Newsies Oneshots

The explosion: Newsies Angst

(Word count: 901
Au: Normal
Characters: Crutchie, Mush, Finch, Mike, Jack, Henry
TW: Death, Talk of symptoms/injury
ALL CREDIT FOR THE IDEA GOES TO MY TUMBLR MUTUAL Maura-moo17!!!! Go follow them!!!)

That day there had been nothing wrong, the newsies sold papers as usual and messed around all day. It was now the middle of the night, around 1 am. The lodgings house was absolutely silent, all the boys were asleep, except for Specs and Romeo, they'd snuck out an hour or so ago. 

Suddenly something crashed through the window, waking only some of the boys. It was dark so they couldn't see what it was, they thought it was nothing and went back to sleep. It had been a brick that was thrown through the window. And it hit the last lit lantern in the house...

The lantern crashed to the floor and shattered....the flame starting to spread through the house, the place quickly began filling with smoke and the boys woke up and woke up everyone they could and tried to get out. Everyone had gotten out...except for two...Crutchie and Henry...

A beam had fallen, breaking the crutch he had and trapping him inside, as the beam had landed on his legs to the point it was impossible to get out of...Henry had been hit by something falling from the ceiling and knocked out just before he could reach the door..

Mush noticed Crutchie was missing and quickly looked around for him.

"Boys?!! Where's Crutchie?! I can't find him anywhere!!!" Mush called out

"And come to think of it, Where's Henry?! He's missing too!!" Mike added, panicked

Jack and Finch ran back inside to find the two boys. 

"JACK!! FINCH!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" Mush yelled after the boys

Everyone knew Jack and Crutchie were together but nobody knew why Finch and Henry were so close, they always dodged the question.

Finch found Henry rather quick since he was knocked out so close to the door and quickly lifted him up and got him back outside. Jack covered his mouth with his hat to stop himself from inhaling too much smoke. At this point there was no place where it was safe to be, everywhere was either ingulfed in flame or filled with mass amounts of smoke. The smoke was so thick Jack could barely see.  

"Dammit Crutchie, where the hell are you?!" Jack mumbled under his breath as he looked around.

Jack felt his anxiety start to rise and thoughts began to race through his mind. What if Crutchie was already dead..? What if he did survive but he was suffering..?

Jacks thoughts abruptly stopped hearing a voice

"J-Jack....Jack help!" Crutchie weakly said, coughing between almost every word

"I'm coming Crutchie!! Stay strong!" Jack called out to him

He continued to push through the smoke until he could see the silhouette of Crutchie's body, and the beam trapping him. Jack made it to his side and tried to pull off the beam but it was too heavy...

"Crutchie its too heavy...I-I cant lift it!!" Jack cried a bit

Tears started forming in the corners of his eyes and he worried he wouldn't be able to save Crutchie's life..

"J-jack.." Crutchie coughed "I-if...if its too heavy...Just leave me.." 

"N-no!! Crutchie I can't just leave you!! I love you too much!!" 

Jack stifled a few coughs from the smoke as he desperately tried to move the beam. He'd forgotten to keep his mouth and nose covered and was inhaling more and more smoke by the second. After minutes and minutes of struggling Jack finally found the strength to push the beam off of Crutchie. He lifted Crutchie up and put his arm around him. He quickly helped him outside. Once they got outside, Albert ran over and helped Jack sit Crutchie down where it was safe. Luckily Crutchie had done his best to keep his mouth and nose covered so he hadn't inhaled too much smoke, only enough to give himself a bit of a cough. 

Finch had gotten Henry awake and hadn't left his side and kept talking to him to make sure he stayed awake. 

Jack had suddenly began coughing like crazy, worrying the other newsies.

"Hey Jack?! Are you okay?! How much smoke did you inhale while you were in there?!" Race asked, eyeing over to Jack

"Yeah. Yeah I'm fi--- why's the world going dark..?" Jack muttered before he passed out

"Jack?!!!" Crutchie yelped

The newsies quickly moved to Jack's side and tried desperately to wake him up. After close to 15 minutes of CPR and trying incredibly hard to wake Jack up....Jack had stopped breathing....

"Boys...H-he's...he's gone.." Mush said shakily as he looked from Jacks pale face to the other boys.

Crutchie felt his heart absolutely shatter hearing those words...his boyfriend was gone...the man he loved...gone because of him..

 Crutchie made his way to Jacks side and put his hands on his cheeks. Tears started streaming down his face.

"Jack...my love please....please wake up...you cant be gone!" Crutchie said shakily

He looked to the boys.

"It should've been me...Jack died because of me...he just had to come save me.." Crutchie cried

"I'm so sorry Crutchie...But he's not suffering at all...at least thats good..." Mike said, in an attempt to comfort him

"Yeah...good..." Crutchie said hanging his head, letting his hands fall from jacks cheeks.

(Sorry for two super angsty stories in a row! I'll try and post some fluff soon!!)