Challenging the End (Upbeatdown and Scriven)

[Scriven]

Part One: The Beginning

​

The whole city stank of rotting bodies. They littered the streets like so many leaves, a feast for the birds who flocked en masse to gobble up the sudden excess of carrion. A fat vulture was nibbling daintily at a thin man’s swollen lips, flapping its wings at any smaller birds who dared approach his prize. The man’s eyes were already gone, pecked out and devoured. It was a macabre scene, thought Quil, but she had already become accustomed to the death around her. She had walked the roads for two days and not found another living soul. Her pockets were filled to bursting with the silver and gold she had looted from corpses before she realized there was no point. There was no one left to buy and sell anymore; only her. Only Quil Purcell, a woman lost in a sea of the dead.


Yet she still couldn’t bring herself to empty her pockets, even though they were so heavy that they weighed her dress down and made her hem drag in the dust. She had found no survivors, but perhaps outside the walls of the city life still flourished. She planned to walk to the gates, find a horse or two, and travel as far as she had to in order to find another living soul. When she did she was going to be rich in gold, silver, and jewels. But first, she thought, turning toward the castle, she had to procure some jewels.


The sun was falling fast in the sky and Quil had no choice but to stop and find a place to rest for the night. For all that she kept a brave face during the day, being alone in a city full of corpses was too unnerving for her in the darkness. Night brought the terror of ten thousand dead bodies, ten thousand corpses rotting and stinking and glaring at her, the only survivor. They hated her, she felt. The dead were jealous of her life and wanted her to join them. As soon as the sun crept low in the sky, she liked to find an empty home, lock all the doors, and pretend she wasn’t the only survivor of the sudden disaster that had struck everyone else. It had happened so quickly, reflected Quil as she pulled open the door of a small but neat home with a thatch roof. It had taken only days for everyone to die and leave her all alone.


Her nose scrunched up in sudden revulsion. The fragrant rot of something dead and putrid drifted toward her. Tentatively she crept forward, a hand over her mouth and nose to block the odor. The main room of the home was clear, but there was a door at the back. Her hands took hold of the cold, iron handle and pulled the door open.


The sight before her made her heave, and soon the bread and sausage she had eaten at midday was splattered across the floor. Hanging off the bed was a young woman, or what had once been a young woman. Some kind of animal had gotten hold of her and pulled her body half out of her bed, then had eaten most of her face and ripped her bowels from her stomach.


Weak and nauseous, Quil crossed the room, stepping over the pool of vomit she had made to grasp the dead, half-eaten woman under the shoulders. She heaved again, but her stomach was empty now and nothing more came up her throat. With a strong tug she pulled the woman out of the bed and began dragging her out of the room. Quil held her breath and didn’t release it till she’d pushed the body out the front door onto the street and closed it firmly behind her. The woman sucked in a breath, chest heaving with breathlessness and fright, her hand over her pounding heart. Touching the bodies was the worst part about being surrounded by them. The first day hadn’t been so terrible, even when it had been shocking and fresh. At least the day they died the bodies weren’t ripe. Now they were beginning to rot and decay, and half of them had been picked at by some kind of animal.


There was a deep copper washing basin in the bedroom, but she had to brave hopping over the woman she had moved to go back and forth to the well to fill it. She removed her soiled dress and sweat-stained chemise, stepping naked into the cold water. It chilled her tanned, freckled skin, making goosebumps rise on her flesh and the hairs on her arms stand up. The cold was a small price to pay to be clean, she decided, lowering her whole body into the basin. She hadn’t bathed in days, and the grime felt thick on her skin. Moving the woman’s half-eaten corpse had made her feel sick; she hoped bathing would rid her of that. Quil dunked her head under the water and scrubbed soap into her scalp, pulling the suds through her thick, unruly curls. She rubbed soap into her hands, which were perpetually stained an ill shade of gray-purple from dying wool till just past her wrists, but it made no real difference on the stains that had accumulated from a lifetime of work. She scrubbed till her skin was pink and sore, then poured water over her head till her hair was free of soap.


Stepping out of the copper basin, Quil dripped onto the uneven stone floor, naked and shivering. Her clothes were in a heap and she picked them up, bringing them to her nose. They smelled like rotting dead, just like the rest of the city. They slipped from her fingers, a puddle of rough brown cloth she had forgotten. With no thought of respect for the dead woman she had hoisted out of her own home, Quil rummaged through the chest at the foot of the bed. Inside were blankets, men’s clothing, and at the very bottom a pale green dress and clean white chemise. It was simple of cut and rough of cloth, but it was a sight better than anything she owned and it smelled clean.


With the dead woman’s comb, Quil worked the tangles from her thick, light brown curls, which liked to stand around up around her head in a messy halo when dry. She braided it into a plait that hung over her shoulder to her waist and tied it with a strip of cloth torn from her soiled dress. She slipped the chemise over her head and draped the clean dress over the top of the chest to wear the next day, then pulled the blanket from the bed and curled up on the floor. The bed, though it had a good, thick straw mattress, was covered in congealed blood and she wouldn’t go near it.


The room grew dark as the sun disappeared behind the buildings that crowded the city. Quil curled up tightly in her blanket, knees pulled to her chest. She fell asleep in the fetal position, her tan, freckled arms wrapped around her legs. When the sun came up she would go to the castle and steal whatever valuables she could carry, then get out the city of the dead.

 

[Upbeatdown]

The nearby rustling of a vulture snapped him back to reality. He was getting lost in his mind again, just like he did in the fields. It was such dull work, his chores. His father would scold him for it, tell him dreams were meant for the night, not the day. He didn't understand what tedious work toiling in the cabbage patch or the potato knitted soil was. Aerik doubted that his father never daydreamed when working the fields. He had to of done it sometimes. A man could go mad just focusing on the farming and chores all day. These days Aerik sometimes suspected that he was mad. Maybe he'd finally listened to his father and thought of nothing but the crop and his blister ridden fingers and it finally got to him. Hell, he wished he was mad. Then, at least, the rotting body of a child that lay before him might not be real. If he was mad, then this whole tragedy would all just be in his head, just like his daydreams.


But wasn't all in his head, and he wasn't mad at all. Sometimes he would swear he could here bodies whisper to him, tell him to climb down to the ground with them, take a deep breath of the death that fumed from their lifeless and agape mouths, and daydream forever with them. But Aerik knew they never really talked. That was all just in his mind, trying to convince him that he'd gone crazy like he wanted but it was all just a tease. It wouldn't be that simple, and he was forced to walk through a real world hell with his sanity intact. The thought made him cry once.


