Disclaimer: I do not own or make any money off the anime Death Note
Suggested Listening : Through Hell by We Are the Fallen
Part 10
~Change~
Matt drove until they reached Utah and they were on the outskirts of Milford City, a rather sparely populated area if his memory served correct; Matt had not really been paying attention when he had been bored enough to read the encyclopedia collection in his apartments basement.
The drive thus far had been silent, almost awkwardly so, though Matt knew it was due to them still adjusting to the arrangement despite the time between their arrival in Utah and the events in Cali.
He had so far been unable to work up the courage to ask Mello if he had ever found his sister, and if so what happened to her. He was curious, but did not want to make the silence between them worse with a bad answer, one that Matt was certain contained death.
It was around ten in the evening, the car off to conserve battery power and the windows up despite the heat. It would be their bed for the night and probably for a long while to come. Matt was uncertain he would ever feel comfortable sleeping in a hotel again, just knowing that the infected were out there and that there was a possibility of them bursting in, or surrounding the place so they could not escape.
There was the same possibility out there on the highway, parked with only the car for protection, but in the city it was a deathtrap. In the city, there were too many places for the infected to hide and not enough room to run. Matt wondered if either of them would be able to sleep in a normal bed again, or if they would be stuck in the car until they died.
That was a rather depressing thought and Matt almost wished he had ignored his alarm a week ago just so he could have slept in his bed a bit longer, cocooned in his well worn but very snug comforter. It was a rather absurd thought considering everything that had happened since, and the problems he now faced with a person who was previously a stranger.
"She's dead, you know."
Mello's quiet voice broke through Matt's thoughts, so completely that Matt looked over in shock. "How?" was out of his mouth before he could even think to hold the question back.
"She was dead when I found her at the apartment." Was all Mello said.
Matt thought back to the apartment and how much blood was there, and how the body was conspicuously absent. Had something come between the time Mello left and before he had gotten there?
Or...was Mello's sister not really dead.
He did not say any of that to Mello however, having already asked enough previously, stupidly so.
Instead Matt reached inside the glove box, hand practically between Mello's legs in order to do so, and pulled out the photograph he had taken. He held it out silently for the blond, who took it with trembling fingers.
"How—no, why do you have this? What made you take this?" Matt watched a little uncomfortably as the blond clutched at the picture, face expressionless even as the rest of his body betrayed him.
"I wanted to jerk off to your sexy ass even if we were not going to travel together again." Matt said in all seriousness, not meaning a single word of it yet not wanting to tell the blond that there really was not a reason when he had taken the picture.
Mello snorted. "Yeah, sure." But there was at least some slight amusement in his tone, an easiness that had cut through the tension; there was still a sadness, a longing even, hidden in the depth of his expression.
Matt had no family so he didn't know what it was like to lose someone in this manner, but he figured it was worse than a knife to the heart.
The night passed slowly afterward, both reclining their seats as far as the things in the backseat would allow them to, and trying to sleep in the humidity. Though sleep was a relative term. They both knew that it was too easy to break windows, and that if any of the infected wanted to get to them that would be it. At the same time, having the windows up—despite the heat—still provided a little protection. Or at least some piece of mind for them.
Matt had charged his hand-held earlier, thankful he had an adaptable car charger for emergencies such as that, and had the screen held close to him as he played Mario Brothers on mute. He was tired, a headache slowly moving from a dull ache to a painful throb, and his eyes simply would not droop.
Mello, on the other hand, did not seem to have the same problem. He was on his side facing the window, eyes closed and breathing steady; though Matt could not say for certain that he was actually sleeping.
There would be many sleepless night to come, that was really the only thing Matt was certain of.
He yawned and withheld a sigh. It seemed it was going to be a very, very long night.
.
Matt woke up sometime around dawn—not remembering when he might have fallen asleep—to the feeling of being watched. He did not move and simply let his eyes adjust. He carefully glanced over to Mello, whose face was towards the window, still sleeping.
So it was not Mello. What was setting him off then?
He let his eyes swivel across the expanse outside the car and almost jerked back as his breath caught in his throat. On the hood of the car sat something, an infected?, and it was eating. It was still a bit too dark to see exactly what it was, but unless there were wolves or the like in the area, they were in trouble.
Matt's mind raced as he thought of all possible scenarios. None of them ended well. If the infected noticed movement it could easily break through the glass...
Did it even know they were in there?
How long would he have to react if it noticed them?
A soft yawn immediately caught his attention. His eyes flickered to Mello who was beginning to stir and back to the infected which had paused, bright eyes turning up slowly to meet his. It was the only thing he could see in the dark.
Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck-
Mello sat up in his seat, rubbing his eyes and Matt did not even think as he turned the ignition and slammed the car into reverse, the now groaning infected disappearing off the hood and onto the ground.
