WALKING DEAD DAY 3 | EXPLORING OFF CAMPUS | RATING PG-13
⚠
VIOLENCE, GORE, ZOMBIES & NON-FRIENDLY HUMANS.
VISIBLE TO VOID RESIDENTS / DERLETH TV
ED & CHRIS DECIDE TO GO EXPLORING & LOOKING FOR SUPPLIES. THEY RUN INTO ZOMBIES & SUCH.
It had been an easy enough patrol with Ed the day before and they’d agreed to go out this morning, to keep searching for food. Although their timelines were hundreds of years away, there was an ease in being around the other man that Chris enjoyed. Of course, when he’d agreed to go out the next morning, he hadn’t known just how badly Loki would kick his ass during sparring.
Luckily, he’d found Orlin and managed to get healed up, but even Starfleet medicine wasn’t perfect. His eye was still a bit tender and he’d been told to take it easy and not to overwork the arm that had gotten broken through his carelessness/stupidity. He flexed the hand experimentally, it felt almost as good as new but he knew overdoing things would find him needing Orlin’s services again.
He was still flexing it and seeing how it felt with a dagger in it - not quite normal, but hopefully it wouldn’t come to that. Glancing up, he saw Ed and gave him an easy smile.
“Ready to go explore some more of this town?” he asked, taking the dagger out of his bad hand and putting it back into his belt.
Edward had barely slept the night before, or for that matter, the night before that. Which wasn't unusual for him; the only time he ever slept more than a few hours in a row was in Stede's presence, because that was the only time the nightmares abated. But adjusting to such a radically new environment was difficult enough without adding insomnia to the equation, and the combination of the two had his hypervigilance at an all-time high.
“Ready as I'll ever be,” Ed responded, subconsciously mirroring the other man with a hand on his own knife in its holster. “You alright, mate?” If he'd noticed Chris’s experimental hand movements – and he had, of course – his tone didn't reflect it. He sounded as casual and amiable as always. It wasn't even an act so much as a lack of awareness of any futuristic healing technology. No reason to suspect what he didn't even know existed, after all.
“Hmm?” Chris asked, lost in his thoughts for a moment. “Oh, yeah, just went a little too hard sparring last night. Orlin healed it, but I’m still supposed to take it easy today.”
A boyish smirk tugged at his lips as he tilted his head towards the town. “Luckily, it’s not my sword hand, so I think we’ll be okay. I’ve got a copy of the map, but I think we might need to go farther out if we want to find any food.”
“Honestly, I’d walk all fucking day to find some decent tea or coffee.” His bad leg might complain if he did that, but Ed was beyond caring about petty issues like that. He’d already depleted his supply of alcohol, and he couldn’t just be expected to go cold turkey on all of his favorite substances.
Ed started down the sidewalk, glancing back at Chris’s arm. “You know someone with healing spells, then?” He’d heard of those from Margo, although she’d made it sound like that kind of magic was rare among humans. But he supposed he shouldn’t have been assuming that everyone here was human… Maybe Orlin was another alligator, and maybe alligators had special healing capabilities. It wouldn’t have been the strangest thing he’d heard in the last couple of days.
Chris groaned, missing the kitchen in his captain’s quarters on the Enterprise. “Do not tease me with hope of real coffee. I’d kill for a good cup of black coffee.”
He raised an eyebrow. “College town like this has to have a coffee shop on every corner. Students live off that - even when it's over sweetened crap.”
Chris fell into step beside Ed. “Spells, nah. I… no. Not too big on magic. Orlin’s a doctor. He’s from my time - well, ahead of my time even. But has some of his tools, so even though I broke my arm sparring last night, it’s nearly good as new now.” There was probably still a faint shadow around his eye where he’d met Loki’s right hook, but well, that wasn’t that strange here.
“Over sweetened?” Ed scoffed playfully. “There’s no such thing, mate.” Of course, he only drank it that way when he was in certain people’s company. Izzy would’ve given him so much shit if he took his tea with a splash of cream and seven sugars on their ship, which meant Ed hadn’t since – well, he didn’t want to think about that.
