Page 62 of Take You Home

When he turns around, Chester is still standing frozen in the middle of the room, his eyes fixed on the floor and his arms crossed tightly like he’s trying to hold himself together. Guilt roiling through him, Obie strides over, putting his hands on Chester’s shoulders. “Locke‍—Locke, breathe, okay? Just breathe. Are you all right? Come on, Chester, look at me‍?—‍‍”

Abruptly, Chester’s hand snaps up, wrapping tightly around Obie’s wrist. He looks up to meet Obie’s gaze, and his eyes are watery like he’s fighting back tears and his lips are pressed together like he’s barely maintaining his composure and‍?—

His voice twines through Obie’s head.Did the Sanctum kill my family?

Obie’s heart falls.

Of course. Chester was never even willing to believe that the Sanctum had any communication with the Chain‍—withdemons‍—letalone that they were capable of doing something as heinous as targeting human families just to make more soldiers.

But Chester just saw hard evidence that the Sanctum’s recent influx of neophytes has been coming straight from the Chain. And he didn’t only see it in Maggie’s documents, either; he saw it with his own eyes in the prison itself, in every signature forged to look like “T. Roz.”

After all that, it’s no longer outside the realm of possibility that the Sanctum could’ve targeted his family. It’s no longer unthinkable that the Council has been lying to him from the start,manipulatinghim from the start, using his trauma from his family’s deaths to groom and mold him into their perfect killing machine.

And Chester knows just as well as Obie does that they can only tell the truth through the telepathic link. Taking a deep breath, he meets Chester’s eyes.Yes. They did.

Part of Obie almost hopes the words won’t transmit, but he knows he’s right when Chester’s face suddenly crumples. He hunches in on himself, a strangled sob choking out of his throat, and Obie’s heart shatters right along with it.

“Oh, Chester,” he whispers, and he pushes into the bond again, needing his words to ring through as clearly and truly as possible.I’m so sorry. You don’t deserve this. No one deservesanyof what you’ve had to go through. I wish‍—I wish I could make it right for you.

For a split second, Chester goes rigid. Like he doesn’t know what to make of Obie’s words, like he doesn’t know how to react to someone honestly caring about him.

And then, with a pained noise, he lurches forward, stepping directly into Obie’s arms and burying his face in Obie’s shoulder. Obie wraps his arms around Chester immediately, pulling him close as sobs wrack through him, keeping him steady as his shoulders shake and his legs tremble.

Trying to hold him together as much as he can.

“I’ve got you,” Obie murmurs into Chester’s hair, and after a moment of hesitation, he pushes the same words through the bond.I’ve got you, okay? I promise I won’t let go.

They end up standing there for a long time.

20

Chester wakes up feeling like absolute garbage. His eyes are sore and his throat is scratchy and he just feels bone-deepdrained,like he’s been squeezed dry and wrung out too much to recover this time.

And he feels… warm. Feverish, even.

Maybe he’s getting sick. Maybe he won’t bother going to the infirmary for it. Maybe he’ll just keep getting worse and worse, and maybe‍?—

Maybe he’ll get to see his family again.

His family. His throat threatens to close off at the thought, fresh tears burning behind his eyes. Mom and Dad and Mikey and Tony and Ricky. All of them gone, all of them dead, all of themmurdered‍—all because of the Sanctum. TheSanctumtargeted them, theSanctumworked with the Chain to orchestrate their deaths‍?—

The Sanctum gave the order to let Chester alone survive. A perfectly willing prototype for them to experiment on, to see if they could use his grief and anger to turn him into a ruthless torturer, tobrainwash him into thinking that demons were evil and that humans‍—thathunters‍—always had the moral high ground.

He remembers arriving at the Sanctum that first day when he was ten years old. He remembers sitting next to another scared little boy, a scared little boy who would grow up to be his best friend. He remembers the Council talking with Chester and JJ, remembers them explaining what happened, remembers theirsympathy.

Remembers believing that he was going to be safe. The thought makes his skin crawl. Even if the rank-and-file hunters don’t know what’s going on, the Council must’ve known the score from the start, must’ve had their plans from the start.

Must’ve been playing them from the start.

What else has been a lie over the past twelve years? Anxiety twists through his belly, taut and unyielding. When they put Chester’s and JJ’s bedrooms on opposite ends of the Sanctum, effectively separating them, was that on purpose? When they put JJ on a strike team but Chester in the prison, was that another deliberate decision?

Unbidden, Obie’s conversation with Sawyer at the end of July flashes through Chester’s mind.

Why?

To separate him and JJ, obviously. To isolate Chester from anyone who would tolerate him questioning the Sanctum.

How about making Chester torture JJ for his final exam, something they must’ve known would destroy their relationship in ways that Chester still hasn’t fully come to terms with? How much of his life has been tainted by everything the Sanctum took from him?

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