A/N I do not own the Outsiders or Reanimator.
Epilogue. Debating whether this adds something or if I should take out.
Darry sat in the main lounge feeling more lucid than he had in a while.
Bits and pieces of that night came back to him.
After he had to kill one brother to save another. After he had to terminate the killing machine that took over, he remembered holding his brother's blood soaked body. Looking at his face, when all was said and done, he looked like he was sleeping. Peacefully sleeping.
He remembered carrying Ponyboy to the truck. Steve and Two-bit had managed to get it started. Soda hopped in the back, with Two-bit as Steve stayed in the driver seat as Darry sat in the passenger seat, Ponyboy in his lap.
On the ride back he told himself this was all his fault. All of it. He had failed them.
He had to take his switchblade and plunge it into the back of Ponyboy's neck.
He had to make Ponyboy run away.
He had to hit Ponyboy.
He started this. He started all of this.
When they got back to the house, he carried Ponyboy's body back to the room he and Soda shared.
That's when the floodgates opened. A sob, and wail came out of him that he would have sworn did not belong to a human. Much less a man.
He was sorry. He was so sorry. But it did not matter. None of it mattered anymore.
He fell asleep with Ponyboy's body in his arms that night.
He was awakened by Sodapop that morning. Soda was gently trying to explain that the coroner needed to take Ponyboy away.
"No."
"Darry..."
"No, I'm not letting you have him. I couldn't protect him before, " He whimpered holding Ponyboy's limp body tighter.
"Darry, honey, "
"GET THE HELL AWAY FROM US!"
Then he felt something stick in his arm. He tried to hold onto Ponyboy but he felt himself getting weaker. He was losing his grip.
He looked up at Soda feeling betrayed.
Only a twisted cry could escape him before – nothing.
Darry woke up and found himself in a bed at Sunrise Acres Asylum.
Not sure how long he had been there now.
He measured time in Soda visits.
No one else in the gang came to visit. Hopefully it was because they had no idea he was here. Hopefully.
Soda had come to visit everyday.
Then not everyday.
One day Soda told him he had to go away for a while. He couldn't exactly tell him why. Or maybe he just didn't want to tell him why. Who knew?
After that time had stood still. Everyday was the same.
Whatever stuff they gave him. Whatever they stuck in him. Whatever pills they gave him to swallow. Whatever they took out of him every so often made it not so bad.
Not great but not so bad.
Darry took his usual seat by the window as he saw the sun was going down. He took out a cigarette, some brand Pony used to smoke, and lit up.
All those years he told Pony those things would kill him, now here he was. He liked the smell now. It was like his baby brother was still around.
As he looked around he saw one familiar face.
He knew those eyes.
Eyes that were full of fear as Ponyboy had lunged for him.
"Come out Bob!"
Pump. Click. Boom!
Eyes that looked more than half crazed at the pieces of that doctor guy he had blown away with a shotgun. And pummeled with a shotgun butt.
Ah yes. Bob.
Eyes that now gazed upon him in dull surprise as he walked over and took a seat catty corner to Darry.
They were both in the same place all this time yet this was the first time they had seen each other since that night.
Bob reached in the pocket of his institutional beige robe, took out a cigarette and lit it.
"Wonder how long they've tried to keep us apart."
Darry just glanced at him, then looked out the window.
"Wonder if anyone knows we're together. Did someone mess up or do they figure we just don't care anymore. Has been two years."
Darry just continued to smoke.
"A greaser and a soc in the same place. Courtesy of Dad of course. This is where Dr. Sheldon hides all his mistakes. Not bad huh?"
Bob just continued to ramble. It was all white noise to Darry.
"You must have type O negative blood."
There was a time he might have jumped on top of Bob and tried to strangle him right there and then.
"Greaser. Soc. In the end we're just cattle. Cattle they occasionally milk."
There was a time he might have demanded answers.
What did you do to my baby brother?
Did you really try to kill him?
Why? WHY? He was only fourteen years old dammit!
But he didn't.
He didn't know whether it was time or the drugs regularly flowing through his system that gave him perspective.
Or the fact that Bob was cackling. Cackling in a way that would send shivers up Vincent Price's spine.
Never mind everything else that happened. Bob's family problems aside. Bob's grisly solution to those problems.
Something happened to Ponyboy the night he ran away.
Bob had something to do with it.
Granted, God, fate, destiny, the universe, had made Bob pay in a way that Darry could not even have imagined in his worst nightmares.
Bob's culpability had nothing to do with it.
If it wasn't Bob it would have been someone else. Something else.
What Darry did know for certain was that before Bob or whatever did something to Ponyboy, Darry himself had struck first.
Darry had set the events in motion.
If he hadn't his Ponyboy hard enough to slam him against the door, he wouldn't have run out to have God knows what done to him by Bob.
Bob and that weird Dr. Sheldon guy who was his brother.
But bad people and weirdos were always out there.
Darry had signed up to take care of his brother. Protect him from all that.
Instead, he struck Ponyboy. Ponyboy ran away. Some forsaken act had occurred. Ponyboy then attacked Bob and Bob fought back. Ponyboy turned on all of them. Darry had to….
To protect one brother Darry had to kill the other.
Darry stubbed out his cigarette. He took out another and was about to light it when Bob struck a match and held it out.
He just looked at him.
Had enough time gone by?
Did it make a difference?
One a brother who failed as a guardian and ultimately had to mutilate his charge.
Offered a light by another brother who, in an act that may have been self-defense or just a long time coming, blew his brother to pieces and had to mutilate the pieces that remained.
Now they were both behind bars in the same Hell.
Hell? More like Hell's waiting room.
Darry wondered if somewhere Ponyboy was laughing. Or at least amused.
He looked Bob in the eyes, then back down and accepted the light.
Bob lit another cigarette for himself.
Darry cast a long gaze out the window as the sun set in the west.
And that's the end. Hope everyone enjoyed. Was at least mildly amused. Possible sequel in the works.
Thanks for reading.