Chapter Text
“Are you kidding? You were supposed to be watching him!” Lukas’s voice is shrill with panic. He needs to be talked down from the edge right now, not pushed off another, totally separate edge. He’s struggling to think, speak, and feverishly run down the hall at the same time.
“I know! I just wasn’t expecting him to suddenly jump into action like that!” Petra defends herself. Lukas doesn’t know what he would have done in her shoes, but he can’t help but be a little pissed. He can’t help but buy into Radar’s words that she shouldn’t be trusted. Ugh! He needs a clear head! Not another crisis thrown at him! Why does he have to fix everything!
He desperately tries to calm himself down, with minimal results. He can feel himself shaking, trying to keep himself steady is just making it worse. As they reach a crossroads they slow down to a stop, they need to pick a direction to go in. While the wood paneled walls look the same as the rest of the school, this is an unfamiliar floor, and they have zero clue what Jesse might be looking for. Who knows what kind of clock they might be running on? He can’t bite down his frustration, at Jesse for running off when they are so close , at Petra for letting him, at the damned spirits for trapping them here. God dammit!
“We should split up, over more ground that way.” Petra suggests, although it doesn’t sound like it’s up for debate. She’s as stern and rigid as ever. Radar stiffens beside him. He looks like he wants to speak up, but Petra swiftly cuts off any chance of that happening, “Radar you go upstairs, Lukas go right, I’ll go left.” He can’t help but bristle at the idea, but he still can’t keep track of his own thoughts. He feels defeated as he lets her have the reins.
Lukas tries to give what he thinks is a reassuring look to Radar before splitting off. He’s going to come back with an answer. He’s going to get Radar out of here. “Ok, meet back here in 20?” Lukas suggests, “Yell if you find him?” Petra looks at him, another unreadable face, but nods.
Ok great, he bolts off. The sooner this is resolved the better. He had his own anxieties about them being on their own. He runs from classroom to classroom, luckily this wing of the school doesn’t seem to be as big as the last. Most of the rooms seemed to be for extracurriculars, like art or music. If he keeps a good pace he can be back in 20 minutes easily. There’s not much of note. He’s sure he’s missing some more history on the school or the curse but he doesn’t care. This isn’t about that anymore. His to-do list is shockingly simple for once. Find Jesse, Go back to the group.
Oh right, and think. The Petra dilemma. He doesn’t really know what he’s going to do about that. If only him and Radar had more time to talk, or maybe not. If only he had more than 20 minutes to think. If only Jesse hadn’t run off suddenly. He remembers something.
He checks his pocket to see what Radar had slipped in there earlier.
Petra’s bandana…. And her paper scrap?
How did Radar get this? When they found Petra her bandana was already missing. Did she drop it somewhere? Why didn’t she say anything about her scrap then?
A missing puzzle piece from earlier slides into place.
He stops running.
What was it that Petra said? When she pulled Olivia’s scrap out of Axel’s pocket? Something about that meaning he had to be involved in the murder? A chill runs over him. He isn’t sure if he can breathe.
Why was Radar so sure that Petra had his scrap?
He thinks back to when they went to fetch the rope, Radar had decided to go back into that cursed bathroom rather than be alone with Petra. Lukas had seen him looking at something on the floor when they untied the rope, was this what he was looking at? Radar had been particularly on edge ever since they found her, Lukas was finally realizing why. He’s starting to feel sick. Even… even back in the library, Radar had suddenly closed off again after Lukas mentioned finding their friends.
“‘She…’” Lukas had just assumed he was talking about the ghost, he never actually got a confirmation, did he?
Why didn’t he tell Lukas? Would… Would Lukas even have listened to him?
Lukas braces himself against the wall.
Petra tried to kill Radar.
And Lukas had left him to wander around the school alone. He can’t breathe.
