Chapter Twenty-Nine:
...Or Swim Back Out to Sea
The explosion was almost painfully loud.
Chris whooped and pumped his fist in the air, rushing towards it. "That was fucking awesome!" he all-but shouted, grinning at the roaring flame. "Why the hell haven't we done that before?"
"Blown stuff up? Probably basic survival instincts," Josh offered, but laughed along with him. It was pretty damn cool. They'd shoved the propane tank into an old cabinet he lugged up from the hotel, shoved a makeshift torch inside, and then backed way the hell up. If part of him wanted to rip Chris's throat out and eat it—which seemed, apparently, to be the case—part of him also wanted to keep him safe. When the explosion had come, he had been halfway in front of Chris before he even thought about it, shielding him from any potential shrapnel.
Now he stepped closer. Heat washed over both of them as the remains of the cabinet burned merrily. It was the first time he'd felt truly warm in a long time. He wasn't even sure how long, really. It felt incredible, but also strange and not entirely welcome. That was probably the monster in him. Admittedly he didn't know much about the wendigos, but he knew fire was a definite bad thing. "Do you remember Joshua Tree?" This wasn't the time for nostalgia, as he'd pointed out earlier, but he couldn't help it. The crackle of the flames and being here with just Chris brought him back to it, back to a time before everything had gotten so fucked up.
"Yeah." He heard Chris chuckle softly. "Horse piss? Horse piss."
It had been the world's worst beer. Of course, they were fifteen and sixteen respectively, so they hadn't really had a lot of options. "We didn't know any better."
"True. Hindsight is always 20/20, right?"
"Yeah," Josh murmured, watching the flames. They were overly bright to his newly sensitive eyes, searing into his brain. There were moments, sometimes, that you knew would be with you always. They were in your memories even when other things, things you actually tried to remember, faded away. He might not be able to remember how to do differential equations, but he could remember a specific log sparking on the dry desert ground of their campsite. This felt like another one of those moments. Years from now, would he remember the way the blackened hinges of the cabinet stood out against the flames?
"We should get out of here," Chris said finally, shaking himself out of his reverie. Josh glanced back at him. "Who knows when that thing'll show up. Get back to the others." To Ashley. Josh could hear the unspoken end to the sentence. He wondered if they were officially together now. He certainly hoped so. Ash was good for him.
Josh nodded. "Yeah." He turned to the fire and held his hands out, willing the warmth to sink in his fingers and stay. The smoke was thick. It was hard to smell much over it or to focus on anything else at all. Maybe wendigos were like bees, lulled by smoke. He wished he'd had the presence of mind to look over the journal when he'd had the opportunity, though he supposed it hadn't really been much of a chance at all.
"We should get out of here." Chris's voice came again. "Who knows when that thing'll show up."
"Yeah, yeah. I get it." As the fire began to slowly die, hampered by the snow, his senses were clearing. The air smelled of grey and charred wood and water and hunger.
Hunger. He knew that scent.
Behind him, Chris let out a slight, choking gasp. "Jo—"
He turned just in time to see the other wendigo pulling its hand free of Chris's chest, fingers red and dripping. Chris's eyes stared at him, the blue of them set ablaze by the firelight. Chris's mouth gaped soundlessly as his body collapsed to the stained snow. The colors were painful: red and blue and the faded army-green canvas of his Dad's old coat, all awash in the golden firelight.
There were moments, sometimes, that you knew would be with you always.
The fire was running through his veins, igniting him from inside out. Was this what it felt like to burn alive? He threw himself forward, his voice ripping itself from his throat as he screamed. If there were words in what he shouted, he wasn't aware of them. That thing was staring at him, its grotesque face twisted into an obscene smile. It lazily waggled its wet, bloody fingers in the air and, just as he came within reach, it leaped over his head, crunching down hard in the snow behind him.
He turned his back on Chris's body—and it was only a body; he could see it in the glassy eyes, the parted lips—and ran for the monster again. It didn't matter anymore if he died. None of this fucking mattered. It hadn't for a long time. All he'd wanted to do was to make Chris see him for what he was. Toxic. A malignant spot that spread tendrils of its black disease out to choke those he cared about. But he hadn't even been able to do that. First the twins, and now… and now…
His voice was raw and broke as he screamed again, the sound morphing into a shriek like those he'd heard so many times in the dark of the mine. He was going to kill it. He was going to kill it even if it killed him to do it.
