Time frame: two days later, beginning of late March
Rating: M for violence
Description: Everything is falling apart
Two more days passed in relative silence. The group stopped asking questions about Jared's issue with Derek the first day when they got no real answers. Most of them assumed that there was just a situation between the two of them that went unresolved.
Jared's relationship with Keith remained strained and distant, adding to the isolation Keith was experiencing. Ellis stopped asking what was wrong by then, but still checked in on his friend as often as he could, just in case something changed and Keith was willing to talk about it.
Nick's condition seemed to be improving with the medication. He was able to get outside more and work with the others without becoming tired as quickly. He was a little cranky being that he and Ellis weren't having sex as often as before, being that Ellis was constantly worried about sending his now-fiancée into another heart attack.
Thanks, El. I feel old as shit.
The group split off that morning, being that it rained the night before and several buckets were left outside to collect water. Aside from bringing them in, everyone was out scavenging for food, being that all of their supplies were running low.
The weather was warming up, but still quite damp. It was still somewhat cold with everything being wet and a spring breeze coming through the trees.
After bringing one of the 5 gallon buckets back into the shop for Coach to put into the tank, Derek decided to exit through the back door to see if anything remained on the other side of the shop.
It was empty, but wild animals apparently were digging through the trashcans the night before.
While he was picking up the cans and replacing the garbage, he wasn't paying attention to his surroundings and didn't notice that he has company slowly approaching.
When he turned to head into the woods, he almost ran directly into the much taller, much stronger man he'd been avoiding for days.
"Jared! Jesus, man." He sighed, trying to shake off being startled.
"Hey…we need to talk." Was the awkward reply he got.
Derek cocked an eyebrow up in confusion.
"Okay…but make it quick. Danny wanted me to…" He trailed off, noticing a handgun in the other's fist.
He took a couple of steps back, looking for an opening to bolt into the woods but Jared was one step ahead, raising the handgun and pointing it at the other.
"Whoa…put the gun down, man." Derek coaxed, lifting his hands up to face-level, trying to keep his voice as calm as possible.
"Let's take a walk." Jared replied, a slight smile creeping into one corner of his mouth.
"Yeah, okay. But we can take a walk without you pointing a gun at me. This isn't necessary." Derek kept his eyes locked on the barrel that was only about 8 feet from where he stood.
Jared didn't lower his weapon, wasn't having any of the proposed peace treaty. He nodded his head to the left, into the woods, suggesting without words that this was where they were going.
Derek sighed, surrendering and heading into the woods, hands still up, with a gun now much closer behind him than it was a minute ago. Jared was close enough to where their footfalls almost touched, the toes of his boots almost flat-tiring Derek's heels.
"We could have just sat and talked about whatever you're pissed about." Derek tried again, attempting to reason with the clearly angry man behind him.
"You know what I'm pissed about." Jared replied, poking the end of the gun into Derek's back to make him walk faster.
"I don't know what Keith told you, but knowing the guy like I do, I'm sure it was less than half of the truth." Derek tried again, wanting to latch the other man into conversation, hoping to distract him away from the instrument of death pointing into his spine.
"Shut up."
"You said we needed to talk. Let's talk. Where do you plan on taking me?" the smaller of the two asked, stepping over a fallen tree in their path. The safety of the shop was getting farther and farther away.
"To whatever's waiting for you after you stop livin" Jared responded, voice gruff but nervous.
Derek scoffed.
"You're gonna shoot me, Jared?" He asked in disbelief, and a hint of disrespect.
"It's what you deserve, and since nobody else knows what kinda man you are, it has to be me."
"Truth be told, I don't think the kind of man *I* am is what you need to be worried about. You've known Keith for, what, a couple of months? I've known the guy for years, and there is definitely more to this situation than what you know."
Jared prodded the other man in the spine again, harder this time.
"You. Shut the fuck up and put your face against that tree ahead." Jared instructed, now that he was unable to see the shop through the trees behind him.
