15.

A priest and an injured father to be stand in the opened doorway on hallowed ground, a home they have shared with others for the longest period of time any of them have had a place to call home since a madness took the world from them. It may have been taken from them though as they see it, they have more of a right to it then the dead do.

Two men at the gateway to heaven with many a reason for worry. The mind of the priest has been fading so, it will only be a matter of time before it will no longer be his. His current company had unintentionally disclosed his wound to one who may forget about it in the very next instance, a wound too which looks so unnatural it places with him the oddest of connections with the dead. The priest is also just as likely to announce the wound to the others and either intentionally or unintentionally at that. Outside, a hell is gathering.

Indeed, the dead currently outside are more than has ever been so close in the time and of the living have been calling this ground home. Two entities begin to move up the stone steps, eying up and indeed making a way towards a meal they wish to claim, a meal just waiting to be claimed.

For a brief moment, those two members of the dead stop and look on, then they continue their approach. To Father Anthony, it is almost as if Jason does have some sort of power over those entities. Is a wound responsible for their approach? Did they respond to him in some manner? Is a wound responsible for the high numbers of dead currently in the vicinity?

Surely a time to move on is imminent, before at least, the outside becomes ... overcrowded.

As those dead do approach, Jason has himself a moment. In this moment, four members of a camping trip he and Jenny were once a part of, return to him as ghosts only he can hear and see, that's if they can be there at all. They stand at the base of those stone step. Dereck, the storyteller from that camping trip, sends up a salute.

'C'mon now Jason' Father Michael says as Jason steps forward to the outside of those doors, himself having a good look around. 'Close the doors, play time is over.'

Jason hesitates, surely these are the first signs that he is losing himself. There were other signs in which he had refused to take note of. This sign too is one he does not want to pay much attention to either. He can indeed hear a voice speak to him but chooses not to listen. Arguments can be made for both men standing at the open church doors to the fact as to who needs a bit of work done the most and as to if the right tools are available to get either job done. Yeah, sometimes the right tools do fit the right job and sometimes the tools don't exist.

Even with the connection thing to which he seems to have acquired, Jason could not have predicted with the assessment of what he had seen beyond those doors, that there was to be a sudden appearance of a member of the living dead, arriving all of a sudden from the left to be almost directly in front the most unlikely of duos. He ... it, must have been close to the doors upon opening with a distraction preventing his appearance from arriving before now.

At the very same time and by chance a ragdoll cat who so has happened to survive the zombie apocalypse to date makes its presence known and it is close enough that without thinking Father Anthony grabs that cat and throws it right at the head of this zombie intruder.

The intruder is knocked over, slithers down those stone steps and the cat bounces right inside the open doors, that cat even knows as to where it now belongs, and it ain't outside. The church doors are once again closed and locked.

'You are not right. You do know that ... don't you?'

'Father?' questions Jason with some surprise to this sudden ... outburst, yeah Jason may have provoked a response, but the priest with the tone he just took, almost seems ... crazy.

'He has told me; you are getting too much like them.'

'Who are you talking about, Father?'

'You, I am talking about you, and I know what I must do ...'

The priest's eyes look ... crazy. His sudden turn, is this something related to his forgetfulness, whatever has been taking a hold of him up to now, seems to have hit a possible breaking point? With the doors locked, Jason is to be left temporally alone with the priest storming off in a frantic huff.

Things are off ... things are certainly off ...