We Are the Kids From Yesterday

Fake Your Death or Its Your Blame

All hope died once you had made it past Zone 3 in the desert. You really weren't under anybody's control anymore, it was no man's land. But also every man's land. If you could get your hands on it, you were lucky as hell, but the chances were very very slim. Most murders happened in there and Zone 5 was the home of probably the largest Killjoy mass grave, the notorious Burial Gardens. For the most part, the bodies were properly buried but occasionally you'd come across a corpse that had just been dumped there. It was always disturbing, but something a 'joy in the desert had to accept and go with. Party had been there a few times, first during his first time off in the desert and he had panicked. The constant feeling of death made you feel like someone was always watching you and it was really just an uneasy place to be. But after that, before joining the Bat City Killjoys, he had gone there a lot just to clear his mind or think. It went from a place he dreaded to something of a sanctuary.

But Party didn't know why he was standing there right now. He had decided to be smart by making sure Blade knew he was heading into Zone 5 and had left early in the morning, renting a motorcycle that Ghoul had started to teach him to drive. He was sitting on a gravestone, staring into the distance. He needed to ponder, think about everything.

How he could very well just have gotten into the relationship he'd wanted for so long.

How he and the person he wanted were both being hunted by a group of the head exterminators.

How his best friends and his brother could start getting hunted any minute.

Was it really worth it?

Party was so tempted to just... not go home. His friends were so much better off without him, there chances of survival would shoot up. But he just sat, running fingers through his cherry colored hair and letting the stress overtake him.

"You got a minute?" came a voice Party recognized, but barely. He jumped a bit before looking back and seeing it was Noir. How did she find him?

"Were you following me?" Party said, glancing back at her. "Trackers disable past Zone 3..."

Noir shrugged before saying, "I saw you leaving. I thought maybe I'd have a better time convincing you if you were away from your weaknesses."
"Don't call them that," said Party. The audacity of this girl, calling his friends his weaknesses like they were something she could just get him to forget about.

"They are your weaknesses though," insisted Noir. "I need to get you blind to them. Blind to their struggles. Trust me, you're better off when you're not always worrying about three guys who can take perfectly good care of themselves."

She had a point. Party really had no reason to constantly feel like he needed to protect them. But he did because it was just in his nature to be a very protective person. He had always been protective over Kobra, even before their parents died and it seemed like the moment he had more people in his life who were just as important, he couldn't bare to lose them. And he really couldn't.

"Maybe you're right," admitted Party, sitting on the grave again, not making eye contact with Noir. "But I don't want to change, you know. Me being over-protective is the reason I haven't lost Kobra yet. You know what I'd be like if I lost Kobra? You don't want too."

Loudly sighing, Noir said, "I'm not telling you to stop protecting them. I'm telling you that your well-being absolutely cannot surround theirs. If it does, then you've already doomed yourself. If they die, you're pretty much useless."

"Likely."

"That's not good, Party. Which is why I'm here. To help."

"Just leave it alone, okay? I don't want your help or for you to be an ally. That shouldn't be so hard to understand."