I recently started Z nation on DVD and I'm loving it. The episode "Going Nuclear" gave me some serious fanfic desires so I indulged. This is a small multi chap that'll I'll be regularly updating weekly, until finished. This is alternating POV's between 10K and Cassandra.
"Somebody needs to do something to cheer up the kid." Doc told the group as a whole.
Murphy snorted sitting down on a chair."Why don't you go handle the teenage angst as our self-appointed moral officer. I've got enough shit to be bothered with without listening to some more."
Warren glared at Murphy and he broke off what he had been about to say and instead took a large gulp from the last of his vodka bottle. Cassandra flicked her eyes back to 10K,. He was outside the fence perimeter and had wandered a short ways from the group and she could just see him walking towards the creek that wound by Homer's cabin.
"I don't care about what you think Murphy. If you don't shut up and sit down, you're going to regret it. We gotta get you to California but just how intact you gotta be is negotiable."
Cassandra heard all Murphy start to reply only to see receive a sharp rebuke from Warren. "Murphy, I'm warning you."
The conversation between Doc and Warren started up again behind her. 10K was almost out of sight in the trees now. Cassandra wasn't sure how she felt about him. It was obvious he liked her...and whether it was nothing more than a crush on the only available female in the group remotely his age or something more, it still complicated things. 10K was a bit younger than her but that was much less an issue now. Age didn't matter when most of the population wouldn't live long enough to see more than a few years if they were lucky anyhow.
What complicated things was more her own feelings. She wasn't ready for a relationship yet, she didn't know when if ever she would be anytime soon. 10K was nice enough, polite , deadly, and smart, all great things for a potential partner in the Zombie apocalypse. But ever since Philly she couldn't stop thinking about what she had been made to do. How what the people she had thought were safe and were her friends and been the same ones whoring her out and trying to turn her into a willing cannibal.
The thought of another man's skin against her own made her sick...and yet 10K was 10K. He had saved her countless times, he had helped rescue her in Philly and he had ridden out the freak tornado with her . And he had never asked or more importantly tried to take anything in return...in this post-apocalyptic madness finding somebody like that was rare enough.
"I'm telling you the kid is torn up. " Doc was continuing behind her. "You didn't hear all that happened in the core like we did, it was bad Warren. He freaked out, was calling Homer dad, kept refusing to shoot him and that was after the guy turned into a zombie."
"As I told you we all have it Present Traumatic Stress no big—"
"SHUT UP MURPHY" both Warren and Doc yelled it this time.
Warren spoke this time. "What are we going to do Doc? It's 10K , he barely talks under normal circumstances...he's definitely not going to want to talk it out now."
"Send the girl, he'll be willing to do a lot more than talk it out with her." Murphy continued now starting to sing loudly off-key. "And when I get that feeling, I want sexual healing—Owww! God damn-it Warren that hurt."
Cassandra didn't turn around, but she could feel her cheeks blushing at what Murphy had said.
"You know that isn't half a bad idea..."
Warren nodded in agreement with Doc, "Cassandra -Cassandra!"
She turned around the second time her name was called even though she had heard Warren the first time. She already knew what was coming.
Warren walked closer, her lips pressed tightly in her nonsense expression that had become even more common since Garnett died and she had assumed de-facto leadership of the group. "We need you to go talk to 10K, Homer dying shook him up." Warren crouched down and lowered her voice. " and even though I hate to agree with that degenerate, Murphy's right. 10K will talk to you, if we've all got a chance of surviving we need everybody to keep it together."
Cassandra nodded. It wasn't like she had much choice. Somebody needed to go after him, and she was the best option but that didn't mean she had to like it.
"Here it's getting dark, take this" Warren passed over her machete. Cassandra slipped it into her own belt holster and set off. It was only a thin stand of trees so she had little warning before she stumbled onto 10k.
She would have laughed in another life. 10K was standing there buck naked except for one of his numerous guns aimed dead centre at her. As it was his face coloured when he saw who it was.
Cassandra felt her own face flush. She should have realised that 10K had probably left the group partly to be alone but also because he hadn't had a chance to wash off after being in the Nuclear plant and possibly being exposed.
Cassandra quickly turned around as she heard him struggling into his clothes. "Sorry, I didn't know you were—" She broke off saying the word naked sounded weird and by the time she thought to substitute bathing it would have been too awkward.
"Yeah, Ho—, that engineer guy said to wash after we—I—got out. Apparently those rad suits were too old to be perfectly safe." 10K laughed but it was forced. "I guess it wasn't only that hot suit that was making me feel like a baked potato."
Cassandra didn't really find anything funny about what had happened. High levels of radiation, a doomsday reactor, radioactive zombies and a suicide run to shut the whole thing down wasn't a laughing matter but she knew why 10K needed to laugh. It was the apocalypse, no either laugh or cry, it was either laugh or curl up in a corner and die.
"Shit—" Cassandra turned around at the groan to find 10K had his trousers in place but he was bent over hands on his knees with his shirt held in his hand.
