Disclaimer: I don't own the movie "The Rezort" or "Fear the Walking Dead." Everything belongs to whoever owns them, my wishful thinking aside.

Authors Note #1: This is a crossover between the zombie movie "The Rezort" and "Fear the Walking Dead." – The idea behind this crossover is that Archer is a different version of Thomas Abigail. Think different universes/crossover-ish stuff. Archer is what Thomas Abigail could/would have been if he hadn't been born with the knack for business. And because Archer wasn't the consummate business man, he never meant Strand and his life never went in that direction. – This this fiction I infer that Archer is bisexual.

Disclaimer: post movie, alludes/mentions/references "Fear the Walking Dead," alternative universes, zombies, gore, blood, canon appropriate violence, adult language, drama, angst, romance, sexual content.

Adevism

Chapter One

It was a messed-up kind of heartbreak when you could go through hell with someone you loved and come out of it forced to realize that you really didn't know them at all.

She wanted to say it'd eaten away at her at first. But the awful truth was that Lewis had been easy to forget. Betrayal had a way of doing that, she supposed. That and being entrusted with making sure nothing like this ever happened again. It was a legacy she'd inherited, but she took to it like a duck to water all the same. Rediscovering a part of herself she thought had died the day she'd watched her father turn and the world she'd grown up in reduced to ash and flame.

Coming to terms with the fact that Lewis had probably only stayed with her because she'd been weaker took longer. Finally understanding it'd been that disparity that'd made him feel strong – that'd made him feel powerful and in control. Up until the island anyway.

The self reflection that'd come after the fact had been ugly.

She mourned them all in her own way, but she never could bring herself to mourn Archer. They told her over and over that she'd been the only survivor. The only one they'd pulled from the water. But deep down she'd never really believed it. There were just some people that didn't die easily. And from the moment she'd caught sight of him angling slow and confident towards the line cars on the island, she knew that was exactly what she was looking at.

If the reanimation virus had taught her anything, it was the difference between predators and prey. The difference between survivors and people that just hadn't died yet. The difference between who she used to be and who she was now.

So maybe that was why she wasn't surprised when he showed up three weeks after the news broadcast from the coast. Blood spattered and face like a thunderclap. It'd been weeks since the massacre at the refugee camp and the spread of the infection into the surrounding cities. A bit more than a week since it'd hopped continents - following her home. Three days since Marshal law had gone into effect in her city. But mostly, it'd been forty-eight hours since she'd barricaded the doors and started sleeping with a loaded gun under her pillow. Waiting.

"Get in, we'll wait it out," she whispered by way of greeting. Tugging him bodily off the porch steps and inside before the action turned into an awkward half-embrace that had him stuck somewhere between staying stiff-backed and returning it.

She inhaled reflexively as her hands wrapped around his neck. Realizing she'd never had the opportunity to do it before - save for the metallic tang of sweat, curdling blood and singed skin from the processing pens. Automatically breathing in as they'd plastered themselves against the door that'd been their last line of defense.

And as always, Archer didn't disappoint.

He smelled like expelled shot, old denim and bourbon.

She smiled into the dark.

Perfect.

He shook his head into the wisps of her hair as he pulled away first. All jutting chin and sober as she took in a smear of blood that went from his cheek to the filthy collar of his shirt.

"It's worse than they're saying," he gritted. Closing the door behind him with a slam that somehow managed to be soft. Perfectly timed to be masked by the sound of a police car turning onto the street. Patrolling for infected or just curfew breakers as the headlights glinted through the gaps in the blinds. Eyes darting to the gun in her hand and two bags already packed and waiting by the door with an expression that could have been pride if it hadn't been so brief. "Its here. We have less than a day before the party really starts. By then its your best guess what the government might be willing to do to contain it."

We're just an island.

The words rebounded.

She'd heard them somewhere.

A horror movie probably.

What do you do when you're trapped and alone and no one is coming to save you?

What do you do with a diseased little island?

"Did you come all this way for me?" she asked suddenly. Biting her lip as his head came up. Staring back at her like-

There was a beat.

