Author's Note:

Hello my amazingly patient people! That's right, Waggy's got a chapter done! I've been working on this thing off and on since Christmas, mostly on the bus between classes at school, and I'm super glad to have it done. It's also the longest chapter yet, which might be partly why it took so long. Who knows?

Now that this is complete, I'd like to assure anyone who's following me waiting for a chapter of House Call that I'm officially focusing on the next chapter of it now. I have to outline the chapter to get my timeline working, but it will actually be in progress now. Thank you so much for your patience, you're all amazing followers and I'm constantly astounded by your dedication to my silly stories.

This story's almost wrapping up! I estimate about 3 more chapters; just a matter of getting it all typed up.

Without further ado, hope you enjoy!


Chapter 7: The Escalation - in which a map would be very useful.

The rain wasn't letting up any more than the infected were. Each rumble of thunder sent another throb of pain through Carter's head, and he had to make a conscious effort at keeping his face from showing it. It didn't seem like there were any more infected adding to the mass outside, but those were definitely a problem enough by themselves. The bars hadn't bent significantly yet, but the occasional creak would still echo through the laundromat and make all three of them freeze and look over at the window nervously.

Steven had taken to pacing the length of the room. His gun was clutched tightly in his hands and dark eyes mostly remained on the drenched floor. Carter alternated between watching him, the window, and Hank, who was still leaning against the wall. The blonde man looked exhausted, his his eyes mostly remaining closed. Considering how much blood he had lost, it was understandable. Most people wouldn't make it through an average day on these streets, even without getting their hands sliced open.

Another clap of thunder made the floor shudder and Carter could hear Steven swear as he paused his pacing to look at the other two.

"Any ideas?" When no one jumped to answer he spun around again and went to the back wall, looking it over as if expecting to see something suddenly materialize in front of him. "There's gotta be some back way, some maintenance door or something..."

"No doors, no other windows," Hank muttered, his eyes still closed. "Whoever built this place wasn't very worried of being trapped inside. Not like washing machines are gonna attack, is it?"

"There's got to be something. There's no way in hell I'm dying in a laundromat..."

Carter noticed himself tapping restlessly at the crowbar in his hand and stilled the motion, glancing out into the rain. Most of his view of the street was blocked off by the mass of bodies, but from what he could see the entire area was flooding. Nothing had been cleaned in weeks and the storm drains were too clogged to do their jobs properly. The storm was dumping gallons of water pretty consistently. He wondered if there had been a hurricane warning he had missed before the infection hit. The thunder wasn't letting up, and a particularly loud crack made him squeeze his eyes shut as his head throbbed sharply.

Badnoise, loudnoisehurt, bad...

The sound of a metal door snapping shut made the young man look around again quickly and it took him a moment to spot Steven moving up the row of dryers, opening each and peering inside them.

"What are you looking for?" Steven glanced up from his work briefly. His face was set, determined, perhaps even a little defiant.

"Anything," he growled. "Someone was in this place before us. There's no reason to board up a place that doesn't have anything worthwhile in it, is there?" Carter vaguely wondered when anything in the entire situation had ever had an ounce of reason behind it. Even so, Steven had never been one to sit down and accept imminent death. No, he would fight it tooth and nail for as long as possible. It was probably the main reason the man was still alive.

Another moan of the metal bars got Hank to stand fully, his arms crossed a little awkwardly to compensate for the bandages. He didn't look worried. Come to think of it, Hank rarely looked actually worried. When things were going bad he either looked almost angry at the situation or just resigned.

"Not to state the obvious, but we gotta get somethin'," he said, shooting a look back at Steven quickly. "Is there any way to distract the things?"

"You mean aside from live bait?" There was a slightly awkward silence, interrupted once by a crack of thunder, before Steven slammed another dryer door shut and turned to stare at the window. One hand ran back through his hair impatiently, only succeeding in making it stand even more on end. "Need either a distraction or some...hand grenade or something."

"Didn't find that in the store, that's for sure..."

Steven returned to his search with a muttered curse and Hank went to stand beside Carter, eyeing the snarling crowd of infected. Not for the first time, the younger man was struck by just how small he was in comparison. Hank hadn't given many details about his life before the outbreak, but he looked like he could've easily been involved in football or weight-lifting or something similar. He was starting to look thinner than he had in the beginning, but that wasn't unexpected considering the amount of exercise they were getting daily and the lack of real substantial food.

