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Futuristic ᴇɢᴏ ᴅᴇᴀᴛʜ

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Rupert's head snapped to the side,
the slap stinging like a live wire. His breathing steadied just enough for him to realize how uneven it had been. His pipe dropped to the floor, clattering noisily.

The glass fragments glittered on the church floor, catching the dim light like a thousand tiny fires. Rupert blinked at them, his vision in swirls as though they weren’t real, as though he were still staring into the blaze outside. But the fire was real. The smoke. The unmistakable stench of decay and something else still clung to his nostrils. His hands trembled as he balled them into fists, willing them to still.

"Settle down," Deron had said. Easy for him to say. Deron didn’t have it—the hysteria—roaring behind his eyes, pressing against his skull like it wanted out, like it needed to devour the world to match what it had already taken.

Rupert turned slowly to face his brother. His lip curled, not in anger but in something colder, sharper. "You didn’t have to hit me," Rupert said, his voice softer but no less raw. "You didn’t have to..." He trailed off, unsure if he believed the words even as he said them.

He felt the statues' judgment, their condemnation, like a weight on his shoulders. Saints, they called them. Twin saints. Cosmas and Damian. He and Deron, maybe, if saints could be broken men with blood on their hands. The fire had licked at both their heels, but Deron didn’t look at him now like someone who had escaped.

"You don’t—" He stopped himself, his hands shaking again. "You were there, but you’re not... You don’t feel it like I do."

“The... the glass,” he stammered, desperate to be believed. “It—it was watching me. The colors—they moved. I saw a face, Deron. I swear I saw a face. It's not in my head.”

Deron didn’t respond right away. That was worse than any denial or confirmation could have been. Rupert could see it—the wildness reflected in Deron’s eyes, a reflection of his own manic energy. Deron wasn’t just cautious, he was a tightly-wound calm, scanning Rupert with the precision of someone taking stock of a problem. He wasn’t afraid of Rupert. He was assessing him, calculating his next move.

"You don’t care," Rupert surmised, his voice rising again. "You’re always like this. Keeping your head down, pretending nothing's happening, ignoring what’s right in-fucking-front of you."

He wanted to shove his brother but, in a show of restraint, didn't.

"You act like nothing touches you," Rupert pressed, the words tumbling faster now. "Like you’re untouchable. But everyone's still out there, and we're in here."

Exactly where they should be.










♡coded by uxie♡
 



















“If I stab myself, it’d make your job easier, so I don’t see why you’re complaining,”
Jesse strained through his teeth, taking the knife in his hand. Because there was no adrenaline left in Jesse’s veins, his hands shook spastically, quaking left and right almost cartoonishly.

Gripping the knife as tightly as he could in an attempt to control the shaking, Jesse placed the knife beside the splintering, couple-inch-wide pole to square up his shot. Slowly moving his hand back and forth, stopping a nanometer from the pole, he lined up his shot. Finally, Jesse, whose forehead was covered in perspiration from pain and focus, drew in a sharp breath and wound his arm back. Then—

WHACK!

As quickly as he could, he hit the pole with the knife, putting a centimeter-deep dent in the side and sending a shower of dust down onto his head. Jesse hacked dramatically, foolishly waving his knife-holding hand before his face to fan away the dust.

“Wish I had Deron’s hatchet,” he mumbled.

Again, he squared up to hit the spot, and—

WHACK!

WHACK!

WHACK!

Each time he hit, the shot was slightly off, causing him to, rather than making a deeper cut in the pole, chip off triangular wedges.

WHACK!

WHACK!

WHACK!

Though dust fell onto his head and blurred his vision, Jesse continued his determined chipping until, finally, he reached up toward the pole and found it to have enough leniency for him to begin to push it forward. He dropped the knife to the ground, then reached up to the pole with both hands and gave it a pull with all of his weight, his veins firming definite lines beneath his skin as he gave it his full might. After several seconds elapsed, he released his grip, let out a breath, and then, inhaling deeply and sharply, began to pull again, pulling and pulling until—

SNAP!

The piece splintered off in Jesse’s hand unexpectedly, and he, pole in hand, flopped to the ground from the force of his yank. He landed on his haunches, wearing an unexpected grin on his face. He gave a chuckle of victory before the pain in his leg panged again.

Determined, Jesse grabbed the knife that laid beside him on the dusty concrete, turned the pole toward the splintered edge, and began to carve the wood.

He had never thought his hobby of whittling could come in such handy.

The blade was much duller now than was optimal for carving, but Jesse’s bag was too far from himself to grab his whittling knife. The knife of Cara’s that he’d used as a makeshift axe had, thankfully, suffered less damage than he’d expected it to—thankfully, the wood itself was soft, likely because it was so weathered.

After a few minutes of determined strokes, Jesse managed to carve something resembling a cane, with a wide handle on top that tapered slightly down to a thick base.

“This will…” He grimaced. “This will have to do.” He looked at Cara, squinting his eyes and reaching his hand out toward her. “A little help here? You’ve done nothing.”










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















When Rupert turned his face back toward Deron, his eyes
were not clear of the expression as Deron had hoped they would be. “You didn’t have to hit me. You didn’t have to…”

Stoically, Deron responded with the same words as he’d said before: “Settle down, Rupert.”

“You don’t—“ His brother was trembling; it unsettled something in Deron. “You were there, but you’re not…you don’t feel it like I do. The…the glass. It—it was watching me. The colors—they moved. I saw a face, Deron. I swear I saw a face. It’s not in my head.”

Deron stared at his twin and sensed deeply but only for a fleeting moment that he was looking at a man testing the waters of madness. For a face so similar to his own, Rupert’s visage looked so foreign; in the dying orange light from the sinking sun, Rupert’s wrinkles were deep gullies that aged him twenty years. Deron had always known Rupert to be irrational, fast-acting, reckless, destructive—but he saw in his eyes now something that he had only seen after their last mission: mental disturbance.

“You don’t care,” Rupert said, his voice raising once more. “You’re always like this. Keeping your head down, pretending nothing’s happening, ignoring what’s right in-fucking-front of you. You act like nothing touches you. Like you’re untouchable. But everyone’s still out there, and we’re in here.”

Rupert’s attempt at insults or deep cuts hit Deron’s skin like pebbles and fell at his feet. People—especially his brother—always said so much that meant so little because they did not understand Deron’s mind. Rupert’s words, his actions, and that look in his eyes…Deron could only think disdainfully of their mother.

You don’t care, Deron? After everything I’ve done for you—son, I’ve raised you with the very best, always given you so much over your brother—this is how you repay me? Just ducking your head and shutting yourself off? You’re just like your father.

Deron scanned Rupert’s face. “Maybe I am untouchable. But I also happen to see what’s in front of me. And I saw what you saw: some living, viscous liquid—something strange that grew at the speed of kudzu. But that is all it was.” Though he could still feel the ghost its tendril-like arms wrapped around his torso, Deron could not pretend as though it was anything more than a scientific phenomenon that needed to be studied. It was not a threat—it was a strange occurrence that could surely easily be explained, perhaps connected to the crystal they’d collected earlier.

