulsion, epileptic seizure; his muscles were contracting and relaxing rapidly. Laree was too horrified to react, out of the corner of her eyes Amarin was frightened completely witless. Somehow Laree could tell that this wasn't actual seizure. No, this is different.

The digital alarm clock on the desk beside Hallvien's head began beeping.

"DALKHUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!"

All within a spilt second, Hallvien swung over the back of the sofa his left arm and pulled, dragging along his entire body weight and the sofa as his flipped from his supine position half a round, kicking the desk over and scattering all the contents. Laree dropped instantly her pen and notepad and stood towards Hallvien, Amarin drove herself further into her armchair, her screaming voice resounding through the lounge. The digital clock fell after the table lamp, bouncing back upon the wooden flooring to land face up, its ruptured display showing a red 3:33. Hallvien tripped over the askew lamp frame, and his temple slammed square into the tilted desk surface, splitting his scalp. His claws digging into his skin as he seized his bleeding forehead, he rolled around and onto the floor mat yelling, leaving smudges of dark red onto the fabric.

What language is he screaming? Laree's eyes were grave. "Amarin! Call an ambulance now!"

"MASKIMXUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!"

Amarin staggered from the sofa and away, nodding senselessly without really comprehending as she cried. Laree fell onto Hallvien and pinned down his arms from flailing; the Lucario was clicking faster than any nutcracker could his teeth, and for a moment Laree had a strange compulsion to push something into his jaws. Raising up high his legs, Hallvien rammed his knee into Laree's side; she grunted and thought she had heard a snap. His strength was crazy. Where are the goddamn neighbors when you want them?

"AMARIN! GET ME A PAPER BAG!"

Amarin dropped the phone back onto the table, letting the receiver dangle off the tabletop as she rushed into the kitchen. Within the few moments she had forgotten completely to contact the hospital, her mind distracted to try to find in the kitchen drawers a paper bag. Amarin rummaged through the drawers, slamming them as desperately as she pulled them. As far as Amarin could remember, Hallvien never had seizures, and he had no reason to have one today.

Amarin struck at the floor and pulled out the last drawer, half-screaming half-sobbing through her tears and frustration, then stared foolishly at the brown paper texture lying beneath the scattered items on the floor, uncomprehending what was going on currently. She yanked the crushed bag from its place, and ran back to Laree, her left shoulder knocking hard into the wall as she passed.

"Here, it's here!"

Laree snatched from Amarin's delicate paws the bag wordlessly, all the time keeping her body knelt low over Hallvien. And she pulled the paper bag over his gaping muzzle, the material crumpling inwards as he inhaled.

*****

Tylior blinked and looked up from the dinner table, his vision hazy and bright.

"Laree?"

He sighed deeply and shook his benumbed arms, both throbbing painfully after he had slept on them. Tylior surveyed the surroundings, the walls dark and shadowed in the gentle evening light, and his eyes came eventually to rest on the clock hanging against the wall. His confused brain took about half a minute to contemplate fully the time.

"Laree?"

Tylior looked to the coat stand, and Laree's taupe overcoat wasn't hanging where it was supposed to be. He moaned exhaustedly, smoothing out his copper uniform as he opened the front door.

"Damn if she isn't late."

*****

Laree collapsed onto the stool panting heavily. Hallvien was laid in his queen-sized bed, his forehead bandaged freshly but trembling slightly still from shock. With some help from Amarin, Laree had managed eventually to bandage Hallvien's ruptured scalp and transport him upstairs to his bedroom. She could have done it probably with half the time, however, if Hallvien hadn't tried his hardest to protest.

Amarin had her eyes cupped lightly in her paws, breathing loudly and unable to afford much more tears. "How ... how is Hallvien?"

Hallvien whimpered lowly in response. Laree exhaled and brushed away from her brow her sweat. Amarin cried again.

Laree estimated that they had spent about an hour to move Hallvien, but she had no actual way to tell, because by some strange phenomenon, both her wristwatch and the digital clock on the desk beside Hallvien's bed had stopped exactly at 3:33. She grimaced and adjusted the bolt on her watch, but it was jammed firm, stuck. She was beginning to lose her cool, one of the things a psychotherapist must never do.

"Where is the goddamn ambulance?"

"Oh god, I forgot."

The handset beside the digital clock began ringing. Laree almost sprung from the stool, and stared at the Lopunny as she picked up the receiver.

"Huh - hello?"

Amarin screamed and dropped the receiver onto the flooring, which split apart and revealed its internal wires and circuit boards. Hallvien shivered beneath the bed sheets throughout.

"There was someone making these weird muttering noises!"

Laree, who had never been a superstitious person, stared at Amarin, and wondered, for the first time, if whatever that was happening within the house was beyond natural. Here I am, stuck in a creepy house with a spineless bitchbag and a misplaced nutcase.

"Call 999, will you?"

Her hand trembling almost as violently as Hallvien's, she reached down and picked up delicately the receiver, squeezing back together the two parts. Slowly, and expecting the same deep voice to appear, Amarin punched in the numbers on the phone. 9-9-9. She pressed to her right ear the receiver, then put it back down four seconds later.

"What?"

"The number's not in use."

"Not in use? That's impossible, 999's the official emergency number used in many countries, how can it ... pass me the phone."

Amarin stared at Laree, her eyes confused and somehow more frightened than Hallvien's. Laree waved her claw.

"Pass me the phone."

Trepidation punctuated in every breath, Amarin removed from the handset the phone and reached out. Laree received the phone and punched in the three numbers that she had drilled into her cerebellum when she was seven, she held the receiver to her ear. It was like breathing, unforgettable, no hesitation.

