A/N: Call it inspiration, but here's another chapter. I write best when Britt is doing something super unethical and gross... does that say something about me?
Chapter 11
thirteen days since last feed
Anxiety high in your throats, you lead them down the country road, blind as newborn lambs. They stick ever so close to you; Mike's hand floating to your waist, Tina's wrapped around your bicep, and their free hands gravitating together. Their nubile eyes miss the things you can see, wrapped in the darkness, and you watch as the wildlife so absent in the days come out to hunt at night. They stay away from you, your tainted blood a better repellent than anything else in the world.
"Who do you think they are?" Tina asks, and you see the scared flash of her eyes gleam in the dark. "Are these the guys we've been looking for?"
"Can't be," Mike replies, his voice firmer than he believes. "We're at least another week out. There's no way Artie's that far off."
You swallow, and your tongue sticks to your dry throat as their scent invades you. It smothers, piercing into every muscle, overloading every nerve, firing every neuron until all you know is the pulse of blood just underneath their skin. So close to you, they are an extension of your being – living, breathing things that absorb into your flesh. Only your steady breathing has any way of centering the ache, spreading it evenly instead of letting it all crawl to your head, and even this is imperfect, for another scent comes.
The overly sweet, flowery smell hidden in your backpack begins to call to you. Softly at first, your teeth ache the longer you walk, its smell seeping through the briefcase and into the air. You begin to pant, pupils dilating to great, black disks, and your skin almost sears off your body.
Tina frowns, the sudden rush of heat under her hand startling.
"Britt, what's wrong?" She tries to stop you, but stopping would mean letting your mind rest – and idling isn't an option now. Not when there's so much at stake. You shrug away, pulling your arm away from her.
"Can't stop now," you mutter, eyes firmly on the horizon. "No time."
But Mike's hand on your waist, previously forgotten, reels you back. You snarl and fight against him, how his forearm suddenly wraps across your chest in a phantom reminder of Sam, but his muscular body keeps you anchored and squirming across his chest. You bare your teeth at Tina who comes in too close, but her hands over your ears feel like twin daggers into your skull.
"I don't know what's happening," she whispers lowly, keeping your head from twisting out of reach, "but I know you're stronger than this. Stay with me, sweetheart."
Even with them pressing in and in again, that damned smell still invades you, turning you into something inhuman. You gasp like a man breaking arctic ice for the first time, barely catching the worried twist of Tina's lips.
Somehow you manage to twist an arm away from Mike long enough to throw your backpack at her feet, the burden instantly a fraction lighter. She cautiously touches the canvas – you wouldn't be surprised if she thought there was a dead body in it.
Tina shuffles in your bag and pulls out the sleek briefcase – the stench strikes you like a backhand straight from hell and you groan in a way that has Mike faltering, the sound too similar to death shuffling on rotting legs.
"Do something," you moan, kicking, "make it stop."
She fumbles, prying open the damaged locks, eventually pulling out three arrows. In the dark its impossible to distinguish one from another and she relies on you, holding each one up to your face. The first two get little reaction, but the three nearly has you snapping the fingers from her hand. Without a flashlight it's impossible for her to know what it is but she tries anyway, feeling through the various items in your bag that you've collected over the months. Mike holds you still as she snaps open a half used bottle of lotion, dunking the bolt inside and out of sight.
The result is immediate.
The smell lessens to a point where you can breathe without being suffocated and you relax against Mike's shoulder, chest heaving so hard you fear your ribs will break. He cradles your sweat-slick body gently, like a sleeping child, and even with your eyes closed you know he's watching you.
"I'm okay," you pant, the buzzing in your limbs slowing, "I'm okay."
He helps you balance on your own two feet and Tina brushes her hand against your warm forehead.
"What was that?" she whispers, and you catch her hand that comes to find your own.
"I don't know," you reply honestly, wiping at your eyes. "The smell hurts me. It's like someone puts an animal in my head."
"It didn't bother you before."
Shadow was there to take away the pain, you want to say, but just shrug instead.
"Things are changing," you sigh, scratching at your stitches. "They always are."
She looks doubtful but Mike's touch across her shoulder has her sighing, keeping tight in your grip as the three of you begin the trek back down the road. Every part of you is wired, humming, reacting in ways that don't make sense, but you've long given up trying to understand yourself when the hunger hits. It's been two godforsaken weeks that you haven't eaten, and you know another day spent trapped in that car will ruin you. Maybe this setback is a blessing in disguise.
After what seems like hours the three of you catch flashing lights that have you diving into the bushes, a tangle of teenage limbs. Through the darkness you see figures pacing on top of a wall, their faces concealed with hats that shade the whites of their eyes, but no amount of concealment hides the binoculars around their necks or the rifles in their hands. Floodlights pierce the night sky, a beacon of misguided hope in the dark.
