Tilting (39)

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Taking Lara by the scruff of her shirt, Max dragged the witch away from Gillespie's body. There was no satisfaction Max could take from his death. It didn't bring Kyle back to life.

Carter stood, clear determination in his eyes, and pulled Lara to her feet. She swayed, unsteady, tear streaks making her no less beautiful, but it was as if she'd deflated. Unable to bring her brother back.

That was fine with Max. An inkling for vindication slithered through him, but it was no replacement for the feelings Kyle lit in him.

"Where is everyone?" Carter snarled in Lara's face.

She looked stricken. As if he'd slapped her. She had no right.

"Where?" He repeated, voice low and sounding infinitely more threatening.

"They're.... they're not here...?"

Obviously they weren't. Max couldn't smell any scents that weren't hours old. Trying to follow them proved useless, ending at the mansion boundary. Max could only growl his frustration as he followed the edge of the forest, trying to pick up something - anything. But it was as if they'd been erased from the earth. This forest was their running ground; their scents should've been practically soaked into the soil, but Max didn't even catch a hint of them.

Back inside, Carter was staring hard at Lara as she hiccuped. Her sobs had tailed off, but the grief was still fresh.

Max didn't have so much as an ounce of sympathy for her. She stole Kyle from him and he wasn't going to apologise for killing her motive.

It was then that he heard it. Or that he really took notice of it. Whispering. Faint, ghostly, sending chills up his spine. Both familiar and foreign to Max. He shook his head, pawing at his ears and grumbling low in his throat. It was just the PTSD, hitting him in a moment of quiet helplessness.

They were calling his name.

"Are you alright?" Carter's voice was sharp, loud, real. It sounded as if he'd been trying to get Max's attention for a while.

Max nodded and licked his nose which had gone dry.

But Lara was staring at him. She scrambled over to him, only stopping when Max gave a warning growl and bared his teeth.

"You! You heard them!" She hissed. The way her eyes latched onto him - where before they were frantic and unfocused - betrayed her hysteria. Wild, and too wide. There was a sort of fearful hope in them. "You heard the voices - oh you can't talk in that form."

Lara had cracked. Muttering to herself, she began biting a nail. The length of it suggested that this wasn't a habit she'd had before.

"What voices?" Carter prompted as Max continued to stare at Lara.

Lara's head didn't actually jerk as she looked at Carter, but the crack of the bones in her neck was audible, and she winced with pain.

"The voices," she said, as if it was obvious. "Max hears them - all the time I bet. They whisper of the past and the future and give advice if you're willing to listen and they like you. My mother heard them. I hear them, but they don't like me, so don't give me instruction."

This... wasn't Lara. Max could see that in her face. Lara had cracked and something - someone - else had taken root in her head. Both Lara, but not.

Had Gillespie done this? To his own sister?

Max lay down, crawling on his belly to rest his head in her lap as might a dog. It was strange, and a curl of revulsion pricked at his bones. Lara seemed not to notice as she pushed a hand through his fur.

"Soft," she muttered, staring at Max. "You hear them, right? They call you, I can feel it."

Even if he could speak, Max wouldn't have told her that he'd never heard voices for any reason other than his PTSD. All his voices ever revealed to him were memories of the worst moments in his life, twisted by his own mind to emphasise his guilt.

Lara moved her hands from Max's ruff to his head, stroking carefully over the bridge of his nose and between his eyes. Max closed them so he didn't go cross eyed, and as he did... something happened.

"Just listen," she murmured.

Behind his eyelids, flashes of sand and blood and gunfire. A bomb went off miles away. Shouted orders; cries of pain; screams of fear. In front of him, black boots running to get to safety. Tilting. Tilting. Tilting. People were dying and he couldn't help them.

"Just listen," the voice said, but it wasn't Lara's.

"Max..."

What was she doing to him? This wasn't right. Was he dreaming? Were his nightmares being dragged to the surface?

"Max."

His heart raced. He needed to get out. To leave. Why couldn't open his eyes?

"Max!"

The tilting stopped.

Max felt as if he'd just been pulled from a lake. The world was clear and bright and stood there with the most beautiful smile was Kyle.

Finding himself human, Max wrapped his arms around Kyle and breathed in that familiar scent, feeling elated and devastated.

"I don't know what to do," Max croaked, burying his face into Kyle's shoulder.

Kyle chuckled softly. "You're not alone Kitten, you don't have to do it all by yourself."

Max only clutched tighter. "Everyone's gone. Lara doesn't know where they are and Gillespie is dead..."

Kyle's sigh felt like a gentle breeze on a warm day. "Max... my sweet Max... I know it's hard, but you've got to follow your instincts. You shove them down because you're afraid your memories will take over and you'll lose yourself, but I know you Max. You're strong."

"I wish you were here..." Max's voice broke as the tears flowed. "Everything's better with you."

Kyle made a weird sound and laughed. "You'll always come back to me, isn't that what you promised? I'll be waiting."

Kyle gave Max the gentlest of shoves, but it seemed to be enough to drag Max away. He reached for Kyle, but there was nothing to hold onto.

Max's mind snapped back into place, like an elastic band, with such force that he expected to have a headache, but there was nothing. Just Carter watching with an expression of fear, and Lara beaming.

He tried to speak, but only managed a grumble, having forgotten he was still in his jaguar form.

So he stood, shook his fur out, and strode into the woods, Carter and Lara on his heels.

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