The door creaked open allowing the morning light to stream into the stairwell. He felt icy wind on his cheeks as his eyes slowly adjusted to the light. Finger on the trigger, Dean pointed his rifle forward. He expected shouting or gunshots, but he was met only with complete silence on the other side.
He immediately looked to the left and right, expecting an ambush of sorts, but there was nothing. Nobody was near the door. Nobody came running or shot at them. That wasn't to say there weren't people on the roof. A large group of people were lying in the snow as if sleeping. Dean approached one of these figures and checked for signs of life. He checked two other bodies just to be sure. Everyone on the ground was dead, their eyes staring sightlessly ahead, mouths agape as if still trying to gasp for air.
Dean closed his eyes and sucked in some cold air. He heard Matin whisper a prayer behind him.
After taking a quick breath, Dean looked around and saw four familiar faces. Nicolas and Maria were standing some distance away, near the edge of the roof. Joan was on her knees off to the side next to Cait who was lying against the battlement wall.
"Hey Dean, out for a morning stroll?" Maria asked.
Her words and tone were overly casual, which Dean felt was extremely off-putting considering the circumstances. He didn't lower his rifle but approached the pair slowly. He was more concerned about the safety of the two girls.
"Cait, Joan!" Dean yelled. "You two better not have killed them too!"
Cait was lying on the ground. Either dead or unconscious. Joan, on the other hand, looked fine. She was on her knees praying and gave no indication that she had even noticed Dean and Matin's arrival. She simply continued praying as she moved to a nearby body. Her voice had a rhythm to it which felt unpleasant to hear.
"Out with it. What did you do to them?" Dean asked, a dangerous edge to his voice.
Nicolas sat with a blank expression on his face. Up until now he'd been like a balloon ready to burst, full of unreleased tension and energy. Now he looked calm, as if he'd made his peace with something. He was pale, paler than Dean remembered and seemed to have trouble breathing.
"They're both fine, well I'm not sure about the taller one but she was breathing last we checked." Nicolas said, pausing to look at both Cait and Joan. "We found them in the cathedral with Methaeus, and they followed us here."
"That makes no sense. Why would they just up and leave the safety of the guest house and come to you?" Matin asked, anger clearly visible on his face.
"The Saviour's words enthralled them, and just like everyone else, they offered up their lives to him and the Goddess, isn't it wonderful?" Maria laughed.
The entire display only made Dean grip his rifle all the tighter. These people were clearly insane. He turned to Joan, who at least still seemed to be conscious.
"Joan, come over here, get behind me." He said urgently. He tried to look at Joan without losing sight of Nicolas. Joan didn't reply.
"She won't respond to you anymore, Dean," Nicolas said. Oddly enough, there was a hint of sadness in his voice.
"Why not? What did you do with her?"
Nicolas shrugged.
"Nothing. She said that the goddess spoke to her. Ever since then, the girl's been going from corpse to corpse and giving them their last rites."
"That's bullshit." Dean muttered.
"Can't come up with a better argument? All you can do is curse at us. Not much going on up there in that head of yours, is there?." Maria chuckled.
"Say what you want, Dean but we've already done what we set out to do. We don't have any interest in those two."
Nicolas seemed tired and disinterested in the whole situation, which only made Dean feel more frustrated. This wasn't how he imagined things turning out. He wanted Nicolas or Maria to give him any excuse to shoot. When the person at the other end of your gun didn't act with violence, it became much harder to justify shooting them.
As they were talking, Dean slowly made his way towards Cait, keeping his rifle leveled at Nicolas and Maria.
"Feel free to check her. She should still be alive." Nicolas said, waving his hands.
"Did you kill all these people too?" Matin asked, gesturing at the people on the ground.
There was evidence of some sort of party all around them, bottles of alcohol, half-eaten food. It had the look of some of the most downtrodden places in the city where Dean had lived.
"If you remember the beliefs of the church, then they are simply on a journey towards their next, much happier lives. You missed them by about five minutes. A pity really, you could have joined them." Nicolas said.
The next life? Those words bothered Dean. But he had no time to ponder them. He had finally reached Cait.
"Cait, can you hear me?" He asked, shaking her. He turned her body to face him. Her face was covered in cuts, and blood had mixed with the snow below. For some strange reason, it reminded Dean of those sweet drinks of ice mixed with strawberry syrup. She was still breathing but looked awful and probably needed medical attention right away.
