Hiya! Welcome to a Nuke one-shot! I hope you enjoy and please leave a review!
Disclaimers:
If you don't like Nuke, then don't read!
In this fic, Nick is still alive, and never got shot in the shoulder. Luke also never got shot in the leg and didn't die in the icy lake.
Anyway, enjoy some Nick/Luke cuteness! XD
Nightmares Of Him...
He watched helplessly as Clementine brought down her bloody hatchet; the one he gave her, into Nick's skull for the third and final time. He called and screamed to the young girl and the short-haired woman beside her for them to stop, but they didn't turn around. Not once.
His hopeless voice could not be heard by the young girl or the woman... in fact, nobody. Luke was a nobody who had to watch every single second of pain take place on his loved ones... but why?
Luke stood blinking, now watching in misery as his best friends corpse gets pulled of the tattered fence and thrown carelessly onto the ground by the short-haired woman, Jane. Her face showed yet no emotion however Clementine looked saddened by what she just had to do. But fortunately, after a few words of motivation and a pat on a back, the eleven year old nodded and walked on with the woman beside her, putting the death of Nick in the very back of her traumatised mind...
But Luke stayed, he re-watched the death of his best friend take place in his mind over and over again until it was too much to handle. He fell to his knees, burying his head into his bloody hands and sobbed.
"I'm sorry Nick, I'm sorry I wasn't there for you..." the brunette man cried. Maybe he was fortunate that nobody could see him...
"Fuck, I should've known!" Luke cursed, hitting both his fist's against the solid earth, causing his knuckles to slightly bruise. He bit on his lip to ease away the pain in now both his hands, internally screaming as every move he made just seemed to become a screw up.
I'm fine Luke... was the voice that kept on repeating inside Luke's head.
Those words tormented Luke to the point that he screamed and cried into nothing in particular. His face was red, his lungs burnt, but most of all, his body felt numb...
If only you could've saved him Luke... But no. You're a screw up. Now you know what it feels like to be depressed, to feel useless... yet you threw Nick away. You told him just to get on with it as if it was the easiest thing to do. But no. It's hard, Luke, and you're going to keep beating yourself up until you finally realise... that you're not alive.
"NO!" Luke shouted, springing upwards within a flash of a second. Beads of sweat made it's way down Luke's forehead. It was the first time he actually felt 'hot' ever since falling into the icy lake... From then on, everything felt like constant hypothermia.
Nick was quick to assist Luke, bolting up out of his sleeping position and now sitting up beside his shaken friend. He could not make out many of his features in the dark, but he could see Luke, sense him really. It's been twenty years of knowing him...
Both men were alongside Clementine, Kenny, AJ, Jane, Bonnie, Mike and Arvo, seeking refuge in a small unfinished building beside the frozen lake. It was hopefully safe enough for the night before the group get going again, early in the morning. Nick and Luke shared a tiny room, sleeping on only what seemed to be thin but rough dust sheet. Not ideal, but something...
"Hey man, you okay?" Nick questioned, shaken himself as he anxiously waited for Luke to explain. It was unlike the brunette to have nightmares. They practically lived in one...
"I... I uh..." Luke shakily tried to answer. He looked to the side to see the slight silhouette of Nick's body beside him, it was then that Luke realised it was just a dream... or should he say, nightmare...
Nick was still alive. Alive and right beside him, his warmth radiating onto Luke, making his skin tingle.
"Nightmare?" Nick questioned, scooting over to the side so that he could practically be pressed against the right of Luke. He wasn't the man to show comfort but Luke needed it... They've already witnessed all the other cabin group members fall, they were all each other had left...
"Yeah... yeah something like that..." Luke tried to reply with a half hearted chuckle, however he was in too much distress due to his nightmare about Nick, that he couldn't hide his inner emotions.
"You can tell me..." Nick replied sympathetically. A small smile forming on his face as Luke pulled himself closer to Nick with ease.
"I um... are you sure?" Luke stammers slightly due to his nerves. He cuddles close to the black haired man, wrapping his arm's around one of Nick's like a small child would. He didn't care though... he needed Nick. As long as he didn't tell anyone in the morning however...
"Yeah go ahead, I'll listen..." Nick replies, now pulling Luke in for an awkward side hug.
"I... I saw you back at the trailer park, but this time you weren't with me... You left to go look for Clem and the rest but you got attacked and you turned and got stuck on a fence. I watched the whole thing but I wasn't really there...I was almost like a ghost. I couldn't be heard or anything..." Luke explains, a single tear making it's way down his face. His back muscles tense up as Nick starts rubbing his back in circular motions, easing the nerves gradually.
Nick listens intently, not speaking until Luke finish's.
"Clem and Jane came by and I watched Clem kill you... I could't stand it! I heard your voice inside my head and somebody telling me that it was all my fault!" Luke now sobs into Nick's blood and sweat covered shirt.
"It's not your fault... it never will be, Luke. I'm here, and I will stay here, with you until the very end. I promise!" Nick explains, holding the brunette close, enjoying the warmth that they shared between each other.
"Okay Nick, okay... thank you." Luke sniffles in reply, grateful that Nick understood. He couldn't believe this was all happening. Does falling into an icy lake wipe you out so much that you turn into an emotional wreck? This was unlike him, being so open about his feelings, but he couldn't process how he suddenly felt about his best friend? Was he just emphasising now that since leaving Carver's, so much more shit had happened, or was there something more about him and his best friends relationship?
Whatever this was, Luke wanted to save it for the morning, another night even... He needed rest.
Knowing that Nick was here, made him feel safe. Weird huh? The man he'd been blaming for screwing up was the man that now he wanted to be around most? These feelings were all too strange...
"Hey um... you wanna get some rest? I'll stay beside you if you like..." Nick casually mentions after a few moments of quiet silence.
Hearing Nick's calm voice sprung the brunette back into reality.
"Yeah, um... could you stay with me though?" Luke asks, a blush making it's way onto his cheeks. Luckily it was too dark to notice these features.
"Of course! I'm damn tired anyway... so much shit happened today." Nick replies, now laying down slowly in which Luke follows and does the same.
"Like me almost dying?" Luke tried to chuckle but he found that he couldn't. The thought of himself back in that icy lake scared him. The situation left him traumatised, scarred and occasionally quite timid. Never would he have thought that exact event could occur... maybe in movies but in real life? That was even scarier...
"Yeah, you almost did... Scared that shit outta me." Nick said sadly, now cuddling close to Luke, not bothering to notice his latest touchy actions on his friend lately. However, Luke didn't seem to mind too much, he hoped.
"Sorry bout that..." Luke replied, smiling a little while nuzzling his face into Nick's shoulder. He loved how warm the black haired man felt. It distracted him from the icy water that numbed his entire body those few hours ago.
"It's okay, let's stick together from now on, okay?" Nick says, only now noticing how he was taking on the 'comforting' role that Luke used on him in the past.
"Okay." Luke simply replied.
It wasn't long after that the faint sounds of light snoring was to be heard, in which Nick used this as a sign to let himself get some well needed rest as well... From now on, Nick will not screw up. He also will not let Luke fall into his own previous state, it wasn't healthy...
They were all each other had left, knowing each other for twenty years and all...
They will survive together.
With or without the rest...