Aerik looked away from the child's body. He wondered how long he'd been away from himself, just staring into its eyes, waiting for them to blink, twitch, cry, anything. It must have been a while, the sun was setting now. Aerik stepped a careful foot over the body and continued down the silent streets that once bustled with live human company but a few days ago. Storefronts no longer showed off elegant or practical wares, but instead hid broken glass window panes behind shabby wooden boards. Residential areas yielded a similar look, with boarded up windows and doors as far as the eye could see. You could get in to some of them, mind you, but you were never met with any pleasant sight. Just yesterday, Aerik wandered into an open home in search of supplies only to find what was left of a family, all huddled together in the corner next to a fireplace. Their skin was ravaged by plague sores and they smelled of the rot of fresh dead. Yet, much to Aerik's surprise, the plague hadn't yet taken them. It was a man and a woman, and burrowed deeply into her bosom was the head of a boy. Behind their festering sores, Aerik could see that they were young, and the child could be no more than three. The man raised a weak hand in Aerik's direction and beckoned to him with a weak and unintelligible whisper before Aerik ran away from there, never looking back.


When Aerik wasn't miles away in a daydream, he often thought about whether or not his father was still alive. He'd fallen suddenly very ill a few days before the plague took the whole city, and Aerik suggested that he travel past the walls to get medicine. But once the plague broke out, the guards closed and locked the gates, opening them for no one, including Aerik. He never did find the medicine. Not too surprising, he supposed. Given the situation, he assumed that the apothecaries were probably making a killing. That is, until they succumbed to the plague too. Who knows, maybe the coin was worth. It must be a rather euphoric feeling, just to hold a small fortune in your hands for once in your life.


Aerik found himself walking passed the church now. It wreaked of decaying humanity, and Aerik didn't dare enter. Instead, he held his scarf against his mouth and nose and looked forward down the streets that what were as dead as the people who loitered lifelessly in them. Somewhere between the smell of plague rats and rotting flesh, Aerik caught a whiff of himself. He would have dismissed it as another maggot filled corpse had the small undertone of tanned leather from his tunic not wafted its way into his nostrils with it. Seeing another open house, he decided it was time to rest for tonight.


Aerik pushed the wooden door open and was hit by a fresh wave of death. It didn't bother him as much as it used to, and this time he only cringed slightly rather than puke his guts out. Directly in the center of the room lay the still body of a half devoured woman, her entrails torn so haphazardly from her body. Behind the body, Aerik noticed the trail of congealed blood that led passed a closed door at the end of the room. No animal would bother dragging the corpse all the way out her only to leave it behind. Someone else had been here before him.


Pulling his tan colored scarf over his mouth and nose, he tied it tightly behind his head before creeping over to the door. Carefully, Aerik wrapped his blistered fingers around the cold iron handle and pushed the door open. Peaking inside, he couldn't believe his eyes. It was another person, very much alive, and not a single plague sore present on her body. As she breathed in a out, her breath came out smooth and calmly, not made turbulent by any fits of coughing or phlegm.


Almost subconsciously, Aerik felt his hand float down to the dagger he'd stolen from the body of a dead guardsman two days ago. If this woman was still alive, she must of just gotten here, coming to the city to loot all the dead like a twisted grave robber. She'd have to know a way out. Glancing down, Aerik caught the cover of a tome lying strewn across the wooden floorboards. Silently, he took it in his hand, only to the toss it at the sleeping woman. Aerik didn't want to risk walking near her. She might still have the plague, despite just entering the city.


"Hey! You!", he called out in a hushed shout. He held the dagger out, pointing its rather dull tip in the direction of the jarred and groggy woman. "Don't come closer! You've got the plague, haven't you? Tell me the way out of the city!", he commanded, glancing nervously down at the weapon before raising his gaze back to her. "Don't make me hurt you. I'll do it, I swear!", he bluffed, knowing that he had no idea how to use a dagger.

 

[Scriven]

Her fitful slumber was suddenly disrupted and Quil awoke in a sharp fit of panic. She didn’t know what had woken her so suddenly, but her breath caught in her chest, heart beating wildly. What had woken her? Why was she suddenly so alarmed?


In the darkness there was a shadow- a darker shade of black against the blackness of the room. Quil felt immobilized by fear. This was what had awoken her, she realized. The sudden presence of... what? Weeks among the dead conjured horrible images. Surely this was one of the dead, risen to kill her. It didn’t make sense, yet simultaneously it was what she feared and suspected most.


"Hey! You!” The shadow was shouting at her, yet his tone was hushed as if children slept in the next room. Quil bolted upright, pulling the blanket up to her chest as she sat on the ground near the foot of the bed. “Don't come closer! You've got the plague, haven't you? Tell me the way out of the city! Don't make me hurt you. I'll do it, I swear!"


There was something in the shadowy figure’s hand- a club? A knife? Quil didn’t know, but she had a feeling she was about to find out. Her fear drowned out his words, making him sound like he was far, far away. She couldn’t concentrate. What did he want? What had he just said? Her instincts screamed for her to stay still, to not move, to not make a sound. Maybe if she just curled into a tight little ball and closed her eyes tight enough, maybe then this would all go away.


Wake up, little girl, she told herself sternly. Whoever this was- no, whatever this was- she wouldn’t let him kill her now. Had she survived the sickness and weeks among the dead to be murdered now? Using surprise to her advantage, Quil suddenly launched herself up and hurled herself at him, her shoulder colliding with his stomach and knocking him to the ground, her on top of him. This man was larger than her and still wielded a weapon. She didn’t dare to grapple with him for it. Instead, she scrambled to get off of him, running barefoot for the door. It was open already. Had she left it open? No, he must have when he came through.


“Ooof-!”


She stumbled, tripping over a corpse. She fell hard to her hands and knees, feeling her palms get skinned on the roughly hewn wooden floor. She looked over her shoulder but the darkness in the next room was too solid for her to see the figure of the man anymore. Quil disentangled herself from the decaying corpse, scrambled to get up. She was in the main room of the little house, and there on the kitchen table she saw a knife glinting in the light from the window. She dashed for it, feeling the bruises from where she had hit her knees, and she gathered the knife into her hand, holding it close to her.


She felt pinned in, trapped between the bedroom where the man or monster waited in the shadows, possibly ready to spring if she darted for the door. “I have a knife!” she called. “Go back to where you came from!”

