Actions

Work Header

Remove The Tricky Tricks

Chapter 11

Summary:

Tyler is a legend.

Josh wants to scream.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

“Cover me!” 

— Clancy  

 

The banditos talk about their hallucinations as they walk. It’s almost like telling scary stories surrounded by your friends in a summer camp; Josh never experienced it. 

But Josh experienced a lot of scary stories in his life.

And he tells them about the shadows with the red eyes and Tyler’s voice; about the white rabbit that could evolve into the shadow. He tells them about Clifford and shows them a note. At this point, keeping the secrets isn’t helping; they’ve had far too many. It’s just another sleepless night — they’re simply too scared to close their eyes. Something might change again, and nothing feels real anymore. Josh is still waiting for the trees to attack him. Josh is waiting for the shadow man to appear again. 

Their torches eat the dark, their footsteps scare the silence away. 

“I saw the kids from my history class die,” Andrew says. “I couldn’t save them. I couldn’t even realize it wasn’t real. That’s the worst thing.” 

Mark listens to him intently, then adds,

“Heaton came after me as a zombie, and I had to kill him again. I’m… Fuck, sorry,” he trails off as his voice begins to tremble. 

Josh shivers under his clothes as he imagines that. 

Jenna only says,

“It was my sister. That night, from the beginning, but this time I was her. And I could feel it. The fire. Everything.”

Tyler once mentioned what happened to Jenna’s sister; Josh isn’t sure if Jenna knows that he knows it, but he just wants to support her. He places his hand on her shoulder wordlessly and squeezes it since his words would only make everything worse. Jenna rubs her knuckles, then wriggles out of his half-hug and speeds up. 

“Insert Tyler’s speech about mental scars here,” Josh mumbles. 

Michael’s hallucination was about him being dragged back to Dema and being held in the dungeon he’s never seen in real life. 

“I thought I knew everything about surviving,” he says. “It turns out I barely survived myself.” 

“You’ll never know,” Mark shrugs. “I’ve seen enough weird shit.”

“That’s the spirit,” Josh says. He replies to his own thoughts, mostly; he’s not even sure where they’re going anymore. 

They’re looking for the signs. 

Jenna suddenly stops and takes a deep breath.

“You think the bishops took him?”

“They called for him,” Josh replies. “He couldn’t resist.” 

This is probably the time for him to tell them what Tyler did to stop him, but his tongue refuses to move. This is Tyler’s secret, not his, but at the same time, Josh has to warn the banditos about the spell Tyler can cast. 

“Josh?”

He needs to stop zoning out. 

“I don’t know what to expect from him anymore.” 

Josh’s feet get stuck in moss, slowing him down; they just keep wandering until the night begins to fade. It would be easier if the map worked here, too, if there was someone to meet them here except for Michael.

“Guys?” Andrew calls for them meekly. “What if they’re not looking for us anymore?”

“What do you mean?” 

“What if they only need Tyler?”

“They need him to show them the way to Trench and brainwash the banditos,” Josh spits. “That’s where we’ll surround them.”

“But he’s tied to the bishops, not the banditos,” Andrew tries.

“Is Clifford a joke to you?” Josh’s voice sounds too harsh even for his own ears. 

Andrew doesn’t argue, showing him his open palms. 

“You won, okay, man. You won.”

Insomnia chews on Josh’s brain like gum, blowing the bubbles of insanity. His muscles ache, and his eyes are too dry to blink. He doesn’t know for how long he can keep up the pace; there’s too much to endure, and he can still smell blood when he sniffles. That was another blood ritual, apparently. He knows they’re going to have to stop eventually, but his mind keeps denying it. His body’s screaming. 

“I have an idea,” he says.

And Jenna says,

“Don’t you dare.”

Josh waves her words away, stopping and turning to the banditos.

“What if we do what Paul did?”

Mark rolls his eyes.

“Oh, really? Pour our blood into the bowl to summon the bishops, what can go wrong?”

“We can try to summon Tyler instead,” Josh shrugs.

Andrew kills his courage with a,  

“You think he’s gonna come back alone now?”

“What the fuck are you all talking about?” Michael chimes in, irritated. 

“Tyler,” Josh and Jenna say in unison. 

“What a legend.”

