For a brief moment, the white fur reminded me of the strange, husky-like ghost dog I’d seen perched on the edge of the mall’s roof, calling out to us.

  But this wasn’t that.

  This creature was something alien. Something like Puck.

  It stood barely a meter tall—no more than three feet— a wild mane of long fur spilling from behind a wooden mask, eye holes glowing faintly with a flicker of blue, much dimmer than Puck’s. The creature was dressed in what looked like a ragged, stained potato sack, form barely visible as it crouched, motionless, hidden behind the box.

  In the moment, it reminded me of the scared kittens I used to find hiding behind dumpsters in the slums, small and desperate, frozen in place as if the world might swallow them whole if they moved.

  “Ugh!” Puck spat, a visceral disgust lining his voice like poison.

  “Why are you here, failure?”.

  I glanced between Puck and the small Feyvolken, trying to divine the reason for his hostility towards the little creature.

  “Does this Fey want to invest in me? Like you?”

  Puck snarled.

  “She has nothing to offer”

  “She?.... Alright? But why does she look so…?”

  “Pitiful? Pathetic? Because she is a cautionary tale, nothing more”.

  With a flick of Puck's fingers, both desk and box the little Fey had been hiding behind vanished, sending her scrambling back, tiny form hugging against the wall. She recoiled like a frightened, shivering puffball, anemic body trembling with fear.

  “This is what happens to a Fey that fails to make a profit. Aether Stones are not treasures for our kind, boy. They are sustenance. Lifeblood.

  Without the magic we consume from the Stones, we lose our power. Power that we need for everything. Plane shifting. The creation of products from Aether. Everything”.

  The tall, lanky Feyvolken took a step towards the shivering little thing and reached out, scratching a finger against her wooden mask.

  “A precipitous fall. A snowball effect. Without our magic, we cannot do commerce. Without commerce, we cannot gain magic. Until we are reduced to scavengers, pilfering what we can from the material world to try and sell. Until even that becomes too hard to do. Until our reserves run so low, that our physical form starts to shrink, wither, if only to conserve what we can”.

  I hissed and grimaced at the fatalism in his tone.

  “Damn. What's gonna happen to her?” I asked, eyes still on the little creature. She looked so scared against that wall. So vulnerable.

  Why wasn't she just leaving like the others had?

  Puck’s voice lost none of that venom but I thought I could hear something almost… tired, in it.

  “She's weakened so much she can't even speak. Can’t even plane-shift and leave the room.

  I told you, boy. Feyvolken cannot die. So her fate is set in stone.

  Soon, she won't have enough power to maintain her physical form, and will be reduced to a formless speck of sentience, starving for eternity”.

  With a dismissive flick of his wrist, Puck turned away.

  “Ignore her. She is already damned”.

  A cloying, clawing disgust bubbled inside me, knotting my guts into a bundle of utter revulsion.

  “What? She's your kind, you're just…”

  “She is Feyvolken. Succeed or fail, there is no third option for us”.

  Puck snarled back, adding something more under his breath. Something that my excessively sensitive hearing still caught. Just barely.

  “Not anymore”.

  I narrowed my eyes, wanting to press him on it, but decided to focus on the small creature. He was not likely to engage in any sort of debate anyway.

  I pushed a hand into my pocket, grabbing one of the two Aether Stones and holding it towards the little Fey.

  Was it how pitiful she looked that was causing such a visceral need in me to do something?

  No.

  No, it wasn’t that. I’d seen pitiful sights before. In the ghetto, in the orphanage, the mirror, all around.

  Was it because she was a small, shivering little thing?

  No. Not that either.

  Well. It didn’t matter. Maybe I could do some “commerce” and help us both in the process.

  Screw it.

  I’ll get more Aether Stones. There’s a whole world of Orcs and Goblins out there, I can get more.

  “You want to trade? I still got some Aether Stones left”.

  Her eyes flickered nervously, darting from side to side, before she did something like a limp-waddle toward me, carefully avoiding Puck, whose snarl still hung in the air like a threat. Her tiny arms were outstretched, trembling with the effort of keeping them up, as though the weight of whatever lay within them was too much to bear.

