A/N: That's supposed to be "Who Says a Funk Band Can't Play Rock?"


I bet you want to know what really happened.

Sure. No fooling this time?

See what you think.

That's what could have happened. But how about this?

It was his apartment...but something was different...

Yeah, the red, pulsating walls on either side of stretches of chain-link flooring covered more or less by squishy blood-soaked carpet. With added dead-hellhound decoration. Yeah. That was it. Old Frank had terrible taste in wallpaper, but even he wouldn't have looked kindly upon the new decor.

What wasn't new was that most of the doors were locked. People in South Ashfield Heights tended to keep to themselves, so it wasn't surprising that very few doors opened. The only one that had, in fact, was 301...which, in retrospect, was the one door which Henry really didn't think should be unlocked.

Given his hobbies, Henry thought. You'd think he'd want to make sure that nobody walked in on him while he was...ah, well, whatever.

Henry jingled the ring of keys in his hand. He was two floors down from the guy's room now, standing outside 102. A dead dog lay at his feet, and his other hand tightened its grip on the axe as he slid the key into the lock and turned the knob.

He needn't have worried. A low slurping sound from inside the door was all that greeted him. Sure enough, the apartment was empty except for ten or so red slug-things wending their slimy way around the kitchen floor, and a tremendous odor that seemed to be coming from the refrigerator. It assaulted his eyes and filled his nose, and he clamped his lips more tightly together to keep from breathing in any more than was absolutely necessary.

I'll never get the smell out of my clothes...I thought cigarette smoke was bad, but this is forever. Well, these boots are shot anyway...slug guts and blood all over 'em…

squish squish squish squish squish squish squish squish squish squish

With some trepidation, he pulled the fridge open. Inside lay what appeared to be a pair of ripped-up jeans, soaked in blood. A small furry foot poked out of one side.

God...it's a cat. Wait...this is the cat lady's apartment. Did she...

Henry reached in and gently lifted up one leg of the jeans. Not that he doubted that the cat had been there for a while...but...well, he didn't really know why. Resting over the cat's misshapen head was a torn piece of red paper, like the others that he'd found already. He pocketed it and turned to leave the room.

Something glinted, off to the side. On the kitchen counter lay a small metallic object. A gun. But not just any gun. A submachine gun.

Hell yeah!

Henry grinned widely as he hooked the small and delicate-looking weapon with a finger and lifted it into the air. It was so lightweight...almost like a toy, or an old-fashioned ladies' pistol.

Beats the old pistol any time. That is, if I can find ammo for it...this thing probably goes through its little bullets like the woman in 204 goes through blinis.

That's not nice, said Henry's conscience.

Too tired to care, said Henry's brain.

He hooked the axe through his belt and took the gun in his hand. It was definitely a one-handed weapon, too small to handle with two hands. His own large hand was loose around the grip, and his finger barely fit on the trigger.

Back out in the hallway, he decided to try out his new toy on yet another demon dog meandering around the door to 101. He stood back, lifted the gun, and pulled the trigger.

...and nothing happened.

He tried again. And again. No, it wasn't out of ammo...

Crap. Ol' reliable, then.

A few axe swipes took care of the immediate problem, and he entered 101.

The gun nut's room. I should have remembered. He should have some decent weaponry.

As it turned out, Henry had no such luck. All of the guns were just wooden models, fakes. Useless except for playing around. There was nothing except a solitary pack of pistol bullets sitting on the counter, mocking him, as if saying Here's all you get, loser.

Man, this is just stupid. This whole place...it's like some depressing chronicle of frustations and uselessness.

Henry was about to drop the little submachine gun on the counter next to its equally useless brethren, but something stopped him. With a shrug, he pocketed the gun and left the room.

He couldn't get the thought out of his head.

Eileen's dead. She has to be. He carved her up...I couldn't save her. I was too late.

He didn't know why that was bothering him so much. Well, he did...the blood and gore and horrible deaths that he'd seen that afternoon had numbed him and dulled his senses, but hadn't removed his humanity entirely. This was Eileen, his neighbor, who he'd seen reading a book and doing her nails and talking on the phone.

Henry turned the doorknob absently.

What did she ever do to deserve this?

The squeak of the door hinges brought him back somewhat.

Concentrate, Henry, or you're going to get yourself killed...

Fortunately, the only resistance he'd run into so far had been a pack of sleepy bat-things in the hallway, which were smacked and stomped into submission easily...but he probably wouldn't be so lucky forever. The door closed behind him, and he turned automatically to the white glow on his left. A lightboard, with X-rays and notes on it...and a Polaroid picture.