Derek did what he said, stepping forward and placing his face into the bark of the tree nearest him.
"Now, put your hands behind your back." Jared continued with his demands.
He watched as the man in the black hoodie hesitated, before bringing his hands around to his back.
Derek held his breath and waited for something to happen, waiting for the quite possible sting of another bullet entering his body.
Instead, he felt cold metal circling and tightening around his wrists one at a time, clicking into place as pressure was added.
Handcuffs? Where the hell did he get these?
After another long silence, Jared pulled Derek by the back of his shirt away from the tree, pointing him back onto the path.
"Move."
Derek began his descent deeper into the woods, with Jared once again behind him close enough to where he'd likely trip over the other's shoes if he didn't walk fast enough.
"Hey, these are a little tight." He complained, not really expecting any relief.
Jared, of course, was perfectly accepting of the "too-tight" cuffs. They were supposed to be tight. They were supposed to be uncomfortable. Jared clicked them around the other's thin wrists until the entire circle was pinching his skin. His blood was pooling in the tips of his fingers.
"Stop complaining. This can't be the first time you've been clapped in iron." Jared replied, eyeing the clearly prison-made tattoo on the back of Derek's neck.
"True, but the cops aren't supposed to make the cuffs this tight." Derek reasoned.
Even when he was arrested, the cops weren't any more rough with him than they needed to be. Hell, the doctors at CEDA didn't cuff him as tight as these were.
"What did you go to prison for? Another rape?" Jared demanded, keeping his voice down even though the two of them were clearly alone.
"No. I went down for drugs and assault. Physical assault. I just lost my boyfriend at the time, and this asshole was talking shit about him." Derek clarified.
Flashbacks came flying back as he responded.
He'd been slipping farther and farther down the rabbit hole of addiction, using meth as constantly as he could. He was losing money, struggling to keep his drug use from showing up in his work. Derek was still coping with losing Travis, with watching him die. For the first time ever, life was starting to matter very little to him and he felt endlessly angry unless he was high.
When he was at the end of his rope, life handed him even more bullshit. He was confronted by Travis Massey's brother, who blamed Derek for his brother's drug use and death. He proceeded to talk so much shit about his now dead brother that the situation quickly spiked into a fist-fight and Derek beat Tony so savagely that the courts deemed it unnecessarily violent.
I still don't give a fuck. I was trying to help Travis. He came home with PTSD and I was the only person that even wanted to spend time with him anymore. His family couldn't handle his outbursts, and I stayed beside him even when he freaked out and beat the shit out of me. The meth was bad, but it kept his crippling nightmares away.
Jared didn't answer. He just continued to march the other deeper into the woods, until the two reached a small clearing.
"This is good enough. Get down on your knees." Jared instructed.
Derek didn't get down at first. Instead he stared at the other in disbelief.
"Down." The Texan insisted, cocking the gun.
Hesitantly, Derek lowered himself onto his knees, with Jared still behind him. The wet ground quickly soaked through the legs of his pants.
"Listen to me, Jared. I know you think you're somehow doing the right thing but-" Derek started, only to have the barrel of the gun smack him in the head.
"Shut up, man."
He didn't shut up.
"No, listen. If you shoot me, the dead will come back. If you shoot me, all of your friends are gonna die." Derek explained.
"We'll take our chances." Jared replied, unphased.
Derek heaved a sigh.
"You'll never make it. As soon as I'm dead, they'll be here in hordes. It's in your best interest not to shoot me."
"Dealing with a horde is better than dealing with you." Jared hissed, tightening his grip on the gun's handle.
This was it. This was what helplessness felt like.
"Someone is going to find me. And if your group survives what's about to come, they're gonna know I didn't handcuff myself and blow the back of my own head off." Derek tried.
Maybe if Jared was fully aware that what he was about to do would be seen as murder, he'd rethink.
"Are you really going to do this from behind? You won't even look at my face when you execute me like a dog, you fucking coward?" Derek taunted.
