(we don't believe in) you and your wrecking crew. face/murdock.

[b0nes]

(we don't believe in) you and your wrecking crew
face/murdock, hannibal, b.a. (the a-team tv show!verse)
r, ~18,200 words
A week ago, everything was pretty much okay. Seven days ago, there were only mumbles or rumors of a new virus that arrived from seemingly nowhere. There were sirens. There was the Journalist in the Tweed Jacket. There was leaked information, there was disproved information and then… there was this.
blood. gore. some harsh language and scary imagery/situations.

notes:: when I saw this request over at a_team_kink I nearly stopped breathing with joy because it was exactly everything I love: the a-team, zombies and apocalypses. I knew there was no possible way I could let this slip through my fingers so I did what some may see as a stupid thing and scooped this baby right up into my loving arms. I also knew that the chances of this being anything under 10,000+ words was inconceivable and that taking this prompt under my wing would mean pushing off to the side everything else I needed to get done. but, you know what? IT WAS WORTH IT. other things you should know before reading: this is focused on the tv show and not the movie. that's important to remember as you read this (although, if you really wanted to pretend, I won't have to know). this story isn't funny (because zombie apocalypses are serious business, gdi) although I did try to keep some of the light-heartedness of the show intact. bad things happen to good people. and, depending on your favorite characters and who you ship, you may or may not like the way this ends. whoever you are, anonymous, I hope this is what you wanted. (also: I read through this a couple times before posting and, as far as I could tell, I fixed all glaring grammar, etc. mistakes. I can't guarantee that I got all of them however. i'm sure that, upon going over it again and again like I tend to do after I post fic, i'll find and correct others).




PROLOGUE.

In the beginning, there were only sirens.

Low, howling, wailing sirens that made your insides ache and vibrate, made you lose more sleep than you were comfortable losing, made you sit in a corner with your ears covered after a week of it droning over and over and over and over and begging for it to just stop.

People did what people did best: they panicked. But not the kind of panicking you saw in the movies, the kind where everyone is screaming and tripping over themselves and each other and crashing over bridges (not yet). It was a quiet seething, a bubbling under the closed lid of a metal pot. One day, the highway was just a little more packed and crawling than usual. And then a couple days later, the airport had to put signs out that they were full for the next six months. The next year.

The radio, crackling even if you sat right on top of the antennae, told everybody it was safer to stay inside. Lock the doors and eat away at that canned food you had been secretly hoarding away for the unlikely situations exactly like this one. The canned food and jugs of frozen water that business partners, coworkers and family members made fun of you for piling away and now look who the hell was laughing.

A reporter said the CDC was involved. Another reporter, a journalist in a tweed jacket, rumpled and exhausted, said that there were reports of an infection, a virus. He made his last television appearance exactly two hours after he had uttered those words. Nobody ever saw or heard from him again.

It was too late though, the entire country had heard what the Journalist in the Tweed Jacket had to say. The man became famous, infamous, his words typed in newspapers, spray-painted on brick walls, hung like streamers off trestles that the trains clicked and thudded over, still moving but this time only moving cargo.

“It’s a virus,” the Journalist in the Tweed Jacket had said, “it’s a virus. We’re all going to eat each other alive.”

. . . .

“Well?” a man in a white lab coat paced, heels scuffing and squeaking against the only slightly blue tile, flecked with bits of brown. He looked up when another man, a short, squat man with a government haircut and a government suit spoke to him, hands in his pockets, trying to cover up how badly he was shaking.

“Well what?” The doctor said, stopping in his motions, straightening his back and tightening his jaw. He hadn’t slept in over three days and he smelled of perspiration and cigarettes.

“You know what. Is he infected? I just need a simple yes or no. A yes or no and I can leave, walk out of here and give the people an answer,” the government man said, pulling a hand out from his thousand dollar pants to gesture as he spoke. The doctor advanced, lifting his arms as if considering grabbing the man by the collar but he restrained himself. Barely.

