The death of Emily brings Cheryl and Harry closer together. The young daughter never lets her father suffer alone. At night, when he is sitting in the darkened living room, he tortures himself by asking questions he will never know the answers to. In the midst of his thought he is interrupted. Little Cheryl stands in front of her father with her thumb in her mouth. Though it is dark, he can see that the rims of her eyes are red. She has been crying. He takes the child up in his arms and sits with her.
A file crashes to the floor and Lisa curses under her breath. She knows she does not have much time left. Her fingers work quickly to pick the lock on the filing cabinet. Something finally clicks. "Yes," she whispers happily. The drawer slides out easily from its place. Each item is scanned only for a split second until she finds what she is looking for. "The White Claudia," she reads. "A perennial herb found near water, reaches the height of ten to fifteen inches. Has oblong leaves, white blossoms, and the seeds contain hallucinogen. Ancient records show it was used for religious ceremonies. The hallucinogenic effect was key." It clicks in her head that the pills she had been taking are this drug. Kaufman is the cause of all her problems. She kicks the filing cabinet. "Damn him!" But she must conceal her anger for now. The time is not yet right to confront him. She has to come up with a plan first.
After learning the truth about the pills, Lisa decides not to take them anymore. Nothing happens at first but once a few days pass that changes. She dozes off numerous times throughout the day, jumping awake only after a few moments. It becomes impossible for her to get more than ten minutes of sleep. Every sudden noise startles her and makes her heart race. Her concentration is lost. She can barely see straight because of the lack of sleep so it is difficult to inject the painkillers into Alessa's IV. "What's wrong with you?" Kaufman asks her one-day. "Do you need more pills?"
"No," she says. "No. I'm fine. Just… tired."
"Go take a nap. Mrs. Gillespie wants to see her daughter."
"Mm, okay." She trudges off into the hallway. A few murmuring voices drift down to her ears. Instead of taking a nap, she decides to see what is going on. The receptionist discusses the condition of everyone outside with a doctor.
"My neighbor left yesterday," she tells him. "I think I might go too. Things are getting too weird around here."
"Is everyone still getting sick?" Lisa asks.
"Don't know but if they are, they're not coming here. There are still a lot of people on this side of town but over the bridge there aren't many left. Are you going to leave?"
"I'm thinking about it. It'll be hard to get out. I want to take that little girl with me."
"Good luck with that. Kaufman freaks out when one person alone leaves. He'll have a fit to know both of you are leaving."
"I wasn't planning on telling him," Lisa says.
"Well I figured that," the receptionist answers. "Just don't get caught, okay? If you do, you'll never make it out." Lisa does not have to ask the lady behind the counter to verify what exactly she means. The image of all the dead nurses is burned into her brain.
"Let me ask you something," Lisa says, lowering her voice. "Have you heard of a drug called 'The White Claudia'?"
"I know something… You can't let anyone know who told you this, especially not Kaufman. Some people here are involved in some weird cult. That old woman that comes here with the yellow looking skin, she's the leader. Before Michelle took off, she said she heard that woman and Kaufman were talking about some little girl. Apparently they tried to sacrifice her or something and failed."
"Michelle didn't leave… Kaufman, he- … He killed her."
"Oh my God. You're kidding?"
Lisa shakes her head as she continues, "She came down to the basement, told me to leave with her. Kaufman was furious when he saw her down there. She told him she was going to leave and that I was going with. They went up to his office and I followed them. The door was locked but I could hear them talking. Then she screamed and a gun went off."
"Oh man… I'm getting the fuck out of here. I suggest you do the same."
"I will. I just need to find a way to take that girl with me. I can't leave her here with them."
"Forget about her. What about you? That girl is as good as dead anyway. They already have her, they're going to do whatever they want to her no matter what."
"No. I can't do that. If there's a chance, I'm going to take it." The patter of footsteps stops them from discussing it any further. Lisa head back to Alessa's room, giving Kaufman no time to question her.
Cheryl is not too excited about going to school once she reaches the age of seven. Though she cannot explain why, she has been fearing this day. Because of this, Harry drives her to school everyday. It is obvious to him that she will not be able to handle it if she is forced to ride the bus. "You'll like it, I promise," he tells his daughter on the way there. This statement does not get a response. The seven-year-old stays quiet. When the car stops, Harry pats Cheryl's head gently. "Try to have fun, honey. If something happens, let me know, okay?"
She says, "Okay, daddy." They give one another a quick hug before she gets out. A lady with short brown hair and a black jacket on walks over to Cheryl.