He wasn't necessarily afraid to die. He was afraid of how painful it was going to be. He was afraid of having his head explode and having no one know who he was when his body was eventually found.
"Yep." Jared replied, pulling the trigger.
The air exploded with the sound of the bulled ejecting from the gun, entering the back of Derek's head.
Blood spattered the moss in front of where he sat as the bullet exited out the other side.
Derek's body slumped forward, dropping onto the ground as blood pooled slightly around his head, soaking into the soil.
"Did you hear that?" Nick asked, looking up from bush he was examining, not sure if this was a "do eat" bush or a "do not eat" bush.
It was a gunshot. No doubt about it.
"Yeah, I hope it wasn't one of ours." Ellis agreed, concerned.
"I hope it was one of ours. We are in no position to fight off a rival gang that's armed." Nick stated, the worry on his face hard to mask.
His eyebrows pinched together as the two stood in silence, listening for the sound of anymore gunshots, or the sound of anything really. The woods were suddenly quiet, an eerie quiet.
"We should… we should head back. Make sure everyone is okay." Ellis suggested.
They were a good 5 minute walk from the shop, and began making the trek back, unsure of what else to do.
They paused, listening to the new rumbling sound off in the distance drawing closer.
"Thunder?" Ellis wondered aloud.
Nick strained his hearing to pin-point where the hell this sound was coming from, but it seemed like it was from all over, and unlike thunder, the sound got louder and louder, not tapering off into the sky.
And finally, there was a new sound, one they hadn't heard in weeks.
A shriek.
An animalistic scream from somewhere in the woods.
"Hunter." They said in unison, confused and suddenly afraid.
Nick withdrew his gun from the waistband of his pants.
The rumbling grew louder, and it became apparent that it was hundreds of footsteps, hundreds of groans and growls all at once, coming closer.
"It's a horde!" Ellis realized.
"Shit- Run!" Nick commanded, taking off back the direction they came from.
Ellis followed, but was not keeping up as quickly, shocked and tripping over tree roots.
"Run goddamn it!" Nick called again, pulling Ellis by the hand, not letting go until they reached the shop again.
The others apparently got the memo too, because everyone was emerging from the woods and making their way as quickly as they could back into the shop.
"Where the hell did this come from?!" Rochelle called, having to shout over the sound of the approaching horde.
"I don't know!" Coach answered, "But they're gonna tear this place down!"
"Come on! This place has a storm cellar!" Keith called to the others, helping Danny crutch Ylaina into the building.
"Since when?" Francis asked, surprised and annoyed that he wasn't informed sooner.
"I seen the hatch a couple days ago! Didn't know if it was safe, but we don't got a choice now! Get in!" He answered, running over to the trap door on the kitchen floor and pulling it up so that all of his companions could get underground.
"Hurry up, El!" Keith demanded as his friend swiped Nick's medication off of the counter before descending into the dark.
Once the lot of them were safe, Keith followed them, closing the trap door and climbing down into complete black.
"Do we have everybody?" Rochelle whispered, not wanting the horde to know that there are people in the cellar if they were to tear apart the shop.
Francis held up his lighter, illuminating the room until Rochelle managed to snap one of the glow sticks she kept in the first aid box. The cellar was lit up with a glowing green light.
It was not a huge place, but it was stocked semi-well with boxed food and bottled water in case of an emergency. There wasn't enough for the group to survive on for an extended period of time, but they'd deal with it later. At least they weren't being torn to shreds by the zombies.
The cellar was only one large room and a tiny bathroom off to the side that may or may not have housed a chemical toilet.
"I…think so." Ellis panted, giving Nick's hand a squeeze.
Rochelle mentally noted all of the people that were present, counting heads, reciting names.
"Where's Derek?" Keith wondered out loud, "Anybody seen him?"
A quiet murmur came over the group.
"No. Don't we keep his ass around so that this very thing doesn't happen?" Nick replied.