Deron looked past his brother’s head to the shattered stained glass window. The lamb’s head remained. The lamb was pure white, its head turned profile and its eye closed. Its body had been fractalized, lay on the ground just beneath its window frame. He turned his eyes back to his brother. “Look at yourself. Your feet are under you. Your lungs are taking in air. Your heart is beating. No colors are moving. There are no faces around here, besides…” He read the names again: OUR LORD JESUS, HIS HOLY MOTHER MARY, AND HIS SERVANTS MARTYRED FOR HIS SAKE SAINTS COSMAS AND DAMIAN, THE TWIN SAINTS. “The statues.” He reached a hand out and placed it firmly on Rupert’s shoulder. “Nothing happened. No colors shifted around, nobody looked at you. You didn’t see what you think you saw. Get ahold of yourself.”

Deron waited a beat, peering deeply into his brother’s eyes.

His lip curled slightly. “Get ahold of yourself,” he repeated, his tone shifting to near disgust, and he stepped away, walking toward the front of the chapel.

Something important came to Deron’s attention once again: the lack of response to the call for their third team member.

Deron turned around to the brother he had spurned. “Where is Georgia?”










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















For a moment, Rupert didn’t move.
Words felt distant, as though spoken underwater. He clenched his fists, staring at the statues.

“Maybe I am untouchable.” That’s what Deron had said. That’s what he always said, in one way or another. Like being untouchable was a badge of honor. Like it was the reason he deserved to lead while the rest struggled to keep it together. Mom, Helen, and Ethan were miserable, but Rupert wouldn't go there. Untouchable Deron didn’t know what it was to falter, to flinch at shadows of doubts.

Unusually, Rupert said nothing, swallowing the anger rising in his throat. He let out a low, sharp breath through his nose, the corner of his mouth twitching while the rest of his body stiffened under Deron's hand. He could no longer hold eye contact.

“Fine,” he said flatly, the word clipped and brittle. His shoulders slumped, and he shrugged off Deron’s hand with a half-hearted motion. “You’ve got it all figured out."

Deron asked where Georgia was. All Rupert knew was that he could still hear her voice in his head.

We can't fight this!

Why hadn't she followed?

If we can't stop it, we need to outmaneuver it!

It was doubtful she would have said that had the mass swallowed her up too, knowing how much of a pain it was to free themselves from it. Maybe that was a good sign.

"I don't know," he admitted finally, bracing himself for Deron's response.

Rupert didn't follow him to the front of the church, guarding the window as much as he was studying it. Once again he picked up his pipe, silently promising this time not to smash any more windows with it. Or his brother, for that matter.

He was on the verge of saying something—what, he wasn’t sure—when the sound came. A sharp, frantic thud against the heavy wooden door. Then another.

“Deron.” His voice came out low, unsteady, almost drowned by the next bang.

“Deron! Rupert!” Georgia’s voice carried through the thick wood, high-pitched with fear, muffled but unmistakable.

“Georgia!” he called from afar, riddled with uncertainty. “Come in!”

Her response was a garbled shout. She'd still been outside—the terror, for her, hadn't a chance to die down. “Open the door! It’s—it’s locked!”

Rupert’s stomach twisted as he darted to the door, shooting Deron a scalding look, his eyes narrowing. Locked?

Deron stood where he had paused moments ago, a faint frown on his face, but his expression was as unreadable as ever. Too calm, too detached, like the banging wasn’t loud enough to stir him.

“Dammit, Deron,” Rupert growled, already crossing the chapel in hurried strides. “Why is it locked? Why didn’t you—” He cut himself off, fingers fumbling over the cold iron latch, swinging the door open to let Georgia come barreling in.

Rupert stepped back, his eyes darting past her to view the almost entirely set sun, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end. There wasn't a chance they'd be back to the meeting point before dark.

“What happened?” he demanded, his voice sharper than intended, though his hands hovered near her, ready to catch her if she fell.

“I lost you guys in the commotion,” she gasped, swallowing hard. “The fire—it came out of nowhere. We were surrounded and then—bam—everything just went up in flames. I didn’t even have time to think, I just... ran. But I heard the glass shatter. I heard it, and I thought—maybe you guys were here, so I came as fast as I could.”

She took another deep breath, her voice growing steadier as she continued. “I’ve been banging on that door for at least a minute before you finally answered. And now it's quiet. Like... like that liquid's gone and seeped back into the cracks.”

Rupert’s jaw clenched itself as he shut the door, catching Deron’s unreadable face again. See? He said, silently. Something’s extra-off.

His attention flicked back to Georgia, his voice gruff but backed by nothing but concern. “Are you sure you’re okay? You look like you’ve been through hell.”

She nodded, wiping at her forehead with the back of her hand. “I’m fine. And I'm glad you two made it out." Her expression darkened. "But we can’t stay here for long. That fire—it’s not just going to disappear.”










♡coded by uxie♡
 



















It was a nice cane,
Cara thought to herself.

"Guess all that whittling paid off," she commented, taking her knife back.

Jesse sat with an arm outstretched, again demanding something of Cara. And listen, she was eager to help, but Jesse never explained anything, and it didn't help that she hadn't a clue on what to do in this scenario.

Do they stay put and let Jesse rest his leg? Do they go, suffering Jesse's whining the whole way? What would Deron do? What would Dad do?

"I don't know what you want me to do," she said dully, gripping Jesse's hand with the assumption that he'd need a lift up. So much for that dumb cane now. Jesse still needed Cara. How about that?

"By the way, since we're planning to make it back to the meeting spot before sunset, you could have just let me roll you on the chairs." Cara glanced at her shoddy construction of a gurney, groaning unceremoniously while she lifted Jesse's weight. "But whatever. Ready to go?"










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















BANG—BANG—BANG!


“Deron! Rupert!” The fearful voice of the missing young woman came from the other side of the worn wooden door.

Deron turned to face the door, breathing out softly in relief to release the tension in his shoulders. He had never doubted that the third member had made her way safely though the gas station fiasco, but hearing Georgia’s voice was reassuring nonetheless.

“Georgia!” Rupert responded. “Come in!”

“Open the door! It’s—it’s locked!”

Locked—the word stuck with Deron. He worked his jaw, his lips curling downward slightly. As Rupert grumbled and stomped by to let Georgia into the church, Deron retraced his steps. He had entered in a hurry, slamming open the door and collapsing to his hands and knees just inside the church’s wood-paneled vestibule. It had taken him a moment to regain control over himself—to realize that his body was still intact, that the goo was gone, that he was safe now. (Even though that had happened mere moments ago, the interaction he’d had with the alien substance—and he used the word alien because he could not imagine that it was natural to its environment—seemed nearly surreal; but he had a missing hatchet to prove that it had happened.) Then, he had heard his brother smash the window.

Had Rupert—the ever reckless—closed and locked the door behind himself? Deron supposed it wasn’t entirely impossible, but…Rupert was Rupert, and Rupert was so irresponsible that Deron doubted that he even understood the purpose of locks. If he was being honest, Deron was a bit impressed at his brother’s ability to undo the latch that he was now undoing; if he had taken a bet on whether or not his brother could open the lock, Deron would have lost his wager right now.

(That was a joke, almost.)

Rupert finally got the latch to open, and Georgia rushed into the building. Deron took a few steps forward toward Georgia, but his eyes flicked out the door to the nearly sunken sun. Shit, he thought, calculating the best course of action as Rupert asked, “What happened?”

“I lost you guys in the commotion,” Georgia responded breathlessly. “The fire—it came out of nowhere. We were surrounded and then—bam—everything just went up in flames. I didn’t even have time to think, I just…ran.”