  When she finally got close enough, a jumble of items appeared in her hands—her “inventory,” no doubt.

  I grimaced the moment the smell hit me.

  A loaf of bread, green with mold, its once-white surface now a festering mess. A small orange, half-browned and putrid, as though it had been forgotten in the sun for far too long. And a handful of dented, half-opened cans of tuna, the stench of them wafting up like the remnants of something long past its prime. Expired.

  It was clear—she had raided a dumpster. Just like Puck said. A scavenger.

  “DO NOT embarrass us more than you have, you abject failure”.

  Puck bellowed, lashing a hand across the “produce” and sending it clattering onto the floor.

  “You are still Feyvolken, still bound to the Laws. You cannot sell something for more than their worth. All that refuse is not even worth a fragment of an Aether Stone”.

  “Hey!” I hissed, reaching to help collect it, but the little Fey flopped on top of the trash, drawing it into a little pile under her, shaking her head ferociously.

  “I'll buy it” I said without thinking.

  The little Fey only shook her head harder. A frantic motion.

  “Listen. I don’t care about these rocks, I’ll get more. I’ll buy the…” I tried again, leaning in, but she drew back, scooting away like a skittish rabbit, refusing even to meet my gaze, shaking her head like someone having a seizure.

  “Hmpf! At least there's still enough dignity in you to admit that it's not worth a purchase. Even though it took me to point it out. Disgraceful”.

  Puck spat.

  "I’ll buy information from her," I muttered, more to myself than anyone else, as I tried to figure out a way to make this deal worth something—anything—that would let me hand her a Stone without it feeling like charity.

  Since, clearly, Fey were not allowed to accept charity. As idiotic as it seemed, their Laws would not allow them. Even the little Fey was now actively refusing to take it.

  “Oh? And do you know how to read Fey Runes? Because she can't even speak anymore, she'd have to write it down” Puck answered with cold indifference.

  “Alright? Then she can… teleport, or whatever it is you lot do… to the shops and bring something valuable. I've seen your kind appear and disappear…”

  “If she still had the capability to plane shift and be invisible to the rotbloods, do you think she'd have offered that refuse? The only reason she came here, is because she most likely latched on to the aether residue of so many Fey plane-walking to this location.

  Think, boy!”

  “Then…”

  “STOP!” Puck barked and the words caught in my throat.

  “Just… stop. Please. Her fate is sealed. There is nothing you can do for her. Nothing anyone can do”.

  A small tug at the sleeve of my jacket pulled my attention back to the little creature who had waddled next to me. Her mask, blank and featureless, hid any emotion, but the way she nodded at Puck's words spoke volumes.

  There was no fight in her, no fear, just a quiet, undeniable resignation.

  She had accepted her fate.

  It clicked then, the reason WHY I'd been so dead set on helping this little one.

  I’d seen that nod before.

  I’d seen it in the mirror. I’d seen it from the other kids in the orphanage. Every time we didn’t get picked. Every time we didn’t get adopted.

  We’d do that.

  We’d nod just like that.

  Next time, it’ll be me.

  Next time, I’ll be the one to get a family.

  But that day never came. Not for me, at least. Until the very idea of hope became poison. Where there’s hope, there’s the possibility of heartache.

  “Hope for nothing and expect the worst”

  I’d chosen to stop hoping. Because no one would ever be there to help.

  But now I was in the position to help. So screw Puck. And screw the Laws.

  The little Fey began to shuffle away, tucking her meager haul of discarded food into the folds of her burlap sack, her steps slow and broken, a pitiful limp dragging her toward the far wall. Her every movement screamed dejection.

  I couldn’t watch it anymore. With a swift motion, I reached out, snatching that rotten, squishy orange from her hands. I'd spent so long trying to find a way to help her within the boundaries of their damned Fey Laws, but Puck kept slamming those walls down around me.

  So I did what I always do. I adapted and skirted around the rules.

  I cracked open my mouth wide and sank my teeth into the rotting orange, skin and all. The taste hit me like a punch—rancid, acrid, and rotting through to the core. My stomach churned, fighting to revolt, but I forced it down.

