Here, have some angst before my laptop dies - I'm on 9% on a train and my charger is at home because I'm an idiot who forgot to bring it. Also, did I scare you with the chapter title? I hope so. I'm evil like that.


It was yet another long night in the passing of infinity. Concept of time was a trick left in an old world which no longer existed – hours lasted seconds but seconds lasted hours. Sleeps came in snatches and left no one feeling truly rested. Dawn was a feeble, ashen thing, fragile as it broached the horizon to discover a landscape void of colour or life.

Sounds from the house had gone silent. Scott propped himself on his elbows and listened carefully for a solid five minutes until his paranoia was satisfied that nothing was lurking at the cellar door. Finch had abandoned her post, curled up at Alan's side with her tail flopped across his waist, and frankly Scott trusted the dog's instincts above his own anxiety. He pushed himself upright and staggered over to the hatch, aching from yesterday's bruises and a night spent on cold concrete.

What little he could see through the crack between the hatch doors revealed a moonscape. Dust carpeted everything. The few trees that had managed to brave the storm were now stripped to mere bones, blackened from burnt-out lightning strikes and stark black against the dust. The sky was bare and empty, overcast and steeped in grey, mirroring the ground below. On the plus side, there were no obvious signs of any infected, so perhaps the last few had finally lost interest. It was the possibility of rotters lurking within the house that had Scott on edge, despite Finch's relaxed demeanour.

"Drink this."

Scott turned just in time to catch the bottle of water John tossed to him.

"Thanks?" He took a seat at his brother's side, twisting the cap back and forth while deliberating how start the conversation.

John looked vaguely amused at the obvious awkward silence. At some point during the night he'd managed to scrub the final remnants of blood off his face and most of it out of his hair and was now wearing one of the many thermal shirts Alan had found in another crate. There was a knife tucked into the side of his boot and the hilt kept glinting as the rising sun shifted light through the cracks in the boarded window.

Scott rotated the cap until it cracked. "Did you sleep at all?"

John let out a dull chuckle. "No."

The awkward silence returned with a vengeance. Scott took a sip of the water, recognising that he had a headache only after it began to ease. Dehydration was a bitch. He drained the rest of the bottle and tried to avoid John's knowing look. There was a fine line of space between them and the distance felt as great as that between the Earth and the Moon. Scott had no idea how to cross it, not when those words were still echoing on repeat, blurred from time and dreams and a variety of adrenaline crashes over the past few hours. He lifted his injured hand into his lap and focussed on examining the grazes. He'd torn the skin to raw scabs which stung when exposed to the faint breeze slinking through the hatch.

John repressed a wince. "Nice work. Real smart move."

"It was an accident."

"I'm sure it was."

Scott bit back an irritated snap. Finch was finally beginning to stir, tail thumping at the sound of voices, and he beckoned her closer, patting her muzzle as she nosed at his hand. It was easier to focus on soft fur and affectionate eyes rather than cold rebuffs and supposed indifference.

John cleared his throat. "I'm not good at apologies."

"Gee, really? I would never have guessed."

"Shut the fuck up and let me speak."

"You're right – your apologies suck."

"Scott, for the love of-" John took a steadying breath. "Okay." He held up a hand for silence and was instantly bowled over by Finch. He shuffled upright so that the dog could flop over his lap whilst still allowing him to talk. "Look, you know I'm terrible at this. But I've spent the past six hours going over everything in my head and it's going to drive both of us insane if we don't talk this out."

Scott patted Finch's side. "Go ahead."

"I owe you an apology."

"Damn right you do."

John sent him a sour look. Scott held up his hands in surrender.

"As I was saying," John continued, with just enough warning for Scott to refrain from any further quips or taunts. "I owe you an apology. I crossed a line and in doing so I broke your trust, so… I'm sorry. I don't know why I said it. I was just- I'd say I was caught up in the moment, in the adrenaline, but that's not- It was inexcusable. And now- I'm trying to apologise but it's not enough. I can't turn back the clock though, so all I can ask is your forgiveness. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Okay," Scott said quietly because he wasn't really sure what else to say. It wasn't okay. Nothing about it was okay. It was so many levels of fucked up and now he finally had chance to recall the moment in detail without the threat of imminent attack or warding off a breakdown in front of the others – who were all mercifully still asleep – it hurt so much more than it had done at the time. It ached, like an old injury reopened after hours. He inhaled sharply. It's okay got stuck in his throat, a lie that poisoned him before it could infect John too. He hadn't realised quite how much that moment had impacted him until now, as if he'd discovered a hit he hadn't even realised he'd taken.

