Not Much To Go By

Not Much To Go By
The doors of Greenly Bay General Hospital slid open with a soft mechanical hiss as Vera and Kane stepped inside. The familiar scent of disinfectant immediately filled their lungs, mingling with the distant beeping of heart monitors and the muffled voices of nurses moving through the corridors. After everything they had witnessed over the past few weeks—walking corpses, demonic possessions, haunted houses, and impossible miracles—the sterile calm of the hospital almost felt unreal. Almost.

Neither of them spoke as they made their way down the hallway toward Eleanor Hawthorne's room. The silence between them wasn't uncomfortable. It was the silence of two exhausted people trying to make sense of a nightmare that refused to end. This was yet another step forward, but neither of them knew if they were getting close to the end yet… They had no idea what was next!

When they reached the room, the door was already half open. Kivior Thames stood beside Eleanor's bed with his Bible tucked beneath one arm. His expression was thoughtful, though there was obvious concern in his eyes. He looked up as they entered.

"I'm glad you're here," he said quietly.

Vera approached the bedside. "Has she said anything?"

Kivior nodded slowly. "Yeah, she’s said a few things. Fragments, mostly. Enough to know that whatever happened to her... it was terrible."

"And?"

The preacher sighed. "It isn't making much sense. Sometimes she says things you can make sense of. Other times, it’s parables or word games. I can’t say for sure."

Eleanor looked nothing like the woman Vera remembered. Only a few days earlier she had been the composed woman looking over the old Hawthorne library. Now she looked decades older. Her skin was pale beneath the hospital lights, dark circles rested beneath tired eyes, and every tiny movement suggested pain. Even breathing appeared to exhaust her.

When she noticed Vera standing beside the bed, recognition slowly spread across her face.

"...Sheriff..."

Her voice was weak and hoarse, as though she'd spent days screaming. Vera forced a reassuring smile. "It's good to see you awake, Eleanor."

The older woman swallowed. "I... I remember you."

"You've been through a lot."

A trembling laugh escaped Eleanor's lips. "You have no idea. It’s not a pleasant thing having a demon live inside you, you know? Makes one feel quite unholy."

Vera gently pulled a chair closer and sat beside the bed. "I need you to help me understand what happened."

Eleanor stared blankly at the ceiling for several long seconds before speaking again. "It... hurt." She squeezed her eyes shut. "It hurt so much..."

Vera exchanged a glance with Kane before returning her attention to Eleanor. "What hurt?"

"The ripping."

Her entire body shivered. "The final ripping and the final tearing."

The room fell silent. Kane frowned. "The final... what?"

"The final ripping and the final tearing." She repeated the words exactly the same way, almost mechanically, as if they had been burned permanently into her mind.

Vera leaned forward. "What does that mean, Eleanor?"

The woman slowly turned her head toward her. Fear flooded her tired eyes. "I don't know..."

"You don't know?"

She shook her head weakly. "I only remember... pain."

"What was ripping?"

"I... I can't explain it."

Her breathing became uneven. "It was like..."

She struggled for words. "...like something was tearing everything apart..."

Her hands began trembling uncontrollably. "My body… My soul… My memories… They kept pulling… And pulling… until there wasn't anything left."

Kane shifted uneasily. Vera remained patient. "Eleanor… I need you to focus. Who did this to you? Do you know? It was Orishirishi. But what we want to know is if you remember anything she said from your time with her. Anything you can expose to help us know what’s coming."

For a long moment, Eleanor simply stared at nothing. Then her eyes widened.

"Oh… No… No..."

Her breathing accelerated. "He's coming..."

Vera immediately leaned closer. "Who's coming?"

Eleanor's terrified gaze locked onto hers. "The man..."

"What man?"

"The man with the hook."

Silence swallowed the room. "The one… who drowns children. He’s coming back to continue what he started all those years ago. It’s no over yet. He’s coming yet again."

Vera felt every muscle in her body tighten. She slowly looked toward Kivior. The preacher's face had gone completely still. Kane noticed it too. "Kivior?"

The preacher lowered his eyes. "I know who she's talking about… and I think we all already do."

Vera already suspected the answer. "Martin."

Kivior nodded once. "Martin Carey."

Nobody spoke for several seconds. The implication settled heavily over the room. Vera finally broke the silence. "But Martin is gone."

Kivior looked uncertain. "We believed so."

Kane folded his arms. "The spellbook cast him away."

"It did."

"So how is he coming back?"

Kivior slowly opened his Bible before closing it again without reading a page. "I don't know."

He looked at Eleanor. "But she isn't describing a possibility. She's describing certainty."

Eleanor's frightened whisper barely carried across the room.

"He's coming..."

Again.

"The man with the hook… he's coming."

Vera rubbed her forehead. "This doesn't make any sense."

"No," Kivior admitted. "It doesn't. But when has anything made sense up till this point?"

He walked slowly toward the window overlooking the parking lot. "But perhaps we're looking at this the wrong way."

The others watched him. "What do you mean?"

The preacher stared outside for several moments before answering. "Think about Greenly Bay."

He turned around. "What was happening before Orishirishi showed up and we started dealing with these plagues?"

Vera answered immediately. "Children were disappearing."

"Who was taking them?"

"Martin. And then Elena Carey."

"And now?"

Silence. Kivior sighed. "I believe Eleanor isn't simply warning us about Martin."

His expression darkened. "I believe she's warning us about Greenly Bay returning to its original state. Things are going to be like as they were before, but lightning never strikes twice. Something would be different, and we’ll be task with figuring that out all on our own—once again."