Women and children first
Er, I really have no excuse for this one. I wrote it last weekend. I forgot yesterday was Thursday.
and oh fuck, I forgot to update FFN as well. >.>
Title: Code Blue (Intermission I)
Fandom: xxxHOLiC
Wordcount: 1,020
A/N: This is almost more of an epilogue to Part I, but whatever.
Previous Chapters / First Chapter
Not much time seemed to have passed when Watanuki woke up again, head pounding awfully. Now would be a wonderful time for Doumeki’s painkillers, he thought dully, and then he remembered the explosion and felt his heart jump into his throat. Hesitantly he pulled himself to his feet and surveyed the damage, hoping against hope that it wasn’t as bad as it had seemed.
The exploding had ceased while he had been out cold, and now a cloud of smoke and steam and dust rose above the place where Kyle’s mansion once had stood. Now all the stood on the ground was rubble, a few uprooted trees, and the remnants of what had once been very solid walls. Everything was absolutely silent.
There was no sign of anyone, including Doumeki.
Watanuki took an unsteady step forward, skin feeling taut and raw and legs screaming in distress. He didn’t want to stop and take stock of injuries, didn’t want to see how badly he was burnt from the explosion that had occurred underneath him. Before anything, he had to find Doumeki. For some reason it was vital to his bewildered mind that this be done before he could contemplate the larger meaning of this sudden change. Freedom, he found, was far too frightening a concept to think about.
He would find Doumeki first, and worry about the rest of his life once that question was answered. If he hadn’t died by now, he was probably going to hold out a little longer.
Somewhere the sun was probably setting, but at Watanuki picked his way through the ruin of Kyle’s dominion the smoky air was not much lighter than it would have been halfway through the night. A dull red light was cast by the smoldering fires that had lay claim to all flammable material, which wasn’t very much but still enough for Watanuki to find safe places to step. What was left of the mansion was ablaze, but died quickly. The rain that presently began to fall hastened matters, but not enough to rid the scene of what light there was.
As he began to search the remains of the mansion, he made an unpleasant discovery - the test subjects, held captive deep underground, hadn’t stood a chance in the explosion. Their mangled bodies strewed the immediate area of the mansion’s wreckage, and the smell of charred flesh filled the air. Watanuki was glad he hadn’t eaten since sometime either earlier that day or the day before, for his stomach heaved and anything he had eaten surely would not have remained down.
What did this? he wondered again and again and he scoured the wreckage for a sign of anyone familiar. He desperate did not want to see Doumeki there - however much of a bastard he was, no one deserved to die that way - and yet he could not help the need to know. But all he saw were the torn bodies of test subjects or guards, and rarely could he distinguish the faces enough to be able to say for certain that they weren’t someone he knew.
And yet he continued to search, ignoring the pain in his legs, focused in the hip he’d injured before, and the innumerable burns he’d sustained. He resolved that he would not stop until he’d found some sort of explanation for the night’s events, even if it was simply the equally mangled body of Doumeki. The thought was frightening. He wasn’t sure why, outside of the fact that he didn’t want to guy who’d saved him to have died. But that shouldn’t have been frightening.
Or maybe it should have. Watanuki had forgotten what few people skills he had ever possessed in his time with Kyle.
The night wore on as he continued to search in vain, growing more fatigued with every step. Eventually he simply sat, unsure of what he was doing and where he could go, waiting for something to happen. It would be a very anticlimactic end to simply die here in the wreckage because he hadn’t done anything, but Watanuki felt as if the last bit of energy he possessed was gone.
No - I’ve got to keep going…
He had expected spirits but had seen none. Were they all gone now that the house was fallen? Was there no one here but him and the bodies?
He got up and kept searching. He had to do something.
Got to…keep going…
--
Doumeki had waited for a long time after the explosions ceased before crawling out of his shelter. The smoky destruction zone that awaited him was no surprise, though he hadn’t been quite sure how it would actually look.
He made his way out of the laboratory’s wreckage as quickly as possible and found a relatively clear spot under a large chunk of metal to sit for a moment. But when he opened his eyes, the fires had burned down significantly and he was wet as if it had been raining. So much for just a short rest.
Now to find Watanuki and go home.
As it turned out, he nearly stepped on Watanuki as he stepped around a piece of wall. The boy had fallen against it, and for a heart-stopping moment Doumeki feared the worst. But no, he was breathing. He must have passed out, though what he was doing in the mansion wreckage Doumeki didn’t know. His clothes were scorched and torn beyond recognition, and he hadn’t fared much better; what skin Doumeki could see was burned and blistered, and bloody in places. Obviously despite the warnings, he hadn’t stayed out of the zone of destruction. Or else the explosion had been far greater than Doumeki had anticipated. The agent supposed that given everything else that had gone wrong, this was entirely possible.
He didn’t particularly want to wake Watanuki, and so instead picked him up and carried him in both arms from the ruins of the doctor’s mansion, to the rest of the world. This was success, Doumeki knew, and yet all he felt was intense relief.