John watched him, wordless, something faintly pleading in his eyes but unwilling to voice that silent wish for forgiveness not because he didn't think Scott would give it – that was an inevitable certainty – but because he didn't think he should receive it. Something had shifted in their dynamic since their escape from the bunker and Scott didn't know what. It was driving him up the wall. Until he knew the cause, he couldn't fix anything, but they couldn't carry on like this. He needed to recover that unquestionable trust, to know without needing to ask that John had his back. The problem with being hurt once was that something buried very deep remembered that pain for the rest of your life, always second-guessing in secret even when your conscious mind had long-since forgiven the culprit.

"It's not okay."

"Not really," Scott agreed, overwhelmingly grateful for Finch's presence as it gave him an excuse to look elsewhere and avoid all eye contact. If petting the dog also occupied his hands so he didn't end up grinding a fist into the ground, then that was just an added bonus which no one needed to know about.

There was an infinite beat of silence.

"We're not okay, are we?"

John's question seemed to echo, hanging in the air like the ash of everything else that had been destroyed. He sounded small which wasn't a word Scott associated with his brother. John was always so certain, so sure of himself, confidence backed by logic and an unwavering faith in his own knowledge, but now he sounded lost, vulnerable, voice cracking with the grieving realisation that there was something very broken between them and that he had been the one to cause it.

"No," Scott confessed, unable to keep the tiredness out of his words only it sounded more like pain even to his own ears. "I don't think we are. Not right now. But it'll be okay. I just need some time to come to terms."

"Scott," John tried, faltering. "I don't- I can't- If I could take it back, I would. And I know that doesn't make a difference because I can apologise until the end of time, but the damage has already been done. I just- I don't know how to fix it." He blinked away traitorous tears. "I am so, so sorry. That's all I can say."

There was something else in his tone – sharp and awfully similar to self-loathing – and Scott sat up straighter, finally looking at his brother despite the fear of what he'd find there.

"I keep fucking everything up." John had a hand tangled in his hair, tugging painfully and Scott reached to catch his wrist, but he flinched away. "I don't know what's wrong with me. It's- I've got the chance of a cure, so why the hell do I feel more like I'm dying now than when I actively was?"

Scott stared at him. The further you went, the greater the fall, and John had been walking a higher tight rope than anyone else for the longest time.

"Talk to me."

"I can't."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means I can't. Not after- I said- to you and now I don't get to- Everyone looks at me differently, ever since I killed that bandit. You don't even realise it. And maybe you're right, all of you, because there's gotta be something wrong with me. To have that capability – to murder someone – not just once, but every time I kill one of the infected. When you do it, it tears you up inside, because you see a person, but I just- I don't even see monsters, they're just a target and I don't hesitate, I don't even hesitate so there's- There's gotta be something rotten in me, right? There's always been something fucking broken in me, my whole goddam life, and now it's taking over."

"John."

Something faintly panicked was rising in his heart, coiled around his ribs, constricting, begging for silence because Scott had never once heard John sound like this, not even during their school days when bullies had made greater impacts with words and fists than John had ever admitted, not during the dark days of lonely college life in which promises were forged out of necessity and fear. It was a similar hatred to the little voice at the back of Scott's own mind and he wanted to reach over and physically shake his brother, snap out of this, because this can't be you.

John choked on a bitter laugh. "I think I'm losing my mind."

"You're not," Scott whispered.

"Aren't I?" John pushed the heels of his hands into his eyes. "You have no idea." His voice was muffled by his wrists. "I know I'm losing my mind and it's getting worse."

"What does that mean?"

John froze as there was movement across the room where Gordon was finally stirring, accidentally clobbering Virgil in the face with an elbow. Alan, roused by the sound of groggy complaints and confused apologies as Gordon finally jolted back to full awareness, also sat up, hair mussed at crazy angles and eyes bleary from disturbed sleep.

Scott caught John's wrists. "John," he repeated, urgency bleeding into his voice. "What did you mean?"

