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Season 2 Finale
Bleeding from the lip, nose and the gash just above his eyebrow, Avon’s head hangs low in the seat that his wrists are tied to, his feet similarly bound to the legs of the chair. With his eyes closed, the brutally beaten author sits without a word to utter, unable to see anything around himself as the room he’s in- whether cramped or spacious- is clouded in utter darkness. Breathing normally, the writer waits for whatever fate may come to him, unsure of anything other than how he ended up in the predicament to begin with. Finally parting his eyelids, Avon finds the same nothingness that he’d seen when the thin flaps of flesh had covered his sights, entrenching him in the void that he’s stranded within. Covered in sweat, the man’s face is struck by the cold air that wafts over his face in every breath, proving more chilly than the stuffy quarters he’s confined to. As he tries to lower his breathing to such a minimal point that not even he, himself, can hear it, the author tries to allow his hearing an attempt at listening into anything that can lend him clarity as to where he is. Struggling to catch much more than the blood in his ears, Avon pulls in whatever oxygen his lungs can expand to accommodate before holding it back, eyes widening as he fights to gain an insight into just what kind of circumstance he finds himself in. Though faint, the sound of verbal scuffle between a pair of men in the great distance manages to penetrate the blanket of darkness the author is forced to call his current home. Though unclear, what is said seems to spark a discourse that grows louder the longer that it goes on, the volume and intensity of such a conversation forcing its way further into the room which the abducted writer is stored inside. “Everyone’s gonna be looking for him!” a man proclaims, the anger carried through his voice bringing the comment to such great lengths that the words can be made out by the subject of the concern. Commencing slow and quiet breaths, Avon begins to retain his grasp on the chatter beyond his captivity, trying to take away as much insight as he can from the confinement he’s been sentenced to. “They don’t like him, they won’t do a damn thing!” a much lower, yet less intense voice replies, fighting the conclusion that was made by the soul he seemingly argues with. “This isn’t just a town thing, it’s a national thing you fat dope!” the first man- who’d initiated the high volume of the conversation- retorts, insulting his cohort whilst correcting the conclusion that was made by him, “the dude’s known all over the fucking country! This shit’s gonna be national news!” “Boys, that is enough!” a third voice interjects, breaking through the conversation in ways that the author hadn’t taken notice of before, lowering the volume of the discussion back toward lesser-heard levels. Pulling in his breaths again, Avon ceases his breathing as he attempts to regain his grasp on what’s being said beyond his reach, only to find this attempt proving futile, no further comments being made coherent enough for him to follow. Shaking his head with disappointment, Avon begins his breathing once more, letting out a long breath through his nose to clear the blood and snot that he’d been incapable of ridding. Feeling beads of sweat trickle down the side of his face and neck, the writer closes his eyes and prepares to await further action once more, no longer able to know what’s happening around him and coming to a temporary understanding of that. Suddenly and without warning, the door that had forced the author into complete nothingness is pulled open once more, provoking the prisoner into deepening the closure of his eyes as a shield from the harsh light that floods into the room and over him. “He’s awake” the third man’s voice remarks, overhearing the pained groan that Avon initially reacts with and taking it to mean what it does. “What the hell do you want from me?” the author questions aloud, his eyes remaining closed and face remaining heavily beaten and bloody whilst his voice sounds rugged, cold, and tired. Without initially replying, the three men that now approach their victim inspect his physical condition, the unintroduced third voice taking Avon by the chin and forcing the man’s face toward the exterior of his own mask, looking through the holds in his visage’s covering at the attack’s aftermath. “You did a decent number on him” the identity-concealed man remarks, still inspecting the author’s face, looking from one side of his sweat-covered skin to the other as if he were a slab of beef in the supermarket aisle he’d contemplated buying. “What do you want from me?” Avon repeats, still yet to open his eyes as he feels the fingers that had pressed into the flesh around his jawline pull away, returning to the side of the man they belong to. “Look at me” the mask-covered assailant replies, urging the abducted civilian to do as instructed, “hey, look at me.” Having whistled and snapping his rubber glove-covered fingers before repeating himself, the anonymous criminal once again gestures for the writer to do what’s been asked of him, waiting for a few seconds as the victim’s eyelids struggle to part with the light that still dazes him. Trying as best he can, Avon parts his eyelids to find a singular smiley face mask looking into his face, the man having dropped to the ground and placed himself upon one, bent knee. To either of the man’s sides, a pair of men in similar facial coverings- one muscular figure and another comfortably overweight figure- stand at attention with their hands hung at either side, prepared to attend to the aid of their presumed leader at a moment’s notice in the event that it’s needed. “What do you want from me?” the author asks for a third time, looking away from the knelt criminal before him in order to pass glances at the assailants to either of his sides, eyes inevitably falling back toward the nearest abductor. Looking into the victim’s eyes, the masked figure continues to kneel in silence, staring at Avon without uttering a word, simply taking the man’s assaulted appearance and helpless nature into his memory as if he were taking a photograph. = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = “We’re not trying to talk in circles, Penny. We’re just trying to make sure we understand what you’re saying without mistake” Beau clarifies, sitting in his passenger’s seat whilst looking at the woman through the cruiser’s rear view mirror toward the woman in the back. “I don’t know how you could mistake anything that I’m saying” Penny responds, “we went to bed, he wasn’t home when I woke up, and then I found the mask on the chair where his laptop is.” “And you checked the entire house for him?” Jake queries, taking part in the conversation whilst navigating the roads from the precinct to the King’s residence, “we’re not gonna walk into another JonBenet Ramsay situation, are we?” Assuring the older officer otherwise, Penny watches as the final turn onto the road in which their residency resides is taken, “There isn’t much home to look through. I did a quick run-through to see if he could be playing a joke, but-” “Who’s that?” Beau questions aloud, interrupting the conversation as he leans forward, looking through the windshield and toward the sedan parked outside of the woman’s home, “do you have company over, Penny?” Shaking her head with vehement denial, the well-educated doctor refuses the man’s conclusion, “no, we don’t” she answers, a comment that the cop in the driver’s seat accepts as the truth immediately. “I believe that’s the car Harlington Spears has registered to his name” Jake remarks, speaking in a low tone, though the words that he speaks are more than spoken loud enough to be heard. “Is he inside our home?” Penny questions aloud, looking toward the building’s exterior before taking notice of the massive front door being left open, the interior of her home visible only through the facade of the screen door that precedes it. “I’m gonna run the plates on the car. Detective Donovan, would you-?” Jake queries, slowing the cruiser to a stop before his partner answers, cutting the man off with a smile on his face. “It’d be my fucking pleasure to, partner” Beau replies, immediately pushing his door open and returning his feet to contact with the ground, the gun on his hip being taken into his possession as he rounds his own vehicle. “Mrs. King, stay in the car” Jake remarks, joining his colleague in entering the scene of what could turn out worse than what they anticipate, his hand being taken to the radio on his shoulder. Sneaking his way toward the house’s front staircase, Beau peers through whichever windows haven’t been concealed behind drapes or shades, seeing nothing from the level that he occupies that can alleviate some of the concerns building within his core. “This is Detective Jake Mansoor, I need plates run on a vehicle parked outside of Avon and Penny King’s residency on Milton Hill Drive” the older officer radios in, reading off the numbers on the licence plate whilst his colleague continues about his journey. Staying low to the ground, Beau ascends the concrete platforms with his side grazing the metal bannister, the barrel of his weapon held in the direction of the ground as he draws closer to the entrance. “Where the hell would he have gone?” a man’s voice questions aloud, raising a wonder that the hot-headed officer is now well in-range to overhear. “I don’t know, but we aren’t in a rush” a second voice replies, catching Beau by surprise with its soft and feminine appearance. “I can confirm the plates as belonging to Harlington Spears, do you require backup?” the officer on the other end of the radio replies, raising the inquiry that Jake- at first- appears eager to affirm. “No, no, no!” Penny whispers, sneaking up on the older cop quickly before covering the talkie with her hand, urging the man not to reply. “Look at Beau!” the woman hisses, pointing toward her building, where the younger cop silently gestures for his partner. “Detective Mansoor, do you copy?” the woman on the radio’s opposite end questions aloud, momentarily disregarded by the gendarme as his sights direct themselves toward the house. “Two people” Beau mouths, pointing in the direction of the door before raising a pair of fingers toward his colleague. Aware of the need for quiet, Jake lifts his thumb toward the younger officer’s direction before pointing at his radio, the circular motion of his finger that encompasses the entire neighbourhood preceding the extended flattening of his hand, leaving his partner in control of the call. Shaking his head whilst waving his fingers at his own throat, Beau refuses the call for backup, a conclusion that the older gendarme trusts enough to put his faith in. “No, we’re all good on this front. Just needed clarity” Jake answers back, refusing the precinct’s request before nodding toward Penny’s direction, gesturing for her to seek cover behind their cruiser before hurrying across the lawn. “There are two people inside- one of them sounds exactly like Harlington, but the other one is a chick. She sounds young- probably mid-twenties” Beau whispers, moving aside to allow the more experienced cop a position in the driver’s seat. “The man is looking for Avon and the woman’s telling him that they’re not in a rush” the young cop adds in, reaching for the screen door’s hand before gently pressing his thumb into it, allowing a quiet entry into the building to commence. “Police! Put your hands where I can see them!” Jake exclaims, his voice bouncing off of one wall and into another whilst he storms down the home’s main foyer, his gun drawn in the direction that footsteps are heard. “Don’t shoot! We’re unarmed!” the woman’s voice proclaims, allowing the detectives to follow the sound of her voice into the kitchen, where they find the subject in question lifting her arms, surrendering at once without any conflict to offer. “Hey guys” Harlington greets with an odd level of confidence, just beginning to dig a spoon into the surface of a newly-opened carton of red gelatin, “how’s it going?” “Beth?” Beau quickly wonders aloud, taking notice of the much more concerned woman, her guilty visage and trembling hands raised whilst she stands a few feet ahead of the man who she’d broken into the home alongside. “We can explain!” Beth hurriedly confesses, turning her head back to face the man that immediately chuckles at her assertion. “Well this is an interesting turn of events” Harlington murmurs, sliding the dessert-covered spoon between his lips before using his tongue to clean the curved side of it, coating it with the cherry flavouring his snack had been laced with, “now it’s you that has to explain the crazy stuff.” Surprised by both the woman’s unanticipated return to Remedy Hills and the fact that she’s riding with a man who’d climbed the ranks of the most wanted fugitives in the town’s entirety, Jake and Beau remain standing with their guns drawn, neither man sure on what to say or how to react to the odd pairing that stands before them. | “I’m just gonna keep asking the same question until you answer it” Avon mutters, refusing to look into the eyes of his captor as the restraints around his ankles and wrists are made tighter. “You’ve been tormenting my wife, you’ve been tormenting me, you killed Beth Ovorre, you’ve killed countless other people, and you don’t seem to be interested in stopping” the writer persists, his grogginess made clear in the uneasy reflection contained within his voice. “For god’s sake, if you’re trying to tell me something- just come out with it” he pleads, shaking his head with a loss before his chin is held steady by the masked assailant’s fingers, another examination of the author’s scars taken. Refusing to play along with this second inspection, Avon violently thrashes his head and pulls it away, shaking from the grasp of the criminal that kneels before him. With the most gentle tilt, the masked cleaner’s head leans toward the right as his eyes stare into those of the author’s, eventually taking to the differing features in the man’s appearance. Coated in sweat, the stuck-together strands of Avon’s hair reflect the light of the hallway that the open door allows to crash upon the imprisoned figure of national interest, the trail of blood leading down from different points of the man’s face having mostly begun to dry. Breathing slowly, Avon’s chest lifts with ease and lowers back to a resting state without issue, the damp collar of his grey, V-neck t-shirt allowing the fabric to stick to his moist body, the sweat upon his flesh reflecting the same illumination that the strands of his hair to. “What do you want from me?” the man questions aloud once more, earning no change in the abductor’s demeanour, and provoking no reaction from the man who has heard the question countless times now. Refusing to answer it as he had in all other instances, the unidentified criminal lifts himself away from the ground and ventures through the room’s door, walking around the corner before coming to a stop shortly thereafter. Inspecting something beyond the author’s sight, the masked abductor sifts through what sounds like various pieces of metal whilst his acquaintances watch on, keeping to themselves before one figure is met with the urge to taunt. “Don’t gawk at me” the heavy-set fellow remarks, turning his sights toward the author before raising a finger in the man’s direction, “you answer to us now. This doesn’t work the other way ar-” *pop pop pop* Without any warning, the apparent leader of the trio retrieves a gun from the waistband behind his pants and fires three rounds at the overweight criminal, two shots striking at the man’s chest before the final one tags him just over his top lip. Having concealed his wince well, the well-built masked kidnapper moves aside as the much heavier victim topples to the ground, not wanting to be taken down by the force of the man’s weight. With widened eyes, Avon watches as the figure who’d bad-mouthed him falls, suffocating on his own blood whilst his brain processes the fact that he’s just been killed- the rest of the man’s body just now beginning to play catchup. Returning into the author’s full view, the leading criminal approaches the man he’d just slain before passing a glance toward the shredded figure beside him, watching as the man raises two hands in surrender as if to suggest he had no issue with the action. Lowering the gun’s barrel toward the ground, the leader turns his sights toward the visibly shocked and appalled victim he’d restrained beyond any means of escape, watching as the author looks up to meet the eyes with his own. Trying to remain strong in the face of terror he assumes was partly made in an effort of intimidating him, Avon refuses to break from the man’s eyes even as the armed murderer slowly returns to him, approaching with a relaxed sway in his posture. Holstering his firearm in the waistband of his sweatpants once more, the criminal lowers himself back to the dust-covered ground, his knee gently pressing into the rock-solid floor directly in front of the imprisoned writer. “What do you want from me?” Avon questions yet again, refusing to allow the inquiry to die the same way the hefty helping hand had seconds prior, wanting to know the answer just as he has throughout the entire ordeal. “You’ve put my wife and I through the ringer. You sickos are too organised for that to have been for pointless torment” he doubles down, assuring the criminal that all of this must be for a greater purpose. “You’ve done everything to make that clear other than outright telling me what you want from me” Avon adds, seeing no change in the movement of the criminal’s eyes regardless of what he says, “just tell me what you want so we can stop getting in each other’s way.” Holding firm in his demand, the assaulted, exhausted, and emotionally-drained author looks for answers to questions that have been left for him since he’d entered the grief-stricken town that now appears to be more of a cause of grief than a victim of it. “Why did you go into the forest?” the masked criminal finally speaks aloud, raising a question to the restrained subject that he’s knelt before, allowing silence to permeate throughout the room once his inquiry has been presented. Just barely parted, Avon stares beyond the mask’s plastic exterior, beyond the glossy material that reflects his battered face and through the slits above the mound at its centre, peering into the pupils that hold upon him. Unmoving, the man’s lips refuse to move in a way which can be considered an attempt to answer, their resting state remaining just the same way despite the seconds that pass between the question and now, unsure of what to reply with. | “What method of self-defence did you use, exactly?” Jake questions, standing before Beth as she sits in one of the kitchen chairs, her hands cuffed behind her back just as her cohort’s are. “We used a fence post” she confesses, watching the officer’s puckered lips take toward the man seated beside her. “No, I used a fence post” Harlington corrects, specifying parts of the story to make it appear more believable, “he was getting up, so I drove the thing through him. He left me no other choice.” “And the two of you went out to that cabin together for what reason?” Jake wonders aloud, watching on as Beau leans against the archway between the kitchen and living room, his arms crossed. “The only time cops have ever backed my side of the story was when the people made such an uproar that it forced their hand” Harlington responds, shaking his head with disgust at the officers, “after letting him slip out of jail, the cops in this town would’ve needed to show someone in cuffs.” “And you’re making it really hard to not choose to make those people the two of you” Beau reassures, something that Penny struggles to argue against, keeping to herself in the corner of the kitchen, her arms crossed just as the younger officers are. “We had nothing to do with helping him escape. We were both out of the state when it happened” Harlington remarks, snapping the fingers of one hand restrained behind himself, “check the car that Beth crashed on the freeway.” “You crashed on the freeway?” Jake queries, a statement that the woman immediately frowns at, “what caused that mishap?” Shaking her head, Beth looks away and rolls her eyes, “fog was everywhere and I got ahead of myself. I picked up my speed and lost control of the thing” she confesses, visibly disinterested in doing so, and not taking kindly to the amused chuckle that her cohort immediately reacts with. “Can we please get around to the whole reason you’re sitting in my kitchen chairs right now?” Penny wonders, growing disinterested in the legal conversation unfolding whilst her fingers remain locked around the edge of the mask in her possession. “My husband is missing and the only lead that I have other than this flimsy piece of plastic bullshit is the two of you” she proceeds, speaking up as the conversation returns to what led her trio here, “why are you looking for Avon?” “Because we don’t have anywhere else to go” Beth answers quickly, a reply that the man beside her doesn’t take much of an argument against. “We’d been staying in that cabin for a few days and just came back into the town proper yesterday” she doubles down, the claim that she makes latched onto and continued by her jailbird acquaintance. “The guy at the library wouldn’t give us any answers” Harlington proceeds, a stance that brings a frown over Beth’s face, “she said there was only one other person that she trusted to be able to at least believe her side of the story.” “What do you mean by ‘answers’?” Jake quickly points out, harkening back to the claim that’s made for the implications that it brings, “what were you asking him?” Bowing her head whilst the man who’d dragged her into this situation in the first place turns to look in her direction, Beth becomes rather reserved for a moment whilst her face wears a displeased scowl, a gesture noticed by two officers and the homeowner, who collectively remain silent. With furrowed eyebrows, the repetition of the question within her head draws a great disappointment over Beth, who lets out a sorrowful sigh as she parts her lips to speak. “My father and Rico Martinez knew each other” the woman confesses, drawing little change in the reaction of Harlington, though the curious looks she gets from the cops quietly insinuate that her further speech is desired. “Rico called my dad ‘Fred’ that same night we’re telling you about. He knew my father on a first-name basis and I have no idea why” Beth doubles down, still looking at the floor whilst the two cops look toward each other, “when we asked Mr. McArthur about it, he got incredibly weird about it.” “Yeah, asking the dude to just verify that they knew each other was like pulling teeth. When she asked how they knew each other, he got even worse” Harlington adds on, drawing the interest of both officers the longer that he talks. “He’d mentioned something about knowing these things to be incredibly dangerous and then ran off to a room in the back of the library” the runaway fugitive carries on, his proceeding silence allowing Beth to finish off the story’s retelling. “When we told him that Rico was dead, he pretty much said that we were too” the woman concludes, drawing the interest of the woman that stands in the room’s corner. “Have you ever heard anything about this?” Beau queries, looking to his partner with uncertainty, knowing the man to have been an officer in the town for longer than he, himself, “about Fred Ovorre knowing Rico Martinez?” “I barely knew Fred Ovorre existed until he died” Jake responds, shaking his head at a loss for what to make of this revelation, “what would the two of them have in common?” As unsure as his colleague is, Beau shakes his head as his arms uncross, falling to his sides as the fifth member of the room speaks aloud, drawing their consideration back to the conversation at hand. “Could Rico being dead have anything to do with Avon being taken?” Penny questions aloud, looking to the members of law enforcement for answers that they just can’t come up with. “Sure, it could. But so could anything else that those people in the masks have been targeting you guys over” Beau replies, admitting that he’s fresh out of certainties in relation to the case at hand, “even if it was the reason, we still don’t know where they took him.” “Well, I’d suggest that you try and figure that part out fast” Harlington replies, earning the redirected focus of his peers within the room as his comments are made, “if they treat Avon with the same kind of courtesy they treated me to... He might not have long.” Sharing concerned stares amongst each other, the cops and the concerned wife hosting this impromptu interrogation silently gesture to each other that, in spite of how in the dark they are, the fugitive may be right. | \ Hours earlier / Walking through a home warmed by only the flames kindled in the brick-laid fireplace, a man with long, grey hair and a rugged, grey beard steps toward the building’s entrance with a pair of metal cantines tucked under his arm. Exiting the home, the older gentleman steps over fallen leaves from the litany of trees that surround his middle-of-nowhere residency as he makes for the pond just outside. Stomping the base of his rubber boot against the thin layer of ice that had formed over the tiny body of water, the woodlander fills his bottles and steps back the way he came, only having departed from the building for one purpose. Pushing the home’s door inward, the man begins returning to the relative warmth and comfort of his cabin before taking a momentary glance outward, seeing past the foggy breath that his lungs spew into the air in both awe and silence. Dressed in little more than a brown coat and a pair of slacks, Avon’s squinted eyes look beyond the fifty yards that separate himself from the off-grid resident, speaking not one word. Without movement, the pair of individuals stand on opposite ends of the forest as each other, acknowledging only the continued presence of the other without making even the slightest of movements, their stare down continuing for as long as the meeting of their attention is prolonged. == Remedy Hills ==
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Tapping his finger upon the space bar, Beau brings the video to an end as the final claims made within it are voiced, allowing the air to go quiet as he leans back in the seat of his police cruiser. Closing the laptop’s lid, the young officer sits in silence for a moment whilst peering into the empty passenger’s seat beside himself, his eyes kept as the exclusive sights to have seen the amateur film since it had been delivered to him.