Thoughtfully, Deron took another few steps toward the door and studied both the lock and the sun. Judging by the sun’s position, they had probably about an hour until dark, including blue hour; that was nowhere near enough time to make it back to their vehicle.

“But I heard the glass shatter. I heard it, and I thought—maybe you guys were here, so I came as fast as I could.”

They had three options. 1) They stay here for the night, leaving Cara and Jesse to their own devices for an entire night, to fend against whatever may come across them. The church was clean enough. It seemed to have been sheltered from much of the decay and desecration that the rest of the buildings around it had experienced over the years; perhaps it was because it was a holy place. Deron doubted that there would be any large predators in this area. Even with the overgrown weeds, there was too little prey for something like a coyote pack to make their home anywhere near where they parked—-though Cara and Jesse might be enough prey for the pack to venture this far out of their usual boundaries for. However, Deron hadn’t told them where the supplies for overnight stays were in the boxes, and he felt a twinge of irritation at the thought of them digging through his carefully organized supplies or overextending themselves on rations. Beyond that, that would put this team behind schedule—full hours out from the truck—meaning that they would be burning time that could be spent locating their missing loved ones.

Not to mention, though the fire was far away now, with nothing to quell the flames, it was quite possible that, in a few hours’ time, the church itself might fall to the same fate as the gas station.

“I’ve been banging on that door for at least a minute before you finally answered. And now it’s quiet. Like…like that liquid’s gone and seeped back into the cracks.”

2) Deron, Rupert, and Georgia could make their way back through the city as far as they could get, then find a safe space to stay for the night. This would waste less time in the morning; they would be able to pick up whatever couple of hours that they needed to finish walking in the morning, and that would be simple enough. But the issue of leaving Cara and Jesse alone in the night remained, and there was no guarantee of a workable shelter for the night. (By workable, Deron meant not bug-infested, not overgrown, not dung-filled, not foul-smelling, which limited the options.)

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Rupert asked. “You look like you’ve been through hell.”

3) Justifying their actions based on the chaos surrounding them and their desperation to find their missing loved ones, the three could gather their belongings and trek into the night hours back through the city, with only the candles they’d brought in case of emergency to light their way back through the blazed trail to their vehicle. Deron had no weapon on him beyond a small pocketknife, so he would have to rely on his brother and the young woman in their company to defend him. (Though this disconcerted him, he reminded himself that there was certainly a hatchet in the supplies he’d brought; he’d just have to make it back to the supplies.) There would undoubtedly be the usual nocturnal creatures wandering about, infested with rabies and other such delightful diseases, but Deron couldn’t shake the feeling that the sentient plasma still lurked somewhere out there as well. They would need to keep matches handy.

But they would be back and would be able to leave immediately in the morning, and they would be spared the scorning looks of the other team members who might think that Deron was incompetent.

“I’m fine. And I’m glad you two made it out,” Georgia said. “But we can’t stay here for long. That fire—it’s not just going to disappear.”

“Thus we leave,” Deron said definitively, turning back to the other two members of his team with a sure look on his face. He reached down and picked up his backpack from the foyer floor, slipping it back onto his back. He looked down at Georgia and gave her a smile. “I’m glad that you’re safe. I know that it’s not easy on your body, since you haven’t had any time to rest, but we really need to go right now if we’re to make it back before the dead of the night.”

He looked at Rupert. I realize I said it was foolish before, he tried to communicate in his stern look to his brother. “We will be walking in the dark for only a short while, and only because we have to. Please take a couple of minutes to relieve yourselves, drink water, eat something from your rations. But we cannot take any longer than that. Have your weapons at the ready.” He pulled out his pocketknife. “I will do my best as well.”










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















“You need to work on your grip,”
Jesse griped, his way of thanking Cara for her help, and he grabbed her hand and, using his other hand in an attempt to push himself off the ground, struggled to stand without putting any weight on his injured leg. After a lot of tugging on his helper’s hand, he finally managed to pull himself up enough to grip his cane with the non-Cara-holding hand. He let go of Cara and put both hands on his cane, and he was ultimately able to pull himself all the way up. Breathlessly, he said, “Yeah, I’m ready to go. So ready.”

The trek back to the truck was much more difficult than even dramatic Jesse would have imagined.

He kept his eyes constantly trained on where his cane touched the ground. Though he tried his absolute hardest, it was nearly impossible for him to shift his weight from his left leg to the cane and not from his left leg to his right leg. Each time he accidentally put too much weight on his right leg, he would cry out in pain, and he would pause for a moment to check and make sure that he hadn’t knocked the bandages loose or begun bleeding again. This, unfortunately, happened about every five minutes.

“How the fuck does Kurt do this on the daily?” Jesse whined, and then he realized: “Oh. Because he had his leg amputated. Maybe we should stop and cut my leg off.” And then, he remembered the time he almost came close to losing his leg, and he realized that was a bad joke. “Actually, no. I think I’m okay.”

As they continued to walk, Jesse sweating profusely and complaining loudly, he thought back to the time his leg had become infected.

“You know,” Jesse began in order to distract himself, “I got bit by a snake once.” He glanced at Cara, then looked immediately back down at his cane. “It was before you were around. I was really little. Seven? Six? Little scrawny guy—“ He winced and hissed in pain as he put a bit too much weight on his leg. He paused a moment, turning his knee slightly outward in order to check on the stability of his bandage and to make sure that no more blood had begun to seep through, and then he continued walking. “And my dad took me out on one of his hunting trips, but it was one of those where nothing was too dangerous and there really weren’t any animals out besides, ya know…rabbits, things like that. It was in that area of woods right outside of the compound.

“Anyway, it was summer. But it wasn’t hot—I remember that it wasn’t hot. So maybe it was still May…sometime like that. It wasn’t the first time I went out with my dad hunting—we went out all the time. So I started getting cocky.” Jesse nearly grinned. “I thought it would be a really funny prank—gotcha, Dad!, ya know—to take off running. I knew where we’d set the traps, so I was sure I could just, like, run around them, make it to a bush before Dad could catch me, and then I’d jump out and surprise him. So we set out. Nice day. Breezy. Good hunting weather—lots of animals were out. Looking back now, Dad probably could’ve made some big scores if he’d gone into the ‘good’ forest that day, but instead, he took me to the safe one to get some bow practice shooting rabbits.

“We hunted for a bit. That was back when I struggled—“ Another hiss, wince, pause, check, and continue. “Back when I struggled to sit still, so Dad was always having to shush me, but especially that day, since I was so ready for my prank, I couldn’t stop talking. And then, eventually, I took off.

“Dad readied his bow and ran after me. ‘Course I didn’t know he was following me that fast. I was laughing, having myself a good time, and I could hear him calling for me. I thought, Wow, I really got him!—and then…all of a sudden, this…this…this huge snake comes out. I swear, eight feet long. And before I even realize it’s there, it’s latched onto my left leg. I fall down and start to scream. It hurt worse than anything I’d ever experienced. And then my dad took aim, somehow knew just the right spot to hit it, and shot it off of me—made it let go of me and everything.

“It was a venomous snake. Cottonmouth. Dad sucked the venom from the wound, but that still didn’t get it all. He carried me home, and I was sobbing. My leg was swollen up at least ten times to its size. They laid me in a bed of my own for once, and when I wasn’t fainted from my high fevers, I was crying. Mama tried to keep me calm with cool water on my head, but that didn’t help much. The pain was in my leg.