He takes a second to weigh his options. He still has zero clue where Jesse is. He promised himself he wouldn’t leave him behind, but he also promised he would keep Radar safe. There’s an assumed unknown timer on both of their lives. Lukas had gotten so used to someone else, usually Jesse, making the decisions it was like he forgot how to make his own. Years, he’s spent years being thrown around in the world around him. Had he any control at any point?
As he stands there paralyzed in the hallway, he starts to think he hasn’t. It’s hard to tell the difference between every single event in his life, every choice and tempo of breathing, leading up to this awful crescendo of tragedy, and between nothing could have prevented this, an inevitable calamity ending with all his friends dead in these callous halls. He falls to his knees.
How does anyone do it? How does one handle the weight of playing hero?
He digs his fingernails into his palm, attempting to ground himself. It doesn’t clear the turmoil ruminating in his head, but he’s able to move again. Paralysis replaced with an ever more familiar primal fear. He finds comfort in the adrenaline rushing through him.
His recuperation is cut off as he hears a voice scream his name. Lukas has made up his mind.
He had no time to waste. Petra had been the one to suggest they split up, and knew exactly in what direction Radar went in. He wills his knees to stop knocking together and to get off the floor. He lets the desperation guide him as he sprints back towards the staircase. He will have to process that later. All that will have to wait, he can’t stop moving now.
His footsteps are loud, blending into the pounding in his ears. He longs for a more dissociative state as his lungs burn and his legs ache, he can’t help but resent his body as he is stuck in its restraints. Not fast enough, not strong enough, all the pressures of this awful school heavy on his shoulders.
Despite the horrors he had already witnessed, he couldn’t help but acknowledge how fortunate he had been. His stomach lurches at thinking of himself as ‘lucky’, but he had made it this far. He was already beating impossible odds. He didn’t know how much more he could get away with. It felt futile to hope for a miracle, but then what was he even fighting for?
Another yell. Sounds echoed far in the deserted school halls. He pushes himself harder.
He whips around the corner as he finally reaches the staircase, he finds them. Petra is on top of him, hands around his neck and Radar struggles beneath him. Her face is wicked and snarling. Radar has reverted to the scared little boy Lukas escorted out of the bathroom stall earlier.
The memory reverberates through him as Radar claws at his neck. Lukas doesn’t think he recognizes her anymore.
He doesn’t think he recognizes any of them anymore. It’s hard to imagine them as the group of adventures that originally entered this place.
“Petra! What the hell are you doing?” Lukas yells, but he’s out of breath, scared to approach her, scared for her hostage. He lacks the confidence to mask his terror, voice coming out strangled and desperate.
Petra looks at him but doesn’t loosen her grip, Radar’s struggle is starting to slow down. “Please let go of him.” Lukas pleads, “Let’s talk about this please .” He can barely get the words out, his lungs constricting in his chest. Something inside him is clawing and desperate. He feels himself growing weaker, his resolve crumbling. He just wants it to be over.
“Talk about what?” She spits at him, “Leaving me behind? I heard you guys talking about it. I’m not going to rot here.” She’s steady in her resolve.
“We weren’t going to leave you behind! Look,” He pulls out her paper scrap, “I have your scrap right here! We can all go home!” Both his hands raise in surrender.
“What about Jesse?” She asks carefully.
He swallows hard, “Let’s just go. Do it without him.” He notices the way she relaxes a bit, “He’s dead weight anyways.” the words feel like glass in his throat.
Her grip loosens further. Radar remains limp on the floor, Lukas can’t tell if he’s still breathing or not. “Good. I already found him. He’s dead. I was worried you were going to be too sentimental to keep going.” She says casually. Like an offhanded comment. The great hero of the New Order of the Stone and founder of Beacontown reduced to an afterthought. Lukas may have whimpered at the news. He isn’t sure. “We are all going to starve here if you keep wasting time grieving.” She remarks. This wasn’t Petra.
“Yeah… yeah.” He relents. It feels awful to say outloud. This wasn’t him.
