Available for download in PDF. I promise you that I don't have any viruses. I just strongly recommend it seeing as this was written in book format. Visit the Tumblr dedicated to this series, "11785", for details.
Or just read it here (:
FOURTEEN
Westin Residence
Willow, Connecticut
Saturday, October 7, 2006
9:12 PM
Taylor's rental car was gone by the time John and Amy Winchester emerged from the depths of the abandoned warehouse, leaving a trail of dust in her wake that told Amy her friend hadn't torn off that long ago. Around them, in the settling dirt that obscured some of the view down the road, darkness covered the deserted lot around them, with only the light of the full moon providing enough to see by.
Rushing for his truck, John jumped behind the wheel and started the engine, barely waiting while Amy slid into the passenger's side before taking off after Taylor. In minutes, the pair had already caught up to the blue Hyundai, with John swerving around the car and barreling past at what Amy could only assume to be pushing at least a hundred miles an hour—a speed she hadn't thought the monstrous, mid-1980s truck could handle. As they passed Taylor, Amy could barely get a glimpse inside, noticing that her bewildered friend had her eyes narrowed at the dark road and the two young girls perched in the backseat were sitting quietly.
While in the basement of the vacant factory, Amy had ripped the tops off the crates with ease, using only her hands and the rush of adrenaline that had come over her as soon as she had raced inside. Pulling the kids free as if rescuing a kitten from a thorny bush, Amy had taken them both by the hand and had spoken as calmly as possible to them, telling the girls to run up to the waiting blue car and to ask Taylor to take them home as quickly as she could. Helping them to the stairs, in case that thing appeared to head them off, Amy told the two to sprint away, hoping they would be up and out of the building before the creature could come back. Thankfully, with what seemed to be momentary luck, the criatura had been too slow to appear, allowing the kids to hustle to safety before it could take them hostage once again.
However, with the savage roar and the sudden evaporation into the ground, Amy had gotten the sense that their luck had faded, backed further still by John's sudden urgency to return to Willow—or so Amy assumed they were headed. Fortunately, the drive would give her time to think, something she hadn't been able to do after racing into the building. Of all the things that had happened during her time down in the basement, the creature's escape had been the least worrying, at least to her. As Amy had ripped those nailed-in, sealed-shut lids from the crates, she had felt something explode inside of her, almost like a sudden surge of strength had erupted in or around her heart, spreading throughout her limbs and allowing her to remove the tops of the containers as if they had been nothing but the pop-top on a ketchup bottle. What was more, just like when Bailey had attacked Amy, she had suddenly found the ability to fight back, something that had been summoned from seemingly nowhere, with tactics and strategies running through her head that she hadn't been given the chance to apply—John taking the opportunity from her as he battled the criatura on his own.
What's happening to me? Amy swallowed as she stared straight out the windshield.
As she sat rigidly in the passenger's side of John's truck, Amy could tell that the rush of energy she had felt prior to entering the warehouse hadn't faded, instead becoming stronger the closer the two of them came to approaching Willow. Gripping onto the side of the leather seats to try to channel her sudden vigor into the foam, Amy crushed the cushion beneath her with her nails, causing her to let it go for a moment as she waited for the material making up the bench to puff back into place. Repeating the calming actions again and again as Farmington came into view, Amy could feel her heartbeat slow to a dull thud as John carried on, pushing the truck to its limits as it sped forward.
Finally, just as the town was coming closer, Amy managed to relax a little, sensing a new problem arising that needed addressing, one that she hadn't thought of in the time that she had been stressing over her sudden bursts of strength: how were they going to find the place the criatura had disappeared to? Turning to look at John, Amy bunched her jaw as she noticed the man's focused gaze, his eyes never veering from the road, not even when she could tell he sensed her stare. Rolling his shoulders back as a warning to keep her mouth shut, Amy followed his silent command, trying to sit still as the question began to fester. Did John even know, or was he just guessing that the thing had headed back to Willow? Had it returned to where it had been prowling, or had it chosen a new hunting ground, one where it was unlikely to get caught until morning? Or had they messed up enough to freak the thing out and send it into another state, where they would need to keep their eyes and ears on the newspapers to see whether or not the thing had picked up where it had left off?
Sighing, Amy nudged her head into the back of the seat and stared up at the roof of the truck, wondering what she was doing here and how she had gotten to this moment. As her fingers twitched with adrenaline and legs felt numb against the rumbling floorboards, Amy tried to calm herself by closing her eyes, sensing another burst of energy coming. Turning her thoughts away, she tried to think of anything other than the fact that she was currently hastening toward Willow at a breakneck speed, sitting beside John as they headed for a fight that might not end well. Instead, she focused on trying to recite her lines from Barefoot in the Park, hoping that the lighthearted play would distract her well enough to allow her to empty her mind for a moment.
