Full-Circle

Octavia had the most peaceful day of all compared to most of the other members of the misfits five.

After lunch, Eli was surprised by his Lincoln breaking down in the parking lot, so he and his driver, James, had to have the car towed and repaired before either of them could carry on with the rest of their day.

Samuel had a blast performing for a stadium of thousands before hurriedly packing and giving every other member of the Arsonists—his band—a rushed goodbye. He felt incredibly impatient, wanting more than anything to get back home and assist his sister with her getaway from David.

Unbeknown to Samuel, however—Mohinder had already removed Hailey from that toxic environment, and she was now lying in a hospital bed, happily medicated and mindlessly flipping through the channels on the TV in her hospital room, her wrist having been injected with something that took her swelling down. The wrist was apparently sprained, and now tucked neatly into a vanilla-colored cast.

So—as the later afternoon set in, and as Samuel made a speedy drive back to Wallace, and Mohinder spent the rest of his workday alongside Alex with no further emergencies to respond to—Hailey sat in her hospital room, periodically glancing at the clock on the wall and waiting for six o’clock to arrive, and Eli was finally driven to the Endzone once the alternator in the Lincoln had been replaced, dropped off by James before his driver cruised away to begin his weekend off.

And beyond them all—Octavia had taken care of all her errands, driven to the Endzone, and parked behind the enormous building, her car facing away from it and stopped at the farthest spot that she could claim, hoping to maintain some isolation and seclusion like usual. After all—when you lived in your car, you often didn’t like to park near others who could peek inside and get nosy. It was Friday night, and this club would likely get pretty busy in the hours to come. It was better if she was parked as far from the other spots as physically possible, especially if she intended to stay here tonight.

Her blue KIA Soul sat on the patch of grass just past the end of the parking lot, and the inside of her car was perfectly equipped to be her miniature apartment; the back seat was coated with blankets, and there were several pillows resting against the side door. The passenger seat contained a cooler, and a few snacks were scattered around it, the floorboard filled with bottled waters and energy drinks, as well as a small bag of dry puppy food for her little dog, MiMi. The back seat was the most impressive, though; it was her bed, her office, and her entertainment area all in one, with bungie cords connected strategically between the handles above the doors, hanging down and holding up a single board of plywood, where her laptop was sitting, and a mouse was connected beside it. A chunky black power adapter was plugged into the lighter port up front, and the power cord for the laptop was plugged into it, ensuring that the laptop would not die if she simply started the car every now and then. She sat with her legs folded underneath the hovering plywood desk, MiMi’s plastic water bowl sitting in the back floorboard and hogtied in place by more bungie cords, the many pillows pressed up against Octavia from behind to give her good back support while she sat sideways in this seat. Black shirts and old sheets were used to cover up the windows while she sat in here, and she had a dark headset with streamlined neon lights along the sides placed on her head, its microphone extended, and her Alienware’s webcam powered on. She was connected to Endzone’s WiFi now, livestreaming on Rumble and speaking to her followers.

“See—but that’s the thing about Elon Musk,” Octavia continued to rant. “If he’s all Team Humanity, and he’s a big superhero for free speech, and if he actually really is against the deep state—then what the hell is he doing with all this AI crap? Why is he saying he’s literally gonna summon a demon with it? He’s freaking weird , man. I just don’t trust him. I don’t know. Like, who says stuff like that? And hello— Nuralink? What kind of damn transhumanist dystopian George Orwell fuckery is that shit?! Oh, I’m the crazy one for not trusting the guy who wants to chip people’s brains?! Well, pfffshit, pardon the hell outta me! I guess I must be fuckin’ psycho!”

She laughed and shook her head, grabbing her Monster can from the slot behind the driver seat and taking a swig from it before sliding it back in. Then, she swiped her bangs aside and leaned closer to her phone screen—which was held up by a tripod beside her laptop, displaying her chatroom—and she read a few of her follower’s comments in her head.

