You didn’t realize you’d miss the company so much.
You had gone without it for close to a year, so it really was pathetic how fast you reverted after being with them for a month and a half.
You had driven the undead hoard for 30 minutes in the direction you and the gang had come from, hoping to lead them away from where the boys would be heading. What that now meant, however, is you have to traverse that mileage again.
You’d been able to get far enough ahead of the hoard and then ditch the car, leaving it to wee woo for eternity (or until the engine cut off) while you made your great escape into the woods, hoping to avoid the trail of undead you left behind.
The idea was that you could go deep enough into the woods to backtrack safely and avoid the road, but fuck it was harder than you were expecting.
Being in the woods meant no reference points for your map, rendering it essentially useless. You were just glad Gaz had given you one of those multipurpose knives that had a compass on the hilt. You weren’t exactly sure where you were going, but you were certainly going the correct cardinal direction.
Still, you were essentially stumbling through the woods blind, especially now that the sun was setting. You could barely see and you were already exhausted from the day’s trek before everything went to shit, but the guys already had a head start on you. If you took too long to get to the rendezvous point…they might leave you behind. You didn’t know if you could stomach that. So onward into the night you went.
If you even went a couple of hours into darkness you’d eventually catch up. At least that’s what you told yourself as you tripped over a fallen log.
A ripple of pain ran up your leg as your hands went in front of your face to catch your fall. Your palms scraped against the sticks and dirt, knees taking the brunt of the impact.
“Shit—“ you whisper, not wanting to attract any unwanted attention.
You whimper a little as you adjust yourself off your stomach and onto your butt, the twinge of pain returning as your ankle hits the ground.
Fuck that’s not good. Please don’t be broken or something.
You press your ankle back to the ground, this time on purpose to test the weight and shit!—it stings. Your legs jerks back into the air on instinct as you eyes cloud just a little with unwanted tears.
“Fuck.” You hiss. Shit fuck shit fuck—okay fine. Improvise, adapt, overcome or whatever.
It’s definitely not broken, and you can walk on a sprain. Hell, you’re supposed to walk on a sprain. With a brace. You can make a brace.
You look around briefly trying to see if there are any flat-ish, straight-ish sticks you can use. It’s hard in the dark and when you’re trying to not use your ankle, but you manage to find two that are suitable enough. You take the duct tape out of your pack and stare at it for a moment. And then you’re laughing.
You’re probably losing it and you definitely look insane, but you can’t help it. All you hear is her voice in your head telling you that one day the duct tape she always made you pack would save your life. She always was weirdly obsessed with it.
‘Don’t go anywhere without a knife and duct tape!’
You made fun of her for it but always listened. And now here you are.
You miss her. Suddenly your laughter stops and you’re trying not to cry again.
You sniffle and rip the duct tape off the roll, wrapping it around your ankle and the sticks to make a fucked up brace.
It’s probably the sleep deprivation and fear and pain and hunger that’s making you so sensitive right now. You’ve tried to not think about her for a while, but you’re alone with your thoughts for the first time in a while and you can’t help.
You imagine her telling you to get up. To keep going. So you stand up and do just that.
It seems that moment of vulnerability unlocked the floodgates of your loneliness, and now you can’t stop thinking of your…of the boys. You pass the time with your imagination.
You imagine if the captain had been with you back in that car. He’d probably be in the passenger seat, giving you directions and muttering snarky remarks when you didn’t follow them. You wouldn’t have been so scared of the trail you were leaving behind.
You imagine if they were here now. How Ghost would look back at you in annoyance as you started to fall behind the group with your bum leg, but ultimately fall back with you and do some dumb shit like take your bag to make the load lighter.
You imagine how much Soap would cheer you up right now. Perfectly timed quips or jokes, and equally perfectly timed real sentiment and encouragement. He’d probably let you use him as a crutch.
You imagine how Gaz would pay attention to your condition, asking the captain for a break even though he didn’t need one, simply because he noticed you did.
