You jumped awake.
The sudden jitter caused the cot you were sleeping on to creak just a little bit underneath you. Your heart pounded, and you felt whatever was left of that adrenaline rush down your legs to your feet. The first thing you saw was the bed that Bede was sleeping on next to you. The room itself was only slightly illumined by the glowing mushrooms out the window. They didn't seem like much when you'd fallen asleep but now their glow seemed to envelop the whole room. You could make out the shape of Bede huddled under the blankets. He hadn't heard your sudden rousing from your sleep. Laying on your right side to keep your weight off your left, you propped yourself up on your elbow, grumbling softly to yourself about waking up. It seemed completely random that you'd jumped awake and for a moment you were about to settle back down and go to sleep, but you ended up thinking quietly to yourself.
"I'm thirsty...."
As carefully as you could, you let yourself roll onto your back. You slightly put out your left arm to stop yourself from rolling and a sharp pain shot like lightning through your arm. You hissed at your stupid mistake, pulling your arm to your chest and putting a hand over your casted elbow. It throbbed uncomfortably under the cast and you sat for a moment trying to catch your breath, looking over to see if Bede had stirred any. He didn't thankfully. After a moment, you threw the blankets off of you. Carefully sitting up in the cot, you looked around the room, waiting for the pain to subside a little. For a moment, the room pulsed. The pulsing in your arm seeming to make your vision swim just a little before it adjusted and became still again.
You carefully stood, and as you did you saw a small shape lift up on the bed. You couldn't quite tell at first, but you soon recognized it as Sylveon, standing up to stretch a little from the end of Bede's bed. She slowly made her way across the bed to you and stuck her face near yours, wondering if you were okay. You slowly took your hand off your elbow and reached to pet her in the dark, reassuring her that you were. As she purred at you, you turned the other way and slowly walked to the bedroom door. Carefully your made your way down the stairs and into the kitchen where you shuffled to the fridge and opened the door. The light stung your eyes, but not for long as you quickly stuck your hand inside and grabbed the carton of milk in the door. A cup and a seat at the table later you were sitting watching the silent telly. Sylveon had gotten curious enough to follow you down the stairs and sit under the telly with you, watching as a silent newscast played, showcasing the weather for the next few days, or at least trying to. The weather in the wild area was so unpredictable that it was hard to nail down exactly. You sipped your milk as you watched the meteorologist pace back and forth across the screen, first pointing towards Hammerlocke and then over towards the Lake of Outrage.
Then something...odd happened. As you took another sip of your milk, the telly screen flickered for a moment. It was only just enough to make you think that maybe it was a hiccup in connection. You had just enough time to swallow the milk you already had in your mouth when the telly did it again, this time the screen had flickered completely black for a full second or two before coming back on again. You looked down at Sylveon, frowning as you realized that she had no reaction to what was happening. Her sleepy eyes were still watching the telly, occasionally looking down to lick her paws and groom her face. You tried to relax as you believed if she wasn't reacting to it, then it must've been a normal thing here. The whole thing still made your stomach turn. You rubbed your eyes and turned your gaze to the window. When your eyes adjusted...
Your breath caught in your throat and you nearly jumped back in your chair. It was enough to make a sound as it scooted across the floor, making your milk slosh about in the glass and get all over the floor and your hand. Sylveon jumped at your sudden reaction, straight to her feet. Her back arched for a moment defensively and following your gaze to the window where you were staring.
Eyes. There were eyes in the window. Not just one but many. About a several dozen pairs of icy blue eyes were staring in the window at you. Pinpricked eyes measuring you up. You wanted to move away but your body was completely frozen. The telly was completely off now, the only light in the room being the eyes. You didn't want to look away as you feared something would jump you as soon as you moved. You trembled, holding onto your milk glass for dear life as you tried to think of what to do, or what was even happening. You didn't move your body but you moved your eyes down in hopes of finding Sylveon but in a second of horror you realized that she wasn't there anymore. Neither was Hatterene in the corner, who had been sitting so quietly in the room while you had your drink. You moved your gaze back up and....the eyes were gone?
