TIMING: Late May LOCATION: the Pines PARTIES: Kit and Monty [@howdy-cowpoke] SUMMARY: A zombie and a vampire walk into the woods... CONTENT WARNINGS: foot injury, gore/blood mentions (of the zombie/vampire diet variety)
—
It was happening again. Alan, bless his heart, hadn’t been able to make the weekly delivery and despite his assurances that he’d bring it the next day, Monty had refused and told him that he had some left over from last time. Which of course had been a lie, and Alan might have known that, but it had been one of the times that his friend let him get away with it. Now he was paying for that lie, wandering the woods alone, late at night, ravenous. It wasn’t like he needed to get himself away from people, there were no living people on the farm for him to be compelled to kill and eat, but there were at least animals out here in the woods that he could snatch up if he was quick enough. Animals that weren’t his livelihood, which was the biggest problem with being around so many of them when he was hungry like this.
And as much as he didn’t like hurting innocent animals, he liked hurting innocent humans even less.
Stone in hand, Monty stood stock still in the darkness of the forest, dark eyes fixed on a grazing rabbit. He was waiting for a good shot at it, arm reeled back at the ready. Then, just as he was about to make the throw, snap! Something large was coming up behind him, and the noise scared the rabbit off. It scared Monty, too, sending him face-first into the tree that was immediately to his right that he’d forgotten was there in his haste to leave.
After getting knocked on his ass, the zombie had to take a few seconds to recover, blinking away the stars. But it was only a few seconds, because then he remembered the big thing that was coming for him. Scrambling backward, he whipped around and tried to get back to his feet, but the forest floor had other ideas. Tree roots were holding him up, tangling around his feet and catching one ankle in a strong grip as his foot twisted beneath it. He whined, barely feeling the pain but falling victim to the panic that was creeping in. Grasping his own leg he began to pull, imagining some huge wildcat about to pounce out from the bushes and rip his head off, deciding that he’d rather tear his own foot off than face that fate.
—
Another night, another long walk through the Pines. Carefully and pointedly walking in the opposite direction of town, further to the North instead. No repeats of last time, thank you very much. Especially ‘cause it would be worse at this point. Kit was hungry. Could feel it like human hunger, like a pit in their stomach but worse. Like the jitter-drone of those first weeks of withdrawal. They were trying to tough through it, at least this very edge of it. They weren’t trying to starve themself, not at all, they just wanted to know they could control it. Because for forty years they couldn’t, not in any way. But they weren’t that anymore and they had to prove that to themself if no one else.
Definitely no one else because Matty would go fucking spare if they ever told him that.
They were acutely aware of the rabbit nearby, could smell the fear on its blood. But there had been a sound like something heavy hitting something else, way too big for a rabbit. Kit couldn’t smell any other blood though and they were just about to start getting scared when they drew into a clearing and saw a tangle of a man on the ground. “Whoa, hey,” they called, hurrying toward him. He looked caught, bottom forest brush caught around his ankle. “You need a hand there, bud?” They approached cautiously, waiting for the scent of human blood to soak into their consciousness, for the pulse to skitter over their every thought. But it never came. The rabbit was long gone and the night air was silent. No running blood, no hearts beating.
But he clearly wasn’t dead, scrambling and scrabbling at his caught leg. “Here.” Kit dropped to their knees near the man, working to tug through the roots that were holding him. “Are you all right?”
—
The sound of a voice was something of a comfort—okay, so it wasn’t a wildcat. But it could still be someone who wished him harm, as there seemed to have been an increasing number of those, lately. Monty stared up at the stranger with wide eyes, still trying to shift away from them as they approached, not speaking a word. Behaving much like a rabbit in a trap, which was a bit ironic considering his dinner plans that night.
When the stranger knelt beside him and started tugging at the determined roots, Monty felt reassured. Okay, whoever they were, it wouldn’t make sense to help free him if they wanted to kill him or whatever. Finally relaxing, the zombie let out a groan and flopped backwards into the dirt. “I think I broke it.” Technically it couldn’t break, but it could get pretty messed up and therefore be impossible to walk on for a little bit. Probably not long, but long enough to be an inconvenience.
Whatever he’d managed to do to the ankle didn’t actually cause him any pain, and he almost didn’t realize once the other had gotten his foot free. “Oh. Thank you,” he stammered, pulling his legs to his chest. Oh yeah, the foot was nooot quite facing the right direction. He grimaced, looking back up at them. “Well… guess there won’t be any walking this one off.” Before he could laugh at his own joke, something… moved? No. That was just tree roots, and those didn’t move. Right?
—
“Oh, shit, dude,” Kit drawled out. A broken bone might mean blood… But they didn’t smell any. They definitely would have smelled the blood, wouldn’t have been able to stop themself. When he pulled his foot out of the mess of roots and forest debris, Kit felt their eyes go wide. Yeah, he definitely wouldn’t be walking on that. But how was his foot that mangled without a drop of blood. Kit keyed into the atmosphere again, listening. There was a rabbit, still running, some distance away. The steady, slow lope of a few calm deer. Nothing else. Not their own, obviously, and not Matty back at the house. And nothing from the man laying before them.
