Noxious [DenNor]

17.

"Tell me again why we have to take off like this? And why we can't even tell Fin or Sve where we're going?" Mathias looked more tired than anything as he shoved his final luggage into the trunk of Lukas' car.

"Because I said so."

Lukas was done with explanations. He had dealt with this evil once before. He knew better than anyone of its capabilities and feared that mentioning the situation in too much depth would be cause for its return... So, to err on the side of caution, he had opted out of telling anyone anything until they were well out of the country and, even then, planned only to confide that which was necessary.

"It seems to me kind of like you're scared of something," observed Emil, his eyes a scrutinous probe upon Lukas' face. After a moment, sinking back in his seat, he continued. "But that would be ridiculous, right? What's there to be scared of?"

Shoving back a wave of irritation at his brother's obvious prodding, Lukas mustered a nod. "Exactly. Everything will be alright. You know, as long as you listen to me."

"Great," sighed a most intoxicated Dane as he rounded the car and plopped unceremoniously down in the passenger seat. "Nothing to read into there, huh?"

Lukas would not take the bait. Seating himself and sliding the key into the ignition, he gave a firm shake of his head. "Not really, no."

Almost at once, he was stricken by the potent reek of alcohol emanating from the leftmost side of his car. He shot Mathias a sidelong glance. "You smell like a beer. When was your last shower?"

Averting his eyes to the scenery outside of the car as they pulled out of the driveway and started down the road, the Dane merely shrugged. "It's been a few days, but it's no big deal. I'll shower when we get to, y'know... Wherever you're making us go?"

Neither Mathias nor Emil had been a willing participant in this spur-of-the-moment, less than conventional journey. Let's just say it had taken some bargaining on Lukas' end... and, when that tactic had inevitably failed, blackmail.

But this Mathias he was looking at now was not a Mathias he was too keen on. Was this the result of Lukas' intervention and apparent failure back at the tomb, he wondered, not without a twinge of guilt? In one glance, it was apparent his drunken irritability intermingling with a sort of self-pitying sadness.

Maybe, once he found out where they were going, it would lift his inebriated spirit right up off the ground.

The airport was a quick jaunt from the house, and it wasn't fifteen minutes later that they were pulling into the car park.

"This will only be for a few days. I already bought our tickets. I'll email them to you once we get inside."

"Okay, cool." Unbuckling his seatbelt, Mathias glanced over at him. "Now that we're here, do you wanna tell us where we're going? And for how long? And, I don't know, maybe why?"

Lukas put the car in park and made a quick, if unnecessary, sweep of the interior, ignoring the way Emil raised an eyebrow at him. He just couldn't risk being followed.

"If you have to know... We're going to Tórshavn."

"The Faroe Islands?"

"Yes." Lukas stepped out of the car. "Now hurry up. Our flight leaves in forty-five minutes."

"Don't get me wrong," said Mathias, rounding the car, Emil at his side, to grab his stuff out of the trunk. "Faroe's cool and all, but he's kind of super boring. There's never anything to do at his place except talk to sheep and, I don't know, take naps."

"That was also almost twenty years ago, Den," Emil pointed out. "Things have changed a lot since then, you know?"

"I sure hope so."

"Maybe being so far away from everything will be good for us," suggested Lukas with a shrug. He, personally, had always enjoyed the peace and quiet the Faroe Islands provided. Life over there always seemed much simpler. "These past few weeks have been crazy for all of us."

"Yeah... I guess there isn't any harm in catching up with Faroe, either."

"Exactly. No harm, no foul. We could all use this." Even as he spoke, Lukas couldn't help but feel a twinge of doubt and perhaps even fear in what the future held. With any luck, this escape would prove a sufficient enough hiding place from the evil he had unintentionally released.

But what if it wasn't? And, even if it was, it's not like they could stay there forever. They had lives, jobs, tasks that weren't going to just magically be done.

Trying- and failing- to push his misgivings aside, he closed the trunk of his car and turned towards the pathway leading up to the doors.

"Come on," he said. "Let's go."