 

[Upbeatdown]

To get up and run at him was the last thing Aerik expected the woman to do. He was armed, wasn't he? Was it too dark? Did she not see it? Maybe he should have waved it around a bit more, make it really known what he held in his hand. Maybe you should have actually act like you knew what you doing, like you even knew what you were holding in your hand, his mind would scold.


But maybe he didn't know what he really held, because when the time came and the startled and panicked woman ran at him, he found himself unable to use it. It seemed like a pretty straightforward concept; simply stick the thing out in front of you, and let her fit of startled rage do the rest. It would be quick, quicker than quick even. As fast as she was on him. But his hand willed itself to the side in that blink of time that passed between her cowering beneath her blanket and him lying flat on his ass. It wasn't you that didn't want to do it, he would think. No, it was your hand's fault. It moved. Your hand's the real coward Aerik, not you.


By the time Aerik understood what had happened, the woman was already on the other side of the room, waving her own weapon in shaking hands. Now you see! That's how it's done, Aerik! That's how you wave around a weapon. Maybe before she kills you with it, she'll give you a proper lesson. Aerik pressed his hands against the wooden boards of the ownerless home and pushed himself up into a sitting position. "Go back to where you came from!", the shadowed figure of the woman shouted. It's funny, he would think. That's exactly what I was trying to do.


And then it hit him. Hit him harder than the woman or a man or God himself ever could. She touched him. "No", he felt his voice quiver softly. He looked down at his hands. They looked normal, but what about tomorrow? That's right, tomorrow he'd glance down and they be covered in plague sores, just like the rest of him. Just like the rest of them. He couldn't believe it. He'd been so careful. He never let any of them touch him, never let any of the hungry rats or vultures get a piece of him. But now it was over. This woman touched him, and soon he'd be just another dissolving corpse lying still on the ground, daydreaming for all eternity.


Suddenly, Aerik jumped to his feet. he hadn't known that he did it until after the fact. "Look what you've done! You've gone and given it to me, haven't you!", he yelled at her, windpipe straining as he shouted. Deep sadness and intense anger were all he felt. He felt suddenly weak in the knees, and Aerik dropped down onto them, expression blank. It was a harsh thing, realizing that you were going to die, and soon. No doubt painfully as well.


"You've killed me...", he panted, looking up at the face of the shadow, dagger dropping from his loose grip and crashing with dull thud against the floor. "I just wanted to go home, and you've killed me. You've made into one of them", he said, pulling the scarf down from across his face. He didn't need it anymore. All of this was for nothing. He couldn't go back to his father this way, carrying a plague.

 

[Scriven]

The atmosphere in the room suddenly changed. It was equally as tense as before, but as the shadowy figure of the man dropped to the floor, the moonlight faintly catching on his unusually pale hair, the room became charged with the loss and despair he projected.


Quil’s heart had stopped hammering in her chest from the shock and fright of being woken so suddenly, greeted by a man armed with a knife who was probably seeking to rape and kill her. Or maybe kill and rape her, she thought, her stomach lurching at the thought of her dead body being- no, she stopped herself there. It had been a sudden and possibly irrational fear, but she hadn’t had time to think. Now his dagger dropped to the floor heavily, uselessly, clattering on the floorboards. And it was a dagger, she noted, not just some kitchen knife like the one in her hand.


"I just wanted to go home, and you've killed me. You've made me into one of them,” he told her. Quil couldn’t help but cock her head at that, her confusion followed by sudden dawning. The sickness- he was talking about the plague. He thought she had it and she had given the virus to him when she had tackled him. The mangled corpse of the woman who had lived in this home was a gruesome reminder of just how terrible the sickness had been.


“I haven’t killed you,” she told him primly, putting her hands on her hips, careful of the knife that was still clutched in her left palm. She hadn’t let go of it and didn’t intend to. “Don’t be such a baby. Do I look like I’m dying to you?”


She sucked in a deep breath, then released it in a sudden sharp exhale. She felt overcome by such a sudden onslaught of mixed emotions that tears stung her eyes. She blinked them back, refusing to let him see.


“I thought... I thought everyone was dead here. I thought I was the only one.”


Under normal circumstances she would have been elated to find another person alive, but the circumstances of their meeting were just too awful. It complicated things and cast a shadow over the realization that if she was alive and he was alive, then that probably meant there were others.

 

[Upbeatdown]

Aerik looked up at her in shock, somewhat surprised she hadn't killed him yet. Part of him actually wished she would. It was a much more pleasant fate compared to what the plague did to its victims. "Don't be such a baby. Do I look like I'm dying to you?", she said, and Aerik felt his face flush with a sudden heat. Was it true? She wasn't infected by the plague? No, no, that was far too unlikely. Even if she didn't think she was, she could just be delusional. Hell, this woman could just be lying to him for all he knew!


But then his own doubts began to grow. He didn't know how, and it was all quite coincidental, but a cloud must have shifted in the sky or the moon itself motioned into perfect alignment, and its natural and graceful light shown through a bit of damage in the ceiling. The acute beam lit up the entire scene; the two of them, situated a careful distance away from each other, clearly unsure of what to make of their sudden mutual company. It was true, this woman didn't look like the others. She wasn't covered in sores, nor was she rotting alive. She certainly didn't smell like she had the plague, though that might be hard to tell given the third member of their little meeting; the half remaining piece of what he could only assume used to be the owner of this home.


"Don't patronize me!", he shouted in that similar hushed tone. From what he was hiding his voice, he wasn't sure. Maybe the dead that surrounded them? Things were already so ridiculous, for all he knew he might wake them. If that was the case, Aerik was sure they wouldn't be too happy about it. "What's a man to think in times like these? Times when nothing makes sense, times when you might not wake up from your sleep because a plague sore choked you from the inside of your throat!". Aerik took a moment to compose himself. He did the best he could, given that she was still holding her knife.


He heard her mention how she thought she was the only one left. Aerik felt himself empathizing with that. There was a long time where he thought he was the only one left too. Of course, he'd witnessed people still alive. Though, they were ravaged by severe plague, and for some reason they didn't count. When you got that bad, you weren't really considered human anymore. At least, not by Aerik's standards.


Aerik cautiously stood back up, purposely not picking the dagger back up. Aerik didn't want to hurt anyone, he never did, and he certainly didn't want to get hurt either. He got himself into this mess, and it was going to take careful steps for him to get out of it. He moved his hands to his front, showing that he held no weapon as he took a step closer. "There are others, but they're all too sick to move... My name is Aerik, I, well, used to help my father tend to a farm outside of the city walls... Do you have a name?", he asked, taking another cautious step closer to her.

