I didn't dream much after that. It was just merciful black sleep.

My eyes snapped open shortly however. I tried to force myself asleep again. Of course sleep doesn't work that way. I couldn't sink into oblivion again.

I tried to hold it back. But I felt all the shame and other bad emotions flood over me.

I whimpered softly. I felt tears again. I buried my face in the hay.

I couldn't mope, I felt like I had to get up. I felt-

I saw him sitting at his desk. He had the little boy's corpse from yesterday, only it seemed grotesquely hollow. I watched in shock, horror and disgust as calmly grabbed a handful of the grass and stuffed it into the little boy.

I felt like I would throw up, but I did not. It made sense, somehow. I looked around at the corpses plastered everywhere. So this is how he did it.

I feel so unclean, like filth. All the things I've seen things I've done? Maybe I'm being corrupted. My once comfortable mind and morality twisted by this beast. It's an incredibly depressing thought.

Yet I don't despair again. I don't cry. Instead I'm enraged, I feel like I'm boiling over. If I had a little less self control I would have given in to my emotions and stated screaming at him or attacking him, fortunately I did not.

I was still so angry, angry at him for what he did, angry at me for not resisting physically or mentally, angry at him for his clever manipulation. He knows what buttons to push... I felt disgustingly impure.

The decision was created and acted upon almost instantly. As if I had planned it all along I opened my backpack with angry sharp movements. I pulled out everything I needed. Gathering it all in my arms I turned on my heel and walked, still naked, out of the office.

I caught sight of him looking at me, and gave him the ugliest glare I could muster. Then I disappeared thought the winding, wet hallways. My heart felt like it would explode, I checked nervously over my shoulder again, he did not follow me.

When my bare feet waded through the water flooding the hall I began to have doubts, but my anger and shame spurred me onward. Finding the main entrance I pushed on it, it was open.

The rain was still pouring heavily. It was icy, bone-chillingly cold, but I forced myself to ignore that. I had to do this. My tears mixed with rain a little as I washed his scent out of my hair. They dried by the time I started on my body. My rage had congealed into cold hard determination by the time I got to my legs. It was shameful to be reminded of my violation, rewarding to finally wash the Creeper's seed off of me.

When I finally felt clean and untainted again I gathered my toiletries and walked, shaking, back into the building. It was unbelievably cold, it felt like I was almost having a seizure I was shaking so bad. I endured, at some level the cold felt good, purifying,

He was still there when I came back watching me curiously as I walked in, teeth chattering and lips blue. I caught sight of the poor boy, now part of the ghoulish decorations. Ohhh I'm so sorry kid, I thought but mostly that just fed fuel to my temper. I glared at him in obvious disgust again, and made my dripping body pointedly comfortable on his dry hay.

He observed me with a neutral expression tinged slightly with curiosity. I snorted contemptuously at him again and deliberately turned my back, then focused on trying to get warm in the hay.

As I snuggled in I reflected on my emotions. Sadness yes, still felt ashamed but the improvised shower made me feel a little better. My rage was only dampened slightly by the cold. I'm so mad at him, I hate him SO much. I thought I'm going to have to deal with this.

Just please don't do anything stupid. He pleaded.

I cried out in surprise; I wasn't even fully asleep yet. I could feel him smile. I remembered how shortly before the rape I had a vision; the corpses had come alive and were screaming at me.

I shut my eyes tightly and held on to my "bed" trying to get a grip. I'm going insane. I must be going insane. I see dreams while I'm awake! I wondered briefly if everything was a hallucination Maybe I was really in a loony bin somewhere.

Please, he said, and then paused helplessly. I understood what he was going through. What can he really say?

I felt my sadness replace my anger. What I did was wrong, I took out my anger on him, and he just wanted to help. I apologized for it.

Don't feel bad, he said reasonably. You have enough bad things to worry about.

I know, I shut my eyes tightly and squeezed out tears. I hate this, I hate pity! Even though I was feeling very self pitying myself.

The boy paused awkwardly again, I knew he was struggling to find something to "say". I fought my tears.

Listen he finally said gently, no one looks down on you, I-we-kinda admire you actually.

