Chapter 5
“Entity would cease to operate without the Archives and its Research and Cataloging department. Knowledge is the first line of defense and often the only thing standing between a Warden and danger.”
Entity Employee Handbook: R&C Edition
After five years in Entity’s Research and Cataloging department, Nic Dyre believed he’d seen it all.
Granted, the odd noteworthy report did cross his desk—like the confirmed Jersey Devil sighting the week before last—but they were hopelessly outnumbered by the endless stream of false leads and routine inquiries. The sheer volume of requests for files on ghosts was enough to drive any man spare.
So, when Alexys Keane had come to him with her Silver Giant case, it caught Nic’s attention. Not because he had any interest in Silver Giants—he’d spent enough time researching those elusive creatures during his master’s program. He’d exhausted all research endeavors in that respect.
But Alexys’s choice of Quadrant in West Virgina? Now that piqued his interest.
The Appalachian Mountains were one of the most fascinating regions when it came to cryptology and the supernatural.
With mountains older than fossilized bones and the highest percentage of cryptid sightings in Entity’s records, Nic was absolutely fascinated by the place.
Not only did the mountains have a diverse population of monsters, there was also a rich history of magic and Native American folklore.
He flicked through Alexys’s proposal again and opened up a blank report.
The Silver Giant case was a clever idea, using a guaranteed non-case rather than merely a simple one to test her Warden.
Nic was also impressed that Alexys appeared to possess a wealth of information on Silver Giants.
The HR team had a tendency to be so wholly focused on their human employees that they neglected to learn what he and his team deemed to be obligatory information pertaining to creatures.
Unsurprising, of course, but he had to give credit where credit was due.
Nic split his report into two sections, and for the time being, he skipped over the Silver Giants.
There was another creature from Elliot’s Quadrant that fascinated him so much more.
The thing that really drew his interest to West Virginia’s mysteries and was the true motivation behind his willingness to write the report: the Hollow Walker.
Classified as a Singularity and a Class F (Unconfirmed) cryptid by Entity’s standards, the Hollow Walker was an entirely unique and compelling creature.
There was only one, it was barely ever seen, and they had virtually no records on it.
Nic was certain Alexys’s team had never even heard of it.
After all, the creature barely even had a formal name.
‘Hollow Walker’ was colloquial, and it raised more questions than answers.
All legends surrounding its existence confirmed it to be deadly, and if the handful of stories he’d heard were to be believed, it was well over a century old.
Company policy mandated that a creature couldn’t be classified as a Class E (Extinct) cryptid until at least ten years passed without a confirmed sighting.
Nic refused to reclassify. Sure, there hadn’t been a confirmed sighting in the last nine years, but Nic wasn’t giving up just yet.
He’d been praying for years that a new sighting would cross his desk and keep the creature profile active.
Nic knew he shouldn’t include the Hollow Walker in his report, but a small part of him hoped Alexys would read it and have her Warden ask the locals about it while she was in the area.
There was hardly a chance of her Warden actually seeing the beast, but any new story or sighting would be happily added to his dismally small collection.
He’d accept anything so long as he could keep the casefile active.
His enthusiastic typing was interrupted by the ping of an incoming information request. He frowned.
One thing after another.
Nic knew it was part of his job, but fielding information requests from HR was his least favorite part of the job.
They never listened to his expertise. They only ever wanted regurgitated information in a nice and neat little pre-made form.
The Wardens were little better with their last-minute, absolutely crucial, need-right-now requests.
It was mind-numbing and frustrating, but working at Entity allowed him to continue his own research into the things that truly interested him. So he tolerated it.
Nic skimmed through the automated email, noting the details of the request. A Warden was being sent out to investigate a possible Riverwyrm, but even from a cursory glance, Nic was fairly certain it wasn’t legitimate.
There was no evidence in the Archives to support a Riverwyrm leaving the water and eating cattle to sustain itself.
He hated calling them ‘Riverwyrms’. It was uncreative and too much of an umbrella-term. If he ever developed an interest in aquatic monsters, he’d go after that label first.
He ticked a box and passed it off to his assistant, Adrienne. Her workload was light since the sudden spike in Mothman sightings had recently died down. Which reminded him, he really did need to nail down his hypothesis on the Mothman’s seasonal migration.
But for now, he could pour over his Hollow Walker files one final time. He didn’t want to get his hopes up, but for the first time in a long time, Nic felt that familiar tickle of the unknown.
To be the one to catalog a never-before-documented creature? Nothing could beat it. If the Hollow Walker was out there, come hell or high water, he’d be the one to discover it.