God you’re pathetic. This is essentially hallucination. Maybe you should stop to rest.
“Cannae have you droppin’ on us, hen.” You try your best Scottish impersonation. It’s bad.
“Shut up, Johnny. Anyone traveling with us should be able to handle it.” You drop your voice two octaves and switch to the specific flavor of British you don’t know the name for.
“Oi mate, lay off.” A lighter British accent.
“Thanks, Gaz, I appreciate that. Shut the fuck up, Ghost.” Your regular voice. You snicker a little to yourself, hand sliding on the rough bark of the tree you’re using to help you move. You would never say that to his face, but here in your little exhaustion-driven delusion game, you can say whatever you want.
“Knock it off, the lot of you.” Your best John Price impression is up to bat.
“Right, Captain, sir! Sorry, Captain, sir!” You put a hand to your forehead in a sloppy salute and you try to get over a fallen branch, nearly tripping again as you do. The twinge returns full force.
Your ankle really hurts. And you’ve been walking nonstop for close to 12 hours. And you ate the last granola bar you had with you. And Ghost wasn’t here to subtly toss you his. A scary thought hits you. Even if you can meet back up with them…will they even want you anymore? If you’re hurt and can’t keep up…maybe they’ll just leave you behind. And you’d be all alone again like you are now. You have no idea if you’ll ever even find the others and then you’ll die in the woods and get eaten by zombies and suddenly your eyes are filling with tears and you have to crouch to the ground or else you’ll fall over from the sudden exhaustion that fills your bones.
You sniffle, “…fuck—“ this is so pathetic. How many times have you almost cried today?
When the hell had you become so reliant on them? You just hadn’t realize how…safe? you had started to feel with them. How much weight could come off your shoulders when there were four people—four capable people—constantly watching your back. And now there was no one and the burden was all on you again.
Maybe it was time to stop for the night. You just needed to sleep. Everything would be better in the morning.
At the crack of dawn you had been awoken by the grumble and shuffle of an undead.
Luckily, you’d been able to dispatch it easily enough, but god did it scare you. A reminder of how vulnerable you are alone.
You don’t know if that was some random stray now that you were entering lower elevation and spring, or one of the ones you had dragged behind you for miles. You didn’t really want to know.
It certainly lit a fire under your ass, though. You started walking as fast as you could back toward the road, if only for the comfort of a distinguishable landmark. Besides, you think you got far enough away yesterday that following the road from the woods should be fine.
At least that’s what you thought, until you got to the road.
Your throat dried immediately. You were almost convinced you were hallucinating again, because standing too close for comfort, like a cockroach that wouldn’t die or a bloodhound that wouldn’t lose a scent…was Graves.
You crouch, putting more strain on your ankle than intended but you didn’t care right now.
How the hell was he here? Last you saw of him, he was still circling that little mountain town, knowing you were too much a coward to ever leave it.
But somehow he figured it out. Somehow he was here, going the direction you are…going the direction the boys are.
Car doors slam as he and his gangly crew get in and out of them. Graves is standing in front of the biggest vehicle, hands splayed over the hood, holding something down. You can only assume it’s a map the way he and his right-hand man are poring over it. He points one hand behind him to the fork in the road, making some gestures. You aren’t close enough to hear exactly what he’s saying, but you can guess they’re taking about where you might have gone next.
This is bad. Of course it’s bad, but they’re in vehicles. If they happen to pick the right direction, they’ll reach the others way before you. And then you’ll get them killed just like—
Your breath is picking up, but you can’t freak out yet. They don’t know where you are. Considering you’re…right here. You can fix this. You can.
You breathe out sharply, dragging your knife out of its holster, and start to move.
You go back up the road a little until you can’t see Graves beyond the car, and take stock of the situation.
There’s the one big vehicle graves is leaning on, then two motorcycles—for the scouts you presume…you’re familiar with that role—which means there’s a max of seven people here. Seven sets of eyes to hopefully avoid.