"Military?" someone wonders, but the wall holding them high in the sky is patchwork, pieces of debris woven into a barrier with none of the precision or resources that a military operation would have access to. Survivors, then. That bodes ill for you – they have so much more to lose.
A manually opening gate is the only way in through the front, and it's guarded by two men at the front and the other that paces overhead. There's a lock on the inside, and even if you could get close enough the noise would have them shooting before you could slip through.
Silently, the three of you slink around the sides of the encampment. It's a sizable thing, maybe half a mile across, and you distantly hear the sound of voices and clanging metal and shuffling feet; fires crackle through the slats of their ragged barrier and the smoke brings with it the scent of life... the scent of blood. Your mouth begins to water and there's little you can do to stop it, so many heartbeats resting easy and unknowing.
"Should we ask to trade?" Mike whispers, placing a hand on Tina's backpack and the metal briefcase. "They obviously want it."
"They can't have it," you hiss back, gripping his wrist so tight he winces. "They'll do bad things. I can feel it."
"We'll be long gone," he argues quietly, "it won't be our problem."
"They won't just let us leave," Tina counters. "Who knows how many more traps are around? They'd just corner us again and kill us."
Mike chews anxiously on his lower lip as you all peer out from the foliage. "So... what, we sneak in?"
"We could try and rescue them. The place can't be that huge."
"If we can even get in, how would we find them? Hell, how would we get out?"
"There has to be a weakness along the fence," Tina states, "let's find that first and then go from there."
You slink along the edges, freezing every so often when a patrol runs by – a mad dash across a dirt road has your heart hammering, but they remain none the wiser. You've done about a three quarter turn when you come across a piece of plywood that leans awkwardly against a hole in the chain-link fence, secured only with zip-ties and a few rusty nails. Tina's knife could saw through the plastic, and Mike's brute strength would do the rest.
After waiting a minute for the patrol to distance themselves they do just that, with you on lookout, eyes darting every way they possibly can. The noise as Mike rips the plywood from the nails seems deafening, but as they dive back into the bush with you, the patrolman doesn't seem to think anything's amiss. He yawns, stretching high, and his rifle waves dangerously in the air before continuing his languid walk along the wall.
You touch Tina's hand, but it doesn't stop her from trembling.
"What now?" you mumble, and you feel Mike's shoulder shrug against you. There's a way in but not much else, and with dawn ever approaching, you're running out of time.
"I think... we need to wait until tomorrow," Tina breathes, looking at her watch that still hasn't lost battery. "It'll be light soon, and we need a plan."
"What if they hurt them?" Mike hisses, horrified, but Tina shakes her head.
"They didn't kill Artie when they captured them, even though he can't walk. If they were killers, they'd just have done away with him to save them the hassle."
He looks doubtful, but the sun that will soon crawl across the horizon banishes his protests. "We need a better plan than just break them out, Mike. How are we going to leave? We don't have cars anymore. We need to think about this."
After a long pause, he sighs, running his hand down her back in agreement. You smile at the silent acceptance and hunker down for a long, long wait.
Turns out sleeping like you're waiting for a bullet to the head is surprisingly easy for you.
You drift in and out for most of the day, the grasses shading you from the worst of the sun. Bugs don't bother you, but after watching Tina slap at her neck for the millionth time you subtly bite through your thumb, letting your corrupted blood bleed into the earth surrounding you. The bites stop after that.
Mike and Tina toss ideas back and forth the entire day, stopping once only to rummage in her backpack for supplies. As a precaution Mike slides his weight onto your back, crushing and smothering, as Tina knocks the bolt with the liquid that drives you mad. You breath through his weight and his smell that seeps into your pores, wrapping its tension around your spine; as it does, another idea begins to bloom.
As Tina chews on a tiny bag of almonds, you watch the patrolman change positions with another, squinting into the afternoon sun. Taking a deep breath, you force yourself to listen, drowning out the twin heartbeats laying by your side, the crunch of Tina's jaw as it moves, and even the wind beating itself against the trees. You hear the squeak of a steel-toed boot against plywood, and the metallic clank of a rifle hitting belt buckle, and finally the slap of two hands coming together to shake. Someone puts their hand on your shoulder, but another takes it away.
"... what's gonna happen?" asks one man, his lungs wheezing as he inhales a mouthful of smoke.
"Dunno," replies the other, "but boss is pretty paranoid. Keepin' 'em locked up real good in the doghouse."
"They're just kids. What's he gonna do, spank them?"
"Heard he's gonna kill them," mutters another, voice dipping so low it hurts to try and listen. "Make an example 'bout what happens when you steal."
"No shit? Fuck, I didn't sign up for killin' a bunch of teenagers."