"Always forget how many of them there are," the blond man muttered. "Don't really think about it until they get like this."

"Were there any...numbers or anything before the news shut down?"

"Probably nothin' accurate. They were tryin' to keep panic down, ya know?" He let out a breath and shook his head. "Some stations were just sayin' it was bad. Best estimate I heard was maybe seventy-percent infection rate, but it probably got worse after the power shut down."

Seventy...hell, how many is that? Carter didn't know how many people were supposed to be in the city, but it wasn't a small one. That meant thirty percent had been uninfected, and judging by how many other survivors they had seen it was likely that most of them had been killed already. He had no idea if it had gotten worldwide or if there were any settlements that had held out. All they had was a chance of finding the army at the school and getting some kind of evacuation to...somewhere else.

Another flash of lightning made the younger man flinch and the thunder that followed set the infected snarling a little louder. What do they attack in a thunderstorm? Apparently whatever was convenient. Not like they could go after the weather itself.

"I think I got - this one's not opening." They glanced over at Steven - what little could be seen of his head above one of the dryers - and he straightened suddenly with a satisfied noise. "Hell, I knew it. Got a duffel bag in here." Hank spun around quickly and crossed the room, crouching next to the bag as Steven tossed it on the floor.

"Guess someone was planning on comin' back for it," he muttered. Carter let himself look over at the still-growling crowd reaching through the window before he went to join the other two just as Steven was yanking at the zipper. "Dunno why anyone would want to backtrack through this mess..."

The bag appeared to have been thrown together as some sort of emergency kit in a last-minute attempt to prepare for travel. There were some water bottles that were, thankfully, still sealed, a bag of trail mix, and what looked like some kind of granola bars. A jacket had been rolled up at the bottom and Steven frowned a little when he pulled it out.

"Something in this, I think..."

The sleeves had been tied and it took a little fumbling to get the knot out before he managed to unwrap the bundle and pull out one fairly long red cylinder. Hank raised a brow when Steven held it up to the light.

"They got dynamite in an emergency kit?"

"Be nice, but not quite." For the first time in days Steven looked like he was halfway considering a smile. There was a little relief in his expression, at the very least. "Road flare. Usually use it to signal for help, but something tells me it could be a damn decent distraction."

Carter glanced over his shoulder at the crowd of infected still clawing through the bars and winced a little as the metal gave another protesting creak.

"Think they'll go after it?"

"I've seen them attacking cars that still had their blinkers on," the older man pointed out. "I think if we chuck it close enough they might pay more attention to the new light show than a smell. It should clear out enough of them to let us sneak by, at least." Hank actually looked a little impressed.

"How long you think it'll last?"

"Depends on the type but I figure these can go ten minutes, at the very least."

"That's enough of a head-start for me." The blond man grinned - he was always the one who found it easiest to smile, even when they were mere feet away from at least thirty snarling infected - and stood, though a little cautiously. "I just wanna get out of this damn room."

"Carter?" The young man felt himself a jump a little when he realized he was suddenly being addressed and his eyes snapped over to Steven. "Any input?" He let himself hesitate a moment, running the idea over his head before shrugging.

"Seems worth a shot. It's not like we have many other options, right?"

"We haven't had many options from day one." Steven twisted the cap off, rubbing a finger over what Carter assumed was the ignitor as if he was testing it. "Grab the stuff; we're getting the hell out of this place."

They packed the supplies back up quickly, adding the food from the duffel bag into Carter's backpack. Steven pulled the new jacket on over his own and stood as close to the window as he could while still being out of reach of the groping arms, staring through the crowd into the still-flooding street.

"There's an awning on the building next to us," he said. "This isn't going to do a damn thing in three feet of water, so I'd say that's the best bet." He turned to look over the other two quickly and frowned a little thoughtfully. "We need a good arm..."

Hank blinked when two sets of eyes fell on him and lifted his bandaged hands with a grimace.

"Not gonna do much good with these. Couldn't hold onto anythin' very well right now, and throwin' it would be iffy at best."

"I was worried about that." Steven let out a breath and raised an eyebrow at Carter. "Don't suppose you were a pro baseball player and forgot to tell us, huh, kid?" The younger man shook his head.

