UNTIL DAWN: Sam's story

IX.

I was waiting with Emily in the basement of the old hotel, when the metal door leading to the hallway opened and three people rushed inside.

"Oh my god! Guys! Thank god!" Emily sighed in relieve when she saw them all okay.

"What took you so long?!" I asked looking at Chris. He was dirty and his clothes were wet, signifying he fell outside in the snow. He was holding his right hip, while leaning on a wall behind him.

"It's not so good up there right now-" Chris mumbled tiredly.

"Understatement of the night," Mike stated as he locked the door. That's when I realized. Only Chris, Ash and Mike came back.

"Chris where's the flame thrower guy?" I asked upon realizing Josh was probably gone when they got there.

"Ah... yeah... he uh," my friend stuttered.

"He didn't make it?" Ash was on the brink of crying.

Em almost freaked out. "Oh NO!" She started shaking and hyperventilating, but I couldn't calm her down, since my bravery was only a façade. I had no idea what I was supposed to do right now.

"What happened?" I continued questioning.

"The thing, it... it tore him apart-!" he gasped, his head hanging low. "Right in front of me!"

"Oh god!"

"Alright. These all the doors?" Mike looked around hurriedly.

"Yeah," I reassured.

"Are you sure?" he moved through an opening in a wall, turning his head in every possible direction, investigating every inch of the place.

"What are you looking for?"

"Another way out," he was still pacing around the room.

"Mike... I really don't think that's a good idea. We should stay put, right here, until dawn. At least we're safe down here-"

"Oh? Yeah?" he was now looking at security footage on a computer in the corner. "All wrapped up like a little present with a bow on top for that thing to tear us apart on Christmas morning?" he hissed at me sarcastically.

"People will come for us. In the morning," I mumbled.

"You don't sound so sure," he looked at me worriedly.

"That's what'll happen. Right Em?" I looked at the latter hopefully.

"Yeah... I mean... right?" she answered also unsure.

"Well you can wait. I'm leaving."

"Mike... there's no key for the cable car –" Emily pointed out, scratching her shoulder nervously.

"Josh," he turned to us, realization splattered on his face. "He's gotta have it."

"Josh?"

"One of his dirty little tricks," he whispered.

"Great. Great!" I turned around, already loosing hope.

"If that fucking thing got a hold of Josh... then... we're shit out of luck," he admitted.

"I don't know Mike... it's possible...," Em looked like she was thinking.

"What's possible?" I really hoped she came up with a plan or something.

"It may have taken him down to the mine..."

"What?"

"I saw some horrible stuff down there... I think it's where that thing lives... and..." she leaned over a table, picking something up. "...huh."

"...Em? What?"

"Fuck it." I heard Mike from behind as I looked at what Emily was holding. "I'm gonna get that key. Right from that thing's goddamned bedroom, and then I'm gonna get us all the hell out of here."

"Em... what is all that?" I browsed through the stuff that was laid out in front of us.

"It's that old guy's bag."

"Is that a map?" Mike leaned over my shoulder.

"That guy was prepared for anything," I chuckled. I read through the map and one sector caught my attention, as well as it did Emily's. "What is this place?" she pointed to it.

"Oh my god," Mike shook his head.

"Wait wait wait. What is that?"

"I was down there. It was horrible," he began explaining.

"You were?" I averted my full attention to him.

"There had been a cave-in. In the fifties. I guess, and these miners got trapped down there."

"Oh my God."

"Some of them survived but... like... fifteen of 'em didn't make it. There was this reporter and I think he figured out there had been some, like, big cover-up going on. I found these plans – they knew the mine was a death trap, but they let the miners keep working anyway. And... I'm not sure what it means but I found this chair, with dried blood all over the place... like somebody'd been tortured," he finished quietly.

I didn't understand one bit of it, but it really seemed as if something bigger was going on here and I wanted to know more. Although Emily seemed unimpressed. "I'd like to maybe focus on how we're going to get the fuck out of here please?" she blurted out annoyed.

"I'm just saying it's weird how much crazy shit's gone on up here...," he explained.

"What's weird is that there's a tunnel leading from the lodge to the Sanatorium, see?" she pointed to the map.

"That's how I got back here," he whispered.

"I saw this. When I was down in there. That's where it lives," she was talking about the mines. And only the thought of going in there freaked me out.

"Shit...fuck fuck," Mike cursed looking above him, as if he was having an internal argument, before he turned to me. "You guys know what to do."

"Yeah," Ash answered when I didn't say anything.

"No one leave. Okay? It's not safe out there," he empathized on the word 'safe'. "Okay? I'll be back soon." And with that he hurriedly walked out towards the tunnel.

I sat down next to Chris, who was still holding his bruise and gave him a comforting smile.

"I thought... that... that he was going to help us," Emily suddenly sighed.

"Who? The flamethrower guy?" Ashley asked while picking up the man's diary from the table.

"Now we don't have a chance..."

"No, guys, it just means we've got to be tough. We gotta do this on our own." I looked at Em and Chris encouragingly, when Ash walked farther away from us.

"This says that because Wendigos are... mutated... from humans... when they hunt us, they know how to perfectly mimic their prey..." Ashley looked up from the diary and then continued reading, while we kept waiting. "Oh... Oh no no no no no," she cried out, bringing the little book closer to her face.

"What?" I asked panicked. "What is it? What does it say?" I got up and hurried to her. When she didn't answer I extended my hand to grab it. "Let me see that!"

"Shit," I cursed when I read the page Ash was on. "Shit-shit-shit...." His notes contained a lot of information on those creatures, but there was this part, that scared the living hell out of me. It wrote: "I have killed 6 Wendigos. But try NOT to kill them. Killing a Wendigo should by the last resort. Death releases the Wendigo spirit into the air." But that wasn't important. The scary part was written below it: "I have contained them. I used traps to catch them into cages. The traps were baited with human limbs from those who had no further use for them. One by one I caught those who had infested the mountain." "We've got to get to Mike, like now!" I dropped the book and rushed after our friend, with the girls next to me and a limping Chris in the back.