Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Scar was worried about Grian.

Of course he was worried about him. Scar didn't know everything about what Taurtis meant to him, but he did know that they had grown up together and that they had been hunting partners for a long time. He knew that Taurtis had been presumed dead once before, and that it had hurt a lot, and that finding out he was alive had nearly given him a heart attack. Now he was gone completely, and Grian hadn't said a word since California.

They were in Wyoming now. That was a long time to be quiet for.

They had only stopped once along the way, at about noon, so that they could both get some sleep. They hadn't been getting much of it lately, what with their quick drive to California and their overnight stakeout. They pulled over somewhere in Utah, where they were shaded and out of the way, and Scar had fallen right to sleep. However, when he woke up, Grian was still staring out the window in the same position he'd been a few hours before.

So yeah, Scar was really worried about Grian.

Wyoming was a pretty sparse state, compared to a lot of the others along I-80, but as the sun began to set, the road signs revealed a small town just off the highway that they could stay for the night. Sleep in a proper bed, eat some proper food, and find their next job. Preferably a job that was farther away, so that Grian could still have plenty of time to process. He didn't want to push him too hard, and if he was still despondent, he could be more at risk in a high stress situation.

They stopped at a run down motel near the edge of the city, unloading the essentials from Jellie and heading inside for a room. It was the same quality that they had come to expect from these places on the road, but Scar had hoped that getting off the road would cause some kind of reaction from Grian. It didn't. He just moved mechanically inside, dropping his stuff next to one of the beds and standing there stiffly.

"How about this?" Scar set his things down on the other bed, rubbing at the back of his neck, sore from driving for far too many hours. "I'm going to go pick up some food for us. While I'm gone, you can use the shower, get cleaned up, all that. I shouldn't be gone long. I'll also look for a laundromat while I'm out, I know I need to wash my clothes. How does that sound?"

Grian shrugged, which had been his response to everything Scar said since the fire. Scar decided to take it as approval and moved to the doorway, pausing with his hand on the doorknob.

"Are you going to be okay here on your own for a bit?"

Grian let out a quiet, broken laugh. "Go. I'm fine."

That was clearly a lie, but it was better than another shrug, so Scar took it at face value. "Okay. I'll be back soon."

There was a tiny burger joint on the other end of town, and Scar decided to be a bit less frugal with his spending, buying them milkshakes on top of the burgers and fries. They earned it. Plus, it wasn't like he was actually spending real money. This was just another false credit card that Cub had set up for him. He also scoped out a dingy little laundromat next to what looked like an apartment complex, though there were no cars in its parking lot. Everything inside looked like it was working just fine, so Scar made a mental note to return in the morning to get their clothing clean.

When he returned to the motel, he was surprised to see Grian sitting at the table, hair damp, flipping through a newspaper. He had kinda been expecting him to still be standing where he'd left him, but it looked like he had actually gone and showered, and there was more life to him than there had been over the last day of driving.

"I'm back." He stepped over to the table, setting down the bags of food atop it. "I got us milkshakes."

"There's a job in Iowa." Grian replied, not looking up from the newspaper. "Two people suddenly paralyzed out of nowhere, no one could figure out why, both dropped dead after three days. There was no sign of it, nothing that would indicate why they were paralyzed or why they died."

Scar slowly opened one of the bags. "Are you….ready for another job? So soon after the last one?"

Grian finally looked up from the newspaper, meeting his eyes. "We need to get back to work."

"I mean, we don't have to—"

"Scar." Grian set down the paper, and there was an almost desperate look in his eyes, like he was drowning and this was the only thing that could save him. "I need to work."

"Oh."

Grian reached for the other bag, pulling out one of the burgers and quickly unwrapping it. He dug into it like he was starving, which, didn't seem all too far from the truth. He hadn't eaten all day. Scar wished immediately that he had gotten more food for him.

"So…paralysis." Scar started hesitantly. "What do we think?"

Grian shrugged. "There's all kinds of monsters known for paralyzing people to make it easier to kill them. We'll have to poke around a bit to see what exactly it is. Usually it's some form of sleep paralysis demon or monster, sometimes even spirits. But for some reason, the paralysis is lasting longer."

