Quote:
You are just getting ready to head to sleep and you're all tucked in when something catches your eye. It's a strange shape, or light, in your room. It's only there for a second, but dread immediately floods through you. It was just a shadow, right? Maybe you pulled too many all nighters? Forgot you put up that new poster and thought it was something else?

...Or was it something else?

Either way, whatever you thought you saw was only there for that fleeting moment. What did you see? How do you react?

...Are you going to be able to sleep tonight?


Richard ran a hand over his short hair and gave a sigh. He had been kept pretty busy at work these last few nights thanks to it being so close to Halloween and around this time of the year there were always groups of teens and young adults who went and got themselves in trouble in the forest. Always. Most of the time he would get stories about how they were hunting some monster like big foot or a werewolf and while he could appreciate the fact that they had a good imagination, he would vastly prefer not to deal with them.

After all a good portion of the time they were either drunk or end up getting themselves lost. Either way he was glad that his shift was over and done with after having to listen to one group talk about how they were hunting a ghost that would follow people home if it thought they had a tasty looking soul. Just thinking about the, clearly fake, story made a shiver go down his spine. When it came to monsters he was fine, he didn't care. Ghosts were an entirely different problem all together. Vampires and werewolves you could fight, ghosts you really couldn't.

He pushed those thoughts out of his mind as he finished changing for bed, having already taken his shower, then climbed into his bed. Once he was comfortable he reached over and turned off the light by his bed, letting his body relax.

The relaxation didn't last long though as just before he could close his eyes he thought he saw movement in the room and his entire body tensed up. His earlier thoughts about the kids hunting the ghost came back, focusing on the ghost who ate souls, and his tension shot up even farther.

As he lay there his eyes darted around the room to confirm or deny what he thought he saw, mentally telling himself he was being silly. He was a Negaverse Lieutenant, he worked with youme, he was twenty-eight, ghosts weren't real! Even though he kept telling himself these things he couldn't get his body to relax.

And then he saw more movement and this time it was accompanied by the sound of something being dragged. He was frozen on his bed for a moment, eyes wide, and holding his breath. When another sound came he jerked himself out of his frozen state and turned on the light.

It took a moment for his eyes to adjust but when they did he sagged back onto the bed and let out a breathless laugh. "How did you get out Lexus?" He asked when he breathing had evened out. The little white ferret squeaked as she tried to drag one of his shirts across the floor, obviously stealing it for a nest again. "Alright, time for you to go back into your cage so you don't give me another scare baby girl." He said as he got out of the bed and scooped the ferret up.

It didn't take long for him to tuck Lexus away and return the shirt to his laundry basket so he was soon back in his bed. Feeling much more relaxed now that he knew just what the movement and sounds were he crawled back into bed and turned off the light. As he slipped off to sleep he decided that the next time a group of teens got lost in the forest he would pass it off to one of his co-workers.

Word count: 586