Getting back to her feet, Chandler hurried on, terrified that at any moment the figure might catch up to her and pull her down. The cars were so close now, but the pain was intensifying and finally she had to stop for a moment as she reached the cart, and she allowed herself a fraction of a second to rest before turning and seeing that the dead man was now only a few paces behind. She glanced around, hoping to see Doctor Levant, but there was no sign of him.
Turning, she hurried toward the cars, only to trip against the trailer’s side and fall forward, thudding down against the mud. She immediately began to haul herself up, but then she froze as she realized she could hear a low, snarling groan directly above.
Slowly, she looked up and saw the dead man towering above her.
“What do you want?” she sobbed. “I don’t have anything! I haven’t done anything to you!”
She waited, but the figure merely swayed in front of her for a moment with the chain hanging low from around its neck.
Chandler began to inch back, while trying to pick the perfect moment to turn and run toward the car. For now she kept her eyes fixed on the figure, which stood silhouetted against the slowly brightening dawn sky. And as she stared at the figure in disbelief, she realized that it seemed to be not so much standing, as almost held up in the air. Its feet were on the ground, and it seemed to walk, but its posture suggested that some external force was involved in keeping it up like a puppet dangling from cosmic strings.
“You can’t be real,” Chandler stammered, still trying to work out what she was actually seeing. “Please, just—”
Before she could finish, the figure let out a low, pained growl.
Panicking, Chandler turned to crawl away. She was still wearing Levant’s jacket, and suddenly the two gold coins slipped out from one of the pockets. Feeling a flicker of pain in her ankle, Chandler stopped for a moment, and then she spotted the coins glistening in the mud. She hesitated, before picking them up and staring at them, and at that moment she remembered having seen something similar on the back of the cart. She’d told Chad Clark to catalog them for later study, but she figured he might have forgotten as usual. In which case, how had they ended up in Levant’s pocket?
Suddenly she heard another snarl, and she turned to see the figure lunged at her. She managed to pull herself out of the way, but in the process she realized that the figure actually seemed to be lunging not at her face but at the hand she was using to hold the coins.
“Take them!” she screamed, before throwing the coins at the figure and then pulling a little way further back. “They’re yours! Just take them and leave me alone!”
The coins hit the figure’s chest and fell to the ground. For a moment, the figure looked down at them, but then it turned to Chandler and snarled again. This time, as it lunged at her, she was forced to roll away, although in the process she slammed her ankle against the figure’s trailing chain. Crying out, she tried to get up onto her hands and knees, but the pain was intense and for a moment she felt as if she might never be able to get up again. Then, slowly, she realized she could hear the chain getting closer.
Turning, she saw the figure lunging at her once more.
She tried to pull away, but this time the creature managed to grab the back of her shirt. Crying out, she tried to get loose but instead she felt herself being lifted up. Her right arm became caught in the chain, but she was powerless to keep herself from being slowly raised from the ground, and a moment later she felt the figure place a hand on her throat.
“No, please!” she yelled. “What do you want from me? I gave you the coins!”
She twisted and turned, and after a moment she managed to slam herself against the front of the cart. This wasn’t enough to get her free, but she was at least able to slip her right arm loose and suddenly she spotted a wooden post on the front of the cart. Realizing that she might only have one chance, she slipped the chain over the post and then she slammed her elbow into the figure’s chest, with enough force to send her slumping back down to the ground.
Landing hard on her elbows, she quickly began to scurry away, before spotting the coins. She turned back and grabbed them both, and then she crawled away until she was sure she was safe. Then, turning, she looked back and saw that although the creature was struggling to catch her, its chain was caught on the cart. And no matter how hard the creature tried to break loose, it seemed unable to understand why it was being held back.
Scrabbling to her feet, Chandler limped over to her car. When she tried the door, however, she found that it was locked, which meant she must have left her keys somewhere else. She checked her pockets again, but then she spotted the keys dangling in the ignition and she realized she’d locked herself out.
“No!” she screamed, slamming her fists on the window before limping around and heading to Doctor Levant’s car.
She tried the door, but this too was locked.
Realizing that the cars were going to be no help, she looked out across the clearing. The nearest road was miles and miles away, and she felt as if she’d pass out before she could get there. For a moment she imagined herself unconscious on the ground, far from help, and she realized she might never be found. Her only hope was to stay at the cabin and to wait for Clark and the others to arrive in a few hours’ time. Slowly, she turned and limped back around the cars, and then she stopped as she saw the figure still trying to free itself.
“Are you…”
She stared at the figure for a moment, but she could no longer deny what she was seeing.
“You’re dead,” she whispered finally.
The figure let out an angry groan as it tried again to break loose.
“You’re dead,” Chandler said again, as a sense of hollow horror spread through her body. “You’ve been dead for a long time, haven’t you?”
She kept telling herself that there had to be some other explanation, but deep down she knew that the man had to be dead. Long dead. She’d never believed in anything like this before, but now she understood that somehow a dead man had come back to life, filled with what seemed like an unstoppable anger. And the anger was clearly directed at anyone who possessed the coins.
“Doctor Levant!” she shouted, turning and looking toward the forest. After a moment she cupped her hands around her mouth and yelled again. “Doctor Levant!”
She waited.
All she heard was the dead figure’s continued frustration.
“Why did you do that to him?” she asked, turning to face the figure.
She waited, but there was no indication that the figure had even heard her.
“Do these belong with them?” she shouted, trying desperately to understand what was happening. “Is that it? Do the coins belong with those bodies?”
The figure snarled at her, but still it couldn’t get free.
Chandler looked down at the coins, but she still couldn’t quite make out the markings. They were like nothing else that she’d ever seen, and – although she was certainly no numismatist – she was surprised that absolutely nothing about the coins seemed familiar. After a moment, she was just about able to make out parts of one word on the first coin’s side.
“Inferno?” she whispered, her mind racing to figure out why that would be relevant. “Infernu? Something like that.”
Suddenly she heard a loud bumping sound, and she turned to see that the figure was struggling harder than ever to get free from the chain. She took a step back, but the urge to run was countered by another, stronger urge to end this madness as quickly as possible. If she ran, the figure might just come after her. If she could stop everything right now and make sure nobody else got hurt, then she told herself she should do that now and ask questions later.