The Cabin in the Woods

NINE

Back up back up back up!” Holden shouted, and Curt slammed the Rambler into reverse, stomping on the accelerator and not even bothering to look in the mirror because he wouldn’t be able to see anything anyway.

Holden and Dana crouched close behind Curt’s driver’s seat. We should get in back and hide, Holden thought, but that would have been unfair to Curt. Something kept them together. United by their near-escape, perhaps now they would all die together. At least being crushed by falling rocks was better than—

This is beyond the zombies, and we all know that now.

Ahead of them the tunnel was in chaos—ceiling falling, slabs of rock pounding down, walls blasting out, dust and grit billowing and scraping against the Rambler’s chassis and windscreen. Visibility was quickly reduced to zero, and their only hope of survival would be if Curt steered them back out into the open air.

A big rock scraped down the front of the vehicle, fracturing the windshield and tearing metal. Nevertheless, Curt held the wheel straight, foot pressed all the way down on the gas. The engine screeched in protest. They shook from side to side, and at the rear of the Rambler one of the sunroofs shattered and let in a shower of stinging debris.

Holden twisted to look and winced as his wounds distorted, and fresh blood flowed.

Through the back of the Rambler he saw a flash of trees.

“Almost there!” he shouted.

The roof was being battered now, dented and ripped where rocks struck. If the whole mountain comes down into the tunnel we’ll be squashed without even knowing what happened, he thought. He held Dana and kissed her, one hand around the back of her neck, another cupping her breast, and he felt her own desperate realization of their predicament.

If there was any way he’d wish to go…

And then they were out, and it was as if the weight of the world had been lifted from around them. There were no more impacts, and Curt looked back past them as he steered the vehicle far from the collapsing tunnel and up against the wall of the roadside cliff. He left the engine running and pulled on the parking break.

Their gasps mingled, and Holden did not let go of Dana’s neck. Given a choice, he never would again.

“Well… ” Curt said. He got up from his seat and kicked the door open. Bent metal shrieked in protest. Dana followed, and she reached back for Holden’s hand as they all exited to stand beside the battered Rambler.

Rumbles still issued from the tunnel’s mouth, and a pile of debris had spilled out across the road. Dust rose in billowing clouds. Grit rained down around them like hard rain.

“They might be following,” Dana said, glancing around nervously. Holden looked as well. The road was bathed in moonlight, but beneath the trees lurked the gloom that might hide anything.

“We drove really fast,” he said. “Even if they can run they’ll be a mile or two back, easy.”

“Yeah,” she said uncertainly, squeezing his hand. “No!” Curt shouted. “No fucking way! This isn’t happening! It’s right there! He gestured across the ravine at the ground beyond, and freedom. They could even see the road curving out from the tunnel, and a ponderous cloud of dust was making the onward journey that now eluded them.

Holden scanned the cliff face opposite, then walked to the edge on their side. The bottom of the ravine was hidden in darkness. There could be anything down there, but then… there was anything up here, too. There were fucking zombies up here.

“You got any climbing gear?” he asked Curt. “Ropes?”

“Yeah, in my fucking dorm room.”

“We can’t climb this. This is limestone, it’s slippery and it’ll crumble under pressure.” “We can’t go back,” Dana said, standing beside them at the cliff’s edge. “There’s no way across?” “What are we gonna do, jump?” Holden said, closing his eyes, shaking his head. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Dana said. “Not in the mood for a jump anyway.”

“No? Zombies don’t do it for you?”

“Dude,” Curt said quietly.

“What?”

Curt nodded back at the Rambler.

“The dirt bike on the back,” he said. “I’m good.” For a few seconds Holden didn’t really comprehend what he meant. So he was good on a dirt bike, how did that help them if…?

“You’re serious,” Dana said, and then Holden got it. He looked from Curt to the other side of the ravine, then back again.

“You really think you can…?”

Curt shrugged, frowned then nodded. Nodded again, harder. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah I can. Now help me get the thing ready, will you?”

The three of them lifted the bike from the rack, and Curt checked it over to make sure it hadn’t been damaged in the rockfall. All we need now’s a puncture, Holden thought, but the bike had survived in good shape, protected by the bulk of the larger vehicle. Curt sat astride, fired it up and did a couple of gentle circuits around the Rambler, making himself comfortable and spinning the rear wheel a few times.

“Holden, we should stop him,” Dana said. “You think he’ll listen to us?”

“No, but we should try.”

