Ring...
Ring...
Ring...
image [https://i.imgur.com/dKNw6Lb.png[/img]]
(I don't want to take calls right now. I'm on lunch break.)
Ring...
(Besides, it's probably nothing interesting.)
Ring...
You have one (1) new voice message:
"Hello?"
"I don't know if this is the right number, but I have a friend who said you guys can help. I, uh, don't know how to describe this..."
They always start with something like that, "I know this sounds crazy, but..." or "You're not going to believe this..." or "I don't know where to start...". This is why I don't like to take those calls anymore. That, and I've got a company to manage now, you know? Rent's due in a week and HR's on my case again about the reports, not to mention the damn coffee machine's broke again.
image [https://i.imgur.com/26jDMsR.png[/img]]
"My husband died a week ago, the funeral was yesterday. And the...the crying hasn't stopped. I can hear it when I'm alone in the showers, and when I woke up this morning...I found tracks leading into the bathtub...down the drain. I don't know if it's some kind of wild animal that had gotten stuck in the pipes, or some kids messing with me. I went to the doctors to get a brain scan, just in case it's something weird going on with my ears, but they said everything looked normal. I don't care about the hair on the mirror or the dead petals everywhere now, I just want the crying to go away. I can't sleep at night because of it, and no one at work is going to believe me if I called in sick for this, so..."
Yeah, that one goes to Line 2. He'll know what to do. We still get these "False Carpideiras" once in a while, but they're manageable.
Ring...
"Hello? Is anyone there? I mean, am I here? Am I speaking to someone? I don't know if I'm hallucinating this entire conversation - I mean, I wouldn't know if I did, you know? It's all so subjective, makes me wonder if sensory experiences are the only ways we can interact with things outside of our consciousness. I can't even see anything anymore. I've been down here for so long, I'm pretty sure my eyes are vestigial at this point, so are my lungs. I really want to shed again, but I've already lost so many layers. Should I metamorphose instead?"
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Not the first guy who thinks he's an eel living in a water cistern. Line 1 can talk him out of it.
"Help! It's eating my alphabet! It already took the _, _ and _, and now it's t_king the _. Oh god, it just _te the letter _. Wh_t shoul_ I _o? I w_s just pl_ying _ g_me of h_ngm_n with my frien_s, but it kept going-"
Well, that one was a little hard to make out, but I think she was missing the letters a and d. Pretty decent guesses for a game of hangman, but I don't know what the other letters are. If Line 3 can get there quickly enough, the hangman won't be completed and manifest into a bigger problem.
Ring...
"So I just redid the wallpaper in my nursery, and there are handprints coming from behind the paper-"
Line 2. Ugh.
Ring...
"Do you do exorcisms? If you do, is it only demons covered under the Lesser Key of Solomon, or can you exorcise demons from other religions too?"
Haven't met a demon I can't exorcise, but your stupid kid would just dig the grimoire out of the trash and try the summoning ritual again. I don't have the time to do house calls.
Ring...
"ᛘᚢᚿ ᚦᚢ ᛘᛂᚴ ᛘᛆᚿ ᛂᚴ ᚦᛂᚴ ᚢᚿ ᚦᚢ ᛘᛂᚱ ᛆᚿ ᛂᚴ ᚦᛂᚱ-"
More ads? Really?
I'm going to imagine my happy place now. Inhale some coffee steam, look out the window, admire the ever-shifting expanse of pale grey that seems to envelope this city. I would have traded this view of the concrete exoskeleton for a nice, soft velvet chair and a new office space, but I have to contend with my station for now, one architecturally designed to leer over humanity the way a lighthouse keeper leers over his claim of the sea. And yes, I leer over it. Because I'm starting to think this city has nothing to offer me other than panicked, broken voices trembling over the phone and the bubbling soft stew of congealed nightmares, slowly oozing from each apartment window like oatmeal.
Sorry, I got kind of carried away there. This coffee hits like a motherfucker.
image [https://i.imgur.com/1BFwKi6.png[/img]]
I think...I'm going to hire a receptionist. I'm getting too old to manage these phone calls, and I've been meaning to start writing a memoir or something. Can't let all those centuries go by undocumented, right?
Aemeth Co. has seen better days, to be honest. Our business was flourishing during stranger times, when the gods drank themselves stupid on worship and thoughtforms were easy to come by. Thoughtforms are the least of our problems now. Times change, and so do the threats. It used to be Aggregates - little clusters of ideas and derangements that crawl into your room and eat your children. Or the Strays, but I believe you people like to refer to them as cultists. Or the million other shadow agencies that really clog up the market for us.
And don't get me started on the digested gods - what became of the digested gods! Seriously, they're everywhere these days.
I can't run this ship alone, and that's why I need help, that's why I'm hiring. I'm looking for someone smart, responsible, a multi-tasker, and...
Ah, forget it. Send me anyone. We aren't picky about sacrifices, after all.