Cassandra moved over, forgetting her own awkwardness as she noted how pale he was. She placed a hand on his still damp shoulder and maybe it was her imagination but he felt a little warm.
"What's wrong?"
He took a moment before replying and in that space she saw him swallow convulsively twice then he answered. "Nothing I just feel a little dizzy."
He straightened up pulling his shirt on. And Cassandra used the opportunity to study him. His face was deathly pale, his eyes were squinted like something was hurting him. She moved from there to studying his face closer, noting the angles of his face, the way his hair stuck up, the—.
"Is there something on my face?"
Cassandra jerked startled at the unexpected comment. 10K was staring at her and if it had been anybody else she would have thought it was a joke. But this was 10K who was largely clueless about most in-jokes, a lot of pop-culture and typical experiences that had been so common before the apocalypse.
Rather than admit to what she had been doing she reached up running and thumb across his cheek. "Yeah, right there. Dirt or something."
"Thanks." He slung his rifle over his shoulder. She thought he would start back towards the cabin but instead and seemed to decide otherwise a few steps from the creek as he abruptly changed course and settled against a tree.
"Tired?" Cassandra hesitated then sat next to him. The sun was setting and it would be dark soon, staying her after dark was begging for trouble from Z's. But she rationalised that a few more minutes wouldn't hurt. Plus 10K looked like he needed a brief rest.
"Yeah."
Seconds passed then 10K cleared his throat. "Thanks."
Cassandra glanced at him "For what?"
He leaned forward and grabbed a pebble tossing it in the creek before answering. "For back at the Nuclear plant..." His eye met hers for just the briefest moment before he grabbed another stone and flipped it around in his fingers. "I kinda lost it back there and you telling me to get out of there . Well it got through—"
Cassandra wasn't sure if he had misinterpreted her actions and she wasn't even sure of what she had meant back there. All that had been clear was that somebody needed to talk him out or he was going to do something crazy like stay in there with Homer's zombiefied body or try to rescue the un-dead man. She hadn't been thinking about 10K specifically, just as one of their group...or had she? Cassandra shook her head mentally chastising herself. She wasn't sure of the answer and it wasn't important. It was the goddamn apocalypse not time to think about feelings and what not. She couldn't afford for her actions to be anything more than trying to help a valuable member of their misfit tea. She needed 10K to understand that and she needed to make sure she didn't lose track of it either. So she said. "Well Doc was yelling for you too; we were all worried."
There was silence then which she felt needed to be filled. "That was brave back there." Really had she just said that? Cassandra mentally chided herself again, here was another reason why 10K wasn't good for her, his presence was turning her into one of those cheesy stars from those pre-apocalypse movies.
"It was just Z's...radioactive Z's... but still Z's." He shrugged. "Nothing new."
Cassandra thought he wasn't going to speak again then he added. "And it wasn't brave...if I had been I would have found a way to save Homer."
"He was a dead man from the moment his suit breached, maybe even before that. I don't think he wanted to live ."
She had meant the comment as a consolation (comfort wasn't her strong suit) but 10K turned to her. His eyes were a bit wild and she would've bet the moisture shining was the start of tears. "You don't get it. It wasn't about that. I'm the one that failed him, I' the one that should have saved him!"
Cassandra softened her voice even as his got louder. "You did what you could 10—"
He shook his head not even listening anymore. "He went into that core so I didn't. He took a bullet for me. He became a Z and I lived. He saved me and I couldn't save him...I couldn't save him." His voice fell at the need to a whisper.
Cassandra couldn't begin to decipher what all he was talking about. Homer hadn't been shot before entering the reactor, but understanding the story wasn't what was important ,it was being there for 10K.
Murphy's present traumatic stress be damned, they were each entitled to a little breakdown occasionally especially the way the last few weeks had been going.
10K had turned away and even though he was trying to hide it she could hear the muffled breaths and sniffing as he tried to hold back the tears.
She reached out grabbing his hand, his palm was clammy and warm in her grip. He turned at her touch and she held her voice firm as she met his eyes. "You didn't save him...you couldn't save him...but you did save me and Doc, Warren, Murphy, probably a whole bunch of others...It's the apocalypse you can't save everyone...even the people that matter the most to you."
10K stared at her for a long moment, then blurted out. "I'll always find a way to save you." He immediately looked embarrassed.
Cassandra wasn't sure how to respond, she tried to make it sound more like a joke but it came out sincerer than she had intended. "I know." She quickly followed up before the moment could become too awkward. "Now get up and let's go back to be zombie killing bad asses. The apocalypse stops for no one"
10K smiled at that then added. "You forget that Murphy's mouth doesn't either, we'll be lucky if he hasn't eaten all of dinner."
"True"
Next update: Next Wednesday...p.s. I do like Cassandra/10K but I think it's really complicated...and so I want to explore some of those issues...Cassandra's issues with being forced to prostitute herself, 10K's loneliest and guilt over his father. and of course the overwhelming issue of the zombie apocalypse.
