In the real world not yet fully affected by the crossover limbo, Aimee and Mr. Night Owl were still in the evidence room. When Aimee found the notebook full of weird and arcane symbols and put it down on a desk with her ice scimitar raised in the air, she was still hesitant if she and her amateurish magic could even do what she wanted.
"If you're sure, just do it." Mr. Night Owl hissed and said with narrowed eyes: "The symbols are giving me the creeps, I think you might be onto something."
"Okay, one, two..." Aimee aimed her scimitar at the notebook, for some reason, she felt that something was trying to stop her, by whispering in her ears, gently and slowly pushing her blade and pulling her arms.
"Stop, Aimee. My daughter." just this moment, a familiar voice came from the entrance of the evidence room, and as Aimee turned around, she saw her father standing by the door: "If you damage that book, you'll hurt me as well."
"Dad? What the - " Aimee frowned and indeed stopped for a brief moment, but then she instantly recognized that this was but an illusion and raised her ice scimitar while keeping her eyes on "her father".
"Aimee, no!" "Aimee's father" choked blood when he saw Aimee raise her scimitar while aiming at the notebook: "Please! Aimee!"
"Shut up, you're an illusion!" Aimee spoke through her teeth, and swung her scimitar down at the notebook.
"Nooo!" "Aimee's father" lunged at her while his face turned grey, pale and full of scars and bumps like a diseased old man: "You're making a mistake!"
Mr. Night Owl leapt from the shelf right at the old man and delivered a scratch attack right on the old man's face. The old man backed off and cried in pain, the scratch marks on his face started smoking and dripping in some kind of dark liquid. And at the same time, Aimee's scimitar landed on the notebook.
"Bang!" the entire ice blade broke and burst into icy crystal shards in the air, the shock propagated to Aimee's body and threw her onto the ground on her back. But her blade still left one mark on the notebook - a deep cut that went through a lot of pages, which struck through a lot of the symbols as well.
The old man screamed again, because another cup just appeared on his back and it had started to release smoke into the air. Mr. Night Owl ran through the old man's legs once again and left two other scratch marks on his legs, the jumped onto his back and tried to tear the cut apart.
"You shouldn't have done this! You shouldn't have!" the old man's face started burning in some kind of blue and green flame as he struggled and tried to get rid of the ferocious talking cat on his back: "He will avenge me! He will punish you! He will crush your entire pathetic being, and use it as the fuel and sustenance for him to come back into this world!"
"Cool story, fucker." Aimee raised the other one of her ice scimitars once and prepared to strike once more. But before she could land another attack, a gush of pale grey smoke jetted out of the cut on the notebook, instantly pushing her away. "Fuck! Fuck!" out from the grey smoke, a few tiny skeletons entirely made of grey smoke latched onto her face, right shoulder and right arm and started biting her like aggressive bugs. She had to immediately concentrate her power and create a thin layer of ice on her body and push the tiny smoke skeletons away.
While Aimee was occupied, the smoke released from the boom had gathered in the air and formed into the shape of a tree crown - only that the branches were made of disturbingly long and skinny necks, and on the top of the tree crown were bunches of tiny human heads, all with different kinds of exaggerated facial expressions.
"Little girl, run!" Mr. Night Owl jumped off the struggling old man's back and said: "Run to your friends!"
Aimee knew full well she was not able to handle this mini smoke tree made of mini smoke human necks and heads, so she just rushed to the door and knocked the old man to the side, and started rushing towards the room where the other officers were holding up.
"It hurts… why does it hurt?" "Come with us! It hurts!" countless human faces on long skinny necks made entirely of smoke grew out from the walls, ceilings and pillars like cursed mushrooms.
"Do not listen to them or get drawn to them!" Mr. Night Owl reminded Aimee: "Get back as soon as possible!"
When they got to the door of the storage room, they saw the shadows of two police officers banging on the door, crying, moaning and begging to be let in. And luckily, Detective Lee adhered to Aimee's advice and did not budge at all.
"Go away!" Aimee conjured another pair of ice scimitars in her hands and lunged at the two shadows. The two shadows were creepy and even terrifying, but they were not able to stand up to the ice scimitars in Aimee's hands. And Aimee was able to repel them with only a few swings.
"Detective Lee! Open the door! It's Aimee!" Aimee knocked on the door. But no one answered.
"Go in by force." Mr. Night Owl said while shaking away the corrosive tears from the eyes.
"Bang!" Aimee charged at the door and banged it open using her shoulder.
Inside the storage room, all the other officers were handcuffed to chairs and pipes in the wall. Some of them were even bleeding on their heads. And everyone in this room, including Detective Lee, had already passed out on the floor.
"Good job, Lee." Aimee closed the door and used a chair to block the entrance, she could see that Detective Lee was the only one not cuffed to anything, which clearly showed that he was the one who cuffed everyone in the room.
"Boom!" something strong banged on the door, and almost got it open. Aimee had to push the door with her body and try to keep the door closed: "Come on, Jason, we're at our last straw here."
The thing that just banged on the door banged once more, this time with greater force. Aimee had to push back at the door to keep it from coming in, and she could see three pale fingers had already reached through the gap of the door.
Just when Mr. Night Owl was about to jump at the entity's fingers, the entity outside screamed in pain, and its three fingers exploded in the air like they were balloons poked by a needle.