Chapter Text
Just as he was about to push in the final brick Montresor double-taked and finally realized what he had come to. His best friend, and who he wanted to be his lover at once, trapped behind a solid wall. With fire burning beneath his feet, and slowly running out of the little oxygen he had to begin with. Fortunato was about to die.
How did it come to this? Why did it come to this? Is this really what his family name was known for? Killing off those who dare insult it's title? It was a shame, a mockery, a shavesty. Why?
Montresor ledged the trowel into the wall and flicked it over, trying to pry the bricks apart before the fire truly burned his friend alive. His friend, yes. He couldn't dare see him go. He wasn't thinking like this before, was the guilt of being a murderer catching up to him? No, that could be it. That was stupid.
But that didn't matter, it didn't matter. Using all his strength to pry a hole out of the wall, throwing brick after brick behind him hearing each one crack, snap, and break as they slammed into the ground, he made a decently sized hole in the wall. Grabbing the torch from the ground and throwing it to the side behind him, the ash scattered as the sizzling flames fell. Montresor took his trowel and went at the chains holding Fortunato to the wall. BANG BANG BANG - CLICK CLACK CLICK - SNAP!
They broke.
The near dead Fortunato collapsed from the wall, and he would have fought for his life if he could. To run away, to hide, get away from this MONSTER that held him in his arms. But he couldn't, he was far too weak. Still on the verge of passing out, of tears falling from his eyes.
Montresor caught Fortunato in his arms before his head hit the ground. Stressing blood rolled down Montresor 's hands, which rubbed off on Fortunato and rolled down the pale cheeks of his face. It was a dark red, but looked nearly black just because it was so dark.
The man beneath him whined and shivered in pain, cold hitting his burns from the previous markings of the flames. He could finally breathe, he was finally fine. He was going to be okay. Would he be okay? In the hands of his potential murderer?
This was it, Montresor had his shot. He could take it now. No one would know, no one would find out. It wasn't the same plan as before but Fortunato could die right here right now and NO ONE would know. No one but Fortunato, which is the only person Montresor cared to find out. The trowel was still in his hands, he could hit him over the head. He could slam his head into the concrete floor, he could choke him until the poor man ran out of air. So, so many simple choices. So so many. They weren't complicated at all, they just needed the confidence. The motivation.
Something he had, but lost. It was there minutes ago but now it's faded away. It was gone, and he didn't know where to find it.
Fortunato tried to keep himself awake, he didn't trust himself falling out on these conditions. Not near him, not in here.
The man hadn't sobered up yet, but while he was coming to terms he felt himself drifting away just as much. In equivalent, different ways. Slowly and slowly the lights fades and his breathing slowed as he took what he assumed what would be his last breath.