“Give the… give the people an answer?! What you’re going to do is tell them not get themselves into a frenzy, that you’re already working on a solution, right? Am I right?”

“Well, I mean, we can’t…”

“Tell them the truth?” The doctor finished for him, his voice rising, “have you seen that man in there? Have you?”

“N-no, I haven’t seen first… first-hand, no…” the government man yelped when the doctor grasped him firmly around his upper arm, dragging him towards the steel door he had been, only moments before, wearing a hole into the floor in front of. He thrust the man against it, turning him around, holding him down so he could stare only through the supposedly shatter-proof window. Nobody spoke, not even a whisper, and everyone just inhaled, exhaled, the man’s breath from his mouth and his nose fogging up the glass.

SLAM. Everything rattled as a body cracked against the other side, the obvious sound of bone splintering radiating through the metal. Blood splattered on the window and the man tried to move, fight or flight kicking in and he grunted and whimpered but the doctor only shoved his face closer, skin smudging the clear surface.

“This,” the doctor said, pushing harder as the person inside the room, the white and fluorescent lit room, kept pounding themselves against the walls and the door, “this is what you’re going to lie to everyone about.”

“Please…”

“Please what? Please make it stop? I can’t make it stop. I’ve been trying to,” he squeezed the government man’s neck when he tried to flail out of his grip, “make it stop for the past three days.” The person inside howled and he bashed his face against the glass, eyes yellow and wild, skin sagging, dry and pale and his teeth shattered, falling out like they were never properly attached in the first place. Black blood leaked past his pink lips. The government man may have whispered something that was close to a prayer. “Fucking look at him,” the doctor said and he opened his mouth to keep speaking but then the glass shattered.

The supposedly, shatter-proof window exploded into a million pieces.

And two thin arms shot out from the now wide open space.

. . . .

“I’m getting confirmation that the virus,” a nervous news anchor said, padded shoulders quivering, her permed, blonde hair slightly blowing in an invisible breeze, a fan tucked away in the corner to battle the heat of the lights, “thought to be contained has… has…” she stumbled, she paused, swallowing, patting at her face with a cloth she kept in her pocket, “it has breeched containment after a… after an infected man escaped the facility from which he was being treated earlier this morning.” Treated was, at least, a better word than ‘being held prisoner’. Somebody whispered from behind the camera when the woman took too long to continue speaking but all she did was keep her head down, eyes averted to her lap, fingers dug in as claws against the shiny desk she was propped up behind. Her breathing was laboured and, even if you weren’t really paying attention you could tell she was silently crying. “I don’t know what to do,” she said, most likely attempting to utter to herself, forgetting the tiny microphone still clipped to her collar, her tiny, choked fear broadcasting across the airwaves.

There was a crash of a door being forced down, the sound of heavy footsteps, of screaming erupting like bats from a cave. The camera shook and twisted, searching for the source but everything was happening upstairs, downstairs, out in the hallway. A man said the news anchor’s name, followed by a string of curses nobody bothered to censor.

“What the hell is going on out there?” he said to someone next to him, the only thing visible the woman’s hands and arms as she nervously shrugged. The entrance to the studio flew open without warning, the metal doorknob slamming against the plaster wall. The shrieking was delayed, as if they all needed a moment to really figure out what was happening and, like the flick of a lever, there was hysteria. The single camera swung around, bobbing left and right, up and down, finally settling on the anchor, head still hanging like she had absolutely no idea anything different was happening around her.

That evening, at exactly 6:23, the entire audience was treated to watching a woman with soft curls in her blonde hair get eaten alive.

If all hell hadn’t broken loose before, it sure as heck was starting now.

. . . .

OUR STORY.