"Bro," the thing said in Chris's exasperated tone. "Bro. Stop."
Josh's stomach heaved, his skin shuddering. He shook his head wildly, trying to shake it off, to get the sound of Chris's false voice out of his ears. It felt like a living thing, like a worm working its way down and into his brain. "Don't," he snarled at it. "Don't you fucking do that."
"Can't—make—you listen—without it," it said, tilting its head to the side slightly. It was using other people now too, but here and there, he could still recognize Chris.
Maybe he shouldn't try to stop it from talking.
This might be the last time he got to hear Chris's voice.
Pain flared in his palms and he glanced down. He'd clenched his fists so tightly that he'd driven his knife-like nails through the skin of his palms. "I don' t want to listen to you. You have nothing to say to me." He was going to kill it. Feinting to the left, he dove right, feeling the muscles in his legs bunch and expand as he jumped. Both arms extended in front of him, his own blood on his fingers, he launched at it.
His hand caught its shoulder as it dropped flat and he jammed his claws into it. The thing's stony skin didn't puncture like his own had, but he clung to it all the same, swinging around its back to swipe at its eyes. It hissed and bucked upwards, throwing him off. He hit the ground hard, the breath driven from him and he looked up at it as it slowly stood to loom over him. Josh closed his eyes for a second against the wash of hatred, of pure, unadulterated fury that swept over him. He didn't just want to kill it. He needed to kill it. Every single part of him wanted to tear its lungs out, to watch it die gasping and choking on its own blood.
Even that rabid voice in his head wanted him to do it.
Whatever he was feeling must have translated in some measure to his face. Perhaps he'd sucked in a rattling breath. Or perhaps his muscles had tensed for another leap or his lips had twitched.
"Filth," the other wendigo said as a stranger, then drew the last syllable out into a long hiss.
Josh didn't even think about it before he screeched again. He'd never heard such a feral sound come from his own lips, but it made him smile. It felt good, like taking a long drink of water after baking in the sun. "I'm going to kill you," he spat at it, scrambling to his feet again.
"No—you're not." It considered him. "Even Makkapitew—could—not kill—me. And—you aren't!—Makkapitew—yet." The name was strange to Josh, but the voice it was said in sounded familiar. It didn't matter though, not really. The thing was wrong. He could kill it. He had to.
"Why won't you just kill me?" he muttered, circling it slowly. It was like it just wanted to keep playing with him, over and over again. If it had as much of Josh's voice as it seemed to, it could have killed him at any point while he'd been stuck in the mine. And it certainly could have killed him in the shed. He'd felt it, in the ease with which it had tossed him into the wall. Not that it would answer. It would probably just—
"Aren't!—Makkapitew—yet," it repeated. Its gaze shifted to Chris's body and it smiled again, wider. "Doesn't it—smell—so—good. I bet that you—'re hungry. Kill—others—kill—you. I miss you—Makkapitew—eat—we'll play." It flicked its fingers at him and he flinched as drops of Chris's blood speckled his face. His stomach heaved again, but at the same time he felt his nostrils flare. It smelled good. It smelled… real. Vital.
Swaying in place, he tried to think, tried to force his brain back into some mode of thought he recognized, but a blanket of hunger and rage and need seemed to lay over him, dampening his senses and his ability to move or make decisions.
Before he could do much more than fight off the urge to lick the blood from his own face, it bounded off again, out of the circle of light cast by the smoldering remains of the cabinet. Desperately, he rubbed at his face, trying to get the blood off. How much had there been? It felt like only a few slight drops, but he could still smell it and it was only getting stronger.
He turned and staggered towards Chris's body, dropping heavily to his knees. He wanted… he needed to eat. Every fiber of his being screamed at him, urging him down, baring his teeth, ripping at him until it felt like he would die.
Kill—others—kill—you.
The others. It was going to go after the others. It wanted him to eat this, to give in and become a beast entirely. The snowy, bloody ground swayed and pulsed before his vision. Bare, brown feet in the snow… no, not in the snow. On the snow. He managed to break his fixation on Chris's outstretched fingers—so very close to him now—and looked up and over.
His sister crouched down beside him. Her gaze was curious. "Are you going to do it?" she asked.
