This chapter is bit dark :D Kinda me just picturing what Matt's past would've been like :D :D :D I KNOW there is no Andy punch in this chapter but trust me it's coming :D Not sure when though since my Muse gives me an idea like two seconds before I start writting something and stuffs up my plans :D But there's a small bit of Memily at the end... I was kinda missing them :D Didn't fully proof-read so if there's mistakes I apologise :D Don't own anything except the plot and my OCs :D
Enjoy :D :D :D
"Gideon we have to get back inside! If the toxic storm comes we'll die!"
Matt looked up from the new tazer prototype in his hand and listened to the cries of various survivors trying to convince his father to come back inside. The toxic storm hadn't shown up in a couple of hours and the creatures were no where to be seen. Surely he was just outside checking to make sure if it was safe to move again.
"Gideon come on! This isn't funny anymore!" Matt heard whoever's voice crack with emotion. They were really worried about him.
"What's he doing now?" he asked one of the armed soldiers standing at the base of the ladder.
The soldier looked over at him and sighed. "Eva has just gone out there to try bring your father in. He said something about 'Our last hope' and disappeared up the ladder."
With a loud sigh, Matt dragged himself to his feet and placed his weapon prototype on one of the nearby shelves. "Next time mate..." he muttered quietly to himself before he spun on his heels and faced the soldier again, trying to remember the guys name. David... or was it Davis. Yeah it's Davis. Michael Davis. "I guess I should go up there and bring him down then."
"Yeah. But make sure you take this with you. That lady from the last bunker said you'd need it someday." Davis held out a small touchpad device the size of a cellphone with the letters A.R.C printed on the back. "She also kept muttering names. No one took much notice of her though."
Matt's eye's narrowed at the small screen. It seemed like such old technology compared to what they had now. And the logo on the back looked very familiar. He looked up at Davis who was frowning at the ladder "What were the names?"
He lowered his eyes to Matt and shrugged. "The usual ones we hear from people I guess. Nick Cutter, Connor Temple, Abby Maitland and I heard her mutter Action Man quite a few times."
"Action Man... I've heard that somewhere before."
"Seriously Gideon!" Eva exclaimed, her voice echoing around in the vast emptiness. Rocks and sand... then more rocks and some more sand. It was all that was left.
Matt climbed up the ladder and made his way over to the pair who sat on a boulder with their weapons in hand. "You causing trouble again?"
"Me?" The tall brunette glared at him when he nodded. "You should be glad I don't have my dagger on me Matt or so help me I would have-"
"You're so much like your mother..." Gideon sighed. "Feisty young thing she was."
Eva's eyes widened. "You knew my mother?"
"And your brother."
"Andrew? But he..." Eva frowned, looking up at Matt who stood in front of them with his arms crossed while surveying the area around them. He didn't seem to be taking much notice of them. "How?"
"It's a very small word."
Gideon looked up at his son with wide hopefilled eyes. He was their last hope. He could save everyone. There was so much at stake here. "It's coming soon Matthew. You need to be ready."
"I am ready!" Matt exclaimed. "You keep saying that like it's going to open up any minute now but you're wrong!"
Gideon's eyebrows raised when he noticed the small grey object he was holding. "What's that in your hand?"
He shrugged. "Don't know. Davis just gave it to me. I think it might be something from the past. The A.R.C. on the back seems familiar."
Gideon smiled as he got to his feet. He uneasily made his way across the couple of meters between his son and himself and examined the touchpad device being held out to him. His whole mood seemed to lighten up at the details of the logo on the back. "There is hope for us all Matthew. Be ready to leave in an hour."
"Where are we going?" Eva asked, following on after the old man and his son.
Gideon made a few grunting noises as he made his way down the ladder into the bunket and looked up at Eva while she climbed down. "You, are staying here."
"Why? I could-"
"You should stay here can't afford to have two people on the other side. It could compromise everything, especially since it involves the era you're..." Matt's voice trailed off at the familiar rumbling of the rocks. Stupid toxic storms He thought as he made his way down into the bunker before the cloud washed over them.
"Since it involes the era I'm what?" Eva exclaimed as Matt spun around to look at her. "You send my brother on an impossible mission through the anomalies but you won't send me!"
Another soldier appeared beside the two with an unreadable expression on his face. He was one of the soldiers that was suppose to be protecting the man they had found from the past. He must be ready to talk Matt thought
"Quinn is awake now. But he's saying he'll only speak to you."
Matt sighed. Danny Quinn. The soldiers had managed to get his name out of him and that he came from the past but nothing else. The man had kept dozing in and out of sleep for the past couple of days, probably as an excuse not to reveal anything when they kept trying to interogate him.
