FOURTEEN #2
A lower voice answers. Southern. Pretty sure that’s Scar. I think his name is Fletcher. I only know because his name was uttered enough times while they were moving through the courtyard. “Can he talk?”
“Not clearly,” the soft one replies, voice gentle, like the calm in a storm.
“Luuush,” the Welsh one groans dramatically, right before muttering, “Just love it when random pilots choose to be all mysterious and unconscious and shit. Very on brand for the day we’re having.”
Ewan. His name was also used enough that I remember it, attaching it to the bastard who has my hat.
My fingers curl around my knife, but not for him. Well, maybe. I don’t actually know.
I keep moving, though, because I have one mission right now.
The shared wall between this apartment and theirs is also damaged near the laundry closet much like the last apartment, the plaster practically falling apart around the old pipes.
I found the weak spot an hour ago while scouting, waiting for the sun to go down enough to act.
See, people trust doors a little too much, even in an apocalypse.
Doors are loud. But walls? Walls are quieter if you know where to find the parts of the building that are dying.
It also helps that the apartment before highlighted how easy it would be to travel through the walls rather than concocting some elaborate plan that could get me caught or killed or both.
I discovered through the third unit that the best way to get to where I need to go is through the shared walls where the laundry rooms live.
Cutting through the softened plaster with my knife, I go about prying pieces away slowly and carefully, taking each piece by hand.
Dust coats my gloves pretty quickly, and my nose itches something fierce, but I refuse to sneeze.
Dying by dust-induced stupidity is a whole new low I’m not willing to stoop to. That would just be embarrassing.
Voices continue on the other side and I track them by their timbres.
Scar is near the front room.
Earrings is still by the pilot.
Headphones is currently moving.
Damn it.
I wait, half-crouched in the laundry closet with one shoulder pressed up against the cold, wet pipes, listening to his footsteps. He keeps them light and irregular, but not sloppy. It’s like he’s purposely keeping it casual, making it harder to track than I’d prefer.
His footsteps approach the kitchen, and then he pauses.
I hold my breath.
“What? Don’t look at me like that,” I hear Ewan grumble, voice slightly muffled. “I’m not actually eating the last protein bar. I’m just, you know, emotionally considering it.”
Fletcher says something too low for me to catch.
“Okay, fine, mun,” Ewan grouches. “Maybe I was physically considering it, too. But I haven’t acted on the impulse, have I?”
Then I hear a drawer open, a crinkle of paper, and then the sound of Ewan moving away. I exhale through my teeth, waiting for a brief moment before climbing through the gap once it’s wide enough.
Their flat seems warmer than the others, though only because bodies have been breathing in it. The kitchen is dark save for a battery lantern set low on the floor in the living room, the glow turned toward the wall to keep from spilling out of the window like a shining beacon. Smart. Also annoying.
The hat still sits on a small table under the side window and my chest stalls harshly at the sight of it. It’s right there. Faded. Wonky brim. Black stitches over the strap where I fixed it last winter with numb, shaking fingers and half a needle.
For a second, the whole room around me disappears, replaced by the memory of Maine. He stands taller than me, smirking as he drops the cap on my head.
Hide your hair, Kota. You look like you’ll glow in the dark like a firefly.
For that first week, I fucking hated that hat. Hated it with a burning passion I never thought I’d feel again. Then he didn’t come back from his supply run and I started to love it so much that it actually hurts.
Without breathing, I cross the kitchen. One step.
Two steps. I pause on the third when Fletcher’s boots shift in the living room.
I flatten myself next to the counter just as the scarred Alpha walks into view, appearing in the doorway with his broad shoulders filling way too much of the space.
His rifle is in one hand, lowered but ready for anything.
His face is turned toward the front door, but not at me.
Definitely not me, because I become nothing. Not still, not silent. Nothing.
He listens for a long moment before turning away, and I move before fear can lock me down and render me stupid and useless.
I make it three steps to the table before I reach for the hat, and my hand closes around it as soon as I’m close enough.
The moment my fingers touch it, something inside me makes a sound too small to actually escape my throat.
Mine. Maine’s. Home.
I shove it under my jacket, pressing it snugly against my chest, and then I turn. Only to find Earrings watching me.