"Yeah, okay, we can definitely check it out." Scar agreed, still a bit taken aback by his sudden switch from being completely unresponsive to actively finding a job without any prompting. "Are you sure we don't want to take a short break?"

"I'm sure." Grian nodded seriously, taking another bite of his burger to avoid looking at him again. "You should shower, get cleaned up. As soon as I'm done eating, I'm going to get some sleep. I don't want to fight a monster if I'm not at my best."

"Okay." Scar pulled out his own burger, peeling the paper wrapping back from it, staring at it for a long moment. "Sounds good, I guess."

-

It was about a 12 hour drive to Iowa, and this time, instead of sitting sullenly in the passenger seat, Grian actually engaged in conversation with Scar from time to time. When he wasn't talking, he was bobbing his head along to the music or reading his hunting journal. It was such a stark contrast to the day before that Scar felt like he was genuinely experiencing whiplash.

"We should be there soon." Grian commented, running his finger along one of the roads on the map. "We've still got some daylight, we should check out some of the victims homes. This could be the work of witches, so we'll need to look for hex bags."

"Paralysis seems pretty specific." Scar hummed. "I don't really think it's witches."

"Well, we can't rule anything out just yet, especially since we haven't checked out anything." Grian frowned, folding up the map. "You'll need to take the next exit for the town."

"Yep." Scar nodded in acknowledgment, changing lanes to be on the right so he could get off at the quickly upcoming exit. "I don't think we should go straight to the victim's homes, it's getting late and usually people are more willing to talk when they're not busy. Right now, everyone's going to be getting dinner ready and spending time together, since school's still going on."

Grian's frown deepened. "We can't do any other research until we meet with them, I'd rather get started right away."

"We can try? But they probably won't be helpful." Scar bit the inside of his cheek, trying to air on the side of caution. He didn't want Grian to fall into the same pit he had been in the day before. He wasn't sure he'd be able to handle seeing him so despondent and unresponsive again.

"When we get to the motel, I'll see if I can get into the hospital records through your laptop, find the addresses." Grian decided. "Then we can visit them before it gets too late."

"Sounds like a plan." Scar agreed, despite his reservations. If this would help Grian deal with his grief over losing Taurtis again, he would go along with it.

They pulled into the motel just as the sun was setting, casting bright colors across the sky and illuminating the clouds. That was one thing Scar liked about traveling a lot. The views were incredible. Especially out in flat states like this one. You could see the entire sky just by spinning in a circle, and tonight it looked like a painting, all vibrant lights and brilliant hues of orange and pink.

Grian didn't pay it much attention beyond a hum of appreciation before pulling both his and Scar's bags out of the car. Scar booked them a room while he gathered all the things they would need inside the room, and once they were both inside, he found himself letting out a long breath. He sat down heavily atop one of the beds, running a hand down his face. His legs were a bit shaky from driving all day, and he was ready for a nice shower and nap. They also had to find somewhere to do their laundry, since they had neglected to do that back in Wyoming.

Grian dug through Scar's bag, pulling out the laptop and plugging it into the wall. Once it had enough charge to turn on, he began typing into it, navigating his way around it skillfully despite his many years of not having one of his own. Scar watched him sleepily as he worked, watching as he occasionally shook out his legs.

"You okay?" He asked, and Grian nodded.

"Yeah, my feet just keep falling asleep. Too long in the car, I think."

Scar hummed in understanding, pushing himself off of the bed. "I'm going to take a quick shower while you try and access the hospital records."

Grian nodded, looking like he had barely heard him, and Scar shook his head fondly. When he got back out of the bathroom, he was still hunched over the laptop, though there was now a crease between his eyebrows that spoke of his lack of success.

"It's so much more locked down than normal." He huffed, typing furiously. "You'd think it would be like all the other hospitals, with their files practically begging to be rifled through, but no. I think it's because they're incredibly unorganized. It's a mess in there."

Scar untied his hair from the high ponytail he'd put it in for the shower, running his fingers through it to untangle it. "You'll figure it out, I know it."

"Don't be so sure." Grian shook his head. "It's honestly ridiculous. We're probably going to have to go in to the hospital itself to get the records out."

"You could also just try looking directly for the address?" Scar suggested. "Instead of going through the hospital?"

