With the railroad spike gripped in his right hand, flashlight in his left, Castiel climbed to his feet and backed away from the Claire doppelganger, unwilling to strike her down, even though he knew her appearance was a lie.
“You’re not Claire.”
It took him another moment or two to see through his own misperception. The evolving pontianak hadn’t taken on Claire’s appearance. She’d become the spitting image of Chloe. In the darkness, lit by the darting beam of the flashlight, his eyes had deceived him once again. How could he trust himself to determine who really stood before him? The recent mothers had been consumed by homicidal rages. Chloe and Olivia had slipped into a comatose state. In light of those events, he could imagine a situation where Chloe had left her maternity bed and made her way out here. What if he was looking at the real Chloe Sikes now, not a reanimated corpse that had taken on her likeness? Could he risk killing her?
One of the other newborn pontianaks struck him from behind, a powerful and painful blow with her fresh claws, slicing through his coat and raking his flesh. Wincing in pain, he drove his forearm into the collarbone of the pontianak on his left and slammed her into the walk next to the Dutch door of a horse stall.
He raised the railroad spike next to his ear, a moment away from driving the crude point deep into the newly formed hole at the nape of her neck. But she shimmered underneath his forearm, becoming another Chloe doppelganger—unless she was the real Chloe—and he stayed his hand.
Hissing, the four other pontianaks closed ranks around him.
By switching his grip, he wrapped his left arm around the throat of the second doppelganger and opened the bottom half of the Dutch door to back her into the stall. His captive reached up and clawed his arm, shredding his coat, her claws nicking his flesh, gradually slicing deeper.
One by one, the other three pontianaks shimmered and then they too took on Chloe’s appearance. He faced four of her, tenuously holding a fifth. He was running out of options. Girding himself, he raised the railroad spike again, ready to strike down his captive.
Unable to cast his doubt aside, he accepted it and whispered, “Forgive me.”