“Then came the infection, and that was what almost did it. My leg was huge, nearly black. And the doctor said that it might have to be amputated. Mama wanted them to go ahead and do it to make me better, but my dad swore that if they just gave me another couple of days, I would be fine. The doctor said it could kill me. Dad had confidence.

“Bee—she was two years old then.” After he said her name, he paused for a long moment, just to hear his sister’s name hang in the air—proof that she was still safe somewhere, a reminder of his mission to find her. “And she would cry when she saw my leg, but then she would—she would tell me, in the little way she could, ‘cuz she couldn’t talk, Jesse is okay. And I would be like, Hell no, Jesse isn’t okay, and my mom would thump me on the head for cursing, and this would happen repeatedly. But it was like she knew, like Dad did. I would be okay.”

Jesse half-smiled, and then breathed out a sigh. “Cara…ya know…stories like that? They make me miss old Pops. But you were probably…closer to him than I was, I don’t know.”










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















The walk was anything but steady.
Cara had to make a concerted effort not to outpace Jesse, a hard thing to avoid even before the raccoon attack. And, for the record, they were very lucky that it was nothing bigger. Cara knew that.

"No time to amputate legs," was her humorless response, eyes fixated on the horizon. "Need to get back. Soon."

Jesse missed his dad. That much was obvious, even if he didn’t outright say it. But as much as Jesse’s rambling tales were meant to fill the silence, Cara couldn’t help but pick them apart. She wanted to look like she was listening—really listening—so as to not spoil the vulnerability of the moment. Like those rare occasions Cara would let Bee into her room, just to sit in silence, even while either of the girls were in a mood.

She thought about how Jesse described his father—kind, strong, able to carry his son home after a snake bite, save him with nothing but determination and skill. He always told these stories with a strange kind of reverence, like he was talking about a myth instead of a man. It sounded nice, almost comforting. It didn’t match the hazy fragments of memory she had to remember her own dad by.

Her dad, Austin Kirk, had been kind once, too. Unflinching, even in the worst of times. He’d kept her safe while the old world rotted away, taught her to stay quiet, to stay hidden, to survive. He could befriend a group of strangers like he'd done PR for a living.

Cara didn’t like thinking about him, not because it hurt but because it felt…complicated. Jesse’s stories were full of certainty—this happened, then this, then this. Cara’s memories of her dad weren’t like that. They blurred at the edges, details slipping away the harder she tried to grab them.

The parts that stuck, by majority, weren’t really good ones.

The way his face had twisted toward the end, his voice no longer patient but sharp, strained, like he was fighting something bigger than himself. The way he had started to mumble under his breath, not to her but to something she couldn’t see. And the way he’d left for so long, disappearing into the night without a word. Jesse’s dad had saved his life. Hers had abandoned her.

Until, one day, he came back...

Cara shook her head, trying to shove the thought aside. It wasn’t fair to compare the two. Jesse had his struggles, his losses. She had hers.

But as he reminisced about that dreadful infection, about Bee as a toddler crying at the sight of his swollen leg, Cara couldn’t stop the knot forming in her stomach. Bee had been two then—a little kid, scared but still finding ways to comfort her brother.

Tai had always been like that, too. Quiet but steady, always knowing exactly what to say to her even when she didn’t want to hear it. Now he was gone, and the knot tightened into something sharper. She hated this—hated that the issue of the lost scavengers couldn't be treated like a wound, like a project full of procedures.

Cara couldn't let herself think about things that would shake her hope. She focused on Jesse’s story, on the steadiness of his words even as his body faltered. Maybe he needed her to hear it, to remind himself that survival wasn’t just pain and fear and running... or limping.

“Cara…ya know…stories like that? They make me miss old Pops. But you were probably…closer to him than I was, I don’t know," said Jesse.

Maybe she was, in some ways.

After a moment, she said, “You know… I’ve got a story about your dad, too. Not as wild as yours, but…” She hesitated, glancing at Jesse out of the corner of her eye.

"Yeah..." she started, "your dad… he… he had this way of making you think you were invincible. Not in a reckless way, but like he really believed you—any kid—could handle anything." She hesitated, the words coming slower now, like pulling weeds from stubborn ground. "I remember one time, Bee and I… we were twelve and thirteen, I think. I hadn't been around long."

"Anyway, he—your dad—decided we were going to learn how to fish with him, instead of from Kurt. So, he drags us out to this muddy little creek near the compound, gives us these awful homemade rods, and tells us to figure it out." Cara threw a hand in the air like W.T.F., right?

She could see the scene clearly in her mind—Bee's face screwed up in frustration, the sun glinting off the sluggish water, and Jesse Sr. standing nearby with his arms crossed, watching like a hawk. "Bee, of course, was furious about it. Kept saying, ‘Why do we need to fish when we have rations?’"

Cara rolled her eyes, knowing well that her impression of Bianca was spot on. "And your dad… he just shrugged and said, ‘Because rations run out. Fish don’t, if you’re smart about it.’ That... shut her up for about two seconds."

Cara chuckled, but the memory brought a pang of something bittersweet. "We were out there for hours, tangled up in the line, falling into the mud. Bee kept swearing she’d never eat fish even if she caught one, and your dad… he just stood there. Patient. Watching. Never saying much, but you could tell he was amused."

The best part was that Cara caught herself a huge bluegill, earning a giant hug from Jesse and Bee's dad. She paused, brushing a strand of hair out of her face.

"Eventually, Bee caught a fish. This tiny, scrappy little thing—not even enough to make a meal out of. But your dad… he knelt down beside her and told her she’d done good." She sent a smile to Jesse, though it was more to his leg as she checked on the conditions of his bandages. "Said it was the biggest catch he’d seen all day, even though I’d somehow managed to snag something twice its size. He… he knew exactly what to say to make her feel like she’d won."

Cara’s throat tightened, and she kicked at a loose rock on the road. "I don’t think Bee ever really got why he did stuff like that. Or Ava, even. Why he was always so… insistent that we all learn things the hard way. But I did. I think it’s because he wanted us to know we could make it, even if… even if he wasn’t there to help us."

She sighed before speaking again. "My dad… he wasn’t like that. I mean, he tried, I guess. But he was… I don’t know. Different. Always restless, always looking for something bigger, like staying still was some kind of trap. I think he cared, in his way, but he wasn’t… present. Not like your dad was."

Cara kicked another rock, sending it tumbling over to the cracked sidewalk. This was no terrain for a light stroll.

"Jesse, are you going to have to stay in the truck for the rest of the mission?"










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















Rupert hated hypocrisy.


Yeah, take that in.

After exchanging a glance with Georgia, he shifted his weight, chewing on the inside of his cheek while he watched Deron assert control over the situation once again. His brother’s certainty always grated on him, especially in moments like this when it felt misplaced—more performance than practicality.

His cheek still raw from the strike his brother landed, Rupert was the first to speak up. "Hey, dumbass—were you listening to anything she just said? We're not making it past that fire."

“I also said that we can't stay,” Georgia added tentatively, stepping closer to Rupert as if drawing courage from his defiance. Her voice hadn't recovered from their harried escape. “Jesse and Cara should be expecting us soon...” She looked back toward the door as if the flames might already be licking their way toward the church.

Rupert gestured at Georgia with a sharp jerk of his hand. "Then let’s just march straight into hell because Mr. Big Picture over here says so. And what about the blazes? They were out here, Ethan, Min, and, and... the others."