It took him two tries to get his voice to function. "Do what?"
"Eat him."
Josh was drooling. Part of him was disgusted and part of him didn't care. One of the parts spoke louder to him now than it ever had before. "W-what?"
Hannah cocked her head to the side. She sounded annoyed. "I hate it when you do that. I know you heard me the first time." She reached out and trailed translucent fingers along Chris's jawline. His eyes were still open, staring. "Do you think it's karma?"
"Karma?"
"You let me die. You passed out and you weren't there and you left me alone in the dark with only Beth's flesh. So now it's your turn. But of course you have no siblings left, so the mountain gave you the next best thing. A best friend. Part of your soul." Her voice turned dreamlike and nostalgic. "The five of us. Beth, you, Sam, Chris, and me. Playing DnD. That time we went to Vasquez and he locked his keys in the car with the engine still running. Going to the Homecoming game just to indulge me. The only option you really had, for true poetic justice, would be Sam. Or maybe she'll be next. I had forgotten, you know. Those memories will go. They won't come back until after you're dead. And they will. So tell me, Joshy, are you going to do it?"
He wanted to do it. He wanted it more than he had ever wanted anything, on an entirely different level than anything he'd ever felt before. It was beyond desire. It was necessity. His stomach was going to tear itself apart, the acid eating him alive. Scenes flashed through his mind: snapshots from all the horror films he'd ever seen, from the fleshy, apocalyptic-level gore of Akira to the bloody flood of The Shining to the horrific mechanical traps that had so inspired him from Saw and Hostel and dozens of others. He would dissolve into nothing, but would that even stop these urges? Could he even die of starvation anymore?
Forcing his head up again, his hands clenched around handfuls of snow, the cold biting through any comforting memory of warmth that remained. "I'm—" It might not even be real; after so long hallucinating everyone he'd ever known, he couldn't be sure it was really her. But if he was going to lose himself completely, if this really was his last real thought as himself, as Josh Washington, as a friend and a brother and a human being, he had to make this right. At long last. "I'm sorry, Hannah." Tears stung his eyes, falling to melt slight depressions in the snow below him. "I'm sorry, Hannah. I'm so sorry."
"What did you say?"
"I'm so fucking sorry, Hannah. I'm sorry I wasn't… I wasn't good enough. I always fucked up. I always did. I know that. I'm so… I'm so sorry I stopped looking, that I gave up, that I wasn't even awake to save you. This never should have happened. Any of it. And Chris—" His fingers found Chris's outstretched hand and he grasped it, squeezing it so tight it felt like his tendons might snap. "I'm so sorry."
He was sobbing. Great, heavy, heaving sobs that shook his whole body. He didn't cry. Josh Washington didn't cry. He hasn't cried, even in the long, lonely hours in the mine. Even when the fucked-up phantoms of his sisters whispered to him that he should die. "I don't know if you're you or in my head, Han, but I'm so sorry that I wasn't better. Better for you. Better for all of you."
He was losing himself. He could feel it—great chunks of his soul getting shredded away. He was losing things. Losing the way Chris had always tried to cheat at poker, the sprinkle of freckles across Sam's nose, the little snort when Hannah was trying not to laugh, the way Beth snuck books under the table when they were having a boring family dinner. "Hannah?" The scent of Chris's blood was heavy, sweet, like copper pennies and freedom and strength and god, he needed it. Just one bite. Just one. That would be enough. Enough to stop this from hurting so very, very badly—
As cold as it was outside, his sister's fingers were colder. They slid along his cheek and his head followed them instinctually, tipping up to look at her. "You're hurting." Josh stared up at her. He could hear the words, but they seemed off, like she was speaking some language he had never quite mastered. "You're hurting very badly."
He nodded.
"I thought I wanted this, you know." Her voice was surprised. "But it doesn't matter, does it? Hurting doesn't help. It didn't help, making the others hurt. And it doesn't help, seeing you hurt. I think I see what Beth was trying to show me." Hannah's nails cut razor-thin, icy tracks along his skin and her lips twitched into a slight, uncertain smile. "Get up. Don't give in to this."
"I—I can't—" Hannah. Her name was Hannah. She was his sister and he loved her. Chris's blue eyes were fixed on his face, judging him. Or was that just his imagination?
