Chapter Text
It’s the hands in boiling water all over again. The complete withdrawal of emotions, withheld in a dam. All the fear, apprehension, and anxious energy collecting in a blocked medical drip. It’s all so quiet in the car; as if every breath is kept in check, just in case it was the slightest bit too loud.
Even the purr of the trans-am’s engine seems relatively hushed, or maybe it’s just Frank’s imagination- maybe his brain is too occupied on the imminent to bother fully converting sound waves into strands of electrical information.
Party Poison driving. Kobra Kid in the passenger seat. Frank and Jet Star in the back. Each of them packed into their own separate spaces, thinking their own separate thoughts. None of them speak.
The tunnel hasn’t changed since the last time Frank was here; although he’s not too surprised, considering tunnels don’t typically change shape or size, especially not within a week. Sweeping down the same tunnel that he had a week ago, still with the same destination in mind. The only difference is that this time, he’s not alone.
The plywood that had originally boarded up the entrance hasn’t even been replaced yet- they’d crashed straight through the gaping concrete into pitch-black, but now the strip lighting on the tunnel ceiling flashes through the car windows like Morse code. Cold white light, slicing through the shadows as if they were never there at all.
The air’s sparking with the kind of icy tension that scratches at Frank’s skin like needles, and next to him, Jet fiddles haltingly with his blaster. He offers Frank a tentative smile when he sees him looking over. In the front, Kobra’s managed to catch himself on a broken-record loop of clenching and unclenching his fists, heels of his hands pressed into his thighs.
Frank’s scar prickles uncomfortably.
Party flexes his fingers and readjusts his grip on the steering wheel. He’s wearing a pair of tattered biker gloves that he’d fished from the bottom of the trunk- god knows what they’ve still got crammed in there, but Frank had seen the way that Party had deliberately not seen the blue jacket thrown into the fray- and pulled them as far over his hands and wrists as they’d allow.
It was the temporary solution to a permanent problem: Jet had suggested that they could try and find someone to cover the BLI tattoo on Party’s wrist with another, but Party had shaken his head so viciously he could’ve snapped his own neck.
“No needles,” he’d spat out, like the words had tasted sour, and it’d been pretty clear that there was no room for debate on that topic. But, at the same time, it was almost impossible to ignore Party’s constant, mindless scratching at his own wrist, so the gloves were the best short-notice alternative they could muster.
“You tried your best, Ray,” Frank had assured Jet, quietly enough for Kobra and Party to be out of earshot. He even patted him on the shoulder.
Jet had nodded along halfheartedly before freezing. “Yeah- what? Did- What?”
“What?” Frank had maintained a perfectly innocent expression. “Party didn’t tell me. BLI clearly doesn’t already know all of our aliases. Definitely not.”
“What?”
Poor guy. Frank had left him to his own devices after that, bless him- hadn’t acknowledged any of them for a couple of hours, especially since he figured that you couldn’t really ask if someone had truly worked out your secret name without actually revealing it. Party had thrown him perplexed looks throughout the entire journey.
Now, however, he hasn’t even glanced at Frank in the last hour- completely focused on the road: his jaw set vice-tight, barely even blinking. So still he could almost be a statue, the white lights marbling his skin.
Frank readjusts his own gloves. Jet tucks a stray lock of hair behind his ear. No one says a word.
Party licks his lips. “Do you wonder if Korse is as bad as we think he is?” he speaks up, glancing into the rearview mirror and catching Frank’s eyes for a second. “Remember when he took the girl and tried to warn us off-“
“No,” Kobra snaps tersely. “Focus.”
Party’s mouth clamps shut. Conversation over.
There’s another checkpoint set up halfway through the tunnel- it hadn’t been there last time, so Frank guesses it must have been an added precaution- but it’s so lazily managed that Party doesn’t even slow down. One draculoid, one scarecrow, and they’ve barely got their blasters in their hands before the trans-am’s slamming through the barrier.
The car jolts from the impact. Two bodies go flying. No one inside the car says a word. Frank concentrates on his breathing. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. His chest feels tight. His heartbeat stutters.
It’s still silent- eerily quiet, as if the entire world is holding its breath.
