“...”
“...Hey…”
Somewhere in the background was the sound of crashing waves and seagulls squawking in the distance.
“...Adellll. Heyyyy.”
“...”
“...Yoooo, you with me?”
“...ADEL!”
*BONK!*
Waking up, Adel jerked his head forward, bonking Cain straight in the forehead, knocking him back onto a white sandy beach. Cain fell straight onto the sand, clutching his head in pain.
“O-Owww! What the heck, dude?!”
“S-Sorry, Cain…” Adel yawned, rubbing his forehead. “I kind of dozed off there for a second.”
“Yeah!! I realized!!” Cain snapped. “How come you fell asleep, anyways?! I take you here and all you can do is take a nap!”
Adel leaned backwards a bit, burying his hands in the sand. He picked up a walking hermit crab and let it crawl around on his palm, his head lowered.
“...S-Sorry,” he said, poking gently at the crab with curiosity. “It was just so nice and warm…”
Letting out a sigh, Adel dropped the hermit crab back into the sand, letting it crawl around him as Adel gave a slight glare to Cain.
“...And why did you wake me up like that anyways?” Adel asked, irritated. “You didn’t have to scream at me like that.”
“S-Shut up, dude!” Cain snapped, fake tears welling in the corner of his eyes. “D-Do you see what you did to my forehead? Huh?! I think you broke it…”
“...”
Adel blinked a couple of times at Cain in disbelief, before turning his back and facing away from him. “...Annoyyyiiing…”
“HUH?!”
Cain ran towards Adel, tumbling into him with playful force. The hermit crab scuttled a way in a panic as the two boys wrestled blithely around the sand.
“C-Cain, stoop!” Adel pleaded, letting out a few occasional giggles. “Y-You’re getting sand in places where it shouldn’t be!!”
“I don’t wanna hear it!”
“Nooooo!”
Adel’s struggles to break free from Cain’s grasp were in vain. Eventually, Cain had Adel pinned down onto the ground, the two facing each other. Cain let out a vain smile, Adel frowning and turning his head to the side in response.
“...So!” Cain yelped.
“...W-What?” Adel grumbled in response.
“I have you trapped here! Now, you have to do whatever I want!”
“N-Never...I’d rather die…”
“Yeah, yeah.”
/ / /
“It’s so stupid, Cain…”
“You keep saying that, Adel. It’s not gonna change the fact that it’s why I’m here.”
“I know… but a dream?! You’re so DUMB!”
The two had been going back and forth about the reason for Cain’s appearance for some time…
“Who even told you to come here, then? Are you even the real Cain?!”
“I-I don’t know who it was! It was just the voice of some little girl, I guess… and yes, we’ve been over this, it’s really me!”
They weren’t making much progress…
“I just don’t understand… you left me. I wasted all this time looking for you, when you were in this place the whole time!” Adel threw another punch at Cain.
“Damn it, Adel! Quit being a dick!”
“I-I’m not being a dick, you are! You left me!”
/ / /
Cain pinched Adel’s cheeks, still pinning him down. He stretched his face around playfully, before Adel tripped Cain back into the ground in retaliation. Cain fell headfirst into the ground, getting sand everywhere in his hair. He shook some of the sand out, spraying some all over Adel, before sitting cross-legged and flashing Adel a smile. The setting sun cast rays of light all around Cain, waves crashing in the background. Adel blushed uncomfortably, Cain looking like a painting in the canvas of the ocean.
“...Heey, Adel. How’d ya like my trip this time?” Cain asked, breaking the silence.
“...It was nice,” he admitted, giving Cain a nod. “This was my first time coming to a place like this…”
Cain let out a goofy smile, feeling proud of himself. “Hehe. And *I* was the one who brought you here, wasn’t I? Aren’t I so cool..?”
“...No, not really.”
“S-So mean..!”
Adel sat with his knees up, smiling sheepishly at Cain.
“I...I wanna come back someday.”
“Really?” Cain smiled, rubbing his nose in satisfaction. “I don’t usually get that level of appreciation from ya..! Well then, I guess I’ll just have to take you again someday, huh?”
Adel let out a slight smile, inching closer to Cain. “...Yeah.”
Cain turned around and set Adel in his lap, the two watching the crimson sky as it faded to black.
“...Cain?”
