The crisp grass crunched under Reid’s feet. Not another sound reached him as he walked the quad, the thick fog hanging like a blanket over the settlement. He saw no one else. The chill air stung his cheek, but he couldn’t tell if it was morning or night and no wind brought the cold near.
The still felt wrong. Unnatural.
The thump of his heart pounded in his ears. What was I doing?
His feet carried him faster through the silent void towards the row building. Its shape seemed multiplied, its height towering into the clouds like an impossible barricade.
Why here? He stared at it as he walked, his pace picking up as need swelled within him.
No one slept in this building. Someone told him once the heat was broken, but he couldn’t recall who. Only that his bed was elsewhere.
They use this place to...
An image slithered in, replacing the fog. A dark corridor. Damp hall. With a blink, he was inside as though he had never opened the door.
A scream rang out.
His feet moved of their own accord. Faster, faster, he rushed down the hall. With each step, the screaming grew louder. With each breath, the air grew colder in his lungs. Doors lined the way, all open and drafty. He stopped at each entry and looked inside, searching but finding nothing.
Have to hurry.
Reid opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. The scream overtook all sound like a solid unending shriek of pain reverberating from the walls.
They're hurting her. He could barely hear his own thoughts. They're hurting her and it's my fault.
His legs grew sluggish, weary, and slow. Like trudging through mud, he struggled forward, bracing himself on the wall as he pushed ahead.
At the end of the long corridor, a steel door stood open a crack. Light pooled out of it, illuminating the cold cement.
So close…
He reached out and grabbed the corner but, as Reid tried to pull the door open, it dragged on the floor. The sound cut through and made his ears bleed, twisting in a tormenting shriek with her screams. It took all his strength to get it open enough to look inside.
He saw himself. His own shape. His jacket, his gloves. My knife. Blood caked his fingers as he turned the blade, jamming it back into her hand on the wall.
No.
Ashely knelt on the floor, her head tilted up, her mouth gaping. The scream billowed out unending from her ghoulish mouth. Black blood dripped from her neck and lips. His mind filled with the pain of her scream and no matter how hard he yelled his voice was silent in the torrent of sound.
His other self ripped the blade clear from her hand. He then dragged the steel across her throat.
It stopped. The screech. The screaming in his mind and in its place a ringing took hold. In a blink, Reid stood where his double had been, staring down at Ashley’s bleeding neck. Her mouth closed, her eyes darkened into nothing and her body dropped limply to the floor.
“I… I didn’t…” he tried to say but something smacked the back of his head. He turned only to see himself push him to the floor and bind his hands in zip ties. With the cement pressing against his cheek, he had to stare forward.
At her. At Ashley. Black blood seeped from her neck as though it were reaching out for him.
Her lips paled as a stark contrast to what oozed forth. But they parted despite her limp form and apparent death.
“Thank you, Reid,” she whispered.
Reid woke with the sheets tangled around him and sweat dripping from his brow. It wasn't the first nightmare he'd had since returning to the college, but their frequency left him shivering in his sheets. Was just a dream... he told himself, but rubbing the sweat from his face he felt no less comforted by the thought.
Slow to dress, he took the time to stare past his window into the quad. The college roused more calmly than he had. The children lined up after breakfast and prepared to head back to their dorms. Those in the community with reason to be up, lazily went about their tasks. No one seemed all that rushed despite the recent happenings. If anything it all looked… normal for post-infection.
It’s not, he grumbled to himself. Reid pulled on his boots and closed the curtains. It’s fucked. It’s all fucked up and it’s-
“It's not your fault,” he said aloud. Though he tried to believe it, the affirmation sounded hollow. That said, Reid wasn’t interested in wallowing. Not when he could do something about it.
He grabbed his coat, tugged it over his shoulders, and slammed the door shut on his way out.
Reid reached the dining hall in a matter of minutes. Though the doors were unlocked, and breakfast still available, the hall was nearly empty.
He could hear why.
The council members muttered above, muddled but loud enough to know it was a heated argument. It wouldn’t be long before it couldn’t be contained in the upstairs space. The few people left in the hall busied themselves with cleaning up what was left from the breakfast rush and preparing the evening meal. Though none of them seemed to notice the voices, Reid suspected at least one was in Finn’s pocket. Which one though, he couldn’t be sure.
Reid scooped himself some chilled leftover oatmeal. All the accompaniment had already been packed away, most likely under lock and key, so he ate the flavourless paste.
