I[]
Edgar had seen the sight with his eyes during his sixteenth year. His mother, Christine, had been healthy once, but that was before the disease took over her body and made her look like a living skeleton. It was almost tragic, because his mother was able to overcome all illnesses. Colds faded in days, and scarlet fever was no match the two times it struck.
Tuberculosis was something else entirely, though. The moment Edgar's father saw Christine cough violently, he knew something was wrong. Then it continued for months. After some snooping around, he found what he had feared most: a bloodied handkerchief. A doctor determined her lungs hadn't collapsed: it was indeed consumption, and all the younger children had to move away for their own good. Edgar stayed behind to help his father, but it hurt to see his mother slowly decay before his eyes.
"Why is mother becoming a skeleton?" He'd always ask. "I wish I knew." His father always replied. When his father was at work, Edgar always peeked into his mother's room, crying as he saw her rot away. Her mouth was always caked with blood and trickling, she coughed until she began to vomit, and her body gradually turned skeletal. No matter the number of duvets and pillows she was given, Christine was always cold and complaining of fatigue. The doctor said it was to be expected, but that there was no miracle cure to consumption other than death.
One day, the coughing began again, but this time, nothing could stop it, and nothing could help with her breathing. The way Edgar saw it, she wasn't replenishing enough air to compensate for the air she was expelling. Edgar's father closed the door when the blood began to spew to the wall, as to shelter his son from contracting the disease. Little did he know, however, Edgar already tasted a drop of Christine's blood in his mouth. Unbeknownst to everyone, what had now entered his body was not consumption. It was something else.
Only a short time passed before all noises in Christine's room ceased. It was silent the rest of the day, and then the next day, the next week, the next month... Even though he never saw his mother after that, the lack of her voice or coughing fits was enough evidence of her death. It was confirmed when he eventually stepped back in the room, only to see the bed was stripped and the room was empty.
That was when Edgar began sobbing hysterically.
II[]
After her death, Edgar found that he could not entirely cope. even after the move to the town of Ire. Something was preventing the sadness from appearing. Instead, he felt rage, and general anger towards the very thought that a simple molecule could take a life. He even had a strange feeling of determination, as if that same something that was giving him rage was giving him a path to potentially stop the disease. It was as if he had two different things telling him what to do with his life, and they each seemed to have control. When he told his father, he decided to give Edgar's thoughts their own identities: Grim was his rage and sadness. Pleasant was his determination and everyday thoughts.
Scarily enough, he sometimes thought that Grim and Pleasant took "sides" in his mind at the same time: There were times where he felt Grim want to stop the pain of seeing dying patients, but there were times he felt his consciousness literally "snap" back to Pleasant and resume his thoughts of determining the causes of his patients' illnesses. That had happened almost four times. When he went to bed after an event, he'd have a strange dream. In the dream, there were reports of screaming from the infirmary. The nurses would rush over, but they would always be too late: the only glimpse they got of a perpetrator was a strange, semi-bipedal creature with dirty hair and a snout of pointed teeth. It would growl at the nurses and flee through a window, leaving behind a corpse drenched in blood.
Then Edgar would wake up from the nightmare, completely unclothed and sprawled within his bedsheets with traces of blood on his fingernails. He never really thought much of it. When he had company stay the night with him, they often said he had a habit of digging into his arms with his nails. They said it was as if he was cold and desperately trying to warm up. Sometimes he thought they were covering something up for him, but he never doubted his neighbors. What Edgar knew for sure was that the dreams must have been real-- to an extent. It was always because of one strange factor. If he went to work that day, he would find the broken window in one of the rooms, broken exactly as it had in the dream. Edgar always had something else to do, though, and he pushed the thought and dream to the back of his mind. From there, his day would begin.
III[]
Edgar looked up from his seat in his study and stared at the painting of the landscape: his fiancée, Viviane, had created for him on the day of his twentieth birthday. The painting itself was his definition of perfection. What spoke to him the most was the fact that she had painted a boy with scruffy, messy brown hair, a pallor, and light blue eyes that seemed alive and glowing constantly. He didn't need to guess who it was, considering he had the same features.
His childhood was pleasant, to say the least. As for his teen hood, he preferred not to speak of it, and considered it rather grim. Mentioning his mother and consumption in general was enough to send him in a melancholic state for almost a week at a time. When that happened, it was usually Viviane who made him feel better. He felt cared for in her hands, as if she were the sister he never had.
There was a gentle knock at the door. "Come in," Edgar called out. The door creaked open as a pale lavender dress appeared within the frame. When the figure closed the door, Edgar got a good look at it. The dress was worn by a black-haired, ivory-skinned maiden. "My, my, Edgar, your study does look lovely." She said as she scanned the room. "You even hung my painting where I told you to hang it. I like that." Edgar turned to Viviane and gave her a soft kiss. He loved her, even if she wasn't entirely a human. Then again, he wasn't either.
"How has your day been, my love?" He asked, smiling slightly. Viviane blushed a bit. She was notorious for being very shy. "My day has been fine, Edgar. I was looking for some mint to help you with your tonics. If I'm not mistaken, mint helps with rhinitis, and I figured you could use some help." Edgar nodded. "It does help. My father taught me that long ago, before I moved from the country to here. He was not exactly a doctor, but he was considered an apothecary during his youth. I guess that my being a doctor has something to do with that."
Viviane's eyes widened. "Impressive, Edgar. I must say--"
Suddenly, she began to cough. The maiden pulled out a handkerchief and gave a set of hacks into it. Edgar began to look concerned. "My love, are you alright?" Viviane nodded, trying not to show concern towards what she had coughed into. "I should probably leave. If I'm getting sick, I don't want to infect you." They said their goodbyes and Viviane placed the handkerchief on Edgar's desk, unaware that Edgar was studying it profusely. Specifically, he was studying the dark crimson stain that had splotched onto the center where she had coughed. As he looked at it, he thought he felt Grim "snap" into control.
IV[]
Exhausted after rushing home, Viviane lay in bed. She was very uncomfortable, her entire body feeling unusually warm. She was glad to see Edgar, but felt bad that she had to leave before viewing his entire study. Edgar was always welcoming of others to see where he determined diseases using research, but today something was different. She didn't feel safe in her own home, and what made it worse was that she lived alone. She wanted Edgar there, but she didn't want to risk him getting sick at all. She knew she had some form of a disease if she was coughing up blood. All she knew of that was that it probably didn't mean anything good, but Edgar would make her better. She was sure of it.
Suddenly, scratches were heard by her door. She didn't dare open it, but the force on the other side spoke for itself. The door burst down to the floor, and in came a monster. "Aieeee!" Viviane screeched as she clutched her blanket tighter. The creature lurked around the room, snarling at her presence as it trudged on twos. In the dim moonlight, she could make out prominent features about it: the creature had tousled brown hair, an elongated, wolfish snout or muzzle filled with pointed teeth, and had a slight hunch to its back. There was something, though, that caught Viviane's attention just as it ripped her throat out.
It had Edgar's eyes.
Everythingslayer (talk) 02:51, October 22, 2018 (UTC)