Work Text:
Some indeterminate amount of time after rejecting Humpty-Dumpty, Elliot awoke under a pile of rubble, lightheaded from blood loss and hurting in places he didn’t even know he was capable of hurting. His head was clear, though, for the first time in nearly two years, and, as he inhaled dust and blood and found that it was too weak to cough it out, he thought that, at the very least, if he died here, he would die thinking clearly.
But Elliot Nightray had no intention of dying. He was completely unable to move under the rubble, and he couldn’t hear anyone else, but that didn’t mean squat. Maybe everyone else was unconscious. Maybe his injuries kept him from hearing anything. Maybe everyone else had died—but no, he wasn’t going to think about that.
“Leo,” Elliot rasped out, because Leo had been right there, right next to him, and if Leo were gone Elliot didn’t know if he’d have the strength to fight to get out. “Leo? …Leo, are you there?”
Still nothing—but he had heard his own voice, which meant that his ears, at least, weren’t fucked too badly. That was good—though maybe it wasn’t, since he still couldn’t hear anybody else around.
“Vincent?” Elliot tried. Vincent had been close by too—had offered to kill him, which was fucked up but fair considering the situation (and considering the fact that Vincent had thought the only other option was Elliot’s friend Oz, who might have been the most mentally unstable person Elliot had ever met), and Vincent had also just said the nicest thing Elliot had ever heard from him in his life.
There was no answer from Vincent, either, and Elliot began to get worried. Oz, Gilbert, and their friend Alice had been nearby, too, but they’d been a bit further away, and—well, Elliot was feeling pretty damn low about a lot of stuff, mostly related to the whole Headhunter business, and he didn’t really want to face them quite yet. Still, though, after a few minutes of trying to get out on his own—he couldn’t move at all, and he thought that he might have had at least a few broken bones, which sucked major ass, Elliot figured that sucking it up was better than fucking dying here, and began to start calling out for them.
“Hey, Oz? Oz Vessalius? Pipsqueak?” he said. “Gilbert? You there? Uh, Alice?”
Nothing.
“...Gilbert-nii-san?” he tried, because he knew his brother, knew that (as awful of him as this was to try) he would not be able to resist even a crumb of affection from Elliot or anyone else that he cared about. Elliot had not called him ‘Gilbert-nii-san’ since he was six, because their older siblings had nearly killed Gilbert over it and Elliot had decided it wasn’t worth the risk, but—well, that was no longer an issue. “Gilbert-nii-san? I, uh, I need some help here…”
But there was still no response. No matter who Elliot called out to, that didn’t change, and nor did his volume, although admittedly he couldn’t yell very loudly at all. As light began to trickle in amongst the rubble, and Elliot felt himself growing weaker, he began to wonder if he was the only person left alive in the building, if somehow, even though he’d decided to sacrifice himself for his family and friends, they’d all died and he’d been the only survivor.
“Leo,” he rasped out, feeling like he was cooking underneath the rubble. “Oz. Vincent-nii-san. Gilbert-nii-san. Leo…”
At this point, he no longer expected any answer, but Elliot could not bring himself to stop calling out for them. To admit to himself that he was well and truly alone—that they were dead and gone, or had all been rescued and he had been left to rot, or that they didn’t know he was alive and hadn’t wanted to risk the rubble and the issues between the countries to get his corpse and had all left him behind—that would be the same as admitting that he was dying.
Elliot did not want to admit that he was dying.
He had lost a lot of blood—he was desperately hungry and thirsty—he couldn’t move. He was fairly certain that he could begin to smell rotting meat, too, which may have been his mother’s corpse or may have been someone else’s, and he didn’t think he wanted to know. As the day wore on, he got hotter and more tired; he tried to keep himself awake by focusing on the severe amount of pain he was in, terrified that if he fell asleep he would not wake up.
Luckily for Elliot, though, he did wake up again, this time in the night, and again, there were no sounds other than the usual nighttime animals.
Fucking shit, he thought, I’m actually going to die here. I’m actually going to fucking goddamn die here.
“Leo,” he whispered. “Leo.”
There was still no response, and honestly Elliot didn’t know what he was expecting. He shifted his head to the side, wondered if he could get in a better position to die in, and began to doze off again. He drifted in and out of consciousness for the rest of the night as his pain began slowly to ebb away with his fear.
I’m going to die, he thought again, but now he found that he didn’t mind the thought so much. It was not that he wanted to die, or that he thought that things would be great if the pain would stop. Honestly, he barely even noticed the pain anymore. Instead, Elliot was flooded with a great feeling of peace, that death was only the next step in life and that everything would be okay regardless of what happened. He would die; the people he loved would never realize they’d left him behind to suffer under the rubble of a great manor house. He would die; he would dream; he would live again.
To die, to sleep—to sleep, perchance to dream…
Elliot had read that somewhere, once. He’d thought it completely stupid at the time, but now his brain was picking at the memory again, as he lay under the rubble. He hoped that when he died he would have good dreams. He hoped that Leo would live a long and happy life, and Oz, and Gilbert, and Vincent. He hoped Leo would find love again. He hoped Leo would find love with Oz.
Elliot Nightray closed his eyes, and he dreamed.