Clearing his throat as he pulls the keys from the ignition, the hot-headed officer steps out of his vehicle, leaving the computer behind in favour of what it had led him to. On his lonesome and beyond the reach of Remedy’s jurisdiction, the vehicle remains at the start of a modest home just as the sun reaches above the horizon for the first time, bringing about the start of a brand new day. Tapping his knuckles against the screen door, Beau stands with his thumbs slipped into the tactical belt he wears whilst patiently awaiting his request for attention to be answered. Surrounded by forest on all sides, the young officer remains composed and level-headed as he begins hearing the tapping of feet from the opposite end of the building’s entrance, their approach obviously drawing closer to the cop. With a squint in her eyes that suggests she hadn’t intended to get up so early in the morning, Leah peers her head around the door that most of her body remains hidden behind. “Good morning, Ms. Bowers. My name’s Beau Donovan, I’m a police officer from Remedy Hills” the officer politely greets, his voice kept somewhat lower than his normal tone despite having remained awake for well over a full day, “I apologise for how early I’m stopping by; my next shift starts in two hours.” “What do you want?” Leah questions back, caring less about the time in which the man had come to greet her than she does of his intentions. “I received a video in the late hours of last night by someone who’d implied you might be able to help me with something” Beau responds, remaining cordial with the woman who’s clearly set out to live in the middle of the woods for some reason unbeknownst to him, “I wanted to swing out while I could and see if that was true.” “That depends on what you’re looking for” Leah replies, inspecting the man’s physique for a moment with genuine curiosity, “you look like one of those strippers people order for bachelorette parties.” Amused, Beau’s lips lift into a grin as he delivers the woman a singular nod, “I’ll take that as a compliment, and it’s one that I appreciate” the man reassures, unclipping the badge from over his left breast before handing it over to the homeowner. “If you would like for me to come another time, I’m more than willing to do that” Beau explains, watching as the woman glides her thumb over the reflective medallion as if she were attempting to reassure its authenticity. Pressing her lips together, Leah returns the breastpin to the man whom it belongs to, wrapping the hand that had cradled the piece around the screen door that she leans halfway through. “What is it that you want to know, officer-?” she questions back, the man’s name having just been spoken, though her mind fails to think back that far. “Donovan. Beau Donovan” the officer replies, refusing to hold the lapse in memory against the woman, “I was hoping you’d be able to tell me about what you’d started to find out about the Remedy Phantom case. I’ve heard that you had done quite a lot of research in the short amount of time that you were in town.” Nodding, Leah runs the tips of her fingers up the length of the home’s entrance, tapping against the aluminium exterior that shields her much heavier, inner door. “Wouldn’t that put you in trouble?” she questions, though the lack of emotion in her voice implies that she doesn’t care much one way or the other, “investigating the phantom case as a cop is like shooting yourself in the toe with a nail gun.” “I would certainly hope that’s not the case. However, if it were, I’d like to believe I know enough people inside the force that’d be willing to have my back if I were in danger” Beau reassures, watching the woman look up to him with as great of an inquisitive squint as she can manage. “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d also like to know a little bit more about why you left so soon” the young officer adds, his charm allowing the woman to take to him quickly, “I believe that could help matters too.” Letting her eyes fall toward the patio’s floor, the woodlands-based once-author pulls in a deep breath before looking upward, taking the man’s proposition to heart before making the call that seems best. “Can I offer you a cup of tea?” Leah queries, watching as the visiting cop sprouts a wider smile than just one of flattery, joining alongside her in entering the home, the allure of the tea almost coming off as enchanting as the possibility for uncovering answers. = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = Rolling out of bed with a groan, Penny pulls her hair back in an effort of tying it into a ponytail whilst she yawns, stepping toward the adjacent bathroom after slipping her feet into a pair of slippers. Running through a short routine, the woman eventually wanders out from the room’s side, finding the mattress as empty as she’d assumed that it was when she’d attempted to get up. Stepping down the hall while yawning again, the highly-educated homebody instinctively turns the corner with the yearning for a cup of coffee freshly on her mind. “Good morning” she murmurs as she rounds the corner, paying a brief greeting to her husband as she reaches the counter, her hand falling upon the handle to the coffee’s pot before pulling it free, only to realise that the glass contained has no brewed liquid contained within it- as clean as it had been the prior day. Surprised by the lack of a new pot, Penny squints at the discovery before turning toward the room’s entrance, taking a sudden realisation that she’s still yet to hear her husband’s voice. Gently placing the container down, the doctor retreats the way she’d entered, peering around the corner to find a lack of any presence behind Avon’s still-closed laptop. Having assumed he’d be slaving over his new work since she hadn’t seen him in the bedroom, Penny’s second expectation proves to fall futile too, leaving her unsure of where the man could be. Coming up with a spurt of the moment quandary, her eyes turn toward the entirely opposite direction, allowing her feet to follow the path laid out for her toward the front door, which affords her yet another curious view when she looks through it. “Where the hell is he?” she queries, finding their vehicle parked in the driveway without an occupant inside of it, the rest of the home seeming big enough to be capable of hosting the writer, but not for his presence to be completely missed as it has been. Pressing her back against the home’s entrance, Penny thinks quietly to herself as she ponders the places in which her husband could be, falling short of anything in the home or close enough to not need a car. | To the sound of a bell ringing overhead, Beth steps foot on familiar ground once more whilst Harlington follows closely behind her, his head dawning a hat and face shielded by the lens of sunglasses. “Can we please just make this quick?” the man questions, making an effort at keeping his profile low, cautious to step out of line in fear of being exposed by a passerby. “Dude, it’s felt like ages since I’ve been in here” Beth responds, looking around the area that she once considered to be her home away from home, the state in which she’d left it in proving to be anything less than undisturbed. “Someone must’ve cleaned the mess” the librarian remarks, gazing toward the shelves upon shelves of hardcover and softcover books alike that her library hosts, the strewn-around state that they had been left to remain in as she’s initially left having been undone. “You’re back” Donald murmurs from afar, catching the ear of the librarian who’d vanished into the night without so much as a note to ease concern, surprise carried in his lifted eyebrows. Turning her head with a smile, Beth faces the man who takes note of her return, approaching with an eye held toward the rest of the room. “Did you do all of this, Mr. McArthur?” the returned resident questions aloud, her hand held toward the sea of novels returned to their natural state. “I wish I could say I had the foresight to expect your return” Donald replies, gently taking the woman’s arms into his hands as if to alleviate any doubts he could have that her retreat to Remedy Hills is anything less than in the flesh, “Mr. King came by shortly after you went missing and fixed the place up over a few days.” Keeping his distance, Harlington turns his back toward the librarian and the figure who greets her back, maintaining the costume that he’d entered with as he looks throughout the building. “Where did you go? What happened to you?” Donald questions aloud, briefly looking past the returned librarian and toward the man whom she’d entered with, unable to make out the man through the minimal, yet effective disguise that’s adorned. “I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you. I needed to make it look like someone had taken me out, and I couldn’t take a chance on anyone knowing the truth” Beth confesses, apologetic for the stress she could have been responsible for causing. “I’d been attacked shortly before I left, so I figured it’d be easier to cover my tracks and pin the blame on those people in the masks” she carries on, speaking whilst her wanted travelling partner gazes the ‘crime’ section of the building. “Just ask the guy what you came here to ask him so we can get moving, Beth” Harlington whispers to himself, only turning toward the woman’s direction once his body is concealed behind the wooden shelf. Having nothing else to pass the time with, the fugitive peruses the aisle and taps the nail of his index finger against the spine of whatever book wordmarks appear the most appealing. Trying to remain patient, the man resorts to pulling halfway out one book after another from their places, standing upright and against each other front-to-back, peeking at their covers as if they were previews to a movie. Surrendering to his complete cluelessness over any of the material lined up before his eyes, Harlington covers his face with one hand whilst randomly reaching for the spine of whatever book his hand happens to graze first, removing that novel from its place in the row. “Mr. McArthur, I’m sure we’ll have plenty of time to catch up. Right now, though, I have something that I need to ask you” Beth explains, having concluded her retelling of the events leading up to her disappearance, coming around to the point of her reappearance. “I’ve heard that the person who escaped from jail recently- Rico Martinez- may have known my father” the librarian carries on, squinting as she shakes her head, gesturing for clarity, “is this true?” Slightly wider than they had naturally rested, Donald’s eyes pull away from the much younger woman standing before him, facing the building’s front windows to look at the cold, empty street. “I know you and my father were always close. I wouldn’t be asking you if I thought it was pointless” Beth restates, doubling down on the need to know that her purposefully-absent cohort listens into from afar, looking over the line of novels that he hides behind to spectate the conversation. “Who told you this?” Donald queries, finally looking back toward the woman’s face without answering her question, his hands having fallen to his sides before swinging upward once more, tapping against each other at his waist. “No one told me anything. I read it online somewhere” Beth lies, offering the best explanation she can manage aside from outright confessing to have been within the presence of a wanted fugitive, “I was looking up Remedy and found an article on some website.” “Well that article must’ve been mistaken” Donald responds, shaking his head before waving at the notion, scoffing at the conclusion that his longtime friend’s daughter brings to his attention. “So my father didn’t know Rico Martinez?” Beth questions back, looking for clarity whilst Harlington judges from afar, trying to read the expression on the face of the man, barely able to catch a glimpse of it from around his acquaintance’s side. “Your father was a decent man. He would have no such affiliation with criminals like Rico Martinez’s kind” Donald reassures, looking away from the woman as he speaks once more, struggling to maintain eye contact. Standing at a slightly taller frame than the much older property owner, Beth watches the man shake his head in refusal, finding the oddity in the man’s body language for what it is. “He’s lying” Harlington calls out, remaining concealed behind the library’s depths as both figures across from him turn in his direction. “He’s ashamed of something and I’m pretty sure it’s that he’s hiding whatever it is from you” the third participant in the discourse continues, guiding his cohort into continuing the line of inquisition, “don’t believe him unless he can say it while looking you in the eyes.” “Who is that man that you entered with?” Donald wonders aloud once the returned librarian spins back to look him in the eyes, the question he asks falling on deaf ears. “He’s a friend, now tell me again-” Beth hastily retorts, looking the older gentleman in the face as she asks the question whilst Harlington flips open the novel’s first page in the distance, averting his eyes whilst keeping his ears on alert, “-did my father know Rico Martinez?” Lowering his eyes once more, Donald shakes his head in refusal before attempting to speak, his efforts thwarted by the woman he stands in the attention of. “Look me in the eyes while you answer the question, Mr. McArthur” Beth queries, forcing the man into conceding his attempts, his face lifting to look at hers, “did my father know Rico Martinez?” “This is a very troubling line of question that you’re embarking on, Bethany” Donald warns, shaking his head again without answering the question that’s begged of him, leaving the woman of reappearance to draw her own conclusions. “I’m going to assume that my father knew that man in some way if you can’t look me in the eyes and tell me that he didn’t” Beth informs, levying her own statement toward the property owner, “one more time- did my father know Rico Martinez?” Pressing his eyelids shut, Donald again attempts to pull his face away from the woman before thinking better of it, opting to endure the strain on his neck as his stare refuses to part. “Yes, he did” the older man confesses, watching the change in the librarian’s face present a slight amount of surprise in spite of the stance she’d declared would be taken, “your father did know Rico Martinez.” “How did they know each other?” Beth follows up, watching as the older man lowers his head once more, eyes falling to the floor before the woman’s behest is voiced aloud. “Look her in the eyes, sir” Harlington warns, speaking the same declaration that the returned woman was just about to utter, catching a momentary glance from the property owner before the man’s eyes find their way back to the woman. “This is a very bad idea, Bethany” Donald again warns, appearing to wear his heart on his sleeve over the fear of what may come from his answers. “I’ve already been attacked and run out of my home by these people; I don’t have much to fear from them” Beth reassures, only for the man that stands at the centre of her interrogation to argue otherwise. “These people will not hesitate to keep things in order, Bethany” Donald explains, vocalising his plea with the woman to not ask of him anything more that could prove dangerous. “Knowing something alone makes you a problem inherently. Knowing even more than just one or two things could spell the difference between survival and surrender” the property owner continues, shaking his head as he presents the woman with his plea, “I beg of you. Your father wouldn’t want you to become a loose thread.” “Rico Martinez can’t hurt her anymore” Harlington interjects, drawing the man’s attention away from the young woman standing before him, emerging from his hiding whilst removing the glasses from his face. “He was killed a few nights ago. He’s buried in a shallow grave somewhere in the forest where he’ll never be found” the living runaway explains, revealing his identity to a now horrified older man, “if they’re playing his game, then they’re too late. It’s already over.” “No” Donald whispers in response, mortified by the information that he’s come into, presenting such in a matter of awe that provokes him into retreating. “You can say ‘no’ all that you want, but it won’t change what the facts are-” Harlington remarks, joining alongside Beth, who stands in silence as she allows her cohort to continue speaking, “-Rico Martinez is dead and his group of masked crime buddies are without a leader.” “You’ve made a terrible misjudgement” Donald again sighs, shaking his head as if he’d just seen the amalgamation of Satan himself form before his very eyes, “this is nothing to be proud of.” “Mr. McArthur, please tell me how Rico Martinez knew my father” Beth interrupts, preventing the man from continuing to speak by returning the conversation to its original course, “I’m already a loose thread. If you want what my father would want, tell me how they knew each other so I can have a fighting chance when whoever it is comes to take care of me.” “It’s too late...” Donald responds, retreating to his room at the back of the library without providing the woman the clarity that she’d come to, his warnings coming off more like threats of outcomes that he already knows for certain, “...you’re already dead.” Furrowing her brows at the comments that are made, Beth refuses to utter a word further as the older gentleman vanishes into the back room, slamming the door shut on his way inside before locking it. Rolling her eyes in frustration, the librarian’s ability to digest the threats paid to her is thwarted by the tug of her arm at Harlington’s hand, his gesture for them to depart the discourse as a whole leaving them in search of a new line to follow. “He’s seen my face and he’s clearly not in the mood to cooperate” the man explains, beginning to retreat with his randomly-selected book in tow whilst the woman he urges to depart watches on, “we’re not gonna get anything out of him, so let’s see if we can figure out something ourselves.” Without needing to say anything further, Harlington returns the sunglasses to his face and begins walking for the library’s exit, allowing his cohort not a moment to settle with what she’d been told. Taking a glance around the library she’d been pulled away from just as she’d been reunited with it, Beth begins following the lead that her partner in crime presents to her, their trail guiding them onto Remedy Hills’ streets in the name of finding answers they’ve been refused. | “Where’ve you been?” Jake queries, passing a glance toward the man that approaches him before returning his sights to the various details pinned to the corkboard, arms crossed and shoulders leant just slightly further back than his waist. Without saying a word, Beau cuts through the distance that remains between himself and his desk before tossing the keys to their cruiser onto the open space of his work table. “I need to talk to you” Beau whispers, tapping his colleague on the lower back before retreating in the same direction that he’d approached from. “What about?” Jake questions back, turning around to find his partner walking off, the head shake that he receives making it clear that he hadn’t meant here. “Somewhere private, please” the younger officer reiterates, watching as his older coworker points his thumb in the direction of the interrogation rooms. “Then why are you walking that way when the interro-” Jake queries, only for his efforts to be cut off by Beau’s restated assertion. “Somewhere private-” Beau whispers, though the words are carried far enough to reach the ears of his partner, the momentary pause that he receives from the older man making it clear that attention is at least captured, “-please.” “What’s going on, Donovan?” Jake questions aloud, following his colleague’s lead through the precinct’s exit and down the handicap ramp that leads toward the front lot. “I’ll tell you when I think we’re far enough” Beau responds, the comments and unclear motivation displayed proving somewhat impossible for the older cop to not take amusement in. “What the hell does that mean, Beau?” Jake chuckles hands held out at either side as he follows the more agile officer’s lead further away from the building they centre their work in, “far enough where!?” Turning back only for the time it takes to reply, Beau answers his colleague before continuing to embark upon the journey that leads them toward safer pastures, “far enough away from the precinct” he reiterates. “Why?” Jake queries, watching his partner again turn back, only to receive no verbal communication of any sort this time around. Returning to the route that he’d wished to take, Beau silently continues leading his colleague onward, across the street, around the nearest corner, and into an alleyway behind the Turkish restaurant that remains open despite barely ever being host to a paying patron. “Why are we out here, officer Donovan?” Jake queries, finally coming to a stop once the younger officer’s journey has come to an end, their destination satisfying enough to allow their conversation a refuge. “Because I can’t trust that the building, or our cars, or the interrogation room, or pretty much anywhere isn’t bugged with microphones front and back” Beau explains, his face wearing the reservations of someone who believes something to be wrong. “Alright, Donovan. Calm down and take a breath here” the older cop explains, leading his partner down from the ledge that he seems to be walking along. “We’re far enough away from the precinct for whatever reason that may be” Jake clarifies, waving his hand in the building’s direction, “now that we’re behind whatever the fuck this thing is, pick yourself up, dust yourself off, get your shit together and tell me why we need to get all worried about being around other cops.” “‘Cause I think I’ve found out exactly why the people in those masks are taunting Avon and killing each other” Beau replies, sinking his top teeth into the flesh of his bottom lip, “and if I have, then I think there might be a way for us to figure out who’s under those masks.” Surprised at the rather unexpected revelation, Jake pulls his head back and reacts with glee, still unsure of why the spectacle was made of retreating from their home base, but willingly looking past that. “That’s fucking outstanding, Donovan!” the man proclaims, wearing a smile of pride in the work that he takes his partner on his word for, “so why the fuck did you need to drag me out here to tell me that?” “Because I think the people under those masks might be cops” Beau mutters, his voice having lowered enough to return to a naturally secretive state, the jubilation that his older colleague had presented him with having now fallen. “And for that matter, I think they’re more than likely our cops” the younger gendarme reiterates, the comment proving to be one that takes Jake by surprise. “Penny King came by the precinct last night. She asked about the phantom case and made some big display by leaving this on my desk” Beau carries on, revealing the transparent blue case that had been left for him. “She didn’t tell me why she was asking or anything. She walked away, left this behind with a note that read ‘Keep This Quiet’ and that was it” the young cop continues, handing the disk over to his partner, “needless to say, my curiosity had peaked.” “What is this?” Jake questions aloud, holding up the tray toward the eyes of the man who’d given it to him. “It’s some amateur film. It was a clip from one of Avon’s interviews with Oprah thirteen years ago. At the end, she asks him about the Remedy case that had just happened, and then it cuts to a guy in a mask” Beau explains, the claims that he makes being taken with utter seriousness by the colleague that’s come to trust what’s said. “The guy said the people in the masks were hired by the local officials- government, cops, you name it- to apparently help aid in a cover up. From what I’d taken from the things that guy was claiming, it sounds like he was implying they were Rico’s men” Beau proceeds. “We already assume they’re Rico’s people, Donovan. What does this prove that what we’ve got tacked on that corkboard in there doesn’t?” Jake questions, challenging the man to support his efforts. “The fact that the guy on this disk is claiming that cops already solved who committed that murder, and that the local government helped cover it up” Beau replies, pointing at the disk in question as the distant sound of burning rubber emerges in the distance. “Of those people, it was law enforcement- us- that went along with the cover up” the young cop proceeds whilst the tire-burning sound draws nearer, “and if that’s the case, then there are people in our precinct who are still-” Interrupting himself, Beau stops to look past his partner before joining alongside the older cop in rounding the corner, taking a momentary reprieve from the conversation at hand to inspect the raucous scene. Watching as a sedan speeds toward the precinct, the two officers wince as the vehicle comes to a screeching halt, the driver’s foot slamming against the brakes to bring the car down from its hurried speed. “Isn’t that the King’s car?” Jake questions aloud, taking notice of the woman that bursts out of the poorly-parked vehicle, her rush taking her toward the steps of the precinct. “Penny!” Beau exclaims, not waiting around to watch the woman hurry into a building they’d be forced to return to, emerging from their cover and rushing up to the aid of the seemingly frantic woman. Turning around in a frenzy, Penny fights to centre her eyes upon the pair of officers that close in, knowing herself to trust them far more than any cop within the building she’d nearly dashed into. Crossing the street without issue, the cops return to the lot they’d marched their way through just moments prior and close in on the woman. “Mrs. King, what’s going on?” Jake questions aloud, the first to address the woman who hurries to their services, watching the quivering bottom lip that the woman wears and taking it as a preview for whatever is about to be spoken. “Avon’s gone! They took him!” Penny proclaims, the comments that she makes being offered in a flustered state, one that both cops try to lower her down from. “What do you mean, Penny? Who took-?” Beau queries only to pull back as the woman retrieves a plastic, party store-bought smiley face mask and turns its inside to face the officers. “They took him!” Penny doubles down, presenting the gendarme pair with the costume piece’s blank, inner material, the white colour of it allowing the black, permanent marker scrawlings within to read as clear as anything could be, “this was left on Avon’s chair” she reiterates. “You’ve overstayed your welcome” the writing reads, paying the woman the same warning that must apply to her husband as well, his absence being the subject of the situation at hand. On the verge of tears, Penny hands the mask off to Beau before looking Jake in the eyes, restating the claim that had sparked their interest in the case she presents to them. “Those bastards took my husband!” == Remedy Hills == “But still, the people fail to sleep when their heads hit the pillow” Avon types, his eyes following the blinking line that speeds across his current page, spewing out letters at whatever pace the writer’s mind is willing to work at. “Whether it be from the memories of what happened- or the fear that it’ll someday happen again-” the words appear, stretching their black lines across the white backdrop they are virtually pressed upon, “-the sleepy town has been left without its namesake.”
Empty in all directions around him, the dining room in which the author writes from sits in complete darkness anywhere the monitor’s intense lighting doesn’t touch. “Swaying in rocking chairs along their porches, seated along picnic benches with eyes in the back of their heads, or tucking their hands into pockets that tools of defence sit within, the town’s residents refuse to let themselves be the newest victim” the text remarks, bouncing off the glasses that their illustrator wears. “There is a paranoia over the Remedy-less Hills. There is a collective, understood, and palpable dread that is shared amongst those who return to it for the shelter of a home” he writes, losing track of the time that passes whilst his wonderment is paid to the cybernetic paper. “Some believe the phantom was already caught” the paragraph rolls on, revealing itself through the void of emptiness in real time like an ancient scroll unfolds. “Though the figure has been publicly ruled out as a suspect, those people appear to believe a now-incarcerated man was behind the slayings all along” Avon notes, reaching the end of one page before starting upon a new one, “to them, it’s the closest thing to an answer they can trust.” Correcting a misspelling, the man’s finger presses down on the backspace key before moving to the appropriate ones, ending the line of thought with a period. “For others, comfort is simply not found in coming up with their own answers. Nothing is taken as canonical in their mind until verified through the channels they trust” he follows through, brushing off the mis-type as nothing of importance. “Their faith is stored in the hands of a legal system who has as many answers now as they had back then” the sheet reads, embarking upon a journey that the prior line of text had read, “for those unlucky few, it seems sleep will never be theirs to have.” Briefly pulling his hands away from the machine’s flat base, Avon lifts the readers from over his eyes and drags the base of his palms down the length of his flesh, expunging the grogginess that leaves him wanting to yawn. “On the other hand, on the other hand, on the other hand-” he repeats to himself, bouncing his head along with each syllable uttered whilst his pause commences, snapping his fingers as he leans to the side, “I’ve got it.” “On the other hand, you have those that refuse to buy into one solution or the other. The people that belong to their own, distinctive minority opinions” he jots down, the bounce that his head had taken now displayed in the tapping of his right foot under the table. “Perhaps the most vocal of those lesser groups are those who believe that there is more to Remedy Hills than just what seems ordinary” the words coming together to form, left with a similar pause to what their controller takes. Hovering over a select few keys, Avon’s eyes stare into the light that bathes his face in an unflattering colour before looking beyond the laptop’s cover, staring off toward the front door directly across the room from himself. Softly pressing his bottom lip between his teeth whilst the closest of his digits remains hanging above the ‘S’ key. Contemplating his newest discovery of thought to write down just as he had all others, the writer hesitates to follow through unlike before. “Something so profound and otherworldly that it exists as boldly loud as a-” the most recent line reads, again coming to a stop as the page’s point returns to blinking. For seconds, the black line bounces out of existence before popping back up, disappearing just as soon as it has re-arrived until the cycle continues to repeat. As time passes, the constantly reappearing bar finishes its flashing, holding firm within the block of writing that it had birthed before finishing off the man’s thought. “-howl from deep in the forest.” = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = While his left hand rests against the side of his chair and squeezes a pressure ball, Beau’s right elbow presses against the edge of his desk to steady his head, allowing his face an unobstructed sight of the bulletin board he’d erected closeby. Every breath and exhale both long and subtle, the man’s composure speaks to an officer deep within hours of simply looking at what’s in front of him with hopes of finding something he has yet to stumble across. “Is the precinct always this empty?” a woman’s voice calls out from across the room, prompting the man to snap out of the trance that his attention had been forcibly taken into. Spinning in his chair, Beau discovers one of the town’s least favourite residents calmly approaching, her hands hung by her sides as she draws nearer. “Being a cop in Remedy Hills isn’t the most desirable line of work, Penny” the officer replies, looking toward the empty surface of his desk with a sigh, all that had once sat atop the worktable having been pinned to the board, “the pay also isn’t worth writing home about.” “That doesn’t stop you from putting in the overtime from the looks of it” Penny retorts, glancing at the evidence-covered pin board before leaving her purse to rest atop the man’s work area. “I don’t do this for the pay. If I did, I wouldn’t have been in Remedy for this long” Beau replies, scratching an itch behind his ear whilst the woman settles into a seat opposite him, occupying the empty chair of his partner. “And here I thought you were only here because no one else wanted a hotshot with a bad temper” Penny calmly rebukes, the humour-less tone that she speaks with allowing her comment to only bring an amused grin over the face of the man opposite her. Allowing his second arm to fall upon the rest at the side of his seat, the young officer nods to himself before looking across. “What can I help you with, Penny?” Beau wonders, allowing the woman’s quip to settle without a rebuttal, wearing the comment with pride and taking the semi-insult held beneath it on the chin like a champion. Before answering, the visitor’s head turns to face an office near the back of the room, looking over her shoulder to find a closed door with blinds drawn over the window that faces into it. “Is your boss gone for the night?” Penny questions aloud, yet to pull her stare away from the room in question, the quandary proving to be one the gendarme takes interest in. “She left about an hour ago. Maybe two at this point” Beau responds, waiting to ask for the reasoning until his face can reconnect with the civilian, “why do you ask?” With an uncertain expression worn, the medical worker hesitates to speak before confirming her own assumptions, wishing to offer the cop a chance to clear himself of any suspicion. “What do you know about the people in the smiley face masks so far?” Penny questions aloud, extending an olive branch that she can only hope the officer will take, “I know you didn’t get a lot off of Tago before what happened. Still, you must know something by now.” Disappointed in the conclusion that he draws, Beau allows his eyes to fall as he takes the question in, shaking his head as he comes up relatively empty. “We have our suspicions that Rico Martinez is behind it somehow. Aside from that, we just can’t seem to make any headway into them” the man confesses, frowning as his stare ventures into the building’s depths, his mind reaching for whatever details he can pick out of importance. “Every lead we get ends up being killed before we can get to them. To make matters worse, they’ve stayed quiet since Rico broke out of jail” he continues, taking his eyes back toward the woman, “I just hope that’s not so they can hide away and regroup for something even bigger.” Looking down, Penny nods at the man’s conclusion before switching the conversation onto other tracks, dictating the journey in which this thought train is meant to head for. “And what do you know about the phantom case?” she questions aloud, overhearing the man’s immediate reaction of a brief chuckle. “Isn’t it your husband that’s writing the book? I figured he’d be the one to asking me that” Beau responds, the humour that he takes from the discourse noticeably not shared by the man’s wife. “Can you just answer the question?” she asks with seriousness, watching the man pause for a second as he tries to discourage himself from taking any further entertainment in the conversation. “Uh, I know it happened a long time ago. I know it’s a cold case. I know it’s why you and your husband are here...” Beau responds, coming up short of anything worth writing home about himself, “...that’s pretty much it.” “What do you know about the phantom case?” Penny repeats, her slightly-widened eyes remaining firm in their focus on the officer, his head pulling back just slightly at the question’s second projection. “I just told you what I know” Beau responds, still somewhat amused by the line of questioning, though he’s more hesitant to show it, “that’s it. I wasn’t in the force when it happened.” “You don’t have to know nothing just ‘cause you weren’t a cop back then” Penny corrects, a conclusion that the officer doesn’t care about improperly correcting her on. “I suppose that’s true, but the only cops I care for around here are Pat and Jake” Beau replies, returning the stress ball to a space beside his cup of pencils and pens, “Jake was in some detective’s program in Des Moines and Pat was just finishing his training in Schenectady.” “That doesn’t mean you haven’t heard stuff through the grapevine” Penny rebuttals, again reaching a point that the officer doesn’t care to dissuade her from taking, though his retort refuses to entertain the line of communication any further. “I’ve told you all that I know about the phantom case, Penny. We don’t bring it up and- between us- cops don’t really work on cold cases after a certain amount of time. At least not here” Beau concludes, “I’m sorry if that’s not what you wanted to hear.” Staying quiet, the visitor reserves her thoughts before the continued voice in front of her carries on with the conversation. “Are you helping with your husband’s book or something?” the hot-headed gendarme queries, wanting to know the point behind his guest’s unannounced drop-in. “Not unless his book turns into something more than that” Penny replies, not taking long to return with that answer. “Your husband’s been writing psychological thrillers since before he left high school, Penny” Beau rejoinders, more outward with his humour as the discussion persists, “what about Remedy would have him straying from the norm all these years later?” Drifting into the corners of her eyes, the medical practitioner looks back toward the direction of the man’s employer before she can have the chance to speak, her newest bout of concerns having rooted themselves deep within. “Why are you here, Penny?” Beau inquires, having followed the woman’s line of sight back toward the locked office at the back of the building, “as you can see by the board behind me, if there isn’t anything I can help you with- I have work to do.” Looking back to the officer, Penny nods in agreement before reclaiming her leather bag, throwing it over her shoulder and walking away without another word to offer. Finding the interaction odd, Beau chooses to keep his feelings for the encounter quiet as he watches the woman wander off, unable to prevent his mind from asking himself questions as to the nature of their conversation. Only spending a few seconds within his own line of thought, Beau’s attention returns to the task that has kept him in the office beyond the point in which he was meant to leave it. With his desk light aimed at the standing board, the cop gently pushes his chair an inch or two away from the desk whilst reaching for the stress ball, taking his eyes toward it as the station’s entrance closes shut. Wrapping his fingers around the spherical, red object, the young cop finds his mostly-empty desk now occupied by something he knows for certain had not been there when he was curating evidence. “Who are you supposed to be?” Beau wonders aloud to himself as his palm takes away from the toy, reaching beyond it and to the blue case that had been left in the place where Penny’s bag had rested. “Keep this quiet” a note reads, its adhesive back having been attached to the outside of the thin, semi-transparent shell that houses an unmarked, unbranded disc. Looking back toward the direction in which the wife had departed, Beau turns his fascination toward the markings that had been left for him to read, unsure if the object concealed within pertains to a can of worms he’s best left leaving closed for the meantime. | Housed within a brick inglenook, a roaring fire warms the cabin that holds host to a pair of equally quiet, kept-to-themselves civilians doing their best to hide away from the frosty air that awaits them outside. Locking her arms together around the legs that she presses against her chest, Beth presses her lips together without any intention of parting them to speak, not having an address to make to the figure that sits a fair distance away from her. Taking his eyes to the fire before letting them fall upon the woman seated beside it, Harlington’s vision directs itself back and forth between the two objects of interest, struggling to keep himself as silent as he knows the woman wishes for him to be. Holding them back, the flurry of thoughts that the abducting assailant wishes to speak are forced to remain locked away, refused an opportunity to be spoken aloud in the name of keeping peace between himself and the person they could only hurt. Instead left to the sounds of the crackling logs of wood that burn across the woodland home, the rocking chair-seated man entertains himself with the closure of his eyelids, using the darkness as a screen to play memories back with. Taking much the opposite approach, Beth’s lids only part further than they would in their resting state, allowing the glossy reflection in the stare that she holds to host the fire that dances around the material that it slowly devours like a gazelle to a lion. Beginning to succumb to the silence that surrounds her, Beth’s lips finally do part to alleviate the tension that had built within her jaw, allowing herself to yawn as she fights away the countless hours she’d already gone without even trying to sleep. His senses heightened minimally, Harlington catches the sound of the woman’s exhaled breath before opening his eyes, watching as his partner in haunting wipes the tears that have formed around her lids. “You should try to get some sleep” Harlington remarks, finally allowing himself to intrude on the lack of noise that had come over the cabin, watching as the woman’s figure remains steady as if he’d not spoken whatsoever. “I’m alright, thanks” Beth rejoinders, returning her arms to their place around her shins, keeping her seated upright and within the reach of the fireplace’s warmth. “You’re clearly not” Harlington counters, aware that his presence doesn’t do much to provide the woman with comfort, but he refuses to allow her to disregard the natural course her body urges her to take. “I’ll grab you a blanket from the closet and you can get as many hours as Remedy will let-” he attempts to offer, leaning forward in his seat with the intent to stand upright and follow through before being directed otherwise. “I saw I’m alright” Beth doubles down, glancing over her shoulder as the declaration prompts the man to return to his seat, disappointment carried in his face as the eagerness to voice what he’d wanted to earlier meets its match. “I understand if you’re mad at me for it, but would you really be able to tell me that you’d rather the people in those masks have snatched you up instead of what happened?” Harlington questions aloud, challenging the woman to validate her reservations of him. “That’s amongst the last things on my mind right now, Harlington” Beth tiredly rebukes, disregarding the man’s comments in a way that brings him into a concession. Not sure what else could be used to support a disinterest in him aside from the mountain of things he’d inflicted upon the runaway librarian, Harlington hangs his head and leans in his seat once more, pressing the soles of his shoes against the floorboards to remain that way. Being met without resistance, Beth is left in silence once more, its continued presence not needing to take long before provoking another yawn out of the woman. “If not trusting me isn’t the issue, then the least you could do is try to sleep off some of this” Harlington interjects, unable to see the eye roll that his fellow woodland resident reacts with, her ire drawn toward him once more. “I never said I trusted you” Beth corrects, wishing to not leave the man in the belief of a misunderstanding such as the one he’d seemingly drawn, “all I said was, I’m alright.” Looking away while pressing his tongue into the corner of his mouth, Harlington shakes his head out of a refusal that he’s yet to voice aloud, trying to convince himself to leave the conversation there and not proceed forward before failing rather quickly. “You’re obviously not alright” he remarks, turning back to face the woman just in time for her hands to pull away from her legs, each palm slamming against the floor as she turns back. “No, of course I’m not alright!” Beth shouts, having grown too irritated with the man’s voice to prevent herself from lashing out, “this is fucked!” “I’m well aware of that” Harlington retorts, the claim that he makes immediately drawing just as much doubt as the one that his acquaintance had made to earn a similar refusal of belief. “Are you? Are you really?” Beth questions back, standing from the floor before walking toward the window across the room, “there is a dead murderer buried fifty fucking feet from us while we hide in a shanty somewhere in the forest!” “Again, I’m well aware of that. I was there when we buried him” Harlington corrects, watching as the woman angrily smiles, turning away with her hands on her hips as the comment draws her further aggravation. “If you know all of this, can you please act like you are?” Beth questions back, daring the man to match the insight that he’s undoubtedly privy to, “maybe if you’d act like this is batshit insane, I’d stop feeling like I’m the only one going crazy in this shithole house.” Feeling it slip like grains of sand through open fingers, Beth forces herself to regain control of her composure as she takes a seat on the chesterfield, allowing her only company to reply. “Prancing around like this is the end of the world and we’re chickens with our heads cut off isn’t going to do anyone any good” Harlington responds, coming to the conclusion that inaction is the most-preferable course of taking action, “what’s happened has happened. There’s no changing that.” “Then let’s do something about it” Beth suggests, crossing her arms as she lowers them to the tops of her knees, using them for support as she leans forward, “instead of sitting around waiting for a ghost to show up again or cops to find the body that we hid in the ground- let’s actually figure something out.” “How do you suggest that we do that, Beth?” Harlington retorts, begging the question to the woman who’s raised this proposal, “since we know for a fact that the cops haven’t found him, I’ve got no reason to believe I’m not a suspect by now.” “That doesn’t mean that I am” Beth corrects, establishing the line that separates her from the man who’d drawn her down this travelled path with the swing of a stone. “The only thing keeping me from going back to the people in Remedy- aside from the masked-up nutcases giving Avon a terror and a half- is me” the woman carries on, convincing herself that there’s nothing preventing her from doing as she desires. “Alright then, think about it this way-” Harlington carries on, playing into the woman’s line of thought before pausing, his shoulders shrugging as his acquaintance looks toward him, “-what are you gonna do when you go back?” Though it’s naturally discouraging when paired with the certainties that she knows to be true, Beth finds the man’s question to be a reasonably valid one, the inquiry being something she doesn’t have much in the way of a good answer to. “If you want to jump into action, be my guest. Take the initiative- good for you” Harlington reiterates, watching as the woman’s eyes fall back upon him, “but, if you’re gonna go running into battle, the least you can do for yourself is figure out what weapon you’ve got and who you’re aiming for.” Lowering her stare toward the ground, Beth considers the man’s point before making her best attempt to figure out where she’d even begin, struggling to start with what’s asked of her. “Also, take into account of the fact that there are going to be people- such as Avon and the same cops who probably have interest in finding you- who are gonna want to know what happened” Harlington proceeds, pointing out the flaws in her desired route, “you could just tell them the truth on that one though.” “I only ran away from Remedy because I was attacked” Beth corrects, watching as the man shrugs off her reply, paying it little mind. “That might work out for you even less than running away did” Harlington rejoinders, drawing a similar conclusion to the one that had influenced his act against the town’s officials, “in their eyes, the attack was perpetrated by the people in the same masks that I’m confident are still doing their dirty work for them. I doubt they’d care what happened to you.” “My point is that concern is taken care of” Beth responds, setting her mind back toward the initial implication that had been wagered when she’d sat down. “In that case, let’s also take into account the fact that you’d be trying to dig into stuff there’s a lot of value in keeping hidden” Harlington replies, accepting the conclusion that his cohort has reached before taking on the role of her mind’s lesser-present analytical side. “I’m personally surprised that the police are looking for Rico at all. I can only assume that there are fewer people attached to the cover-up in there now than there used to be” Harlington concludes, drawing the woman’s fascination. “Why do you say that?” Beth wonders back, looking into her acquaintance’s eyes as he reiterates the stance that’s taken. “Well, there had to be more to Rico’s escape than just the attack on the hospital” Harlington replies, speaking as if the conclusion were one of the more obvious bits of information they could take into account. “He was locked away in a jail overseen by the same people that he’d colluded with. They didn’t even arrest him willingly the first time around- the public outcry forced their hand” he doubles down, confident in the claim that he makes, “Rico still had to bust out of jail to start.” “You think he had people on the inside helping him?” Beth queries, only to see a smile stretch from one side of her assailant’s face to the other. “I’m not sure if you’ve seen a movie with a prison break before, but even Hollywood films make it look harder than I’m sure Rico had it” Harlington replies, taking genuine humour in any such opposition to that claim, “you wouldn’t be able to surprise me if you said there was a guard waiting on the outside to hand him a pair of car keys and a snack.” Even further discouraged than she’d initially become, Beth lets her eyes fall as the odds she stacks up against only worsen for her with each passing comment, leaving her with a discomfort that isn’t easy to miss. The only other person to take notice of those such feelings building within his fellow hideout, Harlington changes his tune to prevent the woman he’d initially forced into his presence with knotted rope from convincing herself that her wings are too short to fly free. “Alright, no one’s saying this would be easy. But let’s also not pretend like we’ve got a reason to fear for our lives here” the man interrupts, regaining the woman’s focus as he leans forward, sharing the same track of thought that she wishes to take. “We want the same thing Remedy wants, and as long as we’re working toward that- the town will protect us” Harlington reassures, holding the sides of his hands toward the ground while he speaks, “the question at hand is- what are we looking for?” Allowed to hold firm on her stance at the man’s behest, Beth is provided with the freedom that she’d initially set out for with bases covered more thoroughly than they otherwise would have. Cleared to search through her exhausted mind, the woman sits with the flurry of questions she wishes to ask and considers the benefit to each other, running around the limited information that she and her literal partner in crime share before pointing out something far more personal than she’d expected. “What?” Harlington questions aloud, watching as the woman’s eyes widen whilst turning toward the window behind her, the stare held in the direction of the fresh grave they’d recently put the finishing touches on, “what is it?” Sitting with her thoughts, Beth pushes down the dread that fills her core as the branches that stretch from the initial root of her greatest wonder begin to threaten her confidence in the desire to carry on with the need for clarity. “I want to know how that thug knows my father” Beth declares, looking up with eyes of newfound purpose as her stare is guided toward the man who’d brought her here in the first place, his eyebrows lifting as the glare holds firm. “Are you sure?” Harlington questions back, not wanting to convince her to set sights elsewhere, but informed enough to know that the answer to such a question may not be as fulfilling as desired. “Rico and his dudes aren’t good dudes. I didn’t like the fact that he knew your dad by a first name any more than you did” Harlington explains, a slight amount of concern worn on his face just as it’s planted upon his cohort. “Whatever the reason is- I need to know how he knew my dad” Beth doubles down, assuring the man that the inquiry is one too great for her to just store away and stay as far as she can from. Recognising this passion in the woman’s delivery and demeanour, Harlington bites the tongue he wishes to use to reiterate the potential consequences, forcing himself to stand in the corner of the conclusion that’s been brought to the surface. “Alright then” the person of interest decides, letting out a deep breath as he nods to himself, biting his bottom lip as he looks toward Beth for guidance, “how’re we gonna do this?” == Remedy Hills == As the sun rises, Beth presses her back against the cabin’s exterior, sulking with her head bowed as the sound of shovelled dirt colliding with the ground greets her ears. Pulling upward with a grunt as he discards one dirt pile after another, Harlington sweats over the makeshift grave as he stands within it, the dirt’s level almost reaching that of his hips.