Templeton Peck, also (and mostly) know as Face, had seen (along with the million others scattered in the city alone) that poor woman get devoured. It had been an odd day for him overall, really. He had awoken later than usual, covered in sweat, only to find that the central air in the entire building had been shut off or, as he heard when he called down to the front desk, temporarily broken. His normally busy schedule had been so often tampered with (meetings scratched off either because they were too afraid to leave their homes or because they had successfully managed to exit the country, as if that was their only possibility of survival) that he soon found himself running out of plans. His date for later that night – a lovely brunette by the name of Jeannine, whom he had run into somewhere in between picking up a few new shirts and gathering enough food to last him until the weekend – cancelled, calling him seven hours before he was to pick her up. She told him, voice quaking (and he could just see her fingers twirling in and out of the phone cord) that she couldn’t make it, that she didn’t think it would be a good time.

When he asked her when it would be a good time she twittered anxiously and just repeated herself, saying it just wasn’t the best time to be doing something. Together. And then she hung up.

Face found himself both utterly confused and with a completely free agenda. He considered calling up acquaintances (anybody really, even the guys he only kept around in case he needed a favour) because this wasn’t something that happened to him, he didn’t wake up and get dressed only to find out he had nowhere to go. It really couldn’t hurt though, he thought to himself as he refilled his glass with cold water from a slender bottle he kept in the back of his fridge, finally loosening his tie and then removing it altogether, tossing it onto the counter, to just stay in.

Sometime a little bit before five in the evening, after he had spent most of the afternoon attempting to read, drinking more liquids than he usually did in a week and accidentally falling asleep once or twice on his borrowed couch, he groggily decided to turn on the television, his mind wandering as he pondered what Hannibal and B.A. were up to and why he hadn’t considered telephoning them earlier.

Nearly every channel – except for a channel that showed only cartoons and another station that aired constant reruns of a soap opera one of his foster parents had on twenty-four/seven, the same person who had smacked him across the face for even asking if he could just watch some Looney Tunes one Saturday morning – had something on about this new virus. If it wasn’t ceaseless updates about The Situation it was a panel of experts – or one, single, stuffy man with a short-cropped beard and red bow-tie – discussing The Situation. Face knew he would benefit from being as concerned as everybody else and, while he had been keeping tabs, it just hadn’t been something that he could be bothered investigating any further than a few simple facts.

After flipping around for almost half an hour, not being able to stay on one show for longer than a few minutes, getting a horrible twisted feeling in his stomach every time he passed that soap opera (”I said no, you little twerp, you can’t change the fucking channel. This is my house and you follow my fucking rules, you understand me?”), he finally settled on the last half of a game show he was pretty certain he had seen before, rolling his eyes and shaking his head when the contestant got the wrong answer, which happened far too often than not for it to even be slightly entertaining. When it ended, cheesy music jingling along as the credits rolled against a black background, he lazily picked up the remote, pausing when, after a short commercial break for some kind of dish-soap he didn’t need, he heard the obtrusive theme song of the local news.

He thought the anchor was pretty, even though she was obviously terrified and wanted nothing more than to not be there, and came to the decision to settle there until he at least got to hear what the weather was supposed to be like for the rest of the week. Ten minutes elapsed and then fifteen and it was, as he could have predicted, nothing he hadn’t heard before. He stood up, about to turn it off and make himself a drink when things started to get interesting.

Face didn’t even remember sitting down, or putting his hand to his mouth, or dropping his empty glass onto the hardwood floor, right by his bare feet. He didn’t recall flipping the television off, then on, then off, then on, as if each time the picture would flicker back and it would have just been some unnerving joke gone just a little too far.

It took another entire fifteen minutes before somebody – or something – made it stop. He liked to think it was someone still alive who pulled a plug but, if he was being realistic, he didn’t doubt one of the infected had decided to gnaw on or trip over a cord. Multi-colored bars and a high, tinny whine replaced the sizzle and crackle of the snow and he left it there until it started giving him a headache.

Stepping over the fragments of glass he reminded himself to sweep up later, he opened a window – the distant howl of a siren he had forgotten about drifting into his ears – and shuffled over to his liquor cabinet, twisting upright a tumbler and pouring a (first half and then an entire) glass of a dark amber alcohol that burned his throat before he even sipped at it. Gathering a pad of paper and a pen from his discarded coat’s inside pocket, he flipped to a clean page and sat down at the tiny kitchen table, trying to sort as much out as he could.

