Scooter: This has got to be the longest chapter I've ever done!! Hallelujah! ((laughs)) Anyway, we're almost done with this little angst-trip. :-) Now, if my math is correct ((glares in the direction of several snickers)) then the next chapter will finish this whole thing up. ;-) So don't go anywhere!! Anyway, I've kept you long enough! WAIT!! Almost done!! Lol. Anyway, in this chapter, there is some Kyon/Itsuki shounen-ai. ((shrugs)) Not heavy, mind you. Just enough for the fans I think. :-P Enjoy!!
Chapter 5
Owww... Itsuki whined mentally, having fallen on the side of his head that hurt the most. He felt like coiling up and going to sleep, but he also knew what would happen if he did.
"...I'll help." He said, rising up into a sitting position, somewhat quickly.
"Only if you're sure...But I'll go get the card; when I have it, I'll hand it up to you, OK?" he asked, hoping te other would listen. He helped the other up and moved towards the black goop, stepping in and shuddering violently, coughing again. He moved in a bit deeper, his movements slowing slightly.
Itsuki inched towards the other side of the foul sludge, on the thin floorboards that surrounded it, so he could cover more ground while Kyon searched that side, being careful not to slip into it.
Once he was at the other end, Koizumi sucked up his courage and hopped in, expecting something just past his shins like Kyon's side, but ended up falling past his head.
Kyon cried out as he spotted Itsuki and he sloshed his way over, feeling around for Itsuki. "ITSUKI!" He screamed kneeling, then instantly rising again, almost vomiting. "Itsuki!" he cried out again, wanting to follow, but not being able to.
A few bubbles rose to the surface where Itsuki vanished, but other than that, no movement.
Kyon narrowed his eyes and jumped in after Itsuki, feeling for hm. He came into contact with a body; an arm to be more precise, and he grabbed onto it, using his broken arm and legs to try and paddle his way up. He broke surface and put one of Itsuki's arms around him and he hauled the ESPer onto dry boards, laying him down.
"Itsuki?" he asked in a trembling voice.
Itsuki coughed, twitching like mad and trying to wipe the black sludge off his face.
"Remind me...never to do that again..." He coughed.
Kyon looked worried sick. He helped the ESPer remove the gunk and he stood slowly, turning his head to cough again, this time a small amount of blood coating his fingertips. He looked at Itsuki. "I'll do it. Please stay here." Kyon moved back towards the gunk, a sick look on his face.
Kyon began feeling around before he, too, sank under, except he was more prepared and he held his breath, feeling around.
Itsuki would have sat up again, but the splitting headache wouldn't permit him to even see straight at that point.
Grasping his head, he tried to apply pressure to see if that would ease it any.
After about a minute, a gurgling was heard and a hand that was covered in blackish goop emerged. It seemed to be holding a laminated card and it flailed trying to get purchase on a wall or something to try and get up.
After about thirty seconds more, Kyon's head erupted from the surface and he coughed violently, his eyes jammed shut, blood coming from his mouth. He managed to get back onto the dry boards close to Itsuki and he slid the card over to him before he quickly got on all fours and vomited up a mixture of actual vomit, blood, and even the black goop.
Tears slowly trickled down his cheeks as he coughed.
As Itsuki lay on his back, seemingly unaware of Kyon's plight, upon a glance it couldn't have been more obvious he was out of it unless he had a large 'VACANCY' stamped across his forehead.
His brown eyes were glazed over as he gazed emptily up at the ceiling, everything a dull echo in his head.
Kyon coughed again and looked over at Itsuki, his eyes widening in horror. "Itsuki!" he cried, scrambling over to him and shaking him, gently tapping his face. "Wake up, Koizumi!" he said in a hurried voice. "I can't do this without you; you can't sleep here! Wake up!"
Itsuki's hand twitched momentarily, before his eyes drifted closed.
"Itsuki!" Kyon cried out, grabbing the card and stuffing it into his pocket before hoisting the ESPer up on his back, or as best as he could, and dragged him from the room. He lay him down on the boards and gently shook him, then roughly shook him.
"Itsuki Koizumi, wake up or so help me!" he stated,his words sounding braver than he was feeling at the moment.
No sooner than Kyon had said those words than the male's body beneath him began spasming wildly like he was being electrocuted, head dipped back and biting his tongue repeatedly.
Kyon yelped and picked the ESPer up so he was sitting. Kyon got behind the ESPer, holding him up, and his breathing increased.
What do I do?! What do I do?! He screamed in his mind, tears of fear running down his face. His own plight forgotten, all he wanted to do was help Itsuki. "You'll be O-OK, Its-Itsuki..." he said, although his voice was far from convincing. Kyon stroked his forehead, having no idea what to do.
"The two hours aren't even up yet..."
Itsuki's seizure came to an abrupt halt, when his body suddenly stiffened like a board, before relaxing in Kyon's arms.