Controlling his breaths so as to not wind himself, the theory-proven abductor slaves over the hole that he creates within the earth’s surface before coming to a stop, inspecting the burial plot before glancing toward the tarp-wrapped body that it’s meant for. “Do you think it’d be immoral to bury someone like Rico in a shallow grave?” Harlington inquires, taking his eyes toward the seated woman a few yards away, “‘cause I’m getting tired and you don’t seem too thrilled about helping.” “How are you just acting like this is normal?” Beth wonders aloud instead, completely dismissing the man’s question as she lifts her face toward him, still shaken from the sights she was exposed to. Sensing a longer conversation than just what the quandary would indicate, Harlington lets out a lengthy sigh before thrusting the shovel’s tip into the soft dirt he stands atop, pressing his hand against the thigh of the leg that he lifts from the hole, lifting himself back to ground level. “We just watched a man be killed by a ghost, and you’re just digging a grave- like it’s your job” the woman continues, visibly distraught in the many changes that the prior night had brought upon her life. “Yes, I am. And part of the reason for that is because the person who’s killed is a wanted fugitive that I’ve probably already been connected to” Harlington replies, undoing the glove on his dominant hand as he nears, “if they find the body, I don’t think they’ll believe a ghost did it.” “I’m being serious” Beth responds, only for her assertion to be doubled down upon by the approaching grave digger, his hands pressing the gloves together and dropping them. “So am I” Harlington replies, retrieving a half-consumed bottle of water from a tree stump. “Maybe I’d be able to get away with claiming self-defence, but I have my suspicions over whether that’d be allowed to fly” he confesses, tilting his head back to take down as much of a gulp as he can. “What the fuck do we do now then?” Beth retorts, looking up to the man with her arms wrapped around her legs, holding them closely against her chest. “What do you mean?” Harlington quickly wonders back, gesturing toward his abducted victim’s free use of every limb, “you’re free. There’s no rope keeping you back anymore.” “I can’t just go back to living my life!” Beth rejoinders, her comment prompting the man to shake his head in refusal, holding off on replying outright as he takes another drink. “Of course you can’t. Do you think anyone can just go back to being normal after seeing that?” Harlington quips, against displaying his refusal before returning the cap to his plastic bottle, tossing the transparent container aside. “What the hell am I supposed to do then!?” Beth shouts, throwing herself back upon both feet as the discourse turns hostile, her resentment directed toward a man who brushes it off as if it were nothing. “How the hell do you think I would know that?” Harlington calmly restates, hands held out at his either side, “I don’t even know what I’m gonna do next. Besides, why choose now to go along with what I say? I practically had to offer an arm and a leg for you to hear me out.” “You kidnapped me!” the woman rebuttals, a point that the man knows to be true, though it’s not the point he was trying to get at. “I sure did. And even though you’ve no longer got ropes tied around your wrists- you’re still here waiting for me to make a move” Harlington rebukes, slowly approaching the woman with his voice lowered slightly, “go ahead and ask yourself why the hell you’d still be waiting on me to tell you what to do next.” “Because I don’t know what to do next” Beth responds, trying to calm herself down to the level her abductor seems to remain at, his tensions never escalating in spite of the challenge waged toward him. “There are still so many things you haven’t told me despite the fact that you’ve had me locked away for days” she proceeds, reaching for whatever straws can be found within a finger’s length, “you won’t even tell me why I’m important to any of this.” “Because I don’t know” Harlington interjects, his admission being one that prevents the woman from continuing to speak, her lips remaining apart despite nothing further being added. “Most of the paranormal stuff that I told you about were just theories. They’re theories that I had reason to believe in- even if others would consider me crazy for it- but they were just theories” the man concedes, dejected in his demeanour as he comes clean about his sizable uncertainties. “I do know that there’s something about you- just like me- that Remedy has a purpose for. But, again- just like me- I don’t know what that purpose is” he confesses, approaching the home to take the seat along the ground that his victim had recently occupied. “I was stalling whenever you were brought up in the conversation. Unlike the coffee or the town being alive, I don’t even know how to begin theorising over what the point of us is” Harlington concludes, “I’m as clueless as you are.” Closing her lips, Beth stares into the distance as she places her hands upon her hips, taking in the serenity that the middle woodlands provides to her despite the deceased body that lies a mere few feet away. Sorrowful and apologetic, Harlington keeps his thoughts to himself and presses the back of his head against the cabin, eyes taking toward the cloudy sky that resides above the trees that surround the area. “I don’t have much of a choice, do I?” Beth questions aloud, her spoken wonderment prompting the man to lower his chin, taking his eyes toward her direction. “If the town is alive, if there’s something it wants... If there’s something it needs from me...” she reiterates, staring back toward her captor without much in the way of belief that any alternative is possible to the conclusion she comes to, “...I guess I don’t have a choice but to figure out what that is, do I?” Without uttering a word, Harlington rests his forearms against the caps of his knees and twists his hands around in defeat, signalling a much similar resolution to have been taken toward by himself. Hanging her head, Beth sucks on her bottom lips for a second before nodding to herself, eyes travelling across the scenery once more before falling upon the covered corpse closeby, her sights again bouncing into the distance as she accepts the fate bestowed upon her. “Fucking hell, Remedy.” = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = “Oh my god, where were you!?” Penny exclaims, spilling into the home’s entry at the sound of an unlocked door opening, the figure of her husband making his way inside just as the sun takes over the horizon, shielded by an army of clouds that makes up heaven’s obstruction. “Doing something that I probably shouldn’t do anymore” Avon confesses, hanging his head with disappointment as he sheds the coat he’d worn out the prior night. Taken aback by the comment, Penny’s approach toward the man comes to a halt before she can reach him, her quiet inquisition understood without her husband even needing to take notice of it. “I’ve spent the last few days chasing something that I’m only now starting to realise probably isn’t in our best interest” Avon continues, hanging up the cotton cape on a hook beside the door before carrying forward. Without elaborating, the author steps past his concerned and confused spouse and makes his way toward the computer he so frequently spends his time behind. “I really hope you’re about to explain what you meant by that” Penny clarifies, a comment that her husband doesn’t react to at first, continuing his approach toward the laptop before breaking his silence as he pulls out the seat. “When the bomb went off at the hospital, the people in the smiley face masks came back. Well, I thought the people in the smiley face masks came back” Avon corrects, letting free a relieved sigh as his bottom presses into the chair’s padding. “It turns out, there was only one guy that showed up that night. From what he says, he’s got nothing to do with the group. At least, not the one tormenting us” the writer proceeds, lifting the computer’s top as his wife draws closer. “He sent me a clip he’d spliced together with one of the interviews Oprah had me do with her. It wasn’t long after I’d published the book about that woman who buried herself” he reveals. Reserving her grand fascinations, Penny watches as her husband curls his fingers toward her, gesturing for the spouse to approach his side of the makeshift desk that he’d set up and join him in gazing at the screen. “A guy cut in at the end of the video and said that there was corruption in Remedy Hills. Something about the cops having solved the murder that made it famous and covering it up so the mystery could live on” Avon explains, removing a crumpled up piece of paper from his pocket. “He gave me this address. It belongs to a woman that the smileys ran out of town way before we came in” he remarks whilst the paper is unballed, “apparently, she wanted to write about more than the mystery.” Opening one of his computer’s files, the author plays the video that was delivered to him in secrecy for his wife to watch on, her silence enduring its entire length until the clip reaches its end. “The guy who sent me this is someone named Devin. The woman he sent me to was named Leah, and she started coming to the conclusion that Dana Whitehead- the chief of police- knew something she shouldn’t have” Avon concludes, leaning back in his seat, “they ran her out of town.” “Does that mean they’re trying to run us out of town too?” Penny quickly questions back, asking the most-noteworthy curiosity that comes over her mind instinctively, holding out hope that at least one worry can be settled in that moment. “I don’t know. I would think that’d be likely, but then again- the first thing they did was send me someone’s chopped off finger” Avon responds, shaking his head at a loss for certainty, “I don’t know what they want from me- if anything at all.” “What the hell are we gonna do then?” Penny questions aloud, watching as her husband leans forward, pressing his hand against the side of his forehead, rubbing at his temple in order to relieve himself of the headache that’s beginning to set in. “I’m not sure. My first thought was to keep rolling with what I told my publisher about taking the story in a new direction if I’m being honest” Avon replies, putting his faith in whatever presents itself as even remotely reassuring. “If I say it’s something like a psychological investigation using the people of Remedy Hills as a case study publicly, that may throw people off my scent” Avon explains, his eyes closed as the exhaustion from a night without sleep wears down on him. “The issue with that is the fact that I’m not sure we’ve even seen the worst that’s yet to come” a dejected writer communicates, his fears spoken aloud for his closest and most-trusted confidant to hear. “We’ve gotten threats, severed fingers and unwanted visits from a group crazy enough to kill each other for stepping out line and leave them in our backyard” Avon assures, his discontent with the situation made clear in the exasperation behind his every breath, “if I look into this any further than I already have, it’ll put us at an even greater risk than we’re already at.” Standing out from his seat, the low-spirited author steps through the patio door and powers on the storm lights, staring out into a sea of grass that leads- undisturbed- up to an equally empty line of trees. “I was told that they don’t kill unless they absolutely have to. They take care of loose threads or whatever is necessary” Avon carries on, joined by his spouse as she follows his lead beyond the home’s interior. “Devin calls them ‘the Cleaners’. He says they are Rico’s men and they do the bidding of the local government and whatever’s affiliated with them” he continues to explain, every word uttered being fully taken down by the woman that shares the deck with him as if they were notes. “From what it sounds like, they stay away from jail time in exchange for this” Avon concludes, shrugging his shoulders as he stares into the distance, “I don’t know who they are specifically or why they’re after us.” “So let’s take that information to the cops. Jake and Beau have been trying to pin Rico with these dudes in the masks already, so maybe they’ll-” Penny suggests, looking her husband in the eyes as he interrupts her, his face turning in her direction. “Part of the people that are supposedly in on the cover up are the police” Avon corrects, his head hanging in dejection as the corner that he feels he’s been backed into becomes more apparent the longer he spends in it. “I’m not implying Jake and Beau are involved in the corruption. It doesn’t sound like everyone is from what Devin’s telling me. It could merely be a select few- in addition to Dana” the man clarifies, not wanting to be mistaken, “but even if they wanted to do something about it, they can’t. Dana Whitehead is their superior, and any in-roads they might be able to establish would be snuffed out before they could even capitalise on it.” “So you’re just gonna shovel this all away and let it rot while you write some think piece about why people kill for the eightieth time!?” Penny chirps back, her eagerness in speaking out against the conclusions her husband had come to surprising the man greatly. “You’ve got people telling you that there’s a massive cover up in one of the greatest American mysteries on this side of the century, and you just...” she proceeds, struggling to wrap her mind around such a case, “...ignore it?” “What else would you have me do, Penny? I’m so far out of my depth! I’m not some investigative journalist, I’m a writer who pens a book every year or two for a decade’s worth of cheques” Avon retorts, speaking ill of the task he’s apparently placed at the helm of. “The people who have any business looking into this stuff are people that I’m not sure I can trust” the man continues, “besides, if I did tell the cops, what happens when the cleaners find out what I know?” “Then we’ll tell Jake and Beau to look into the stuff in secret” Penny replies, quickly having come onto the side in favour of delving deeper. “If there’s some fucked up shit going on in this town, the only choice we should be thinking of other than telling someone about this would be to leave” she doubles down, watching as her husband’s frown places itself in her direction, not a verbal reply to accompany it. Reading the man’s face, Penny inspects her husband’s eyes before her head pulls back, a reprieve taken from the conversation itself as she tries to process what his demeanour implies. “You want to leave, don’t you?” she questions aloud, the shamed expression that carries itself back toward the town’s distance lending her conclusion credence, “why?” “Because none of this is worth the trouble that comes with it!” Avon proclaims, his voice not loud enough to come across like a yell, but not low enough to be construed as civilised. “We’ve got some freakshow group of criminals trying to shut us up while- at the same time- they commit acts of domestic terrorism by blowing up an entire fucking hospital” the author continues, allowed to continue speaking freely as his wife goes quiet. “People are being killed, Beth is off god knows where, and I’m finding it impossible to trust our own damn police department to tell us the fucking truth” Avon declares, slamming the palm of his hand against the patio’s bannister. “If that’s not bad enough, it’s not just me that gets put in danger if all of this cover-up bullshit turns out to be true and someone finds out that I know about it...” the man proceeds, turning to look his wife in the eyes that take toward him, “...it’s you too.” With a frown, Penny stares away without a reply at first, allowing the valid point that her husband makes to settle itself within her mind. “Don’t get me wrong, if a cover-up did happen- it’s entirely fucked up” Avon explains, licking the insides of his mouth as he, too, turns his full attention to the entrance of the woodlands at the opposite end of their spacious backyard, “but trying to play the heroes in solving the Remedy Hills mystery isn’t a role that we belong in.” Knowing her husband’s point to be true, Penny remains silent, her own hands resting over the wooden railing that the pair stand at, her sights falling to the ground. Sharing in the quietude, Avon sits with the discouraging sensation of sickness that comes along with his refusal to present justice for the lives lost as a result of the mystery’s prolonging, the feeling making no effort to sit well within him- though it’s one that he forces himself to endure in the name of his family’s interest. | “It’s really just the idea that the town- or the ghost if you’d prefer to think of it that way- doesn’t want the people in the town sleeping longer than needed to function” Harlington confesses, ceasing his explanation as he aids the woman who shares his company in relocating the corpse. “Maybe it has something to do with the coffee itself or maybe the coffee is just how the town deals with it- but sleep isn’t something that Remedy has the luxury of” Harlington doubles down, “if New York were the city that never sleeps, Remedy Hills would be its distant cousin.” “You can stop speaking in riddles any day now and just... be direct” Beth assures, groaning as she steps into the shallow grave, leading Rico’s body by the feet whilst her abductor carries the rest of the criminal’s weight. “Fine. I think that the town either does something to the coffee that keeps people up for most of the night, or keeps people up for the night themselves” Harlington replies, cutting his theory short at her behest, “if it’s the latter, then coffee might be how they cope.” “And what do you think it wants with us?” Beth carries forward, dropping the body’s legs into the hole just as Harlington relinquishes his grip of its top-half, leaving the criminal to the place in which his final rest will be taken. “To figure out what actually happened that night the boy was killed” Harlington responds, wiping off his dirt-covered hands whilst his newly-minted acquaintance releases her fingers from the gloves she’d talked him into giving her. “I already helped the cops solve who murdered the girl we saw this morning. I doubt it’s her murder that we’re supposed to solve” Harlington confesses, leaning over as he catches his breath. “The only other thing that comes to mind is the Remedy Phantom case” he concludes, a natural route that the woman across from him also comes to, “if the town is run by people corrupt enough to let Rico get away with his shit, I wouldn’t put it past them to do the same in the Phantom case.” Wrapping her fingers around the wooden handle that protrudes from the shovel that Harlington had buried into the earth, Beth begins the process of covering the tracks for a living town, the murder it had committed now falling on her hands to pretend never happened. “Why did you start following me?” she questions aloud, digging the tool’s head into the dirt once more whilst gaining the man’s attention. “You followed me out of Remedy after I left, right? It was after the people in those masks attacked me. I tried covering my tracks and getting as far away as I could” Beth clarifies, yet to pry the metal head out from the soft pile as she locks eyes with her captor, “why did you follow me?” Hanging his head, Harlington declines to speak at first, instead looking to the ground as the woman begins the process of covering their tracks. “Don’t go silent on me now” the woman stoically remarks, a slight grin carried in the corners of her mouth as she takes notice of the lack of hurry in the man’s attempt to reply, “you’ve already convinced me that the town is alive. If you’re afraid that I won’t believe whatever explanation you come up with- you haven’t been paying attention.” “It’s not that you won’t be convinced by my answer- it’s that you’re not going to like the answer” Harlington corrects, hanging back whilst the woman continues filling the grave with its natural covering of soil. “I don’t like the fact that the town is haunted, but I’m gonna have to learn to live with that, aren’t I?” Beth questions back, again making a proclamation that the man disregards. “It’s not that kind of dislike that I’m talking about” Harlington again counters, his persistent refusal to answer the question only drawing greater intrigue from the woman who asks it. “For the love of Remedy, just tell me before I decide to bash your brains in with this shovel” Beth declares, earning an amused chuckle from the man she threatens. “You can try, but Remedy won’t let me die any sooner than it’ll let you die” the man jokes, looking up to the woman before finding a complete vacancy of humour in her stare, eyes darting in his direction with adamancy. “Just answer the fucking question, asshole” Beth again prompts, the energy in her voice having faded entirely as her patience reaches its end, leaving her partner of unbelievable circumstance little choice but to provide her with clarity. Wiping a bead of sweat from his glistening forehead, Harlington pulls in a deep breath before letting it free as he speaks, his face finding the woman’s from across the grave. “Because the people under those masks weren’t the ones that attacked you that night...” he confesses, watching the visage of a patience-expended victim revolt into something of disapproval and disdain, “...I was.” Her efforts of putting Rico’s body away for a permanent slumber having come to an unintended halt, Beth stares blankly at the man opposite her, his voice yet to provide context behind the admission of guilt. “Before you left Remedy Hills- before I’d even attacked you- I was starting to have these weird dreams whenever I’d try to get an hour or two of sleep” Harlington continues, having waited long enough for a rebuttal from the woman that never arrived, giving him the greenlight to carry on. “Every time I’d have these dreams, I’d wake up and the whole town would be covered in fog. After asking around, I’d find out that most of the things I’d been dreaming of had actually happened” he proceeds, adjusting his posture as his balance begins to grow less steady, threatening to drop him into the hole that Remedy’s victim lies in. “The guy that got killed a few weeks before I started following you- I dreamed that happening before it did. I don’t even know what it meant now, but I know that I envisioned it” Harlington continues, still speaking to the woman who looks at him in silence, “other little things that I still can’t piece together- I saw those. And then, I want to say it was about three days before I- y’know... I saw you.” With its tip firmly left within the ground, Beth releases her grasp of the tool as the tension in her body heightens, interested in hearing out the man that spill his guts to her, but struggling to keep herself from lashing out in a physical way that the shovel would only make worse. “I saw you being dragged away by a group of people in those masks. I saw you being ripped into a van and taken away” Harlington further explains, his spirits lowering to a similarly-defeated level as his victim’s. “All I remember is you walking out of a house, the air being foggy, and you getting snatched up” he assures, shaking his head and dispelling any alternative solutions that could be reached. “I didn’t see who was under the masks, I didn’t see what happened before, I didn’t see what led up to it, I only saw what happened” Harlington pleads, still able to make out the shaken and hurt demeanour that Beth pays to him. “Unlike the other times that I had those dreams, there wasn’t any fog when I woke up that night. I ran over to the library and I saw you talking to Avon King over coffee” Harlington persists, shrugging his shoulders as the lieu of any more comforting explanation to make dawns upon him, “I realised that there was a point to seeing you in my dreams and figured that I might be able to stop whatever it was that was supposed to happen to you from actually happening.” “So you attacked me?” Beth responds, watching as her assailant’s head shakes, a gesture of correction being made before the assumption can fester any further resentment. “I didn’t know what else to do. I recognised the scene that night from my dream and knew I had to step in before the van got there” Harlington explains, at a loss for a better conclusion even after the fact, “I didn’t have much time to work with after you stepped out of the house. I looked around, saw a rock, and-” “And you hit me over the head with it” Beth replies, finishing the man’s story on his behalf, already aware of where it was meant to be leading. “That was the only dream I had that didn’t come true yet. In my defence- it still never came true” Harlington retorts, a rebuke that would otherwise infuriate the woman, but is now just another horrible memory on top of a mountain of others that have come to plague her mind in the last twelve hours. “I’m not trying to come off like I saved your life or anything, but I know that there had to be some reason why I saw that happening before it actually happened” Harlington proceeds, stepping around the grave’s edge in hopes of displaying his apology for the action. “I’d followed you from that point on and figured that I needed to appear somewhat-” the man continues, only to stop in his tracks as the woman backs away, putting her hands out to prevent him from nearing any closer. No longer met with an explanation, Beth tries fighting through the clutter in her mind whilst the town-haunted man just beside her voices his apology once more. Letting free a heavy breath, the woman points at the shovel and walks off, returning to the cabin in an effort of creating space for herself. “You can take over from here-” she mutters, looking from one side to the other in quick succession as she tries to gather herself enough to depart, “-I need, I- to- I- uh.” Stammering over her words, Beth refuses to finish her thought before heading off, closing in on the cabin’s entrance before disappearing behind it under Harlington’s watchful eye. Looking at the heavens before punching the air in aggravation, the assailant accepts the chore left behind for him as he growls beneath his breath, angered by the circumstances that surround the two of them as he reclaims the shovel, taking over for his victim in finishing off Rico’s final resting place. == Remedy Hills == With the radio switched off and nothing to keep him entertained, Avon’s mind loses itself in a flurry of assumptions as he mans the steering wheel, piercing through the cloudy, small town night with only the mounted GPS’ guidance affording him a path toward answers for his questions. “Turn left. Then, keep straight” the machine reads aloud, its feminine voice doing just enough to keep the man’s mind from straying down territory better off left undisturbed.