That caught me a little off guard. I thought that over for a moment. I could only ask him why.

Well, he stumbled a bit, It might be presumptuous, but, I know a little of what you're going through. But there's no way I would hold out as long as you did. I could never have coped like this.

Ha, I thought sarcastically, I am losing it.

He said, much more seriously, I have to tell you something, you are not going insane. I am real, real as you, real as your mom.

I looked over and saw her there, next to the older dark-skinned woman.

Oh God I thought in horror. I couldn't face her, not now. I started trembling and almost cried again. But he helped me. Its okay, its okay he assured. Don't worry about it. I'm sorry, I thought-

Who are you?! I demanded. I didn't know if I was going insane or not, but I wanted still to understand. I didn't know if I could even trust this blurry apparition or not.

Well like I said before, he said uneasily, you have to figure it out.

I thought about him, why couldn't I see him? I thought about what I saw, I remembered my mother I shook my head. I didn't even want to think about showing my weak pitiful self to her. The more I thought of her, the sadder I became. I missed her so much. Even though she died a while ago I still felt-

Then I had my first realization. She was dead, did that mean-?

I stared at him in shock. He became slightly clearer. I could see him nod.

Oh, was all I could say. He was dead. I was talking to a ghost.

Before this, before everything, that idea might have alarmed me, but now I felt nothing except surprise.

We both said nothing for a few minutes. I finally stabbed the silence with an obvious statement, just to make sure. You're dead. I said in a soft, hopefully respectable tone. Yeah, he replied simply. There was no happiness or sadness in this answer. He was simply sating a fact. I thought again and instantly came up with my next question.

If you are all dead, why-why can't I see you? I saw my mom.

He didn't seem angry or anything, to my relief, I really didn't want to start pissing off dead people.

Like I said, you don't see me because you don't want to see me.

Because if I do I'll see something terrible? I replied.

Yeah, he simply stated again.

He's dead, I thought, dead people, dead people what? Why can't I see him? I see dead people, okay movie I guess, didn't really help me though.

Focus, I told myself, this boy is dead, why would he talk to me? He said he understood...Then came my second realization: You were killed by the Creeper! I cried. It made sense.

Yeah, he said, another monotone. I began to feel maybe I was angering him now. Maybe he didn't want to talk about it. Understandable, I wasn't even dead and I didn't want to talk about it. I almost apologized but decided against it.

Realizing who had killed him was only another step. I now knew why I didn't want to see him. I've been trying my hardest not to see the people like him. Despite my fear and horror, I turned to look. He began to become clearer. I trembled, it was awful. I didn't want to look, but I was too curious not to. I knew I would see something horrible.

Even if it's terrible, even if it's the worst thing in the world, I will still look.

When I was finally able to focus, I could see him. It was truly terrible. He must have had an unbearable death. He was naked, but there were no worries of modesty. He was handsome I suppose, or had been handsome, well muscled, in shape. My eyes traveled upwards. He had no bellybutton, I saw his face.

This is what he must now look like I thought dizzily. His lips were chewed raw, and I knew it had been in the agony of his gruesome end. His mouth was slightly open, screaming in silent torture. His shaggy hair was mussed.

But that wasn't the worst, not by far. When I moved to look into his eyes I had to scream in shock and terror. He has no eyes! His eyes were gone, just gone! I was staring not into his brain, or even into his skull, I could see right through him!

I simply stared in silent horror for God knows how long. I noticed his sockets were crusty, they had congealed. There were claw marks trailing away from them.

Oh God, I moaned again, it was obvious, He ripped them right out! Now he's just a decoration!

Yessss, he hissed in barely concealed rage. Pulled them right out of me, ripped them out while I was screaming and begging for my sister, for my mother-

Stop! I begged the corpse. Please, I'm so sorry, I was trembling now, I felt sick again, sad, terrified. I couldn't stop shaking.

Hey! He cried out, instantly adopting a more gentle tone. I'm not mad at you I'm mad at him. I'm mad because, well look!

I looked again, the shock was lessened somewhat, but I was still trembling I'm sorry, was all I could say. I could understand his anger, his rage at the monster that had done this. All my problems suddenly felt trivial.

