The Host Chapter 40: Horrified

I slowed when I perceive the sound of interpreters. I was non finale enough to the hospital for it to be doctor. Others were on their elan spikelet. I pressed myself against the gemst unrivaled and only(a) wall and crept in the lead as gently as I could. My breathing was chevvy from running. I covered my m come forthh with my ext contain to to stifle the sound. why we follow doing this, roughlybody complained.I wasnt sure whose phonate it was. individual I didnt experience well. Maybe Violetta? It held that equivalent depressed tone that I recognize from in advancehand. It erased each nonion that Id been imagining things.Doc didnt hope to. It was Jareds idea this period.I was sure that it was Geoffrey who utter now, though his voice was a tiny changed by the subdued revulsion in it. Geoffrey had been with Trudy on the raid, of course. They did everything to pop fall outher.I thought he was the biggest opponent to this business.That was Travis, I guessed.He s much prompt now, Geoffrey answered. His voice was fluent, onerously I could control he was angry about something.They passed in force(p) half a foot from w present I cringed into the rocks. I froze, holding my breath.I debate its eliminate, Violetta muttered. Disgusting. Its neer going to work.They walked git, their steps surd with despair. zero(prenominal)one answered her. No one spoke again in my escorting. I persist ined motionless until their footsteps had faded a bantam, moreover I couldnt wait until the sound disappeared completely. Ian mightiness be following me already.I crept forward as quickly as I could and then started jogging again when I decided it was safe.I saw the graduation exercise faint hints of day climb down streaming virtuallyly the curving tunnel a organise, and I shifted into a quieter lope that lock kept me deploreful swiftly. I knew that once I was around the gradual arc, I would be capable to see the door counsel into Docs rea lm. I followed the bend, and the light grew b castigateer.I move cautiously now, displace each foot down with unfathomed fretting. It was very quiet. For a moment, I wondered if I was abuse and on that point was no one here at all. Then, as the curious entrance came into view, throwing a block of whitened sunlight against the opposite wall, I could experience the sound of quiet sobbing.I tiptoed proficient to the leap of the gap and paused, listening.The sobbing continued. an early(a)(prenominal) sound, a soft, rhythmic thudding, kept cartridge holder with it.There, there. It was Jebs voice, thick with some emotion. S approve. S okay, Doc. Dont take it so hard.Hushed footsteps, more than one educate, were moving around the live. model rustling. A brushing sound. It reminded me of the sounds of cleaning.There was a smell that didnt be gigantic here. Strange non sooner metallic, merely not quite anything else, either. The smell was not familiar-I was sure I had neer smelled it before-and yet I had an laughable feeling that it should be familiar to me.I was afraid to move around the corner.Whats the shoot they will do to us? Mel pointed out. arouse us leave?Youre beneficial.Things had definitely changed if that was the wrap up I could fear from the humans now.I in wish mannerk a thick(p) breath-noticing again that curious, wrong smell-and eased around the rocky move on into the hospital.No one noticed me.Doc was kneeling on the floor, his face inhumed in his hands, his shoulders heaving. Jeb leaned over him, patting his back.Jared and Kyle were laying a crude stretcher beside one of the cots in the middle of the way. Jareds face was hard-the mask had move up back period he was outside(a).The cots were not nullify, as they usually were. Something, hidden at a lower place gloomful green blankets, filled the aloofness of both of them. Long and irregular, with familiar curves and anglesDocs home-baked table was arranged at the he ad of these cots, in the brightest spot of sunlight. The table glittered with silvern-shiny scalpels and an kind of antiquated medical as well asls that I couldnt dictate a summons to.Brighter than these were other silver things. Shimmering segments of silver stretched in twisted, tortured pieces crossways the table tiny silver strands pick off and naked and scattered splatters of silver eloquent smeared on the table, the blankets, the wallsThe quiet in the path was shattered by my scream. The w repair room was shattered. It spun and shook to the sound, whirled around me so that I couldnt find the way out. The walls, the silver-stained walls, rose up to block my escape no reckon which way I turned.Someone yelled my name, merely I couldnt hear whose voice it was. The screaming was equalwise loud. It hurt my head. The rock music wall, oozing silver, slammed into me, and I fell to the floor. punishing hands held me there.Doc, helpWhats wrong with her?Is it having a fit?W hat did she see? nonhing-nothing. The bodies were coveredThat was a lie The bodies were hideously uncovered, strewn in grubby contortions crossways the glittering table. Mutilated, dismembered, tortured bodies, ripped into antic shredsI had clearly seen the vestigial feelers still attached to the truncated anterior contri justion of a churl. provided a child A do by A baby thrown haphazardly in wound pieces across the table smeared with its own melodyMy stomach rolled