“No—I don’t want anything to do with hot lusty sex with an Elon Musk robot,” she stated. “And, yes, I am in my car. If you’re new here, then welcome to the world of Ozzie—I live in my car because living in a house is fucking impossible to do in the deep state’s dying America. No—actually, it’s genuinely just not worth even trying. I make sixteen dollars an hour, and I can’t afford a place that’s worth a damn. I’d have to go broke just to live in the crappiest places possible here—and I can’t save money doing that. But I can save money by never having to pay rent and utilities, so there.”

She paused and watched the chat fill with a few more comments, squinting intently at one of them.

“Do I have anyone I can stay with?” Octavia read aloud, glimpsing at her back windshield, which was currently covered up by a dark t-shirt draped over her laundry bag, though she knew the Endzone building was right out there, and she sighed and made a shrug. “Well, no, not anyone I wanna ask.”

She looked to the laptop and the phone again, still skimming over the chat.

“Why did I leave my mom’s?” she read. “Aw… sheezus, you guys, what’s up with the personal questions? Uuum… well, she had her own ideas about what I should be doing with my life, and there was no work out there… and I didn’t wanna leave my hometown in the first place, so… I just made my way back here. My dad is a deadbeat in prison, and most of his side of the family is dead… so… y’know. I’m just on my own.”

Her eyes landed on another question in her chatroom.

“Why am I not scared of living like this?” Octavia uttered, then laughed, reaching under the head rest of the driver seat and pulling out the handgun that was tucked beneath it.

She held it up for the camera for a second, then stuffed it away again, sighing and tossing up a hand.

“I’ve had to pull that on people before… and I’ve gotten pretty numb to it,” Octavia told them all. “Doesn’t scare me or worry me at all anymore. In fact, that was…”

She paused, glancing down and huffing out a breath.

“That was grandfathered in a long time ago,” she murmured. “Growing up with my dad’s side of the family just… well, it… it just makes you get used to violence and insanity from a really young age. I’ll just say that. I’m dead inside to it anymore.”

Octavia stared downward for a moment, then looked to the chat again, cracking a smirk.

“Where’s MiMi?” she said, reaching to the front seat and picking up the small gray pit-bull puppy who’d been sleeping there. “Here she is…!”

Octavia held up the tiny pup in front of the camera, Mimi licking her lips and wagging her little tail.

“Awww, yes, there’s my sweet girl,” Octavia beamed, holding her precious puppy close and letting her vigorously lick her cheek. “N’awww… lil’ puppy coffee breath…”

The chat began to move more quickly with happy and excited comments, just as it always did whenever MiMi would make an appearance on camera.

“Where did I get her from?” Octavia read off the screen. “I found her at the Gas Express here in town. Somebody left her there. She’s my lil’ rescue baby. The puppy distribution system is real, y’all. Just pray real hard, and it will find you, too.”

She placed Mimi down and allowed her to curl up on the blankets beside her. Then, she leaned up front, peering out the windshield—the only window that wasn’t covered up—and saw that the sky was steadily growing darker.

“Might have to go inside pretty soon,” Octavia said, leaning back and facing her camera again. “I’m supposed to be meeting a friend at this place I’m at… I just got here early, so I decided to talk to y’all for a while first. Oh my God… you guys…”

The thought of meeting Eli again entered her mind, and she suddenly wanted to tell the story to her followers, but she paused for a second, rethinking the whole thing and wondering how much of it she should tell on stream. After a moment, she decided it would be fine to tell the tale, so long as she kept certain things rather vague.

“This guy… okay,” Octavia began, raising her hands and smirking, gesturing while she spoke. “First of all, it’s worth mentioning that living with my dad kept me moving like all the time when I was a kid… so I never got to make any actual friends until I lived with my mom, and by the time that happened, I was in high school. I made five best friends there, and they were like… everything to me. They were there before these last friends I had that I lost during COVID. They were there before everybody else… and I haven’t thought about them in freaking forever, you guys. Then… I go to the protest today… and lo and behold, one of them is just there, and he’s kind of part of everything. Now, we’re gonna hang out…”

She hesitated, glimpsing down and sighing, biting her lip as she briefly lost herself to her thoughts.