"If you want to make this right, get up. I gave in. I didn't understand. I thought there was no other choice. But you and I both know there is. Don't listen to it. Don't listen to your Psycho anymore. Don't listen to that monster. Fight it. Get up. Go back, Josh. Now."
-o-
Every corner they rounded seemed ominous, dark with shadows and things ready to leap out and eat them. Wendigo shrieks echoed through the air around them, seeming to come from every direction. They sounded different too, more human and pained than Sam was used to. She thought of Josh and Chris off in the night somewhere and tried to focus on getting them back down to the saferoom.
There was no more thought of her wandering off to find Hannah, no chance of her slipping away unnoticed. She tightened her grip on the bat, making up the rear of their group. This might be the first time she'd ever wished she'd taken up organized sports. She would probably much more comfortable with a bat if she had.
They were moving so slowly. It wasn't his fault, but Mike was still a disaster. He was conscious, which was good, but between the shock and the blood loss and the lack of painkillers, he staggered along slowly, supported by Matt. Jess was jumpy, swinging her flamethrower from side to side. Sam was a little afraid of what would happen if it jumped them down in the basement. Flamethrowers in enclosed spaces seemed like an incredibly bad idea. Another ragged scream tore through the night and she shuddered. She suppressed the urge to tell the others to hurry. They all knew. It would be a pointless waste of breath.
Something in the trees was snapping branches. Sam glanced back as the others moved as quickly as they could down the basement stairs again. Was she really seeing movement in the ruins or was it her own imagination? She slammed the door and heard the lock engage.
She rushed down the steps after them, glancing up towards the ceiling. Her Grandfather used to have her do that when they crossed the street. Left and right for cars. Up for helicopters. Down for gophers. Sam swallowed an uneasy laugh. There was that dollhouse again. And the rocking horse. And Hannah.
No one else seemed to notice her, all of them hurrying down the hallway. They stared at each other. "I—" For all her bravado with Jess, Sam had no idea what to say. "Han—"
The spirit shook its head and pressed its finger to its lips. It jerked its head towards the group. "Hurry," Hannah mouthed.
From somewhere up above her, Sam heard another muffled wendigo screech and the sound of something large slamming into something solid. "Hurry," Hannah urged, her voice louder this time. "Go now." The bang sounded again, accompanied by the sound of splintering wood.
She sprinted after the others. They'd heard the sound too. Mike, drawing on vestiges of strength that amazed her, had broken into a staggering run beside Matt. Em shoved in front of Jess, hammering out the pattern on the saferoom door. She didn't even give them time to respond, just rapped out the pattern again and again and again, frantically. The door swung open and she rushed inside.
"Em? What happened—"
"It wrecked the helicopter," Emily snapped to Ashley. "It's coming down here. Get everyone inside."
Jess and Sam stood guard, each facing down opposite ends of the hallway, waiting. Sam's heart was racing. The splintering—had that been the door down to the basement? Had it been another room upstairs? Where was it? And where was—
"Josh!" Jess exclaimed. "Holy shit!"
Sam spun. Josh had skidded to a halt about ten feet down the hallway, staring at them with wide, wild eyes. Blood speckled his face and clothes, water soaking his cuffs and knees. Even from that distance, Sam could smell campfire smoke and the chemical stink of propane. "Josh? Are you okay? It worked, but the thing messed up the—"
"Jess, get away from him," Sam said slowly, sliding her hand around Jess's arm and tugging her backwards. "Josh, say something. Say something so I know you're not going to attack us."
He shut his eyes, chest quaking heavily, then forced them open again. His tongue darted out to taste the air and he shuddered again, his entire body shaking. "S—Sam. I—I'm okay. I'm okay. It's coming. It's coming for you. I'm okay." He seemed to be repeating the thought more for himself than for her.
"Where's Chris?" Ashley had emerged back into the hallway, Matt just behind her, relieved of his burden.
Josh just shook his head, his eyes still squeezed shut.
"Where's Chris?" she asked again, louder, her voice higher pitched. He shook his head again. "No." Ashley shook her head. "No. No no no. Where is he? Where is Chris? Why isn't he here?"
"It—it got him."
An ear-splitting cry tore through the air. Ashley flung herself forward and Matt grabbed her around the waist. He tried to pull her back but Ashley fought like a fury, clawing at him desperately. "Matt, let me go! He's out there! We can't leave him out there!"
