Through The Valley by Yates, B.D. (feel good books .txt) 📕

on watch tonight, it was The Reverend. Someone who wasn’t actively trying to kill him.

Maybe it's worth checking out...

He considered it a moment, then nodded to himself. It was worth checking out. An ally in the hellish situation he was in would be invaluable; especially one that could help him navigate and survive the winter wilderness long enough to find the mythical, ever-sought-after light. Someone to help carry Pup when he got too tired. And, if it came down to a brawl with Roy and his attack dog Poke, two on two was much better odds.

Emmit eyed the door, which he remembered was locked with some mechanism he wouldn’t be able to see, even if his glasses were intact and safely on his nose. That would be the next obstacle to overcome.

He ruffled Pup's oily hair gently and said "I'm gonna go get some help, Pup." He almost told the dying boy to stay there and wait for him, then thought better of it and kept his mouth shut.

  Emmit circled the shed like a bat in broad daylight, trying to plan his next move while also combating the gnawing sensation of dread in his gut. It was telling him that he had already seriously pressed his luck, and he would be discovered at any second. He refused to let it in. If he did, it would cripple him; effectively removing his legs. He might as well lay down beside Pup and wait for his turn under the hammer and knife.

  Wait, he thought suddenly. That's it.

  He slipped one of his knives out, which he had decided to hide in the layered waistbands of his pants, and then snatched the bloodied hammer off the counter. He did his best not to look at the dismembered feet, but in his blindness, he bumped into the table and sent one of them tumbling to the floor. The sole of the foot was a deep reddish purple; full of coagulating blood that had settled to the lowest points. As the foot thumped to the floor, all the stored fluid poured out as if Emmit had knocked over nothing more sinister than a cup of wine. Emmit's stomach did a somersault.

He approached the entranceway and slid the knife blade into the crack between the door and the frame. It was a tight fit for the stone blade, but with a little effort he was able to slide the knife up and down like a credit card. He jammed it in about a third of the way up the crack, then slowly slid it down until he felt it catch on something. It wouldn't be a tumbler and knob, of course, because there was no metal in the time warp. The door "handle" Roy used was nothing more than a hole for your fingers to push and pull. Whatever mechanism Roy had engineered to lock the meat locker, Emmit had found it. And he was going to destroy it.

He poked the knife around, trying to guess where a weak point in the lock might be, but it was futile without his eyesight. One spot felt just as good as another. He shrugged, muttered the words "fuck it", and began tapping the wooden handle of the knife with the stone hammer like an ancient sculptor. When he didn't feel any significant movement from whatever was holding the door securely shut, he added a little force. Then a little more. Then his arms were straining as he pounded the end of the knife. He struck the hilt of the knife so hard that the sharpened stone that comprised the blade splintered into a jigsaw puzzle that clattered around his feet like broken china.

Fuck!

  He was growing desperate now, anxious heat coming off him in waves, and he discovered that he no longer cared if anyone heard him. He had a hammer and a spare knife, didn't he? An armory behind him? Let them come.  He was done being a prisoner in this blood-drenched tomb, in this claustrophobic camp of cannibalistic criminals, and this frozen arctic wasteland where the living dead swarmed like killer bees.

  "I want out, and I'm getting out," he said to himself firmly.  Pup mumbled a sleepy response, hugging himself on the floor. Emmit began to slam the hammer into the wood of the door itself.

  Heeere's Johnny! He thought to himself, managing a strange and insane-sounding chuckle. Weak and impoverished Emmit Mills had become a powerful machine with a steam powered piston arm. The hammer rose, arced down to slam into the wood, bounced off with a brittle sounding thwack, then rose again.

  Someone will hear. Someone is already on the way.

  Let them come.  I'm ready for them.

The wood of the door had begun to form a question mark shaped crack, splintering around the scuffed and scarred wood where the stone hammerhead kept connecting. It was beginning to cave in, and now each hammer impact made a satisfying crunch. Emmit let the hammer fall to his side and began slamming his shoulder into the door, grunting and snarling with each impact, numb to the shocks that dug into his shoulder bones and the weary muscles that knitted them together. The dulled pain was a fantastic motivator; it hurt him, which made him angry, and his anger made him stronger. A hot stitch began to stab between his ribs, but even as he gasped for breath he did not relent.

Out out out OUT—

The door could stand no more abuse, and whatever locking mechanism Roy had fashioned was suddenly obliterated. Random hunks of geometrically shaped wood and stone rocketed off into the night like cannon fodder, and the door swung open and slammed against the wall of the shed. A long rectangle of firelight stretched out from Emmit's feet, turning the snow into a river of sparkling light. His shadow was a dark island in that river, his shoulders rising and falling, his body impossibly tall and brooding.

He stepped