11th December, 12.02 a.m.
AS MAUREEN APPROACHED THE FAR end of the hospital corridor, she heard whispering coming from Nev’s room. Nev was becoming more confused and secretive lately and all the more belligerent for it. His old habit of talking to ‘imaginary people’ had returned, usually with him sitting muttering against the window of his room.
Maureen entered the room quietly so as not to alarm him. When her eyes adjusted to the gloom, she saw that Nev was in his usual spot at the window. He was muttering away and, curious, Maureen stepped closer.
Something was out there.
Some ancient instinct warned Maureen to hide. She crouched, and saw, in the gap lent by the chair legs, the silhouette of a massive furred animal, its head close to the old man’s face with only glass barrier between them. She crept closer and she heard the strangest, most terrifying, conversation for Nev wasn’t mumbling words, he was making sounds – tiny snarls, whines and huffs – and the thing at the window responded with deep, rumbling growls. It was as if the old man was trying to appease it in the language of wolves.
She knew what it was: it was the creature she’d seen the night before Bryan Shelton’s body was found.
Terrified, she shuffled out of the room, and only stood when she was safely in the corridor.
Maureen padded into the staff area, rushing past her bemused colleagues to find the small automatic camera they used to photograph the residents’ special occasions. She quietly opened the fire exit doors then peeped around the corner to the opposite end. The outside lighting was inadequate, but if she squinted she could just about see its shape: an animal the size of a Great Dane, sitting close to Nev’s ground-floor window. Maureen quickly raised the camera and took a picture, the burst of intense light from the flash lighting up the moment.
It immediately came running, first on two legs and then on all fours, in bounding strides, hurtling towards her. She took another picture when it was halfway close, revealing in a flash its true monstrousness and she fled to the doors, slammed them behind her and backed into the shadows. The beast didn’t stall – it galloped past the building, and cleared the barbed-wire fence to be devoured by the night.
From the other end of the corridor, came a long, wretched wail.