#para(graph)noia

It took a little longer to arrive outside the gas station convenience store in Gotham, a few hiccups along the way and a snack break to replenish waning strength but October found herself in the city once again. Brightly colored and carrying her familiar orange pumpkin pail, she emerged from a shadow behind a dumpster and flailed like a gangly fawn onto the street.

"Friend? FRIEND?!" She yowled out, looking for the strange boy she had agreed to meet up with.

"NoT HeRe..." a rasping wheeze echoed weakly from the pail.

"He's here he said he would be here..." October retorted in indignation.

Late summer nights when the days weren't as inforgiving and the setting sun brought some reprieve and a whispered promise of easier autumn days to come- a blessing after months of baking. Tonight was one of those nights, the nights that beckoned to those willing to wander out when the last rays of light had finally flickered, keeping streets busy and businesses comfortable.

It made moving inconspicuously more difficult.

Not that it was of any particular mind to the scrawny beast, it understood that humans who saw them were so quick to forget. A particularly large stray dog, a trick of the shadows cast by eye-straining neons and LEDs, something to be written off and forgotten in favor of more tangible and explainable phenomena.

It wasn't strange for people to lock their doors and windows in this day and age, even out here this far in the woods. Never knew what knife-weilding maniac or drug-addled speedfreak might barge right in to steal or do far worse damage to the occupants. Of course, there were those that forgot- and on a night like this would prove to be difficult for their senses of privacy and well-being.

It seemed monthly now there was a string of missing pets, cabin break-ins that left homes in wild disarray with nothing of real value taken. Occupants swore they hadn't left their homes or even recalled anything wrong on those nights, simply waking up in the morning to find their homes wrecked, muddied and anything not nailed down to be damaged and ruined. Usually chalked up to bears and forgetful summer cabin owners but there was always something off about this particular theory.

Of course they wouldn't remember, that was the beauty of this inborn "curse"- people would dismiss the sight of a beast ransacking their homes.

She didn't recognize this area, she hadn't for some time. Then again anything less than distinctly Urban was foreign to the young wanderer, and here was no different. October knew she was far from any established city, or perhaps even town, her last stowaway ride had dropped her off in heavy woods and foliage that was all but disorienting to her. Still, she walked through the trees, stumbling through snagging brush and tripping roots for about a day and a half. When she wasn't sure that hunger would kill her she was certain the pitch black night would tear her to pieces if not for the rainbow of glowsticks she had with her. That wouldn't help her with food, however, and she wouldn't have enough to make it through tonight.

With some minor stroke of luck, she found a gap in the trees, what would be a meadow or clearing if not for the ample growth of strange plants cultivated there. She recognized some plants, however, fruits that looked familiar enough to eat, and without hesitation lunged for them with voracious hunger.

There were always downsides to travelling at night, but given the oppressive heat that baked the concrete jungles during the day it was more or less the only option if one wanted to avoid heat stroke. The street lamps and lights that beamed from inside the still open shops and restaurants provided more than ample light to walk through- a city as big as this one was plagued with enough light pollution to keep the streets in a perpetual twilight of halogen and neon.