"Neither did I, but... it's a scary place out there. I gotta keep my family safe, and safe is here."
"Depends who you ask. I already know a bunch of people plannin' on leavin'."
"Yeah, and they'll be dead in a week. Keep safe, dude."
You blink your eyes open, your starving lungs inhaling deep and drastically. Mike and Tina press in like twin guardians, each holding a trembling hand with their own.
"They're gonna kill them," you whisper hoarsely, "soon. We have to do something."
"Fuck," Tina hisses, but Mike tilts your head towards him.
"Did they say where?"
"The doghouse. Maybe a shack or something?"
The afternoon sky has begun to darken, the sun starting its descend into the netherworlds. Whatever time you have to come up with a plan is fading as fast as the daylight, but you're barely a step closer to realization. A truck roaring past nearly stops your heart, pressing your forehead into your spindly forearms.
Tina rummages around in her backpack. "Between us, we have a crowbar, a metal pipe, a combat knife and two pistols. Not enough to take on the entire place."
"So... we need a distraction?"
"Like what? One of us tries to draw them away? That's dangerous, Mike."
"So is sneaking in there at all. We need something like—"
"—zombies," you whisper suddenly, prompting the other two furrow their brows.
"Britt, what are you talking about?"
"There's a bunch near here... I saw them with Shadow. They were heading this way. We can bring them inside."
Tina swallows, unsure. "Setting a pack of zombies on innocent strangers? Isn't that sort of... well, cruel?"
"They're going to kill our friends," Mike reminds her. "We can't afford to be forgiving."
"But who would bring them here?"
"I would," you reply plainly. Wasn't it obvious?
"No, I want to do it," Mike interrupts you, frowning. "I'm faster."
"You can't see in the dark like me," you smile, playing with his fingers. "You can't hear them. They'll eat you."
"But... they'll eat you too."
Your eyes catch Tina's, a mirthless smile playing at the corners of your lips. "There's something wrong inside of me. They feel it. I'll be okay."
"Are you sure?"
"I lived like one once. I didn't die then, so I won't now."
Mike sits back on his haunches with eyes so mournful it feels like they look right through you, but you just laugh and squeeze his hands with your own. He's so gentle and kind that his good hands came naturally, not needed to be fought for or begged, chasing away the ragged edges and putting softness in its place.
"Don't look at me like that, Mike. I'll be okay. I always am."
The three of you plan up until night falls in earnest – they'll sneak in through the hole they created, slinking through the shadows and quiet corners of the compound, searching for the place where your companions are being kept. Once they find them, they'll have to wait until your distraction draws them away to make your escape. Between that time and finding where they're being kept, searching for their lost supplies would be helpful... but priority is getting everyone out safe.
"How will we know you're back?"
You remember how many of them there were, stumbling and groaning with vacant eyes.
"You'll know."
Tina pulls you aside while Mike peers through the bushes, tucking a strand of stringy hair behind your ear.
"They don't pay attention to you, Britt. How are you gonna make them follow you?"
The thud of her pulse in her wrist makes you grin.
"I need your help."
She doesn't question it when you pull out an empty water bottle, or a knife, or even when you check that the knife is sharp. However, when you offer it to her, she looks at you like you've lost your mind.
"Blood. I need your blood."
"My what?"
"It'll get their attention."
"Why can't you use yours?"
"Mine doesn't work. It's dirty. Sick."
"Britt, blood doesn't work like that."
"It does for this."
After a moment's hesitation she sighs, snatching the knife from your hand. You press the bottle to the tender skin of her bicep, waiting for the inevitable – it takes her a few seconds to work up the nerve, but a sharp inhale through her nose has her pulling the knife across her flesh, creating a long line of crimson. She even does it vertically to make your job easier. How thoughtful.
The moment it hits the open air you bite your tongue to stop yourself from shuddering, the urge to pant like a cornered animal strong and feral. You know just one taste would ruin everything you've worked for, and the way she watches you watching the blood drip down into the bottle leaves no margin for error. You tuck your head away in a vain attempt to avert your eyes gone dark like twin storms.
Mike, however, notices – instead of slapping it away he gestures to his own arm, ever worried about his mate. You nod a bit too eagerly, watching the same knife create an identical line down the strength of his bicep and how the blood rushes faster than it did with her. They may look different, but they're all the exact same shade of red on the inside.
After a decent amount sloshes about in the bottom you take it away, letting them tie up their battle-wounds in relative intimacy; you bite your lip so hard it bleeds in an effort not to breathe in the aroma that wafts like a copper spill around you, spitting your own worthless blood into the grass.
They hug you once before you leave, and you promise it won't be the last time you see them. The briefcase, now returned to you, is a heavy burden to bear.