“What is it, buddy?”
“...Where are you going..?”
“...”
Adel tilted his head out a bit, trying to get a grasp of Cain’s face. But he was in no position to see him clearly. Adel gave up and leaned back into Cain, sighing a bit.
“...Do you really have to leave?” Adel asked once more.
“...”
Cain let out a heavy breath, resting his chin atop of Adel’s head.
“...Yeah, I do. I’m sorry, Adel. I don’t want to leave you, either. But I gotta do this.”
“...W-Well, can’t you tell me where you’re going..?”
“No...I...I can’t do that…”
“...Why? You never tell me anything...”
Tears began to well up in Adel’s eyes. Cain gently wiped them away as he turned Adel around to face him.
“...I promised that I’d be back, right? You just have to sit back and wait for me.”
“N-No..! I always just wait...I-I’m tired of it...you always leave like this. M-My parents, too…”
“T-This isn’t like that,” Cain insisted. “I’ll be back and we’ll take care of each other like always, right? C’moon. Don’t be like that on our last night together.”/ / /
“You could’ve just told me where you were going, dummy!”
“I couldn’t, because then you’d follow!”
“DID YOU WANT ME TO FIND YOU OR NOT?!” Adel screamed. “I DON’T GET YOU! RRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAGGH!!!”
The explorer boy tackled Cain and pinned him to the ground.
“Adel, knock it off!”
“YOU KNOCK IT OFF! Stop being weird… you’re weird! I don’t understand…”
/ / /
Adel turned his head away again, looking somewhat angry. A few worried glances later, Cain unwrapped his scarf and took off a beautiful diamond necklace. It shone against the light as Cain carefully placed it around Adel’s neck.
“A-Alright, fine...Then I’ll give you this to wear,” Cain said gently. Adel’s eyes widened, knowing the importance the necklace had to Cain, but he wouldn’t hear his objections. He placed his palm on Adel’s lips to keep him quiet. “And you know how important this is to me, right? So instead of waiting...I want you to come find me.”
Adel was in awe, looking at Cain’s desperate stare. “After I’m gone, come look for me. I’ll be waiting for you. And when we meet again, that’s when you can give this back to me. Alright?”
Adel sat in silence, processing Cain’s request. After a few moments of hesitation, Adel grasped the necklace tight in his hand, nodding. “I won’t wait this time...I’ll come find you, Cain.”
Cain smiled, wrapping his arms around Adel. “Then that’s that.”
The waves began to calm a bit as the moon rose. The pair took the time to appreciate their time alone together for the last time.
“..Don’t be scared of the world, Adel,” Cain said, patting his back. “There’s so much curiosity and wonder around us. So much to appreciate and explore. I don’t want you coming to me all confused and desperate. I want you to report back to me excited about what you were able to experience, and I want to be annoyed about how you can’t just shut up about how much you love the world. If you can do that, then I think we’ll be just fine, right? That’s the life you deserve.”
“...”
The pair embraced for moments more, trying to make an eternity out of nothing. But eventually, their time together came to a close.
“...Let’s get you home,” Cain smiled.
/ / /
“I told you to come look for me, and you found me, didn’t you? I gave you that necklace...”
“You did…”
Adel was just laying on top of Cain at this point, both of them tired.
“Adel, you found me, so please stop being angry at me…”
“Fine…” the explorer muttered. “But now what, Cain? You sent all my friends away... “
“I’m sure they’re doing fine.”
“What’s gonna happen to us…?”
“We’re going to escape when the fighting’s over. I just… I didn’t want you to get hurt,” he pointed to the ceiling. “Up there, you know?”
“It’s always about what you want, isn’t it… you left me alone, because you wanted me to find you. You took me from my friends, because you didn’t want me to get hurt…” Adel buried his face into Cain’s chest. “It’s so stupid… why? Why did you do it? I had to enter this contest… I watched people die. Deirdre died… Rocky died… they all died! I wish Devin blew
me up, too!”
Cain wrapped his arms around the other boy and held him tight. “Adel, I… I never knew this was going to happen…”
“So then why did you come here…?”
Cain sighed. “I already told you-”
“I don’t like that answer.”
“...”
“...”
“Adel…”
“What?”
“Do… do you hear that?”
“All I hear is the dumb, stupid crap coming out of your dirty mouth…”
“No, it… it sounds like footsteps.”