“He could be trying to set me up. I don’t know why he wouldn’t do it when he had the chance that night, but that doesn’t mean he won’t take it tonight” the man thinks aloud, speaking to a car empty of passengers other than himself. “Why would I even entertain something like this? They killed Beth, they killed their own members, and they tried to kill me” he further murmurs, bypassing the concerns he voices aloud by following through with the source’s request. Rolling to a stop at the red, octagonal sign planted into the rough terrain off toward his right, Avon lightly taps his foot along the gas pedal as his hands grasp tightly upon the wheel he rolls to the left. “In half a mile, turn right at the stop sign” the device he’d mounted a short distance away from his line of sight remarks, leading the final down the final stretch of passageway between himself and the man he searches for. “These are vicious people. These are evil people” the writer continues to whisper, trying to talk sense into himself despite his intentions being nothing close to willing, his mind already made up on seeing this journey through. “I should do the world a favour and put them down when I get there. The world is better off without these kinds of animals” Avon continues, speaking whatever thoughts linger upon his mind without any people within earshot to hold him accountable for them. “These people are depraved. They’re ruthless, and they will stop at nothing to hurt people” the whispers continue, refusing to silence as the destination has yet to be reached. “They hurt Beth. You gave that woman your word, and you let her down” he says as a glance is passed toward the machine’s screen, the trail that he’s meant to follow shortening the further that he seeks out what lies at the end of it. “You can’t allow these people to get away with something like that. Jake and Beau are trying, but- if this guy is right- you can’t trust the cops” the comments are uttered, only interrupted by the feminine voice once more. “At the stop sign, turn right. Then, continue straight for half a mile and your destination will be on the left” the device mutters aloud, prompting the driver to come to his final stop outside of his intended area of interest and guide the vehicle accordingly. “This man’s haunted you. He’s haunted your wife, and he’s killed so many people” Avon continues to declare, preparing himself for the soul that he prepares to find himself at the courtesy of, finally coming face to face with the smiley face demons that had plagued him. “This man is a savage. Even if it seems like the two of you can find common ground- he cannot be trusted” the author proceeds, refusing to let up in his conclusion, “react to him as if he were the devil itself.” “You have arrived at your destination” the feminine voice proclaims whilst the car’s driver pulls onto a gravel driveway, the substance bringing a different sound over the vehicle that the paved roadway had not offered. At the behest of his device assistant, Avon brings his vehicle along whatever length of the rock-covered stretch of continued passage that’s provided to him, only stopping when his driver’s seat is aligned with the steps that lead to the home’s front patio. “He’s vicious, he’s ruthless, and you need to be careful” Avon mumbles, twisting the keys in the ignition before sliding them out once the car’s engine has been powered down, keeping them in his hand as he steps out of the car. “He’s vicious, he’s ruthless, and you need to be careful” the author repeats, slamming the door shut on his way out before marching for the front steps, repeating the line as he nears them, “he’s vicious, he’s ruthless, and you need to be-” Interrupting himself as he stops dead in his tracks, Avon looks toward the home’s entrance to find a man emerging from within, the face one so hauntingly familiar that the writer recognises it immediately. With a cup of hot tea in his hand, Devin joins his visitor in the crisp air of Remedy Hills without uttering a word, his eyes simply falling upon the new arrival with a friendly enough demeanour to mistake for any of the other town’s people. “Welcome, Mr. King” the soft-spoken, well-mannered man remarks as he, too, comes to a stop just feet away from his own front door. Dressed in a knitted green sweater and a pair of beige khakis, Devin stands before the unannounced visitor with a pair of glasses worn over his clean-shaven face, looking toward him with a semi-smile. “I’m glad you could make it” the decent-appearing subject of Avon’s torment proceeds, lifting his cup toward the man, “care for a cup of tea?” = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = “Where do I factor into any of this?” Beth queries, her eyelids pressed together and head leant back against the chesterfield’s padded backing. “I beg your pardon?” Harlington wonders back, curious as to the context in which the woman’s question is offered, taken by surprise at the sudden vocalisation from a woman who’d been quiet for so many hours that he’d mistaken her for being asleep. “You said earlier that there was a reason that I survived the crash” Beth responds, the middle finger on her right hand flicking at the index digit on her left, nothing else to do whilst still confined to the rope’s restraint. “You’re important” Harlington answers, adding nothing more to the reply than the two words, a conclusion vague enough to prompt the kidnapped resident to open her eyes and stare forward. Without uttering a word at first, the hostage looks toward her keeper without the slightest sense of understanding what was meant, though it quickly becomes apparent that her abductor neither has one himself. “I don’t get it either. Remedy Hills seems to think you’re mightily important” Harlington shrugs, the lean in his rocking chair having ascended all the way back once more and remained there, the climb back down prevented by the steadily-firm planting of his feet. “Did a ghost knock on your window and tell you to kidnap me or something?” Beth wonders aloud, not finding it within her to disregard that conclusion as something so far out of left field that it’s impossible to be answered with. “No, but I would’ve rather one had” Harlington confesses, crossing his own arms as his chin presses against his chest, head bowed as he looks at the floor. “Please tell me it’s something less ridiculous than the ghost story you fed me a few hours ago” Beth quips aloud, holding out the hope that her intelligence will not be insulted the way her kidnapper had traipsed over it earlier. “It’s tame in comparison, yes” Harlington confesses, speaking with the tone of a man yearning for nothing more than a good night’s sleep, his spirits having lowered to a similar level to the woman he’d forced into imprisonment. “That might just be my opinion, though” the abductor admits, his head leant toward his right as he funnels through his head for the answers to the woman’s quandary, “it’s hard to find it anything less than tame when it’s something that lives alongside you for years of your life.” Frowning, Beth’s head hangs as she braces herself for the reply that she’s bound to receive, unsure of what kind of mythical statement she’ll be forced to endure. “I haven’t stopped getting these weird things since that night in the cab” Harlington recalls, dismissing the variety of oddities that have come and gone like they were people he’d encountered in life and quickly moved on from. “I stopped driving after Rico’s taxi company shut down. There wasn’t much reason for it having business in Remedy in the first place” he says, yet to lose the woman’s attention as it currently stands. “When I was a few days out from the end of the year, I’d planned on moving out. I wasn’t enough of a survivalist to live off the land, and there wasn’t much in the way of work people associated with Rico could get in this town” Harlington speaks as he stares at the floor, his face still illuminated by the candle between himself and his prisoner- though it’s dwindled substantially. “Around this time, I started getting threats from some of the people I worked with. Most of them came to the same conclusion that you did- I’d feigned the ghost story as a cover for ratting on Rico” he explains, still managing to retain the focus of the woman that sits opposite him. “I packed my things, hopped in my car, and I sought out leaving town. When I got to the bridge- the one over the river- I was stopped by a group of dudes.” Familiar with the area in question, Beth continues to reserve her speech until the man finishes his own, holding back her doubts that it will end in any way she would deem believable. “Long story short, they dragged me out of the car, roughed me up a bit, and left me there” the man remarks with a frown, the events having happened in such quick succession that he’d failed to keep track of it, “I drove myself to the hospital, got stitched up, and they said I was lucky to even be alive.” Having lost part of the feeling in her hands, Beth squeezes her fist in intervals in order to rid of the pins-and-needles sensation that overcomes them, refusing her the opportunity for comfort. “I felt like shit, my body was aching, and I knew there was no way I was making it more than a few minutes on the road before the sores got worse than I could manage” Harlington reveals, stricken with pain over the way he’d felt that following night, “I went back to my cabin and tried to sleep it off.” As her teeth press together, the runaway librarian holds back her concern that the paranormal aspect of the man’s stories will prevail when she least expects it, holding out the hope that such will not come to pass. “That night, I got a knock at my door. It took me a minute to answer it, but when I did- I figured they’d come back to finish me off” the dirty blonde-haired resident confesses, shaking his head with displeasure at the sight he’d been beholden to that night. “They hadn’t actually come to my house before, so it took me by shock. I leapt back, fell down, and the first guy that I saw walked in” Harlington murmurs, swallowing a wad of spit as his mouth goes dry. “I swear, I’d never been more terrified of anything in my life. Even when I saw them on the bridge, I got out and yelled at them ‘cause I thought they were some pranksters looking to piss me off” he confesses, shaking his head in refusal, “I realised I was going to die that night.” Balling his right hand into a fist, Harlington sits in silence whilst his victim is left- in that moment- with only the sound of the wooden wick in the candle to catch her ear. Remaining seated in silence, the kidnapper struggles to continue speaking over the stranglehold that the fear he had in such a moment left him with, paralysing his mind like a virus to a cancer-ridden patient with no immune system left to fight it. Pressing his hands against the floor, Harlington drags himself away from the group of men who tower above his laid-out body, wincing at the struggle that comes with every small movement. “What the hell did- argh!” the jobless, wounded civilian questions aloud, thwarted in the moment by the pain that shoots up his body as it twists beyond the point of composure, taking control of him for no more than a second, “what did I do to you!?” Saying nothing, the man at the front of the group steps through the doorway and slowly approaches the cabin’s tenant, leaving the injured young man to continue retreating as quickly as he can. Followed in by a second masked man, the towering figure at the head of the group draws closer to the handicapped Harlington before reaching around his hip, hand vanishing behind his back in an attempt to brandish what the victim has yet to find. Violently spinning back toward the home’s entrance, the two men who pose the resident harm look toward the same direction as the rest of their group, caught by surprise at the sound of snapping that comes over the area. “What was that?” a masculine voice questions, extending the inquiry toward those that he shares the home’s entrance with, equally unsure as they all are. Just as his quandary is raised, the man’s eyes fall upon the air that surrounds the cabin’s exterior, listening into the snapping and crackling sounds as they grow louder whilst a thick fog rolls over the town. Preoccupied, the group’s leader watches as the clothing of his conspirators begin to thrash in the wake of a strong wind that suddenly consumes Remedy Hills, picking up like a storm within an instant. Ruffling through the air, the sound of disturbed trees that had calmly sat along their branches begin to whip as an even louder snap than the one that had persistently caught the attention of the terrorising group commences. Emerging from their brace at the caution, the aggressors who’d yet to advance into the home look toward the sky for the cause of the noise, appearing to hurry in the final moment that their leader sees them as they were. “What are you do-!?” the masculine voices questions aloud, once more begging for an answer from those that immediately disappear just as a massive thud crashes against the ground and buries them beneath. As in awe as the intruders are, Harlington gasps and ducks as closely to the ground as he can manage, bracing against the impact of the object that had plummeted toward earth. Growing steady with as little of a warning as it had picked up steam beneath, the winds of Remedy Hills die out as the storm’s onslaught vanishes as quickly as it had arrived, leaving the three souls within the home to find the results. In silence, the pair of masked criminals look toward the doorway and find it blocked off entirely, cut off from the outside world by a massive obstruction that refuses anyone within an exit. Leaping off the ground as quickly as he can manage, Harlington lunges into the back that the group’s leader still holds toward him and pushes the taller man into his slightly-shorter, less-muscular colleague. Though his intention had not been to, the shove that the wounded homeowner had met his assailant with dislodges a firearm from the man’s back, its shell bouncing along the ground and coming to a stop off toward the distance. “Stop!” the injured man exclaims, dropping to his knees and picking up the pistol, taking aim at the men that he cannot get a decent look at. Cut off from receiving any of the moonlight by the massive object that now blocks the front door and the home’s forward-facing windows, Harlington is left in the same darkness as his aggressors are, holding out the hope that one of them will be standing wherever his gun is aimed. “Go, go! Get out! Get ou- ARGH!” the smaller assailant screams, shoving his heavier friend toward the back of the home, their eyes following the closest thing to natural light that they can. Interrupted by a gunshot, the guiding force that attempts to lead his friend to sanctuary drops to the ground as a bullet pierces his lower back. Stopping his retreat, the larger-built criminal hurries back to his friend’s side and helps guide him around the corner, shattering a window in the process whilst their prey becomes the predator that forces them to flee. Mustering as much strength as he could, Harlington follows the lead that the perpetrators had left without the will-power to do so as quickly, only managing to catch up with the intruders once they’d already begun driving off, scattering into the night in failure. Looking back to the home’s newly-destroyed front patio in search of the obstruction that had left the cabin impossible to leave through the front, Harlington finds a massive oak tree that had occupied a space just a few feet away from his home to have perfectly collapsed across its face. Crushing the other invaders beneath its massive weight and killing them instantly, the towering beast now refuses him the ability to re-enter his residence, sparing him from a cruel fate instead. “Why should I believe any of this?” Beth questions, returning her abductor to the present day and the task at hand- answering her inquiries and alleviating her doubts. “You go from telling me that there’s a cover-up in Remedy, to spinning some ghost story, to this” she reiterates, the man’s face directing itself away from her and through the window just beyond, “you haven’t even told me how I factor into this, and you just spill your- what!?” Cutting herself off, the kidnapped librarian snaps at the man’s refusal to look her in the eyes before taking her sights toward the glass pane behind herself, watching as a dense fog falls over Remedy Hills- clouding the headlights of a vehicle that parks just beyond the cabin. “It’s happening” Harlington mutters aloud, stepping out of his chair with a newfound energy upon his face, one that lights his features as if he’d just awoken from a full night’s sleep. “What? What’s happening?” Beth questions aloud, clueless as to what the man was trying to get at. “The fog only rolls over Remedy when the town is watching... Willing to step in to protect what’s within its best interest if need be” Harlington replies, voicing his devotion and trust in the claims that he’d made since the pair had first met. “Who the fuck is that, Harlington!?” Beth shouts, watching as the approaching headlights come to a stop, their beams falling upon the home that the vehicle they’re attached to now stops at. “Someone that Remedy Hills is going to have to take care of if it wants what’s best for it” Harlington replies, walking over to the woman and lifting her by the arm, turning her around to face the scene that awaits them outside as he undoes the knots that tie her hands back. “You want to know why you should trust me or believe anything that I’m saying- even the most ridiculous parts? Well, you’re about to get it” the abductor replies, freeing his victim before turning her body to face him, her eyes falling upon his own. “I brought you out here so you could see it for yourself” Harlington reassures, nodding as he looks away, setting his sights on the front door he’s prepared to venture beyond, walking past the woman without uttering another word. | “No, I did not kill Beth Ovorre. In fact, I haven’t killed anyone” Devin corrects, his statement immediately drawing the ire of the man who sits in the seat opposite himself. “You say that with a lot of confidence for someone who’s killed multiple people. Probably more than just the people you’ve anointed as human scarecrows in my backyard” Avon corrects, his rebuttal doing little to convince the man of truths beyond the one he’d uttered. “That was not me” Devin replies, immediately prompting the author to ask the follow up question, “who was it then?’ he wonders aloud, holding a straight face toward the man he sits opposite of. “They’re the people that used to work for Rico” the naturally low-voiced, sweater-wearing gentleman responds, “they’ve been working for the town’s officials in return for not getting convicted on their variety of crimes.” “And that’s not you?” Avon responds, answering the man’s concerns sarcastically without missing a beat, “it was your face that I saw underneath that mask when the bombs went off.” Nodding in agreement, Devin lowers his teacup onto an equally-small plate and reaches over to a nightstand a foot away, letting it sit as he continues the conversation. “It was my face under the mask” the baby-faced man corrects, shaking his head as he leans back in his seat, hands folding atop his small, almost unnoticeable gut. “Just because I wear one of their cheap, plastic masks doesn’t mean I align with them” Devin explains, visibly refusing any potential creativity from consideration, “they’re not meant to be fashionable, they’re meant to get the job done.” “What job are we talking about in this scenario?” Avon hastily questions back, refusing to lower himself from the guard that he’d erected to stand atop, using it as an outpost as if he were a guard in search of the truth. “The job of keeping one’s identity away from recognisable eyes. That’s the only purpose of this- a blown cover is the worst crime you can commit to them” Devin answers, watching his guest’s head shake instantly. “Who is ‘them’?” Avon queries, pointing out the man’s refusal to speak of himself and those responsible for the crimes he’s taken to expecting of the smiley face group as one in the same. “The same people who’ve covered up what happened in Remedy all those years ago” Devin replies, finally following up his speech with a pause that doesn’t get interrupted by the antsy writer who’d found him. “The same people who kill loose threads, the same people who scare writers out of Remedy, the same people who no one in the town is even aware exists beyond a select few...” the well-mannered man continues, clicking his tongue as his voice comes to another momentary stop, “...the cleaners.” “The Cleaners?” Avon repeats, more of a curious tone taken in his vocalisation of the group than that of the man across from him, “who are ‘The Cleaners’?” Clearing his throat, the home’s polite owner reaches for the teacup once more as he answers, licking his lips to moisten them as they continue to dry just as his mouth does. “They’re mercenaries hired in secret to keep Remedy Hills a quiet little town in Massachusetts and no more of a tourist attraction than it’s already become” the slightly-older man responds, clicking his tongue again as he lifts the cup to his lips. “And how do you know this?” Avon queries, raising his suspicions and refusal to fully buy into the tale being spun whilst the home’s owner takes a drink. “Because I used to be one of them. For a short time, anyways” Devin answers as he lowers the cup, the plate he’d picked it off of held in the opposite hand, “at first, we were only supposed to run this one woman out of town. We were told she knew things that were dangerous, and it could get us all locked up just like Rico.” Sorrowful in his presentation, the man’s voice begins to rise just slightly from its resting tone, growing less stable the louder he becomes- even if minimally. “Then we all found out it wasn’t us she had information on, it was them... The local police. When we went to them, they tried to cut us a deal” Devin recalls, shaking his head in refusal, “we took it. We were- held on retainer, so to speak- meant to nip snoopers in the bud in case they tried to dig deeper than the mystery itself.” “I thought you said you weren’t part of the Cleaners?” Avon corrects, interrupting the man’s claims before being returned a reiteration without pause. “I’m not anymore. As far as they’re aware, I died of cancer a year or so back” Devin explains, his comments proving difficult for the author to fully comprehend. “My brother- who looked a lot like me- was diagnosed a few months before he went. I saw that as an opportunity to run for the hills” the man clarifies, subduing his voice once more in the name of retaining its strength. “I was not proud of it. However, I knew what needed to be done.” Devin summarises, falling silent for a brief moment as he looks away, eyes appearing displeased when they take back toward his guest. “Had they realised that I wasn’t interested in playing mercenary anymore, they would’ve gotten rid of me at the first chance they had” the man remarks, bowing his head in shame as he pauses once more, “I saw my way out and I took it. I may not be proud of it, but I did what I had to do.” Staying silent, Avon finds himself captivated by the story that’s unfolding, finding it difficult to keep track of, but worth hearing out anyway. “I’m sorry for giving you the illusion on that video that there were more of us rather than just me” Devin proceeds, staring at the author across from him with hope, “after what happened with that driver- the night that you rolled into town- I knew all of this had gone too far.” “So, you’re just a random citizen, laying low and playing dead, who wants the Cleaners done away with?” Avon questions with genuine curiosity, only to be met with a reiteration of his question. “They’ve manipulated this town. These senseless tragedies never stop. That needs to end” Devin answers, again lifting the cup of tea to his lips, “by getting rid of the people responsible for it, you get rid of the cleaners. And finally, Remedy Hills will be at peace once more.” “So you used to be fine with it all until you weren’t?” Avon queries, only to be met with an immediate shake of the head in refusal. “I was never fine with it. At the start, I only saw it as a means to self-preservation” Devin rejoinders, making it a point to make such clear, “then killings increased. Remedy Hills became a cesspool for these strange oddities that simply made it impossible to not think that there was a wound inflicted upon this town that had been refusing to heal.” “So what do you want from me?” Avon questions back, metaphorically extending a hand of trust that would allow him to put faith in the answer he receives from the relatively-unfamiliar confidant. “I want you to help me do what the woman we ran off those years back should’ve done” Devin explains, interrupting himself by lifting a finger. “You want me to write an exposure piece on the town’s corruption?” Avon queries, the assuring nod that he receives doing enough to make the message clear. “If the truth were to slip out- especially from an already-popular author like yourself- there’d be nowhere to hide for them” Devin explains, running string around points as if to create a visual path to follow, “the people who use the Cleaners would be doomed. They’d go into hiding, the Cleaners would die off, and their filth would go too.” “You say that like any of it’s guaranteed. That’s not to mention what kind of risk it puts me at” Avon responds, watching as Devin frowns, looking off to the side before shaking his head. “I never said it was a danger-less task” the soft-spoken man replies, watching the author’s chin lift with concern as he hears out the man’s point, “but if you’ve come this far to look for the truth, I’m sure you’ve already buried yourself so deep in this rabbit hole that there’s no other way out.” | “Harlington Spears!” Rico proclaims, still dressed in the uniform of the prison guard he’d killed days prior, emerging from the fog and stepping into the fog as the man himself exits the woodland cabin. “You’ve found me, Rico” Harlington proclaims, throwing his arms out at either side as he walks alone, welcoming an attempted hit from the man who’d come to deliver just that, “there’s no more running for me to do.” “You shouldn’t have started running in the first place” the escapee proclaims, holding a firearm at his side as he looks a former acquaintance in the eye. “You had a lot of balls doing what you did to me. Hell, I’m shocked you’re even still alive” Rico doubles down, the barrel of his stolen pistol still held toward the leaf-covered ground, “maybe I should start taking heads off of my own men. None of them could seem to do the job. It didn't take me much of an effort to get done, did it?” “What can I say, Rico? You’re really good at what you do” Harlington replies, not meeting his tormentor with an ounce of fear- but rather- an openness to accept whatever is to come, “why don’t you go ahead and finish me off?” With a squint and a smirk, Rico begins chuckling to himself at the ease in which he’s seemingly met with, unaware of the woman who shields herself in the cabin, her head turned away from the scene out of fear that her kidnapper will rue the stories he tells. “You have a death wish, son? Is some lady not giving you enough love to make this world seem worth it or something?” Rico queries, finding his ability to take aim and pull the trigger without issue to be too good to be true. “Y’know, for someone who likes to tell tall tales- maybe I shouldn’t put it past you to convince yourself of the same bullshit you spun with me” the runaway prisoner remarks, lifting the barrel of his weapon toward his adversary, “you think you’re invincible, boy?” “I guess we’ll find out once you pull that tri-” Harlington begins to reply, only for his eyes to direct themselves toward the same direction as his potential killer, interrupted by his hostage’s frantic voice as she fearfully runs through the door. Having pressed her back against the cabin’s entrance and averted her eyes, Beth shields her face by placing her hands against each side of her head, not wanting to see whatever is about to unfold just beyond the home. “Look” a feminine voice whispers, catching the newly-freed captive by surprise, the volume of the chirp being louder than the breathy tone in which she’d believed herself to hear. “What?” Beth whispers aloud, furrowing her brows as she lowers her hands, looking toward the candle at the coffee table’s centre before her eyes take toward the kitchen. “Look” a woman whispers again, her face holding itself toward the ground as the mystified librarian takes notice of her presence. Widening her eyes, Beth leans her chin forward as she refuses to pull away from the home’s entrance, trying to breach whatever amount of distance she can between herself and the lady that captures her every ounce of focus. “Beth...” the unnamed woman whispers, quickly leaving the spot she’d stood in before lifting her face, revealing a visage mangled beyond the point of what can be feasibly considered human, “...look!” “THERE’S SOMEONE IN THERE!” Beth shouts, throwing herself out of the cabin and away from one horror completely separate from the one occurring outside. “Beth, what are you doing!?” Harlington exclaims, watching as the teary-eyed woman looks to him and points toward home without saying a word. “Spears!” Rico angrily shouts, his face having gone from a mixture of confusion and intrigue to one of unbridled anger, “what the hell are you doing with Fred’s girl!?” Looking back to his enemy, Harlington’s concerned visage turns to one of loss, his squinted eyes and shaking head indicating his uncertainties. “Who the fuck is Fred!?” the abductor shouts back, the arms held out at each side now representing his cluelessness. “Fred!?” Beth quickly repeats, losing track of the instance within the home in light of the name that’s dropped by the man with a gun outside of it, “as in my dad Fred!?” Without uttering a word, Harlington guides his eyes toward the woman at his side before directing them toward the criminal across from him. “What the fuck are you up to, Spears!?” Rico queries, steadying his aim with the gun before holding back on firing the trigger, “are you with them!?” “Them? Who the fuck is them!?” Harlington questions back, genuinely out of his depths as far as his understanding is concerned. “Forget that! How the hell do you know my father!?” Beth interjects, the screaming match between the three secret-keeping figures turning into a war on all sides. “Who the fuck is ‘them!?’” the subject of the criminal’s aim shouts again, urging the firearm-wielding man to answer the inquiry as he disregards his hostage’s concerns. “No! Answer me! How do you know my father!?” Beth screams instead, stepping forward before her arm is pulled back by Harlington, who repeats his own question, “what ‘them’ are you talking about!?” “SHUT THE FUCK UP!” Rico proclaims, watching the man who’d turned him in rip the librarian prisoner back and begin stepping forward, forcing a redirection of his aim and a reach for the trigger. “Who the fuck is ‘t-!?” Harlington questions aloud again as tensions flare, chased after by Beth before they’re both forced to leap back as the weapon is fired. “AARRGGHH!” Rico screams, firing a bullet randomly into the distance as he’s thrown forward, the unexpected assault leaving him completely incapable of comprehending the sight that’s forced Harlington and Beth into a speechless stooper of shock and awe. Upon howling out in pain, the escapee’s eyes widen as his strength to wield the pistol he’d attempted to take his nemesis’ life with disappears, allowing the firearm to fall aimlessly to the ground. “OH MY GOD!” Beth screams in terror, falling back as she kicks herself as far away from the scene as she can manage, the escalating tensions having died immediately into a stillness that falls over the air, one that even takes Harlington by shock. Gasping for air as blood runs from his mouth and down his chin, Rico looks toward his sternum to find the wooden branch that had impaled him, driving itself through his body just as he’d set his finger on the trigger. “Look” the ghostly apparition that had horrified Beth enough for the woman to run as far away from the cabin as she could whispers, staring toward the scene of remarkable chance that unfolds. Looking back, Harlington’s eyes widen to see a familiar presence, one that the shaken librarian can no longer deny the existence of. As his brain processes the injury he’s been afflicted with, Rico’s face gradually bobs toward the ghost’s face, shocking him even beyond the grave injury he’d sustained. Saying nothing further, the apparition waves her hand toward the lanced convict and ushers the tree branch away, driving it out of the man’s body the same way it had punctured him. Dropping to his knees immediately as blood begins rushing through the gaping wound in his sternum, Rico’s head reconnects the communication that had been severed upon the brunt impact his body had suffered. Looking toward Harlington with the last ounce of energy he can muster, the apparition’s killer realises that the rat’s tall tale from all those years prior had been true all along. “You...” Rico growls, unable to say anything beneath his own power, falling forward just as the man in question turns to face him, “...you son of a-.” Hitting the ground, the escaped convict dies without finishing his final statement, silenced just like the woman he’d silenced had been. In awe, Beth crawls away from the ghost that now turns to look at her, the apparition’s eyes taking upward toward the man who’d brought her here. Without uttering a word, the ghost of Rico’s victim waves her hand toward the sky and disperses the fog, returning Remedy Hills to the state it had always belonged in- clear skies without a cloud in sight. To the sound of only the running vehicle that the now-deceased convict had stolen, the apparition looks away from Harlington and back toward Beth, continuing to remain in silence before fading into a mist-like fog of her own and vanishing. Amazed in both horror and absolute astoundment, Beth gradually spins her head around to the figure that stands behind her, the man’s other-worldly claims appearing to no longer be of such deniability. Catching the breath that the ghost had stolen from his lungs, Harlington looks back to the woman at his feet, his eyes having widened just as her own have, aware that his every statement has now been verified beyond the point of doubt, but unable to find it within himself to gloat in any way. “Remedy H-” Harlington whispers, stopping himself as a smile launches from one end of his face to the other, overjoyed at finally being vindicated in all that he’s said, lifting his voice to proudly declare what he had all along whilst looking Beth in the eyes, “Remedy Hills is alive!” == Remedy Hills == “This just doesn’t make sense” Avon murmurs to himself, sitting at the end of the dining room table closest to the sliding doors whilst staring into the screen of his laptop, running through long walls of text without any end in sight. Stepping through the home’s entrance, Penny leaves her bag atop a table off to the side of the foyer and wanders further into the home, her arrival earning a passive recognition from the man she approaches.
