CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
goodbyes are not forever,
goodbyes are not the end.
they simply mean, ill miss you
until we meet again.
THE RAIN HAD CLEARED UP AND TURNED
into a windy cool breeze as the pogues waited outside the murder scene. once they got back to the car, and took in what they actually saw, Kiara panicked and decided to call the cops.
Bambi still had her hood on her head even though it was completely soaked. she had her sleeves over her hands as she wrapped them around her stomach, trying to stay warm.
she was scared, she was scared for John B because how was he meant to come back home and enjoy his life? Ward was a powerful person, he could probably buy the whole island.
soon enough, police cars pulled up, their lights on but their sirens off. Shoupe got out of the car first, telling his crew to stay there as he followed the pogues to the top of the construction.
they explained what happened as Shoupe stayed silent, looking around to see if there was any sign of anyone being there but to their shock, it looked like the place had been untouched.
the pogues spoke fast, becoming out of breath as they tried to get everything out at once, their voices overlapping each other.
Shoupe stopped them, trying to calm down before he pointed at Kiara, asking just her to speak, "look, it was right here, and this is where that maniac claimed his next victim."
the older man looked at the pair, not believing a single word, "uh, huh, his next victim?"
Kiara nodded and Bambi could tell he didn't believe them, it was almost like everyone was playing a huge joke on them just so John B couldn't come home, "we watched it over there, i saw and heard it with my own eyes and ears."
"right." Shoupe stared at her before looking at his watch, "and how long ago did this happen?"
"Forty-five minutes ago, shoupe," JJ told him, the older man beginning to write on his little book where he kept his notes.
"and so, Ward Cameron just popped one off and shot him." Shoupe raised his eyebrows, the pogues nodding, "execution style? and then cleaned it all up in forty-five minutes?"
"obviously." Pope nodded, looking down at his camera, making it more obvious, "we filmed the whole thing."
"you filmed it?" shoupe repeated.
"yeah but then Kiara stepped on my hand and then i fell into JJ who fell into Pope, kicking him in the face and making the camera break," Bambi explained.
"this is a telephoto, and we needed to get a long-distance image, and, and then we fell and it broke so the videos were basically unusable but.. but we were there, and we were with-"
"so the dog ate your homework?" Shoupe stopped him, "look i don't know what you kids expect me to do with this, you drag me out here in the middle of the night for a whole lot of nothing except for some crazy stories about how Ward Cameron's on a killing spree."
"we're not making this up, shoupe!" JJ snapped at him, the old man thinking they were just telling lies and nothing was true.
"it's not a random killing spree!" Pope told him, "Gavin was his pilot, okay? he was paying hush money because he was on the tarmac that day."
"Gavin was blackmailing Ward because he had the gun that Rafe used to kill Peterkin," Bambi began, the blonde nodding beside her.
"and then he called him here and tried to pay her off but it wasn't enough so he shot him, with the murder weapon." JJ finished off the story for her.
Shoupe looked at them in disbelief, they knew too much information about it, "how do you know that?"
"Pope did this thing with his phone and he put it in his car and-"
"i heard their whole conversation." Pope put simply, shoupe scoffing at them.
"you wiretapped them?" he asked, making them stop and think for a second.
"is that bad?"
"no, no, just stop, just stop." Shoupe put his hands out slightly, "i've had enough."
he began walking away and Bambi sighed, running a hand through her hair. no matter what they tried to do, the man just didn't listen.
"what?" JJ scoffed, his anger rising, "are you just going to look the other way, again?"
"you ever heard of the boy that cried wolf?" Shoupe retaliated as he began walking down the stairs, the pogues following.
Bambi was right behind him, she had to do this for her brother so no matter how much convincing and effort it took, she was going to prove that he was innocent.
"why would we make this up?" she asked, holding the railings as she walked down the stairs, "why do you never listen to us?"
he walked out of the building, the other cops standing outside of their cars and looking at him, "all right, there's nothing up there. false alarm."
"no, no, please don't go home, why would we make this up?" Kiara tried to stop them but they followed Shoupe's orders, getting in the car.
"why can't you just do your fucking job for once, you always take Ward's side and it's pissing me off." Bambi snapped, throwing her hands up.
