Separated

Oh my god... two hundred reviews? *Dies* That's... wow, that's really an honor. Thank you everyone who's reviewed, faved, alerted, and all around read this story from the deepest depths of my heart. Really, its mind blowing and appreciated more than I can express. I hope to keep y'all happy with further chapters!

Chapter 29- Life is Beautiful; Sixx A.M.

'I've know some things that you don't. I've done things that you won't, there's nothing like a trail of blood to find your way back home. I was waiting for my hearse but what came next was so much worse. It took a funeral to make me feel alive.'

"For by now I could have stretched out my hand and struck your people with a plague that would have wiped your people off the Earth."- Exodus 9:15

When Alec woke up, there was a light snow falling. He was cold and stiff and when he sat up his spine crackled like fall leaves that had been stepped on. Rubbing his eyes with the heel of one palm, he yawned, briefly wondering where he was before a soft snore startled him. Looking toward the front of the shop, he saw that the female from the night before was still there, sound asleep and trembling from the cold. The male had laid out on his side and was curled into a light ball on the wood floor, shivering slightly. Standing up silently, he peered over the bar where he had assumed they had originally been. No blankets or any signs they had even been back there. Furrowing his eyebrows, he moved over to the female.

Her injured leg was stiff in front of her and her arms remained crossed over her chest. She was wearing a bloody and slightly torn up black leather motorcycle jacket and the remnants of a tee-shirt poked out of the bottom of it. Her hair was a silvery-brown color, a couple of sun-bleached dirty blonde streaks in it and was raggedly cut but had a wave to what was there. She had a long scar across the bridge of her nose and right beside her left eye that looked like they had just healed. She had a stocky frame, broad shoulders and a short torso, short hands and thin wrists. Without a single sound, Alec moved to the male. He was long framed, long legs and a long torso. His hair was a medium brown color, that also had a slight wave to it. He was wearing bloody torn jeans and a tee-shirt under a thick jacket. Both of them looked to be in their teens, far too young to have to go through all this. Then again, Alec had just turned twenty one when the Infection hit so he would be considered too young too. Hell even surly old Bill could be considered too young.

Moving away, Alec slipped toward the door, peering outside to get a look at the town now that it was light out. The sun poked out from behind one gray cloud, illuminating the small mountain town. It brought new meaning to 'old and run down.' It may have been nice once upon a time, but with all the destruction caused by the bombing and the Infection in general, it looked awful. In his line of sight, he couldn't see any drug stores or gas stations which made him deflate in disappointment. Knowing his luck, they would all be destroyed. He was tempted to just go off and try and find them but figured that if the two humans had been here long enough they would know the town and he would be able to get back to Ellis that much faster. Given they woke up before noon.

They woke up only five minutes apart from each other, the male being the first to rise. He and Alec got into a brief staring contest before he looked away and busied himself with cleaning some dried blood off his shotgun. The female woke up with a sneeze, groaning and muttering something about coffee. She didn't seem to be fully aware of her surroundings for a couple minutes, then she slid out of the booth she was in and stood up on uneasy feet. "Holy shit I need pain killers." she grunted, lifting her injured leg off the ground.

The male snorted, a reluctant grin twitching onto his expression. "Well its a good thing we're gonna go to a drug store now isn't it?" she looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "Yes I decided to go along. With your crap eyes and lameness you can never be too careful." she scowled at that.

"Hey let's not forget who's the better sniper here." she stated, scratching her side. Now that Alec could see her face clearly, he realized that she had a slight glaze to her eyes which were a gray-blue color, and that they seemed to be slightly unfocused. She must have felt his curious stare because she turned toward him and grinned. "All I see is blurry crap once things get past three inches in front of my nose."

"Her glasses broke when she couldn't get out of the way of a Hunter pounce about a month ago." the male continued, standing up and hefting his shotgun over his back and yawning. His eyes hardened when he looked at Alec, and he tilted his head some. "I hope you don't give us a reason to shoot you."

"Oh lay off would you?" the female snapped at him, scowling. "Has he given us a reason to distrust him?" when she received no reply she snorted. "Exactly. Let's go." she didn't wait for a response. She just half limped, half marched, past Alec and out the door, not pausing to make sure they followed. Alec started after her but a hand landed on his shoulder and stopped him, also startling him.

"I'm being dead serious. She may trust you but I don't. We've had too many incidents where someone we trusted turned against us." he practically growled, his voice as hard as his eyes, which were like chips of ice. He released Alec and stared at him pointedly. The Hunter studied him for a heartbeat more before turning wordlessly and following the girl. Now he really didn't know what to make of these two. It almost seemed like the male had taken on the female's coldness from the night before. He understood the suspicion but didn't appreciate the threats. He had done nothing to them without being provoked, and had hardly said anything to them. But if they had been repeatedly betrayed by people they at least considered familiar acquaintances it was no wonder the male was ready to shoot Alec if he made any threatening moves.