The grind of tyres on asphalt. The crack of white overhead lights. Then they’re bursting out of the tunnel and into the rain, swerving to a stop in front of Better Living Industries’ main doors. Battery City is splayed out around them like it’s set on a sacrificial table; a mess of pinprick lights clustered in a small galaxy. It’s almost surprising that Frank realises he doesn’t miss the place a single bit. There’s no pang of nostalgia for the city he grew up in; the city where he withstood everything from 2012 to the Helium Wars; the city he ran away from, after burning every packet of medication he had been given.
It could’ve been a place that he’s never even visited before.
Through the building’s double doors, Frank can see draculoids and ‘crows bustling in and out of sight. Not one of them turns their way.
This is it.
Adrenaline firing. Muscles tense.
This is it.
Inhale. Exhale.
Inhale. Exhale.
Frank clambers out of the car and into the cloud of grey rain.
It’s easier than you’d expect, breaking into a high-security facility. Maybe it’s because Party knows the place so well- knows the quickest route to the offices, knows the easiest ways to avoid the security cameras. Or maybe it’s because BLI is so unprepared.
It must be luxurious, being so assured by your own strength that you don’t need to contemplate the potential of someone challenging it. They make through the foyer within a minute: it feels as if Frank wakes up the moment that the blasters begin to fire; he’s awake, he’s ready, and he’s lifting his arm and firing back without a single thought.
Sight the enemy, squeeze the trigger. Sight the enemy, squeeze the trigger. He can feel the electricity spark, the blaster’s recoil making his fingertips buzz.
Inhale. Exhale. Fire.
The foyer plummets into silence. Every draculoid and ‘crow that he can see is sprawled out on the pristine white floor, grey smoke curling away from the white uniform and soaking the air. Party doesn’t slow down- doesn’t even look back. He steps over one draculoid and heads straight for the farthest door. They all follow him without a word.
At some point, the alarms begin to blare, but Frank can’t precisely pinpoint when; maybe it was just as they entered the building itself, or maybe it’s as they head down one of the many corridors- all he knows is that the rooms shudder from a sharp white glow to a shocking, flashing blue light, and there’s the shrill, incessant wail of sirens overhead.
Frank can taste the electricity in the air. It mixes with the sweat and the adrenaline and the excitement rushing through his veins, tumbling into a wild smorgasbord of noise and colour that’s close to becoming a tangible thing.
Ahead of him, Party lifts his head like a dog on a scent before glancing back to them, and then turns down another corridor. There’s ‘EXTERMINATE’ posters plastered over the walls- Frank’s own scratched-up face staring back at him with tired eyes.
“Get back!”
Party’s lunging back around the corner as a laser-blast crackles over his shoulder, striking the opposite wall and exploding into a shower of sparks. He crashes into Frank and almost sends the both of them flying. Jet catches hold of Frank’s shoulder before they do.
“You okay?” Frank chokes out.
Party’s got a vice-like grip on Frank’s forearms. “Dracs right around that corner,” he pants. “Three of them. Blocking the door.”
He can barely hear him over the sound of the alarm, but Frank stops Party when he goes to pull away. “You still with me?”
Party manages a jerky nod. “It smells just the same,” he whispers, like it’s a confession, like being afraid of the place should be something to be ashamed of. But then he straightens and chokes down another breath, shaking Frank off. “We need to keep moving.”
“Sure.” Frank drops his arms and turns away, slipping over to Kobra and Jet. They’re pressed to the wall, and as he watches, Kobra leans around the corner, just to immediately jump back again as another shot whistles past his face. Jet turns towards them, face tight, his one eye boring into them. “You both okay?”
“We’re fine.” Frank lifts his blaster. “Keep them distracted for a sec an’ I’ll get them out the way.”
Jet’s just opening his mouth to protest before Frank starts forwards, rounding the corner and firing at the first white shape he can see. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Kobra firing leaning after him and firing aimlessly at the draculoids, then Jet and Party joining in; it offers just a second of the draculoids’ diverted attention, but it’s still enough. He manages to take down the first, then the second, and the third draculoid is just turning back to him, just taking a step forward, as his third shot gets it straight in the centre of the forehead. It crumples like paper to the floor.
Behind him, Jet lets out an impressed whistle. “Nice one.”
If it were any other day, any other situation, Frank would give a modest little bow.
They continue down the corridor and Party leads the way without a word, his expression rigid and his posture ever more taunt. For a long minute, the only sound Frank can hear is the wail of the alarm, the hammer of his own heartbeat reverberating in his ears. Blue flashing lights.
Inhale, exhale.
Focus on the back of Party’s head.
Inhale, exhale.