“It’s just us left… C’mon Petra lets go home! Together!” Lukas tries his best to sound convincing, hoping it isn’t too late. He thinks he might see Radar open his eyes.
Then her snarl upturns into something sadistic. “Perfect.” She gets off of Radar, pulling him up with her as she stands, and then tosses him down the stairs head-first.
“ No! ” The scream is stuck in Lukas’s already raw throat.
He hits the first step and something snaps as he continues to fall down the stairs. He completely ragdolls as he bounces off each step tumbling to the ground.
Radar lands at his feet with an awful thump. Crumpled in a pile of his own limbs. Unmoving… and wrong . His neck is bent at an unnatural angle. Lukas can barely comprehend what he’s looking out. He thinks he’s going to go insane, but all he can do is fall to the floor and hold the poor boy.
“Wha-” Lukas feels he no longer resembles the man he once was. Who is he without Radar? Who is he but his growing pile of broken promises? His one reason for getting out of here is getting increasingly pale.
He tries to shake Radar awake. “C’mon… c’mon man…” Lukas mutters. “Radar…”. There’s a soft groan of the air leaving Radar’s lungs, punctuating his life span. He runs a shaky hand through Radar’s hair and down his face. One last act of kindness in such a cruel place.
He hears the footsteps going down the stairs in front of him, He manages to rip his eyes away from Radar’s fading colors. Petra looks wild. Her eyes are wide, her muscles move unnaturally under her skin, her smile is pinched.
“Why would you do that?” Lukas asks a stupidly simple question, but he needs the answer. His brain is tearing itself apart trying to figure it out. They were so close . Everything was going to be fine. They were going to go home.
Petra finally reaches the bottom of the stairs, unresponsive to his question.
“So.. so what?” The events of the past hour are starting to rush past him, the room spinning around him. “Are you going to kill me too? Are you so considerate as to let us all share the same grave?” If Petra moves to attack him, he’s not sure he could fight her off. He doesn’t have it in him anymore. Fine. Go down with the ship. It suddenly doesn’t seem like that bad of an idea.
He had failed. He hadn’t managed to keep a single person safe. He abandoned Jesse and neglected Radar. He hadn’t spoken up enough for Axel. He hadn’t even acknowledged Ivor’s death. And maybe worst of all, he hadn’t been there to help prevent Petra’s fall from grace.
He thinks back to the red-headed girl from Beacontown. One of his very best friends. He thinks of the way they used to spar and the way they would laugh it off when she totally knocked him on his ass. He thinks of when he failed to save her from the Witherstorm and swore to never let it happen again. He remembers the knot in his throat as he feared losing her forever to Wither sickness. How awful it felt to watch that kind of corruption spread. He thinks of the local hero with wind in her hair as she brandishes her iconic golden sword. Her eyes, her smile, the way she walked, he recalls it all in near perfect memory.
And he doesn’t see a single bit of her in the person standing in front of him.
Petra kneels down and grabs his hands, “No. We are going home.” She holds on tight and clearly has no intention of letting him go. He weeps, aware it will grant him no mercy.
She pulls her paper out of Lukas’s hands, “You need two people to go home right? You better not be bullshitting about my scrap. You’re out of options.” She says coolly, she’s getting closer, trapping Lukas against the wall.
Lukas spits at her. “Fuck you, we can both die here.”
She hums.
“Do you think that’s what he would have wanted?” She tempts, looking down at the boy now shared in their laps. She’s still moving closer, climbing over him like he isn’t there. One hand holding the paper with her name on it, the other at the base of Lukas’s neck. Holding him in place, threatening a similar fate.
Lukas thinks back and he’s not even sure. Radar was ready to sit down and die, and Jesse probably DID lay down and die. Who was he fighting for anymore? Himself? He couldn’t think of one good thing waiting for him on the other side. The only friend he had left was holding a loaded gun to his head. His face is hot with tears. He doesn’t even bother holding back sobs. There’s nothing left. He’s nothing.
Even if he gets out of here, any part of himself with any real value will be left here with the rest of the cold, bug ridden bodies.
