Author's Notes: I will be blunt, I'm not satisfied at all with this one.

As with Emulation, this was originally written for a Discord server's writing contest with a specific prompt and a limit of 2k words. However, it quickly became apparent that the prompt didn't inspire me as much as I thought it would, and by the time I got to write it, I had surpassed the word limit and it was too late to edit it in time for the submission.

I am putting it out here because I wasted too much time on it, and when the prompt is used again (I wasn't alone in not submitting anything this time around), I want to write something else. I also want it visible so I can have a clear example on what I need to work on in the future and my flaws as a writer. I don't expect much attention given to this story given the weird premise and the fact that it's full of OCs, both of which are fairly alienating to the average Fate fan. But if I can at least get one person curious as to why it's a Fate/Zero AU, I will consider that a silver lining. This is definitely a premise I want to try writing at some point.

If anything else, it helped me try out writing in present tense and in first person.

"We can rest here."

At Ajay's suggestion, our little group comes to a halt, presumably our last stop before getting to the passage. Among the rest of the abandoned cars in the tunnel, we have stopped next to a RV, a real godsend. Damien and Eva go inside the trailer, their weapons at the ready, helped by the door on the driver's side of the vehicle having been left open (thoughts about where the driver went are far too grim so I try not to dwell on it), and hoping to scavenge whatever is left inside, be it food or material. Since it's his turn, Marcus climbs up the back ladder to the roof to have a good vantage point from which he can stand watch and look back to where we came from to see if we are followed. With the overhead lights not working and the entrance of the tunnel far enough behind us that it was reduced to a pinprick of white in the distance, there is only so much that Marcus' flashlight can do to illuminate in the tunnel, leaving the four lanes of eastbound traffic to disappear into the black arch of the tunnel.

But it's not like they are especially smart, or at least not smart enough to perfectly hide in the dark. Chances are, we will hear them coming before we see them. And considering the size of the horde this time, it will be hard to miss.

After their quick search of the RV, our two intrepid teenagers certify it to be empty of threat and anything useful. Almost immediately, Eben gently helps his pregnant wife into the RV so she can rest inside. Lana obviously cannot walk for very long, often stopping to catch her breath and slowing the group down as a result. As the one for whom this journey has been the most difficult, Ajay, as her personal and only attending doctor, most likely proposed this rest for her sake. Speaking of the man, he is currently bent down to attend to a spot of bleeding on Vito's leg, probably to verify the mafioso hadn't been stung. Watching the scene makes me instinctively touch my arm, repressing the urge to scratch it.

With everyone else occupied, I slide down against the RV to sit on the ground, trying to make myself as small as possible and hoping the car next to it hides me from view. I check to see that no one is looking at me, and roll up my sleeve to look at my forearm for a moment. There's no visible change, only the usual sense of unease, so I roll my sleeve back down and rest my head against the car, a heavy sigh leaving my lips.

With this impromptu break, I can take stock of our situation. As dire our circumstances may be, it still feels very surreal to be standing in the Lincoln Tunnel on foot. I have lived in Manhattan all my life, and I have never walked through the tunnel, only ever using my car to get to Jersey. And why would I? The tunnel is, what, one mile, two miles long? Way too long to just take a stroll if you ask me, and I'm no Alberto Salazar to do it simply to stay healthy.

And yet here we are, walking in an abandoned Lincoln Tunnel and making our way toward the Jersey side using the catwalk. The situation is strange enough, but the Lincoln doesn't feel like itself either. The usual overhead fluorescent bars on the tunnel's roof are out, as with every lights in the city, plunging it in thickening darkness barely illuminated by our flashlights. The most visible objects in proximity are the whitish tiles that dress the upward-curving walls, and the muted flashes of chrome of the countless abandoned cars jamming the tunnel's lanes bumper to bumper. Sometimes, the glass lenses of inactive closed-circuit TV cameras reflect our lights in brief flashes. But otherwise, the tunnel is in complete foreboding darkness. And without the lights of the tunnel accompanied by the lights and noise of hundreds of cars during rush hour, the Lincoln Tunnel is nothing more than a claustrophobic passage of stone walls at risk of being crushed under the weight of the Hudson.