It didn't take them long to catch up to the female, who was waiting impatiently at a corner. She looked between them, her eyes hardening some and a frown pulling at her mouth but she didn't say anything. A cold silence formed between the three as they navigated the small roads of the town. They eventually came to a small drugstore that had been borded up but was completely intact. "Think those claws of yours can tear down the plywood?" she asked Alec, raising an eyebrow.

"Hell, I don't know. Haven't tried anything like that yet. I open doors like a normal person." that drew a snort from both of them but a good humored one. That made Alec relax some as the tension in the air lifted a fraction. If he could make them trust him a little bit then things would be easier for all of them. "A well placed shotgun blast might do it too." he glanced at the male who shrugged.

"Well we need to conserve all the bullets we have so... put those claws to work." the female poked him lightly in the arm, nodding toward the drug store. Alec sighed, getting a sneaking suspicion that he was about to make a fool of himself and approached the building. Studying the plywood laid over the door, he didn't see any place where he could easily slip his claws in and pull it off except the top and he would have to hang from it to apply enough force to pull it away. One eye twitching in irritation, Alec hopped up, hooking his clawed fingers over the top of the wood, planted his feet against the middle, and pulled, grunting from the effort. It came away slowly at first then suddenly popped loose, sending him to the snowy ground below with a startled yelp. Shoving the wood off him and standing up, feeling snow stick to his back, he repeated the process for the other side then wrenched the doors open, waiting for some sort of security alarm but none started. It must have been disabled. "Good job." the girl said behind him. She wasn't looking at him when he turned though, instead she was bent over, prodding at her knee.

"That's going to need an actual splint isn't it?" the male asked, peering at her with concern shining in his eyes.

"Yeah. Its starting to swell." she straightened up and shrugged. "May as well make use of this place. Its more fortified than the cafe anyway."

"All our ammo and weapons are back there though."

"But there's not a lot of it. After we help him out we can go and get it." she nodded toward Alec, who was peering into the store cautiously, looking and smelling for any form of a threat.

"You're right. Why are we helping him anyway?" he sounded genuinely curious, no trace of his previous hostility to be found.

"I don't know. 'Cause it fills us with warmth and fluff?" she shook her head. "It feels nice to be doing something productive instead of running and shooting and barely surviving." she sighed, limping forward, her leg throbbing with each step.

"We're gonna have to go to a different town once your leg gets healed up. There's not much wildlife around here and what food we have is going to run out fast." he hummed thoughtfully before continuing, following her inside and vaguely noting where the Hunter had moved to. "But with it being winter and the nearest town being who knows how many miles away... that's going to be a challenge."

"Everything else hasn't been?" she looked at him from where she was searching for splint kits and raised an eyebrow.

"I never said that. But, between defending ourselves, getting enough food and not freezing... it might just be smarter to wait until spring then move on. Hopefully all the food left in the town will be enough to sustain the two of us."

"It should be. I mean, there's bound to be something in the houses and we haven't even tried the market store yet." she picked up one kit, ripped it open and looked at its contents. Only good for if a wrist is broken, not a leg. She replaced it with a scowl and picked up another. Glancing up she noted the blurry top of the Hunter's head on the other side of the small store and narrowed her eyes. "What do you think of him?" she asked quietly, dropping her voice so the Hunter wouldn't hear her.

"I don't really know. He seems decent but so do a lot of people. But... if he's willing to travel fifteen miles through the forest to get medication for one of his friends then he might be worth getting to know."

"Then try and be a bit friendlier won't you?"

"Hey, you can't be too careful in today's times. He's wearing a camouflage vest for the love of crap. For all we know his 'friend' could be in the military and he could be leading them right to us." it sounded like he was trying to convince himself just as much as her and it wasn't working so he just sighed and shook his head. "I don't really know what to think."

She looked up at him, her glazed eyes seeming oddly clear as she grinned widely. "Are you saying that because its true or because you're jealous that he seems to already be taken?" he simply spluttered at that, not able to form a coherent response before she continued. "And anyway, he probably won't stick around once he loads up on enough medicine. If his 'buddy' is that sick he'll want to get out of here as fast as he can."

"I'm amazed he stayed the night." the male snorted, watching Alec move around the store with a plastic bag dangling from one hand as he placed boxes and bottles in it. "Did you hear the noise he let out when we were pinning him last night? He must have thought we were gonna kill him and was thinking of what would happen to whoever is sick." he peered down at the female as she held another package close to her face so she could read its contents.