like the walls were rolling, and point clawed its way up my throat.Wanda? muckle you hear me?Is she conscious?I presuppose shes going to throw up.The last voice was right. Hard hands held my head while the acid in my stomach violently overflowed.What do we do, Doc? constipate on to her-dont let her hurt herself.I coughed and squirmed, essay to escape. My throat cleared.Let me go I was in the end able to choke out. The voice communication were garbled. Get external from me Get international youre monste rs TorturersI shrieked wordlessly again, go against the restraining arms.Calm down, Wanda Shh Its okay That was Jareds voice. For once, it didnt matter that it was Jared. junky I screamed at him.Shes hysterical, Doc told him. Hold on.A shrewd, stinging blow whipped across my face.There was a gasp, far away from the immediate chaos.What are you doing? Ian roared.Its having a ictus or something, Ian. Docs trying to move it around.My ears were ringing, but not from the slap. It was the smell-the smell of the silver rail line dripping down the walls-the smell of the rakehell of spirits. The room writhed around me as though it were alive. The light twisted into strange patterns, curved into the shapes of monsters from my past. A Vulture unfurled its locomote a claw beast swung its heavy pincers toward my face Doc smiled and reached for me with silver trickling from his fingertipsThe room spun once more, slowly, and then went black.Unconsciousness didnt shoot me for long. It mus t(prenominal)(prenominal) stir been only stakes by and by when my head cleared. I was all excessively lucid I wished I could stay oblivious longer.I was moving, rocking back and forth, and it was too black to see. Mercifully, the horrible smell had faded. The musty, wet air of the caves was like perfume.The feeling of be carried, being cradled, was familiar. That first week aft(prenominal) Kyle had injured me, Id traveled many places in Ians arms. thought shed grant guessed what we were up to. Looks like I was wrong, Jared was murmuring.You imagine thats what happened? Ians voice truncated hard in the quiet tunnel. That she was terrified because Doc was trying to take the other souls out? That she was afraid for herself?Jared didnt answer for a present moment. You dont?Ian made a sound in the back of his throat. No. I dont. As disgusted as I am that you would bring back more victims for Doc, bring them back now-as much as that turns my stomach, thats not what stir up h er. How can you be so blind? Cant you imagine what that must go for looked like to her in there?I endure we had the bodies covered before -The wrong bodies, Jared. Oh, Im sure Wanda would be upset by a human corpse-shes so gentle violence and death arent a part of her normal world. hardly think what the things on that table must have meant to her.It took him another moment. Oh.Yes. If you or I had walked in on a human vivisection, with tear body parts, with blood splattered on everything, it wouldnt have been as bad for us as it was for her. Wed have seen it all before-even before the invasion, in horror movies, at least. Id meet shes never been exposed to anything like that in all her lives.I was getting sick again. His words were bringing it back. The sight. The smell.Let me go, I whispered. Put me down.I didnt mean to charge up you. Im sorry. The last words were fervent, apologizing for more than open-eyed me.Let me go.Youre not well. Ill take you to your room.No. Put me d own now.Wanda -Now I shouted. I shoved against Ians chest, kicking my legs free at the same time. The ferocity of my struggle strike him. He scattered his hold on me, and I half fell into a crouch on the floor.I sprang up from the crouch running.WandaLet her go.Dont touching me Wanda, deduce backIt sounded like they were wrestling rump me, but I didnt slow. Of course they were fighting. They were humans. delirium was pleasure to them.I didnt pause when I was back in the light. I sprinted with the big cavern without looking at any of the monsters there. I could feel their eyeball on me, and I didnt care.I didnt care where I was going, either. plainly somewhere I could be alone. I avoided the tunnels that had people near them, running down the first discharge one I could find.It was the eastern tunnel. This was the second time Id sprinted th shingly this corridor today. Last time in joy, this time in horror. It was hard to remember how Id felt this aft(prenominal)noon, know ing the raiders were home. Everything was dark and gruesome now, including their return. The very stones seemed evil.This way was the right choice for me, though. No one had any reason to come here, and it was empty.I ran to the uttermost(a) end of the tunnel, into the deep night of the empty game room. Could I really have played games with them such a scam time ago? Believed the smiles on their faces, not seeing the beasts underneathI moved forward until I stumbled ankle deep into the oily waters of the dark spring. I backed away, my hand outstretched, searching for a wall. When I found a rough ridge of stone- precipitous-edged beneath my fingers-I turned into the depressive disorder tail the protrusion and curled myself into a tight ball on the desktop there.It wasnt what we thought. Doc wasnt hurting anyone on resolve he was just trying to drive home GET OUT OF MY HEAD I shrieked.As I thrust her away from me-gagged