2019-07-16 - A Word of Caution

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : Mr. Clayton? I received your text messages. Is there any update on Dr. Faust's condition?

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : No. Her throat was cut, and she was stabbed in the lower back. Last I heard, she was still in ICU.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : I'm sorry. I know she's a professional associate of yours. I hope she pulls through.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : She's a friend. But so do I. We have discovered our friend William's identity, thanks to Dr. Glass.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : I wanted to let you know that I don't intend to relinquish the bones I have in my custody to you. It doesn't seem fair that you also carry the burden I willingly accepted, so if we're going down, we're going down together - you, me, Byron, Vivian and the rest. I wanted to ask what you did know about what happened to Dr. Faust...and Vivian found out? How?

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : I'd be lying if I said that I expected you to say differently. And that is her story to tell in detail, but long story short, instead of a face-melted monster archivist, she met a doctor who ran an asylum for, well, people like us. And then he died. But William is quite famous, and I damned well should have placed him sooner: William Gohl, one of Gray Harbor's most accomplished serial killers.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : ....wait, WHAT? I'm sorry, Mr. Clayton, but I'm afraid we're treading onto your territory now than mine. I don't know if I should be aghast or surprised about the fact that Gray Harbor had multiple accomplished serial killers, let alone to have enough that you can actually categorize them from one another based on prowess. Who is William Gohl?

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : 140 estimated victims is notable even on a national scale. Mr. Gohl has his own Wikipedia page. He was a union official - preyed on migrant workers and sailors. Only convicted of two murders, in the end, but odds are quite good that he was personally responsible for a heft percentage of the area's murder rate for a while.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : In what era was he active? Turn of the century, prohibition?

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : Early 1900s. Putting the 'wild' in the Wild West. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Gohl

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : So my takeaway is that we have the bones of a serial killer, which the Dolorphage, or whatever these shadowy figures are, want. And we know there's something else out there that's looking for him based on what happened in the sewers and the hospital during the storm. Thank you for obliging all my questions, Mr. Clayton - not just for my benefit, but also for another. Like I said, I can't fight what I don't know. Erin Addington sent me a note as well while I was neck deep in research, around the same time you tried to text me. She was the woman in the hospital with me....we both heard the same thing. Except that her experience was slightly different than mine.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : You said dolorphage! Does Thorne actually use my word for them?

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : I'm sorry. That's not relevant. Please continue.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : She said that she also heard the entity in the hospital call for Billy, and when we were there together, she felt an extreme sense of hatred wash over her, like whatever we encountered in the stairwell in the hospital wanted her dead. Considering multiple family members of hers died just recently, she is now taking the threat she felt that day very seriously. It's different from what I experienced, but I think I know why she felt that.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : Interesting. Your hypothesis, Miss Reede?

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : Because the entity in the hospital that day felt familiar, like he and I shared the same blood. I think what we encountered that day was the shade of a Baxter. Considering we already suspect a long-buried feud between the families, it would make sense as to why Ms. Addington would feel that. But with your most recent revelations thanks to Vivian, I'm now wondering what possible connection the Baxters have to William Gohl.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : Gohl could be a Baxter through his mother. This would have been not far from Lindon's time, as well. Perhaps they were related. Which could put this person, this person looking for Billy, as our murderer. He can create dreams, it seems. You said he killed a man. At the hospital. How did he do it?

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : Much of the family tree is still unknown to me and there's an entire branch that I have no idea about - the descendants from Lindon's sister, Elizabeth's line. I managed to parse out my half of the family tree thanks to my own research and what I managed to get from my mother and grandfather when I asked them via phone call, after our visit to the Archivist. I'll have to show you and Byron the updated chart. He killed a maintenance worker at the hospital, and nearly killed one of the visitors, a blonde woman I didn't recognize. Whatever he was manifested as an electric charge that passed through the woman. I assume that the same happened to the maintenance worker - I found him at the bottom of the stairs, though, so I'm not sure if the shock killed him, or if he fell because of the shock and the fall ultimately killed him. And for some reason, despite being dead, the entity left a kind of...after effect, bringing him back to life. That was how I got my injury.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : Hmm. And he controlled the slimes in the sewer. It suggests that, to whatever extent this thing is human, it shares my general sort of abilities. Although raising the dead is not anything I've discovered for myself. Nor do I intend to experiment.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : I didn't think that was possible outside of Dreams until that day. It wasn't like...it didn't seem like reanimation, where you can just control an object with your mind. The thing could still SPEAK, Mr. Clayton. He did so before he attacked me.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : There are people who can heal. Perhaps the extreme of that ability is limited reanimation? I honestly don't know. I've never seen anything like it in a real place.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : Neither have I. This does go back to the question as to whether we should bury the bones or burn them, now that we know who he could be. I don't know if I'm inclined to follow the wishes of a notorious serial murderer.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : There is another issue. If this person looking for William is our murderer of Addingtons, and nearly of Dr. Faust, then we may need to...bait him. To end him before he murders again. Burying the bones might do that. Burning the bones might also do that, but he might just start frenzying, instead.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : The prospect of us killing something that might be already dead is extremely cagey, Mr. Clayton. But I'm always up for a challenge.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : And this is one of the many reasons I am beginning to quite like you, Miss Reede.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : ::laugh emoji:: 'Beginning'? I thought you already did.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : It's a sliding scale. It moves slowly. Rusty, you see.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : It sounds like you need more lubricant. May I suggest a massage to go with your yoga? ::smiley face with a halo, it looks just as innocent as one would expect coming from Isabella::

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : A massage. I can't imagine doing that to the poor masseuse.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : I'd also suggest an acupuncturist but I don't know if the presence of needles would make that better or worse.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : Needles are fine. I assume. I've never actually tried. Sticking needles into myself always seemed counterproductive. Have you tried acupuncture?

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : (long pause)

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : I have. For an old injury. It helps.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : I'll add it to the list of 'get a life' activities, then. Did I hit a sore spot? Pun actually intended.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : ::laugh emoji:: The fact that you're even taking that comment seriously warms the heart, honestly. I don't think I've ever met a man who so readily took my suggestions before.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : I'm not sure if that's a compliment, a complaint, or just an oblique judgment on all the men you've met before.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : Yes.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : In all seriousness, however, I mean it in the good way this time. I think it could benefit you to take your own advice to me on occasion and not getting sucked in by the work.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : So noted. And how dare you. Quoting my advice back to me. It's rude.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : ::laugh emoji:: I'd say you'd be surprised as to how much I can actually dare, but something tells me you've twigged on that already.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : Bold, passionate, and rather gleefully trollish, at times. I have noticed.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : How dare you, sir. I'll have you know that I do most things gleefully, and not just trolling. 😉 But I'll take this as a compliment.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : I hope you have some good ideas as to how to fight whatever it is looking for Billy if we're using his bones as bait.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : Honestly? Not a clue. Just a raw desire to show that bastard that he's not the only one who knows how to play with knives. But I'm very angry, so perhaps my planning skills aren't the best. We should try to meet, when we can, and discuss if that's what we want to do and how we might survive doing it.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : We can talk about it before or after Friday. Sometimes anger is detrimental, but most of the time, I find it a volatile enough fuel to produce just the right results. Anyway, I should go...I have a supposedly cursed artifact to study. Stay safe.

(TXT to Isabella) Alexander : Don't die, Miss Reede.

(TXT to Alexander) Isabella : I won't, stop saying that!