it's the end of the world as we know it and... (ifeelfine) wrote in immune_ic,
The next turn of events went down so quickly that if Gabriel's head could spin, it probably would have done it. One second he was staring down the barrel of a gun and the next the guy had been thrown back into the frenzied crowd of people trying to get out of Carnegie Hall. That in and of itself was absolutely surprising, but when he saw his rescuer to be none other than his freaking brother? Well… surprised didn't feel like an appropriate description of the emotion he was feeling right then.
As someone who was never known to give up, someone who always tried to be pragmatic about situations that were beyond his control, it was hard for him to admit that he'd given up on ever seeing his family again. Present circumstances in mind, it wasn't an unreasonable fear. For all he knew, they were all still in Texas, either alive or not. But here he was, looking at (and then being crushed to death by) his living, breathing, seemingly uninfected brother. He was speechless at first, and for a good long moment. He allowed himself to be crushed as he tried to come to grips with the situation at hand and stop his mind from reeling about how whiplash-like the situation was.
In yet another whiplash inducing moment, Lukas shoved Gabriel behind him and took down a pair of infected, flashing on and off between combat mode so easily. It probably should have been shocking, but it wasn't. This was Lukas after all.
It occurred to Gabriel that he hadn't spoken yet, but he'd never dealt too well with being stunned, and being rescued by his brother of all people was the most surprising thing that could have happened to him, for sure. Lukas' next couple comments, the garbled, jumbled sentence, made Gabriel laugh a little bit, and he finally spoke. "I know how you feel," he said simply, giving a small, surprised smile. "You know I never left, because I figured that one of you would come looking and if I left the city we'd probably have missed each other somehow."
That or he'd have died. But he didn't feel the need to add that.
As expected, Lukas went into protective mode. Gabriel didn't really need protecting… but it was nice to have someone else around looking out for him for once. He'd spent a long time looking out for himself, and seeing a friendly, familiar face was enough to bring the full-fledged smile back to his face. "I do," was all he said. "Let's go. There are buses out there taking people to another safehouse I think…"