Holden knew she was right. But at the same time he was looking at the jump and trying to judge the distance, the arc the bike would take, and the chances of Curt making it across. And the more he looked, the more he thought it looked good. There was a decent rise on this side just before the drop-off, and the other side was clear of trees and boulders. A good place to land, so long as he stopped before the cliff face over there. And then if the bike made it in one piece he could go for help, be back here within a couple of hours with cops and the army and—

But what if Curt didn’t make it in one piece? What if he made it across but spilled, broke both legs? Would they really have to watch each other die?

“I dunno…” Dana said, shaking her head. And Holden knew that she was thinking the same thing. She hated Curt risking this, but she also knew it might be their only chance at escape. Even now back there in the forest, things would be coming for them.

“Okay,” Curt said, skidding to a stop beside them and eyeing the ravine.

“Curt, are you sure about this?” Dana asked.

“I’ve done bigger jumps than this.”

“You’ve got a smooth run,” Holden said. “A slight rise here, and maybe a five foot differential on the other side, which is good. But you gotta give it everything.” “You know it.”

“Curt…” Dana said. He came down off his adrenaline kick for a moment and looked at her. He’s already lost so much, Holden thought, and he wondered how a guy like Curt could still function having seen his girlfriend’s head kicked around by a zombie. But it was precisely a guy like Curt who would continue to function after such a terror. Functioning—doing something—helped him forget, at least for a time.

Sitting by, doing nothing… that would eat him up.

“When I’m across and gone, you guys stay in the Rambler,” he said. “If they come, just keep driving away from ’em. I’ll get help. If I wipe out I’ll fuckin’ limp for help, but I’m coming back with cops and choppers and large fucking guns and those things are gonna pay.” He glanced aside. “For Jules.”

Dana leaned across and kissed him on the cheek.

Curt gunned the bike.

“Don’t hold back,” Holden said.

“Never do.” Curt grinned at them and ran the bike back along the road a little, standing in the saddle and leaning to curve around to the right. He didn’t wait and rev up, but let go instantly, knowing that even that small bit of momentum could give him the added speed he needed when he hit the drop-off.

Go on, Holden thought, go on, you’re the jock, the good-looking guy every girl wants to go out with and every guy wants to be. It’s only right that you’ll be the one to save us. And as Curt powered past them on the dirt-bike Holden knew definitely, absolutely, that he would succeed. He hit the slightly raised lip of the drop-off with the front wheel high, speed good, and Holden punched the air and yelled, “Yeah!” because the jump could not have been performed any better, it was perfect, when they got back to the world Curt would be able to make a profession as a stunt—

The bike struck something and exploded in mid-air.

“Noooo!” Dana screamed.

The fire and burning fragments spread far and wide as if he’d struck something solid, and beyond the extremes of the flames, sparking blue lines flicked into and out of existence. Straight lines, perfectly vertical and horizontal like a grid.

What the fuck what the fuck what the fuck—?

Curt didn’t make a sound, and Holden hoped that he was already dead as he fell. Because he was on fire. His clothing was splashed with fuel, his hair singed away, his face aflame, and he twisted slowly as he plummeted into the ravine like a living flare, lighting the cliff walls all the way down. And all the way, those severe blue lines flickered in and faded out all around him.

“Oh God, oh God…” Dana chanted, and when Holden grabbed her arm her muscles were hard as steel, fists clenches so tight that he felt a dribble of blood issue from beneath her fingers.

“He hit something!” Holden gasped. “There’s nothing! What’d he hit!”

The flames had fallen away now, going down with the remnants of the bike and his dead, still-burning friend. But between them and the other side of the ravine, something stood guard. Curt, he thought, and his face crumpled as he thought of his friend’s ready smile and friendly manner. He took a couple of steps and saw a faint glow somewhere far below. But then he stopped, because he didn’t want to see what gave that glow.

“Puppeteers…” Dana said softly. He’d never heard her sounding like this before. Tender, yes, and shy, and scared and terrified. But her voice now was tinged with defeat.

“Did you see it?” Holden asked. “What’d he hit?”

But she was looking at something far more distant than either of them could see.

“Marty was right. God.”

“Get in the van!” Holden said urgently. There was just the two of them now, and if those zombies could run—

“Marty was right…”

“Dana, get in the fucking Rambler! We can talk about this later, but right now we have to get away from here. They’ll be attracted by the…” Explosion, he thought. Our shouting. The impossible explosion, and our useless shouting, because whichever way they turned—

But he would not be defeated. Curt would have snorted even at the thought of defeat. He had died trying to save them all, and Holden would run and fight and do every single thing he could to honor his friend’s sacrifice.

