Chapter Text
"You're gonna be famous. Shadyside's newest piece of shit makes the front page! Local dyke slays girlfriend, friends…brother…"
Deena lets out a furious yell, trying to shove him off, trying to scratch his face, rip that smug grin right off, but to no avail.
Nick laughs. "And they're gonna give me a fucking meda—"
"What about me?"
Nick freezes above her.
Deena blinks confused.
"What happens to me?"
Clad in a bright orange shirt, Ziggy emerges from the darkness, gun aimed at him. "C. Berman survives another massacre? Sheriff Goode performs CPR after her heart stops?"
Nick gapes as if he was seeing a ghost.
"What happens to me, Nick?"
From where she had collapsed, Sam stirs and groans, her eyes fluttering open.
"Sam?" Deena whispers hopefully.
Sam blinks, catches Deena's hopeful expression and snarls.
"Stay!" Nick orders harshly before his features soften at Ziggy. "Stay."
Sam obeys, though not without giving Deena a murderous look.
Nick pulls himself off Deena, only for Sam to switch places with him. Nick hands her the knife which Sam places against Deena's neck, but doesn't move forward.
"Sam..." Deena chokes pleadingly. "Please."
Sam just lets out a low growl, waiting.
Nick approaches Ziggy, haltingly. "Hey, Ziggy."
Ziggy keeps the gun trained on his head. "Let them go."
Nick sighs, stopping four feet away from her. "You shouldn't be here."
Ziggy lets out an incredulous laugh.
"But since you are…" Nick straightens, adjusting his neon green splattered collar. "How are you?"
Ziggy grits her teeth, trapped between the urge to kill him right there or slap him across the face.
She gets a chance to do neither.
"Hey!" A panting Martin, clutching a baseball bat, skids to a halt beside her. "Ruby Lane's ass is right behind me! Josh is trying to—" On noticing Nick, Martin's eyes immediately narrow. "You," he seethes.
"Hello Martin," Nick greets pleasantly as if they stumbled upon each other on a grocery shopping trip.
And as if on cue: "Martin..." Multiple inhuman voices whisper. "Martin..."
"Mother Mary..." Martin pales, gawking at the pulsating mess beside Deena and Sam and makes a sign of the cross. "What the fuck is that? And how does it know my name?”
"I suggest you stay right there, Martin," Nick responds, annoyed at the interruption. "Or you'll find out the hard way."
Martin grits his teeth, his grip on the baseball bat tightens, ready to smash Nick's head repeatedly and never stop. "If you think for one moment I'm going t—"
Ruby Lane barrels into him. The bat clatters away in the darkest corner of the cavern.
“Martin!” A wide-eyed Ziggy gasps. Nick barely flinches as Ruby climbs on Martin, laughing delightedly as she straddles him.
“I’m alright just kill that mothe—oh shit!” Martin grabs Ruby’s wrist before the razor blade slices his throat open.
"It's over Martin…" Nick declares calmly. "You lost."
"Lost!?" A struggling Martin snorts. "I'm a grown-ass man being pinned by a sixteen-year-old dead girl." He grabs Ruby's other slashed wrist before head-butting the girl, who falls backward in a heap. "I'm coming for you, bitch!"
A pair of arms suddenly lock Martin in a choke hold from behind.
Ziggy instinctively moves the gun towards the killer she had never seen before. Someone in a doctor’s lab coat, wearing a surgical mask and gloves.
"Martin…Ziggy…Deena…I'd like you all to meet Doctor Edward Carson," Nick introduces as the man brandishes a large surgical saw infront of Martin's bewildered face. "The Humpty Dumpty Killer."
“Oh fuck…Of fuck...” A wide-eyed Martin hyperventilates as Ruby recovers. Eyeing him with disdain, she raises her hand before slapping him across the face. She then presses her razor blade against Martin's cheek with narrowed eyes. The Humpty Dumpty Killer places his weapon under Martin’s chin. "Fuck."
"Like I said…" A smiling Nick turns his attention back to Ziggy’s terrified face. "It's over. You lost."
Ziggy recovers from the shock and aims the weapon back at Nick's head. "You're the one who has a gun pointed at his head."
"And yet you still haven't used it." Nick tilts his head curiously. "Why?"
"Christine…" The ugly thing made out of rotting flesh, blood and nightmares practically purrs. "Christine…"
Ziggy grimaces.
"Well, Ziggy?"
Ziggy squares her shoulders, jaw clenching tight before finally asking: "Why did you leave that note?"
A struggling Deena and Martin both pause with surprised looks that had nothing to do with possessed and dead killers.
Nick on the other hand looks utterly stumped. “What?”
"It's Happening Again," Ziggy reminds him.
The complete and utter mask of indifference he was wearing flickers. He seems genuinely surprised by the question.
"Well, Nick?" she asks evenly.
“I…” Nick inhales steadily, looking suddenly young and boyish. "I was hoping..."
"Hoping what? We could bond over psycho killers again? Finally start a Judy Blume book club?" Ziggy laughs bitterly before glaring at him resentfully. "Or whether I knew what was happening so you could use me to get to the kids?"
Nick doesn't deny the accusation.
Ziggy finds her head shaking furiously. "You knew…you knew about the curse. You knew Nurse Lane wasn't crazy when she attacked Tommy. You knew what would happen if you said Tommy's name. You…you killed...all those kids. You killed my sister! You killed me!" she bursts, sixteen years of rage and pain pouring out. "And then…you brought me back…why? Why did you do that?"
Nick's shoulders slump. "I told you before...that day...I couldn't let you die, Ziggy."
Ziggy laughs brokenly. "But you'll let everyone else die, right?"
"I tried to save as many when Tommy…I didn't think it would work."
"And what about Ryan Torres? Was that a mistake too? How many did you try to save at the mall that day?"
"It was during closing hours. And I was able to save Martin."
"Fuck you, man!" Martin curses enraged.
Ziggy's nostrils flare. "Give me one good reason I shouldn't kill you right now."
Nick remains unfazed as he faces the barrel of a loaded gun. "Because I can bring her back."
Ziggy's lips tremble. "Who?"
"Cindy, of course."
Ziggy grits her teeth, presses the guns against his forehead, enough to make him wince. "Cindy’s gone,” she whispers harshly, eyes shining with unshed tears. “Because of you."
"Gone?" Nick frowns, perplexed. "What are you talking about? No one's gone."
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Ziggy growls, trying to figure out what he was doing. How he was lying to her…
"Can't you hear them, Ziggy?"
"Hear what?"
Nick closes his eyes, peace overtaking his features. “Death touched you before. You should be able to hear if you focus…"
"I'm pulling the trigger right now," she threatens. “Goodbye Nick.”
"Ssh!" Nick shushes her like she's a child who’s holding a toy gun. "Just focus and listen…"
And she doesn't know what insanity possesses her, but she obeys and listens to him, then beyond the sounds of Martin and Deena struggling….beyond the sound of the thing calling her name…
More whispers. Familiar and unfamiliar. And then:
Ziggy?
Ziggy gasps at the voice she hasn’t heard in sixteen years, clear as day. “C-Cindy?” she rasps, her own voice small and tearful. The weapon in her hand trembles violently.
Ziggy…Ziggy, don’t—
“See, Ziggy?” Nick interrupts, carefully cradling her shaking hands, his thumbs rubbing soothingly over her wrists. “She’s still here." He looks into her tear-stained face. "They’re all still here. Everyone...all the way from Solomon Goode's time right up till now.” He glances at the mound of flesh, beating at an increased pace. “The curse…it keeps them all here. Because of my family. Because of me.”