The thought of all that water above, the tunnel collapsing, the water flooding in, all crushing down on us, makes me feel squeezed. The solid darkness provides the perfect theater screen on which my mind could play out its fantasies, and the abandoned cars provide the perfect fodder. Against my will, my brain imagines what happened to all the drivers: everyone rushing to drive out of the city, getting stuck in the traffic caused by everyone else having the same idea. Many leaving their cars to continue on foot, only to be met at the border with New Jersey by the barricade raised by the National Guard and the Army. Grim-eyed soldiers in germ-proof and sting-proof attire crouched behind guns equipped with infrared scope, their job to cut down anyone who tried to come through the tunnel. The shots, the blood. And the survivors going back to the city, knowing full well that they were heading to their deaths at the end of the tunnel.

Their deaths, or worse.

My dark thoughts are interrupted by snippets of conversation above me. Eva and Damien have joined Marcus at his post, and are conversing with him. They are on friendly terms with him, since he is the one closest in age to them out of all of us. I strain my ear to listen. Anything to distract me.

"Man," Damien drawls, making his elongated "man" sound more like a loud sigh than an actual word. "You know the first thing I'm gonna do once we're out of here? I'm gonna go watch a movie, any movie. I haven't seen one in forever." A pause, and I can almost see the boy's grimace in my mind's eye. "Well, not any movie. I'm probably not gonna watch another...erm, what's the name of those movies with zombies as a metaphor for Americans or some shit?"

"Dawn of the Living Dead, dumbass," answers Eva in mock exasperation, though the fond undertone in her voice is unmistakable. They almost certainly got together, finally.

"It's Dawn of the Dead actually," corrects Marcus with a chuckle. "By George A. Romero. You confused the title with his previous film, Night of the Living Dead. And Damien, the zombies in Dawn represented consumerism, not Americans."

"Oh right, thanks."

"Yeah, yeah, what you said. Anyway, what I was saying is that I don't think I will be able to watch these movies ever again. Or any horror movie for that matter. I have seen enough of that"

The silence stretches on longer this time, uncomfortable, suffocating. I keep forgetting that these kids saw the same horrors we did, and it will plague the rest of their lives. Hell, by the time we found them, they had watched all of their classmates die. I can't imagine what they are thinking right now, but I would bet they are reliving their own personal hells, not much different from my thoughts a moment ago.

Damien breaks it first, because it's always Damien and he can't stand silence, but not for the first time, I ask myself if he was always like that or if these weeks made him like that. He resumes speaking with a softer voice: "Hey, what do y'all think they say outside caused this? You think they know about the plane?"

"I...I think they keep track or at least a record of all flights," Eva says, just as softly. "And the crash of Flight A300 made the news too, I recall seeing them at home. Not like we know any more than that ourselves."

"Well, in Romero's Night, radiation from Venus irradiating a space probe is what caused the 'ghouls'," Marcus says. And although he just used the terminology of the film, the fact that he says it however innocently causes me to tense. "I doubt the government will do anything but accuse the Soviets. Or maybe they will switch things up and say it's an Iranian plot."

"I mean," Damien hesitates, "couldn't it have been the Commies?"

"Doubt it. Too accidental and untargeted for it to have been deliberate. If anything, I would expect them to have a plane crash in DC to better cripple the government, or have planes crash in every major city. Hell, if I was a Ruskie, I would have tried to infect Reagan himself! But any of that fails to effectively destroy America better and faster than just dropping nukes."

I could picture him shrugging at this point.

"To be honest, I don't really care. I just hope Sky France was sued into bankruptcy—"

I would have listened to them more, but Eben comes out of the RV with a cigarette in hand, clearly intent on having a smoke away from his wife and unborn child. I tune them out, and motion for him to come over.

I take us some distance away from the others, and I show him.

The sight of the red swelling on the skin of my forearm, with a little black sting stuck in it, makes him go very quiet. I can barely hear him breathing.

"Since when?"

"Since we escaped from Penn Station. I got careless."

And I would have died were it not for the sniper, but I decide to not mention that detail. If the sniper was who I think it was, there's no reason to repay the favor by exposing their identity. Plus, I can see the guilt and concern on Eben's usual stoic face, and I don't want to add to it by revealing I almost died.

"It's okay. There's nothing you could have done," I say, smiling sadly. "I was the one who decided to buy us some time, and we needed that time. We...you have found both a way out of the city and a possible cure." I shrug with a nonchalance I do not feel. "For that, I do not regret my decision," I lie.