“But I’m honestly kind of nervous… just a little bit,” she murmured. “Because I…”

Octavia paused and swallowed, remembering the last time she saw Eli over twenty years ago and suddenly replaying the memory of it in her mind, a memory that she hadn’t revisited in a very long time, and she felt a strange, anxious flutter in the pit of her stomach.

“Honestly… way back then, I had a super hard crush on this other guy in our group,” she explained, breathing out a laugh and combing her bangs back. “But this guy… this guy I ran into today… he is… something else. The whole thing with him was… just… ah… I don’t know. He was the last person from that group that I ever saw… and something happened that…”

Octavia stopped, shaking her head once and swatting the air.

“I’m not gonna get into all that on stream,” she said. “The point is, these people used to be like family to me, and I’m super nervous now, because I don’t make friends or keep friends very well… even though I’d really fucking like to… so if anybody has any advice on how to keep friends, lemme hear it.”

She fell silent and waited a moment, reading more comments from the chatroom.

“Okay… one of you said I should just be myself,” Octavia mumbled. “And… another one of you said… definitely don’t be yourself. Okay… cool… thanks. Yeah, you guys are a big freaking help. Problem solved.”

She snickered and scanned over the comments even more.

“Did I see the gas prices? Yes… I fucking did,” Octavia griped, her tone instantly rising. “And it’s fucking insane… like eight dollars a gallon, and still going up. That combined with the data centers… like… holy shit, none of us are ever gonna be allowed to have gas or water anymore, and God knows the food is all going to shit, too. Can’t afford that, either… not that most of it is even actual food anymore…”

She took a breath and drank a swig of water from one of the bottled waters in her floor, and she continued reading off questions and answering them for a while longer.

“Do I believe that the government can control the weather?” Octavia muttered, tapping two fingers to her mouth. “Well… it’s not really up for speculation to believe or disbelieve, to be honest. It’s been documented since the 1940s. I mean, I’m not gonna lie… out of all the conspiracies in the world, that one definitely sounds like one of the most ‘out there’ ones… and it genuinely just sounds crazy. It actually sounds like something stupid and psychotic that a paranoid schizo would come up with. But like… it’s documented. They’ve been experimenting with that kind of shit for a long damn time. You can’t just say it’s not real when they’ve literally been doing it…”

She glanced at the windshield again, seeing that a late-day sunset was steadily darkening into an autumn twilight now.

“I’m gonna have to go… but I can read one more question,” Octavia disclosed, hunching closer and choosing her final comment for the night. “What is my plan for the end times?”

She leaned farther back and pondered on this, resting against her mountain of pillows and gazing up at nothing in particular, huffing out a big cloud of breath.

“Honestly,” she said softly, placing her hands atop her head and intertwining her fingers together. “I don’t really have one. I have some doomsday preps in my car, but… other than that… I don’t really… plan anymore. I stopped planning for that when I stopped having people to plan for.”

There was a long, vacant silence following her words.

Then, Octavia sat back upright and sighed, giving the webcam a conclusive nod.

“All right… that’s it for tonight,” she said. “Thank you everyone for your questions and donations… and I really, really, seriously super appreciate you. I’m gonna go in this club and die from social anxiety now. Happy Friday! G’bye!”

She pulled up Streamlabs on her laptop, clicked on END STREAM, and let out a massive breath, flumping back against her pillows and peeling the headset off at long last.

MiMi perked up and leaped onto her stomach, walking up to her face and licking her repeatedly, her tiny tail whipping to and fro as she did.

Octavia laughed and hugged the puppy, petting her and simply holding her, savoring the moment of peace and quiet. However, the longer she lay in her back seat, the more noticeable the distant, echoing ambiance of car engines and strangers’ voices became to her. The night at the club was beginning, and everyone was showing up to start their weekend of fun…

She knew it was time to go inside and find Eli, but she still felt hesitant. It was partially because of how the two of them had left things all those years ago—but even more than that, she felt a touch of apprehension at the idea of getting close to someone.