You didn't calm down. Not at all. Your eyes whipped around the room. Your legs shook horribly as you backed into the center of the room, looking at all the windows in turn. Nothing, there was nothing. There was silence. Slowly. Ever so slowly you made your way to the front door, peeking outside. You couldn't see anything. Literally anything. It was pitch black outside of all the windows. That HAD to be impossible, there were always the glowing mushrooms lighting up the forest outside, there was no way it was just pitch black out there. Your breath hitched as you backed up again. The dark from the outside felt like it was closing in on you, yet you kept your eyes glued to that door. The knob was locked you knew but you just had a feeling. You weren't safe, you weren't-
Something behind you clamped its hands on your shoulders and you immediately shreiked, yanking yourself away and dropping the glass on the floor. It completely shattered spraying milk and glass shards absolutely everywhere. Not a second later you hit the floor, scrambling back against the wall in an absolute blind panic. Not even wanting to see what had touched you, your hands came up to cover your eyes as you curled back against the wall, whimpering loudly as you shook with terror.
"Leave me alone..." you whimpered pitifully, shaking with every breath. A second passed and something touched you again, this time carefully grabbing your wrists and trying to pull them gently away from your face. You sobbed and tried to pull away again, but the shape moved its hands to your face. You opened your tear filled eyes again and looked at the creature that was touching you. The shape was dark for a moment like the outside had been a few short moments ago, but it cleared up, revealing a disheveled looking Bede. You could finally hear his voice past your crying and he cooed at you softly in the dark, running his thumb across your cheek as he tried to calm you down. As you trembled in his hold, the room behind Bede seemed to brighten back up again. The soft glowing mushrooms returning to light the way they had been before. With another moment of hesitation, you reached up and touched one of Bede's hands that was on your cheek. He was real, his skin feeling soft and really warm to the touch. You took in another shaking breath as you sobbed into his hand, nuzzling your cheek into his gentle hold.
Bede relaxed and pulled you against his chest, wrapping his arms tightly around you as you sobbed. He could've complained about you screaming in the dead of night and he could've given you grief about breaking one of his glasses, but he didn't. Instead he sat there on the floor and held you as you cried, trying to speak soft words of comfort to you. He had a feeling that he knew what had just happened. If it hadn't been for Sylveon coming to wake him up, things could've gotten a whole lot worse. So much worse.
"I'm sorry..." you whimpered softly to him. "I'm sorry, I didn't know...t-the window...I was so scared..." Bede hushed you softly, lifting his head to look at the window. Of course there was nothing there now, but he assured himself that there was never anything there in the first place. If there had been, Hatterene would've warned him of an intruder, but there wasn't one. Sylveon had come, warning him that you were not okay.
You took another shaking breath, sitting up just a bit to see something smeared across Bede's sleeve. Blood. You ran your thumb across it, thinking it was his, only to find more on your hand. Bede sat you back just a little and saw what you were looking at, instantly looking to your right arm. Not a lot, but some blood was starting to trickle down to the floor. He then turned to the mess of broken glass and milk on the floor not far away. You looked down as he returned his gaze to you, feeling guilty for making a mess and getting yourself hurt again. Before you could even say anything he pulled you back into him again, feeling him softly exhale.
"You're lucky I like you..." he said softly. You could hear the smile in his words. You knew he was messing with you, but you also knew he was right. You were lucky.
Together, you went back up the stairs, going into the bathroom where he helped you clean out your cuts and bandage them up. He wanted to go clean up the mess himself but you refused to let him go without you. You absolutely refused to be alone right now.
You two shared a bed for the rest of the night. Even though neither of you got any sleep, you did have each other. And you both knew, going on, that things weren't going to get easier.