Slipping his knife out from its holster as they walked, he tossed it up in the air in front of him and then caught it again. Then he stole another glance at Chris, his eyes narrowing a bit. “You broke it? Little intense for sparring, isn’t it?”
Chris put a hand over his heart and feinted being wounded. “No, Ed… don’t tell me you’re someone who only wants a splash of coffee with the sugared milk! You wound me!” He chuckled before raising an eyebrow in appreciation at Ed’s knife skills. “You’re going to need to teach me how to do that.”
At the comment about his arm, a flush spread up Chris’ cheeks. “Well, I may have been sparring with a god who seemed to need an outlet for his anger.”
“I can do that. It’s easy enough to learn, if you don’t mind slashing up your fingers a bit.”
Ed caught his knife for the third or fourth time and paused, fixing his gaze on what he now recognized as the very faint outline of a black eye on Chris’s face. He’d sensed something of a kindred spirit in the guy from the beginning, but Ed was only now beginning to appreciate just how fucked up he actually was.
Which, of course, made him think of Stede again. He had to stop doing that.
“Look, I’ve never met a god, but I feel like maybe there are better targets for their anger out there,” he noted dryly.
“There’s always a bit of a learning curve, isn’t there,” Chris said with a smile. “But maybe I should start with something duller so Orlin doesn’t give me too many lectures or worry too much about me.”
“He’s… a friend? Maybe? Kind of? I think? I don’t know. We’ve sparred before and talked and he’s a bit of a loose cannon - but I don’t know. Something about him. Someone he cared for disappeared from here recently, and since he’s not the type for talking, figured some sparring might help.”
Chris shrugged, hand instinctively going up to touch the tender spots on his face. “Maybe not my brightest idea, but I’d rather he take his anger out on me than on someone else.”
[cw: ableist language] Edward pursed his lips thoughtfully, returning his attention to the flipping of his knife as an excuse to stay silent for a moment. It was stupid to care about people, and even stupider to try to talk a masochist out of hurting themselves. He should know. But this place was… different. This place had saved him from his fate back home, and he couldn’t help feeling a protective urge toward its residents.
That was easier to justify when it was a child with a cat’s tail, less so when it was a fully grown adult who could handle his own shit, but still. “Well, be careful,” Ed said with a shrug. “Or don’t. You’ll just reset if you die anyway, right?”
“Supposedly you reset at the beginning of next week, but only one person has died while I’ve been here, and …” Christopher trailed off, not sure what he quite wanted to say. Something about his future fate, his tendency to rush into danger, his complicated feelings for several of Derleth’s residents. “... despite evidence to the contrary, I don’t actually wish to test that theory.”
He let his shoulder brush against Ed’s, casual enough to hopefully not overstep any unspoken boundaries the other man had. “Besides, can’t abandon you when you just got here. That’d make me a shitty friend.”
Ed almost opened his mouth to say that he did kind of wish to test that theory, but he thought better of it just in time. Probably not the exact right moment to admit that he was a total flaming hypocrite, he reckoned.
The shoulder brush was unexpected and he tried not to let it show, though his hand faltered just slightly on his knife. He didn't really have physical boundaries, at least among friends, but the last time he'd been touched in any way other than violently had been by Stede, and that sent a wave of grief coursing through him. “Yeah, well, I'd forgive you ‘cause that's the kind of friend I am,” he quipped, surprising himself with how steady he managed to make his voice sound.
Chris chuckled and gave the other man a bright smile. “Very generous of you. But you’re allowed to kick my ass if I die doing something stupid.”
He’d noticed the tiny falter, partially because he’d spent too much of his career noticing - when a crew member was a little slow to react, when a hostile opponent gave away their movement, when heads of state reacted to proposals - the slight movements that gave him extra information that allowed him to trust his gut. He wondered what Ed had been through before coming here. There was something about him that made Chris think of a stray animal like the type his mother had rescued back on the ranch - skittish but yet in need. He’d seen it in humans too, during his years with Starfleet. People who had been hurt and didn’t know who to trust.
He turned and gave Ed a curious look. “Were you serious about that getting stabbed on the left side thing? Or is this some sort of old caribbean legend to get your opponents to leave themselves open?”