After all—when Octavia had first moved back into Wallace, she made a new group of friends at the community center, a group of kind, loving, and fun individuals who didn’t think twice about offering her a roommate deal. Those people became great friends, people she felt strongly attached to—but then, COVID happened, and suddenly, she became their enemy, simply because she didn’t get a COVID vaccine. It wasn’t as if she made a huge anti-vax show of it or expressed any hatred towards them; Octavia simply didn’t feel comfortable with taking the shot. She saw someone collapse into convolutions at the hospital after taking it, and after witnessing that, she simply did not want to have it. Her roommates kicked her out of their house—and now, here Octavia was, retreating to her usual default status of loneliness and isolation, because, in reality, it always seemed to be the only status she could trust.

She hated to admit it, even and especially to herself, but some deep part of her still held a bit of a grudge towards her high school friends for disappearing out of her life so easily. Then, when she made new friends, and when she actually dared to think she was worth keeping as one—those people went far out of their way to prove her wrong, even resorting to calling her names and saying truly awful things to her, implying that she should end her own life for ‘causing the pandemic,’ as they had worded it. It was as if they had transformed into entirely different people from the sweet and loving ones she knew from the community center, as if their loyalties and friendships suddenly meant nothing at all to them anymore.

But now—now, that door was opening once again, and the possibility of having a close bond with someone was presenting itself temptingly to her, just as it always had in the past shortly before landing her in a world of heartbreak.

Octavia lay in silence, MiMi resting her little head on her shoulder, and she stared emptily at the dark ceiling of her car, releasing a stressed cloud of breath.

Throughout her life, everyone seemed to dismiss her as crazy, or strange, or villainous in some way. She hardly ever dated anyone, and when she did, it never lasted. She rarely had friends, and all those friendships ended, either dismissively or outright badly. Even among the misfits five, she never talked much about her beliefs, or her feelings on the world, or the fact that she liked to do doomsday-prepping, because she knew how it looked and sounded to other people, and it always made everyone else take a step back from her.

But, the longer she dwelled on it, and the more she pondered specifically on Eli Riley—the more she began to consider that he, of all people, might react differently than the rest.

Eli seemed to be on her side throughout everything that unfolded at the courthouse today, as if he understood the issues at hand in just the same way she did. Not only that—but she distinctly remembered that Eli knew more about her conspiracy research and her doomsday-prepping than anyone else among their original friend group, and even back then—even when he was just a lonesome teenager trying to flee from the ghetto—he didn’t show a hint of judgment towards her for it.

It wasn’t as if she ever expected Mohinder, or Samuel, or Hailey to judge or hate her for it—but she just didn’t think they would understand it, and in Octavia’s experience, anyone who failed to understand the behavior often kept whoever was attached to it at arm’s length, at absolute best.

Still—this was Eli, and she very much wanted to rekindle some kind of friendship with him. In fact, he seemed to want the same thing. Maybe he would understand her, at least better than most.

After all the times she’d been hurt, attacked, or forgotten about, she couldn’t help but feel hesitant to become close to someone again—but, nevertheless, she certainly couldn’t shake the stronger feeling inside her, the longing and the desire to simply go for it and seize that meaningful connection that she’d been craving and starved of for so long now.

“Screw it,” she mumbled, pulling out her phone and swiping the screen, deciding to send him a text.

She typed it out and sent it. The message read;

Hey, I’m here, parked out back. Where should we meet up?

Octavia laid the phone on her chest and sighed. Moments later, it vibrated, and she checked it again.

Eli’s response was;

Just come on in and I’ll find ya OC

Octavia’s eyes narrowed, and she scoffed with a laugh, sitting up and shaking her head. She reached into the right-side pocket of her tight leather jacket, double-checking that her .25 was in its usual spot, then she fixed her beanie onto her head and grabbed a handful of puppy food from the bag up front, placing it in a tiny pile on the back seat for MiMi to feast on.

“I’ll be back later, sweetie,” Octavia said gingerly, kissing the pup on the head as she began to chomp on her food. “Seeya. Be a good girl. If anybody comes in here, bite their dick off.”

She extended her legs over the middle console, sliding into the driver seat and popping it open. When she stood on the grass outside, greeted by the chilly night air all around, her legs ached, and she stretched and rolled her neck before swinging the door shut and hitting the button on her keys, ensuring that her car was locked.