"Just now. It's suddenly very clear that you and I have absolutely nothing in common," Amy mentally recalled. "Don't oversimplify this! I'm angry. Can't you see that?"
Unfortunately, before she could get any further than the scene they were supposed to run for blocking on Monday, Amy felt a very painful stab in her chest, something that came with another rupture of power. Letting out a muffled cry, Amy felt her back arch as she squeezed her eyes shut, trying to focus her thoughts on making the sting pass. Suddenly, as quickly as it had come, the feeling was gone, disappearing the moment John's truck rumbled beyond the sign welcoming them to Willow, Connecticut. Taking a sharp breath, Amy sat up straighter, deciding that her questions about how they were going to find the thing couldn't wait, the abrupt pain clearing her head of everything except what they were doing.
"How do you know where to look?" Amy asked calmly, still trying to collect herself.
"We'll hear it," John answered shortly, clipping his words.
Furrowing her brow as Amy glanced at John, she slumped in her seat at the irritation hidden underneath his tone, sounding as though no more questions would be tolerated or answered. Bunching her jaw as John pulled around the empty lot marking the beginning Willow's town square, Amy glanced in all directions as they turned onto Main Street, noticing that John was rolling his window down to listen. Slowing the engine to a quiet growl as the car coasted along the street with John's foot barely grazing the brake, Amy copied his movements as she focused her hearing outward, hoping to pick up on a strangled scream or something that would point them in the right direction. As John was about to make his way around the park that sat at the center of town for the third time, with resolve still evident on his face, Amy narrowed her eyes to look for any signs of light inside the homes facing the street, noticing that all of them were dark. Glancing at the clock on her cell phone, Amy checked the time, a sense of something being awry filling her gut.
"This isn't right," Amy muttered, swallowing hard. "Something's off."
Nodding as though he had already picked up on what she was saying, John stopped the truck outside of Main, killing the engine a moment to listen to the eerie quiet. For a second, Amy felt as though she were sitting at the helm of an abandoned town, one that had been left behind in some sort of silent boycott. As crickets chirped and the rustling of trees filled the overlying stillness, Amy held her breath to listen, wondering what was going on. Popping the door open on instinct, Amy glanced at John before sliding out of the truck, taking a few steps around the grill of the vehicle to walk into the street. As she headed toward the middle of Willow Lane, the street that ran perpendicular to Main, Amy felt a sense of electricity in the cool night air, one that charged her and caused her to feel renewed.
Suddenly, coming from the other side of the park, the sound of a high-pitched cry rented the calm, causing Amy to spring forward and race toward the strip of houses facing in her direction. Behind her, John's truck roared to life, tearing away from the curb he had been parked at in the sound and smell of burning rubber as he sped toward the direction of the scream had come from. Hopping out and reaching inside his coat pocket for the gun and flashlight Amy had previously seen, John jumped in front of her as she reached him and stood with his head turned down toward the pavement, his ears perked and obviously trying to determine which house the sound had come from. Eyes searching the façade of each residence after a moment, John finally chose the Colonial one next to where they were standing, clearing the three front steps in an impressive leap and kicking in the front door.
Following behind as another shriek came from upstairs, along with the pounding of fists against either walls or wood, Amy trailed John up to the second floor of the home, noticing that an adult couple stood helplessly outside of a closed-off archway. Parting as John announced himself as police, the two shrank to the floor just as the man poised his gun toward the knob of the door. Firing off a shot, Amy flinched at the noise, the smell of gunpowder biting the air and clink of a ricocheting bullet causing nearly everyone to jump. Standing a minute later when she was sure it was clear, Amy straightened up to see what John had done. Just beneath the handle punctuating the whitewashed wood, a tiny opening splintered through to make a peephole, one that John was now using to peek through.
"Amelia, false bottom of my truck, there's an axe. Get it. Now."
Nodding obediently, Amy glanced at the couple as they held each other, sitting against the wall of the hallway the door sat in with their eyes turned on one another. Seeming not to notice her as she passed, Amy descended the stairs two at a time before jumping the last handful, landing roughly before racing out to the truck. Opening the door to the driver's side, Amy dug under the mats and books sitting inside the cab, finding nothing that could be considered a blunt weapon or a trap door. Glancing around, Amy tried to find a spot she had missed, then turned to look at the bed of the vehicle, wondering whether or not John had given her indirect instructions in his fervor to get inside the room that was been blocked off.