A week ago, everything was pretty much okay. Seven days ago, there were only mumbles or rumors of a new virus that arrived from seemingly nowhere. There were sirens. There was the Journalist in the Tweed Jacket. There was leaked information, there was disproved information and then… there was this. Someone, an infected someone, apparently a man, had escaped. He had escaped that morning and, less than six hours later had managed, allegedly, to contaminate enough people to break into a newsroom in Los Angeles, killing practically everyone in sight.

That would mean, he surmised, underlining the words and numbers a few times until he had torn through the sheet of paper he had been scribbling on, that it took less than two hours from the moment the person got infected to when they completely changed.

The first thing he thought was that there was no way this was actually happening. The next thing that crossed through his mind was that if it was, indeed, happening, the sheer amount of chaos outside would be near unbearable. After that, he wondered if he had remembered to load that shotgun he kept in the back of his closet.

And then, by that point, he had no other option but to pick up the phone and call Hannibal.

. . . .

Face had parked his car on the street, more out of convenience than anything else, and it should have taken him only a few minutes to hop into the front seat and take off towards the office building Hannibal had suggested they meet at (their conversation had gone surprisingly calmly considering the metaphorical explosions happening around them) but he was waffling, unsure of what to bring with him – if anything – and he groaned, running a hand over his face, wiping the sweat off on his thigh. Pulling a duffel from under his bed, he shoved every weapon he had stored around the apartment – as well as a couple shirts and underwear – into it’s gaping hole and he zipped it shut, shouldering the now over thirty pound weight and not thinking to lock the door behind him.

He passed by one of his neighbors, an elderly gentleman who stopped to speak to him, to ask if he had seen what happened, to ask if he knew what exactly was going on but Face just shook his head, giving one sentence responses, shifting the bag from one arm to the other, bending sideways as the strap dug into his skin and pulled him down.

Outside was eerily quiet. Or, to be more exact, it was quieter than he was used to it being around this time, when the sidewalks would normally be packed by well-dressed men and women, just heading out for what Face thought he would be doing when he woke up this morning. Instead, there were only one or two scattered people, dressed sloppily and with a look of desperation, as if they had left their lofts and houses not knowing why they had done so or where they were supposed to be going in the first place. Face considered talking to one of them but he didn’t know where it would get him so he did his best to ignore their swaying and shuffling and floundering and jogged to his car, still pristine tires pushed against the curb.

He didn’t have to – he never had to – but he made sure to carefully open the driver’s side door, leaning over to toss his bag on the passenger seat floor, taking a moment to catch his breath and stretch the muscles in his arm. When he glanced up, he jumped slightly, not expecting a dirty-blonde haired woman to be standing just opposite him, staring, all wide-eyed and shaken. Neither of them spoke and, just as he was about to open his mouth and inquire if she was alright, she murmured:

“Take me with you.”

Face was, for lack of better words, momentarily stunned.

“But you don’t know where I’m going.”

“I don’t care. I need to leave.”

“You know, it won’t be any better wherever I’m going than it is right here,” despite being titled – amongst his team, at least – one of the best con-men to walk on solid ground (Face had requested if that meant there was a better con-man who could walk on water to which Hannibal only made a face that warned him not to go there) Face did appreciate the occasional instance of honesty.

“Where’re you going?” She seemed harmless enough, but instinct told him that specifics at this point were only a small part of the enemy.

“I’m not leaving the city,” he said. Not yet.

“You’re not? What’re you, crazy?”

Face couldn’t help but laugh. If he had a dollar for every time somebody asked him that…

“Probably. Look—” he started but she shook her head and lifted a hand, palm straight against the air.