Then, Octavia pocketed her hands and walked around her car, gazing across the darkened rear parking lot and seeing that several more cars were parked up and down it than there were when she first arrived here in the afternoon, a few strangers standing outside the building and passing a joint around, most of the people in her sight leaving their vehicles and marching off toward the back entrance of the club.

Octavia took in a breath, cocked her head, and broke into a steady stride, silently hoping this night would be worthwhile.

Mere minutes after Hailey was officially discharged from Wallace Medical Center—she emerged in the lobby to find Mohinder waiting there for her, standing by the glass double-doors and giving her a smile and a wave.

Hailey grinned, feeling positively elated, and only partially due to the painkillers; she practically skipped over to him with her white backpack dangling around on her shoulder, ignoring the dull pain in her stomach and her face, her bruises feeling almost absent from her awareness. Even her aching wrist felt leagues better now, and her hair had been combed neatly down and tied back in a short, tiny ponytail, her hand safe and sound in its cast, and her disposition noticeably lighter and calmer now.

“Glad to see you’re feeling better,” Mohinder remarked.

“That’s ‘cuz of you ,” Hailey grinned, tapping him on the nose.

“No… that’s because of oxycodone,” Mohinder laughed. “And me too, I suppose…”

“You… are just… so damn wonderful,” Hailey smiled, tilting her head and gliding both of her arms around one of his, gently swinging it back and forth. “Do you know that…?”

Mohinder opened his mouth, then let out another laugh. “No… but I imagine things from your perspective right now look all manner of wonderful, don’t they?”

“Nooo… juuust… you ,” Hailey squeaked, booping his nose again and giggling faintly.

“All right… let’s get you home so you can sleep it off,” Mohinder chuckled, placing a hand on her back and guiding her out the front doors. “I went ahead and grabbed a new blanket and a down pillow from the store on my way back from my shift. My couch isn’t anything special, but it’s a foldout, so… y’know… you’ll have an actual bed to sleep in.”

“Ooooo… sssss,” Hailey paused on the concrete path outside, inhaling sharply through her teeth and making a wincing sort of face. “Oooo… you know what I forgot I had to do?”

“What?” Mohinder asked.

“I… have to go… to the club,” Hailey recalled. “’Cuz… Sam’s going to the club. Yeah… he’s s’posed to meet me there and take me to his little rented room, ‘cause he was gonna do what you ended up doing today… which is… moving me out…”

Mohinder stared strangely at her. “Haven’t you… called him? I figured you would’ve told him what was going on by now…”

“Nooo,” Hailey gasped, shaking her head. “No, no, no… I can’t call him. He was like… super busy… like all day today… and he was doing a whooole lot of driving. I can’t give him bad news when he’s driving…”

“Oh… right,” Mohinder mumbled, only just remembering what kind of driver Samuel was. “Okay, I see your point…”

“I mean it… it’s not really bad news,” Hailey shrugged, swaying slightly in her stance. “I get to move out, and he doesn’t have to stash me in his lil’ bedroom, and I get to start a lawsuit, and David goes to jail…”

“Yes… but Sam will only hear the part about you being hurt,” Mohinder determined, and she nodded in agreement.

“Yeeeah… and he’ll get reeeally pissed,” Hailey snickered. “Awh… aww, he’s a good brother… I’m just mean …”

“You’re intoxicated is what you are,” Mohinder smirked, gently escorting her toward the parking lot. “Come on… let’s go. Easy, now…”

They stepped over the curb, and Hailey yawned and rubbed her eyes while they ventured across the parking lot, approaching Mohinder’s black four-door Sedan. It was an older model car, and he unlocked it before pulling the passenger door open for her, holding her by the hand while she wobbly wormed her way inside. Then, he closed her door and moved to the driver side, climbing into the car and pulling his own door shut.

