Simon had not received any more answers from NEVADASPHINX112 but regretted not asking about the monster. The boards soon dried up and other topics received attention. He decided he should not leave too much of a digital footprint, so he deleted it. He began to make an interactive map, making notes on all possible victims of the monster. He knew he should have gone out to ask people near the sifters about any unusual observations, but the truth was he dare not leave his flat.

That was of course nonsense, considering that Sandra had been killed in her flat, but it was just an automatic reaction, he assumed. One of the many things he felt was new to his mindset. He was easily scared by sounds he could not identify, slept with lights on, and carried around a knife at all times. One with a solid blade, as Brockmann had advised him to.

After a week, he felt the need to talk to someone, and there was only one person he was seeing.

So, there he was, lying naked in his bed after what had been a sorry excuse for sex, which Alex seemed not to mind at all when he finally said it.

“Sandra and I saw something. I believe I might be in danger,” he told Alex whose naked body was pressed against his under the thin blanket.

“What did you see?” she asked, in what was almost a whisper.

“A monster,” he said. “We saw a monster in the subway and I think that’s why she kicked me out. I think she knew what was coming. I think she knew more than she told me.”

“A monster? What kind of monster? Like a giant rat or something?” Alex laughed a little.

“No, it was like some sort of humanoid thing, with tentacles and a really spooky face.” He sat up, already regretting that he had brought this up.

“Sounds like something . . .” Alex shrugged and sat up too.

“Like what? Like I’m crazy?” Simon looked at her.

“Okay, so what do you think Sandra knew?” Alex asked, “You think your ex-girlfriend knew stuff about monsters and got killed by one? Seriously?” Alex sighed. “Simon, maybe you should see a therapist.”

“Maybe it’s better if you leave now.” He got out of bed. He went to the bathroom and heard her sigh.

“Sure, if you say so,” she replied.

When he came back from the bathroom she was gone. Simon felt terribly lonely, realizing that she might never show up again.

She was right. What did Sandra know? He had no idea. Maybe the police knew something, but even if they did, they probably would not believe or even understand anything they found in her flat. Her computer was probably the key, but they would have taken that, right?

Simon stared into the darkness. And then it hit him. He hit his hand so hard against his head it actually hurt.

The back-up. She did daily data back-ups, and he happened to be the guy who had installed it for her. He knew the password. How could he have forgotten this?

He jumped on his couch and grabbed his laptop. He opened it and connected it to the Wi-Fi. Then he opened the back-up function, signing off with his account and typing in the email address under which Sandra had been registered by him. First name, last name. Email provider. He remembered how proud he had been that that address was still available.

He got access. She hadn’t changed the password. He saw she had made a back-up on the day of her death. He picked it and pressed the “RESTORE” button. The download began and he bit his lip.

He waited patiently in the dark for it to open on his screen and smiled when it appeared.

****

She had worked a lot in the weeks after they had split up. She had been in email contact with the local sanitation company about something she called “the finding on Kieler Straße.” He searched her email history and found out that it had been about rats. Dead rats. Hundreds of them ripped apart and eviscerated. She had made a map of the findings of the rats and had marked sewer entrances. Of course, how did a monster move without being seen? Sewers! Sandra had been a step ahead of them. She had photographed sewer covers; some had been moved at night. She had copied an article about the mysterious sewer-opener. It had caused several car accidents and the police had assumed that was the intent of the whole thing. To damage cars by them dropping into a sewer opening in the middle of the streets. Of course, Sandra had a different theory. She had made circles on her map. The innermost circle was around the harbor region. It was also where the mutilated swimmers had been found.

There were also several sewer entrances marked around her flat. She had photos of them, and they all showed signs of forceful openings, locks broken and everything. In fact, she had found a number of dead rats in what appeared to be her own backyard. Simon breathed heavily as he saw it. She had known it was hunting her.

He went into her search history and found several searches on how to acquire a gun. She had downloaded the TOR browser to enter the dark web and dig deeper, but that naturally had no history stored.

Then there was a folder called Brockmann. Simon opened it and it contained several photos of the man. She had been following him. She had taken pictures of him leaving his house. The address she had noted. Then she had to make notes on his media habits. HAS NO INTERNET. USES OLD PHONE. FIRMWARE 2.33.2 EXPLOIT?

