Work Text
The group is sitting on the couches, talking quietly amongst themselves. Teala has just been killed, and the monster is nothing more than dust on the wind.Everyone is thinking about who’s next.No one is safe tonight. That much is obvious.You constantly have to check your shoulder, watch the locks, look at the people around you.That’s the worst one of the carnival master’s tricks, Matthew thinks, making it so that you can’t trust anyone.But you still do, despite your best efforts, because you’re human and if you’re left alone with your thoughts in a place like this you won’t last an hour.Ro is sitting close to Matthew, holding onto the cuff of his jacket like he’ll disappear if she doesn’t.Matthew looks at her, biting the inside of her cheek as she watches the rest of the group.If somebody betrays her, she’ll crumble.She’s stronger than everyone gives her credit for, but she trusts so completely and with her whole heart that her soul’s fragile.Matthew puts his arm around her again. He’d been so worried when she went into the challenge. “Are you doing okay?” he asks her for what must be the eleventh time.She rests her head on his shoulder, trying to find comfort in the hug.“I’m fine,” she says, in a small voice, and he knows it’s not true, but he lets it go.He just hopes they can make it out of here.***It’s been too long since the last attack.Joey’s watching the windows, Matt’s covering the door, and Safiya’s leaning against the wall near the map.Ro’s playing Go Fish with Colleen using the cards from the Snake Woman, and Manny and Nikita are tossing a baseball back and forth.They’re all killing time, fear prowling around in the back of their brains.Matthew’s heart is beating too fast, and he can hear everyone breathing, can hear the cards scraping against one another, can hear the thud of the ball against skin.Every single sound is digging into his brain and tearing it to shreds.He needs something to happen, or he’s going to lose it.Matthew scrubs the back of his hand against his hair, and the front door bangs open.Everyone leaps to their feet, cards fluttering to the floor, the ball bouncing off the couch, ready to fight.But it’s just Mortimer, mouth cocked in a smile, brandishing a bottle of pop.“Hey, guys! I found this at the drugstore,” he announces, grinning like he deserves a medal.Nikita crosses her arms over her chest.“It’s the end of the fucking world, and you got that?!” she asks. “What about some supplies? What about a phone? What about anything that’s more useful than a goddamn bottle of pop?”Matthew nods in agreement, and Manny sighs. He’s exhausted. They all are.Mortimer looks hurt. “Come on, guys. I thought it would be something fun.”“What the hell is Tab?” Joey asks, reading the label. “I’ve literally never heard of that before.”“It’s a diet cola manufactured by Coca-Cola, it decreased in popularity after Diet Coke was invented,” Matthew recites, hopping onto the couch and sitting on the back of it.“How- you know what, I’m not gonna even ask,” Colleen says, throwing up her hands, and Ro giggles.“I’ll take some,” she volunteers, adjusting her beret as she walks over to the table.She thinks she sees a gleam flash in Mortimer’s eye when she says that, but she decides it’s her imagination.“Me too. I could use a Diet Coke, and since that’s not an option, I’ll take this,” Matthew agrees, pouring the drink into a plastic cup. “Anybody else?”“Hell no,” Manny laughs. “That stuff looks gross as shit.”Nobody else wants any, so when Matthew takes a drink, he makes a big deal out of pretending it’s fantastic.The reality is, there’s a strange bitterness to it, almost acidic, really.“Do you feel closer to your ‘70s self now?” Safiya questions, gesturing to the oversaturated clothing they all have on.“Nah, I think I’ll stick with Diet Coke,” Ro says, putting down her cup, and Matthew copies her.“Now we go back to waiting, huh?” Colleen sighs, cracking her neck. She doesn’t like that there’s nothing to do. It makes her feel restless.“I suppose so,” Safiya responds, trying to fix her bent-out-of-shape sunglasses.