“Okay,” Mohinder mumbled, glancing at the digital clock on the stereo. “Two minutes after… all right. I actually have one more errand to run for a friend tonight, but I’m gonna go ahead and take you home first. Same destination, anyway…”

“Waaait,” Hailey moaned, slumping over in her seat and reaching crookedly over to him. “I have to go to Endzone to meet Saaaaaaam…”

Mohinder turned and squinted at her incredulously. “Are you serious? Hailey… I don’t think you’re in any condition to go out in public right now. Particularly not… alone.”

“But I’m not alone… ‘cuz you’re here…”

“Yes, but…” Mohinder sighed. “I have to take a friend to the pharmacy and get him his medication. I can’t stay with you at the club… at least not until after I’m done.”

“Well… how long is that lil’ errand gonna take? Hmngh?” Hailey asked him. “What, like, ten minutes? I can be alone for ten minutes. Nothing’s gonna happen.”

Mohinder gave her a long, skeptical stare.

“You’re not gonna drink, are you?” he muttered.

“ No … pshhh… are you kidding me?” Hailey laughed. “That’s like the last thing I need right now… but that’s the first thing that Sam’s gonna need. I need him to get just a little bit of alcohol in him before I start telling him everything that happened… so he’ll be a little bit calmer.”

Mohinder made a slow, understanding nod, sighing again and turning the keys. “All right…”

He pulled the Sedan out of its parking spot, the headlights casting twin beams before him as he drove out of the hospital’s parking lot and rolled onto the road.

The Friday night traffic in Wallace was always a bit thicker than the rest of the week, but Mohinder took his usual backroads in order to avoid the problem.

By the time he found himself cruising beneath the sweeping streetlights of Williams Street, it was precisely ten minutes after six, just when he intended to meet Wally.

He drove toward the club—Endzone and its fantastical neon lights now dominating the darkness of the night—and he pulled over to the curb, stopping the car and giving Hailey a look.

“Listen… I live right across the street, right in those apartments over there,” Mohinder stated, pointing across the street at the building behind the liquor store. “And that’s where my friend lives, too. I have to go pick him up and run him down the road real quick, and then I’ll be right back here. You understand?”

Hailey stared caustically at him. “I’m just a little bit high… I’m not a three-year-old. You don’t have to talk to me like that…”

Mohinder choked out a laugh. “Well… you seemed pretty affected by that medication when we left the hospital.”

Hailey gazed over at him and let out a heavy breath, gently shaking her head. “Nope. I really am just that happy.”

Mohinder fell silent for a second.

“Oh,” he uttered at a loss.

Hailey snickered, reaching over and tapping his nose once more. “Gotcha.”

“All right… all right,” Mohinder said, motioning for her to go. “I’ll be back here soon… and if you need me, just call.”

“Yessir,” Hailey affirmed with a salute, opening the passenger door and stepping out to the curb. “Seeya soon!”

“Seeya soon,” Mohinder nodded.

She shut the passenger door, and then, he drove back onto the road, easing into the turn lane and crossing over into the parking lot across the street.

Hailey wandered into Endzone—and Mohinder parked his car in its usual spot in front of his apartment building, powering the engine off and stepping out. He glanced over at Wally’s apartment, then upstairs at his own, his stomach aching, a gnawing hunger eating away at him. He hadn’t eaten since Elroy’s, and he found himself craving one of the bananas on his kitchen counter, just something to fill the void for now.

Mohinder pocketed his keys and decided to go upstairs and grab that quick snack before running his final errand for the day. He approached the rickety metal stairs and thumped up them—and when he was halfway up, his phone began to ring and vibrate from his pocket.

He pulled the phone out and answered it as he ventured up the rest of the stairway. “Hello…?”

“H… hey, man,” Wally’s voice spoke into his ear, sounding wispy and faint.

“Hey, Wally, perfect timing,” Mohinder said, pinning the phone to his ear with his shoulder as he fished out his keys and approached his apartment. “I’m just gonna grab a snack out of my kitchen before I come down there. You ready to go?”

Wally fell silent, the only noise on the other side of the phone call being a faint shuffling sound.

Mohinder sorted through his keys and found the correct one, then made an odd face and grasped his phone properly again.

“Hello?” he uttered.