Georgia hesitated again, then turned to Rupert, her voice dropping to a near whisper, though it was clear she still intended for Deron to hear. “I don’t want to turn back either, Rupert, but if we go any further, we’re just making it worse. It’s smarter to turn back now before it’s too late. We can make it to Cara and Jesse tonight, or in the morning."

“They're not meant to be out after dark,” Georgia said, her brow furrowed in thought. “And if we’re going to go through the fire…”

“We shouldn’t go through the fire,” she corrected herself quickly, her face pinching with worry.

Rupert huffed, running a hand through his hair. “Then what? What are we supposed to do, huh? Pack up, sneak around the corner, and hope that thing isn't waiting for us when we track back?”

“No, but—”

“Then say it!” he snapped, the words sharp enough to make Georgia flinch again. She looked down at the floor, and Rupert immediately felt like an asshole.

Her eyes lifted to his, and there was something in her gaze—an unspoken understanding, maybe even agreement—that made his chest tighten. She wasn’t going to push him on this, but she wasn’t going to fight Deron either. That left him on his own.

Rupert turned back toward his brother, who still hadn’t said a damn word. “And you, with your big speeches and your pocketknife. What's the plan, huh? Pretend the fire doesn’t exist and hope it gets bored? Real solid leadership, bro.”

He knew he was being antagonistic, but he didn’t care. Deron needed to hear it. This wasn’t just about being in charge—it was about who was right.

“I want to keep following the blazes,” he said finally, his voice tight but resolute. “We’ve wasted enough time already. Ethan could be right down that road. We can’t just throw away the trail.”

He could see the disagreement written all over Deron’s face before the man even opened his mouth.










♡coded by uxie♡
 



















Rupert’s cocky, brazen idiocy was tolerable when directed at Deron,
as Deron had developed the ability over the course of his life to, frankly, not give a shit about what his brother’s input was in any given situation; however, Deron’s composure was tested when he watched his brother turn the same attitude toward someone else.

“Then what? What are we supposed to do, huh? Pack up, sneak around the corner, and hope that thing isn’t waiting for us when we track back?” Rupert huffed at Georgia.

Georgia floundered for words. “No, but—“

“Then say it!” Rupert snapped.

A paternal flame ignited in Deron’s chest, flickering up to his lips for a moment in a disgusted scowl. He stepped forward protectively. He glanced at Georgia, scanning her face and finding a crestfallen expression; Deron’s jaw clenched.

When Deron looked at his brother again, he was peering into his brother’s eyes. “And you, with your big speeches and your pocketknife. Wehat’s the plan, huh? Pretend the fire doesn’t exist and hope it gets bored? Real solid leadership, bro. I want to keep following the blazes. We’ve wasted enough time already.” Rupert said the words in a tone that sounded like a mockery of Deron’s resolution: firm, determined, not up for questioning. “Ethan could be right down that road. We can’t just throw away the trail.”

Don’t bring my damn son into this! Deron wanted to retort, feeling an angry churning in his stomach. His nostrils flared in clear irritation, his jaw clenched. Hundreds of rash words flashed through Deron’s eyes, clearly legible to his brother.

Rupert thought he knew better; he always thought he knew better—from the time that they had been kids, Rupert always thought he knew the best. He had always been like a tick who thinks he’s a dog—a parasite on the back of someone greater who took credit for forward movement. But every single time that Rupert got his way, Deron had to save his ass. Rupert always came crawling back, never admitting his stupidity, never admitting how wrong he was, but desperately needing Deron to save him.

And immediately, Rupert always forgot who his savior was. The twins’ mother—hell, their whole society—had always told Rupert and showed him through their favor who the best leader was, who made the wisest decisions, who deserved the most reverence, who truly was the worthy leader: not Rupert. The lack of the community’s collapse in on itself under Deron’s leadership had proven who was capable of making the best choices: not Rupert.

Rupert’s gall never surprised Deron, but the mention of Ethan was not what Deron had expected in the moment, like a punch in an unguarded gut.

The words that Deron immediately wanted to say, and pardon his french, were, Fuck you. Instead, he kept his lips sealed, slackening his jaw; his austere demeanor and inhospitable glare as he searched for words which would not betray any amount of disturbance by Rupert’s probing was middle finger enough.

“If you want to go out into the dead of the night and chase a two-week-old trail in the darkness,” Deron said coldly, “be my guest. We’ll be by in the truck in the morning. If the night is nice to you, it’ll at least leave your bones so we can know what became of you.”

Deron brushed past his brother and out the door through which Georgia had just entered. The dying light of the sun cast an orange glow on his skin and deepened the shadows of his wrinkles as he removed his large backpack. He stepped back to assess the dark-colored church before him. It towered over him, its figures and windows watching him with almost scornful eyes, but the church’s pointed top was in sight. He wandered around the building, looking for the perfect place to do what he planned to do.

He hadn’t done this in awhile.

Finally, his eyes landed on what seemed like the best spot to accomplish is goal on the east side of the building: an area where the stone-laying had imperfect and crooked.

Deron supposed that he appreciated this builder’s laziness.

Deron approached the spot, sizing it up from a closer angle. Yes, this would be fine enough…

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

He hoped he was still strong enough.

Deron kicked off his shoes and socks. Squaring his shoulders, he walked forward and grabbed ahold of the brick.

Picturing the face of the statues inside, Deron closed his eyes muttered a small prayer: “I need to make it.”

And he opened his eyes and began to climb.

Every one of his muscles strained against him, begging him to stop. God, he hadn’t done this in fifteen years. He grunted in effort, pulling himself up higher and utilizing his bare feet’s gripping ability to relieve some of the pressure on his shoulders.

In his mind, as he climbed, he tried to take himself back to the days spent doing this in his youth.

Deron never had been a very physical child. He was certainly the weaker of the brothers, though he would not admit this aloud. He had lost every physical fight with Rupert—save for one that had occurred when Rupert was sick with the stomach flu. Deron had never been the greatest at brute strength; he could not carry the heavy loads—or sometimes, even the lighter loads. This had always been a sore spot with Deron, but it was a part of his nature.

Oddly enough, however, perhaps because he was meant to be on top, Deron had always been a climber.

Some of his earliest memories—before he had fully realized the importance of performing household chores—were of climbing up the tree out back of his childhood living quarters to avoid helping Mom with the cleaning. When she would call his name, he would run out back, and before she could come outside and find him, he was already halfway up the tree. His mother called and called and called, but she never discovered Deron or his hiding place, and so Rupert had to pick up his chores.

The tree spot was something Deron had never shared with Rupert—not that he had ever been one much for confiding in his brother. And on the late nights when Deron nursing black eyes from fights with his brother, he would find a tree and climb it to the very top, and he would let the cold wind against his face soothe his wounds.

But shit, it was harder these days. The callouses on his hands had worn off, so his hands ached, and his muscles were in agony.

Finally, Deron made his way to the roof. With a labored grunt, panting for his life and sweating profusely, Deron managed to get his forearms onto the eave and pull himself up enough to get his feet beside him. From there, it was much easier for him to push himself up fully onto the roof.

He took only a couple of moments to catch his breath; he could not waste valuable time. The sun was already so dangerously low.

He stood up and walked to the edge of the roof. He peered toward the burning gas station. The flames licked high into the air. Aerially, he could see thick smoke billowing toward the southern direction. He scanned around the gas station’s perimeter.

There were about 20 feet on the side of the gas station that were clear—a path only 20 feet wide.