"I guess." Grian frowned, bending down to rub at his ankles. "But I also want to see what the similarities are between the two cases. They'll have everything written down in there. Maybe we pass as CDC?"

"It's a good thing I got those new IDs printed then." Scar yawned, leaning back on the bed. "The hospital isn't going to be eager to help us out now though, it's too late in the evening. We'll have to go in the morning."

Grian sighed, running a hand down his face. "I was really hoping to get something done today."

"I'm sorry." Scar said sincerely. "I tried to drive as quickly as I could."

"No, it's not your fault." Grian waved him off, still squinting at the screen. "I just have to keep working on this, eventually I'll get through."

"I believe in you." Scar yawned again, then moved so that he was laying down. "I'm gonna get some sleep, I'm pretty beat from driving for pretty much the entire week."

"Mkay."

Scar slipped underneath the covers, pulling the pillows around him and closing his eyes. The light was no problem, he had learned to sleep anywhere at any time from being on the job, and the flickering overhead light wasn't anything compared to the sun in the middle of the day. The last thing he heard before he drifted off was the sound of the laptop keyboard tapping emphatically and the ruffle of Grian's pants as he shook out the pins and needles in his legs again.

Chapter Text

Scar swung himself out of bed at 7 o'clock on the dot, silencing his alarm and stretching. The first thing he did was pad across the sticky tile floor to open the curtains, letting the morning sunlight stream into the room. It wasn't a huge difference, since the curtains didn't do much to begin with, but it still made the space feel a little bit less dingy. He carefully pulled his suit out of his bag, smoothing it over the bed and nodding to himself when he saw only two wrinkles near the bottom of the shirt. They would be hidden by his suit coat, so there was no worry there. He quickly changed into the suit, careful not to let the pants touch the floor as he did so. He didn't want to get them dirty.

He left his tie sitting on the bed, moving to the bathroom to brush his teeth and splash cool water over his face to wake him up the rest of the way. He had to look professional for the conversations with the families and the hospital visit. If everything went well, they would be able to figure out what was going on here fairly quickly and get rid of the monster before the evening. He wanted to spend a day in town to recover from the many hours of driving and to finally wash their clothing.

When he emerged back into the main room, Grian was stirring in bed, face scrunched against the sunlight. Scar smiled, sitting down on his own bed and doing his tie, slipping on his socks and dress shoes. Then he gathered up his things, packing them away in his duffel and taking it out to the car. He had been expecting Grian to be up and at least half ready by the time he got back, but when he entered their room again, he still in bed, sitting up with a strange expression on his face.

"Scar." He said, cutting off the witty remark Scar was going to say in response to him still being in bed. His voice shook on the name, and that was when Scar fully processed the look in his eyes. He looked terrified.

"What's wrong?" He immediately asked, stepping closer. "Grian?"

"Scar, I can't move my legs." Grian shook his head, lifting the blanket away from him to reveal his legs. They looked normal, but he was staring at them with horror. "I can't...I can't move. They won't work."

"Oh." Scar said, a bit in shock. "That's not good."

"Is there….hexbag?" Grian asked, head whipping around as he searched everything nearby. "Check the motel, it must be here somewhere, it has to be a witch, they must know we're hunters or something."

Scar didn't comment on how unlikely that was, instead mechanically moving to search the motel. One hour later and the complete disassembly of the room revealed that there was no hexbag, and Grian was getting more panicked by the second.

"Okay, this is fine. We can figure this out." Scar stated, setting the cut open mattresses back down on the beds. "We'll figure this out."

"It has to be a spirit, right? I didn't see any monster, we warded against them anyway, and there's no hex bag." Grian said from the floor, leaning back on his hands.

"Unless it's something we don't know about, or it got past somehow." Scar pointed out, beginning to pace back and forth.

Grian gave him a withering look. 'Thanks for the positivity."

"...sorry." Scar rubbed the back of his neck apologetically.

"It's fine, we just... clock's ticking now. The other two died after three days, right? So we have three days to figure this out." Grian took a deep breath to steady himself. "Well…probably less than that, it must have been why my feet were falling asleep so much last night."

"Right." Scar nodded, coming to a stop in front of him. "Okay. So what do we do then?"

