A loud bang echoed through the forest, disturbing the earth around it, dirt and dust puffing up into a cloud. While coughing, Joseph emerged from the dirt cloud, lugging along a dark, long bag. He hoped to God, a rare occurrence, that no one would disturb him, and he could relocate his current experiment subject to his laboratory in peace. He looked around, seeing if he could spot anybody near by. Luckily, he couldn't notice anyone. Joey let out a sigh of relief, fixing the position of the bag and going to start on his way back to his lab.
Joseph could hear faint footsteps from nearby, as a curious vampire walks towards the bang, head tilted.
"Hello?"
He turned his head around, looking at what had just spoken.
"Oh, uh, hello there!" Joey smiled nervously, trying his best to act natural. "Lovely day out today, isn't it? What brings you to the uhhhhh, forest on this fine day?"
"Well, considering I live nearby and could hear the loud noise from my house," Claire sighs, adjusting her glasses, "I wanted to come check on whatever this is." She gestures vaguely at him.
"Ohhhh, well it was probably just some big, louuudd forest creature! I'm sure that something or someone must've scared it off by now, soooo I believe you have nothing to worry about!" He grinned, wanting to leave as quickly as he could. Despite his attempts at looking casual and non-suspicious, it only made him look even worse.
Claire tilts her head. "Is that so? Considering the dirt cloud, it must still be around here somewhere. I wonder if it's predatory, because if so, we may possibly be in danger." She smiles softly, looking to the side. She doesn't believe Joey in the slightest.
"Wellll, IIIII won't be in danger if you just, let meee, get back to my work. " Joseph gulped, taking small steps backward to distance himself from Claire. "I didn't see anything predatory, so I believe we are both okay! Aaannndd, I have a degree in science, so I know my animals. There is absolutely no danger here in this exact moment right now!"
"I'm curious as to what kind of degree and which type of science," Claire smiles, stepping slightly closer and matching Joseph's pace.
"Huuuman Biology! But, us humans and animals are quite similar. Yes, yes, we too have our groups of predator and prey! In fact, I'm starting to feel like a small piece of prey right now.." He replied, mumbling under his breath at the last bit.
"How interesting. So, back to the initial question, what are you doing out here in the middle of the woods?" Claire steps forwards, putting her hands behind her back.
"Just enjoying the lovely day, of course!?" He answered, not even believing himself. "And, I found some wonderful things to bring back to the lab with me, that's what's in the bag!" He pat the bag he was lugging over his shoulder as he smiled nervously at Claire.
"The lab?" She tilted her head to the other side.
"Yes, I have a lab! A little outdated, not fulllyyyy up to code, but it's a lab nonetheless!" Joey nodded, quickly fixing his glasses. "I found some good.. earth samples to test. A lot of them."
"How fascinating. I hope that goes well for you." Claire takes another step closer.
"Well, thank you! But it can't go well unless I gooo away to my lab now. So, good day!" He quickly adjusted the bag and tried to walk away as quickly as he could. A feeling of being watched would loom over him as he walked, but if he were to look back at Claire, she wouldn't be there. He felt strange, something was definitely off. Regardless, he tried his best to continue on his way, hoping that small interaction wouldn't cost him all of his hard work. After a little more walking, he set his bag down and took a break. Joey began walking again, leaving the forest and heading into the city to get back to his lab.
---
Joey is in the city now!! He is walking, again trying his best to keep his suspicion levels down. In the distance, by some abandoned cars, he can see a white blur moving around. Joey squinted, trying to make out what the figure in the distance was. He took off his glasses, breathing onto them and cleaning it off with his sleeve. When he put them back on and saw the blur still there, he felt a little uneasy, but he decided to slowly continue walking toward it.
It appears to be some sort of human-like entity? It appears to be something loosely based on a human, a pale skin tone with six long, spindly legs segmented by four knees on each one, suspending its torso in the air. It has no face aside from a mouth full of human teeth, and has arms that barely reach down to the first knees. As it walks, it occasionally moves its body down so that it can eat an animal carcass or something. As it hears Joey approach, it looks up to him, blood dribbling down its chin.
"H-e-l-lo?" it croaks out, in a voice sounding almost human. Like one of those videos of someone showing off their husky that they taught to speak.
Joey stumbled back a bit, trying to figure out what the fuck this thing was. It honestly creeped him out a little bit, sending a shiver down his spine if he looked too long. "Hello.." Joey responded, gulping and taking another step back.
"Wh-e-re i-s h-o-me?" it croaks, the head looking down at Joey. It steps closer to him, before turning its head to look down the road. In the distance, a black van can be seen rolling towards them.
"Home? I don't know. " Joey furrowed his eyebrows. "How am I supposed to help you with that? I'm just trying to get back to work.." He looked into the distance, seeing the van. He tried his best to move backwards, trying to get away from both the creature, and the impending doom of the van.
The van stops around a quarter mile away from Joey and the monster. The door slowly opens, and a man with ginger hair wearing a denim jacket with patches steps out. He's not wearing any shoes, and he's carrying a notebook. He has a messenger bag on him as well. On the side of the van is a shittily spray-painted picture of a slice of red velvet cake.
The man hastily power-walks over to Joey, trying to make as little noise as possible. He hands Joey the notebook, on which the phrase: 'DON'T FUCKING MAKE A NOISE' is written in honestly pretty shitty handwriting.