(You remember what happened last time you made a promise, but push it away.)
The foliage seems so much denser without Mike around to part it, and you cradle your warm charge close to your chest as you struggle through the bush. You know the sick ones headed north, but could they have changed direction? Were they really going north at all? Your directional skills are laughable at best, but you know you'll always be able to find your way back with the way the sprawling compound lights up the night, almost as fierce as the supernovae that bloom whenever Shadow's skin touches yours.
Eventually you allow yourself on the path, wandering without real direction. The blood in the bottle erases any useful smell, so you have so you rely on hearing to guide you, waiting for the deadened lungs to echo through the trees. They don't come for some time, and Tina's borrowed watch blinks 11:47am at you, over an hour since you set off. Have you been walking in circles?
The way your feet trip over nothing with a decided twang says no, you haven't.
You grunt, landing hard on your shoulder as the bottle of blood rolls across the road. Your ankles sting, and your thumb rubs across the narrow strip of red flesh that shows what caught you; a tripwire, strung carefully across the path. Either they knew you were here, or...
You dive headfirst into a ditch as two heartbeats become known, trampling down from an unseen lotion. Your breathing stills as they click open a flashlight, but so thick in the foliage it becomes impossible to see without descending into the brush – exactly what they don't want to do.
"See anything, Jimmy?" one grunts, his heavy footfalls shaking in your skull.
"Maybe it was an animal?" offers another, grip tight on his rifle. His voice places him no older than fourteen, and you remember the boy whose bird you ate. Such a shame the good ones die first.
"Animals don't carry water bottles."
It crinkles as he picks it up, inspecting it.
"What's in here? It looks like..."
He gags and throws it down – your heart sinks into your stomach as you see the meager amount of blood seep into the dirt.
"Who the fuck carries blood in a bottle? Christ, that's fucked."
"M-maybe we should head back... it's way past curfew."
"Curfew doesn't apply to hunters, boy," scoffs the older man. "The boss'll thank us when we drag in their corpses. Corpses don't cause trouble."
"Do we really have to kill them, Pa?"
"Right now, those kids are wounded animals. What's the only thing more dangerous than a wounded animal?"
"A scared wounded animal," the boy intones, like he's heard it millions of times before. The older man chuckles and pats him fondly on the head.
"That's right, boy. Dangerous animals have to be put down."
Ever so slowly, you wiggle the knife from under your belly into your right hand, grip on the handle sweaty and unsure. Still, with your eyes widened to near-blackness, it's impossible to miss the younger boy as he walks closer to your position. It's a shame, really – but in a shameless world you can't worry too much about who becomes collateral.
"You think they went—"
Bunching your legs underneath you, you surge forwards in one violent push; his scream rings shrilly in the silence as you grip his shirt and yank him back down towards you, pressing the knife up into his belly as you fall. Gravity has him tumbling on top of you, the blade sinking so deeply it scrapes against his spine. Blood explodes over your shirt and you don't have time to worry about how your entire existence condenses to that smell, not when his father sprints across the path to see to him. You roll away, taking the knife with you, and freeze in a wide crouch as a halo of light hits your face.
His father presses his fingers to his son's neck for a few beats, never taking his eyes from you who squats on the wet ground like a thief in the night. You know that he's not long for this world – the way you felt the knife tear towards his sternum attests to that – but it's the mumbled dad that turns the lights off in his father's eyes.
You don't know what it's like to lose a child, but you imagine it's something like the reckless way he raises his rifle and fires at you in hopes of causing as much damage to you as you did to him.
You dart out of the way fast enough to avoid a shot to the body, but your left arm is still caught in the line of fire, and you howl as the bullet grazes your shoulder deep enough to leave a channel like a searing hot poker pressing into your flesh. It rips through your shirt and leaves the sleeve hanging precariously from one end, but you fight through it and lunge; you miss, but your quick blow with the knife shatters his flashlight and has you slinking away in the dark.
"Come out, bitch!" he roars, blindly whipping his rifle to where you used to be. Another shot, another wrong. "Look what you did to my boy! I'll kill you!"
"Find me first," you hiss, ducking for cover behind a tree as he fires another round.
Moving ever so slowly, you make a wide circle to the point where you can clamber up onto the path again – a few thrown rocks makes it almost painfully easy to get around him, constantly watching every twitch in his rigid frame. He calls himself a hunter?
(He's the real prey here.)
Crossing behind him on all fours (well, threes, your injured arm cradled close to your chest), you lick your lips with a grin, clutching the knife as you bunch your legs under you. He's still watching the last place he thought you were and his breath is so loud in the dark, his heart so strong that it's the greatest mercy you can do to take away the sound.
