Work Text:
Emily could not believe that she had been stuck down here for three days now. Three days! Three entire days since she had fallen from that radio tower and straight down into the abandoned mining tunnels that ran beneath the entire mountain. Three days since that… that thing chasing her had blocked the tunnel that had lead to what way have been the only way out of this hellhole.
(Or, at least, she had to assume so judging from the large sign that had read ‘SURFACE ELEVATOR’ behind that stretched skin of that things skull. Though considering how her luck had been going that whole entire evening leading up that point, it had likely been broken. So being forced to run even deeper into the mine shafts had probably been her best choice amongst all the other shitty options that had been at her disposal.)
Three days since she had somehow managed to lose the monster that had been chasing her, and she hadn’t seen it since. Actually, she hadn’t seen anyone else since then, monster or human alike. Well, except Jess of course, though Emily still wasn’t quite sure if she counted considering all the help she had offered thus far. Which had unsurprising been a total amount of absolutely none at all!
(Not that any of that was really Jess’s fault of course. She couldn’t even move right now with all of grievous injuries she had sustained. Hell, it was a miracle that Emily had even found her alive considering the absolutely horrific state that she had been in. Nearly naked and almost every inch of that bare skin covered in large, deep gashes. And that was ignoring the deep dark blues and blacks of frostbite that had started to encroach at the tips of nearly all her extremities.)
Three days since Emily had found herself as the caretaker of the very person who she had spent the last half year hating the absolute guts of. And though she wasn’t even sure exactly what Jess was to her now, she did know that whatever it was it was sure as all hell better than being stuck down here all alone. Though at this point, she was more than ready to leave this disgusting and depressing place far, far behind. Help should have arrived ages ago after all! And okay, so maybe the rangers hadn’t been able to find Hannah and Beth when they’d fallen down here last year, but this was different! There was an entire freaking radio tower just chilling down in the mine now! A radio tower that she and Matt had called for help from even! So one would think that someone would be scouring the mines for any survivors or even investigate to see what the hell happened for a tower to collapse like that. But apparently not! God, those so-called park rangers really were useless, huh?
(Which had been extremely obvious thanks to the simple fact that she had been the one to find Beth’s phone on the trail, not them. Had they even been seriously searching for the twins at all?)
But all this meant that here Emily was, still stuck in these mines for three days and caring for a miraculously alive Jessica. Shovelling snow with her hands into a somehow intact miner’s helmet that she had found so she could carry it back to where she and Jess had been taking shelter.
(If she looked up, Emily would see not only the sky—sun shining brightly in the clear blue of the mid-morning winter sky— but also the cliff where she knew for a fact that Hannah and Beth had fallen from. A fall that had killed Beth instantly if Hannah’ desperate scribbles had been anything to go by. It was a death that Emily didn’t like to think about, one that filled her stomach with grief and guilt, so she didn’t. So she refused to look at either that or Beth’s long decayed head that still lay nearby where Emily had unwitting found it.)
Returning to her feet with the freshly filled miner’s helmet in hand, Emily steadily makes her way back to the shelter. Favouring her right leg as she does so, cause even though the bandages she had wrapped around the large gash on her shin had stopped any bleeding, that didn’t stop it from hurting any. That, and Emily had long ago used up all the bandages that had been in the canvas bag on both her and Jess. She really didn’t want to have to try and clean them with nothing but the cold, stagnant water from the pool again.
“Hey, Jess. You actually awake for once, or are you still lazing about in your solo pity party?” Emily calls out as she enters the shelter (the same one where Hannah had once slept, where she had once buried Beth’s dead body not far outside, but Emily refused to think about those thoughts too). Immediately, she is met with the soft crackle and pops of the small fire she built before leaving. Still thankfully burning steadily from where she had built it not too far from where Jess lay bundled up in a thin, tattered sheet on that moldy mattress in an attempt to try and keep her warm. Not that the fire seemed to help much, not with how Jess was still continuing to shiver and whimper. As always, it was a sound that set Emily’s teeth on edge, but considering it meant that Jess had somehow managed to live yet another hour longer than she figured, she guessed she couldn’t complain.
(That was a lie. It was a beautiful sound; the most wonderful that Em had ever heard. One that brought tears to her eyes and something that caught in her throat. But it wasn’t a feeling that she had ever felt ready to decipher, and especially not now. So she pretended like it didn’t exist just like she always did.)
