"All But Sadness" (Ice Nine Kills fanfiction)

Ricky

I wasn't lying to him when I said there was a murder the day before, I just didn't think he would take it this far into killing me.

But now he's gone, and got what he deserved.

Do I feel sad? A little, yes. But he tried to kill me—video showing that he snuck drugs in my drink that night. So I don't feel remorse.

Dan helped set up the bad guys, which were just actors that we payed. They didn't have to go that far, though.

Spencer Charnas fell for it, hard.

At first I thought that Spencer would never hurt anyone, let alone a fly. I don't know why he wanted to kill me, maybe he was sleepwalking, but I never heard anything about that, or he was just drunk and a fucking creep.

Shevy did an excellent job.

So, we said goodbye to the Salem Hospital and police, in my house now, with my dog, Starks.

We all sit on my couch, waiting for nothing. Joe Occhiuti, Dan Sugarman, Patrick Galante, me; Richard Armellino.

"So, Spencer is gone." I say.

"Yeah."

It's very awkward.

The gifts the fans brought, they weren't really for him. We made that up, too. The rest of the cards were empty.

We all just sit quietly.

Dan sighs. "Nadia, can you get me a beer?" he calls.

Nadia Teichmann walks over with two beers, one for herself, sitting down with us in the black dress she's in.

"You okay?" She looks at me.

"For eleven years, I never thought he would plan to kill me. Actually kill me. I wonder if he planned it from the very beginning." She stares at the TV with a blank face. "Our anniversary is December thirtieth."

"Yeah, I don't know." Patrick says.

"Okay," Joe says, standing up. "I have this feeling that it wasn't Spencer."

Patrick slaps his knee. "Come on, man, don't—"

"It's been four days!" Dan yells.

Joe sighs. "I know. But Spencer is a great guy. We obviously can't tell the fans because they'll flip!"

"Occhiuti. You pulled this out of your ass so quickly..." Patrick rubs his eyes.

"Don't you have a feeling, though?"

"We have proof. He's in jail. Now we just got to find another singer. A black figure that looked like Spencer drugged Ricky's drink."

"It wasn't Spencer. I swear."

Nadia scoffs. "Then who was it?"

"I don't know, another guy."

I roll my eyes.

A call comes on my phone. It's Spencer. I put the phone on speaker. What does he want?

Dan leans forward.

We hear breathing. It wasn't your friend...

"What is he talking about?" The voice isn't Spencer.

It wasn't any of you...

Huh? "Spencer, what are you doing? Don't prank us."

The voice goes deep. It was us.

The TV turns on by itself, it scares us. The phone ends the call randomly.

My heart drops. A news reporter.

"...of Ice Nine Kills has been sent to Salem Prison for twenty years after allegedly trying to kill one of his band members, spiking his drink in the middle of the night, and allegedly being involved with the Massachusetts murders. But when we came to check on him, he was dead in his cell, a slit to his throat, blood covering the floor. Investigators say it was likely a suicide, grabbing an object, but none are confirmed to be true. The investigation is still going on and the body of the frontman of the heavy metal band, Ice—"

The TV switches to a mask. Our mask.

The Silence mask.

So the murders were real...

My heart sinks.

The person under the mask laughs. You could have saved your friend, but you blamed him. Look back again.

The TV turns off.

Patrick pulls up the security footage. He gasps.

We all see a man, with the Silence mask on, pour the drugs in the water. He looks up at the screen. Then the video ends.

"That wasn't there before..." Joe whispers. "It was Spencer, I thought..."

We all look at each other.

We framed the wrong man.

A text pops up on my phone; the Instagram sender's user as silence_k!llz, the account that was supposedly deactivated:

Your frontman is dead, and now you're all next.

My eyes go wide.

Shit.

It's all but sadness, and now it's revenge.

Patrick, Joe, everyone smirks.

Thank God it's Friday.