"Tried to play in middle school. That wasn't a good idea for anyone involved."

There was a cap on top of the lid that came off with a snap and Steven examined it critically before swearing under his breath. He didn't look at all eager to suddenly be the one responsible for the distraction and Carter wondered just how much experience he had with things like road flares in the first place.

"Alright, let's get this over with...got everything?" The others gave a nod in the affirmative. It was quick work to get what little barricades they had set up moved from the door and Hank kept himself braced against it in case the infected suddenly decided to turn their attention to the weaker point.

Steven stared out the window again for a few moments and then glanced down at flare. His expression was some mixture of wariness and stubborn determination, but it seemed the stubborn side won out. He struck whatever was on top of the cap against the top of the flare sharply and held it away from himself quickly when a sudden bright shower of sparks leapt from the ignitor.

Carter could see the infected's attention shift suddenly; their eyes snapped over to the light and it was as if the idea of getting to the humans inside had suddenly vanished in favor of getting to this new sparkly attraction. Steven waved the stick a few times, letting out what might've once been a bark of a laugh when the crowd followed its movements intently with renewed groans and snarls.

"You want it, you sick little freaks, fine by me." He took another short moment to analyze the throw and then hurled the flare out into the rain.

It was obvious as soon as the thing was in the air - well, maybe not obvious to the others, Carter realized, but definitely obvious to him - that the throw was off. He watched it even as the infected all turned to follow it, as the three survivors were pushing out into the street again and were immediately knee-deep in the water.

The flare did manage to hit the awning, at least. It just didn't hit well. The mob went surging after it, chasing the spitting, sparkling lights as they arced through the rain. The end of the flare struck the edge of the awning, bounced off, and fell straight into the street. It was quickly submerged in about three feet of water.

The three men froze, staring as the infected surrounded the now-dimmed light, clawing at the water and screeching their displeasure. It managed to last a good four or five seconds before they could see the red light flicker a few times, and then it seemed to decide that sparks weren't very effective under water. There were another few seconds in which the clawing and snarling continued, but it didn't take long for them to realize that the new prey had died off quickly. The street fell silent, save the steady sound of the downpour, and then another soft growl rose from the crowd as one of the mutilated faces turned back toward the survivors.

"Oh, you have got to be -" Steven swore and spun around, shouting what was probably an unnecessary "Run!" over his shoulder.

Still sore, exhausted, stuck in knee-deep water, and now soaked to the skin again, they ran.

It was impossible to differentiate between the sidewalk and the street anymore; everything had turned brown and there was unidentifiable debris being pulled along by the current. In some way, they were a little lucky; running against the flow of water would've been even more exhausting than going downstream. That was probably the only upside to the entire thing, of course. The crowd behind them seemed far less hindered by the water and gained ground steadily. Carter found himself fending off a groping arm or two by swinging his crowbar blindly. Steven was attempting to keep the pace even with his sprained ankle while keeping his gun out of the rain as much as possible, and Hank had nothing to defend himself with but his wrapped hands.

The weather wasn't letting up at all. Cracks of thunder still made Carter wince and sent the infected into another screeching frenzy. It was almost as if they were blaming the humans for the weather and expected it to get better once the instigators were eaten. Yeah, because zombies have logic.

He could see Steven go down out of the corner of his eye, see his bad leg suddenly sink further into the water than it it seemed like it should and the man stumble. That was all it took for the faster infected to catch up and there was a swarm on him in less than a second. Carter spun immediately, vaguely realized he was shouting Hank's name before he was suddenly in the middle of everything.

A small part of his mind noticed that he absolutely no idea what he was doing. Everything was relying on instinct, on reaction, on a sudden strange rage that had suddenly enveloped everything. He could tell Hank had come back and was working to pull Steven out of the crowd, using elbows and kicks to deter anything that got too close.

The sounds of the infected screeches and cracking bone under metal were almost drowned out by the roar of wind and rain. There was blood spreading out in the water, beginning to flow down the current that used to be a street.

Badblood, badsmell, nogoodnotprey.

