Hello darkness my old friend
The house seemed to be uneventful for the next hour. Through their exploring, Melanie had swapped coats with Jon so he could be warmer. Not long after that, Jon was also wearing her scarf and gloves. He kept trying to turn her down, but lost that battle fast.
Jon took a moment to really look around, trying to Know if there was any trace of that woman from earlier. There was nothing to See. Just a cold and empty house.
“Melanie, I don’t think we are going to get any better footage.”
“Yeah. Hate to admit it, but probably right. Let's take a peek in the basement level real quick then we can head back. I’ll treat you to something warm at the station.”
Jon nodded and followed behind.
Melanie descended the stairs and Jon noticed a moment too late to catch her. The moment her foot touched the floor, she fell through. Like the surface was water. But it wasn’t that. Jon could See in water.
This was Darkness.
He let off a scoff before tossing the camera into his pocket and following in after her.
The air was thick, if it could be called air. “Melanie, do you hear me?” His voice barely sounded like it made it an inch past his face, let alone anywhere she could hear it.
The only advantage Jon had was she still had the Tape recorder. He might not be able to see, but he could feel it.
Jon reached out while navigating the seemingly endless Dark until he felt an arm. He’d hoped it was her, as he pulled. “Melanie, is this you?”
“Jon. You sound so far away.” Her voice sounded like a whisper, while he is sure she was shouting.
“That happens in the Void. Hang onto me.”
Melanie’s grip tightened on him. Jon couldn’t see the way out, but he never quite lost his footing.
Jon let out a sigh only he could hear. If this were the future, Seeing through wouldn’t have been a problem, but as the Eye was limited by reality, the Dark and it held equal footing on reality. To get out he was going to need to accept the darkness which would leave its mark.
Jon cursed mumbling about how it felt like he was on “a bloody speed run” which confused Melanie as she heard it in whispers, but she couldn’t focus as it was getting harder to breathe. Like there was just enough air to keep her from suffocating, but not enough to feel like she was getting full breaths. She felt Jon tug on her.
“Melanie, take a step up. Trust me.” So she did and she was back on the steps, the world back in clarity. Jon focused on her with a face full of eyes, all glowing.
“What the fuck was that.” Sweet oxygen filled her as she looked to the basement floor. It was still just as dark as it had been when she fell in?
“That would be the Void. It’s complicated to explain, but at the root of it, it's a puddle of dark stuff and we just went swimming in it.”
“That didn’t feel like swimming...but I think I get it…” She padded her pocket and looked horrified. “Shit, I think I dropped the recorder. All that…”
“I’ve got the tape, don’t worry. It’ll show up by the end of the week. Good to go?”
She nodded. “That doesn’t make any sense, but I guess you know how your weird stuff works.”
“Mmhmm, and not to worry, I got the camera nice and safe.”
“I wasn’t worried about it, but now that you reminded me, you better not lose that Sims…”
Jon let Melanie pass him while going up the stairs. He wanted to make sure she didn’t get caught in it. Though now even if he couldn’t See still, he could Know the Dark, and he Knew everything that was in there.
The lady from before stood in the doorway and stared down at them.
“̨͕̮̝͋̇̉͠Y̧̏ó͙u s̻̲͇̓̓h̢̰̭̲̎͛͐̈͛ͅou̢̦̯͊̓̉̔̅͜͜l̞̙̎͌͢ͅḑ̲͎͕̈̀̆̌͜n’̮͕̭̾͑͟͠t͚̕ ḥ̙̜̑̒̉͟͠a̜͈̯̎̈́̉̉͜v̬̻̇̿ę̭̯̹̋̊̎͝ b̧̩͇͆̋é̲e̡̟̪̎͆͊n͓̖͗̉ ã̻blê̺̖̪̈́͘ t̝͚̔̈́͢o̩ l̬̠̠͗̂̎ȩ̢̹̎̒̿a͈̥̠̽̎͝v̛͍̠̊é͚̰͎̔̓.̹͒”
“I’m afraid that our interests don’t align on that.” Jon was calm enough to get out the camera. Nothing like a good shot of an ominous figure blocking the doorway. “My apologies for interrupting your dinner plans.”
