A Peculiar Time in 1944 - A Millard Fanfic (Miss Peregrine's Home) #wattys2020

Chapter 78

"What a beautiful day to go to Hell." {Jacob Portman, pg 63 book 3}

Seven Stages of Grief: Stage Three – Anger, frustrated outpouring of bottled-up emotion

MILLARD POV

Millard felt like he'd left his kidneys behind after they crossed into the loop. By the looks of things around them he worried they'd been brought to a punishment loop after all. The water was thick with sludge and grime, the people who walked along its banks were dressed in rags and from beneath their dirty faces there was nothing but disgust and loathing, though one person who saw them grinned. It was a wicked grin, one that looked amused by their suffering and it made Millard's heart drop into his stomach. He prayed to the birds above that Aurora would not follow him here. He knew Emma and Jake would want to, somehow pulling together some plan, but he prayed Aurora took no part in it. His heart lurched, knowing in his core she'd come too, nothing would keep her away – just like how nothing would keep him away if their roles were reversed.

It didn't take long before the boat docked and they were grabbed and tossed ashore like boxes of cargo – which to the wights, they were. Nothing more than an import, the newest peculiar souls to steal. There was a truck waiting for them, it looked like the ones that carried soldiers, with a tarp thrown over the curved roof and an open back. They didn't need something with a lockable door, if any of them got out where would they run? The whole loop was full of thieves and murderers, he almost laughed at the irony, that now their safest place was with the wights.

One of them approached the truck and pulled a bundle of something from inside. He threw it to the ground and Millard saw it was a prison outfit, a shirt and pants made of black and white stripes.

"Invisible, put it on!" he ordered and Millard hesitated. In that brief second another wight pulled his gun and aimed it at Hugh's head. The small boy screwed his eyes shut bracing for the shot.

"Alright! Alright!" Millard shouted picking up the clothes. He took off his jacket and started pulling the pants on as quickly as he could without falling. Of course they'd want him dressed in more than an overcoat, how easy would it be for him to pull it off and run? No, they needed him in something that would take time to disrobe out of so they could catch him before a window of opportunity ever showed itself. When he'd finished buttoning the shirt he pulled his coat back on and was loaded into the truck with the others. Two of the wights sat up front, the rest dividing between standing in the back and standing by the opening, each still armed with a gun that would put hundreds of bullets in you with one pull of the trigger.

Millard leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he watched the hellish loop out the back, the houses and people passing as the truck took them to their doom.

AURORA POV

"I didn't hear anything." Sharon lied. Whatever the hollow was doing couldn't be good as a grinding sound began against the wood. The vultures were now demanding Sharon show them what was under the tarp, he tried to blame it on a defective boat but when they didn't buy it he offered them more money which – at the very least – bought some time as they considered it. Jake looked like he was trying to concentrate, his eyebrows scrunched together as he tried to make the hollow go away. Aurora could sympathize with his frustration, she remembered when she was trying to find her own trigger back when she could only heal subconsciously. She couldn't imagine what that must be like without an ymbryne helping you and having your life on the line.

There was another thud, thud, THUD from below and Aurora started to tear up at the thought of never seeing Millard again, either the hollow or the vultures would kill them all before she even got a chance to help him.