Josh wants to read Tyler’s journal once again, he can’t get enough of his thoughts, quite depressing sometimes.

Tyler is a legend. 

Josh wants to scream. 

 

***

They’re running circles, and it’s driving Josh crazy. Same trees, same creeks, same clouds in the same sky. At this point, he’s about to believe Michael. But the thought of Tyler roaming this wasteland makes him too anxious to stop. Josh has to get some sleep though, but when his mind is turned off, his nightmares surface again. He only hears the hissing sounds of the vipers and smells blood again.

“Josh!” somebody shakes his shoulder. “Josh, wake up!”

Josh wakes up, his long-suffering bandana sticks to his face. 

“Your nose is bleeding,” Mark says.

“I noticed,” Josh grumbles, pressing the already blood-stained cuff of his sleeve to his nostrils. That’s why he could smell it. 

The sun is rising, and their little camp is almost packed up. They have to go again. Staying in the same place for more than a few hours can still kill them. This is the rule that was engraved in their brains back in Dema. Josh rolls up his sleeping bag, his sleep mostly felt like a faint again. 

“Jenna said she saw Clifford,” this is how Andrew greets him. 

“It’s possible,” Josh looks at Jenna a few feet away. She’s packing her things, focused and unimpressed. 

Andrew stops him when he’s about to go.

“What’s going on?”

“What do you mean?”

“Apathy, nosebleeds,” Andrew bends his fingers as he lists it. “Nightmares too. General irritation.”

And Josh says,

“We’re just getting closer.”

“To Trench?”

Josh hates to break it to him.

“I don’t know.”

Something has happened to him during the night with Tyler in Michael’s shack. He can’t quite put it into words, but something just clicked, cracked inside him, letting the visions from the outside creep in. He yet has to name this new emotion, but he doesn’t want to distract the others as they walk again. Josh is careful, not to let reality trick him again. 

“Is it just me or there’s a body in the river? Should we—”

Josh swallows the tail of his question as the others notice what he sees — a dark silhouette in shallow water, face-down and with their legs splayed out. The water is icy cold, and Josh jumps over the rocks as he runs. He falls to his knees and slides down a muddy grass, stopping by the water. He rolls the body over as the fear of uncertainty makes him feel like drowning.

“It’s Tyler!” 

Josh puts his freezing fingers onto Tyler’s neck, feeling the soft pumps of a heartbeat. 

“He’s alive!”

Josh has no idea how long Tyler has been lying here, soaked to the bone and unconscious; he drags Tyler out of the water for the other banditos to stare at both of them.

“I need a sleeping bag, towels, dry clothes, fire, come on!” 

Josh is about to sob.

He stands on his knees in front of Tyler, not quite sure if he’s breathing; he might’ve gulped a ton of water, and Josh should give him mouth-to-mouth. There’s a commotion around them, and Josh hunches his back and lowers his head to press his lips to Tyler’s.

Feeling like a savior, he doesn’t expect Tyler to hack up water in his face. 

Feeling dumber than ever, Josh sits back on his heels, wiping his eyes with his palm.

“Too early?” Tyler wheezes out.

“Right in t-time,” Josh stutters out. 

Tyler nods and begins to cough, violently, on the brink of throwing up. And he does throw up eventually, Josh rubs his tensed back until he finishes. It’s mostly water and bile, and Tyler doesn’t have time to take a breather when his body spasms again and again. Tyler lies still when he finally stops retching, and Josh can feel how cold he is. He’s shaking, although he tries not to show it, and Josh swallows his pity as he starts to undress him. Tyler lost his backpack somewhere, so they are sharing clothes now.

The fire and the towel are here; the banditos keep their questions to themselves and turn away politely. 

There are new bruises on Tyler’s body, he keeps pressing his right elbow to his ribs, and Josh has to be careful as he helps Tyler slip into a gray hoodie and tie the laces in too-baggy pants. Josh throws the sleeping bag over his shaking shoulders and leads him to the fire. Tyler sits far too close to it, it might melt the soles of his shoes, but he’s too exhausted to care.

“Do you remember anything?” Josh asks.

Tyler drops his head onto Josh’s shoulder.

“Everything, to my chagrin,” he sighs. “I just wanted to warn you.”

Jenna hugs her knees, feeling visibly uneasy. 