Then another.

Then-

"I have a place," he said hoarsely. Ducking his head but not before she taught the glint of his eyes in the dark. Wondering if he knew how much they gave away as she swallowed the lump in her throat. "By the coast. It's fully stocked. Safe. There's a safe room- a bunker."

Somewhere outside a siren started wailing.

It reminded her of the recording safely filed away on her phone.

The one where her father told her with his eyes that he was about to die.

She nodded. Letting the action smooth the tiny hairs that were trying their best to prickle across the back of her neck. Shouldering her bag as he grabbed the other, thumping the metal buckle into the door frame behind him. Accidentally cutting into the drywall as drizzling, pearl-grey flakes started hushing across the carpet.

"Then let's go."

"Go- you go first. I'll hold them back."

"No!"

"Melanie, go...I'll be right behind you, promise. Go! Go! Go! Go!"

"What happened you?" she asked, watching the fifth military officer in under two hours stuff the curl of pound notes Archer handed them into their pocket. Seeing the reflection through the rear-view mirror as they waved them through the checkpoint with tension burning in her chest. Deliberately not asking how or why, but deciding she deserved an answer to at least one of her questions as he grimaced into the smoky air.

His fingers were calloused and thick against the steering wheel as the lights from the check point gradually faded from view. Making them the only point of light in miles as the towns around them suffered through the mandatory blackout. Conserve power. Prevent accidents. But more importantly, don't draw attention from the infected. They'd lost entire cities that way. Mowed down and crushed by massive herds all converging at once. She still remembered the smell.

"I made it out, just like you," he answered, mostly without inflection. Calloused tips gliding across the expensive leather in a way she could actually hear as she kept her hand on the cool metal of her Glock. Still not sure about the thigh holster he'd tossed her the moment they made it to the sleek luxury sedan parked out front. Hood already dented and stained tacky-red. Proof enough that getting to her hadn't been easy.

She eyed him archly, shivering as he turned the air conditioner on blast. Knowing when she was being bullshitted.

"I didn't want to die," he told her blandly. Like that'd been what she'd really been asking. Unmoved by her expression but firm enough that when he shifted gears and revved the engine she knew he meant it. "I just wasn't afraid to die. There's a difference, Melanie. Besides, it was a judgement call. Never been much good at free-climbing anyway."

There was a ghost of a smirk there, haunting the very backdrop of his expression. Like he was laughing at his own expense as the orange glow of the street lights punched the hollows below his eyes a couple millimeters deeper with every pass.

"After I emptied my clip I just pushed through them. Turns out there wasn't as many as there looked. I was able to get ahead of the main crush and just ran for it. I found my way outside and well- you know the rest."

She shook her head.

Not even close.

"Why didn't the rescue boats pick you up?" she questioned, attention caught when they roared past a car crash still hazing smoke. Front hood crumpled against an electrical pole as a trio of shambling shapes lit up like bloody dust in the glow of the headlights.

Archer didn't even slow down.

She said nothing.

"I popped out on the west side of the island, nearly brained myself on the rocks and got swept up in a rip-current. Almost fucking died anyway. The choppers were focused on the docking end. Not where I was. So it was easy to slip past before they tightened their grid patterns."

The question of why tried it's best to push past the seam of her lips.

"Lucky for me I hire good people. I own an aviation company - among other things. One of my pilots was monitoring the channels and heard about the strike, he was able to get me out before the coast guard expanded their search," he remarked, shaking his head ruefully despite his eyes never once leaving the road.

Her father had been a journalist. He'd been able to smell lies and inconsistencies a mile off. That was why he'd been out in the streets when containment failed. He'd known that the government was lying. Lying about something big. But he'd always known the stories not to touch. Sometimes the past was better left there. Sometimes, when it was harmless enough, there was no reason to drag it back up. He'd told her that the mark of a good journalist was someone that knew the difference.

