ᴡᴏʀꜱʜɪᴘ ᴍᴇ (ᴇᴊ x ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ)

14: Renewal

Eight hours. The next priest, Adam Krul, lived eight hours away somewhere in Michigan. Your hands felt like they were going to fall off any minute now. Gas stations and rest stops had only helped but so much. It was nearing 2 pm, and you'd practically been driving from the second you'd woke up.

By now you were deep into rural Michigan. Leafless trees lined the roads, foliage long stripped by the cold wind. The sky was a dull grey, and a little thermometer icon on the car's screen told you it was nearly freezing outside. The grassy fields on either side of the road had a layer of frost over them. Though it was midday, the sun hadn't come out to melt away the ice.

The car ride was quiet as it always was. Jack was slumped in his seat, leaning against the door of the car with his gaze turned out the window. Aside from telling you to find somewhere to stop every now and then, he hadn't spoken. You could tell he wasn't one for small talk, and neither of you was too keen on talking about heavier topics. Stalking, murder, and death weren't things you wanted to think about. You were glad he hadn't brought it up.

Glancing down at the GPS, you saw there were only ten minutes left. You gulped. You wanted to forget about the committee. Even after everything you just wished they'd poof out of existence so you'd never have to deal with them again. But something like that wasn't possible. Jack wanted them gone, and the only way that was going to happen was if he got rid of them himself. And of course that meant you had to be there to witness it all alongside him.

The ETA ticked down until you were right down the street from your destination. Adam's residence was different from the other two. Both had lived in neighborhoods, but as you drove you never found an entrance nor were there any houses along the street. The only thing this road seemed to lead to was a large white building.

Father Krul didn't live in a house, no, he lived in a church.

When your car neared the church you didn't turn into the entrance. You drove straight past it, hardly looking in its direction as you pressed down harder on the acceleration. Its white exterior seemed blinding, shining under the sun and burning your eyes in your peripheral vision. You could feel your heartbeat quickening, and you only started to panic more when Jack turned to you after hearing the GPS declare that you'd arrived.

"What's wrong? Why aren't you stopping?" He asked, the eyes of his mask staring at you.

You glanced between him and the road for several seconds before choking out. "...It's a church."

The car fell back into silence. Both of you knew what Father Krul residing in a church meant. He wasn't a changed man, he hadn't turned a new leaf. That horrible man had only started again.

The cult had been renewed.

Neither of you spoke as you sped away from the church. Jack never vocalized his anger, but you could feel it radiating from him. His fists were balled and his foot continuously tapped against the floor. In this moment he wasn't bothering to hide his emotions. Gone were his cold walls that blocked you from knowing what he was thinking. With the way he was acting now, you could practically hear his thoughts.

Horror, shock, rage. Both of you knew the committee was made up of selfish, cruel, people, and yet neither of you had ever imagined one of them would try to start back up the cult. Before Jack had shown up you'd forced yourself to stop thinking about them, and after he revealed they had run away from their past lives you assumed it'd stay that way. That they'd remain as cowards and pretend like nothing had ever happened.

Adam Krul was the outlier. He hadn't put the past behind him, he'd embraced it and brought back what should have died at the massacre. How many people had he brainwashed so far? How many people had he hurt? You didn't have the answer to any of the numerous questions running through your mind, and a part of you was terrified to find out more.