"Yeah I heard it. It was absolutely heart breaking to hear." she muttered, moving over to the check out counter and sitting on it with the splint pack still in her hand. Silently, she unwrapped her knee, ripped open the package and splinted it, her eyes narrowed to clear up her vision some. "God I hate having shitty eyesight." she grumbled, making one last pass with the gauze before taking out the medical tape. "I'm glad that damned Hunter's dead now. But I don't appreciate the fact that, in trying to save me, you almost shot me at the same time." she glared up at him, ripping the medical tape at the same time.

"Well I didn't did I? And besides, if I hadn't shot when I did you would have been disemboweled." he replied with a shrug, noticing Alec come up out of the corner of his eye. "Find what you needed?"

The Hunter seemed caught off guard by the question, his blazing red eyes sparking for an instant with an unknown emotion before he nodded. "Yeah. I left plenty for the two of you though." he paused, thinking for a moment. "If you want, I can give you directions back to the cabin where my group is bunking so if something happens here you'll have a friendly place to go." he raised an eyebrow, the scars on his face pulling and twisting some. The two humans exchanged a look, seeming to have a silent conversation, a stubborn challenge in both of their eyes as if they were silently daring each other to answer first. Alec cast his eyes off to the side for a moment as he felt the air between the humans crackle. He was almost ready to just back out of the store and head back to the cabin but the male sighed and spoke before he could.

"Fine. That sounds like something to consider." the female smirked from her seat on the counter, scratching the her side and looked at Alec.

"Thanks. Consider your debt repaid." she stated, like she had actually expected Alec to do something along these lines and she wasn't surprised. Alec offered her a lopsided grin, turning when neither of them looked like they were going to say a farewell, waving over his shoulder. When neither of them stopped him, he exited the store. As soon as he rounded the corner, he crouched, placing the handles of the plastic bag between his sharp teeth for convenience sake, and pounced to the low roof of the building across from him.

He wouldn't stop until he reached the cabin, he didn't have the time to lose. If Ellis had gotten as bad as he was when Alec had left in two days, who knew how ill he was now. Alec didn't want to waste any time, didn't want to make stops, but the snow gradually got heavier until it was getting hard to see. There was minimal wind, but the amount of snow falling forced Alec to travel through the shorter trees of the forest or so that if he his a trunk he wouldn't have far to fall. He was also slowed by the absolute cold that enveloped him despite the desperate burning of his legs lungs and arms.

The moon was rising by the time it the snow got thick enough that he couldn't see at all and forced him to stop for the rest of the night. He crouched, shivering, on the branch of a large evergreen, sheltered to some degree from the snow. The cold pressed in around him, making him bury his face in his jacket's collar, breathing in the scent of dried blood from the torn up shirt under his vest and his own scent which was mostly snuffed out by the smell of Infection. He still had the smell of his old house, incense and the cologne that his father had insisted he wore everywhere that had always irritated his nose and made him sneeze for five minutes after he had put it on. He must have wore it so much that it became part of his scent permanently.

Lifting his head, he puffed out a breath, the cloud of fog hanging in the air for a scary amount of time. He vaguely wondered what the temperature was but didn't really care as long as he didn't get frost bite or hypothermia. The chances of that rose the longer he remained where he was but he couldn't travel anymore without the risk of breaking his neck through a head on collision with a tree. Fingering the plastic material of the bag that he had set between his tucked knees and chest, he looked around, listening but not really expecting anything. Any smart creature would be asleep in a deep warm hole somewhere instead of out in the horrid cold that he was stuck in. Shivering, he buried his nose in his jacket again, closing his eyes and praying he would wake up without any blue or purple body parts in the morning.

When he did wake up, the sun was making the snow sparkle in a million colors. It had stopped falling and had settled in a fine powder on every surface, including the top of Alec's head and his shoulders. Lifting his head, he dusted the snow out of his hair and looked around, all the while flexing every muscle in his body to make sure that he hadn't froze in any form during the night. Luck must have been on his side because he was still perfectly thawed. Sucking in a deep breath, making his lungs burn from the cold, he stood on the branch stiffly, stretching his legs and arms and twisting his back to make sure he was ready to go. Once he was sure he wouldn't lock up mid-leap, he placed the handles of the bag between his teeth again and leaped. I have to be almost there. I traveled for a few hours before stopping. He mused, his heart hammering with worry as the sun rose. God I hope I didn't get lost. His fears were pacified though when he spotted the cabin through the trees. Something was horribly wrong though. When he paused in the treeline, he saw that one of the upstairs windows was open and the reek of extreme sickness permeated the air around the cabin making Alec's heart turn to a block of ice and crawl into his throat.

I know I'll be shot for such a place to leave off but I felt it necessary. And the two humans will remain unnamed until either a) someone figures out who they really are, or b) they show up again. Which they will. Hope y'all enjoyed this chapter and once again thanks so much for the two hundred reviews!