It's a beautiful day, the sun is shining, the birds are singing on the rooftops. What could possibly go wrong? I hope you all enjoy the newest chapter with many more to come.
Disclaimer: I don't own The Flash.
They came back at around 10 after dealing with a meta who had a bastardized version of Mirror Master's. The ability to control and manipulate mirrors. Honestly, that power seemed so limited it was like a joke. It was just mirrors. Not any reflective surface such as glass, metal, or even water. Just mirrors. They'd dealt with more dangerous people who had a much wider range of capabilities. Although she might have been able to develop it a little more if she'd given it a bit more time.
There was still one thing bugging Barry about this whole situation. The interrogation with Joe that Barry was watching.
"There's one thing I don't understand. You came from a good family. Your family was normal. You had a normal childhood. Nothing ever happened to you. Went to college, met your husband and married right out of school. Bought a house and a dog." Joe was detailing her life to the meta. "Then a week ago, your husband claims you found out about your powers. That they just showed up. Neither of you even knew you were affected by the accelerator. So what was so god awful about your life that at the first opportunity, you took your powers to cause all this destruction? Why did you hurt and kill all those innocent people?" Joe showed her pictures of bloody bodies. Of people who she had hurt on her sudden rampage.
The woman looked over the pictures with a calm expression before a grin appeared and she started to giggle. She shrugged and just said casually, "It was fun, boss,"
Joe looked at her with mild horror. "You're getting off on this, aren't you, you freak?" Joe didn't give her a chance to respond. "We're done here. Take her away,"
The police officers by the door grabbed her by her dampener restraints and dragged her away to be put in a holding cell until morning where they could transfer her to Iron Heights.
Joe approached where Barry was watching from the glass. "Some people just make me sick. Other people I can understand. They dealt with trauma, they were dealing with hardships, financial or personal. Something to trigger them into crime. But her? 'It was fun'? Sometimes I wonder how much good I'm actually doing,"
"Don't doubt yourself Joe," Barry assured him. "Some people are just born rotten. You can't help that. You try to help where you can. It is contributing. Never let that be in question. You can't control people. But you can protect them,"
"I thought I was the one dispensing tidbits of wisdom?"
Barry shrugged. "I had to get it from somewhere." Barry noticed the time on the clock on the wall. "I need to get back. Caitlin is expecting me. We need to relieve Allegra of her job as babysitter."
"Go. Don't let me keep you up," Joe practically shoved Barry out of the room to get going.
Barry and Caitlin returned to their home, grumbling angrily to each other about how the day went to see Allegra just watching TV in the dark. "Hey. Ramona's asleep?"
"Put her down a while ago and haven't heard anything from her."
"Thanks so much for this. How much do we owe you?" Caitlin asked, taking out her purse to rifle through some bills.
Allegra shook her head. "You don't owe me anything. You've already given me more than enough,"
"Nonsense. We employed you for a job. And with a job comes payment. It's only fair." Caitlin dismissed her and gave her a couple bills.
When Allegra received the money, her eyes widened upon seeing how much she'd just been given. "This is-"
"Exactly what you are due. We went overtime and that's expected for a little extra as compensation." Caitlin raised an eyebrow, almost daring her not to accept the money.
"Just take it. Money is not an issue," Barry said, leading her to the door.
"This is a little?" Allegra said to herself in shock.
"There was a time when I would have reacted the same way. I'll check on you tomorrow. Have a good night,"
In an abandoned warehouse, there were piles of bodies in a pool of blood. All of the bodies each had various chunks of flesh ripped from them. A couple were missing fingers and noses. It made for a very horrid sight.
Then all of a sudden, a few of the bodies had their eyes changed completely black. A black goo seeped out of their injuries and when it disappeared back inside them, there wasn't a hint that they had been injured at all. Life was brought back to them, their hearts started beating and air passed through their lungs.
The corpses that had been reanimated crawled out of the pile of bodies they'd been dumped in. Each of them seemed to be at the very bottom of the pile, probably meaning they were the oldest bodies of the bunch. They were the ones who had the most time for the mutated blood to work its way through their system.
But their brains were still overtaken by the black blood that they were nothing more than mindless creatures. Victims to the black blood that entered their system without their master releasing them.
So that was the sight that Rosso found himself in the next time he was experiencing a black out and came to deposit another snack for him to save later. Multiple bodies of his victims standing with darkness in their eyes all staring at him, awaiting orders.