"Why did you torture her? Hasn't she gone through enough?" Dean said, his voice faltering as he tried to keep himself from breaking down into sobs.
"She's been named a sinner by everyone here. Nobody cares what gets done to her. I just needed someone to vent on and she was conveniently on hand to oblige me." Maria chuckled.
"Why does everyone call her a sinner? Maria, you weren't ever that religious to begin with. Why all this bullshit now?" Dean shouted.
Maria shrugged her shoulders.
"Certain things can happen to a person to make them turn to the faith. But who am I kidding. I still ain't that religious, but for some reason that girl just makes me angry, and I wanted to hit her. Simple as that."
Dean couldn't believe what he was hearing. Each and every person who had met Cait had been at best, cold towards her and outright violent at worst. All without any reason. What the hell was wrong with this place?
Dean's breaths quickened. His mind swam, looking for answers, looking for a reason as to why this had all happened. It made no sense. Only one meaningless death after another, all in the name of some goddess. This was why he'd left this damned monastery in the first place.
"Their deaths meant nothing. The Goddess doesn't even exist. It was all a lie so that Oscar could rial up the countryside for his political gains. It's always been like this!" Dean yelled.
Nicolas looked at him. A sad smile on his face.
"Your words hurt the Goddess more than you could know, my old friend. And yet you were always like this. So faithless and lost. Tell me, what do you have left after all your running away? What has the city done for you?"
"I went to the city to find my own way. Away from this sham of a religion." Dean answered.
"And what do you have to show for it? Success in business? Friends? A lover? You have none of these. Can you even prove that your life outside this monastery exists?"
"What would you know about my life in the city?" Dean sneered.
"The Goddess knows, and she told me," Nicolas said with a smile.
"So why did you do this? Give me a straight answer, dammit!" Dean shouted.
He aimed the gun right at Nicolas' face. Nicolas didn't even flinch.
"Why? Because you returned to the Monastery, Dean. If you hadn't come back, Addi wouldn't have died, and we wouldn't have needed to kill Oscar and the others!"
"Me? It's my fault?" Dean whispered.
How could his return have caused all this? It didn't make a lick of sense.
"What does Dean have to do with any of this?" Matin asked, echoing his thoughts.
Nicolas shrugged his shoulders.
"The Goddess didn't feel the need to tell me. She simply told me to keep you alive until the very end so you could experience the pain of losing those closest to you."
Addi, Oscar, Rosetta, Marianne, Methaeus. So many had died, and for what? Was he being punished for running away or something? No, there was no divine being dishing out punishment like some mad judge. Nicolas and Maria had simply been looking for an excuse to take down those in charge. He readied the rifle to fire.
"Oh, you're going to kill me? You'd only be putting me out of my misery, so go ahead."
"You killed Addi and the others. Apologize now before I send you to hell," Dean said.
Nicolas let out a laugh. It was thin and raspy, as if he hadn't enough breath to spend on it.
"You think I killed her? I've only killed those who deserved it, and I didn't even have to lift a finger to kill Marianne. Don't you see? They died because the Goddess willed it. It was natural."
"Natural?" Dean spat. He remembered Methaeus' corpse, desecrated and pinned to the wall. "There was nothing natural about their deaths, and you know it!"
Nicolas' mirth vanished suddenly, and he sighed, a bored expression on his face.
"Talking to you is a waste of time and effort, Dean. You just came here to put a bullet in me. Well, let me help you preserve your innocence, for old time's sake."
He gave Dean one more condescending look before turning his back.
"Don't want to see me pull the trigger?" Dean asked.
He could feel himself smiling. He was going to do it. It was time to end this man's life and put an end to all this. Dean caressed the trigger with his finger. All he had to do was put a little pressure on it, and it would all be over.
Nicolas looked back and smirked. Ten, he did the unthinkable. He stepped forward once, twice and three times towards the edge of the roof.
Dean lowered his rifle slightly and was about to shout out however, just before Nicolas' feet stepped over the final edge, Maria grabbed him by the wrist.
"Oh, no you don't, I haven't said my bit yet."
"M-Maira?" Nicolas asked.
"Not bad. Glad to see you still have the savior act down, but I'm not letting you off that easy. Don't forget our talk last night."
She yanked him back away from the edge, and Nicolas fell backwards into the snow.