“Fair enough, I'll hold you to that.” Not that he necessarily wanted to kick Chris’s ass, but sometimes a little violence was an itch that needed scratching and besides, as he'd nearly told the man earlier, stabbing each other was how pirates said ‘I care about you.’
And how they said ‘I want you fucking dead.’ Being a pirate was weird like that sometimes.
Having decided that distracted knifeplay probably wasn't the smartest idea without a doctor around who could heal him, Ed slipped his knife back into its sheath before returning Chris’s curious look with one of his own. “What do you mean? Course I was serious.”
Chris laughed and smiled. “Excellent. Sometimes I need people to hold me accountable and stop me from being an idiot. Or try to, at least. Might be a futile job.”
He ran a hand over his hair. “I mean that I get lectured and yelled at by my ship’s medical staff every time I get stabbed , no matter what side it is, as though I’m risking death each time. Now I’m trying to imagine my doctors face if I tell him “it’s not serious because it was the left side.’” Chris could imagine Boyce giving him quite the lecture if he tried to pull that shit. “It’d probably earn me a slap or two upside the head.”
Ed wondered what that was like, having someone to stop you from being an idiot, someone to care when you got yourself stabbed. Izzy cared, sure, but only because if Ed died then he’d have to run the ship himself, and he wasn’t anywhere near likable enough to keep a crew from mutinying against him. And of course Stede cared, but that was a bit like the blind leading the blind, wasn’t it? Two idiots looking out for each other. Well, maybe it could work. Maybe you just needed the right idiots.
“What’re you saying?” He furrowed his brow in Chris’s direction. “It’s not safe to take a sword on the left?”
“Not saying that, but I’m not a doctor. Just saying that I get yelled at for every injury. Something about me being a self-sacrificing idiot.” There was a smile on his face though. He was grateful for the friends that looked out for him, even if the lectures got a smidge annoying. And somehow he’d found similar people here - who were equally self-sacrificing but still quick to lecture him.
“Already got an earful about how I shouldn’t spar with angry gods.” He gave Ed a look, lip twitching with a mischievous smirk. “But I’m not always great about doing what I’m told.”
Ed wasn’t sure he believed Chris, but he decided to let it go. His ‘left side only for stabbing’ strategy hadn’t failed him yet, after all. Although he was beginning to develop weird cramps on that side of his stomach, but hey, what was a little more pain added to a whole body’s worth?
“Yeah, well, they’re right, you shouldn’t spar with angry gods.” Ed may not have met a god himself, or even known much about them, but even he could guess that. Still, he couldn’t help adding with a smirk of his own: “Unless it’s like… a lot of fun.”
Chris slung an arm around Ed with a grin. “Finally, someone who understands it. I mean, getting your arm broken isn’t exactly fun, but the rush that comes from that type of sparring?”
He dropped his voice to a whisper. “Kind of worth it.”
This time it was Calico Jack he thought of as he allowed Chris to pull him in with an arm around his shoulders, and Ed’s expression darkened just a bit at the memory. It wasn’t grief, exactly, or guilt – he had zero regrets about abandoning his old compatriot to save Stede’s life, even now – it was just another reminder of the life he wanted so badly to forget. But he recovered quickly, and grinned back at his new friend. “I mean, it sounds worth it,” he admitted, “especially if you can just get yourself fixed right up afterward.”
There was a small quizzical eyebrow at the myriad of emotions on Ed’s face, but Chris wouldn’t push. Not yet, and not when they didn’t have a good supply of alcohol - somethings just needed to be discussed over whiskey. Or Saurian brandy.
“I might be a little lax about self-preservation knowing that Orlin has medical tech from my time here. If we were doing this with medicine from your time, I might be a little more careful. Might being the key word here.”
So far, they hadn’t encountered anything but empty streets and empty shops. Chris’ eyebrow arched at Ed. “So, any truth to the stories about pirates - Anne Bonny, William Kidd, Blackbeard, Long John Silver.. I mean, history says they existed, but it’s hard to know what’s real and what’s not.”
“Wh—” Ed nearly tripped over what he could have sworn was a crack in the cement, or maybe an errant tree root, but turned out to be just his own two feet, at the mention of his own nom de guerre. He cursed under his breath as he grabbed Chris’s shoulder to right himself.