You jump, and even with your injured limb it's easy to wrap your legs around his waist and draw the blade across his throat, sending his blood spewing into the forest. He gags on it as you let him fall, and for a second you almost give into the urge to sink yourself into his flesh, to feed like your body demands you must, but you still have enough presence of mind to find the empty bottle and press it to his neck, letting what he had taken return to you. Your fingers, red and red again, are licked clean as you twist the cap closed. A strange satisfaction fills you – the thrill of the hunt, the glory of the kill.
Is this really what the hunger does to you? A monster wearing human skin?
When your gaze settles on the now-corpse of the little boy nearby, that feral triumph dims. Collateral, you tell yourself, it had to happen, but the fact that you didn't need an excuse at all is more unsettling. You shake your head, pushing the thoughts from your mind. It's done now. There's no use crying over deaths you can't erase.
(But there's no use cheering either. Right?)
In the descended silence that boasts only the trickle of blood leaving the body comes another sound – distant crashing through the brush, wheezing lungs that breath through no real reason. The dead have heard your work and come to investigate, and their slow, unsteady steps are music to your ears. You know what they want and almost go to join them, but the blood-spattered watch that blinks 12:25am at you puts you back on the right path. There'll be time for that, you promise the beast that isn't easily soothed, but they need our help.
Shuffling in your bag, you gingerly pull out the bottle of lotion that Tina used as a rough decoy. The worst of it is wiped off, and even now you pull the familiar pull over your mind, hazing your thoughts, but you struggle through it and break the little capsule with a careful cut of your knife, and its unknown contents spill into your bottle of blood. The combination is overpowering, and you fall back onto your rear as you try and breathe through the entirely new meaning of crazed.
Not yet, whispers something in your head, and you latch onto it like a dying man. The dead are closer now, and with a swallow you shake the contents thoroughly before tipping it all over your chest.
It soaks into your thin tank and stains the entire front of you crimson – the overflow that rushes onto your hands is wiped onto your face, smeared across your neck, spread over your shoulders; it drips down your stomach and through onto your thighs and down your calves where it wets your white socks and wiggles between your toes. You gasp and it dribbles through your lips and onto your tongue that has been parched since the day you were born; the strange taste of the liquid mixed with his blood is the greatest drug you'll ever know, and it takes away something human in you, something that understands the world beyond yourself. All you know is your hunger and your anger and how these men tried to hurt you, how they came from the bright place and they try to hurt the ones you love. The wheezing bodies are here now, shuffling blindly out into the open, and you vaguely remember your goal.
The empty bottle drops to the ground and you slap at the first zombie that crosses you – it turns, bewildered, and you mimic the groan that comes from its lips. It makes the others take notice, all turning to you at once, and your scent so strong begs them to follow.
They do, even as you scramble out of the ditch, even as you begin a loping pace that often grows frustrated at their slow progress. The watch keeps blinking, bleeding away time just as the blood hardens on your skin, and by the time you see where you need to go it's late and your breath pants and your fingers shake and you hurt everywhere. It's like a knife ripping at you from the inside out until each inhale is an agony, and you know nothing except that you need to make it stop.
There's only one way.
After looping around to slink your way inside it's 1:37am and you're desperate, sweating and trembling, teeth aching with a fury you can't remember. The board is pulled away from the hole with impatience, your feet quick as you dive behind an outcrop, and you hold your breath in order to hear the sick ones over the thud of your diseased heart. They come, as they always will, and you draw them to you with a scream that sounds like nothing from this earth. It tears from you, mouthpiece to this animal thing inside, and you scramble into the dark as they begin to flood inside. There isn't much time, but first... you need to eat.
Gunshots are your backdrop as you dart from shadow to shadow, red skin almost black in the sickly glow from a few lanterns that are scattered about the makeshift streets. You hear the residents whisper their worries, how the shrieks in the night become closer and louder, how more and more lungs join the noise with fewer heartbeats to match. There must only be forty people that live here, and they'll be lucky to survive through the night.
You catch one running to help the scouts, yanking him off balance and smothering his mouth with your hand. He jerks as your knife slides messily between his ribs and you follow him down, not bothering to wait until he expires to sink your throbbing teeth into the junction of his neck. He gurgles, but with his gun out of reach he can do little more than bleed into the earth as you tear him straight from his bones.
As his body goes lax you eat in earnest, able to press easier through his muscle. Each mouthful is a blessing that slides down your throat, warm and heavy and nourishing, and you feel your wasted muscles swell with strength. You take his vitality as your own; the once defined sculpt of his arms, the stability of his core, the anchor of his legs. All of it becomes yours as you eat and eat until you think you'll bloat, only dimly aware that your ravenous noises will bring about unwanted spectators.
