"Master!"
It was faint, but it came again. Harker still has his wide opened mouth placed over Joan's expressionless face, as if he was going to bite her entire head off.
"Master!"
The sound was like falling rain, not soft snow. No, it was like the dripping of blood.
This had happened before. It was much clearer in his mind now, that night he became something else. He was about to die, and only his instincts saved him. He accepted it instead of fighting back, even when it was wrong, or disgusting, or whatever people may say.
He ate flesh.
And now he wants nothing else but to do that, his whole life.
"Master!"
The final call, like the final ringing of a bell, was like an offer to a choice. It was beckoning, yes, but it was still up to him in the end.
Which was stronger within him? To fight or to succumb?
He can't stay halfway forever. Stuck in between, always so indecisive. He must act, not think, and put all his willpower in whatever he wants to enact.
It was Joan or him. That was what he knew. Her life, or his….
He gritted his teeth, and struggled once more with those loud shouts. But then he came to realize that they were not here to antagonize him at all. They were tools, like nails, scissors, knives, ropes, and even fire.
It was up to him how he used them, whether to his destruction or survival.
And so he closed his eyes. He felt like he was tearing his own body apart. But that was alright, because he made his decision now.
And that was to pursue the truth. The real truth.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!" He screamed as he tried to take control.
It was as difficult as someone driving a car that crashed on a tree, and trying to drive despite the damage on his body and the car itself. The car was his own body, and his mind was fighting to get it moving to the right direction again.
He needed an anchor. A strong one. Something enough to accomplish the impossible…..
Various faces came to his mind. His father's face, his mother's face. His sister and his brothers, His greatest friend. His first love. The people that believed in him, the people he had spent some good memories with. He even thought about the small moments when he felt like that towards Ahanu and Blank, whether they were 'real' or not.
And he saw Joan. Saw her for what she was. Not just any woman, not just any tempting piece of flesh he wants to devour. Not just a professor, not just a mourner. She was…..
Someone he loved, and felt loved by.
"He said to them 'Go!'. And so they went out, onto the bodies of the pigs nearby. They rushed into the lake and drowned with the demons inside them."
Harker opened his eyes.
This time, it was dark and nighttime. There was the sound of the crackling of fire, and whirring of helicopter blades.
But more importantly, there were the heavy footsteps of the large, strong bodyguards all around him.
They were all holding flamethrowers, burning tall wendigos. There were much more of them than before. It was like a whole army, swarming with no strategy towards these men like bees that got their beehive broken.
The bodyguards managed to fight them off well, and even started using grenades. There was carnage everywhere, and....
Harker had most of his body buried in the snow. He was in wendigo form, with his limbs outstretched and skin grayish.
When he sat up, a bodyguard almost burned him to crips when—
"Wait! It's me!" Harker exclaimed, realizing that it was someone named Tom or Tim.
The man lowered his gun, and looked at him with both relief and disbelief. "Mr. Jones!? We've been looking for you for 3 weeks now! What happened? Why are you….. And you're naked in the middle of the snow…. You really do many weird things, don't you?"
Harker did notice that he somehow lost his clothes. He looked around.
"Have you seen Joan?" He asked.
"We did. Actually, we found her in a cave where she was sleeping all alone. She said you were just there, and that you have another companion, but we can't find either of you."
Harker let out a breath that he didn't know he was holding. So she's safe…..
But they were not really safe. Not only did the wendigos come, but the 'Sasquatch' also joined the fray. It did not say anything as it slammed its fists to knock the helicopters out.
And it did manage to destroy one of them. The passengers inside no doubt had perished in such a quick and gruesome death. The metal would be mixed with their own flesh and blood, being crushed like that. But more than that.....
The hairy giant was trying to reach into another helicopter flying away from the mountains. Harker's enhanced vision spotted Alejandro in it, his hand on the gun while his large frame blocked someone wrapped in a pile of cloth.
That someone was….
"Joan!" Harker called out, but as he did....
His hand turned into that grayish one again, and his lower canine teeth protruded to pierce his own upper lip. It hurt, but Harker quickly controlled his body to turn back to normal.
Nowhere was safe, not even his own mind. The wendigos and the Sasquatch were not his worst enemy.
He looked at his chest. The lines were clear, and his veins were popping out like spiderwebs carved into his skin. They were twitching about, like the blood inside was moving...
Harker gritted his teeth and pierced his own skin with his sharp nail. He took out a 3 inch long black worm.
These weren't worms. He now recalls where he had seen this.
They were the 'living' flesh of the zombies that Victoria created. The tissues that had become sentient on their own, and could join together and 'regenerate' the body of the host unless burned through fire.
He took out all of them, purging his one body from these pests and parasites.He looked up at the Sasquatch, and called out.
"I know what you are now! Come and face me instead, Father Gerard! This is between you and me!"
The hairy monster and all the wendigos turned to him. Soon, the giant wore a large smile.
"So you decided to continue dreaming, Harker Jones. To be confined in this world and its rules. How disappointing. I thought you would have woken up from that appetizing treat I offered you."
The Sasquatch and the wendigos soon exploded into a bunch of black worms, and eventually coalesced together to form….
The form of a man. It was Blank, but he was wearing a Catholic priest's clothes.
"Let's talk and have some tea first, shall we?"
And so, he swallowed Harker whole. The black swarms merge with him, two bodies into one.
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