“I saw Clifford.”

“He saw you too,” Tyler rubs his forehead as if he’s in pain. “The bishops are coming after you.”

“You were… With them?” Josh asks. Josh knows the answer before Tyler nods.

“I thought I’d give up to them to save you. I wanted… To sacrifice myself for all of you, but… That was not what they wanted. They didn’t need my blood anymore, not after it got all dirty. My sins are like stones in my pockets, weighing me down. And they knew it, they wanted me to work for them,” Tyler’s teeth chatter, interrupting his speech.

“Did they… Just let you go?” Andrew asks. 

Tyler smirks nervously.

“I ran.”

“How did you find us?” 

Josh flinches when Tyler begins to rummage in his wet clothes, hanging on the tree branch to dry. Then he takes the medallion out of his pants pocket, holding it in his palm.

“It’s a map. Your blood led me here. We all are tied together, remember?” 

The roots and the cobweb of the tree crowns are still rusty-red. Tyler was carrying around pieces of them, and this is the weirdest act of dedication Josh could’ve expected from him, but at the same time he can say he expected it. 

“Oh, man,” Mark swallows thickly. 

“The bishops didn’t touch it,” Tyler says in a soothing tone.

“Well, sounds reassuring.”

Tyler just laughs at Mark’s sarcasm.

“I have something for you,” Josh reaches for his backpack. He takes out Tyler’s jacket with the yellow tape on it and his journal. 

Tyler pulls the jacket on gratefully, zipping it up as he keeps shaking a little. He cradles the journal to his chest, smiling as he notices the logo on the cover. 

“Double protection,” he nods.

“Couldn’t trust anyone,” Josh explains. 

Michael looks at them, then averts his gaze. 

Maybe their togetherness is too obvious now. Josh doesn’t know how to act now, though. Tyler doesn’t bat an eye, squeezing his thigh, dangerously close to his crotch. 

Maybe they have to go into the tent now. Josh feels kind of guilty about his body reacting to Tyler’s touches this way. Come on, this guy has just puked his guts up after drowning. Tyler may still feel caged; these memories will never stop tormenting Josh’s mind. Tyler is always a prisoner, and even the vision of the Tower of Silence fucked up Josh pretty bad. Tyler makes him feel things in the weirdest way possible, but it feels so right. 

So when Tyler shoves a medallion into Josh’s hand, he nearly drops it.

“What?”

“Take it,” Tyler says firmly. “I gotta go now.”

“Tyler? What? No,” Josh grips at Tyler’s forearms. He can’t let him go, he can’t — not when he’s just found him. 

“We can figure it out, man,” Mark says from the opposite side of the fire. “Just… Just slow down.”

Tyler bites his nails and only now notices Michael, it seems; he stares at him, thinking hard. Disturbed, Michael waves at him.

“Hey?”

“Hey,” Tyler scratches the skin behind his ear. “I don’t know you.”

“It’s fine, I guess.”

Michael smiles with the corner of his mouth.

Tyler smiles back. 

Tyler doesn’t look at him the way he looked at Paul, his brother, or at Nico. 

“You helped Josh,” he understands somehow.

“Josh helped me,” Michael replies.

It’s good that he doesn’t know what happened in his shack. It’s good that Josh remembers. Michael is a nice guy, at least he didn’t try to kill any of them yet. 

No one offers to tie Tyler down anymore; it didn’t work, and no one can stop him at this point. 

“They’re coming for you,” Tyler tries to get up again, but his legs don’t hold him. 

“Tyler,” Josh puts his hands on Tyler’s shoulders to pin him down. “How did you end up lying in the river?”

And Tyler says,

“I saw a dragon.”

And Josh says,

“Okay.”

“It was real.”

“Of course it was.”

Tyler huffs and crosses his arms over his chest. Josh wants to talk to him, for real, but Tyler gets up shakily and limps to the tent. His clothes are still not dry enough; Josh hopes he’s not going to leave without packing his things. So he follows Tyler and crawls into the tent. Tyler lies on his back, staring at the ceiling. 

Josh tosses the medallion onto Tyler’s chest. 

“You might need it.”

Tyler raises his head.

“Huh.”

“Don’t huh at me, man,” Josh lays down beside him. Tyler’s arms are still crossed over his chest, his hair ruffled, and his eyes are red-rimmed. 