Finally had your fill, you swallow with a last gasp, raising your head to the sky. You've eaten all the way along his shoulder and down his front, pulling the flesh from his ribs to show the lung you punctured with a quick slip of your knife. It glistens, black as you assume your soul to be, but you wipe your mouth with the back of your hand (useless, but you try) and stand on wobbly legs instead of mourning for something that had to be done. Returned to a state of mind that allows for something other than acting, the throb of your injured arm begins to make itself known in an entirely too human way. Still, you push it away and look around; it should be time leave now, and you don't want to get left behind.
With the man's shotgun firm in your hands you seek out the familiar sound of your friends, a cluster of terrified heartbeats that echoes at the edge of the compound. The clash of sound from where you entered doesn't do enough to mask them and all too soon you find them at a stand off with three burly looking men – guns are pointed every which way and tension breathes thick into your lungs, settling and stagnating.
In the shadows, it doesn't take much of an aim to blow off the nearest one's head.
The other two wheel to you and you pump the shotgun, blowing an odd-looking halo through one stomach cavity and letting Puck disable the other. You watch impassively as he staggers to his knees, clutching whatever remains of his organs. Shotgun wounds are always the most... artistic.
"Christ," you hear from behind you, and turn to face them. "What the fuck happened to you? You look like Carrie."
"I don't know what that is, but I used it to lure the zombies."
"That's way more blood than we gave you, Britt."
"I ran into some hunters. They tried to kill me, so I slit their throats instead," you shrug, not seeing the problem. "Only one of them deserved it, so that was sad. But I had to."
"That is so fuckin' wrong I can't even begin to describe it," mutters Puck, but Quinn rolls her eyes.
"It doesn't matter if it looks like she went swimming in a tank of cow's blood, she's alive. And so are we... but not for much longer if we don't get the hell out of here."
"There are a lot of zombies," you agree. "The people here are losing. We should leave."
"I saw the cars by the entrance," Mike interjects, shrugging Artie onto his back. "The keys should be there too."
"Supplies?"
"Dunno. We should grab whatever we can find."
The pack of you begin a jog to the gates that are now deserted, and it's not long before you unearth your vehicles stripped of supplies that haven't gone far – everyone that can helps with loading them back up, and it's lifting a heavy crate that your graze finally makes itself heard. You flinch, letting the box drop with a heavy clang into the flatbed. Your entire shoulder throbs like it caught fire.
(That's one thing you like about the animal – you feel too much, but also not at all.)
Hands on you and you know they're Shadow's before you even have to think about it; her scent, masked with sweat and fear, still radiates from her like a holy shroud and you take a split second to bask in it. She gently touches your bicep, knowing now your left arm is bad for two reasons entirely.
"Shit, that looks like it hurts," she mutters, unceremoniously stretching the wound a little. You hiss but only half-heartedly pull away, too caught up in the different fires she creates.
"I'm okay. He missed."
"Barely. We'll get Tina to do some hippie magic on it once we're safe."
They finish loading up the vehicles as fast as they can, killing only two straggling zombies that have found their way outside of the pack. The survivors in here are starting to form a cohesive group, sticking together to eliminate the worst of the threat, but you know the casualties are many; you can smell the wounds already beginning to fester, hidden on a hand or the back of a calf, spreading its disease through the bloodstream to sully their blood. Just like yours. It won't be long until the fever hits and they die like the others.
Finn pops out of the little storage center that were holding your supplies, chewing his lip. "I only have one set of keys."
"Look closer, Frankenteen," Shadow grunts, hauling the last water jug into the back. "We can't fit all of us in one truck."
"We have more supplies than we came with, so there's less room," Quinn agrees, her critical eye sweeping over the hasty job. "Are you sure they aren't there?"
"It's completely empty. They have to be somewhere else."
"I knew I shoulda learned how to hotwire a car," Puck grumbles angrily, and you count four sets of eyes roll at once.
"The asshole with the crazy scar took it, didn't he?" Artie realizes, frowning over Mike's shoulder. "I saw it on his belt last night."
"Fuckin' great. Now what?"
"Someone goes and gets it, duh."
"Not it!" Finn yells before covering his mouth, and all of them follow suit until it's just you, staring blankly into the distance.
"Really?" Mercedes sighs, "she saved our asses and now we're tellin' her to go on a goose chase?"
"She was last," Finn defends, and Shadow scoffs from beside you.
"I'll go. No use bitching about it."
"I'm coming too," leaves your mouth before you can think about it, and she eyes you silently but doesn't protest. It feels like approval but reaches deeper than that, into the way she looks at you when no one watches.
"In and out," Quinn warns, catching Santana's shoulder. "No fucking around. You're still injured."
"Please, Fabray, I'm golden. With Britt here looking like she bathed in Satan's asshole, no-one will want to touch us." She smiles a little, and though it pulls awkward on her mouth it's one of the most genuine things you've ever seen. "But thanks for caring or whatever."