Gordon scrambled to his feet with an obnoxious yawn. "It's sunrise, people! We survived the night. Hey, who wants to place bets on what's gonna nearly kill us today? Alan? Virg?"

"Zombies," Alan grumbled, still not fully awake.

Virgil stifled a yawn in his sleeve. "Uh… I don't know. Acid rain, let's go with that."

"Zombies, acid rain… All good guesses. I'm betting on bandits, 'cos it's been a hot minute since one of them made an appearance." Gordon swung around to face Scott and John, sweeping his arms out in a grand gesture. "You want to take a guess?" He frowned, forced humour evaporating. "Hey, are you okay? What happened?"

Scott hesitated.

John yanked his wrist free. "Nothing." He forced a smile. "I'm guessing radioactive fallout. Scott, what's your choice of death today?"

Alan buried his head in his hands, groaning. "Shut up. It's not even funny anymore. Can we not be this morbid before eight in the morning? Jeez, it's like you want me to freak out."

Gordon reached for the rucksack. "Sorry." He offered a tin of mixed fruit. "You can have first choice of breakfast rations."

Alan accepted the fruit. "You're forgiven, I guess."

John made a small sound which was awfully close to a sob and hauled himself upright, clawing at the wall for balance. He yanked the beams away from the hatch before anyone could protest, clambering into the rush of morning light without hesitation.

"Uh…" Gordon shot Scott a confused look. "I guess we're checking the house now then?"

Scott reached for the nearest gun. "Guess so. I'll meet you guys up there. I'm going after Johnny."


It was eerie above ground. There was a vulnerability about the open expanse, reinforcing that sense of being an ant, easily crushed without warning, helpless to defend oneself. Even the house was its own danger. Scott had the gun at hand and had stolen an axe found in the cellar for good measure. Now, as he tried to adjust his vision to the sudden light, he secured the gun at his hip, keeping the axe at the ready, his latest first-choice of weapon given its silent precision.

John had already abandoned the idea of entering via the front door. Scott tracked his prints in the ash and located him prying open a window around back. The panes were shattered but the fragments of glass left behind were too hazardous to risk crawling through the space. Lifting the entire frame didn't take too much effort, leaving them standing at the entrance of a dark room.

Wind whistled through the house, catching on loose fabric and sounding for all the world as if there were a person crying in the attic. The sound was chilling. Scott took a step back just in time to escape being clobbered in the face by wings as a crow erupted from the window, fleeing into the gloom until he could no longer spy those dark feathers amid the clouds. He exchanged a long look with John.

"Still think this is a good idea?"

John yanked his knife free of his boot. "We need food. We're not going to find any out here."

"So… the crow didn't seem at all ominous to you?"

"Superstition is a lie. It's illogical."

"And you're all about logic recently, right?"

It came off more sarcastic than Scott had intended. John shouldered him aside and ground one boot into the ledge, pushing himself through the window to land lightly on dusty floorboards, taking care not to crunch glass under his heels where possible. Scott took a final glance around the empty fields and followed.

As far as terrible ideas went, this had to be in the top ten. Heading into a known infected hotspot without any intel or surveillance, just the two of them as the others had yet to surface – it was just the sort of impulsive, irrational move Scott would've once pulled. To have John making such a play was another piece of concerning evidence. It was a clever strategy too, because Scott couldn't speak up for fear of drawing any infected to their location – in terms of avoiding a conversation, it was a fool-proof method, if only it weren't for the danger it came hand-in-hand with. Which then begged the question as to why John would go to such an extent to avoid admitting the truth. What the hell did losing his mind entail?

John flung out an arm before Scott could step directly on a broken floorboard. It was practically creaking just looking at it. Scott gingerly inched around it and tried to avoid John's glare.

"If you're going to be an idiot, go back. I can do this by myself."

"I'm not the one being an idiot," Scott hissed in return.

There was an ominous scuttle from somewhere up above. He tensed. John froze, gripping the knife in front of him to take the first strike if anything jumped out. After a moment of silence, they both remembered to breathe.

Scott lowered the axe for a moment. "This is ridiculous. What are you trying to achieve? We should have scouted for longer, waited for Gordon, formed an actual plan. It's like you're trying to get yourself killed."

John spun around instantly, practically bristling. "I am not trying to get myself killed. I'm trying to keep you alive."

