In which Aiden meets two relics at the End of the World. And in which he ponders sharks.
Chapter 3 Friend or-
Page 71, How To Fend Off A Shark
One: Stay Calm
Aiden had always thought of himself as a reasonably calm individual. Underwater though? Wrapped up in nothing but heavy, wet… blue?
He pursed his lips, a finger tapping against the beat-up cover of The Worst Case Scenario, and contemplated the colour of water fit for sharks. That's what the ocean looked like, right? Blue. Not green. Not brown. Not like lakes and rivers, but a Deep Sea Blue.
Plus, oceans had salt in them. That'd sting his eyes.
So.
He'd be in the water. He'd have no air. His eyes would sting (just how much he couldn't be certain of, since he'd never swam in an ocean). And to top it off, there'd be a shark.
How big do those things get anyway?
Respectably big, he assumed, and that was what he pondered next as he lifted his eyes away from the book to squint into the late afternoon sun. It hung over a valley so thickly blanketed by forests he couldn't see the river snaking through the valley's base. Aiden knew it was there though, somewhere, endlessly fed by the mountain ranges it carved through.
He stayed clear of the river. Of the valley, really. Dead villages cosied up against the river's shore and those villages brought hordes of Infected and near impassable roads. Aiden had avoided both.
Now he sat— cross-legged —on a derelict bus leaning on its flat tires, surrounded by the rusted over skeleton of a traffic jam, with nothing stirring but the wind. A waterfall rumbled off in the distance, its waters foaming white. Birds called back and forth. A distant scream— not human, but near enough —drifted up the steep mountainside.
Aiden's gaze dropped back to the book.
2: Hit the eyes or gills.
That's fair, he thought. Nothing liked getting poked in the eye, though, to be honest, he found it hard to imagine taking a swing while underwater. Water dragged. A lot.
Aiden slid a finger under the page and— very carefully —flipped it, not wanting the thing to fall to pieces right then and there. It looked the part, with its spine stripped and replaced by tape, and the front cover missing an entire corner.
Handwritten notes were squeezed into the margins of almost every page, and as he'd skimmed through the book he'd found two distinct voices. Neither of which he could read, on account of one being German and the other written in an alphabet he was entirely unfamiliar with.
It did leave him wondering though just how many owners this particular copy of The Worst Case Scenario had gone through before he'd found it three days ago; on a Biter lying on its back, its arms up in the air and its heels kicking grooves into the dirt.
A fellow Pilgrim. Now ex-Pilgrim.
The Pilgrim (who'd chosen to wear his badge tattooed on his neck) had carried a pack almost as tall as half of Aiden's height. Maybe that'd been what had gotten him killed. Maybe not. Travel light, a rule best left unbroken. Either or, it had been what kept the Bitter on the ground, tangled up in the pack straps and underbrush out in the middle of no and where, vaguely adjacent to some and where.
Aiden had killed the Biter. Then he'd rifled through the pack to come away with a reasonable dinner, a pair of fresh socks, a jar of salt, some batteries, a sharpening block that he traded for his old one, and the book. After that, he'd hung the pack from a low tree branch where it was easy to spot (as was customs when you couldn't complete another Pilgrim's route for them), and kept on walking.
And walking.
And walking.
Then walking some more.
On and on, his only companions his careful focus and his marginally less careful thoughts.
Aiden, his thoughts arguably careless right then, scratched at his neck and leaned his head to the side, curious why someone had glued eyes on the picture of a shark on page 72. Or why the book felt it necessary to point out that a shark's nose was not worth punching.
Page 73 mentioned not to wear shiny jewellery while swimming.
And page 74—
—a flock of birds took off, sudden and quick, their wings a flurry of noise and their calls loud.
Aiden's eyes snapped up. The book snapped closed.
Up ahead, where the road curved around a bend, a man came into view. While he was too far away for Aiden to make out much, the obvious detail stood out right away: Armed. Aiden, with the book sliding down between his crossed legs, quested for his hatchet.
Though then the man kept coming, slow and steady, with not a hint of malice in his steps, his hand never reaching for (what Aiden assumed to be) the baseball bat sticking out from behind his shoulder. Aiden's brow furrowed and he looked closer.
