The ringing... it was so loud, almost deafening. In the closed-in spaces of the subway, after narrowly avoiding being squashed by an ambulance, pounced by hunters, or startling a witch, it was a wonder they had even made it far enough to get to that alarm.
And, quite frankly, Ellis was terrified. He wasn't afraid to admit it- he wasn't like Nick. He wouldn't lie and say he wasn't scared. He wouldn't try to put on a brave face to save his image. No, he wasn't like Nick at all, but sometimes he wished he were.
And now was one of those times.
Nick yelled out some sort of insult to an infected woman that clawed at his suit, her hair stuck to bits of skull as the shotgun blast ripped her apart. Rochelle screamed as a hunter pulled her away. Coach cried out for help.
The alarm still rang, and Ellis, being the only one who wasn't being completely bombarded, merely trying to fire at the zombies that held Nick away from helping their team, knew that there was one way he could be of some sort of help.
Turn off that damned alarm.
He wished he was like Nick. Nick would know what to do - he always did. He had the idea of jumping into the pool from the roof, had the idea of searching a room that just so happened to give them a hint on where to go. He had known to avoid the men at the church, standing around and hollering something in Spanish. He had known.
He always knew.
Ellis could easily admit the man was attractive. Nick had to be, if his stories were true. And, though he sometimes doubted all of Nick's tales, he hadn't pegged the conman to be a dishonest man all the time.
And Ellis, of course, was an excellent judge of character.
The two had hated each other at first, Ellis out of defense and Nick... well, Ellis didn't know why Nick hated him so much. The man had started off by insulting his accent, calling Ellis a no-good Hick - many things that most people would say were inexcusable.
Oh no, not Ellis. Ellis kept trying. He's long ago accepted that no matter what he did, there would be people who hated him - but this was ridiculous. What had Ellis done to deserve hatred so quickly?
Or, perhaps Nick was reacting out of fear? He had a hard time believing that the man, no matter how 'rough' he seemed to be, was truly so cruel as to hate a man on sight. Then again, the law hadn't allowed him to have possession of fire arms.
Alright, so perhaps Nick was a tad rough around the edges, but he wasn't all bad, and Ellis knew that.
Mental fingers pointed at the night they were stuck, alone, separated from Coach and Rochelle, in an old military camp.
At first, Nick was all toughness, screaming into a radio, with no response, of course. The man cursed, slamming it onto a table. The rain outside pounded onto the roof, and the loud sound made Ellis' body jerk away from Nick in shock, eyes wide.
Nick glared at him.
"What, kid?" Nick hissed through gritted teeth, and Ellis looked down slowly, shivering. He was wet, he was cold, and he was scared. Not a good combination.
"...Nuthin'." Ellis had responded, and he curled further into himself in a desperate attempt to regain his lost body heat. He coughed; it was getting worse. He was freezing... he was getting sick, and he knew that wasn't in the least a good thing, especially not with a god damn zombie apocalypse.
"Kid, don't go messing around." Nick growled, eyes flashing in anger as he grabbed onto Ellis' collar, bringing him up. Ellis was forced to look into Nick's green eyes, Emerald tones soothing him into calm. Nick stared at him for a moment before grunting, shoving Ellis away, slamming him into the fence that Ellis had previously been leaning against.
"I ain't 'fraid of you, Nick." Ellis murmured, his eyes darker than normal as said man whirled around to face the southerner once again.
"What did you just-"
"I ain't afraid of you." The boy repeated, his eyes finally meeting Nick's. They stared for a moment before Nick looked away, running his hand through damp hair.
"...What do you suggest we do, 'el'."
"I dunno." Ellis responded honestly, shrugging his shoulders. He coughed again, moaning in discomfort as the wind picked up outside, blowing rain directly into his face. He grunted angrily, crawling to the right, away from the broken doors.
"If you aren't going to say something useful, Ellis, then-"
"There's nuthin' we can do." Ellis interrupted, and Nick froze. "Face it, Nick, we're alone here, until this storm passes. So why doncha just sit down and relax for a while? It'll do ya good."
Nick stayed in place for a moment, leaning on the table with the radio for support for a moment before he closed his eyes, rubbing his temples. "...Alright. Why not." The conman sat a good distance away from Ellis, and the southerner frowned, biting his lip.
"...Nick."
"What, kid?"
"...It's gon' be okay." Ellis whispered, and something in the room changed. Nick's shoulders slumped as his head came back to hit the fence, his eyes closed, lips pursed, but not in anger. As if he was keeping something back.
Tears? Naw, Nick wouldn't be cryin'. Not him. Not-
But he was. A small, lone tear fell, but that was all. Ellis felt his heart stop, his stomach flip, his own eyes water. He was watching a strong man admit defeat.
"...Don't give up, Nick. It ain't the end of the world-"
Both men chuckled at the irony, but Ellis continued, "We kin' make it through this. Man, we've made it through so much already, d'be a shame if we went out now, wouldn't it?"
Nick allowed himself to chuckle before he opened those bright green eyes, staring at the wall emotionlessly.
"Sure, kid. It would be a damn shame, wouldn't it?"
The two had continued their conversation, speaking of their old lives, and the kind of people they met, the people they loved that were dead now. More than once Ellis thought Nick would lose his composure - he never did.
Something changed, that night. Nick stopped calling him 'Kid'. Stopped calling him 'El'. Stopped teasing him, ridiculing him. The only name he called him was 'Ellis'. That, in itself, was enough to change Ellis' mind about... about... well, everything. They'd make it through this. They had to.