Sam couldn't breathe, couldn't think. It was possible Josh was lying, but she couldn't see why he would possibly do that. There was nothing to be gained and everything to be lost by such a deception. She swallowed hard. "Hold onto her, Matt." The words were painful; she could barely get them out. But it didn't matter. It was too late. It was too late for Chris. It might be too late for them too.
Ashley screamed again, voice breaking as she dissolved into tears. "We can't leave him out there," she said desperately, begging Matt to listen. His eyes were full, but he kept his grip on her, holding the struggling girl in place.
The others came out into the hallway to better see what was going on. Sam smacked the heel of the bat against her thigh, trying to jolt her out of the haze of disbelief and dawning horror. What were they going to do? Mike leaned heavily in the doorway and looked at her, pain written into every line of his face. He seemed decades older than he had even an hour ago. "Sam—"
She heard, rather than saw Josh move, taking slow, staggered steps towards the group. His eyes, open again, were fixed on Mike's bloody arm. His tongue darted out again and he sighed with what looked like relief and pleasure. "Josh, stop there."
His entire body shuddered again and he swung his gaze around to fix on her. "I had to leave him, Sam. I had to. I c-couldn't touch him without—I wanted—but I didn't. I didn't, Sam. But I don't know how much more I—It's coming, Sam. Lock yourself in the saferoom and let me try to kill it." Despite the crowd around them, it felt for a moment like they were the only two people there.
Shaking her head, she tried to find the words to reason with him. "We'll fix this. We can save you. We can—"
"I need—" His eyes jerked involuntarily back to Mike's arm and she saw his throat move as he swallowed. "I can't stop—"
There was a loud thump and Josh dropped, his eyes sliding back in his head. Ashley stood over Josh, looking down at his unconscious form. Her arms shook from the impact of her heavy pack against Josh's head. looked at Sam, her arms shaking from the impact of the book against Josh's head. Her eyes were red and raw, but her face was set and determined. "If you want to save him, we need to do it now."
"Ash, are you—"
Ashley cut her off with a sharp gesture. She took a deep, unsteady breath and met Sam's gaze. "Don't. I'm not. But if Chris is—if he's d—" She couldn't finish the thought. "You saw what I saw. Josh is losing it. We do this now or we don't do it at all."
"But he's the only one strong enough to fight the thing!" Em snapped. "You want to get rid of our only real defense?"
But the redhead didn't spare her a glance, her focus still on Sam. "We do this now or we don't do it at all," she said again, her voice trembling but utterly sure.
A crash echoed down the hallway, followed by the wendigo's piercing call. They could hear a woman's voice, distantly calling for them. "Children? Children? Children?" in the exact same intonation over and over again.
"Get Josh," Sam said quickly to Matt. "Where can we go? The saferoom won't hold." It wouldn't. Swinging doors with a bar on them? It would be child's play to a wendigo. It had been stupid of them to ever think it might, not once the thing discovered it. And a quick glance back down the hallway showed her that Mike's injury had left a trail of blood drops that would lead it right to them.
Hank interjected quickly. "Follow me. We can retreat further into the hotel. I'll find us a place."
"How the hell—" Melinda stared at him, leaning on her crutches.
He shrugged. "Bob and I checked the place out before he bought it. That included the hotel. It did not include the fucking monsters," he muttered.
Matt scooped up Josh and looked to Hank. "Let's go, then."
Sam quickly lost track of the hallways they passed down. She hoped against desperate hope that Hank knew what he was doing and where he was going. He was mumbling under his breath: "Limited entry. Multiple doors better. Layers. Checkpoints. Fuck." She supposed that at least suggested that he had a plan, which was more than she had at this point.
The call continued behind them. "Children? Children? Children?" She was going to hear it in her dreams, assuming she lived long enough to ever sleep again. Sam wanted to scream back at it, but that would only give away their position even faster.
As a group, they rushed through a set of double doors into what seemed to have been a club room of some kind. Old leather chairs sat arranged around an ornate fireplace and the walls were lined with decaying cloth- and leather-bound volumes in built-in shelves. He slammed the doors shut and gestured at Emily. "We need to brace this door. A first barrier. There's a few more rooms past this that'll be good, but we need to blockade this first."
