Flambeaux & Staug Ch. 09

Very few stars were visible in the blackening sky, and when the heavy fog accompanied it, the entire setting became somewhat unsettling.

The fog set in once they entered Down, passing the city limits littered with bodies. Driving through Down was even worse, the bodies were mangled in an even worse fashion than they had been in Aftersun, and what with the fog and the ever threatening heavens, Nick, Matt, and Michelle found themselves shaking a bit.

"God damn," Michelle uttered from the back seat. "One guy did all this?"

Matt turned back to her. "Shut up," he snapped. "I'm trying to drive in this huge fucking graveyard and all you can say is-" Matt changed his tone to a more mocking one "-one guy did all this?"

Michelle held her middle finger in front of the rearview mirror as Nick tried not to laugh. Matt looked over to Nick. "I'm serious, man," he sighed. "We just need to get out of here."

With that he lit up another cigarette as he continued slowly down the road. "Hey," Michelle barked out. "Those are my cigarettes!"

She snatched them from the dashboard and lit one up for herself. "Um, could I have one too?" asked Nick timidly.

Michelle rolled her eyes in frustration and handed him one. "Jesus Christ," she muttered. "What the hell do you think th-"

She was interrupted by something hitting the side of the car. The loud sound indicated that it was of moderate size. Matt sped up the car. "How much longer until we're out of here?" Matt asked.

Michelle was shaken and didn't answer for a bit. "Just keep driving like that."

Then Matt noticed that the car's suspension was off. As though one of the tires had been damaged. "Fuck!"

Nick and Michelle looked at him, too frightened to actually ask what the problem was.

"...I think we've got a flat," he muttered.

Nick dropped his head into his hands as Michelle looked out the window fearfully. Matt interrupted the silence. "You have shit to take care of these things, don't you?"

Michelle shook her head slowly, the situation sinking in. Matt shook his head angrily and got out of the car. Nick followed, and Michelle soon after.

"I think," Matt started, "that before we get out, we should look for survivors."

Nick and Michelle gawked at this. "You can't be serious," Nick shouted. The look on Michelle's face suggested she wanted to say the same thing.

"What about Jack," Matt said. "And her."

Michelle's look did not change.

"The point is," he went on, "is that if we find more people, we'll be better off."

"Safety in numbers.." Nick mumbled.

"Yeah. Besides that, I drove all over Aftersun and found nobody but Jack and you. In Down we find her. Don't you think somebody else might be around?"

Nick and Michelle thought about this. "And," Matt continued, feeling he was in the home stretch of his proposal, "Can you honestly tell me that if someone else is out here experiencing this all alone, you wouldn't help them if you had the chance? Nick?"

Nick knew he was right. There were three of them, two of which with guns. And they had found another person in Aftersun....

"Fine," Michelle said. "But if we're going to be walking around this place, I'm stopping by my place to pick up some stuff."

Matt rolled his eyes. "Maybe I was wrong," he chuckled.

Matt and Nick drew their guns as Michelle led them down a street. This town was worse than Aftersun not just in the right that it was a darker environment at night even without dead bodies lying around, but it was very cheap. Mobile homes covered the side of the road on the opposite side of the shops, which were all little "Ye Old T Shirt Factory" and stupid small town names like that.

They continued down the road as its features began repeating itself. Each step that Michelle took was another ounce of fear that added to that which had already wracked her greatly. She was growing nearly incapable of speaking without stuttering like an imbecile, her legs were threatening to give out beneath her at any moment, and the pit in her stomach and the lump in her throat made her just want to drop to the ground in a ball and cry until help arrived. But the logic still alive within her told her that no such help was on the way, that it was up to her and the two guys she'd just met to save the lives of any survivors here and them themselves.

