The first thing he had done, after talking to Angelica Foster again, was talk to her doctors.

He had heard from his CSI team. They were clear that Tommy had to have been killed after she got hit over the head.

This is because his blood had pooled around her. There was no way for that to have happened before she hit the ground. That meant she got hit and something hit Tommy so hard it was like he got hit by a car.

The hit and the squeezing were two separate events. He got hit so hard it broke ribs, then something grabbed and squeezed him like a bottle of toothpaste. And they couldn't tell him how that happened.

He was littered in bruises. All of which could have been contributed to being hit by a car, or by held down and then pressed upon until everything exploded in him.

Neither of which could have happened in that kitchen, so honestly they were at a complete loss as to how it happened. But they knew she couldn't have done it because she wasn't strong enough to have done it.

And, of course, she was unconscious at the time.

Angelica's doctors very kindly informed him that she was, in no way, faking her injury. Not only was her skull lacerated but her MRI confirmed a brain injury. She wasn't in danger, she wasn't internally bleeding, but she was concussed and it would be best to keep her for observation.

He had commented right away that she was in a private room, with the heavily implied question of how that had happened. That wasn't because she could afford it, but because strange things had been happening around her.

Her first MRI had been interrupted by a light shattering above her. They had to wait to clean everything up before trying again. Since she was pitching a fit even before the light shattered, they had decided to sedate her before the second one.

That first one though, it had gotten half way done before they were stopped by the light. They showed him the results too, they said there were no way to get lines like that unless something electronic was messing with the machine and they all confirmed that nothing was in there with her.

They chalked it up to whatever short circuit took out the light, but they had all gotten weird feelings around Angelica. To the point where they put her in her own room and nurses were arguing over who would be going in to check on her.

They said every time they walked into the room, no matter the time of day, there were shadows. Deep dark shadows that they swore moved along the wall. They felt as if something was watching them, the air felt oppressive, like something was standing there eyeing their every move.

He would have waved it off, but he too had felt the same way, both in her house and around her. He had even felt it in the room too.

After he was done talking to their doctors, he went one floor up to the psych ward to talk to Sloan's doctors.

By this point Sloan would have been on that ward for about twenty four hours. The first thing the nurses did when they got there was sedate him. He wanted to see if he was a little more coherent now.

But when he went to see him, he found out that he had regressed.

Sloan would no longer talk, but he kept trying to draw. When they didn't give him paper he had used the food they brought him. When they took that away, he cut himself open and used his blood.

One of the nurses finally gave him paper and a pencil and the things he was drawing... they weren't normal.

Sloan wasn't an artist so the pictures were... crude to say the least, so it took him sometime to decipher what he was looking at.

There were a few that were just a mass of tangled... god he didn't even know what. Vines maybe? All whirled around a face that was screaming.

But then, when did the vines have pointy white teeth? Maybe those were the thorns? But why were they only around the middle where the face was?

But mostly what he was drawing was a monster. He only ever drew the face, but it didn't really look like a face. It looked like something that should have had a face but it was missing? Or smudged? Either way it didn't quite look human and he was calling it the Pale Man.

Campbell had no idea what that was supposed to be and seeing as Sloan wasn't talking, just drawing and then naming those drawings, he was of no use.

Whatever it was it didn't look human.

So, either something monstrous was in that house, or Sloan had lost his mind after witnessing the two murders and had made the villain into a monster to reconcile the horrors he had witnessed in his mind.

His doctor said that they were going to try and work with him, but it didn't look promising.

This left Campbell with two things to check on.

Firstly, he hadn't been lying when he told Angelica that the CSI folks had found evidence of Dan's blood under the couch. A couple of drops, nothing they'd consider life threatening, but it was there.

He was going to need to see if there was anything under that couch, like a trap door, something the CSI folks might have missed cause they were rushing to get out of the house.

Secondly, though he had already done this, he wanted to go back and really do another thorough check to see if someone else was living in that house with her.

Both of which meant that he had to go back into that house.

He had already asked a lot of his team and his deputy with the first search, and he knew drumming up back up to go back to the House of Death would be even harder, cruel even.

To save himself the time and the stress about worrying about one of his officers on their own in that house, he went by himself.

Stupid, of course, but he had never had a problem in the house. The house seemed to sense that he was no nonsense, that he had no intention of being scared off by it, and that false bravado seemed to get him in and out without anything too weird happening.

You know, other than weird feelings and a few whispers, and he'd like to keep it that way.

He called in where he was going, noting that no one volunteered to meet him there, and then he made his way back to that house.

He let himself in past the police tape and then immediately went back to searching.

He started on the top floor.

Nothing in the attic. No sign of life or movement. Nothing in the dust patterns, nothing that would say there was a hidden door or anyone coming and going.

Then he went down one floor to her quarters. Nothing had been moved there either. Everything was the exact same as when he had been in there last, but that eerie feeling, the feeling of something's eyes on the back of his neck had gotten worse. It was heavier and his heart rate kicked up, but he ignored it and kept going.

