Clawing Free

by Josh Roberts

  He watched her intently as she spoke, thinking of how odd it was that she could say all of those things after the afternoon they’d just had. But seeing her so happy helped him to force the thoughts down and reply, “Then we’ll stay all night.”

  She laughed. “What would the others think of that?”

  “Who cares?” He lay back on the rock as if to put a final point on the statement. “Although . . . we’re gonna have to find a softer rock.”

  The two of them laughed as she lay back too, his arm encircling her and her head finding its place on his shoulder. He knew he wouldn’t get a more perfect moment than this one.

  “Mia,” he said.

  “Yeah?”

  “I have something for you.”

  She sat up excitedly. He loved how eager she got when he gave her things, like a kid on Christmas. He sat up, pulling the chain and the ring that hung from it out of his pocket, keeping both concealed within his hand.

  “What is it?” she asked, making no attempt to mask her enthusiasm.

  “Put out your hand.” He began to shake with anticipation. “And close your eyes.”

  “David, what are you—”

  “Just do it.” They both laughed.

  She put both hands out, creating a small bowl with them, and closed her eyes. “You better not put something gross in there.”

  “Me? Never.” He slowly lowered the chain, ring first, into her palms. She began examining it with her hands, immediately recognizing the shape of the ring.

  Her eyes snapped open, growing large at the sight of the ring in the moonlight. “David I-Is it—”

  “My mom’s. And now it’s yours.”

  She beamed back at him. “I don’t even know what to say. This is the sweetest thing anyone’s ever given me.”

  “I’m not saying we should get married next week.” He took her hands, necklace included, into his own and looked into her eyes. She was so pretty he thought he might explode. “But I want you to know, no matter how long we wait, I’m not going anywhere. You don’t ever have to worry about our not being together. I’m yours, always.”

  Tears spilled from her eyes. “I love you, David Sheridan.” She kissed him gently on the cheek and then pulled back. “Put it on!” She handed him the necklace, turned around, and waited as he draped it around her neck, locking the clasp.

  “How’s it look?” She spun to face him.

  “Like the rest of my life.” He grinned and hugged her, feeling like the embrace could actually last forever. But something shifted. Mia pushed back abruptly, her eyes rolling back in her head. He recognized it as the same look she’d had earlier that day when she had freaked out by the lake.

  “Mia?”

  She didn’t respond.

  “Mia, what’s going on?” He nudged her. She was completely still, but then suddenly she stood and began screaming in terror. David flinched, falling off the rock and into the dirt.

  “Mia! Snap out of it.” He stood and shook her frantically, but it did nothing. She only breathed harder, panting as if running, but she was still just standing there.

  Her gasping intensified until she screamed again and stumbled backward onto the rock. She backpedaled as if something were looming over her and moving toward her. She dropped her head, covering it with her hands, cowering from some unseen attacker from above.

  David jumped onto the boulder, got her to her feet, and pulled her into a tight hug, worried she would hurt herself. She struggled against him, screaming and jerking. He could tell from her eyes that she didn’t even recognize he was holding her. She was somewhere entirely different.

  Holding her for what seemed like an eternity, he begged her to snap out of it or respond, but she wouldn’t—couldn’t. Then, she went limp in his arms and began to sob. He thought that it was all over, but he knew it wasn’t when she shoved him back, knocking him off the rock a second time. He fell back on the pebbly ground, gashing his hands.

  “Leave him alone!” she shouted, this time as if she were yelling at the moon.

  David was at a complete loss. He wanted to help her, but she was acting like she was out of her mind. He would never forget that horrifying scene. Her eyes were rolled back, and her head tilted up as she cursed the sky like she was yelling at the devil himself.

  “Mia, please,” he pleaded one more time. “Please just stop. I need you to—”

  Suddenly, she dropped into a heap. Her countenance had shifted instantaneously, finally free from whatever spell had bound her. She opened her eyes and blinked up at him. “What?”