 

[Scriven]

They were doing an odd little dance with one another, weren’t they? Scared of one another, yet both clearly filled with the same longing for the existence of another life. Clouds shifted outside in the night sky, the moon peeking out and washing the room in wan light, but enough to dimly illuminate them. The man was healthy and well, his skin clear and his eyes bright. Illness had clearly not touched him. Funny, she hadn’t even considered that she should fear those who carried the sickness. She hadn’t seen a living soul in days, and besides, she had been surrounded by them two weeks ago when it all began and the world suddenly shifted, her life changing forever.


Around her people had begun coughing, hacking up phlegm, then blood. Their skin began to fester, their limbs swelling, hair falling out in patches from their heads. Even alive they had begun to reak, their skin rotting on their bodies. The living became the dead, but Quil had just been Quil. She had remained strong and healthy and it hadn’t mattered if she touched them. She had felt simultaneously cursed and spared.


"Don't patronize me!" he ordered her, his voice hushed. "What's a man to think in times like these? Times when nothing makes sense, times when you might not wake up from your sleep because a plague sore choked you from the inside of your throat!"


Quil’s temper flared. “And what am I to think when I’m awoken by- by- well, I don’t even know what you did to me, but you scared me half to death! And looming over me with a knife in your hand, shouting at me?”


She wasn’t normally so emotional, but this was all too much to suddenly take in. God, she felt so relieved! Here he was, another living being, and she was shouting at him! Why was she shouting at him? She felt tears stinging her eyes once more, could hear herself continuing to yell at him.


“Do you have any idea how much you scared me? Being surrounded by all these-” she gestured pointedly to the corpse on the floor, unable to finish her sentence. “And at night you just come out of nowhere and...” She sucked in a gasping breath, and mortified she felt the tears begin to fall, then they seemed to pour from her eyes, coming faster than she could wipe them away with her hands.


“I’m just... I was...” Quil wasn’t even sure what she was trying to get out. He tentatively stepped closer and told her his name. Aerik. His name was Aerik. She put the knife down, laying it back on the kitchen table, then she collapsed heavily into one of the chairs pulled up to it.


“Quil,” she told him. “I’m Quil.” She wiped her eyes, her nose, managing a watery smile. “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m...” crying, she finished in her head, gesturing to herself pathetically. "Is it too late to say that I'm really, really glad you're here?"

 

[Upbeatdown]

A fresh wave of guilt washed over Aerik as he approached her, and it had him standing completely still like a deer listening intently to the snapping of a forest twig. His hands fell weakly to his sides, and it for a few seconds it was very difficult for him to look her in the eyes. It was selfish, he knew, getting mad at her. This was, after all, completely his fault. In the middle of choking back tears, she mentioned him scaring her half to death. Aerik was sorry for what he did, but he was unsure of what to do! It was too dark to see her, he didn't know if she had the plague or not. He didn't know if she was dangerous.


Forcing his body to continue moving forward, he took a seat across from her at the table. "I'm sorry for scaring you. Times like these... I don't know, you don't think straight. It makes you think like a savage", Aerik said, trying to rationalize his own actions. The more he thought about what he did, the more embarrassed he was.


He didn't know what else he could say to comfort her. This woman was so upset... He wondered how much this plague took from her. Aerik at least had the hope that his father might still be alive, that the entire world might be still be alive passed those walls. But what had she lost? How much had she lost?


Then she told him her name; "Quil", she said. That was a good sign, that was progress. A little step closer to earning her trust. But then, she did something he did not expect at all. She apologized to him! He had to catch himself from letting his jaw hang slightly agape. After all he'd done, woke her up, scared her, pointed a weapon at her, threatened her... she was apologizing for crying. "It's... It's alright, Quil", Aerik said, feigning a smirk. "I'd be upset too if I were in your place".


What she said next, while not as shocking as her unwarranted apology, was still effective at surprising him. "Is it too late to say that I'm really, really glad you're here?", she asked him, still combating her intense sadness. Admittedly, this question confused him. She was glad he was here? She was glad that he woke her up, scared her, and threatened to harm her? Aerik attempted looking at that from every perspective he could think of in the short few seconds he had before he was obligated to answer her, yet still he found her position confounding. Was it because she hadn't seen another living person in a while? That is what she said, right? That she thought she was the only one left in the city?


"No, I suppose it isn't too late", he said, looking away from her again. Aerik found himself not wanting to look at her while she was crying, but not because he was embarrassed by it or because she should be. He couldn't exactly figure out why, it just felt like the right thing to do, like he was trying to lift some sort of incorporeal pressure off of her.


"Listen, Quil", he started, trying to gather his words. "I've been trying to get out of the city. I've got someone I need to get to. I don't know if you knew, but they locked the gates to try to stop the plague from leaving the city. Do you know a way out?"

 

[Scriven]

Aerik was looking away from her, probably as embarrassed by her sudden onslaught of emotions as she was. She folded over in the chair so that she could use the hem of her chemise to wipe the last remaining tears from her face without lifting the whole garment up, then straightened. Her face was splotchy and her eyes were red from crying, but she was determined and resolute. The quiver was gone from her lower lip. Quil forced herself to take a quiet, deep breath, filling her lungs.


This was alright. No one was trying to kill her, and he wasn’t some horrible, gruesome corpse come to life. Lately that had been a popular element of her nightmares. The dead rose against her, tearing her limb from limb. When he had appeared, waking her from her sleep so suddenly, she had panicked. But that was okay, she told herself. Things were set straight now and no one had found themselves skewered by a sharp implement.


"I've been trying to get out of the city,” he told her. “I've got someone I need to get to. I don't know if you knew, but they locked the gates to try to stop the plague from leaving the city. Do you know a way out?"


Quil shook her head. “No, I... I had planned to leave soon, but I hadn’t tried yet.” She frowned. “Can’t the gates be lifted? I mean, we’re on the right side for that, aren’t we?”

 

[Upbeatdown]

She had planned to leave? What kept her here, surrounded by a horrible plague and a flood of corpses lining the streets every which way you went? Aerik hoped it was important. Perhaps she was looking for something? Someone perhaps? Maybe a member of her family was caught in the massive turbulence that arose from this plague from hell. If his father was lost in the city, Aerik knew he'd risk infection to find him. For a brief second, Aerik was reminded of his brother, off who knows where in the military. He never wrote home, but he sent home gold to help support the farm. That was the only way they still knew he was alive, really. God, Aerik hoped the plague hadn't left the city...