The sudden snap of gunfire cut through everything else and the flash of the muzzle was nearly lost in a burst of lightning. Steven was up and apparently his gun was still functioning. Hank had resorted to simple hits, just trying to get their attackers far back enough to be shot. The bullets were being used sparingly, carefully, and a distant part of Carter's rational mind noted that it was probably to avoid hitting him by accident.

Badprey, badpreydie...

"Carter!" He could hear the voice, but it didn't really sink in, didn't really have any meaning over the haze in his mind. His focus was on the thrashing bodies around him, dodging any attempts to grab him, spinning around to face the new opponent... "Carter, we gotta go!" A touch on his shoulder made the young man whirl around, teeth bared in a snarl. The hand was withdrawn quickly and it took a second or two for the face to come into focus. Steven's eyes were wide and he had taken a half step back. After a slight hesitation he let the gun lower slightly. "The slower ones will catch up in a second; we have to move, now."

Carter realized his crowbar was still brandished and he forced himself to lower it some, brown eyes doing a nervous sweep of the area. There were bodies strewn around the street, most half-submerged and - he was vaguely surprised to see - most with their heads caved in.

"Was - was that -"

"I mean now, kid!"

They took off again, at a slightly slower run since the infected that were left tended to have broken legs or other various stages of decay that kept them from moving quite as quickly.

They had run like this once before, he could remember. It was near the beginning right after the two older men had found him; there hadn't been nearly as many after them then, but they had been just as relentless. It had taken far too long to shake the things, dodging through back alleys, climbing over fences, and the like.

By the time they had lost their pursuers that time, it was easy to tell that Carter was definitely the least athletic of the three. Hank looked like the type to be out running on a regular basis, but Steven continuously surprised them both with his level of endurance. He had never given very extensive reasons for it, though Carter and Hank used to joke that he worked for the CIA before the outbreak - he definitely looked the type. In contrast, however, Carter had been out of breath after the first few blocks. It had been mostly adrenaline and the threat of a painful death that had kept him going back then.

Today...today was different. He had no idea how far they had gone, but if anything it felt like the fighting had given him even more energy. Hank already looked exhausted - partly from the blood-loss earlier, he was sure - and Steven was panting heavily, his limp more pronounced. Carter felt almost invigorated. His mind was racing, half-coherent thoughts flashing across it before he had time to really tell what they meant. Muscles were burning, but it didn't register as pain. Somehow it was doubtful just a few weeks of sneaking around with occasional sprints could suddenly get him in shape...but he didn't have time to consider it at the moment.

"Where - where're we going, Hank?" Steven managed to grind out between breaths. Carter noted that, while he could vaguely recognize a street or two just by name, he had no idea where they were. Hank was staring around a little frantically and let out a breathless curse.

"Goin' the wrong way, s'what we're doin'," he told them. "Got turned north - goin' straight back into the city."

"Can't really double back," Carter pointed out, realizing just how obvious of a statement that was a moment later. "Is there somewhere to circle around?"

"I don't...dammit, I don't know. We gotta find somewhere to stop, I can't exactly plan a route on the run..." Hank had been their guide from the start. While all three of the men lived in the city before the outbreak, Hank had grown up here. He claimed he'd never seen any real reason to leave, and that gave him the advantage of knowing not only the streets and potential places to find food, but obscure abandoned warehouses and which sections of the city were more likely to be picked clean already. Generally, Steven would think up some basic idea of a plan and Hank would tell them how to get there. In the state they were all in now, however, it had to be a good deal harder.

Carter realized that he had pulled a little bit ahead of the others and let himself pause a moment, his empty hand going to lean against a lamp post as he scanned the area around them. He could feel - actually feel - his mind working furiously, analyzing things his conscious mind didn't even know were important.

Dangerstill, indangertooexposed, badpreyfight, toomanytoomanytofight...

The young man shook his head sharply to try and clear it, glancing back at his companions as they caught up. The infected were getting farther behind, but they gained ground steadily and, unlike their targets, didn't tire out.

Can'tseetoolowtoolow, can'tseecan'tfight, toolow...

"We at least need a...direction, some plan..." Steven was keeping his weight off of his bad ankle as he hesitated long enough to push the wet hair out of his face. "Can't just keep running like this, we're not going anywhere."

"Up." It took both men looking at him curiously for Carter to realize he had actually spoken out loud.