There was another program too. Simon tapped on it. A map appeared with a lot of red dots and one green dot. Every dot had a date. The green one was from today, about an hour ago. Simon was impressed at how she had managed to pull this off. She had pinged Brockmann, getting his location through some virus or program installed on an ancient mobile. She probably had help with that one. Her bank account had been well filled with money. He had seen it once. She could afford to pay a hacker.

Sandra had tracked both the monster and Brockmann. Simon noticed that the pins on Brockmann were not at his home address. He quickly did a search for his home address and found out that there had been a murder. A grizzly killing that the police didn’t comment on, but informed sources linked it to another murder in the Schanzenviertel. That was where Sandra had lived. The monster had killed Brockmann? No. His mobile had been moving afterward. Had the monster eaten his mobile? Had Brockmann escaped and another poor soul had bitten the dust? Simon knew he had to know. He had wanted to speak to Brockmann but had no means to do it. He packed the laptop and put it into his backpack, then grabbed two knives, a flashlight, and his designer coat. He breathed heavily even at the thought of leaving his own four walls.

He stood for fifteen minutes in front of his door and then finally ripped it open and left.

****

Brockmann decided against calling Fornby. He knew he could do little for him, and besides, he didn’t want to admit defeat just yet. He knew the monster would come for him if he didn’t get arrested soon. It was a smart one which explained why it had not shown up anywhere again. It knew it was in danger and had to be careful and cautious until it had eliminated the danger of exposure.

Brockmann hated that he had been outsmarted by the thing. Everybody seemed to outsmart him nowadays. He sat in his room with his gun ready for days. He went out to buy protein bars and water at the kitchen around the corner, but other than that, all he did was wait. He slept in full clothes, his hand at his gun. When he had to piss, he lay the gun where he could easily grab it. After a day, Fornby started calling him and sending messages urging him to get in contact. He did neither. He waited.

It was his third night in the room when he felt it. Something had woken him up. He snapped up and immediately wished he hadn’t, as pain ran through his back. He grabbed the pistol, almost pushing it off the small table next to his bed. Then he realized the room was dark. He had left the lights on. The light bulb. He had woken up when it busted. Slowly he got out of bed and aimed at the dark room. He took his lighter out of his packet and pulled the shell to ignite the fire. It didn’t work the first time. He tried again and a flame appeared, throwing a dim light into the darkness. Not very far, but better than nothing.

Slowly he stepped into the room. He felt that restlessness people call fear. It was the fear of darkness. The thing about darkness is, we're not afraid of darkness itself, but of what might be in it.

Then it hit him. It was so fast he didn’t see when the two tentacles with long sharp claws at their ends ripped through his shirt and cut open the flesh below. Gasping, he stumbled back. The thing dropped from the ceiling and, in the dark, it stood to its full height.

The pain, the adrenaline, Brockmann did what he wished he had done at Sandra’s flat already. He aimed high and fired three shots at where he assumed the thing’s head was. It squealed and stumbled back. He kept on firing, as it leaped away and through the door to the bathroom. Brockmann heard the click of his gun and stumbled away into the corridor, hearing the painful inhuman sound of the thing.

“I KILL YOU!” It said from the bathroom. He heard the door shatter, just as he made it out into the corridor. The wound was worse than he had thought. He felt the warmth of his own blood, soaking his clothes. He stumbled into the corridor as the thing began to move towards him.

****

Simon had made a short visit to Brockmann’s flat, but at night the house was locked, and he decided against waking anyone. Then he had opened the laptop and had followed the pings down the harbor right into the Reeperbahn district, the red-light part of town. He passed the brothels, the sex shops, the bars and strip clubs, until realizing that Brockmann was on a parallel street. He stayed on the Main Street as long as he could because he felt safe among the hundreds of teenagers, punters, and tourists visiting the famous district to bathe in its artificial atmosphere of wickedness. It was really a tourist trap, with expensive beer and questionable characters everywhere.

He turned towards Brockmann at the last second, though he had to ask several women not to molest him when they asked him if he wanted to party or offered him the time of his life.

Finally, he turned left and stood in front of a motel. A cheap place for people who paid for rooms by the hour.

“Oh you are such a champion of good taste, aren’t you?” Simon smirked. Then he heard a thundering noise. Another and another. He had never heard a gun fired, but were these shots?

He knew he should run but, somehow, he’d had enough of running. He went inside and saw that the receptionist was grabbing his phone. “Don’t do it! Go!” Simon shouted as if he knew what he was doing. The man looked at him and then decided it was not worth it and ran. Simon took out his mobile and started running up the stairs. On the first floor, he opened a door and saw nothing but punters in underwear standing in the corridor and looking around. “Hear these shots?” One asked.

