Caleb stumbled back from the door and down the hallway, out of the hospital wing, desperate for air, for somewhere open, where he could regain control. Rowan was roaring inside of him, clawing up through his mind, and it was taking every bit of will he had not to lose his grip, his hold on the kid's body. He'd heard Perry, felt what Perry had said to Julie, and things felt clearer now. The boy was no demon. He'd been taken by a demon, but the evil had let him go, and he was just a kid now. There was nothing about him to fear. Just to prove it, Caleb made himself stop at the bathrooms off the locker hall, made sure noone was near, and found a mirror inside.

The kid stared back at him, cuts healing on his face, the gash freshly taped, his upper lip dark with blood.

And those eyes.

Crystal blue, piercing.

Haunted.

They were his now. His beautiful eyes. Caleb felt it inside as a truth as he stared at the face in the mirror, and a smile spread slow and wide.

He had a good smile now too. Even and bright. And while he used to have blonde hair, now he had hair so dark it was almost black.

His face, his smile, his eyes. Caleb stared back, owning what he saw, and slowly, the kid inside fell to silence.

Caleb straightened, and his smile grew into a grin, one that made his eyes seem almost feverish. He'd done it. Stuffed the kid down. Shut him up. Now, how could he make it permanent?

Dipping a cupped hand under the tap, he quickly splashed the cool water over his mouth, and wiped the blood away, gently, almost tenderly. It fell in weak pink puddles against the porcelain as he stared at himself.

This time it would be very different. He wouldn't let himself get hurt by anyone. He'd look after himself, treasure this second chance God had graced him with. He'd help people too, and it'd be a meaningful life, a good life, not the pathetic, lost life that'd ended in blood and crap and gurgling screams in a dead-end alley.

Gratitude swelled in him, and he felt his eyes sting with tears as he turned away from the mirror and headed back into the locker room, meaning to climb the stairs to the exit.

But he stopped dead at the sight of at least a dozen men rushing past, donning body armor and pulling rifles from the cages along the south wall.

He grabbed the arm of one of the men passing, a guy he didn't know, who must have come to town after he left, and nodded to the room.

"What's going on?" he asked, and the man frowned at him before shrugging out of his grasp.

"Someone's flying overhead," the guy said, and his voice held a trembling edge. "Flying real low, circling the town. We're to bring him down."

Caleb stared at him, his mouth falling open. Another plane? It couldn't be a coincidence... it had to be someone from the city... someone searching for Rowan and Julie?

His heart fell. If they shot this one down, it'd only bring more, and he'd seen the city through Rowan's memories, he knew what kind of military force they had.

They'd just keep coming.

He pushed through the assembling group, and joined the stream of men racing up the stairs. The light was blinding outside, and he blinked against a surreal scene of almost forty soldiers raising arms against a lone aircraft low in the sky, it's engine whining as the pilot banked sharply and away.

"STOP!" he screamed, desperate to reach through to them, to make them see how stupid it was to attack.

But it was too late.

There was a jarring percussive blast from the front of the group, and Caleb watched in horror as a rocket shot up towards the plane, and the world exploded in sound as the men around him opened fire.

The rocket missed by what seemed like inches, but some of the shots hit true - black holes appeared on the underside of the fuselage and along one of the wings, and the plane almost seemed to shudder at that moment, as if it were truly some wounded airborne creature, before straightening and disappearing from view.

Who was flying? Who was in there?

As the men around him froze, as if waiting for a fireball of a crash, Caleb wrestled with something deep inside. A terrible, fearful dread that did not feel like his own.

Who was in the plane?

The crackle of static burst from somewhere ahead of him, and there was an exchange of voices. His father, and someone on a radio.

"Morrisey!" came Samuel's voice from the front of the group, and every head turned his way. Caleb looked too, seeing his father over almost everyone elses head, and it struck him, how tall he was now. God hadn't seen fit to grace him with height in his old life.

Who was flying?!

Caleb took a deep breath and tried to calm the fear inside. Why did he care? Was it someone Rowan knew?

"Jeb's on the wall," Samuel continued, "says the plane looks like its going to land on the lake. Take two squads, track the plane, recover what you can."

"Got it, sir," Morrisey answered from the right. "Taking the doc too, just in case."

Caleb stared at the soldier in surprise. Why do I have to go?

Samuel waved them off. "Good, go."

Morrissey came for him then, and pointed at the bunker door. "Go get your kit, might need it."

Caleb shook his head. "I don't thi-"

"Don't make me wait kid," Morrisey said, giving him a not-so-gentle push. "Move it."

Glowering at the man, Caleb headed back in, and despite his intention to take his time as he pleased, he found himself rushing, his heart thrumming hard in his chest, his limbs jerky with nerves as he checked on his brother, then grabbed some triage supplies from the shelves in the hall. One improvised kit later, he raced back upstairs in time to catch the last jeep spewing a dark smoke as it idled waiting for him.