It's over for me, not for you, he reminded. You keep going, use your head-

I'm sorry, I said, but I have to know, who are you?

The corpse's mouth curled and opened, I was still shaking.

I was really shaking, The Creeper loomed over me, and his foot was on me, grabbing me, shaking me awake. I squawked weakly in protest. Apparently satisfied I was awake he immediately left me alone.

I was still shaking, still staring blindly in mute horror at what I had seen. It wasn't that scary, I had seen far more scary things lately. But the shaking wouldn't stop, couldn't stop.

That's when I knew something was wrong.

Two days later

I'm sick.

Not morning sickness, not vomiting in disgust. It's real feverish, vomiting, aches and chills sickness. It must have been the rain.

God I feel so stupid.

I've been lying on the straw naked and wet, alternately shivering and roasting. Whatever wasn't fully digested promptly came back up. I barely had the energy to turn my head, let alone get up and tend to myself. I spent days simply resting on the straw, like a weak sickly animal.

HE's been of little help. I saw him wipe up the mess when he realized I couldn't even sit up, let alone clean it. I felt him sniff me a few times. Today when I was conscious enough to register him inspecting me he looked directly into my eyes. "Not normal." He grated out.

"No, not normal." I coughed back.

There was nothing he could really do. Or anything I could do. I just had to wait till it was over.

I felt so stupid. My shame and anger caused me to stand in freezing rain in order to wash him off. Now I was paying the price.

To escape I mostly slept. My dreams were barely coherent. They were the kind of hazy horrible dreams that can only be imagined during fevers. I don't really remember them, they certainly weren't lucid, but I know I dreamed of copses, of crows, of eyeless faces.

I had one long strange dream of a battle. A violent epic war wrapped in a blurry red haze of blood, anger and horror. Sometimes it seemed to be in third person, but sometimes I felt I was one of the warriors fighting. I knew the battle was hopeless, I knew I would probably die, but I and everyone else knew that we had to fight.

The evil we fought against was nameless, but immense. Our armor shattered, our blood spilled, our horses panicked at trampled their riders. I attacked with uncontrollable fury heedless of the pain burning in my head, or the knives protruding in my stomach. My throat was scraped raw by screams of fear and fury. My whole body shook.

Eventually we proved futile. The crows that had longed circled are army finally descended. Eyes and tongues and brave hearts were mercilessly removed. Our bones returned to the dust, our bodies corrupted into clay. Eventually all that was left of our once mighty army was rotting banners, rusting armor and a frozen horrific tableau of the corpses of men and beasts bursting through the dried mud. I saw an eyeless face gazing at me.

I woke up screaming again shortly after.

Unknown

So sick I can barely think

Unknown

It's nearly impossible to figure how much time has passed. I'm so unbelievably sick. It's only gotten worse. I've only has the strength to crawl over and drink some emergency water, once. The only relief is sleep, but that's only temporary and a poor relief anyway. I dream only of my grinding stomach, my burning forehead and the knife scraping my throat raw.

I hate being sick, it's never fun but this sickness seems worse somehow. Maybe it's because I don't have the energy to care for myself, nor the will. When my thoughts were coherent I actually wondered if I was dying, then realized I really didn't care if I was.

I have no external help either. I've stared into his eyeless face, but the fever acted as a prism, scattering and confusing my dreams. Sometimes I dreamed of my mom, I dreamed of being held, that was the most comforting thing I had experienced. HE has been of no help either. I only vaguely remember him sniffing me. I think once he might have licked my face, if he had done anything to help me I don't know. He simply didn't exist to me.

Maybe this sickness only seems long, maybe it's drawn out because at home I would have had friends and family or at the very least medical personnel looking out for me, taking care of me. Here I have no one, only an inhuman monster with a vested interested in keeping me alive and probably only the faintest idea of what he's doing. It a scary and lonely thought, depending totally, completely on yourself.

I'm falling asleep again. I lick my chapped lips; the fever has destroyed my senses can't tell you what was taking place three feet in front of me, I need to…

Later Unknown

I fell asleep. I slept for a very long time. I woke up feeling slightly better.