“How was your day?” he inquires as he normally would, not receiving much in the way of an answer at first as he continues reading the documents on the screen, his mind too preoccupied to notice his wife’s heels tapping along the floor closer. Without placing a voice to her reply, Penny rounds the dining room table and closes the computer’s screen, snapping her husband out of the fixation his eyes had glued themselves to as she climbs into his lap. “I like where this is going” Avon remarks initially, hearing his wife’s breathy laugh react to him whilst the fingers on her hands lock together around the back of his head, prompting him to do much the same around his wife’s waist. “My day is much better now” Penny replies, a long and drawn out sigh preceding the remark as she leans in, her lips locking against the man recently-immersed in his investigation, his full attention now paid to the woman in his lap. Growing more intense the longer it lasts, the kiss the husband and wife share eventually leads the author to lower his hands from his partner’s lower back to just beneath her, lifting her up as he steps out of his chair. “Let’s make it an equally good night while we’re at it” Avon rejoinders, turning around the way in which his spouse had travelled to direct their display of affection toward the bedroom at the opposite end of the home, Penny’s laughter cheerfully bouncing off the walls. “Avon!?” a young- yet maturely declarative- voice calls out from beyond the residential plot’s front door, accompanying the request for an answer with a set of knocks from the knuckles. Rolling his eyes before closing them and shaking his head, Avon reacts visually with the same dissatisfaction that his wife voices aloud, “you’ve gotta be fucking kidding me” she remarks with a sigh, climbing down from her husband’s arms as he steps past her. “Beau, you are the ultimate cockblock” the author remarks upon opening the door, greeting the officer he’d already recognised the voice of. “Thanks, but my presence alone usually isn’t the reason for that. My good looks seem to get the job done without fail” the younger officer replies, nodding to the author as he steps into the home, familiar enough with the town’s newest residents to grant himself entry without the need to ask. “Good evening, Mr. King. Apologies for the unannounced arrival” Jake quips as he enters the home, doing so much more cordially than his younger colleague does. “So am I” Avon replies, a remark that his wife wastes little time in doubling down upon from afar, “make that three.” “Actually, make it four. I’d much rather be coming here to chat or for a barbecue than why we’re here” Beau reassures, playing the sarcastic cop well enough to warrant his own clarification. “Mr, King, we wouldn’t otherwise disturb you with this had it not been for the target on the backs of you and your wife” Jake explains, standing closer to the door whilst his fellow officer stands closer toward the rear patio doors with his arms crossed. “We found your book in a cabin owned by a man named Harlington Spears. Does that name mean anything to you?” the older cop questions aloud, looking into the momentarily in-thought writer’s face as he ponders internally, searching through his head for any recollection of such a name. “No. I don’t believe I’ve ever even met someone named Harlington” Avon answers, his genuine effort proving to be of little use, “but if he had my book- so what? Plenty of people do.” “As true as that is, most of them don’t have a direct connection to a man who just used- if not orchestrated somehow- an act of domestic terrorism in order to escape prison like Harlington does” Beau corrects, his face wearing an obvious displeasure in the remark. “This guy is connected to Rico Martinez?” Avon questions aloud, only for his inquiry to be glossed over by his wife, who finds a deeper rooted interest in the comment their guests make, “did this Harlington guy blow up the hospital?” “The only thing we can guarantee is that it wasn’t Rico. Other than that, we don’t know who blew up the building” Beau corrects, wanting to address the more-pressing concern before moving onto anything else. “Harlington isn’t only connected to Rico Martinez, but he lives in his old house” Jake proceeds, returning the dialogue to its initial point, “well, he did before he seemingly vacated the premises.” “So what’s the point in telling me this?” Avon queries, sliding his hands into the pockets of his sweatpants as he glances back and forth between the officers, their faces going mostly unchanged from what he’d been able to see from his home’s warm lighting. “We think that Mr. Spears may be sheltering Rico Martinez for the time being” Jake soon responds, “they’re probably waiting for the heat to die down before Martinez gets into whatever it was he tried to get free over.” “Do you think we’re targets of him- or, rather- them?” the author proceeds to question, able to hear the deep breath that the younger officer takes in along his right. “It’s certainly possible. One of the strongest suspects we have behind the people doing this to the two of you is Rico Martinez” Beau explains, noticing Penny’s face as it drifts away, looking into the distance as she turns around with dissatisfaction, “if he is, then Harlington may be another person we can attach to this case.” “And this is all because you found a book?” Avon questions aloud, watching as the younger officer uncrosses his arms and shrugs his shoulders. “The scene that we found in that home was of two seats set up opposite each other. Under one of them, we found your book” Jake explains, using one hand to illustrate his speech whilst the other slides into his pocket for residency, “it’s not a very firm string to make assumptions with. It may be a coincidence or more- we don’t know yet.” Frowning, Avon remains standing with his arms crossed whilst his wife retreats down the hallway toward their bedroom casually, her hands falling upon her hips as she turns back around once far enough away from the discourse. “What book was it?” the author inquires, looking to his left to find an uncertain expression paid to him from Jake, the older officer’s face quickly taking toward his partner’s own. “It was ‘The Garden Manifesto’” Beau answers, watching as the writer pulls his eyes away and begins staring at the wall directly opposite himself, not yet uttering a word in return. “Is there something wrong, Mr. King?” Jake wonders aloud, noticing the squint that comes over the writer’s eyes from the man’s side, an immediate reaction to the question not paid to the officer that stands by. “Not at all” Avon answers after a short pause, sucking on the corner of his mouth as the inner flesh of his lips are pulled against the front of his teeth. Speaking not another word on the matter, the author stares forward intently whilst thoughts are kept within his head, rummaged through like stored away boxes in search of something more than what was hidden aside. = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = “You mentioned the coffee a few days ago” Beth remarks, one leg kicked over the other as she still sits with her arms restrained, the itches that her wrists have been plagued with from the scratchy rope that ties around her wrist having become easier to disregard in recent days. “Something about how it was easier to stop drinking it than others” she reiterates, looking at the man that sits in the rocking chair opposite herself, his hands draped over the ends of its armrests. “Yeah, that part was the one that I wasn’t too excited to get into” Harlington confesses, looking toward the exposed wax candle that sits on the table at the room’s centre. “Everything else about the idea of a cover-up and people wanting to not catch the killer are- even if far fetched- at least not beyond the realm of imagination” he continues, looking at the flame that bathes his face in the faintest amount of light whilst shaking his head, “the coffee is just a slice of a bigger part.” “You mean this web you’re still trying to convince me of?” Beth questions back, challenging the man’s comments as his eyes take upward, looking at his prisoner. “You started trying to convince me that Remedy was alive before my hands were behind my back” the runaway young woman recalls, staring toward the face that pays her much the same, undivided attention, “don’t shy away from continuing to try and spin it more than I’ve got no choice but to entertain it.” “It’s not a lie” Harlington corrects, having waited for his imprisoned accomplice to finish voicing her thought aloud before interjecting his own into the equation. “Everything about Remedy- the town, the people, and the things in it- just works differently here than it does anywhere else” the kidnapper continues, gently swaying back and forth in his seat as he speaks, “I don’t know how else to explain it other than saying the town itself is alive. There’s a force that won’t let this place go.” “And what proof do you have of that other than the fact that I got lucky and escaped a car crash uninjured?” Beth wonders aloud, expecting a displeased frown to come over the opposite man’s face. “The coffee” he instead answers, not taking long in doing so, as he attends to the woman’s dejections toward the claim. “Remedy Hills runs on the coffee. Anyone that drinks the coffee here just can’t help themselves but continue to drink it all throughout the day” Harlington proceeds, folding his hands atop his lap whilst his elbows rest along the sides of the rocking seat. “It doesn’t matter if it’s the crack of dawn or an hour after sundown- everyone in their home is drinking the coffee. When they stop, the town does everything in its power to convince them to take another swig.” “Or perhaps the fact that caffeine is a drug and drinking it so much makes it impossible to go cold turkey without some side-effects has something to do with it?” Beth argues the opposite, only for her claim to fall on deaf ears. “Beth. I need you to tell me in good faith that you could expect to walk into a town anywhere else in this country and see everyone that calls it home running a pot of coffee at eleven at night” Harlington retorts, “I’m assuring you- no one does that.” “So Remedy Hills has a coffee addiction unlike anywhere else in the country. Alright, let’s just pretend you’re right” the woman responds, knowing internally that such a case is likely somewhat true, “how does that correlate to the entire town being alive? Not just the people being alive, but the whole damn town being alive?” “It doesn’t” Harlington responds, providing a rebuttal that the woman across from him had not come around to anticipating. “The hooks that caffeine has on this town is just one of the easier things to point to in lieu of actually showing you how the town’s alive. It’s one of the first examples I go to” he furthers, trying to lend credence to his argument, “the town hasn’t truly slept since the murder happened, and now- until the case is truly solved- the people in it won’t get to either.” “There’s a lot more sense to make out of a claim like that than there would be if you’d been arguing that the coffee was drugged and we got hooked onto it” Beth responds, watching the slight amusement that her kidnapper takes in the claim. “If you’d told me that, I’d be more inclined to believe there was something fishy going on” she remarks, a comment that her abductor simply nods along with, “I’ll be honest, I’m a lot less inclined to believe this is the doing of a living town.” “Of course you are. I’d look at anyone who’d argue otherwise a lot less pleasantly than I look at you” Harlington retorts, not blaming his company for the doubt they present. “Let’s pretend that the town’s coffee intake were more easily-explainable than the town being alive for a second. We’ll keep our feet rooted in reality and try to be sceptics that don’t want to be swayed” he proposes, looking off to the quaint cabin’s side as he searches through his mind, “explain the fog.” “What do you mean ‘explain the fog’?” Beth queries without much of a pause, listening to the faint creaking of the wooden chair that her kidnapper rocks gently in, “we live near the Appalachians. We’re bound to get fog.” Puckering his lips and nodding, Harlington sits with that conclusion in his mind as the lean in his seat takes him all the way back, only for the feet that he presses against the old, wooden floorboards to refuse him any descent from the peak of his recline. “Since when has fog ever just fallen over some place in one massive swoop?” the man queries, pointing out the flaws in the woman’s explanation, “and since when has it only lasted a matter of minutes- sometimes seconds- at a time before disappearing without a trace?” Glancing off to the side, Beth thinks of an answer for a few seconds whilst the man across from her waits on, refusing to interrupt the train of thought that eventually arrives at a destination without a station. “I don’t know. It’s weird fog and we’re a weird town” she concludes, triggering another humoured reaction from her captor, his smile widening from ear to ear as his head bows, trying not to look at the source of his amusement out of respect. “That’s not how fog works and I know that because I’m a grown ass woman. I get that, alright?” Beth chirps, calling her abductor down from his gleefully indulged state of emotion, “it’s still better than explaining it away on some supernatural town theory.” Lifting his eyebrows as he lets out a sigh and shakes his head, Harlington lets the joints in his legs release from their statue-esque stiffening as the rocking chair leans forward, allowing him to step away from its restraints. “What does it matter anyway? You’re just making an empty statement without telling me why you have it or even what the point of it is” Beth proclaims, watching as the man walks off for the kitchen, his eyes wandering toward the fridge. Watching as the man’s figure is entrenched within the warm light from the machine’s interior, Harlington’s hostage thinks quietly to herself in the moment of silence that her kidnapper pays her. Listening to the retrieval of a glass bottle, Beth watches as the cabin’s owner steps toward the opposite end of the nearby room, grabbing a bottle opener from within the drawer it resides in. “With all of these questions that you’re asking me, why don’t I ask you one?” she finally decides upon, mimicking the course of action that he’d taken with her, “why do you believe the town is alive?” “Because I saw it myself” Harlington answers without hesitation, doing so just as he snaps the cap off his bottle of beer and lets the metal piece fall to the ground, jumping along the floorboards without a purpose before slowly coming to a stop upside down. “A few years ago, I found myself on hard times” he speaks, lifting the bottle’s rim to his lips as he takes a swig, sighing with relief, “I got a call from a friend who offered me a job taxiing people around.” Interested in hearing the man’s comments for reasons other than her lack of another choice, Beth sinks further into the sofa she’d been left upon and allows the man to continue speaking. “One night, I got a call from someone who wanted to be driven out of Remedy” Harlington proceeds, returning to his chair with the drink in tow, “usually, I wasn’t supposed to take people out of town. But, this person, she just sounded like she needed something to go right for her that day.” Wrapping his fingers around one of the armrests, the abductor sighs as he lowers himself into the seat, again lifting the liquor bottle to his lips. “She probably wasn’t any older than her mid-twenties, but she was dressed like she didn’t belong in a town as small as Remedy Hills” Harlington confesses, “I asked her why she was trying to get to a place like that. She obviously didn’t belong, and it seemed like even she knew that. The whole thing just seemed unusual.” Staring back into the candlelight, the abductor begins speaking slower than he had as he furthers along the story, unsure of just how much attention his captive audience is truly affording him. “She said there was more to everything than just what it looked like. There was always something more- and that applied to people too” Harlington admits, lifting his right leg over the left as he begins rocking in his seat once more. “She said there were too many people that couldn’t see that. For that reason, she was going to do whatever she could to change that” the man speaks to a woman who resides in silence, her mind not too certain on how to react to the words that are being spoken. “She stayed quiet for another few seconds in the backseat before she started talking again” Harlington remarks, “she said that- if people could never close their eyes- they’d eventually have no choice but to see everything.” Turning his eyes to the ground, the man sits without absolute stillness for nearly a minute before snapping out of the daze, another drink taken from his beer whilst Beth watches on, not wanting to speak up until the story is finished. “She said she wouldn’t let them” Harlington finally mutters, looking back to the woman opposite himself before reiterating, “she said specifically that she wouldn’t let them. I didn’t know what that meant, but I didn’t need to- she stopped talking after that.” Though she tries not to subscribe herself to the horror-like ambiance that comes with the man’s declarations, Beth struggles to not succumb to the hair-raising chill that surrounds her, a part of her mind following the story along as if it were a tale told around a campfire. “After a while, we got to her destination and I parked along the side of the road, I heard the door close after a second or two and thought nothing of it” Harlington proceeds, the tension in his face deepening. “But then I didn’t see her” he explains, deep in thought about the night that he can’t shake from his head, “I checked all around the car. I looked in the back, I looked through the windshield, I looked everywhere. I hadn’t even taken into account where the hell we were.” Again sipping from the bottle, the man’s face never slips into a descent from its sour and confused visage, curiosity wrapping itself around him like a snake to its prey. “Aside from an old apartment complex that didn’t look like it had been lived in for years, all she had me do was park on the side of the road” Harlington proclaims, his face almost managing to illuminate out of the stupefaction that the night left him with. “We were in the middle of nowhere, and this chick was nowhere to be found, and I had no idea why the hell everything felt so odd” he continues in quick succession, his words again being spoken at a regular pace. “So, I got this sickening knot in my stomach and got out of the car. It was just such a weird thing that I just wanted to make sure she was alright and we were actually at the right place” the man proceeds, still going without a reply from the woman in his company. “I got out, called for her, and heard nothing back” he remembers, shaking his head without a clue in the present time just as he had that night, coming up empty for a reasonable explanation, “it’s like she just straight up vanished.” With a slight widening of his pupils, Harlington looks at the floor once more, the same hair-raising reaction taken as the woman that he speaks with. “When I went back to get in my car, I caught just the smallest glimpse of a piece of paper on the telephone pole I’d parked a few feet away from. I didn’t see anything the first time around, but it was enough to warrant a second look” the man proceeds, carrying his line of sight back toward the restrained Beth, “it was a missing person’s poster.” With a squint of her own, the hand-tied former librarian looks forward without much of an idea over what to say if anything at all. Keeping his eyes glued upon the victim of his abduction, Harlington jumps forward in time from that night, detailing only the most vital pieces worth remembering. “After I saw it, I got back in my car and drove to the police station” he declares, rocking in his seat slowly, “I told them what happened, I left, and when I walked out of there- fog was everywhere.” Resting his beer upon the table just one leg’s length away, Harlington couples his hands atop his lap once more whilst his involuntary guest listens in, having asked for this in the first place. “They found her body not too far from where I dropped her off. She’d been dead for weeks by then, and when they followed the evidence- It led them all the way back to my boss...” the man confesses, watching Beth's eyes widen as he pauses, building up to the reveal he makes a point of, “...Rico Martinez.” “Stop” the woman immediately responds, shaking her head in disbelief at the result in which her abductor had come to, neither finding the sense in it or wanting to. “The taxi company was just a front for Rico’s other dealings. It was a way to wash the money that he’d bring into Remedy. I was one of the only people he employed- hand to god herself” Harlington doubles down, surrendering the belief in his recollection to the woman who it’d been uttered to. “Apparently she owed him a ton of money and he had her disposed of when she didn’t pay it back. Cops didn’t buy my story, wouldn’t leave me alone, but the people in Remedy didn’t care” he continues to recall, shaking his head just as Beth does, “the evidence was cut and dry. Even if they thought my story was as fishy as Rico thought it was, there was no denying that my hands were clean in this matter.” “That can’t be- no, you’re- you- no” Beth immediately refuses, the shaking of her head proving to be the opposite reaction of the repeated nod that her captor takes. “The people demanded justice and the cops switched their focus from me to Rico. It didn’t take long to bring him in” Harlington explains, standing firm in the stance that he takes, “Rico thought it was bullshit and that I was a rat, and the public assumed that I made the story up as cover- that I didn’t wanna snitch directly.” “‘Cause that’s what you did” Beth replies, refusing to buy into the claim that the man makes, only for his vehement standing to persist. “It’s not. I bought Rico’s old cabin off the state when it went up for auction and most of the people in his little network fucked off to keep their business going on somewhere else” Harlington doubles down, assuring the woman’s of his accuracies in the story spun like a tale, “people think it was phoney, but I- I’m telling you- I saw that woman that night.” “She was dead, that’s bullshit, and I don’t believe you” Beth replies, only for the extension of Harlington’s finger to lift toward her, refusing to let her continue with such a stance for much longer. “You don’t have to. Most people don’t. There’s a very select few, but you’re certainly not alone in that” he commands, “but I’ve got people that see what I see. As long as that’s the case, I can sleep well at night for the most part.” “Harlington, I don’t believe you” Beth proclaims again, reaching a decision that the man had already been long prepared for. “Of course you don’t. I already told you that you wouldn’t, I don’t expect your mind to change” the man rebukes, shrugging off the woman’s conclusion for the dismissal he cares to pay it, “the fact of the matter, however, is this- the guy that thinks I ratted on him is now on the loose and most likely coming after me.” Falling silent, Beth licks her lips and looks away, staring into an unimportant corner of the home as she sits with her thoughts, shaking her head slowly. “If you don’t want me to keep talking, I’ll stop right now. At the end of the day, it was you who asked why I bought into this town being alive” Harlington responds, reminding her of such a fact, a return to the initial inquiry that brings the woman’s face back toward his own, “I’ve bought into it because I’ve seen it.” “Stop talking” Beth counters, watching as the man lifts his hands in surrender, displaying his palms to his hostage and reclining in his seat once more as the audible silence commences, falling over the living room with ease. | Whilst his wife sleeps on the opposite side of the home, Avon searches through the treasure trove of information that his laptop affords him, the various screens his eyes wander into paying him looks of one picture after another of the soul that had been spoken of earlier in the night. “Harlington Spears” the search bar of the social media page he visits reads, affording the man a look at the various profile pages that apply to such a name or one similar. Glossing over one photograph after another, the man searches through unfamiliar visage after unfamiliar visage with no end in sight, the desire to find anything that stands out to him giving him the energy to carry on with his endless navigating of the screen. From social media, the author takes his attention to the main web page itself, looking through the browser with the same man’s name written on its own feed, offering thousands of pages to be seen by those who stumble upon them. Hanging his head, the trial that unfolds begins to take its toll on Avon, who presses his palms against his eyes as his lips part to yawn, the stretching of his arms bringing him back into the moment. For another few seconds, the man aimlessly wanders toward anything with the mention of the name before conceding defeat, reaching for the computer’s lid with the intent to close it before taking his eye to one, final headline- wanting to lose sight of the screen in good faith. “Remedy!” the man mutters aloud, hurriedly returning the laptop’s lid to an upright position as his widened eyes fall upon the headline to an article relative to the town in which he resides, finding more hope than he had all night long. “Local business owner arrested in connection to grizzly murder of young girl” Avon whispers, reading the bold headline before running his sights down the lengths of the page. “Spears (left), pictured beside-” the author further grumbles under his breath, reading the description of a group photograph before losing sight of the text, his undivided focus instead being paid to one face out of the many that appear within the image. Falling silent, Avon suddenly pulls back and rubs his eyes once more, diving forward into the screen again as he falls upon one, particular visage. “Found you” he whispers in disbelief, looking back toward the small text underneath the picture, searching out the name that accompanies the appearance familiar to him, “Devin Reed.” Reclaiming possession of his mouse, Avon directs his cursor to the bottom of his screen and pulls up the video that’d been meant for his eyes only, finding a similar stature and complexion to the amateur film’s subject to the one displayed in the group portrait. Returning to the browser, the sleep-deprived writer looks up the subject of his interest before a smile dawns upon his face, one that’s joined by enough clarity for the man to leave his seat and take toward the home’s rear patio door. Brought to a strange peace of mind from the cabin-front photograph, Avon steps onto the balcony of his backyard and triggers the storm lights, staring into an empty plot that stretches toward an equally-empty line of trees, the scene coming together for him. At the same time, the cabin depicted in the image that hooks Avon’s fascination finds itself hosting life it hadn’t anticipated since its evacuation earlier in the day. With its lights on, the woodlands-based home is visited by a man in a set of heavy combat boots, their bottoms traipsing through the interior from one end to the other and back again. “Where the fuck is it!?” a man angrily growls, pushing over furniture and throwing lamps across whatever rooms they reside in, looking for similar answers to the ones that the town’s newest resident had sought out. Eventually finding his way to the kitchen, the intruder finds himself in possession of a stack of letters, the contents of one in particular affording him a very pleasant discovery. “I’ve got you now, you son of a bitch” Rico murmurs, reading off an address separate from the one his old cabin had been fitted with off an electric bill, a vindictive smile stretching from ear to ear. With keys jingling in his hand, the escapee takes to the driver’s seat of a stolen sedan and hits the open road in search of his target, one that his mind has been enraptured by since the moment he hit the open road.” == Remedy Hills == “And what is your role in all of this?” Beth queries, her upper body draped in a denim jacket- the sleeves of which conceal the hands that remain tied behind her back. For a moment, Harlington does not answer, his foot continues to gently rest on the gas pedal that directs his car around a few soft turns in the quiet, forest-surrounded road. Despite the calm and unimposing scene, the view of nature appears less pleasant whilst the silence and seclusion of it creates a sense of concern.