"Hello, dear. I'll show you where you can put your backpack," the lady says. Cheryl follows her with her head down, her eyes on the gray tar below their feet. On the ground by each side of the double doors lies everyone else's backpack. Cheryl puts her own bag down in a spot by itself. Right from where she stands, she can see all the children play. Groups of girls play hopscotch or jump rope. Older girls jump through two jump ropes at once. Many of the older boys play basketball together. Some children fight over the swings. Cheryl does not know what she wants to do. She cannot jump rope and with the limited number of swings, there seems to be no chance for her to do that. Her decision ends up being to stay by the fence. With her backpack in her arms, she sits on the ground.
The whistle blows, a high-pitched nose that sounds like a familiar screech. Her hands clasp over her ears until it stops. She follows the group of children into the building. It is a small school so it only has two floors: ground level and a basement. The kindergarten teacher is everything you imagine a stereotype to be, which is not necessarily a bad thing. She greets the children with a warm smile. They all take in her bright appearance. Blonde hair is confined in a bun on the back of her head; the sleeveless red dress she wears covers her ankles but not her red heels. Upon seeing the teacher, Cheryl finds herself feeling a little more comfortable. The children do not avoid her as she has expected and they do not call her names. It is quite the opposite; in fact, a few of them play with her on the first day. She comes home cheerful, a smile spread wide across her face.
A small surprise waits for her on the couch. Harry has brought her a new sketchbook. While she draws in the living room, her father writes at the table in the kitchen. Ideas flow to his pen out on the paper swiftly. There are rarely any days such as this for him anymore. Work has been slow. He just has not had much inspiration lately, and with Emily's death, he has had trouble coming up with subjects to write about. Cheryl's humming reaches his ears and makes him smile. "How was school?" he asks while he continues to scribble.
The humming stops, Cheryl says, "It was fine."
"Did you have fun?"
"Yeah."
"Make any friends?"
"Yeah."
"See the new sketchbook I bought for you?"
"Yeah. Want to see the pictures I drew, daddy?"
"If you bring it here," he calls back, "I can look at it." She runs into the dining room with the book held out in front of her. On the cover is a giant circle with two big eyes and a smile. "That's really good, Cheryl."
"It's you, daddy. I drew it real fast. It's a pretty fast picture, isn't it?"
"Yes it is. You're probably the best fast drawer there is." She climbs into a chair across from her father and makes herself comfortable. The two work on their separate projects with deep concentrated. Harry's pen moves quickly, writing one line after another. Cheryl sketches out more of her fast drawn pictures with her tongue sticking out of the side of her mouth. She does this because in her mind, it makes her look professional. The sight raises a chuckle out of her father. "Working hard?" he asks her.
"Yeah. Are you working hard too, daddy?" He nods instead of verbalizing an answer.
The bandages that once covered Alessa's body are removed. She can now feel the slight breeze of a draft tickle her skin. Lisa decides to give the fourteen-year-old a present on this day. "Hey, Alessa," she says. "I have something for you. Now that you can move your fingers, this might be appropriate." In her hands, she holds out a notebook. It is a simple red notebook that has a clasp on the front to hold it securely shut.
"Thank you, Lisa," Alessa says, not knowing what else to say.
"Your mother is coming by to see you today. She should be here fairly soon."
"Oh." It is not a secret that the young girl fears her mother. Normally, Lisa stays by the doorway but today she is going to take the opportunity to search through Kaufman's files. Kaufman will be in the basement along with Dahlia and Lisa views this as hallucinations were so much worse then. Not only that but she became extremely exhausted and dozed off during the day. As a result, she went back to it.
When Dahlia shows up with Kaufman, Lisa dashes to the first floor. A bobby pin from her hair once again proves its worth as she successfully picks the lock on his office door. Inside, she wastes no time in getting the file cabinets open. In the bottom drawer she finds, not only a file on Alessa, but on Dahlia as well. After the papers are in her hands, she fills the empty spot with a different file. The next task she performs is raiding his desk. But there is nothing that she finds useful. She returns to the basement floor where she temporarily hides the files between stacks of towels in the linen room. The voices of Alessa and Dahlia float out into the hall. Alessa refuses something her mother offers though Lisa is unsure as to what. Soon the talking ceases.
After they leave the room, Lisa watches them go upstairs from around the corner. Once she is sure they have gone, she retrieves the files. The fourteen-year-old is sleeping now. From the tormented expression on her face it is easy for Lisa to see that the girl is having a bad dream. In Alessa's file there is a description of her burns but no the cause. She already has a guess sitting in the back of her mind. She figures Dahlia has something to do with it. The next page in Alessa's file is handwritten, Kaufman's handwriting. The messy letters make it hard for her to decipher the words. All she can make out is, "… half of the… gone… will be administered… bring the other half… give birth to… will bring about Paradise."
