Chapter Endgame - Ethan
ENDGAME ETHAN
The twins had unbolted the door of the office. They were ready for him. Ethan found Thomas and Tabitha already standing behind the desk, lit only by a dim lamp with a green glass shade. The fire had died. The room was freezing.
As Ethan walked, he felt something gummy cling to the soles of his boots. It was Ryan Phan’s blood.
Ethan looked at Tabitha. “How did y’all do it?”
She tilted her head. “Do what, Mister Cross?”
“The same thing y’all did to those folks in the fifties.”
The twins exchanged a look of raw, unvarnished surprise. Tabitha almost looked proud. “You’ve never figured that out before.”
Before.
Kyla shuffled into the office looking, as always, like she desperately did not want to be here. Hunter and Fernanda followed a few steps behind her. If Ethan was crazy, he’d have said that Hunter looked afraid.
The time was 11:42.
Ethan felt a sudden, new cold spread up his spine at Tabitha’s words. “What do you mean, ‘before’? I’ve never been out this way in my life.”
The twins traded one of their mute shrugs. Thomas said. “We are in some disagreement on this.”
“Like much in philosophy, it hinges on the question of the soul,” Tabitha said.
“Does it exist?”
“In what form?”
“Does it survive death?”
The lamp on the desk sputtered and whined. The generator was struggling to keep the motel lit. Standing at the window by the fire, Fernanda said, “One of the lights outside just died.”
With a flurry of scratches and bangs, the thing in the back of the office SHRIEKED behind its walnut door. The creatures outside answered.
There was no hiding it now: Hunter was frightened. “Ethan, come with me. Come on.”
Ethan didn’t budge. He didn’t turn away from the twins. “What does a soul have to do with any of this?”
“Everything, Mister Cross.” Tabitha looked almost astonished by the question. “The soul—or whatever exists within the human form—is a source of immense power. A catalyst waiting to be sparked.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Ethan said.
“I’m inclined to believe that the soul persists after death,” Thomas said. “One permanent soul. That’s what the people in the city seemed to believe.”
“I was always the stricter scientist,” Tabitha said. “I’m not sure it’s the same souls every night. I’m not even sure it’s the same guests every night. Not in the strictest sense.”
Another moan from the mountain shook the earth. Time took a giant step forward. 11:47.
Thomas said, “If I am correct, it would imply that you’re wrong, Mister Cross. That you have been here before.”
Tabitha said, “On the other hand, I’m inclined to believe that you are correct. You—this you, speaking with us right now, tonight—have never been here before.”
Ethan stared.
“I was hoping that tonight might be different,” Tabitha said.
“A relief it wasn’t, when you realize what’s at stake,” Thomas said sourly.
11:51.
Kyla said, “Why is time moving so fast?”
Tabitha said, “You should have asked Sarah when you had the chance. She was the physicist.”
Thomas said, “We are but humble archaeologists.”
11:54.
Fernanda said, “Another light just died outside. There are eyes everywhere.”
Ethan said to the twins, “Why us?”
“Because the ceremony seeks repair,” Thomas said. “Without it—”
“It’s an evil thing we’ve done,” Tabitha said.
Thomas’s head snapped around to study his sister. She wasn’t supposed to say this. “Be quiet.”
11:58.
“We’ve been doing this for so long,” Tabitha said. “It isn’t working. It can’t survive.”
A wave of SHRIEKS rose up from the desert and didn’t stop. The creature behind the walnut door grew wild. A savage wind buffeted the motel, shook the windows, moaned through the roof.
“What is this?” Ethan said. “What have you done to us?”
“There’s no time to explain,” Tabitha said. “It’s almost midnight.”
Ethan said, “Then take us to your safe place. Explain what the hell is going on.”
“There is no safe place. Did you ever really believe there was?” Tabitha said.
“You aren’t supposed to say that,” Thomas said.
“I never agreed to those terms,” Tabitha said.
11:59.
Tabitha looked at Ethan. At Kyla. She looked desperate. “Please, tomorrow—find a way to remember.”
Thomas held up a hand to stop her.
Tabitha ignored him. “We’ve been trapped for so long.”
“Be quiet!” Thomas said.
“We’ve been trapped here,” Tabitha said. “Just like you.”
The clock struck twelve. The noise cut out.
All of it, at once, just like that: the moaning from the mountain, the SHRIEKS from the desert, even the clamor behind the walnut door.
The wind died down to a mournful breeze.
It played across the porch and the parking lot like the last gasps of the past.
In the silence, in the cold, they heard a new sound from the desert.
It was the whisper of tires on a gravel road.
Tabitha went pale. Thomas looked at her, almost triumphant.
“I told you he’d still come.”