“Damn, still alive huh? You’re more stubborn than I thought. Though I guess you always were a bit of a bitch that way, you never did know when to listen to what was good for you.”
Emily waits for the response that she knows will be coming (“Takes one to know one.” “You’ve always been such a bitch you know that?” “Why did you have to be the one to find me?”) but it’s when the only reply she does receive is just a muffled, weak sob that she actually turns to look at her.
(Starts to fear that death may be closer than she thinks.)
And yet, even then, even though she is terrified that this might just be it (that she might actually find herself stuck all alone down here), Emily still can’t help but try and turn this into a fight. “Oh please, as if I’d be lucky enough to have you die on me. You’d never be that nice to be, let’s be real here.”
She leaves the helmet of snow near the fire so it can melt, and carefully kneels down next to Jess on the moldy mattress. Reaching into the canvas bag (the one that she refuses to ever have leave her side) she knocks aside a couple of the flares that are still left and pulls out the canteen of water. And after unscrewing the top, she carefully and gently lifts Jess’s head just enough so she can slowly start to trickle water in between her dried, chapped, and blue (how can they possibly be this blue?!) lips. “We can both admit that you never were that good of actress Jess, so you can stop faking this whole ‘oh woe is me, I’m so injured and sick’ bullshit anytime now.”
Emily’s more relieved than she would like to admit (and she will never, ever admit it—not even to herself) when Jess blearily starts to open her eyes as she weakly tries to drink the water. “Fuck….you….”
She just rolls her eyes with a scoff. “Is that really all you have to say to me? I mean, I figured that you had managed to lose those few brain cells you did have when you started dating Mike of all people behind my back, but this is worse than I thought.”
And slowly, so slowly, Emily just watches as Jess weakly raises her hand, and her middle finger with it. She tries not to notice how obvious it is that the blue-black of frostbite has now expanded to nearly the full length of her fingers despite the finger-less gloves that cover most of it from view.
Unfortunately, it isn’t long before Jess’s already weak sips start to slow before she stops drinking entirely and Emily is forced to close the lid of the canteen and put it back into her bag. Jess’s eyes closing once again as she drops back into that painful, restless sleep that only threatens to bring her closer to death with every minute that passes.
(She refuses to acknowledge the gentle way she had lowered Jessica’s head back down, or they way she had carefully brushed some of the bloody, sweaty strands of blonde hair from off of her forehead. It means nothing. Probably just some stupid maternal instinct or whatever. The fact that she had never once in her life been what anyone would call maternal means nothing too.)
Emily doesn’t even have to bother checking Jess’s bandages to see how much worse the damage must be now. Even hidden underneath all the layers of the letterman jacket, thick, green coat, and jeans she can smell it. No matter how many times she can wash and clean the bandages, it will never stop the rot and infection that has already set in.
(And just like she has absolutely refused to acknowledge everything else, Emily steadfastly ignores the way she affectionately tugs down the beanie lower to try and cover Jess’s ears better and tightens the laces on the thick soled winter boots that cover her feet. It won’t do anything to prevent the frostbite that’s already set in but it’s better than nothing.)
Turning back to the small fire, Emily isn’t surprised to see that the flames had died down almost completely by now, leaving nothing but bright embers still burning in the ashes, but not much else. She takes a couple of the smaller pieces of wood from the pile she’d built up of the last couple of days and adds it, hoping to see it catch alight. It’s only when it still hadn’t after a couple of minutes that she reaches back into her bag and pulls out both the worn journal and the small lighter from within. With little fanfare or hesitation, Emily rips a couple of pages from the back of the book and crumples them into balls for kindling, watching as the paper quickly catches fire from the lighter.
It isn’t until sees the wood itself finally starting to burn with a sharp crack of splitting wood that she turns to the helmet that’s no longer filled with snow but with water. And after a couple of quick taps to ensure that the metal isn’t hot enough to burn her fingers (it isn’t of course, hasn’t been since that first night when she put it way to close to the flames in desperation for the snow to melt faster) she begins the process of attempting to carefully pour it into the canteen. Most of splashes to the rocky ground of course, but it doesn’t concern Emily too much. It’s not like she’s going to have to look very hard to find more snow in the middle February after all.