It would be dangerous. They would run a great risk of burning themselves. But it would only be a dash of a couple hundred feet before they were clear of the flames.

Georgia and Rupert didn’t need to hear him say the specifics aloud.

“There’s not much room, but there is some,” Deron called down. “We have no other option. We cannot be added to the ranks of missing individuals. We will have to run beside the fire.”

It was safer, to Deron, to go through the flames than to be alone in this strange place at night—especially with that liquid around.

Scaling down the building was much simpler, as the weight was more often on Deron’s lower half than his upper.

When he landed on the ground, he immediately pulled on his socks and shoes before tramping back into the church building, searching the area with a purpose. His eyes found something usable—a white table runner with blue embroidery—and he whipped it off of the table, knocking a dirty rosary and a small candle onto the dusty ground.

Deron ripped the table runner into three pieces with great effort using his teeth, and he handed one part to Georgia and one part to Rupert. “Wet these with water from your canteens,” he commanded. “Use them to cover your nose and mouth. Whatever you do, you need to keep your eyes down and run. You don’t need to get any embers in your eyes. The smoke is blowing in the opposite direction, but that doesn’t mean that the winds can’t change.”

As he removed his canteen and studied his piece of the table runner, he only now noticed the embroidery on his section:

A fire goeth before him,
and burneth up his enemies round about.

His lightnings enlightened the world:
the earth saw, and trembled.

The hills melted like wax at the presence of the Lord,
at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth.​

He doused his piece in water. “The worst will be the heat. Stay as far away from the flames as possible. Flames are unpredictable, but do your best to predict them.” He looked out of the open door. “We’re pretty far away now. When we approach the fire, be hyperaware of your surroundings.” He took a drink from his canteen. “If you see any warning of the…” He wasn’t sure what to call it. “If you see any more of what we saw back there, run faster. If you have to drop your backpacks or lose any personal articles, do what you must. Though we have limited resources, I’d rather you be alive.”

He looked back at Rupert and finally gave a rebuttal for a part of his brother’s speech. “We’re not throwing away the trail. Dead men can’t follow blazes.” He looked at Georgia now, but he addressed both of his team members. “Now hurry. Drink water. Eat a small portion. Relieve yourself. We must go. It’s not safe, but it’s safer than our other choices.”










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















Jesse caught himself grinning at Cara’s story, distracted enough
to even go a couple of minutes without stopping to check his foot. It was a sad, nostalgic sort of grin—one that comes when you can still see a moment like it’s happening around you, and you just let yourself pretend for a second that you could reach out and touch it if you really tried.

"Said it was the biggest catch he’d seen all day, even though I’d somehow managed to snag something twice its size,” Cara continued. “He…he knew exactly what to say to make her feel like she’d won."

“I remember that happening, I think,” Jesse said. “I was getting back from a hunt that day, starving like hell, and I wanted Mama to hurry up and finish whatever it was she was frying up, and she scolded me for rushing her and also said that I was gonna be disappointed. And she gave me Bee’s little scrappy…I mean, it was a glorified pollywog.” He let out a hearty chuckle, picturing the skinny smelt staring at Jesse with the same sort of round eye that was staring right back at it. “And Mama made me eat that thing. And made me tell Bee how good it was. Meanwhile, you guys got to eat your fish…” There was still a hint of jealousy in Jesse’s voice, like he wasn’t completely over it even after all of these years.

He sighed softly, remember his father’s face. “Dad tried a bite of Bee’s fish, too. That thing was so…gritty and awful, but you couldn’t tell by Dad’s face we were even eating the same fish. And he kept going on and on about how proud he was of you two for coming in with your fish…when I’d, ya know, come in with three or four huge hares I’d trapped. He was talking us all up the same.” He kicked at a rock with his good foot, his grin fading as the sadness crept in a bit more. “He was always doing stuff like that. Acting, like…ya know…acting like he did, I guess. I mean, he was tough…always made us do the things we never really wanted to do in the ways we never wanted to do ‘em…but he was always…ya know…like that in the end.”

Jesse wasn’t great with words.

Cara kicked the same rock that Jesse’d kicked; it made it several feet in front of them. “I don’t think Bee ever really got why he did stuff like that. Or Ava, even. Why he was always so…insistent that we all learn things the hard way. But I did. I think it’s because he wanted us to know we could make it, even if…even if he wasn’t there to help us.”

Jesse felt a pang in his chest. He’d tried not to feel it for a long time, but he felt it, strong and painful, right where his heart was. “Yeah,” Jesse said hollowly. “I always wondered if he could…see the future or some’n, ‘cuz he always knew what to do. Maybe he actually could. Maybe he knew what was coming all along.”

There was a long, quiet moment; Jesse’s foot pain was somehow long-forgotten.

Cara sighed. “My dad…he wasn’t like that,” she said. “I mean, he tried, I guess. But he was…I don’t know. Different. Always restless, always looking for something bigger, like staying still was some kind of trap. I think he cared, in his way, but he wasn’t…present. Not like your dad was.” She kicked another rock.

“’s that why you’re, like…the way you are? I mean, like….shifty?” Jesse said, meaning in completely innocuously. “Not in the sketchy way. In the sort of I might pack up and leave town without a trace or a word one day kind of way?” He stumbled slightly over the rough terrain. “You always scare me that you’re gonna…pick up someday, ya know. That you’ll tuck your bedding into your bag and run off, and Mama will come over and shake me awake and by the time I’m up enough to see you’re gone, I’ll have no hope of seeing you ever again. Is it ‘cuz you ain’t used to living a place?”

Unwittingly, Jesse was betraying that he cared about her, at least just a little bit.

"Jesse,” Cara said, and he turned his head toward her, swearing almost that he heard a little bit of worry in her voice, “are you going to have to stay in the truck for the rest of the mission?"

The thought had not yet occurred to him, and his visceral reaction came in the next instant: “Oh—fuck me, am I?” he asked in a desperate whine.

He looked down at his foot. He’d been babying it this whole time, and it still hurt and pulsated like hell. What would it be like tomorrow?

“Shit, Cara,” he said, looking at his companion in a panic, “missions like this don’t need deadweight. Cara, we’re on a rescue mission...” He grimaced, and he groaned painfully, “Oh shit, I fucked everything up.”

He slammed his cane down on the ground in frustration, and then immediately bent down and picked it back up and continued walking. “You don’t think he’d really do that, right? Deron, I mean?” Jesse asked the question as though his own injury wasn’t the thing keeping him down. “Shit, he would. He definitely would. He’d have me sit in the truck and rot away…on a rescue mention.” His genuine dread sounded almost sarcastic given his over-the-top pulling downward on his face. “I was supposed to come and help, and instead, I got torn apart by a crazy raccoon and am gonna get a five-hour lecture from the man who thinks he shits golden eggs, and—“

He looked at Cara with terrified eyes. “Mama’s gonna kill me. Like, really kill me.”

He groaned dramatically, and he continued forward at a much more rapid pace as his mind raced. What would he do? This was a fucking disgrace—he was making a mockery of himself and his family, all because of some wild animal that was nothing compared to the beasts he took down on the regular. He had no idea what he could do to answer to—

His mopey eyes caught on something that sparked an immediate idea. He stopped in his tracks and looked at Cara.

“You think I could…I dunno. You think I could ride a bike?”