"Up," Steven repeated, his brow furrowing. It wasn't a question, really, but Carter nodded confidently, suddenly sure of the idea, even though he had no idea where it had come from.

"We need a vantage point, somewhere defensible, right? Somewhere they can't all come at us at once. We need a roof." He could see the others weighing the options and Steven looked up a little warily before he steeled his expression again and nodded.

"Right - let's find a roof." Hank drew in a deep breath and seemed to push aside the exhaustion forcibly, glancing back once at the infected that had gotten a good deal closer in the short time they had paused.

"There's a few...apartments down here. Gonna have fire escapes - should work, yeah?" Steven set off without another word and the other two followed automatically. Carter made himself hold back a little this time, matching their pace despite the growing urge to run ahead.

Getupgethigh, toolowtofight, can'tpouncecan'tfight...

The streams of thoughts had gone from occasional spurts to a fairly steady muttering in the back of his mind. It was difficult to block them out anymore and he just had to focus on ignoring the weirder ones, the ones that urged him to leave the others and get to higher ground on his own.

Carter spotted the first metal staircase when he glanced down an alley as they ran, barely visible through the sheets of rain and shadows.

"I got one!" He ducked into the alley, a mixture of instinct and experience telling him his companions would follow. He barely heard a soft moan from one corner and dispatched the idle infected that had been slumped against the wall without thought.

Getup, upnowhavetobehigh, getup.

"The ladder's out, kid." Brown eyes glanced around quickly and narrowed when he spotted the metal ladder, barely sticking out of the water. It might've been just general wear or maybe someone had broken it on purpose, but either way... Hank swore behind him and muttered something to Steven - the words didn't actually sink in as Carter stared around. The persistent mantra continued to ring in his head.

Getup, havetogetup, havetogetupnow.

"Watch my back," he called over a fresh crack of thunder. Carter ignored his companion's inquisitive looks and stared up at the first platform, his hand tightening around his crowbar restlessly. It was fairly high and the logical part of his mind knew it wasn't a feasible jump...but that part was being drowned out by the part that was determined to get up higher.

He was moving before he realized it. Once again, everything was instinct that he didn't know he had before this; an overturned trashcan was used as a push-off point, the muscles in his leg seemed to coil in preparation, and he found himself jumping a hell of a lot higher than he would've been able to before the breakout. The wind was knocked out of him a little when he hit the platform, but it didn't take more than a heartbeat to recover and pull himself up the rest of the way before turning. He flattened himself on his stomach, one ankle hooked around the nearest metal rung and his good hand reached out toward the two men below him.

"Hank, give him a leg up or something." Carter tried to ignore how the curiosity had turned to plain shock, how Steven's face had darkened a little in what could have been suspicion. "That ankle isn't going to hold for any sort of jumping, you know that."

"There's no way you can pull the both of us up -"

"No offense, Steven, but you're practically skin and bones these days." The slight snap in his own voice surprised him and Carter glanced toward the street. "You can help with Hank, but it's either that or wait to be cornered down here. Something tells me we don't have a lot of time to debate it."

Steven exchanged a quick glance with Hank and there seemed to be some sort of silent communication between them before he nodded quickly.

"Right, fine..."

The growing sense of urgency wasn't helping Carter clear his thoughts or keep his focus. He knew suddenly Steven was gripping his arms with a soft hiss of "Hell, kid, watch those nails," knew that somehow they managed to pull Hank onto the platform with them, and that they had enough of a pause to get a bit of breath back before the first infected appeared at the mouth of the alley. With that, they started up toward the roof.

Getupgetup, havetoseeprey, havetobehightoseeprey...

The rain was still coming down in sheets and part of him wondered if they ran more risk of being struck by lightning up here. Regardless, it was less of a risk than being torn apart on the streets. Carter managed to keep his pace slow enough to match the other two, pushing back the instinct that screamed at him to just get off the side of the building as quickly as possible.

The groans of the small horde below them had faded by the time they reached the top of the fire escape. Typically, it didn't actually reach the roof itself - perhaps it was a little pointless having stairs that went all the way up when they were supposed to help people get down - but the apartment that it opened into was quiet. The faint smell of lingering smoke burned the back of his throat and Carter glanced around in an automatic attempt to find the source. There wasn't a good deal of damage, but he could see scorch marks near a door that might have led into the kitchen.