"It's for the best," Archer continued, twirling the wheel gradually to avoid some debris on she didn't see until the last minute. Heart jumping into her throat as her nails bit into the leather exterior of the arm rest. "I had no intention of getting tangled up in all that cock-measuring government bureaucracy. Besides, Sadie's stuff? It had to get out there. Another voice, especially mine, probably would have taken away from it."

There was another story there.

Lurking the backdrop of the words he'd let go of so casually.

Still, she let it rest.

She had a feeling Archer was the kind of person you picked your battles with.

"It was strange though," he started, only to shake his head and look like he regretted saying anything. Punching the radio as they listened to the same repeating emergency broadcast before he growled under his breath and switched it off again. "Hell, maybe I did hit my head."

The tone was unfamiliar enough for her to look up, wishing she could see his face. Suddenly wanting to know what uncertainty looked like when it was caught between stubble and frown-lines.

"What was it?"

He shook his head again.

"Nothing, probably. It's just- when I hit the water -I don't know if it was the force, how I landed or even if I hit something going down, but I remember getting caught underneath the water in some sort of current. Felt like I was stuck in a washing machine. It didn't matter how much I kicked, it had me. And when I was down there, drowning, I saw- I saw something in the water. Flashes. Things that should have been memories only none of them were familiar."

Her hand curved carefully around the seat-rest.

"What did you see?"

His expression was rueful again, only this time with a curling upper lip that threatened a snarl just as much as it did a self-depreciating laugh.

"Another life?"

There was a small question mark tacked onto the end. Like part of him didn't want to question what he'd seen out of respect for it - despite knowing how impossible it sounded.

A muscle in her cheek ticked.

She'd admit that some days it felt like anything was possible.

But this?

"Tell me," she said simply, knowing it was the right thing to say even before the line of his shoulders sagged. Like he'd expected her to laugh or worse. Clearly not knowing that there was very little Archer could say that she wasn't ready to believe.

"Believe me, I know how it sounds. But it wasn't what they say- you know? That you relive your life before you die or some shit. It was like something got mixed up and I was looking at someone else's memories, someone else's entire life. Like somehow the two of us were dying at the same damned time and our wires got crossed. Because thing was, it was me, but it wasn't me. Some things were the same, but most of it? It was like looking at a completely different person. Makes no damn sense, I know. But-"

Behind them a set of headlights appeared in the distance. Cutting Archer off like an unwanted opinion.

Alternative universes.

That was where her mind went automatically.

It was people's choices that made things different.

It was what set timelines apart, so bad television theorized.

Decisions and actions were all we really were in the end, after all.

"God damn it," he cursed, eying the headlights as they seemed to get closer rather than dropping behind. Matching their speed and gaining as he pressed down on the accelerator.

"Were they doing any better than us?" she said, meaning it to be playful only to have the expression fall flat when the lines on his forehead only deepened.

"Worse," he bit off, still watching the headlights behind them. "The infection was just starting, only it was world-wide and in the United states – maybe even started there. I guess no one thought of a Brimstone Protocol. They fire-bombed the major cities when containment failed but it wasn't enough. It wasn't a war. It was the end. Everyone for themselves. You could see it. People scattering where they could, making plans, trying to stay alive."

The headlights behind them flickered out. But the tension in Archer's muscles only tightened.

"This other you, what was he like?" she asked quietly. Not saying anything when he switched off the headlights. Taking his foot off the gas slowly until they were coasting, struggling to gain momentum. Careful not to light-up the brake lights as she realized what he was planning.

"Soft," he grunted. Turning the wheel sharply as another car wreck glinted just ahead. Kicking up a spray of gravel as he maneuvered them around the back of the car. Easing closer and closer until the crumpled metal partially hid them. Letting the concrete barrier bring them to a sudden halt before he cut the engine and waited. "He didn't make it."

Predators and prey.

Maybe that version of him never had the chance to learn.

Maybe.

They watched the road in silence. Waiting like she remembered on the island - tense and fearful every time his hand went up. Straining to hear. Straining to see. Straining to know why he looked so tense when all she could see was trees and wild grass. He'd been on another wave length from the start. Even Lewis had commented on it.