Taking a seat near the top of the hall, he tried to tune into the voices and make out what they said. They had to be arguing about Ashely, that much seemed obvious, but in what way remained muddled. Finn was up there, hard not to pick out the slight Irish lilt in his words. But he didn’t shout or get easily goaded into losing his calm. Magda’s shrill quavering tones cut through with a knife and the occasional word piqued his interest. “Can’t” “dare you” and her brother’s name, “Jonas”. Reid tried to imagine a time he’d seen her calm and couldn’t.
Twice he thought he heard his name. He definitely heard someone say “Tish” but his focus was cut as a plate shattered at the end of the hall.
When he could listen in again, the passionate conviction from Helena, of all people, surprised him.
Then, the voices died down. The dining hall started to clear. A woman he didn’t recognize swept up and took away his bowl, glaring a little as she scurried away.
Never good when they fight so loud, he thought. The last time they'd argued this long and loudly had been when they’d chosen who got to go find Ashley.
A shiver crossed his arms as he unconsciously remembered the dream. He closed his eyes and tried to distract himself, concentrate on the dimmed voices upstairs, but all he could see was her black-blooded lips.
The door to the council stairwell opened with a creak and Reid looked up. Magda stalked out in a fit, her brother a few paces behind. He seemed less upset, but when his eyes rest on Reid, the medic looked away. The last thing he wanted to do was to draw Jonas’ attention any more than he already had.
The Jekyll’s sauntered out, Evelyn and her son Lyndon. He was muttering to her about something and she couldn’t look more distracted. The rest of the council followed with Helena and Eric at the rear. Both made a point not to look at him.
“Of course you'd be fuckin' here.” Finn smirked and shook his head.
“What was that all about?” Reid motioned upstairs.
Finn laughed but he already looked tired so early in the day. “Lancaster.” He motioned for Reid to follow. “For a fuckin' psycho, the doc sure as hell knows what game he's playin'.”
Reid had heard Lancaster's broadcasts. Everyone who could get at a radio had.
“What’s he got to do with this?”
Finn looked ahead to where the council disappeared beyond the massive doors of the dining hall. He waited until they’d all left before slowing and dropping his voice. “There’s an issue with the radio, the long-distance one. We need radio bits to contact anyone outside the city. We asked the good Doctor to trade.”
Reid sighed. “Let me guess, he asked why you needed them?”
“Fuckin’ smart psycho, that one.” Finn stepped out into the open air and the brisk breeze stung Reid’s cheeks. “For a man of questionable faculties, he put two and bloody-two together. Now that he knows he has something we need, the shit is gettin’ a little haughty for my taste. ”
They started for Finn’s sanctuary at the center of the quad.
“So what does he want?” Reid pressed.
“The world my friend, what else. But today he'll be satisfied with keeping his radio parts until we’ve sent a team to bring him ‘a few fuckin’ things’. His conditions don’t exactly sit all too well with the rest of us.”
“Like?” The two men entered the building and grew quiet, passing a few of the survivors just mulling around. Finn pressed a finger to his lips and motioned for Reid to follow him into his parlor. Only when the door was tightly closed did he speak again.
“Lancaster’s interested in your new belle.”
Reid stopped. He’d started to sit but his arms tensed and he stared hard at Finn.
Finn flopped down into his leather chair. “He insists she accompanies our escort to his lovely Casa Loma. Goddamn pretentious fuck…” Finn snarled the words.
Reid’s pulse quickened. “He’s nuts. No way he can ask-”
“Well, he did. And because the fuckin' Jekyll's have a sick son that needs more than our sweet Miss Black will provide, the council has agreed with this shit fuck of a plan.”
“You can’t be serious.” Reid sat down with a huff and leaned forward, his head in his hands. “We tracked her down, we… Laurence died, Finn! All so we could bring her back here and what, just hand her over to some deranged recluse?”
Finn’s eyes narrowed. “Says the shit who tried to let her go.”
Reid opened his mouth to say something to defend himself, what he would say he hadn’t decided when Finn shook his head.
“Don’t. Don’t try your bullshit with me, Reid. You fucked up and it took a lot to keep them from putting a bullet in you and dumping your carcass over the wall.”
“Right. Fine. I made a choice and you may not agree with it, but Jesus Christ, Finn. Sending her, sending anyone back out there is nuts!”
But in his mind, he couldn’t stop hearing her voice, her warnings only days before. And above all else, what Ashley was capable of.
“She'll have an escort. Council agreed those who have experience out there would be best. Shannon, Tish, and Eric were suggested to escort Helena.” The sound of her first name seemed unfamiliar on Finn's lips. He'd always called her Miss Black before but that courtesy disappeared.
Reid became aware of how intently Finn watched him when he said her name. “And a few others will join them, people the council feel are more loyal to our cause. Don’t want another escort growing a conscience when it doesn’t suit us.”
“Who?”
Finn took in a deep breath. “Monte and his boys.”
