hold me closer

61

"Why are we always the ones examining the dead bodies?"

"Would you rather be finding the Anuk-ite?" Lydia questioned me.

"That is an obvious yes," I responded.

We were in the morgue at Beacon Memorial Hospital. Halwyn, the Hellhound, had made some sort of connection to Lydia. It was very odd seeing as he was dead. We had seen his body lying still for hours. She wanted to find out more about it.

Malia opened the door and I pulled out the table. Slowly, I unzipped the body bag. Halwyn looked exactly the same. Pale body, same bullet wound to the head, and the same scratch marks on his chest.

"Well, it's still here," Malia stated. "Still dead. What else were we supposed to do?"

"Figure out how a Hellhound led me into the woods to find another faceless body while being technically dead," Lydia answered.

"Technically... " Malia repeated.

"I don't think I would have been led out there if he was fully dead," Lydia said.

"I don't think we should be hanging out here waiting for him to spring back to life," I voiced.

"We don't have to wait if we can figure out how he was able to reach me," Lydia told us.

"And how do we do that?" Malia queried.

Lydia looked down at Halwyn's face. "I'm just going to have to ask him."

We set up a station. Lydia laid on an autopsy table with her eyes closed and her hands folded over her stomach. Her head was inches away from Halwyn's.

After a moment, Malia, who was crouched down next to the tables, peeked her head up by Lydia and Halwyn's heads and whispers to Lydia, "Anything yet?"

Lydia's eyes flew open and she rolled them irritably and replied, "As opposed to when you asked three minutes ago? No."

Lydia groaned and sat up. "Ugh. It's not working."

"Maybe you should touch him?" Malia told me.

"That's ridiculous," I said. "There's no way I'm touching a dead- "

Malia had grabbed my hand and put it on Halwyn's arm. His skin was cold at the touch.

"Anything?"

"Nothing," I told her.

Malia grabbed my hand again and placed it on Halwyn's chest. I groaned with displeasure.

"What about now?" Malia asked.

"Nope," I said, pulling away.

She grabbed my hand again and put it on his chin. I pulled away again and backed up so she couldn't try it again. "I don't think I can get anything from someone who is dead."

Malia made an equally grossed-out face as she gently turned Halwyn's head, exposing the back of his neck. She then looked at us for approval. "I could try it?"

Lydia shook her head. "You could damage his brain, maybe even more than that bullet already has."

Malia looked slightly relieved and gingerly returned Halwyn to the prone position. She walked back and leaned against a table and said, "How did it work last time?"

"Last time, I was unconscious," Lydia informed.

"Unconscious." She turned around, then looked back at us. "Okay, we can work with that!"

Lydia sat in the desk chair. Malia banged the metal hammer on the table. Lydia looked at Malia as though she had lost her mind and Lydia shook her head in refusal.