"Look at him, he's living."

At the time it'd made her wonder what'd he been doing before.

If he hadn't been living until he'd looked down the sight of his rifle, what did that mean?

And worse, what did that make her?

What had she been doing since the end of the war?

Living?

Or just surviving?

"There was someone with him in the end. They- he- ended it," Archer finished quietly. Catching her eyes in the rear-view mirror.

She thought about Nevans and Jack. She thought about Lewis and the shocked finality that'd lived and died in his eyes as he looked from her to the gun she'd pressed into his hand.

"He was with someone he loved," she said carefully. Pausing for a long moment before voicing the rest. "He was lucky."

Her chest seized tight when the car that'd been trailing them rolled up beside the tangle of cars. Nothing but a barely visible gleam, given away only by momentum and the screen of the GPS lit-up on the dash.

Go past.

Just go past.

Please.

She didn't close her eyes. Instead she turned her head and watched the easy way he reached for his rifle. Gradual and slow. Confident even as the headlights blinded them as the car eased to a stop. Inspecting the wreck as two men in military camo argued animatedly in the front – all cut-throat gestures and muffled words.

"Then what happened?" she whispered, voice so calm it didn't even sound like hers. Sucking in a deep, shuddering breath as the passenger door cracked open. Flinching as one of them leaned out of the cab, shining a flashlight that fell on them like a spot-light.

Oh god.

"Easy," he murmured, hand ghosting over the curve of her stomach. Keeping her firmly in her seat as the man with the flashlight made another pass. "Don't move. They won't see us if we don't move."

But instead of making her shy, the solid weight of him against her belly made her bold. Open. It made something in her want to give rather than shy away. Feeling a surge of heat arrow down to her core. Making her suddenly paranoid that he could feel it through her shirt. Wondering what the hell was wrong with her before she realized he was speaking again.

"Then- then I just- popped up. My fingers found the surface and I broke water," he rasped. The corner of his mouth twitching as the man with the flashlight cursed and turned on his heel. Gesturing to the driver to start the engine. "Just when I figured I wasn't going to make it, suddenly there was air. I tossed up water for what felt like hours, and then there was a helicopter beating above me. Blinding me with salt water and wind and my man was lowering a basket. It wasn't until they got me into the bird that they told me the military had pulled one person out of the water. And I knew- I knew it was you."

The car drove away, belching exhaust.

But they stayed that way.

Chained with flesh to oblivion.

He exhaled slowly, not looking at her, but like he knew it. Fingers flexing just so against the soft of her stomach. Thumb brushing over the barest curve of a rib-bone before stilling again. Like he knew this wasn't something they could shrug off or walk away from without things being different.

Change was a requirement of life.

But sometimes it was as terrifying as it was essential.

"I knew you were alive too," she murmured. Meaning it in a way that didn't quite register until it was out in the open. Suddenly needing him to believe it as she looked up at him through the fan of her lashes.

His smile was all in his eyes this time as he inclined his head and started the car. Easing them around the wreck and back onto the road. Headlights off as his hand slowly pulled away. Leaving her colder than before and feeling like she'd lost something.

The person she'd been before The Rezort would have left it there.

Too cautious and afraid to take the chance.

But that wasn't her anymore.

Instead, she reached forward and rested her hand on his thigh. Smiling small into the dark as the muscles underneath her hand jumped. Daring to look as his expression changed. Morphing into something between surprise and contentment. Melding tension and a desperate sort of want – the type that screamed about the honesty of skin against skin.

Even then it wasn't enough.

It seemed only natural when her hand gravitated to the curl of his palm. Nudging entry until she could feel the rasp of his callouses across the small of her hand. Resting it there until something shifted – broke – giving way as he sighed through his nose and wove their fingers together. Squeezing her hand, gentle and quiet as she remembered how to breathe again.

It was enough, for now.

A/N: There will be two more chapters, stay tuned. Thank you for reading, please let me know what you think.

Reference:

- Adevism: the denial of gods from mythology and legend.