He grabbed Dana’s hand and pulled her toward the van. She was slow—he was almost dragging her—and he wanted to shout and rage at her to not give up, never give up. But when they reached the Rambler she let go and opened the door, holding it open for him to jump in first. And though distracted, he could also see something new appearing in her eyes: anger.

Holden jumped into the driver’s seat and Dana sat beside him. She was deliberate, almost calm. All the fear had dropped from her face. And she’d been talking about… puppeteers?

He gunned the engine and swung the Rambler around, away from the tunnel and back the way they’d come. Perhaps he’d pick out one of those fucking zombies in the headlamps and be able to run the thing over. Then reverse. Then run it over again.

“You’re going back,” she said.

“I’m going through,” he said. “We’ll just drive. There’s gotta be another road, another way out of here.” “It won’t work,” she said. “Something will happen. A bridge will collapse, a road will wash away. We’ll fall into a sinkhole.”

“Then we’ll leave the roads altogether!” he said, unreasonably angry at her sudden sense of defeat. “Dana, we’ll drive as far as we can into the forest, go on foot from there—”

Dana shook her head.

“You’re missing the point.”

“I am?” He hated her fatalism; he was trying to help them here. And he had never seen that in her before. I thought I was getting to know her, he thought, glancing at her sidelong. “Hey,” he said. “Look at me.”

She looked. She even smiled a little, but it was one of the saddest smiles he’d ever seen. “This isn’t your fault,” he said.

She laughed softly but it did nothing to lift the sadness.

“I know. It’s the puppeteers.”

“Please don’t go nuts on me, Dana,” Holden said. Puppeteers? What the…? “You’re all I got.”

She continued staring at him. He glanced at the road, back at her, and her relaxed, sad expression did not change. She looks as far from mad as I’ve seen her since this began.

“I’m okay,” she said.

“Good. ’Cause I need you calm.” He took a tight bend, fighting with the wheel, unused to the big vehicle and almost letting the rear end swing out from behind them. He’d have to go slow—if he wrecked or rolled the van that’d be it for them. The thought of being trapped inside while those zombie bastards bashed and hacked their way in… “No matter what happens, we gotta stay calm.”

A rush of optimism hit him. He didn’t know where it came from but he grabbed on, relishing the way it brightened his view a little, and made Dana feel just that little bit closer. They drove on, sweeping around bends and making their way back toward the cabin. And still flushed by optimism he smiled and opened his mouth to say, “Everything’s—”

Something pressed against his throat. His voice ended. And the newly enlightened world grew suddenly dark.

Dark red.

She’d sensed a changed in Holden, but she knew it was nothing like the sense of doom that had settled over her. They could drive, they could run, they could hide, but the Puppeteers would find them. They’d find them because they were controlling this, and perhaps even now they were being watched by someone or something she couldn’t understand. In a way she hoped it was something, because if someone was responsible for all this… how sick must they be? How twisted?

She glanced at the road ahead of them, then looked back at Holden in time to see the shadow moving behind him. He was smiling as the scythe curved around his throat and flicked, opening his skin, tearing the meat of him, spraying the windscreen with a splash of blood, and she screamed, falling from her seat and pressing back against the side door as she saw who was there.

Father Buckner. The family killer, the murderer, the zombie, pressing his knee to the back of the driver’s seat as he tried to tug the scythe free.

Holden’s hands were still on the wheel, his eyes wide, body pulled back tight against the seat by the rusted blade buried deep in his throat. Blood bubbled there as he tried to scream.

Dana screamed for him, high and clear. Buckner did not even look her way. He tugged and shook and growled, throwing Holden’s body around in the seat like a— —like a puppet—

—and then the scythe came free with a wet sucking sound, and arterial blood geysered from the wound as Holden’s terrified heart thumped and pummeled, splashing the windscreen and spattering across Dana’s face and throat. She held up her hands and felt its warm impact, soft as a wet kiss across her wrist, and she screamed again because she knew what was to come.

Holden’s hands lifted from the steering wheel as he tried to hold in his blood. They pressed to his ruined throat, finding meat and bone and gristle instead of skin, and the big wheel jerked and spun unchecked.

We’ll hit a tree, Dana thought, and Father will go through the windscreen and I’ll pull Holden aside and—

But the Puppeteers would never allow that to happen.