They tore down the road as soon as he was in, leaving a dusty, smoky haze behind them, and soon reached the main gate where they were waved through by the guard. Above them loomed the wall, and the dead, offered back up to God. The sight disturbed him, as much as he tried to convince himself of the justness of the act. Joshua had explained why they did it, and he'd nodded along as he'd listened, eager to be a part of his family again, to be a part of the community. But it just didn't seem right, every time he looked up, and the doc's words came back to him...

They've gone wrong here boy.

It sat badly, and he tried to shake it off, blinking against the wind, and the dust left by the jeep ahead as they made their way down the hill road to the paved highway. Dodging downed tree limbs, abandoned wrecks and gaping cracks in the asphalt, they took the next highway straight through the middle of town and across the lake bridge.

Caleb's eye was drawn back to the main center of town, where sparse store fronts lay shattered and gaping. A skeleton lay stretched against the side of a red sedan outside the ransacked supermarket, its skull in pieces against the pavement. Inside the car there'd been another skeleton, and the sight had twisted his gut as they passed. A tiny mummified corpse, still strapped securely in a bright red car seat.

Squeezing his eyes against the memory, he turned back as they pulled off the highway onto the lake road, and tore down the cracked asphalt under the rapid staccato flashes of sunlight through the trees.

"There!" One of the men yelled, his arm raised towards the body of water they were just starting to see through the thinning forest.

Caleb strained to see what it was, and finally spotted something sticking out of the water, not too far from the shore, about half a mile ahead. Maybe part of the wing? The lead jeep had already pulled off the main road and was ripping across an open stretch of meadow toward the shore, and he gripped the roll bar tight as they bounced off on the same path. As they got closer, he could see it was definitely the tip of the wing.

Lord above... the whole plane's under...

There was something horrible about this. He needed to get to the plane RIGHT NOW.

Even before the jeep had come to a complete stop, he was out, pulling his bag with him as he ran towards the thin muddy shore, to join the other soldiers gathered there.

Two of the men were dragging someone from the water. The figure was limp in their arms, clothes hanging heavy and dripping from his frame.

The clothes, the man's build, the hair dripping wet over his sagging head, triggered a sharp, horrific recognition.

That's... that's...

Caleb's head and heart wrenched violently, and suddenly Rowan was rushing forward, the taste of his own blood salty on his lips, as the soldiers dumped the man on the shore.

"DAD!" he roared, falling almost on top of his father, who hadn't moved. A muddy, bloodsoaked handtowel was wrapped tight above Mark's right knee, and Rowan saw in a panicked instant the bullet wound that had passed through just below, and knew that something vital had been cut.

His father was cold, terribly pale, and unresponsive under his hands as Rowan turned him over, shaking him, calling his name. Beyond terrified, his eyes wide in shock, Rowan checked for a pulse, for breath, and found nothing.

"No no," he whispered, and tilted his dad's head back for a rescue breath, as Morrissey barked something above him at the other soldiers. A few men detached and started back into the water as Rowan tried to breathe for his dad and couldn't - something was blocking the air.

Water.

His father had drowned.

"DAD NO!" he yelled, the sound a sharp angry bark of a command. He thrust down just under his father's sternum, pushing the diaphragm up hard, and water gushed from Mark's mouth in a sudden stream. He did it again, rolling his dad over as water spilled from his lips in a thinning trickle, then pushed him back and finally tried another breath.

It went in, his father's chest rising and falling. Stilling. One more breath, and Rowan moved to compressions, hard and fast, his eyes burning with tears, his nerves live wires just under his skin.

He would not accept this. This was not going to happen. He was going to keep his head about him this time and bring his dad back.

"Dad, you come.. back.. for me now," he grunted, in between compressions, "I.. came back... for you, you... have... to... do it... for ME!"

His dad's body jerked in time beneath his hands, then fell still as he stopped to give two breaths. Rowan's skin was itching with fear as he gave the last breath and rose to pump again. Nothing was happening. NOTHING.

"Dad, I fucking MEAN IT!" he roared, "MOM! You get HIM BACK HERE!" The tears rushed to close his throat, but he swallowed them hard, gritting his teeth as he pumped angrily, defiantly at his dad's chest. He wasn't going to stop, he was going to do this until his dad sputtered and opened his eyes. He stared down at his dad's face, watching for that moment, but there was nothing there, just a cold, waterlogged corpse jerking with each compression.

"YOU CAN'T... HAVE BOTH... OF THEM!" he screamed, looking up through the gathered soldiers to the blue above, before diving for more breaths.

There was a hand on his shoulder, then, firm and warm. Morrissey's voice came to him softly as his blood pounded in his ears.

"God takes who he wishes, son," he said quietly, and the hand on his shoulder squeezed. "Ain't nothing can be done if it's His will."

