"I... expect that doing things out of curiosity around the Beholding is safe, as long as you don't think 'might turn you into a very intellectually curious sociopath with too many eyes' counts as unsafe. It likes it when people are curious." He drinks a sip of his tea. "It's happened to two people, both of the people who gave me a statement who weren't already my employee. I confirmed Naomi, the first-- uh-- victim, had the nightmares, but I can't interview her in depth, because one of the major funders of the Institute plays an important role in her statement and prefers not to have their affairs dug into."

“Well that’s not incredibly suspicious at all. And, uh, I’d rather pass on being a curious sociopath with too many eyes, thanks.”

"So here's my thoughts on what we should do. I'll share what I know about the paranormal with you and keep sharing it as I discover more non-digitizables. I would appreciate it if you'd keep a nightmare journal, I already do; we can compare notes and maybe get a better sense of how many of the nightmares are due to the Beholding and how many are due to trauma. I thought about appropriating Institute funds to cover you going private for nightmare therapy-- partially because I feel bad and partially to rule out the nightmares being mostly caused by trauma-- but I think that might be unwise because if you're helping us and getting money from us the Beholding might decide you're an employee. And if anything else weird and paranormal comes up, you can tell me and I can have... at least one person who has given a live statement I can follow up on so I know what happens. --I am very optimistic about your chances of not getting devoured, which is unusual, because the life expectancy of someone who gives us a non-digitizable statement is probably something like six months."

“...Okay. Why am I any different?”

"Uh, a lot of them are like 'I'm being stalked by a murderous spider, it won't leave me alone, please help me' and then we don't help them because that's not our job and we don't know how to anyway, and then we do followup research and it's like 'two weeks after giving the statement the person was found dead encased in an enormous amount of spiderweb.' You are not being stalked by a giant spider and not linked with the funders of the Institute, and I want to take advantage of this opportunity. And it's even better that you're also interested in investigating the paranormal-- although honestly after all of this I would not blame you at all if you decided to start a cooking channel instead."

“No. I want to figure out what’s going on, or at least learn—something. Let’s just hope I don’t anger any, ah, murderous spiders.”

"Well, here's what I know, anyway." He slides over a stapled set of pieces of paper that reads like this:

Spirits

-The Beholding
--Existence and name confirmed
--Servant: Lev Aarons
--Associated Family: Keay
--Other Associates: the Magnus Institute; eyeless man
--Interests: curiosity, knowledge, nonintervention
--Motif: open eye; library; books
--Relationships: opposed to the Lightless Flame, the Hive, the Fractal; allied with the Fog
--Statements: 1, 5, 11, 12, 24, 26

-The Hive
--Existence and name confirmed
--Servant: Jane Prentiss
--Associated Family: unknown
--Other Associates: unknown
--Interests: parasites, connection?
--Motif: parasites
--Relationships: opposed to the Beholding, the Fractal
--Statements: 6, 21, 22

-The Web
--Existence and name confirmed.
--Servant: unknown
--Associated Family: unknown
--Other Associates: unknown
--Interests: unknown
--Motif: spiders
--Relationships: unknown
--Statements: 12?, 16, 22

-The Spirit of War
--Existence confirmed
--Name used to refer to spirit, but may be nickname
--Servant: unknown? Possibly Wilfred Owen (deceased)
--Associated Family: unknown
--Other Associates: unknown, possibly Rayners?
--Interests: war
--Motif: music? poetry?
--Relationships: unknown
--Statements: 7

-The Lightless Flame
--Existence confirmed.
--Name used to refer to spirit, but may be nickname
--Servant: unknown
--Associated Family: Rayners
--Other Associates: Robert Montauk; People's Church of the Divine Host; Chris Parker; Mr. Pitch?; Outer Bay?
--Interests: unknown; possibly involves waiting 300 years for something?
--Motif: lightlessness; closed eye; strange symbols and chanting; glowing or heat or burned out candles; malfunctioning electronics etc
--Relationships: opposed to the Beholding
--Statements: 9, 11, 15, 26

-The Fractal
--Existence confirmed.
--Name assigned by Archivist.
--Servant: Michael.
--Associated Family: unknown
--Other Associates: Fieldings
--Interests: unknown
--Motif: fractals; bones in inappropriate places; blood? rotting apples? honestly I do not get this spirit's aesthetic at ALL
--Relationships: opposed to the Hive, the Beholding
--Statements: 8, 23

-Mentis
--Existence unknown
--Name used to refer to spirit, but may be nickname
--Servant: unknown
--Associated Family: unknown
--Other Associates: Father Burroughs; Breekon and Hope Deliveries
--Interests: fucking with people's brains; possibly minds in general
--Motif: mind control?
--Relationships: unknown
--Statements: 19