Maybe he was a vampire, like them? There had to be some around – Matty found that freaky one to help change them, after all. Before they could find a way to subtly ask, though, the roots under them, around them, shifted. “What the hell?” they stuttered back, eyes on the shifting trees. “Ah, listen. I’m thinking it’s probably best if we, ya’know, get the fuck outta here.” She rounded over to the other side of him, hunkering down. “If I help you, do you think you can walk?” More rustling from the roots and horrible, hollow noise from above them. “Do you think you can walk fast?”
Kit didn’t know what the hell was happening with the tree…trees? something else? But they knew they didn’t care to stick around and find out. And being a vampire hadn’t made them any taller but it sure had made them stronger. When they reached down to hoist the man up, he goes easily. So they can slide an arm under his, on the side with his fucked-up foot and meet his eyes. “Cool?” they ask.
—
It would heal quickly, Monty knew, but not quick enough to get up and run. And he would definitely be hungry once it was done, as it always seemed to go after a severe injury. This person, whoever they were, wasn’t safe around him. But what choice did he have? The freaking tree was coming alive, and dying (again) by being crushed to death by a tree wasn’t high on his list of ways to go. He didn’t even know if it would kill him, but he knew it would suck. A lot.
“Uh, yeah,” he stammered, clinging to them and trying to hobble to his feet, finding that the stranger hardly needed any help. He let out a soft whoop! as they righted him quickly, fingers digging into the fabric of their shirt. “Cool,” he breathed, noting that they didn’t feel hot to the touch like everyone else seemed to. Huh.
As the pair started their fast-walk away from the spot, something huge started to creak and groan behind them, and the forest floor erupted in leaves and dirt and shredded ferns as the roots ripped themselves from the earth around them. Monty spared a glance behind them, and immediately regretted it. “Ah! Faster!” he balked, trying to limp as fast as he could, willing the stupid ankle to just fix itself already, even if it meant outing him.
—
“Cool,” Kit echoed, again, laughing a high-wheeling anxious laugh. “Okay, just hold on tight and we’ll get out of this jam, okay?” They trailed along as quickly as they could, ever-surprised at their new strength. It took no effort at all to heft this fully grown man along. “My place isn’t too far from here, so we can just–”
And then there was a horrifying noise behind them, like those earthquakes on the West coast but worse. Like an earthquake where the ground itself was yelling from the pain of splitting itself in two. “Fuck,” Kit spat out. And yeah, they agreed with the guy: faster. So they did just that, went faster. Faster than any human should rightfully be able to go but fuck it, apparently the trees themselves were chasing them. Plus they were pretty sure that whatever this guy was, it wasn’t exactly human either.
Kit didn’t stop until they found the edge of the treeline, a break in the woods that marked the beginning of a trail leading back to their house, the roof’s peak just visible. And it was then that they realized they’d more or less hefted the man up entirely, fully carrying him through their dash. Setting him down gingerly, they offered a sheepish smile. “Sorry. Like, you good?” And they listened out for any more of that horrid, wood-and-dirt sound, trying to gauge if whatever the fuck that was was still coming after them.
—
He could comment on their speed or strength, but he didn’t. It wasn’t his business, anyway. Slapping a hand to his forehead after he was set down, gaze fixed on the direction they’d come, Monty’s eyes were wide and he looked a bit wind-swept. “Huh?” He blinked, ripping his eyes away from the forest and back up at his rescuer. “Oh! Ah… yes. Fine.” Those dark eyes bounced down to his mangled foot, which was not so mangled anymore. Wiggling it from side to side, he pushed the hand on his face through his hair instead before dropping it back to the ground. Hm. All better.
He looked back in the direction of the moving trees, nerves on high alert. He couldn’t see anything moving now, but he was slow to trust that they were out of danger. “Let’s, um, get to that house you mentioned… I feel a little bit like bait out here in the open.” Taking their hand to hoist himself upright, he dusted off his clothes and tried putting some weight on it, finding that it seemed to be working fine, now. That would probably be a question he’d have to answer in a few minutes. Once they were inside.
—
Kit looked with him, down at the foot that had been an absolute wreck but now it was…fine? Huh. “Funky little trick,” they murmured, wondering what exactly he was. Had to be something on the supernatural spectrum. They wondered if he could clock that they were also not quite entirely right. He proved that further, hopping right up and walking fine on it. “Truly funky,” they doubled-down.
“Yeah, for sure,” they agreed, head bobbing in a rippling nod. “Learning all sorts of fun things about this place. Trees with an attitude problem. Maybe Tolkien had some real-life inspiration after all, huh?” They figured Matty didn’t know about that, would have warned them otherwise, and they felt a squirm of delight at being able to tell him. Ents! Live and in color! Too bad they seemed to be fucking murderous but, well, it couldn’t all be rainbows, could it?