"First thing's first, you're going to get me a wheelchair." Grian instructed. "I'll stay here and try to get into the hospital records again. You go in person, call me if you manage to get anything. There has to be something similar between the victims, something to do with them, something that connects them. There has to be."

"Alright, I'll go over right away." Scar declared, straightening his suit coat. "I promise we'll figure this out."

"Just…" Grian hesitated on the words, then shook his head. "Drive fast."

-

"Agent Grimes, CDC." Scar stood, wincing slightly from the discomfort of the hospital waiting room chairs, then stepped forward to shake the doctor's hand. "I'm here because of the paralysis cases?"

The doctor took his hand graciously, shaking it once before gesturing him to follow somewhere quieter. "You're in the right place. I'm a bit surprised they sent someone, it's still relatively small."

"We have to make sure it won't escalate into something larger." Scar replied easily. "Make sure it isn't a disease or something similar."

"Of course." The doctor agreed. "I don't think it's a disease, they tested negative to everything. I really can't place why this happened. There was no trauma, hormone levels were fine, no sickness. By all accounts, it doesn't make sense."

"Well, that's part of the job, figuring out those things which don't make sense." Scar said lightly. "I don't suppose I could access the files on these two? We need all the information we can get for our scientists."

"I'm not sure…" The doctor caught Scar's expectant gaze and immediately paused. "But…I'll see what we can do."

"Excellent, thank you." Scar smiled. "Before you do that, is there anything you can tell me about the patients? Any weird markings, any symptoms, anything like that?"

The doctor considered him for a second, then nodded. "Both reported symptoms of feeling their limbs falling asleep before losing feeling entirely. Over the course of the next few days, they both reported pain at the bases of their spines, and after about 48 hours, they developed a dark bruise at the source of the pain. However, when we did x-rays, there was nothing wrong with the spine. Everything seemed perfectly intact, there was no reason for them to be paralyzed. We ran tests, as many as we could, but nothing turned up. Then, in the middle of the night, their vitals dropped. We couldn't figure out why, we tried to bring them back but there was nothing we could do. They were just…gone."

Scar frowned, piecing together the information. It didn't sound like anything they'd ever dealt with before. It definitely didn't seem like a witch hex. "I see. Thank you."

"Don't thank me, I haven't given you anything." The doctor sighed. "We tried to find similarities between the patients, find out what might have been the cause, but there was nothing. The closest thing we had was that they use the same water lines, but the whole town does so it still doesn't make sense."

"Well, thank you for your efforts." Scar patted him on the shoulder. "We'll look into more similarities. Do you know if the two families had any contact with each other?"

"The second family had never even heard of them." The doctor shook his head. "If it's something transmittable, it would need to carry across multiple people without showing symptoms."

Scar could already feel a headache beginning to form behind his eyes, pulsing through his head in steady heartbeats. "Right. Okay. Do you mind if I step out to call my superiors for a moment?"

"Go right ahead." The doctor held out his hand to shake again. "I need to get back to work, if you have any other questions, go ahead and ask Shayla, she's the secretary."

"Will do. Thank you very much sir, I appreciate your cooperation." Scar shook his hand firmly, then turned around, moving to a corner in the lobby and pulling out his phone. He quickly tapped Cub's profile, bringing the phone to his ear as it rang. It rang twice before he answered, a cheerful note to his voice.

"Hey Scar, how's it going?"

Scar felt a smile come to his face despite himself. "Hey Cub. I'm working a case right now with Grian, over in Iowa."

"You should stop by, I'm probably only a few hours away." Cub hummed. "But I'm assuming that's not why you're calling me."

"Unfortunately not." Scar sighed. "Okay, get this. We came to this town because there were two cases of paralysis followed quickly by death here, completely unexplained. Day after we get in town, Grian loses all feeling in his legs."

"Well that's not very good."

"Nope." Scar agreed. "At first we thought it was a witch, but when we—well, I—searched the apartment, there was nothing there. And trust me, I searched really hard, there was definitely no hex bag. There's no relation between the two victims besides their symptoms, they don't have any mutual friends or anything. I'm probably going to go to the families next, ask where they went before they were paralyzed, but at the same time, Grian hasn't gone anywhere except the motel. We got into town and got a room immediately."