"I'll be down there later." Matt replied. The soldier nodded and made his way back to the holding rooms.
"Please Matt. I want to help. I can't just sit around doing nothing. It's not in me!"
Matt turned towards the shelves and picked up his weapon prototype then turned back around to face her. "You can help me with this."
Eva frowned down at the rifle-like weapon. "What is it?"
Matt grinned smugly. "An Electro Muscular Disruption Weapon. Invented it myself."
"A tazer?"
"These are unlike anything we've ever used before Eva. Give them a chance. Come on, I'll show you how they work." Matt searched around the small room until he found a smaller prototype he'd made and nodded towards the ladder. "We could go up there but I don't think it's safe enough yet."
Eva rolled her eyes when he handed the smaller EMD to her and begun to climb the ladder. "You worry too much. The toxic storms haven't been so frequent lately. We'll be fine for an hour or so."
"Eva we can just use the training dummies in the-" His voice was drowned out at the sound of the bunker hatch swinging open and he watched Eva disappear from view. He frowned and quickly followed after her.
"There's another bunker just up there. We could test these out while he make our way over" she said excitedly.
Matt glanced around at their surroundings. He had a feeling something bad was going to happen to them out there. They needed to get back inside. "Even though I love your enthusiam Eva, we need to stay here. We need to stick together this time! What about that story you told me about your-"
"Millie didn't get caught up in this Matt. She followed my brother through an anomaly. Come on!"
They had only moved a meter or so when they came out of nowhere. Their growls bouncing around off the boulders. Matt let his instincts take over and shot the EMD at the creatures, watching them fly backwards through the air and landing with a heavy thump against the rocks and sand.
"Matt!" Eva screammed as she ran towards him, her EMD managing to stun a couple of the creatures.
"We have to get back inside." Eva nodded in agreement as they spun around and begun to sprint back to the bunker.
Matt found it easy finding his footing on the loose rocks surrounding them but Eva slipped, falling onto her hands and knees with a loud yelp. There was a cracking sound and Matt's heart dropped.
"Eva!" he sprinted back to her and found her on the verge of tears, clutching her wrist. "Come on we have to get inside. You can do it." Matt shot his EMD repeatively as more creatures came at them. "Come on."
"I've broken my wrist Matt! I can't!"
"You have to come Eva. Don't give up." Matt called over the creatures growls.
"Just go. I'll catch up with you."
Matt frowned down at her as he shot a creature trying to sneak up on them. "I'm not leaving you, come on!" Matt glanced around at the creatures as their growls begun to get quieter and quieter. Something bad was definitely going to happen. He could sense it. His frown deepened. "They're leaving... now's our chance" he quickly helped her to her feet and they slowly made their way back, Matt supporting Eva with his arm around her waist while she held her broken wrist to her chest.
Matt froze as the ground begun to shake beneath them. His eyes were wide when he saw the large cloud advancing closer towards them. "Come on Eva, we have to get inside!"
"We're not going to make it Matt!"
"We can!" Matt called as the rumbling got stronger and the winds begun to pick up. He frowned at the distance between the two of them and the bunker. She was right, there was no way they'd be able to make it before the cloud swooped over them.
They managed to cover half of the distance before they fell to their knees on the rocks and sand and tried their best to cover themselves as the toxic storm blew over them.
Eva let out an ear-piercing scream as the toxins from the cloud came in contact with her wrist. Her chest burned as the polluted air filled her lung and Matt quickly shielded her body with his just as the cloud begun to thin and they stayed like that until it was gone.
Matt coughed, the air making his chest feel tight. He took a deep breath of the air and turned to Eva. "Come on, before the next wave comes or the creatures return!"
"I... can't..." she gasped for a breath but failed to supply her lungs with the oxygen she desperately needed. She knew she shouldn't have screamed. She had taken in too much of the toxins from the cloud.
Matt craddled her in his arms as he quickly carried her back to the bunker. Davis was waiting at the base of the ladder when he saw the state of the pair as the hatch opened.
Matt carefully lowered Eva down then followed himself, locking the bunker hatch securely behind him.
"What happened out there?" Davis asked as he gently placed Eva down on the floor and assessed her injuries.
"You know... the usual. Creatures, injuries, storm clouds." Matt rummaged through the shelves for the right boxes containing the liquids and quickly returned back to Eva. "Drink this..."
She did as she was told, wincing at Davis' cool fingers against her boiling skin. "Definitely a fracture. Not much we can do except click it back into place and give her some antibiotics."