Shoupe turned around, finally facing the four, "hey, i know, i know your upset and i know you think your brother was innocent but you weren't there. the only actual witnesses who are above ground say the exact opposite, all right?"
"that's the thing though, shoupe." Bambi crossed her arms, "i was there but again, you always take Ward's side just because he has money!"
"you weren't there, Bambi." Shoupe shook his head, "the people that say so have much more credibility than all of you right now."
Bambi scoffed, biting her lip as she glared at him, "i think i would know if i was there."
"i saw your little art project on Ward's wall." he looked at Kiara before pointing at Bambi, "and i heard about what happened in the cafe."
"oh yeah? well, you weren't there. what say do you have in any of this." Bambi threw back at him, if he was going to do that to them then she was going to do the same back.
"do not do that again." he shook his head, "all right, or your gonna make things a lot harder for the both of us."
Bambi ran a hand through her hair, watching as the older man got into the car. the wind was cool against her face, her soaking wet jacket stuck to her skin. she felt like crying, but she couldn't.
she walked away, feeling like the world was crashing in on her. why did Ward have more power over her in this, it's not her fault he had more money than her.
"i told you this would happen." JJ complained, looking at Pope's back, "like, you're the one that had to drop the camera."
"it was your fault!" Kiara fired back, protecting the boy that she had formed a relationship with.
"oh, that was my fault?" JJ scoffed, "you're the one that stood on Bambi's fingers so that was your fault, plus, why do you never take my side, why do you always take his side?"
Bambi couldn't be bothered with the shouting, everything that had happened tonight gave her the worst headache she had ever had, even worse than when Barry hit her.
she turned around, looking at the pair, "can you two just stop arguing for a second, what's done is done so stop arguing."
the two stopped, looking at her with a guilty face. it was her twin brother, after all, her other half so they could imagine what she was feeling.
"we're not out of this yet." Pope muttered, "we can still go get the gun."
he looked over at the drain, three words were painted on above it.
'drains to ocean."
THE POGUES STOOD OUTSIDE ONE OF THE entrances that lead into the drain. they had just gone through a pile of rubbish that could have possibly had the gun in but after putting it all into trash bags, the gun was still nowhere to be seen.
Bambi was hot, the sun was blooming and even though all she was was shorts and a short tank top with her hair in a pony, the sun was getting to her. she wiped her head, sweat transferring onto her hand, "i'm too hot."
"well, that was fun." JJ sighed, wiping his own forehead before putting the trash bag over them, out of the way.
"if it's not in the trash, then it's gonna be in the storm drain." Pope pointed out the obvious.
"yeah." JJ nodded, agreeing, "it's in the drain."
Bambi placed her hands on her hip, using one of them to go over her eyes to get rid of the sun, "are we gonna do rock paper scissors?"
"no." JJ shook his head, using a tool with Pope as he began to open the entrance.
"what about alphabetically?" she asked, earning another no from in and finally, she realised why they were saying no.
"in the sewer, there's this worm that you get when you're down there. it gets into your blood and then it comes out of your pecker," JJ made up an excuse, the girl nodding sarcastically.
"oh yeah?" she raised her eyebrows.
"yeah, so, uh.. that would be a hard pass from me." he got his point out there, refusing to go and search for the gun.
"yeah, me too." Pope agreed.
Bambi turned to Kie who stared at the drain with disgust written on her face and Bambi knew that it was her that had to go down there, "i get it, you guys are scared. you could have just said."
the three began to disagree, the boys saying it was because of JJ's imaginary worm disease and Bambi chuckled, "it's kind of cute, i understand that you can't control fear."
"you don't have to be scared." she walked over, stopping at the entrance, "i'll do it."
JJ nodded, stopping her before she crawled in, "be careful, okay? don't come out with some disease that could kill you or something."
Bambi smirked, "no i will, just so you guys can feel bad for making me go down there."
she began crawling in, the water instantly cooling her body as it touched her skin. it might have been disgusting water but she wasn't complaining that it cooled her down.
"just, uh, holler if you need anything, okay?" JJ shouted, his voice echoing through the tunnels.
"we'll, uh, we'll holler back."
"yeah, okay." she nodded, getting deeper and deeper, "i don't know if that will help but i appreciate it, babe."
the water got deeper, covering more of her body as soon her feet were barely touching the floor. she tossed the littler around, trying to see if she could find or at least feel the gun.
her foot touched something hard, and she lifted it up slowly, revealing a sight that she wished she had never seen, "guys, there's a body!"
the pogues were quick to reply, worry taking over them, "is it a body?"