Without hesitation, Reid stood from the chair. “Those fuckers that attacked her? No way! Who knows what he'll do if he gets alone with her again! They can’t be serious!”
Finn shrugged. “Not my choice.”
“Not fucking good enough.” Reid moved for the door, intending to go speak his mind to the council directly.
But, in a smooth and prepared motion, Finn stood and blocked Reid’s path. “And what do you think you’re going to do?”
“I'll go instead. Monte stays, I go.”
“Not gonna happen.”
“Why the fuck not?”
“You’re an idiot if you need to ask that fuckin’ question.” He motioned for Reid to sit. The gesture was not a suggestion. “No one trusts you to do the right thing.”
“The right thing?” Reid countered. “The right thing sure as hell isn't sending her out there with-”
“I'm not here to argue, Reid. The decision’s been made. You are not going.”
Deep breaths filled Reid’s lungs but they didn’t calm his nerves. He knew this would one day happen. The whole point was to trade her for sanctuary, to the people that scared her more than the dead shambling around the city. To people more terrifying to her than Monte’s torture. It wasn’t that it was Lancaster, the old man wasn’t what really sparked his fear. It was moving forward. It was getting closer to the trade itself.
Maybe this is how it’s supposed to be. When Reid thought back to that moment, when he’d agreed to let Ashley go, a part of him wished he hadn’t.
For a few moments, Reid wrestled with his emotions. What he could say, what he could do. Trading her like goods still made him sick and the implications of what she was capable of, of immunity, demanded more. More than Monte, more than being a ticket to safety.
“Thank you, Reid.” Her voice whispered in his mind.
I’d do it again, he decided and his pulse stopped racing.
Finn’s eyes hadn’t let up. He watched Reid with that goddamn narrowed glare.
“You're makin' plans,” he said. “I don't like shit fuckin' up plans I'm obliged to see through.”
“You’re damn right I'm making plans.” Reid gripped the armrests of his chair, his knuckles aching from the pressure. Across from him, Finn did the same, the pair of them poised and ready to pounce.
“You owe me.” Reid's voice had lost the panic it held moments before. It firmed into a stern resolution that he knew would make Finn uneasy. “You fuckin' owe me.”
Shifting in his seat it was Finn who broke eye contact first with a curse dripping from his lips. “This is too much.”
Reid stared back unflinching.
“Too fuckin' much, Reid.” Finn shifted in his seat, glancing up to meet Reid’s eyes only to look away again. The silence seemed to aggravate Finn more than anything Reid could have said. “I can't do it this time. I won't fuck up our only chance—My only chance out of here.”
Reid leaned forward in the chair. Gentle, but intense pressure slithered from him in the gesture. It’d been a while since he’d bothered to slip into his old ways and become the man he’d been. The kind of man people like Finn turned to when shit got serious. Someone who volunteered to go out beyond safe walls, who was comfortable with a knife and gun in his hand. The kind of man who still slept at night after killing.
Saving the kids, letting Ashely go, those were but patches of a clean conscious on his already bloodied hands. They couldn’t save him from what he’d done but…
With each second of silence, he settled into who he used to be. Who he’d never really stopped being.
“You owe me.”
With a sigh, another curse, and sagging shoulders, Finn finally met Reid’s eyes. He could have sworn fear festered there and maybe that was for the best. Reid didn't want to go down memory lane, drudge up a past but he needed Finn to think he would.
Finn nodded reluctantly. “We're square with this, you hear me?” The mock superiority that Finn carried around faded. “No more favours. I’m done watching you’re back. I sure as shit don’t like being in anyone’s fuckin’ debt.”
Reid nodded.
“I can get you outside the wall unseen.” Finn rubbed his chin in thought. “Once you’re out there, see about trailing them for a while before making contact. But make sure you don’t wait until they’re too close to Casa Loma. Even Monte’s not likely to turn away the extra help and if they do, you can just follow ‘em.” He didn't look to Reid as he plotted, his fingers stroking the first few hairs from a night’s growth. “I'll sweeten it with some weapons. I've had a few guns put aside for emergency purposes. Better than the shit they sent you out with.”
Finn cracked his neck and sat back in his chair. “They leave tomorrow morning. Just keep a low-fuckin profile until then?” Less than pleased, Finn shooed Reid from the room. “And not a fuckin' word about this to anyone. Get me in more trouble than you're worth...”
As the door slammed shut behind Reid, he let out a sigh of relief and tried to flex the tension from his hands.
[MAD Wendigo - Prologue Narration]
Thank you for reading! As always, I love being able to share this story and I love having readers. If you have any comments, feedback, hype, etc, I'd love to hear from you.