When I awoke there was a musty-smelling old blanket, how it got there I had no idea. Did I pull it on myself? I thought, but I had no way to be sure, and it truly didn't matter anyway. Under the blanket I was broiling, when I yanked it off I was shocked by how cold it was. Then I realized that in all this time I was still naked. It was incredibly disorientating.

I knew what I had to do, but it was hard. I wasn't in the horrible catatonic fever filled state as before but I was still weak and in pain. I cursed my stupidity again. I crawled, slowly, off the mound of hay. Pausing to rest every few seconds I made my way slowly over to my luggage. Luckily my emergency water packets were on top. I ripped one open-the energy that needed was almost too much- and drained it. To my relief I held it down.

The next task was much harder, but it had to be done. Opening the bag I pulled out the first clothes I saw; a very thin cotton nightshirt and sweat pants. I pulled them on.

I actually had to lay my head on the bag and doze on the cold floor for a few minutes, I was that weak. Afterwards I crawled back onto the dead grass and pulled the blanket on me. For the next few minutes I dealt with my wretchedly uncomfortable chills. I threw the blanket off and pulled it on again in semi-sleep. At one point I felt so hot I considered taking off my sweat pants again. But eventually I found some sort of medium and drifted into sleep once more.

Sleep

I spoke to the dead boy again.

It was hard, I didn't want to look, so he became blurred, when I turned to speak to him he became clearer, but it was so terrible and sad to gaze at him, I usually gazed away again.

He seemed to be able to control his appearance, he gradually appeared less horrifying. He was no longer naked; I saw a yellow shirt with the word BANNON dimly printed on it. His blood and wounds disappeared; it was still hard to look where his eyes once were though.

It seemed liked he was wavering between his death and his life. Sometimes I saw a corpse, sometimes I saw a living boy. I asked him to show me his eyes, he said he couldn't.

Same basic principle, he explained. You don't want to see them, so youcan't.

During my few waking hours I thought about it. This boy, if he wasn't an insane vision, was dead, and he died by the Creeper. He had his eyes ripped out, and his belly button cut out too by the looks of it.

Oh My God I realized, you're a part of him now. He ripped out your eyes and ate them.

After that it was hard but I worked up my courage, with him supporting me every step. I would trail my eyes slowly up to his. I didn't even want to think of the Creeper's gaze so I usually failed.

However the boy insisted I persisted and. I thought of the few times I could look into the monster's horrible face. I tried to imagine the Creeper's eyes in his sockets.

My eyes, he growled. They are mine, he just stole them!

I'm sorry, I said sheepishly. He swiftly said it was okay. Then he urged me to concentrate again.

Eyes, I thought. What did those eyes look like? I struggled to remember, they were brown, okay that helped. When I pulled up some usually traumatic memory it seemed I could only remember the Creeper's glare, not the actual eyes.

I focused again. I thought back to the first night, the first time I saw him. The dream morphed. Oh, there's the gas station, no one is there, I go in, I hear screaming, I move with curiosity and some compassion into the back. I see two figures.

a large figure in a trench coat leaning over a figure on the ground, which was bleeding profusely, a large whole in the middle of his stomach. I screamed and the figure turned, it was holding was horribly looked like PART of a stomach!

Noooo, I moan, I can feel the boy's arms on me, he's reassuring me, telling me it's okay, that I'm doing great.

There I am, I slide down that drain pipe, like an idiot. I stop and stare in wonder and in horror, like a coward. I don't resist, I don't fight, I'm positive the end is near.

Then something totally unexpected happens, instead of being killing me he's on top of me. My body is chained; I can feel his tongue, his skin. I can hear his grunting and snarling. I can see his eyes roll in sheer ecstasy.

Then I remember.

When my eyes first met his, I was terrified. I can see the evil, the lust, the hunger in them, but a small part of me was struck by the same eyes. I thought that despite what they revealed about him, they were a surprising soft brown color.

Now that I've relived the worst night of my life, I raised my eyes again. My whole mind is screaming not to do it, I hate looking into the Creeper's eyes, into the boy's eyes.

