Me First [Mr. Scratch & Alan Wake]
They are in a bedroom like the hotel bedrooms down in Night Springs, but this is the Dark Place. Alan still remembers: how Scratch had him dragged out from the hall and into the room, pinned against the wall, and they fought in a hand-in-hand combat only to be led beneath his weight on an once cleansed bed. Yet the red against white isn’t only Alan’s own.
Blood slips out of Scratch’s lips, and for the first time Alan has his mouth parted to taste it. Feels like himself. He doesn’t lick them off—it oozes down the tongue and down the throat. Alan lets it go. They aren’t so different. Scratch tightens the hold around his neck without tenderness, instead with an insistence in keeping Alan laid down and defenseless.
Alan punches Scratch’s ribs. It’s just like hitting water. He tries again, and again, and the laugh comes growled. Hitches only when Alan manages to find the draft of it. More blood pours and Scratch spits it over Alan’s face.
“You aren’t getting away,” the distorted voice threatens. “This is your end.”
A mouth clicks.
“I would never say that.” Another Scratch says whilst sitting on a nearby chair. He wasn’t there about three minutes ago. “Is this the version of me you want to be in your story, Wake?”
The other Scratch hisses, easing the hold to pay attention to his other self. “You are the weaker one.”
“You barely have any lines! All you do is whine, growl, roar… what are you, a dog?”
Alan, taken back by fear and anger all the same, tries: “He is a monster like—”
“Shh baby, we are having an important conversation here.” The elegant Scratch gestures vaguely. “Now, why are you stealing my role? I had it first.”
“You lost it.”
The banter goes on, and Alan groans, sinking in the bloody sheets, hoping to find a breach against Scratch or that this yet another loop would end soon.
(It did not. At least, not as soon as he wanted.)