Chapter 31
Darkness… nothing but the black of death…
Suddenly, patches of red forming, fizzling in and out of the black. Patches of pain, appearing and disappearing in the cloud of death. Coming and going, unsure of what to do.
The red becoming more apparent, coming forward and staying for longer before dying out. Becoming larger. Becoming brighter. Staying longer. Beginning to overtake the blackness.
And than a light, a white light, shining through everything.
Shadow's eyes glittered with tears as she stared down at Dan. It hurt her to even look at him. She was surprised, in fact. Not that it hurt, but that she was able to keep looking without going completely insane.
She wasn't sure that it made sense, and at the same time, she was positive that it did. Of course it all made sense. Everything fit together, as it always seemed to… No matter how much she didn't want it to.
Dan was lying on the ground, bleeding, probably dead. Oh yes, bleeding, bleeding badly. She was watching the man she loved bleed to death, and suddenly she realized that she'd never said goodbye, that…
That she'd never told him that she loved him. Never had she been able to bring herself to do it, and now it seemed that she wouldn't get the chance. "Too late…" a voice in the back of her mind cackled madly. "Toooo late, you were too late!"
Part of her, a silly, unreasonable part, felt that she could've saved him by telling him she loved him. The larger part of her, that which constituted most of Shadow, told her that he had done what he had in the name of love.
She was struck by that. He had done this for her, because he loved her. Maybe because he wanted to prove to her that he loved her very much, that he'd do anything for her.
And she was helpless against it all. That part hurt. Hurt a lot, in fact. She wanted to help him. Shadow wanted it to be like a fairy tale, one where she could kiss Dan to wake him up. Suddenly, she felt an almost irrepressible urge to do so, despite the obvious circumstances.
Such were the run of thoughts circulating rapidly through the young woman's head as she looked past Mike and towards Dan, willing him to live. Commanding him to live. Wishing he could live.
"Dan?" Mike was bending over the body, his voice hopeful. It occurred to Shadow that he was hopeful for her sake, though she didn't quite grasp it at the moment.
There was no reply. Of course there wouldn't be. There'd never be another reply, because Dan was gone, and there was no going back, because once you passed the point of no return, there was no turning around. Once you passed by death, there was no going back.
"Dan?" Mike tried again, though the hopelessness in his voice was more obvious this time.
Suddenly, it occurred to Shadow that simply calling his name wouldn't work. Maybe life was a little bit like a fairy tale. After all, the stories had to come from somewhere.
Feeling as if she were in a dream, almost sure that she was, Shadow stepped forward until she was beside Dan and knelt down. As she did so, an overwhelming sense of reality rushed over her.
The cold, hard-packed dirt of the ground. The slight breeze that swept in whispers through the leaves of the surrounding trees. The fresh air. And something… a labored, heavy noise…
"Dan?" this time she spoke herself, not loudly, but hopefully. She was renewed; she had found the maybe, the fairy tale hope.
There was no reply, but she wasn't put out yet. No, she couldn't be. Not with the fairy-tale ending. There had to be another way. "Dan?" this time she shook him softly, placing her hand on his shoulder, ignoring the cold feel of his body, sheltering herself against it and feeling instead for the deep warmth. Her ears took no notice of the gunshots that emitted from nearby, flying through the forest.
Something was in there. Something that could maybe signal life. "Dan?!?" this time her voice was more frantic, and she shook harder, not thinking that maybe it was hurting, fully believing it would help.
Suddenly, mercifully, beautifully, Dan's eyes opened slowly, in an almost painful rise. "What…?" he spoke in a dry, soft voice, and began to struggle to get up.
"Dan, Dan, it's all right," Shadow spoke in what she hoped was control, though she could barely contain herself.
Her breath had caught in her throat, and was beginning to let itself out bit by bit. Could it be true? Was he really alive? Honest to God living?
"Shadow." No question this time, and there was a faint smile on Dan's lips. It was followed by a minute cringe, and Shadow placed her hand on his forehead.
"Relax… you're going to be fine," she smiled, and knew it was true. Had to be. It felt right. Anything that felt that right had to be right.
He did relax, responding to what she had said, but his eyes remained open, and for that she was glad. There was vitality in them, and suddenly she knew that those eyes had been the indicators that had told her he would live. He would live because he wanted to, and because she wanted him to.
"I thought I was gone…" his eyes switched to Mike for a moment, than back to Shadow, where they settled once more. "Shadow, I… I…" He coughed, unable to finish, drowning the words.
Tears had begun to cloud Shadow's eyes, and she leaned forward, wrapping her arms lightly around him, not moving him and yet comforting him. "I love you, Dan. I'm so sorry."
Dan smiled and she leaned back. "I love you too…" he choked, and Shadow suddenly felt better than she had in a long time.
Dan's mind was clouded, and he understood very little. What he saw was mostly mixed in haze, in with those clouds of red, and ever-fading spots of black. What he saw was understandable, but, for the most part, just barely.
