As promised, here's the Oneshot.
...I seriously teared up at the end of this.
Song: Falling in love at a Coffee Shop; by Landon Pigg.
I think that possibly
Maybe I'm falling for you
Yes
There's a chance that I've fallen quite hard over you
The tunnels were quiet despite the shaking, shooting, roaring and screaming overhead.
It drove me insane, but I really had no desire to talk.
Jason was dead, so I felt god-awful for Lily.
Lily was one of my best friends, and now she was crying and there was nothing I could do.
The more I thought about it, the more I hated myself for being so stupid.
I couldn't think of anything I could do to comfort her or anything, so I did nothing at all.
Stupid!
I've seen the paths that your eyes wander down
I want to come too
"I can't see anything." Lily complained.
"I think there's a light on the camera." Rob murmured and walked over to Hud and almost stepped on me in the process.
"There is?" Lily temporarily perked up.
"Yeah." Rob pushed something on Hud's camera and our immediate area filled with a soft glow.
Hud eagerly pointed the camera at all of us so we all covered our eyes in turn, then pointed it up to the ceiling.
As if whoever watched his little "Documentary" wanted to know what a ceiling looked like.
I think that possibly
Maybe I'm falling for you
Later, Hud walked at my side as close as he dared, so it was more like a couple steps behind me but whatever.
Somehow, knowing he was near was strangely...comforting.
I never thought I'd feel that way about the little weirdo.
"The ocean is big, dude!" Hud insisted.
"All I'm saying is, a couple of years ago they found a fish in Madagascar they thought was extinct for centuries." He added.
"So, what, It's been down there all this time and nobody noticed?" Rob stared at him over his shoulder.
"Sure! Maybe it erupted from an ocean trench, y'know? Or a crev-ass!"
I shot him a dirty look over my shoulder for mutilating the English language.
"...Crevice." He said quickly.
No one understands me quite like you do
Through all of the shadowy corners of me
"It's just a theory. I mean, for all we know, it's from another planet." He continued.
My turn to speak up.
"You mean like Superman?"
"Yeah, exactly! ...Wait...You know who Superman is...?"
How is this guy older than me?
"Oh my God...You know who Superman is?" I put both hands over my chest for an added affect.
"I'm feeling something...Are You aware of Garfield?"
What little of his face I could see seemed to be blushing.
I never knew just what it was about this old coffee shop I love so much
All of the while I never knew
"A lot of people think he's from a planet he's not actually from."
Who knew what Hud was talking about now.
"I can't stop thinking about how the last thing I said to her was 'Good luck tonight, Travis'." Rob sighed.
Rob was definitely not talking about whatever Hud was.
"She knows you didn't mean that...I think of some of the things I said to Jason..." Lily comforted him.
God, why can't I comfort people like that?
Maybe then half of my ex-friends and lovers wouldn't hate me...
"That's different." Rob muttered.
"Why?"
"Jason knew you loved him."
Somehow, I got the idea they both were trying to make me feel terrible.
At least Hud apparently had enough guts to walk close enough to me for our arms to brush.
Of course, after about five minutes he fell behind again, and I fought the urge to turn, grab him by the wrist and pull him close to me again.
It was weird, earlier just today I would've slapped him for being close enough to touch me.
I never knew just what it was about this old coffee shop I love so much
All of the while I never knew
"Hey, do you guys remember a couple of years ago when that guy was lighting homeless people on fire in the subways?"
Hud chattered.
"Jesus, Hud."
My thoughts exactly, Rob.
What does it take to shut this kid up?
"What?" Hud stared at him innocently.
"That might not be the best topic for combination down here."
"Right." Hud was quiet for about 15 seconds.
"I just can't stop thinking about how scary it would be if a flaming homeless guy came out of the dark at us right now!"
"Hud, seriously!" Rob and Lily turned and glared at him in perfect unison.
Impressive.
"Sorry." Hud made me think of a puppy with it's tail between it's legs for peeing on the rug.
...Okay, that is a very awkward simile...
I looked at him over my shoulder again, trying to look stern, and hide a slight smile.
Heh.
Flaming Hobos...
I think that possibly
Maybe I'm falling for you
Yes
There's a chance that I've fallen quite hard over you
A weird noise rang out from the other end of the tunnel, yet it sounded close.
Kind of a metallic 'clang' sort of noise like a Subway train tipping over or something.
"What was that?" I turned and stared, feeling every muscle in my body go tense.
We all turned to stare except Hud.
"Let's just keep moving." His voice shook a little.
I suddenly swore loudly within seconds.
"Oh God, this is nasty!"
Rats poured out from between our legs and over our shoes.
I hated rats.