But he didn’t mind. At least he had that much.
and oh fuck, I forgot to update FFN as well. >.>
Title: Code Blue (Intermission I)
Fandom: xxxHOLiC
Wordcount: 1,020
A/N: This is almost more of an epilogue to Part I, but whatever.
Previous Chapters / First Chapter
Not much time seemed to have passed when Watanuki woke up again, head pounding awfully. Now would be a wonderful time for Doumeki’s painkillers, he thought dully, and then he remembered the explosion and felt his heart jump into his throat. Hesitantly he pulled himself to his feet and surveyed the damage, hoping against hope that it wasn’t as bad as it had seemed.
The exploding had ceased while he had been out cold, and now a cloud of smoke and steam and dust rose above the place where Kyle’s mansion once had stood. Now all the stood on the ground was rubble, a few uprooted trees, and the remnants of what had once been very solid walls. Everything was absolutely silent.
There was no sign of anyone, including Doumeki.
Watanuki took an unsteady step forward, skin feeling taut and raw and legs screaming in distress. He didn’t want to stop and take stock of injuries, didn’t want to see how badly he was burnt from the explosion that had occurred underneath him. Before anything, he had to find Doumeki. For some reason it was vital to his bewildered mind that this be done before he could contemplate the larger meaning of this sudden change. Freedom, he found, was far too frightening a concept to think about.
He would find Doumeki first, and worry about the rest of his life once that question was answered. If he hadn’t died by now, he was probably going to hold out a little longer.
Somewhere the sun was probably setting, but at Watanuki picked his way through the ruin of Kyle’s dominion the smoky air was not much lighter than it would have been halfway through the night. A dull red light was cast by the smoldering fires that had lay claim to all flammable material, which wasn’t very much but still enough for Watanuki to find safe places to step. What was left of the mansion was ablaze, but died quickly. The rain that presently began to fall hastened matters, but not enough to rid the scene of what light there was.
As he began to search the remains of the mansion, he made an unpleasant discovery - the test subjects, held captive deep underground, hadn’t stood a chance in the explosion. Their mangled bodies strewed the immediate area of the mansion’s wreckage, and the smell of charred flesh filled the air. Watanuki was glad he hadn’t eaten since sometime either earlier that day or the day before, for his stomach heaved and anything he had eaten surely would not have remained down.
What did this? he wondered again and again and he scoured the wreckage for a sign of anyone familiar. He desperate did not want to see Doumeki there - however much of a bastard he was, no one deserved to die that way - and yet he could not help the need to know. But all he saw were the torn bodies of test subjects or guards, and rarely could he distinguish the faces enough to be able to say for certain that they weren’t someone he knew.
And yet he continued to search, ignoring the pain in his legs, focused in the hip he’d injured before, and the innumerable burns he’d sustained. He resolved that he would not stop until he’d found some sort of explanation for the night’s events, even if it was simply the equally mangled body of Doumeki. The thought was frightening. He wasn’t sure why, outside of the fact that he didn’t want to guy who’d saved him to have died. But that shouldn’t have been frightening.
Or maybe it should have. Watanuki had forgotten what few people skills he had ever possessed in his time with Kyle.
The night wore on as he continued to search in vain, growing more fatigued with every step. Eventually he simply sat, unsure of what he was doing and where he could go, waiting for something to happen. It would be a very anticlimactic end to simply die here in the wreckage because he hadn’t done anything, but Watanuki felt as if the last bit of energy he possessed was gone.
No - I’ve got to keep going…
He had expected spirits but had seen none. Were they all gone now that the house was fallen? Was there no one here but him and the bodies?
He got up and kept searching. He had to do something.
Got to…keep going…
--
Doumeki had waited for a long time after the explosions ceased before crawling out of his shelter. The smoky destruction zone that awaited him was no surprise, though he hadn’t been quite sure how it would actually look.
He made his way out of the laboratory’s wreckage as quickly as possible and found a relatively clear spot under a large chunk of metal to sit for a moment. But when he opened his eyes, the fires had burned down significantly and he was wet as if it had been raining. So much for just a short rest.
Now to find Watanuki and go home.
As it turned out, he nearly stepped on Watanuki as he stepped around a piece of wall. The boy had fallen against it, and for a heart-stopping moment Doumeki feared the worst. But no, he was breathing. He must have passed out, though what he was doing in the mansion wreckage Doumeki didn’t know. His clothes were scorched and torn beyond recognition, and he hadn’t fared much better; what skin Doumeki could see was burned and blistered, and bloody in places. Obviously despite the warnings, he hadn’t stayed out of the zone of destruction. Or else the explosion had been far greater than Doumeki had anticipated. The agent supposed that given everything else that had gone wrong, this was entirely possible.
He didn’t particularly want to wake Watanuki, and so instead picked him up and carried him in both arms from the ruins of the doctor’s mansion, to the rest of the world. This was success, Doumeki knew, and yet all he felt was intense relief.
But he didn’t mind. At least he had that much.