"Hey, you remember what I said last year, right? We're Zombie Boy and Ghost Boy. I'm not ever gonna leave you."
"Promise?"
"One hundred percent."
***
In which Alistair fights the monster that possessed his friend alongside his friends, while trying...
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Chapter Twenty: Regrouping
(The Flayed, Pt. 2)
***
"It was the same thing. It was the exact same thing that happened to Will last year."
Nancy put down something on the coffee table as she went on, "And look at this. Look at the body temperatures."
Alistair, Cami, Will, Lucas, Max, Mike and El peered at the thing Nancy had put down—hospital charts. Charts that had patients' temperatures, or more specifically the body temperature of the old woman Nancy claimed was possessed like Billy and Will were, that had apparently been eating fertiliser after she'd reported crazy rats who'd done it first, which had Cami's eyes wide and had a look of terror on her face before she pushed it away.
Something about the rat part niggled at Alistair's brain, but it was shoved down as he saw the temperatures—and how concerningly low they were.
"He likes it cold," Will said as they looked back at Nancy and Jonathan.
"Okay, so this crazy old woman who was eating fertiliser—" Mike started, at which Nancy interrupted, "Mrs. Driscoll."
"Right, yeah, Mrs. Driscoll," Mike amended. "What time was the attack?"
"Last night," Nancy answered.
"Right, but what time last night?" Mike clarified.
"Around nine," Nancy replied, inciting a reaction from Jonathan.
"You waited all night to call?" he asked.
"I was waiting for the doctors to run some tests," Nancy explained.
"You weren't there?" Will questioned his brother, Alistair biting back a comment how his sister hadn't been there either, wherever the hell she was—hopefully somewhere safe. Maybe at Pennhurst or maybe she even blew it off to hang out with Eddie and his band or either Chrissy, Robin and Valerie, or Steve.
"Well, I'm here now, aren't I?" Jonathan said, to which Nancy rolled her eyes and exclaimed, "Hallelujah!"
"Ooh," Lucas muttered as Cami winced, as Alistair now registered the tension between Nancy and Jonathan.
"Um, so, what time was your... sauna test?" Nancy questioned, brining attention back to that and the matter of the Mind Flayer possessing more than one person now.
"Around nine," they all answered.
"Well, that proves it. That proves my theory," Nancy said.
"She's Flayed, just like Billy," Mike realised.
"Flayed?" Jonathan inquired, sounding confused.
"The Mind Flayer. He flays people. Takes over their minds," Mike elaborated. "Once they do that, they basically become him."
"Honestly surprised we haven't been calling that earlier," Cami admitted.
"If there are two Flayed..." Lucas started.
"We have to assume there are more," Will finished.
"Heather," El murmured, and every person aside from Max and Cami turned to her as she explained, "Billy was doing something to her. She was scared. She was screaming. Bad screams."
Alistair frowned in confusion at that, as Lucas asked, "What's a good scream?"
"Max said—"
"Doesn't matter," Max cut in.
The confusion was wiped away as Alistair's eyes widened in another realisation, about why the part of the rats niggled at him.
"The ghosts," he said, making everyone look at him. "They've been trying to show me something, twice now. I heard screams and roars. I... I think they were trying to tell me about the Mind Flayer possessing Billy and Heather. And the rats."
"Rats?" Lucas questioned and Alistair explained, "The first night they tried to warn me, I... kinda ran away and stumbled onto these rats. Allie told me not to follow them. She must have known they were Flayed, and was trying to keep me from being Flayed as well."
"Oh," Lucas said.
"I'm sorry, I'm lost. Who is Heather?" Nancy questioned.
"She's a lifeguard at the pool," Max explained.
"Heather Holloway?" Nancy pressed, her eyes wide.
When the seven of them nodded, Nancy and Jonathan looked at each other and said, "Tom."
That reaction had Alistair remember Tom Holloway was Nancy's and Jonathan's boss at the Post—and that Heather's family was possibly Flayed now, including him.
That meant they had to get to the Holloway house. Now.
After Cami made a quick phone call to her parents' house—where she found out her sister was curiously absent and that her parents and Annie were fine, but she told them to stay away from any crazy rats and anyone who acted weird and to keep Annie inside and away from said crazy rats—the nine of them moved to Nancy's car, where Nancy and Jonathan got in the front and Max, Cami, El and Lucas got into the backseat, leaving Mike, Will and Alistair to sit in the very back.
"Seriously?" Mike complained.
"Welcome to our world," Will remarked bitterly, Alistair nodding in agreement. The trio moved to the back and climbed in, Alistair doing his best to ignore how pressedly closed he was to Will. Hugin cawed disgruntedly, complaining, Too close.
"Can't change anything about that, Hugin," Alistair muttered. Hugin only croaked his displeasure again.
Turning to them, Nancy ordered, "Seatbelts."
They did so, and a moment later Nancy was driving away from the Wheeler house and down the street.
Right to the Holloway house—and whatever waited for them there.
***
Short chapter, I know. But I promise the next one will be, hopefully, longer!
Yeah, this is just Nancy and Jonathan and the Party minus Dustin regrouping and making the connections with the Flayed (and Alistair slowly making the connections on what the ghosts, especially Allie, were warning him about...)
Now off to the Holloway house! And then the hospital... >:)