He loses himself within the maze of endless white corridors and wanted posters, and after a while- it could be seconds, or minutes, he loses track of time, too- his own face seems to become less familiar, more distorted, and his heartbeat only jumps faster.
He’s not stupid. They’ve got a short loan of borrowed time. Each second passed is another second closer to them being swarmed by an unconquerable mass of dracs. It’s another second closer to Korse catching up with them.
Inhale, exhale.
Another right turn, another door, and then they’re there: the pack of draculoids still crouched at the computers confirms it. Frank takes two of them out, and Kobra takes the other. And the girl, perched on an office chair in the very centre of the room, jumps at the first blast, as if she hadn’t heard them come in.
Jesus Christ, the girl’s still alive. Frank hadn’t been expecting the tidal wave of relief to wash over him, but now that it does, it’s almost dizzying. He hadn’t been sure- He’d always worried-
Party pushes past them all and falls to his knees to wrap her in a hug, and the girl hugs him back without a moment’s hesitation. She looks so relieved.
They’re there for a long moment- maybe a fraction too long, and there’s an instant that Party’s spine stiffens, as if he can see something that the rest of them cannot- but despite the growing urgency of the alarms and lights, and the draculoids Frank can see through the glass walls (honestly, what purpose do glass walls even possess) marching hurriedly towards the foyer, Frank can’t ignore the warm, heavy feeling that’s beginning to settle in the pit of his stomach.
It’s something close to coming home. It’s something close to a spark of hope.
“Oh man.” Party finally pulls away and settles back on his heels. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry for everything.”
The girl shrugs it off. “It’s ‘kay. I woulda probably been the same way.”
“Nah.” Party ruffles her hair. “You’re way stronger than me. You’d scare ‘em off.”
She grins up at him. “I’ll do that next time.”
“How about we try not to let there be a next time?” Kobra leans forward with crossed arms. “How ya doing, buddy? Been kickin’ ass an’ taking names?”
“Guys,” Jet interrupts, “We have to go. We have to go right now.”
There’s something heavy in his voice- something sticky and dark as tar, something that hits overwhelms the warmth that Frank was previously swimming in and douses him in something else. It’s not dread- it’s more resigned than that.
When Party stands up, there’s a glimmer of the same distress in his eyes. It’s only there for a split second, but it’s long enough for Frank to catch it. It’s there long enough for his heart the freeze over.
But then it’s gone and the tight, measured expression is back. Party nods sharply. “We need to go,” he agrees, and leads them back to the door. The rest of them fall into step behind- Frank at the back, the girl just beside him. He can’t help but glance back every few seconds. It takes a moment for him to work out quite what’s bothering him.
“Listen,” he begins, and when the girl glances up at him, he bites his tongue. He hasn’t spoken to her for months, but- “did you see Korse? The pale guy in white? Or The Director? You know where they went?”
“Of course.” The girl nods vigorously before slowing down and turning back to point at the same room they just left. She has to raise her voice to be heard, but Frank still has trouble making out what she’s saying. “She was in there, just before you guys turned up. She went off somewhere. I dunno where though.”
“Hey, Ghoul!”
Frank looks up to see Party waiting for them. He’s on edge; Frank can see from the way he holds himself, the white-knuckled grip on the blaster in his hand. When he meets, Frank’s eyes, his jaw tightens. “Come on.”
The girl trots on ahead as Frank catches up to Jet and Kobra, and they continue in silence until they reach the foyer again, ready for another wave of draculoids, but- there’s nothing. There’s no new enemies. No draculoids rushing from cover. There’s something spectacularly off about the whole thing, an uncomfortable itch of foreboding.
And then Korse and a pack of draculoids are streaming towards them, from behind them, and Frank’s turning and he’s got his blaster in his hand and-
There’s only slashes of colour amidst the white, white world, the five of them mixing into a blur of coloured jackets and erratic movements. Franks skips out of the path of one blast, feels the heat clawing at the back of his neck, and he twists to fire straight back at the sender of the original shot.
He doesn’t have chance to check to see if it hits its mark- he barely has time to look around and see who’s left standing. He’s already moving again, darting back into the middle of the room and sending off another volley of shots towards another draculoid lurching towards him.
The girl’s there and she’s still alive, thank god, with her head down and her hands pressed to her ears, but Frank wants to yell at her to run, get out, but he can’t find the voice. And at least he can protect her while she’s close- they’ve only just got her back, and he’s in no rush to get her ripped away again.