This does not appear to comfort him. If anything, his face looks even more pained. "'Nothing I could have done'? John, you're going to become a Ghoul, nothing can excuse that!" He almost raises his voice, but restrains himself. He whispers next, his voice desperate. "What about the cure? Couldn't it help you?"

"You know as well as I do that it won't." Does he think I didn't think of that? "It's only a possible cure, and we both know that the compound is incomplete because it only approached the problem through the eyes of modern science. It needs elements from the side of magecraft, and the resources for that are outside of New York. We don't know how long it will take or if it will even work, so wasting our only sample on me is just a bad idea."

"But we can't just...give up! Maybe the Association—"

"The Association nothing. Do you really think they will help me?" I almost bark a laugh. "Even if I wasn't just an American magus with barely 300 years of history, they will happily let the US government bomb or even nuke their own city if it takes care of the worst breach of the Concealment of Mystery in history for them. I wouldn't be surprised if they scoured the blast site in the aftermath to execute any possible survivor, just to make sure. The fact that this was all because of one of the freelancers they hired means they will do anything to cover up any lead about their involvement. I can't even count on being preserved as a research specimen, after all, they sent freelancers after Borzark because his research wasn't worth being Sealed."

I take an almost perverse glee now in shutting down Eben's arguments. His discomfited face brings me a feeling of elation I haven't felt in years. The fact that he just wants to save me is immaterial to that.

Because if I am going to die or turn, I want to have as much fun as I can before it's too late. Even if it hurts a friend.

His mouth opens, but I interrupt him. "I'm not going to ask our country either, that's just asking to end up on an operating table in Area 51. The Holy Church is a no brainer. And the Dead Apostle Ancestors probably consider the Borzark Ghouls and Bees to be an abomination." I take a deep breath. "I have thought about this. It's the only thing I've thought about, and I know what I have to do. The biggest horde we have ever seen will soon come into this tunnel, and someone needs to stop it from reaching you while you take the passage."

The absolute worst outcome would be that a Ghoul or a Bee manage to follow the group in the passage and get out in Weehawken, free to spread the Borzark infection in the outside world. There was also the possibility that the horde would rush down the tunnel and overwhelm the barricade there, but I wouldn't be surprised if there was a contingency plan to collapse the tunnel in such a case. But if that were to happen and the group was still in the side tunnel…

I grab Eben's shoulders. "We don't have much time. You need to get out and fast, and put as many states between New York and the rest of you as you can. You sent your boys to the family you have there, right? Head there and lay low. You are this city's only hope for a cure."

Eben appears to still want to protest, but I must have convinced him because he stays silent, the only sign of his disapproval being the thin line his lips have become. He nods solemnly.

"You have my eternal gratitude, John," he says with emotion in his voice.

"Don't sweat it. A magus lives with death always beside them, so I am not afraid." I think I succeed in keeping the sobs out of my voice, and I really hope it is far too dark to see the tears in my head. "Hey, name your kid after me, and we'll be even."

Our group departs soon after. Showing my sting to the others garnered the reactions I expected. Even after all we had seen and all the people we had seen die or turn into those things, it doesn't make it any easier. Eva even cried a bit. Lana has a sad, resigned look on her face, which is all I could have hoped for. Only Vito didn't really express sympathy, but I'm not surprised. I never really liked the asshole, and he appears to share the sentiment. He's probably the third danger to the group next to the horde and them being caught escaping, and I suspect he wants to bring a sample of the virus back to his boss (everyday, Galvarosso Scladio having been out of the city when the quarantine was instaurated is a travesty). Hopefully, the Wingards can suss out if he attempts to double-cross them, even if the cop of the duo was hindered by her pregnancy.

After walking in silence, each in our somber thoughts, we eventually reach the unmarked utility door, thankfully far enough from the New Jersey barricade that I doubt we could be seen even through a scope. If the hobo was right, behind the door would be stairs leading to an abandoned passageway running between the Lincoln and the North River tunnels, forgotten after Amtrak finished renovating a few years ago.