Rounding to the tailgate, Amy quickly pulled it down and removed the canvas shielding the back, trying to find anything that could be used to break open the door inside the house. Stopping just beside the roped-down toolbox that had been securely fasted to bolts in the siding, Amy noticed something sitting underneath, a lever that had been imperceptible enough to miss in the dark. Yanking it, Amy swallowed hard as the sound of hydraulics followed, a sudden fear that she had broken something overcoming her. Thankfully, a moment later, a long, narrow cupboard toward where she had been standing at the end of the truck appeared, popping out to display an impressive set of stainless steel weapons that had obviously been recently cleaned. Finding an axe sitting at the base of what seemed to be an upside-down triangle of artillery, appearing as the cherry on top of the guns, knives, and crucifixes that all gleamed up in bright silver, Amy removed it from the padding it was encased in, pulling the lever again as she raced back inside the house.
Taking the stairs three at a time as she hurried to the second story, Amy waited until John removed his boot from where he had been roughly shoving it into the door before tossing him the axe. As he traded her with the gun he had been holding, something she hadn't been expecting, she caught it gingerly and watched as he began chopping at the wood, the sound of the screaming coming from inside reaching deafening levels. After a few minutes, the right half of the door was removed, giving John enough space to slip inside the room, snapping his fingers for the pistol again as he tossed the axe back to her. A moment later and the boom of a gunshot echoed throughout the house, causing the couple huddled in fear against the wall to shake in place. Offering them a small, reassuring smile before removing what was left of the door stuck in the frame, Amy shoved it open just as a young, redheaded girl raced for her, hugging her around the middle as she cried.
"Laura!" the woman to Amy's left cried, tearing the kid's attention away.
Running toward who could only be her mom just as Amy caught sight of John being tossed into a nightstand and breaking it, the girl headed for the couple, getting scooped up and taken away as the family started down the stairs and out the door. Watching them leave as the splintering of yet more wood carried from the other room, Amy turned toward the fight, unsure whether or not to jump in. For some reason, her body was screaming to get in the middle of the spar, wanting nothing more than to send a few solid punches toward the criatura's face, but her mind was telling her to stay out of the way and to let John handle it. From where she stood, even though she could see that John had been thrown into a bookshelf, she could tell that he had the upper hand in the fight, taking the creature down to its knees as it flickered from its water form to one more concrete, making it look as though it belonged in an old horror movie. Its hands and feet were webbed, its face resembled carp, and its body appeared to be made out of hard, black scales on a biped form.
Holding the gun at the ready with one hand, John fired off a shot, missing entirely as the criatura ducked and rushed him. Taking him down, the creature landed on top of him, using its slimy hands to shove John's head into the hardwood floor. Deciding now was the time to step in after waiting in the wings, Amy sprung forward, tugging the thing off of the man and sending it spiraling into the wall beside the bed. As it recovered quickly, charging for her, Amy flipped it onto its back, the creature up on its feet a moment later. Feeling her apparently underlying abilities boot up, bucking her into the passenger seat as some other force took over, Amy landed a roundhouse kick to the creature's side, sending it once again into the wall. Suddenly realizing the axe was still in her hand from when John had given it to her earlier, Amy swung at it, hitting the thing square in the chest and stepping back as it let out a primal scream.
"Get down!" John shouted behind her.
Without hesitation, Amy fell to the floor as six rounds were fired, each of them hitting the criatura in the head and spraying black blood everywhere. Shielding her face as the dark liquid rained onto her clothes, Amy buried her head under her arms, only listening as the creature's horrible shriek became an ear-splitting cry. Tensing herself for something more, she waited as the sound of something heavy hitting the floor came from beside her. Pausing a moment, Amy swallowed hard before looking up, finding herself only an inch from where the criatura had fallen and was now becoming a puddle of oily ooze. Narrowly missing the spreading fluid as the creature melted, Amy scrambled to her feet and backed up, keeping her eyes on the thing and ramming right into John.
Putting his hand on her shoulder, the two watched in silence as the thing disappeared, fading into the floorboard in a dark stain that looked as though it had been there for quite some time. However, their moment of triumph was short-lived. A second later and a dozen heavy footsteps rushed up the stairs behind them, the sound of guns clicking following closely behind. Tensing, Amy's heart hammered in her chest as John's hand firmly grasped Amy, both of them seeming to sense the same thing.
"Freeze! You're under arrest!"