“I’m sorry,” Tyler says, not even turning his head at Josh. 

Of course, Josh knows what he’s talking about.

“What happened in the shack?”

“I couldn’t let them kill you. I had to stop you from getting yourself killed, too.”

Tyler sighs, almost pained. Josh turns on his side to face him, and Tyler does the same, still hesitating to look into Josh’s eyes.

“It’s fine, I understand.”

Tyler looks and sounds confused.

“That’s all?”

“That’s all.”

Josh wants to hold him, again, and wants to share his warmth with him; Tyler is still cold when Josh touches him, trembling under his clothes. And Tyler exhales into Josh’s neck, “I missed you,” and then he touches Josh’s pulled-down bandana.

“You need to wash it.”

There’s no disgust in his intonation. He just cares. 

“Got a couple of nosebleeds,” Josh says. Josh doesn’t say, “I could feel you.” Tyler doesn’t say, “I know.”

They don’t need words to communicate sometimes; and Tyler’s hands slip under Josh’s hoodie, fingers running up and down the welt on his side. Josh takes Tyler’s hand and rolls up the sleeve — the bandages here are gone, and a long red line on Tyler’s forearm has turned into a peeling-off scab. 

“I’m healing, see?” Tyler says, dead serious. 

“Now I’m healing too.”

Josh has a moment before Tyler leaves again; he can’t keep him, he can’t save him — it’s hard to admit, it’s selfish, but Josh wants to spend as much time with him as he can now. Tyler throws his leg over Josh’s hip, pressing himself harder, slamming into Josh’s body. And Josh just lets him do it the way he wants; he enjoys Tyler’s courage. 

Tyler begins to untie his pants, gasping as Josh’s palm cups his dick. 

Josh mentally bashes himself for wanting to clarify their relationship status, but Tyler’s actions give him an answer now. Tyler moans, pulling his pants down, touching Josh’s erect dick with his fingertips. Josh thinks he’s dreaming, closing his eyes because it feels so good —

When he hears somebody scream, he realizes he’s not dreaming. 

“Guys!” Mark’s panicked voice crashes down on them like an avalanche. 

The moment is ruined, the passion is gone; they adjust their clothes and skid to the source of the noises. 

The first thing Josh sees outside is Paul, dressed in a red robe. 

Tyler cracks his neck as if taking a fighting stance.  

“So betraying us once wasn’t enough?”

“Same question to you,” Paul mirrors Tyler’s arrogance. 

“If you get in between someone I love and me, I’ll destroy you.”

Josh wants Tyler to take him down with that ray of energy. 

“We’ll fight back,” Josh says, taking the torch from the hole in the ground. He comes closer to Paul, almost shoving the flame into his face. His robe might choke on fire, but he takes a step back. 

For a second, Josh feels powerful. 

Other banditos take their torches too, surrounding Paul just like the bishops once surrounded them. Paul throws his head back and laughs,

“You think I’m so dumb I came here alone?”

At first, Josh thinks it’s blood rushing in his ears; then he realizes it’s the sound of the hooves hitting the ground. Beside him, Tyler listens to it too.

“A horse?” he whispers. 

There’s only one horseman, with his robe looking almost black in the dark.  

“Don’t you feel outnumbered?” 

The question slips off Josh’s tongue when the horseman stops beside Paul. 

“The death of your friend didn’t teach you a lesson, did it?”

“He died like a hero while you keep living like a coward,” Tyler stands up for Josh when he can’t find the words again. 

“You know you’ll go with us.”

Tyler says,

“You can take my body, too.”

Josh wants him to stop talking, he shouldn’t be negotiating with the bishop. They probably had to split up all across the territory to find them. This is Nico, with his face white and wrinkled and covered with a veil in the hood. 

“Or should I take his?” Nico nods at Paul.

Paul flinches. 

“I’m serving you,” he mutters as fear fills his eyes. “You said it would free my family…”

“They will never be free,” Nico cuts off Paul’s whining.

They fooled him, again; Josh wonders what way Zack chose after all. Tyler doesn’t ask. Because when Paul opens his mouth to say something else, Nico takes a dagger out of his sleeve and drags it against Paul’s throat. He slices the skin and the artery like butter, blood gushes out of the wound and Paul falls to the ground like a puppet with no strings.

