Restless

Lakeview Hotel: Sex, Lies and Videotape

There’s a stairway up out of the prison, surprisingly enough, and when she walks far enough she finds not only the shore of the lake but a boat dock. It’s foggy as hell now but on the other side of the lake she can just barely see the outline of a building. She gets into one of the boats and unties it. Jenny has never rowed a boat in her life, not that she can remember, and her arms hurt after only a couple of minutes. But if she keeps going, she’ll be at the Lakeview and see Mitchell. And she still has the videotape stuffed into a pocket of the jacket.

When she gets there she remembers the place after all. It has a nice little garden, which doesn’t even look overgrown, and the inside is old-fashioned with wood paneling everywhere. All the doors seem to be locked, though. She shouts for Mitchell but there’s only silence. Once she hears something thumping through the hallways, reaches for the gun, but then everything is quiet again. Finally one door opens, Room 312. When she gets inside she wonders if this is the room they stayed in all those years ago.

“All the rooms probably look alike,” she tells herself. Then she sits on the bed and puts the tape into the VCR.

It’s Mitchell, looking into the camera, oddly formal like he always was, wearing the grey suit.

“Today we’re in Silent Hill at the Lakeview Hotel. And… we went to the historical society today, didn’t we, and found out about the religious history of this place and… why are we doing this, Jenny?”

Her own voice is off camera, encouraging him to just play along.

“All right, well, we’re having a good time on our vacation. This is a nice place, really. Very peaceful, and I like it here.” He coughs then, and Jenny winces as she watches him.

Then the scene changes. Mitchell is lying in bed, not the bed here but somewhere else. He’s under the covers, wearing pajamas. At first Jenny can’t figure out what’s going on. They’d never have taken a sex video. Mitchell would have had a fit at the very idea. Then she sees herself, holding a pillow. Now she knows exactly what this is a videotape of. She wants desperately to close her eyes but she can’t; she just watches in horror as she presses the pillow down over Mitchell’s face. He’s struggling… oh, god, she remembers how long he fought her; it seemed like forever even though he was so weak by then.

Finally Mitchell lies still and the tape ends in static. Jenny just sits there, trying to cry, but she can’t. Finally she leaves, wanders down the stairs, tries to figure out what happens now. When she walks into the restaurant, Ian is there.

“Did you find Mitchell?” he asks.

“I watched the tape. Mitchell isn’t here. He’s dead because… because I killed him.”

Ian just nods. “And not three years ago. Three days ago.”

“I felt sorry for him; he was in so much pain...”

“But he didn’t want you to kill him. He said he’d live with the pain if he could spend his last few days with you.”

“You make him sound so romantic—“ she protested.

“But he said it.”

Jenny just nods.

“You never did anything for Mitchell. He didn’t even want that much, and you complained about every little thing,’ Ian says.

“That’s not true, I—“

“You kept promising him someday you’d have a baby, but you were lying. You never wanted any children at all.” Ian says. “All he wanted was a son, someone—“

“To name after that grandfather of his. Ian Sunderland.” Jenny looks over at the chair but of course it’s empty now.

Finally she gets up. There’s nowhere to go… even if she could get back to the boat dock, find her car, what would happen then? Can she go back to the world knowing what she did? But she passes into the next room anyway, a banquet hall, and shuts the door behind her. There’s a little stage, and they’re on it, and it’s no surprise.

“Jenny!”

It’s Mike, with the pyramid thing behind him, an arm wrapped around his neck. “Jenny, help me!”

She just stares. The thing runs a hand up Mike’s thigh and rubs his crotch. A tongue protrudes from under the helmet and licks his neck. He screams. “Don’t! Jenny, don’t let this thing—“

“It’s over,” says Jenny flatly. “It’s finished.”

Pyramid Head raises the knife and stabs Mike in the back, the blade running out through his chest, blood pouring over the stage. Jenny just watches as Mike falls with dead horror in his eyes.

“Your turn,” she says to Pyramid Head, raising the gun. She shoots, but it only walks off the stage, drops to the ground, keeps walking toward her. Jenny reloads, shoots again, keeps going. The bullets clang off the helmet but Pyramid Head doesn’t stop walking toward her. Finally she’s face to face with it, and she knows the gun is no use. Then the monster lifts the knife and Jenny waits for the pain – but instead it slits its own throat. Blood pours out over the apron as Jenny stares. Now she’s properly sickened, watching the thing fall to the ground in a red pool, and she runs from the room, finds a white hallway that shouldn’t be there and just keeps running.

She can hear voices as she runs.

“Jenny… stop visiting me, I’m no good to you anymore…”

“Mrs. Sunderland, the insurance isn’t going to cover anything but hospice care now…”

“I’m costing you too much money, aren’t I Jenny?”

“At least let me come home to die…”

At the end of the hallway there’s a door, and when she opens it she finds herself blinking in sunlight.


The Ending: In Water


She’s in front of a store, right there in Silent Hill. And she sees him, in his suit, waiting for her.

“Mitchell...?”


“I don’t think so. I think Mitchell is dead, since you killed him.”

It’s just Mike, in that T-shirt, getting closer and closer to her.

“I thought you were dead, Mike,” Jenny says. “And you might as well be.”

“What do you mean by that? I thought you wanted me, wanted to see if I was any better in bed than he was. Just think how much fun we could have, Jenny. And I wouldn’t even spend as much money as he did.”

“You’re not Mitchell,” she replies flatly.

“But you never wanted Mitchell anyway… So just shut the hell up about your husband. You can’t have him!”

She can see Mike’s face ripple and change, turn white and fanged. He’s just another monster, or maybe he always was. Jenny doesn’t even hesitate, just lifts the gun and shoots at him.

He’s still moving, and something sharp stabs her. Mike has claws now, but he’s bleeding all over, and when she shoves him away he falls to the ground and stares up at her with eyes that aren’t dead yet.

“Jenny...”

She’s heard that voice too often. Jenny reloads and shoots Mike in the face, and he doesn’t even scream. Now he looks almost human again, a human corpse covered with blood and gore. And she still doesn’t want him.

The car is right there behind her, and she gets in, turns the key. All the walls are gone now; all the streets are whole, so she just keeps driving. She wonders if she could even drive away from Silent Hill, but she has no intention to. After a few turns she finally sees the lake and that’s exactly what she wants. She drives right up to the dock, boards rumbling under her tires, and just keeps going over the edge.

Mitchell’s voice is in her head. “I love you, Jenny. I didn’t mean to get sick, to lie there in that bed, to be such a damned trial to you.”

She only hopes her breath will be gone quickly.

“Mitchell… I’m sorry…” she murmurs as the car sinks into the water.