“Ahh…” Wally mumbled, and there was another shuffling noise. “S… sorry…”

“You all right?” Mohinder asked, turning slightly and placing a hand on the metal railing.

Wally hesitated again, sniffing loudly and letting out a faint choking sort of noise.

“You haven’t gone in your apartment yet?” he wondered, his voice sounding weak and hoarse.

Mohinder glanced over at his door. “No…”

“Ohk… okay…” Wally breathed. “Okay… then… listen. Seriously… listen. This is im… portant.”

Mohinder made a slow, strange nod. “All right.”

Wally paused once more, swallowing roughly and sounding as if he was forcing himself calm enough to speak.

“Oh God, I… fuck… I’m sorry,” he sputtered. “I know this is gonna fuck you up, and I really don’t want that… but I c… I can’t… I can’t have this going the way it’s going… and I need you to hear me… really, really hear me, please, and don’t… don’t ever forget anything I’m about to tell you.”

Mohinder lowered his hand from the railing, keys dangling from his fingers, eyes landing on the metal stairway. “Do I need to come down there right now…?”

“No… no… just listen, please listen,” Wally pleaded. “I just really want you to hear me… please …”

“All right… all right, I’m listening,” Mohinder assured.

Wally inhaled a deep, trembling breath before he continued.

“They say… I have… schizophrenia,” he explained. “And that… has always been the case. It’s getting too damn hard for me to hold it together. I went out today… after you left… because I had to get a few things done before I…”

He stopped for a moment, gulping and choking out a breath.

“I… I thought the lady at the notary office was part of them,” Wally croaked, his voice wavering. “And sh… she might be , for all I know. Her fucking face changed… goddamn… into a demon face. And I don’t think it’s just me, man. I don’t think I’m just seeing things and hearing things. I think this is real. I think… I think… everyone who sees and hears this shit is seeing something real. And it’s evil. It’s evil. It’s so fucking evil. It gives me nightmares and shows me some scary shit… and here lately… here lately… all the nightmares have been the same. Everybody riots, and people starve, and people start just going ape-shit… and it looks like… it looks like… apocalypse shit. I don’t know… but the people laugh. The people with the fucked-up faces just laugh … even when they die… even when they get fucked up… because they want it. It’s so fucking evil, man… and they want it… they want it to go bad… they want everything… and every one … to get… fucked …”

He stopped and let out a sob, trying his best to maintain some level of composure.

Mohinder’s expression hardened, letting everything he said sink in and feeling a spark of concern inside.

“We need to go get your—”

“Medication isn’t gonna make it stop ,” Wally choked, sniffling and crying as he spoke. “It’s just gonna make it less… but it’s still gonna be there. It’s done nothing but get worse, and worse, and worse. The only thing that kind of made it stop was heroin… and that wasn’t a good fix, either, because as soon as the first big high of it starts to wear off, then the fucking demons come raging back way worse than they were in the first place… so I guess heroin actually makes it worse, too. Nothing is ever gonna make it stop… nothing is… and I c… I can’t… shhh, no, stop fucking crying, goddammit!”

He smacked himself hard across the face and forced himself to speak on. Mohinder winced slightly at hearing it.

“No… no, listen, listen,” Wally ranted breathlessly. “I don’t know how right I am… but I’m pretty fucking sure about this… and don’t forget anything I’m telling you, because you… you… people like you are the only things in the world that have any kind of hope. Listen to me. Demons are in people … and the people in your corner matter a lot . Make sure they’re never, ever, ever the wrong ones. Only keep the best people in your corner throughout everything that’s gonna happen. All right? You understand that? Promise me that… promise me that. I need to hear you say it. I need to hear you promise me!”

“I…” Mohinder stammered. “A… all right, I promise.”

“Pray to God,” Wally exhaled. “Pray for protection… and go to your friends. I know you don’t have a lot, but that’s good , because more friends means more demons hiding around you.”

“Wally,” Mohinder said seriously. “Come outside so we can talk face to face…”

“No… no, one more thing,” Wally argued.

Then, he hesitated once more, taking a deep, forceful breath and releasing a shaky, crying laugh.