He wasn't dead, that much was certain. What he was seeing and sensing was reality, plain and simple as that. Well, maybe not so simple, but the basic idea was there. He wasn't dead, and he didn't intend to die. That idea stood out firm, along with one other.
Shadow was there. Shadow was looking down at him, and she was alive. That had brought him further up, giving him more reason to live, to fight the black spots and ignore the large red ones. Shadow, Shadow, Shadow. The name, the face, the voice, the woman, rang in his mind.
She was the one he had done this for, and she was safe. She was safe. That kept playing over and over, and he didn't mind. He needed to be reassured of the fact, needed to know for sure. She was safe. It was like listening to his favorite song so many times everyone else became irritated.
Mike was there too. Dan thought they were still in the woods, but her wasn't sure. He felt pain, almost saw it, swimming in the background. None of that mattered, though. None of it was really very important, after all.
Shadow was important. Shadow, Shadow, and Shadow. She was safe. She was right next to him. For the moment, he couldn't think of a situation he'd rather be in. For the moment, he'd forgotten that he had been shot.
When Shadow told him she loved her, when she hugged him… Dan had thought his heart would burst with love for her. She loved him, she really did. And now she'd finally said it. She'd been able to find it in herself.
He loved her, she loved him. It didn't matter that he'd been shot. It sounded stupid, it sounded like foolishness. And maybe it was. To Dan, it didn't feel that way. To Dan, that didn't matter at all.
"Shadow… later…" he murmured, feeling himself sinking back.
Only this time, it wasn't black. This time it was gray. It was gray, and gray was all right. He wasn't going to die.
He was going to live, and he loved Shadow, and Shadow loved him…
Dan sunk into unconsciousness smiling, unaware of what was going on elsewhere, only knowing what he wanted, what he needed to know.
Shadow smiled at Dan, than suddenly grew worried as his eyes slipped shut. She shook him, muttering, "Dan? Dan?"
She felt a hand on her shoulder, and turned to see Mike staring down at her, his face looking very relieved. "He's going to be fine," there was a smile on his face, one that was sad. Shadow didn't catch the sadness, only felt a wave of relief.
"Are you sure?" she asked anxiously.
"Yeah… he's still breathing," he motioned. "And I think he'll hold on for you."
Shadow smiled again and stood up. She stared at Mike for a moment, seemingly unsure of what to say. "Now what?"
"We've got to get him some help."
Shadow felt an urge to smack herself, then decided against it. Of course. Help was what he needed. He was fighting for life, but he'd need some help. "How?"
"Carry him to a hospital," Mike shrugged.
It didn't occur to Shadow that maybe picking Dan up would be bad, didn't seem to fit with anything. It couldn't hurt, it could only help. Perhaps it was the right mode of thinking. Perhaps leaving to get help would've been bad… surely it would've.
"All right," Shadow stepped lightly aside, casting an eye on Dan, making sure he was there. Her eyes caught the rise and fall of his bleeding chest, and she felt a little better still. He was breathing fine… as fine as could've been expected, anyway.
Mike lifted Dan in his arms carefully, dealing without any humor. Any humor he'd previously carried had been replaced by a dead seriousness, a sense of reality. To Shadow, he looked almost like the Savior… or was that what Dan looked like to her?
"Let's go," he motioned back down the trail, had even taken a step in the direction of the road, when Shadow shook her head.
"I'm going after Matt." As she had watched Mike turn around, the gunshots she had heard played in her mind.
She watched as Mike's jaw slacked. Didn't drop, slacked. "Shadow, don't…" he pleaded. "Please. It isn't safe."
She ignored the tone of his voice, shaking her head firmly. "I have to. He might need help."
"Shadow…"
"Don't," she spoke with the same resolve Dan had used earlier, and Mike nodded slowly at her.
"Come back safe… to the hospital," he spoke as if he, too, were in a dream, and Shadow supposed that was probably how he felt.
"See you soon," Shadow turned and started down the trail, not letting herself look back. If she did, she'd stop She knew that.
Because Dan was back there, and she wanted to be with him. To stay beside him. Be there when he woke up. She didn't want to leave him for a bare second, and here she was, walking down a trail to… to where?
"Death," a voice whispered, but she didn't think so. Had a feeling it'd be over by the time she got there.
Still, she couldn't leave Matt with the psycho. Couldn't leave Matt or Ginger. With this resolve, she pulled out her gun and started forward.
Mike watched as Shadow walked down the trail in solitude for a moment, shaking his head slowly. There was no stopping her. Why was everyone so damn stubborn?
He didn't like letting her go down there. It wasn't safe. Felicity was down there, after all. And yet…It would be safe. Another gunshot rang through the air, and suddenly he knew it. It's be safe, and if it wouldn't…
Well, that was better left without thought. He had a feeling that Felicity would take care of herself if she hadn't been killed yet. Or was that wishful thinking? Mike wasn't sure, and, for the moment, it didn't help to think about it. Nothing along those lines of thinking could be very good.