"I can't..." she coughed, her eyes fluttering.
"You're okay sweetheart just, hold in there."
"Matt..." her voice was weak and it hurt to talk. Pain shot through her chest every time she tried to move and her wrist wasn't making things better. "Tell... Andrew..."
Matt's hand raised to her neck, trying to find her pulse. He found it but the beat was slowly fading until he felt nothing beneath his fingers. "Eva! Stay with us!" he exclaimed suddenly.
Others from deeper in the bunker came to see what was happening, a few of them burying their faces in the shoulders of friends and loved ones when they saw the scene playing out. The color was slowly fading from Eva's tear streaked face and Matt was frantically trying to perform CPR.
Gideon appeared then with a blank look on his face. It wasn't the first time someone had been caught in the toxic storm and didn't survive. He had lost friends to the disastrous cloud. Behind his blank face held sympathy and sadness, however. He hated seeing his son witness the same things he had. He hated seeing anyone witness them.
"There's nothing to see here!" he announced to the group, slowly moving them away from the scene. "Return to what you were doing."
Davis slumped back against the wall, tears burning behind his eyes as he watched Matt hopelessly pump life back into the poor girl. "Come on! Don't leave me! We have to stick together!"
"Mate, she's gone. There's nothing we can do..."
"No!" Matt growled, shooting a death glare at the soldier. "We can bring her back! I have to bring herback!"
Gideon appeared again a thick black bodybag dangling in his hand. "Matthew, there's nothing we could've done. She took in took much of the toxic fumes. We have to carry on as best we can."
Matt slumpped against Eva's cold motionless body, her hand lifeless in his. "I can't do this anymore Gideon. I don't know what to do anymore..." he mumbled against her neck. He closed his eyes, praying to whatever hope was left.
His father sighed, looking over to Davis who had composed himself and was eyeing the bodybag in the older mans hand. Gideon tossed it to him and turned back to Matt. "We carry on with the mission. That's our number one priority right now. Why don't you go and get some rest. Davis and I can deal with this."
Davis slowly laid out the bodybag just as Matt raised his eyes. "No! She's not just going to be dumped like the rest of them! We're going to bury her properly!"
"Matt we can't-"
"We can! It's what she would have wanted..." Matt argued.
Gideon sighed. "Alright. But remember we have to concentrate on our mission. If you succeed, all of this will change. She'll be alive again." Matt had a faint of a smile as Davis slid Eva's body onto the body bag and begun to zip it up.
He managed to get one last look at her face before the zip covered her. "Tell...Andrew..." her last words bounced around her mind. Tell him what? He didn't even know who he was...
Matt woke up to the sound of the toilet flushing for the tenth time in the space of an hour. Emily slowly dragged herself back to the bed and buried herself in the pillows. "When will this end?"
Matt grinned. He'd gotten over the sensitivity and sickness after breakfast with a special concoction Jess had put together. Emily, on the other hand, still wasn't taking the after effects very well.
"Everytime I eat... it comes back up. Everytime I drink... it comes back up. Everything I think about it coming back up... it comes back up! What's wrong with me?" she mumbled against the pillows.
Matt laughed quietly, rubbing her back to try and sooth her. "It'll wear off in a day or so. It's just your system fighting back against all the alcohol you had last night."
"It sucks."
He leaned forward and placed a light kiss on her exposed cheek and sighed. "I know it does sweetheart. Just go back to sleep and get some rest."
Emily was quick to follow his advice. Her eyes drifted shut and she snuggled in closer to him. "I love you Matt." she mumbled against his warm chest.
He smiled, wrapping his arms around her and gently rubbing her back again. His mind couldn't help but jump back to his memory and the bad feeling he got before the creatures attacked. It didn't help that that exact feeling was coursing through his veins at that moment.
Something was going to happen. He didn't know what but it was going to be big.
He tightened his arms around Emily and frowned. 'Go back' he told himself. 'You have to go back!'
Matt's chest tightened with worry. It wasn't over yet...
I've been meaning to end these with cliffhanger-ish endings. I kinda like this one... a tiny bit. Still not as good as my Jecker and Conby but still good. The finale of series 5 gave me the idea. Just how Matt was kinda angry when he told Abby that everyone was dead... my imagination was sent into overdrive :D Ooo and Danny in the future :D :D :D Thought I'd squeeze him in there somehow.
I wouldn't mind hearing about what you think is up with Andy :D :D So um chop chop get reviewing (Wow that was kinda rude... I'm hardly ever rude... I don't LIKE being rude...) Review if you want to :D :D :D