Eileen...

He leaned against the board, and his head fell back. She was there, in the hospital. Which meant she might still be alive...

The nurse's note on the desk confirmed it, and he walked back into the hallway with a new sense of purpose. He had to find her.

Her bag lay abandoned on the floor. Purple and shiny, to match her dress. It was almost weightless in his hand.

Funny...I haven't touched a handbag since I was a little kid helping Mom get ready to go to work...such a little thing…

She had to be there. He knew it.

But she wasn't easy to find. Not with possessed ghost wheelchairs kneecapping him at every turn and rooms full of smelly...God knows what. And the occasional seven-foot-tall Amazon with a pipe, or a dead body with zombie 'shrooms growing out of it...

At least he'd found the missing key. Just not the room to go with it.

The last two rooms lay in front of him, at the far end of the hallway. As the wheelchairs closed in on him again, he turned the knob of one door. And turned it again. The door wouldn't open.

He yanked at the knob in frustration. Then, he remembered the key. It turned smoothly in the lock. He flung himself into the room, heedless of whatever might be lurking inside.

Fortunately for him, the room's sole occupant was flat on her back, unconscious. She was still in her party dress, ankle wrapped above those silly heels (how do women walk in those things?), with one arm in a cast and sling.

Henry crept over to the bed and was about to wake her when she sat up, screaming...

After the explanations were done, she looked around the little room.

"What kind of screwed-up hospital is this, anyway?" she asked him.

"St. Jerome's, I think," Henry replied. "Things look weird in this world, though."

She eyed the axe hanging from his hand warily.

"Know how to use that thing?"

Henry shrugged. "I do now," he said.

"Got anything for me?"

"No, not really. Just this," he said, swinging her bag from his finger.

She took it from his hand and looked at it as if she'd never seen it before. "Where did you find this?"

"Downstairs."

She swatted at the wall with it. It hit with a solid thump.

"That'll have to do for now," she said. "Kinda useless, though, unless there's a deadly moth around here or something."

Henry smiled. "I'll let you try your hand at the bats, if you're up to it."

"Bats?"

"Bats. Anyway, it's not the most useless thing I've found. I've got a submachine gun that won't fire."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah."

"Can I try?"

Henry hooked it out of his pocket and tossed it to her. "Knock yourself out. Just don't point it at me, please."

She made a face at him. Her hand gripped the gun firmly, pointed it at a bottle on the cart by the bed, and pulled the trigger.

The noise was deafening in the tiny room. Henry winced and put his hands over his ears as Eileen shot the bottle to bits in a wet, exploding mess.

"Hell yeah," she smiled. "That was fun."

"Don't waste the ammo," Henry replied. "I don't know if we'll find any more."

As it turned out, Eileen took readily to guns. Very readily. So readily, in fact, that Henry was able to let her do a lot of the heavy killing while he figured out where they needed to go.

He found it particularly entertaining to watch her as she slaughtered things mercilessly. When she'd see, say, a demon dog, an evil smile would creep across her face and she'd stalk it – as best she could, anyway. Then, just before it turned to attack, she'd pull the trigger. She'd gotten pretty good already at making things dance in the air before they dropped dead. It reminded him of when he was a kid, watching the cat stalk a bird in the back yard…if Eileen had had a tail, he thought, it would have been twitching wildly.

And they had only gotten partway through the subway station again.

"Doesn't that hurt?" Henry asked her as she stood triumphantly over the latest bleeding corpse. They were up at the turnstiles again, on their way to the King Street trains.

"What?"

"The gun. Doesn't it make your arm sore, or something?"

"Kinda," she said. "I'm getting the feeling that this isn't really the best thing for me to be doing right now. But it's just too much damn fun."

"Well, be careful," he said. "Don't want you getting any worse."

"Thanks," she said, smiling.

They approached the escalator down. Henry had done his best to get past the weird wall-men on his way up a few minutes before, with just this moment in mind.

"Get that thing ready," he said as they stepped onto the escalator. "You're going to have plenty of use for it…"

The first wall-man emerged, and the evil smile did as well. Henry crouched down and covered his ears with his hands as the shots flew and the blood spattered and the escalator carried them down…down…down…

In the King Street train, he'd found a golf club before. This time, a wrapped present lay on the seat, partly torn open. There was a note on the package.

Have fun! For us girls only…sorry, Henry.

C.