"What are you doing?" He asked, eyes wide and panting.
"Sorry, Nick, I can't watch someone else I love go before me."
Nicolas grimaced and covered his eyes with his arm, refusing to look at her.
Dean had lowered his rifle completely. What had just happened had driven all thoughts of shooting them from his mind.
"Oh, don't look at me like that. We may have gone a bit mad, but we're still the people you hung out with all those years ago."
The previously crazed second in command of the cult shrugged her shoulders and leaned against the battlement, looking up to the sky above.
"Why are you acting all different suddenly? Was it all some sort of elaborate act?" Matin asked.
Maria cracked a satisfied smile that didn't reach her eyes.
"No, you're still looking at a killer here. I guess I feel calm and at peace now that everything is done and dusted and I'm facing the end. Funny how that happens."
She laughed, a low cackling sound that made Dean's hair stand on end. Suddenly she clapped her hands together, the sudden movement causing Dean to once again raise his rifle. However, Maria seemed to have no intention of acting violently.
"All the bastards are finally dead. Oh Goddess, I'm so relieved." She looked over the corpses on the roof and spat before letting out a large sigh. "Now," she said, turning back to the two men. "Before this all ends, I'm happy to set a few things straight. Think of it as a little favor to my old friends. You can put the gun down now, Dean."
Dean hesitated but slowly lowered the rifle.
"Were you and Nick the ones who killed everyone, killed mother?" Matin asked, unable to hold his silence.
"Damn right I did," Maria said, relaxing against the wall. "Or that's what I'd like to say. When Addi and Rosetta died, it felt like my entire reason to live had been crushed. I wanted nothing more than to join them in death, but I couldn't rightly do that with those responsible still walking around."
Maria looked up at the sky and sighed.
"I wanted to kill them all, really, and I was happy to use Nicolas' influence to justify it and get the help of some people. But despite all that, Marianne went and offed herself, robbing me of the chance."
"That's a lie!" Matin screamed. "She'd never do something like that!"
Dean agreed silently. Marianne had no reason to kill herself, not with Matin still alive.
Maria sighed and shook her head.
"Well, I don't know what to tell ya. We didn't kill her, and it looks pretty obvious that she jumped."
"You're just trying to avoid responsibility."
Maria gave Matin a genuinely confused look.
"After admitting to killing all these people here? What reason do I have to lie to you now?"
Matin gritted his teeth but could not find any more words to say.
"So Nicolas killed everyone else then?" Dean asked.
"Just Oscar and Methaeus." She said. "What? You think we had some grand plan to kill everyone?" Nicolas replied.
"Well, what about the orphanage? Why did you attack it?"
"Ah yeah, that." Maria said as she looked down at the corpses littering the roof. "They got a little out of control with all the drugs and alcohol. Don't worry, they've since paid for that mistake."
Dean recalled the night of that despicable attack on the orphanage. Was Maria telling the truth?
"You say you've killed these people, Oscar and Methaeus, but what about Addi and Rose?"
"Yeah, it was incredibly vexing. Someone else was always a step ahead. Of course I had no part in Addi's, Marianne's or Rosetta's deaths. We figured it was Methaeus' doing but can't be sure. Hell. Maybe it was one of those two over there," Maria said, pointing at Cait and Joan.
"Cait was with me when Rosetta Marianne died, and just look at her! She's so weak from her imprisonment, she wouldn't have been able to hurt a child!
Once again, Maria laughed.
"Right, silly me."
The smile fell from Maria's face in an instant, and she spat on the ground.
"The how of it doesn't matter. Everybody in this fucking place deserved to die. Especially those three. Come on Dean, you get where I'm coming from, right? They made Addi and Rossetta and so many other people suffer for their own gain."
"Mother didn't deserve to die!" Matin yelled.
Matin's eyes were wet with tears as he stared Maria down. Maria turned a sharp eye towards Matin.
"Your mother was a greedy bitch who tried to use you to make up for her own shortcomings. Wake up, Matin, you were nothing but a tool to her."
"She was still my mother, and I was happy to do what she asked of me. You never once asked me how I feel about her"! Thanks to you, I don't know what to do with myself anymore!"
Maria shook her head in disappointment.
"I can see you still haven't grown a backbone yet, even after all you've been through."