  Apparently, Puck had been serious about my dietary changes. Normal food? I couldn’t stomach it anymore.

  Each bite was a battle against my gag reflex. I chewed—or, rather, bit down repeatedly, tearing into the foul fruit without bothering to chew, swallowing it in large chunks. Puck’s eyes bore into me, and the little Fey's gaze was no less piercing, but I ignored them both, focusing only on finishing.

  When the last of the rotten orange was gone, I shoved a hand into my pocket, fishing out one of the Aether Stones, and crouched in front of the little Fey.

  "Fey Laws this, Fey Laws that... You said it yourself, didn’t you? This isn’t just your world anymore. It’s a melded world, right?"

  I shoved the Stone closer, the weight of it solid in my hand.

  "So here's a Law from my world—the Law of supply and demand. I’ve been craving fruit all day, and this little one right here, had the supply. So as far as I’m concerned, it was worth exactly one Aether Stone."

  Puck scoffed, voice dripping with disdain. "Do not think you can circumvent our Laws, infant. You—"

  "Oh, cut the crap, will you?" I snapped.

  "You sell something as subjective as information. You ‘invest’ and ‘negotiate’. It doesn’t take a genius to realize your precious 'Laws' are nothing but semantics. Open to interpretation. So, here’s one for you."

  I pushed the Stone closer to the little Fey, more sure of my choice with every word.

  "You say the Fey only sell things for what they’re worth? Well, to me, that orange was objectively worth one whole Stone".

  Puck stood there for a long moment, as if wanting to say something more, but then shifted his gaze toward the little Fey. She hadn’t moved, wide, dulled blue orbs locked onto the Aether Stone with an intensity that said everything.

  "Well?" Puck’s voice was a low rumble, laced with incredulity.

  "If the fool is so desperate for a rotting fruit that he’s willing to pay an entire Aether Stone for it, who are we to deny him? He has a demand, and you’ve brought the supply. The Law has not been broken. You did not oversell anything. He willingly overpaid."

  The little Fey’s eyes flicked between Puck and me, her tiny, trembling arms stretching toward the Stone, hesitant and shy, like a squirrel reaching for a nut.

  I didn’t rush her. I didn’t move. Just held the Stone out, letting her take her time.

  As soon as her tiny hands grabbed the blue crystal, she gave me one last look as if to make sure I was willing to give her so much raw magic for a rotten orange.

  I just gave her my best interpretation of a gentle smile and let the Aether Stone go.

  In that same squirrel-like manner, the moment her hands wrapped around the Aether Stone, she recoiled, limping quickly a few steps back, her tiny form jerking away with an almost frantic urgency. She pressed the Stone to her mask, and for a heartbeat, I thought she might actually take it off, but instead, she tilted it to the side, just enough to reveal the lower half of her face.

  It was covered in the same soft, dirty-white fur that cloaked the rest of her, but what caught my attention were her teeth. Her mouth opened, a thin, cleft upper lip pulling back to show a row of needle-like fangs, each one sharp and small. Without a second thought, she clamped down on the Aether Stone, tiny jaws working with surprising strength, cracking the crystal as though it were nothing more than a brittle cracker.

  “Bah. Nonsense” Puck spat again, watching the little Fey chew on her stone.

  “It is not in the nature of the Fey to overcharge. Even idiots willing to overpay. This feels wrong” he muttered and flicked his wrist, extending that lanky arm across the room, towards me.

  “Equivalent exchange”

  In his palm, glimmering in the cold light, were a pair of small double-A batteries.

  Narrowing my eyes, I made to reach for them.

  “You’re not gonna take her Stone are you?”

  Puck scoffed.

  “I am merely providing a one-off extra service to make sure you get your value’s worth for the Aether Stone you paid. To make it right. This will not repeat itself, and no, I do not intend to demand anything for doing this. Not from you, or her”.

  I smirked and took the batteries.

  “Well, would you look at that, he’s got a heart after all”.

  A growl was all I got as answer and decided to not push my luck any further.