"What's this?" Eileen asked. Her hand slipped into the long, flat box, and came out with…

"A shotgun. Nice," Henry said.

"May I?"

Henry shrugged. "Given what I just witnessed on that escalator, it's yours if you want it."

Amazing, how these guns of hers never ran out of ammo, Henry thought.

He was concerned about her, though. The red marks on her body were changing and growing darker, and her eyes were growing wilder. Or perhaps that was the effect of her newly-discovered love of splattering undead hell-beasts all over the surroundings.

"Eileen, why don't you sit down for a minute," he said, slamming the gate to Wish House behind them. "Take a rest. I have to go back to my place for a few things anyway. Here, hang on to this torch for me."

Eileen nodded. "I don't think that he'll be coming in here. I may just do that. Hurry back, OK?"

"Don't worry. I will."

However, the presence of ghosts coming out of the walls of his apartment slowed things down a bit. By the time that Henry dealt with the issue and got back, it had been a few minutes. He still hadn't bothered to work out how time passed in the other world when he wasn't there, so he didn't know if it had been minutes or hours.

Eileen was still sitting on the steps of Wish House, smoke rising from around her. But that evil grin was back, there was more blood on her dress, and in her hand was…

"What…the hell…is that?" Henry asked.

"This, Henry," she smiled, "is a chainsaw. Found it by a stump up thataway," and she motioned to the main gates. "Along with a couple of doll parts that you might find handy."

Henry sat down next to her on the steps. Her green eyes danced with glee.

"You really should have been resting," he said.

"I did," she replied. "For a while. You still hadn't gotten back, so I figured that I'd see what I could do to help. Met some skinny flaming guy…"

"Jasper. So that's what happened to him."

"Another of Walter's…"

"Yeah."

"And a couple of others. Not too bad with good preparation. You know, I love my shotgun," she smiled.

"You're starting to scare me."

"Well, stay out of my way, Henry, and I'll try not to hurt you," she grinned. "You know I wouldn't, though. Right?"

"Thanks. Actually, it's you I'm worried about," he said, standing up. He walked to the burnt torso in the wheelchair.

"Why?"

"Toss me those doll parts, wouldya?"

As Eileen picked them up, a piece of paper fell to the ground.

"Oh yeah," she said. "This note was with it."

Good luck. This thing's slow, but effective. No gasoline required. Be careful.

H.

"Trust me. It is," Eileen said.

"Oh, I believe you," Henry said, as he fitted the doll's leg to its body.

Eileen started to struggle to her feet. Henry helped her up, and they stood side by side in front of the doll. Its head lolled forward, and it seemed more grotesque with one arm and one leg than it had with no limbs at all.

"Ugly," she said.

"Yeah."

"You never answered my question."

"All the work you're doing can't be good for you," he said. He pointed to a red patch on her skin where the shotgun had left a mark. "That's going to be a nasty bruise tomorrow."

"Tomorrow is why it's there. I want to do what little I can to make sure that we get to tomorrow to see it."

Henry nodded. "Thanks."

When they exited the small circular room on top of the water prison, there was Walter with his smile and his gun. Henry heard the engine of the chainsaw start, and the look of surprise in Walter's eyes was the funniest thing he'd seen all day.

Still, given the slow speed of the chainsaw and the recoil of the shotgun, it seemed best that Henry make his rounds by himself while Eileen rested.

Still, some combat was unavoidable as they made their way around the third floor. He left her in the one-o'clock room happily babbling about old Romero movies as he dropped back down to the basement.

Up on the third floor observation room, he found a beautifully crafted hunting rifle laying on the floor. Henry hadn't known a thing about guns until that morning, but he could feel the fine wood and see the craftsmanship that indicated a well-made weapon. Alas, even before he picked it up, he knew that it wasn't for him by the note tied to the barrel.

Useful for distance shooting…even I had some luck with this. And I can't shoot worth a damn.

J.

Some people have all the luck, Henry thought. Well, at least she'll enjoy this one, and maybe it won't injure her as much as the shotgun or chainsaw.

When he finally went back up to the third floor to collect her, he saw just how big a difference that was likely to make. Eileen's back was swirling with black marks now as well as the red ones. Her hands were twitching, and her hair was disheveled. She didn't seem to hear him enter the room until he shut the door after him.

"Henry," she said, turning to him. "I…I'm getting worse."

"I know," Henry said softly. "Is there anything I can do?"

She shook her head. "I don't think so," she replied. "I'm going to fight it as much as I can, but…well, I'm sorry for anything stupid I might do."