Joey takes a little while to make out what the notebook is really saying. He nods at the other man, keeping his mouth shut. Joey pulls out a pen from his vest pocket, quickly but neatly writing a message back. It reads: 'Why exactly can I not speak?'
The man scribbles in his notebook; 'THIS ONE HAS NO EYES WHICH MEANS ITS OTHER SENSES ARE INCREASED WERE RISKING OUR LIVES EVEN WRITING THIS DOWN IT CAN PROBABLY FEEL THE VIBRATIONS'
He read, glancing up at him. He looked confused, raising one eyebrow. 'Do you have any clue what it's intentions might be? I've already spoken to it, is that bad?'
'PROBABLY TO EAT OR INFECT YOU' He looks up to the monster, before gesturing for Joey to follow him as he starts to very quietly powerwalk to the van. Joey follows, being careful to not let his bag hit the ground and make any noise. He tapped the other man on the shoulder, gesturing to the back of his van, implying that he wanted to put his bag back there. The man nods as they reach the van.
"Prrrobably okay to talk now, hi I'm Axel and I'm a monster hunter kind of."
Joey gently puts his bag into the back of the van, immediately letting out a sigh of relief. One, because that bag was heavy, and two, because they were a safe distance from that monster. "I'm Joseph, but you can also call me Joey. I'm a scientist... Now, what's your knowledge on that monster we just ran into? Tell me everything. " He asked, pulling out a small notepad from his pocket. "I would like to take some notes, incase it can help me in any experiments. "
"Okay, so uhhh.... my group calls them Hounds and they're basically like zombies? Like if they bite you you can become one, they're like Hallowed but worse because it comes with weird deformities like that," Axel gestures to the general vicinity of the monster, "Though the deformities are usually minor, I dunno what's up with that one.. Uhh!! They sometimes gain attributes of things they eat a lot of, so maybe that thing ate spiders, I dunno," he chuckles.
Joey nodded, scribbling down whatever information he thought was important. "Hm. Quite interesting how their biology can change so much.." He put his notepad away, looking over at the monster. "Oh, and another question, this monster asked me 'Where's home', do you have any idea what that means or implies?"
"Either trying to lure you in or it still has some memories from its time as a human. Both are equally as disturbing."
"Huh, alright. Well, I'm truly glad you came along! I am a smart man, but who knows what could've happened if I continued talking to that thing. " Joey grinned, reaching out to shake Axel's hand.
Axel shakes his hand, "Yeah it happens to the best of us."
"Do you think it will approach us again? Or are we safe for now... I don't want to stay around here if there's a chance of it coming over. "
"Probably best to get out of here soon, that thing has a lot of legs meaning it can probably move fast."
"Mhm. Probably for the best, I have to get back to work at my lab anyway! Would you mind giving me a ride there?" Joey smiled, fixing his glasses. "It's a bit of a walk, and my bag is heavy."
Axel smiles, "Sure, jump in the passenger seat and we'll be on our way." Axel gets in the van.
Joey gets into the van, looking into the back to make sure everything's fine with his bag. "Thank you! It's pretty easy to find, just go down that street, take a few rights, and it's the big white place that says 'Katz Laboratory for Technology and Science!'"
The inside of Axel's van is DECORATED. There's green LED strips lining the ceiling of the van, as well as strips of fake leafs. There's a ton of memorabilia detailing aliens, bigfoot, mothman, etc. The dashboard has a ton of stuff scattered on it, mostly notes about various monsters.
"Alrighty!" He starts the gas and starts DRIVIN G
"Nice...interior." Joey said, not really meaning it but trying to be nice. It definitely wasn't his style, but it wasn't his van so it didn't really matter. "You've got a lot of notes in here. How long have you been researching and hunting these things?" He asked, looking at the dashboard and skimming through some notes.
"Since around 2018, that's when sightings of the Slender Man started picking back up and I got really into it, and that's when I met my group! Er.. Well, only Jynx really, I only knew her at the time." The notes detail various cryptids, some common like fresno nightcrawlers and notdeer, but then things like... dromen? Revenants? The Horror?????? Huh.
"Ahh, okay. I haven't been in touch with the outside much recently. Been busy with my experiments. " He continued to flick through notes, taking mental notes about the things he found important. "I knew things like this existed, but I've hardly ever encountered them. You could say I'm not very in-touch with this current decade. "
"Ah they've become like REALLY common lately because of the whole apocalypse thing, but they've been pretty common for a while beforehand"
"Mhm. I haven't had the time to research them myself, but maybe since they are more common now it will be a bit easier. " Joey shrugged, he stopped reading the notes and looked over at Axel. "Do you ever kill these monsters? "
"Me personally? No, I try to help the people affected by them and ward them off. The only times I've ever considered killing something is when people take advantage of the monsters, claiming things like 'it made me do it' and stuff like that. And I don't mean proxies, I mean people who do bad shit and blame it on the monsters."
"Hm, interesting." He turned his head around, looking back at his bag once again. "I would only kill one for science. As I do with most things. " Joey smiled, turning his head back to face forward.
Axel nods in silence as they pull up to Katz Laboratory for Technology and Science!. "Well, this is your stop!"
"Yes, thank you very much! I hope you don't run into any more monsters today!" Joey got out of the van, going around to the back and lugging his bag out, slumping it over his shoulder. "You have a good day!"
Axel waves with a smile, "You as well!" And he drives off.