Nick and Matt, on the other hand, were shaky but prepared. By now Nick had developed the ability to conceal his fear and let his determination take the proverbial wheel. Nick also felt that Matt was an officer of the law and took his job very seriously. Why else would he want to look for survivors? Nick had a strange feeling that everything wasn't as bad as it seemed; the first hint of optimism since Matt and Nick spotted what looked like the lights of Hillton.

Finally Michelle stopped shaking as they reached the road's ending. "Alright, we take a right and we'll be at my house," she said, getting a little excited. Matt offered a laugh as he and Nick followed, keeping a keen eye on their surroundings. "It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for all this fucking fog," Nick muttered.

"And the dark," Matt added.

"And the dead bodies," Michelle chimed in from up front. They all shared a laugh at this as they continued on, the general mood brightening. Soon they stopped in the middle of another street with small shack-looking houses on either side. Pointing to a sickly vomit-green colored house, Michelle smiled, "There's my house!"

"Say, Michelle, how about you go in while Nick and I will keep an eye on things out here," Matt offered.

Michelle nodded and opened the rickety gate, closing it behind her. "And could you get some food?" Nick asked.

Matt and Michelle laughed. "Sure," she answered sweetly. "I'll find something. If the refridgeration isn't out..."

She unlocked her door and walked in, leaving it open behind her. Matt snickered as he watched Nick watch her walk inside. "So you like her, huh?" Matt asked. Nick blushed. "Well, now that she's being nice..."

Matt pulled a silencer out of his pocket and equipped his gun with it. "Well, I've got to take care of her," Matt said.

Nick laughed. "Shut up," he smiled, slapping Matt's shoulder. "Seriously, where did you get that silencer?"

"From me," said a low voice from behind Nick. Nick spun around to see the man who'd killed Maynard walking towards him. Nick was bewildered. "You look suprised," the man grinned. "Perhaps I'd better explain a thing or two to you." Nick let out an exasperated sigh, dropping his arms haplessly to his sides.

"We suspected that Maynard was going to fuck up," he began, "so we had Matt keep tabs on him. As it turns out, Maynard did in fact royally fucked up."

He made a small, sinister sounding chuckle. "With the way that Aftersun is surrounded by mountains, we knew it would serve us well once we had found it," he continued. "And Maynard had shown ability in jobs he'd done for us in the past, but had a tendency to think that he was the one in charge. His skills were enough to convince us to give him another chance, and he botched it horribly. His kidnapping you, killing everyone in Down, he'd forgotten that he was a meaningless pawn, so we had to humble him.

"Matt was our contingency," he went on, "and now you can see that he was needed. Who knows what else that fool Maynard would have done."

He cracked his wrists and neck. Nick turned back to see Matt acting as though nothing had been said. "So you did know where to find me," Nick stammered, feeling his anger rising. "Of course," Matt answered calmly. "But you and Michelle were never the real objective; I was here to watch Maynard. Building up a reputation, so to speak. And the bit about looking for survivors was a diversion, my other assignment was to look out for any other survivors. And as we both saw in Aftersun, there were none."

Nick felt as though he was about to be sick. The man spoke again. "In the early stages of our plan, i.e. the next couple weeks, we can't afford to have people who know what's going on." He looked over to Matt. "Does the girl know anything?" Matt shook his head. "Then leave her," he went on. "Noone needs to die needlessly."

He then looked at Nick. "You, on the other hand, are privy to far too much information." Matt raised his suppressed gun and aimed it at Nick's forehead. "You were on their side all along," Nick murmured.

"Well, I don't remember saying I was on yours," Matt answered. With that, he shot a hole into Nick's head. As the lifeless body collapsed at his feet, Matt looked up at the man with him.

"So we're moving on as planned?"

He didn't recieve an answer, rather cold steel slicing through his neck. He watched Matt's body drop beside Nick's, and wanted to hide and look at the girl's reaction, but he had to get back. He smiled blackly as he looked into Matt's lifeless eyes. He wiped his sword off on Matt's shirt, put it back in its sheath, and hurried off.