They dragged one of the armchairs over, then another. Just as they'd wedged the back of one of the chairs under the handle, the door shook in its frame, sending a shower of dust cascading over Jess. The blonde stared at it, then looked back at Sam, her eyes wide. "It's not going to hold," she said softly, her jaw tightening. "We'll try to do something here. Hurry."
She squeezed Sam's hand, then let go, looking around the room wildly. Rushing to the wall, she pulled at the edge of a heavy oak bookshelf, heaving it with all her might. Emily ran to help her, shoving her shoulder into the far side. It moved a few, screeching inches. Sam couldn't move, couldn't breathe. She couldn't just leave them there.
As if hearing her thought, Emily glared at her. "Go, Sam. Now!"
Hank and Jess exchanged a nod. "Let's go," he said.
"You're not going to get another chance," Jess said, breathing hard as she continued to force the bookshelf further in front of the doors. The plaster of the wall seemed to be crumbling, collapsing in on itself.
The thing slammed into the door again, the shock of it seeming to reverberate straight through her.
"Sam, are you coming?" Melinda's voice, pitched high with anxiety, carried back down the hall.
She swallowed hard, nodded to Jess and Em, and turned to bolt up the hallway as the bangs and wild shrieks of the thing seemed to carry after her. It doesn't matter, whispered the insidious little voice in the back of her mind. Even if you do save him, you'll all die up here. You can't stop it. The only one who could fight it at all was Josh, and you're trying to take away his ability to even do that much. You're an idiot. A naïve idiot.
Skidding through another, single door, she found the group again. This time Ashley looked at her and let out a little laugh that bordered on hysteria. "I think this is my stop." It was a smaller room that looked like it had been some kind of service room. There were mops and other antiquated cleaning equipment, spare carts, and other various bric-a-brac.
This wasn't right. She tried to reason with the girl. "No, Ash—you have to—the cure—"
The redhead shook her head and shoved her bag into Sam's arms. "You know as much as I do. And I think… I think it should be you, Sam. The wendigo blood is in a jar in there. Just go. We'll keep it from—we'll keep it as long as we can."
A warm hand closed over hers, where she gripped the bat. Mike took it from her stunned fingers, hefting it in his left hand. "Go be the big hero, Giddings. We've got this."
"No—"
"There's no time for you to fight me on this," he told her firmly. "I can't carry Josh and I can do more good here. I've still got a few good swings left in me." It was all falling apart. She was going to lose everyone. Absolutely everyone. His lips quirked up in a little smile as her arms tightened around the bag and its precious cargo. "Sam, if anyone can pull this off, it's you. Go."
She went.
The next room had been a dining room, back in the day. It was large, with a high, open ceiling, and now boasted moldering velvet-backed chairs and dusty, crooked chandeliers. Most of the tables were stacked along the wall, but there were a few out in the open. Melinda was ripping back the sheet that covered one of these. She rushed over to them, just as Matt deposited Josh on the surface. Sam didn't bother to shut the door. She didn't have time to barricade it and when—if—the thing made it past Jess and Emily and Ashley and Mike… But that wasn't helpful. Hank rushed back to try to block them off, but she ignored him, turning her attention to Josh.
Matt had been right in his assessment. Josh tossed and turned, alternately growling and moaning with pain as he fought his way back towards consciousness. His fingers dug into the fabric of his stomach, his chest, his face. Countless small cuts decorated his exposed skin and he looked nearly skeletal, his skin unnaturally pale and stretched tight over the bones of his face. Melinda was crying silently, tears streaking through the dirt caked onto her skin.
"What now?" Matt asked. She glanced up at him and the utter trust and confidence in his eyes made her want to scream and cry and throw up simultaneously.
She swallowed again and shoved her sleeves awkwardly up her arms. Looking to Melinda, she wondered if she should try for bravado. Instead, she settled on the truth. The woman deserved that, after everything that had happened. "It might not work, Melinda. I don't really know—"
"Just fucking do it, Sam. Whatever you need me to do, I'll do. I know that he might—just do it." For all the tears, Melinda's voice was steady and certain. It only doubled down on her desire to cry, but she bit it back. Later. Later, when they were all fine, Sam would cry.
"Okay," she mumbled. "Here we go, Washington."