“Fucking sidewalk, man,” he muttered, trying to play it off as clumsiness and not sheer panic. “Kidd was a bit before my time, he was already in prison by the time I made it to the Caribbean. Heard stories, though.” He had, in fact, known Anne Bonny — last he’d heard, Jack had knocked her up and sent her to Cuba — but he couldn’t admit to that without incriminating himself.
He didn’t have a clue what to say about Blackbeard. It genuinely hadn't occurred to him that people from the future might have even known that name. It wasn’t like he invented something, or saved a bunch of lives, or anything else worth memorializing. Ed wasn’t lying about being a pirate because he thought he was famous here; he just didn’t want people to know he’d maimed and murdered and stolen other people’s riches.
Safest to distance himself from it, he figured. “Never met Blackbeard, honestly. He keeps a low profile, you know? Lot of people want him hanged.” Ed couldn’t help tossing in there, “Heard he’s handsome though.”
Chris was quick to steady Ed with both his hands. “Easy there. Don’t need to carry you back to campus if you break your leg or something.”
There was something about Ed that made Chris think there might be more that Ed didn’t want to share about his past. But then Chris had known lots of people like that. And he was always willing to give second chances. “Handsome, eh? I could see that. The rugged sea captain, the swagger, the sword fighting.. it’d be easy to fall for that.”
Chris shrugged and smiled. “There are death warrants for me in certain parts of the galaxy. People wanting him hanged doesn’t mean he was necessarily a bad man. The way I read the stories, it seems like most of the pirates were folks who didn’t fit into society for one reason or another. The sea life gave them freedom. And sometimes the laws they broke were stupid laws.”
“Well sure, that’s Blackbeard. Leaving a trail of hearts wherever he goes.” It was hard for Ed to even say that without laughing. Of course he’d participated in the standard pirate activities – sex was right up there with hard liquor and gratuitous violence, in terms of ways to pass the time at sea – but mostly because it was expected of him. Personally, he could take it or leave it, and most of the time, he left it. There was a reason he’d always worked so well with Izzy, who had the world’s biggest stick up his ass about that sort of thing.
“Death warrants, huh? That’s kind of impressive.” Maybe his truth would be safer with Chris than he’d initially assumed. Part of Ed wanted to come clean, but another part just wanted to forget that era of his life had ever happened and move on. “Most of the laws were pretty stupid back then,” he remarked, impressing even himself with how easily he slipped ‘back then’ in there, like he’d been gone for ages and not just three days. Anything to distance himself from it.
“Weren’t there laws about things like spitting and the proper way to toast the King or something?” Chris asked. He’d read some things about the age of sail, fascinated by it as a precursor to space exploration, but he didn’t remember all of the tiny details.
“I mean, who can even keep track? That’s why I lived in the Bahamas. Technically the British still own it but there’s no governor to enforce the laws, so anything g—” Ed stopped in his tracks and swung an arm out across Chris’s chest, like he might do in a carriage to keep someone from jolting forward when the horses came to a sudden halt. “You hear that?” he murmured, nodding his head toward their left, where he could’ve sworn he heard something rustling beyond the trees.
The sudden stop in conversation and Ed’s arm across his chest caused Chris to stop short, hand going to the hilt of his sword. He nodded, sensing some sort of threat and turning, following Ed’s gaze and then slowly turning, trying to assess where the threat was. He heard more noise from the other side of the road. Shit. Were they surrounded? He turned so his back was against Ed’s, not wanting to leave either of them exposed.
Ed drew his own sword as quietly as he could, knowing that any sound could potentially attract further danger. With his back to Chris he scanned his side of the road, looking for signs of movement. Finally one came, as he saw rotting flesh emerge from the treeline. “Just a zombie over here,” he whispered, his voice still tense since he had no actual proof that was the only one, not to mention whatever was happening on Chris’s side. He readied his blade but didn’t move, waiting for the creature to shamble closer.
There was something to be said for ‘Just a zombie’ as if it was a casual thing. “Don’t let ‘em get too close,” Chris whispered. He’d run into zombies with Percy earlier in the week - when they’d discovered that loud noises were not great. “If there’s too many, we run.”