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















Cara kicked another rock, this time harder.
Jesse was easily outmatched by the reigning champion of the biannual rock-kicking contest, even before his leg wound. And it was strange, how something so small could remind Cara of the way things used to be. Living through the fallout of a disaster seemed to ingrain such a deep-seated sense of nostalgia into every survivor.

It was easy to forget they had good memories, especially in the middle of a high-stress mission. And it was so very easy to let those memories slip through her fingers, buried beneath layers of survival, of loss, and of fear.

“’s that why you’re, like…the way you are? I mean, like….shifty?” Jesse's voice came through.

Cara shot Jesse a sharp look, her brow furrowing at the word shifty. Her lips pressed into a tight, flat line. Shifty? She wasn’t sure if it was the word itself that bothered her or the way it felt like an accusation.

She stopped walking for a moment, her hands on her hips. "Shifty? You think I’m shifty?” Her voice had an edge, not quite angry but definitely defensive, a bit thrown off by the question.

“Not in the sketchy way. In the sort of I might pack up and leave town without a trace or a word one day kind of way?” Jesse clarified, and Cara's demeanor changed dramatically. They were hard words to hear, but undeniably true.

“But I'm different than who I was when I was twelve,” Cara insisted. She didn’t have to explain it to him—Jesse had been there. He knew. But somehow, saying it aloud made it feel real in a way it hadn’t before. "You saw how bad I was. I didn’t want anyone to see me. I barely said a word to anyone for months. Just... stuck in my own head, trying to forget."

The words hung between them for a moment, her eyes flitting away from Jesse’s face as she thought hard about her next words, and the value of her secrets. "My dad was always moving us. I don’t know. He tried to protect me, but he wasn’t... he wasn’t always the guy I thought he was." A flicker of something—something that looked like her father’s face in the corner of her vision—caught her, and she flinched, pushing it down.

"You don't trust people out here. That's why it's so quiet—if anyone's even alive." She took a long breath, the silence between them heavy now, before she added with a half-smile. “I don’t know if I’ll ever shake these feelings. Maybe it’s just part of who I am. But... I guess I’m here, and that’s something.”

Cara looked Jesse in the eye, straining to meet him from a less cold and analytical standpoint despite much of the warmth behind his words being lost on her. Marie's blackberry pie was enough reason to stick around, let alone Tai or the family she'd found when she had nothing left.

"It'd be a mistake to leave something like this," she decided, a confirmation meant for more than one person.

That was when Cara switched the topic, her mind stuck on the gravity of the present mission.

"You want to ride a bike?” she repeated slowly, her brows furrowing in confusion. It was such a Jesse thing to do—to throw out some random solution in the middle of a freakout, hoping for a fix. "You mean that thing, over there?"

Her eyes pointed to, sure enough, a bicycle sat up against a wall beneath one of the team's old blazes. "Jesse, if Deron even thinks you’re gonna make things worse by riding a bike—well..." She sighed, knowing full well how their leader could be. "He’s not gonna let you risk yourself."

Cara paused for a beat, and then something inside her shifted. She wasn’t sure what it was—maybe it was the way Jesse’s dramatics mirrored her own upset, or maybe it was the fact that he genuinely didn’t want to let everyone down. They were already going to be in so much trouble, as young adults who shouldn't even have been let on the mission in the first place. But turning back was clearly not an option.

“I mean...” She exhaled sharply, rolling her eyes in mock exasperation. “You could try. Can you pedal? Shouldn't you get training wheels?"

Cara had never actually seen a bicycle in one piece—mostly just kiddie tricycles left behind at abandoned houses in the suburbs.

"Also, if Deron's in a bad mood after his search, I'm definitely not getting in between you two."










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















Deron' silence always came from a place of cruelty.
It wasn’t just that Deron wasn’t speaking to him—it was that he refused to speak to him, like Rupert’s words were a waste of air, his thoughts so irrelevant they didn’t even warrant the dignity of a response.

Rupert and Deron had never been a perfect match, though they’d come into the world only minutes apart. Their mother used to say they were two halves of one soul, but Rupert often felt like he’d gotten the lesser share.

When they were boys, they’d fight as much as they played, roughhousing in the dirt until an adult's voice split the air, sending them skittering apart like startled dogs. Deron always won the arguments, even if Rupert won the fights. Words had never been Rupert’s strong suit, and Deron wielded them like a whip—quick and cutting, leaving marks that didn’t fade. There were many things he'd said that stuck with Rupert, always out of their mother's earshot—an easy thing to do, with how preoccupied the woman used to be.

But what Rupert reportedly lacked in cleverness, he made up for in strength. He was the one who hauled firewood in the bitter winter, the one who shouldered the blame when they were caught sneaking out past dark, the first one to their mother’s bedside when her body began to betray her. Deron, the golden boy, the heir to the leadership, the one "wise beyond his years", could disappear for hours—days even—off scheming some new plan to save them all.

It was Deron who could look at him in a way no one else could, like he was still that little boy in the dirt, fists clenched and lip trembling, desperate to be understood. In front of Deron, his family, his friends, and his followers, Rupert felt so undeniably small, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with him.

Rupert said nothing as Deron walked out the door, though a part of him burned to say something—anything. But what could he say? They both knew he wouldn’t split off on his own. He never did. Even when it felt like the right thing, the only thing.

Exasperation creeping into her soft voice, Georgia asked, “What are you doing this for, Rupert? To be right? To be heard? Or just to make sure Deron doesn’t get the last word?”

Her words carried the same feeling as Deron's silence, and Rupert flinched, his mouth opening and closing as he searched for a retort.

But none came.

Georgia didn’t wait for one. She stepped past him, taking the time to gaze up at the statues around the place. Her hands were trembling. She hated conflict. Hated it.

“There’s not much room, but there is some,” Deron called out from the roof. “We have no other option. We cannot be added to the ranks of missing individuals. We will have to run beside the fire.”

So be it, thought Georgia.

Minutes passed and Deron was back with another plan. It didn’t leave room for questions. It never did.

Rupert took a long breath, grabbing a runner of his own. The cloth in Rupert’s hand felt like sandpaper as he wet it with water from his canteen. He rubbed the fabric between his calloused palms, imagining it was Deron’s neck.

“He climbed that roof for us,” Georgia said softly.

“I’ll give you this,” he muttered under his breath, mostly to himself. “Climbing up the church roof is a bold move for a coward.”

Georgia heard him, though, her soft gaze flickering toward him in silent reprimand. She must have been exhausted.

“Deron’s trying to keep us alive,” she said finally, her voice careful, measured. “You’re both just… different about how you do it.” She always said things like this. She always would, as though one day the twins would really believe it.

She paused, twisting her runner to wring out the excess water. Her breath caught as she stepped toward the door, the sight of the distant inferno flickering against the painted sky making her heart race. She tucked the damp runner into the collar of her shirt like a scarf. It was a pretty color on her, caught in the dying light.

Rupert stood straight, his knees popping audibly, and hoisted his pack onto his shoulders. The weight felt heavier than it had any right to—supplies they’d fought for, bled for, all bound up in a patched-up canvas sack that suddenly seemed absurdly fragile. His fingers flexed unconsciously at his sides as he watched Georgia double-check her own gear, her movements brisk but nervous.

"Screw your wisdom," Rupert said, pushing past his twin on his way outside.