“Bullshit,” Simon said. He closed the door and made it up to the next level. He could hear the gasping already when he stood outside the door, and the gnarling sound of something that sounded inhuman. Another shot was fired and then something moved, something big. He didn’t think, he took his mobile, opened the photo app, and ripped open the door, activating the lights of his mobile. Brockmann was leaning against the wall and bleeding from a stomach wound. Simon barely recognized him, since what he saw, what he truly only saw, was IT. Stopping halfway towards its defeated prey, it turned its head up toward Simon. The monster was real. It stood right in front of him and left no doubt that it was very real. Simon realized he had probably made the last mistake of his life. What had he been thinking? He had a small knife, and this was a giant monster that was literally killing people.

A monster that was hiding from people.

He played the only card he had.

“I know what you think. You kill that idiot and take the mobile.” Simon said as the thing grinned with whatever parody of a face it had.

“Smile, bastard. I'm streaming LIVE!” Simon yelled. He closed his eyes. He heard the monster move, heard it scream in . . . was it hunger or frustration?

Simon expected death, wondering how painful it was to be ripped apart. He didn’t find out that day. After five seconds, he opened his eyes and he was still alive. Brockmann was the only horrible thing in the corridor now, leaning against the wall and growing pale. Simon breathed in and out, and when the thing was nowhere to be found, he quickly stepped over to the older man and knelt next to him. He took off his coat, made it into a skein, and wrapped it around Brockmann’s stomach.

“What did you do?” Brockmann asked. Simon sighed.

“I pulled off one hell of a bluff,” he said. He wondered if the monster had internet. It gave him a certain satisfaction to think that it might find out that he had not been on a live stream. Taking the gun from Brockmann and putting it into his bag, he looked at the old man, who was pale and weak now, shaking in his legs.

“No, you are not gonna die on me. I will drag you out and get you to a hospital, you hear me?” Brockmann opened his eyes and nodded. He was in no state to discuss anyway.

****

When he opened his eyes, he saw the face of Fornby above him. Saying he looked unamused was an understatement. How concern and anger could mix in an expression all at once without moving a muscle was amazing. Then the pain kicked in and Brockmann gasped.

“A centimeter deeper and it would have ripped open your stomach,” Fornby said, “You’re lucky this thing is almost as incompetent as you are.”

“It played with me. That’s why I made it. It wanted to scare me.” Brockmann looked around. He was in a hospital and an IV drip was attached to his arm. “Where’s the boy?”

“Outside. He didn’t leave your bed for two days,” Fornby said.

“Two days? Good Lord.” Brockmann gasped.

“Yes, two days, and from what the doctors said it will take another ten before you can leave. It cost me quite a bit of money and effort registering you under a false name, now that the police are looking to question you and all that,” Fornby sighed. “What mess did you make there, Brockmann?”

Brockmann looked at him. “These things are messy, Fornby. You were always hiding behind your desk while we had to deal with this stuff.” Fornby looked at him and nodded. He probably remembered the Berlin incident.

“The boy saved you,” he said. Brockmann gave a deep grunt and then a defeated nod. Without a doubt, he had.

“He scared it away with some senseless babbling,” Brockmann said.

“Sorry, am I disturbing you?” Simon asked as he poked his head through the door. Fornby looked up at him and Brockmann did the same.

“Do you care?” Brockmann asked.

“Not really. So I assume you’re Nocturne too?” he asked Fornby. Brockmann had to smirk. He sat up, but his stomach hurt.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, young man,” Fornby said. Simon smiled.

“I take that as a yes,” he said. He closed the door and looked at the two men. “So, I think I can add quite a bit to this. I actually got information and I saved your pal there, despite him being an unfriendly asshole.” He pointed at Brockmann who grunted again. Fair enough, he thought.

“So you’re the boss, I assume?” Simon asked Fornby. The older gentleman didn’t reply.

“Yeah, he is,” Brockmann said in his stead. Fornby shot him an angry look. The man had not understood what Brockmann had got already. They needed the boy’s help, and Simon always wanted something for giving something. The boy might not have realized it yet, but he traded in truths. He was rather good at it.

“Okay, can we negotiate then?” Simon asked.

“What do you want to negotiate, Mr. Bleicher?” Fornby asked. Brockmann already knew what he wanted.

“I want in.”