Chapter 11... huh.
I'm going to make this intro short: I really, really love this fic except that... it's moving way too slow. I really don't want it to feel like I'm stretching it out. I want to tell the story at a comfortable pace, not a boring one.
I'm guessing... one-or-two more chapters, MAYBE three.
Also, I really-really-really-REALLY-want-to-start-working-on-this-other-idea-I-have-for-another-LU-fic-and-I-kind-of-have-this-personal-rule-where-I-only-work-on-one-thing-at-a-time-and-the-urge-to-write-that-fic-and-the-urge-to-finish-this-one-are-literally-TEARING-ME-APART!
Heroes Aren't Forgotten
Chapter 11 – Logic
The wind IS light this day.
It would be sunny but FOR the clouds.
Admit it.
The third day. HA!
Retire YOUR convictions.
Nothing holds IN this failure.
Alone, the coyote sits. He has since abandoned the green-and-black of his past glory days.
A new man sits on this rock.
His brown fur, under dusty leather and faded denim, under the grey and pepper-black sky, shivers in the cold.
He does not wear the uniform, not anymore. He doesn't deserve it.
Abandon IS correct.
Wrong is not RIGHT, this is right.
No more.
Tech E. Coyote is terrified. Nothing is worse than the silence.
Noise. That was what Rev brought. Rev brought NOISE.
Silence
dragged him by the ears from the pain of reality.
Affirmed.
Reactions OF anger from yesteryear.
Forgotten.
Acceptance is in NOW.
A radio, the radio, held under his arm. So stupid was he.
Always so stupid. Since day-fucking-one.
Lead a violent END.
Such is BASIC.
Forecasts ARE never cloudy.
MINE!
The voice.
The voice had been the key.
But he was ignorant; selfish, even.
And now he was broken.
Broken-minded, broken-hearted.
He lifted the radio up from under his leather sleeve, brought it up to his yellow eyes. They burn and water at the sight.
No, wait. That's just dirt.
Tech blinked and looked around, lost in a raging storm, a storm of dust. Squinting, he can barely make out anything more than ten feet away.
Unperturbed, the canine pulls something out of his coat pocket: a water bottle. Struggling with the cap, he gnaws at it, cutting it open with his teeth. Calmly, he pulls out a red scarf, moist with water. He wraps it around his neck and mouth.
Yes, he is terrified, but not of the outside world.
Not anymore.
The silence terrifies him because it brings the voice.
It had been right all along, tried to warn him. He was a fool to ignore it.
He wanted to be the hero, to save the day. Because no one forgot about the hero.
"Bullshit."
Heroes were forgotten. Because, in the end, no one really cared. And those who did were punished.
Rev, like so many others, would die in some ditch, or under some building, in the fucking dark, because nothing was more important than individual survival.
The old woman cared.
SHE LOST.
The "doctor" did not care.
HE WON.
Mark cared.
HE LOST.
Tech cared.
HE LOST.
Now, Tech does not care.
It was all so simple. Self-sacrifice got you nowhere. Heroism got you nowhere.
Well, it got you to an early grave.
This world, this "post-Acmetropolis" world that the canine found himself in now, this was the real world.
And here, in the real world, the man without limits was king.
Heroes are forgotten, should be forgotten. The voice had been right the whole time. Hunting down Rev was a mistake.
In the middle of nowhere, stuck in a dust storm with a radio and no batteries. That's what heroism and good intentions had gotten him.
That and a severe psychological breakdown.
Had he listened, he could have been spared all of this pain. He could have embraced the voice, made things so much easier for him and those around him.
There were no good guys and bad guys.
Only strong men and fools.
Purpose was a joke, as was morality. The wasteland had taught him much.
But there was a flaw.
Blind THE mirrors.
All that is PAST.
Heroes are forgotten.
But...
Alliances needed to be struck. Nothing was more important than survival, and no one could survive in a world of enemies.
Grasping AT straws is not recommended.
DEVOUR all.
No, in this world, you needed someone.
Someone who you could trust.
Someone who wouldn't stab you in the back.
Loyalty among the redoubtable damned.
Monsters need monsters.
"But Rev is no monster..."
…
Fuck it. You've been through hell and back. One more day of playing hero probably won't kill you.
Well, it probably will, but who gives a fuck.
Find Rev. Then be done with it.
He had killed for the clothes on his back, and now he had killed for a few lousy batteries. The back panel to the radio lay open now, and his shaky hands could barely get the batteries into the small device.
"C'mon, Tech! You fucked up the 'doctor's' goons no problem! WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?"
He was shivering, partly from the kill, partly from the cold. He warmed his feet in the red puddle beneath him.
God, Tech, you are fucked up.
The batteries snapped into the machine with a tiny click, and Tech hastily twisted the knob to eighty-seven.
"Rev, you there?"
Silence.
"Rev?"
Silence.
"Fuck."
Sure, he couldn't get a hold of Rev, which either meant that he was unconscious or dead, but in no way did that stop him. For three hours he ran through the wasteland, and with every minute Tech swore he heard less static.
And then he started to hear more static.
The coyote stopped dead.
He turned around, turned to face the "building" he had just passed. It could have been ten, maybe twenty floors at one point. The earthquakes three days ago had rendered it to one.
And it looked like Rev was in there.
Or his corpse.
The canine sighed.
Dammit Tech, this is it. Time to dig.