He shifted Dan in his arms slightly, moving slowly as he did so. He though that maybe it wasn't a great idea to be carrying the man, and yet there was no real good way. He had thought the options over quickly, and this had seemed to be the best of them.
He started in the opposite direction from Shadow, towards the road. Ah, Shadow. That look in her eyes as Dan had spoken, that hopefulness…
Mike sighed tiredly. It would pass. Everything had to pass eventually, right? Feelings were just feelings, and his didn't matter. He was just a part of life. He was helping, and that was what he wanted to do.
Dan would be okay. That much he knew. It was obvious, really. Ginger? Matt? He didn't know. He hoped they'd be fine, really, honestly did. Ginger had always been so serious, and yet she'd always been one of them.
Just another Rocket, that was it. They were all Rockets. Just because they'd been taken down didn't mean they couldn't be put back up. Of course they could build themselves back up. They could become a new generation of Rockets, in a sense. Working from the ground up.
This renewed Mike somehow, and he was able to forget his feelings, to push them aside as he always had. The path opened onto the street up ahead, and form there it was only a short distance to the hospital.
Mike suddenly lifted his head, as if in defiance to the world. They'd make it. They'd all make it through this, and be stronger because of it.
Chapter 32
Ginger didn't quite realize what was happening, even as she felt the bullets tear into her chest. It didn't fit with anything that she was thinking. She was thinking that she was going to kill Felicity and now it wasn't working like that. She didn't get it for the moment, though.
Even as she began to falter, to drop to the ground even, Ginger continued forward, pushing herself towards Felicity. She was angry, and anger had taken over her. Allowing it to do so had been her biggest mistake, and yet it hadn't left and she didn't understand that it was so.
The blood that flowed out of her didn't matter; Felicity's laugh didn't matter. The crazy woman had lowered the gun slowly, Ginger saw that much and took it as an advantage. The cold weapon, that glinting metallic bringer of death, was down, and maybe that meant she could attack. Maybe that was her chance, right then and there, to go for it.
"You…" she spat over and over, unable to say anymore, unable to place her tumbling thoughts into words that would fit, words that would work for her. "You…"
"Yeah, me," Felicity laughed again, her voice cutting icily even through the winds which blew over the rock face. She still stood with the gun down, even as Ginger neared.
Ginger began to feel a biting sort of throb on her chest in two separate areas and wondered vaguely what it was about. She lunged forward, part of her wondering why movement required so much more effort, most of her concentrating on moving forward. Felicity was the target. She had to kill Felicity.
She reached down and felt the handle of the knife. Her fingers grasped it, though they were shaking at a rate that would've been alarming, had she cared to think about it. The first attempt she made to pull it out was unsuccessful, and she came up with air. The second time, however, she managed to clench it between her fingers.
This caused her whole hand to shake unsteadily, but she had the knife, she had the weapon. That was what she needed. As she brought her hand up, she brushed her chest and felt something warm and sticky. A moment of thought flashed in her eyes, yet she ignored it. The sticky crap didn't matter.
Gripping the knife with her shaking hand, Ginger glared at Felicity, again voicing, "You… You…"
In response to this, Felicity simply crossed her arms, attaining a casual appearance without trying very hard. This infuriated Ginger further, and she pushed onward, trying not to notice that she was going to fall, that her feet felt like lead. It was getting hard, but the rage hadn't left, and she ran on it.
This was the woman who had killed Dan. Had killed Trae. Had deserted the Team. This was the bitch that deserved to die right away. The world would be better without her, right?
Suddenly, everything intensified in Ginger's mind. Everything seemed too real. The stars, gleaming high above in their safe, far-away havens, high above the cloudless sky. The cold wind, zipping around her, biting into her. Felicity, laughing like the maniac she was, her blond hair whipping in the wind. And unexpectedly, the bright burst of pain.
Ginger felt the pain with shock and, though she tried to push on, began to fall. It seemed that she had no energy left, nothing to go on. She was sapped dry, and what was she supposed to do? She tried to will herself onward, but her traitor legs had given out, and she found herself laying back up on the cold stone.
For a moment, she still didn't understand what had happened. Didn't understand why her chest felt as if it had been crushed inward. Didn't understand why blood was running around her. Didn't understand why she couldn't get up. And then she did.
"Murder is her game, and she knows how to play it well." Her own voice echoed in her mind. She'd said that, when? Not long ago, because it had been to Dan, while they were walking down the sidewalk.
Suddenly, the anger was replaced by realization so hard she almost screamed. She had fallen into the trap. Become nothing more than another loser of the game, because there was Felicity, grinning down at her. And that was the pain, the gunshots. She had been hit, and now she was bleeding. Before her eyes, her life force spread over the ground.
How had she let herself be led into it? How had she not allowed herself to take control over panic? Panic, why oh why had she let it in? There was no going back now, and nothing could be done. Unless there was a miracle, and Ginger didn't believe there would be a miracle. Felicity had won.