-The Fog
--Existence unknown.
--Name assigned by Archivist.
--Servant: unknown
--Associated Family: Lukases
--Other Associates: Solus Shipping PLC
--Interests: dead people? human sacrifice
--Motif: fog; blank-faced people who don't speak
--Relationships: allied with the Beholding
--Statements: 13, 31

-Blue Sky
--Existence unknown.
--Name assigned by Archivist.
--Servant: unknown
--Associated Family: Fairchilds
--Other Associates: Open Skydiving
--Interests: unknown
--Motif: the sky
--Relationships: unknown
--Statements: 20

-Meat
--Existence unknown
--Name assigned by Archivist
--Servant: unknown
--Associated Family: unknown
--Other Associates: unknown
--Interests: slaughtered animals?
--Motif: meat, flesh, mazes?
--Relationships: unknown
--Statements: 18, 29

Creatures

[Creatures are embodied, eat or attack people, and do not have a known connection to spirits.]

-Vampires
See Trevor Herbert's statement for remarkably helpful and complete information. 
Statements: 10

-Anglerfish
Imitates a human standing in a dark area, but is not capable of impersonating them fully.
Statements: 2

-Lycanthrope
Has "sharp" hair, teeth, eyes, and skin, but otherwise resembles a human. Hunts humans; attacks similar to a wild-animal attack. Able to endure being shot with multiple bullets.  
Statements: 30. 

Artifacts

Salesa
-Sells antiques which do horrifying things to people. 
Statements: 14

Leitner
-Had collection of books; items with his name on it do horrifying things to people.
Statements: 5, 17

The Circus of the Other
-At least one associated item does horrifying things to people.
Statements: 25

Breekon and Hope Deliveries
-Does deliveries which sometimes do not do horrifying things to people. 
Statements: 3, 19

Unclassified Statements

4, 12, 27, 28

but with summaries of the relevant statements included,

"Unfortunately yours is in 'unclassified,' I can't help much with it."

“Right. Can I look over the statements you’ve verified, and the research? —You might not know this, being a psychologist, but the Magnus Institute doesn’t exactly have the best reputation for... Well, you took my statement, and it’s not like I had evidence. You seem like a great person and all that, but I’d just feel better if I could double-check.”

"Yeah, of course, but most of them are unverifiable either way. My notes are-- working from the premise that our local evil spirit is correctly identifying true statements. Verifiably true statements never digitize, and verifiably false statements always do, but... it could always do that in order to deceive us into thinking it's telling the truth about the unverifiable ones. It's impossible to know for certain and, uh, it is not exactly a trustworthy spirit. --I don't know exactly how involved you have to be in the place before it won't let you leave, but uh. I just wanted to point out that if you start digging through our research it might decide you're an archival assistant."

“Right, well, if I’m an archival assistant at least I get free therapy and maybe fewer nightmares.” Sigh. “I’m sorry. I should probably wait, make this decision not on impulse. I’ll do more independent research and let you know if I find anything.”

"Yeah. Nightmare journal, keep an eye on things and see if anything else paranormal comes up, I'll shoot you an email in a week or so?"

“Yeah.” Sigh. “For whatever it’s worth, I’m pretty sure there was—a genuine, bona fide ghost at that hospital. I don’t know what the hell Sarah Baldwin is, but I know what a ghost is, and there was something there that was attacking her. Your call if you want to put it in your little monster manual.”

He thinks about it. 

"Sure. I'll add it in when I get home." 

“Right. Okay. I... Guess I’ll go then? It was, uh, nice to meet you. In person, I mean.”

"Nice to meet you too."

At home that night Lev is very smiley:

"Melanie's great. I like her."

“You’re really cute when you’re happy, you know.” Kiss. 

"She asked good questions! And was extremely skeptical of everything I was telling her! And she called my monster manual a monster manual even though I had specifically changed the title in order to be professional!"

“Cute. Did you... find out anything? You know, about the nightmares.”

"Mostly I was trying to get her to want to do a nightmare journal. I am not sure there's going to be anything useful retroactively."

Nod. “Makes sense, I guess. How much did you end up telling her?”

"Gave her the manual, told her she could come look at the statements if she decided she wanted to but it might be a bad idea because the Beholding might decide she's an archival assistant. Didn't tell her why the Magnus Institute is incompetent."

“Yeah, that’s fair. Did she have anything useful?”

"Static in the recording might be something called 'EVP.' We should try listening to the static more closely and see if we can hear words."

“I can do that! I don’t remember it sounding like words at all but, yeah, I can definitely check.”