"Hmm." The sound of rustling papers came from the other end of the phone. "It's probably a ghost. Sometimes there are rare cases in which a spirit can manipulate things beyond just murdering a person or bursting a few lights. They can cause a slow death in their victims, rather than a quick one. It's called ghost sickness. I don't know a ton about it, but I'll take a look into it and call you back when I have more."

"Okay." Scar nodded, even though he knew Cub couldn't see it. "Go quickly, because the other two victims died after 72 hours of showing symptoms. Grian has maybe 50 hours left."

"Got it. I'll read quick."

"Thanks, Cub." Scar felt the tension lift from his shoulders ever so slightly. "I appreciate it."

"It's no problem."

"Once we finish this job, we'll definitely drive out to see you." Scar promised. "See ya."

"Bye Scar."

Scar stuffed his phone back in his pocket, straightening his suit coat and heading over to the secretary's desk. "Hello, my name is Agent Grimes, I was wondering if you could help me access a few files?"

-

Grian ran a hand through his hair, his frustration boiling over. He was trapped on this stupid bed in this stupid motel and he couldn't move his stupid legs. Not to mention, the base of his spine hurt. It was throbbing with a deep pain that he couldn't shake, no matter how he twisted and shifted the way he sit. The laptop was discarded at his side, his efforts at digging up information from the hospital abandoned after several hours of nothing.

He needed to do something, he couldn't keep sitting here, couldn't keep stewing in his thoughts. Thinking was dangerous, thinking led to remembering and remembering led to that night, and that night led to fire, fire consuming the whole room, Taurtis screaming from where he was pinned ot the ceiling—

STOP.

He dug his palms into his eyes, letting out a choked sound. He hated this. He hated this so much. He was completely useless, there was nothing he could do here except stare at the laptop and fail over and over and over again. It was probably pointless anyway, Scar had probably already gotten all of the files he needed, there was no reason for him to keep looking. He had to do something though. He had to. He couldn't keep sitting here, spiralling faster and faster. They had picked up this job because he needed to distract himself, because he couldn't think about what had happened, and it had been working.

But now he was in pain, so much pain, both physically and emotionally, and he couldn't move past it. He couldn't ground himself in any meaningful way. He was stuck, trapped, and it hurt. It hurt and he couldn't do anything about it. He wished Scar were here, then he would have someone to talk to, someone to take his mind off of what was going on. Scar would fill the silence. He would make things a little less overbearing.

But no, Scar was out doing his job, doing the job that Grian should be doing, what he could have been doing if he wasn't stuck here, pain pulsing up his spine and making it impossible to think. The pain only drove him to feel more and more insane, thoughts swirling in his mind, and after only a few minutes, he couldn't take it anymore. With a frustrated sound, he reached for the laptop again. To do what, he wasn't sure yet, but anything was better than just sitting there and stewing in his thoughts.

It was as his fingers brushed against the laptop that he saw his breath cloud in the air, the sensation of freezing cold hitting him a split second later.

"Crap."

"Murderer."

The voice was colder than the air, cutting through it like a knife, echoing off of the walls of the dingy motel. Goosebumps darted up Grian's arms and he fumbled for his gun, already packed full of salt. He couldn't see the ghost yet, but that didn't mean there wasn't any threat. The air had already dropped another ten degrees, the glass of water sitting on the nightstand beginning to frost over, and Grian swallowed back his pain and fear, focusing instead on the matter at hand.

"Murderer."

"I haven't killed anyone." Grian said aloud to the hissing air, tightening his grip on his gun.

Was that a lie? Did vampires and werewolves and monsters and ghosts count?

"You killed him."

Taurtis. It was talking about Taurtis.

They had fought, the two of them, in the parking lot of the motel. Grian had driven him away. Driven him to his death.

But that wasn't all.

"You knew he was going to die. You knew. It's your fault he's dead."

Grian took a shuddering breath in, pressing himself back against the headboard. "No."

"Yes. You saw him. You knew what would happen and you let him go anyway."

"I didn't—" Grian's words cut off as a hand wrapped around his throat, icy fingers digging into his skin as a figure came into view. A young woman, no older than 20, hair tangled and hanging around her face, eyes boring into his soul.

"You did."