But the room’s suddenly brimming with draculoids and scarecrows, every single one of them armed to the teeth, and he almost wants to scream that this is unfair, that they’re completely outnumbered, that all they wanted to do was save one kid. But even if he did, he doubts anyone would listen: he see Korse out of the corner of his eye- a shadow in ruffled clothing, firing off a rapid barrage of shots before melting back into the fray.
And then, for an instant, he’s distracted, but it’s nearly long enough- there’s a snarl of electricity and he dives to one side as a blast tears past his thigh. But he’s too slow, and there’s a fresh flare of pain firing through his veins, like an extra shot of energy.
He hits the ground, staggers, and by this point, there’s no time for thinking; they need to get out of here, and they need to get out of here fast, before they’re overwhelmed. This is all a fight to the death, a survival based on pure instinct, and he lets muscle memory and senses keep his head above water.
His hair’s in his face now, a strand’s stuck in his mouth that he can’t brush out of the way, his fingers slipping on the sweat and the grease. The room’s swimming with the stench of burning clothes and smoke, filling his nose and clouding his head. He can taste the electricity in the air. It mixes with the sweat and the excitement and the adrenaline rushing through his veins, tumbling into a wild smorgasbord of noise and colour that’s close to becoming a tangible thing.
It’s a chaotic mess that blurs into a running panorama of adrenaline, One minute, Party’s at his back, with an icy, closed-off expression and deadly accuracy that would be disturbing if Frank had a moment to fully comprehend it and what it could mean. And then it’s Jet at his side, and Frank’s covering his blind spots as well as he can manage as Jet takes out whichever draculoids come close. And then he finds himself standing over the girl as scarecrows rush for him, but still perplexed to find that they don’t pay the girl any attention whatsoever. She’s the reason that they’re here, after all: wouldn’t BLI want to keep her close?
And now there’s another drac behind him, throwing itself forward, and its fist hits his shoulder just as he takes aim for it. His shot arcs wide and he reels back, almost trips over his own feet, but the drac isn’t giving him any time to recover. It’s raising its blaster and he ducks beneath its arm, forces its ray gun up, the blasts firing uselessly towards the ceiling. A kick in the stomach and it falls. One shot to the head and it won’t be getting up again.
He gives himself a second to look around- the girl still hasn’t moved a single inch, but Kobra’s only a few metres away, shooting at whatever draculoids come close. There’s swarms of them, and he’s firing off with pinpoint precision, not wasting a single shot. But there’s a shape behind him, only a handful of metres away, and it’s raising its ray gun towards him and-
And Frank shoots the draculoid in the chest and it slumps to the floor, Kobra turns to him in surprise- he hadn’t even seen it coming.
“There’s too many!” Frank’s not sure if Kobra can hear him over the cacophony of blasters and alarms, but he’s given a grim nod and a taunt half-smile in reply before pointing back towards the same doors they came through. It’s their only viable way out. But there’s still too many dracs between them and the outside.
Kobra’s being hauled away by a scarecrow before he can get another word out, and then Frank’s got another blast flying past his ear- so close that it burns- as a draculoid crashes into him, sends them both flying.
Then the air’s ripped out of his lungs and there’s a knee in his stomach, and he’s hitting the floor, his vision smeared with red-hot pain as his head strikes the white tile with an audible crack. There’s white gloves tearing at his hair, ripping at his jacket, clawing at his neck- oh god oh god it’s on his neck he’s not gonna be able to breathe oh fuck- before he manages to kick it away.
The onslaught’s unending and overwhelming; he can only make out wave after wave of white masks and bloody mouths, the BLI emblem grinning down at him triumphantly. He tries to rear up, scramble away, but there’s another scarecrow on top of him, and this time, he can’t manage to reach his blaster, and-
The scarecrow gasps- almost as if the snap of electricity comes as a surprise to them- before it splutters, convulsing once in a full-body shudder, and then it slumps to the side. Its breath smells of tablets and plastic.
“You’re my knight in shining armor,” he tells Party, who’s standing over him with a still-smoking blaster in his hand. His chest is heaving, there’s a thin line of blood above his eyebrow, and his hair looks as if it could be on fire, and Frank thinks he looks gorgeous. Gorgeous, but more importantly, alive.
“How you holding up?” Party croaks, his voice hoarse and smoke-stained. There’s a flush settling in his cheeks.