As she wiped thick arterial blood from her eyes a shadow whipped through the air and she heard thwack! as Buckner buried the scythe’s point into the side of Holden’s head.

Dana gasped at what had been done to the man she had kissed and caressed just hours before. His throat was open and spewing, one eye had erupted from its socket, and his face was distorted by the metal buried deep behind it.

At least he’s free now, she thought as he slumped forward over the steering wheel, leaning to the right and turning the van to the left.

And then Dana tried to scrabble up to see over the dashboard and out the windscreen, because she had to know where they were going. For a second she thought, There’s nothing out there at all… no forest, no sky, no stars… it’s all make-believe… And then she saw that they were going for the lake, its calm expanse speckled only with the memories of long-dead stars.

She braced against the dashboard moments before the van hit the water.

If they hadn’t been moving so fast maybe they would have splashed down and floated for a while. But they hit hard and fast, and the already-fractured windscreen exploded inward. Lake water powered in, shockingly cold as it flowed down and lifted her up against her seat, pinning her there as the Rambler’s momentum drove it onward and increased the weight of the water pouring in. She kept her mouth squeezed tightly shut. Don’t scream don’t scream hold your breath and when we stop moving it’ll be time to swim—

Holden was thrashing in the seat beside her, and it was more than the water waving his limbs and battering his body. He was still alive! The zombie Buckner had gripped the scythe’s handle and was now struggling to free it from Holden’s skull.

How can he still be alive? Please let him be dead… I don’t want him to be alive if he’s like that, broken beyond mending.

The scythe came free with a terrible grinding sound, audible even above the thunderous water. Buckner swung it again, but without Holden’s body as an anchor the water blasted him back into the Rambler, rolling and shoving him toward the rear as the vehicle quickly began to fill. Doors broke from hinges, chairs tumbled, and the whole van shook as it came to a standstill.

Lake water still poured in and they were sinking quickly. Beside her, Holden had turned her way, hands clasped to his throat and his ruined face turned toward her. Fight through the pain, he’d said when they first jumped in and felt such coldness. It’s worth it. I’m nearly convinced it’s worth it. There was no way he could fight through this pain, because on the other side was death.

For him, blessed death.

Please die please die, she thought, and she pushed from her seat as the water filled the cab. She scrabbled at the ceiling and took in a deep breath, and when she ducked back down the thunderous sound was muted, and the still-lit headlamps cast a ghostly glow through the cloudy water.

Holden had slipped from his seat and was pressed against the rear of the front cabin, close to the toilet door where they’d kept the keg on their journey up and where Buckner must have been hiding. And as she let go of the seat and the water pushed her that way, she saw him die. His mouth opened and bloody bubbles rose in a final breath. The water around him was clouded with blood, and it was quickly obscuring the already-poor visibility.

I’ve only got seconds, she thought, but she held her breath. She’d always been a good, strong swimmer, but that was no comfort here. If she died in this sinking van, it would not be from drowning.

Maybe it should, she thought. Maybe I should just let go. I’m the last one, and there’s no escape, and who-or whatever has been controlling all this—the puppeteers—surely can’t see me now. So I’ll cheat them their final sick victory. Grab onto Holden—he’ll still be warm—and open my mouth to tell him about all the times we might have lived through together.

But Dana had never been one to give in. And she could imagine her friends’ reactions if she did.

So she kicked past Holden’s corpse, but she had no real control. The van was shifting as it sank—

—how deep is this fucking lake?—

—and the water inside swilled and shoved her this way and that, forcing her up eventually against the ceiling, tumbling her toward the back, toward where she’d seen Buckner swept just moments before.

She grasped onto the rim of one of the ceiling vents, thrusting her face up into a small air bubble there, thankful that it hadn’t been smashed when the tunnel caved in. She inhaled—it was stale and acrid, and she thought about stuff like battery acid, toxic fumes, and other horrible ways to die—and then she ducked back down.

Still holding on tight she looked to the rear of the Rambler. The water was almost impossible to see through, and the headlamps’ light barely reflected back this far. She knew that he was back there somewhere, though, and she wondered whether zombies needed to breathe. Of course not. If they did, the puppeteers would have never crashed them into the lake.

Anger replaced her fear with a burning, raging intensity. If she saw Buckner then she’d have gone for him, trying to rip him apart with her bare hands instead of doing her best to escape. It would be a poor revenge, destroying something already dead and sacrificing herself in the process. But she had no idea how much free will she still had. Perhaps she’d never had any.

