I don’t want this! Don’t want to sleep. Don’t want more people dying.

So helpless. So tired.

No sleep! No dreams! Please!

Cannot stop it.

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Terror turned into horror when Jonathan pulled out his weapon and pointed it around, with a grimace of utter pain and desolation on his face. A young cop, barely three years in the force. Two more experienced cops, both of them women, tackled him and got the gun out of his hands before a shot was fired.

One of our theories had just received a huge support. We woke up the psychologist and fetched him by patrol car. Jonathan had been one of the four who had taken Robert in. Whatever short contact they had with him in that time, it must have been enough.

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I used my authority and put the other three under supervision, and asked them to surrender their firearms. Two did, the third one I had to formally suspend. At night, when the chief is asleep, I have that authority. In the morning, I would have to get him to confirm it.

Robert had been in his cell, asleep, while all this went down.

Jonathan, it turned out, had been napping in a corner just before he rose to his feet and, for all we know, was trying to shoot us under some kind of outside control. He was a strong young lad, with a clear mind. Maybe that bought us the decisive few seconds.

I gathered the men while Jonathan was being examined, and told them a version of that famous line in From Dusk till Dawn. That I don’t believe in ghosts, but what we are seeing is not normal. From now on, until the mystery is solved and a rational explanation found, we would consider all possibilities no matter how outlandish or paranormal and take preparations against them.

The first thing, and this I took on me, was that we would all sleep in cells, with our firearms out of reach in the hall, for our own protection. Only after a quick check by the door guard that we are of sound mind would they open the door.

The guys and girls were not a fan of that, but we were all still under impressions of what had just almost happened, and nobody spoke up against the measure.