A zombie stumbled out of the bushes on his side, followed by another. “I got two.” With these odds, he was pretty sure they could still hold their own.
“Right,” Ed responded, waiting just another moment to make sure his zombie wasn’t immediately followed by more before advancing toward it with his sword raised. He hadn’t actually killed one yet, but it seemed easy enough. They couldn’t even fight back, how hard could it be?
“Aim for the brain,” Chris warned, trying to keep one eye on Ed and one eye on the zombies. They weren’t too close yet, but he didn’t really want to be fighting two of them at once.
Ed nodded and did as he was told, aiming his sword at one of the zombie’s eyes — and immediately regretted it, because of course it reminded him of Stede, killing that naval officer’s brother, and he wasn’t sure if he stumbled or the zombie did but somehow his sword went through its throat instead.
“Fuck me,” he muttered to himself, shoving a hand into the zombie’s chest to get enough distance to withdraw his sword and try again.
Chris glanced over at Ed with a bit of worry, he didn’t want Ed to get bitten, especially not on his watch. Of course, that meant taking his eyes off the zombies and the next thing he knew they were closer. He kicked one in the gut and swung his sword at the other. “You alright?”
“All good,” Ed responded, wresting his sword free then lunging forward again to thrust it upward through the zombie's skull. He must have hit the brain, judging from how its body collapsed lifelessly in front of him. With a foot on its chest to keep it down, Ed pulled his sword back out and swung around to see how Chris was faring.
Chris hacked an arm off one of the zombies and was gearing up for another swing when the zombie he’d kicked lurched towards him. He sliced off the head of zombie and backed away, trying to put distance between him and the other zombie.
Ed wasted no time coming to Chris’s aid, charging forward with his sword raised above his head, using the full force of both hands to drive it through the zombie’s temple. It gave way more easily than it should have – he'd been expecting solid bone, not decomposed tissue – and he stumbled forward a bit, getting himself sprayed with blood in the process. “Fucking gross,” he grumbled, swiping an arm across his face as he turned to check on Chris.
The head that Chris had chopped off was still fucking moving on the ground and Chris ran his sword through it, not pulling the sword out till the head stopped moving. He pulled the sword out and shuddered a bit. “God, I want a shower.”
He gave Ed an appreciative look. “And you, sir, are damn good with that sword.”
“Oh, well thank you very much,” Ed said, giving a sort of silly little bow, before glancing over at the decapitated head on the ground with a grimace. “That's fucked up. They should die when their heads come off.” Of course, they were technically already dead, which was the only reason he wasn't having a panic attack right now over killing them. It's not like they were people anymore.
“On that we are very much agreed.” Chris wiped his sword off on his pants. There was a brief desire to kick the head, but even if they were undead corpses, he still felt the need to somewhat respect the dead - undead - corpses, whatever they were.
He took a deep breath. “Should we keep up the search for supplies?”
Ed, on the other hand, felt no such need to respect a decaying lump of flesh, and he poked at the lifeless head a few times with his sword to test its resistance (and maybe just to be kind of a dick to it; after all, it had tried to eat them).
“Mhmm, no rest for the wicked.” He clapped his free hand to Chris’s shoulder, giving it a quick squeeze before continuing down the road. “That was fun, doing that with you,” he added, only half-joking.
Chris chuckled. “Definitely glad to have you at my back than fighting against me,” he grinned.
Chris kept his sword out, more wary as they continued walking. They needed to find some food because he wasn’t sure how else they’d make it through the week - even ignoring the zombie attacks.
He hadn’t been this way before and sheathed his sword so he could pull out his padd to sketch where they were going. He moved closer to one of the buildings, peeking in through one of the windows to a basement of a building.
“Ed..” he called in a hushed whisper, gesturing to the windows where it looked like maybe someone might have been living. He didn’t think zombies needed sleeping bags.
Ed had kept his sword out, partly so he could clean it off a bit on his pant legs – he was really glad those would go back to pre-zombie-brain-matter in a few days – and partly because it just made good sense for one of them to be combat-ready at all times, especially as they wandered further from the campus.
Hearing his name, he joined Chris by the side of the building, crouching down to peer through another window. He saw the sleeping bags, but so far no people. “Think they're still around?”
