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A couple of months ago, the city of Harran had itself a makeover, had chucked out most of the living, and kept the dead around, along with those that hadn’t quite decided on the matter and went about eating their neighbours, because why the hell not.
Zombies. Ha. Who’d have thought.
Well, Kyle Crane hadn’t. Not at first. But now they’re his job, and he hates his job at this point, with how it drags itself on day by day. There’s always another thing that needs doing. Another errand to run for someone as absolutely dumb as him, because he’s yet to learn how to say No.
Like this one. “Crane— we’ve lost power in this ratty piece of shit unit way fucking out of the way, why don’t you walk over there and fix it? Please. Thanks. Bye.”
He mouths the question at the thin air as he lets the door in front of him fall open. His grip on the crowbar he’s holding aloft and at the ready tightens a little in anticipation, but the place is empty.
“Sure,” he whispers back at himself. “It’s my pleasure. Need me to drop by the store on the way back? Pick up some eggs?”
His stomach nods. An enthusiastic, growling sort of nod.
He rolls his eyes.
So. Yeah. Zombies. They suck, and they come in different shapes and sizes. Literally. There are the Biters. Slow and stupid, but outnumbering the living, because these days even misery likes to fling bad poetry. Then there’s sad little screamers. Things that used to be kids. Aren’t kids any more. And Volatiles, ugly mother fuckers that come out at night and make Crane’s ballsack crawl for cover— because shit. Not much more to say about those.
The one that throws itself out from a closet at him, that one ’s new.
It’s tall. Thin. Saucer eyed. And it goes “AAAAH!” as it flings itself forward, a broom for a weapon. Admittedly, the broom’s snapped at the top and has a pointy end, and Crane “ AAh!”’s right back at it. He knocks the broom aside with the crowbar, and they “AAH!” for another second or two before it’s finally settled that they’re both just plain old, stupid humans.
* * *
“No,” Crane says and wonders if he ought to just get a marker and write it on his forehead, because he’s been repeating himself and he’s thoroughly done. And if he’s getting better at it, because he’s kept it up for quite a while now.
“It’s too far out, kid. And it’s too late. Try again tomorrow, one of the other—“
“ Not a—“
Crane grunts, glances at the lanky stick stood in front of him, a set of sad, drooping clothes on bony shoulders and an equally sad tangle of brown hair on his head. No longer AAAAH ing at him as he stumbled into the room, but not sitting down quiet and leaving him in peace. No, quite the contrary. Not four hours in after he’d brought him back to the Tower, the only bit of safe Harran has to offer these days, he’s following him around and being insistent on recruiting him for some none-sense or the other.
Typical.
“Not a kid, yeah. I heard you. Doctor-something.“ Even if he doesn’t look much like one. Not old enough. Not anything enough, save for a sort of feverish focus that catches Crane as he tries to march past him, because he’s hungry and it’s dinner time.
The kid ( Reid ) steps into his path. Briefly. Clumsily, a shoulder shifting into his path and then half dancing out of his way, half jostling into him.
He’s terrified. He’s desperate. And he won’t quit.
Crane’s stomach sinks. He’s out of variations to the word No, and so food will have to wait.
Because he’s fucking terrible at this whole No thing. Why’d he even try?
* * *
The kid is jittery. His eyes are everywhere but where they ought to be— “Front. Watch where you step.” —and he fidgets whenever they pause, his hands playing around a pipe Crane shoved at him, long fingers tapping on the metal while his mouth works quietly.
Sometimes Crane picks up snatches of what he’s mumbling. Numbers, mostly. Words too, sometimes. Improbable, he hears often, once followed by a strained gasp for air as a Biter lurches into his direction. There’s a moment when he’s ready to swing the pipe, and then that moment is gone, and Crane hooks the crowbar around the staggering Biter’s leg and gets it crashing to the ground.
He grabs Reid by the dirty leftovers of what might have been a suit vest at some point, and pulls him along with him.
“They’re not dead, ” he hears him mutter.
No, they’re not.
And it’s hard to forget that the yellow eyes finding you as they come at you, aren’t altogether there any more. But are still human, too. So he doesn’t blame him when he can’t hurt them.