"Nick and I heard a gunshot earlier. He's been actin kinda off lately. You don't suppose…?" Ellis trailed off, not sure of how to properly word the rest of his sentence.
No way he went out into the woods and ended it all, right?
He wouldn't do that.
We were becoming friends. Last I knew, he told me that he'd keep us all safe.
"No, why would he?" Rochelle replied.
"I don't know, Ro. Maybe the pressure of bein like he is got to his head?"
It didn't make any sense. He was getting along with the rest of the group, aside from Keith and Jared. He'd even started to look a bit healthier and happier. His behavior was more withdrawn, but it didn't add up. There was no way he just walked off and took his own life.
But then, why were there suddenly so many zombies?
Where did they come from?
Why were they all tearing the shop apart out of nowhere?
"I'm just wonderin. Just tryin to put two and two together, ya know? There was no sign of these damn zombies when he was around and now there are, and he's nowhere to be seen. Maybe he ran into some nearby marauders?" Ellis continued to reason.
"If he did, he's probably going to be their only victim. That horde will take care of every living thing in its path." Coach added.
The group continued to quietly offer theories, wondering uselessly about the whereabouts of their final member. It was unlike him to stray too far away.
The wheels in Keith's head were spinning extra fast, and he was doing all he could to maintain his cool. His eyes very slowly found their way up to Jared's, keeping brief eye contact with him until that cold stare he received was too much. And yet it was enough to know that whatever happened to Derek wasn't an accident.
Keith kept his curiosity in quiet dignity until the others simmered down for the night, trying desperately to make themselves comfortable and get some sleep. The sound of the horde on top of them was hard to ignore.
The glow stick was still illuminating the room, but not as brightly now. Most of the group had been quiet for over an hour. Most of them looked asleep.
He waited for Jared to make his way toward the bathroom before following, averting his gaze from the quiet movement coming from under the tattered old blanket that Nick and Ellis shared. Nick's hands were gripping the mechanic's shoulders, the front of his body was pressed into Ellis's back, pinning him to the floor as he littered kisses to the back of the younger man's neck.
Keith continued past the two of them, into the bathroom and cornered Jared inside.
"What did you do?" He demanded.
Jared stared at him in mock confusion.
"With Derek, what the fuck did you do?"
"What I needed to do, babe." He replied, voice flat.
Keith stared in bewilderment.
"What...what was it you needed to do? Was that gunshot you? Did you..." Keith trailed off, becoming more and more annoyed by the look on Jared's face.
"I did what I did for you-"
"Fuck you, ya did it for me, my ass! I didn't ask you to do shit. I certainly didn't ask you to fuckin' kill him-" Keith was furious, furious and disgusted and struggled to keep his voice down.
"Why do you give such a shit? Why the fuck are you defending him?" Jared hissed back.
Keith sighed, his head was spinning.
It's not everyday my boyfriend kills somebody because of me.
"I'm not defendin shit, but that's fucking murder. You had no right endin him just because you felt like it."
Jared stepped forward slowly, noticing the quickening in his partner's breath. He took the smaller man about the shoulders in an attempt to calm him.
"I couldn't stand to see you scared of him anymore."
"You doomed all of us. You're a fuckin murderer and now we are all gonna die."
"Nick?" Ellis whispered.
"Mmm" Nick answered, awake but trying desperately not to be.
Ellis turned over to face him.
"How are we gonna get out of this shit?" Ellis asked, unsure of what the next order of business was.
"I have no idea, kid. We're in a tight spot. We need to just hang tight until the horde goes away."
"That don't seem too bad." Ellis replied, relieved for a moment.
"Yeah...unless people start losing it. We're stuck underground with limited food and water. That tends to put people on edge. If just one person snaps, we might be facing hysterical people, and that shit is where it gets dangerous. Best case scenario, the horde goes away soon. Worse case, our friends go crazy and kill each other, and then we starve to death in this cellar."