"is it Gavin?" Kiara shouted down.
"Bambs, don't touch it, okay?" JJ began, "that's how you get worms and you don't want to pass them onto me!"
unknowing to them, not far above them stood Rafe Cameron and Barry, trying to also find the gun, just a different way.
Rafe looked at Barry with a straight face, "flush them out."
Barry scoffed, sure, he was a bad person but he wasn't so bad that he would kill a person, "you flush that pipe, you kill her."
"yeah." Rafe nodded, knowing that was what was going to happen but at the end of the day, he didn't care. he's got away with killing the Sherrif so it would be easy to get away with killing Bambi Routledge.
Barry stepped forward, closer to Rafe, "the last thing you need is more dead bodies showing up around this bitch. you realise what you're doing if you do that?"
Rafe scoffed, "alright, if you want to be a pussy, you can leave."
Rafe went to step forward, but Barry stopped him one last time, "do you realise what you're doing? look, Bambi might be a pain in the ass but she's a good person."
Rafe didn't care, he wasn't scared of killing somebody no matter how much they meant to him, "get the hell out of my way."
Barry stared at the blonde before sucking his teeth, "alright then, tough guy."
"if you don't want to be here for this then go find the truck, okay?" Rafe told him, throwing the keys over to him.
Barry looked at him in disbelief before walking away and Rafe didn't wait until he was gone to start the water up.
Bambi was still panicking but she hadn't seen whatever she had seen since so the pogues above weren't too bad, "you all owe me for life!"
the water began to almost bubble around Bambi, the panic setting into her more. it wasn't normal for water to bubble like that, it normally only happened when...
the drains were getting flushed.
she let out a squeal as the water splashed on her more, swimming over to the ladder so she could grab hold of it, "shit, guys! the water!"
"Bambi, get out of there now!" JJ shouted, his own panic setting into his body.
"i don't have time, i can't do it!" she replied, the water rising even higher up her body as she helplessly held onto the ladder.
Kiara, Pope and JJ all began pulling on the bars at the top, shouting her name repeatedly until water rushed out that way, forcing them to find another way to get her out.
she was at the top of the ladder, trying to hardest to push the metal bars above her. her life depended on this and in the end, she would end up just like her dad, dying from water.
she heard the three shouting her name as they ran over to her, attempting to pull it with all their strength as they got to her.
"JJ!" she shouted, the water now up to her neck, "please don't let me drown."
"we're gonna get you out, Bambs, i promise." he pulled his knife out of his pocket, attempting to cut it but going back to pulling when it snapped.
Bambi's cries got louder the higher the water rose, she had never been so close to actually dying and knowing it was going to happen was terrifying.
the water soon rose over her face and she took her last breath in before she was completely covered by the water. JJ began panicking, using all the strength he had to try and pull.
her life depended on how hard he tried, she could die right in front of his eyes and it would have been his fault for not going down instead of her, for making the stupid worm theory.
"bambs." he let out a small sob before he, kie and Pope used the last of their strength, the grid finally coming off.
Bambi took a deep breath in, finally getting air into her lungs as she looked up at the sky, trying to stop her head from spinning from the lack of oxygen.
"bambs, are you okay?" the blonde immediately asked the girl, rubbing her back as she began coughing, "you good?"
Bambi nodded, placing a thumbs up, glad that she wasn't dead, "do you guys feel bad yet?"
JJ let out a chuckle, realising she was okay and wrapping her around her arms, leaving small kisses on her head.
she leaned back, placing a hand behind her back and pulling something out, "is this what i was supposed to be looking for?"
the pogues looked at the gun that she held in her hand, a smile coming to all of their faces as they realised what happened.
"you did it!" Kiara grinned.
JJ took the gun off her, wrapping it in a bandana as he placed his hand out, helping her to her feet, "we're gonna get this son of a bitch, man!"
Bambi smiled at how happy her friends were, she did it. she was going to clear John B's name.
ELLIE SPEAKS¡
a little bit of a filler, i don't really write much scenes of JJ and Bambi alone anymore
so i think that's what im going to do more of.
hope you enjoyed <3
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