Why? How? The questions pounded in her head for what seemed like an eternity as she struggled to get up, though it was really only seconds. She couldn't stand, couldn't even get to her knees, and she wasn't surprised. Her strength was gone. It had been used up when she had tried to attack Felicity.
It had been so futile! She never could've reached Felicity, and the bitch had known it. That was the kicker. The bitch had known everything. It had been in her plan for everything, and now Ginger realized that her previous thoughts had been true. Felicity was insane, but not stupid. She seemed to have become smarter, in fact. Maybe that was a side effect or something…
"How do you like losing?" Felicity sneered down at her, eyes gleaming in her madness.
Ginger didn't warrant that with an answer. It didn't deserve one. Instead, she suddenly saw that she was going to die, and that her life would end very soon. She was almost dead, anyway. At least, it felt that way.
Dead, she was going to be dead. Never going to see anyone again, never going to be a part of life. She wouldn't see the Team be built up again, wouldn't see it rise to glory. She wouldn't see her family. She wouldn't see her friends again. Worst of all, she wouldn't see Matt.
The very idea struck her like a bolt of lightening, and suddenly she wished badly that she hadn't been so stupid, that she hadn't run off after Felicity in the first place. Because now she'd never see Matt again, and she didn't want that at all. She wanted to see Matt badly, really badly…
Felicity? Where was Felicity? She'd been there a moment ago, and now she was gone. Had she leapt into the river? Tried to escape? From what? Why?
The bushes across the clearing split open, and Ginger tensed, ready for anything, wishing it would hurry up and end if it was going to do so. She imagined terrible, awful things coming out of the bushes, coming to attack, coming to hurt. Maybe hurting Matt.
No, the person who emerged wouldn't hurt Matt. The person was Matt! "Matt!" Ginger managed, trying not to listen to her voice, which was weak, and, she knew, growing weaker by the second.
The expression on Matt's face was one of panic mixed with love and anger. He looked across at her, she looked at him, and she saw his eyes widen. Then he was running to her, and then he was beside her, oh sweet mercy, she could at least say goodbye, and maybe it would be all right, because Matt was there.
"Ginger," Matt's voice was choked in a way Ginger had never heard before, and his steel gray eyes were full of concern, full of fear, full of immense sadness.
"Hi…" she tried to reach up to him but couldn't. He leaned over her, seeming unsure of what to do, seeming unsure of Felicity…
Oh shit, there she was, right now, right behind Matt. Ginger tried to say something, tried to scream, but she couldn't she was falling out. She was dying, approaching the huge black storm cloud of silence and eternity.
Felicity was creeping up behind Matt, but Matt didn't noticed. All he seemed to notice was that Ginger was dying. Ginger wanted to warn him, but found herself beyond speech, beyond anything.
The cloud was beginning to engulf her, and suddenly Matt's face was swimming with a black shroud. Then there was nothing but blackness, and the whole world was dark. From the outside she heard noises that didn't make sense, didn't comprehend.
Down below she saw something, even in the darkness. It was blacker than black, something that sounded impossible but was undoubtedly true. A monster, a blacker cloud, the bearer of death. It was coming for her.
She tried to run, tried to turn away, but couldn't find the light. The blackness was everywhere, and when it turned around, the deep black was close, so close… Ginger tried to run, and found herself exhausted. The cloud neared her, approaching slowly, slowly…
Matt stared in stark disbelief as he felt Ginger's body go limp. It couldn't be happening, could it? She couldn't be dead, no… no… Ginger couldn't be dead…
She was, though, and he knew it. Her breathing was… God, was she even breathing? No, oh shit, she wasn't breathing, and he couldn't do anything about it, because death had taken its stake, and death never gave up what it took.
How could he have let her leave? He had known something would happen, and yet he hadn't stopped her. He could've, could've…
"No, that's not true. She wanted to come," the voice of his own mind spoke, and he swatted at it in his mind.
No, no, no matter what, he should've stopped her. Now she was dead, Felicity had killed her easily, just because she'd let her guard down, just because she had come out on her own. Let her guard down?
Suddenly, too late, Matt realized that he had done just that. Even as he felt Felicity's foot slam into his forehead, he knew that he had let his fear take over, and that maybe he'd end up with Ginger.
"Maybe that'd be better," he though tiredly, and at that instant it seemed that it really would be better if he was dead. Then he could join her…
"No! Maybe she's alive! Maybe!" his mind answered itself, himself letting it, feeling schizo and not caring.
That was ridiculous, he could plainly see that she was dead. But he didn't have to die. Ginger wouldn't have wanted him to die, right? Besides…
He looked up in time to see Felicity kicking Ginger's body. It seemed further away than it had been, but… Wasn't that wrong? How could that happen?
Felicity's smile broke even wider. "Say bye-bye," she laughed, and kicked Ginger's body again.