But if the murdering bastard was back there, maybe the water’s flow was still pressing him against the rear window. So she grabbed the handle that lifted the roof vent and started turning, trying not to gasp out precious air as she found sprains in her arm she didn’t know she had.

It took seconds but it felt like hours, and as she pulled herself up to punch out the propped plastic cover, she thought she saw shadowy movement below her.

Don’t think about it, get out, swim. She pushed her arms through the small opening and propped her elbows either side of the hatch, then pulled. Above her, the surface of the lake glittered with stars and the promise of air. As her hips squeezed through and the feel of open water welcomed her, the Rambler shifted violently beneath her, dragging her sideways and shocking a gasp of precious bubbles from her mouth. She thrashed in the hole, trying to swim herself out, and a hand closed around her ankle.

Somehow she held in the rest of her air.

Dana thrashed, kicked, using her hands to move her body from side to side, shoving down with the heel of her free foot, and she knew that if he grabbed that one too, then he would only have to hold her for a few more seconds until she drowned. Then he’d pull her back into the sunken van and carve her up.

Kicking, her anger raw and red in her eyes, the pressure building in her lungs and her head thumping, she felt her heel connect with something more solid than water, but softer than something alive.

The hand released and she pulled through the hatch, swimming for the surface. When she broke through the cold air in her lungs was soothing, the starlight on her skin welcoming her back to the land of the living.

She trod water for only a few seconds before spying the wooden dock twenty feet to her left. And then she swam for her life.

Ahhh, Sitterson thought, time for beer.

Sometimes at this juncture he’d feel an overwhelming sense of anti-climax, as if something momentous should happen, but never did. And even though he knew that this was all about making certain something momentous didn’t happen, he’d feel an element of being let down. Cheated. All that effort with no visible result.

But not today. Today it had been closer than ever before. If he really let himself think about how close it had been, he’d probably collapse on the floor in a gibbering wreck and not be able to speak coherently for weeks. That time would come, he knew. Nights when he slept alone and the darkness closed in around him like a huge, crushing hand…

So, beer. Celebratory, and also to numb the possibilities that had been avoided. He flipped the lid from the cooler beneath his console, pulled a bottle and lobbed it to Hadley. Then he took out two more, one for himself and one for Lin.

Lin. Joining them to celebrate. He grinned. She’d obviously seen how damn close they’d come, too.

At the rear of the control room, two more mahogany panels had been opened, two more levers pulled, and deep, deep down the blood would have flowed, and the etchings would be filled. Old carvings given new life with someone’s death.

Only one left. And that one…

Well, that one was optional.

“God damn that was close,” Hadley said.

“Photo fuckin’ finish,” Sitterson agreed. “But we are the champions… of the world.” He glanced at Truman and held up a beer. “Tru?”

Truman shook his head.

“I don’t understand. We’re celebrating?”

“They’re celebrating,” Lin said. “I’m drinking.” Sitterson raised his bottle and took a swig, and as he did so he glanced at Lin. Damned if she wasn’t almost smiling. He’d always wondered if she might not be the cold fish he once thought—she couldn’t be as cold as she projected, or she’d be as dead as the Buckners— and perhaps it had taken something like this to warm her up a little. He wondered just how much she’d been warmed up. Whether after festivities had truly taken off, she’d be up for a walk somewhere, a shared bottle of bubbly, a liaison in one of the small admin offices down the corridor.

He chuckled and drank more beer.

“I still don’t understand,” Truman said quietly.

Sitterson pointed at the large monitor, on which a bloodied, exhausted Dana could be seen swimming toward the wooden dock.

“Yeah, but she’s still alive,” Truman said. “How can the ritual be complete?”

“The Virgin’s death is optional,” Hadley said. “As long as it’s last.” He watched the screen for a moment, nursing his beer in his lap. “All that really matters is that she suffers.”

Sitterson stood and leaned on the back of Hadley’s chair.

“And that, she did,” he said with genuine respect. Truman might never understand. The drink was a celebration, and an expression of relief. But it was also a toast to the swimming girl and her four dead friends.

“I’m actually rooting for her, believe it or not,” Hadley said. “The kid’s got spunk, which is more than—”

“This where the party’s at?” someone said. The door was wide open now, and several people were peering inside with huge grins on their faces.

“Hey, thank god,” Hadley called. “Tequila! Get in here!” The people entered—lab smocks, suits, uniforms—one of them carrying a huge bottle of tequila. The new arrivals milled and shook hands, laughed and clapped each other on the back, and even Truman smiled when a cute lab tech started chatting with him, handing him a plastic cup half-filled with booze.

