Amen

[Slam]

---

He was standing in front of the door. It was time to go.

He hadn't done anything with Matt's body. There was nothing he could do that would even come close to representing what Matt was to Nate. There were no words, no gestures, nothing. He'd tried to pray, but there weren't any prayers. Matt was dead, and he couldn't do anything to change that.

The basket of chicken wings had been reduced to bones. The aroma had been unmistakable, just standing obnoxiously amidst the smell of death that had permeated the room forever. He'd eaten a basket of chicken wings whilst surrounded by dead bodies. He didn't know how he'd done it, and he didn't want to. There was an aftertaste stuck in his mouth. It was unpleasant.

He might've passed out at some point, but he wasn't really sure. It had all just blurred together, his sense of time lost.

He'd seen the gun. He'd thought about it.

Now it was in his hand. He knew he wouldn't use it, not for that. He didn't think he could. He wanted to, more than he wanted anything. He couldn't keep doing this.

But Matt had said he had to go home. Matt had wanted him to live.

So that was all there was to it.

He gripped the handle of the pistol tight, the metal pressing back. He didn't know the first thing about guns.

The machete was in his other hand. He'd wanted to leave it, but he couldn't. This was what he'd decided to do, the second he pulled it out of Jon's body. He'd told himself he'd use it, even if he hadn't tried to use it on Matt. Not that it mattered. And like Matt said, if he wanted to go home, he had to kill someone.

He wanted to go home. At least, that's what he'd been telling himself for the past few days. He didn't want to deal with this anymore.

If he went home, he wouldn't have to. That's what he wanted to believe, that there had to be a way out. For his sake, and for Matt's, he had to believe. There had to be a point.

He'd left his daypack. He was too tired to keep lugging it around, and it was way too big for him anyway. He didn't need it anymore. Like Matt said, there weren't many people left, so this probably wasn't going to last much longer. If he forgot where a danger zone was because he didn't have his map, well, that would be how it ended. If he got too thirsty and died, or starved, well, that would be how it ended.

There was one more thing he was taking from the storage closet, which he never in his life no matter how long wanted to return to, and that was Matt's jacket. He'd had to roll up the sleeves a tonne, and it draped far past where it should've been, but he wasn't going to take it off. It was the only thing he had left. It was Matt's embrace, wrapped around him. He needed it to keep standing.

He left the storage closet. It was time to go.

((Nate Turner to be concluded))