Chapter 109

A ghostly chill penetrated the hallway outside the infirmary, drilling into my bones with needle points. The sick, twisted part of me welcomed the cold because I knew it, could stick a label on its familiarity, when days ago I hadn't felt it at all, even though mine and everyone's breaths had caught in the air.

I ran the glove on my broken hand along my itchy scales on the other. Maybe my theory about the ghosts still being inside me held weight. Maybe I was haunted, and the cold the rest of the crew had felt was because of me. Now, with the doppelganger's ghost on the ship, I had to hope I would be fine. I had iron to repel it, and I had fresh, happy parasites to spark my addiction. Once again, I was dressed in my corset, leather pants, boots, and ice pick necklaces - thanks to Ellison's help. And jammed down the front of my corset was the cylinder of consumectalons I'd filmed, only because I had nowhere else to currently put it. I was me again. Mostly.