Lisa mumbles to herself, "What the hell? This must be that…" Her jaw mouthed the word cult but it did not come out. She knows they are going to do something bad to Alessa. Even from what information she got from the file, she is not exactly sure what is going on. "Paradise?" She stuffs the file under Alessa's mattress and looks through the next one. In Dahlia's file is a newspaper clipping about the house fire that occurred seven years ago. "The cause of the fire is still unknown," she reads. She finds it peculiar that it does not mention anything about the people who lived there. Names are not mentioned nor does it acknowledge that the house even belonged to anyone. On the next page is a handwritten list of people. There is no indication of what this list is for. She moves on. Page three is unreadable to her eyes. It is documented in symbols and strange words that are foreign to her eyes. The file finds a hiding place under the mattress as well.
Despite the nightmares, Cheryl's first year at school goes surprisingly well. Although her teacher discusses the weird drawings created by the seven-year-old with Harry, she (for the most part) never gets in trouble. As the end of school nears, Harry asks his daughter if she would like to go somewhere over the summer. "Okay, daddy," she says. "Where are we gonna go?"
"Where do you want to go?" he says.
"I don't know."
"Think about it, okay?"
"Okay. I will."
At school, she asks her friends where a fun place to go is. They say names of cities and towns where their relatives are. She shrugs the answers off, not sure what to decide. Even her teacher provides a suggestion but it does not catch the young girl's interest. Finally Harry throws out a suggestion. A town just out of state, a place he has to go to drop something off to someone. He says, "We can stay there for a while if you like." She agrees although she is not too excited. One day while she is flipping through a book at school, she sees a map. On the map, her eyes are drawn to a small dot and next to it "Silent Hill" is written.
"Silent Hill," she mumbles. The two words roll off her tongue easily. The name sounds familiar to her though she is sure she has never heard it before. "Silent Hill." When she says the name out loud, it feels familiar. It feels like home. Cheryl convinces her father to go there for a vacation instead. He agrees but tells her they may have to make a detour to the other town first.
At Alchemilla, Lisa begins to feel as though she is the only nurse left. Many of the people in town are gone. It is not evident if they left or if something worse happened to them. A majority of the patients are gone as well. Any time Lisa finds someone to talk to, they tell her they plan on leaving. She finds it odd that they never actually go anywhere. "The doors wont open," a nurse answers when Lisa asks. "I don't think they're locked. It's like it's sealed shut or something. I know I'm not crazy because other people have said the same thing. They don't want us to leave- that lady and Dr. Kaufman. I can feel it."
"What about the patients? What's happening to them? It's obvious they can't just leave," Lisa says.
"A lot of them are dying from being sick. Some of them are just gone. You can go to check on them one day then come back the next and find nothing. The bed's made, the machines are off- the room looks like no one was ever there."
"Did you try opening a window, I mean-"
"Stuck. Wont open either."
"What are you going to do?"
"I don't know." In the basement, Lisa makes up, in her mind, a plan for her and Alessa to escape. She knows she cannot leave the fourteen-year-old here alone. Especially not with her mother and Kaufman lurking around. They have a plan for her.
"Alright people, quiet down," an older man says, his voice rises to talk over the small crowd. His graying hair is concealed by the dark brown hair dye he used on it not too long ago. His aged face gives off a stern expression to the others in the room. All of them are dressed appropriately for the workplace, which happens to be a police station. The officers go silent and listen to what their boss had to say. "There have been some communication problems with the next town over. Silent Hill. There was a report of some strange, deaths. We tried to contact the police station over there but haven't gotten an answer. I need someone to go over there and check it out." The group murmurs among themselves for a moment. No one really wants to go to that town. Many rumors circulate around it that frighten people.
"I'll go," a woman with short blonde hair volunteers.
"Officer Bennett. Aren't you on an assignment already?"
"Yes but if you give me some time I can finish it up quickly and take on this one."
"… Can you handle it by yourself?"
"Yes, sir. I'll be fine on my own."
"Alright then… Everyone back to work." The people in the room go back to the task they are assigned to complete. Davidson, the boss, stops Officer Bennett from leaving. "Are you sure this is something you want to do? I can always find someone else," he says.
"It's no big deal," she tells him. "I'll have to check it out and come back here. If you were worried because of the rumors, I'd save my energy. You know I don't believe all that."
"Well… just be careful, Cybil."
"I will. Now I have some work to do." Many of the rumors spread around concerning Silent Hill are about witchcraft, sacrifices, and devil worship. Some people have told her that children were sacrificed there. Some have said weird blood rituals are performed at night. But Cybil finds that hard to believe. When school gets out less than a month later, Harry tells Cheryl to pack.