“I’m not sure I understand what you mean by that” Harlington responds, his composure intact as he maintains control of the vehicle, periodically glancing toward level areas of the ground beside the road to be prepared for any unexpected encounters. “If there are people trying to not cover up the case itself, but the perpetrator- what is your role in it?” Beth reiterates as per request, “are you in on it? Did you make the call? Were you one of the people that kept it quiet?” With a grin, the man shakes his head without offering an answer at first, the hesitation to respond allowing Beth to prod at the man, coming up with her own conclusion in lieu of her kidnapper’s own. “Maybe you’re just some conspiracy theorist” the woman remarks, staring through the windshield with a look kept on the man out of the corner of his eye, “you’re not the worst guy to look at, and nut jobs like those aren’t usually attractive. Then again, you did kidnap me.” “Like I’ve said before, I wouldn’t have to tie you up if you hadn’t tried to kill yourself” Harlington replies, defending his actions in a way that the subject to them doesn’t take much care in. Forming the faintest frown with her lips, Beth turns her attention toward the window at her side, allowing herself a glance at the continued, multi-mile stretch of treeline that bleeds into Remedy Hills, running down the length of the town like sweat down a marathon runner five miles in. “There’s this group that’s existed in Remedy Hills for a few years now. I don’t know what their name is and I’m not sure who’s in it, but I know what they do and why” Harlington explains, giving into the request that was paid to him whilst the drive continues. “For years, the people in this town that knew better than to just buy what the cops had been telling us had been noticing certain oddities in the town” he persists, rolling with the gentle right turn in the road. “It’s a small town and the killer knew the in’s and out’s of it so well that they had to be one of us. That was the conclusion we all came to, but the years that followed the killing made us seem like we were played for fools” Harlington concedes, shaking his head with disappointment, “years had passed and there was only the one killing. To any sensible mind, the killer came in and did his bidding before leaving- never to return.” “Does that not make more sense than someone from a small town killing a boy and chopping him into pieces- only to never do such a sick thing ever again?” Beth queries, her challenge accepted by the car’s driver. “If you count out the idea that they could’ve gone out of the town to get their thrills- if that’s why they killed- then sure, it could make sense” Harlington assures, physically nodding at the conclusion, “but it also doesn’t entirely line up.” “Nothing ever entirely lines up, that’s the point” Beth responds, reaching an argument that her kidnapper fails to find the full sense in, “everything in life is a massive grey area that people just pick a side to. If anything were cut-and-dry, there would be no divide.” “Maybe that applies to the more mundane things, but that doesn’t really apply here” Harlington responds, shaking his head to visualise his disagreement with the statement. “This wasn’t just an argument. This was a little boy who was killed, chopped up into pieces, and no one ever stopped talking about it” Harlington corrects, following the path that the roadway leaves him, “there was no room for motivations or an inspection into the suspect’s mind- it was just clear cut evil.” “If Avon’s book implied anything, it’s that what the woman did was out of more than just-” Beth quickly follows up, attempting to double down in arguing for her side’s triumph before being stunted, interrupted by the man behind the wheel. “It was clear cut evil... End of story” Harlington counters, looking away from the road for a moment to set his sights upon his kidnapped passenger, attention eventually making its way back, “that kind of evil doesn’t just come up once and then hide away.” Though the man’s unlawful capture of her leaves Beth untrusting of the man’s nature, his yet-seen aggressive retort still proves surprising enough to be taken aback by. Failing to find the words that could stand her ground in the conversation, the woman’s mind instead takes elsewhere just as her eyes do, watching the flora that passes along the car ride’s journey. “I figured they could’ve moved away in the years after the murder. Maybe they’d had a change of life, or they’d passed away, or they’d gone somewhere else, or-” Harlington explains, returning to his prior point before falling into a silent defeat, shaking his head with a loss for anything conclusive, “-I’d just figured there’d be something I could find to point to as a reason for why they’d never killed again.” Keeping his eyes on the road ahead, the driver’s face is found by the eyes of the town’s runaway librarian, who looks toward him as he speaks with a newfound reservation. “Then Avon King came to Remedy Hills” Harlington confesses, a look of horror written across his face whilst his passenger draws her own conclusions at what he’s trying to say, “after thirteen years, another body was butchered.” “Avon wasn’t in Remedy Hills thirteen years ago” Beth replies, her comment prompting the man’s face to turn and face her. “What? NO! I’m not saying Avon’s the murderer for fuck’s sake!” the man proclaims, casually smacking the top of his steering wheel with the base of his hand, “I was just using his arrival as a marker for the new murder.” Triggering his turn signal like a proper driver, Harlington pulls the vehicle along the gravel driveway just beyond the point of a small cottage in the middle of nowhere, the sight of their new residency welcoming them with open arms. “And you think the person responsible for killing that boy thirteen years ago is responsible for the person that was killed when Avon came to town?” Beth questions, holding out hope that she’d finally come to understand one piece of her kidnapper’s mindset. “I don’t have any reason not to. The way it was described to me was-” Harlington proceeds, again stunting himself from continuing to speak. Only able to watch as the sound of a gentle wind rolls through the tree leaves that surround them, Beth calmly waits for her captor to continue, able to see the faintest hint of distress in his face- the likes of which she can most liken to a struggle over saying parts out loud that are mostly kept to oneself. “-It just struck me like a bad memory” the man finally confesses, powering down the car and removing the key from the ignition before climbing out. For a brief moment whilst her kidnapper walks around the front of the vehicle, Beth is left to sit within the mostly-numb quiet that follows, trying to uncover any meaning behind the manner in which Harlington speaks about the tragedies at hand. = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = “What the hell do you mean the answer was ‘no’, we’ve got every right to get a warrant!” Beau shouts, rolling his eyes and turning away once his superior scolds him. “Mr. Donovan, I will not have you raising your voice at me in my own damn office!” Dana proclaims, pointing her finger in the man’s direction whilst his older partner stands by, holding the same kind of outrage as his younger colleague, though doing a much better job at composing himself. “Chief, we’ve done everything to code and have everything in place to request a warrant” Jake explains, doing so in a calmer tone than his partner is capable of offering. “The cabin used to be owned by Rico Martinez and the man that lives there used to be connected to him. It’s the closest thing to a physical address on the inmate that we can inspect” the older officer explains, “if that’s not good enough to request a warrant over, then I don’t know what the state of our justice system is.” “As unfortunately sad as it is, the two of you are going to have to find a way to convince Harlington Spears to let you inside his property” Dana responds, returning the pair’s denied request to the more-composed cop. “Why don’t I just walk up to his door, politely ask to be let in again, and then aim my gun in his face until he obliges?” Beau retorts, receiving a pair of rolled eyes from those within his presence, “what!? It seems like that’s the kind of thing the judge wants me to do.” “If he wants a reason to lock your hot-headed ass up, I wouldn’t find much in the way of a reason to blame him” Dana responds, pushing her seat back before climbing to her feet, “and even though I know you’re being facetious, Officer Donovan- never speak such a claim in my precinct again.” “Tell the judge to get his head out of his ass and I wouldn’t have to” Beau responds, aware that he’ll get nowhere from this interaction enough to leave the room, not granted the permission to leave, but taking it anyway. “Officer Mansoor, please go keep your partner from taking his anger out on the water fountain” Dana remarks, her voice holding the weight of someone tired from the legal hoops she’s been meant to jump through, “the last thing I need is him running up an unnecessary bill.” “Yes, Chief” Jake replies, bowing his head toward the woman as he turns around, just barely able to catch the door before it closes behind his partner in an attempt to follow after the younger cop. “It’s bullshit, Jake. I’m telling you, this is bullshit!” Beau remarks, angrily marching toward the interrogation rooms before approaching the wall at the back of the room, his partner’s quiet shadowing doing little to prevent his partner’s aggravations from rising. “It’s like they tell you to do the job the right way and then handicap you every time you try and do it” Beau continues, his hands finding their way to his hips as he turns back, watching as his partner enters the room and closes the door. “It doesn’t matter if it’s bullshit, it’s the process and we’ve got to suffer with it” Jake explains, walking over to the microphones and switching them off, “if we’re gonna do our jobs, we’re gonna have to deal with the red tape that litters the place.” “Why the hell would the warrant be denied? That might be the most solid, open-and-shut request that’s ever been issued in the history of everything!” Beau questions, cutting the distance between himself and his colleague in half as he steps forward. “It doesn’t matter why it got rejected. The fact of the matter is that’s what happened and there’s nothing we can do about it” Jake corrects, refusing any answer worth considering over means beyond their control. “The question that we’ve got to find an answer to now is how we get in that house without the warrant” the older officer explains, directing their collective focus toward more worthwhile avenues, “Harlington Spears will not let us in out of the goodness of his own heart, so let’s see if we can do a little bartering with him.” “What? Like cut him a deal?” Beau queries back, the silence that he’s initially met with leaving him little in the way of a reply to take from the suggestion. Looking off to the corner of the room, the younger cop searches through his mind in an effort of finding an olive branch to extend, only for the realisation he’d already made to re-centre itself upon his mind. “Jake, I don’t know a goddamn thing about the guy” the hot-headed detective explains, “what would he want that we’d have?” “I’m not sure, but we’ve got a whole car ride to figure that out” the older officer responds, laying out the mental ground for himself and his partner to traverse. Without much of a reason to dismiss the proposition, Beau shrugs his shoulders and steps past his partner, leading the collective journey back the way they’d come from and toward the cruiser they’ve grown increasingly more well-attached to. | “Penny, hi!” Poe proclaims, lifting his hand into the air to greet the woman who approaches him, a knitted sweater worn over a blue top and a pair of dark grey pants, the slits which her legs spill out from tucked into her winter, fur boots. “It’s nice to see you” Penny replies, her left hand holding onto the strap of her burgundy purse as her right side leans against the man, offering him a half hug that’s nearly impossible to confuse with something romantic or personal. “When Anne told me that I should call you, I have to admit- I was a little hesitant” the man confesses, lowering himself into one side of a booth whilst his acquaintance occupies the other end. “Really? Why?” the woman inquires, genuinely curious to hear such an admission of near-practice, “was I that off-putting in the bar that night?” “No, no- you were very cordial” Poe replies, assuring her otherwise with an entertained grin, his hands coupled together atop the table they now share as waitresses step past them with trays for other guests. “I just didn’t want to come off seeming like I was trying to swoop in on someone who’s already happily married, y’know?” the man clarifies, his head slightly hung as he looks toward their table’s surface, trying to conceal his guilt, “that’s not the kind of person I am.” “I was never under the assumption that you were” Penny reassures, not wasting much in the way of time before lending the man a spirit-lifting boost of consolation. “I know there are plenty of people who say that’s not who they are but couldn’t be more full of shit, but I don’t take you to be someone like that” she remarks, watching the pleased expression take its hold on the man’s expression as his chin lifts higher, “if I’m being honest, that’s the reason I agreed to this lunch.” “That’s a real big relief, believe me” Poe replies, nodding to the woman as their server approaches, handing off her tray to another waitress before retrieving a notepad from her apron to take their order. | “Mr. Spears!” Beau calls out, repeatedly slamming his fist against the door that he awaits an answer from, his head bowed toward the ground whilst his partner stands by, thumbs slipped into the belt his holster is attached to as he waits just as the man beside him does. “It’s your favourite cop buddy here with that warrant you wanted!” the younger cop proclaims, smiling through the corner of his mouth whilst chewing his peppermint bubblegum, “why don’t you come on out and open the door?” Surveying the peaceful scene that surrounds them, Jake stares off at the woodlands their cabin resides within and squints, continuing to hear his partner’s call out whilst the environment’s cool breeze captivates him. “Oh, Mr. Spears!” Beau continues, remaining as animated as a children’s movie in the delivery of his request for attention, pleading for those within to grant him at least the time of day, “I know you loved looking at this handsome face, Mr. Spears. Come out and get another look.” Nearly bringing himself to laughter with his each proclamation, Beau watches on as his partner steps away from the home’s modest front patio, still waiting for an invitation from the man within to check the premises. “Did you notice a car out here earlier?” Jake questions aloud, back turned toward his colleague as he stares out at the forest, taking a notice of the tire tracks that lead across the dirt and away from the two spots they’d initially parked their cruiser in. “Yeah... ours” Beau replies, meeting the man with a level of sarcasm that prompts the older officer to turn back, looking at his partner from over his shoulder, “no, I did not see a car out here earlier... Unless you’re talking about ours.” Looking back toward the trail in the dirt, Jake follows the set of tracks with his eyes away from the property’s entrance before noticing their lead being taken around the quaint, middle-woodlands home. “Come on, Mr. Spears! I really don’t want to have to kick your door in!” Beau calls out once more, returning to his prior efforts whilst his colleague does as he pleases, investigating whatever is left for his eyes to follow, “I’ve been on my feet all day long! Don’t make me have to use them even more!” Waiting for a reply that remains as elusive as a mild-mannered Beau does, the officer ceases his attempts for a moment whilst his eyes watch on at the older cop’s gradual retreat along the ground’s markings. Without uttering a word, Jake begins to wander across the dirt lot and toward the side of the home, continuing to keep his eyes glued in the direction of whatever remains ahead whilst his partner watches on from afar. “This is your last chance to see my pretty face voluntarily, Mr. Spears!” Beau proclaims, again pounding his fist against the front door just as his colleague vanishes around the side of the home, “if you don’t answer this door, I’m going to have to kick it in!” Unsure of what his partner is up to, the younger officer awaits his fellow cop’s return before acting upon his threat, uncertain as to what the older man will find in his travels. Reserving his voice, Beau waits for another few seconds as the sound of his partner’s presence ceases to meet his ears, falling behind the shroud of uncertainty that’s left with the void of his friend’s appearance. After a few seconds longer, the sound of footsteps pressing down on dry dirt commences once more, drawing in the opposite direction from the one his colleague had travelled in. Rounding the corner and back to the home’s frontward-facing exterior, Jake extends his arms out at either side and calls back. “He left his garage door open and tire tracks are leading away from it” the older cop proclaims, watching as his younger colleague rolls his eyes and looks away, “he’s gone.” Sucking on the corner of his mouth for just a moment, Beau nods to himself as the information settles with him, a sudden thought dawning upon his mind as if a lightbulb had gone off within his head. Squinting, the younger cop retreats from the cabin’s front patio and inspects the building’s face, unable to find the small outliers from the old school design in which the construction had been finished. “What are you doing?” Jake queries, watching as his partner leans back for a better view of the home’s presented side. “I’m quite positive that- for someone who seems hesitant to trust the police- he probably lacks the modern surveillance methods that a possible criminal would have, if you know what I mean?” Beau replies, stepping forward once more toward the patio’s side, retrieving a stone from a small flowerbed purposefully lining the building’s front. “You’re saying he doesn’t have security came-?” Jake wonders aloud, stopping himself from speaking as he finds his partner’s hand pulling back, its forward-sail launching the rock he’d picked up through the window just beside the front door. “Hey! What the hell did you do that for!?” the older cop exclaims, arms held outward as his partner retreats from the cabin, standing along his colleague’s side whilst looking toward the sky and whistling. “Whoopty-doopty-doo. Gee, it sure is a wonderful day to sit back, relax, and enjoy the- Oh my god!” Beau comically exclaims, looking around the forest before setting his eyes upon the shattered window he’d left behind, “Officer Mansoor! It looks like this homeowner’s been the victim of a B-and-E!” Realising what the detective had taken liberties of his own in accomplishing, Jake chuckles as his hands meet his hips, his head hanging as it shakes. “It seems like our duty to protect and serve our community must be put into practice right now!” Beau proclaims, retrieving his pistol from the holster at his side before running forward, making his march toward the front door, “don’t worry, law-abiding-citizen! We’re here to-!” Interrupting himself whilst his colleague remains behind cackling in amusement, Beau leaps through the air to deliver a karate kick into the door’s absolute centre, firing it into the home without any issue whatsoever. “-save you!” the young cop concludes, aiming his pistol into the depths of the home before lowering his guard, not fearing for his safety in the slightest as he follows through with his prior warning in a whisper, “alright, Mr. Spears... Here’s my pretty face for ya’.” | “Thank you” Poe remarks, paying the server his compliments before reaching his wallet and slipping his hand into the slit that his cash resides in, only for the woman across from him to gently pull the waitress back. “Here you go” she proceeds, handing the woman her debit card and the cheque book she’d left at the table’s centre, though just slightly closer to the man. “Are you sure?” the waitress queries, watching the woman’s light squint reply to her as Poe looks on without moving, his index and middle fingers already holding together a few crisp, fifty dollar bills. “What do you mean? It’s a cheque- of course I’m sure!” Penny cheerfully quips, knowing what the server had tried to get at without interest in it, sending the woman on her way to the back whilst the conversation between the two parties commences once more. “I would’ve paid, y’know?” Poe questions, a gesture that the woman refuses to doubt even discounting the wallet he still holds in his hands. “I know, I’m just not really interested in coming off like I only came out here for a free meal” Penny explains, watching the man’s head pull back just slightly, “I’m not insinuating that you thought that, I just don’t want to come off that way with someone that- with all due respect- I don’t think I’ll be seeing a whole ton of.” Taken by surprise, the man’s head leans to the side as his lips press together, trying to part with a question that just seems to evade him at the moment. “Listen, Poe. I think you’re a really good dude with a good heart and a good head on your shoulders. I think plenty of people are lucky to have you in their lives, and I’m sure many more will in the future” Penny explains, trying to best present her case. “I’m a nurse. I work in the only hospital in Remedy, and it’s always got me running around and doing something” she continues, watching the man’s steady face remain held upon her, “when it isn’t and I have some kind of free time, nine times out of ten- it’s spent with my husband.” Bowing his head, Poe holds his hands toward the woman as a way to visualise his understanding. “No worries, I get it” Poe responds, quickly doing his best to slide out from the booth and leave the interaction with as much decency and reason as he can manage, “I’ll see you around.” Even with as much credit as she’d given the man, Penny is left slightly surprised at the ease in which the conversation had come to an end, a much friendlier and understanding conclusion made than even what she’d best hoped for. Reclaiming his light jacket from the seat, Poe makes for the restaurant’s exit as his acquaintance remains behind, waiting for the server to return with her copy of the receipt and the card she’d handed off. Politely skirting around patrons of the establishment that wait to be seated in the eatery’s entrance, the man digs his hand into his pocket and retrieves the phone within as he steps out of the building, the friendly visage he’d worn fading off as he presses the device to his ear. | “Well, what do we have here?” Beau wonders aloud, continuing to hold his pistol by his side as he wanders down the steps to the building’s underbelly, peering over the bannister that guides him into the concrete-encased room. “It looks like somewhere I’d rather not find myself” Jake responds, following his partner into the depths of the home after sticking a piece of tissue paper into the deadbolt’s hinge. “Do you think this thing was put into use or was it mainly just for show?” Beau queries, looking around the room to find very little of interest, a few flat, cardboard boxes left sitting in one corner with nothing other than the chairs to capture their interest. “He couldn’t have left any more than a few hours ago” Jake replies, finally making it to the ground that his partner already travels, their journey carrying them to the seats left in the centre of the room. “The seats don’t feel warm. I mean, they’re metal folding chairs. I know they retain heat, but not for very long” Beau remarks, dropping to his knee before the nearest seat to his partner before inspecting it. “It looks like there were two windows. I saw one of them when I rounded the house” Jake explains, pointing in the direction of the one his eyes had captured before glancing toward the opposite side of the room, “the pillows in them look like they were left there for a reason.” “Well that isn’t a good look” Beau remarks, earning a nod from his partner as if the comment were made toward the discovery of the pillows at each end of the room, only to find a completely different reason carried in the younger cop’s hand. “Do you think we have a fan of Mr. King’s?” the hot-headed officer queries, holding up “The Garden Manifesto” cover for his older colleague to take a look at. “Why would Harlington Spears have a copy of Avon King’s book sitting in the middle of his basement?” Jake questions aloud, watching as his partner’s lips part in order to answer the inquiry, only to stunt it with the extension of his hand. “I’m not asking that as a literal question, Beau. I’m more interested in the motivation” the older officer clarifies, “it could be Rico Martinez’ assuming he was here, but even then- what reason would either of them have to own one of his books?” “Well, do you know what “The Garden Manifesto” is about?” Beau inquires, watching his colleague’s chin shake whilst his shoulders shrug. “I’m not opposed to Mr. King personally, but I find his books to be kind of shitty” Jake confesses, only for his comments to take a backseat to the shocking conclusion he draws, one prompted by the look that his younger colleague gives to the cover, “hold on a minute, do you!?” “Is the fact that I read some books from time to time really that shocking for you?” Beau questions, taking humour in the bewildered conclusion that his elder partner proceeds with. “You!? Absolutely!” Jake retorts, watching as his partner flips him the bird and chuckles, genuinely humoured, “no offence meant, Donovan. You’re just a young dude who has more abs than he has patience. I’d imagine you’d be trying to pick up women at a bar, not sitting back and reading a murder mystery.” “I love my job, what can I say?” Beau sarcastically replies, groaning as he lifts himself off a knee and back upon both feet, “The Garden Manifesto is about a woman who killed her family, chopped them up, and scattered their remains across town.” With a squint in his eyes, Jake looks off at the corner of the room in an attempt at trying to find the similarities; it seems like his mind is meant to wander toward. “Aside from the chopped into bits part, none of that has any meaning to me” the older cop confesses, taking the novel into his hand as his young partner hands it over. “Avon wrote the book to detail the mind that the woman must’ve had in the weeks that followed. She acted all crazy and shit, made herself the prime suspect and then committed suicide by burying herself in her flower garden with a note on top” Beau explains, “it’s some sick shit, but it’s more of a mental dive.” “Again, Beau... What does this have to do with this sterile book club arrangement Mr. Spears has got going on down here?” Jake questions, struggling to find the train of thought his partner follows before realising that there is none. “I have no idea, but I’m inclined to find out” Beau confesses, turning to look back at the seats, “he’s got two chairs and one of Avon’s books. How much do you want to bet the other chair had Rico Martinez sitting in it?” “Well, I was more assuming that Mr. Spears might have something to do with those guys in the smiley face masks that’ve been bothering Mr. King” Jake admits, the conclusion he’s reached not disregarded by the younger cop. “If that turned out to be the case and this solved just one of our mysteries, it wouldn’t surprise me” Beau concedes, “but we’ve got an inmate on the run, an acquaintance of his who’s now nowhere to be found, and some things to draw my favourite kind of lines between.” Shrugging as Beau pats the base of the staircase’s bannister, Jake follows the younger cop’s lead as they prepare for their departure, leaving behind a home that still wields mysteries they’ve yet to uncover- if not having already introduced a new one. With the closing of the basement’s doors, the home is left to the quiet peace that comes with the lack of an inhabitant whilst the officers direct their cruiser back toward the main road, looking for answers to even newer questions. == Remedy Hills == Pressing the upper halves of her fingers into the perforated top of a cardboard container stuffed within a cabinet just over her sink, a blonde woman in a knitted, beige sweater removes just one paper packet from within. Whilst the outside of her home appears dark beneath the cloudless night sky, the inside of the cosy and out-of-the-way cabin the lady inhabits is kissed with a calming, orange glow from the dim bulbs that line her home.
Removing a ceramic mug from a rack of dishes off in the corner of her kitchen countertop, the woman tears open the flimsy packet and gently removes the tag that first meets her eye. Whilst the increasingly-loud sound of whistling emanates from atop the stove just a few feet away, the woman sits the packet of tea leaves within her cup and drapes the adjacent string over the edge, letting it sit over its rim as she redirects her attention elsewhere. Relieving the home of the intense scream that the metal pot of water gives off, the cabin’s owner carries it over toward her drink and gracefully tips the container over. With a dense and audible wobble, the boiling liquid within falls beyond the lip of the woman’s kettle and allows a steam to permeate through the air. Spending the next few minutes situating herself in the corner of a quaint and bookshelf-lined den, her thin rectangular glasses reflecting flames of candlelight in their lens’. Returning to her beverage, the woman takes the handle of her mug between her curled index and middle fingers before retreating to the sanctity of her nook and sinking into the vintage leather-upholstered seat with a softcover book in hand. For a few minutes, the peace that she’d prepared her evening for is left entirely intact, undisturbed by the chaos that commonly waits until sundown to unfold, the words on each page of her book catching her eyes as if they were mitts to a ball. Guarded by the cameras, storm lights and alarm systems that modern technology affords her the comforts of, the author’s mind wanders as far away from the harrowing underbelly of the world that she leaves the grime of at the door. Instead, her eyes carry her into the embrace that comes with the fantasy thriller that reads throughout the novel, her mind filling in the gaps that the simple, black text the narrative is constructed through leaves in its wake. *knock knock knock* Looking toward the doorway whose wooden entrance had been removed from the hinges long ago, the quiet, blonde civilian directs her attention toward the sound that beckons for her answer. Removed from her reading, the woman gently folds the corner of the page she’d left off upon and sets her novel upon the cushioned seat she leaves behind, an unexpected visitor being amongst the least-anticipated things she’d come to be met with, let alone at such a late hour of the evening. Curious, the woman marches on to the deadbolt-locked entry and peers through the small hole at its centre, looking through the glass divider between herself and the figure on the other end. Pulling her head back, the reader stares at the ground without a clue over the reasoning behind seeing who she finds on the other side, trying to come up with one on the fly before ultimately deciding to answer. Pulling the home’s large entrance open before resting the palm of her hand against the knob to a screen door just beyond it, the woman steps onto the front patio of her home to address the man that she finds. “How can I help you?” the soft-spoken lady inquires, watching her visitor’s hands unfold from his lap whilst one extends toward her. “Good evening, miss... I’m Avon King” the man introduces himself, breaking the ice that the woman meets with less fondness than he’d hoped for. “Yeah, I know who you are” the woman replies, crossing her arms in a gesture that refuses the man’s handshake, her reservations presented to the man without an explanation, “how can I help you?” Taken by surprise at the woman’s initially cold-appearing demeanour, Avon lets his hand fall back toward his side as he answers the question. “I was told that I might be able to find someone to help me at this address” the author explains, noticing his opening line fail to provoke any change upon the homeowner’s aloof presentation, “are you Leah Bowers?” “Who told you that?” the woman immediately asks, leaving no room for a breath to be taken before meeting the man with her rebuttal. Still put off by the lack of warmth that is presented to him for reasons he cannot understand, Avon stammers over his first attempt at replying before offering the best he can manage. “There are these people back in the place that I’m living in- Remedy Hills” the writer confesses, trying whatever subtleties he can present to make himself appear less-imposing. “They’ve been wearing these smiley face masks and-” he continues, only for his response to be interrupted by the secluded soul’s refusal, her back immediately turning toward him as she retreats to her home. “I can’t help you” Leah replies, letting her arms fall as she quickly pulls open the screen door, only this time in an attempt to enter the home, offering no explanation for anything involving her end of the interaction. “Please, they wouldn’t leave me alone” the man proclaims, blurting out whatever he can with the hopes that it would prevent the woman from getting far enough to close the door, not wanting to physically block her. Seeming to strike her interests just enough to keep her second half from stepping back into the home, Avon watches as the woman he’d made an unannounced visit to the cabin of turns back, keeping quiet to allow him a chance to continue. “They’ve spent weeks tormenting my wife and I. They’ve killed people, they’ve given me disgusting gestures- they’ve tried everything to make me go away” Avon explains, his words appearing to strike an even greater chord with the person whom he visits. “But no matter what they did, they couldn’t get me to leave. Instead, they showed up at my house last night and gave me a DVD” the author continues, looking into Leah’s eyes as her silence allows him to proceed. “There was someone who filmed a video. It had parts of an interview that I did with Oprah thirteen years ago and then him saying something about how it let him think of me with an open mind” Avon carries on, not sure what else to make of it, “he said some shit about Remedy and that I might be able to help solve some mystery about the killing. He gave me this address and said a woman named Leah Bowers might be able to help answer some things for me.” Expending all the information that he’d arrived with, the mid-thirties writer leaves fate into the woman’s hands, hoping that what he’d been able to provide her will be enough to convince her to assist him. Staring at her guest in silence, Leah takes a few seconds to process what she’d been told before looking off into the treeline that surrounds her home, using it to lend her a peace of mind to make an on-the-spot call. Hanging her head with an audible sigh, the woman takes an additional few seconds to accept the decision she’s come to before briefly looking toward Avon beyond her door. “Come back tomorrow” she finally concedes, stepping into her home without uttering any further word as she vanishes into the home, allowed to do so without rebuttal by the author that she leaves behind, his eyes wandering into the distance of the property in an attempt at making sense of the interaction. = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = “You two talked this morning?” Anne inquires, curled up on one end of the King couple’s chesterfield with a cup of cocoa in hand, “how did that go?” Puckering her lips as her eyes wander off toward the distant corners of the home, Penny contemplates the certainty in which she can answer the question, considering the concerns she’d shared with her husband and the conclusions that they’d come to. “I think it went well” the woman confesses, nodding in an approving fashion as she looks back toward her colleague, “we’ve always been really good about the way that we feel and wanting to work with each other.” Retaining her voice so as not to impose, the registered nurse that occupies the home’s sofa as a guest holds onto her mug with both hands whilst she watches on from across the furniture. “We both weren’t happy with how things were going and we’ve decided to set a better course for ourselves” Penny continues, lifting the mug that she wields like a prop toward her lips. “And you’re happy with that?” Anne inquires, waiting to receive the reply she’d interrupted her friend’s sip for. “Yeah, I am” the healthy-spirited wife replies, watching the woman across from her nod at the answer, “I said a lot of things that I shouldn’t have, and I’m just glad we can move past them. Others might not be that lucky.” With a squint, Anne gradually pulls