[ Denmark/Mathias P.O.V ]
It was quite a surprise to see them. Weeks prior I've accepted that everyone I knew and was family to were dead. It was cutting close to when I started believing that no one else living was still walking this earth. Months had passed since I've seen someone walking around with a beating heart. Seeing Tino and Berwald again were... quite a heartwarming sight.
However, meeting them wasn't like how it was when I saw them last. If I could recall, the last time we were together, Berwald and Tino were playing with Peter in their living room. I had come over to borrow some- y'know, what I came to borrow isn't important. Anyways, I went over to borrow something I would need later on that night and saw Tino fixing up the living room as Peter watched TV with Berwald. Tino was smiling and glowed his usual lively happiness. Peter was laughing and acted like how any child would. Berwald sat stoic where he was whilst reading the newspaper, a small smile every now and then creeping on his lips.
At the time, that was normal. That's how it was all the time, every time I saw them. Now as I look back at it, it's such a foreign memory. Almost as if it were a dream.
"You can sleep near those shelves." Berwald said softly, pointing over to an old shop shelf that used to hold up medicine bottles. I had settled down with them after we were reunited and found out they were hiding out in this shop for the time being. Surprisingly, that was all they told me so far. Not much, right? You leave the fam for, what, at least four months and that's all you catch up on. I don't blame them though... I have my fair share of events I've kept silent.
"Thanks." I replied absentmindedly as I kept to my thoughts. Yes, it wasn't a surprise amongst all our demeanors. We were all quite different.
I glance over at Berwald. He was stashing some unperishables into his backpack and organizing them. His eyes gave off a glint of tiredness and a hint of loss. Overall, he just appeared worn out. Well, that wasn't entirely new since often times he'd appear that way in the past. But there were a few hints of sorrow. When I looked over at Tino, there was a massive change in demeanor. The Finnish male was cleaning his gun and wiping some dried blood off of it. His eyes were ever so slightly wide as he stared down at the weapon. The look on his eyes were different than Berwald's. I saw pain in them. Regret. Broken.
What the fuck happened to them? Where's the jolly Finny I knew who always greeted those with a bright smile. Where's the hard exterior but soft interior Berwald who always glared but was always silently pleased with everything. It was as if those personalities of their's were just an illusion remembered only in my own mind... I mean, I shouldn't be too surprised. I'm sure I've changed and just haven't noticed. I know things have changed, that's for certain.
"I'm going to go outside to see if it's safe to sleep." Berwald mumbled, setting his backpack down and standing up. I nodded as I watched him grab a pistol from a shelf and disappear through the door. There wasn't much of a difference when he left. It was still as silent as it had been for the past two hours.
I let out a sigh and bunched up my dirty jacket in the corner of two shelves, trying to create a makeshift bed. It wasn't great but it had to do, y'know. As I was starting to settle down, I noticed Tino doing the same a couple feet away from me. Silence still rang across the room, not that I minded. It was a common sound to me.
"Mathias?"
I blinked, glancing over. I saw Tino sitting on his knees, looking at me with an unreadable expression. The gun he was cleaning was set down beside him as he, too, was making himself a bed. I forced a small smile, "Yes, lil Teeny Tino?
He leaned back against the wall, staring at me while he scratched his cheek. Those eyes. They were dead looking. If it weren't for his body movement, he could easily be mistaken as dead. The Finnish man's eyes shifted over to me then to my hair. "That pin."
He didn't need to be specific for me to know what he meant by that. It was as if cold water was poured over me and dripped down my now pale back when those two words were said. Goosebumps crawled against my skin as the cold metal on my hair ever so gently pressed against my head.
"That... was Lukas's." Tino continued, his tone chillingly dull. I gulped and nodded, words struggling to form in my mouth.
"Mathias! Help me!"
"I-I'm trying, I'm trying!"
I shakily reached up and unclipped the metal cross from my hair and held it in my hand. A red hue glowed faintly on its reflective silver.
