IN THE QUIET OF THE ESTATE, SHE SITS IN SILENCE. The killer is not stalking the grounds, the survivors are not scurrying from generator to generator trying to get out. It is empty, hollow, even peaceful. The fog is light, the stars shine, and the moon is a waxing smile. The crows barely stir at the slightest movement. Their master is not hunting, not seeking.

She sits with Her back against the hand-laid stone wall of the small enclosure, and She waits for THE GIRL to come forward. She laid out enough clues for Meg to find her way here, between the lack of pallets and boxes, and the path lit by sickly fireflies.

Her inhuman eyes look up, reflecting red from within the iris, when She sees her. In Her arms, a twisted bundle, damned shape that is not meant to exist. It does not breathe because it does not live. ❝ Where is your G̻̏Ļ̚Ȯ̧Ǎ̞T̟̓Ǐ͚Ṇ͊G͈͋ now, sweetheart? ❞

She rises to Her feet with the bundle. It will be the last She ever tries– in the culling of the spring equinox She’d hoped, against all foolish reason– this would be the one to live. Meg got away, wounded Evan severely, and the PUNISHMENT had been enacted. Taking Deliah’s form was easy, and tormenting Meg even easier… for all of Her strength, She thought it wouldn’t be so taxing to do so. She didn’t think it would cost Her this child. But it had.

❝ Tell me now, with no guises hiding my face, hiding what I am from you, ❞ She closes the gap slowly with bare, blackened feet, the air crackling around Her.  ❝   Belittle my work, run around and chide my pawns for their parts to play. Tell me that this is a worthy r̛̰e̞͝w͈̿a͇̒ṟ̐d̤́ for your I̖͂ŇS̘͌Ǫ̑L̳̿E̘͒N̈́C̯̀E̛͔. ❞

With a single gesture She drops the little CORPSE into Meg’s arms, lets her hold the mangled flesh that was meant to be Her child. Wrapped in a black blanket deceptively soft is a mass of flesh. Were Meg to pull the cloth back, the tragic shape within would hold a mix of human and arachnid features. An infant’s face, with button nose and pouty lips, but further down, baby soft skin is replaced by blackened flesh and sharp legs curled in on themselves like a DEAD SPIDER on the floorboards– because that is what this poor creature is. DEAD.

               IT  IS  NOT  OFTEN  FEAR  RISES  in  the  throat  of  Meg  Thomas:  she  is  a  human  fire  filled  to  the  brim  with  adrenaline,  always  trying  to  keep  one  foot  ahead  of  the  game.  She  is  a  taunter,  a  vaulter,  a  perfect  distraction  and  decoy  for  keeping  killers  busy  and  in  the  loop  of  torment  and  humiliation.  She’s  the  fastest  of  all  her  friends,  the  original  core  four,  and  her  years  of  fleeing  from  killers  and  juking  their  hits  has  made  her  overconfident.  Keen.  Perhaps  even  arrogant.  Meg  knew  when  she  wounded  Evan  as  severely  as  she  did,  there  would  be  consequences.  Consequences  that  came  to  her  dressed  up  in  the  flesh  of  her  sickly  mother,  who  quickly  morphed  into  the  vile  true  guise  of  the  Entity  and  reaped  her  revenge  for  the  pain  Macmillan  faced.  But  now,  their  agony  is  greater  than  any  infected  flesh  wound.  For  the  first  time  in  a  long  time,  when  her  mother’s  eyes  dissolved  into  those  terrible  glowing  pupils,  fear  found  a  home  inside  Megan:  and  here,  alone  with  the  Goddess  again,  it  rises  from  her  belly  upward.  But  the  Eldritch  abomination  seems  weak...  but  Meg  soon  will  learn  why.

              What  sits  in  the  blanket  feels  cold.  Stiff.  Hard  and  heavy.  Her  heart  beats  rapidly  in  her  rib  cage,  tells  her,  desperately,  not  to  pull  back  the  cover  and  unveil  the  truth  ---  be  she  cannot  help  herself,  and  does  so  anyway,  with  trembling,  bloody  fingers.  She  carefully  peels  back  the  dark  cloth,  only  to  find  all  of  a  sudden  her  stomach  feels  as  if  one  end  of  her  intestine  has  been  tied  to  a  heavy  object,  and  thrown  off  the  edge  of  a  bridge,  flung  DOWN  DOWN  DOWN  into  ice  cold  water,  washing  over  her  system  and  numbing  her  marrow  with  shock.    “...I...  I  didn’t  know.”  It’s  all  she  can  say,  staring  at  the  sad  lump  of  flesh  and  spider  limbs,  of  this  deceased  infant  of  both  god  and  human  blood:  a  child  that  had  been  very  well  breathing  maybe  moments  ago,  moments  that  may  seem  like  days,  weeks  ---  but  without  its  mothers  strength  to  feed  it,  nurture  it,  focus  it  solely  on  survival,  it  has  perished  like  all  the  others  that  came  before  it.  It  seems  where  the  Entity  is  excellent  at  preserving  and  resurrecting  life,  She  cannot  create  life  anew.  

               *  THE  FASTEST  FINAL  GIRL  OF  THE  FOG  !