They had ugly pinched noses and creepy beady black eyes, and their tails looked like worms, which I also wasn't too crazy about.
"This is disgusting." I growled, feeling rather queasy.
"They're all...running in the same direction..." Hud mused.
"Like they're running away..." Rob added.
"From what?" I asked.
Hud turned to face the direction the tiny demons were running from.
We hurried up, not wanting an incident involving rabies.
"Hey, how much farther?" Hud called to Rob.
I noticed he was standing near me again.
"I don't know, let's get out at the next station,'Kay?" Rob called back.
"Yeah." Hud agreed.
I've seen the waters that make your eyes shine
Now I'm shining too
"Ooooooh!" I whirled on the spot.
"Did you guys see that?" I pointed behind us.
I wasn't sure what I saw, but it wasn't really something you wanted to know was following you in a dark tunnel.
Or maybe it was all in my mind.
I said a quick prayer in the back of my head for it just be me going insane and seeing things.
Then, I heard noises.
It was weird, maybe like some sort of toad croaking, but more slowed down.
Someone running something slowly over the teeth on a comb.
"What is it?" Lily whispered.
"Just listen." I whispered back.
"Huh...I don't see anything..." Hud leaned forward to the point of almost tipping over as if that'd help.
"Shh!" I hissed.
He panted something unintelligible.
"Shhhh!" I hissed again.
"Oh man, this is worse..." He panted louder.
"Will you be quiet for five seconds!" I snarled.
"Oh, turn on the night-vision!" Rob commanded Hud.
"What?" Hud sounded confused.
"Hang on..." Rob ran in front of Hud and leaned over and began pushing more buttons.
"It's right here..." Rob told him.
"Is it on?" Rob asked.
"Ohhhhhhh..." Hud stared at the ceiling.
"What, What, What?" Rob panicked.
"Run! Okay, Run! Okay, Run! Let's start running! Keep running, Keep running!"
"Huh? What?" Lily latched onto my arm and we took off running.
"Just keep running! Right now!" Hud screamed.
"Run! Run! Run! Run!"
Why did I decide to wear these boots?
Because
Oh
Because I've fallen quite hard over you
I heard a terrible noise, like some sort of wailing screech.
Like something in Alien vs. Predator or Jurassic Park.
Next thing I knew, whatever it was, it was on top of Lily, making awful noises.
Lily screamed and failed as the thing appeared to be rolling her back and forth in some sort of vicious attack.
"Lily!" I screamed and turned to run back for her.
Rub and I bent over, trying to rip it from her bleeding body.
"Nenene!" Another one came out of nowhere and tackled Hud just as Rob and I freed Lily.
Lily had pinned herself against the tunnel wall, scared out of her wits but generally ignored by the giant-bug-things.
Rob seemed to have the one that was going after him under control, so I ran to help Hud.
Hud managed to fling it off of him, panting and still laying on his side weakly, but it came back to him for another round.
"Oh God! Oh God!" From what I could hear over our screaming and the bug's battle cries, Hud was crying slightly as mopre and more of the Freaks piled on top of him.
Looking around desperately, I found a short bit of metal pipe.
I grabbed it and savagely started beating the weird bug thing angrily.
"Let go of him!" I wanted to scream, but I was past words.
In the back of my mind, my brain weakly offered "Let go of my Hud!" But there was no way I would say that.
Hud's attacker let go, but a third Bug came out of nowhere and leaped on me from the side and I screamed in a much higher voice than I normally would.
Rob made some very interesting noises while aiming kicks at the Freakish Bug Thingy.
Suddenly, I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder as it locked it's jaws around my upper arm.
I screamed louder, and unfortunately, Rob finally managed to peel it off of me while it still was latched on, so some of my flesh happened to get pulled off with it.
He got down and pulled me back up, and ran with me, since my body seemed to be refusing to work right.
Lily had opened the door to the station and stood with it wide open.
"Get in, Get in! Hurry!" She sobbed as Rob, Hud, and I burst inside.
Only one of the Bugs was still chasing us, and Rob tried to slam it in the door.
I ran over to help, even though pain shot through my body with each breath I took.
Finally, it was over and we all breathed a collective sigh.
I hate bugs.
If I didn't know you I'd rather not know
If I couldn't have you I'd rather be alone
Rob basically smashed open a water bottle machine and pulled out two bottles.
Lily took them and poured them gently over the gaping tear in my shoulder.
I held back tears, it stung so bad, especially when she pressed down on the cuts with a bit of cloth.
Hud sat next to me, watching as if still in a bit of shock about what just happened.
"Hey..." He said gently, as if he thought my arm would tear off completely if he didn't talk softly.
"How does it look?" I asked, turning so he could see my heavily bleeding bite.