And yet. He can’t say the words. He can’t beg Petra to kill him. He tries to stomach the idea of dying here. Of never sleeping in his own bed again, of never seeing his cat, of never going home.
It’s an awful ending for an awful person. It fits right in with how everything else has been going. Nothing will ever feel like home again.
“Save your self-pity for after we get out of here.” She demands.
He isn’t feeling very agreeable, but he nods. He pulls out his own scrap, still stained with the gross pool muck. He remembers the feeling of the hand curling around his ankle and wonders what would have happened if it hadn’t let go.
“Okay, tell me how we do this. No bullshit, if you damn us here forever, I’ll never give you the pleasure of dying.” She threatens him again.
He takes in a shaky breath, recalling what the book had detailed. “If either of us mess it up, that’s it. No do-overs.” He recites the ritual to her, skipping all the details he found to be unimportant, not that she’d know.
She tightens her grip on him, “You sure?”.
He nods solemnly. He remains firm in his decision.
She keeps one hand tightly around his arm and she uses the other to extend her scrap towards him.
They join them together in the space between them.
They chant in unison.
“Sachiko Ever After”
“Sachiko Ever After”
“Sachiko Ever After”
When they finish nothing happens for a beat, just the anticipation left between them. Petra looks up from her scrap to glare at him, he smiles.
The unworldly room around them spins, shifting space and time once again.
----
Lukas wakes up in a familiar room. The most striking difference is the smell. A sharp inhale of air, he notices the distinct lack of decay. He frantically looks around and it’s just… his room. With his door open he can see Dewey sleeping in the living room. He’s… safe.
He promptly leans over the edge of his bed and throws up.
He can’t… what? What is he…?
Despite clearly being home it all still feels wrong . There’s just…. Where is it? Where are the crumbling walls and stagnant air? Was it all just a dream? But everything felt so…
He doesn’t know how long he spends sitting there, grasping at loose threads. He just… he just…
It all flows over him. Everything.
Axel being reduced to ground piles of meat, abandoned by his friends.
Ivor’s decomposing face. Bug’s having devoured his eyeballs long before he got there.
And Radar begging Lukas to trust him, only to end up dead at Lukas’s feet. Damned by his inaction. A wave of regret washes over him. He wanted to take Radar home so badly, and he couldn’t even be there when Radar needed him.
And he’s sure there’s more. More friends lost wandering those halls. It was a weird feeling to mourn what he didn’t know.
He doesn’t even notice he’s hyperventilating.
He thinks he might have passed out, he’s not sure. By the time he comes to, he’s softly stroking his blanket trying to ground himself. Feeling the familiar fabric makes him feel nostalgic and estranged in his own home at the same time.
In and out.
In and out.
In and out.
Right, he’s safe. What a nightmare…. A nightmare. Of course.
He feels a little bit too weak to stand, but that doesn’t stop him from trying. He has to use the wall for support, he needs to see them. He needs to see them safe. He needs to see them breathing again .
He rinses out his mouth and stumbles out of his house. The sun feels nice on his skin, but it’s still far too bright. He can barely open his eyes. He keeps moving forward. He’s barely dressed, but he goes to get his horse from the small stable. Something seemed to have spooked it during the night, but that made two of them. He still felt too frantic to be the calming voice in the room. He needed to leave now.
He doesn’t even remember the trip back into Beacontown. It all blurs together around his tight white-knuckle grip and another breathing exercise. All he processes is him stumbling over his own feet. He doesn’t remember getting off the horse.
By the time he’s surrounded by familiar buildings he feels like a starved animal. He runs into a random citizen on the street and pulls her aside. He can see she’s frightened by his demeanor but he has no time for pleasantries.
“Radar…?” He croaks out, his voice is raw from crying. That’s not exactly what he meant to say, but it’s what he wants to know.
The woman is kind enough to not slap him in the face and run off. She gives him a nervous smile, “Uh… what?”
