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It was a dark and stormy night and we found ourselves in a stairway of an old repurposed building and make our way to an office, specifically an office of a buck. The buck in question was sitting down at his desk asleep however he was sweating and twitching and grunting for he was dreaming. In dream he felt presence, a vile presence of something. No, of someone. All he could feel was his body going limp, like his nerves were giving out and could only sway and weakly twitch his body and only thing he could do is watch. He stared upon the door of his office as a cyan green light flooded the hallway behind it, and then few seconds later beamed into buck´s office. Everything started to feel colder.

The door to his office opened itself and weird goo-like tendrils slithered their way into it, along side the walls, ceilings and ground. Buck started to hear a weird high pitch tune and noticed that he could see tiny warm clouds of his breath due to the cold. It was well below the freezing point and he could feel the hair on back of his neck standing up. He started to shake as the entity stepped into the room and tilted its head left and right. He could see the figure clearly now, it was tall and wore a black suit and a pale white mask, but he couldn't tell what it was. Not feline or a canine or anything, it had no distinguishable features whatsoever. The entity started to reach with its hand towards the buck and as it passed over the desk the contents on the said desk started to float. Like if the gravity itself left the reality, buck closed his eyes and stopped his breathing, he didn't know what's going to happen, all he knew that it will hurt. He started to feel the freezing shadow of the stranger´s hand go over his snout and head and felt how it is feeling his antlers. The tune started to become way too loud, buck wanted to shout and the only thing he felt and heard was snapping of his of antlers. But suddenly he hears creaking of the door and opens his eyes.

He was wide awake now, with his mouth open and eyes bloodshot and dry. Leaning into the back of the chair he slowly directs his gaze unto the doorway and there was a young male feline, dressed in a short-sleeved shirt and buttoned-up suit like vest, he was also wearing a dark cloak with runes inscribed on them and wore dark blue pants. After a brief silence "I-I know its late, but" the cat stuttered "do you have some time?" Felines was quiet and soft, typical of his kin in his early twenties. The buck shook his head to awake and reached for his black-rimmed round glassed that he set on old archived newspaper and put them on his eyes. The newspaper in question had a headline reading "Arch-Witch Hunter behind the Purges found dead, Authorities are left confused." Buck lifted up a bit his glasses massaged his closed eyes and then put the glasses back on and said: "What's going on, Liam?" Contrary to young buck´s appearance his voice a bit more rough yet still gentle, sign he was in his late thirties.

"Well sir," the cat said "it happening again." "What do you mean??" asked the buck, then he stayed silent for a while, thinking. "Wait, are you bleeding?" asked the buck, he remembered. "No, sir. I didn't really check, but I felt it again. Something moved within me again." Liam replied. Buck took a deep breath and said:" Go and wait in the usual place, its right next door as usual, okay?" Liam nodded and headed off. Buck started opening drawers at his desk and some of the cabinets, he was looking for a small wooden box with tools necessary to check on his assistant's special "condition". "There it is.": he mumbled to himself. Box was plain looking, with some small decorative carvings there and there. As he made his way to his door of his office, he glanced at the writing on the glass that was on it: "State Legislated Private Investigator specialized in all things Magical, Robert Greaves." He smiled then a bit bitterly and gently shook his head and went through it, out to the hallway.

He walked next door; Liam was silently waiting for him there sitting on the table. The room in question was a meeting room but it looked more of a like a classroom, with desks placed facing a podium with stand and a huge blackboard behind it plus a white board on wheels. The procedure Robert here was going to perform on Liam would better be off done at a doctor's office or dentist´s but time was fleeting and it would be better to check now. Robert sat in front of Liam and set down the box next to him. Greaves then opened the box, it contained a dental mirror, probe and other tiny things among them being charms and other such trinkets including some scented candles.

"Okay Liam," said Rob "this is how we are going to do it; I will first check for any bleeding gums or anything else and then you are going to tell me what you saw. Deal?" "Of course.": agreed Liam. This was a normal procedure for these two, Liam here was a highly gifted individual. While he may be able to cast magic as any other magic user, he was also a medium able to see the future at times or some magical events, however there was bit of a draw to that, they weren't always one-hundred percent accurate and sometimes they could also come out as false-positives and sometimes not. Ergo what he saw didn't need to necessarily happen.

Robert finished checking Liam gums and teeth and said: "Well I couldn't find any bleeding, maybe a false-positive this time?" "Yeah, maybe." Answered Liam. "So, what did you saw, before we write it down?" asked Greaves "Before I say it, may I ask you something?" Both of them went silent for a while. "Where is this coming from, Liam?" "Its nothing its just. Please hear me out." "Okay," said Rob "go ahead." Liam looked behind him just generally around the room and then moved his face closer to the buck´s. "You ever get the feeling you are being watched?" Robert froze for a second, he tensed up for a minute and clenched his hands on his own knees, he glanced to the side and said: "What do you mean?"