“What?”
“Outside the door. Someone’s here, I think,” Cain said, rolling Adel off his chest and reaching for his gun.
“W-who is it? And do you really know how to use that thing? Wait, isn’t this a bunker? Doesn’t that mean ‘no bad guys allowed’?”
“I wish it did, but, this is kind of a shitty bunker. Plus, I think your hot robot friend broke the door. Stay behind me.”
Adel did as he was told, and hid behind Cain, who had his gun aimed at the door. The footsteps got louder and louder. Cain was able to make out the sound of at least three guys behind the door. They were human.
“Sir, it’s open!” a gruff, male voice shouted. They opened the heavy door, and into the bunker stepped a large, well-built man. You could use his jaw to make sure your shelf was level. He held a cigar in one hand and a standard pistol in the other. Behind him were two armored soldiers with assault rifles.
“Boy, put the gun down.”
The gun shook in Cain’s hands. “Who’re you guys? FBI?”
“No, no. CIA. It’s my understanding that one of you is Adel Wagner?”
“That’s me…”
“Well, that’s
excellent news. Why don’t you come with us? And, uh, tell your friend to put the gun down.”
“You’re not taking him from me. We’ve been waiting for each other. You are
not taking him from me,” Cain’s voice cracked.
“Put. The gun. Down,” the man demanded. His voice was deep and unsettling. “Put it down, now.”
“No!”
“Do it!”
“I won’t!”
“NO!”
*BANG* *BANG*Two simultaneous shots rang out; one from Cain, one from the other man. On the floor between them was Adel, critically wounded. Cain dropped his weapon and met his friend on the ground.
“ADEL!” he cried out. “WHY? WHY DID YOU JUMP IN FRONT…?!”
The man, who had not been hit at all by Cain, took a puff from his cigar. “Tragic. Simply tragic. I can’t believe you shot him!”
Cain looked up at him, tears in his eyes. “You shot him, you fuck! What’s wrong with you?!”
“Hmm, well, that’s not what my report’s going to say. See, what really happened here today was an especially depressing murder-suicide.”
“What…?”
“Yes. On this day, Adel Wagner’s life was tragically lost when he was shot by his best friend, who then, out of guilt, shot himself three times in the back of the head.”
“That’s… but--”
Before Cain could complete his thought, he was tackled by the other two men and pinned down. He could see every speck of dust on the floor and watched with horror as blood began pooling around Adel’s body. Something touched the back of his head.
“It’s not fair, I know. It seems random, sure. And maybe it is. But that’s just life, ain’t it? Some men are meant to fall to the wayside, while others are meant to be the ones to push ‘em over.”
Cain’s feelings of disbelief and guilt were quickly relieved.
*BANG**BANG**BANG*…
…
...
“Alright, boys, looks like the job’s done. Scope out the area. I gotta make a phone call.
…
…
…
“Hello?”
“Director Grant?”
“Speaking.”
“Yeah, this is Agent Cipher with the CIA. It, uh, well, it pains me to say this, Director, but we found that boy you and your guys have been looking for…”
“Is he alive?”
“No, I’m, uh, afraid not, ma’am. Looks like he was killed as part of a murder-suicide with some other kid. The whole thing’s tragic, really…”
/ / /
As the two were walking under the moonlight, Cain playfully wrapped his arms around Adel.
“Heeey. Adel. I’ve always wondered. What’s our relationship?”
“...Huh?” Adel asked, confused about the question. “What do you mean?”
“I meeeean...aren’t weee...you know….liiiike...uhhhh….”
“...Cain, I don’t understand what you’re asking.”
“...I-I mean, we’re like...that, right? It’s...hmmm….how do I put this…it’s like, uhhh...y-you have a donut, and a hot dog…”
“...W-What..? Stop being annoying…”
Cain’s face turned red, too embarrassed to continue. “A-Aww, forget it..! It’s nothing..! I didn’t say anything..!”
“..?”
Adel looked stupefied at Cain, who was too frustrated to face him properly.
“Fuuuuu...I haaate you, Adelllll!” Cain yelled, crying playfully and running away. “I haaate youuuu!”
“C-Cain?! What’s the matter?!” Adel cried back, chasing after Cain, the pair just running and running until the night would turn to day.