"By throwing yourself into danger? How does that make sense?"

"You tell me – it's exactly what you've been doing for years."

"That's…" Okay, fair enough. Scott couldn't really deny that. He crossed his arms, trying not to give into the urge to snap back defensively. "And you've always criticised me for it. Look, c'mon, just…" He pitched his voice softer. "Just talk to me."

John levelled him with a deadpan stare. "I don't think a house possibly teeming with infected is the best place for this."

"Well, you didn't exactly give me many other options, did you?"

Scott just knew how this was going to go. John accidentally hinted at an issue, admitted there was a problem, then refused to admit what said problem was and clamped down on any and all details until he managed to repress everything, and everyone forgot there had been anything wrong in the first place. It was the same godawful pattern as always and it predated the apocalypse by a good couple of decades. But, unfortunately, John had won this round, because he was right – this was neither the time nor place. So, Scott lofted the axe and followed his brother deeper into the house without further questions.

It had evidently been abandoned by choice as everything was neatly cleared away. Even the chairs in the dining room were pushed under the table. The kitchen sink was empty. When Scott tried the tap, all that emerged was a groan. John found a few more tins in the cupboard and a multipack of chips which were within date. There were cartons of long-life apple juice stored on top of the fridge too. It wasn't a fantastic haul, but it was better than nothing.

The same scuttle from earlier sounded from directly above them. John slowly laid down the final carton of juice on the sideboard and caught Scott's eye.

"There's something up there," he mouthed, reaching for his knife.

Scott wrapped a hand around the axe. "Go or stay?"

John listened closely for a moment. The scuttling shifted to a dull thud, accompanied by a wet squelch, as if decomposing flesh or intestines were smacking against a brick wall. Leaving would be easy, but when had they ever taken the simple choice? Scott lifted the axe and made for the stairs, aware of John close behind.

At the top of the stairs was a window covered by blackout curtains. Scott pulled them apart, smearing dust away from the glass with his glove. Beyond, the fields met a tarmacked road which ran in a straight line towards the horizon. John tapped his shoulder, gesturing to a door to their left, barricaded shut. As another thud sounded, the entire door juddered in its frame. Whatever was on the other side was leaking rotten blood. It seeped underneath to stain the carpet. The stench of decay was sickening. John tightened his mask, pressing a fist to his mouth in an attempt to stifle a gag.

Scott took a step closer. The infected within grew excited, hurtling against the barricade with even more vigour as if it could smell him. He curled his fist tighter around the axe, breathing through his mouth. It was a dilemma. The infected was already trapped and not a risk to anyone, but there were some which were so far gone that killing them was a kindness. Even if they discovered a cure, there was no going back once it hit a certain state of decay. Not even modern science could regrow entire limbs and multiple organs.

John eyed the door suspiciously. He lifted a hand and Scott paused, trying not to comment as John got down on his knees and peered through the gap. The thuds ceased instantly, replaced by a rapid gasping, inhuman and feral, snarling and salivating. Rotting fingers scrabbled beneath the door, desperate to reach them. John jolted away. Scott hauled him upright before he could trip over his own feet and do something dumb like fall down the stairs.

"Alright?"

John swallowed. "It's pretty human. Not very decayed. I say leave it."

"Yeah?"

Scott studied him for a long moment. John had come face-to-face with more infected than he could count at this point, but he hadn't been this shaken by an encounter in a long while.

John turned away from the door. "Yeah."

There was a single room left to check. Scott recognised the stench before he crossed the threshold. Decomposing bodies had a different smell to that of the infected and while he couldn't quite put his finger on exactly what, he remembered it from that corpse Alan had discovered all those weeks ago. He blocked the doorway before John could enter, which was fairly redundant given John was no stranger to dead bodies these days. But this- It was immediately obvious that this was something different. It wasn't a suicide like the other corpse had been. There were chunks missing, but they weren't bite marks. Someone had cut pieces of flesh away. Suddenly the marks on the carpet made sense.

"Oh my god," John made the connection at the same time. "He was feeding it? Using his own-"

Scott wanted to throw up and yet somehow he couldn't tear his gaze away. He'd seen some seriously fucked up sights in his life, but this surpassed all of them. There were knife marks down to the bone. The guy had clearly died of blood loss. The infected in the other room – presumably once his wife given the wedding ring – hadn't decayed as much not because it was newly turned but because he had feeding it, allowing the parasite to consume offered flesh before the host itself.