"Think we should hole up in here a while?" Hank's voice was almost drowned out by the continued pounding rain, but it sounded loud in his ears. Carter glanced over at him and could make out the older man's attempts to get his breathing back to normal by resting his hands on the top of his head. "Seems...it's drier, at least."

Steven looked like the idea was tempting, but his eyes were still narrowed as he glanced around the room. It wasn't entirely silent in the building, Carter could tell, but he wasn't sure if the others could pick up on the sounds over the background noise and occasional rolls of thunder.

"We don't know the layout of this place," Steven finally muttered, his free hand pushing wet hair out of his eyes. "I don't want a repeat of that laundromat; too easy to get pinned in rooms like this." The alternative, of course, was being stuck in the rain, but that was preferable to having to fight their way out of another horde. "Come on. Roof access has to be around her somewhere."

They moved slowly through the building, giving a wide berth around broken doors and shadowy rooms. Hank would stop occasionally to pull open drawers and cabinets in search of anything useful, but the place appeared to have been stripped clean. He did grab a slightly tattered coat from off the floor and, ignoring the stains that looked a little too dark to be anything but blood, threw it over his shoulder.

It seemed strange, when considered too carefully, just how apathetic they had all gotten about the state of everything. It didn't matter what sort of stains were on any clothes, as long as they didn't have too many holes. Any slightly flat surface that didn't have jagged metal or anything actively trying to eat them was generally alright to sleep on. It didn't really pay to be picky in the middle of an apocalypse.

Carter found himself getting anxious the longer they spent in search of the stairs. It seemed to be more tense than it had been on the street; out there at least the threat had been visible. In here there were shadows everywhere and the sounds of the storm outside could potentially drown out the sound of anything moving nearby. Every particularly loud crack of thunder left a ringing in the young man's ears and seemed to warp anything he did hear from the doors they were passing.

Badplaceloud, tooloudcan'tsee, needout...

"Think we've got it here." Carter started a little - even speaking so quietly, Steven's voice seemed far too loud - and looked around. The older man was half-hidden by shadows in a doorway that was set back a little from the rest. There was a lighter spot on the wall near it, but the sign had been torn down at some point for whatever reason.

"Stairway clear?" Steven paused to peer a little closer into the shadows and listen. There didn't seem to be anything other than the steady pounding of the rain and the thunder, but Carter didn't figure it would do much good to mention that. The older man nodded decisively after a moment.

"Seems like it. Let's get up there before there are any more surprises."

There were a lot of leaks in the roof that had formed into a few unexpected puddles on the stairs, but that was as dangerous as it got. It took a few hard shoves before the door at the top opened enough for them to squeeze through, and Carter noticed a few bullet holes in it as he brought up the rear. Apparently they hadn't been the only ones to think of taking shelter higher up.

It was a relief to find the rooftop empty, if completely soaked. Most of the drainage systems were clogged and he could see a lower point toward the center where it looked like part of it had actually begun caving in. The three took whatever cover they could get under a small overhang that had - so far - survived the storm. The rain hadn't let up in the slightest since they had gotten inside; whatever had started to dry in the short time they had been sheltered from the weather was promptly soaked again.

"You know where we are?" Steven asked, glancing at Hank as he pulled open his bag and started rooting through it. The other man glanced around briefly before his eyes turned up as he thought.

"This building's on...what, somewhere along Oracle? We backtracked a bit - went too far toward 5th."

"Think you can figure out a route?"

"Yeah, I'll think of somethin'." Steven nodded, pulling a water bottle out of the bag and opening it before handing it to the blonde man.

"We'll rest here a while; seems defensible enough up here. See if the rain lets up a bit."

Carter ran his hand back through his hair, trying to block out the throbbing from the bite wound that had joined his headache. His whole body was telling him to rest, but there was still a coiled tension that didn't want to be ignored. They were as safe as they were going to get for now, yet he still felt like he needed to be ready to jump into a fight at any given moment.

"I can take first watch," the younger man offered, pulling his hood back up despite the knowledge that it wasn't going to do a hell of a lot of good. Steven's expression was carefully closed off when he looked over but he nodded after a moment.

"Alright, go for it." He tossed another water bottle over and Carter caught it before pulling the bag off his shoulders and setting it beside the other two. "Keep out of sight; I'd like to actually get a break for once."

