CHAPTER TWO: Cecilia: Searching

[Kadael]

"I am here to help."

Tears rolling silently down her face, Cecilia takes the pen, uncaps it...

"I like helping."

...and stabs it through the center of the paper.

"It's what I do best."

"Get your hands off me, you FUCKING PSYCHOPATH!" she screams, pulling back and slapping him across the face. "What the hell is WRONG with you?!"

"I met Jack. He was friendly, even if you didn't know him... he listened, he never forgot your face, and he didn't like to see people cry.  He wanted people to be safe - happy! - even if it meant putting himself in a lot of danger. And he didn't care about how fair it was, or if there was any justice..."

"He was there to help."

Cecilia sweeps the tears from her eyes and stares at him.

"Who are you?"

[Laraqua]

Countdown,30 seconds left until the madness comes down!

[Seon]

"Does it matter?!" the voice of hate hissed. "I EXIST! I AM HERE RIGHT NOW! DOES IT MATTER WHO I AM, OR HOW I WAS BEFORE?! NO!" Jack's body grappled onto Cecilia. "No, it doesn't. I. Just. Am. I am..."

Jack doubled over, dropping the shotgun beside him. A different voice, this time of pain, cried out.

"Cecilia... RUN!"

[Seon]

"Oh god..." Jack murmured. "I'm sorry...I'm so sorry... It hurts... I'm so sorry..." He leaned against the wall and began to sob. "I don't know... I don't know what happened... I saw... I saw something... in the computer... something bad... And I couldn't... there was something else...I...I..."

"I don't want to die..." he said blankly. "I don't want to die... I don't want to die..."

[Kadael]

Cecilia snatches up the shotgun and springs to her feet, taking a deep and shuddering breath. She's alive. And Jack...

She stands over him, wide-eyed as she listens. It's hard to trust him, as much as she wants to. Even though she feels compelled to sit with him, to tell him that everything's going to be all right, to say that she forgives him...

...it isn't true.

"I'm not going to hurt you." Her fingers twitch on the shotgun's grip, though the muzzle is pointed at the ground.

Not until you try something.

"Tell me what you saw."

[Seon]

"NOOOO!" Jack wailed. "I don't want to remember. Don't want to remember. God, it hurts... it hurts so much... why does it hurt so much?"

Jack sobbed. "I saw... I saw... my autopsy report..."

[Kadael]

"You... but you're right here." Cecilia blinks once, then twice, and drops the shotgun on the ground with a clatter. "I don't understand..."

But it's why he thinks he's dead, right? It has to be false - like everything else in this hospital, in this town, it can't be trusted.

[Laraqua]

Katie peeks around the corner of the doorway. "Mommy, we can't trust him, can we? If he's dead, then that means ... that means.... Oh, I'm scared, mommy. It's a trap. I know it is! Please, mommy, pick up the gun and let's just go!"

[Kadael]

"I..." She looks back at her daughter, then crouches down to pick up the shotgun again. "You're right. Let's just - just leave."

Cecilia walks over to Katie and takes her hand, sighing. The sooner they get out of this town, the sooner they can try to forget.

[Seon]

"And then I remembered it..." Jack muttered. "The knives, puncturing my lungs... filling them with fluid... the shock..." he shuddered. "I felt my heart stop. RIght there on the emergency table..."

Jack chuckled sadly. "It's what I get for trying to be a hero, eh?"

[Laraqua]

Katie takes her mommy's hand and gazes up at her with big, forlorn eyes as she says in a low voice. "He's not going to just let us leave, is he? He'll follow us and he's bigger than us. What're we gonna do, mommy?"

[Seon]

"She's not your daughter," Jack muttered, suddenly remembering something.

[Laraqua]

"Liar!" spat the girl, clinging to her mommy's hand. "Y'see? He won't let us go!"

[Kadael]

"But you're not dead," Cecilia says as she turns to him, not realizing the futility of her words. "And what are you talking about? Of course she's my daughter, she..."

Her grip on Katie's hand loosens, and she looks at her with raised eyebrows. "What do you want me to do? I- I can't just... Katie, what's going on?"

She's six years old. Does she even know the word "autopsy"? Are children - especially ones raised in safety and comfort, like Katie - capable of understanding death like this? She's taking it all so easily...

[Laraqua]

"Mommy?" Katie looks confused, her lower lip trembling in fear. "Mommy, that noise, that humming, it's not good. It's not good! We can't have much time and he's gonna follow us and he'll hurt you and he'll hurt me. I don't wanna get hurt."

[Seon]

"Bullshit," Jack muttered, standing up. "Real Katie was admitted into the hospital. Cecilia and I both saw the files. It was a recent event too... Serious as well... Ash, a total stranger that you met in this town, seemed to be...so concerned..."

"And then there's this Detective, who mentioned this OTHER blond ponytailed girl running about in the hospital... I believe she visited Jack Fifer as well... when he should have been dead."

[Laraqua]

Katie looks confused at that. "What other ponytailed girl running around? I haven't seen anyone like that! You're crazy." She turns back to her mommy. "He's crazy. We should go before he gets his crazy on us and shoots us up with the shotgun."

She shudders and looks down the hall.

"Or when the humming lady comes and gets us."

[Kadael]

"Right, you - you told me she was here, so that's why I came," Cecilia says, looking back and forth between Katie (Katie?) and Jack as she tries to understand. "What happened to you? her? K-Katie?"

I didn't expect to see her running around... I thought she'd be in one of the patient rooms...

Some other blonde girl...? She looks into her daughter's (daughter's?) eyes, expecting to see Katie... she looks the same, doesn't she? She's Katie. She has to be Katie...

"Katie," she says, her voice steadily rising. "Jack. Someone- someone tell me something that makes sense..."

[Seon]

"How the fuck should I know?" Jack muttered. "You know what? This is silly. The girl looks human enough. All that matters right now should be getting out of here. I..."

Jack looked around. "I'm...so sick of this place... I want to leave..."

He locked eyes with Cecilia. "You can't... You can't just leave me behind in here... I... I don't want to die again!"

[Laraqua]

"We can't take him with us!" pleaded Katie. "He's crazy pants! Please, c'mon, daddy wouldn't take him with us! We have to leave him here."