This chapter has been edited due to content. If you want to see the unedited version GO HERE.
JASH
The scent of corpses in the air was like a cacophony to my senses. The battle, more like a slaughter, had ended with the police station painted with death. I stepped over yet another of Scratch’s victims and heard Alex’s footsteps behind me. There would be a reckoning between us and my words would have to suffice as an ointment to my betrayal.
I forced myself not to eat the corpse that was now behind me. It was hard to resist the urge to cannibalize when there seemed to be an endless feast around me.
Scratch had pursued Saga Anderson when it saw easier prey. Its anger made it summon Taken to kill those he didn’t have the time to deal with. It needed the Clicker because Alan Wake wanted it to have it. But I would need years to truly understand the revelations that had flooded my mind.
By Hircine’s grace, Saga had used powerful lights that the FBC had set up. While it hadn’t been hers to kill Scratch, she had had the strength to drive the piece of Darkness away from the police station.
At the end of the bloodbath only myself, Alex Casey, Saga, Kiran Estevez, and Ilmo Koskela had survived. All of us would never outlive the sounds of screaming and the silence that followed.
“You should have told us.” Alex said and I stopped to look at him. “Hell, you should have told me. We could have prevented this!”
I looked at my love and saw anger mixed with adoration. He still wanted me even after I had sacrificed countless people for a goal he didn’t yet know of. If there had not been that love under his anger, I would have lost.
“As we’re caught up in Alan’s story, we are in a loop.” I said with what felt like my final breaths. “You and Saga have come to Bright Falls countless times. In all of the loops, the majority of them, this police station is attacked. At different times and in different ways. But it is always attacked.”
“How the hell do you know that?” Alex hissed.
I held back a shiver as the memory replayed in my mind. One moment I had been ignorant and the next knowledge had assaulted my mind. I longed for the ignorance of a hatchling now.
“The moment I entered the police station, I saw memories of past loops.” I explained. “I saw secrets that I had been ignorant of. I saw my reason for being here. I also…I sa…we didn’t always survive. Sometimes you would die first. Sometimes I would.”
Alex’s stoic face charged with anger broke like buildings in a fierce storm. I wanted to take the pain away from him but it wasn’t ours to do so.
“Death isn’t the only outcome.” I somehow managed to continue. “There is another far worse outcome.”
“Possession.” Alex correctly guessed.
“I had been debating telling you the truth about Alan this entire time. But when I entered the police station I gained memories of past loops. Once I saw those…I knew the way to protect you was to hide the truth for just a little longer.”
Betrayal, pride, and despair washed over Alex’s face like waves upon the shore. He understood why I had lied to them. I wanted to kiss him so that he had something to hold onto. Maybe the trust hidden underneath would rise to the surface and give him hope.
We both turned to watch as Kiran escorted Ilmo out. The man looked beaten and on the verge of running away. I think he just wanted the Dark Presence to take his life as he knew that being out of the police station wouldn’t take him away from the danger.
“You made sure that Mr. Scratch didn’t possess me.” Alex said once they were out of earshot. “Right before the attack.”
“He called himself Scratch back at the lodge.” I corrected my love. “And he wouldn’t have possessed you back in the jail. The only body he wanted to use then was Alan Wake’s.”
“Then why use a ward?”
Alex wouldn’t like this next part as I had no self-preservation when those I loved were in danger.
“I provoked Scratch when trying to use the By My Soul Shout at the lake.” I said slowly. “I then annoyed him when I proved too powerful an opponent at the lodge. Now that I used the ward and made sure he couldn’t touch you, Scratch is now fully focused on me.”
“**** no!” Alex yelled. “You can’t let Scratch possess you! No, it’s not just going to be that, is it? You’re going to let him take your human body and then you’ll kill that part of you!”
I managed not to flinch when Alex yelled. There was the glistening hint of tears in his eyes. I shouldn’t make him begin to break apart like this.
But I saw no other way.
“When Scratch possesses me and I kill my dryskin part, Scratch will be weakened.” I said. “And we want him to be greatly weakened when he possesses Alan after leaving me.”
“We don’t want Alan possessed.” Alex replied. “You don’t know what it’s like to have that…that thing in your head!”
“Neither do you.”
“I know more than you do.”
“And I know more than you do about what needs to be done.”
“And why does Alan need to be possessed at all?”
“From the past loops, it appears that Scratch can only be killed after possessing someone and then returning to his host.”
“I’ve been possessed. You don’t need to do this.”
“Even in loops when he possessed you in the forest, it wasn’t enough. All it did was give Scratch a taste.”
“Why the **** not?”
“Because certain things need to happen in a certain order.”
I watched as Alex’s face struggled to pretend to be strong. He must be trying to fool himself so he didn’t fall apart. Our future was crumbling into dust and it was the one thing he had been holding onto for years.
“I can’t use my dryskin body like before.” I tried to reassure him. “It is a part of me that needs to be pulled off like an infected scale.”
“But once that’s gone, so are we.” Alex said as a tear escaped his eye. “I won’t ever see you again.”
I wanted to spend eternity with him. I wanted to wake up to him and see him right before falling asleep. But it was ours to see outside of my desires and hope that after he died we would meet once again on our Mountain. It was also ours to try and not to worry if the loop remained unbroken, that he could not step into Oblivion.
“I am ******* pissed off at what you did.” Alex said with a voice that tried its best to be angry. “But you’re the best ****** thing that ever happened to me. It was hard waiting for you and now…now you’ll be gone. I won’t ******* make it.”
I put my hands on Alex’s hips and felt him shiver. But he looked up at me with eyes that couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. He ran a finger on my cheek and I realized tears were coming out of my eyes too.
“I have gone too far down this path.” I said as my voice began to break. “There is no turning back and the unfairness of it all can’t be helped. When this is over, a part of me will forever be lost. A part of me was shattered when I couldn’t save Scouts-Many-Marshes and the last pieces of me will die when I am able to save you. You have known me my entire life, my love, and know it is not ours to hold our desires above those of the world.”
“Kaoc.” Alex hissed as his fingers ran over the Ring of Hircine, the sign that the Daedric Prince I worshiped still gave me strength. “Be selfish.”
“I am the Daedric Prince of Balance and Extremes. Hircine is the Daedric Prince of the Hunt. If we are to have a future together, you need to pray to better gods that Saga can figure something out.”
Poor Jash and Alex! What a choice to be confronted with. I hope Saga can save the day. :/
ReplyDeleteHere's hoping ;)
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