The roof wasn't an ideal place to rest, but at this point he figured they would be happy with anything that wasn't currently under siege by the infected. The rain was relentless and Carter found himself wincing as another bolt of lightning lit up the area before booming thunder announced its departure. He made himself take a few drinks from the bottle even though his body insisted it wasn't thirsty. Steven was checking over Hank's bandages when he turned away and he pointedly ignored the storm, striding out into the downpour to the roof's corner.

After a moment of thought, Carter pulled himself up onto the ledge and let his legs dangle over the drop. He tilted his head back, putting his crowbar within arm's reach next to him and letting his eyes close. The water was cool against his face and as long as the thunder wasn't ringing in his ears, the steady sound of the rain was almost pleasant.

Despite the noise, he could hear his companions behind him as they started speaking. It was quiet, but the young man felt himself angle his head a little instinctively to pick up the sound a lot more clearly than he would've thought logical.

"-get some more bandages when we can. We're going through them a lot faster than I like." Steven sounded tired now. He was good at appearing invulnerable when he thought it was necessary, but that act had dropped now. "At least the bleeding stopped."

"S'not as bad as it looks," Hank muttered, though a slight hiss of pain disagreed with his words. "Not that deep..."

"It got down to the bone, Hank, I saw it." Steven paused and sighed after a moment.

"Just gotta keep it clean - try not to open it up again."

"Be nice to heal as fast as Carter, huh? Barely needed the bandages after a few days." Carter glanced down at himself briefly, flexing his shoulders to test the closed-up wounds on his chest. The scar tissue pulled a little, but it didn't seem at risk of tearing.

Did you heal that quickly before this? He couldn't remember. His attention turned back to the others when Steven spoke again, his voice even lower now.

"There's a lot about that kid that keeps surprising me. He was..." The man hesitated and when he went on, Carter had to strain to hear the words. "How the hell did he do that, Hank?"

"Do what?" Hank's tone suggested that he knew exactly what Steven was talking about and preferred to ignore it. Apparently that wasn't an option.

"You know damn well what. He took down at least ten of those things single-handedly in the middle of a mob. Didn't even get scratched." There was a crunch of gravel and Carter assumed he had sat down; his voice got a little clearer as if he was now facing the corner - as if he was staring at his source of suspicion. "That should've gotten him killed."

"They weren't movin' as fast as usual, not with that water -"

"What about that jump?" Steven cut in. "Ten feet, at least. Straight up. You ever met someone who could manage that?" There was a lengthy silence and Carter was beginning to think Hank wasn't going to reply until he sighed heavily.

"Can't say I have. Hell, I dunno. Nothin' around here is normal anymore. He probably saved our lives; I'm not gonna complain."

"Maybe," the other man conceded, "but with everything else that's happening...I don't want any more surprises. He barely talks anymore, he can outrun both of us, hardly eats even when we get food...I'm glad he was around, sure, but it still seems...off."

"Only helped us so far. Odd, maybe, but it's helped."

"Still - warrants a little concern. I'm still keeping an eye on him." Hank grunted and Carter pulled his attention back to scanning the street below him as they fell silent again.

He's still paranoid of you. It made sense. Hell, who could take out a mob of infected like that? He hadn't even really been aware when he did it, only that one minute he was fending off an attack and the next there were bodies strewn around the area and a good deal of fresh blood spattered on his hoodie. Seems like a good enough reason to be concerned...

Uphigh, gooduphigh, watchpreywatchforfood, goodforpouncing...

Who the hell can jump like that, anyway? Not like you were a basketball star or something - could barely run a block a few weeks ago.

Watergood, preycan'tsmell, goodcovergetmoreprey, good...

Carter shook his head sharply, one hand going to rub his temple as he turned his face toward the rain again. There wasn't any reason to worry about it; he was pretty well healed from the Stalker's attack, they weren't in any immediate danger now, and they'd get to the evacuation within a few days. He reached to scratch at a spot on his calf that had been itching persistently for a while - probably got debris in his jeans when they were on the street - and let out a steadying breath.

You're fine. There's nothing wrong with you.

Even so, Steven's words seemed to repeat themselves persistently in the back of his mind; "How the hell did he do that...?"