This time Matt realized what had happened. Felicity had been kicking the body towards the edge of the cliff, and that last kick had… Had shoved Ginger off. "Ginger!" he launched forward reflexively, knowing she was dead, not caring. She was still Ginger.
By the time he reached the edge, she was in the fast-flowing river. For a moment he considered diving in after her, than discarded the idea. It wouldn't help. Felicity was the problem.
She had caused his real trouble. The Team could be fixed, but this couldn't. Death wasn't something that could be put back together to make life. Death was a replacement. There was the problem.
Seeing Ginger's body go had hurt him, mostly because now she was really gone, and now he knew the true pain. It pulled at him strongly, hurting him, and he wanted her back so bad that he almost did turn around and jump in. Instead, however, he whirled around to face Felicity.
He almost fell over the edge himself when Felicity kicked him, but he managed to remain on just the same. For a moment he wondered why she hadn't just shot him, and then decided it didn't matter. What mattered was that she was still alive.
In a flash, he had his own gun out of its holster. Felicity just laughed at him. "I've already won," she laughed dryly. "I've won, and you can't do anything about it! You're alone, Matt! All alone! How's that strike ya?" She laughed again, and Matt realized she was getting worse. If he gave her a chance, she'd overpower him by simple madness.
"Fuck off, bitch," he spat dryly as he pulled the trigger.
Felicity felt the bullet bury itself into her head. Felt the pain that almost immediately became numbness as the metal sank into her brain. Felt the cold power of death begin to run towards her.
She didn't feel herself fall, didn't know what was happening. Really, she didn't care. Because she had been taken down, and that was fine with her, because she had been falling. Nothing much could've been accomplished past what she had already done, after all.
For that moment she could still feel the overpowering madness, and for that moment she was completely proud of what she had accomplished. A job well done. And a hell of a way to go, right?
As she fell into the dark layers leading to death, however, the insanity began to peel away, falling off of her. It was unnecessary in death; it was just another point of life that didn't matter in the end. Not really.
As the madness fell away, Felicity felt something that could've been regret, something that could've been guilt, something that could've been compassion. With the insanity gone, she could almost grasp what it meant to be kind.
And then she was falling towards her death, falling past unpleasant memories of the past as she did so, the memories her insanity had covered up. The psychologist. Her parents avoiding her and eventually shunning her. The other kids, giving her strange looks and backing away. The fear that everyone had felt of her. The loneliness she had felt and tried to ignore.
Then she was sinking into death. As it came to her, she smiled slowly. As death came to Felicity, she embraced it readily.
Chapter 33
Matt nearly dropped his gun as Felicity fell, forgetting for the moment that he was holding it. Everything seemed to rush out of him, and the world dulled to gray. For a moment he was sure he'd go down, though he didn't know why, probably stress.
He gained his feet and felt the sensation of the ground beneath them once more, however, and was able to keep himself up. He took a step forward, towards Felicity, and glared down at her. He extended his arm slowly, almost painfully, until it was pointed at her head.
Inside, he knew that she was dead. Hell, every part of him knew. His mind wasn't satisfied, though. Even more so, his heart wasn't satisfied. There was too much pain for one shot to cure all.
The bullet hole in the center of Felicity's forehead held no meaning at the time, nor did the torrents of blood that flooded out, taking their insanity with them. The fluid seeped out onto the rock, turning into dark, unmistakably thick puddles.
Felicity herself seemed at peace. More at peace in death than she ever had been in the course of her life. Matt understood this, and hated her for it. Hated her because she'd done it to others, most of all because she'd done it to Ginger, than laughed at him.
"I've won, and you can't do anything about it! You're alone, Matt! All alone! How's that strike ya?" He heard it as if she were still alive, as if she were speaking to him straight out.
For a moment he was sure he was, sure that somehow she had lived and was ready to torment him further. He shot two more bullets into her limp body, watching it lift slightly and fall back from the impact.
"All alone!" he heard her voice laughing, and shot again, not realizing that tears had begun to form at the edges of his eyes. He hadn't cried in years, in what seemed like forever, and he didn't notice, didn't care.
By this time the body was splattered fairly intensely with blood and bits of guts, as well as four bullet holes that had been peppered in. The one on her forehead didn't look peppered, though. It was more like a crater. Matt wasn't sickened at all, but seeing her bleeding like that, seeing her so far past dead…
It reassured his nerves that she was dead. That voice was there, playing in the back of his mind… "All alone…" But that was all, Felicity was dead, she was never going to live another day, never going to terrorize another soul.
Matt suddenly understood, though that was the one thing he fully could comprehend at the moment. Everything else seemed unreal, as if in a dream. It occurred to him that this was natural, though he wondered.
Was it? Was the haze natural? Maybe all humans felt it, but maybe it was something not so obvious, something beneath the surface. A way of protection? Maybe. Maybe something else.
He shook his head, looking down at Felicity again. He placed the gun back in its shoulder holster slowly, his eyes glittering in the fluorescent moonlight. She was dead, that much he knew.