  “What am I supposed to do with these?” I asked, holding the batteries.

  Puck pointed to the security guard’s corpse.

  “A method for you to reach the companions you came here with. Should you wish to do so”.

  Without a word, Puck turned on his heels and strode toward the little Fey. His long, spindly finger came to rest gently on the top of her head, a stark contrast to the sharpness of his words.

  "Come failure, I’ll plane shift you somewhere safer."

  She was completely absorbed in the Aether Stone, tiny jaws working steadily, little arcs of magic crackling with each bite, but she stopped for a second and waved timidly at me, before swiftly returning to her nibbling.

  I reciprocated.

  “See you around Puck. You too little one” I said, still crouched and looking at how ferociously the little creature was eating. It was adorable, in some twisted, alien way.

  “Puck. She is also named Puck”

  I shook my head, thinking I’d misheard.

  “Wait what?”

  Puck turned his head to look me in the eyes.

  “Fey names are priceless treasures beyond all comprehension. So to all non-Fey, we are all named Puck”.

  “So how am I supposed to call to a specific individual when I got Aether Stones to buy stuff?”

  "Just say the name. We will know who you are referring to," the Feyvolken said, his voice a strange mix of indifference and quiet authority.

  With a sharp turn of his head, he vanished. Not a sound, not even a shift of dust on the floor. In the blink of an eye, both Fey were gone, as if they had never existed in this space at all—nothing more than a whisper in the air, a fleeting memory fading before it could even be grasped.

  The room suddenly felt oppressively quiet as I was left alone with my thoughts.

  Heaving myself up from my crouch and going to the security guard’s corpse, I started rummaging through its pockets.

  If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  The bent, foldable baton was a far better weapon than nothing, so I strapped it to my belt, the metal cold against my side. I found a wallet with barely ten bucks in it and a handful of photos—grandkids, mostly, smiling faces frozen in time... nothing that could help me.

  I still pocketed the money though. Old habits and all that.

  But then, I felt something solid in his breast pocket—a piece of plastic that caught my attention.

  Palm-sized, black, and worn with age, the walkie-talkie was probably the thing Puck had hinted at. It was the only piece of equipment that needed batteries, after all.

  Clicking the power switch gave no result, the screen dull and gray, and I flipped it, popping the battery hatch open.

  "And hence the batteries," I muttered to myself, a wry smirk crossing my face, as I let the spent ones clatter to the floor and replaced them with a fresh pair of double A’s.

  I sat there for a long moment, thumb hovering over the power switch.

  “Is there a point to doing this? Did we not intend to leave them?” The Animal’s voice echoed in my skull.

  “You gonna keep whispering in my skull from now on?” I hissed back.

  “But we didn't leave, did we?” the Animal carried on, ignoring my hostility.

  “We justified it, over and over again, and stayed. Well? What’s the justification now? We brought them here, helped them reach the mall. Find safety.

  Well, pat on the shoulder for us. Aren’t we mister good and noble.

  Our reward? We got shot for it”.

  I felt my upper lip curl into a snarl.

  Whether it was because I couldn’t fault the Animal’s logic or the memory of getting shot and getting shredded like a damn hunk of beef in a grinder, I couldn’t exactly tell.

  “So then, my weaker self, why would we want to contact them again? Because I see NO REASON why we should help….

  ….. oh…..

  oooooh….

  this we like…. THIS is right”.

  I grimaced as the Animal purred in my head.

  It liked my idea.

  This wasn’t about offering anyone help anymore. The little Fey had been one thing, but the group I’d come here with? They didn’t deserve anything more from me. I’d done more than enough for them.

  This was about Bill.

  “I’m hungry. Escaping that herd and healing all that damage took a lot of blood out of me. The way I see it, going back to the forest and searching for a Goblin would take too much time, and I’d have to cross the herd of rotbloods again. So, I’ll go and hunt the only one that deserves to die. Bill.

  An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. He shot me, so I get to hunt him”.

  “Finally, we are beginning to make sense. Yes. First Bill and then the rest….”

  “No. Only Bill”.

