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Well, I guess that's it. Chapter two...
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Bound by Fear: As the World Churns
Are you all still following me?
Douglas Cartland
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Finally, I could say I'd stopped chain-smoking. Heather- er. I mean, Cheryl'd said it already made my voice sound like Oscar the grouch, or something, and didn't need to get any worse. I listened to her... didn't know why. As my mud-stained boot crushed life from the burning tobacco (And Go- nobody knew what else), I couldn't help but realize just how wet it was.
It was a few hours after the meeting, and was really pouring down at two AM. I tended to be a bit more of a night owl these days, as I really didn't cut it in the daylight... big men in brown trench coats have a tendency to draw unwanted attention when they walk into the middle of a lunchtime rush and ask for a fistful of burger. I don't like burgers anyway.
I lit another cigarette, shielding the flame from rain before drawing it under the brim of Hea-dammit, Cheryl's baseball cap. She made me wear it... Kid was constantly looking out for me, despite the fact I was probably a goner in ten years anyway. It was pink. Another thing I only half-gave a damn about. The gesture was appreciated.
Time was probably about two-thirty, two-forty five before I opened the door to the apartment building and trudged up the stairs, dripping wet.
We were going back.
I stopped, hand on the collar of my trench as it lingered inches over the coat hanger. The hat I'd tossed on the couch; I'd get it in the morning. I couldn't believe it, what Kennedy'd said. We were all going back, without tanks, without nukes, without even bulletproof vests. So why did it hit now, just as bed was suspiciously close? We'd all sat silently as he spoke those evil words, then nodded as if it were no big thing... left the meeting without complaint hours later.
He was right.
And there it was. Truth, the kind that only came at eleven PM after your ninth pot of coffee and second shot of vodka for lack of anything better to do than play hokey-pokey with your liver. Kennedy was right, and the only way we could stop this was to learn about it first. But still, why send the old detective and the young teen to Silent Hill again with the guy who saved the president's fucking daughter? Why not send the third guy who'd been there, whoever he was? James, right? The guy in the green coat and jeans.
He doesn't trust me.
That much was likely, too. I'm not a trusting guy... and as a result, people have a tendancy to not trust me back. Wasn't much I could do about that, though sometimes it had its side effects. I couldn't afford to trust anyone, not anymore... Except Cheryl. Claudia had used me... and Cheryl's the only one who was ever straight with me, all through that. Vincent, that asshole. I can't forget Vincent and his scheming ass.
Go to bed.
I'd sort it all out in the morning. I was up on caffeine and alcohol (not much. Girl'd hid most of my stuff. Or thrown it out. Either way...), and raving circles in my own head. I could already hear her sleeping... Yeah. Snooze away, girlie. Its you an' me against the world anymore, and I don't think the next few weeks are gonna make it easy on us.
Ended up hitting the sack like a side of prime beef cut from the meat rack. Kind of. I'm not entirely sure how they do it in the slaughterhouses, but if they ever hit sacks with sides of prime beef it'd be kind of like that. One thing I could say for certain was that no matter just how much bean I'd had, these old bones could fall asleep without issue. Sometimes. It was when the fog rolled in through the streets, and the streets were empty that... well, suffice to say on any other day certain parts of my life seemed little more than a dream. Regardless, as hard as my pillow was, Mr. Sandman eventually got off his lazy ass.
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The taxi was quiet. The driver wasn't particularly conversational, and Cheryl wasn't much for starting talks unless she could think of something interesting to say. It was moving fast... not a bad thing, since I think we were a little late. I didn't recognize the route, though. Not that I would have normally, since we were supposed to be going someplace new. For reasons I didn't quite understand at the time, I actually asked the driver where we were going.
"To hell. We're going to hell."
"Whut?"
"Repent, and you'll be saved. You will have a place within paradise."
It wasn't the kind of accent I'd expect from your basic Spanish-primary taxi driver. Almost perfect English... The guy had a silver cross hanging from his rear-view. How did I miss that? Normally that's the first kind of thing I notice.
"Come again? I mean' location relative."
"You told me yourself, Mr. Cartland."
And I swore I hadn't told the guy my name. I would have asked the obvious, if we hadn't then parked. I couldn't exactly force the question out through my lips, in lieu of simply finding someplace else to be. Forget this. It isn't worth your time, even if the words sounded too familiar.
I popped the door without paying the guy, and he didn't protest. I think he knew he'd just blown a job. As I went around to the other side of the car to either wake Cheryl up or snap her out of whatever coma kept her from opening the door, the dull thunk of a car compartment seemed to jerk my attention... why did the guy pop the trunk? Almost perfectly in sync with my motion, no less. Looking through the back window of the car into the front seat, it was hard to see... but he wasn't looking back at me. Dubiously, I lifted the lid up.
A baby... a baby, wrapped in a dull black blanket... No, this was too much. What in the hell was the guy doing with a baby in the trunk? This wasn't right! I reached in, pulling the silent Caucasian child from the compartment with sudden haste, as if to jerk it away from the driver himself... then rounded the rest of the car, to wake Cheryl u-
She wasn't there.
The door was open, the seat empty.
"Heather!"
Cheryl
Alessa!
Look what you've done now!
Witch! Witch
She's dead! You killed herI know you did! Witch!
There she was. She'd stopped at the side of the bridge, and was looking out over the water. This wasn't our destination, was it? Where was Kennedy? Where was the guy in blue jeans and where was Vincent?
Vincent?
"Heather, we gotta go. There ain't nuthin' here fer us, an' I found-"
"Me."
"-In the trunk."
"I am in your arms."
I couldn't talk for a moment... the quiet child in my arms had started to whimper, as if on the verge of tears, and Cheryl'd thrown me through a loop. How could I be holding her, when she was right there?
"What are you talking about?"
"I am in your arms. You are holding me. I am here. You can see me."
She turned, and the deadpan sun glinted off that blonde dyed hair for all of a second. Her face was lowered, staring at her shoes...
"I weep, and the world cries with me."
"Heather, snap out of it..."
"I chuckle, and the world laughs."
Silence from me. I found my eyes drawn to the horizon, as fog loomed upon the horizon and the sound of sirens in the distance wound up the octaves.
"I scream, and the world wails in unison."
"Wh-"
"I'm burning, daddy... and so does the world burn!"
And the she burst into flames... dumbfounded, what could I do but watch as the flames scorched her skin? I couldn't move, think, act... only watch as the blanketed being in my arms smoldered into an open hearth...
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...And almost fell off the bed, cold sweat cooling the air on my face as I reflexively tried to untangle myself from the sheets. A nightmare. A fucking nightmare, at four in the fucking morning. Fuck. And I wasn't normally one even for thinking curses. As my alarm clock's red digits shone its 4:12 check, I knew returning to sleep wouldn't be an option. Two hours and a pot of coffee would have to be enough. I could sleep on the plane... or the boat, or the train, or whatever was in store for us. It wouldn't be the first time I said to hell with sleep.