  “I don’t know,” he said, moving toward her. “You went ballistic, screaming and hitting me. What were you seeing, Mia?”

  She pushed herself into a sitting position and he held her close. “I-I don’t know. It was horrible. Something was . . .” She erupted into tears. “Oh, David!”

  He pulled her against his chest and kissed her on the head. He told her that everything would be okay. But inside he was petrified. His best friend in the entire world, the girl he wanted to be with for the rest of his life, was losing her mind. And the implications of that were something he had no desire to think about.

  “Let’s go home,” he said as she began to regain her composure.

  “I’m just not sure.”

  “Mia, why would you want to stay?”

  She lifted her head and looked him in the eye. The look troubled him. It was the most conflict he had ever seen in those eyes. “I’m just not sure,” she repeated. “I feel like I need to be here. I feel . . . drawn in.”

  Now he was angry. “Mia, we need to go. You’re freaking me out. All of this, it’s nuts. And now you say we should stay here to see what terrifying thing happens next? We’re taking you to the hospital.”

  She stared into his eyes and, as if she hadn’t heard anything he said, asked, “David, what’s happening to me?”

  “I don’t know.” He hugged her again. “But we need to go before it happens again.”

  “Do you think it will stop if we leave?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. But we’ve got to try something.”

  Again, as if she were having a conversation completely of her own, she said, “There’s something happening here. Something really, really big.”

  Simultaneously, her words made him hurt and brought to life the stories he’d heard about the lake his entire life. It no longer felt like something from legend or folklore; it felt like something close, something alive. They would leave if he had to force her into the Jeep himself.

  26

  August 30, 2019

  Waking with a Jolt, Lissy’s eyes shot wide. The change in the room’s atmosphere was jarring. Other than LEDs lighting the faces of various machines and the clock on the wall, it was completely dark. Also, she was completely alone now, not even Neil remained. She wondered what had caused her to pass out, if there was more going on than the doctors had initially realized. There was a consistent thrumming in her head now, accompanied by the sensation that a hot poker was slowly pressing to the base of her skull. She closed her eyes, attempting to will the pain away, but it held fast.

  Recalling her conversation with Porter, she knew she should’ve kept her mouth shut. She was lucky he hadn’t zip-tied her to the bed. It occurred to her that he’d probably deemed her a suspect—the suspect. The more she considered it, the more it made sense. He had no way of knowing why she kept showing up at the lake, or why she’d been in contact with both victims before their deaths. And—in his mind—there was no good reason for her to say anything about the inevitability of his men dying. That was, unless she was threatening them herself, or knew something she wasn’t telling him. Either option wouldn’t make her look any better through his eyes. She couldn’t believe how stupid she’d been. There was no way she’d slip out of the hospital unnoticed after that outburst. Someone had almost assuredly been instructed to keep an eye on her.

  It struck her that there was something odd in Neil’s not staying. She knew
if they’d let him, he would be there. Which meant he’d been instructed to stay out. There were really only a couple of reasons that would be the case. The first was that the doctors felt she shouldn’t be bothered due to the swelling Nurse Margot had mentioned—or something else they’d found after she passed out. The second was that Jack was worried Neil might try to assist her in getting out of the hospital and told them not to allow him in the room. Of the two options, the first seemed more likely and would explain the absence of Rose as well.

  Another particularly compelling thought presented itself: What if the headaches and the blacking out weren’t related to the crash at all? She had blacked out twice over the prior two weeks, both times accompanied by a vision. Perhaps this was just a continuation of whatever preexisting condition had caused those episodes. She toyed with the idea of hitting the call button, bringing a nurse in and outright asking if there was something broken in her head.