The man wore a simple set of dark and tattered clothes. Pilgrim's threads. Specifically chosen to blend into the local foliage so he'd be hard to spot. A slim pack with a single strap was slung around his body, tight and secure. His skin was black. His hair was near non-existent.
Ah. Recognition came quickly after that.
Aiden's fingers glanced off the hatchet's hilt and he jerked his hand up instead, giving the man a wide, sweeping wave. A wave that was driven by a sudden burst of pressure welling up in Aiden's chest.
Where'd the pressure come from?
From relief over how he wasn't about to have to go through the excruciating moments between are you friendly or am I about to have to defend my right to breathe?
Or from plain old excitement that he knew the man?
"Spike!" Aiden called, loudly, and had himself promptly startled by the sound of his own voice.
That liked to happen. Especially when he hadn't said a word in four days; not since Spike had gotten a hold of him, anyway, calling him out on a cross-country hike that Spike had promised would be worth it. Even if it took Aiden on a detour. And even if Spike had refused to tell him the exact whys and the whats.
They'd settled on a road marker, a vague time that'd leave room for delays, and off Aiden had gone, leaving behind makeshift civilisation for a quiet trek deeper into the forested mountains.
Spike's arm raised just enough to covey a greeting of sorts.
"You're late." Aiden's voice felt scratchy and unused. He cleared his throat and gathered up his gear. The book went into his pack.
"And you still have no respect at all for your elders."
It was a statement, rather than a question, and Aiden flashed Spike a small smile before he hopped from the bus to meet his old friend halfway.
Contrary to Spike's teasing, Aiden had nothing but respect for the man. Pilgrims (by virtue of the lifestyle that'd chosen them) tended not to live very long. Yet here was Spike: Alive beyond a typical Pilgrim's usual life expectancy. Because I'm fucking awesome, was the reason Spike gave when asked how he'd managed for so long, something Aiden was not about to disagree with. Though it also helped how the man had limited his range to only a few territories, and how he more often than not coordinated contracts rather than carrying them out himself.
That didn't mean he didn't get his shoes muddy on occasion. Sometimes, the wild just kind of called for him. Or so he said.
Did Aiden know how old exactly Spike really was?
No.
Had he wanted to?
Of course.
Did he have to?
Not exactly. Spike showed his age, with his face deeply lined and his skin having taken on an almost thin look, stretched taut over sinew and muscle and hoarding spots like a tree hoarded rings. And he certainly looked older today than Aiden remembered from the last time they'd met.
"Shit, it's good to see you, Spike. How long has it been?"
"Too long, man." Spike, wearing a wide smile, traded Aiden a firm grip; a spirited, one-handed grab of their hands clasped around the other's forearm.
The pressure that'd pushed outwards from Aiden's chest (the excitement, or the relief, or whatever it'd been) immediately popped, driven off by the brief touch of someone who not only still had a mind of his own, but was also not inclined to bash his skull in over whatever little Aiden carried on his back. A baffled chill replaced the pressure. Snared his throat shut tight.
Embarrassed— and with his mouth dry —Aiden pulled his arm back.
Spike, either unaware of Aiden's discomfort, used to it, or too polite to let it show he'd noticed, jutted his chin forward, indicating the road as it ran on behind Aiden. "Come on," he said. "I have something to show you."
"Yeah, what's that? You were pretty vague on the radio and this detour is going to cost me at least four days. If my rep tanks I'll blame you."
"Trust me, your rep can take the hit."
"Uh-huh." Aiden followed Spike along a short stretch of road before they cut into the forest. The underbrush was merciless here and the ground sloped upwards. "You're dodging the question."
"It wasn't something you broadcast on an open frequency," Spike said, explaining nothing.
"Well, we're not on the radio anymore. So spit it out—" Aiden grunted as a bramble latched on to his arm, which required a bit of careful negotiation before it could be convinced to let go. "—old fart."
Spike barked up a laugh. "You got anything new on Jane?"
Still not explaining shit, I see.
Aiden threw him a look, right as they finally broke through the thickest of the underbrush and out onto where the forest floor was mostly a blanket of fallen needles and twisted, broken branches. A squirrel shot up a gnarly-barked tree.
"Nah," Aiden admitted. "Trail went cold after New Paris. But you were saying?"