The Nidoking and Nidoqueen's cold bodies laid crumpled upon the floor, holding tight each other, both unwilling to release from its mortal shell the other's fading soul. The Nidoran shuddered uncomprehendingly before the sight. All she could see was red. Dark red. Outside the windows, it was raining red. Dark red.

Why didn't you take me?

Take me too, she had said.

TAKE ME!

Tears unstoppable, her shaking claw extended towards the phone broken upon the floor.

Laree stared at Amarin.

"But that's impossible."

*****

Tylior shrugged in his copper uniform and shivered. During this time of day he would have been on the porch together with Laree and enjoying the chilly night complemented with a fresh plate of pasta, but today the main course would be delayed. He was quite glad that Laree had left in her drawer a copy of her documents though, he was beginning to worry about her.

Then Tylior noticed his colleague on patrol, he would have recognized that fin on his head anywhere.

"Hey Dareun, peaceful night huh?"

"Tell me about it. Too peaceful I say."

Tylior chuckled. For all you know the Chief might be involved in some satanic cult, the Gallade had once said. Collecting skeletons in his closet.

It's alright now, you're safe with me.

The Nidoran wouldn't stop, her tears were soaking into his shirt.

Why?

Her crimson eyes stung his heart. They were begging for death, screaming louder than her voice.

Why didn't he take me?

"By the way, are you on duty as well?" Dareun indicated Tylior's uniform.

"No, just looking for Laree."

"Not back from work yet?" Dareun walked beside Tylior and nudged him teasingly in the elbow.

"Yeah ... 8 Glacier Bay." Tylior smiled.

"Which is ... that house?"

Dareun nodded at the distance, obscured behind some trees was a column of bungalows. When Tylior, followed closely by Dareun, had reached the particular house, the only visible lighting in the two-story was a second floor room. His instincts prickled for an instant; the solemn bungalow was giving him the bad vibes. Has she already left?

"Tylior?"

"Yeah?"

"Is that ... what the hell is that seriously?"

Tylior looked at Dareun, then in the direction in which he was pointing. Straight up.

The moment he saw it a shiver spread throughout his entire body. His mind was numb beyond what he had ever felt.

Surely this can't be real?

*****

"Ihavetogetthisthingouttamyheadjust -"

"Hallvien?"

Laree sat onto the bed and leaned closer, Hallvien's pupils were percolating, one hand had pressed hard the bed sheets into his chin, the other was shaking again. Laree edged in cautiously; she didn't know what to believe in any longer.

"Justdontrererergetjistshinginchurererermybedrururuh -"

"Hallvien, what's going on?" Laree was whispering dangerously low, her breath quivering.

Then it began.

Laree was off the bed before she had seen it coming. Hallvien sat bolt upright, his mouth gaping so wide his lips began to tear. His arms were twisted by his side, his whole torso shaking left to right erratically. Amarin screamed, her paws thrust over his maw. What Laree was seeing frightened her so much she could not think.

Hallvien was rising, his entire body along with the bed sheets off the bed.

He was levitating.

There came a hoarse voice resonating with the room, whispering.

Barra.

The light bulb exploded.

The sudden darkness blinded Laree like a torrent, and she shielded impulsively herself from the glass fragments. The next thing she knew when she had opened her eyes, the room was dyed in an otherworldly blue, Hallvien was no longer there, and Amarin was screaming.

"HALLVIEN!"

Amarin ran to the window, heaving against the navy curtains to open the windowpanes.

Then she was out.

*****

At least a dozen Noctowls scattered among the trees, all pure white, all staring towards 8 Glacier Bay. Tylior was breathing heavily, because they seemed to be fuzzy, blurred. The Noctowls were entirely white, except their eyes. Their eyes were giant, black orbs.

"Ty ... Tylior ..."

Then Tylior heard something heavy hit the grass.

*****

Amarin was flying.

A moment ago, she had been pushing mindlessly against the window to open it. Now she was flying.

Maybe Hallvien ran outside. Amarin didn't even pause to consider the fact that his room was a story above.

There's an angel in the sky.

There was impact. Then bright lights.

*****

Laree was uncomprehending.

I am alone.

The curtains fluttered. And she saw it.

A flurry of white.

Take me too, she had said.

Then her claws were screaming along the floor.

*****

Someone had just fallen from the window.

Tylior stared at the Lopunny lying outside the bungalow, then back up.

The Noctowls were gone.

Slowly, his consciousness seeped like hot water back into his body.

Then he was running.

"DAREUN! TAKE CARE OF THE LOPUNNY!"

He slammed through the ajar door and felt for the grip. Damn. My gun.

Strangely, he found Laree walking down the stairs, with an unfathomable look in her eyes. His mind spun too fast for him to comprehend the room.

"Laree!"

They walked towards each other.

"What happened?"

The Nidoqueen wasn't moving any longer towards him, she was backing away from him.

"What did you see?"

Laree was whispering, as if she was cold. "I can't explain it."

"YOU WERE THERE!"

"There was a white Noctowl ..."

Tylior stopped. Laree continued walking back.

Suddenly Tylior was afraid. More afraid than he had ever been in his life. More afraid than when he had entered Laree's home to find her two dead parents the same night twelve years ago.

"It was ... just staring at me ..."Chapter End Notes:Now to clear some questions!

1. Anubias anugustifolia is a type of water plant for use in aquariums.
2. Ornithophobia is the fear of birds.
3. Phasmophobia is the fear of ghosts and supernatural occurrences.
4. Just in case you're wondering what DALKHU, MASKIM XUL (the words Hallvien were screaming) and BARRA (the voice) is, they're Samerian.

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended, and is applicable for all consecutive chapters that follow.