"I'd think giving into petty revenge shows even less backbone," Matin countered. "I chose to stay by mother's side despite her flaws. I wouldn't expect a deranged psychopath with no parents to understand."
For the first time since the conversation had started, Maria flinched. She quickly recovered, however, and gave Matin an unsettling smile.
"Maybe I was wrong," she cooed. "I could send you off to join her, if you want?"
Dean stepped in front of Matin, raising his rifle. Maria didn't cower but simply continued to smile blankly. He sighed and lowered the rifle once again.
"Enough killing's been done today," he said. "Do you know anything, Nick? And don't say it was Cait or Joan. Give me a proper answer."
Nicolas, who had been unusually quiet, finally got to his feet and shook his head.
"Maybe it was the Goddess who killed them. Whoever it was, it just feels like this place has been cursed since you arrived. Addi and Rose probably got caught up in it."
Maria gave Nicolas a withering look but didn't say a word.
"What? You're saying some magical ghost killed them, don't fuck with me on this, Nicolas." Dean said. "I saw Rosetta's, Marianne's and Methaeus' corpses. Someone murdered them!"
"What even Rosetta?" Maria asked quietly.
"What?" Dean asked.
"If you didn't notice Rosetta's depression, then you're thicker than you look," Maria said flatly.
Dean simply didn't want to believe it. Better that she had been murdered than that. Her untidy room, getting out of bed late and ignoring responsibilities. He was so focused on the obvious problems in front of him that he had failed to notice Rosetta's pain.
"Ah, that's a good look on you. You feel responsible, don't you? It's your fault she died. It's everyone's fault. But more than anyone, it's my fault. I should have been there for her when she needed me most, except I turned my back on her."
A hint of anger had returned to Maria's voice, but this time there was pain and self-hatred mixed in.
"We all should have tried harder to talk to her." Matin agreed. "I always thought she just preferred to be alone."
A brief silence fell upon them. Matin hung his head, refusing to meet anyone's eye while Maria stared off blankly into the falling snow. Dean could sympathize with her. No one had a keener dislike for this town and its leaders than himself. Even so, going around slaughtering everyone wasn't the answer. Despite her claims that everything had gone according to plan, she looked defeated, as if her very soul had been sucked out of her, leaving nothing but a cold husk behind.
"Well, it's about time I bring this sorry tale to a close." Maria sighed.
She stretched and turned to face everyone. Wearing a sad smile that did little to hide the pain in her eyes, she took a step back towards the edge of the roof.
"Maria, wait!" Nicolas cried as he ran towards her. She easily pushed him away.
"Nicolas, don't throw away your life here. I know you have a serious illness, but do as I said and try to see a doctor before you give up."
"Why are you saying this now? I'd rather choose my own way out than waste away in some hospital bed!"
"Sorry, Nick, I just can't bear to see you die. After losing Addi and Rosetta, I was sure I'd never experience any kind of happiness again. I was ready to burn this place to the ground, but then you had to come along and mess all that up."
Maria took another step back, her smile looking much more genuine.
"Thank you for making these painful days just a little more bearable. Goodbye, my savior."
"Wait!" Nicolas shouted.
Just as Maria's right foot stepped over the edge and she began her last fall, Nicolas leapt after her. He grabbed her in mid-air, and the two disappeared.
The last thing Dean saw was Maria's expression. At first, there was shock, but it quickly turned to a small smile before she disappeared over the edge.
Dean ran to the edge. By the time he looked over the edge, he could see both Maria and Nicolas motionless at the bottom. Both had their arms around the other in an embrace. He felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Dean, we should probably check on Joan and Cait." Matin whispered with tears in his eyes.
Dean hadn't even noticed, but the snow and wind had both grown in intensity. He wondered whether the numbness he felt was coming from the cold or something else. Matin was right. They had to get Joan and Cait inside and treated. He turned to where Cait was lying.
"Matin, can you get Joan and..."
He cut off in mid sentence. Cait was no longer there. A small indent in the snow was proof that she had been lying there not a few moments ago. He looked around in a panic, but there was no one aside from himself and Matin on the roof.
"Where did they go? We only looked away for a few minutes!" Matin cried.
Dean cursed and ran around the rooftop, checking every nook and cranny. It was during this search that he noticed something all the more disturbing. Off in the distance, an orange glow pierced through the snow. It came from a short distance away, at a much lower level than the library rooftop.