"I was saying you need a little patience."
Rolling his eyes— but unable to keep a smile from pulling on his mouth —Aiden dropped the subject. For now.
They spent the rest of the climb exchanging notes on settlements within and adjacent to Spike's territories; the ones that'd flourished, the ones that'd been reduced to nothing but five rickety huts and a ramshackle fence (namely, Baines), and those to avoid because they'd either collapsed entirely or had been overrun by a cult equally likely to eat you as it was to pay you.
A small hovel named Cindertop had fallen, Spike told him, its walls washed out by a nighttime mudslide. Aiden frowned. He'd strike it off his map later.
When the terrain eventually evened out, what passed for small talk between Pilgrims quieted in favour of keeping an eye on the foliage. A steep incline was safe. Somewhat. Unable to keep their balance forever, Biters had a tendency to roll downhill, but as soon as a forest flattened out, caution was in order. If the shade was thick enough, it could attract an entire herd.
Thankfully, the only thing attacking Aiden right at that point in time was a cloud of buzzing mosquitos. He swatted one against his neck, flicked another from his forearm, and ended up waving his hand in what amounted to a spectacularly futile gesture.
The mosquitos kept buzzing.
Ahead, Spike called for him to hurry up. Something about them being almost there.
Almost where? Aiden nearly snapped back, though then he settled for falling into a jog. He'd just about outpaced the mosquitos when he reached the remains of a narrow driveway sweeping up through the forest (which would have been a much easier climb, he thought). Relatively untouched by wild growth, the path was covered in a generous layer of damp detritus.
Tracks had churned it up.
Tire tracks.
A shock of cold bit Aiden's spine. He slowed. "Uhm. Spike?"
"Yeah?" Spike had already reached an iron gate at the top of the driveway, its design needlessly intricate. A tall, white (or once-white) concrete wall sectioned off the area.
"You saw the tracks, right? The tire tracks? Right here?" Aiden stepped around them, his eyes flicking from the deep imprints up to Spike.
"I did." Spike grabbed the gate's iron bars and heaved. It rolled open with a painfully loud screech. "Relax, man. You're about to meet some friends of mine."
Aiden winced.
It wasn't like he didn't trust Spike. He did. Enough to walk by his side and to wait out nights with him by sleeping in shifts. But a friend of a friend was a stranger by a different name. Plus, loyalties changed. Goalposts shifted. Someone you considered friendly yesterday might change their mind tomorrow.
Aiden sighed. You're being paranoid.
Recognizing the unease for what it was, he squeezed himself in through the gap after Spike. They closed the gate behind them, which meant more screeching; exactly the kind of thing Aiden's gradually fraying nerves needed. Not.
He breathed through it, turned around, and faced a massive, blocky villa so deceptively untouched by time that he couldn't help but stare.
"Wow."
"Pretty nice crib, right?" Spike agreed.
An understatement.
The villa stood two stories high. It spread out wide— wider than some settlements he'd found huddling out in the wild —and had a facade covered in thick vines. Its concrete walls looked pristine enough, vines or not, and a row of intact windows looked down at them from the second floor. Lanterns dangled from posts up front, weaving in the air along with what'd once been cheerfully coloured cloth triangles strung up on a line. The cloth was now bleached and tattered.
Three cars had rusted themselves to death on the right.
But. Yeah. The villa was something.
Spike kept walking. Aiden, torn between being trusting and giving in to the twinge of alarm squeezing the back of his neck, followed at a careful distance. Which was just as well, since about halfway across the yard— and a long yard it was, plus seriously wide open —a man appeared on the flat roof.
Aiden's feet glued themselves to the ground. In order words: He froze.
The man leaned forward and propped a leg up on the roof's raised lip. A crossbow rested on his shoulder, held in place with a lazy grasp on its stock. The crossbow's business end was pointed skywards, away from Aiden and away from Spike, but Aiden remained exactly where he was, with his fingers already by his hatchet's hilt.
Which was pointless if the man decided to take a shot. Close as they were, neither he nor Spike warranted being called target practice. Especially at that angle.
Aiden's eyes cut left.
Then right.
Yeah. Just like he'd figured. He couldn't have taken cover even if he'd tried.