  If she was losing her mind to a tumor, then all this dragon business was just a side effect. However, calling a nurse would ruin any chance she had of escaping without the staff realizing she was gone. If she could get out of the hospital while they thought she was asleep, she’d have a head start at making it to the lake before Porter was called. She couldn’t help but feel that this would be some kind of defining moment in her life. She could choose to believe that everything she’d seen and experienced was reality, that this hellish beast had slain Melissa, David, and probably Mia. Or she could wait in the bed, tell the doctors the crazy thoughts plaguing her, and possibly get the help she needed. But just as quickly as the conflict within her arose, it was gone. All it took was a single thought of Mia climbing into David’s Jeep to reignite the allure of the lake that she’d felt so intensely when she flipped her car. It didn’t matter whether she was stark raving mad or perfectly sane, if there was the slightest chance of making a connection with her sister, she had to try.

  Sitting up, the throbbing in her head threatened to put her right back down again. She froze, attempting to keep it at bay. Being still seemed to help, but it wasn’t an option. She moved her legs to the edge of the bed and slid them over, slowly lowering them to the floor. It was as if she could feel every beat of her heart sending hot lava up to her skull, but she didn’t pass out.

  After another second of rest, she began pulling the electrical nodes off her body, the adhesive tabs burning her skin as she ripped them away. Yanking the IV from her arm, a sharp pinch sent another shot of fire through her and into her brain. She winced and waited for the excruciating pain to subside.

  When she finally felt the agony dull to something manageable, she took a deep breath, stood, and braced herself for more pain. To her surprise, the motion didn’t ignite a flare. Moving across the room, she found her clothes on a small built-in shelf in the wall near the bathroom. As slowly and as quietly as she could, she pulled on her jeans, which were tattered and stiff with blood from the crash. Next, she slipped into her sweater, of which she could feel a large rip in the fabric on the left side. Finally, she slid the bandage from her head, sending stacks of bloody gauze falling to the floor. As the packing was loosed from the back of her scalp, tendrils of pain spread from the wound as if someone had poured scalding water into it. She was paralyzed.

  It was a matter of minutes before she could even open her eyes again, but eventually she was able to begin moving and got her shoes onto her bare feet, unable to find her socks in the dark. Making her way to the closed door at the head of the room, she inhaled deeply. She’d have to open it ever so slightly, peek out, and formulate a plan from there. It crossed her mind that Porter may have even placed a guard outside, but after considering it, it wouldn’t change her options. There was only one way out of that room. She pulled the handle and inched the door open.

  The sudden burst of volume almost caused her to lose hold of the handle. Through the slit between the door and the jamb, she could see the staff rushing around the hall. Doctors were shouting commands as the nurses pushed patients on gurneys into various rooms. Glancing up, she saw it was just after three in the morning. What could possibly be going on that put the hospital in such chaos in the middle of the night?

  Just as the question passed through her mind, two men in scrubs wheeled a patient past her, one of them noticing her through the cracked door as he continued by. But she wasn’t concerned with being seen anymore; she would no longer be of interest to the staff. She knew now why they were panicking. The woman being rolled by gave her all the information she needed. The patient’s clothes were torn, and her face was a bloodied, purple mass of swollen flesh. But none of that was what stopped her from breathing and pumped fresh adrenaline into her bloodstream. It was the single gash that extended from the left side of the woman’s torso to the right. The doctors had been attempting to pack it with gauze as they moved. It was a gash like the ones David had described seeing on his friends after their bodies were found at the lake. None of the hospital staff would care about her anymore because the Imugi had attacked Mitchum. Possibly, it was still attacking. She’d taken too long. The beast was angry and proving a point.

  Stumbling back into the dark room, Lissy let the door fall closed. Her mind flooded with questions as the light from the hallway disappeared. How many were dead? Had the beast shown himself to them? Was it too late? And then the questions that carried the most weight: Were Neil and Rose still alive? What of Yunjin, Albert, and Lee?

  Finally, the realization that this was her fault almost leveled her. If she had made it to the lake, to the Imugi, maybe these people would still be alive. Overwhelmed by the desire to stop the bloodshed, she stepped forward and jerked the door open again, shocked by what she saw on the other side. Jack Porter stood directly in front of her, hand outstretched toward the handle. And behind him was Neil.

