Maddie sat on her bed sketching in one of her notebooks. Abby was out with Ian, as she usually was on Friday nights. Most everyone on campus was prepping for tonight's party, creating a special kind of silence that wasn't very common.

It felt like it truly was just her, alone in the huge building, with her friend's new fascination. Even through her headphones blasting Sabaton, the same subtle sound infiltrated her mind. A tortuously prolonged, rattling exhale, as if someone were straining to breathe.

Maddie removed her headphones and looked up at the closet. The breaths suddenly ceased just as suddenly as they had started. She stared at the wooden doors, as if she were gazing through the wood panels to meet the glassy stare of the head.

The uneasy feeling had returned not long after she had sat down with her book and pencil, a knot in her stomach, an alarm in her brain frantically screaming about an unknown, unseen danger. She had tried to ignore it, focus her mind on her sketching, but it lingered heavily.

With silence reforming, she looked back to her sketches. She hadn't even been giving much thought to what she had been drawing, desperate to keep her mind elsewhere. The images she had sketched were normally bizarre and random, though the images she had just created were lacking the usual vibrant emotion.

These images displayed grisly scenes. Lines of corpses floating down a stream, faces melding into screaming abominations, severed limbs forming some kind of ritualistic symbol. She flipped through the pages, horrified by what she had drawn, even more so by the fact she had no memory of doing so.

It was unlike anything her imagination could come up with, even at its most bizarre. Where had these vile desires come from, to create such dark and grisly imagery? It scared her not knowing the origin, even more so to consider thinking about an answer.

Another hiss filled the air, but this one was different. It sounded like a voice, someone struggling to form a word, forcing out disjointed syllables carried by raspy exhales.

"...M...mad...ie..."

She jumped up from the bed, sending pencils scattering over the floor. The voice continued, slowly becoming a chilling hybrid of low animalistic growling and human-like groaning. She wanted to leave, run for the door and never return to this room. But she was frozen in place, physically anchored by fear. The voice croaked and grumbled, fumbling over half words and raspy grunts.

"...Mad.....ie......" It managed to groan in a strained whisper, "...Maddie..." As if in response to her panicked predictions the closet doors trembled lightly, creaking open at a tortuously slow pace until they quietly tapped to a rest against the walls.

Maddie could only watch, petrified as three long claws slid into view, a large hand gripping the door of the closet. The voice continued choking out a symphony of random syllables, a towering figure stepping out of the closet, concealed by shadows.

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The thing was hunched over, three limbs touching the floor with its second arm still clutching the closet door. Two eyes shone through the darkness, one bright red, the other milky grey; a gaze Maddie was all too familiar with by now.

It reached up with its other arm, claws gripping the frame of the bedroom doorway. The creature turned to fully face Maddie, rising from its crouched position. Even with its knees visibly bent, it took up the entire doorway, sealing off any hope of escaping. Another raspy hiss filled the air, louder than ever before.

"...Feed..." the voice croaked. A sharp, scratchy howl broke out as the thing suddenly rushed at her with terrifying speed, claws outstretched to reach for her. Maddie jumped awake, nearly falling backwards out of her chair.

Quickly she caught herself, her eyes squeezing themselves shut as she gradually pulled herself out of the false panic. She slowed her rapid, sharp breaths back to a calmer pace and gently lowered her chair back to a stable resting position.

Nightmares were nothing new to her, but this was something entirely different. The image of that horrible creature, the unnatural sounds it made, all still replaying in her mind on a loop. She willed her eyes to open, turning and looking out to the hall.

The closet stood closed, just as she had left it. She sighed heavily, the sight relieving some tension. It was just a terrible dream, the result of the knot in her stomach and alarm in her mind running rampant in her overactive mind as she dozed off. She took a few deep breaths, calming her frantic thoughts and racing heart. The dream had felt so real, the fear, the sounds.

Nagging paranoia refused to back down so easily though. Terror still gnawed at the back of her mind until she gave in and got up from her chair, slowly approaching the closet and reaching for the knob. She stood there for a moment, locked in place as panic and willpower battled.

Finally, she snapped the door open. The head sat as she had left it, cater-corner to the doors with its glassy eye staring back at her. Brushing off her thoughts, she reached up and shoved the snout of the head to turn the thing until it faced the wall and its gaze was no longer aimed at her.

Across the room, one of two windows sat ajar, unlike how she had left it. Two hands reached up, followed by an arm, and a person, falling through the window and rattling the table nosily. Maddie jumped at the sound, her attention snapping to the intruder, who she quickly recognized.

"Jesus, Sam..." she muttered, taking a moment to recover from the sequence of unnerving events.

A hand waved at her from behind the table. "Hi," The younger teen clumsily got to his feet, closing the window he had entered. "Not too late, am I?" he questioned.

"About 2 hours early actually," Maddie answered. Confused, Sam got out his phone and read the text again.

"Oh... I swear that 8 was a 6," he admitted.

"Told you that font was dumb," she retorted with a half smile.

"Well, I already used my get out of jail card, so... Unless you'd rather a 15-year-old adolescent boy wander a college campus alone for a few hours..."

"Sit down," Maddie interrupted, chuckling softly as she closed the closet doors before making her way to the kitchen. She and Abby always liked having Sam around, and right now she was somewhat grateful.

Maybe having someone else present would help quell the strangeness, even a little. As Sam took a spot on the couch, Maddie dug through the pantry, tossing a resealed box of Oreos to him and claiming one of her own.

"It's a wonder you don't go totally crazy with how quiet it is here," Sam commented.

"Feel like I am already," Maddie replied, sitting next to him and flicking on the TV. She glanced back at the closet, sighing quietly.