I noticed Tino raising a brow as he stared at me. Was he wondering what took me so long to answer? Why hadn't I answered? He merely stated that was his clip. I could simply say the word 'yes' and that would be an answer. A simple word that took a lifetime to say.
"Yes, it's his pin." I murmured, using four words to reply. I noticed Tino lick his lips absentmindedly as his eyes locked onto the pin.
"Where is he?" Did he not know any sensitivity as he asked such a hard question in such a blunt tone?
"Dead. He's dead." My answer this time was short, flashes of events of the past crossing my eyes. I could feel his oncoming question and decided to answer it before it was asked. "We were running away from a herd and decided to climb up a tree to get away from them. Y'know, biters don't climb... So, we were climbing and I heard a branch break. I was further up than him and I look down to see him hanging upside down with his foot being stuck between a cracking branch-"
His fearful eyes stared up at mine- the most life and emotion I had ever noticed in his eyes. His hands fumbled helplessly as he tried to pull himself back up. The biters' growls below grew louder by the second.
"I tried moving down to help him up but the branch his foot was stuck on was the only one I would need to step on to reach him and that branch was too fragile to break. If I broke it, he would fall-"
Crack.
"By the time I found another branch to climb to, the branch snapped. I looked back at him and... he... someone else had taken him and decided how his life would be. They decided to end it-"
I was hanging from a branch, staring down at a bloodied hand reaching for me from the grass floor below. Screams. His screams pierced through my ears and my eyes took in the whole sight. The sight of his flesh being torn from him as the biters feasted upon him. The sight of his hurt and fearful eyes never leaving mine even as he was being eaten. The sight of his crimson dripping hand desperately reaching up to the branches of the tree I hung on. The sight of that same hand twitch and slowly drop and disappear into the crowd of biters that surrounded him.
Tino's eyes fell to his lap when I looked up at him. I don't know how I appeared to him. Maybe I looked irritated that I had to explain it all. Maybe I looked sad to recall the events. Who knows. I've lost all knowledge of how to recognize my own emotions and thoughts. They just happened.
"I'm sorry." He replied softly. Silence once more.
"It's fine." I said blankly, my eyes going back to the silver clip in my hands. "I managed to recover this... when it was safe again."
I climbed down the tree when the biters had been distracted from a gunshot ways away. I noticed two figures running (one tall one and one shorter one with longish hair in a ponytail), but decided not to ponder on them. I hopped down from the tree crawled over to Lukas. It was the most devastating sight I had ever seen... Describing him would make anyone hurl and wish they didn't have ears. Hell, I wish I didn't have eyes to witness the body of the one I cared very deeply for. His eyes were half open and I could see tears still welled up in them. I grasped the bloodied hand that had so desperately reached out for me but I knew it was too late when he didn't return my hold. The only thing I could find on him that wasn't harmed was the clip. The only damage done to that is it being bathed in it's owner's blood.
I closed my fist around the clip, feeling it's forever cold metal press against my palm. I don't remember ever feeling it warm. It's always been cold.
"We should rest." I mumbled, trying to shift the conversation somewhere else. I didn't want to talk anymore about the past- especially about death. Tino nodded, grabbing his jacket and draping it over his shoulders.
Lying down on my makeshift pillow, I placed the clip back in my hair. I always wear it. Ever since that day I haven't gone a day without wearing it. Don't ask why because I wouldn't know what to answer. I don't know how to answer any question accurately now. Everything is just a mystery now and direct answers don't exist.
It didn't take long for me to fall asleep. I'd developed an ability to make my sleep quick and awake to the slightest noise. However, as I fell into my slumber, one last thought crossed my mind.
Did Berwald come back yet?
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Author's Note:
Aye I found out I could write on Wattpad on my school iPad so my chapters will most likely come along more frequently now. Well, I hope.
I hope you guys like this chapter!
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