Lifting his upper lip, he pulled back his right leg swiftly, than drove it into Felicity's side. It was what Felicity had done to Ginger, and seemed fitting. Felicity's body lay limply on the edge, and Matt stepped over to her, his feet scraping over bits of loose stone.
There she was, the bitch who had caused so many problems, the bitch that had been the real trouble. She had been dangerous, she had been insane. And now she was dead, laying defenseless and lifeless on the ground.
Matt felt no real pity for her, though someone who had not seen her 'work' or the way she played the game might have. She didn't appear to be dangerous, even with her eyes open. The insanity had been with her while she lived, but had left after she died.
"Good riddance," Matt thought tiredly, looked over the edge.
The water raged down below, flowing deeply and quickly. There was no real need to shove her in, but Matt didn't want to leave her on the cliff. A river like the Naseau was a perfect place to throw a body, a palace where it could wind up far, far away.
Looking at it made him think of Ginger, made him think of how she had been shoved in, but he pushed it away. For the moment, his mind was blocking thoughts of her. Those thoughts hurt, and he wasn't ready for the hurt yet. Not quite yet, at any rate.
With a final sneer at Felicity, Matt kicked her body, than watched it tumble lifelessly into the water. As it fell in, the water splashed about it in droplets, and Felicity disappeared underwater. Matt watched for a moment, than turned away. There was no more to see, after all.
He started across the rock face, trying not to think of Ginger. Trying to think of the others. He had made it halfway across when the bushes split apart.
Without thinking, he drew his gun, ready for anything. The person he saw relieved him, however, and he put the gun back. "Hi, Shadow," he nodded.
Shadow looked around with a sense of amazement. Just a plain rock face, that was all, but somehow, somehow it seemed like so much more. It was like looking into a pond from a boat. Thinking it was shallow, but somehow being sure that it was deep, so deep that a person could easily drown.
That was her first thought, anyway. Something had happened, and the thought had connected with it readily. She wasn't sure where it had come from, but it had fit like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle were supposed to fit.
She had been cautious while approaching, and even more cautious when she had heard more gunshots. They seemed to be the final warning. She had almost turned back then. After all, if Matt had been shot, what was it going to help if she rushed out and gotten killed?
She had kept walking forward despite these thoughts, though. She wanted Matt to be alive, and wanted Ginger to be there with him. It was possible that they would be alive. Very possible. After all, Dan had lived.
So she had continued, and when she had reached the clearing, she had almost jumped out shooting, sure she had seen Felicity shooting at someone…
It had been her imagination, however. The area she had originally saw was open, free from people. When she turned her head, she saw someone, but it wasn't Felicity. It was Matt.
She felt a great relief at this, but not as much as she wanted to feel. Where was Ginger? Where was the young woman who had been her friend for so long?
Shadow hoped, Shadow prayed that Ginger had started back some other way. That Ginger was safe. "Please, please, please let her be safe," she thought, hoping without almost as much grit hope as she had with Dan.
As she had watched, Matt had kicked someone, it was Felicity, of course, over the edge. Shadow had been surprised, but not overly so. There seemed to be righteousness in what he did. Well, maybe not righteousness, but it seemed to fit.
When Matt turned around, Shadow had seen that his eyes were terribly worn looking, strained and haunted. Shadow felt that she knew what they meant, but hoped over all hope that she was wrong.
She had walked out of the bushes, and wasn't surprised when he pulled out the gun. He put it away after a moment, and nodded at her, than spoke in a voice that was calm despite the turmoil in his eyes. "Hi, Shadow."
"Hello," she walked forward, feeling her throat begin to clog up.
That was silly, though! She couldn't let herself get choked up before she knew the truth. Maybe it was something else. Maybe Matt's eyes looked like they did because of something else. Maybe they always looked like that.
"You know that isn't true," her mind spoke dryly. It was the part she hated, the part that loved the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help it God.
She looked at him, willing herself to believe that it wasn't true, willing herself to believe everything was all right. What good would that do, though? If what she believed had happened really had happened, what good would denying it beforehand do? It'd just make it worse. Besides, that look in Matt's eyes…
"Have you ever seen him cry before?" This time the voice wasn't just dry, it was ice-cold as well.
Matt wasn't quite crying. Leaking, was how the man who had adopted her long ago would've put it. Barely anything, and yet, she suspected that it was a lot to Matt. She'd never known he could come close to crying.
It was true. Had to be. She couldn't keep staring at him, letting his mind take over for him. She knew how it felt, because Ginger WAS dead, of course she was. Ginger was dead, and she wouldn't come back.
That struck Shadow, and she bit her lip. Ginger had been her friend for a long time. They'd stuck together in tough situations. They'd been part of the Team. Hell, Ginger had introduced her to the Team, hadn't she?
"I'm so sorry," she embraced Matt in the way that only one who is feeling a mutual loss can, and felt tears sting at her own eyes.