  “Bah. Weak. They owe us. We put so much effort into bringing them to safety, they owe…”

  "Shut your hole," I snapped, irritation clawing at my words. "And why the hell am I even talking to you?"

  The Animal went quiet instantly, but the silence only made my anger burn hotter. It felt like I was arguing with myself, but every intrusive thought was turned up to an unbearable volume, each one cutting through my mind with an uncomfortable clarity. And damn it, some of those thoughts were hitting too close to home.

  Puck’s warning still echoed in my ears: "Be careful. It’s easy to fall into its grip."

  I had to stay sharp. The Animal’s whispers always made it tempting to give in, to listen, to follow… and it was harder now than ever. The weight of its pull was constant, lurking just beneath the surface.

  And on top of that, the exhaustion clung to me like a second skin. Even after the healing, I could feel it—a dull, gnawing ache, as if every part of me was being stretched too thin, pulled by invisible chains that wouldn’t let go.

  I’d felt so damn alive when I’d given in to the frenzy. Free. Unburdened. No thoughts, no second guesses—just action. Every movement was pure, instinctive. It was like the weight of the world had lifted, if only for a moment.

  By comparison….

  …Now I felt like I was dragging myself through molasses. Every step, a chore.

  Maybe… maybe next time, when I take something down, I could let myself feel that again. Just for a moment. Just a little bit….

  The sharp sting on my cheek from where I slapped myself snapped me back to reality. For a split second, I could’ve sworn I heard the Animal’s laughter—a low, guttural sound, buried deep in the chaos of my mind, as it drew further into the back of my mind.

  Puck was right. It was going to try to influence me in ways a lot more subtle than just arguing with me in my head. It had tried to play on my exhaustion, just now. Trying to warp my train of thought.

  "Sly bastard..." I muttered, shaking my head hard, as if trying to shake loose the last vestiges of that damn voice, still lingering like a shadow at the edge of my mind.

  I snapped open the walkie-talkie, fingers tight around it, determined not to let that sneaky, damn thing get the upper hand. Ever.

  The white noise of static filled the room and I waited for long seconds. Then a minute. Then two.

  Nothing.

  Just more static.

  This was a shot in the dark anyway. No reason for me to assume that anyone else had gotten their hands on a walkie-talkie.

  But why would Puck hint at it? And go so far as to give me batteries for the blasted thing…

  A sharp beep sliced through the static, followed by Tina’s voice—warped and distorted by the radio’s crackling buzz.

  “Once again. If anyone’s out there, if anyone’s alive, we’re holed up in a safe spot. Does anyone read me?”

  I jerked my finger away from the Speak button before the urge to answer her took over.

  Bloody hell.

  Would you look at that? The crazy tomboy had actually made it.

  Good. I had no real problem with her.

  I paused for a moment, eyes narrowing as I planned my next move. I needed to figure out how to reach out, how to get some sort of hint about their location. But more than that—Bill’s location. The mental image of all that fresh blood. I could almost taste it already.

  The real problem, though, was that there was no way I could explain how I’d survived a point-blank shotgun blast to the chest and a fall into a sea of cannibal corpses without her starting to ask too many questions.

  And answering any of those questions truthfully was bound to take Bill out of my reach. No way they were going to tell a vampire about their location. Not unless they were suicidal.

  And I wasn’t a good enough liar to come up with a good story of how I’d survived.

  Another full minute passed, my mind running through one plan after another.

  Nothing.

  Not a damn thing. Except for one idea. It made me a little cross with myself, but it was the best I had.

  Play it like I was on the edge—just barely holding on. Badly hurt. Pull at her heartstrings. Make her feel like I was in a worse state than I was.

  The Miller sisters seemed like a good enough sort, they’d probably tell me where they were holed up.

  Maybe.

  As long as I got my hands on Bill, it was all that mattered.

  I pressed the Speak button, the crackle of the walkie-talkie biting into the silence.

  “Tina… s’that you?” I began, slurring my words on purpose and putting as much pain in them as I could act out.

  “heh… hehe…. are you a voice for sore ears… girl. Good to hear you…”

  The static cut through immediately, followed by Tina’s voice, sharp and filled with relief.