"It looks painful...I mean, It looks...b-bad.." He stuttered, no doubt me bleeding like hell scared him.
"What, you're saying you don't think this is attractive?" I teased, looking away from him.
He quickly changed the subject. "Thanks for saving me back there."
I turned and faced him again.
"What, you don't think I seem like the kind of person who'd do that?" I asked, trying to peek around the camera to see his face.
"No, No! I know you're not.." I caught him off-guard again.
I'm so stupid like that.
"Did you see those things? One of them tried to carry me away, what was up with that?" He changed the subject again.
"Maybe it liked you, Hud." I teased, smirking slightly despite the pain even grinning gave me.
"Yeah. Maybe it wanted to make me it's queen."
I smiled at him, my first smile of the evening, and even though it hurt, the fluttering of my heart chased the pain away.
I never knew just what it was about this old coffee shop I love so much
All of the while I never knew
"I think we should go back up, you know, to see where we are." Rob muttered and we all nodded.
Everything else was a blur to me, stumbling blindly up some stairs, and reaching what I think was once some sort of mall or department store or something.
"You okay?" Lily looked over her shoulder at me.
"Yeah, Yeah...I'm just..a little dizzy." I bent over, panting, but trying to look brave.
"Will you be alright?" Hud asked, and I came dangerously close to blushing.
"Yeah..." I repeated.
Suddenly, a soldier came out of nowhere.
"Freeze!" He shouted and we all threw up our hands like we were under arrest.
Rob slowly approached, and began attempting conversation.
"It's our friend, she's hurt, she's trapped in her apartment..." Rob stammered desperately.
The Soldier shook his head slowly and gave Rob the sad news we'd been telling him all evening; Beth was beyonf help, it was too dangerous to go to the middle of the city.
He also said something about bombing Manhattan, and Helicopters at O'600 hours, and if we had any sense at all, we'd get the hell out of New York.
I didn't care about any of that, I was distracted by something warm and wet running down my face, like my eyes were watering.
I never knew just what it was about this old coffee shop I love so much
All of the while I never knew
I ran one finger under my eye so no one would think I was crying, and froze.
Blood.
I sniffled, my nose beginning to bleed as well.
I suddenly felt shakey, like my body didn't know if it wanted to be hot or cold.
It hurt to breathe, and worse, it felt like something was tearing away at my stomach.
I could feel blood working it's way up my throat and out between my lips.
Trembling, I put a hand on Hud's shoulder.
"Hud..." I groaned. "I don't feel so good..."
Hud only stared in disbelief, even with the camera in his face I could see his mouth was gaping.
"Bite! We've got a bite!" A woman shrieked and next thing I knew, people were grabbing for me.
"Hud!" I screamed and lunged forward, only to vomit blood and who-knows-what onto the ground.
The people in Hazmat suits dragged me roughly, it made my legs hurt like my stomach and heart.
"Hud!" I cried again, the blood coming faster now.
"Marlena!" He shouted, shoving his way through soldiers and more people in Hazmat suits.
His camera dangled at his side, so I could see the look of pain and fear on his face.
"Hud!" I couldn't say his name enough, shrieking it over and over as I tried to break free.
I wanted to run to him, I wanted him to hold me and comfort me like I was a child, I wanted to feel the warmth of his lips against my bloody ones as he cradled me, and then I could die happily in his arms.
I wanted him to help me, to stop the bleeding and the pain, to make them let me go and protect me from the people.
I was so scared, I didn't know what they would do to me.
"Stop, I want to be with Hud!" I wanted to scream, I wanted to run to him and throw my shaking arms around him and never let go, but my lips could only scream and everyone else was so much stronger than me.
"Marlena!" He slowed as they approached a screened off area.
All he could so was watch in horror.
The pain increased and I began sobbing, too weak to shout.
"Marlena!" Hud cried again, trying to find a way to get closer.
I wanted to feel his name cross my lips again, but I couldn't find my voice.
Suddenly, I felt a sharp, intense pain, as though I had been shot in the spot between my heart and stomach.
There was a flash of bright light and warmth, and the pain stopped.
There was nothing but darkness, but it felt wonderful.
I was safe now, I didn't have to scream and cry anymore, but I was...alone.
Hud still walked among the living, and there was no way for me to get to him.
I couldn't go to my parents or any of the friends that I could've been out getting drunk with that night.
I couldn't go to Rob, or Lily, or even Beth, assuming she was still alive.
For a moment, I thought I caught a glimpse of Jason, and followed him.
Bye, Rob, Bye Lily.
Bye Mom, Bye Dad.
Bye, Beth, Bye, Everyone.
...Goodbye, Hud.
May we all meet again.
All of the while
All of the while it was you
You
You
You