The second floor was just rooms. Ones that were locked and being saved for when she got her licence to be a hotel.

Not sure how that was going to work with all the death and creepiness around the house, but that would a problem she would have to solve. The Millers had profited off the House of Death angle, maybe she could do something similar.

He wasn't sure anyone in town would appreciate that though.

There was only one door on that floor that he didn't need to use the keys on.

There was no bed in it, but there was a cat tree, a guitar and a whole bunch of cat toys. All odd because she didn't have a cat.

Maybe she was planning on getting a cat... but then why was the guitar in that room?

A music-slash-cat room maybe?

When he left that room a sensation ran up his body. Like a bug was darting a long his skin. He had shivered but ignored it. Or... well... he had tried to. There was a sudden pinch in his shoulder, kind of like he had put his shoulder out of joint but he wasn't sure how he had done that.

He tried to rotate the feeling out of it but it didn't budge so he figured he'd ignore it for now and if it persisted he'd go see the local chiropractor.

But then he heard music. Like the guitar was playing. Just a few strummings of chords he didn't recognize. He opened up the door again and nothing had moved. The guitar was sitting silently where it had been left.

Whispers erupted like static in his ears, starting out soft and building up quickly, the wind outside picked up, knocking branches against the windows in long scratching bursts. Heaviness pressed on his chest, panic rushed through his veins, he got the distinct feeling that something was rushing at him though nothing was there. It was just the same sensation he got when a suspect charged him.

He shut the door quickly and backed away. The feeling in his chest subsided, briefly. He couldn't hear the whispers anymore, but shadows were starting to play across the walls. He had been there way too long, he did not want to be in that house when it got dark. The daylight was the only saving grace when being near or inside Culverton.

He made his way back down the stairs to the front of the house. There was the little check in area which had been downgraded from an actual desk to a Key box that was still locked and a side table. He moved through the hallway to the kitchen, but there was nothing there either, before heading back to the living room.

It took one shove to push the couch out of the way, and then he kicked the carpet over so he could look at the floor. He tested floorboards trying to see if they squeaked or felt off, he even tried to pry one or two up, but nothing was there.

No trap door.

With his hands on his hips he just stared down at the floor. Honestly, this case was just super weird, like all of the Culverton House cases.

Something had happened here, something awful, awful enough to drive a man crazy. One person was missing, presumed dead, he had his only surviving victim lying to him, and someone had died in an unexplainable way.

Culverton had so many secrets as is, why did it want more?

There came a sudden skittering, the sound of claws against stone and he turned around. The fireplace was behind him, from his understanding it wasn't functioning but he swore he could see dust drifting down.

Well it was an old house, he could hear the wind creaking against it, it was probably moving something in the chimney.

He almost felt stupid for being startled, but then he looked up and immediately froze.

Angelica had a mirror hanging above the mantle place and in that reflection it wasn't just his face looking back at him, but there was something else, something behind him.

A pale face, with no features. Just black beady eyes, looming behind him.

Campbell froze. He had never frozen in his life but this time he did.

Because it was Sloan's pale man. It was there, it was behind him. But he had to be seeing things, he had to be, there was no way that thing was real, there just wasn't...

Hands appeared, massive, pale, the limbs long, gangly, way too long to match the torso. But they were there, and they were reaching out for him. The hair on the back of his neck shot up, electric fear tingled up his spine.

He whirled around, gun in hand, his back slammed against the mantle.

Nothing was there.

Behind him came the skittering again. The definite sound of nails against stone, this time louder, closer. A critter stuck in the wall, but directly behind him. He turned, ash was definitely falling from the chimney into the fireplace, something was definitely in there.

As he was peering at the chimney again the apprehension returned. The feeling climbing up his spine. He swore he could feel someone, a mouth right by his ear.

But there was no breath, no touch. It was simply the sensation of something there and the soft whisper of: Get out in his ear.

Campbell straightened slowly. He took one step away from the fireplace. Turned back around, his eyes scanning for anything, any sign of movement, anything that could explain what was happening to him.

He looked at the couch, still off kilter, the carpet peeled back and decided that it wasn't worth it. He calmly and quietly walked to the front door. He ducked under that crime scene tape and then shut it behind him, not even bothering to lock the door.

The second he got to the door the pinch in his shoulder left him. By the time he was out and by his squad car his heart rate had gone back to normal and he was desperately trying to rationalize what he saw, what he felt, what he heard.

There was nothing behind him, it had to be his old, tired, stressed eyes conjuring up Sloan's pale man. That had to be it.

The house had finally gotten to him. It had found a chink in his armour and infiltrated.

Or... there really was something in that house. Something that had been killing people, something that had gotten Dan and Tommy.

Could he really afford to let anyone back into that house if that were true?

Would anyone believe him if he told them?

Well, the town would. He wasn't certain how Angelica would take it.

Buthe knew he'd have to try. Because if there really was something in that house...it was only a matter of time before it got her too.