The heat hit Rupert before he even crossed the threshold, a choking wave of air that made his skin prickle beneath his clothes. The smell of smoke was thick, clinging to his nostrils like an unwelcome guest. His boots crunched over the brittle asphalt weathered by rainstorms they really could have used right now. He could already feel sweat pooling beneath the damp cloth around his neck, mixing with the grime of the day.

Georgia brought up the rear, her eyes darting between the familiar flames and the shadows that stretched and shifted across the ground. Now, they knew something dangerous had been hiding here. Hopefully, it was dead.

"Don't stop for anything," Rupert shouted over the noise, taking in their long, narrow path. "Can you do that?" He turned back at the others and smiled, confident in himself.

The fire licked unpredictably at every direction. The wind could close the gap at any moment, or the smoke could suffocate their lungs, or the ember and ash could blind them temporarily—or permanently. A gust of wind rushed parallel the narrow corridor, dragging the fire with it. A wave of heat slammed into Rupert like a physical blow, forcing him to shield his face with his forearm.

Without waiting for a plan, without thinking, Rupert charged ahead, his legs pumping as he barreled headfirst into the inferno.










♡coded by uxie♡
 



















Jesse hobbled over to the bicycle.
“Deron,” he said, dropping his cane to the ground to grab ahold of the rust-covered handles, “can carry me himself if he’s got a problem.”

Admittedly, he had never been trusted to ride a bicycle. Bicycles were considered invaluable, since so few were found that were able to be used as bicycles and not just as scrap metal or spare wheels. Jesse’s accident-prone tendencies had caused the teaching of him to ride a bike to be deemed as a waste of time; the bikes could be used in so many, well, useful capacities in the time it would take to teach him to even get the bike to stand up on its own. Kurt had let him try briefly when he was eleven, alongside all of the other kids his age, but only those who had a natural knack for it were ever allowed to try it again. This was the first time he was laying his hands on one in his adult life.

“Can’t be that hard,” he said, looking back at Cara. “It’s just a balancing game.”

Cautiously, he lifted his bad leg up and over the bike, sat down in the seat, and lifted his injured foot onto one of the pedals. He let out a slow breath, recognizing some tension in his shoulders. Why was he nervous for this?

He lifted his other foot off the ground for just an instant, but the bicycle wobbled beneath him, and he loudly yelled, “AGH!” and immediately dropped his leg. His heart pounded painfully in his chest.

He breathed out a long, shaky breath, gripped the handles tighter in his hands, and tried once again to get his foot off the ground.

For an exhilarating moment, Jesse, slowly grinning, had both of his feet off the ground and on the pink, sunbleached pedals of the bicycle.

Then—CLUMP!—the bicycle flopped to the side.

“Ow!” Jesse whined, though most of the weight of the fall had been on his shoulder, which could handle much more than any other part of him right now. He sat up on his haunches, rubbing his shoulder blade. “Ow, ow, ow, ow…”

Much easier than he had when he’d begged for Cara’s help earlier, Jesse pushed himself up off of the ground, grumbling about the pain in his shoulder. Determined, he picked up the bike and repeated the process again, up to the point of putting his foot on the pedal.

Again, his heart pounded in his chest.

He planned out his next couple of moves, and then, as quickly as he could, he placed his good foot up on the pedal and shoved down on the pedal with all of his weight.

CLUMP!

It seemed as though he had discovered how to brake.

Again, with much complaining, he picked himself up off of the ground. This time, his brows were set low in resolution.

His shoulder really hurt.

On the seat again, Jesse drew in a sharp breath, squeezed one eye shut, placed his foot on the pedal, and pushed forward in the opposite direction.

The bike pulled forward, wobbling underneath his hands.

“Ah!” Jesse cried, almost terrified of the discovery he’d made.

Jesse pushed his other foot down in a long stride, grimacing at the pain in his wound.

“Ahaha!” This time, the call was half a laugh.

The bicycle wobbled wildly, but it stayed up somehow, perhaps as consolation for all of Jesse’s efforts.

“Cara look!” he said, steering in a circle by accident. He ran over his cane, and he nearly fell again.

“Come and get my stupid cane,” he said, grinning in disbelief, wobbling like a leaf on a branch. “We’re headed back!”










♡coded by uxie♡

 



















For a few moments before Deron began to move,
Rupert, outlined in bright orange, was an inhuman figure half-silhouetted in the shadow of the towering church building, hunkering toward a fiery hell—

Deron blinked, wiping the smoke from his eyes, and his brother’s figure was human again, bathed in the orange light of the sinking sun. Now was no time to be angry or illusioned.

Deron coughed, gritting his teeth and holding his wet cloth near to his face, and he began to walk, glancing back toward Georgia with stern eyes. “Be careful,” he said to her, anxious that he hadn’t communicated it clear enough.

Please, whatever you do, do not get yourself hurt.

He quickened his pace for several steps so as to get onto his brother’s tail. The crackling and popping were loud and constant—nearly deafening—and all about, white strands and flecks of ash tossed like putrid snowflakes. A white strand fell upon Deron’s eyebrow, and he brushed it from his face.

The heat was nothing like Deron had ever felt. They drew closer and closer, and it was as if the flames were siphoning the oxygen from his lungs; he pressed the damp cloth to his face, taking his last few glances around himself while he still could.

“Don’t stop for anything,” Rupert shouted. “Can you do that?”

When Rupert turned around, he was smiling.

Anger ripped at Deron’s chest—and Rupert disappeared into the blaze.

“Shit,” Deron muttered, sparing a quick glance back at Georgia before ducking his head and following into the fire.

This was real—this was unreal, but it was real. Deron followed behind the sherpa of his shadowy brother. With each hurried step, Deron felt smaller and smaller, an insect beneath mud-caked boots as he rushed only a few feet from a brick wall and even fewer feet from a slithering, curling sea of angry flames. The cloth over his face helped only slightly to clear the air that entered his lungs, and he hacked desperately into the makeshift oxygen mask. His eyes were narrowed to slits in his face, cloudy, teary, and bleary, though he had them focused completely on the ground.

The worst was the heat. Suffocating, like it was somehow in deeper than his skin. Filling every pore, pushing past his filter.

And the flames were tinted citrine—haunted by the strange goo.

Something fell before Deron’s foot, something he saw for merely a split second. For a moment, it did not register what it was.

ETHAN.

He stopped in his tracks, only a few feet from the clearing, frozen.

Ethan’s compass. He had seen Ethan’s compass, shattered on the ground—worn, shattered, but sure, with its big EDF carved on its cover.

He looked down at the ground, nearly shaking.

Where was it? Where was it?

He dropped to his knees, dropping his cloth. He hacked desperately, squinted his eyes, patted along the ground where he had seen it.

Where had it gone? It was just right here.

Had he let that, too, slip out of his fingers?

The flames were gone from his consciousness—disappeared temporarily, even as his body cried out for him to leave, to escape the yellow-tinted flames.

But he had seen it—he swore that he had seen it. It had been real, had made a sound, was really here—his son’s compass, right before him in—

A switch flipped in his mind.

…In the flames? In the fire? It had somehow survived intact, survived thousands-of-degree heat, just to drop before him? Him—in this very moment? And then, like it was nothing, it disappeared, without a trace.

I’m going fucking crazy.

He was going to get himself killed over something he’d imagined—over wishful thinking.

Like his very being was rejecting what had just happened, now pushed by furious anger and adrenaline, Deron picked himself up off of the ground and rushed forward, finally making it through the inferno.










♡coded by uxie♡

 
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