Henry handed her the rifle.

"Wow," she said. "This is gorgeous."

"Maybe it'll be safer to use, too."

"Henry," she said, looking at him. "You trust me with this. Why?"

"I just do."

"Thanks. If I get really bad…"

"I'll take it from you."

"Thank you, Henry."

"Ready to try it out?"

"Yeah."

The look on Andrew's face as Eileen took him down was one that Henry hoped he'd never see again.

Yes, the rifle had been better for Eileen. And more effective on the ghosts. Henry had been able to pin Andrew faster than he'd thought possible, and the squad of double-headed monsters between them and the exit door only gave them minor trouble.

Eileen's pace down the spiral stairs was slower than before. Henry waited for her to catch up to him at the bottom. He reached for her hand and took the rifle.

"That bad, huh?" she asked, not meeting his eye.

"This way you don't have to carry it. Don't worry, I'll give it back when you need to use it."

"Right."

Damn, she saw right through that one.

Henry smiled. "Seriously, I will. You're too good with this."

"What makes you think I won't turn around and shoot you instead?"

"That's a chance I have to take."

Five seconds later, Henry was as good as his word. Richard floated down to meet them, and Henry fumbled in his pockets for his last silver bullet. Then he remembered…it was back in the chest in his room. A handy hole beckoned, but he couldn't leave Eileen there alone with Richard and his pipe.

So, he tossed the rifle to Eileen and readied his axe. As he wound up his swing, he heard the BAM of the first shot. Then, a second later, another…and another. Richard roared and dropped like a rock.

Henry stood for a moment, slack-jawed. Then, he ran forward, pulled out a sword, and leaned on it with all his might. Richard squirmed in frustration, but he was clearly down for good.

"Nice shooting, Tex," he smiled.

Eileen grinned widely for a moment. Then her grin twisted sideways. Henry caught the rifle as it dropped from her hands, and was nearly knocked off of his feet by the sudden pain in his head. She stood there, shaking, spouting gibberish in an unearthly voice.

Oh my God. So this is what she really meant by being cursed. Damn you, Sullivan…

After a while, the gibberish ceased, and Eileen looked around, dazed.

"What…what just happened?" she asked.

"I don't know," Henry replied. "I think…I think you lost it, Eileen."

She nodded. "That's what I was afraid of. Henry…" Her hand reached for his.

He took the hand and squeezed it. It was cold.

"It's OK. We're going to get out of this."

Henry did everything he could think of to protect her from that point on. He left her in an elevator while he ran down to the Southfield, and he took her upstairs to the sporting-goods store to stay safe while he figured out how he was going to get her down to the bar.

"Henry, please," she said when he returned from his room. "I'm OK, I really am."

"No, you're not," he said. "All of this fighting is taking it out of you."

"Well, being left her by myself isn't doing any good either," she said. "At least when I'm with you, I can help."

"Eileen…"

"Well, let me put it this way," she replied. "I'm coming along, and there's nothing you can do about it."

"I could leave you at the bottom of a ladder…"

"Very funny."

"Fine, be that way," he said, handing her the rifle. "Make yourself useful."

She smiled. "Thanks."

Fortunately, their only resistance on the way upstairs came in the form of slugs and dogs, both of which presented little resistance to Henry's axe and Eileen's rifle.

"Eeewwww," she said as Henry put the boot in another slug.

"Squeamish?"

"No, just…gross. Fascinating, but gross."

"Wanna try?"

Eileen raised an eyebrow, then grinned. "Sure."

Henry knocked a big one off of the pulsating wall, and stepped back. Eileen lifted her foot, hesitated a moment, then slammed it down into the slug with a splat.

"Hee," she said. "That was nasty. Now I've got slug guts in my shoe."

"Fun?"

"Hell yeah. You sure know how to show a girl a good time."

Henry laughed. "Not an ideal first date."

"That's OK. You can make up for it later."

When they reached Eric's apartment, Eileen went to the sink and rinsed out her shoe as Henry put the cake candles on the birthday cake one by one and Eric gurgled on the floor.

"Hmmm," he said.

"What?" Eileen asked, as she dried off her shoe with a towel.

"This box."

"Looks like an ordinary bakery box."

"Kinda big for a round birthday cake."

"Now that you mention it…it is," she said, buckling the strap on her shoe around her ankle.

Henry peered at the top. "Helen's Bakery," he read. "Crispy toasted dead right to your very door."

"Weird. Anything in it?"