(She has a feeling she wouldn’t be needing much more of it soon anyways.)
Without thinking, she brings out the little baggie of jerky from inside the bag and takes one of the few remaining pieces so she can drop it into what little water remains in the helmet so try and soften it up just a little, but pauses. She considers if for a moment—dry, tasteless and completely unseasoned— with a grimace and turns back to look at Jess—cold, basically on death’s door—and drops both it and the baggie back into the canvas bag. It would be wasted on her after all, not like she can eat any of it no matter how long Emily tried to soften the meat.
And well, it’s not like she wants to eat it. Stuff tasted absolutely awful. She’d rather starve than try and force even another bite of that crud down.
Despite how shakily she gets to her feet, Emily’s head is held high and there’s surety to her steps as she confidently marches (hobbles) out of the shelter. Past the dug up grave that contained nothing but cracked bones and past the pool of stagnant water. Ignoring the loud creak and rush of water as the water wheel still continues its spin even decades after being abandoned.
She continues her purposeful march until she stands before the open metal door. Her boots splashing in the shallow puddles of water and stepping over the decapitated head that had rushed out when she had opened the door only a couple of short days ago.
Until she stood in the exact same spot where she had screamed and puked at the sight of the dead bodies of the people that she had once considered some of her closest friends.
Chris is hanging from a chain, head gone and a hook snagged deep into his back and ripping through all those layers of shirts and sweaters and jackets that he always seemed to have on. That Emily had loved to rib him about with Josh and Jess enthusiastically backing her up with their own colourful commentary and opinions of Chris’s fashion choices. All as he would continue to sputter indignantly and shoot back that it wasn’t his fault that he was the only one with the sense to dress warm.
Matt's hanging as well not far off, though his was somehow a far more gruesome picture. The hook that kept him suspended snagged right through his jaw and jutting out his open mouth, his dead eyes still opened wide in absolute terror as blood still continued it’s slow dribble out the corner of his mouth. The guilt as she stared at him still hurt the most. Sure she may have kind of been a little bit of a bitch to him that night—angry and confused for reasons she couldn’t (refused to) name—but that didn’t mean that she had ever wanted him to die.
Unlike the others, Ashley’s body wasn’t immediately obviously out in the open, but that didn’t mean it didn’t exist. That, Emily had discovered to her horror, had almost been shoved into a corner. Like it had been a thoughtless, worthless acquisition compared to Chris and Matt. Though once realizing that Ashley’s body also seemed to be missing it’s head just like Chris, it made a bit more sense. Cause while no amount of searching had been able to locate Chris’s, Ashley’s had been easy. Hanging locked away in a cage above, like it alone had been the pride and joy of her death.
(Sam, Mike, and Josh’s bodies were conspicuously missing from the collection, though that didn’t mean much. Not when she knew exactly where Josh’s was: hanging in the shed not far from the lodge itself. The first victim of a night of gruesome murders that had left her and Jess as the only survivors. And though the lack of Sam and Mike’s corpses had once given Emily some small hope that maybe, just maybe, at least a couple of her friends had managed to survive, it was a hope that had just like everyone else. All because while she wasn’t sure that Mike cared all that much about what happened to her, Sam was a different story all together. She would have looked, would have sent help if she was able.)
Emily ignored all of them. Ignored all the corpses of the people she had considered close friends not that long ago. Who were the only reason that Jess was still warm and alive even now. She walked straight past them and up to the only body that mattered. Until she stood in front of the decapitated body of the creepy old man that had so rudely shoved her off of a ledge, and winded her with an old, smelly canvas bag that he had tossed down after her.
A bag that had been stuffed with flares, a lighter, a handful of cigars, a roll of fresh bandages, and baggie of jerk, a canteen of fresh water, and small hunting knife, and most importantly, a journal.
A journal that had explained exactly who what the thing that chased her through the mines was. Explained what they were, and how they came to exist.
If Matt, Chris, and Ashley were the reason that’s Jess was still alive even now, than the old man was the only reason that Emily was still alive as well.
And as she took out the hunting knife out of the bag and began to unsheathe it, would be still be keeping both her and Jess alive for the foreseeable future. Cause Emily refused to die, not like this and certainly not here. And above all else, she refuses to live alone.
(Emily’s already lost the rest of her friends, she refuses to lose the most important the last one she has left.)