The windows were easy enough to open and put his PADD away, trying to see if he could get in through the window. “Didn’t think anyone was around but they might have supplies.”
He wasn’t a huge fan of stealing, but Derleth needed supplies and it didn’t seem like anyone else was around in this zombie hellscape. He raised an eyebrow at Ed. “Should we check it out? See if there’s anything useful?”
It actually shocked Ed that he had to consider the question before answering. He wouldn't have thought twice back home; his only concern would've been getting in and out without being seen. And to be fair, that was still probably 95% of it, but that other 5% was unexpected. What if they were stealing from someone who was barely surviving?
But they'd been here three days and found no evidence of other living souls, and they were barely surviving. “Fuck it, let's do it.”
Gently cracking his window open, he paused to listen for any sound from inside, then when none came, he crouched down to slip through. There was a bit of a drop to reach the floor but Ed landed like a cat, gracefully on his feet.
Chris followed suit, slipping through window and landing - perhaps not as gracefully as Ed - but not making too much noise. Although the sword made a bit of noise - he wasn’t used to moving with one of those. He held his breath, waiting for any noise. When he didn’t hear any, he got to his feet.
“Alright - food, water - those are the priorities. Food might be in tins or boxes. First aid supplies and weapons would be great too if we can find them.”
Personally, Ed wanted one of those sleeping bags. For their time they might not have been fancy, but he’d slept on worse back home. Also good to muffle the sounds when he inevitably started thinking about Stede and ended up crying himself to sleep at night. So far his roommate was very kindly pretending not to hear anything, but it was still embarrassing.
He ran a hand over one of the sleeping bags, a little relieved to find a layer of dust on his fingers afterward. If they were lucky, whoever had been using these was long dead – and fingers crossed, had left behind some good shit.
“Might have to leave the first aid supplies to you, not sure I’d know them if I saw them,” he admitted. But surely food looked about the same everywhere, right?
“If I see some, I’ll let you know. Otherwise, grab anything you think might be useful.” Chris picked up a dusky backpack and peaked inside. Some granola bars and socks. Better than nothing. Slinging it over his shoulder, he moved through the room, finding some random cans that might have been food and tossing them in the bag.
“Will do.” Ed rolled up the sleeping bag and tied it off, slinging the strap over his shoulder as he scanned the area for supplies. A nearby duffel bag turned out to contain a bottle of some brightly colored substance called Gatorade, as well as a small pocket knife and a couple dented cans without labels. “Think I found some alligator food. Does this look like what he’d eat? Or drink, I guess?” He turned toward Chris, brandishing the bottle of liquid.
Chris looked over. “Hell, that might be human food. We’ll check it out when we get back to campus.” At some point, he’d have to explain food replicators to Ed, but that might make his brain explode, so he’d save that for a time when they weren’t fighting zombies.
He picked up a container of something, opened it, wrinkled his nose and gagged and quickly closed it again. “Whatever that is, that is past its prime.” He tossed it aside and moved on, rummaging through things, grabbing a roll of tape and adding it to the bag.
Ed shrugged and placed the bottle back into the duffel bag before throwing its strap over his free shoulder. Continuing on, he found a stash of little paper pouches he couldn’t identify, until when he brought a few up to his nose. He’d know that smell anywhere, even if it was sort of fruitier than he was used to. “Fuck yeah, found some tea,” he called to Chris as he shoved several handfuls of packets into the duffel.
Chris chuckled and smiled, enjoying how excited Ed could get about things. “Now if we can just find some coffee and a bottle of whiskey, I’ll be a happy man. Or well, a decent pantry so I can make pancakes.”
He made his way to another room, going through shelves, not noticing that they weren’t as dusty until he heard noises outside the building. “Ed! Hold up.”
Ed had just joined him in the next room when Chris called his name, and he paused in the middle of shoving a half-empty box of biscuits into his bag, his ears very nearly perking like an animal’s. He definitely heard footsteps; no voices, but no growly zombie sounds either. Reaching for his sword, he moved closer to Chris, positioning himself protectively, just slightly in front of the other man.
