Chapter 27: Reality

Reality

“G-Gh!”

The dull sound of screams was heard from every corner of the barn.

Every object in their path was violently pushed aside.

The windows were shattering. And fog was pouring in.

Chase, holding his bottle of alcohol, watched the scene in bewilderment.

Dozens of them.

The boy knew very well what a single one was capable of. He had witnessed it firsthand during his escape from San Ramael High School a few days ago; their strength, their agility, their speed, their unpredictable behavior... Nothing a human could accomplish on their own.

And now there were him and Vines, surrounded by dozens of them.

Fortunately for them, only five decided to enter. The rest waited outside, peering through the remains of the windows.

What options did they have? The rest were on the second floor. Calling them would alert all the Dreamers, which wouldn't be much different than cordially inviting them in.

Even fleeing on their own could be catastrophic. The fog wouldn't disappear, and if the risk was already high with several people, navigating the fog alone was unthinkable.

Considering this, Vines stood up, trembling.

What was the point? The Dreamer was two meters away, clearly staring at him. If there was a glimmer of hope for escaping unharmed, it was that, for some reason, the Dreamer hadn't attacked him yet.

In fact, he stood motionless in the middle of the room.

Her complexion resembled that of a middle-aged woman. She held her hands out at her sides, as if carrying someone in both. Her tilted face and her hair draped over it obscured her gaunt features.

She began to murmur words in a low tone, while swinging her arms from side to side and walking in circles around the room for no apparent reason.

"..."

A second Dreamer followed behind her at the same pace, this time a boy. And he took her hand.

Both Dreamers continued walking around the room, occasionally stopping when they reached a piece of furniture, wall, or object in their path, and changing direction.

Neither Chase nor Vines knew what to do. The suspense was unbearable.

At one point, the pair stopped in front of Vines. He flinched in shock.

They were doing something.

Perhaps he hadn't noticed it before because of fear, but one of the boy's arms seemed shorter than the other.

It was clear when he lifted it; it was missing a hand and part of his forearm.

He brought the remains of this arm to the woman at his side. She leaned in slowly.

She began to bite it as if it were a piece of ground beef. The boy didn't flinch.

"Aa...! Ah...!"

But Vines did.

He couldn't bear to watch the atrocity unfolding in front of him any longer. He panicked.

In a desperate move, he swung the liquor bottle in his hand and smashed it against the woman's head.

The Dreamer froze for a few seconds, then continued to tear off the pieces of skin and bone with his teeth.

Instead, it was the four Dreamers waiting in the back who really reacted.

"GYAAA!"

One of them quickly approached Vines and pushed him. Despite the simple, even clumsy movement, it felt like a car had hit him; he was thrown abruptly against one of the wooden walls.

They were going to kill him. Chase watched as they surrounded him. And he would probably be next.

At the rate things were progressing, no one in that barn would be able to survive.

He didn't think about it.

They were in the living room of a lonely barn. Construction tools could be found on the furniture and walls.

He didn't really think about it.

“Gah! Ah! Ah!”

When he came to his senses, the bottle in his hand was no longer a bottle, but a long carpenter's saw he had picked up.

His face stained crimson, the teeth of the saw were embedded in the neck of the Dreamer closest to Vines, in a diagonal cut that could have reached his windpipe.

The Dreamer held his own neck and head, trying to keep them in place, and soon after, he fell face down onto the floor.

He was motionless, dead. Chase confirmed it with his eyes; he was inert at his feet.

"Ch-Chase!"

"Huh...? Tsk..."

One of the remaining Dreamers had grabbed a piece of furniture from the living room and thrown it at the boy. The blow struck his shoulder, knocking him roughly to the side.

"Fu...!"

Like his partner, Vines grabbed the first tool he could find; a heavy sledgehammer that soon fit perfectly into the Dreamer's right earlobe, knocking him to his knees as blood spurted from every corner of his face.

"Heh... He he...."