***The bitterness in Ro’s throat has transformed into almost a burning sensation over the past few minutes.She looks over at Matthew, and he seems uncomfortable, too.Even when she tries to speak, it hurts.She opens her mouth, to try and talk to him.But then she’s retching, and she’s throwing up on the ground, and Matthew’s choking, and it sends the room into a panic.Everything’s spinning together, and Ro can’t tell what’s up and what’s down, and she falls over, and she’s on the ground now, and she can see Matthew run over to her, but then he’s falling too.It’s all happening in slow motion for her.A note slides under the door, and Safiya is the first to notice it.She grabs the paper.“Your friends have been poisoned. You need to complete four tasks to retrieve the ingredients to the antidote. Better hurry, though- there’s only fifteen minutes on the clock.”Fear rushes through everyone, at different speeds.“They all lie at the center of the fences.”“What the fuck are ‘the fences’?” Manny asks, frustrated.“We’ll find out as we go. We need to run,” Joey says quickly, and then they’re gone.Matthew and Ro are still on the floor.***“What do you think happens when we die?” Ro asks, laying on the carpet next to Matthew, because she can’t stand. The effects of the poison are taking over.It’s getting harder and harder to breathe.“I don’t know,” Matthew responds, feeling his fingertips go numb. He squeezes his hand shut, trying to regain some feeling, but all it does is send a static burst of pins and needles through his fist.Ro’s lungs constrict against the toxins in her blood, forcing a cough out of her throat. “I hope there’s sun there. I’m getting really sick of the night.”Matthew smiles. “What do you think it’s going to be like?”“Well, I think it’ll be really big, and really bright, and all sorts of people that you never got the chance to meet will be there, and you can talk to them.” A little bit of the light returns to her eyes. “It’s always the perfect temperature, and you can send little messages to the people that are still alive through tiny perfect things that can happen in their day, and there are dogs, and flowers, and trees…”“You’ve thought about this, huh?” Matthew asks, fighting back the bile that’s rising in his throat. “I just don’t want to be alone,” Ro says, trying to memorize the way the world looks right now, trying to take as much of it in as possible.There’s a moment of quiet, a lapse in the final conversation they’ll ever have.“Matt?” Ro asks, her voice soft.“Yeah?”“I don’t want to die,” she whispers.Matthew grabs her hand.It’s feverishly hot, the blood racing beneath the skin.They don’t have much time left.Two minutes, maybe less.“We’re going to be okay, all right?” he says. “We’re going to be okay. It doesn’t matter what happens next. We’re going to be fine.”Ro tries to believe him. But it’s hard to believe anyone when it feels like your throat is scraping itself apart.“I think that the afterlife is going to have all the people that we miss,” Matthew says. “All the people we wish we could have said things to, but we didn’t. A redo on missed opportunities.”“That sounds nice,” Ro responds.Crickets chirp in the night.When you’re going to die, nothing seems important enough to say.You’re trying so hard to fight against what’s happening to you, but when there’s nothing you can do, it’s really just a matter of waiting.And waiting is made worse by silence.The world’s edges are starting to blur together in Ro’s eyes, lines and colors transforming into blurry, shapeless things, her splitting headache forming spots over her vision.Soon, she can’t see anything, the poison spreading into her eyes and shutting her off from the world. She knows it’s not long now.Matthew feels a cough building in his chest, and when it escapes, it makes his ribs ache, and he can’t stop coughing. He can’t get air into his lungs.He’s coughing, and he’s coughing, and he’s coughing, and soon there’s blood coming out of his mouth, and his lungs are swimming in liquid, and he’s trying so hard, but there’s no way he can win, and blood’s coming out of his eyes now, he’s writhing and screaming--and then he’s done, body wracked with pain.Ro hears the coughing start, and she reaches for his hand, flailing in the empty space.