“Do you know where Radar is?” he clarifies.
“I don’t…” She looks around, seeing if anyone will save her from the strange man on the street. “I don’t know who that is.” she responds politely.
It catches him off guard but he is quick to recover. “Fine. Where’s Jesse?” He tries not to demand.
She’s still looking at him like he’s crazy, “... Who?”
He holds back a frustrated sob, “The mayor???” Has she never been outside before? How unaware could someone be? He bites back his anger, it’s misdirected at her.
But then she says something that strikes him to his core. “We don’t have a mayor.”
“What? What are you talking about? The guy who saved the world? Twice?” He’s getting frantic, he can see it reflected in his face.
She just nervously shakes her head. He manages to let her go.
It doesn’t matter who he asks. No one has heard of Radar. No one has heard of Jesse. No one knows what the Order of the Stone is, and everyone thinks he’s a deranged lunatic. He can’t blame them. By the time he stops interviewing random people in the street the sun is much closer to the middle of the sky. The loss of time is the least disorienting thing on the list.
He’s running out of options if he wants to see a familiar face. He wasn’t really… If even it was all a dream he wasn’t sure he wanted to see her yet. He could still see her haunting visage every time he goes to close his eyes. He didn’t know if he would see the red-headed warrior, or the mad eyed monster, regardless of the reality.
But he needs to see someone, anyone .
He finds himself in front of the small house on the outskirts of town. It was really only meant to be temporary housing, for when Petra wasn’t out exploring on the open road. She liked to keep it simple and modest, but Lukas knew she was more attached to it than she let on.
He shakes as he raises his fist to the door and knocks. His hunger for a familiar face at war with basic survival instinct. He tries to calm his nerves as he waits for a response, tightly holding himself. It just now occurs to him that he isn’t wearing his jacket, he had been in too much of a hurry while running out of the house. It’s adding an extra layer to how vulnerable he feels.
No one answers the door.
He doesn’t get a response when he knocks again, or when he calls out her name. He suddenly feels the need to vomit again. He wraps his hand around the doorknob and prays to some unknown entity. His pleas go to a creator he isn’t sure he believes in anymore.
He braces himself as he opens the door, anticipating an oncoming attack. Either she was still fast asleep, or ignoring him on purpose. But he opens the door and there’s no one there. Instead there’s a mess of a place, something torn through here and left all the remains of wreckage behind. Everything treated with a distinct lack of care or grace.
It’s empty. Abandoned.
Lukas had been to Petra’s a handful of times. He can see the way everything is out of place. She didn’t even bother taking her armor. It seems she just left with her sword and the clothes on her back. What was the point of trashing the place if she wasn’t looking for anything?
He just can’t wrap his head around it. He can’t wrap his head around anything . Why would she leave? Unless…she had something to run from.
He inspects the room closer. It looks like she started packing a bag before deciding she didn’t need it. Some clothes, rations, a potion or two. Petra usually packed light but this was sparse. As someone who lived out of a backpack, she was a quick and efficient packer. This was way too sloppy to be her usual work. It was like she was hysterical or something.
Lukas sits down on her bed, starting to feel lightheaded again. It’s all just too much.
As he shifts his weight back on his arms one of his hands slips under her pillow, he feels paper.
He lifts the pillow to find the damned scrap. The same one Radar slipped into his pocket in his nightmare. A torn piece of paper with Petra’s name written on it.
He thinks of all the people missing from town, but Petra’s bed is lukewarm. The body that slept here has been gone for a while, but lacks the chill of a bed that has been empty all night.
Only the two of them had made it out in the ‘nightmare’.
She was the only one he could even prove existed, and she hit the road to leave him to bare the weight of it all on his own.
All of it. The horrors of Heavenly Host, their friends' final breaths, and every single one of their treasured memories together. She left. He’s unsure who abandoned him, the warrior or the monster, but it’s the final betrayal that hurts the most.
He should have just let her kill him.