He stands in the living room near the pilot, half in shadow and gun lowered to his side. He doesn’t raise it, doesn’t shout. Hell, he doesn’t even move. His dark eyes meet mine, full of softness. Not harmless. Never fucking harmless. But soft in a way that makes my panic worse instead of better.
For one heavy, impossible second, neither one of us breathes. Then his gaze drops to where I’m clutching the hat under my jacket, and something passes over his face. Not pity. Worse. Understanding.
Nope. Absolutely not.
I don’t wait around.
I run.
“Wait,” Earrings calls quietly, low enough that it shouldn't chase me but still somehow manages it.
Fletcher curses, and Ewan dramatically blurts, “Oh, bloody hell, she’s in the fucking walls.”
I shoulder through the gap before they can even consider cutting me off, tearing my sleeve on a broken piece of plaster.
The first apartment blurs all around me as I run.
Laundry closet. Hall. Kitchen. Broken couch.
The same depressing rooms I crept through on the way in now turn into an absolute bastard of an obstacle course under my boots, one created from the very depths of hell.
Behind me, boots thunder across the floor.
Fletcher reaches the gap first. I hear it before I see it, the weight of him and the way the floor answers, in the sharp scrape of broken plaster being shoved aside.
Ewan is lighter, faster, and swearing under his breath like he’s been massively inconvenienced.
Funny, because the fucker shouldn’t have taken my hat if he didn’t want trouble.
Earrings moves quieter than the first two, though, which is actually more alarming.
I don’t bother looking back. Looking back is how people end up as cautionary tales told to children to keep them in their beds at night.
Instead, I slash through the first apartment quickly before squeezing through the broken closet into the second, my shoulder catching on splintered wood hard enough to send pain scorching down my arm.
Something tears, but I couldn’t say if it’s fabric, skin, or my shit-sucking dignity. Could be any of them, honestly.
There’s simply no time to check.
The second apartment still smells like damp carpet and thriving mold. I vault over a toppled coffee table, skid through a patch of rainwater under the broken window that does nothing for my fucked-up knee, and slam one hand against the wall to stop myself from going down.
Behind me, Fletcher’s voice booms through the rooms. “She’s cutting through the units.”
Fucking A. Of course he sees the route. Of fucking course.
“I don’t remember anyone asking her to be this slippery. I didn’t miss that, right? Right?” Ewan demands, his voice way too close.
I bare my teeth behind the bandana and keep moving.
Third apartment.
Almost there.
The last apartment is darker than the others, curtains still hanging in thick, rotted strips across the living room window. I burst into the room with the appropriate amount of dramatic flair, shoving through the room until I reach the balcony doors.
The glass sticks, because apparently the building has chosen its loyalty, and the betraying fucker has chosen the Alphas chasing me down like I just stole their fountain of youth or some shit.
“Oh, come on. Not today,” I hiss, driving my shoulder into it.
The door gives with a damp shriek, and I don't hesitate for even a second before I dive through and haul myself over the railing. For half a second, I hang over the courtyard with Zeds groaning below, then I swing down onto the balcony below.
My bad knee weeps when it jars hard enough that my vision turns momentarily white. No sound leaves me, though. I silently roll, slam into a rusted chair that has to be made of fucking steel, and shove myself upright with panting breaths.
The Zed directly below me lifts its head.
“Shit,” I whisper, just as Ewan’s head appears over the railing, one hand braced against the frame while his hair falls into his face.
“I gotta say, that looked wildly unpleasant,” he says, looking down at me.
I flip him off and run through the balcony door.
“You’re so real for that,” he calls after me. “So fair!”
A second later, gunfire splits the air from below. Not from the Alphas currently chasing me, but the sound seems to still everyone for less than a heartbeat. Then another shot rings out, closer this time but not inside the building. Outside.
Male voices shout through the park district, and they’re not ones I’ve heard before or recognize. It’s not Fletcher. Not Ewan. Definitely not Kaito.
My face drops with my heart.
Looters.
Along with my heart, my stomach sinks, but I keep my feet moving.
I burst into the apartment hallway, skidding on wet carpet, and take the stairwell down.
Not up this time. They’ll expect it just because I came from height.
Down is worse, meaning down might actually work.
It’s a risk, but what the fuck do I have to lose at this point?