"Well, like you know sometimes I fall asleep at the study where I do my research on magic-based items the departments find at scenes right? I as woke up and went to sprint down the hallway to get you I felt a presence. Like I felt it with my whiskers, it was wet and...smelled of fish." "Anything else?" worriedly asked Rob. "Yeah, I think I am sleeping today with a magical ward. Just in case. What do you think it was?" Rob shrugged and said: "Wayward spirit, ghost? I guess I could contact an exorcist to have a look around the place." Shrugged Robert, then asked: "But now, what did you saw in your vision?"

Liam took a deep breath and spoke: "I saw a large feline being ripped in half," Rob immediately grabbed a notebook with a pencil from his pocket and started to take notes and encouraged Liam to continue "the perpetrator was a small mammal with huge floppy ears and seemed to have some magical familiars to aid him, it took place in like a fortress building. Unfortunately, that's all I can remember for now." Robert scratched side of his own face: "Any interesting details?" "Well," Liam said "I wanna say the "feline" had stripes, definitely of more bright colour and then the one with the familiars looked..." he stopped for a moment, trying to find a correct word. "Go on." Buck gently encouraged. "He looked like he was in pain." Liam finished.

The interview went on for a bit, in the end it led to a dead end. They recapitulated what they could and made some notes, then Robert said: "Well that's all, listen" he said to Liam and pulled a small pill bottle "It would be better to take some of these when you go to sleep tonight." It was a bottle of sleeping pills. "Look Rob I don't need this stuff.": dismissed Liam. "I think you should," responded Robert "it can be hard to sleep after these things, I saw it before on you and influencing your sleeping schedule." Liam looked away. "Please, for me." : pleaded buck. Liam looked back at the buck then at the bottle. "Fine," he sounded bit annoyed but not enough to be angry, he went silent for a second "...you sure they work?" the cat asked. "Definitely.": said Greaves "You use them?": Liam asked "From time to time.: nodded Rob, and then he said:" Let's lock up for the day, okay?" Liam agreed with that statement. They went back to their workplaces and cleaned up and locked up for the day then they met in the hallway. "I guess you need a ride home, right? With that storm outside." asked Robert. "Yeah, its pouring like crazy." Replied Liam. "Come on, let's go.": buck gestured towards the door.

Both of them got out of the building and before them was parked a vintage looking car, one of those that collectors would like to own. It had quite a slim design and quite stylish, the type that nobles would own as a status symbol, but unlike other nobles this one has seen a slightly amount of wear and alteration. "Get in, friend." Said Robert and opened the door for Liam. "Ladies first.": Greaves joked. Liam couldn't help but to smirk and have a light chuckle at that, he knew that Rob always had at least some resemblance of humour. The ride to Liam´s place was un-eventful, silent for the most part not much to chat about. The vintage car rode and hum past the street lights which every few seconds illuminated cabin with our investigators, splashed puddles of rain water on side of the road and rain-drops hit the windshield and slid down and were spread by wipers. "Hey, Robert." Asked Liam. "Yeah?" answered Greaves and looked over briefly at Liam. "What were you dreaming about?" asked Liam.

Robert started to sweat a bit, but took a deep breath and calmed down. As much as Rob wanted to stop the car he said: "What do you mean?" "Well, when I opened the door to your office...you looked pale and were swaying left and right. It was clearly something more than just a mere nightmare." Robert clutched the steering wheel and forcibly closed his eyes for a mere second quickly thinking up a good answer. "A phantom, a phantom of my lineage. It haunted our family for years, possibly even longer." He stayed silent for a bit: "Look, it would better to explain this later to you. Not now, please." Liam nodded, and replied: "Okay," and padded Robert's shoulder "just remember I am here if you need someone to talk to." Robert smiled, he got assigned such a bright feline to his investigations. Truly someone dearly special to him.

They pulled out in front of a small apartment where Liam resided. "Listen," Liam said "what I said about needing to talk to someone, I mean it. Okay?" Robert nodded. Liam got out the vehicle and before entering the apartment waved goodbye to the deer, Robert did the same and with that Greaves headed towards his own apartment. On the way he was tapping the steering wheel with his fingers, he was thinking: Should I tell him? About it all? My family manor?_He signed, it was a lot to unpack and even then, it wouldn't be much of a stretch for Liam Teal to not believe him. Rob decided to tuck it for later, time is not now to talk about this...thing. He parked his car in the parking lot near his apartment, got in and did his nightly ritual which consisted of regular routine. Brushing his tooth and general hygiene stuff like that. Once he got into his sleeping clothes stopped and thought for a second about the vision that Teal had, hoping that it would be nothing and would end up being false and then he thought about something else. He started reflecting on...that one moment which left him uneasy and...somewhat haunted. When he opened that door and him and someone else saw that twisted and mangled corpse with shocked and scared expression on its face and not to mention the eyes that were rolled back into its head. It was definitely hard to accept that he would get that office in the first place but then was bitterly happy that he wouldn't take his position and then there was that phantom. _What does he want? He thought to himself. No Robert was in the need of those sleeping pills since he...unnerved himself. The deer opened a drawer at his bed post and rustled in it a bit and fished out a pill bottle, he gulped one with some water and placed his glasses on the bed table, laid down, pulled up the covers and eventually fell asleep.