"This was once a home," John whispered, voice cracking. He instinctively took a step closer until their shoulders brushed. Scott could feel him shaking.

"What?"

"This was once a home," John repeated, pointing to the graffiti across the wall. He grimaced. "I can't believe he actually went this far. It's- Jesus, how much pain was he in? For what? Did he think he could cure her?"

Cure it, Scott amended in his head, because there couldn't be anything human about that thing trapped in the bedroom. He swallowed bile. "They say love makes you crazy, huh?"

"This isn't just crazy, this is psychotic."

The infected seemed to sense it was the centre of the attention as activity picked back up, growls and the scratching of nails against carpet overly loud in the silent corridor. It remained trapped behind the lock, not a concern, but still disconcerting. Nothing could be as disturbing as those lax limbs, partly trailing over the sides of the bed. There were even fingers missing. The wounds weren't cleanly cut, but jagged, desperately hacked by a man who'd sacrificed everything for love, including his own sanity.

"We should go." John tore the curtains open to examine the fields. Somewhere amid the smouldering aftermath of the storm, more infected were lurking. He side-stepped the bloody knife discarded on the floor and paused in the doorway. "Scott. Come on."


The house had initially felt oppressive. Ominous. Steeped in shadows and dangerous secrets. Now it simply seemed haunted, as if the evils that had occurred inside it had imprinted on everything. Except- Was it evil? Or was it just another tragedy?

"Do you know what's weird?"

John didn't look up from packing supplies into a bag. "This entire situation is weird."

Well, he wasn't exactly wrong, but that hadn't been Scott's meaning.

"Finch has been uncomfortable with this place from the get-go. She's warned us about rotters before, but usually she growls. But she just laid there and watched, all night."

"If you start talking about ghosts, I'm writing you off as a lost cause."

"I'm not talking about ghosts. I don't know what I'm talking about. It's just…"

"Weird?"

"Sad."

John studied the final juice carton for a moment.

"Yeah," he murmured, not really seeing the item in his hands at all. He glanced at the ceiling where faint scuttles dislodged dust. "Sad. But you have to wonder what made him go that far. How did she get infected in the first place? Was it his fault? Was this an entire guilt complex scenario?"

Thin sun beams were beginning to struggle through the clouds. Scott had never been so glad to see the light in his life. The gloom was suffocating.

"Or maybe he just loved her that much. She was all he had left."

"Love or guilt then."

"Maybe both."

"Either way, it cost him his mind."

Scott looked up sharply. "We're still talking about the dead guy upstairs, right?"

"Obviously." John headed for the door, voice faintly muted as he called over his shoulder, "What else would we be talking about?"


Losing several hours to the storm had not been ideal, but the radiation was still a safe distance away. So long as they continued heading north without too many more holdups, they shouldn't face any significant issues. There were, of course, concerns regarding the radioactive exposure they'd already received upon escaping the bunker, but there wasn't a lot anyone could do about that. There were no decontamination packs lying around and it wasn't the sort of thing one could find in a standard abandoned drug store.

Travelling was tiring. Not so much the walking, but the constant hypervigilance. They took it in turns to keep watch, one at the back and one at the front. Finch helped, acting as an early warning system when something untoward was approaching.

There were a few encounters with the infected which Scott, Gordon and John quickly took care of, while Virgil tried to double-down on medical attention because none of them were in particularly great shape right now and while Alan was doing a concerningly good job of hiding that cough, it was getting worse. Finch kept close to his heels, tail drooping as he stifled another cough in his elbow. Up ahead, something flitted between rusting cars. The tricky part was distinguishing between tricks of the light and real infected. This time it was a false alarm.

"I hate everything about this," Alan announced, lacking any of his usual dramatic flair. He slung the baseball bat higher over his shoulder. "Are we sure they're not still tracking us?"

Honestly? Scott had no clue – which was fast becoming a new theme in his life because the world was getting stranger and there was no guidebook to the apocalypse. He was tempted to tell John to write one – give him something to focus on other than whatever the hell losing his mind meant, which remained a secret and was slowly but surely driving Scott up the wall. Knowing there was something wrong but not knowing what was almost worse than not knowing anything at all. Or something along those lines. Who knew anymore? It was difficult to think when it was this hot. Wasn't it supposed to be winter still?

