Chapter Text
“Pat!” Alison yelled, looking around her as she walked into the drawing room, “Pat I need some help!”
She looked around the room; there was nobody there. Just another empty room in a, as far as she could tell, empty house.
“Julian told me Kitty’s death day was coming up,” Alison continued, walking around in an awkward circle, “I wanted your help planning something.”
Silence.
“Well, if you’re just gonna ignore me I suppose there’s no point,” Alison said, hoping it might coax any of the rest of them out of hiding too, “I’ll just go find someone else then.”
She walked over to the boiler room door and sighed, reluctant to go down there. It gave her the creeps seeing so many blatantly dead people in one small, dank, underground room but hopefully, they would know where the rest of them were. It’s not like there was anyone else to ask. She slowly made her way down the steps, feeling for the light switch and eventually finding it.
Lights flickered in the small room but… It was empty. Not a single plague ghost.
“Guys…?” she ventured, slowly stepping further into the room, “Where… where’ve you gone?”
There was no reply. The only sound was a quiet sizzling of the pilot flame and the occasional rattle from the pipes. Should they be doing that?
Anxiety rose in her and she raced back up the stairs, not bothering to turn off the light switch.
“Seriously guys where are you all?” she shouted, a lump forming in her throat, “Guys you’re scaring me a-and I know you’re ghosts but I’m really freaking out now.”
She ran back into the drawing room, eyes flitting back and forth from the windowsill to the chessboard to the sofas. No one. No one there.
Alison put a hand to her mouth in shock, trying to hold back tears. That was when she noticed a tapping. Faint and irregular but… definitely there. She followed the sound until she was standing in front of her own laptop, opened on a coffee table. She stared at it in disbelief.
The key moved and she fell to her knees, tears welling in her eyes and breathing becoming uneven.
“No,” she whispered, hardly audible, “No no no no no no no no oh god please no…”
She dropped her head into her hands and felt her entire body hit the thin, scratchy carpet through her clothes.
“Mike!” she screeched, so loud it hurt her throat and ears, “Mike!”
Mike ran into the room, panic-stricken only to hear painful, heaving sobs from behind a chair. He ran around it to see Alison curled up on the ground, holding her head with her face covered.
“They’re gone,” she murmured, hardly comprehensible, “They’re all gone.”
Mike’s face turned from one of fear to one of confusion. He looked at the laptop next to her shaking body and his face settled into one of pity and sadness. He placed his hand on her shoulder and shushed her until she fell silent and calm and asleep.
In the search bar of Alison’s laptop read two words:
‘We’re here’