And we closed the gate… how dumb was that?
The man on the roof raised an arm. Aiden— half expecting to find out what having a bolt lodged into his chest would feel like —flinched.
But all he got was a challenge. "Who goes there?" the man prompted, loudly. Oddly enough, his voice hid a hint of mirth as it carried down into the yard. "Friend or— ow."
Aiden, with his feet still glued where he'd left them, but with his brows trying to hike right off his face with how high up they'd shot, watched a pebble bounce off the man's skull. The projectile sailed off to the side.
"The hell, Fi?" the recently pebbled man complained. He rubbed at the back of his head. "You're ruining a perfectly rehearsed line there, you little skunk."
A second figure appeared at the roof's edge, one much shorter and much narrower. A woman, Aiden realised, a detail which momentarily gave his mind pause. That was rare.
Not the bit with his thoughts slowing to a confused crawl, but the bit where he ran into women out in the territories. Especially ones looking at him and Spike with an intensity reminding him of a stray settlement cat he'd watched once. It'd been a scrawny thing with matted grey fur and it'd been getting ready to pounce on a finch.
"Hi Spike," the woman said. She did not pounce. "Crane would like to know what took you so long. And if he's got to give you a life next time around?"
The man by her side gave his skull another rub with his knuckles. He muttered something Aiden couldn't catch.
"Well," Spike called back, "you tell Crane that his wheels are cheating and that I'll smoke his ass in a fair run any day."
The woman folded her arms and cocked her head so she could throw her companion a brief glance.
He, in turn, flashed Spike a grin. "Bold, old man. Very bold. Now head around the back, we left the garage door open."
And with that, they both stepped out of sight.
What the hell was that?
Spike looked over his shoulder at Aiden, still solidly frozen on the spot. "Look at you all puckered up. You need a minute there?"
Aiden scoffed.
Still alive and without a bolt lodged in him, he followed Spike.
Past the three rusted cars and a sharp turn left, they found the garage the man had mentioned. Its gate had been raised, but not fully. They ducked on through.
A fourth car sat in the gloom, its tail sporting patches of moss and its black coat dulled by a thick layer of dust. Leaves had blown inside over the years, had formed piles against the flat tires, and cobwebs hung off those small mirrors mounted to the car's side. The ones that reminded Aiden of fish fins.
Next to the car stood a motorbike.
Its tires weren't flat. Its body wasn't coated in dust. A scent hung near it— fuel, exhaust, like those tired generators wheezing away in settlements —and there were enough bags and packs strapped to it that Aiden figured he could have easily fitted everything he'd ever owned on there.
He stared.
Stared some more.
All the way until a rattle— a sudden, loud commotion from right behind him —made him whip around, grab for his hatchet, and almost pull the weapon free. Spike's hand landed on his arm and stopped him mid-draw.
"Lord have mercy," Spike said. "You're going to give the kid a heart attack."
"Apologies," said a patch of shadows to his left, the voice familiar from when she'd been up on the roof, rather down here and right. next. to. him.
Aiden, his throat tight, realised he'd missed the woman standing barely an arm's length to his side, tucked in a corner where the light from the grimed up garage windows didn't reach. All because he'd been too busy staring at the damn bike. Which— right then and there —made him the residential idiot.
A dead idiot if she'd been inclined to shank him.
Today was turning out to be a lot more eventful than he'd predicted when he'd gotten up.
After she'd locked the garage gate and turned to him, Aiden fought to put on his best smile reserved for first impressions. The one he'd gone out of his way to practice in cracked and grimy mirrors and which was meant to convey that he was no threat. It didn't survive for long, crumbling the moment she slid her eyes over him with a guarded intensity that brought him right back to that cat and its finch.
Sussing him out, he figured.
Right, well, he sussed her back. That was only fair.
If she was a Pilgrim— as he'd originally anticipated —she didn't broadcast it outright. And while her clothes were put together from often-mended pieces, they were nowhere near as ragged as he was used to seeing on people out in the wild. Like Spike's. Or even Aiden's own sorry set, some of which were a few more washes away from coming apart at the seams. A fact he was painfully aware of and which he dreaded, truthfully, because the last time his pants had given up (torn by a barbwire fence), it'd taken him four entire days before he'd been able to find a new pair.