"The mechanism takes two people", he said, finding the courage to look at her again. "One on each end of the gates. I guess the city guard was a little optimistic, thinking that they'd make it through with at least two people". Or maybe they knew. Maybe they knew that it would consume everything, destroy everyone. Pulling those locks into place... It must have been one of the hardest choices they ever had to make, he thoughts would suggest, a little bit of pity resonating in their tone.


"It's like a system of winches", he added. "One handle on each end, and when both are in place, another mechanism holds the locks open. But you can't just wind them up individually. It has to be at the same time", Aerik concluded before glancing down at the wooden table. The moonlight was beginning to fade again. Maybe it was passing clouds after all. He let the pale skin of his hand brush a short distance across it's surface. It felt both smooth and rigid, probably coated in a fine layer of gloss to preserve the wood. It was certainly a nice piece of furniture, certainly expensive. Maybe given as part of a dowry? No, couldn't be. The misses was lying on ground next to them, but he didn't see a mister.


"When are you planning on leaving?", Aerik asked, hoping the answer was very soon. "The two of us, we can probably open the gates, you see".

 

[Scriven]

"The mechanism takes two people", Aerik explained to her. "One on each end of the gates. I guess the city guard was a little optimistic, thinking that they'd make it through with at least two people"


Quil laughed humorlessly, just a short ‘hmph’ through her nose. Oh, how the world had changed so quickly. They were truly living in dark times, when optimism meant there were two people living in a city that held thousands. She listened as he explained the mechanism to open the gate, nodding along, her lips pressed into a thin line. When he asked when she planned to leave, Quil suddenly averted her gaze. She couldn't look at the pale haired stranger, because surely he would see the truth in her eyes. She was base and immoral, greedy and scared and selfish, and she refused to apologize for it. She was being a realist; decorum and respect were two luxuries she couldn't afford.


It made no sense to feel guilt over surviving through any means necessary, but she did. While Aerik had been looking for a way out, Quil had been coming to grips with the world around her, unable to entirely process what had happened. But she had also been looting, praying that outside the city walls the world was still safe and whole. Hope had remained inside of her that she could start over. The gold and jewelry she had taken off the dead was still in the other room, bundled up in her dirty clothing.


“I still have something I need to do,” she told him evasively. It would take a day to travel to the small castle where the lord who resided over the town had lived and to search through for valuables, another few hours to get back across town to the gates. “If you wait at the gates, I’ll go there the day after tomorrow.”

 

[Upbeatdown]

Aerik would be lying to himself if he said he wasn't slightly disappointed. This place... he just wanted to put it all behind. He just wanted to open those damn gates, and never look back. Over the past several days, everywhere he went, Aerik was stared down by the dead and motionless eyes of plague stricken corpses, their mouths eternally hung open. They all looked ready to call out to him, beg him to not leave them, ask that he just come sit by their side for a while.


But it was selfish of him to be hung up on having to wait a little bit longer. Hell, he should be grateful that he has this chance to leave at all! "I understand", he responded, offering up a somewhat genuine smile. However, it was rather short lived. "If you wait at the gates, I’ll go there the day after tomorrow", is what Quil said next, and for reasons not immediately known to him, it made Aerik feel worse than when she insisted their escape wait.


Aerik didn't want to be away from her. Now that he had found another real human; someone who could understand what he was saying, someone he could be around without free of falling ill, he didn't want to be without her. Without this woman whom he had only known for almost an hour, Aerik would be left at the mercy of the corpse sea. They would stare at him, even as the vultures tore away at their irises. They would make sure he could see them, make sure that he knew that what he was seeing was not one among thousands of dead. No, they showed him his future.


"Are you looking for something specific? Maybe a person? I can help you, you know", he suggested, trying his hardest to keep from begging. "Another set of eyes and hands can go a long way". He looked at her, and she looked back at him. He didn't know what her answer would be, and that was beginning to scare him more than any of those corpses ever could.


"Please, Quil", he said, his expression stricken by sadness yet marred by seriousness. "Don't leave me alone with them", he finished, his hand gesturing to the city around them.

 

[Scriven]

Their hushed conversation was interrupted by the howl of a dog- or was it a wolf? It was answered by several others, the night becoming a chorus of howls and barking. They sounded close, and sure enough it was only a moment later that Quil heard the dogs snarling outside the house. She rose quickly, going to the door to make sure it was securely shut. If the gates were closed, it either meant there was another way in and out that wild animals had found, or once domesticated dogs had gone feral since their owners had died. She’d seen more than one dog with its bloody muzzle buried in a human corpse, and more than one had turned an unfriendly growl in her direction.


She found she couldn’t sit anymore. Instead, she stood near the door, her arms crossed tightly over her stomach, her expression tight as she strained to listen.


"Are you looking for something specific? Maybe a person?” Aerik asked. “ I can help you, you know. Another set of eyes and hands can go a long way.”


Quil didn’t immediately respond. She chewed on her lower lip, shifting so she could see out the window. Through the leaded glass, Quil watched as a pack of dogs fought over the already mangled remains of a horse that laid in the street. It hadn’t been the victim of the plague- just negligence after there was no one left to care for it.


"Please, Quil,” Aerik implored. "Don't leave me alone with them.”


She finally turned her troubled gaze back to him, guilt evident in her brown eyes. Well, it was now or never, she thought. Time to put it all on the line.


“There’s no one I’m looking for,” she told him. “I’m not that brave, okay? The truth is... I don’t want to have nothing to show for myself when I leave this town. If I’m going to start over, I’m going to need something to start over with.” She tilted her chin defiantly, as if daring him to argue. “I’m going to the duke’s castle so I can see if there’s anything valuable I can take with me.”


She glared across the short distance of the kitchen at Aerik, her expression adamant.

 

[Upbeatdown]

Aerik's ears perked at the sound of her speaking. He wanted her answer, he needed it. It was funny, he thought, how much he was dependent upon her company. It was as if his very sanity balanced on this contact between humans. It had only been weeks, but that long period of time without contact, without conversation, with another human was worse getting worse than the plague itself. That aside, the corpses weren't very good conversationalists.