“̣̻̖͎̒̊́̓H̠͉͉̖͓͖͍̓̈́̀̒͛́õ̮͓̰̩̲͛̏̑͝w̧͙̦̤̦̥̬̞̄͑͛̀̈̄͒͋ d̨̦̖͂̒a̻͎̣̱͌̈͑r̟̫͒͘é̟̘̥̩͓͎̥̐͛̓̌͞͡ y̬͓͉͎̥̤̯̓̄͛̃̍͊̕͢͝o̢̭̰̦̰̜̽̾̅̏̕͡u̅͟.̨̞̹͙̰̉͑̐̽͞”̻̼̦̫̤̥̭̰̂̔̽́̄͊̍͌͘͟ͅ Her voice hissed.
“Stop that.” Jon’s eyes looked at her and she seemed to get the hint. “Now, we will be back in a few days' time. It would be wise for you not to try anything.”
The woman scoffed and vanished into the shadows.
“Did you seriously just grab the camera to get shots of her while threatening the monster lady?”
“Um...yes? I doubt she will show up again next time you come back, and I told you one more shot then we would go home…?”
Melanie laughed as she finished exiting the basement. “You are too good to be hidden away in the archives of spooky central.”
---
They both sat in Melanie’s flat while she looked over the footage they got, and Jon enjoyed some hot cocoa. Turned out they had been in the Dark longer than the later of the cafe’s were even open. To be precise, it took them a solid 2 hours to get out and it wasn’t until about 2:30am that they made it back to London.
So Jon followed her home, while explaining a bit of “horror creature” lore to Melanie. It was very basic things, no reason to explain the fear in detail, so it was mostly just him pointing out that various creatures enjoy humans in different ways. While he was very content to just feed off scared people, the lady there straight up let people wander in the dark until they died.
What he left out was the woman was most likely leaving her home on new moons to avoid her own Becoming, but ultimately failed after some time. He didn’t Know it like he would most things. The Dark was still something of an odd blind spot for him. But chances are, her first warning was the lingering humanity, while their second interaction was anger at a lost meal.
“This is definitely enough to make for a good episode.”
“You should censor the location. If people try to investigate themselves, she would probably be happy to make a meal of them.”
“It’s creepy when you talk like that you know.”
“I’m a creature that nibbles on horror. I’m not going to pretend others have more manners than I do. I quite like the idea of her starving.”
“Heh checks out. I’ll see what I can do. Probably just blur the address and slap a big ‘warning: we are professionals, don’t try this yourself’ banner in the beginning.”
“Like that would stop stray humans.” Jon laughed thinking of all the times he jumped right into every bad idea that came his way.
“I can’t be responsible for their stupidity.”
“Yeah. Humanity is too large for that.”
Melanie uploaded the data onto her laptop and it held up way better than her or Jon figured it would.
“Looks like whatever you did, worked like a charm. Want to come with me to a train graveyard? My team isn’t too keen on joining, but my gut tells me it’ll be as good as this one.”
“Sure. but we are waiting till the summer for it. I’m not doing any more cold excursions other than our return to get the footage you need for the rest of the episode.”
“I thought you weren’t planning on coming again?”
“Well, that was before a creature of the Dark tried to eat my friend.”
“Pfft. Are you being a territorial spooky?”
“Do you want to be eaten?” Jon looked away, his expression very much saying ‘maybe’ as a few of his eyes betrayed him by not taking their focus off her.
“Not quite. It’s nice you know. Like having a lion or a wolf as back up. Even if you are scrawny as anything. Think you could take that lady on in a fight?”
Jon smirked, just a little. “Yeah. I would just look at her really hard. Her type don’t like being looked at.”
“Is that the same with all of them?”
“No. Not at all. There are only a handful I’m useful with. The rest I’m not even a snack.”
“Oh. Well you lost the lion status. But you can keep the wolf cause of the whole phrase wolf in sheep's’ skin thing. You pull of the people thing well.”
“I did start this way. Do you ever actually listen to my explanations?”
Melanie made the so-so gesture with her hand while making an ‘eeeh’ noise.
“Of course.” Jon set his mug down and laid out on her couch. “I’m confiscating this till morning.”
“Sweet nightmares.” Melanie put on her headset while she tried to get the audio off the tape recorder.