The banditos pull back, and the blood forms a puddle on the grass. 

“He couldn’t replace you,” still in the saddle, Nico looks at Tyler.

Paralyzed with fear, Josh chants mentally, sahlo folina, sahlo folina. He doesn’t notice when he says it out loud; he notices when the others repeat it along with him.

“Sahlo folina! Sahlo folina!” as a cry of agony. 

Their voices echo through the night. They’re fighting for their freedom, still, always; Paul was fighting too, but his methods were just too vile. Josh doesn’t know how he’d act if his loved ones were captured in Dema. The only thing he knows, though, is that he won’t let them get Tyler. He deserves a bit of happiness after all the shit he’s been through — after all the shit they’ve been through, all of them.

They keep repeating their mantra, their battle cry, their prayer — a prayer written by heathens. They used to say that Dema don’t control them, but the only uncontrollable thing now is their fear.

“There’s more of them!” Jenna screams, outstretching her hand and pointing at the river. 

There are more of them. The bishops hold the torches, too, they’re not riding horses; their feet barely touch the water as they cross the river. Unimpressed, they stand in line, one by one, in front of Paul’s body. How much blood needs to be shed before they win? It’s a mystery. 

“The horrors of the forest brought us together, once again,” Nico says. “And it’s still not enough for you to listen to my advice.” 

Usually, it’s Tyler who speaks. But this time, Josh can’t tame his anger.

“Advice? This is what you call a murder these days?

“You found a loner,” Nico nods at Michael. 

Michael holds his torch higher. 

“You can snap my neck, but you won’t defeat me.”

Nico laughs.

“Boy, you don’t even know what you are fighting for.”

“Neither do you,” Tyler shrugs. “There will always be people who won’t fit your standards.” 

“You didn’t care about the “standards” when you were doing your dirty things in church,” Nico points out.

The horse huffs. It’s probably going to die in some sort of ritual later, too.

“You can’t get closer,” Josh suddenly realizes. “Right?” he waves the torch in his hand. “This is why you haven’t attacked us yet, this is not your territory, this place belongs to the banditos,” he’s getting hysterical as the emotions cut his chest open. “Sahlo folina!” 

“Sahlo folina,” Tyler repeats, looking at the sky.

Josh looks up too, seeing one of the stars taking off; he makes a wish. The same one he’s been making since he was a kid, he always asks for freedom. His foster families kept saying he should ask for forgiveness.

They’re growing stronger together, and the nine of their foes don’t dare to move. The horse hits the ground with a hoof, but the reins in Nico’s hands pull its head back. 

“You’re protected by the blood,” he says. “But nothing is unbreakable.”

“Even the wall of Dema,” Mark suddenly adds. 

Nico hums, thinking. 

“We could grant you immortality.” 

“I’d prefer independence,” Tyler says, loose tongue can make things either better or worse.

“You can be independent in Dema.”

“Dema doesn’t exist anymore.”

“It’s a part of your mind, boy.”

“You’re the one who lives in an imaginary world.”

When Tyler smiles, Josh thinks he’s finally lost his mind; then he thinks it’s him who lost his mind. Down the hills, comes a yellow avalanche, lighting up the surroundings. There are people with yellow tape on their clothes, dozens of them, all coming to enclose the bishops into a circle. 

This is something that Nico didn’t expect. 

Tyler looks at him boldly, with a smug grin on his face. 

There’s a man with his lower face hidden underneath a yellow bandana; a vulture is sitting on his shoulder as he approaches Josh. Clifford coos and screeches as soon as he sees Tyler, flying toward him and almost slapping him across the face again. Tyler chuckles and pats Clifford’s side. These two still have a connection between them. 

The man with a covered-up face reaches his hand for a shake. Josh squeezes it, bewildered, looking into the man’s eyes like in the mirror. There are deep wrinkles around his eyes, on his forehead, and his eyebrows are furrowed. For a few seconds, Josh is sure he’s looking at the older version of himself. The hood throws the shadows upon his face, making the illusion more vivid. 

“My blood,” the man says. “I found you.”