"You shut the FUCK UP!" Rowan snapped back, the heel of his palms on his dad's chest again, "It's.. MY WILL.. here! MINE! Dad.. you hear.. that?! You're.. COMING BACK!"

And he kept pumping, he kept breathing, even as the soldiers returned from the water carrying what they could scavenge from the plane, and Morrissey ordered them to return with the first jeep. He heard it all, but his eyes stayed frozen on his dad's pale face as he worked, even as it blurred away with the tears that had started to spill.

"Son."

Morrissey's voice again, gentle, deep, reaching him through the brittle panic.

"Eric," the man said again, and Rowan scowled back at him, coming up after two more breaths. "He's gone, boy."

"NO!" Rowan roared, and it gave him new energy to keep fighting, even as his arms started to shake, and his breathing came hard and fast.

But his thoughts were sliding into drowning despair. His dad lay an empty shell beneath him, and it'd been over fifteen minutes now... the chance he'd come back, let alone with normal function was stupidly low.

Dad's.. gone.

"NO!" he screamed, shaking his head as he kept pumping. Whatever it took, he couldn't let his father go. Not when it was all his fault. His dad couldn't die because of his mistake... he couldn't take that!

God, or whatever was up there... could take him instead. He'd died before, he'd cheated death so many times... maybe it was time to pay up.

"Take me," he whispered, and that's when arms locked around his shoulders and pulled him away.

"Get the body in the jeep," Morrissey barked, just behind his head.

"NO! GET THE FUCK OFF OF ME!" Rowan roared, kicking and thrashing in Morrissey's arms as two soldiers gathered Mark's body and pulled it from view. Adrenaline tore through him like a wild thing, and screaming, he wrenched himself free, swinging at Morrissey before he caught up to the men, and pulled his dad back to the ground to start CPR again.

"DAD! YOU COME BACK!"

The world exploded in agony as something struck him hard in the back of the head, and he fell to the ground beside his father as his limbs forgot how to support his weight. Blinking slowly, he rolled back, looking up at a man standing over him, rifle butt raised as if to strike again.

"Pick him up," Morrissey said wearily. "Put him in the jeep."

"..dad.." Rowan whispered, trying to reach for his father, but his limbs stayed leaden and still. Hands grabbed him, lifting him from the ground, and a heavy despair smothered him as they pulled him away.

Voices came to him in snatches as they hefted him over the side of the vehicle and lowered him against the wheel well.

"...kid nothing... trouble..."

"...get him in... have to... town..."

Rowan surfaced and sank, drowning under a black void, heavy with grief. Motion came to him, the vibration of a rough idle, then a distant pressure against his cheek, again and again.

"Eric, hey," Morrissey's voice from somewhere above. "Damn this, shouldn't have hit him so hard."

The light slapping renewed, and Rowan jerked away from it, trying to raise his hand to stop whoever was touching him. His skull was a pounding mess of hurt, his heart a tight ball of pain in his chest. His dad was gone. They'd shot him out of the sky, and stopped Rowan from bringing him back. Tears choking him again, he slipped back to the dark.

"..just go.."

His body shifted with a sudden momentum, and sensation reached him slowly through the void. There was something cold, wet, pressing against his leg.

The wrongness of it leached into his awareness, and frowning, he struggled to open his eyes.

The pale body of his dad was wedged against the opposite wheel well, an outstretched leg, the wounded one, pressing up against Rowan's own. Mark's head lolled with the motion of the jeep, and his pale hands lay limp, curled to the sky.

A deep grief crushed Rowan, squeezing his heart, pulling out a long, agonized moan.

Which was cut suddenly short, as he saw his father's hand twitch.

"..dad.." he called, meaning to yell over the sound of the jeep's engine and tires on the road, but it came out as a hoarse whisper.

Leaden body betraying him, he tried to move to his dad's side, but the jeep's erratic motion threw off what little balance he had, and he landed awkwardly, falling to the floor beside his dad's hand.

Which twitched once more.

Rowan reached for him then, as he tried to push himself back up, fingers seeking his dad's throat. He needed to know that it wasn't just the motions of the vehicle, wasn't just a body's random electrical glitches.

The flesh beneath his fingers was cold. Still and cold.

Dad... no...

As he struggled and failed to keep his head above the dark, struggled and failed against deadening limbs to hold his dad close, he fell back against the floor of the jeep, and stared up at his father's chalky face as the world shrank away.

To nothing.


Chadjb - thank you so much for your review, and the wonderful encouragement :) and thanks to everyone for reading. Let me know what you think if you have a moment. The above chapter wasn't a happy one, but has a big impact on the direction of the story from here, one that surprised the heck out of me when I was writing. I wonder what everyone thinks will happen next? ;) Hope to get another chapter up tonight, but we'll see.