“It took you three steps to get to cannibalism.”Jem held up three fingers and shook them in Tean’s face.“Three!And I don’t want the bright side.I want the dark side.”
“Well, the dark side is that the generators would probably function perfectly until they restore power to the lodge.”
“But we’d still be dead.”
“Well, yes.We’d still be dead.And decomposing in this room until someone found us.Which would inevitably take longer than normal because of the storm, the overwhelmed staff, and the chaos that would come in the aftermath of the blizzard.”
“We’d be super gross by the time they found us, though, right?”
“Oh, definitely.And, I mean, that’s assuming that she didn’t shoot me while I was sitting on the hearth.”
Jem perked up a little.“Why?What would happen?”
“Well, I’d probably catch on fire.”
“Oh shit.”
“Eventually.I mean, I’m sitting too close to the flames.And once this fabric dried out, it would ignite.”
“Would the whole lodge burn down?”
“Probably not, because of the storm—”
Jem started making a growly noise in his throat.
“But then again,” Tean corrected quickly, “it’s entirely possible that the fire would be too hot for the snow to put out.The smoke would be even more dangerous.And, of course, any survivors would be trapped up here without food or shelter, which would inevitably lead to cannibalism.”
The scowl almost made Tean smile.
“There,” Jem said.“Was that so hard?”
“Was it hard for me to catastrophize about our dead bodies becoming the fuel for a fire that would kill hundreds of people?”
“Yes.Was that so difficult?”
“Uh, no?”
Jem groaned.“Not like a question, babe.”But before Tean could respond to that, Jem gave a considering look around—as though seeing the burned-out ruins of the lodge—and in a surprisingly satisfied voice, said, “This place would be haunted as shit.”
“Well, in theory.But not actually, because ghosts aren’t real.”
“Sure, they are,” Jem said.“Scipio and I saw one.What do you think she was looking for?”
The change in topic almost left Tean behind—he was still working onScipio and I saw one.But after a moment, he managed to say, “I’m not sure.”
“This room isn’t near the elevator.It’s not on the ground floor.There’s no chance she picked it by random.Plus, she was watching you last night.”
Tean made a noise of assent.
“But we don’thaveanything,” Jem said.“That’s what’s so fucked up.We weren’t even going to stay the night, so we didn’t bring anything.”
“I don’t know,” Tean said.“But she was in here.So, she wants something.”
Jem scratched his beard.After a moment, he said, “Is it crazy to think she had something to do with Gerald?”
“I don’t know.I don’t know what that connection might be.But on the other hand, it’s hard to imagine that thereisn’ta connection.”
“Right,” Jem said.“That’s kind of what I was thinking.”