The excitement, the adrenaline, made him smile.

The remaining Dreamers fled through the windows in panic.

But those waiting in the opacity of the fog entered.

While the barn was flooded on its first floor, the situation on the second floor was even more precarious.

"Quickly!"

"W-What?! What's going on?"

Jevo grabbed the unconscious Cadie by the arms and dragged her, hiding her inside the closet in the room. Rousset and Earlene wondered what was happening.

He had taken too long to do it because his exhausted body didn't allow him to go any faster.

When he was about to finish, he heard a growl coming from the balcony behind him.

The Dreamers were climbing the cabin.

He didn't have time, nor did he have a choice. They were right behind him; he saw it through the reflection of the glass. And his own reflex was to also enter the same closet and slam the doors shut.

This decision left the girls outside, exposed to these things.

"AAAH!"

Rousset was close to fleeing through the door if not for the screams heard from the floor below. Before she could think of an alternative, the Dreamer who had climbed was now walking slowly toward her.

He didn't stagger or falter. His gait was perfectly upright, and extremely slow. At twice her height, she couldn't help but feel cornered.

Terrified, the young Earlene stood behind her. She watched as the figure inexplicably stretched, growing taller and taller.

Considering the circumstances, even if she screamed, she knew very well that no one would come to her aid. And this thought also crossed Rousset's mind for a moment, but in a different way.

"AH! G-Get away!"

As she retreated, she had glimpsed a small birdcage on a shelf. She grabbed it with her only free hand and slammed it toward the man's face.

"A-AAH! AAH!"

Blood splattered onto the floor, where the Dreamer made a failed attempt to get back up; Rousset pummeled him relentlessly until sharp pieces of the cage remained embedded in the man's neck.

When she noticed his movements ceased, she shakily dropped the remains of the cage and, standing next to Earlene, burst into tears.

“Ah... A-Ah...”

As quick as it started, it ended.

Seeing that the Dreamer was no longer a threat, Jevo left the closet, glanced out the window, and crossed the room toward the exit.

After all, the silence hadn't returned. A struggle could be heard on the first floor. There was a chance they were still alive, so he needed to check the safety of his surroundings before checking theirs.

“Gh!

In his haste, he slipped on the blood he'd stepped in, causing him to fall onto the steps.

“Gah...! Damn...”

And between these steps, a hand reached out to tightly grasp his calf.

“W-What...?!

He didn't have enough time to finish his sentence. He was sucked into the area below the steps. The wood was rotten, so it wasn't difficult to break it and be dragged into this dark place.

“Tsk!”

Slumped on the dusty ground, he noticed the reddish-violet finger marks etched into his leg. He was close to holding it in pain, but peripheral vision made him see something else among the cobwebs and broken timbers in the distance.

If he had to describe him, perhaps he was an old man. One like any other, who might even feel familiar. But his image was blurred before his eyes.

Unconcerned with the fog, he simply watched him as if he were making quick, short movements on his body in random patterns, frantically tossing his sparse gray hair.

This Dreamer stopped and slowly turned toward Jevo, at which point his face became visible.

His eye sockets were intentionally crushed, leaving a large black smear around each one. With his pupils fully dilated, his reddened eyeballs were barely visible.

“Ha... H-Ha...”

Trying as he might, Jevo was unable to contain his ragged breathing. He kept thinking he wouldn't be seen if he remained silent.

He stared at the eclipse, and it stared back at him.

The Dreamer smiled, and kept smiling. His smile stretched to the point where it made his jaw crack and his lips break to reach further.

“A-A-AAH!”

Immediately, Jevo scrambled through the rubble to escape.

The Dreamer leaped toward him.

“Gh!”

And he was violently knocked to the ground.

It had been the sturdy Vines Pall, holding a thick sledgehammer in both red-coated hands.

He seemed distracted, as if he didn't know where he was or what he was doing. However, he let out intermittent smiles.