her head back as she sits with the conclusion that her co-worker had come to, the pause that she proceeds with not taking long to be noticed by the homeowner. “What?” Penny wonders aloud, knowing there to be something at the forefront of her acquaintance’s mind that she just can’t identify. “Well, you know you did have a reason to say those things, right?” Anne responds, speaking as if the comments she makes were rooted within unarguable grounds, “he got attached to that girl really fast for something that was merely platonic.” “Can you blame him?” Penny retorts, begging the question for her well-educated friend to defend, “we practically came into this town with targets on our backs. The two of us pretty much gravitated toward whoever was willing to give us the time of day.” “Yeah, but still... It doesn’t strike you as odd?” Anne doubles down, looking past the truth behind her co-workers' defence in favour of poking deeper than the surface level explanation. “If I were dating a guy that got attached to a girl that fast, I’d be thinking something was up” the single nurse confesses, not appearing reluctant to admit such as she leans her left side against the sofa’s cushion, “maybe you got cross a line just a little, but it’s not like you didn’t have your reasons.” “I wasn’t right to accuse him of having an affair just because he made friends with someone who was nice to him” Penny calmly responds, defending her stance without certainty over what she’s meant to argue for, “it’s Avon. He once befriended the guy who delivered mail to our old home because they both had the same hat.” “Well, do you know he wasn’t having an affair for sure?” Anne rebuttals, presenting her friend with the possibility as if the wife were a fish she was dangling bait in front of. “I’m not saying that he was cheating, but think about it for a second... Do you know for sure that they weren’t sleeping together?” the nurse again doubles down, holding firm in the inquiry that she levies, “this wasn’t just some co-worker of his. This was a cute, young, sweet librarian we’re talking about.” “No, it’s a cute, young, sweet librarian that you’re talking about... I’m not taking part in whatever conversation you are” Penny laughs, not dismissing the woman’s dialogue entirely, but poking an innocent fun at it to imply her lack of real thought she affords it, “I trust my husband. I don’t need any more certainty than that.” “I’m just saying... I wouldn’t be so quick to believe someone without something to prove they’re telling the truth” Anne concludes, shrugging her shoulders as she takes a sip from her mug, allowing her acquaintance to let the intrusive thoughts win. “Have you ever wondered whether or not that could be a reason why you’re still single?” Penny queries aloud, watching as her guest’s eyes take toward her immediately, the slightly-audible sip she’d begun to take coming to a sudden halt. Coming off more reserved and less playful than she’d initially taken part in the conversation with, Penny looks to her friend from the corner of her eye as the pause commences. For a few seconds, the nurse lets her beverage’s warmth rest against the top of her lip as she takes the comment to heart, following through with the rest of her gulp before lowering the mug. “Anyway...” Anne proclaims, jutting her face to the side as she swipes hairs out of her face and attempts to direct the discourse elsewhere, “the guy from the bar we were at sent me a text last night.” Lifting her eyebrows as she quickly tries to meet her friend’s efforts in disregarding the comment that leaves a sour taste in her mouth, Penny nods as she leans toward the coffee table a few inches away, leaving her warm cocoa atop a coaster. “He said that guy you were talking to- Poe- couldn’t stop talking his ear off about you” Anne carries on, the comment being one that flatters the happily married woman. “If I weren’t in a committed relationship, I’m sure I’d be flattered” Penny responds, only for her attempt at dismissing the newest line of dialogue to fall futile upon her friend’s assertion. “He’s not trying to fuck your brains out. From what I’ve heard, he just thinks you’re a pretty cool person” Anne explains, assuring the woman that her intentions aren’t malicious in nature. “Why would he think that? We barely got much time to talk before the hospital called us in” Penny replies, not seeing the sense in the comment that her friend takes advantage of the opportunity in. “Which is a perfect reason to give him a call and agree on a time to grab coffee together or something!” the nurse cheerfully concludes, watching as the wife rolls her eyes and sways her face away. “Again, I’m not suggesting the two of you hook up! You said it yourself- not a whole ton of people are too interested in giving you and Avon the time of day” Anne proceeds, finally finding ground with the woman that she slowly convinces to prop up an open mind. “He seems like a nice guy! Why pass up on getting to know someone that could become one of your closest friends someday?” the nurse continues, again trying to convince her friend to take the offer up for the opportunity that it provides. “Hey, if you can trust Avon to make friends with other girls, then why wouldn’t you be able to trust yourself to make friends with other guys?” the devil-on-the-shoulder beside Penny questions aloud, raising a question that’s rather hard to oppose. | “I only stayed in Remedy for a few weeks. Most of my nights after the first three were sleepless” Leah confesses, sitting in one of two chairs that face each other, her guest occupying the other. “It started with tapping on my motel room’s window. On night five, it escalated to slamming on my door and yelling at me to let them in until someone drove them away” she continues, speaking to a crowd of one just as captivated as hundreds of others would be, “it was anything to get me to leave.” “Why didn’t you?” Avon queries aloud, not finding the sense in staying put that he had been able to bear the weight of. “I was there to write a story. I was there to learn about the people and the town that all of this happened in” Leah replies, not taking long to formulate her answer, “it was going to take a lot more than just keeping me from going to sleep in order to deter me from getting what I’d come there for.” Reserving his comments, the author that the homeowner hosts folds his hands atop his left thigh, the leg it’s attached to draped over his right. “Unlike you, I wasn’t planning on moving in. There was no property or roots that I was laying down that kept me from running off. All they needed to do was get me out of a room and never come back” Leah explains, shaking her head as she stares at her hands, their coupling in her lap allowing the thumbs to spin around each other. “But I was headstrong. I was younger and I thought I could take on the world. I figured it was obvious that the people didn’t like me and this was their way of showing it” the soft spoken soul continues, not holding back much in the name of keeping secrets. “So I carried on. I always had questions about the case and the way it was handled, so- for the short time I was there- the police station pretty much had a visit from me pencilled in” Leah jokes, bringing herself a slight grin. As quickly as the smirk appears, it vanishes from the secluded, woodland-residing reader’s face who’d just wanted to spend the prior night with a cup of tea in hand and a good read to spend the hours before bedtime with. “At the time, there weren’t a lot of cops that had been on the case. Most of them had retired or gotten promoted to higher positions in a precinct outside of Remedy” she speaks, “there were still a few, and most of them were really pleasant when we talked.” Having lowered his notepad to the ground roughly ten minutes prior, Avon keeps his lips pressed together and ears as open as his eyelids are, trusting himself to remember the details without the need to pull himself from the line of communication to jot down some bullet point. “They’d ask about family or friends or how my stay in Remedy was. They were very polite and well-spoken” Leah recalls, only to come across a display that still sits with her all these years later. “Whenever I’d bring up the case, they’d get a lot less open to talking. They were still polite. They never waved me off and ended our conversation, but they also wouldn’t really answer questions” the one-time writer explains, “it’s something that’s hard to hide. When people are totally willing to be open and honest, you just pick up on those moments when they’re just... not that open anymore.” “I know exactly what you’re talking about” Avon reassures, watching the woman’s eyes take toward him as she pauses, almost as if she were quietly holding out a hope that he knew what she was trying to put into words. Reassured, Leah nods to herself as her eyes take toward the window that her sofa had been propped at the base of, staring at the cloudy skies that appear both above and through the treeline that surrounds her entire property, rain oddly not present. “I knew enough to realise that there was something more that I wasn’t seeing. Even if I’d ask questions about how investigation went or what came of it, I’d still get some of the same non-answers I always would” Leah carries on, crossing one leg over another as she leans to her side. “When I started to see that I wasn’t going to stop getting the non-answers, I just started trying to see if I could bait the cops into saying more than they should’ve” she confesses, “I knew there was something.” Unintentionally matching the host’s posture, Avon leans toward the opposite side of his question’s subject as he waits for her to continue speaking, a momentary diversion taken in her recollection. “By this point, the people that had been keeping me up started to get a lot less easy to deal with” Leah admits, disheartened to concede the strength of considering herself above their bothersome tactics, “one night, they’d light a bag of shit on my doorstep. On another, they’d key my car.” Disturbed, the woman tries to brush off the less-pleasant memories in favour of getting through to what her guest had come looking for. “I’d throw out things- names or people or suspects- that I’d pick out from the crowd. I’d ask about their involvement or what happened to them as if they could’ve had anything to do with it” Leah proceeds, a deeper squint carried in her eyes as her mind reaches one particular instance. “Then there was this one time where I walked by a woman that just wouldn’t talk to me and decided to use her that day” she remarks, gesturing dismissively at the thought whilst it runs through her head in real time, “so- mid conversation- I decided to ask what her involvement in all of it was. And...” Falling silent, Leah’s face takes toward the ground as her already mostly-steady spirits take a descent, her soft voice becoming even softer than she’d presented it to be for her guest. “It didn’t go over well” the woman confesses, taking her line of sight back to the man that sits across from her as she speaks, “all of a sudden, I was met with him asking me about who’d mentioned her and why I was looking into what her role was and... it was all just so confrontational.” Starting to lean forward in his seat, Avon’s barely-noticeable forward-direction centres itself upon his interest in hearing the woman’s claims through. “Who was the woman?” he wonders aloud, watching the hesitation to continue saying anything more than what she already had begins to come over the seemingly hidden-away once visitor of Remedy Hills. “Apparently someone important enough for those freaks in the smiley face masks to leave a severed finger on my doorstep that same night” Leah responds, her eyebrows furrowing as her breaths grow less easy to take. “I packed up the few things that I had, left my room, got in my keyed-up car and got the fuck of that town as fast as I could” the woman admits, her comments both intriguing her guest and being carefully tucked aside, “I left a note that said ‘this was a mistake’ and never went back.” Clearing her throat, Leah looks into the eyes of the man that occupies the opposite chair as he parts his lips again, his mind latching onto the most vital piece of information he’s heard thus far. “The woman that you asked about... What was her name?” Avon inquires, suddenly beginning to believe that the goose chase the smiley face group’s video had sent him on may just have legs of its own to stand on. With her bottom lip extending farther than the one above by the slightest margin, Leah takes her free hand and gently sweeps her hair aside. “Dana Whitehead” the woman confesses, answering the question she was asked with both honesty and reservation, “she was the Chief of Police then, and as far as I’m aware... She still is.” | “I don’t see anything noteworthy about that woman at all” Beth responds, having been kept awake for hours now with the reading of the hardcover novel her friend had pieced together thirteen years prior, “aside from the fact that she was mentally deranged, I don’t care to know anything about her.” “It’s not her that you’re supposed to latch onto, it’s what she did” Harlington corrects, leaning toward the ground to gently rest the novel upon the ground just beneath his chair. “It wasn’t the crime that ever fascinated people, it was everything that didn’t make sense. Her being an oddball, the way she killed herself, the way she strung the cops along, it was what she did” the man furthers, trying his best to explain the case as coherently as he can manage. “What does it matter? Does it change what she did? Did it bring back who she killed?” Beth challenges, not knowing what she’s meant to get out of the novel as a whole, “why should I be interested in what a terrible, sick and twisted woman did enough to care?” Letting a more casual smile come over his face, Harlington leans forward in his seat whilst his prisoner watches on, wanting a genuine answer to her question. “The book wasn’t meant to give you a reason to be fascinated, it was designed to explain why all of that fascination came about in the first place” the man explains, speaking to a party of one that is only quiet for the sake of hearing out her answer. “People are slaughtered in ways even more brutal than what Whitney Merrimack did to her family every other day, but no one cares. No politician comments on them all, there aren’t national holidays over them” Harlington carries on. “What people are fascinated by are the gory, gruesome pieces that get highlighted in the headlines. There’s a reason no one talks about what Whitney did anymore... It’s just how she died and what her final days were like” he continues, still failing to find much in the way of common ground with his prisoner. “People flock to this story for the same things that people flock to Remedy Hills for” Harlington clarifies, “they don’t care about the murders... They care about the mystery.” “No shit, Sherlock. Anyone with half of a brain in this town knows that” Beth responds, growing tired of being led down one train of thought after another, “tell me you didn’t sit me down for hours to read me a book to come up with the same conclusion I could’ve spent three seconds to make on my own.” “No, I read you the book to show you why there might be a method to keeping a mystery as a mystery and never letting the questions die” Harlington responds, watching the woman’s reservations remain intact, though her posture- in spite of the rope that holds her back- adjusts slightly. “With how small Remedy Hills is, did it ever cross your mind that it might not be too difficult to piece together who was responsible?” the man wonders aloud, finally seeing a change in Beth’s demeanour. “The crime was heinous, it was sadistic, and it made national headlines” Harlington argues, trying to lend credence to his claims with as much sense as can be taken from them, “don’t you think there’s a chance that- with all the attention the little town from Massachusetts gathered- maybe there’d be people who wouldn’t want the mystery solved?” “What are you saying?” Beth interjects, wondering aloud the question that sits upon the front of her mind, presented with the possibility that her years of personal conflict may have an answer worth buying into. “I’m-” Harlington replies, only to widen his eyes upon the slamming from above that interrupts him, face taking toward the floor above as repeated knocks against his front door ring out. “Who’s that?” Beth questions, watching as Harlington quickly leaves his seat and looks toward the higher level, waiting for a repeat of the knocking that doesn’t take long to meet his ears. “I don’t know” the man confesses, holding his hand toward the woman in hopes of holding her off from speaking for a moment. “I promise that I’ll answer every question you have when I get back if you just stay quiet, alright?” Harlington queries, making for the bottom-most step on the bannister that leads to the ground floor. “I know it’ll be hard to think of me as anything less than the guy that stalked and kidnapped you, but if you’d just trust me...” the man pleas, watching as the woman stares at him without certainty over how to react, “...you’ll see that it’ll be worth it.” Without saying anything more, Harlington climbs the steps that lead from the basement and makes toward the front of the home, holding out his hope that all will be fine with patience and confidence. Interrupting a fourth set of knocks by opening the door he’d rather gracefully pull in than watch be kicked in beneath the might of a boot. “Good evening” a young and charming officer remarks, his elder colleague standing alongside no more than a few inches away, “I’m detective Beau Donovan- this is my partner Jake Mansoor.” Lifting his eyebrows, Harlington rests his arm against the front door’s frame as he takes part in the end of the conversation he’s meant to prop up. “Greetings, gentlemen” the decent-appearing resident of the cabin responds, “is there something I can help you with?” “Yeah, we were actually holding out the hope that you’d let us check around your home” Beau responds, continuing to uphold his charming demeanour so as not to act in outright opposition to the cabin’s tenant, “we had an inmate escape prison a few nights ago and believe he could be in this area.” “This cabin was built for that convict prior to the man’s conviction. From our records, the deed was never signed over to anyone other than him” Jake adds on, taking over for his partner before any hot-headed action can be taken. “Rico Martinez? Yeah, he didn’t need to sign it over to anyone. I bought it off the town once they repo-ed it when they took him in” Harlington recalls, playing his story as best as he can. “How’d you manage that?” Beau queries, poorly hiding the fact that he doesn’t buy the story for anything it’s worth. “I used to work for him. I was one of his drivers” Harlington responds, pulling his palm away from the door’s frame before crossing his arms whilst standing in the middle of the doorway, “you oughta know about that. You lot wouldn’t stop bringing me in on suspicions until the town got all up in arms about him.” “And now you just live here... All by yourself?” Beau questions back, his partner accepting that the faux-pleasant attitude that is presented will be too difficult to tame for what it’s worth. “Well, you get the occasional lonely lady at a bar just looking for a little bit of love, if you know what I mean?” Harlington tries to charmingly play off, mocking the presentation that the younger officer provides him with, earning a grin from the youthful cop for his efforts. “Anyway, he’s not here. I guess that- if you really wanna take a look inside- you’re gonna need to grab me a warrant first” Harlington responds, watching Beau’s head hang just slightly as he takes displeasure in the refusal. Having expected this, the officers lift their hands as a show of surrender and retreat from the property, their backwards stepping allowing them to return to the cruiser they’d driven up to the property line with. “Alright, then. Since you asked so nicely, we’ll go grab that warrant for you, sir” Beau remarks, nodding toward the homeowner as he points to the man’s direction, “we’ll see you soon, alright?” “I can’t wait!” Harlington smiles back, faking the same pleasantries as the officers do before returning to his home and waving toward the authorities as he closes his door, sealing himself within the property with bought time. “You could’ve been a little less straightforward with that uptight, stick-up-your-ass, shit-eating grin of yours” Jake groans, lowering himself into the driver’s seat whilst his partner responds. “You know just as well as I do that he’s got something going on in there. If we didn’t have to plead our case to the judge for a warrant- we’d be in there by now” Beau retorts, fastening his seatbelt into place as his partner begins driving off. “Besides, I feel like I did a pretty good acting job” the young cop sarcastically adds in, only to receive a smug frown from the older cop he turns to look at. “It could use some work” Jake confesses, meeting his partner’s humour with a quip of his own before taking to the main road, forced to go about their business in the lawful manner whilst the feeling like a race against the clock has begun wraps itself around the officers like a lasso. == Remedy Hills == “Welcome back to the Oprah Winfrey show. My guest today is an author whose newest release is taking the nation by storm” the woman remarks, seated across from a much younger gentleman before a captivated, live studio audience. “Tackling the cause behind our fixations on the sick and depraved acts in this world left for only God to know the truth behind” she declares into the running camera, “here to talk about his newest book- The Garden Manifesto- here is Avon King!”
With a youthful grin and the wave of his hand, a much younger and less-experienced author occupies the seat across from the host he nods toward, appreciative for the roar of the audience’s applause that she’d initiated. Watching the events play out from behind the screen of his laptop, a much older and life-experienced Avon King watches himself from the past with his hands folded beneath his chin, the recording allowed to play just as it had all those years ago. “Mr. King, thank you for joining me. I’d like to start with this- after I read your book for the first time, I was so intrigued by a lot of the parallels you were drawing between the murders in this book and the ones you’d covered in your last one” Oprah compliments, holding a copy of the novel in question for illustration. “I couldn’t help myself but go back to read this for a second time because my mind was so captivated by your writing” the host proceeds, flattering her guest. “Well, thank you. I must say, I found myself following a similar line of thought when I’d initially begun to write the book” Avon confesses, watching the grainy effects similar to that found on VHS tapes tear across the screen in spite of the disc this recording was burned to. “Acts of evil like the ones Whitney Merrimack committed against her family are so much more than just empty encounters with evil” the young author explains, “there’s emotion there- a disturbingly human kind.” Allowed to continue speaking by the host, the author is left with the audience gathered together in silence, the hair on the women both curly and puffy to go along with their shoulder pad-fitted suit jackets. Though outnumbered, the men in the audience- dressed their bushy moustaches, plaid shirts and khakis- join in a similar intrigue, latching onto every word with every last bit of the same fascination. “When cruelties such as the ones depicted in the Garden Manifesto are committed, people are incredibly quick to write them off as an act of depravity so sick that it can’t even be considered natural” Avon confesses, looking toward the ground as he formulates his explanation on the fly. “There are a lot of these acts that receive that treatment even though it’s not that true” the young man continues, “even if they aren’t humane- the criminals, that is- their actions often can be rooted in that.” “You’re talking about their emotions, correct?” Oprah interjects, adding emphasis to the man’s point whilst the audience sits in a collective hush, the air slightly chilled by the studio’s central air conditioning to leave their hairs on a half-stand. “Yes, more specifically- their motivations” Avon replies, nodding along with the woman’s conclusion, “on a surface level, Whitney Merrimack’s actions seem like a heinous display of empty evil. When you dig in, she feels much colder and ruthless.” “And that you’re talking about are her motivations, yes?” Oprah tacks on, again keeping the conversation to a more-direct point. “Yes, very much so. But also, I’m talking about the way in which she’d committed her crimes” Avon proceeds, lifting his left leg to sit upon his right, “it’s one thing to believe she’d felt trapped in her marriage and that was why she’d killed her family, but it’s another for her to not just kill her family, but to dismember them and scatter their remains.” Watching the footage cut out the following comments, the edited video that the future Avon King watches skips to a later point in the interview, one picking up mid-conversation. “-gued that there was a point to her not taking off and trying to out-run the consequences of her choices that wasn’t out of self-preservation, explain that for us?” Oprah questions, leaning toward her left side with her right leg gracefully crossed over her left. “Well, the thing that people need to remember about Whitney was that she was a very unstable woman” Avon explains, pausing with his hands gently placed atop his lap as he attempts to clarify his rationale. “So is every woman!” a man interrupts out from the audience, earning a mixture of laughter and jeers from those that he’s surrounded by, the crowd split evenly. Amused herself, Oprah tries to contain her humour as her guest turns his focus toward the crowd, his finger pointed in the direction of the comment. “And that’s exactly why I’m never getting married!” Avon jokes, again humouring the audience in a much more unified way, the laughter shared amongst those in a light-hearted moment, its presence much appreciated with the conversation unfolding at hand. “But Whitney specifically had been off of medication for months, and her less-reasonable demeanour was always allowed to go unchecked. Her husband just figured it would sort itself out” the author continues whilst the audience quiets down, returning to their genuine interest. “Everything from leading authorities on to the way in which her life ended was less about being an odd character, but about the way in which she was remembered” Avon proceeds, “it was what she wanted.” “You’re saying that her behaviour after the fact was all for show?” Oprah inquires, finally presenting a suggestion that her guest can’t fully dedicate himself to. “No, I wouldn’t argue that. I’m more so talking along the lines of the aftermath of her actions” Avon corrects, emphasising his point further, “you have to remember that- as odd as it is- there’s something persistently-striking about committing suicide by burying yourself in your own flower garden and leaving a laminated confession.” “So it was about how she would be remembered” Oprah concludes, nodding along as the author’s explanation lends her own discovery credence. “Yes. She was fully aware of what she’d done, but it was her last days immediately following her crimes that led her to use them for notoriety” Avon proclaims, “we all- as humans- want to be remembered after we go. Leading cops on, killing herself in such a horrifyingly fascinating way- all of it- was meant to keep people talking about her.” Reaching the end of that line of dialogue, the studio audience begins to applaud as the host’s face takes toward the camera, her lips parting to throw the show to a commercial that never presents itself. Again watching the feed skip into another segment of the episode, Avon’s viewership of his past-self slides past the commercials and right back to the start of a new line of questioning. “Arguing that Whitney Merrimack wanted her crimes to be talked about long after she had come and gone leaves you in an interesting personal conundrum, doesn’t it?” Oprah inquires, elaborating further on her question, “do you feel a personal guilt for writing this book knowing that it’s what was wanted by someone that did such a deplorable thing?” With the slightest grin, a younger Avon relishes in the difficulty that comes with answering the question, knowing that such is the case with at least a part of his reasoning. For a few seconds, the man nods to himself as he stares at the ground, considering the inquiry for as long as he needs before finally providing an answer. “To a small extent, I’d say I do. I almost think it would be disrespectful to try and find an excuse to vindicate myself in ways that others wouldn’t- or shouldn’t- use” the man confesses, owning up to his own creative shortcomings, “but I also see there being a justification in using Whitney Merrimack’s actions as a cover for what The Garden Manifesto actually is- which is a breakdown in the simplest terms of how something so unthinkable is so ironically easy to imagine.” For the third time, an older and wiser Avon watches as the video skips multiple other lines of communication, eventually ending back up on the start of the host’s next set of inquiries. “-is a noble undertaking, but it does seem as though it sets you up to be a ‘go-to guy’ almost for when situations like these arise” Oprah proceeds, staring at the ground as she forms her following question, “on that note, would a situation similar to the one that occurred only a few days ago be similar to this?” For a moment, the younger Avon looks off toward the colourful talk show set as he lets the question linger, trying on his own to find the line of thought that the host has presented him with. “You’re referring to the murder that happened in Remedy Hills, right?” the man questions, given his answer through the silent nod of agreement that the interviewer returns to him, “possibly. There are obviously parallels to draw even if it's impossible for Whitney Merrimack to have been the Remedy culprit.” “I’m not talking about the similarities, per say, as much as I am the motivations like you’d argued earlier” Oprah confesses, steering the man’s mindset onto the track she feels it best desired upon. “Well, I’d say it’s very much a possibility, but we’re not going to know until the investigation has all played out” Avon responds honestly, “with Whitney Merrimack, we know what she did and can speculate on her motivations. Until the killer is caught in Remedy, we can never know for sure.” “You remember that interview, don’t you?” a man in a smiley face mask questions from within the laptop’s screen, seated upon a metal folding chair as the talk show segment is cut away from completely. “You gave that interview thirteen years ago. I’m sure that’s more like a blast from the past for you, but for me- it’s so much more than that” the facially-obstructed, lone subject of the video explains, continuing to hide his true identity as he addresses the author. “When I heard you were coming to Remedy Hills, I figured just as anyone else did. I thought you were just another writer looking to cover your ass as best you could so the locals didn’t run you out of town” the smiley face mercenary confesses, “I’ve never thought highly of writers- at least the ones that came to Remedy. This town has always been so much more than its mystery, and yet- its mystery keeps the town from ever keeping going back to being sleepy and cosy. I blamed people like you.” Lowering his hands toward either side of his computer, Avon looks deeper into the screen and squints, his ears incapable of making out any distinctive speech patterns within the comments that are made. “And that’s how most of us remain, Mr. King” the tormentor on the other side of the screen continues, shaking his head as he leans forward, arms draped over both knees, “but some of us realise that you- as ironic as it is for a writer to be- may just be able to help put the town to sleep again.” Genuinely curious, the writer drops his index finger onto the spacebar and pauses the video, leaving his chair and picking up the computer before turning away from the still-unobstructed sliding back door. Wanting to keep the video’s contents to his eyes and his eyes only, Avon walks over to his kitchen and closes the blinds on them, redirecting the laptop’s screen away from the direction of any windows before unpausing it. “Something that you were wrong about in that interview was that we wouldn’t know what the motivations were until the investigation had all played out” the smiley face figure reveals, “we didn’t find out the killer’s motivations. However, that’s not because the investigation never ended... ‘cause it did.” Pressing the palms of his hands against the kitchen countertop, Avon stares into the screen before lowering the volume, taking as many precautions- even those unnecessary- as he can manage. “Keep this secret between us and I can promise you that this story will be your best one yet” the plastic mask-hiding individual explains, “I can tell you on good authority that the police worked day and night to figure out who the killer was for years... Then they found them.” Silent and still, the air in the home leaves the author’s ears burdened by nothing less than his own attention, its pay given to the video in full. “Remedy Hills is a quiet town. Its people are not used to seeing things like explosions and prison breaks, and yet- that’s what tonight showed them” the mysterious figure confesses, “but before tonight, the people had to be exposed to visitor after visitor, tourists coming from all over the globe wanting to visit the grizzly little town. A mockery.” Lowering his head, the masculine-appearing figure takes shame in the revelation that proceeds his continued explanation. “There was profit to be made in leaving Remedy Hills to end up like Centralia, or Pripyat, or Nagasaki. People from all around the world come into a place haunted by chaos and refuse the right to put its ghosts to bed” the tormented vigilante continues, “the ghosts of Remedy Hills still walk these streets looking for peace... But the system will not allow them to rest.” “What is this Ghosts of Ishinomaki-like shit?” Avon whispers in wonder, finding the claims made in the video to be crazy, though they come from a source that keeps him from writing them off and looking away. “I can promise you that the police in this town already figured out who the killer was. From my understanding, they may have known for as long as a decade by now” the smiley face injustice fighter heralds, “but the corruption rooted deep within the ground wanted the mystery to live on.” Lifting his head from the ground, the smiley mask takes its gaze toward the camera lens, looking deep into the soul of the man he cannot see- but knows will inevitably be on the opposite end. “No writer, nor tourist, has ever come here looking for the truth before” the masked vigilante carries on, pointing his finger toward the camera’s direction, “but with how long you’ve disregarded our attempts at running you off or keeping you out... Maybe you really should be one of us.” Stricken by an uncertain feeling that lingers deep within his body, Avon fights the urge to look away from the recording in an effort of knowing more, too invested in what’s presented to look away. “When I watched that interview of you after you’d already moved in, I began to get this feeling that you might not be the same kind of writer that this town usually sees” the purveyor of justice proclaims, “for the first time in my life, I believe that a writer- of all people- might just belong here.” Clearing their throat, the figure behind the smiley face mask nods to himself with reassurance. “I can promise you that I’m not the only one here that’s starting to feel that way. However, I can’t be sure- just yet- that your heart is where I hope it truly is. I suppose I can extend an olive branch and give you a chance to prove my instincts right, Mr. King” the vigilante proceeds, leaning back in his seat with his full attention on the camera’s lens, “write down this address.” = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = Watching the back of a hardcover novel slam against the basement’s floor, Beth lets the wafting sound of impact that echoes from one side of the room to the other dissipate before speaking aloud. “What is this?” the restrained woman wonders aloud, watching Harlington retreat to the chair across from her. “Do you recognise it?” the man asks, prompting the woman to take a second look at the novel’s front cover, its upside-down appearance properly adjusted by the man’s foot so she can better register its promotional face. “Avon King” Beth whispers after a few seconds, reading the name of the author printed at the bottom of the book’s title, the name bringing a slight widening of her eyes. “You know him, right?” Harlington asks aloud, his question being left to simmer in the silence that