* * *
He does blame him though when he realises he’s been right. By the time they’re halfway to where Reid wants to be bad enough to risk nightfall, Crane is counting minutes and his eyes keep drifting to the sinking sun.
“I’m going to eat you from your ankles up if you get us killed out here,” he grunts and Reid swallows, his throat bobbing nervous like.
* * *
So he picks a shortcut. Things don’t go so swell..
* * *
“Jump!” Crane barks at him. The first of the Biters reaches him, dragging itself up the slope. Behind him, Reid does anything but, and Crane whips the crowbar forward with a sweep of his arm. Feels the Biter’s chin meet the metal and the thrum of the impact jolting his bones. The thing goes flying, tumbles back down the slope and takes a few of its friends with it.
“Jumping from as little— much —as twenty feet results in impact at twenty-five miles per hour,” Reid whines and gets interrupted by a hearty howl from Crane, right back at the Viral clambering to latch onto his arm.
He directs the thing past and trips it down the ledge. It vanishes and hits the water below shrieking and splashing.
“Compresses your spine,” Reid continues. “Risk of breaking bones. Concussion.”
“Risk of getting fucking eaten! ” He turns to face Reid, who’s still holding on the pipe, and very wide eyed because maybe now he regrets having asked to cross the Quarantine, but it’s too late and that’s now sinking in.
Crane snaps his feet together, briefly crosses his arms in front of him. “Toes first. Arms tight. Go!”
“This is at least sixty fee—“
The crowbar comes up and he takes two quick steps forward, sets himself up with arms spread wide and chest puffed out and gives the kid his best roar.
Reid drops the pipe and then he’s over the ledge, legs and arms and wild hair and all, and Crane is set to follow. But he’s turned just a moment too long, let a Biter come a little too close, and before he can leap, there are hands on his arm and teeth headed for his meat.
“Shit-Shit-Shit-Shit—“ He boxes a fist into the thing’s head. Gets it reeling. Gets himself reeling with it, because the fucking thing won’t let go, and then a rock ruins his day, catches on his heel and sends them both over the edge.
So much for toes first.
Turns out the kid is right about those sixty feet, and all the other shit he’s been on about. Crane doesn’t land well. Cold, hard and wet ground smacks into him. Folds around him.
And things go very dark.
* * *
His lungs are on fire when he wakes up, and that’s just wrong, because lungs aren’t supposed to be burning up. He hacks up air. Draws in water. Or the other way around, he can’t quite tell, and then he’s on his side and heaving up his stomach and whatever will he’s had left to live.
Crane counts his limbs while he’s throwing up, takes stock of how they’re aching, but moving, and how his spine protests every violent convulsion.
“You’re alive,” he hears off to the left, and then the voice bobs closer and clammy hands grab him by the shoulder and help him upright.
He is, even though he’s not sure how and when— until Reid swims into view, blotchy and blurry and wet. Shivering, too. Crane leans back, rubs the back of his thumbs over his eyes to try and get the blur out of them, and they sting. But stinging is good, because stinging means alive.
It sinks in a moment later why he’s still breathing. Or breathing again, he figures, because when he looks out from under the rock outcropping Reid dragged him ashore at, he sees the drop they’d come down from a little too far off in the distance.
“Thanks,” he rasps, and Reid bobs his head.
There really isn’t much else he can think of saying at that point. Or do, really. Except struggle to his feet and keep moving, because now he owes the kid, and he’ll be damned if he won’t get him where he needs to be.
* * *
It’s a crummy building that greets them, and a very sharp set of brown eyes meeting Crane as he tries to get the front door open. They look at him from down the length of a sidearm pointed at his chest. Very centre of mass, with a tight grip on it and a finger a squeeze away from ending him.
The kid saves his life again. A name. Emily. It slips from his mouth, all hoarse and full of hope clawing its way up from the pit of despair it had gotten chucked into. The gun sways. The eyes snap past Crane.
Okay.
So maybe he’d had a good reason for trying to get himself killed, because who’s he to judge if a girl is worth trying for or not. Even if it wasn’t his style.
Honest.