Taking a look around, he noticed that not all of them had been brought back to life. There were a good number still on the floor. There were one or two that were currently undergoing reanimation, slowly pushing themselves back up from the floor.
Rosso considered the situation he found himself in for a moment before coming to a decision. Dropping his newest victim into the room, he gestured with his hand for the ones standing to come out. "Come to me,"
Instead of doing as they were told, they copied his gesture and spoke the same words he did.
Rosso raised an eyebrow in surprise. So it would take a little time to get them under control. No matter. This just became interesting.
Ramsey woke up in his old bedroom in his mother's house again. What was going on with him? He was so disoriented that it took an embarrassing amount of time for him to notice the number of people standing over him. All of them with wounds that were currently being healed by a black goo that looked suspiciously like his blood.
Like the scientist in him, that was what caught his attention in this whole situation. This just became interesting.
Barry was playing with his daughter when he got a message on his phone. Checking it quickly he saw it was from Julian with the message 'You need to check this out' with a folder for him to see.
Opening it, he saw it was a forensic report. Barry still wasn't back at CCPD yet and nobody was pushing him to go back yet but he would admit that he was beginning to feel a bit restless being cooped up in only his house and STAR Labs. Caitlin wasn't even here right now. She was at STAR going over some files and doing research.
Curiosity won in the end and he started going through it quickly. Immediately he noticed that this was related to that cannibalism case that Joe mentioned a while back. Blood samples of the deceased and those missing. There was apparently another substance found at the scene that Julian was analyzing.
Going down to the results, Barry saw what had made Julian so surprised and sought out his advice. That was strange.
Phoning him immediately, Julian picked up at the first ring. "Are you sure?" Barry bluntly asked.
"I checked the sample three times. Checked my equipment, tried again and got the same results. I'm positive," Julian replied.
"I'm picking you up to STAR. I just need to drop Ramona off to Allegra's. This changes everything," Barry breathed out.
Barry sped to Allegra's place, telling her there was an emergency he needed to attend to and he apologizes for just dropping in without any sort of notice. Allegra waved him off. She loved babysitting. It gave her something to do and gave her a sense of giving back for all he had done for her.
Barry thanked her and ran out. Once out of sight, he really ran to grab Julian, a couple samples and headed to STAR Labs. Everybody jumped at his sudden appearance.
"You'd think after all this time we'd get used to the occasional sudden drop in, but nope," Cisco sighed.
"No time for that, we've got some new developments in the cannibal case." Barry said.
Julian set up his findings and displayed them on the monitor. "This is everything we've gathered about the case. Victims that have been identified. Bodies left behind and bodies taken. Blood samples left at the scene. We're still identifying some of them to see if there's any sort of pattern to which ones are being taken and which are left behind. But at almost every crime scene there's this substance found." Julian moved through the pictures to show a black substance. "At first, we didn't think much of it, just took it for forensic evidence. My initial theory was some kind of oil. I finally got to analyzing it. It's blood,"
For a moment everybody was silent. "You're kidding," Cisco said.
Julian raised an eyebrow. "Point taken," Cisco conceded. "But how? Is it human?"
"It's human alright." Julian confirmed. "So obviously if this thing were human, the blood had to have changed color due to a mutation, so I'm thinking 'metahuman'. So I check its dark matter levels. Here's the interesting part,"
Julian pulled up the report where he listed it. Caitlin skimmed through it and saw the interesting part. "No dark matter at all?"
"Less than none! I know that doesn't make sense, but there is absolutely no dark matter in the blood at all. Not even trace amounts." Julian was starting to get excited judging by his tone. "So now I'm thinking how this is possible. How can someone be mutated without the foreign substance to start it? That's when it came to me. It's all external. For regular metas, it's all internal. The dark matter bonds with our DNA and acquires traits of it, such as replication. But what if that didn't happen here? What if this metahuman's mutation feeds off the dark matter in others? So I introduced it to a little bit of dark matter. Watch what happens."
Julian took out a little knife and quickly made a cut on Cisco's arm. "Hey! That hurt,"
"I'm sorry, relax. Just watch," Julian let Cisco's blood drip onto a sample of the black blood and magnified the view, putting it on the monitor again. Changing the lens to scan the DNA for dark matter, they slowly watched as the dark matter from Cisco's blood transferred into the black substance and there it remained, but its levels were slowly dropping back to its original levels.