  “Holy shit, Jon? Jon, is that you, man? You’re alive?” Tina’s voice came out of it, rushed and almost frantic.

  “Yeah…. just barely though…..” I rasped, forcing the odd coughing and wheezing fit between the pauses, letting the sound trail off before answering again, trying to sell the charade as much as I could.

  “Not gonna lie…. ain’t doing too well….”

  “Crap man, you don’t sound good either”

  I drew phlegm in the back of my throat and answered back with a wet, gargled laugh.

  “Y-Yeah… buckshot missed my vitals… slipped under the zombies while they tore the other guy apart… ehe-he-cough-cough… guess I got lucky.…”

  Another beep, followed by the sound of movement distorted by static.

  “Where are you?” Tina’s voice was steady now, but urgent. “Tell me where you are, Jon. I’ll get to you, alright? Just hold on.”

  I opened my mouth to answer, but the words wouldn’t come. Long, tense seconds passed in silence.

  The casual ease with which Tina had suggested she’d trek through a zombie-infested mall to save a man who sounded like he was barely holding on hit me like a slap. It was almost enough to make me feel guilty for playing on her feelings—it left a bitter taste in my mouth.

  Bless her heart.

  “Jon? Jon, you still there?” Her voice broke through, a tight edge of worry in it.

  “Yeah… yeah, I’m here…” I muttered.

  “Okay. Phew. I thought I lost you there for a second… Mina? What? No, sweetie, I can’t hear you, stop whispering—HEY!”

  There was a sharp cut-off, replaced by a few seconds of static. What the hell was happening on their end? Were they in trouble?

  Another beep, and this time, Mina Miller’s voice crackled through the speaker, low and calm.

  “Jon?”

  “Yeah, I’m still here… what’s happening on your end?” I started, but the words died in my throat as that small, sharp voice cut through.

  “What are you?”

  I clenched my jaw, my eyes snapping shut in frustration. Damn it. Of course.

  I could lie to Tina, throw her off, but Mina? Not a chance. Smart, analytical, sharp-as-a-tack Mina Miller could see right through me. She could smell the shit I was spewing a mile away.

  I pressed the speak button again, desperately hoping I could salvage this—still get the info I needed.

  “What do you mean…?”

  But I didn’t even get the chance to finish before the beeping cut me off.

  “Jon, don’t insult my intelligence,” Mina’s voice came through again, flat and cold.

  “You might be able to fool my sister—and shame on you for that, by the way—but not me. Running twenty minutes with a person on your back? Clearing a ten-foot fence in a single leap? Taking a shotgun blast to the chest and landing in the middle of a zombie horde? No, Jon. People can’t do that. None of it.”

  I grimaced and let the walkie-talkie fall loosely against its strap, the weight of it dragging around my wrist. Damn this girl. She’d known for a while now, probably just keeping quiet so I’d be none the wiser.

  “So, here’s the deal,” Mina continued, her voice unwavering. “You’re not human. Not in the usual sense, anyway. Sorry, Jon, but until you tell me something real, I’m not sending my sister out there looking for you. And I’m definitely not telling you where we are. You’re probably not even hurt, are you?”

  I sighed.

  Cat was out of the bag anyway, no point in keeping the charade going. Either the twins were going to tell me what I needed to know, or I was going to comb the entire mall until I found my prey.

  I brought the device back to my mouth and spoke, all trace of weakness and pain, gone.

  “Is Bill with you, Mina?”

  “That’s not what I was aski…” she started, trying to keep the calm steadiness in her voice, but I didn’t let her.

  "True. It's not. Let me put it this way, Mina," I said, my voice level and cold.

  "It don’t matter what I am. What matters is this—I’m not a danger to you, Tim, or your sister. And the best way to keep things that way is for you to tell me if Bill’s with you".

  “I see…. what are you going to…” she began.

  “I’m going to kill him, Mina. I’m going to kill the sniveling little shit that murdered someone and tried to murder me” I answered flatly.

  She said nothing for the longest time and the tension hung in the air, palpable despite the distance separating us.