"Or whatever," Quinn mimics, rolling her eyes. "How eloquent. We'll hold it down here until you get back."
The both of you begin the trek to the back of the compound where the fighting's gotten more spread out – the zombies have thinned, but now dispersed they wander half-hidden in the darkness, waiting to snatch an unsuspecting survivor from a standing tree or shambled house. Every so often you touch at Shadow's waist, so lightly it must barely register, but she always knows – a moment after hiding come men with guns, forever on alert. You smell death on one of them and wonder how long until his companions notice the wound that rots even now.
The two of you work like a well-oiled machine, and her presence brings a calm not even the flesh can take away. You feel weightless, limitless; a god unchained by the shackles of regret. It's addictive.
Once at the hole, you take a glance around. It's been deserted in favour of fighting battles on other fronts, and you watch from the darkness as Shadow goes to each and every corpse; a quick glance to the face is all that's needed to discount them as her target, and as precaution she bashes them in afterwards. You remember Finn quoting a movie once, something about rules, and though you never quite figured it out Shadow's insistence to "double-tap" seems to be an important one.
She sighs, rubbing at her brow. "He's not here. That would be too easy."
"This place is kinda big... we need to find him before they find the others."
"No shit, Captain Obvious. I still need to get that son of a bitch back for hitting Quinn."
One of the corpses groans and rolls over onto its side – she yelps, narrowly avoiding its hand, and scowls as she stomps its head in with her heavy boot. Though you used to hate it, her anger is beautiful to you now, if something like that could be said. It brings flush to her skin and a fire to her eyes in ways that yawn like black holes, absorbing all they see and never letting it out again. You, like all things, are drawn into that intrigue.
(You're only human, after all.)
"Fuckin' pieces of shit, never know when to stay dead. I swear to God—" Shadow pauses, midway through wiping her boot on the grass. "Britt, don't move."
"Why? I'm—"
"Gonna get your head blown apart," comes the voice from behind you, and you bite your tongue in an effort not to make any sound. Shadow's gaze, hard as diamonds, flicker only once with worry.
(Fitting, really, that she'd be the distraction that kills you. You wouldn't have it any other way.)
A heavy hand lands on your shoulder and your skin crawls, but the metal pressed up against your temple poses greater concern. It brings a memory to you, surfacing like a snake that rises from sleep, parting grains of sand with the tips of its nose. Not now, you hiss to yourself, but all you remember is fever and pain and blinding white light.
Shadow levels her rifle, but you know she'll never shoot. Not when you're in the way.
"Let her go," she snarls, grip tightening. The man laughs long and low and in the reflection of the broken window to your right you see the scar that curls down his face like a wild vine, warping and wrapping as it goes.
"Why? So you can leave? Nice try."
He pulls you to him, forearm pressing to your throat, and the gun bites so deep it bleeds.
"This one's caused a lot of deaths today, you know. Good people. Strong people."
"Obviously not that strong if they're dead," Shadow sneers, flipping her hair over her shoulders. "What did you call us? Toddlers? Even toddlers can outrun zoms."
"Yeah? That's what you thought when you let them into our home?"
"I didn't think shit, moron. I was locked up like everyone else. You brought this karma on yourself."
"Well, karma will have your friend's brains all over my shirt if you don't start talking."
Shadow makes to say something but he pulls his forearm so tight you choke, and it's a really good thing your lungs don't need to breathe all the time or else you'd probably die anyway. She swallows and looks at you, and only your inhuman eyes see the way the rifle trembles.
"Talk about what?"
"The case, bitch. Where is it?"
"I don't have your fucking case."
A blow to your head has you seeing the supernova that spells Shadow's name in flares of brilliance, flashing in front of your vision like a neon sign. You stagger, held upright only by his grip. Blood begins to trickle through your hair.
"No one likes a liar," snarls Scar, "especially not your friend. Isn't that right?"
"Why the fuck are you still talking?" Shadow hisses. "It was in the car. Unless you're fucking blind, you have it and you're just being an asshole for the hell of it."
Evidently, blind was the wrong thing to say. His thumb digs so hard into your throat you're left with awkward wheezing noises, but his elbow that pins you across the chest stops you from twisting away. The vision in your right eye blurs until the world is shrouded in a gauzy grey curtain, your right hand slipping from his arm to hang limp by your side.
"See that?" you hear chuckled into your ear. "I'm blocking blood to her brain. If you don't start talking sense it'll just get worse."
"Christ, are you deaf as well? Get it into your psychotic head that we don't have it. It's gone. Maybe if you click your heels together three times and wish hard enough, it'll magically appear in your hands."