"That was horrifying," Cisco said. "My poor blood."
"So what are we dealing with here?"
"We're dealing with a metahuman that feeds on other metahumans," Julian declared.
There was a moment of silence before Cisco broke it. "I'll get the coffee,"
"Okay, let me see if I got this right," Joe rubbed his forehead in exhaustion. "This cannibal case I'm dealing with isn't actually a cannibal. It's a metahuman that needs to eat dark matter to survive and they're getting their source directly from other metahumans?" Joe had immediately been informed of this recent development and they had just finished explaining the gist of what they concluded.
"Exactly," Barry nodded his head. "Eating the metahuman itself is just a consequence. This guy, and yes it is a guy. We tested the blood and saliva, it's definitely a male and the same one so we're not dealing with multiple. This guy probably struggles with his hunger. He fights his urge to eat as long as he can but he can't help himself. Eventually his hunger will overtake his conscious mind, forcing him to find his next meal. It's possible he isn't even aware of what he's done yet. This guy probably didn't start as a cannibal, but we can't rule it out. It's possible that he may have accidentally eaten a metahuman, not knowing they were. And that's how the initial dark matter entered their system, forcing them to consume others. It's more likely however it was the other way around. That the dark matter entered their system first and then the consumption of others began. Either way, something happened to trigger this spree."
"So what is he doing with the bodies? Why is he leaving some behind and taking others?" Cisco asked.
"I might have an idea," Caitlin spoke up. "I remember reading an article about cannibalism,"
"Yeah, that's totally a normal thing to do," Cisco said sarcastically, rolling his eyes.
"Anyway, in the article I remember them mentioning that cannibals are able to differentiate between drug users and a clean person. They taste different. Maybe that's what's different about the ones he takes. They're the metas and the ones left behind aren't. They serve no use after their trace amounts of dark matter have been taken."
"So we were right. He did take the bodies to store them for later. But how did he take so many metahumans? You'd think one of them would get the jump on him," said Cisco.
"They're probably not all metas. Most of them are probably ones that have the highest potential to be metahumans. They have a higher count of dark matter than their counterparts. Probably only a small minority of them are actually metahumans. Ones with relatively lax powers, easily overtaken by a secondary ability of his. Probably enhanced strength but it could be something else." Julian answered.
"So that explains the why and the how. Now I just need the who," Joe said. "You've got his DNA. Can we get a match?"
"No matches in the system. Not even from previous cases. So either our theory of this being his first bout of cannibalism is true, or his mutated DNA is different enough from his previous that we can't get a match. Although it's not like we exactly have many cases of cannibalism to compare to. We can check dental records but the bodies may have been too mutilated for an accurate reading,"
"So basically, we've got nothing to find this son of a bitch," Joe sighed.
"You know what to look out for. We know what we're dealing with now. We can prepare." Barry assured him.
"And how is that going to help me catch this guy?"
"It's not. To get more assistance, we'll need more evidence," Julian said solemnly.
"By more evidence, you mean…"
"We're gonna need more bodies," Barry confirmed sadly.
Joe sighed. "Anybody got coffee?"
Cisco nodded his head and led him to where he was brewing a fresh pot.
"This is going to suck, isn't it?" Caitlin asked rhetorically.
Nobody needed to answer to know what it would be.
They had to scrap the idea of only dealing with one person after many more crime scenes, but this time with the saliva of multiple different people left behind. The strange thing was that this was the DNA of people they had confirmed had been taken. The team had no idea how that was possible, or how the original person might have persuaded the others to join in his proclivities.
It all came to a head when Barry got called about an attack in a building. There, Barry saw multiple people killing and then feasting on their remains. Barry actually saw one of the attackers bite into a dead woman's arm and the orange glow of dark matter leaving the appendage and being sucked into the cannibal.
"Hey!" Barry shouted to get their attention. That was either the right thing or a terrible thing because every head, dead and alive, which was slightly shocking, turned his way. And he was met with several pools of literal darkness where their eyes should be. And he wasn't kidding about the corpses turning their heads. Barry swore that the bodies which had been recently killed and lying in their own blood were now completely fine and for some reason… joining their attackers? This wasn't good at all.