  By the time she finally spoke, I was almost ready to get up and start searching.

  “Bill’s not with us. It’s just me and my sis here. After he shot you and the other one, Tina knocked him out and took his shotgun. All the shells too.

  He was a liability and we left him on the roof.

  After that, me, my sis and Tim found the service stairwell and started making our way to the service corridors behind the shops. We didn’t get past the first flight. Zombies poured out of the shops and cut the two of us from Tim. He ran back up to the roof and we ran… a different way” she ended, cutting herself off before she could slip up a hint as to where they’d holed up.

  “So Bill’s most likely still on the roof?” I muttered back into the speaker.

  “... yeah… and Tim is probably there too”.

  I nodded to no one in particular.

  “Is all I needed to know. Thanks”.

  I made to close the walkie-talkie and get up, but another beep stopped me short.

  “Jon, about Tim… you’re not going to…?”

  A frustrated sigh escaped my clenched teeth. The girl still didn’t believe me that I wasn’t a threat to them.

  Normally I’d applaud that. It was only logical to not trust an unknown factor like me.

  But considering the lengths I’d gone out of my way to help them, time and time again, with the Goblin Dogs, the zombies, the escape.

  To put it mildly, it irked me the wrong way.

  “Already said I’m not a threat to the three of you, right?”

  “I know, I know, I just… ummm… okay listen… here’s an idea. I don’t really care what you intend to do to Bill. Bastard’s made his own bed, he’s gonna have to lie in it. I mean, hell, my sister was about a second away from tossing him off the roof.

  But Tim…

  … any chance I could persuade you to look for him? Maybe… help him to safety or… something?”

  A vein began to throb at my temple.

  There it was.

  A favour.

  Despite all that I’d helped them with. And what had been the rewards for my “good deeds”?

  Getting shot.

  Kept at arm’s length like some sort of freak.

  And STILL she had the gumption to ask me for a favour.

  “Nah Mina. Nah. I’m good” I answered back, interrupting whatever else she was going to say. I was too tired mentally to walk on eggshells anymore. Once I got my hands on Bill, I could go my own way. That was the last loose end to cut.

  “Listen, I’m done, alright? No more favours. I got all of you here, I did the right thing. I’m gonna go find them, throttle the life out of Bill for shooting me and give Tim the walkie-talkie. I won’t be needing the damn thing anyway. After that, you two can guide him to wherever it is that you’re holed up”.

  The squawk of the Speaker button being pressed sounded out again, but no voice came through. Mina was hesitating. That was new.

  “If you explain what happened, what… how you’re alive, I’m sure we can come to an understa….”

  “I told you, I’m done” I snapped back into the speaker, a little more forceful than I had intended.

  “I’m not your keeper, I did more than my part by getting you all here and I’m still going out of my way to give Tim a lifeline. Listen, I’m gonna level with you two here, I was intending to leave the group the moment we left the old campus, but stuff just kept interfering.

  So I’m going to go while the going’s good, yeah? I’m not going back to the campus.

  Why would I? You’ve seen what Andreas’s doing? How quick the other students were willing to sacrifice us gophers just so they’d remain safe inside?”

  I took my finger off the button and waited. I’d said my peace. But then the beep came again and Tina’s voice rang from the device.

  “Alright man, as long as you’re no threat to us. Listen, I’m not really in perfect shape right now, otherwise I’d go and find Tim myself, but… If you really do intend to look for him… please don’t kill him? Bill can hang for all I care, but Tim’s not a bad guy…”

  I pressed the button one more time and answered in a voice a little too tired to recognize as my own.

  “Yeah, sure. I’ll close this until I got an update. Jon, over and out!”

  The device squawked it’s annoying sound one more time when I let it go and I let my head rest against the cold wall.

  Just one more loose end.

  I snarled and rolled the back of my skull against the hard surface, trying to massage away the burgeoning signs of a headache that had started thrumming from the back of my head.

  There’d been too much talking and too little progress done.

  Screw it.

  Just one loose end. Find Bill. Feed. And then I could bounce.

  If I happened upon Tim while doing it? All the better.