We do our goodbyes. Ajay gives me a firm handshake, wishing me luck. He follows up by giving me his handgun, telling me I will need it more than him and that he is a terrible shot anyway. Eva hugs me tight, and her wet cheeks moisten my clothing. Damien hugs me as well and I think I hear him let out a few sobs. Marcus gives me dap and pound hugs me, speaking a brief Islamic dua in my ear for safety. Eben gives me another firm handshake, but we exchange no words, having said all that needed to be said.

Lana is last. Her huge belly doesn't allow for hugs, so she settles for kissing me on both cheeks. The wetness when our skins come in contact tells me she's actually crying. The mad thought of kissing her on the lips comes to my mind, but the guilt of even thinking that follows soon after and overwhelms me.

Lana deserves better, and Eben is actually good for her. My own selfish jealousy makes me want to vomit.

I say my thanks and goodbyes, and I watch as everyone goes through the door, seeing them for the last time. I commit to memory as much as I can of their features.

I close the door behind them, and start the slow walk back. Without anyone around to pretend for, my false bravado leaves my body, leaving me bone exhausted, like full weight of the river above crushed down on me. Putting a foot in front of the other feels like fighting the whole planet itself. More than once, I stumble and fall hard on the hard ground, and almost stop fighting, wishing I could just stay lying down.

Here lies John White. He died alone.

But the thought of the others getting caught up by Ghouls give me the motivation to slowly rise up, and keep going.

I return to the abandoned RV, get onto its roof, and wait, holding my rifle in one hand while the other touches Ajay's handgun in my pocket in reassurance.

Another hour passes before I can see them. Or rather, hear them.

One bee buzzing is almost too soft to hear. But the sound of the frantic buzzing hundreds (thousands? millions?) of bees easily fill the dark of the tunnel, even before I hear the shambling of countless feet on the pavement. The distant faint light of the tunnel's entrance is soon blotted out by the mass of countless bodies. The discordant chorus of moans join in unison with the buzzing of the bees, forming an infernal orchestra of noise for the monstrous parade that fills the living with dread. Many Ghouls constantly hit cars, not bothering to avoid them in their directionless trance, adding percussions to the hellish ensemble.

There is the coppery smell of blood and raw meat in the air. And the faint smell of something else I can't identify at first, a pungent odor I can only describe as "spicy-bitter", the smell of smoke on a damp day, before I realize that what I'm smelling is the same smell from my sting. It's bee venom.

Strengthening my eyesight with magical energy, I can now see more details of the horde. A crowd of hundreds and hundreds of red eyes staring blankly ahead, they would look almost normal if a bit emaciated were it not for their eyes and their mouths left hanging wide open, with saliva dripping in fine tendrils from them. Some of them look not human at all, their faces so swollen from having been stung all over by swarms of bees that their eyes were reduced to slits, underneath a bulbous mishmash of puffy flesh dripping with pus.

Bees fly aggressively all around them, so violently that they frequently collide with one another. Some are entangled in the hair and clothing of the ghouls, moving slightly with difficulty to try and extricate themselves, when they didn't just not move at all, seemingly dying trapped.

I do not wait for them to reach me. I activate my circuits, the familiar sensation of burning my nerves coursing through my body. Immediately, I activate the magecraft of my family, and summon our familiars.

Those in proximity respond quickly. I can feel them through my senses, like invisible threads connecting me and my countless servants, all rushing to the tunnel or coming out of its darkest corners to my help. Soon, a large black mass of waves of squeaking rats and skittering cockroaches join me, prepared to defend me from the bees while I take care of the ghouls.

This is the only magecraft afforded to a newly made family living for 300 years in the city of New York: a deep connection with its pests and invasive species. Cockroaches, rats, pigeons, squirrels, raccoons, even stray sewer alligators on occasions. The pestilence and the filth, the refuse created by human civilization, is what we studied for three centuries and what will die with me.

I don't wanna die.

I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die.

Even now my fear of dying consumes me to the bone, every cell, every nerve, my very blood screaming for me to get out of here, to run, to not die.
Magi walk with death? You need to accept death to practice magecraft? Bullshit, empty words. I did not feel so afraid when I first activated my magic circuits, or when I inherited the Magic Crest of my family. But now, in the dark, facing monsters with no master and no purpose other than eat me or make me one of them, I have never been so afraid.

But I have no choice.

Lana.

I walk towards the light at the end of the tunnel.