As she rounded the last corner before her room, she almost collided with a tall, spider like figure.
The doctor smiled down at her, hungrily. "Ah Sister, just who I was looking for".
"Doctor Arden!" Mary stammered, jolted out of her rumination. "I'm sorry, I didn't see you" she apologised.
"Not to worry my dear, I was hoping to run into you. I didn't mean to take it so literally though." Mary joined in his laughter with a nervous chuckle. Whilst the asylum doctor had been nothing but kind to her, there was something about his demeanour that made Mary Eunice nervous. However, everybody made her nervous, so this was nothing new.
"How can I help you, Doctor?" She smiled tentatively up at him.
"Well, I know it's late Sister, but I have a rather urgent matter to attend to in my lab, and was wondering if you could-" he lowered his voice and leaned close to the blonde, "tend to our, friends, in the woods this evening".
Mary's breath hitched in her throat at the prospect of venturing outside to feed- whatever those things were hiding in the grounds outside Briarcliff, especially at this hour. She nervously glanced out the window at the fast fading daylight. The doctor noticing her hesitation, winked at her confidentially. "Don't be afraid Sister, you will be perfectly safe. The creatures only feed at night and you still have half an hour of daylight left." Mary Eunice gulped uneasily, but, badly wanting to make up for her mistake with letting Lana into the asylum earlier that week, pushed her fear aside and nodded bravely at the Doctor.
It took all the courage Mary had to sneak through the secret passage and into the woods, carrying the metal pail filled with meat from the kitchen. But despite her nerves at once again defying Sister Jude's express wishes of nobody leaving the building after curfew combined with her knowledge of the creatures that lurked in the trees, it felt good to be outside.
Her scolding with Sister Jude earlier that day began to seem like the distant past, insignificant, even. The setting sun bathed the grounds in a rosy glow and a soft breeze played with Mary's cloak as she walked. She swung the bucket in one hand, humming a soft tune under her breath as she walked. A peaceful smile spread across her lips.
"Lost in thought, are we Sister?" Came a sudden voice from behind her.
Mary Eunice squealed and spun around, nearly dropping the pail and its contents on the leafy ground.
Lana stood before her, crisp and perfect in a dark purple blazer and matching pencil skirt. Even in this somewhat wild setting, the reporter seemed to float, appearing completely at ease amidst the conifers and brambles. A cigarette was balanced casually between her fingers, smoke trailing faintly from its smouldering tip.
The brunette raised the cigarette to her lips and took a drag, her ruby lips twisting into a smirk, clearly enjoying the conflicting emotions register on the younger woman's face.
Mary Eunice, her shock apparent at seeing the reporter, the reason for her all problems this week, in the flesh standing a few feet from her, was speechless for a few moments, transfixed by what she was sure must be an illusion.
"Cat got your tongue, Mary?" Lana asked with mock innocence.
Blushing the same shade as the reporters lipstick, the blonde managed stammered "Miss Winters, what- what are you doing here?" She averted her gaze, trying to compose herself in front of the older woman but instead becoming even more flustered.
Lana simply smiled at her and took another drag on her cigarette.
"You shouldn't be here," the nun continued shakily. "I got into awful trouble for letting you in the building last week, you don't understand. If Sister Jude finds out you came back..." Mary trailed off, unnerved by the woman's amused gaze. "She already wants to press charges for you stealing Kit's file," she attempted, after no response from the brunette. "I'm sorry but I can't let you in again," she finished lamely.
Lana let out a wry chuckle, flicking her cigarette to the ground and crushing it beneath a designer high heeled shoe. Fleetingly Mary wondered how the reporter was able to walk on flat surfaces, let alone the treacherous ground of the woods, in heels that tall.
"I didn't come here for another tour, Sister," she said, taking a step towards the nun, who instinctively took a step back. "I realised," she continued, advancing on Mary, "That I never properly thanked you for your help. You made breaking and entering into the asylum remarkably easy... that secret passage is quite a stroke of genius." The brunette would have been half a head shorter than the nun, but with her shoes on they were eye to eye; dark brown hues staring playfully into innocent baby blue.
The blonde's nervousness showed, and Lana would be lying if she said it didn't excite her. From their first encounter in Sister Jude's office, she had felt an immediate attraction to the pretty blonde thing. Her shy and innocent demeanour has captivated the reporter; the young woman had an aura of youthful naivety and beauty that this hellhole had failed to steal from her, and goddammit, Lana found it attractive as hell.
What's more, she knew that Mary Eunice felt it too. Lana wasn't blind- she noticed the way the young nun had stared at Lana when she thought she wasn't looking. Whether Mary knew it or not, the brunette had a hold on her, enticing her, tempting her into a world of sin so exquisite and alluring it was beyond the younger woman's comprehension.
Mary stared down at her feet. "Helping you was wrong, Miss Winters. Sister Jude was extremely angry-" but she was cut off by the brunette closing the distance between them with a step and tilting her chin up with a manicured finger so the blonde was forced to look Lana in the eye.
"Mary, listen to me carefully," she said. "Fuck Sister Jude." This earned a gasp of shock from the blonde, who's knees were feeling weak from Lana's proximity. "She doesn't own you, Mary. You did the right thing by letting me in- now I can expose the horrors that go on in this place. I can't thank you enough."
She suddenly registered the bucket that the nun had set down beside her. "What's that?" she asked, nudging it with her foot, causing the bloody contents to swirl, which jolted Mary out of her trance. Alarmed, the blonde looked around. Darkness was beginning to fall.