Fiddler's book had been so difficult to sort through. Thank god for Ashley and her puzzle-happy mind. It was at least enough to give her a place to start. As to the rest, she figured she'd just follow her instincts. She yanked the stoppered jar from Ashley's bag and set it on the table next to Josh, then immediately had to snatch it back as one of his violent gestures almost sent it spinning to the ground.
She grabbed her knife and dug it into the thick cork. After a moment, it came loose with a sucking noise and the thick, metallic scent of blood washed over them all, layered with something putrid and almost oily. From the corner of her eye, she saw Matt gag and cover his mouth.
Well, he would just have to deal with it. She handed him the jar, and he held it obediently in front of him. Gesturing, she grabbed Melinda's hand and pulled the tip of her knife along the woman's palm. It was dirty, but the idea of getting infected seemed almost laughable. Blood, dark and garnet-red welled up in her hand. Melinda cupped her hand and held it close to her stomach, letting the blood continue to build up in a pool.
Here, she faltered. It had been in Fiddler's book. The wendigo blood—or whatever you wanted to call it—wanted to be out. It wanted to be with its kind, just as Josh's human self wanted to be with his family. But short of just slitting Josh's wrists, Sam wasn't sure what to do.
She could kill him. And not just in a 'leave him to die' kind of sense. She might cut him and he might bleed out right here in front of her, with her unable to do anything to save him. It might be just like… "…like last time," she whispered. When he'd tried to do it himself, years and years ago. This was stupid. She was being stupid. He was going to die if she didn't do this. It was impossible to tune out everything around her and focus. All the invasive thoughts, the noises, the fear, the grief were overwhelming. They were like some tangible thing in the air, poisoning and suffocating her.
Sam didn't realize that she was feverishly hot until she felt sweet, blissful cold against her skin. She glanced to the right.
Dead though she might be, Beth's eyes were shining with tears. Her hand on Sam's shoulder was icy, but it didn't hurt. It didn't penetrate, just hovering against the surface. "You can do it, Sam. It isn't like before. That was his illness, making him do terrible things to himself. You're helping him."
"Beth?" Melinda's broken, bewildered whisper was almost enough to pull Sam's attention away. Almost.
"Shh, Mom," said a new, soft voice from Sam's left. "Let Sam concentrate, okay?"
Sam's head whipped around so fast it hurt. Even without the glasses, Sam knew it was Hannah. It was all there, in the lines of her face, the amusement and fond annoyance in her eyes. "Hannah?" The pale girl nodded, her hand coming up to rest on Sam's left shoulder, mirroring her twin. "Hannah, you're… you're you again?"
The spirit's lips quirked up slightly. "I'm afraid I always was me. I probably owe you an apology or seven. But right now, I think you should try to help my idiot brother out of this mess he's gotten himself into."
"What do I do?" Sam asked, looking between both twins.
Beth hesitated, then shook her head. "I'm not sure. I think you have to just trust what you read."
The other spirit laughed, the sound harsh but finally, perfectly, truly Hannah. "That's my Beth. Always with the books. She's right. But also trust your gut." Hannah's eyes grew serious and pained, her voice earnest. "Even if you kill him, Sam, it's better. It's better than becoming… that. Believe me. I know."
Their cold continued to seep down into her, but rather than being painful, it made her calm. Sam took a deep breath, then another, and looked down at Josh. He was still unconscious, she thought, though it was hard to tell. His eyes jerked wildly under closed lids, his throat shifting as he seemed to swallow over and over again. He wasn't growling anymore. Instead, she could hear a soft, high-pitched keening, like a dog whimpering in pain.
It was Josh. After everything he'd done, everything she'd done, everything they'd been through… it was Josh. Josh Washington. Brilliant, tormented, selfish, generous, passionate, desperate fuck-up. She loved him. No matter what happened from there out. She loved him. And she couldn't leave him like this, no matter what it cost her.
From off down the hall, she could hear shouting and more banging. There was no more time.
Sam grabbed his arm, pulling it back and exposing his wrist, with its old white scars that he hated for people to see. "Come on, Washington," she said fiercely. "You complete and utter asshole. It's go-time." The knife had been dulled by its hard use, or perhaps his skin was already something more than purely human. It tore into his skin jaggedly and she pulled harder, feeling as though she was trying to cut into stone.
Slowly, steadily, blood began to well up. It was thick and dark and moved sluggishly, more like mud than blood.
