peterick + 69 (nice) (also these are all gonna be peterick because there are so many good ones for them)
@floralegia haha you both had the same idea...uh in contrast to the funny number, this is kinda pretty angsty ybc...sorry? Been wanting to write some young blood chronicles and this was kinda the perfect opportunity
69. “Why the hell are you bleeding!?”
Patrick comes to.
Patrick's eyes have been bright yellow this whole time, possessed not by demons but by a constant, overwhelming onslaught of sensation.
Pete has been fighting Patrick, he realizes now, not to protect the briefcase or even to protect himself, but because that's all that's left to do. That's what's expected of them.
Well, Pete's not gonna do what they want him to anymore.
He sets his bass-cum-machete down on the ground. No more.
As he does so, Patrick's hook catches him in the stomach, the momentum plunging the blade deep into his guts. Pete falls, in what feels like slow motion, watching the yellow seep out from his best friend's eyes, changing to brown and then his natural blue.
Patrick stares down at him, aghast.
"Why the hell are you bleeding?!"
Pete looks down at himself, his abdomen a mess of blood and guts, and chuckles weakly. "Your hook," he says, and suddenly it's the funniest thing in the world. He can't stop laughing.
Patrick looks at his hook in horror, registering the smear of red across the metal and the blood dripping from the end.
He drops to his knees. "Oh fuck...Pete, what have I done?" He gathers Pete to him, laying his head gently in his lap. Pete is still in hysterics, his breath coming in short, sharp gasps now as life leaches out of him. "Everything was just so loud," Patrick whispers. "I just wanted it to stop, and- WILL YOU STOP LAUGHING?"
Pete manages to contain himself. "I'm sorry," he says weakly. "It's just...after all this... it's the way I would have wanted to go, Patrick."
Patrick presses his eyes closed. Pete hears his breath catch. "It's not the way I want you to go," he says. "I don't want you to go at all!" His breath hitches again, and suddenly he's crying and trying to stop himself from crying all at once, angrily brushing tears away from his face as they fall. "First Joe and now you," he says.
All Pete wants to do is comfort him. He reaches up and touches Patrick's face. "It's not your fault," he promises. None of this is Patrick's fault. He won't let Patrick blame himself for what those people did to him.
"I just wanted it to stop," Patrick whimpers. "I didn't know how to make it stop."
Pete brushes tears away from his eyes. "It's OK, buddy. We made it stop."
Patrick shakes his head. "You made it stop." He sniffles. "What am I supposed to do without you?"
Pete tries to shrug, although he's not sure it comes across. "You keep going. Keep fighting. For both of us."
Patrick shakes his head. "I can't- I have to make this right. I have to save you, Pete. I- I'll get you to a hospital, they can fix you up, it's a stomach wound, stomach wounds don't kill you immediately, I read that somewhere once, we've got time."
Pete shakes his head. It makes his vision go blurry. "No time left," he manages to say. Words are getting harder now - harder than they've ever been. He puts every last ounce of effort into his next ones: "I don't regret a single second of it." He squeezes Patrick's hand, so Patrick knows that he means he doesn't regret a single second with him.
Patrick forces himself to give Pete a watery smile. "I don't either," he admits. "Well, apart from the killing you with my hook part. That part sucked."
Pete laughs. "Yeah..."
"I wish we had more time," Patrick whispers.
Pete lets his eyes flutter closed. There'll be no more time for him. "In another life," he whispers, and he hopes Patrick hears it, hopes he believes it.
The next moment, he's gone.
