Witness and Worship | An Outlast Document

Chapter Fourteen - Lightning Fields

The only reasonable thing to do now is to run. Things that crawl. Under. Doors. Aren't the kind of thing that can be fought off with a broken chair leg and good aim. But for some reason, all I can do is sit there on the floor, stunned, pawing helplessly at something behind my skull that I can't reach.

I don't know exactly what I feel, just that something is off. Like there's something missing, a fragment of my soul broken off and scattered to the wind. A numb, fuzzy part of my brain that won't switch on again. My teeth chatter uncontrollably, and I'm not entirely convinced it's the cold.

I give a strange, choked whine. Miles has a hand clamped so tightly on my shoulder I don't know how he's not in agony. Only the faint beep of the camera's battery brings him back to himself. He moves as if waking from a dream, or a nightmare I suppose, picking himself up off the floor and slowly pulling the door open again.

Nothing.

Have we both just gone completely insane?

But do crazy people see the same things? Are we going the way of the patients, with all their talk of demons and conjurings? Or were they right all along, and we just thought ourselves too normal to see what they did?

I push myself to my feet with trembling arms, rubbing that spot behind my temple that seems to have just gone. I almost wonder if I've hit my head one too many times, but the rational part of me knows that's not true. We step into the narrow corridor, which turns out to be a tiny storage area with gates on either side. A hiss emanates from the other side of the bars near the fountain, someone's crying in my ear again, and I fling myself back in terror. Miles has one hand out protectively in front of me, the other holding up the camera.

Nothing. Nothing but the lashing rain and the corpses sitting by the water.

The gate on our left is open. I think Murkoff might've used it for the assorted crap they couldn't get rid of upon acquisition of Mount Massive; broken fence posts, an upturned utility shelf, pallets and piles of timber sorted and stacked against the brick wall. It certainly looks like it hasn't been used for years, overgrown with weeds and thick with mud. Perhaps the hiking boots weren't such a bad choice after all.

A ladder waits in the blazing light of an outdoor lamp. Miles holsters the camera and makes his way up it carefully, mindful of his fingers, the slick metal, and the occasional loose rung. I follow him uneasily, trying not to cringe too hard when a bolt of lightning cracks across the sky. Usually I don't mind thunderstorms, but this is too much. He has to help me up when I reach the top, it's too dark and slippery to risk feeling my way onto the roof myself.

Gazing out at the courtyard below, I'm struck by a weird sense of deja vu.

"You know how I said if you were going to complain I'd kindly ask you to stay in the car?" Miles says.

I have to strain my brain, but I remember vaguely. When we were just about to climb the scaffold and I called him a criminal. It feels like a lifetime ago, and sort of hazy around the edges, like it's a memory belonging to someone else. But I nod. "Kind of."

"I'm glad you didn't. I don't think I could do this alone."

A shudder ripples through my body and I don't know if it's the cold, or fear, or what. The amount of times I've screwed up so Miles had to save me, or done something that he has to fix, is probably more to count than on both hands. Surely his own hands would still be intact if I'd not abandoned him when he was attacked by Trager.

"No," I say, "you could've. I've been nothing but a burden on you. And you're strong, and brave."

He shakes his head, frowning. "Don't be ridiculous, of course you haven't been a burden. You've dealt with worse than I have, and you had no idea what I was bringing you into when you agreed to come with me."