Josh's back arched, his entire body spasming up off the table. She heard Matt curse and Melinda gasp, but she didn't let go of his wrist, still holding it as firmly as she could, continuing the cut. It was like one of Beth's fairy tales. Like Tam Lin. You didn't let go, no matter what happened. You held on through the pain. You battled through it.
"I'll never let go, Jack," Hannah muttered drily.
The complete incongruity and irreverence of the comment somehow gave Sam strength. She pulled the knife as hard as she could manage. More of the sluggish alien blood welled up, clinging like a blob to his skin. Sam spared a quick look at Matt and Melinda, who each held out their respective blood. Everything smelled of it—copper and rust and lightning and life and death. Her skin tingled, the cold of Beth and Hannah still seeping into her, creeping down her arms and chest, combatting the sudden fever that she could feel raging through her. It made no sense, but even knowing that it made no sense didn't help her shake the feeling of lightheadedness.
The black blood on Josh's arm quivered and his entire body shuddered. Yet the blood didn't move. It didn't separate the way Fiddler had described. She shot another look to Matt, who stared at her helplessly. He held out the jar even further and shook it slightly, setting the mud-thick liquid shaking.
And still nothing happened.
"No," Melinda said desperately, shaking her head. "No. This can't be it." She looked to Sam. "What do we do? What else are we supposed to do?"
A furious, animal scream ripped the air in two, reverberating around them and making all of them jump. All six heads turned to look to the door. The thing hung there, suspended in the doorway like a spider. "Makkapitew…" it growled, in Fiddler's gruff voice. There was a crack of breaking glass as Matt dropped the jar of wendigo blood and many things happened in an instant.
Hank swung a chair hard at its head and the wood shattered upon impact. The thing screeched in his face and grabbed the side of his head, flinging him out of the way. The older man crashed into a pile of tables and tumbled to the floor, unmoving. Melinda shouted his name, forgetting her cupped hands, and her blood splattered across the table and ground.
The creature hissed and launched itself from the doorway towards them, just as the blood on Josh's arm twitched again.
Then it split. True to Fiddler's description, it was like a magnetic pull, the globs of thick, brackish blood splitting itself in the air in front of them. Murky, oily muck separated, spattering violently towards the wendigo. Matt ducked out of the way as more and more of the sludge flung itself at the monster, each drop hitting it with an impact that sent it staggering.
It screamed, clawing at its skin, scraping at the blood and desperately trying to remove it. Josh's other blood, red and real, simply fell back to drip down Josh's arm. He collapsed, the painful bow of his back giving as he slumped down, still whimpering. The blood flowed faster. It seemed like enough blood for an entire murdered person, spurting and spraying as if the result of some unseen onslaught.
The thing continued to scream. Josh's wendigo blood seemed like a living thing, crawling across its skin. Sam wasn't sure if it was burning the thing or trying to choke it or just plain driving it crazy, but she didn't care. It seemed to be going mad. The screaming was incoherent, ragged and raw as it all-but fell backwards and away from them. It rallied for a moment, rearing up to hiss at them, spittle flying. The cold touch of the twins vanished and Sam saw Beth step forward, anger twisting her features, and she nodded to Hannah. The girls disappeared, flickering out of sight like an over-exposed photo.
Light, painfully bright, burst through the room and a sound like a bell, as loud and overwhelming as if they were in an actual bell tower, resounded through the room. Sam staggered, trying to shake off the ringing in her ears and the spots dancing before her eyes. She could just make out the blur of the thing falling back and turning to flee, rushing back through the door and away. She could hear its screams receding.
On the table, Josh shuddered again, weakly. His eyes fluttered open for a moment, then closed. He continued to bleed, his blood purely his own. His face, with it monstrous disfigurement, began to relax. Sam studied his face, waiting, looking for any sing of a change—would he lose some of his gauntness? Or maybe she would see his cheek begin to seal itself back together again, his predator's teeth shrinking.
But there was nothing.
Matt scrambled back to his feet and headed for Hank, but Sam and Melinda continued to watch Josh. Melinda's voice trembled: "Was that—did it work? Nothing happened with my…" She looked down at her spilled blood and blanched. "Did I ruin it? Sam, why isn't he waking up?"
Josh's lips moved, slightly, but Sam couldn't make out a word. Then he went still, his last breath going with a sigh.