Waving a hand, they led him up through the clearing and onto the path toward the house. Moonlight was still glowing high above them which was a relief. At least they didn’t have to race against sunrise on top of everything else. “Think my roommate is out on some errands which is a relief, actually. He can be kind of a mother hen, you know the type.” They reached the house before long and Kit trailed up to the entrance on the lower-level. They gestured for their newfound friend to go ahead of them, making sure the door was locked and secure behind them. Not that whatever the fuck those things were would be knocking, but it couldn’t hurt.
And then, turning toward him with their hands on their hips and a tilt to their head, they asked, “So, hey. Figuring between the foot and the fact that you’ve got no pulse. Maybe you’re…something like me?”
—
The hunger pangs were swift to follow the healed ankle, and as Monty followed them to the building they’d described earlier, he closed his eyes for a few seconds at a time, looking… uncomfortable was the best way to put it. “Tolkien.” Moving trees. Oh—he’d never read the books, they were way above his skill level, but he’d seen the movies at some point or another. He remembered the tree men that released the river. “I hope for his sake, it was just a coincidence!”
Nodding as they both stepped inside, Monty took in the place with a discerning eye, wincing again as his hunger roared louder.
They were asking a question, and he struggled to focus.
“Huh?” Something like me. “Oh. Yes, I’m—oh, you’re dead, too?” He looked suddenly hopeful, dark eyes brightening and posture straightening up. “I hate to be so to the point, but… I don’t suppose you’ve got any animals around? Dead, or… available for eating? With their brains still…” He tapped a finger to the side of his head. “There? I am sorry, it’s just—healing that break—” Or what would have been a break, if his bones could do such a thing, “—has made my hunger significantly worse. And I was already getting dangerously close to starving.” It was never good for anyone when Monty got to that point.
—
A laugh burst out of Kit at the casual posing of the question. “Yeah. Yeah, I guess I am.” Dead. They didn’t often consider that fact of it all, that they were dead. Because they were also very much something else along with that, and the something else was usually a lot more pressing. Like at that moment, with their strange hunger tearing a hole through the side of their head. And that hunger was something that their new friend could relate to. Even if it wasn’t exactly the same, apparently.
“Uh, brains?” They hoped that wasn’t a kind of vampire that they could become. Kit had eaten their fair share of, well, everything with blood in it, including brains. It turned their stomach to consider it now, but that didn’t mean they were going to judge this guy for it. Neither of them could choose what their appetite was. “Not so much, no. Just the blood. That wouldn’t work for you, huh?” They had a feeling it wouldn’t, not when he had specifically asked for something else.
Kit gave a sympathetic wince as he described the hunger, being starving. They could understand. “There’s… There’s animals around?” They offered, half of an idea forming. “Plenty of them out in the woods. And I could– I mean, I’m fast, you saw that.” They could hunt something. A few deer or rabbits, maybe a moose if they got lucky. It wouldn’t be the first time Kit tracked down something wild and drained it. Far from the first time. But the first time in this form. “We could split it. I’ll take the blood and you take the brains?”
—
“Afraid not,” Monty answered, sounding a little downtrodden. “Trust me, it is not… I don’t like it, but it is what it is.” His gaze landed on his shoes until they suggested going back out into the woods to find something to eat, like he’d been trying to do with that damn rabbit, and he gave an anxious glance toward the door. “Um… okay, sure. As long as we head in the opposite direction of the ent,” he chuckled nervously. Kit was faster than he was, and as long as they could catch something, he could make sure it stayed down with relative ease, if it was big enough to try and fight them off. “Blood’s all yours. No need for that, just the… brain.” And maybe the eyes. And the tongue—he shuddered, hating the way the hunger started to carry him off like that.
Shaking out the ankle that’d previously been rendered useless, Monty gave it a quick test hop before nodding at his companion for the evening. “Right! Ready when you are. I will try to keep up!”
—
“Hey, d’you think I’d be sucking down pig’s blood if I didn’t have to?” Kit trailed out a huff of a laugh, eyes sympathetic. It is what it is. Yeah, wasn’t that just the rub? They were the both of them stuck with their uncanny appetites, nothing to be done about it. Except, of course, try and feed the hunger. Matty probably wouldn’t be stoked to hear that they had gone hunting live prey but, fuck, it beat jumping some poor innocent human, didn’t it? And besides, they would be helping a friend! He was starving, he had said. They weren’t going to leave him to bash some other poor innocent’s head in for their grey matter.
“That, my friend, sounds like the definition of a win-win.” Or would it be more killing two birds with one stone? Feeding two undead monsters with one rabbit? Whatever the idiom, Kit had a smile for the other living corpse. “C’mon, bud, let’s go crash an entmoot.”