  “Good, you’re awake,” Porter said, anxiety lacing his tone.

  “Lissy, it’s Mitchum,” Neil added. “It attacked.”

  She stared at them, unsure what either of them wanted her to say. Porter glanced at Neil, then back to Lissy. “What attacked? What do you two know?”

  “Nothing you’ll believe,” Lissy said, then added, “But believe me when I tell you I need to be at the lake.” She started to push past the sheriff, but he grabbed her arm. Before she could protest, Neil swiftly knocked the larger man’s grip from her bicep. Porter glared at him but left it at that.

  “You’re not going anywhere until you tell me what’s going on in my town,” Porter said, his face growing the bright red that Lissy had become all too familiar with that week.

  “We don’t have time!” Acrid pain stabbed from the wound on the back of her head to a pinpoint right behind her eyes. She winced and brought her hands up.

  “Sheriff, she’s in no condition to have this—”

  “There’s a thunderstorm over Mitchum, the likes of which I’ve never seen. And thirty minutes ago, half the town was ripped to shreds by nothin’ more than wind and rain. Cars thrown, buildings crushed, people bein’ tossed like rag dolls by gusts that don’t seem to affect nobody else. And Elisabeth seems to be the only one that seen it coming. What’d you say?” He locked eyes with her. “I think it was ‘They’re going to die; it’s going to get worse.’ Well, it got worse.” He leveled his gaze at her. “Now you need to talk. What just happened to my town?”

  “Something far bigger than the three of us.” She looked at Neil. “And the only way to stop it is—”

  “Lissy, it’ll kill you.”

  “If it reached Mitchum, what makes you think it won’t come down here next? It knows how to find me. It’s not a question of that. It’s a matter of how many people have to die before I’m willing to do what it takes to end this.”

  “What is it?” The sheriff was livid now, speaking through clenched teeth.

  “I’m going,” Lissy said, turning to walk down the hall.

  She took two steps before the sheriff reminded her, “You ain’t got a car, hon.”

&nb
sp; Turning back, she said, “Well, then one of you is going to have to give me your keys.”

  “I ain’t just gonna give you my keys,” Porter replied. Neil shook his head, also denying her request.

  “Then the next death is on you both.”

  The men stood silently, clearly unsure how to proceed.

  “I can’t,” Neil finally said. “And you shouldn’t either, Lis.”

  The sheriff stepped toward her, pointing his finger. “Listen, I ain’t even got nothin’ to tie you to the uproar up the mountain. How do I know you’re not just delusional and this ain’t nothin’ to do with you?”

  Lissy held his gaze as she replied, “You tell me, Sheriff. You’ve got a ‘thunderstorm’ wreaking havoc in town, and your gut instinct is to drive ten miles down the mountain to me. Why?” She paused for effect and then continued. “What made you think I have anything to do with what’s happening? You said it yourself. All you know points to the fact that I’m losing my mind. You came because you felt something. Just like Neil feels it and just like I feel it.” The two men had no words. They stood, glaring, neither wanting to concede.

  Thinking of all the times she’d talked to Jack in the past week and a half, it all suddenly became crystal clear. So she drove the final nail home. “Neil, you told me wherever I lead, you’re supposed to follow. Well, now’s the time.” Then, turning to Porter, she said, “And Jack, you’ve been pushing back on this the whole time, even going so far as to blatantly ignore evidence. I couldn’t fathom it, you—a man I’ve known the majority of my life—being either that ignorant or that corrupt. But now I see it. You’re neither. You’re afraid. Afraid of being tied up in something so much bigger than you—bigger than anyone. You knew. Not specifics, but you could feel it. The same way Lee did. The same way Neil did. And the same way I do.” She stepped closer to him. “Don’t ignore this anymore, Jack. You’re part of it. We all are.”