"Itsuki!" Kyon cried out, burying his face in the crook of the Esper's neck, tears coating his skin and running down Kyon's face. "Don't leave me alone here. Please don't be dead. You have to help keep me sane from Haruhi, remember? Wake up, Itsuki,"
After a few moments of silence and no movement on Itsuki's part, his right had suddenly clenched and released.
"...Urgh..." He moaned plaintively, waking up to his splitting headache.
Kyon was still crying, one hand around Itsuki's chest to hold him there in case he fell over, and the other at his side, limp and worthless.
He heard the other's small moan and he jerked up. "I-Itsuki?" he asked, turning to the side and coughing again, a small amount of the black stuff coming out.
Next time I see a skunk...It'll smell like cedar and daisies compared to this...
"I'm sorry...what happened?" Itsuki asked helplessly, not feeling weak, but in pain.
Kyon turned away. "Nothing happened...I'm fine, you're fine. I got the card." He diverted his attention. If the other didn't know that he had gotten sick, then he wouldn't worry Itsuki. He pulled the card out and handed it to Itsuki, already knowing what it said.
Kyon turned to the side and coughed up a bit more blood, wiping his hands on his pants.
Itsuki sat up, gripping his head with one hand, and putting the card in his pocket with the other.
"One more door..." He whimpered, the will to be strong beginning to fail him.
Kyon just held the ESPer for a few moments, his eyes sad. "I can go, Itsuki. I could get the other card. I did the last two, I'm sure I can get this one." He said, trying to add some life to his words, to try and reassure the ESPer.
Itsuki had been strong for him, now Kyon would be strong for Itsuki.
"No...no, I'll do this one for sure." Itsuki replied, staggering to his feet.
"I-Itsuki...I really don't want you to hurt yourself. Please..." Kyon said, helping the other stand, only to double over himself and cough violently, blood coating his hand this time. His vision swam in front of him and he stumbled, shaking his head slightly to get his bearings.
Itsuki swallowed the blood coming up in his throat, making a small gagging noise as he stumbled towards the next door, falling against a wall momentarily for support.
In the hallway, he could make out two dimly shining butcher knives in front of the last door.
Kyon was at his side instantly, finding that for some reason he could move easier than the ESPer. "...I'm having a terrible feeling about this..." Kyon said, putting his good arm around Itsuki. "Here, lean on me, I'll help you," Kyon said softly, moving towards the door and the two butcher knives.
His heart began to speed up.
Itsuki wobbled against Kyon slightly, reading another note on the door that read, 'IN THE BELLY OF THE BEAST'.
"..." Slowly, he leaned over and picked up one knife for no other reason than to arm himself against whatever might have been inside, or at least to give himself a high sense of false security with it.
Kyon picked the other knife up. His breathing began to get raspy and he licked his lips unconsciously, opening the door slowly. He had the handle of the butcher knife in his teeth since his other arm was currently stupid and could do nothing more than hang there like a limp piece of meat.
he opened the door all the way, and grabbed the knife in his free hand.
Another, yet less potent than the room before them, disgusting smell hit Itsuki in the face yet again.
However, the sight more than made up for the less pungent smell, in the fact that it could have been likened to a meat freezer, dozens of corpses hanging from thick nooses latched to the ceiling in a freezing room with thin sheets of ice on the walls.
"I'm going to vomit again...That'll be three times..." Kyon said unconsciously. "If we have to cut those things down..." He shuddered and a sickening thought struck him. He began to hyperventilate and his legs shuddered.
"I-Itsuki..."
Itsuki gazed in shock at the many hanging corpses, feeling like his legs would give out from beneath him.
"...'Belly of the beast'..."
...Kyon would never be able to handle what I think that means...
"Itsuki...do you know what it means...tell me..." He said, then gave a shaky laugh. "I can handle it...How could I not after all of this?"
Obviously, he didn't think that other things could be worse.
Itsuki gulped, seeing not only human corpses, but rat corpses littering the floor, and laying inside the burrows of the flesh they chewed through.
It was disgusting. Utterly and truly disgusting.
Stepping forward, Itsuki shivered and decided he would never complain about cold kitchen floors in the mornings.
Kyon let his arm drop. "Itsuki...please tell me...what do you think it means?" He asked, stepping to be behind the ESPer. He concentrated on what Itsuki had to tell him when they got out of here in order to stop thinking about all of the bodies that littered this entire room.
Itsuki gripped the knife tightly in his hand.
"...It means..." He murmured, feeling unable to finish his sentence, and opting for demonstration instead.
Pacing towards the nearest body, he plunged the knife into the stomach of it.
Kyon felt bile rising in his throat and he looked at the ESPer and dropped his own knife. "One of us has to die?" he said, already knowing the answer. That's why there were so many bodies...one had to have died.
The teenager sank to his knees, crying. "I thought we could both get out..." he whimpered, his eyes glazing. "I can't kill you, Itsuki,"
Itsuki shook his head, thinking at least this would be better than having to kill Kyon.
"It means we have to cut through these things to find the last card." He said, feeling a bit of relief edging his tone.