No more Ginger. Never again would she see the girl. Yeah, Dan was okay, but Felicity had killed Ginger. Sure, Felicity was dead, but that wouldn't bring Ginger back.
"It's all right," Matt's voice was still calm, and Shadow realized as she stepped back again that it was almost dazed.
Suddenly, she knew that he hadn't quite come back to reality yet, that he hadn't felt the real hurt. Shadow cringed inside, maybe even on the outside, at this thought. He'd be hurt, and she knew it.
For a moment Shadow blanked out, and than she half-stammered. "At least Felicity lost."
"Did she?" Matt's dark eyes seemed to storm in front of her face, and Shadow suddenly realized the depths of the torment he would feel. "Did she really?"
Shadow could think of no answer for this. Matt was right. Felicity had been headed to her death anyway, past critical insanity. She had taken people with her, too. Taken people they knew. Shadow suddenly saw the depths of Felicity's game, and wished she'd never heard of it.
Matt started walking slowly towards the short bushes and the trail again, and Shadow followed. She figured he'd want to be alone soon, but for the moment, she stayed beside him. Sometimes loneliness didn't help.
"Are you okay?" she asked, feeling stupid and yet not able at the time to think of anything better to say.
He nodded, than looked at her eye to eye. For a moment she thought he'd finally broke through to reality, and then he spoke in that calm, collected voice. "Is Dan all right?"
Shadow nodded, and couldn't help smiling slightly despite what had happened. "He'll be all right."
"That's good," he said in that distracted, off tone voice.
Shadow placed her hand on his arm and he stopped for a moment, directly in front of the bushes. "Matt, I'm going ahead to catch up with Mike and Dan, all right?" She felt bad about it, but also felt it'd be better for Matt. "We'll meet you at the hospital... if you want to go."
He nodded again, that tired, almost creaky movement. "All right. Sure."
Shadow took one more look at him, than started off down the trail at a brisk pace. She didn't look back, couldn't. If she did, she'd go back, and at the moment she had to go ahead and find the others. Matt would be fine.
"We all will," she thought.
"All of you except Ginger," her mind sneered, and she batted it away quickly.
That stinging, hurting memory would be there forever, and she knew it. Ginger was gone, and it upset her, but… But she had to go on. Ginger would've told her to. Everyone would've told her to. Because that was how life was.
Go one, but never forget. And she'd never forget her old friend, even as they built a new Team, even as they continued. Friendship really could last forever, Shadow thought.
The hopes of the new were beginning to dawn in her mind, and Shadow began to feel better. Death was behind her, and Dan was ahead, waiting. Shadow suddenly realized she had a bright future waiting for her.
Matt stood where he was until Shadow disappeared in the night, than turned around and looked at the dark night sky, lit up with stars. Stars so high above the earth that they were incomprehensible.
Wasn't everything incomprehensible, though? When it got down to the chase, it was. Everything. Life, love, death…
Ginger was dead.
That was when it finally hit him, and he almost fell over when the impact smacked him in the face. Ginger was dead, oh shit, he had seen her die right in front of him, and Felicity had shot her, just shot her because the bitch had been insane, and now Ginger was gone, gone…
Matt felt himself shaking and was unable to do a thing about it. When it came down to the real shit, you couldn't do anything, just had to go with the flow. And Ginger was dead because of the flow, because of a psycho's goddamn game!
His hands flew to his temples, and he rubbed them quickly, trying to get it out, trying not to think of it. He didn't want to. Didn't want to feel the emotional pain. Physical pain was fine, but emotions… He didn't know what to do.
Ginger was gone. He'd never see her again. Never see her bright smile light up her face. Never hear her voice as she called his name. Never feel her silky auburn hair. Never again, never, nothing…
She wouldn't be there. When the built the Team, she'd be gone. When they ran it, she'd be gone. When they all died, she'd be gone.
He was alone, oh shit, he was alone, and now he was realizing it, and now it hurt. Hurt really, really bad. Ginger had been his love, his only love. He'd thought he'd never stop loving her, and he'd thought there love would never end. Apparently, he'd been wrong.
That hurt. Memories always hurt, especially when they were good ones with bad turnouts. Memories hurt, oh why did they have to hurt?
"Stop it," he told himself. "This isn't going to help."
It wouldn't, either. Turmoil was never good for the mind or the body. It could lead to insanity, and he knew that he didn't want that. He settled his mind, brought it under control with a practiced ease.
Sure it was under control, but the pain was spreading all over. The hurt from the loss was spreading… And it wasn't going to leave anytime soon. Matt felt a sense of despair at this, than pushed it aside. That wasn't going to help him. Panic, turmoil, and despair were bad.
Pain was bad, too, but pain was tolerable. He could live with pain. Hell, he could be smarter because of the pain. Be harder because of his loss. Part of him knew he wouldn't love again. It was melodramatic, yet it was true. Ginger had been his one true love, and she was gone.