Chris shifted, drawing his sword and moving so he had the wall at his back. He glanced around, looking for an exit - going back out the way they’d come was possible but not the easiest route. He leaned his head towards Ed and whispered. “Don’t suppose you see an easy exit?”
Ed shook his head. “Just the staircase, but that’s the only way in.” They’d left the windows open, but they’d have to get across two rooms and do some climbing to get out that way, and judging from the creaking of a door opening on the floor above them, there wasn’t time.
“Ambush them? Or hide?” Chris whispered, glancing around the room and trying to see if there was any good place to hide. He didn’t like getting caught without a clear path of escape. He didn’t care for the situation. It was too unpredictable, especially as it didn’t sound like zombies upstairs - which meant a potential new threat.
“Hide for now,” Ed whispered back, scanning the room as well. Despite his reputation back home, violence wasn't usually his first choice; if he could talk his way out of a situation he'd just as soon do that. Besides, he liked to know who his enemy was before he fought them.
There wasn't much in terms of good hiding spots, but there was a tall bookshelf nearby so he darted behind it, grabbing Chris by the arm to drag him along.
Chris followed Ed, hearing his PADD chirp with messages. Probably the Derleth residents trying to warn them of something. But he couldn’t afford to look right now. He reached into his pocket to silence the device, pressing himself next to Ed and keeping his eyes on the stairs.
The footfalls that were coming from above sounded almost … normal. He wasn’t sure if that was reassuring or not. He held his breath, eyes trained on the stairs.
Voices. Ed heard voices. They were muffled from being a floor away, but they were definitely human. Well, maybe he couldn’t make that assumption, around here – but they weren’t zombies or alligators. Backing up a bit, he crept toward the edge of the bookcase, letting Chris cover the stairs while he searched for alternate hiding places. There was a closet with the door ajar about 20 paces away, but that would take them even farther from where they’d come in.
Chris’ glance moved from the stairs to Ed to back to the stairs. When the voices got louder and the steps creaked, he pulled Ed close, making sure they were both hidden behind the bookcase. Peering out, he watched as several people - five? Six? came down the steps and headed towards a room he and Ed hadn’t explored. He didn’t have a clear line of sight, but he saw axes and guns. They wouldn’t stand a chance. He tapped five times on Ed’s arm, indicating the number of people he thought he saw. There was a chance there were still people upstairs, but he couldn’t hear anyone.
Glancing at Ed, he raised an eyebrow and pointed upwards. Running might be their best option.
Ed turned back toward Chris at the shoulder taps, rolling his eyes since he couldn’t exactly curse out loud. He couldn’t get eyes on the group, but it sounded like they were moving toward the next room – which meant it wasn’t going to be long before they noticed the open windows and missing supplies. Nodding a bit, he leaned over to double check their path toward the stairs. It was a straight shot; if they were fast, they could make it. He looked back to Chris with raised eyebrows, waiting for the signal to go.
Chris gave him a nod, slipping out from behind the bookcase and moving quickly and quietly towards the stairs, heading up the stairs and glancing behind him to make sure Ed was with him. Luckily the door at the top of the stairs was still open. Combat training and experience told him to not look back, but like Orpheus, he found himself looking back to make sure Ed was with him.
Ed darted toward the staircase several paces behind Chris, but he was light and quick on his feet, and by the time Chris reached the top stair, he was nearly within arm’s length. Now coming from beneath them, he could just make out sounds of alarm in their voices – he was pretty sure he heard the phrase “What the fuck?” – and Ed surged forward, grabbing Chris by the waist and pushing them both through the door, nudging it shut behind them with his shoulder to buy them some time.
Chris leaned against the door with for a moment, catching his breath. Seeing a garbage can, he moved it in front of the door, wedging it under the doorknob. “I think it’s time for us to get the hell out of here.”
“Yep. With you there.” Ed eyed the empty street before thinking better of it. Those guys had guns and they were probably better than the ones he was used to back home; being out in the open was a bad idea. Instead, he nodded toward the other side of the building, the one without any open windows (hopefully) and with a patch of woods behind it that they could take for a bit before emerging. “This way,” he added before slipping around the corner of the building.
Chris nodded, following Ed around the building and into the woods, doing his best to keep a low profile. They should be able to make it back to campus if they kept going this way.