“Matt!” she calls out, helplessly, trying to move towards him. Her legs aren’t working, and she still can’t see.She’s crawling, pulling herself forward with her arms, but there’s nothing she can do.The screaming stops, and she’s desperate now, clawing uselessly at the carpet, not moving towards him but away from him, but she doesn’t know it.He’s still breathing, but she can’t tell.She thinks he’s dead, and she doesn’t have enough breath right now to cry.But something shatters in her heart.She knows it’ll start soon, though, the symptoms of death, in the arrhythmic thumping of her heartbeats, the stabbing, searing pain that’s cutting into her head.“MATT!” she yells. “Matt, where are you?!” He can’t respond. His jaw is locked in place.“Please,” she whispers, voice thick with tears and poison. “Don’t make me do this alone.”Matthew wants to scream. He wants to hug her.There’s a faint beat of Ro’s heart, one that’s too weak to get what little oxygen she has to her brain. She’s still alive, but not for long, and she knows, can feel every second pass in the throbbing of her head.“Please,” she whispers, forcing the syllable out, coated in a cough.Matthew is thrashing, trying to regain control of himself, and his hand crushes against a new note.Through his fading vision, he reads it.There’s only enough for one.***“COME ON!” Joey shouts, his voice ravaged with desperation.He and Safiya have retrieved their ingredients already, but the rest of the group is moving slowly through their puzzles.Nikita’s digging in the dirt, trying to find the plant with purple roots that was mentioned in her clue. There are bugs swarming around, and she’s trying to hold the flashlight with her teeth, and all the flowers she’s pulling up have white roots.“Matt and Ro are dying, you guys!” Joey says angrily. “Can’t you go any faster?”“Joey, you’re not helping!” Colleen shouts back, trying to mix the powders she’s found together.Safiya doesn’t yell like Joey, just crosses her arms and paces the length of the fence, crushing her teeth together.She hates not being able to help.But she can’t go into the arena and find the other parts of the antidote.That’s against the rules.She wonders what happens if you break the rules.But she knows what’ll happen.You die, or maybe worse.This town has taught her that there are things worse than death.Nikita’s section of fence lifts up, and she sprints out, holding the plant in her hand.“I got it,” she says, panting, and Joey puts it in the vial.Manny’s next, with the seeds, and Colleen finally finishes a few minutes later, although it feels like years.“Okay, it’s almost done,” Safiya reports, holding up the tiny container.“Almost?!” Joey exclaims.“We only need the alkali to stimulate the reaction.”“Normal-person speak, please,” Colleen says, crossing her arms.“Let’s go to the drugstore,” Safiya paraphrases quickly, and the group follows her.They can all feel desperation pumping through their veins. There are lives on the line, not in the abstract sense they’re used to by now, but in the reality of two of their best friends debilitated in the lounge.None of them say anything, though, because that would show weakness, and they’re all too scared to do that.The drugstore’s fluorescent lights are too bright after the pitch-black outside.Everyone’s panicking, shuffling through the glass bottles, mumbling among each other, trying to save their friends.Sort of naturally, they’ve split into general teams.Colleen’s with Nikita and Manny, and Joey and Safiya are searching the shelves in the back.Safiya looks at her watch.They’ve still got one minute.Sixty seconds to stop them from dying.“Would ionic salts work?” Nikita asks, holding up an amber-colored bottle.“Yes! Yes!” Joey says, grabbing it and pouring the solution into the bottle.It turns a vibrant shade of blue, and no one cares, they just want to fix Matt and Ro.“Okay! Okay, we’re done!”Safiya grins. They’re going to make it, she thinks, running with the rest of them to the lounge, pushing through the clump of people to the door.The first thing she notices is a splatter of blood on the carpet near her feet.The second thing is Matthew’s pale face, glasses slipping off his nose.