"Guys, I'm gonna need some backup here. I might have just solved the mystery of why there are suddenly multiple cannibals. It's because the people the guy feasts on become infected and now they're-"
"Zombies?!" Barry heard Cisco shout. "Are we dealing with a zombie apocalypse right now?!"
"Get out of there Barry!" Caitlin shouted in concern.
"Yeah, I'm- Ahh!" Barry cried out when somebody, a corpse that he must have missed behind him, jumped on his back. "Get off of me! Get off!"
By the time he managed to throw the diseased person off of him, Barry had been surrounded and arms were grabbing at him in all directions and more of them were piling up on him. "Guys. Help!" Barry managed to call out before he could be smothered by the zombies, for lack of a better term, who were trying to drain him of his powers. "Ouch! That hurt! Stop that! Stop biting me! I'm trying to save you!"
"Barry!" Caitlin shouted. "Cisco, get us over there!"
"I'm on it!" Cisco replied. Putting on his sole glove, he used it to form the breach. He had yet to be able to channel his powers through his prosthetic, but he thought it might be possible. Or at least replicate it. That didn't matter at the moment though. The breach formed, and Caitlin wasted no time to jump through, bleaching her hair as she went through, not wasting time to get her costume on.
The sight that greeted her was one of horror. It was a feeding frenzy, with the black-eyed people crowding around what was presumably her husband, leeching off his powers. Caitlin tried to help, trying to draw attention to her so they would get off Barry. While it worked for a few, who she immediately put on ice, and the arrival of Cisco helped as well, the 'zombies' seemed primarily drawn towards Barry. Between her and Cisco, they were whittling down the number of crazy people, only for them to heal their wounds and get right back up.
Barry was moving erratically. He could feel his powers leaving him. Literally see it too as the orange glow of dark matter was being sucked out of him through bite marks. He wasn't moving as fast and couldn't pull off his usual tricks. If he were at full power, he might have been able to phase right out of this mob but with his powers being drained? Not a chance. Barry was trying to shake these people off of him, trying to get away, not realizing he was actually moving dangerously close to the window.
Cisco and Caitlin were distracted by the cannibals ganging up on them and they were never able to put them down for very long. Even injuries that should have been debilitating or fatal were healed in a matter of seconds. So they were completely caught unaware when they heard the sound of smashing glass. They both looked up in the direction of the sound to see a hole in the window and a noticeable lack of people. Including Barry.
It didn't take long for both of them to figure out what happened.
"Barry!" Caitlin shouted in distress. Her emotions went haywire and her powers reacted accordingly. A giant wave of cold burst from her and hit everybody in the vicinity. They collapsed but it wouldn't be long before they got back up. But the cold temperature should slow them down long enough for them to get to Barry.
Caitlin and Cisco went up to the broken window and were just in time to see Barry's body hit the pavement with a resounding smack. "No," Caitlin whispered.
The two metas took their own paths down the building. Cisco opened a breach that would lead him to the ground while Caitlin recklessly jumped out the window after her husband, creating a glacier to create a gradual break to her fall. By the time they arrived, the mindless people had dispersed, leaving Barry by himself in a pool of his own blood.
"Hey, hey." Caitlin crouched down to cradle him. "Look at me. Stay with me. I need you to stay awake, okay? I'm going to get you some help. You're gonna be okay. You-you just need to stay with me."
Barry groaned in pain. Cisco arrived but didn't approach. He couldn't handle this. So many people had been taken from them. He'd lost so much for a variety of reasons. Cisco was even a cripple now, having lost one of his hands. But he never imagined it would be Barry. Not so soon after escaping his prophecy that foretold his disappearance.
Barry slowly, weakly, reached for one of her hands, drawing lazy circles on the back of her hand with his thumb. His touch was so light, Caitlin might not have known it was there.
"Caitlin," he whispered. She turned her attention away from any wounds he had back to him. She saw him smiling sadly. "It's alright,"
Her eyes widened. Why was he talking like that? He was going to be fine. His healing was going to kick in. His wounds were going to close and she was going to check him over at STAR Labs just to make sure everything was okay and then berate him for making him worry. Sure, the massive amount of blood on the pavement was cause for concern, but it was barely a scratch compared to what else Barry had dealt with. This would be no different. Caitlin shook her head. "Don't talk like that. You're being stupid. You're going to be fine,"
Caitlin looked around her. Why was the place so empty? There should be some people around. Someone who could help. Why wasn't Cisco whisking them away to the safety of STAR Labs where she could get a better look at him? She looked at Cisco. "What are you doing? Get us back to STAR Labs!"