Frank takes a deep, steadying breath, before batting away Party’s offered hand and clambering to his feet on his own. “Could be better,” he manages, and Party gives him a tight grin, a brief small flash of teeth. Frank uses the moment to look around and immediately regrets it: it’s complete chaos, with any semblance of a plan having dissolved into a frantic ecstasy to fight and survive. The frantic flare of blue lights matches time with his heartbeat, the alarm making his ears burn. The mayhem isn’t even particularly surprising- if he’s honest with himself, he hadn’t expected them to even get this far.
Korse is still around- somewhere, somewhere, but just always lurking out of sight- but there’s only the vague threat of him on the edges of Frank’s vision, where he’ll slip in and out of the shadows, aiming and firing and retreating again.
“Listen,” he starts, as Party takes aim at another draculoid and ghosts it before it can leap for his brother. He glances back at Frank. “We gotta get out of here. Right now.” Frank sees him hesitate, casting another fleeting look at the midst of the fight, and feels the familiar sense of dread flood his system again. “There’s no time to go after Korse.”
For a moment, Frank wonders whether Party’s going to leave anyway- wonders whether he’d go after him, or hold him back if it came down to it- but then Party meets his eyes, bites his bottom lip and nods once. It’s nothing more than a sharp jerk of his head, but it’s enough, and Frank can’t help but let out a breath as relief floods his system.
It’s just as Frank’s turning back towards the fight that Party catches him by his shoulders and drags Frank back towards him, smashing their lips together before Frank can even catch hold of a breath. He kisses back as hard as he can manage.
“Be careful, Gee,” he forces himself to choke out, trying to ignore the way that Party’s looking at him, like he’s trying to memorise every line, bruise and scar on Frank’s face, as if he’s expecting it to be the last chance he’ll get. Frank tells himself that he’s not doing the exact same thing in return.
“See you, Frankie,” he says softly, his voice little more than a whisper, but still louder than everything else in the whole world. Party gives a watery smile and a salute before turning away, red hair fluttering, and Frank’s heart stings.
Inhale, exhale.
Inhale, exhale.
Frank forces himself to not look back as he steps away, for his feet to start moving. There’s a pack of draculoids ahead of him and he speeds up, head down, doesn’t think as he lifts his blaster and fires. One scarecrow manages to turn, lifts its blaster, but a blast catches it in the chest and falls. The next one doesn’t even have chance to react before it’s ghosted, the electricity snarling and tossing up a cloud of ash and smoke, dissipating with the sound of the blast.
There’s a whistle of a blast above his head and he has about half a second to dive to the side before the wall behind him explodes. The sound is deafening, the plaster pummelling his face and hair, and he only looks up again to find another draculoid aiming right at him.
He rolls, throws himself to his knees, fumbles for his ray-gun but he can’t keep hold of it, his fingers unsteady and uncoordinated with adrenaline, and he looks up to find the drac’s gloved hands reaching for him. He lashes out, grabs its wrist and drags it to the floor, and for a moment it’s caught off-guard, but it’s just enough. The sound it makes when Frank presses his blaster beneath its chin and pulls the trigger is soft, something akin to a sigh, almost resigned, before it drops to the floor. Its red-paint grin leers at up him.
Inhale, exhale.
Frank can taste the metallic tang of blood in the air.
They’ve got to get out.
They’ve got to get out.
They’ve got to make it out
Between him and the exit, there’s about a dozen draculoids. Korse is somewhere. The girl still hasn’t moved a single inch. Suddenly, with a jolt, he realises that he’s still looking out for another flash of red hair, but it’s not there. The emergency overhead lights flare intermittently.
Then he sees Party at the far side of the room, methodically taking out every threat one after the other. Jet’s working his way back to the center of the room- and to the girl- whilst Kobra is battling his way furiously towards his brother. He’s shouting something, waving his free hand, but his voice is impalpable beneath the alarms and the growl of fighting and ray-guns. But Frank starts towards him anyway, unable to decipher what the problem is-
Korse.
Korse barely five metres from Party, but Party hasn’t seen him yet.
No. No, no no no no.