“Oh my god,” somebody whispers behind her, but she doesn’t know who said it and she doesn’t care.Matt and Ro are curled up in separate corners, backs rising and falling in stuttered, clipped breaths.They are so close to death.Safiya runs over to Matt.He jerks his head so he can look up at her. She can see the tightness in his jaw, and the flickering pain in his eyes. His teeth click together in an involuntary shiver.But when she holds up the antidote, he shakes his head, as much as he can manage.His hands are clenched reflexively, unable to be released, and he waves his arm in the direction of Ro.Safiya gives him a look. “Don’t be stupid,” she says firmly. “You both need this antidote.”Matthew slams his hand onto the ground, revealing a note clutched in it. He forces his fingers open, and Safiya can read the paper.There’s only enough for one.“Oh, shi…” she starts, looking at the antidote in her hand. Matthew’s sweating, and his limbs are twitching, and he can’t talk.He has no chance without this antidote.Safiya bites her lip, and Matthew must know what she’s thinking because he glares at her.She would consult everyone else, but that would definitely start an argument that they don’t have time for.Safiya goes over to Ro.She can’t see her, based on the vacant stare and cloudy eyes. The poison must have worked its way into her retinas.Her face is pale with a greenish tinge to it.But she latches onto Safiya’s arm.“Matt?” she asks, breathless, pushing the word out through clamped teeth.“Ro, it’s me,” Safiya says. “I’m right here, okay? You’re going to be fine.”Ro whispers something.“What?”“Matt’s dead,” Ro repeats, tears soaking her face.“No, he’s not! He’s not dead! He’s right over there, I swear.”“He’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead,” she sobs, and she’s hysterical now, wanting to scream but not having the voice to.“Ro, you have to be calm,” Safiya tells her, smoothing down her hair, matted with sweat. “We don’t have a lot of time.”She turns around and looks at Matthew. He’s in so much pain. Colleen’s holding a wet cloth to his head, but it’s not doing anything.But he sees her, and his bloodshot eyes are pleading.Give her the antidote.Safiya looks back at him. No. No way. We can figure this out. There’s got to be a trick, something we can do.We don’t have enough time for that, Safiya. This is what I want, I promise.Matt, she’s going to hate this.But she’ll be alive, Safiya.Safiya breaks eye contact with him. She looks down at the glass vial in her hand, and she knows she has to make a decision.The cap pulls off easy enough, and the antidote inside looks deceptively innocent.“I need you to drink this,” Safiya says to Ro, holding the edge of the bottle to Ro’s lips, feeling the dread build up in her gut. She can’t go back now.Ro does, and her pupils constrict, then dilate, and they focus on Safiya slowly.“I… I can see you!” she exclaims. “I can see everything!”“Don’t strain yourself, all right? It’s pretty bright in here.”“Where’s Matthew?” she asks, voice soft again, still too raspy to muster any energy.She peers over Safiya’s shoulder, and Matthew’s limp form is laying there.Ro’s legs still don’t work, so she hoists herself onto her elbows and clambers over to him.He’s fading fast now.“Matthew! Matthew, you’re alive!” she says, hugging him, and she’s crying, because he’s here and just a few minutes ago he was dead.“Safiya has an antidote. She can save you! You’re going to be okay!”Matthew manages a smile, and he squeezes her hand with a tense fist. “I’m really sorry, Ro,” he mumbles, and he watches her face shift into confusion.“Wait, what? Matthew, what are you sorry for? Matthew?”He looks at her, trying to memorize every last bit of her face.God, he wants to tell her so many things.Keep going and You’re my best friend and I’ll miss you.But his jaw won’t move, and his throat is too swollen to force any more sounds out.“No. Safiya, give him the antidote. The antidote, Safiya, he needs it, he needs it,” she says desperately. Her stomach pinches with fear and nausea.Everyone else has caught on now.“There was only enough for one,” Safiya says gently, and realization passes over Rosanna’s face, heavy and dark and terrible in its undeniability.