Henry lifted the top of the box. "I'll be damned," he said. "Check it out."

A shiny metal flamethrower rested in the box, with a note attached.

Me again. Look at what I found. Careful of flammables!

C.

"Would you like to do the honors?" he asked.

"Not in here. Let's find something outside to kill."

"I thought you'd say that," he smiled.

Sure enough, a couple of demon dogs blocked their path outside. Henry stood back and let Eileen fry them to a crisp. The smell of burning flesh reminded him unpleasantly of Richard, still writhing under his sword downstairs…but there was nothing to be done about that.

They found out that while it worked against corporeal beings, the most it would do against ghosts was to stop them in their tracks with surprised expressions on their undead faces…which would have been funny if they hadn't been running for their lives.

Still, it seemed to be a weapon that Eileen could handle without too much problem. And when she felt herself going into one of her fits, she would drop the flamethrower on the ground, and Henry would get out of the way and keep things under control until she was done.

The downside of the flamethrower was that it prevented Henry from helping out much. He couldn't walk forward and swing his axe from the side, or he'd get fried too. And when they ran into the fast-moving doubleheaded monsters again in the apartments, now joined by what Henry could only describe as buttheads, they found that the flamethrower just wasn't fast enough.

"I could try the submachine gun again," she said after Henry had dispatched the immediate threats in 301.

"No, it's going to hurt you too much," he said. "Do what you can with the shotgun or rifle, and I'll hit 'em with the axe. We'll get by somehow."

It wasn't until they got to 204 that another option presented itself. As they entered the room, something gleamed at them from the other side. Eileen hobbled forward, but Henry's arm shot out and stopped her.

"Careful," he said softly. Instead, he moved into the kitchen, and she followed him. He cautiously leaned sideways toward the living room, looking down the hallway, then pulled his head back quickly.

"Damn. He's at the other end. Stay here."

Before she could react, Henry ran across the room. A shot rang out, but it missed him by inches.

"What the…"

"What is it?"

"You're not going to believe this," he said. He turned around. In his hands was…

"Is that…a rock drill?"

"Sure looks like it. Funny thing is, it's not that heavy," he said. "I think you could manage it if you're careful."

"How can a rock drill not be heavy?"

"Got me," he said, as he ran back into the kitchen. This time, the only sound was Walter's laugh echoing down the hallway.

"All yours, including the note."

Like the chainsaw, this needs no refueling. Be warned…it's slow, but deadly.

H.

Eileen picked up the nutrition drink on the counter and tossed it to Henry. He popped it open and downed it at once, with a grimace.

"You OK?" she asked.

"Tastes like crap. Still haven't gotten used to it," he said, wiping his mouth. "Let's go."

At first, Henry wasn't sure that they'd get much use out of the rock drill. It took forever to start up, and Eileen couldn't move while it was running. However, after a few tries, they worked out a strategy. Henry would bait the monster into running toward him, and then would sprint past Eileen as she stepped into the thing's path with the drill pointed forward. Wet and disgusting things would happen, and the monster would be down for the count.

"I feel like such a chicken," he said after the dozenth time or so.

"Don't," she said. "This beats trying to axe them to death."

"It's just weird…but that's nothing new here."

But she was getting worse. Henry had to leave her in the front foyer of the building as he went to remove the chains binding Frank's door, and when he returned she was most definitely not all there any more. And when she finally left him after he found the little red box in Frank's apartment, he realized just how much she'd helped him with the monsters when he found himself out of ammo and out of options apart from running like hell. Which he did.

God, I hope that nothing's happened to her…but where is she?

With a final cry, Henry lifted his arms and shoved the two-pronged spear into the huge body hanging over him. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the black-tinted figure that was Walter writhe in pain on the floor.

As Henry readied his axe behind his head, he turned his gaze to the small figure tottering on the wooden platform, purple from bruises and blood. Eileen looked so small and alone, stripped of not only her consciousness but of her weaponry...

Funny. Before a few hours ago, I'd never have imagined her holding a gun...now I can't imagine her without one.

Guess it's up to me now.

Walter stood facing him. His mouth opened, and his darkness faded.

He is as he once was...

Henry gritted his teeth, and swung the axe. Walter grunted and doubled over. As Henry lifted the axe again, he was stopped dead in his motion.

Walter was smiling at him. Smiling in that otherworldly way he had about him...

The long blond locks swung, and Walter turned. Before Henry could react, something connected with his side, and he was flung ten feet back onto the floor. Walter's laugh echoed through the chamber.