Kyon's face showed obvious relief, and he picked the knife up again, and tried to rise, only to sink back down again, finding his legs paralyzed with fear. He pushed his will down to his legs and he struggled up, moving over to a body and slicing it open, gagging.
"M-My God..."
Itsuki cut through the stomach with a steely gaze, focusing on the goal, and not the disgusting way he had to get there.
What else could he do at that point?
Kyon raised the knife again and cut through the bodies, his body becoming covered in entrails and innards of some of the more recent ones. Though there weren't many recent ones, mind you. He saw something fall out of one of them, and he picked it up.
"Itsu..." He tried to speak, but his voice came out in a rasp. he tried to make a noise to no avail. He instead just walked over to Itsuki and tapped him on the shoulder.
"...?" Itsuki glanced back at Kyon, aggressively stabbing his knife in the shoulder of the body he was sifting through and leaving it there.
Kyon handed him the card, then pointed to his throat and shook his head. He tried to speak the other's name, but it only came out in a rasp. "I found the last card,"
Itsuki reached up and took hold of it, eyes still stony with resolve, and a few other emotions mixed it. He was about to place it in his pocket, when he felt his fingertips brush against something taped to the card's back.
Turning the card around, he saw a small scalpel, no longer than 5 inches, on the back of the card.
"..." Putting it in his pocket all the same, Itsuki turned his head towards the door.
"What was that?" Kyon rasped, then closed his mouth, seeing how Itsuki held himself. "Never mind, I don't want to know," He cleared his throat, clenching his jaw and coughing again and following the ESPer out the door.
Once they were out of the freezer room of horror, Itsuki came to a stop, taking a few steps out into the hallway.
"Kyon...I think there's something I should tell you now..."
Kyon took a step back, fear showing in his brown eyes. It plainly spoke that the teenager couldn't take anymore surprises. "What is it, Itsuki?" He asked in a cautious voice than was weaker than he had hoped it would be.
"You don't think we're going t make it, do you?"
Without a word, Itsuki spun around and threw his arms around Kyon, taking his lips in a sudden kiss.
Kyon blinked in surprise and was almost knocked back on his rear, but he managed to hold his balance.
I-Itsuki... He said in his mind slowly. He blinked slowly and wrapped his one good arm around Itsuki, kissing back.
"Nn..." He sounded in a quiet voice, his eyes falling half closed.
In truth, Itsuki had been expecting to be pushed away, called a jackass, and then have something thrown at him, or at least met with cold shock...but, wow.
This was kind of a shock to him that Kyon was reciprocating, or even edging it along at all.
Kyon pulled back and looked at Itsuki. "Why did you tell me now? Is it because you think we won't make it?"
The kiss should have made him happy, but it only gave him a slight feeling of dread. Kyon sighed and rested his chin on Itsuki's shoulder.
"..." Itsuki blinked, still surprised by Kyon's warm reaction to this sudden display of affection.
"...I wanted to say that I love you, and I have for awhile...we might not make it out, and I don't think I could have not have never let you not know how I felt."
Kyon sighed and turned his head to the side, coughing yet again slightly. "I really hope we make it out of here." he said quietly, thinking back to Itsuki's seizure. He shuddered.
What if he couldn't help next time?
"I've...felt something with you too...but I guess I've never been that brave enough to have told you..."
Itsuki suddenly broke apart from the close contact, looking serious.
"Let's just get down to the safe." He said lowly.
Kyon nodded and pulled back, rubbing his eyes. He coughed again, blood coating his fingertips, and he didn't even bother to wipe it off; what good would it do? He'd just cough again anyway.
"I just hope we really can get out of here," Kyon said, moving up next to Itsuki, in case the other needed help to walk. Kyon gently cradled his broken arm to his chest.
Itsuki nodded, walking into the kitchen, looking around in the sparse light for the safe.
His face and aura both seemed angry.
"Itsuki...what's up?" Kyon asked, knowing that the answer could be many different things: We're poisoned. We're trapped. We could die. We might never get out of here alive.
Kyon sighed and cringed, his eyes closing for a brief moment before he opened them to assist the ESPer in locating the safe. "Where is it?" he whispered.
"Let's just search." Came his surprisingly piercing tone of voice. He wasn't shouting, but the irritation he was feeling came off thickly in his words.
He felt around the walls, not seeing anything on the counters or table.
Kyon cringed and nodded, looking around hard for any sign of the safe that supposedly held the antidote to the poison that was in their bodies.
What if it was a lie? What if there was no antidote? Kyon's body froze up and he blinked hard, coughing again and forcing himself to keep looking.
"Itsuki...what if..." He let his sentence die.
Scooter: Before I let you all go, wondering what's going to happen to the two males, I have one question for you that I would like you to answer in your review:
What is the scalpel for?
Where do you think the key is located?
Scooter: Please, please, please tell me your thoughts in your review. :-D I won't update till I get a few opinions!! Just kidding. I'd update anyway, but please, tell me what you think!! Anyway, seeya next time!!
--Scooter--