He looks back to Kobra, then back to Party again, just to see him pressing his blaster into the small of another draculoid’s back and pulling the trigger, winding his fingers through the black hair on its mask and ripping it off as he does. There’s a howl, and then the drac falls forward, and Party’s left standing, the glow of the blast still hanging in the air. He looks cold and determined; a bright beacon of hope in the white world, but Korse has seen him- he’s moving forward-
Frank’s opening his mouth, needs to find the sound to yell, needs to warn Party… but Party doesn’t seem to see him. He’s still holding the draculoid mask- standing, staring, shaking as he takes a step back, seems to glance down at his black clothes and then back to the white mask… and for one short second, one short, shattered fragment of an instant, his wide eyes meet Frank’s. He can’t miss how crazed he looks, like a cornered animal at the end of a hunt, the whites of his eyes showing and the fear unmistakable.
But now Party’s taking a step back, slamming straight into Korse, who swings him around and forces him up against a wall. And he looks so small, overpowered by Korse’s comparable strength and size, and Frank’s thrashing through the dracs to get closer, and he’s raising his blaster for a clear shot-
Something white and large crashes into him, throwing them both sprawling to the floor; it’s another furious, drugged-up scarecrow, but Frank’s past the point of caring as it fumbles for his wrists, trying to force the blaster from its face. But Party’s in danger and Frank growls out a curse as he kicks it away, sends a final blast into its chest, and-
And-
And-
Frank can’t see Party anywhere.
Frank can only see Korse.
He can only see the cold smiling licking the corners of Korse’s mouth as he stares down at the figure in front of him; The figure gradually sliding down the wall, slumped over with their chin to their chest, their luminous red hair obscuring their face.
Party’s lips are inches from his own. He’s looking down at Frank with eyes of broken glass. “Ghoul…” he whispers, “I don’t wanna be alone. I don’t want people to leave me.”
Frank can hear someone screaming.
It’s a sound stained bloody red, rippling with animal horror and incomprehensible agony. It’s the kind of sound that humans shouldn’t ever be able to produce. Faintly, Frank wonders if it’s Kobra Kid screaming like that.
Of course, it could be Frank himself, but he’s not convinced, because Frank doesn’t feel like screaming. He only feels hollowed-out, as if his veins have been taken to with a scalpel, the contents of his skull scraped clean.
The scream doesn’t even stop for air- it just drags itself on and on and on, like barbed wire- and it’s almost something of selfish relief when there’s a hiss of electricity that snaps out like a whip and the scream cuts off. He supposes that it must have been Kobra screaming after all, because Frank can see him collapsing too, folding like someone made from old paper.
The music’s fading again, filtering away into the night like sanding trickling between his fingers, and Frank drags his thumb up the side of Gerard’s neck.
“Ghoul!” Jet’s yelling his name, but Frank can’t make himself take his eyes from the folded-up figure against the pillar.
They look so small like that: with red hair fanning around their face, eyes closed, like they’re asleep.
“Ghoul! Frank, we gotta go! We gotta go now!”
Jet’s got his hands on Frank’s shoulders, trying to shake him into action, and he forces his numb legs to move. He trips, stumbles, but then he’s running, his body cold, all pain gone. He manages to snatch the girl’s wrist and she falls into step behind him. The draculoids are all so focused on the two fallen Killjoys that the two remaining ones seem to take a second priority. As if they only remember why Frank and Jet are there when they’ve passed them.
Frank catches back up with Jet and together, with the girl in tow, they bolt for the exit door, the electricity writhing in the air like it’s something alive and ravenous. He remembers how burnt and bloody it’d left Party’s shoulder- and that’d been with the protective BLI jacket.
“Jet?” Frank pants, breath rattling between words, “Sorry... for sayin’... wantin’ to keep the girl safe was… was selfish…”
“What are you on about?”
Frank can smell the sweat and cigarette smell of him, can feel his body trembling.
Jet gets to the doors- almost crashes straight through them- and Frank shoves the girl after him. Then he pulls up before them, and Jet skids to a stop, tries to reach back for him, his lips forming Frank’s name…
“I won’t leave you,” Frank murmurs. “I won’t leave, Party. I promise. Never.”
The thud as the door swings shut seems so final that the sound reverberates in his chest. The girl’s got tears streaming down her face and she’s yelling for him, reaching back as Jet Star hauls her away.
It’ll be worth it. If Jet manages to get her away, it’ll all be worth it.
Inhale. Exhale.
He can see Gerard curled up on the other side of the room. Black clothes, red hair, white face.
Inhale. Exhale.
He raises his blaster again as he turns around, pulls in another breath.
Frank’s not ever leaving Gerard again.