The boiler room is hot. The air is thick, suffocating—or is it the tears congesting her throat making it difficult to breathe? Veronica couldn't tell either way. J.D is there, in all his manic glory. Waxing poetic about death like he's some sort of God, and not a seventeen year old with serious issues.
"People are gonna see the ashes of Westerburg High School and think 'There's a school that self destructed not because society doesn't care but because that school was society'!"
This isn't fair.
The voice in her head insists. Begs her to turn, to run, to leave. To save herself while she still can, and leave this homicidal maniac behind.
"The only place that Heathers and Marthas can get along is in heaven!"
This isn't right.
This isn't fair.
She says something mildly insightful about his upbringing, about the injustice of the society the two of them have been forced to live in. It, as expected, is all for naught. They fight over the stupid, stupid handgun she told him to stop carrying around with him.
There's a shot. A grunt of pain. Blood. Blood, all over her hands, her skirt, her blazer.
She just shot him.
She just shot Jason fucking Dean.
The shock and sick satisfaction is replaced soon by a chilling dread and crippling guilt. Never mind the stabbing pain in her ankle, she's mortally wounded someone. Someone she—inexplicably and inexorably—loves.
"J.D- Jason, I- Fuck-! What the fuck is wrong with you!"
He laughs. A pained, wryly thing. It sounds like he's rubbed his vocal cords on 40 grit sandpaper. It makes Veronica's stomach twist painfully. The blood coating his duster is spotting the ground in patches. They're both still on the ground, the gun discarded somewhere in the boiler room.
"How- How do I turn off the— J.D, please, how do I turn the fucking bomb off-!"
She grits her teeth past the pain and guilt and dread and nausea. Limping as she hurries to figure out the stupid buttons on the stupid bomb. Her hands are shaking. Her breaths are shallow, and far too quick. She feels like she's dying.
"All the buttons. Press 'm all at once."
J.D's voice is a blessing and a curse, the smug gravelly tone of it makes Veronica want to turn and kick him in the ribs.
It's a trick.
She thinks, unsure if trust is a thing she can afford right now. Less than a minute left on the clock. There's no way either of them are making it away with this thing in time. Fuck. Every second she hesitates is a second lost. She presses all three buttons at once.
A beat passes. Another. Another. A shaky breath forces its way from her lungs as she slumps to the ground, cursing at the way her ankle flares and throbs in protest. She looks over at him, still smirking in that awful way as he holds a hand over the wound in his side.
"You chose this, y'know. All of this. Chose me."
A rage rises in Veronica, boiling through her blood and purging any guilt or shame she'd been feeling. Her breathing stutters as she struggles to maintain some semblance of calm. Tears fill her eyes and she can't help the bitter scoff that escapes her.
"You think I wanted this? That I wanted to fall in love with someone like you-?!"
Veronica's breaths are hard and fast now, like she's been running. A sharp contrast to the stutter-y breaths as he tries to limit the pain in his side. His smirk falters, hurt evident for a fraction of a second before it's gone again. It only makes her angrier.
This isn't fair.
It's silent for a while—as silent as it can be with the pep rally upstairs—as Veronica gathers herself, grabbing the duffle he'd brought the bomb in and stuffing it back inside, alongside the gun which she has to crawl to and her croquette mallet.
She forces her way to her feet, and manhandles J.D into leaning on her for support as she gets them out of this.
It's agony, climbing up the stairs to the Gym with the duffle and J.D, but she manages. Despite the nausea from the pain roiling her insides about, she gets in her car and drives them both to the hospital. She sits and waits as J.D spins another disgustingly believable story about 'messing around with a gun when trying something new in the bedroom'. Watches him give them both fake names and ages, and has the two of them rush off before they're charged for their care.
Why are you doing this?
She can't wrap her head around his reasoning. She tells him as much when they pull into the 7-Eleven that started everything. It's dark now, and she knows she won't be able to get the blood out of her car seats as he looks over at her with that same stupid smirk. The bomb, gun, and croquette mallet are in the trunk of her car, it's all she can think of as she trudges aimlessly behind J.D in the 7-Eleven. She ignores the odd concern on the cashier's face, she knows the dirt and blood on her must look terrible.
It's surreal, sitting on the curb with the freezing cold Slurpee in her hands. It's so cold it burns, but she cant bring herself to put it down nor take a sip. Her hands still shake.
"What the fuck are we gonna do?"
It's the first thing she actually remembers saying since they left the school, voice shaky. Terrified.
"What the fuck are we gonna do, J.D?"
There's blood in the boiler room. In her car. In her hair. She's tainted with it, tainted by him. Underneath her nails and in her clothes and—she's going to go to jail. She and J.D are going to rot in cells with bitter resentment between them and the death of three high-schoolers.
She thinks she hears someone calling her, but she can't parse through the words enough to give them meaning. There's tears blurring her vision and the cold burn of the Slurpee has begun to subside. Did she drop it with how shaky her hands were? It feels like she's drowning and there's nowhere near enough air for her lungs. She can't breathe, she's going to die, they're both going to die and—
She jumps when J.D grabs her shoulder, shoving away from him frantically. The world snaps into focus jarringly, and she wipes away the tears to see J.D's worried face. There's a splash of red on the curb, her untouched Slurpee now melted on the asphalt.
"Veronica? Jesus, what the fuck was that!?"