By Ruinous Wyrn (a new author here at IIT)
News of an entirely novel sort reached our ears recently when whispers were heard of an extraordinary occurrence that shockingly isn’t part of a conspiracy theory. We traced the story to its source and found that it originated with one Mark Obambulare, a freshman here at WCC.
“I was walking back up to the dorms after nightfall,” Mark said in an interview we were able to have with him today “As I walked across the field towards Holy Rosary, I noticed that it was so foggy, I couldn’t see the streetlights from the road behind me or the parking lot ahead of me. I kept trudging along the path, but when the fog lifted, it revealed a landscape I had never seen before.”
According to his account, he stayed in this strange land, which upon inquiry of the inhabitants was the land of Faërë, for about six months. However, nobody at the school noticed any absences, and his dorm prefect confirmed that he hasn’t spent a single night anywhere else.
We took this strange story to a contact of ours known only as the Shelfwalker of Baldwin, an expert in ancient lore and fantastic fables He confirmed that the time discrepancy in Obambulare’s story in no way discredits it, but rather confirms it beyond doubt.
Other than a strangely shaped scratch on his cheek that will occasionally glow blue, Obambulare seems to have been mostly unchanged since the incident, except for a tendency to try to have conversations with trees.
IIT analysts recommend that students exercise caution in the Holy Rosary field after dark. The Shelfwalker also gave advice: “Try to avoid the field during the full moon,” he warned, “and don’t stop to talk with anybody you meet, especially if they have wings, more than two legs, or try to tempt you to leave the trail with Turkish Delight or something.”