Grian brought his gun up, firing it directly into the heart of the spirit. She let out a shriek of pain, dissolving into mist, and he gasped for air, pressing a hand to his pounding heart. The base of his spine was singing out in pain, as if in response to the ghost's presense, but he didn't have time to pay attention to that. The ghost would return any second now, he had to be ready. He didn't have time to call Scar, there probably wasn't reception here anyway.

"Taurtis?"

His own voice, hollow in the frigid air. His own voice as he'd heard it time and time again in his dreams.

"Grian?"

"Grian?!"

Scar's voice. Urgent and scared and concerned. Grian could see his eyes, bright green and focused on him, rather than the flames.

"No, not again, not again!"

"Stop." Grian growled over the sound of his own panic. "Shut up."

"NO!"

"You watched this. Time and time again. You knew it would happen. And you still let it play out."

"I didn't know!" He shouted at the empty room. "I didn't know it was real!"

"You had visions before. You knew."

"Shut up!" His grip was too tight on the gun, it would throw off his aim, but he couldn't bring himself to loosen it.

"It's your fault he's dead. You killed him."

Grian couldn't say anything to that. There was nothing to say. It was true.

The ghost materialized again, hands outstretched to strangle him, eyes glowing a sharp blue as the lights flickered overhead. There was nothing but rage in her expression, a violent, aggressive look that indicated nothing but malice towards him.

"Why do you care that it's my fault?" Grian hissed out, shuffling back on the bed. "I didn't kill you."

"It's your fault."

Grian snarled, lifting his gun and firing it through her again, watching as she evaporated into the air again. "I know it's my fault. I have to live with it. I don't need some stupid ghost telling me that."

"Murderers deserve to die."

"I didn't—" Grian took a shaky breath. "I didn't kill him. I just…it's just my fault that he died. I'm not a murderer."

"Murderer."

This time, when icy fingers clamped down on his throat, he wasn't able to stop them from tightening. His limbs had gone slack, his body limp and unmoving. He couldn't move. He strained, the gun was still in his hand, he could fire again, but his fingers didn't even twitch.

"It's your fault he's dead."

The words were colder than her hands, sending chills up and down his spine, even as adrenaline coursed through him from the lack of oxygen. He still couldn't move.

"And now you'll die too."

Chapter Text

The door to the room slammed open, doorknob hitting the wall with a loud thud. For a split second, the hands around Grian's throat loosened, and his head sagged to the side to see Scar standing there. He was still wearing his suit, a phone pressed to his ear and a gun in his hand.

BANG!

The ghost dissipated once more as the salt made contact with it, and Grian managed to get a few sips of air in, even as his head lolled. He still couldn't feel anything, but the fact that he was able to breathe meant that he wasn't entirely paralyzed. His heart was still pounding loudly in his chest, and tears sprung to his eyes from the pain around his throat and in the base of his spine. It felt like it was being crushed, a deep pressure that felt like it was breaking bone.

"Grian, Grian, hey, are you okay?" Scar rushed to his side, dropping his phone onto the nightstand and taking his face in the hand that wasn't holding a gun. "What's going on?"

"'S my fault." Grian gasped out through the tears. "I'm the reason someone died."

"…what?" Scar frowned. "Who…Taurtis? That wasn't your fault—"

"I saw that he was going to die." Grian squeezed his eyes shut. "I saw it and I still pushed him away. I had a vision of it. I knew."

"Okay." Scar said, voice steady. He…he wasn't upset? He wasn't angry? Grian had just admitted that he was reason Taurtis had died, and he was just…taking it at face value? Wasn't leaving him to the ghost?

"Here's what we're going to do." Scar continued, and a moment later, Grian was being pulled off of the bed and slung across his back. "Are you able to move at all?"

"No." Grian peeled his eyes open again. "Neck on down is paralyzed. I can still breathe and my heart is still beating though, so I don't think it's real?"

"Gotcha." Scar adjusted him on his back, taking his arms and wrapping them around his neck, forcing his hands to clamp around each other. "If feeling starts returning, just hold on."

"Where are we going?" Grian glanced around the room, doing his best to search while still not being able to turn his head. "She'll follow us."

"Not in Jellie." Scar snatched his phone back up. "I've got her warded against spirits. You'll be safe."

"Scar, I'm going to die soon." Grian stated simply. "Regardless of if Jellie is warded or not, I'm going to die."