He shakes Josh’s hand, hard, then gives Josh a half-hug as if he’s not allowed to touch him. Then his hand goes into his pocket, taking out yet another piece of paper; it lands in Josh’s palm. Josh’s lungs are full of fire and doubt as he reads: 

“We’ll win, but not everyone will get out.”

“I thought I’d give you this one when I meet you.”

The pieces of a puzzle click together in Josh’s head.

“Clancy?!”

The others look at them too, the bishops look at them too; they’re still standing close to one another. A thin veil of fog begins to descend from the sky; there’s something unfamiliar in this. Something disturbing.

“Can you have your heartwarming father-son moment when this shit’s over?” Tyler jerks his shoulder and Clifford spreads his wings, flying into the fog. 

Tyler always says the things that don’t come to Josh’s mind. His blood, blood protection — he can’t wrap his head around it; he can’t feel anything for a man who just found him. Clancy still doesn’t show Josh his face fully, but the resemblance is just immaculate. This is why Clifford picked him without any doubt — Josh had the spirit of the rebellion in his veins since he was a kid, but it was dormant at that time. 

It’s time to wake up. 

The fog begins to smother their torches, filling their lungs with smoke. 

“What’s that?” Josh coughs up.

Next to him, Tyler coughs too. 

“They’re summoning the energy from the walls of Dema,” Clancy replies. His people begin to draw the signs on the ground, using their knives to cut the moss. “When the walls crumbled, all the energy from the stones got released. They can control it.”

Of course, things have never been easy. 

“We have to keep going,” Tyler drags Josh forward. 

There are the spirits in the fog, milky-white and gloomy, they spread their arms, trying to stop the banditos. The bishops are moving now, too, getting their powers back. Maybe they’re feeding on the souls of their prisoners, their slaves, their followers; Josh blinks and covers his eyes with his hand when he thinks he sees Paul among them, along with a woman and a little girl in her arms. 

This is a sickening sight. 

“Josh,” Tyler’s erratic breathing burns Josh’s ear. “Promise me this: if I lose, you won’t mourn a day.”

Josh tries not to think about the note Clancy gave him. 

“It’s gonna be alright,” he replies. 

He doesn’t add anything else, letting Clancy speak instead.

“We came from the east. From Trench, it’s just behind this hill,” he points his finger at the green mountain. “There’s the river, and then… Welcome to Trench.”

He should be a motivator, right? They’re still protected by their color, but it begins to fade as the fog settles on their clothes like ashes. Maybe it’s the dust from the corpses; bones, maybe it’s a poison. Josh’s heart jumps up in his chest when he hears the thuds of the hooves. 

“Run,” Tyler says. 

“I can’t run without you!” Josh tugs at Tyler’s sleeve to make him move. “Are you fucking crazy?!”

Tyler stands still.

“I pretty much am.”

The Eastern banditos take them in a protective shield with their torches and the symbols taped to their clothes as they wade through a ghostly wall. It turns everything to gray, it won’t let the sun shine again. The only color that exists now is the red of the bishop’s robes. They break the circle, knocking some banditos off their feet as the horse races through their group; sitting up in the saddle, Nico splays his hand out, and the tips of his fingers slide across Tyler’s throat.

“No!”

Josh expects to see blood. 

“Tyler!”

But he only sees long black lines instead. 

On the ground, Tyler chokes, scraping the skin under his jaw to gulp some air. Josh kneels next to him, unzipping his coat and loosening the ties of his hoodie. 

“He can’t take your ability to breathe, listen to me,” Josh tries, almost crying in despair. 

Tyler listens to him, taking one shaky breath when his lips already begin to turn blue. Josh thinks of his own hands on Tyler’s neck during their time together, and how fragile Tyler looked back then. And Tyler is fragile now but in a different way. Josh hoped that Tyler’s jacket would cover him from Nico.

The horse stops next to them and Tyler’s breath hitches again; Nico squeezes his fingers, and the black hues on Tyler’s neck deepen. 

“Let him go,” Josh pleads. “Take me instead.”

The story repeats itself, but even with the strength they took from the wall, the bishops can’t control all the processes here. 

They don’t take Josh. 

They take everything that ever had meaning for him. 

 

***

“You can’t just sit here.” 

Josh looks at the reflection appearing behind his own in the river.

“Josh.”

The wind sends shallow waves down the water. 