Aerik got what he pleaded for, he supposed. It deeply disappointed him, but he got it nonetheless. So it was true; she was just some sort of grave robber, capitalizing off of the plague. She was no better than the vultures and rats. So greedy with vigilant eyes, the vultures made themselves known, plucking flesh from bone one gobble at a time. And they were delicate too, careful and delicate. It was no rush for them, the corpses weren't going anywhere. Was that how Quil thought? Like the vultures and the crows? Much like those avian creatures lined their stomachs with the spoiled meat of fresh dead, Quil lined her pockets with the once important valuables and mementos of the plague's victims.


But Aerik could get passed all of that, everything she had just admitted to, if that for that glare she gave him. It was merciless, lacking remorse and carrying false understanding. It was ignorant is what it was, and any resentment that Aerik already had for her had suddenly increased exponentially in that half of a single second that it took for her to formulate her expression, to don that defensive and arrogant pose. Aerik felt his fist tighten weakly, as if taking the muscles in hand by surprise.


And as much as he wanted to argue, to yell at her until the wolves heard and clawed the door down, he didn't. In fact, Aerik made sure that he didn't even look the slightest bit disappointed. Because as much as he hated what she was in that moment, she was still a human. She was the only other human. She was a petty pseudo-criminal to him, but Quil was also alive.


"I understand", Aerik lied, feeling disgust for himself build up and press against the pit of his stomach. "Let me come with you. We can cover more ground together". Outside, the wild dogs led out a few snarls to each other, securing alpha and beta positions. "Besides, it isn't safe. For all you know, the duke and his men could still by alive. I stumbled upon you and you're still alive. If the duke or his men stumble upon you, they won't be as merciful. That, I promise you".

 

[Scriven]

Quil was ready for just about anything that Aerik might throw at her: disgust, anger, revulsion. There was something about the way he spoke and carried himself that told her he was one of those rare morally upstanding people, and so she prepared herself in the brief silence after her confession for his indignant reaction.


It didn’t come though. Her eyes, adjusted to the darkness of the night, saw no flicker of emotion on his pale features. She hadn’t realized how tense she was until she suddenly relaxed a little, her shoulders sagging just a hair. She leaned back against the roughly hewn wooden door, her face softening.


He offered to accompany her, which surprised her, but also didn’t. Maybe he wasn’t as morally black and white as she’d assumed, but more likely he didn’t want to lose the one living, healthy human contact he’d made since the plague. She couldn’t blame him.


“Thank you,” she whispered, her voice just a little choked.


“For all you know, the duke and his men could still by alive. I stumbled upon you and you're still alive. If the duke or his men stumble upon you, they won't be as merciful. That, I promise you.”


“Do you really think they might be?” she asked, hope making her stand up straight, her voice stronger now. “At night, I’ve looked up at the Duke’s castle sometimes. I haven’t seen the light of a candle in the window, or shadows moving behind the glass. But maybe... Maybe there are others. I mean, if there’s you and me, it’s possible, isn’t it? Surely we’re not the only ones who didn’t-”


She stopped, unable to finish, her brown eyes falling to the floor. Quil’s long brown hair fell down around her face, hiding her and giving her a moment of needed privacy. That was a pain still too fresh. At first she had been in shock, and then for days she had been frightened and bogged down by depression. She had finally forced herself to take action and to try and move on, but it didn’t mean the reality of what had happened didn’t affect her. It very much still did, but she buried those emotions deep.


“We should get some sleep,” she said, looking back up and tucking her hair behind her ears, changing the track of their conversation. She couldn’t look backwards, she could only move forward. Don’t think about the past, she ordered herself. Just focus on tomorrow.

 

[Upbeatdown]

"Well, I can't possibly say for sure", Aerik said, leaning in a bit from the back of his chair. "The duke has wealth and influence though, and a big castle to lock himself inside of". Or maybe he had wealth, influence, and a big castle. Maybe all he has now is a lot of friends, all floating along with him in the sea of corpses. They make great company, Aerik. Maybe you ought to give'em a try.


He stopped his mind from wandering before it took him too far away. As much as he wanted to be far away from this god forsaken place, his thoughts had a way about them, a way that he didn't always appreciate. They could be so... honest sometimes. But their honesty wasn't for the purpose of being constructive or informative. The way they had about them, it was mean, it was hurtful. Aerik sometimes wished that this place of death and despair would drive him mad because he felt as if then his own thoughts might take him seriously. They would just love that, wouldn't they? All their criticism would finally be justified. Yes, they would just love for him to (give'em a try) go mad, wouldn't they?


It was easy to notice that something weighed down on Quil's mind too. It looked like guilt to him, but it wasn't any simple look of guilt mind you. It wasn't the look you gave the corpses after you plucked the valuables from their pockets. It was the look you carried when you snatched treasures from a corpse with a familiar face. It was dirty, soiled by grief and self pity. Before Aerik could pry, Quil's conscience raised its defenses and suggested that they get some rest. While he was reluctant to leave her so burdened by sadness, his body was seriously inclined to agree with her suggestion. It had been a long and arduous day. When you were behind the walls, every day was long and arduous.


Aerik watched carefully as she made her way back to the spot where he found her. After a silent moment to himself, he followed in her example, entering the bedroom. In doing so, he had to step over the corpse of the woman who once called this disheveled hovel her home and, to him, it felt almost disrespectful to do so. Aerik pressed his back to the wall situated to the door's direct right, slowly slumping down onto his behind and leaning back. He gave Quil one final look, and then diverted his gaze, shutting his eyes and letting his thoughts carry him off.

 

[Scriven]

Light streamed through into the bedroom from the window in the front room of the small house. A beam of it flickered over Quil’s eyelids, making her roll over, blinking herself awake. For a moment she didn’t move; she just let herself look at him, slumped over across the room from her. He was still sleeping, yet so undeniably alive. In the darkness last night he had been little more than a shadow and a voice, but now she could see every feature.


He was younger than she had imagined, and it wasn’t just the shadows that had made him look gaunt. His cheeks looked sunken, his eyes set deep in his narrow face. He was startlingly pale, almost a uniform shade of white from skin to hair. She knew it was rude to stare so intently at a sleeping person, but she couldn’t help herself. She was curious, and her eyes felt oddly starved for the sight of someone living and breathing.


She could see his chest rising and falling, his lips slightly parted as he softly breathed out. He bore none of the initial signs of illness, either. His skin was even and smooth, he appeared to have all of his hair. But... was he always so pale, so gaunt?


