you flipped a coin—

You'd seen plenty of horrors within the boundaries of Prehevil, but none were quite as nauseating as the simple sound of a cheerful hum through the fogged streets. Sometimes, it broke out into a deranged laughter, utterly mad and impossible to determine whether it was of pain, insanity, or pleasure.

As far as you could tell, it was a man. Not even moonscorched by the way he looked, no abnormalities nor significant distortions. Only a shit-eating grin, uncannily wide, and bluish, clown-like face paint differentiated him from your fellow human survivors. Countless times you heard his cold laughter as he approached, devoid of life. You would hide in an alleyway full of debris, sheltered from his sight by broken panes of wood, almost sick with how hard your heart was pounding. You'd see him waltz by, a syringe full of greenish liquid in one hand...an abomination of a whip in the other, filthy needles attached to each cattail.

You weren't the only one being stalked by him. The others who were on the same train as you had come across him too, especially the businessman from Edo who had a particularly close encounter that still seems to haunt him. You all converge on the rather apt nickname of "Needles" to identify him. None of you have a damned clue who he is or what he's after, but you all easily agree the less you see of him, the better.

Your luck catches up with you by the third morning. He was waiting for you, you're absolutely certain of it, by the way he had emerged from around the corner straight into the dead end alleyway. He was clearly sane enough that he was consciously blocking your only path of escape, so you had no choice. You survive a direct hit from his needle whip and narrowly dodge the aim of his syringe so you could stab your scalpel into the artery of his neck, heaving as the madman falls to his knees, bleeding out with a giggling gurgle.

You meet his eyes as the light rapidly leaves them, seeing a brief frown flicker there. You almost think you see recognition in his last moments even as he falls, spilling red over the pavestones and your nice shoes.

You cough from the panic and exertion, wheezing from the rushing adrenaline and nausea of whatever substance he'd injected into you with his filthy needles, praying that whatever it is, it would at least kill you swiftly. The stress of the last two days and something about the man leaves you on edge. You beat the body for good measure with your foot, just to sate some of the nauseating paranoia that the mad clown would rise up any moment now—you would hardly be surprised with all the things you've already seen.

You grab his drugs and toss them aside at the far wall, waiting one minute, three minutes, five minutes with your scalpel tight in your fist and eye trained on the body until you're convinced that Needles truly is dead.

As you stare at him, waiting for him to suddenly surge back to life, you feel an uncomfortable twist in your gut. Carefully you approach and turn the body over face-up with the toe of your shoe. He's heavier than you expected. You stand over him and stare at his bloody face, trying to understand, and then something clicks.

He reminds you of your father-in-law, the Baron Eihner von Dutch. The man who took you off the streets, gave you a job in his home, came to treat you like a son. Taught you medicine in exchange for your occult knowledge, gave you his blessings to marry his daughter. The man whose corpse you found in the von Dutch estate as you returned from the war, body marred with self-inflicted wounds in a sacrificial ritual that also took your wife.

You saw her, too. Right here in Prehevil. Another monstrosity that looked terribly like her.

No. No. Absolutely not. It takes you everything you have to stay standing through the dizziness that overtakes you. It must be the stress of Termina and the bullshit terrors of this city, the festival and the moon playing nasty tricks on you in its bid to drive you insane. It must.

Shakily you stumble out of the alleyway, at your wit's end. It didn't matter where for now, but you had to escape. Preferably lock up in a safe corner with a goddamn drink and free yourself from the horrors for a few minutes, a few hours if Alll-mer be willing.

Anywhere but here.