Now there was a memory Aiden liked staying clear of. So he did that. Stayed clear of it.
In comparison, the woman's getup looked criminally sturdy.
Her moss green sweater hugged her torso tight, with a leather-lined hood bunching around her narrow shoulders. A leather vest— worn open and looking particularly well-oiled —stuck tight to her narrow waist and extended down past her tailbone like a sparrow's tail. Strapped to her thigh— over a near-patchwork pair of pants that had been a solid brown once but now boasted all sorts of autumn colours —she carried a hatchet.
A hatchet which made Aiden's own feel, ah, what's the word? Inadequate? Poor? Wanting? All of the above? Where his was held together mostly by tape and wishful thinking, hers seemed entirely made from solid black metal and very, very sharp spite.
Though even if her clothes (and the weapon he could see) didn't show the road's relentless wear and tear, she, herself, certainly did.
Scars textured her arms. More marred her face, where they were layered over blemishes and imperfections that extended down along her thin neck. One particular scar caught Aiden's attention though. Enough to have him stare.
A bite mark. On her chin.
A human bite. Not canine. Not whatever-else you could reasonably get into a scuffle with. Nope. That'd been a person who'd chomped down on her, and judging by how faded the scar looked it'd been a while since.
His thoughts got into each other's way and promptly tripped from his head. Which was to say he spoke before he had a chance to think it over.
"You're infected?"
Her brow creased. Next to him, Spike cleared his throat.
"I mean— ah—" Aiden, grasping for anything that'd make the embarrassment quit biting, tried being polite. Since being polite tended to give anyone a leg up, right? Hopefully. Especially since he'd just gone and shoved one down his own throat. He offered her his hand. "I'm Aiden."
"Zofia," she said, not missing a beat. His hand (plus the question he'd blurted) she readily ignored in favour of adjusting her hat (a light brown cap worn backwards, with a green headscarf trapped underneath).
You deserved that. Aiden dropped his hand to rub it idly against his thigh.
"You hungry?" Zofia— with a sharp Zo at the start —left him steeping in shame and slid through the shadows in the garage, her sneakers barely making a sound.
"Could always eat," Spike said, which was a bit like pointing out how water was damp. Pilgrims liked to exist in a constant flux between hungry and starving; or so Aiden figured, anyway.
"Splendid. I've got some birds earlier, enough for sharing," she said. "That's if Crane hasn't eaten them all already."
Aiden— realizing he'd been standing stock still while Spike had followed her —finally uprooted himself and hurried to catch up, heading for the stairs at the back of the garage. A door waited at the top.
When Zofia pushed it open, her left hand laid out flat against it, he noticed how she missed three fingers on that hand.
The villa was a dusty, but untouched affair.
Golden light swept in from tall windows, squeezed through uneven fallen apart blinds, and illuminated a large room that told Aiden how someone had been celebrating something or another before eventually abandoning the villa for good. Beer bottles stood upright on a table. Overhead, colourful paper decorations threatened to shake years upon years of dust down onto him.
The air was musty. Thick. It smelled distantly of roasting meat.
Aiden's stomach squeezed painfully. His mouth watered.
Enough to make him not mind how Zofia didn't give them any time to look around. She walked them right over to another staircase, a silence trailing her that Aiden began to perceive as a stifling, almost tangible, thing.
He tried filling it. "Where've you two met?"
Zofia graced him with more silence. Not even the stairs under her bothered creaking. That, they reserved for when Spike and Aiden climbed after her, punctuating their steps one creak at a time.
Creak, they went.
Creak.
Creak.
"Harran," said Spike.
Creak.
It took a moment for what he'd heard to properly sink in. "Hold on. Wait. Harran? Your Harran? The Harran? The first Quarantine Harran?"
"That's the one. And those two—" Spike indicated Zofia with an offhand sort of gesture. "—her and Crane, they're the reason why some of us made it out alive at all. They're good people."
Spike had said it all so casually, Aiden couldn't help throwing him a side-ways glance. "Really?"
Spike nodded.
"I categorically deny any and all involvement," Zofia said from up ahead. She reached the top of the stairs, where a wide and short hallway opened up onto a balcony flooded by fading daylight. "And don't let Crane hear you say that. He'll get weepy."
