Snippet #2723417

Having been discharged from the hospital not long after arriving, Felix had spent the rest of his weekend and Monday not up to much. Since he was here to study, he would just be working a few evenings a week, plus Saturday, so he wound up in his room most of the time, refusing to go out for fear of something weird happening again, reading comics and novels to pass the time. He had decided to stay away from TV for the time being, after switching it on and immediately seeing a news report about a death here in Timberland.

What certainly didn’t help was that his ‘annoying sidekick’, as he was now calling it, had figured out it could essentially shapeshift and cast illusions on him, being part of his psyche and all. On Sunday night, he had been kept up by scratching and distorted, unearthly whispering noises at the door. Now he had figured out the culprit, it was slightly less nightmare inducing for him, but the trick where it turned into a horrifying mutated goat and charged at him still made him flinch, which obviously amused the creature, as it changed back to its normal form and rolled on the floor in hysterics. Throwing in a few spiders and snakes seemed to be working pretty well too.

He was actually relieved on Tuesday morning when he finally had to leave the flat. He thought he would be a nervous wreck walking around town after the recent incidents, but he always felt safe surrounded by other people, especially in the daytime.

Everything went pretty normally from there. His walk to the campus was short and peaceful. His first lessons of this year were more like poetic rambling than teaching anything practical but he listened intently nonetheless. Last year he had gotten looks from the others as he was one of those students who take excessive interest. He still managed to work up a small mountain of notes, but his peers were used to it by now. Even his inner demon found him hard to distract.

Having spent far too long reorganising said notes, and struggling to stuff them and his books back into the brown laptop bag he was now keeping in his locker, he set off to grab some lunch.

Nearing the dining area, he heard some scuffling and what sounded like someone collapsing. He hurried around the corner to see if something was up, only to run into one of the people he’d met the other day. Sebastian was standing up and seemed fine, and although it seemed some kind of wound was on his neck that hadn’t been there before, there were no signs of bleeding.

Felix approached him, waving to the young man just has he was picking up his phone, making him wonder if he had fallen over or just dropped his mobile and struggled to get it off the ground quickly.