Play@YSDC

"Well, uh, goodbye," Lily says to the figure. She keeps the coin clutched in her hand, wishing she had anything to carry it with - it'll make a nice addition to something, she's sure.

Despite the feeling that something isn't quite right, she leaves the bathroom anyway.

It's dark outside. The feelings of warmth and the orange glow to the room is gone, replaced by the dampness of the mist. The door to the outside world was propped open, allowing the cool air of the outside to intermingle with the inside. The lights were turned off... And all the corners of the bar showed signs of decay similar to everywhere else.

Rochelle was gone. So was Charles. Disappeared, without a trace. Lily reaches for a light switch nex to her when she hears a voice.

No, it can't be.

"Ash. Ash, are you there?"

It's Jack. The passion and mocking tone in his voice was now completely gone... But it was still unmistakably him.

And he was in the bar with her.

No. No, this isn't possible. Jack is dead - she saw his body. There's no way he could be here.

Then how is this happening?

The paralysis of fear grips her, stifling the instinct to get out and run. Charles is gone. He can't save her this time. The wound in her side starts to ache again.

"Please, please don't hurt me!" She doesn't have it in her to be defiant. "I'll do a-anything you say, j-just don't hurt me!"

Silence. Then footsteps.

Jack appeared round the corner with a perplexed look on his face. He was holding a small clip on radio.

"When did you get in here? Hurt you? Why would I do that?"

She stares at him for a few seconds, wondering if she could be mistaken - no, it's impossible. "Don't act like you don't know! What did you do with my brother? And Rochelle?"

Her hands are shaking, the Death card nearly slipping from her fingers. "How are you alive?"

"Lady, how should I know what happened to your brother?" Jack said, scowling at Lily. "I just got here. And Rochelle, I'm pretty sure she took a sick leave. Are you mistaking me for someone else?"

"And as for that last question... If I'm dead, I can't be answering these questions now, can I?" Jack yawned before turning away back into the bar, digging around its cabinets for whatever supplies he could find. He left the radio on the counter, set on "receive."

"Hey, you, whoever you are, you want something to drink?"

"Quit fucking around with me! What, do you have some evil twin named Jack who goes around stabbing people?" Lily returns his scowl, teeth bared not unlike a wild animal. "Because I really, really doubt that."

"You didn't just get here. No, you gave me this-" she walks up and slides the card across the bar to him - "and then you shot Charles. Don't pretend you don't remember, and tell me where they are!"

"Ah, I see where the difficulty is. I am Gregg, Jack's uncle," Jack said. "Nice to meet you. How's Jack doing? Still into Tarot Cards, I see. You can buy'em from any convenience store near by for five dollars."

Silence.

"HAHAHAHAHA! I'm just joking, I'm just joking. Yes, my name is Jack. Apparently you met me already. You say that I shot Charles? Oh my, is he your brother? Okay."

Jack turned his attention back to the radio.

"This isn't funny! Stop it!" Lily tries to reach over the bar and grab him by the shirt. "My brother's gone, Rochelle's gone, and you should be dead but you aren't and I want answers!" Tears sting at her eyes again; the fear is back, but it's different this time.

The radio hisses a blast of static that punctures the sudden silence. Through the burble of static, slight sounds can be hurt, slowly increasing in frequency and volume. Sounds of a woman whimpering, or perhaps weeping. From outside the bar, Jack canhear shuffling footsteps approaching while Lily hears nothing over the static.

"Everybody wants answers," Jack said. "Not everyone gets them."

Jack rose from his seat on the counter, grabbing the radio, and began to move towards the "Staff Only" area.

The door opens easily into the empty corridor. There's a dried, flaking blood smear that leads into the kitchen but it's otherwise a clear route to the rear door, the office, or the staff toilet. Lily doesn't remember seeing a dried smear there before, though she hadn't been looking in the right direction when she'd headed into the pub she's sure she would've seen it on her way to the toilets themselves.

Jack walked directly into the kitchen.

Lily rushes after him, questions about that stain taking root in her mind. "You can't do that! You can't just leave! You should be dead! Rochelle shot your head apart, I saw, I saw..."

The kitten scampers past underfoot and climbs up Jack's pants and onto his shoulder, nipping at his ear as though furious for being left alone for so long. The kitchen is dark and gloomy, the shuttered windows keeping out the wan light from outside, and there seems to be no power to any of the light switches in this place. There's a rank smell in here though, of decay and meet and a rancid beer-tinged stink of old sweat and bad breath.

Jack shut the door behind him and quickly locked it.

"Really, Rochelle did that? Than obviously you did not get a good look at the corpse's face. Are you sure that you did not mistake me for someone else?"

He placed the radio close to his mouth. "Ash. Ash, are you there? I want to speak to you. Now."

Nothing but static though at least the whimpers had died down a little, though not entirely.

"ASH!" Jack screamed through the radio. "What's going on there?!"

The whimpers increase in volume and there's a clatter inside the bar as though the door that had been propped open had been knocked back, or something similar. The kitten paused in its ear biting to bristle and growl in the direction of the 'Staff Only' door that lay between them and the bar. It was dark in this corridor, lit only by fog-streaked light coming from the small window in the rear exit door.

"Ash," Jack said, softly this time. "Are you... are you okay?"