"That's slander," called the man from earlier good as immediately.
Aiden, his eyes cutting left and right in search of a crossbow pointing at him, made it out onto the balcony, where a soft breeze pushed and pulled on decorations hung overhead. Old lanterns. Frayed strips of coloured cloth. They'd been fixed to a roof made of wooden slats and they drowned in thick, green vines.
The smell of roasted meat was almost unbearable now. In the best kind of way.
He found no crossbow, but he did find a chalkboard sign that he had to step around (End of the World Party, it read) and the not-weeping man (Crane, presumably), who came striding up to them, his long steps full of some purpose or another. Aiden, with his fight or flight instincts overtaxed, shuffled to a halt.
"Get in here, old man," Crane (still, presumably) said. He'd flung his arms out wide and he was smiling, Aiden noted. No. Grinning. A wide and toothy grin. And he didn't stop walking until Spike met him halfway. Then they just kind of, uh, collided. Yeah. Collided. In a fierce, full-on frontal hug that had Aiden fear for Spike's ribcage.
Aiden convinced his eyebrows to hike back down— since they had gone and tried to shoot off his forehead again —and felt suddenly reduced to a rock that'd recently gotten shaken out of a shoe. Set aside and forgotten. Which was just as well. It gave him time to look around. Scope out the balcony. Think of anything else than how he'd, somehow, ended up in the company of not only one, but three survivors of what was, arguably, the beginning of the end.
"It's so fucking good to see you again," he heard the presumed Crane say. Then— while Aiden found the Pilgrim's nest set up on the balcony —came insinuations about how one of them hadn't aged near enough and how the other should be in a retirement home. They laughed.
The nest was orderly and put together from an arrangement of lounge chairs and a low table. A makeshift fire burned low at its edge, framed by bricks. A metal grid hung over it. Four (small) plucked birds cooked on that grid, with a pot alongside them. Beyond the nest, the balcony eventually dropped away (with no railing in sight) to offer a view of mountains dressed in skirts of fiery autumn leaves. Looming in a wedge between the nearest hills that rolled away from the taller mountains, stood a wall; a massive and unyielding thing.
While Aiden took it all in and remained perfectly rock-shaped, Zofia settled down by the fire. She crossed her legs under her and leaned in close, deftly turning the birds, one by one. Their skin had browned and split. Fat dripped from them, sizzling as it touched the flames.
They smelled too good. Way too good. I must be starving.
"So, what's with the pipsqueak?"
Startled out from his rock-shaped existence and away from thoughts of snatching up all four birds and running off into the hills with them, Aiden snapped around, where he found a hand ready to be shaken, along with a set of intensity curious brown eyes looking down at him. The man was at least half a head taller than him, wore a hard life's worth of scars on a deeply suntanned face, and carried white in his hair.
Bristling, Aiden shook his hand. And, stubborn, he squeezed tighter than he probably should have. But, really? Pipsqueak? "It's Aiden."
"Aiden, got it. Kyle Crane."
Between one shake and the next, Aiden found time to note how Crane was armed with a knife sheathed diagonally on his chest, and that his gear was otherwise nowhere near as well put together as Zofia's. An often-mended, short-sleeved leather jacket was thrown over a slate blue t-shirt and his road-weary pants were held up by a belt sporting a Pilgrim's badge for a buckle. He'd chosen a feisty scorpion engraved into the metal, its pincers snapping at the world. The body was painted a rich orange.
The colour made the badge very hard to miss. Or not look at to begin with. Tacky.
"No, really." Crane— his curious tone replaced by something a lot more insistent —pulled his hand away and gestured towards the lounge chair arrangement. Sit, the jab of his arm said. Why Aiden felt suddenly compelled to do exactly that was a) beyond him and b) a little bit infuriating. "Why's he here, Spike? You about to tell me this kid knows where Waltz is?"
And just like that, Aiden's world slammed to a sudden halt. He heard nothing but the drumming of his heart in his ears. Felt nothing but a twist of vertigo, and understood nothing but a memory of cold hospital corridors and the soft and warm touch of his sister's hand in his.
Mia.
"Waltz?" he blurted. "You found Waltz?"
I'm going to find my sister?