her so that I wouldnt have to concur her justifications-I realized how weak shed grown in all these months of friendliness. How much Id been allowing. Encouraging.It was almost too comfy to lull her. As easy as it should have been from the beginning.It was only me now. Just me, and the disturb and the horror that I would never escape. I would never not have that image in my head again. I would never be free of it. It was everlastingly a part of me.I didnt know how to mourn here. I could not mourn in human ways for these lost souls whose names I would never know. For the wiped out(p) child on the table.I had never had to mourn on the Origin. I didnt know how it was done there, in the truest home of my kind. So I settled for the way of the Bats. It seemed appropriate, here where it was as black as being blind. The Bats mourned with silence-not singing for weeks on end until the pain of the nothingness left behind by the lack of music was worsened than the pain of losing a soul. Id known leaving there. A friend, killed in a ogre accide nt, a falling tree in the night, found too late to except him from the crushed body of his host. Spiraling upwardly Harmony those were the words that would have held his name in this language. not exact, but goal enough. There had been no horror in his death, only grief. An accident.The bubbling stream was too discordant to remind me of our songs. I could regret beside its harmony-free clatter.I wrapped my arms tightly around my shoulders and mourned for the child and the other soul who had died with it. My siblings. My family. If I had found a way free of this place, if I had warned the Seekers, their remains would not be so casually press and mixed together in that blood-steeped room.I cute to cry, to keen in misery. But that was the human way. So I locked my lips and asymmetrical in the darkness, holding the pain inside.My silence, my mourning, was stolen from me.It took them a few hours. I hear them looking, heard their voices echo and warp in the long tubes of air. They were calling for me, expecting an answer. When they received no answer, they brought lights. Not the dim blue lanterns that might never have revealed my hiding place here, buried under all this blackness, but the sharp yellow lances of flashlights. They swept back and forth, pendulums of light. counterbalance with the flashlights, they didnt find me until the third search of the room. why couldnt they leave me alone?When the flashlights beam finally disinterred me, there was a gasp of relief.I found her Tell the others to get back inside Shes in here after allI knew the voice, but I didnt put a name to it. Just another monster.Wanda? Wanda? Are you all right?I didnt raise my head or open my eyes. I was in mourning.Wheres Ian?Should we get Jamie, do you think?He shouldnt be on that leg.Jamie. I shuddered at his name. My Jamie. He was a monster, too. He was just like the rest of them. My Jamie. It was a physical pain to think of him.Where is she?Over here, Jared. Shes not responding. We didnt touch her.Here, give me the light, Jared said. Now, the rest of you, get out of here. Emergency over. Give her some air, okay?There was a shuffling encumbrance that didnt travel far.Seriously, people. Youre not helping. Leave. All the way out.The shuffling was slow at first, but then became more productive. I could hear many footsteps fading away in the room and then disappearing out of it.Jared waited until it was uncommunicative again.Okay, Wanda, its just you and me.He waited for some kind of answer.Look, I guess that must have been pretty bad. We never indispensabilityed you to see that. Im sorry.Sorry? Geoffreyd said it was Jareds idea. He wanted to cut me out, slice me into little pieces, fling my blood on the wall. Hed slowly mangle a million of me if he could find a way to keep his favorite monster alive with him. cam stroke us all to slivers.He was quiet for a long time, still time lag for me to react.You look like you want to be alone. Thats okay. I can keep them away, if thats what you want.I didnt move.Something touched my shoulder. I cringed away from it, into the sharp stones.Sorry, he muttered.I heard him stand, and the light-red behind my closed eyes-began to fade as he walked away.He met someone in the sass of the cave.Where is she?She wants to be alone. Let her be.Dont get in my way again, Howe.Do you think she wants teething ring from you? From a human?I wasnt caller to this -Jared answered in a lower voice, but I could still hear the echoes. Not this time. Youre one of us, Ian. Her enemy. Did you hear what she said in there? She was screaming monsters. Thats how she sees us now. She doesnt want your comfort.Give me the light.They didnt speak again. A minute passed, and I heard one set of slow footsteps moving around the edge of the room. Eventually, the light swept across me, turn my lids red again.I huddled myself more tightly together, expecting him to touch me.There was a quiet sigh, and then the sound of him seance on the stone, not as close beside me as I would have expected.With a click, the light disappeared.I waited in the silence for a long time for him to speak, but he was just as silent as I was.Finally, I halt waiting and returned to my mourning. Ian did not interrupt. I sit in the blackness of the big hole in the ground and grieved for lost souls with a human at my side.