Second Option

She’s cornering me. Bitch.

Slept longer than usual. Ain’t a good thing. Just meant she had more to show me. Dream started like usual, with me and Windmill, leading off from an RV campground. No sign of the others. The rope snares me out of nowhere, and I’m damned sure it’s the Hanging Man hauling me in. I’m bloody, and every time I watch I see more injuries. Twisted wrist from trying to catch on something, as I’m bein’ pulled. Fingers snapped as I’m trying to shield my face.

Like usual, I thought she would reach for me, and I’d wake myself up. I was wrong. Got to that same point, and then it all just stopped. Rewound like a movie. And, somehow, I was able to see it going on in my mind’s eye while She showed me something new.

What would happen if I don’t wind up at that site, I reckon.

Sleeping in a motel. Three of us, in one room – ain’t sure where Windmill’s supposed to be. Still late at night. I ain’t asleep, though; must be my watch, in the dream, ‘cause Curt and Alyssa are both passed out good on the same bed. Maybe not fighting, anymore, for them to be that close together. Anyway, I hear something outside. A growling. Pawing at the door.

Me in the dream, and me watchin’, we both know what it is. I grab the Mauser, start hauling things in front of the door. It wakes Curt and Alyssa up. They don’t ask questions, they just start helping. But it’s no good.

The Black Dog bursts through the barricade, jaws gnashing, and I see everything. Fragments of bone and reeking flesh stitched together under this mass of dark, and I can make out their faces. All of their faces. They look like the two men, and Georgia, and Kallaway, and everyone else I killed.

And for a second, before I watch ‘me’ fire the gun into the Hound’s face, I can make out Ambrose and Clara’s faces, too.

I shoot, and the sound makes my ears ring so bad I feel like my ears are bleeding. No sign of the Hounded. Don’t relax, ‘cause I know better. And I’m right.

From the wall behind, the Dog rips through it like it’s tissue. Snarling even more, big bleeding hole in its face, but it ain’t stopping.

Charges right past Alyssa and Curtis, and it starts tearing into me. Piece by piece. Clawing through my stomach and dragging intestines out by the teeth. The other two, they’re trying to pull it off. They can’t.

And once it’s done with me, it starts in on the two of them.

Back in my mind’s eye, that’s the exact point I get close enough to see that silhouette, the one that might be the Hanging Man. I don’t know what to think.

The Vision giggled from behind me, and this time I turn. Look right at her. Don’t quite meet her eyes, but I see they ain’t natural. Blank, like. Pupils are giant, like gapin’ black holes trying to suck me in. And she whispers at me, urging me to give in to her. Says I can end it now, before she shows me what else I could expect, tomorrow night.

She’s closer than I know how to deal with, and I force myself awake before she can grab my face.

Seems like I’m being shown my choices. Get to pick my poison.

Those are two options. Whenever that time is, when it comes, I’m gonna be in one of the places she’s showing me.

Choose my own death.