“I love you, man,” Wally whimpered. “Thank you s… so much… for not giving up on me like everybody else. You have no idea how much of a difference you made… every time I saw you… and every time you talked to me. The world is evil… and the evil runs everything… and it’s gonna try really, really hard to ruin, and corrupt, and destroy… but people like you are… like… the light… inside the darkness. I d… I don’t have a lot, but I… want you to have what I do have. I made it official… with a notarized will. And I don’t want you burning up all your time and money on me when you’re gonna have a lot more on your plate soon. You need to look out for you … and you need people in your corner. No, you… they… you all need that. And you have that. You just have to… look for it again.”

“Don’t talk to me like you’re giving up,” Mohinder said faintly, his heart pounding. “Please, d…”

“ Look for it again,” Wally told him with soft, insistent finality. “Pray. Get good people in your corner. And never… ever… ever stop being this badass caring person for the people in your corner with you. I love you, Mohinder. Godspeed, my friend.”

“Wa—”

Click.

Mohinder inhaled, lowering the phone and staring down at it, seeing that Wally had hung up on him.

A terrible sinking feeling festered inside him, a sense of urgency shooting up and down his body like lightning.

Mohinder looked to the metal stairway—and he broke into a sudden hard stride, thundering down the stairs as his pulse seemed to skyrocket with worry.

He stormed directly toward Wally’s apartment and tried to open it, but it was locked, so he hammered loudly and rapidly on the door.

“Wally—open the door!” he yelled. “ Open the d —”

BANG.

Mohinder’s fist froze midair, just an inch away from the door—and he fell totally still, the loud, echoing noise muffled only by the apartment’s outer wall, a brief, instant flash illuminating the dark window, if only for a single split second.

The sinking feeling inside him grew immensely in milliseconds, a dark, horrible dread descending into the pit of his stomach, his heart jolting with absolute panic.

Suddenly—his body moved on its own.

Possessed by adrenaline—Mohinder clenched his teeth and reeled back—smashing his boot into the door with all his might and sending it launching open, the lock tearing wooden shards from the frame and sending them flying into the darkness.

He staggered into the room and barely caught his balance, his eyes darting around in search of Wally—until his gaze landed perfectly on him.

Then, he fell deathly still once again.

This apartment was smaller than his own, with only a single main room, a living room with a couch facing the front, the only light on being a single lamp with a crooked shade sitting on a shelf in the corner, the living room messy, the television off—and the fresh, still body of Wally sat on the center cushion, slumped back, hands out, 12-gauge shotgun having just slipped from his grasp to the floor, the red, pulpy, ruined remains of his skull still oozing to pieces, utterly destroyed, shrivels and chunks of flesh and bone falling to the crimson-soaked shirt and the once tan cushions beneath him, the couch and the wall behind it now painted and splattered with a red, morbid mist.

Mohinder was still, rooted to the spot, everything inside him seeming to have stopped, his breaths having simply ceased, and for a long, awful moment, he merely stared, inhaling a deep, shaking breath and feeling his stomach churn terribly.

He couldn’t have known how long he stood there, but at some point, after time seemed to have vanished entirely from his awareness, and after every thought had abandoned his mind, he found himself stumbling backwards, backing out of the apartment, clasping a hand around his mouth, fingernails digging into his cheeks as his expression became warped with mortified despair and disgust, forcing down the sudden overwhelming desire to vomit.

Mohinder stopped at the edge of the parking lot, standing beneath the darkening sky with a hand viselike over his mouth, his chest now rising and falling with every adrenalized breath, glaring intensely into Wally’s dark apartment as if it had deeply wronged him.

Seconds passed by that seemed to last hours.

People began leaning out of the other apartments, looking around in confusion and muttering to one another, wondering that the noise had been—but Mohinder didn’t see them, didn’t hear them, didn’t notice them at all.

He simply remained there, frozen, staring into the darkness of the open door.

And as he did—only one thought managed to break through every ounce of sickness, sadness, emotion, and horrified shock he felt now.

He just couldn’t believe this was happening again.