"We're going to figure this out, I promise." Scar put his phone on speaker, already hurrying out of the room. "Cub, did you hear any of that?"

"Grian's paralyzed even more now?"

Grian had heard Cub a few times over the phone, mostly when Scar was trying to get them set up with a new credit card. Still, it was a bit of surprise to hear him now, in the middle of danger.

"Yeah, and our good friend Maria was there as well." Scar stepped out into the parking lot, right as the ghost reappeared in the air, hovering in front of them. Scar didn't even flinch, shooting her again and trekking over to where he had parked Jellie. He stuffed Grian into the passenger seat, closing the door before getting in on his side.

"So, Grian, to catch up," Scar turned on the car, rolling up the windows. "You've got a weird case of ghost sickness. You're not actually paralyzed, once we get rid of this ghost, you'll be fine. I spent a while poking through the files at the hospital and found a patient by the name of Maria Harpenter."

"Hang on." Grian cut him off. "Ghost sickness?"

"It's a rarer way that ghosts interact with the mortal world. Usually it manifests in the same way that the ghost died, the same sensations, the same symptoms." Cub chimed in, the phone balanced on the dashboard. "So the paralysis you're going through, that's what that's from."

"Okay." Grian managed to force his body to take a deep breath. "So I have ghost sickness. And Scar, you said…Maria?"

"Maria Harpenter, age 20." Scar put them into reverse, backing out of the parking lot. "Six months ago, she got hit by a car. A drunk driver. She was immediately paralyzed from the waist down, and 72 hours later, she passed away from unknown complications."

"Let me guess, the first person to get surprise paralyzed was the drunk driver?" Grian groaned.

"Yep." Scar nodded. "So now we're going to go to her grave and burn her bones."

"You know where she is? Already?"

"Right again. Violet Hill Cemetery." Scar turned the car, and Grian slumped against the window, unable to balance himself. "Sorry."

Scar reached over and righted him before fumbling with the map in his lap, trying to locate the best route to the cemetery. "This is a lot more difficult when you can't help me."

Grian was about to respond "it's not my fault", his mouth opening to form the syllables, but the ghost's words came back to him and the words died in his throat. Because it was his fault. All of this was his fault. Taurtis's death, coming here to Iowa, getting paralyzed. All of this was because of him. Now, Scar had to drive them up to the cemetery and dig up the grave of the spirit all on his own, while Grian sat there, useless.

"I can hear your thoughts, you know." Scar tapped his fingers against the steering wheel. "Not actually, but…G, this isn't on you. None of this is."

"Yes it is." Grian closed his eyes, trying to ignore the aching pain in his spine and his throat. "I should have done something to stop Taurtis from going in there. I should have—I knew what was going to happen and I didn't stop it. I didn't save him. And I was the one to push for us to come here, running away from everything."

"G," Scar paused, then upbruptly pulled over to the side of the road. The car swerved far more aggressively than Grian had ever felt it, and Grian nearly fell onto the clutch, only caught by Scar's expecting hand.

"Are you crazy?" Grian spluttered, and if he could lift his head to stare at Scar, he would have. "What are you doing?"

"We need to talk." Scar declared, pushing him up so that he was leaning against the door and actually able to see him. "About all of this. The blaming, the death, the visions, all of it. We're not putting this off any longer."

"I—"

"No, you're listening to me, mister." Scar folded his arms. "When we met up with Taurtis, you only had one vision. And even then, it was in spurts. How often do you have nightmares?"

Grian felt a surge of…something rise up in his chest, a dark twisted thing of anger and shame, built up over the past few days. "That's not relevant, I—"

"Answer the question." Scar cut him off again, not letting him change the subject. "How often?"

Grian swallowed back a nasty reply, barely keeping it from leaving his lips. Instead, he answered truthfully. "Almost every night."

"How many of those nightmares have come true?" Scar continued. "Not including ones that are rehashing the past."

"One." Grian could see fire flickering in his mind's eye.

"And before Taurtis?"

"Zero."

Scar hummed softly, nodding to himself before speaking again. "You thought they were nightmares."

"I should have known better." Grian squeezed his eyes shut.