With one last look at the open, deep blue sky, Matt inhaled a deep breath, trying to relax his nerves. It worked, but the pain intensified. It seemed to work that way. Take care of the physical, and it became intensified as emotional. Intensified, but something he could deal with. Something he could keep inside, to keep out from interfering with his work.
He'd been doing that for a long time. Sure, this was bigger, but he could do it. He'd remember her for as long as he lived vividly, and the memories would sting, but that was okay, he'd live with it.
He had loved her, he would always love her. As he turned towards the trail and started walking back to where the others would be waiting at the hospital, he realized it was true. The others would remember her, but he'd remember her most of all, probably because he would keep it inside.
As he set off down the trail, it once more occurred to him that his life was in front of him, that Ginger wasn't there. He paused momentarily and looked behind him, towards where the treetops opened up into the vast dome of the atmosphere.
"I'll miss you, Ginger," his voice was choked yet confident, completely truthful.
After that, he turned his head back to the trail and swallowed hard, blinking firmly. He started forward again, letting everything follow him, letting himself go in solitude.
He walked on alone, into the life that would begin again, into the life where he would keep this pain inside.
Author's Note:
I can't believe it.
I suppose that about sums up how I feel at this moment. I've just finished this, finally finished this fic I've been working with for… God, how long has it been? A long time, that's all I know. A very long time. I've worked with it a lot, spent so much time thinking about what would happen when and how.
And now it's over. I can't believe this.
I've finally finished it. What I feel is something good and something bad. I feel a sense of joy mingled with pride, the result of my accomplishment. At they same time, however, I'm sad that it's over. As I finished, I realized that it was over, that they were done. It all ended with Matt walking away from the rock face.
So much time. I'll say it again. I can't believe it. All along, I never thought I'd reach the end. I mean, I said I did. Several times I stated that I'd finish this, that I'd be able to. I don't think I ever quite believed it, though. I've never finished anything above a short-story sort of level before, and this comes as quite an amazement to me.
This isn't extremely long. By whatever standards someone goes by, it could be long, short, or somewhere in between. It's a lot, though, I'll tell you that. Once I've worked on it for so long, put so much into it, I know.
I'll miss this. It'll be something I think about, something I pride myself in. because it's done, because they were able to finish conveying what they wanted to have said.
There've been times when I thought it was done for, when I'd toss it aside. This is including a case of writer's block that lasted for nearly six months… Man, I hated that. There were also times where I felt that there was an unstoppable amount of energy I could put into this.
There were certain aspects that kept me going. Comments from people telling me to finish helped, and thanks so much to everyone who has stuck with me all this time! The tips, the compliments, everything worked to get this going in the right direction.
My inspiration is sometimes strange, but it works. Reading is a big one, especially anything connected with Stephen King's Dark Tower series. Music is also a big part. Anything from American Hi-Fi's 'Don't Wait for the Sun' to the Goo Goo Dolls's 'Iris' to James Newton Howard's 'Malcolm is Dead' (that's the Sixth Sense for all ye who didn't know). Depending on what and when I'm writing, it varies.
I think what really kept it was the characters, and that underlying urge to keep going. As much as I said I'd stop, I knew I couldn't. Writing seems to have a drug-like effect. If you've written anything, you may know this, may have experienced it many times.
Once I started, I couldn't stop until it was finish. I wanted to know how it ended. Wanted to know who would live and who would die, who would be victorious.
It didn't always go as I thought it would. The ending was completely different than initially planned, and changed several times until it came to the meeting on the cliff, with Ginger and Felicity's death.
Giovanni's death came as it did. Seems the man can't live when I write… poor guy. I love him, it was just how it went. Same thing with Ginger. Not the same with Trae, however… What? I never really liked her character.
Many of these characters were created a long time ago, and most were made up in the confines of my, eh… different, mind. As I went along, their lives began to unfold before me, and I began to better understand them. As this happened, the story continued.
Initially, Felicity wasn't going to be insane. I didn't really know she was until she admitted it to herself. There was no real plot to this for a while, and then I saw it. Strange how things work out, isn't it?
Matt was going to die and Ginger wasn't, than both of them were, than Dan was, than Shadow was, than they all were. So much has changed as I've gone along. Hell, the basic characteristics seemed to change as I went on.
There was a lot more in this that I could write about, but the basic idea is, again, I can't believe it. Funny, eh? It's done… That's a real new idea for me. Maybe sometime I'll write down all of my thoughts about it, everything I changed… Hm, that'd be fairly interesting.
Maybe it's not quite done, though. These characters aren't quite, not by far. For this story they are, for this they have no more to say. But maybe a sequel…
Yes, I'll say it here. I have been planning a sequel. The plot is undefined, as this one's was initially. I have a first chapter planned out, as well as several portions of the story, including who Shadow's parents really are.
I'm considering what characters will have major parts, and it seems that, once again, Shadow and Dan will. Geoffrey will have a bigger part, which is a good thing… right? What do I care what you think, I like it! Heh.
So maybe it isn't over. Maybe there's more to this twisted world.
We'll see.