After the incident with the thing in the alley, Bertrand went home, thinking of, for the very first time in his whole career, getting a decent night of sleep.

Even if it came to shoving a whole bottle of sleeping pills down his throat.

There simply couldn’t possibly be a way of the things he’d been experiencing to be real, yet his cheek was swollen and in pain. When he touched it, before getting in the car, he saw blood staining his fingers. And there was a mark across his face when he looked in the rearview.

I’m going crazy, right? It’s not real... he thought, while driving. A whole day and night of sleep, I’ll wake up tomorrow brand new, and ready for a cup of coffee.

But he didn’t.

The detective got home to find that something had invaded his place.

Someone or something had intruded his home.

The lights were off, and he heard movement in his room. However, even if he did receive some martial arts training, and practiced it from time to time, he had no idea if it would ever word to defend himself against whatever hid in his house.

Not with the currently frail and sickly body of his.

Why the fuck don’t I have a gun again? Bertrand asked himself, trying not to get too elated by the atmosphere surrounding him.

Step by step, he approached his room, his steps sounding louder than he wanted. It’s only because of the fear. DAMNIT! Just why?

He could hear his heart beating like a drum, through all over his body.

The detective turned the lights on in the hall, and noticed that there was a slight pool of blood coming from under his door, and as he opened it inch by inch.

Bertrand was hoping to at least a body, to crown his already fucked up day, but for some reason, he didn'd sense death near. Which was already nervewrecking enough.

But then he heard the sound of munching and cracking, watching the shadow of a raccoon, eating on something, next to his bed.

The investigator felt somewhat safe, and at the same time, confused as nuts, due to the unexplained blood. He flipped the switch on the wall, finally drowning the room in light, only to question his whole sanity.

“No... What the hell... What the fuck is happening...?”

There was blood all over his floor, and the raccoon looked at him, while unworriedly munching on what could only be the weird fruit that the detective woke up to, earlier in the day.

The problem was, that by a closer look, it was the fruit itself that was bleeding, and its bleeding pulp was nothing more than a myriad of tongues, eyes, ears, lips, fingers, and teeth.

Which explained the cracking sounds, at least.

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Bertrand didn’t know what to think, tears running from his eyes. But not from sadness, nor pain.

It was horror, despair, raw and simple fear. And then he started feeling sick all at once, but without any strength in his legs to go to the bathroom, he vomited on the floor, observing the animal, as it kept eating at the... Thing, that couldn’t possibly ever be called a fruit, and couldn’t possibly ever be real.

And as his entire world collapsed, Bertrand passed out, falling flat over the blood.

***

His eyes were a bit swollen, so he had some difficulty in opening them.

It was clear day already, the raccoon wasn’t anywhere near the tattered figure of the detective, and he felt soaked with something. The room was hot, so it could be sweat.

The PI passed down and ended up sleeping on the floor, and something smelled a mixture of copper and sour. He tried to get up.

“Don’t make a single fucking sudden move, Bert...” he heard Jake’s voice beside him, not too far, and then, heard the cocking of a gun.

“Jake...? What the hell, man?” he tried to say, his voice grumbled as if he was drunk.

“You heard me. Get up slowly, sit down, and tell me this is not what it looks like...”

Bertrand got up slowly, as his partner told him to, sat down on the floor, and tried to open his eyes. One was easier to open than the other, but when he came to see it all properly, the scene around him didn’t change from when he passed out.

There was blood everywhere, teeth, fingers, ripped tongues, and a pool of vomit right beside him.

The detective touched his face and felt that what was covering one side could only be a mixture of blood and his own vomit. On the other cheek, the painful trail still remained.

“It wasn’t a dream...?” his voice sounded hollow, desperate. He looked towards Jacob, as if waiting for a reply.

“Don’t fuck around, man. We couldn’t reach you for five fucking days! I come here after my shift to check if you were okay, to find what? Bert... Seriously, what the fuck is all this?” Jake’s voice was sullen, with traces of elating, but not enough to say that he was actually mad.

Of course Jake didn’t believe Gonzales in the first place. He was the only cop that agreed to partner up with the detective Gonzales called “Sixth sense motherfucker”. They worked together for years, and he was the only one to know Bertrand’s story, the scars over his body, and inside his heart.

Yet, he was there, gun in hand, pointed at his partner, eyes filled with dread.

“Five days?” Bertrand asked. “What... What do you mean by five days? You called me yesterday, to attend a crime scene. I even met you at the convenience store, so that we could grab a coffee and drive to the scene, but... But you couldn’t drive me there. You said... You said you had one more report to write... And drove away...”

The PI’s mind was confused. The more he tried to remember that night, about the nightmare, the call, the driving, the more it became blurry.

“What the fuck are you talking about, Bert? It’s been two weeks since our last case together, you remember? The...”

“Yeah.” Bertrand replied. “The vanishing of that Jane Doe’s body from the morgue, I remember.”

The strangest thing about his thoughts, was that this memory was clear as water, but all else – all that he needed to remember – was fuzzy.

“Come on, Bert... I don’t wanna shoot you. What’s going on?” Jake1’s tone became resolute.

“Shoot me?” the detective’s eyes went wide. “You called me, I went to the scene, and even found some disturbing stuff...”

“WHAT FUCKING SCENE, BERTRAND?” Jake yelled, finally losing his temper. His fist breaking the ceramic of the bedside lamp. Blood starting to trickle from his fingers.

“THE WOMAN WITH THE RIPPED FACE, FOR CHRIST’S SAKE!” the PI yelled too. His emotions boiling like lava, his eyes filling up with tears.

Jake froze in place after hearing it.

“What... How do you know about... No...” the gun started shaking in his hand. “Gonzales can’t be right about you... Tell me what this all means, Bert... I KNOW YOU, AND YOU’RE NOT A FUCKING SERIAL KILLER!”

“WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT, MAN!”

“SHUT UP AND JUST EXPLAIN!”

“I... I can’t...” Bertrand replied, hollow and lost.

“No... It can’t be... IT CAN’T BE!!!” Jake shouted with all his lungs.

“Jake...” the detective tried to reach out for his partner.

“NO!”

And then there was the sound of the gunshot.