“Matt, you’re so stupid,” she whispers, and she’s still holding his hand, still anchoring herself to this one bit of him. She’s not crying, just scared out of her mind, and she wants more time but she knows she doesn’t have any.So she holds onto him like she did after Teala was killed, only this time he’s actually leaving.She knows she’ll remember the look on his face until the day she dies.Of course, she doesn’t know if that’ll be later tonight or in sixty years.She hugs him close.He’s shaking.She can feel one breath, temporary and shuddering, and then he’s gone.It’s almost laughable, how quick it is.One moment he’s tense and trembling against her, the next he’s limp and very dead.His eyes are rolled back into his head, and he doesn’t look like Matt anymore, he looks like a puppet or some crude re-creation.She stands up, quick and unsteady, her breaths echoing in her own ears.Ro wants to run. She wants to get out of this hellhole. She wants to find Matt.But he’s dead.Slowly, robotically, pre-programmed, she sits down on the couch as Manny heads out with Joey to throw Matt’s body outside.She wonders how Steph will take it. Her and Matthew were each other’s everything.I’ll be there for her, Ro decides, and it gives her a purpose, something to be in a moment of chaos, and she feels a spark of something in her chest.But she doesn’t know that her lungs are corroding. She doesn’t know that there’s still poison working its way through her.How could she?***It’s a few hours later.Colleen’s dead.So is Manny, killed by the strongman.Ro hasn’t been very present, because her mind is buried in the quagmire of grief and loss.She can’t stop thinking about how he looked just before her vision blacked out.Completely and utterly helpless.Something behind her ribcage twists in pain, and she yelps.“Ro? What’s wrong?” Nikita asks, rare concern on her face.Rosanna feels the burning, feels the now-familiar weight in her limbs from before.Maybe if she had told them right then, everything would have been okay. She could’ve kept going.“I’m fine,” she says.Those two words are what kill her.Well, metaphorically.Literally, what kills her is leftover cyanide, lurking in her veins.It eats away at her, taking over red blood cells, and she can feel the dizziness come to a peak at the back of her head in a starburst of pain.Wasn’t she safe?Didn’t the antidote save her?Is there even a chance to fight?She knows the answer to all of these questions, but she doesn’t want to think about them. She wants to believe that there are rules, that there’s a fair system that everything adheres to, that cheating is out of the question.But she’s going to die in a minute or two.Safiya strums the harp with Joey, one, two, three times.And as Ro’s vision goes completely dark, she hears them call out a name.“Matt.”No.No, she has to live.She can’t die without saying goodbye.She needs to hold on, she needs to see him, she needs-Ro feels blood start to seep from her nose, and she can’t breathe and it won’t stop.Matthew runs out of the void, gasping the desperate breaths of someone who’s just been brought back from the dead.Everyone’s laughing, everyone’s happy, surrounding him, and it’s only when Safiya looks around for Ro that she realizes what’s happened.She’s been dead for at least a few minutes.Her lips are a pale purple, starved of oxygen, eyes dark with burst blood vessels.Death smells like puke and dust, and Safiya covers her nose with her sleeve.Unlike Matthew, who closed his eyes when he died, hers are wide open, brown reflecting the lights.There’s less of a struggle apparent.She stopped fighting.Safiya sinks to her knees because she doesn’t have another choice.Matthew’s looking around for Ro.“She’s over here,” Safiya tells him, but it’s barely audible because she doesn’t really want him to hear it.But it doesn’t matter. He’s already there, running through the motions, shaking her, trying to get her to live, trying to make her breathe.Safiya’s just tired.She watches it all play out from a disconnected perspective, almost like she’s watching it on a screen or from above.She sees Matthew crumple like he’s been punched in the gut, sees the happiness in his eyes drain out slowly.He knows that they can’t cheat twice.Nikita has a hand over her mouth, and Manny’s trying to get her to look away.Safiya sits down. She thinks about how Ro was so happy to be invited, how excited she was to see Joey again.They all thought Ro would be okay.The antidote promised them that, for fuck’s sake.And now she’s sitting in front of them, dead.Matthew whispers one word, the word they’re all thinking, and his voice is broken, and he will never be the same.“Why?”