I'm A Contract Worker For A Secret Corporation That Hunts Supernatural Creatures... Not A Walk In The Park...

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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/02321 on 2024-11-18 17:48:08+00:00.

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Bit by bit my living situation had improved. I could afford heat, at least two meals a day, and warm socks. Those comforts came at a cost. A bullet wound in my shoulder was still healing up. The company I worked for offered magic-laced medicine that could heal wounds faster, but they cost more than I could afford. Better to let things heal on their own. A deep ache from my legs bothered me. It got to the point that I knew I needed to get a checkup before working again. I hated needing to see the doctor for old wounds simply because medical costs aren’t cheap. After this check-up, I might not be able to afford heat for the rest of the colder seasons this year.  

I wasn’t certain what sort of creature Dr. Fillow was. He looked human enough. I called to see if he had any open times for an appointment, but he told me he could swing by in a few hours. He was very busy treating supernatural creatures and sometimes humans like myself. He was always on the move, so it was easier to see him outside his clinic.  

He’s been by my place three times in the past two years when my legs got too bad to deal with. The scar above the right knee looked redder than normal. My knee also felt weird. It made an unnatural creaking sound and sometimes popped out of place if I pushed myself too hard. My left leg needed to be wrapped with a special cloth. It had turned black, the darkness fading around my hip. I hated looking at the scars. I should be thankful that I was able to get my legs back, but they were a constant reminder of the day I lost the person I cared about most.   

Dr. Fillow arrived with a few months' supply of cloth for the left leg. He needed to redo some painful spell work because the magic that kept my leg attached had been weakening, when I pulled magic from other sources through my body while on the job, it had messed with the spell that attached new flesh to old.   

“I hear you’ve been working again.” He said after the treatments were finished.  

He often stayed for a few minutes to chat and get caught up. I always offered him a drink or a snack, but he refused saying he didn’t like sweet things or liked tea. Once he accepted a cup of coffee. He wore a mask over half his face and sounded as if he always had a sore throat. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen his full face before. He adjusted large glasses over top of his mask and brushed aside light brown hair.   

“I needed the money. I figured it was about time. I can’t seem to get any easy jobs though.” I shrugged.  

My legs hurt like hell. I dreaded the idea of staying in bed for a few more days to recover. I needed to get a job soon to pay for this treatment.  

“Don’t push yourself too hard. Paying off your debts is not worth your life. Have you found anyone to support you?” He asked looking around my barren and rundown apartment.  

“No. I figured I needed to get myself back together before I dragged a person into my mess. And with scars like these, it’s not as if I’ll find someone who would be interested in a simple fling either.”  

“No friends? Nothing of the sort?” He offered almost sounding worried about me.  

I shrugged again. I was about to tell him that August offered to work with me whenever he was free. I didn’t feel like boring him with my personal life. Or lack of one.   

“Go make some friends. Get some rest. Call me if your pain increases.” He said as he stood up ready to leave.  

This was all the advice I'd heard before. I paid what I could then mentally flinched when I saw the rest of the amount I still owed. I promised I would take it easy as the doctor left to see another one of his patients.   

I did plan on staying in bed and resting for as long as I needed. However, two days later I found myself sitting on a bench in a park ten minutes away from my apartment. A job came in saying a handful of people saw some sort of large animal and a young girl had gone missing shortly after the sightings. It wasn’t confirmed a creature had been behind these events, but The Corporation didn’t like taking chances. The park was so nearby I figured I would check it out.  

I walked over during the day looking for any kind of clues. The park led off into a short nature trail. I assumed if there was a creature it would hang out in the trees. An entire day of searching led to nothing. Since monsters came out at night, I was stuck staying up late.   

Aside from some recent graffiti, nothing appeared out of place around the park or the trial. My legs ached from all the walking. I spent a few hours sitting on a bench almost wanting for something to happen.   

I found out the hard way if I focused hard way not use my talent of seeing traces of magic after my leg treatments. The migraines I got did not mix well with the leg pain, making them both unbearable. Speaking of something unbearable, my phone kept going off because August figured out how to send GIFs. I should have blocked him. He would on occasion send a good cat gif in the mess of other memes that made it worth letting his messages go through.  

“Is your girlfriend worried about you?”  

A voice made me jump. A girl had silently walked behind the bench to see over my shoulder. She had gotten a glimpse of the random messages. I stood up to face her honestly expecting a monster. Instead, I found a petite dark-haired girl wearing a plain white dress. She even had sandals in this cold weather. She had her hands behind her back. Healing bruises spotted her arms.  She looked anywhere between sixteen and nineteen. She shouldn’t be out in a dark park at this hour without a coat. I put my phone and wallet in my pants pocket then took off my jacket. I offered it to her without hesitation.  

“Where do you live? Do you need help getting home?” I offered.  

She smiled in a way that looked very familiar. Her black hair and dimples made me think of August. She took my jacket, snuggling down into the warm collar for a moment.  

“I’m not normally the kind of girl who lets strange men take me home.” She joked in an overly sweet voice.  

“I’ll call you a cab.” I said not wanting her to get any ideas. “By chance do you have any siblings?” I added.  

She shook her head confused over the odd question.  

“No. Are you disappointed I don’t have a sister?” She suggested.  

It was as if she was trying to flirt. She was very bad at it if that was her goal.   

“No, you look like a friend of mine. Must just be the hairstyle. Now come on, let’s call a ride for you.”  

The smile on her face appeared forced. I wasn’t going along with the game she wanted to play. I started to walk down the pathway towards the park entrance with her following behind. My phone didn’t want to turn on again. Sometimes it shut off in the colder weather.  

“What are you doing out at this time of night?” I asked her as we walked.  

“Looking for monsters, how about you?” She said, her sweet tone dropping slightly.  

I froze. Carefully I turned my head towards her, my brain trying to work out if she was a threat. Some creatures looked like innocent weak humans to lure in their meals. She may be a monster ready to rip my heart out, or just a weird girl in the park because she had an interest in the occult. If I made a run for it, I risked leaving a poor girl stranded. If I didn’t leave, then I also risked getting eaten.  

I wasn’t aware of how right I was about the risk of being dinner for a creature. A burst of wind came down on us. I started to move to grab the odd girl to get her out of danger. My body was too slow. To my horror, a beast came down from the sky. In one lightning-fast movement, a black beak scooped her up around the waist. In two beats of its wings, it lifted back into the sky tossing her into the air. Her small body was swallowed whole by the monster that recently started to stalk the park.  

It was a crow the size of a car with three glowing red eyes but oddly enough, paws as legs. Like hell, I was going to let her get eaten like that. We stopped near a bench. I prayed I had enough strength to fight back in time to save her.  

Every living thing had magic. The amount depended on many different factors. I was in the middle of a park with countless plants, trees, and dormant insects all with their own life force. That magic leaked into the air. It was a reason why some forests felt so strange to humans. If you knew how you could ask to use the power nature held. Humans weren’t built to handle magic. I still made a silent request to everything around me. I put out my will to take whatever was given. I then grabbed a hold of the bench that had been bolted down into the stone walkway. A burst of power came through. I aimed for the glowing eyes in the sky and threw the bench as hard as I could towards it.   

The metal and wood found its target. I heard the impact and saw the crow fall from the sky screeching the entire way down. The backlash of using so much magic hit hard. My right knee popped out and I swore it felt as if it was going to come apart at the old scars. My arms burst with pain and my muscles cramped up. Each one of my hands curled uselessly. I forced myself forward towards the downed crow hoping it wasn’t too late to ...

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