"Is that a fire?" Dean asked as he squinted in an attempt to look through the thick snow.
After a moment, the orange light intensified, followed by the sound of an explosion.
"That came from the direction of the guest house!" Matin shouted.
Dean shook his head.
"No, no, no. Not there too!"
All thoughts of searching for Cait and Joan forgotten, he rushed towards the rooftop entrance to the library.
"Hey wait!" He heard Matin shout. "Dean!"
He ignored his friend's calls and ran as fast as he could down the multiple flights of stairs until he reached the ground floor. He slammed through the front door and stumbled into the waist-high snow. The entire world was white aside from the fierce orange glow in the distance. With no other choice, he began fighting his way through the snow. He could hear Matin's yells behind him, but he did not stop. All feelings and all rationality left him, and he was left with only one thought: move forward.
The orange glow slowly grew brighter and brighter as he approached until at last, he stood before the guest house. It was alight with such a fierce inferno that he had to stop a few meters from the building. He absentmindedly wondered how a stone building could burn so fiercely, but his mind was fixated squarely on those who were supposed to be inside.
"Layota! Mitch! Mark!" He shouted the names of the people he knew were inside. He thought of the children. They'd all been huddled together in the VIP room the last he saw them.
"Why is this happening?" He sobbed.
All of it — Addi's death, the murders, the mass suicide and now the burning conflagration before him. It was all too much to be the work of mere revenge or bad luck. It was as if this entire place had been cursed with misfortune, too cruel to be real.
"Matin!"
He remembered his friend, who had been chasing him just a few moments before. Surely if he went back, he would find him. He ran from the guest house, crying as he went. He crawled through the snow until even the orange glow had long since faded. The world was now entirely white.
He should have come upon the library building by now. Where was it? With no other choice, he continued forward as best he could. Once or twice he changed direction, and after a while he turned around in a panic, hoping to find his way back using the trail he had left in the snow. However, even his own trail had disappeared, covered once more by freshly fallen snow.
He hadn't felt cold for a long time. In fact, now he simply felt sleepy. He stopped running and began crawling on his hands and knees.
His mind wandered.
Seeing only an infinite whiteness, his eyes began to play tricks on him. He saw a group of seven children running. A girl with pale skin, white hair and red eyes. A boy with red curly hair and glasses. A girl with short brown hair and green eyes. A black-haired boy. A frightened-looking blond girl.
He saw a younger version of himself proudly leading the group forward. Behind them, a lonely figure tried to keep up but tripped in the snow. The other children continued on, oblivious of their fallen friend. The vision faded, replaced by another.
A boy and a girl together in a garden. The boy was standing on a high stone wall and making wild gestures while the girl looked upwards. She had a black book in her lap. Why did she look so much like Joan?
"Now, now. You don't deserve to see happy memories, do you?"
Flash.
The children had vanished. In their place was a pile of black and red. A burned and bloody hand reached out from the pile as if begging for someone to pull them out.
Dean screamed. No sound came out, and yet he screamed all the same.
The pile consisted of what remained of all his friends and their families. Their bodies were in such a state as to leave no doubt they were dead. Oddly enough, they lay on a bed of white flowers that was almost indistinguishable from the surrounding snow. Their faces were twisted in expressions of agony that would never fade, frozen in the icy snow.
There was one more body among them. Dean realised that it was himself. Ah yes, that's right. He was dying, or perhaps he was already dead?
"I didn't want this. I just wanted to save them," he whispered, voice laced with regret.
"Maria was wrong, you know. This was all your fault."
"My fault."
"Yes, you selfishly ran away, and because of that, the lives of all your friends have turned to dust. If only you hadn't been such a coward."
"I want...to...change...to save," he gasped.
In response to his pleas, laughter echoed from all sides.
"But you never change, do you? Die knowing that all this is the result of your wretched nature. You could not save them. You are and shall ever be, a hero who cannot save anybody."
As his vision faded. Two feet appeared in front of him. Pale skin covered with a dark piece of cloth. He tried to look up at the person, but his vision had gone blurry. The only detail he could make out was that they held a large black book in their hands.
At last, his strength faded, and he could no longer hold his head up.
His vision faded to black. His final thoughts were filled with regret for the friends he had lost. He would leave behind nothing but a frozen corpse in an endless world of white. Perhaps that was for the best. He wanted nothing more than to rest.