It doesn’t matter, she decided, sitting up. Even if he was sick, it didn’t matter. Whatever illness had gripped everyone she knew, it didn’t affect her. He was probably the same, though he did hold a great fear of the plague. She didn’t know what his circumstances were, but she had seen it up close and personal. She had cared for her family as they withered, washing their rotting skin, holding their hands as they cried and moaned, softly stroking what was left of their hair during their final, miserable hours. If she was going to get it, she would have already gotten it.


Quil rose quietly, trying not to wake Aerik as she crossed the room to where she had left the dead woman’s dress. She pulled it down over her head, securing it over her chemise, glad to find that it fit well enough. She also lifted her bag from the ground, which held all the items she had pillaged: gold and silver coins and jewelry, for the most part. The coins tinkled against each other as she slid the strap of the bag over her head and across her shoulder- the guilty sound of her greed and steadfast determination.

 

[Upbeatdown]

It wasn't long after Quil found herself awake that Aerik too fidgeted groggily back into reality. Of course, this place didn't much feel like reality sometimes, or maybe he just wished it to be that way. He wasn't sure. Aerik looked up at Quil, honestly a bit surprised to see her still here. Part of him doubted that she would stick around long enough for him to actually help her. She seemed like the kind that would have a soloist mentality.


Aerik forced his hands to the dusty floorboards and propped himself up from his previously slouched position. The daylight was almost blinding, he would think. The sun must be just overhead. Aerik stood up and stretch his limbs. He fiddled a bit with his slightly matted hair. It felt dirtied from sweat, dirt, dust, and fear. He was sure he smelled atrocious, but he couldn't really tell anymore. Part of him wondered how much of what he smelled on a daily basis was the corpses. One of the things he longed for was fresh air. This whole situation made him realize how much he took for granted. The fresh air, the living faces of other human beings, the bread he ate everyday, and death. Death was the biggest though. He would never take the death of anything for granted anymore.


"Good morning", Aerik said to her with a faint smirk. It was so nice to be able to say that to someone other than himself every morning. He had tried saying it to a corpse once, but it just hung its jaw open and swam with all the others. Or maybe it drowned. Maybe they all just drowned.


Aerik suddenly found himself perked up in realization. Reaching into his back pocket, Aerik pulled out half of a scrunched up and hardened roll of bread. It would be enough to keep Aerik fed for the rest of the day if he played his cards right, but he looked over and Quil and wondered how long it had been since she ate. She looked malnourished sure, but so would anyone else in their situation. "Are you hungry?", Aerik asked her, already knowing the answer was yes. Taking the remainder of the bread in his hands, he pulled it apart, sending tiny bits of hardened crust falling to the floor. He held out one of the halves in her direction. Aerik knew she was hungry, but what she didn't know was whether or not she would take it.

 

[Scriven]

There was the oddest of expressions on his pale face, Quil thought, her head tilting thoughtfully to one side. Why did he look so... pleased? amused? She found herself smiling back, baffled.


“Good morning,” he told her pleasantly. Was this some sort of test? Was he judging her response?


“Good... morning...” she said haltingly, then shook her head to herself. Why was she so distrustful of him? Perhaps it was because she didn’t quite understand him. She watched Aerik as he rooted around in his back pocket for something, finally coming up with a rather squashed chunk of bread from his back pocket. It was crumbling a bit, pieces sprinkling onto the floorboards.


She had been observing him with only half a mind, the rest of her thoughts already turned to the day ahead of them. Travel through town, get into the castle. The duke’s door was usually open to the public, since so much business was conducted there. Hopefully during the sickness it hadn’t been sealed off. It was, after all, designed as a fortress. If the front gate was closed or the keep locked, Quil stood very little chance of getting in. Drat, she hadn’t thought of that before.


“Are you hungry?”


Quil snapped back to reality, her eyes focusing and attention falling to Aerik, who was holding out half of his bread to her. “Wha-?” she asked, at first not quite comprehending. “Oh! No, no, I’m fine.”


Her stomach growled, the sound loud in the quiet house. Quil’s eyes cast sideways, her cheeks glowing to a rosy hue of embarrassment. “I guess my stomach says otherwise.” She reached tentatively toward the offered bread, then took it from his hand. “Thank you. I-” Quil stopped, shook her head, and smiled softly. “Just... thanks.”


She took a bite. It was dry and hard, almost tasteless, but it was also the best thing she had eaten in days. She chewed, swallowed, then squared her shoulders and nodded to herself. “Right. Let’s get going! I figure, no matter what we find at the castle, it’ll have to be a good thing, right? Either no one is there and we’ll be able to gather some valuables, or there’ll be survivors.”


She didn’t mention her premonition of reaching the castle only to find it sealed. She had been wallowing in sadness and negativity for so long, hardly able to get herself out of bed, but she was determined now to do something. She wouldn’t let herself join the dead.

 

[Upbeatdown]

A nod was all took for Aerik to make his acknowledgement of her thanks known. He was glad she took it. It felt strangely relieving to have someone to share his food with. Even if it set him back a bit from what he had planned. That was alright. More people meant more eyes to look for food with, right? Part of Aerik wondered if Quil would travel with him once they got the gates open. However, another larger and more selfish part of him wished that she didn't have to. He wanted to believe that the plague had been contained within the city, that the gates had stopped it from ravaging the outside world. But it had been a couple weeks now, and as far as he was concerned, no other humans had attempted to enter the city to see the aftermath of one of the most deadly diseases of the century. As disheartening as the quiet of the inside of the city was, the quiet of the outside world was even more so.


Aerik tried to push those surprisingly persistent thoughts out of his mind's attention by climbing to his feet and moving to the door with Quil. He wrapped his thin fingers around the chilly metal doorknob. When did his fingers get that thin? It must have been since last night, right? They weren't that emaciated looking the day before, were they?


With a twist that took a surprising bit of effort on Aerik's part, the door swung open slowly, a narrow and shrill creak echoing about the deathly silent corpse ridden street. Situated right before the door was a pile of a few of them, tore up a bit from the wild dogs that came in the night. The sun seemed to break through the clouds then, shining its light right down on the bodies, almost like a spotlight. It wanted them to see it, Aerik thought. Wanted him and Quil to know what they were in store for. Wanted them to know what their lives had become now.


Aerik's cautious feet were the first to venture off the dusty wooden boards of the home and onto the cobblestone street-way. A faint wind blew through the air, pushing his hair over his eyes a bit and carrying the smell that he'd grown far too accustomed to up deep into his nostrils. It used to make him gag, but not anymore. When did that change? When his fingers did, he supposed.


