Hide Your Lungs||SMPLive AU

Chapter Eight

Travis stared at the body, his arm slowly falling to his side as he swallowed the lump forming in his throat. The snow surrounding it was stained a deep crimson, making it stand out like a sore thumb. It had been stripped of most of its clothing, the most notable being its top and shoes. Short black hair stood out against the snow almost as intensely as the blood. Travis felt like throwing up as the heavy reality hit and Joko.

That could be Ted.

Joko moved forward, crowbar tightly in his hand. He walked right up to the body, shouting his eyes tight before letting out a breath and rolling it over with his foot. Travis could feel his heart pounding in his stomach and his vision was shaking.

He watched as Joko's eyes widened with horror before being replaced with a relieved smile and teary eyes as he looked up at Travis, "It's not him."

Those words hit him fast and hard. Panic was quickly replaced with relief. So fast in fact, that he doubled over and vomited. It hurt, it hurt a lot. He had forgotten how much he hated to throw up. His throat burned and his mouth was coated in bitterness as he emptied his stomach onto the ground. Tears pricked at the corners of his eyes as he finished with one last gag. Shuddering, he slowly opened his eyes, making sure to avoid the mess now at his feet. Joko gave him a worried look as Travis rose up and walked over to look at the body himself.

"Are you okay?"

Travis nodded, about to say it wouldn't happen again, that it was a one time thing and he would be fine. But when he looked at the body, he wasn't sure he could stay true to that. The person's face looked nothing like Ted's, which was the only good to come out about the whole thing.

Travis' gaze was immediately drawn to the eyes, which were a mess. At first, he thought they had been taken out, but the closer he looked the more he realized that they were still there, they were just nearly completely liquid. Said liquid spilling out of the sockets and down the face, creating an illusion of tears. The torso had been crudely cut into, in fact it looked as if it had ripped open, and the things like ribs or organs had been removed.

Travis looked away, hoping to save his already weak stomach. While Joko on the other hand, kept looking at it, his face became more and more twisted with worry as time went on.

"We have to go, Travis. Call the others, whoever did this probably is still around, and I don't really want to run into them..." Joko started moving away from the body, grabbing Travis by his free arm and dragged him away.

Travis glanced behind him on time before switching the walkie-talkie back on. As soon as it was switched on, the pair was met with Schlatt practically screaming at them.

"-oko?! Travis?! What the fuck is going on?! Fucking answer!"

Travis flinched as Schlatt's voice echoed into the empty city, "Schlatt, we're here, please stop shouting..." He did not stop shouting. In fact, it took a good solid twenty seconds of Joko and Travis listening to Schlatt shout before Wilbur was able to calm him down. Travis waited a second, making sure he was actually going to to be able to speak, "Look. We can't talk for long, but Joko and I found something and we need to leave now. How close are you to the car?"

"What is going on-"

Joko grabbed the walkie-talkie from Travis, quickly spitting out a few words, "Schlatt for once, just fucking listen and don't ask fucking questions. Get to the car, and then we'll explain," Silence was all that met them, and Joko swallowed hard before continuing, "Thanks."

Joko didn't wait for an answer before he handed Travis the walkie-talkie. Travis glanced at Joko, who was looking everywhere, obviously trying to keep an eye out for anything dangerous, "Do you think Ted is okay?"