Seeing that the Dreamer didn't move anymore, he finally noticed Jevo, perplexed.

With a short mumble and a nod toward the living room, they both left the room.

The one they found kneeling in the middle of the room was Chase. Like Vines, he was covered in the crimson liquid.

Taking a last look around, he dropped the worn saw.

-[Ø]-

It took a few hours for the fog to dissipate.

As they made their way through the forest and toward the city exit, they encountered no other people, whether human or Dreamer.

Their feet touched the concrete. The wide road in the middle of a wide field of amber cornfield.

It was the same one they'd stepped on when they arrived in Figuras, on the other side of town.

They'd made it. Everyone was able to flee the swamp and the city, and no one could boast about it.

"Ah..."

Falling back onto the pavement, Jevo's legs struggled to stand. The damage he'd sustained and the extreme exhaustion affected him more than anyone, even though he'd procured a rustic wheelbarrow from the barn, to transport the maiden, Cadie.

Earlene approached to help him up, or so she thought. Chase stopped her by grabbing her arm.

"H-Huh? Why…?"

"Quit it. Hey, Jevo," Chase said, approaching the exhausted boy.

His tone of voice was serious and melancholy, since what he was going to say was devoid of emotion.

"You too. Drop her off somewhere and let's go."

“...”

Looking up, Jevo replied.

“No.”

“...”

Chase quickly approached him and grabbed him by the torn sweater he was wearing.

“Gh!”

“W-What do you think you're doing, asshole? Huh? Don't you see? Don't you see US? Do you think we're okay with carrying a dead weight now?”

He was furious, and frustrated. Jevo could see this in his expression.

Chase always tried to show a face of disinterest and confidence, but anyone who had known him for several years wouldn't be fooled by such masks.

“...Are you telling me to abandon her?”

“D-Don't give me that shit. She hasn't woken up since we left the shelter. She's a Dreamer! Accept it” he pointed at Cadie “When this woman wakes up and proves it to you, it will be too late. What's more...”

Dropping Jevo down, Chase picked up a rock from the ground and approached the young woman in white. His intention was nothing more than to put an end to the problem before it even happened.

"Tsk!"

However, Jevo wouldn't let this happen in front of him.

Not again.

Grabbing him by the waist, he knocked Chase down, and they both fell. They exchanged random blows with what little strength they had left.

"G-Get off! You son of a bitch!"

The confrontation didn't last long, and one of these blows stunned Jevo, who was pushed aside.

"Fuck! What the hell is wrong with you?!" Chase exclaimed, clumsily getting up. "O-One more---! ONE MORE WOULDN'T MAKE A DIFFERENCE!"

Holding back their tears, the others understood. The massacre that happened hours ago. They were the ones who caused it; The deaths of many people at their own hands.

There was no turning back. Regardless of the outcome of the events that would determine their fate, these young people would be judged for their actions.

White birds circled overhead.

"You don't know. You know nothing. We just have to take her to La Quilla with her brother, right?"

Rousset couldn't meet his gaze. Remembering what had happened, she was afraid.

The reason they headed toward La Quilla was because it was the closest town from their location. The desire to help the ailing Cadie had died longer than she'd thought.

At that moment, Jevo realized the truth he refused to admit; all those years of knowing each other, sharing together, had been for nothing. The difference in personality and values ​​between him and them had always been noticeable, and it came to light when a real life and death situation happened.

He had a reality check, and knowing it made him feel more relieved than annoyed.

He was alone.

“G-Get out of my face.”

“...”

Hearing those words, Chase surprisingly didn't reply. Instead, he tugged hard at Earlene's arm, and together with Vines and Rousset, they continued along the endless highway toward La Quilla.

“...!”

Jevo saw their backs, and a few last words came out of his mouth as they walked away.

“Congratulations, Chase. This is the only right decision you've ever made...”

“...”

With his comment ignored and his assumption validated, Jevo Deems had been abandoned.

To be continued…