All was silent, but silence tended to be misleading. So Aerik looked all around in more directions that he thought could possibly exist. No dogs, no other people, no walking corpses. He sometimes often expected the latter over the two former. "Quil", Aerik said in a hushed tone that still seemed to carry around the entire city anyway. "I don't see the dogs anymore"

 

[Scriven]

The smell of death was overwhelming. Quil covered her hand with her mouth, gagging as the scent of shredded, rotting bodies assaulted her senses. She tried to move past them quickly without seeing, but she gagged and bent over, throwing up the bread she had just eaten. Her head pounding, Quil wiped her mouth off with her arm.


“God, I can’t do this,” she muttered. “I need to get out of this place!” Her voice was thin and strained. She was restless. Afraid. Tired. Tired of being afraid.


She didn’t want this man beside her to see that though. She didn’t want others seeing her vulnerability, so she turned sharply, almost jogging toward the well so she could lower the bucket and get the taste of bile out of her mouth. She pulled the bucket back up, cupping the cool, clear liquid in her cupped hands and taking a sip. She swished it around in her mouth, spat, then drank some more to give her stomach a temporary feeling of fullness.


“I think you’re right,” she told him, setting the bucket of water on the edge of the well. “We should just go. I can’t be here anymore.”

 

[Upbeatdown]

Quil's attitude changed so rapidly that Aerik had almost thought her a completely different person. That's what places like this did to you he supposed. He watched with uncontrollable disgust as she heaved up the small meal he'd just given her. A more cynical side of his mind wanted to chastise her for wasting precious food, his precious food. But that wasn't him. That wasn't Aerik.


she spoke afterward, mentioning how she couldn't take being here anymore, that she needed to get out. It was strange to see such a sudden transition in her character. The night before, she was hellbent on raiding the duke's manor for riches. The look Quil gave him last night was like that of stone; unchanging, never moving. Yet now here she was, bent sickly over the edge of the cobblestone well, telling him that he was right, and that they needed to leave. Quil needn't tell Aerik he was right in wanting to leave as soon as possible. He knew he was right. This place, once a thriving metropolis of commerce and life, was now a wasteland devoid of any living faces. Even Quil's face right now shared a bit of resemblance to the dead that lay at their feet. This place... it changed you... made you into one of them.


"Are you certain, Quil?", Aerik asked, careful to not move close to the puking woman. "You seemed so adamant about stealing from the duke... Not that I want to stay here any longer than I have to", he said, feigning a smirk at the end, but even that quickly faded away. Aerik willed his feet to moved toward her, and he planted a caring hand on her shoulder. "You have to be certain this is what you want. Is this what you want?"

 

[Scriven]

Ever proud and haughty, Quil stood her ground, chin rising defiantly. “Of course I’m certain,” she told Aerik. She focused her gaze on the dark waters in the well. Aerik materialized beside her, his hand on her shoulder, his voice caring. It made her want to take back her biting tone. Almost.


“I had a thought,” she told him, striding away from the well. She walked in the direction of the city gates- the opposite direction of the Duke’s grand castle. Her pockets were weighed down by her looted treasures, the satchel that was strung across her chest making her neck ache. “What if... What if we spend all day walking to the castle, then we get there and- and- it’s locked up. Right? Don’t you think that maybe when people started getting sick and dying everywhere, that the Duke probably ordered the castle to be closed? And it’s... it’s... what’s the word? It’s fortified. It’s made so invading armies can’t get in, so how are you and me going to do it? I just don’t want to waste anymore time.”


Her long hair was hanging loose down her back, but she pulled the coarse brown locks over one shoulder and began plaiting, using a scrap of twine to tie off the long, thick braid. She made no mention of her rapidly fraying nerves, her fear of the dead, and the way the smell of death overwhelmed her, threatening to drive her to madness. She needed the fresh scent of the earth, the feeling of a breeze that didn’t carry the odor of rot, and if there was a God, the sight of another person. Part of her was still reeling from her meeting with Aerik. She wanted to hold onto him tightly and not let him leave her side, but she couldn’t do that. She knew that as soon as others appeared, he would likely leave her. He had a plan. A goal- a selfless one, unlike her. Aerik was cut from a different cloth than she. Did her crudeness offend him? Likely, she thought. She hadn’t been quite so coarse before, but the events of the plague had hardened her.

 

[Upbeatdown]

Of course this was all nothing but good news to Aerik. He'd wanted for sometime to get out of the city, to see how his father had been fairing with his illness. He was sure the man was more worried sick than he was actually sick. It took only a couple days journey from their land to reach the city, but Aerik had lost track of how many days he'd been away yesterday. Or was it the day before? Oh, how the farm must look a mess.


Quil seemed cold about the subject of abandoning her initial plans. It was to be expected, Aerik supposed. Nobody liked having to admit to someone else's point of view; that feeling of wrongness and regret had a tendency to turn one a bit sour. But then she said something else. "What if", marked the beginning of her thought as she denied the plausibility her own plans. It was true, the Duke's castle would most certainly be closed to the public given the circumstances. Then, as if timed in sequence with some sort of cruel twist of imagination, a whole slew of what-ifs found themselves filing out of his brain. What if we get there and it isn't the Duke at all? What if we get to the gate and the door needs three sets of hands? What if my father never got sick? What if I killed you, Quil?





"Life doesn't answer what-ifs", Aerik finally said, taking a step back, nearly stumbling awkwardly over some poor souls hand. Had he forgotten where he was that quickly? "There only is what is. Things you can't change, y'know?". Aerik cast his gaze to the cobblestone street once more. What if you killed Me, Quil? What if my father's dead? What if the only thing waiting behind those walls is more sickness? Aerik let loose a deep exhale and looked back up to his newly found companion. "Quil, let's do it. Let's go to the castle. We gotta. It's important, I just feel it".


Thoughts of his father and their farm ran through his mind. It would take some time to get to the castle, not to mention rummage through it to find whatever Quil was looking for. After that, they'd have to walk back, open the gates, and then he'd have to start the two-day journey home after. Was he giving up his father, his whole life before the plague, undergo this quest? And all because of a feeling? Aerik had a lot of feelings after all. How many have, over the course of his entire life, been correct? Enough.


"Don't worry about them", he said to Quil, an outstretched arm gesturing to all the bodies and probably to the rats and dogs too. "There has to be a reason right? We haven't gotten sick yet, and the animals haven't gotten to us. We've been lucky so far, but we just need to press that luck a little bit longer".