"No!" Barry said suddenly, grabbing her wrist as firmly as he could. "He knows. I'm on my last legs. There's nothing you can do. So please, don't let me die in a hospital."
Caitlin squeezed her eyes, refusing to believe him. "No, stop that. I'm not going to lose you. I can't lose you too."
Barry's hand on her wrist moved up to cup her cheek. "Caitlin," he said softly, looking at her with such a tender look. "Stop,"
Caitlin flinched away in shock and fury at the way he was acting. Did he want to die? How could he? He had so much to live for. She wasn't going to let him just give up. Caitlin opened her mouth to let him know exactly how she was feeling when the intense look that he gave her doused her fire of rage in her. He moved his other hand to lift the one that she placed on his chest to reveal it was stained red with his blood. The sight made her wilt. "You're giving up, just like that?"
Barry's gaze on her made it seem like they were the only two beings in existence. Cisco must have left because she couldn't hear him. What he was doing, she didn't know, nor did she care at the moment. Barry's eyes shifted over her face, like he was drinking in the sight of her, memorizing every detail he could. Caitlin was still as she looked into those beautiful green eyes with her brown, wondering what was going on in his mind. He'd always been such an unrelenting figure. A beacon of hope and goodness.
Why was he giving up now?
"Just stay with me like this. I don't want to be alone," Barry whispered, taking heavy breaths.
Those words, while possibly giving comfort to Barry, did nothing to alleviate her nerves. How could they when they meant the beginning of their goodbye. They couldn't. She refused to. She refused to entertain this notion. They weren't saying goodbye. She was going to save him. It was her job. His healing was going to kick in at any moment.
"It's gone. It's not going to work," Barry said, as though he were reading her mind.
"You're being stupid again." Caitlin snapped. "You're The Flash. You make the impossible happen everyday. That's who you are, Fleet Feet. You're going to pull through." She said resolutely but Barry didn't react. He didn't believe her. Well too bad. She was going to make him believe her. "You're going to be okay. You're going to be okay, and then we're going to go home to our daughter. Our daughter! We have a child. And we're going to raise her and love her, and she's going to be such a daddy's girl that I'll be forgotten about… right?" Cailtin needed him to say something, anything and hear the will to live behind it. Instead he kept a steady silence and looked at her with such sadness and fatigue. And pity. She hated it. She needed to convince him… she had to! "We're going to-we're going-" Caitlin felt the lump of defeat form in her throat.
Caitlin swallowed it down and shut her eyes to the world. She breathed heavily through her mouth. "I can't do this without you," her voice broke despite her best attempts to make it steady.
Barry's large hands tightly squeezed hers. "Yes you can Mrs. Frosty. You're so strong. Stronger than… I've… ever been…"
Caitlin couldn't help the scoff that escaped her lips at that? Her? Stronger than him? Barry, the one who suffered hardships his whole life? The one who lived through abandonment, humiliation and death his whole life and she was the one stronger? Even now, on his deathbed, Barry was the one who was trying to instill comfort in her. He was the strong one, not Caitlin.
She was about to tell him that when his eyes suddenly started to drift and close. No no no. Not now. He couldn't… she wasn't ready yet!
"Hey!" Caitlin yelled loudly and smacked his face repeatedly. "Wake up Barry!" She squeezed his arms so tight her knuckles turned white. His eyes fluttered open and relief flooded her. They'd only been closed for a second, it was basically just a blink, but it felt like a lifetime. The next time he closed his eyes, they might stay that way…
Panic arose because that was the first time she thought that she was definitely going to lose him, which was becoming clearer with every passing second. Her eyes widened in fear as they were veiled with tears at the prospect of losing him. The thought of living in a world without Barry Allen was unthinkable. The idea that he would just be gone and nothing would change in the world. She wished desperately for anything - anything - to give her the power to change things. But it couldn't. She couldn't do anything now.
It wasn't supposed to be this way.
They were supposed to grow old together. Retire from the life of a superhero and raise their child and any that came after. Reminisce in a rocking chair on a porch about their past experiences.
