October
20, 1995
I often wonder these days what it's going to take. What
are we suppose to be doing to make things right around here? Animal
has been more or less distracting himself by playing with Meryle
instead of talking to me how he has been taking Wraith's death.
Monster, on the other hand, seems to be completely different with no
sign of who he once was. I've seen him alone wondering through the
trees along the property gazing off into the clouds through the
canopy. If anything, I'd say he looks... regal. It's hard to admit
it, but Monster has definitely changed. Animal is changing too, but I
worry that it might not be for the better. Jonathan has been bringing
Meryle by for her play dates and managed to convince her foster
parents that it has doing her some good emotionally. They seem to be
under the impression that Meryle has been acting differently because
of her father's absence. Though it's true no one has heard or seen
Dornan, his disappearance is not what is causing Meryle's troubles.
She was on the front lines with us during a crisis that almost torn
this town apart. She's traumatized, and Animal is the only thing that
I know of that seems to be helping her.
While Meryle and Animal play outside, Jonathan and I
grab a drink and talk about how the whole Grim situation has been
progressing. He tells me that the transformations of those infected
are always happening at night and rise in frequency around the same
time every month, during a full moon. It can't be a coincidence, and
it's the only thing we have to go on. I'm no scientist, but Jonathan
is, somewhat. Time is running out, and if Dornan doesn't come back
soon, I have no idea what is going to happen. After Jonathan found
out where the Grim were 'coming from,' he began to subdue and
restrain them until sunrise, at which point they returned to normal.
But with the frequency in incidents rising, Jonathan won't be able to
handle all of them much longer, and this all staying quite will be
impossible.
Just this afternoon, after Jonathan and I came to the
conclusion that we need Dornan back to fix all this, Monster came to
have a chat. He started off with how he knows that we have had
difficulties on the past and apologized for his actions. I swear it's
like he has been completely replaced with another Primeran. He
shocked us by saying that if we still had a problem with him that we
wouldn't have to be concerned for much longer. He was leaving. He
presented to us a green colored glass orb. When he showed it to us,
it began to glow and slowly reveal a Primeran, a female. She had the
appearance of fox and was bowing on her hands and knees as if
pleading. She introduced herself as Takai, and pledged her allegiance
to Monster and his cause. It was some kind of previously recorded
message in which she was pleading for him to return to Ferus Mundas.
From what I understood from the message, Primeran foxes have been
allied to Dragons for a very long time, and band of Primeran thieves
stole an important relic of the Dragons that the foxes had in their
possession. Monster explained that this relic was a scroll that
detailed important research that dragons had performed on themselves
in order to become stronger, but also reveals numerous weaknesses.
Weaknesses that enemies of the dragons would do almost anything to
acquire knowledge of.
Monster plans to leave in about three days, but
considering Wraith is no longer with us, I had to ask how exactly he
planned to get back to his home world. Apparently, the Foxes are one
of the few clans that have a way to travel between Earth and Ferus
Mundus, but it has one catch. Two Primerans open the gate together
with one going through so that both can support the passage on each
side. Though Monster will be able to go through, it means that the
Primeran keeping the gateway open on Earth has to stay here in order
to allow Monster to pass through. Having a Primeran I've never met
stranded here doesn't sit well with me. Call me jaded, but Monster
promising this Primeran will not cause any problems has me still
doubtful.
When I sat down with Animal to explain what was going
on, he was quiet for a long time. Suddenly, he spoke up and dropped a
bomb on me.
“Do
you think he would let me go with him?”
I was speechless, at first I couldn't understand why he
would ever even consider going there, let alone with Monster. But as
I tried to object, he opened up for the first time since Wraith's
death and began to cry. No tears flowed, but his words certainly did.
“It
hurts Kate, it hurts so much to be here. I just think that if I act
like things are okay then they will be, but it doesn't get better, it
just hurts more. I need to go. I need to see what its like, the place
where Wraith is from, where I'm from. Monster helped us to stop
Ghast. I want to help him, to do something, to... not hurt.”
I tried to wrap my arms around him, but he was always
too big for it. As he started to calm down, I told him that if he was
going to go, he better have some new clothes, the old ones get
wreaked during his fight with Ghast. I then added that I would need
to change things up as well, because I was going with him.
It didn't take long for me to whip together a new set
of clothes for him, we also made a sash from what remained of
Wraith's cloak that we found after searching the remains of Ghast's
tower. While Animal got ready, I made some additional preparations.
When Dynatech fell I gathered a large amount of munitions from their
security depot. Grenades, shotgun shells, bullets, etc. But after
learning more about Primeran biology, decided to add a special
ingredient. If Animal was going to find himself, I was going to find
my strength to stand next to him, no matter what comes our way.