The reason for the heat was the sun which had finally broken through the clouds now that they had put several miles between them and the house. The body and the infected and the terrible secrets the place had harboured remained an untold tale. Scott wasn't about to provide further nightmare fuel for the others and for once John apparently agreed with him without arguing about it first. That final conversation held in the kitchen still concerned him though. He was certain they hadn't just been talking about the dead man upstairs.

On the plus side, they made good progress over the next couple of days. On the downside, they were all constantly exhausted which meant short fuses and a lot of snapping. Gordon seemed to keep a lid on his temper by taking out any infected which crossed their path, a coping strategy which John seemed to mirror whenever he wasn't zoned out - which was happening more often than ever. Meanwhile, Alan, who had yet to actually kill anything thank God, took out his frustration on a nearby car with his baseball bat.

"What happened to staying quiet?" Gordon protested, trying to avoid looking impressed at the state of the car because damn, Alan had really done a number on it.

Alan spun around, levelling the bat at him. "Are you volunteering to be next?"

"Is that supposed to be intimidating? Aw, man, that's great, Al. Keep trying."

"Oh, fuck you-"

"Silent time!" Virgil separated them, pushing Gordon to start walking again and encouraging Alan to leave the car alone. "We're spending enough energy fighting the infected, we don't need to attack each other too. Got it?"

Alan gave the passenger window a final whack for good measure. "Got it."

"Whatever you say," Gordon called over his shoulder, sounding suspiciously sarcastic, but at least he wasn't trying to antagonise Alan any longer, so Scott called that a win and apparently Virgil did too as he didn't make further comment, but rather fell into step beside Scott.

"What?"

Virgil sent him a distinctly unimpressed look. "Reminding Alan that vandalism isn't a healthy coping mechanism might be a good idea."

"It's not like anyone's going to miss their car any time soon."

"Oh, so now you're encouraging him. Fantastic."

"I'm not encouraging anything."

"Really?"

"If I was encouraging him, I'd have joined in."

Virgil didn't say anything. Scott could sense his irritation without needing to look across. He repressed a sigh and slowed down to fall into step beside Alan, because yeah, alright Virg, he got the hint. It just so happened that he hadn't particularly wanted to have this conversation in the middle of the open but hey, apparently that was what was going to happen.

Alan wrung the baseball bat between his hands. "Whatever you're going to say, don't."

"Okay."

Scott examined the road ahead. Gordon had taken the lead and John was once again only partly present, either very focussed on an empty sky or lost in his thoughts. Virgil was trying to keep an eye out for any unwanted tails.

It didn't take very long for Alan to break the silence.

"You can say something though. This is just weird."

"I thought you didn't want me to speak?"

Alan glared at him. Scott tried not to laugh.

"So, is this your long overdue rebel phase, or…?"

For a moment, Alan appeared to consider the pros and cons of a sarcastic retort. The cons must have won out as he relented with a heavy sigh. The bat slumped at his side to trail along the ground, dragging in the dust.

"Maybe," he said eventually. "I'm not really cool enough to be a rebel though. I think I prefer fixing things to breaking them." He scuffed one boot in the gutter. "I already feel guilty about that car."

"It was a pretty nice car," Scott agreed, before his mind caught up with the first half of that statement. "And hey, what are you talking about? You're totally cool enough to be a rebel. Not that smashing cars is a particularly great hobby and I definitely won't be encouraging it, but you're still pretty cool."

"Okay, but you have to say that."

"Who told you otherwise?"

"Pretty much anyone my age ever until our identities got revealed and then anyone I met had really high expectations which kinda got crushed the second I opened my mouth."

"Is this about those kids at the bunker?"

"Kinda. I don't care about them. But it still sucked, because they thought I'd be some zombie-killing badass and instead I just geeked out over science the entire time."

"Science is cool."

"Yeah, I know, but it's not great for popularity." Alan picked up his bat before it could become caught in the pile of clothes marking the resting point of a corpse picked clean by crows. "This is such a dumb conversation. The world's dying. Who cares about whether people like me or not?"

"If it's bothering you, then it's valid. But for the record? Those kids were total asshats."

