Behold the Scalded

Chapter Fifteen

I never screamed so hard in my life. My lungs burned and my throat ached, and the urge to collapse where I stood overwhelmed me. "Not again," I cried. "No, not again."

As the creature continued to stalk the remaining hunters, the sweet burnt smell increased and the trees on the other side of us rattled and shook.

"Let's get the hell out of here." Hermit grabbed my elbow and urged me toward the hospital. We ran. Me, reluctantly, until we burst through the hospital doors and locked the plank in place immediately upon entering.

While Hermit went to the window to peer out, watching and waiting, I collapsed to the filthy tiles, taking comfort in the darkness of the room that obscured me. The moon did its best to light up the space enough for me to see Hermit finally back away from the window and take in a breath of relief.

Tears poured from my eyes and coated my face with its wetness. "I killed Lilac. He was my only friend."

"Sshh." Hermit was close and did his best to comfort me. "You have to get yourself under control, Kyla. Remember the power you possess."

The responsibility was crushing. I didn't want to think about it, or get up, or even attempt to get it together. "I'm so exhausted." And I was, in all forms. I was tired. Tired of running, hiding, surviving. "Maybe I'm supposed to give up. Maybe I'm all wrong about what would happen if I die."

Hermit shook his head, upset. "I knew you couldn't do it."

The disappointment in his tired eyes as the moonlight lit his face said so much, but I had more to say. "I couldn't do that, but I can tell you what I did do. I killed hundreds of people. Mostly innocent people who were in the radius when it erupted."

He huffed with no sense of sympathy in his tone. "You weren't trying hard enough. You gave up. Like you're doing now."

"Nurse Jane who was like a mother to me, Sarah, Jessica, Selina, Jojo..." People we both knew inside and out.

"Because you're weak," he added.

I ignored his complaints and only sulked in my remorse. "Look at what I've turned you into." I sat forward, shaking my head at what I saw before me. "You're wife, your daughter—"

He rushed forward and grabbed my shoulder with one strong hand. Anger in his eyes. "Don't go there. You hear me?" He tightened his grip. "You want me to hurt you, huh? Is that what you want?"

I smacked his arm away. "What's the point in trying to prevent Hell from taking over if this entire place is full of nothing but evil?" I collapsed to the floor, uncaring and done. Ready to be turned into melted gunk to become one with the creatures. Maybe that was my fate the entire time. Where I needed to end up. Maybe that's all I was destined to leave behind in this world, remnants of me in the monsters.

Hermit walked away, putting space between us. But he didn't go far, deciding to sit behind the reception desk in one of the lopsided chairs. He casually fiddled with the Winnie the Pooh backpack that remained on the desktop near the dead, dried, and unused kindling.