“Talk to me.” 

Josh doesn’t talk.

“Please.”

Josh takes a stone and tosses it into the river, crushing everything he sees there. Clancy sits down next to him, face still half-covered. One more secret, but Josh is too gutted to investigate it.

“We couldn’t save them,” Josh finally says.

He hands Clancy his note. His last note, maybe. 

“I couldn’t get to you earlier. Sometimes Trench lets you in, but then it doesn’t let you out.”

“He had to copy all of your letters to get us out of Dema,” Josh throws his head back not to sniffle too loudly. “He did it all by himself, you know? And I just lost him like that!” Josh hits the ground with his bleeding knuckles. “Wish we could turn back time.”

Clancy throws the note into the river.

“None of that was your fault, son.” 

“Don’t call me that,” Josh bristles. “Not after the bishops fucked up the meaning of this word.”

He doesn’t know what’s going on inside him, he still can’t believe that he’s going to continue his journey alone now. This is the result of some unhealthy codependency probably, but he can still feel Tyler’s presence, even now, when his body’s lying in a boat, rocking on the waves. Tyler is gone, a goner with a dream, with a mission. Along with the two others who choked on smoke during the bishops’ attack, he’s gone. Some banditos volunteered to bury Paul in a nameless grave after the bishops’ capitulation. The banditos’ common experience saved most of them, after all. 

Josh gets up when the ceremony begins; they all hold handfuls of yellow petals again, and the boats are decorated with yellow gerbera daisies. One is tucked in Tyler’s hands, and he looks like he’s just sleeping. He’s sleeping to wake up in peace in the Tower of Silence. The inside of Tyler’s head has never been silent. 

Tyler was usually the one to hold up the speech, but now the banditos have to perform a speech for him. 

“You know what I think of you,” Josh says, eyes unexpectedly dry. “You know it’s not the last time when you see my annoying face.”

Tyler’s eyes are closed. He’s sleeping. 

Jenna puts a roll of yellow tape into the boat.

“Just in case. You liked to say that.” 

“You are so good at talking, but I know you secretly hate long speeches,” Mark says, laying a metal flask on Tyler’s legs.

Andrew adds,

“And you will always be our leader.”

Clancy enters the river and pushes one of the boats.

“You’ve got my people by your side, forever and always.”

Josh didn’t even know the ones who passed away today — but he has a hunch that he has to get used to it. It’s such a bitter feeling; in Dema, he had to witness people suffer while being locked up, and now he’s witnessing them suffer for freedom. Dying for the others. 

Maybe next time, the boat will become a home for him.

They all toss the petals into the water, into the boats, carefully, not to interrupt the banditos’ slumber. The waves take them as they take the petals and flowers, leaving them floating underneath the surface. The boats disappear in the mountain cleft, just to turn to the landmarks for the next generation of banditos.

All of them will turn into the notches eventually.

 

***    

They have to move on after the ceremony; they take their backpacks and bandage their wounds. Josh keeps some petals in his pocket, shoving his hand into it and letting them slip through his fingers. He closes his eyes and focuses on the way his lips move, emphasizing every letter.  

“Sahlo folina.”

And,

“Sahlo folina.”

Josh flinches as the softest echo of his words bounces off of the stones, and the trees. Out of the habit, Josh looks up. 

“Sahlo folina.”   

On the top of the hill, he sees a lonely figure with its head cocked to the side in a familiar, bird-like way. There’s a vulture on its shoulder, sitting still, wings folded. 

The sun comes up, illuminating them from behind, bathing them in yellow light. 

And nothing feels real again. Not even death. 

Josh stares at the silhouettes until his eyes tear up, and he can barely see them. He and the banditos paid a high price to make it to Trench. The sounds of the battle are still rattling in Josh’s ears; for a second, he’s sure that the man from the hill waves his arm in a beckoning motion. Josh blinks the blur away and he disappears. So does the vulture. They’re still waging the war in their crumbled minds but, 

They know that it’s almost over.

Notes:

CAN'T BELIEVE I DID IT
I FINISHED THIS PART
everyone thanks for reading, commenting and kudos, ily <3
---
i have a PLAN for part 2 already and im excited about it!!
---
tumblr: i-seeaspaceshipinthe-sky

Series this work belongs to: