February 29

Chapter 29

Reaching the hospital took all of five minutes, and by the time they had gotten there Mark wanted to enter the place even less. The whole place radiated dark, sickening energy that gave him a headache and made him want to vomit, and looking over he could even see Stacy was affected as well. She had paled considerably, and her body shuddered with almost invisible shivers. Trying to ignore his instinct to pack everything and run, he decided to park in the desolate parking area and run in and out. He could scout out Ethan by feeling his presence, which was getting darker by the second but still slightly distinguished from the Aura's. Killing the engine, he sighed, ran his hands through his hair, and glanced at Stacy.

"We're here," he said softly, rousing her from her daydream.

"I know," she replied softly. "But I don't know if I'm happy about that."

Mark shrugged. "I definitely am not. You don't have to be either."

"My father is in there. I know it," she said firmly. "But if I'm so sure, the why do I not want to go in? He would."

"You're scared," Mark reasoned. "That's why you don't want to go in. That's okay. I'm scared too."

"Then let's get this over with. We don't have forever."

She opened the door, allowing heartlessly cold air to stir into the car's warm interior. Mark did the same. Once out, he gave the car one more somber look before shutting his door firmly and forcing his feet to walk towards the entrance.

"It's dark in there," Stacy noted. "Do you have a flashlight?"

"Yeah, definitely," he replied. "I'm not surprised. The thing probably blew the lights out first chance it got." He sighed. "I just hope Ethan's okay."

She muttered something he couldn't catch, but he could tell by the tone that she wasn't very enthusiastic.

They got about fifty feet from the hospital before Mark managed to noticed a human-shaped smudge on one of the dirtied sliding glass doors. He squinted and froze.

"You see that?" he asked absently, trying to assess whether it would be safe to approach. Stacy had barely heard him before she rushed forward, sudden tears stinging her eyes. "Wait!" he exclaimed.

"Daddy!" Stacy sobbed, recognizing the hair, the posture, the stance and position and picture that she had grown to love. Without a thought she ran towards him, her heart's flame igniting and filling with rapture. He was there. He was okay.

She reached the door and proceeded to pull the glass apart, with such ferocity and determination that Mark was afraid she'd hurt herself. She finally made a gap wide enough for him to fall through. His body slumped through the opening and would have cracked against the concrete ground had Stacy not caught him. She had barely caught one glance at her father before releasing an earsplitting shriek.

"What is it--" but Mark was suddenly cut off too, catching sight of the man and feeling a wave of vomit rise in his throat. He turned towards a bush and let everything he had eaten for that day flow out of his mouth. Afterimages of the of sight, of the man's swollen neck, laden with black veins that resembled long leeches, of the bloody hole on the right side of the head where ears should have been. The other ear looked as if it had been torn off. A bloody, thick gash had been cut at his mouth, giving him a smile from ear to ear. The man had no eyes anymore. They must have been pulled out of their sockets. There was nothing but void-like, black hole pits left of them. Mark tried desperately to chase it out of his head, but he couldn't. He wanted nothing but to run now, even though he knew there was nowhere to run, not anymore.

"I have to stop this," he said. He glanced briefly at Stacy and noticed that the corpse had completely disappeared, leaving nothing but her crumpled crying body on the rough hard concrete. He thought of consoling her but could find no way of doing so. It was a terrible trick on the Aura's part. Finally, he just approached her, placed a hand on her shoulder, and proceeded to hugging her gently.

"It wasn't real," was all he said as she sobbed her heart out. He tried a hopeful approach, a remedy he had used to encourage many of his patients. "That wasn't really your dad. He may still be alive. That thing...it was an apparition. The Aura knows that we're trying to save Ethan, so its trying to drive us away. It was terrible, but we can't let it stop what we came here to do."

"What if he is dead and this is all for nothing?" she cried out. "I bet he really is gone. Ethan probably killed him days ago."

"That's not true. The Aura wouldn't kill something he needs, which is why it kept Ethan alive. ITneeds fuel. People are fuel. I don't think your father is dead," he said with a lot more confidence than he felt.

As if that was the push she needed, she brought herself to a slow stand and smoothed her clothes out. Surprisingly, she wiped her face and nodded weakly, seeming to gain some resolve. "I know. I know that it wasn't real. He looked milky, like a ghost. My father is in there."

Mark gave a shaky smile. "So is Ethan. I bet my wife and child are somewhere there too."

"Wife and child?" she asked, brushing a tear away.

"I was married to a beautiful woman named Lisa. We were childhood friends, grew up together. It was almost inevitable that we married. And then we had a son named Danny."

Stacy looked unsure of whether she wanted to ask more. Shifting her gaze, she asked, "What happened?"

Mark sighed. "Well, back then, I had to go to Europe for a business trip. I was told to tend to some patients at a mental asylum in Berlin. That's where I first encountered the Aura. One man had come in with complaints of bad dreams. He was schizophrenic, so I thought that maybe it was just the typical instance of his problems catching up with him. But when I wanted to visit the second time, I found out he had been burned to death."

"How? Was Ethan born then?"

"No, that's what's scary about it. The thing didn't burn the man itself. My guess is that it probably made the man kill himself. Mind games. Psychologically, that is. After seeing that man, I started to get nightmares as well. My wife sent me some herbal teas and stuff to keep me from dreaming, and that worked for about two weeks. Then it started to talking to me, telling me to do things."

"Like what?"

"Like kill people," Mark answered bluntly. "And sacrifice them to it. Insane, almost demonic things. Well, when I got back to the states, I drove back to my house, excited to see her and our boy. Just gotten a dog. I wanted to show them the little thing. I got to the door. I unlocked it walked in. First thing I smell is cooking meat. Thought she was making reunion dinner, so I called out in greeting and prepared to go to the kitchen to say hello.

"Then i heard the smoke detector going off. I saw this giant black cloud of smoke rising from the living room. I was thinking that there was a fire and that she and Danny had fled the building. I ran to the living room to make sure no one was there. And well..." he cleared his throat. "I found my family burned to death in the same fashion as that man. Half the body was ash. Her hair had left nothing but sores and scars. And my boy....My son was three. I guess she...she must have killed him right before...before--"

"Stop," Stacy cut in, looking horrified. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry I asked."