You start to count. Graves and Oz at the hood. Two guys walking around the road ahead, watching for trouble. Two guys at the rear watching for trouble (that you’re about to bring)…and maybe one more you can’t see. That’s not good. Or maybe there was just no one in the middle seat, which is also a fair assumption.
How are you supposed to get past the two guards at the rear?
What would Ghost do? Ugh, he’d probably be able to kill them both at once, absolutely silently with only a spoon, which…is not in the cards for you. If you tried to take out one, the other would notice. Okay. That’s fine. You can do it your own way.
You look around you, sticks and rocks. What were you expecting?
A thought hits you and you tilt you head in contemplation. Stupid, so stupid. But might just work. Or get you killed…only one way to find out.
Of course Ghost's way is badass and your way is the stupid way. You're not going to dissect that now.
You sneakily make your way back up the road a little more, then you start to groan.
You're shuffling along, making as much noise on the forest floor as possible. Stepping on crunchy leaves and fragile sticks, grumbling and moaning loud enough to be heard from the car.
Through the leaves, you see the two rear guards perk up, then one yells to the front that they're going to go check it out.
Success. You cannot believe that worked.
You immediately stop making noise, crouching low to speed back to your previous spot. You pass right by the guards as they walk with their guns up to where you had just been.
You're on the clock now. It will only be so long before they realize there is no undead in the trees, or look back to see you.
As soon as they enter the foliage, you're darting out and crouching back down behind the vehicle, hoping that Graves didn't spot you. You ignore the way your ankle is protesting.
Okay quick, fast, don't let them see you. In and out, they'll only know you were here once you're gone. You jam your knife into the back two tires, then peak your head around the vehicle to where the motorcycles are, the small hiss of air starting to leak from the tires fills your ears.
There is a guard at the motorcycles that you knew you'd need to take care of, but now you actually need to take care of it.
You're not strong enough to knock him out without making a ruckus. The only way would be to slit his vocal cords.
You've killed before. No one gets to live this long with clean hands. Still, you like to think you're fairly discriminatory about who you kill. It's the only way you can live with yourself. So you tell yourself that he works for Graves, that he has to know the things he has done and just doesn't care...that he's just as bad. You imagine him doing what Graves did with a smile on his face, and you tell yourself there is no way he is innocent. He can't be.
Then you step out behind the car, standing and grabbing for his lower face, muffling him as you drag him to the floor. Your knife finds his throat, cutting deep enough to only need the one stroke. He doesn't get the chance to call for help, and you pretend like you can't feel the blood leaking onto you.
You focus on the closest motorcycle, shoving him off you. Your knife's next home is the rear tire of the bike. You're so focused you don't hear the ruffle next to you.
Your head snaps up. Seven. Fuck.
Okay, party's over, they know you're here. The "get-the-hell-out-of-dodge" part of the plan is officially here.
You don't bother with the new guard, you just beeline toward the remaining bike, standing fully, any thoughts of stealth abandoned. Shouts are coming up from all around you, but through the fog of your thoughts, Graves' voice is like a bullet.
You're seated on the bike by the time Mr. Seven grabs you, his hand digging into your bicep so hard you have to fight to stay upright. On instinct, the knife in your hand comes down on his forearm, going with him as he rips his arm away. It doesn't matter, it gives you enough time to kick up the stand and start the bike, tearing away as the others converge on you.
Graves was always more pragmatic. He doesn't bother running for you, instead going for the door to the car, planning to chase after you.
Despite everything, it makes you giggle. You think about how pissed he's about to be when he realizes that the back tires are flat, that you are responsible. He always thought you were weak, fragile, incapable.
Not anymore. He made sure of that.
You rip down the road, only hearing the tail-end of his yell of frustration.
It makes you smile. You're satisfied with yourself enough that you don't think about the inscription on the knife they now have, or that you just inadvertently told them which direction to go.