precedes the woman’s head lifting up toward him. “What did you do to him!?” the woman worriedly questions aloud, her immediate question prompting her kidnapper to look at her with confusion. “What did I-!? NO!” the man proclaims, pulling back in his seat as he realises his immediate efforts had been misunderstood. “I didn’t do anything to him! I was asking you about the book!” Harlington explains, extending his hand toward the two hundred-plus page novel at his feet. “It’s one of his best sellers. He wrote it after this murder that happened across the country about twenty years ago” the kidnapper proceeds, clarifying the intention behind his quandary, “it took the nation by storm. Conservatives hated it and Liberals wanted it banned from schools for the graphic depictions of violence.” “So?” Beth questions back, unsure over what the man is trying to get at. “He’s living in Remedy Hills now” the captor quickly responds, crossing his arms whilst sitting on the left side of his hip, leaning against the back of his chair, “he’s doing a new novel on the murder that happened thirteen years ago and doesn’t even realise he’s practically writing the same exact story.” Meeting the hostage taker with silence, the former librarian looks her jailer in the eyes and waits for him to continue. Without much in the way of background noise to fill the vacancy of speech that’s left in the wake of each pause, Harlington’s hairs raise with the prolonged opening that follows his explanation before leaning his voice back into the fold. “A grizzly murder happens, police don’t know what could’ve happened and the murderer never faces justice” the man remarks, citing the order of events as if they were bullet points for him to read off a grocery list, “well, the woman in this book was eventually found out, but it was only ‘cause she killed herself and admitted to it all when the cops found her trail. The mystery that unfolded captured everyone’s imagination, but unlike the woman in this story- an entire town became the mystery.” “The Garden Manifesto?” Beth questions aloud, taking a second glance toward the object left just a few inches away from her feet, reading off the title of the novel with curiosity. “Whitney Merrimack killed her two sons and her husband. She chopped them up into pieces and started scattering them around town for people to find in their recycling bins” Harlington remarks, “police took a few weeks to catch her trail, and she killed herself when they did.” “What does that have to do with-?” Beth proceeds to question, only for her captor to interrupt her attempted inquiry, continuing along with the recollection of the tale. “She’d been feeding them lies and giving news interviews with this really strange and erratic behaviour before the officers caught on and starting looking at her as the primary suspect” Harlington proceeds, “she wrote a confession, laminated it, and buried herself deep under her flower garden. She suffocated within hours.” “What does that have to do with anything!?” the woman again speaks aloud, interjecting her question into the discussion at hand for her kidnapper to elaborate upon. “Because there’s been something going on with Remedy Hills for a very, very, very long time” Harlington explains, reaching toward the ground and reclaiming the hardcover book, presenting its cover to his prisoner, “like I said, some aspects of what I have to say sound crazy. Others however, don’t sound that insane.” “Like what? Implying there’s something wrong with the coffee? Or claiming that the whole fucking town is alive?” Beth questions, having made peace with the situation that she’s in enough to come off oddly composed for a prisoner outside of her own volition. “No, there’s not much that I can do to make any of that seem less insane” Harlington confesses, listening to the sound of an engine riding off into the distance, freeing him the comfort of mind that their third resident has departed. “When I was younger, my babysitter used to read me a story about how there were never any monsters under my bed, and I was convinced” Harlington explains, resting the hardcover book atop his lap before turning to the first page, “so I’m gonna read you this book. Hopefully, when I say the stuff that sounds less-insane than the town having a mind of its own, you’ll be more inclined to at least entertain it.” Waiting for the woman to reply, Harlington looks across the sealed-off room of the home and waits for a rebuttal, only to watch as the former librarian juts her chin forward and shakes her head. “What?” Beth questions, almost as if she were unsure of what he was waiting for, receiving no reply as the kidnapper’s attention sets upon the book, ending the awkwardness by reading the first page. | “Ruben Spence?” Beau calls out, slamming the passenger’s door to his cruiser shut whilst Jake steps out from the driver’s seat, waking up to a man in a green flannel as he traipses across his front yard with a bundle of lumber carried over his shoulder. “Can I help you boys with something?” the man of similar age to the younger cop questions aloud, setting his building materials down upon a saw table whilst the detectives answer. “Yes sir, we were hoping to ask you a few questions about Rico Martinez” the older officer proclaims, watching the blue collar worker look toward him with a confused squint in his eye. “Rico Martinez? What do you wanna know about him for?” Ruben questions back, removing his white hard hat before meeting the cops halfway, “didn’t that psychopath get locked up years ago?” “He did. Unfortunately for us, just because someone gets sentenced to life imprisonment doesn’t always mean they actually stay there until they’re dead” Beau replies, tucking his hands into the waistband of his slacks, “he escaped from the correctional facility a few miles north last night.” His alert immediately being raised, Ruben rolls his eyes in disbelief as he stares out into the surrounding treeline, nothing more than his shack and a cosy cabin to be found aside from the driveway. “That sick son of a bitch escaped?” the man replies in horror, hands pressing against his face as he tries to quickly let the information settle. “He did, and now we’re looking for any place he could be hiding out in” Beau responds, continuing to lead the conversation as Jake comes to a stop at his side, “the two of you were pretty connected back in the day, we figured there might be a chance he could’ve come out here to hang low for a few days.” “We weren’t connected! He paid me to build a cabin for him a few months before he got locked up!” Ruben responds defensively, almost insulted at the notion that he’d be close enough to the convict to warrant being a noteworthy figure, “if you call that connected, then you’re really reaching for it. I wouldn’t even call us contractor-and-contracted let alone connected.” “Where’s this cabin?” Jake interjects, not paying pleasantries to the man’s comments before latching onto the notable discovery that catches his ear. “It’s a mile or so out from the border of the town! Hidden pretty deep in the woods just like my place” Ruben replies, accepting the extension of a notepad that leaves Beau’s side, given to the figure in hopes of earning an address. “Mind if we take a look inside your house real quick for good measure?” Jake inquires, patting Beau on the shoulder with trust that he’ll perform a thorough search once the homeowner grants them permission. | “Where are you headed out to?” Penny questions, her voice tired and spent as she watches her husband round the corner, the sweatpants and sweatshirt combination he’d normally wear in the home replaced by an outfit different from the one he’d greeted her in the night prior. “I have to go get my laptop fixed” Avon answers, his upper body draped in a black, long-sleeved shirt and lower body fitted into a pair of blue jeans, the ends of which hang over a pair of grey running shoes. “Oh, yeah- alright” Penny responds, too tired to make much of a deal out of the reasonable explanation that she’s already too exhausted to take much consideration in as is. Standing in an odd silence, the couple remain unmoved within each other’s presence as the prior night’s conversation soon returns to the woman’s mind, the recollection bringing with it a faint- yet present- hint of newfound energy to the depleted wife. “Shit, I forgot about last night” Penny remarks, hand pressing against her forehead as she stares off at the side of the room, her husband’s head nodding as he reserves his voice, not wanting to speak out of line. “Um, I guess I said some things that I probably shouldn’t-” the woman begins, preparing herself to apologise before her husband’s soft and reassuring voice interjects, preventing her from continuing on. “I understand and it’s alright” Avon concedes, watching the woman’s face take toward his direction, a noticeable guise of guilt worn upon her face. “I definitely didn’t give you a reason to think that I’d do... that... to you, but I can see why you’d have your suspicions of me” the author continues, accepting his end of the blame in lieu of anything else being said that can’t be taken back, “all that matters is that you know there’s only one woman that I have eyes for, and it was never Beth.” With a slight pout in her bottom lip, Penny steadies herself as her husband approaches, her eyes looking up toward the man’s own. “You’re not mad?” she wonders aloud, watching his grin spread from one side of his face to the other, his hands taking the woman by each side of her face as he shakes his head in refusal. “I’m not mad, baby” Avon replies, leaning in to give his wife a long, drawn out kiss on the lips. “You’ve had a long night. Let’s get you to bed, and then I’ll head to drop my laptop off, alright?” the man questions aloud, watching his wife muster enough strength to lift her lips into a smile, her nod gently nodding with his touch. “One more thing, alright?” he questions, watching the woman’s eyelids part from the momentary closure they’d taken on, watching the reassuring light in the man’s eyes glisten, “from here on out- we’re going to be totally transparent with each other.” As her smile deepens, the sides of Penny’s face rub against her husband’s palms as she nods in agreement, “no secrets from now on” she whispers, the man that she stands before using his thumbs to move hairs away from her face. “No secrets from now on” Avon repeats, smiling just as intensively as his wife does before leaning in to kiss her once more, leaning toward the ground just slightly in an effort to sweep her off both feet, his arms carrying her down the hall and back to bed. Turning out the bedroom light, Avon gently closes their bedroom door shut and makes for the living room, walking down the hall as the sun begins to set, entering the communal area before making for the dining room. Grabbing his coat off the back of the opposite chair from the one he normally occupies, the author dawns it upon his person before picking up his computer, walking toward the front door with it under his arm before redirecting himself. Flicking on the lightswitch beside a closet off near the side of their home’s entrance, Avon hides his laptop beneath a pile of sweaters in a nearby cubby, shielding it with the soft, warm fabrics before closing off the room and stepping through the front door with keys in hand. Descending the steps to the vehicle, the author unlocks the car and takes over its driver’s seat, pausing for a moment as he sits at the wheel and thinks to himself. Reaching into his back pocket, the author picks out the folded note that he’d stored away and unfolds it, reading the text that was written upon it in pencil before making out the address that he’d earlier been told to jot down. Punching in the address in his phone, Avon sets up the screen to face him as he pulls out of the driveway, his tires crunching down upon saltrock as he descends through the neighbourhood’s quiet streets, driving off into the night toward wherever the GPS takes him. == Remedy Hills == Season 2 Premiere
“Attention. All units needed at Remedy Medical Center. I repeat, all units needed at Remedy Medical Center” a woman’s frantic voice calls out, her proclamation carried through the radios of every cruiser the precinct has on the streets. “We have reports of an explosion at Remedy Medical Center. Mass casualties are expected. Code green is now code black.” the woman continues to speak, urging those on the road to head toward the devastating scene. Flooding with sirens, the streets of the quiet town are forced to host a flurry of sirens and screeching tires in all directions, stripped of its ability to sit in silence by the raging inferno that wages on in the centre of town. Gathering together in groups along quiet, residential streets, the people who call Remedy home watch on from the safety that their distance brings, the community as a whole made to bear witness to the violent display. Whilst the elderly emerge from within their homes and occupy their front patios to look on from afar, the town’s youth step out from their places of business or the various holes in the walls they’d been partaking in the recreational activities of. Regardless of generation, the people of the grief-stricken Remedy Hills centre their attention on the same, intense locale. Kept at what had been deemed a safe distance from the law-abiding civilians, the inmates of the county prison calmly reside within their cells with the lights out. Whilst some lay upon the pitifully-thin mattresses with their hands folded atop their stomachs, other prisoners defy what had been demanded of them by the guards, their arms hanging through the metal bars of their cell doors as they stand in attention, staring out into the larger room beyond their confinement- yearning for freedom. On his lonesome, a single prison guard occupies a desk near the centre of the room, the baton that had initially been attached to his belt having been left atop his desk. Though he’s meant to watch over those trapped within the prison’s cramped corridors, the patrol officer proves to be anything other than on active duty. With his navy blue baseball cap sitting over his face and feet kicked atop the table he occupies, the serviceman catches up on the easiest night of sleep he’s had in a while. Whilst some inmates watch on from their places along the prison’s doors with a variety of displeased expressions worn, others carry a stoic, unbothered visage that would normally seem out of place on nights unlike this one. Nearest one end of the row of cells, however, a single look of determination is carried upon a prisoner who fails to feel even the slightest sense of restraint, his desire for freedom not as starved as his peers- because he already has it. Being met with an opportunity the moment he hears the first snore come from the on-duty patrolman, the silent aggressor at the end of the cell block gently takes the metal bars into his palm and slides it open. Not making a peep, the inmate steps out from his confinement and quietly approaches the sleeping guard, eyes falling upon the man with malicious intent whilst his peers refuse to offer even the slightest peep, instead being far too interested in watching the events play out. From a cup near the end of the central workstation, the inmate quietly snatches a pen that he uses to violently stab at the no-longer-slumbering guard’s neck, repeatedly puncturing the jugular vein until satisfied with his work. As he lifelessly falls from the chair and slumps onto the floor, the corrections officer’s mouth is allowed to slip from the coverage of his assailant’s palm, any scream he’d attempted to offer in the name of help being refused at once. Playing the role of hero perfectly, the violent aggressor snatches the cell block’s keys off the serviceman and hurries toward one cell in particular. “Well done, boy” a hispanic man remarks, his hands draped through the metal bars that he leans against, waiting to be the first that’s freed from his confines. “Thank you, si-” the reserved prisoner who’d initiated the event begins to reply, only for his mouth to be covered before he can have the chance to finish his thought. Carved out of the end of a toothbrush, the newly-freed inmate silences his hushed guardian angel and repeatedly stabs the man in the stomach, waiting until the body across from him goes limp. Just as lifeless as the guard that he’d slaughtered, the key-wielding convict plummets to the ground and bleeds out, his wounds just as great as those worn by the cellmate the hispanic yardbird leaves behind as a second victim. Uttering not one peep, the inmates whose opportunity to be freed had been snuffed out amidst the lone wanderer’s actions watch on as their peer tosses his bloody shiv across the room. Stripping the dead guard naked, Rico dresses the serviceman in his own, orange jumpsuit and drags his body into the cell he prepares to leave behind. Laying the scene out in whatever way he wishes, the violent convict uses the clearance obtained by his victims to exit the block. Keeping his head down the entire way, the criminal manages to reach the prison’s exit without any issue, the faintest redirection of his face and extension of the keycard at each member of security’s line of sight affording him clear passage. Through the front doors and to the audible sound of police cruisers hurrying to the same, central scene, Rico takes his eyes to the fire that rages on in the distance before taking ownership of the deceased guard’s vehicle. Using the cover of chaos to flee the scene, the newly-freed inmate drives in the opposite direction of the raging inferno, discarding his victim’s keycard into the treeline that runs along the side of the freeway he now becomes the only occupant of. = Remedy Hills is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards = “Stay here, sir!” a firefighter proclaims, speaking over the flurry of sirens that only grow in volume as more of Remedy’s emergency services arrive. “My partner- he’s still in there!” Beau responds, struggling to catch his breath through each cough, his face covered in a dark, black soot from the fire he’d just been pulled out of. “Sir, you need to stay here!” the protection-draped professional replies, only for his warning to be disregarded. “Get out of my way!” Beau fights, shoving the heavily-clad serviceman out of the way as he attempts to hurry back toward the building, only for the corner of his eye to catch the glimpse of a man all too familiar to ignore. “Mansoor!” the younger officer proclaims, covering his mouth as he breaks out into a coughing fit, watching as his partner is helped away from the scene of devastation just as he was. Politely gesturing for the firefighter to return to the aid of others, Jake lowers himself to the ground as his fellow officer hurries up to his side, leaning his hand on the older cop’s shoulder. “I’m alright, kid. I’m alright” the experienced policeman reassures, patting his peer on the side of the face as he’s joined in taking a seat along the ground. For a few seconds, the two detectives gather their bearings in silence, unable to take their eyes away from the roaring flames ahead. Finally catching their breaths, the two officers grimace together at the unfolding scene of devastation, watching as their peers race into the flames with hopes of saving whichever lives are trapped within. In every direction, doctors and nurses still dressed in their professional attire hurry around the frantic parking lot in an attempt to administer assistance to whomever may need it, treating burn victims and blood-soaked faces just as they attend to the sick and in-need. “They keep beating us to the fucking punch” Beau concedes, shaking his head in disbelief and self-aggravation as he leans back, losing his upper body’s balance as he lays out along the asphalt. “We were this fucking close! And now- fuck!” the younger cop proclaims, his own safety and that of his partner guaranteed, allowing his own irritation at the events that have transpired to take centre stage once more. Slamming his palms against the ground, Beau stares toward the star-filled night sky that he can just barely make out through the thick clouds of smoke that billow from the only medical centre for miles. “I know, kid. I know” Jake disheartedly responds, hanging his head as he remains seated upright, staring out at the hellacious terror that unfolds ahead. | “Oh, fuck- what the-!?” Beth scowls, thrashing her head back and away from the putrid scent that fills her with such a vehemently awful and temporary headache. “It’s alright, you’re alright! Don’t worry!” Harlington urges, quickly pulling away from the woman and holding his hands out toward her, offering the faintest gesture of reassurance as she comes to, awakening from the unconsciousness that had consumed her, “smelling salts. That’s all this is- it’s just smelling salts.” “Where the fuck am I!?” the woman quickly rebukes, instantly taking notice of the twine that holds her hands around her back, restraining her at the wrists and to the chair that she sits upon. Before long, the cramped confines that she finds herself held within are taken notice of, the concrete-encased basement that is illuminated only by a pair of lightbulbs hanging by a cord along the ceiling being all that she can find aside from a flight of stairs leading upward. “You’re safe- don’t worry” Harlington replies, quickly tossing the torn-open packet of smelling salts into the corner of the room, wiping his palms of the stench that still lingers upon his flesh. “You’re in a house just a little less than half a mile inside Remedy” the man clarifies, his comment prompting the tied-up captive to widen her eyes, “No one’s gonna hurt you. The only reason I have you in restrained is so you don’t running off and getting yourself in trouble.” “You kidnapped me!?” Beth shouts back, her immediate conclusion prompting the man who’d saved her from the wreckage of her mangled vehicle to hang his head. “Well, in loose terms- yeah, I did” Harlington replies, quickly defending his course of action before the woman’s rebuttal can have a chance at being offered, “but what did you expect me to do!? You tried to kill yourself!” “And you think being kept in your fucking basement is a better alternative!?” the imprisoned young woman questions aloud, the answer that she’s given doing little to satisfy her. “Then letting you go off and keep trying to get yourself killed? Yeah, I do!” Harlington retorts, nodding along with the conclusion that sets his captive on a direct-course with a panic attack, “you can’t get yourself killed, Beth! You need to be alive in order for any of this to get better!” Looking into the distance without the ability to breathe freely, the runaway librarian sucks up every small gulp of air she can take in before her captor leaves his seat, dropping to a knee beside her. Violently throwing herself back in an attempt at getting as far away from her kidnapper as she can manage, Beth shakes her head without the ability to refuse her imprisoner’s help, his nonacceptance to leaving her to fend for herself leaving little alternative choice. “I’m not going to hurt you, I promise!” Harlington calmly reassures the woman, gently placing the palm of his hand against the back of the frantic young lady’s own, his other hand resting on her left knee, “you’re safe and no one’s going to hurt you. The air is fine, you are fine, and everything that seems wrong about any of this will be fixed before you know it!” Her lungs expended to such great lengths that the veins in her neck appear more defined through her soft skin, Beth’s fight against the man’s calming tone is forced to vanish in the name of self-preservation, her lungs finally freeing one breath of air to come in after another. Gradually lowering her down from the anxious, terror-filled horror that had enraptured the woman, Harlington watches her eyes become more at peace as she finally comes into a more manageable state of mind. “I’m going to try and explain as much as I can right down, but I’m gonna promise you this...” the unrestrained man explains, trying his best to speak to the woman as calmly and collected as he can manage, “...you’re not going to believe all of it just yet.” Gently removing his touch from the woman’s skin, Harlington steps back to the chair across from him, trying to remain as approachable as he can manage to keep from the situation escalating beyond control once more. “I lied to you the other day when I insinuated that someone was paying me to stalk you” the man confesses, appearing strangely more trustworthy and less-deranged than he has any right to be, though the woman across from him refuses to buy into such an act being an accurate representation. Staying as alert as she can manage despite the situation she finds herself in, Beth’s reservations are kept unspoken, her eyes simply remaining on the man with the faintest hope all can be well. “I was stalking you, but I wasn’t doing it because someone was feeding me cash. I was stalking you because- as long as you weren’t in Remedy- it was the only way to keep an eye on you” the man confesses. “You’re not making yourself sound any less insane right now” Beth reassures, breaking through the silence to add one quip with hopes that the man’s tune can change. “Correct, and I’m fully aware that there will be portions of what I’m about to say that will make me seen even more crazy” Harlington replies, coupling his hands together to present his hostage with a gesture of hops, “just remember that I’m already aware of how little you’ll believe me.” “I don’t have any other choice, do I?” Beth questions back, watching the man’s eyes steady upon her as he remains quiet, wanting to allow her a further chance to speak. Looking toward the distance before glancing over her shoulder, the woman takes notice of the two pillows that had been duct taped over the windows in either corner, keeping her from seeing anything even as small as daylight. “You’ve got me tied to a chair, locked in a basement, and you’ve put pillows in the windows to keep me from screaming” Beth continues, shaking her head as tears and sweat bead down from her face, messing up the small amount of mascara she’d applied to her face. “I’ve got no way out of this shit hole and the only thing that I can hold onto would be that you’d- out of the goodness of your own heart- let me go” she concludes, “and here you are- pretty much promising to sound insane.” “I’m only going to sound insane because the truth of the matter is insane” Harlington corrects, shaking his head out of his own dissatisfaction, not wanting to see the woman in the state which she resides, “I’m just the one unfortunate enough to have to say the crazy-sounding shit out loud.” “Then say it” Beth interjects, her terror being put on the shelf as anger takes over, consuming her immediate functions and the willingness she has at hearing the man across from her out. “Alright fine, I was following you to make sure there was always an eye keeping out for you” Harlington replies, wasting little time in following through on what he’d wanted to confess to her, “you being in Remedy allows us to keep an eye out for you from afar. That’s not guaranteed when you’re away.” “Keep an eye out for me from what?” Beth questions back, entertaining the man’s claims whilst they remain still somewhat rooted in reality- the claims still sounding plausible for the time being. “I don’t know what I can and can’t get away with telling you yet, but what I’m sure I can tell you is that there’s something out there worth keeping you safe from” Harlington answers, assuring the woman of her importance, “your safety is so incredibly important that I can’t even do it justice.” “What does that even mean?” Beth queries, shaking her head at a loss for words, the information that she goes without being afforded making anything else that she’s told seem impossible to buy into. “It means that there’s a reason behind why some really strange things happen in Remedy. And at that- why some really strange things happen to people that call Remedy home” Harlington replies, nodding as he leans back in his seat, hoping more distance will give the woman some peace. “Almost anyone else gets into the crash that you were involved in and they end up dead” Harlington replies, holding the palms of his hands toward the woman across from him, “and yet here you are with only a few scratches.” “I got unlucky, so what?” Beth quickly retorts, only for the man across from him to redirect the conversation. “You’ve been having some fucked up dreams for the last few nights, right?” Harlington questions, watching the woman’s right eyebrow lift higher than the left, “you’ve been seeing things, having a hard time sleeping, you’ve been a little erratic at times- kinda like just a couple minutes ago with the panic attacks?” “I’ve lived a little bit of a fucked up life, what can I say?” Beth responds, writing the man’s oddly-accurate and wildly-specific assessments off as just ramblings not worth paying too much attention to. “No, you’ve been drinking the coffee” Harlington rebuttals, watching the eyebrow his forcedly-captive audience had recently lifted descend back to a more natural resting state, “and for some reason- unlike the others in Remedy Hills- you decided to stop.” “It’s not always a bad thing to kick a caffeine bug” Beth responds, still trying to remain steady in the face of the man’s claims, not wanting to allow her kidnapper to feel as though he’s managed to break through some of her boundaries. Nodding along, Harlington leans further back in his seat as his hands fall limply into his lap, the palm of one resting against the rear side of the other as he stares off into a distant corner. “I wonder why the rest of the town wouldn’t do the same thing if it were as easy as you seem to make it out to be” Harlington responds, soon redirecting his eyes back upon the woman across from him, “at that rate, I wonder why more people don’t just kick the habit when they realise their eyes never close for more than a few minutes at night.” “What are you saying? Is the coffee poisoned? Is the water poisoned? Is the- what are you saying?” Beth interjects once more, stumbling over her suggestions before finally coming along to the inquiry for clarity that sits at the front of her mind. “I’m not saying anything that I’m supposed to” Harlington responds, looking the woman in the eyes as he makes his proclamations calmly, “I’m not even following you for the reason that I’m supposed to.” “Can you please just stop talking in riddles and tell me the part that I’m supposed to think is too fucked up to believe?” Beth queries, growing tired of the directionless line of questions that she’s afforded. “You didn’t die in that crash because Remedy Hills will not allow you to die without its name being cleared” Harlington responds, swallowing the wad of saliva that’d formed in his mouth, “it wants peace that it’s not being afforded and it needs people to fight for it.” “I’m not getting anywhere with you, am I?” Beth concedes, bringing herself to accepting defeat as the hair on her head falls over her face, growing tired at the dialogue she assumes are just more riddles. “When I told you that the town was alive the other day, I meant it literally” Harlington doubles down, watching the woman’s face lift back toward him as his declaration was made, buying into it just as much as she’d bought into everything else- almost not at all.” “The fog, the coffee, the people- all of it. It’s all part of the town’s doing and that’s the part that’ll make me sound crazy” Harlington explains, watching the woman’s eyes centre upon him as he leans forward. Draping both hands over his knees, the man steadies his focus upon Beth as she keeps her lips pressed together, waiting for the man to finish his thought. “Remedy Hills is alive.” | “Penny!?” Avon exclaims, his car having been parked and left running at the very end of a row of countless others, side-stepping any law enforcement agencies that attempt to prevent his passage toward the scene of chaos. “Penny!? Penny!?” the man continues to blurt out, looking around frantically for the wardrobe he knows his wife would be wearing, finally just managing to catch the glimpse of an out-of-place green shirt within a sea of others. “Penny!” Avon proclaims again, bolting past a nearby firefighter who attempts to obstruct his passage just as all others do, only to fail much like the rest as the author nears closer to his wife. “I got an alert on my phone a couple of minutes ago! I had no idea the explosion happened here!” the man proclaims as he holds his lover close, her arms wrapping around him to reciprocate his embrace, though she makes an easily-recognisable effort to pull away rather quickly. “Avon, listen- I’ve got to get to work here!” Penny pleads, looking up into her husband’s eyes as he takes her face into his hands, tears having formed in his eyes out of the fear that his wife could’ve been amongst those lost in the attacks. “Work? Didn’t you just come from a bar!?” Avon retorts, releasing his hold of each side of the woman’s face as his hands take toward her own, fingers wrapping around her palms as she again tries to make an attempt at returning to duty. “I had one drink. I’m performing surgery, I’m disinfecting wounds and bandaging people up- there’s clearly not a ton of reason to sideline me completely with what’s going on” Penny answers, again pulling away as she dismisses her husband’s concerns, “honey, I really have to get back to work.” Forced to give her husband the cold shoulder, the medical professional returns her attention to the wounded that are scattered amongst the inferno that Remedy’s first department desperately tries to get under control. Left behind, Avon tries to console himself with the guarantee that his wife was at least unharmed, the jarring sight of chaos that rages well into the night being the only other certainty he’s afforded. Aware that his wife’s service is needed by people other than himself, Avon tries to bring himself away from the horrified mindset that had prompted him to speed through traffic at rates that would otherwise have seen him pulled over and ticketed heavily for. “Avon, get back home!” Beau proclaims, catching the faintest glimpse of the man from the corner of his eye before pointing at his person, “lock your doors and don’t answer unless it’s your wife or one of us!” “Why!?” the author questions back, watching the younger officer hang his head and pull away from the more experienced partner that continues for their cruiser’s driver’s seat. Meeting the policeman halfway, Avon waits to hear the other man’s reasoning until they’re no more than a few feet apart, watching as Beau’s hands take toward his hips with immense dissatisfaction. “Rico Martinez escaped from the correctional facility a few miles down the road earlier tonight” the hotshot cop confesses, watching the author’s eyes immediately take the information as a reason to prop further open. “I know most people around these parts don’t like you, but I’m gonna warn you anyway- don’t tell anyone this...” Beau proceeds, keeping his voice lower as he takes another two steps toward the town’s newest resident, “I’ve got every reason to believe this was his doing.” “What? The fire?” Avon questions back, the proclamation that the cop offers him being accompanied by a gesture to the decimated medical building. “Jake and I were in the emergency room right before it went off- it was a bomb” Beau corrects, refusing to mince words with the closest thing to a non-uniformed friend he has, “there was a patient. Some guy- just like the attorney from the precinct a few days ago- came in to finish the patient off.” “So one of the dudes in the Smiley face group?” Avon questions aloud, only for Beau to shrug his shoulders and nod at, appearing as if he weren’t sure, but making it clear that he’s drawn his own conclusion. “The patient he finished off had a bomb ticking down inside of him. Jake and I just barely managed to get a few corners away before it went off” the younger officer proceeds, “the fact that the entire precinct was ordered here on the same night that Rico escapes can’t be a coincidence.” “To be quite honest with you- it doesn’t sound like it is” Avon replies, passing the man the faintest hint of sarcasm, one that Beau takes like a playful jab on the chin. “Listen, just get back to your house and lock your doors. Penny’s gonna be safe here for as long as the place is swarmed with cops” the younger policeman proclaims, pulling away from the discourse to return to his vehicle in the search for answers, “just lock yourself down and I’ll send your wife home with an escort.” Triggering his sirens, Jake floods Remedy’s normally-quiet streets with the flashing blue and red lights that it has come to find frequently on this night. Whilst the author watches on, the pair of officers retreat from the scene that their presence as victims is no longer asked for, hurrying in the opposite direction as the crowd that gathers together in the name of getting a front row seat to the chaos. == Remedy Hills == |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
December 2025
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