It wasn't fair that their future had been taken from them just as when that future was starting to look more attainable than ever. She grinded her teeth to prevent the urge of wailing to get through. Caitlin sniffled instead and buried her face into the crook of his neck, wanting to be as close as possible. She wished they could stay like this forever. "Sorry," she apologized for any pain she was causing.
Barry slowly shook his head. "It doesn't hurt. It doesn't hurt anymore,"
Caitlin wanted to believe that meant his powers were returning, but it was more likely that he had lost feeling in his body. Buried in his body gave Caitlin a small moment of peace. She couldn't do anything. His speed was gone, and with it, his healing. Probably not all of it though. There were likely still traces of it in his system and given enough time, it would return in full. But they didn't have that time. Barry's spine was probably severed from the impact and he'd lost too much blood. Even if he did still have his powers right now, it would have been hard to save him. There was nothing she could do. That realization didn't bring a lot of comfort to her though. But she could still make sure his last moments were as comfortable as possible.
"Hey," Barry whispered softly.
Caitlin carefully lifted her head. She wanted to shush him to save his strength, but she let him speak. Her eyes questioning him.
"Before… when we both agreed to not have anymore kids… because we agreed we didn't want them… we were both lying, right?" Barry was looking at her with such a pleading and vulnerable look that Caitlin almost broke down right there.
Her gaze trailed down to avoid his gaze before she sniffed loudly and huffed. Caitlin let out a small chuckle before nodding her head. "We were both lying."
Barry smiled. "Good." His eyes started to drift shut again, but she wouldn't let him. Keep him talking. Distract him. Don't-
"You really want more kids with me?" Caitlin spoke up. Barry's eyes opened again to look at her.
"Would that be so bad?" Barry smiled shyly. It almost made Caitlin forget the whole situation for a split second.
"I wasn't that much trouble the first time we went through this?"
Barry let out a breath that could have been either a scoff or a laugh. She wasn't too sure anymore. "I never loved you more. It's all I ever wanted Caitlin,"
For the first time in a long time, Caitlin felt immeasurably stupid for spending their first few years fighting each other. They could've had so much more time together if they weren't such stubborn idiots with each other. Life was so unfair. Caitlin trembled in despair as her sadness caused her lungs to empty for a moment. She couldn't breathe.
For a terrible moment, she wished she could join him so that she wouldn't need to go the rest of her life without him.
"It's not fair…" She sobbed. The pain she was experiencing was becoming too much. Caitlin couldn't stop herself, even if she were trying, as she leant down and rested her head on his chest, not caring that his blood was in her hair.
"I know," Barry whispered to the top of her head. His body was completely still under her's. Caitlin gripped him tightly, silently begging to whatever was out there that they wouldn't take him from her. Please, she thought please, please, please.
They stayed like that until her sobs quieted down. It was so silent she thought the worst but when he sighed she almost gasped in relief. She held him closer to her body.
"Caitlin," he whispered into her ear.
"Hmm?" She mumbled, too afraid to let him go.
"I need to tell you something," Barry paused as though contemplating what to say. It was long enough that fear coursed through Caitlin again but then felt the warmth of his breath. "There are no words that can express how strong I feel for you. There is no force on Earth, the moon, or Sun, that can change how I feel about you. You are everything to me,"
Caitlin was caught between laughing and crying due to his cheesiness. She loved this man so much. "I don't have any regrets when it comes to you. I don't regret the two years I spent hating you. I don't regret the months I spent avoiding you. I don't regret the 3 years I spent married to you. And I don't regret the time we have now. There are lots of things I'm regretful for, but none of them concern you."
Caitlin captured his lips with hers and put all her emotion behind it. She felt him respond to her and in that moment, everything was perfect.
Barry was the first to break away, but he didn't open his eyes.
"Barry," Caitlin brushed her nose against his. No response. "Hey…" her lip quivered as fresh tears filled her eyes and slipped down onto her cheeks. "Barry… Come on, wake up. Please wake up…" Growing desperate she slightly shook him and then more forcefully to pull the sleeping speedster out of his slumber. "Please," her voice cracked. "I'm not ready for this… Please come back. Come back to me!"
Violent sobs wracked Caitlin's body as she chanted his name over and over again until she was speaking unintelligibly.
And then the new widow pulled back and heaved an anguished, guttural scream into the air.
...