You blink hazily, tilting your head up a little to look at the sky.
"I took it," you whisper, and almost instantly the hold on your throat loosens. Things return to the places they should be, color bleeding back into a three-tone world. "I used one to bring them. Can't you smell it all over me?"
He jerks, and for the first time he really takes in the color of your skin, red as an autumn moon. "Your people even helped. I wouldn't have had enough without... what was his name? Jimmy? He lived long enough to cry a little."
"You're lying," he hisses, but you just smile a little.
"Am I? How else would I have brought them?"
Scar presses the barrel to your head to the point where it will undoubtedly make bruises – your eyes catch Shadow's and they ask to trust. She swallows but makes no move to shoot, every part of her vibrating with tension.
"Where is it?"
"I can't let you have it. You'll do bad things with it."
"Give it to me, or I swear to God I'll blow a hole in your skull."
"Someone already tried that before. I have broken brains now, but I didn't die."
He sees the stitches in your skull; his pulse, normally so steady, begins to thump ever louder.
"Sad to say, sweetheart, but people don't survive being shot twice."
You loll your head back until your mouth rests warm by his ear. "I'm infected, you know," you murmur, looking at the stars. "If you try, my blood will make you turn into one of them too."
"Bullshit."
He swallows so hard you see his throat bob, and you lick your lips, still tainted with blood. You're jostled, the gun pressed again, but you feel his doubt in every inch of his body.
"You know what's funny?" you breathe, so quiet only he can hear you. "I think I already am."
Your hand that moved to cup the gun jerks as you throw yourself forward, mouth opening wide as you bury your face into his neck. It goes off, singeing past your eyebrow, but your teeth have already found anchor in his throat and you bite with all the energy returned to your rejuvenated body, sawing through tendon and cartilage to sever his blood vessels. What seals his fate is the way you rear back, tearing his flesh out with you, exposing his arteries that reward you with a great spray of blood spattering across your face. He collapses in a heap, not even able to sum up the energy to cup his neck as it bleeds him out with every pound of his heart. Barely remembering you have an audience, you spit out your mouthful and crouch down next to him.
"It's strange," you whisper, unsnapping the keys from his belt. "No matter who they are, people all taste the same."
His eyes go dull and lifeless even as his body shakes, caught in spasm. Maybe he's seeing the rapture you were always told would come with death.
(You don't remember anything. It was just dark, and empty, and a vast reach of nothing at all.)
You stand up, not bothering to wipe the blood from your face. The keys jangle.
"Got them," you grin cheerily, nearly falling back over into the dirt when Shadow runs into you, your ribs squeezed so tight they groan in protest. She stays, even as your wet, bloody hands tentatively touch her sides, leaving imprints of you scattered across her body.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" she hisses into the junction of your ear, causing a shiver to run from head to foot. "You could have died."
"But I didn't," you shrug, "so does it matter?"
"Does it— yes, it fucking matters! Don't you care at all?"
"I'm alive now, and he isn't. That's what I care about. Isn't that a good thing?"
She runs her hands over her forehead, smoothing back her wild hair. She's still so close, breathing the air that you exhale, and the heat that rushes from her open mouth has you dizzy with desire.
"Why the hell were you so reckless? He had a gun against your head! Christ, you could've turned to brain jello right in front of me."
You study her for a moment until your understanding flickers to life like a ghost gone too long.
"I'm sorry I scared you."
"You... you didn't scare me." The way she turns, bottom lip sucked into her mouth, says otherwise.
"I knew you wouldn't risk hurting me, so I had to hurt him instead. I promise I'm okay."
Shadow blinks, and in the reflection of her eyes comes the nebulae she must have been born from, a collapse fitting to birth one so complex. There's no doubt stars have been destroyed years before, wandering too close to her gravity; gravity that prompts you to place a bloodied hand on her neck and cement the stardust into her skin. You never want her light to go away.
She looks at you, fingers feather-light on the back of your palm. "Never do that again, okay? Just... just don't."
"Okay," you promise, and you aren't sure whose wellbeing will benefit more. "No more teeth attacks."
It draws a chuckle, but with it comes the familiar barriers that arise like stone from the sea. You patiently draw your hand away, tucking it into your pocket. It's weak now, and the one thing you're familiar with is waiting.
"We should get going," she coughs, absently rubbing where your hand used to sit. "Quinn is gonna start foaming at the mouth."
"That's unhealthy."
"So was you biting a guy's throat open. Like, seriously. That's disgusting, but also really badass."
(If only she knew.)
"He didn't expect it. That was the point."
"What did you say to him?"
"That I was a zombie whisperer and used the blood of a virgin to lure them here."
She blinks, pausing momentarily.
"I don't even know if you're bullshitting or not."
You smirk.
"Neither did he."