Free
It's over.
It's finally fucking over.
That thing is dead. Harry's got Alessa – Cheryl – bundled safely in his arms, and although he's got cuts, bruises, burns and one hell of a headache, they're all alive. He's got a death grip on Cheryl, and as he hesitantly stumbles forward towards that road where it all began, he can't help but smile.
They're free. They can leave this hell.
The fog is already beginning to lift, and the deserted town suddenly seems that much more... placid. Quiet. Silent, the thesaurus in his writer's mind supplies, and he turns to share the quip with Cybil.
Except Cybil isn't anywhere to be found.
That horrible, sinking feeling he's almost grown accustomed to grabs at his gut again, and he quickens his pace forward, not looking back anymore.
The fog is completely gone now, and Harry is no longer comforted by this. He's running now, blindly turning corners, wildly dashing down the streets of this abandoned fucking ghost town until he finally reaches that street, the horrible place where it all began, and he sees it.
A horribly mangled piece of machinery – possibly a scooter, or a moped, but Harry knows instinctively that it was once a motorcycle – is just laying there in the middle of the road. Underneath it lies a corpse in similar shape, only identifiable by the beautiful bleach-blonde hair tinted red with blood.
He can't help it. Harry falls to his knees, and through the tears he can begin to feel the bile rising up. Falling forward all the way onto his hands, it all comes forward in a rush, and above the burning in his throat and the tight, constricting sorrow in his chest the goddamn POUNDING in his head just keeps getting worse and worse and -
Rising to his feet, ignoring the incessantly intensifying pain, he drops the empty mass of blankets in his arms and begins to stumble forward through the final stretch. The Jeep is finally visible now, and as he squints forward, hand above his eyes, he can just barely see the outline of a person in the driver's seat.
When he brings his hand down, he sees the blood on it.
The headache is gone. Harry lets out a single, barked laugh – one that sounds more like a sob than actual mirth – before slumping forward, lifeless.
He is free.