Sitterson watched them all and acknowledged the congratulations that came his way, smiling when a woman flirted mildly with him, laughing when someone from Story said he should go work for them. And all the time his eyes kept flashing back to the big viewing screens that continued to show what was happening down by the cabin in the woods.

I’m actually rooting for her, Hadley had said. Sitterson was too. But he knew that her death would be slow, painful… and soon.

Somehow she found the energy needed to swim. In high school she swam for her school in the state championships, helping them streak to a win in the four-by-one-hundred meter freestyle. The year before, she’d taken part in a sponsored swim in her local river, covering three miles and raising over a thousand dollars for charity. It had always been easy for her. It had always been a pleasure.

Now it was neither.

She slapped at the water instead of slicing her hands through it, her breathing was labored, and she kept her head above the surface, afraid of what she’d see or what would see her if she turned her face beneath. The dock was close, but with every stroke she took it seemed further away than ever. The water was cold, but felt warm and slick as blood. It tasted clean and pure, but she smelled only entrails and death.

Swim, she thought, trying to give herself a regular rhythm. Swim… swim… swim…

She didn’t know if zombies could swim. She didn’t even think these were zombies, not really, not according to the pop-culture use of the word. They seemed to walk and work with intelligence, their only aim to trap and kill her and the others, and she’d seen no evidence of eating… no blood on their jaws. They wanted to kill in the most painful ways, and make them suffer, and she let out a sob as her hand struck a wooden post of the dock.

She was the last one left alive, which meant that she had suffered the most. And when they finally held her down and slashed her throat or plunged a blade into her eye, it would be the memories of her dead friends that would accompany her into death.

She hung on for a few seconds, trying to regain her strength. But her muscles were knotted and ice-cold, cramps throbbed in her calves, and the longer she hung here the less chanced she’d have of ever hauling herself out.

So she started climbing. She gasped in effort as she pulled herself from the lake, then screamed in frustration as she fell back in. She clung onto the post but it was coated in slime and moss, and her nails scored fresh trails as she was pulled below the surface. Kicking, coughing water, she pushed back up and tried again. Every time she went back under she expected to see Father Buckner advancing on her, walking across the lake’s bed and grinning, the scythe in his hand ready to part her skin as he had done to Holden—

But she wouldn’t think of Holden. Not yet. She couldn’t.

At last she pulled herself far enough up to reach onto the dock’s surface and curl her fingers in between boards. She waited there for a while, catching her breath and listening for the sounds of anything breaking surface close by, and then with one final massive effort she tugged, raised a leg, and then rolled onto her back.

Dana coughed up water and gasped as she stared at the stars. Beyond exhausted, beyond terrified, she spread her hands on the wood and relished its solidity. She was afraid to close her eyes in case she saw things she didn’t want to see in there, sights that would haunt her for the rest of her life, however long that might be. And there would be such sights.

She breathed in and tasted Holden’s mysterious, lightly spiced breath; glanced at the treeline to her left and saw Curt’s eyes peering over the trees, blood on his temple and cheek, confident smile on his face as he revved the dirt-bike; moved her hands across the rough, dry wood and felt the warmth of Jules’s blood on her skin. And Marty, dragged off and killed; sweet innocent Marty who’d had a crush on her which she had never truly acknowledged. She had enough memories for a million nightmares. If she could only keep them at bay a little while longer, she might have a chance to get away from here.

Through the woods, she thought. As far and fast as I can. Or back to the tunnel, see if I can climb up and over the mountain or down and across the ravine. Or… or… and what she’d said to Holden echoed back to her now, about how there would always be something in their way. Or someone. The puppeteers would see to that.

But by not giving in and drowning to steal Buckner’s bloody victory from him, she had decided to fight those fucking puppeteers. And she would continue to fight them, every step of the way.

Her breathing became more regular, her determination grew. She saw a point of light moving slowly above her and thought perhaps it was a satellite. Her paranoia rich and hot, she gave it the finger.

Something smashed into the wooden dock right beside her head. The impact thumped into her skull, the noise shocking, her hair flicking up, a breath of displaced air giving her ear an intimate caress. She sat up and turned onto her hands and knees, ready to leap aside, and saw Matthew looming over her. The crowbar was still sticking through his face.

“Come on then, fucker!” she shouted, and found that she was hardly surprised. But terrified, she realized that she’d wet herself with fear. And that made her fury grow into something blazingly hot. “Come on, come on, come on!”

He came.