And now, that damned alarm was threatening it all.
He had to help. His team needed him.
So he pushed on, slamming the butt of his gun in the faces of many zombies, shoving them back before shooting them, gritting his teeth, tightening his jaw. His arms were sweaty, his body trembling, on the verge of collapse as he pushed forward, blood dripping from his brow. His vision was blurry, his grip on his gun was loosening... just a few moments of rest couldn't hurt, could it-
A loud, pained scream from Nick rang louder than the alarms, and Ellis awakened from his tired thoughts, growling at the zombies as they came closer.
The alarm's switch was just up these stairs...
Nick yelled in anger, fighting a hunter off of him. As he rolled over the top of it, he repeatedly hacked it to bits with the fire ax he held in his hands - Rochelle came to pull him off, and Coach stopped.
Silence. They stood in shock for a moment - the hordes had stopped coming. Nick frowned, wiping a small bit of blood from his hands - he was pretty sure it wasn't his. The shrill, mind-numbing noise of the alarm had been silenced... but how?
"Heh... alright, Ellis, so you were right. I guess we should have been more c- Ellis?"
Nick turned to his left.
No sign of Ellis. His right.
Nothing.
He looked behind him.
His heart nearly stopped as he looked up at Coach, then down to Rochelle. She also shrugged, panic registering in her eyes.
"Ellis? Ellis, sweetie where-"
"AAAGH!"
The cry was enough to launch all three of them into action. Ellis' scream had been shocking - but the hunter's yell of hunger was even more frightening than the cry itself.
Nick was first. His long legs put to good use, he shot forward, racing through the station hurriedly. As he neared the stairs, a horde of zombies greeted him, blocking his path. He yelled in anger, annoyance and, dare he admit it...
Fear. Pure, unadulterated fear. His emerald eyes shimmered as he cried out in pain at his legs being beat against by an infected that had his legs cut - he finished him off of with a single slash of the ax.
Ellis' cry pierced through the air again, and Nick was going into overdrive. His fingers deftly pulled out his shotgun, pulling the trigger as fast as he good, blowing the infected away from him.
The cry died.
The hunter's didn't.
Nick felt his heart stop. The silence, other than the guttural growling of the hunter that was more than likely coming around the corner for him, was thick and oppressing. His entire being felt useless, and if he came up those stairs and found what he thought he would -
It's gon' be alright, Nick.
The voice from the military base rang in his ears, and he stepped up, shooting the hunter fearlessly.
He knew what he'd find. He hadn't a doubt in his mind. Still, the mere sight of it made him want to wretch, find the nearest trash can and empty what little he had for breakfast out onto the floor.
Ellis, lying in a pool of his own blood. Ellis, slashed open beyond recognition - legs spread pathetically, arms limp, one over his chest and the other out, as if he had been searching for something - his gun, merely two inches away from his hand.
On his other side?
The deactivation switch for the alarm.
Rochelle let out a choked cry, covering her mouth as she turned away, crouching slightly and leaning her head forward, tears dripping behind her fingers. Coach bowed his head, muttering soft prayers.
Nick couldn't move. He simply stared.
Sacrifice.
What was it that Ellis said?
" 'Don't give up, Nick. It ain't the end of the world. '"Nick quoted, slowly sliding off his jacket. He stepped forward, and for a moment, all else was silent. Rochelle silenced her cries, watching in shock. Coach, too, halted his prayers to watch in respect.
Nick knelt on one knee, placing the white jacket, the third part of his favorite, expensive suit, over Ellis' mangled body. "It's been fun, K- ...Ellis." Nick smiled lightly, standing and turning away from the two behind him, pulling up his supplies.
"Let's get out of here. The screaming would have attracted the infected. We've gotta move."
He didn't leave without Ellis' hat.
Days passed. Days turned into weeks, weeks into months. Months into years. Not a day went by that Nick didn't wake up in the middle of the night, chest heaving, throwing the covers away from his body and rushing to the toilets, emptying what little he had to eat that day. Some things had never - and would never, for that matter - change. It didn't matter how they had gotten to Barcelona, Spain, and to be honest Nick didn't even remember, not that he had wanted to. He had purposely deleted those particular files from his memory. All he remembered was Ellis' sacrifice; if it hadn't been for that sweet-talkin', zombie-lovin', tractor ridin' hick he called a team mate, they wouldn't be alive.
No. He wasn't a simple 'team mate'. He wasn't just one more body, kept only to keep them alive. He was more than that.
Nick hadn't known the word. Not until now. But they'd crossed the boundaries of 'acquaintances' that night at the base. They weren't just 'holding out' until rescue. They weren't tolerating each other, anymore. They were...
It was hard for him to say. To think about. All his life, he'd been alone. He chuckled to himself, his eyes slowly drifting across his bedroom to rest on a single glass case. The one memory he held.
The hat.
He wasn't an extra health pack once he died. He... he was a friend.
With the memories of Barcelona and the base fresh in his mind, his eyes slowly slid closed, loosening their grip on the blankets as he faded away into a new nightmare, one that every time, he would awaken from to enter an even worse one.
"It ain't the end of the world."
"Yes it is, Ellis. It's the end of yours."
Sorry for the slight OOCness. Okay, more than slight. xD I tried! Better than my other one, right?
Anyway, as with 'The Coldest Stream', this is based on an in-game role-play a friend of mine and I had. I almost cried. Sorry it drags on, but I felt the need to explain a few things. Hope it didn't mess it up!
Review, please, if you have the time~