"You couldn't have known better." Scar sighed. "So you saw it before it happened. So what? You couldn't have done anything different. You didn't know it was real. And even if you had done something…we don't know if that would even change what you saw. It could have just played right into it."

He was right. God, he was right, and Grian hated it. He hated that everything Scar said made sense, that it spoke to his heart, that it was accurate. It made it impossible for him to blame himself.

"And coming here?" He found himself saying, voice barely more than a cracked whisper. "I pushed for us to come to this job."

"Again, you couldn't have known what the ghost's motive was." Scar finally put his hands back on the wheel, not quite pulling back onto the road yet but preparing for it. "We needed another job, to take our minds off of what happened. This happened to be close."

We. They both knew Grian was the only one who really needed this job. Yet Scar still said we. Like they were both struggling. Like they were in it together.

"Listen, I don't really know what's going on with this whole vision thing, but whatever it is, I'm in it with you. Whether you like it or not." Scar slowly eased the car back onto the road. "We've already done several missions together, and I like having you around. You're like a walking ghost encyclopedia, even when you don't know things off of the top of your head, the moment Cub starts talking, you catch on immediately. Not to mention your wardrobe of disguises, your quick thinking, and your charm and good looks."

Grian snorted despite himself, and a grin spread across Scar's face at the sound.

"You're stuck with me for a while yet, Grian." He declared. "Don't you dare forget that."

"Alright, alright." Grian sighed. "You're too charasmatic for your own good."

"I gotta keep you around somehow." Scar replied easily. "Now, time to go burn some bones."

It was remarkably easy to find Maria's grave. In fact, it was a bit shocking how easy the whole process was. Grian stayed in the car, watching with his head leaned back against the seat, as the ghost battered on the windows. It was useless, the wards were far stronger than she was, and more than once, Grian thought that she would go after Scar instead. But she never did. She was locked on to him, slamming against the glass as he felt numbness creep higher up his neck. It had begun to tickle his jaw when the ashes began to rise from when Scar had dug up the grave, halting right before it hit his lips.

The ghost, Maria, pounded her fists against the windows again and again, even as her skin dissolved into ashes and smoke, crumbling against the glass with one final scream. Grian closed his eyes as the embers floated up into the rapidly darkening sky.

He didn't open them until Scar returned to the car, setting the shovel and bag of supplies in the back and leaning back in the driver's seat with a sigh.

"Grave burned." Scar declared, out of breath. "How are you feeing?"

Grian slowly lifted his head, pins and needles spiking down his neck, taking a deep breath in. "Well…I can move my neck, I couldn't do that a minute ago."

"Can you move anything else?" Scar asked hesitantly, eyes taking on a worried look. Grian quickly put it to rest, pushing the rest of himself up with a weak and shaking arm. He let out a quiet hiss as tingles stabbed their way under his skin, shaking out his hands and wincing as his nerves woke back up.

"I'll be alright." He reassured Scar, closing his eyes again. "Just have to let everything get back to normal."

"You sure?"

Grian lifted his hands again, giving him a weak grin. "Well, I can move again, so I think that's a big sign."

"Well…" Scar slowly sat up, starting Jellie up again and placing his hands on the wheel. "We're gonna have to stop by the motel, grab our stuff, but then we should probably get out of here. We both fired bullets in there, something that I doubt they'll be happy about."

"Yeah, probably not." Grian huffed. "So we're hitting the road?"

"Seems like it." Scar nodded. "Where do you wanna go?"

"Illinois isn't too far."

Scar tilted his head to the side, considering it for a moment before nodding. "I like that. We'll go crash on Cub's couch."

"Sounds like a plan to me."

When they pulled up to the motel, there was a police car parked in the lot, lights on. By that point, Grian had gotten feeling back in most of his body, with only his feet still tingling, and both he and Scar got out of the car, leaving it running.

"How do we want to play this?" Scar asked quietly. "You're the strategy guy."

"Am I?" Grian replied skeptically.

"Yep."

Grian hummed. "Best thing to do? Just walk in like normal. See how far we can get. If we get stopped, you bluff our way out. Worst comes to worst…want to add a charge to your criminal record?"

"What crime would that be?" Scar raised an eyebrow.

"Assaulting an officer." Grian winked, then made his way to the door of the motel, head held high.