Ryan McCormick (mediumwell) wrote in remains_rpg, @ 2016-06-25 14:50:00 |
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Entry tags: | # 2019 [06] june, ryan mccormick, violet holladay |
Who: Ryan McCormick & Violet Holladay
Where: Their restaurant
When: Backdated to 6/7, because I struggle to post things in order this week
What: They arrive at their mess of a restaurant :(
It had been a long drive. Violet couldn't imagine what it would have been like in a normal car, but she imagined it would have been cramped and probably not nearly as tolerable. The truck was roomy, gave them space, because even if it was Ryan she might have snapped at him from being stuck there so long in a car. Plus it had a kitchen, and even if it was a kitchen on a truck it felt more like home solely because it had burners and a fridge. Then they made it to Austin, where there was a real kitchen in a real restaurant on the horizon.
“Thank God,” she sighed as she put the truck into park outside the building they'd been directed to. “I thought we'd never get here.”
"It only took…. Four days. Maybe five? They're starting to blend together." The mornings and nights on their journey had been fun, spending time with the others who'd caravaned down with them, but the days spent driving around abandoned vehicles and avoiding zombies had been tiresome.
The truck engine turned off and Ryan's back and legs were sore from sitting for so long, but he made no move to get out just yet. As excited as he had been about this move, the glimpses he'd gotten of Austin from the truck windows were… unsettling. "This is the right place, right?"
“I don't know how many days, they're all mushed together in my head,” Violet confessed, unbuckling her seatbelt and standing up to be able to stretch her legs, which she only did for a moment before glancing out the window. “It should be, yeah. I double checked the address before we got in here.”
Austin was no Chicago from what she'd seen so far, but that had kind of been the point. “Should we go check it out? And then maybe nap? Because I am really looking forward to sleeping in an actual bed again.”
Ryan glanced out the window again and frowned. "Yeah, I guess we should." Wariness or not, they were both exhausted. Now that Violet had put the idea of a nap in his head, he couldn't get it out. So he carefully emerged from the truck with their shotgun in his hands, that frown still on his face as he took in just how hot it was down in Texas. His expression only deepened once they moved closer to the building and a few things became a little more apparent.
"Tell me I'm just imagining things and there's not a hole in the roof, right?"
Violet waited for Ryan to get out before following him, her nose scrunching slightly at the heat, but she supposed she would have to get used to that. She tilted her head as they approached the building, not looking nearly as high as him until he mentioned the roof.
“Wrong,” she said after glancing up, an unsettled feeling forming a pit in her stomach. “That is definitely a hole.”
"Aw, man." How had they not known about this before they purchased the place? Ryan looked over at Violet, hoping she'd clue him into how they were supposed to handle this. "This is manageable, though. Right?"
“It's manageable,” Violet replied slowly, chewing on her bottom lip for a moment. “It can be patched over, and that shouldn't be that hard to do.” In theory, anyway. “Let’s go in and make sure there isn't something worse.”
"Yeah." A few more steps closer, enjoying the slight breeze, before Ryan stopped in his tracks again, and Violet nearly ran into him. "The windows are all broken. And I think…. This sounds kinda crazy. But is part of the wall missing on the far side? You can see it through the busted glass."
Violet frowned, folding her arms across her stomach as she stood back and did her best to give everything a once over - at least, everything she could see. It was in far worse a state than she might have imagined even if she had been told it was in need of some repairs. They hadn't even gone inside and it was already seeming like an overwhelming task.
“I'm just going to bite the bullet,” she said after a moment, pursing her lips and steeling herself before crossing the distance to the door and letting herself into the building. Their building.
It was just as bad on the inside, from what she could see as her eyes adjusted to the dimness, though there were spots of light from the windows, and of course the hole in the roof. Violet started to make a mental list of what needed to be fixed, but then she heard it before she saw - unsteady footsteps moving toward her.
Though they'd been trained in guns and shooting after the first few months of the rising, Ryan's first instinct at the all-too-familiar sound was still to drop the gun and grab Violet's hand -- though he didn't. She glanced around quickly and saw a few bodies moving in the shadows, and a shriek died in her throat as she turned on her heel and high tailed it for the door, Ryan hot on her heels.
He nearly crashed into the door of the truck, he'd been running so fast, and it wasn't until they'd pulled out of the parking lot that Ryan felt safe. Immunity didn't help a person feel better with the undead. "I really don't think they represented the place all that accurately," he said, the words coming out stilted and short as he took deep breaths, working through the panic.
Violet only drove them as far as she needed to to feel some distance between them and the building they'd bought - apparently infested with zombies. She pulled to the side of the road and threw the truck into park, her heart still racing and breath quick and shallow. “We can't… that place…”
She swallowed hard and pressed back against the seat, her hands gripping tight onto the steering wheel even though they were sitting still. “A hole in the roof, that was do-able. This is not.”
Ryan nodded silently, shaking his head. The decision to move down to Austin, to a notable war zone, had always been a heavy one, but it never weighed so heavily on his shoulders down as much as just then. "You think we can sell it back?"
“Doubt it,” Violet said almost instantly, leaning forward and resting her forehead on the wheel. “Not in that state.” She closed her eyes, drawing in a breath and exhaling it slowly. It suddenly seemed like a rash, wrong decision, packing up and moving across the country but it was a little too late for second guessing. “We need a plan, Ry.”
"I guess moving back home's not an option?" It was a joke, one Ryan was sure Violet wouldn't misinterpret. She didn't, but it did make her frown. Everything they owned was in the truck with them, and they'd sold the place they'd had to finance their move south.
"We're just gonna have to make this happen, somehow," he added, more seriously now. "There must be someone fixing up buildings? Remember three years ago, you couldn't go down a single block without seeing a crew working." Austin was in worse shape than Chicago had been back then, though, even during the highest point of zombie activity -- their city hadn't been bombed to hell. "It's gonna… We'll make it work. And in the meantime, it's not like we don't own a food truck. We can make this work." The underlying worry went unsaid: We don't have any other choice.
“We can make this work,” Violet repeated quietly, and she knew they could. They had to. He was right, they had their truck. Maybe that was for the best - they could get their feet under them in a kitchen built for two, establish themselves with the truck, get the restaurant fixed up and then find people to work there for and with them. “Start with the truck, figure out who does construction around here, and then see what happens?”
"Yeah. We can do that." He tilted sideways, crossing the distance between their seats, and leaned his head down against hers, taking another deep breath. Violet made a soft sound of gratitude for the contact, reaching over to take his hand. It was a worse start to their Austin adventure than they'd anticipated, but they could make do. They were together, after all; that was all he could ask for. "And, hey. At least the zombies didn't decide to make us into burgers, right?"
“Small blessings,” she murmured, drawing in a breath as though steeling herself for movement. “Alright, let's find home. I still want a nap, and I think we especially deserve one now.”
He shot her a grateful smile. "Sounds like a plan to me."