"Matt what the-"
"Get a gun and shut up." He commanded, surprised by how calm his voice was in comparison to his racing heart. He kept it in reverse, one eye in front and one on the rear-view mirror.
Mello did not even question him and pulled free a handgun. By the soft curse uttered, Mello had spotted the now upright infected.
"That was on the hood when I woke up." He muttered, slowing the cars reverse as the high beams illuminated the disheveled body that stood almost paralyzed before them; its head was tilted to the side, mouth dripping blood, and what looked like an arm clutched in its grasp. Dexterity was only something Matt had encountered with the relatively newly infected.
"What?!"
Mello's shout broke the standoff and the infected dropped its previous meal and barreled towards them. Matt did not think and threw open the door, took aim and shot. The first missed, grazing a shoulder and the second only hit an arm.
The third shot did not come from him, but Mello who had rolled down his window and fired.
There was the deafening echo of gunfire in the otherwise eerie silence as the infected collapsed to the ground. Matt stood frozen with his hands shaking around the gun. He jerked, gun aimed, as something tugged on his shirt.
Mello had his hands up and Matt lowered the gun.
"Get back in the fucking car and shut the door." The blond commanded. And Matt, hearing how utterly pissed off Mello sounded, did as he was told.
"What the hell did you think you were doing?" Mello seethed, turning both ice blue eyes onto him.
"I was killing it, though you seem to be a better shot than me." He was back to being slightly cocky now that his heart was no longer hammering away at his chest so that he couldn't think.
"You could have run it over! Opening the door is the single most stupid thing I have seen you do, never mind the stunt with knocking it from the hood, which there had to have been a better way of handling. What if there had been more out there, they could have come right in the goddamned car after they took you out!" Mello's voice had risen louder and louder towards the end and the longer he talked the more Matt's eyes narrowed behind his goggles.
"It was you sitting up in the damn seat that set it off in the first place, not me backpedaling the car. It had been eating someones arm quite happily on the hood of my car before you pissed it off!" Matt snapped, so close to hitting the other he could hardly think straight. He should have let the infected come inside and eat the ungrateful leather covered son of a-
"How long had you been awake?" Mello's voice had gone quiet, almost whisper like, and it immediately calmed Matt's ire just as quickly as the blond had sparked it.
"Long enough to know we would be in deep shit if it broke through the glass." He muttered tightly.
Mello was silent for a long moment afterward, long after Matt had taken it upon himself to drive away from the area of the incident, but still staying out of the small city until daybreak.
"I had been asleep, so it was not something I did consciously. I did not put myself, us, in danger. What if I had been unable to hit it? You should not have opened the door." Mello said finally, his words leaving a dry taste in Matt's mouth; one that he doubted even water would cure. What was worse, he knew Mello was right.
But for the life of him, Matt could not understand what had made him step out of that car.
-End Part 10-
AN: yay another one XD I have been sooooo busy this weekend. I figured you wanted another chapter up than review replies, but if I was wrong you can yell at me :D
This fic has been completed for over a year and thus can not be influenced by outside material, as I have stated before, so with that said, I have been reading the seriously EPIC "Newsflash trilogy" by Mira Grant (Feed, Deadline, Blackout). It is an interesting twist on the zombie genre. It is also full of conspiracy, heart pounding and very intense scenes. Seriously creepy shit.
Now I mention this because well... I sooooo want to do a sort of xover with that universe using the 'Irwin', 'Newsie' and 'Fictional' types of news bloggers portrayed in the book. And of course it gives me an excuse for more Horror/Sci/Fan, which is my genre of writing :D
I did a quickwrite loosely based on Deadline that I will be posting (minus the lyrics that make it intense, find that version on my AO3 soon) and wanted to know your opinion on if I should delve a bit in the series. Yes I already have another zombie quickwrite I spammed you with last time, but as I said, I am a horror writer XD (and I LOVE zombies.. most of the books I own are about them hahaha)
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Preview of next chap: Matt had just shoved two packages of band-aides out of sight when something out of the corner of his eyes caught his attention. At the end of the aisle, the side he had not yet gone down, there appeared to be a spill on the floor. Normally a spill was nothing to write home about, but the color of this one had Matt's hand tightening on his gun.
He let go of the next package, putting out his hand to steady the row so none of them fell, and crept step-by-step to the edge, wishing the store had those mirrors on the top of the shelves to let him see what was there.
Matt heard nothing, but that did not mean there wasn't something there.
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Special thanks to reviewers: Keono, IssaHORROR, whatevergirl1396, MelMat :) , Kari Twilight Mist, goldenpaw, LinkinPark X, Deadly Nightshade1395, CatatonicVanity
Review?