Okay, Henry. Time for a new plan.

Which was a hard thing to come up with while running around avoiding revolver shots and pipe swings, he found. He was reduced to sneaking up behind Walter and taking potshots at him. If he was lucky, he'd get away without a bitchslap...but, as he'd found out a long time earlier, today wasn't his lucky day.

After the umpteenth time, Henry found himself flat on his back next to the wooden platform. Walter was several yards away, so he had a moment before he had to get back up and start running again. Eileen took a step down the stairs, on her way to the rotating blades, and stood next to him. He looked up at her one last time, to try to fix her face in his mind before either one of them met their fate.

His mouth fell open. She was facing straight forward, but her eyes met his. Before he could say anything, she winked. He heard her voice in his mind.

Distract him.

That wouldn't be a problem.

Henry hauled himself to his feet and took off in a dead run toward the huge body at the other end of the room, weaving back and forth as Walter's bullets whizzed by him on either side. As he heard Walter come up behind him, he readied his axe again and stepped quickly to the side to avoid the latest shot, turning to attack.

What he saw behind Walter damn near killed him right then and there.

"What the..." he stuttered.

"HELL YEAH!"

He was just able to recover in time to sprint away, as Walter spun around, startled. He stumbled over some steps, and his back hit one of the shadowy red figures at the edge of the room. As he sat down hard, he saw Walter's expression change briefly to confusion and then sadness, just before the rocket hit his chest and he exploded in a cloud of red.

When the mist cleared, nothing was left but a pipe, a gun and a single shoe. Eileen stood at the base of the steps, rocket launcher on her shoulder, looking like the cat that just swallowed the canary.

Henry was too stunned to say anything.

"Lookie what I found," she said, lowering the huge weapon to the floor. "That was...great. Better than sex." She walked toward him.

Conscious thought returned to Henry and started working overtime.

Well, what guy could measure up to THAT? In any way?

"Eileen, where..."

"Where do you think I went after I left you in the apartment? What, you think I just walked out the door straight into Walter's loving arms?"

Well, now that you mention it...

"This was sitting below the stairs. Don't tell me you didn't look there on the way back."

...oops.

"But...you were..."

"Yeah, I know," she said. "I was pretty out of it in the apartments. But the strange thing is that, as soon as that bell started tolling...I felt fine. I still have all of this," she said, indicating the writhing redness on her skin, "but I felt OK otherwise. Figured I'd play along with things. It wasn't until you put that last spear into that thing there that I felt lousy again...but I sucked it up and pulled out this baby and here we are."

Henry wondered idly where she'd pulled it out of, but squashed that thought as soon as it had started.

Let's just write it off as a Deus Ex Machina sort of thing.

"How do you feel now?"

"Fine. Best I've felt in hours. You?"

"Headache's gone."

Eileen sat down next to him. They contemplated the circular blades in the center of the room as they slowed and finally ground to a stop.

"Wow," she said finally.

"Yeah," Henry replied, lamely. "I think it's over."

"Yeah. What now?"

"No idea."

Walter's left shoe sat, lonely on the floor, soaked in red. Henry idly waited for it to wander over to him and...start kicking him or something.

Crazy thoughts. That's OK.

He smiled at her. "You know, if you told me right now that all you need is a tub of Noxzema and a good night's sleep, I'd probably believe you."

Eileen laughed. "Now that you mention it, that would help. This stings, you know."

"No, I didn't. Looks uncomfortable, though."

"I can't complain," she said. "You've had it a lot worse than I have. Thank you."

Henry stared at her.

"For what? You were the one with the heavy artillery."

She shrugged. "And you got us the hell out of all of this. Got me out of that hospital, got us through everything. Thanks."

Henry nodded. "And thank you. Now," he said, struggling to his feet, "want to see if we can find a way out of here?" He held out his hand.

She took the hand and let him pull her up. "Sounds good to me. I can't wait to get out of these damn heels. They're murder on the feet."

...What?

..That's different.

You don't believe me again.

Nope.

Why not?

Look, weird things happened, I know that. Really, really weird things. But you're asking me to believe that somebody put a freaking rocket launcher under the stairs on the first floor.

Yes.

That's way too much for me to swallow.

Why?

It just is.

You're trying to tell me that you know all of this better than I do?

Well...no, but...it just doesn't fit. Way too Resident Evil. Not Silent Hill at all.

Dammit. Guess I suck at this.

Heh.

It was worth a try, anyway.