Alan hid a smile. "They kinda were, weren't they?" He swung the bat in a wide circle. "I guess you're right then. Cool or uncool, this can be my rebel phase."

"Does this rebel phase involve destroying more cars?"

"Probably not."

"Thank God. I mean, I let you go wild on the last one because clearly you needed a space to get rid of all that anger and we don't have access to a gym right now, but there are better, healthier ways of coping."

"Such as?"

Scott came up empty handed. "Going for a run?"

"Burns too many calories."

"Talking?"

"Lame."

"Thanks. I'll make a note of that."

"Hey, no I didn't mean you."

"No, no, it's too late, you already said it. Hey, Virgil!"

"Oh my god," Alan announced, trying his best to repress his laughter. He made a wild flail for Scott's shoulder. "Shut up, Scott, I was joking."

"Virg, Alan thinks I'm lame!"

Virgil didn't miss a beat. "You are."

Up ahead, Gordon let out a loud bark of laughter like a seal. "Roast him, Virg! Fatality!" He turned to John. "Yo, Johnny, do you think Scott's cool?"

"No," John replied distractedly, then blinked. "Wait, what was the question?"

"Too late," Gordon sing-songed. "We already got our answer."

John took a moment to catch up on the conversation. "Why are we picking on Scott?"

"Because it's fun." Gordon gestured dramatically. "See? Even Al's laughing."

"Traitor," Scott teased, earning another undignified snort from Alan.

John sent Gordon a sunny smile with a hint of evil behind it. "You know what's also funny? I distinctly remember you trying to create a certain society last week… What was that again?" He snapped his fingers. "Ah, yes. The Scott Tracy Protection-"

Gordon shoved him into the nearest tree. "Go back to daydreaming!"

Virgil raised his voice to a shout. "No physical violence!"

"Yeah, yeah."

"Gordon! I mean it!"

"Oh my god, alright, I won't push John into any more trees. Jeez, Mom, take a chill pill." Gordon stole a glance back at Virgil and immediately regretted it. "Oh, man. I take it back. You look kinda mad. You're like an angry bear. I don't like bears. They're a top apex predator. They've conquered multiple environments. One day they'll probably learn to fly too. God dang, Virg, I said I was sorry."

For all his 'polite reminders' – aka pestering – about not burning unnecessary calories, Virgil didn't hesitate to launch into a run after his brother. Gordon fled full pelt down the street with a shriek that was bound to attract several infected, but it was nice to have a conversation that didn't end in a terse silence for once, so no one criticised him. Besides, Gordon had more experience surviving around the creatures than anyone else.

"I really was joking," Alan piped up again. He fiddled with Finch's collar. "Just in case you thought I wasn't. About the lame thing. I guess you're kinda cool."

Scott had a physical struggle not to laugh. "Thank you."

"Should we stop Virg from murdering Gordon?"

"Hell no, this is the best entertainment we've gotten in months."

Alan side-eyed him. "Aren't you supposed to be responsible?"

"Supposed to be, yes, but you've already called me lame once today, so I don't want to invite any further comments…"

Alan elbowed him. "I took that back already! I even complimented you and everything."

"Ah yes, kinda cool – the ultimate compliment."

There was another squawk from up ahead. Gordon disappeared from sight beyond the brow of the hill. Virgil, armed with a fistful of dust, was hot on his heels.

"Responsible," Alan reminded Scott, with a mischievous grin.

"Nope. John can take that role. I can't be responsible, I'd have to give up my title of cool dad."

Alan was suspiciously silent. Scott glanced at him.

"What?"

"Nothing. It's just- you said… Nothing. It's nothing." Alan picked up a nearby stick and flung it in John's direction. "Hey, Johnny, you've gotta be responsible and stop Virg and Gords from fighting because Scott and I can't be bothered."

John tossed up his hands. "Seriously? Why is that my job?"

"Because." Alan beamed at him.

"That's it? That's your reason? Just because?"

"Yup."

John stared at them for a long moment of silence. "Unbelievable," he relented. "You're lucky I like you both. If I get dragged into their scuffle, I'm blaming you, Scott."

Alan waved cheerily at him. "Bye, Johnny!"

"Have fun!" Scott tacked on, just to laugh at the glower he was treated to. He slung an arm around Alan's shoulders. "See? Like I said – best entertainment for miles."

Alan grinned. "Hell yeah."