Don't do it, don't do it, my lips are trembling, but I still force my gaze up. I try to think of his eyes by aesthetic purposes only. They really are nice eyes.

When my eyes meet his it was both shocking and anti-climatic. I jumped, but shortly afterwards I realized there was absolutely nothing to fear. It was like opening a closet to find the scary shadow was only actually something mundane. Fear, then instant relief. I felt a little foolish for being so afraid in the first place.

You did it! Holy shit, that was great! He cried. I gave a trembling smile and blushed, and tried to retreat, it's nothing, really. I'm actually quite a coward.

My ass! He cried playfully and grabbed my hand. He eagerly pulled me along. I looked into his eyes again. It was hard to believe they were the exact same eyes.

Later

He told me about his death.

He adopted somber tone. I kept respectfully kept quiet.

I was traveling on East Highway Nine with my sister. He explained. It was Spring break.

I wondered briefly how many sad stories started with "I was on East Highway Nine", mine did.

He attacked us, like he attacked you, big ugly truck, horns blaring, scared the shit out of us. Of course we thought of the story of Kenny and Darla, of COURSE we dismissed it. I was instantlyjolted back into memory, I thought about the legends I had heard too.

He went on, describing his hilarious sibling rivalry, the stupid bickering they had, he recalled the stupid country song he sang to tease his sister. He even remembered the goofy lyrics.

You broke my heart in two

Now I can't even find the duct tape

to put it together for you

I'm crying now, silently.

As he told his story the dream shifted. I wasn't just hearing his voice I was looking into his private memory.

I saw the Creeper, unrecognizable as anything but a man dumping corpses down the drain pipe. I saw and shared with the boy's horror when he saw inside the church. The paralyzing fear afterwards, the actual, honest- to- God psychic that tried to warn them, the cops killed, the strange cat lady, the Police station.

That's where it boiled down to. Apparently even the Creeper didn't know who he wanted until the very end. He had to smell them both. Maybe brothers and sisters smell similar.

I was weeping in fear and pity by the time the Creeper had the boy. I was struck by his sister's impassioned defense and her offer of self sacrifice. The boy shared with me a guilty secret:

When I realized it was me not her, my first thought, my first instant thought, was "No, take her not me!" I immediately felt guilty, horribly guilty. I begged her not to but of course she ignored that and offered herself instead. When that didn't work I felt a small satisfaction. At least she would live. Her life would go on.

He gave me a small quick look, but then continued.

I died, here, right in this room, he explained quietly. It was horrible, the worst pain imaginable, God I hate him, but it was over fairly quickly. I'll spare you the details, you've been through enough but, he appeared as an eyeless corpse again, I heard the Jeepers Creepers song playing hauntingly in the back ground. You know what happened.

I nodded, too overwhelmed to speak.

I'm dead, he said simply, nothing can change that. My death was horrible but it was a long time ago. I still hate the fucker, I felt him tremble briefly in anger, but the dead shouldn't hold grudges, there's absolutely no point. No purpose, it just holds you back.

He turned to me, once again looking like a living boy; my only regret is the time I wasted. I wish I didn't argue so much with my sister. I really loved her you know, and she loved me. He sighed; it was such a long sad sigh that I started crying again. Life is too damn short. He concluded.

Through my tears I asked, why are you telling me all this?

The question seemed to catch him off guard. He paused for a long time then slowly explained.

Well, I um, I'm trying to help you

That surprised me. I plainly never considered that.

Okay, I said, how?

Well, knowledge is power right? I know him, ask me anything. I want to help you.

My first question was immediately blurted out, but it didn't seem to be one he expected.

Who are you? I asked. He seemed surprised.

Then the dream world disappeared. The Creeper was shaking me awake again.

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A/N: Kinda another filler chapter. THANKYOU to all those who review, especially eat me, I was worried you had exploded or something. I should use redplantetes drawings more often. The offer is still in effect, as well as the baby Creeper one.

Funny thing is, I started getting horribly sick when I wrote this. Luckily it only lasted a day.

The small flashback Maria has is a direct quote from the original fic, so I can't take credit for it. Thank you Fnxmoon, wherever you may be.