“Don’t. I get it. I just thought I’d try,” she watched him sit, watched him jam the keys into the ignition and listened as the engine rumbled and whirred, “good luck,” she said, slowly wiggling her fingers in a goodbye that was only shared between two people who cared a lot about each other but didn’t want to admit how upset they were that they were separating.

“Thanks.”

. . . .

Face stopped counting at the twenty-first police car he passed in five minutes. The roads were packed, cars attempting to make turns onto closed streets, men exiting their vehicles to argue with the police officers, women and children cowering with fear and embarrassment in the passenger and back seats, trying to get their husbands, their fathers, their grandfathers, to just get back in the car. He clutched tighter on the steering wheel and glanced at his watch. They hadn’t set a definite time but Face knew Hannibal wasn’t going to just hang around forever, he wasn’t the kind of guy who would just stand there, arms crossed, chomping on his cigar and waiting. He should have, in retrospect, expected this. It wasn’t like he would have been the only person to think they could get out while there was still a chance.

He hadn’t been paying attention and nearly sped through a red light, jamming his foot on the brake just in time, tires jumping over the white line and he exhaled heavily, letting out a small sound of annoyance when he saw a police officer leave his post on the corner to meander in his direction.

“Everything alright?” he had a thick, distracting moustache and a round stomach, his hat to one side, belt crooked as if he had woken up from his day off and was told to get his ass into work. Face raised his eyebrows vaguely and blinked. Was everything alright. The officer seemed to get it and his mouth twitched. “You almost ran the light.”

“But I didn’t,” Face reminded him.

“No, you didn’t. But watch yourself,” he said, eyeing the light which had only just clicked to green. Somebody behind Face leaned on their horn but quickly halted when the policeman turned and pointed, “we don’t need another accident.”

“Another…?” Face began but the officer pounded with a flat hand on his trunk, which was his silent way of telling Face to get a move-on. Face saluted slightly and rolled away, only thinking to peek into his rearview mirror once he had driven a block or two. The officer had disappeared but Face had no reason to think it was for any other reason than he had somewhere else to be.

. . . .

The building was pale stone, tinted windows and a single door, which was exactly the kind of place that Hannibal found perfect to meet, but that Face had always said made it a little too obvious sometimes (not that Hannibal ever listened). He hadn’t realized he was looking for the van until he couldn’t find it but he parked around the corner anyway and had to double-back because he had forgotten his bag. The last thing he needed was to leave all his guns out in the open where people would have no problem in snatching them up, thinking they knew what to do with them. He leaned against the door, expecting it to just fall open and take him with it but he faltered when it wouldn’t budge. Without seeing if this was even the correct building or perhaps that he could pick the lock because he didn’t suspect there would be any kind of difficult security, he grabbed onto the knob and shook, as if that would be enough to force it loose.

“Dammit, Hannibal,” he said loudly, stomping a foot and facing towards the street, a woman with her window down giving him a strange look as she traveled by. Face nearly had a heart-attack when he turned around to see Hannibal standing, completely serious, on the other side of the glass. He was beginning to get really tired of people sneaking up on him today. Hannibal turned his head to one side and narrowed his eyes and Face mimicked him, signaling towards the lock. Hannibal nodded and fumbled with it eventually, finally, pulling the door open just enough for Face to squeeze inside. “What was that for?”

“You can’t be too cautious,” Hannibal said, not stopping to say anything more, giving Face no choice but to follow him down a hallway into a small room off to the right that was packed with unused tables and chairs coated with layers of dust. B.A. was sitting on the edge of one of the tables, perched as if he was waiting for it to collapse and he only dimly smiled at Face who waved. Murdock was nowhere to be found. “What’s in the bag?”

Face dropped it on the ground with a heavy thunk.

“Exactly what you think I’d have in there,” Face sighed, “I don’t like this. This… this isn’t the kind of stuff we’re used to dealing with here.”

Hannibal crossed his arms, “I’m aware. Doesn’t mean we still can’t have a plan.”

“Here we go,” B.A. grumbled, mouth twisting into a frown, “what we need to do,” he said, “is get the hell outta here before it gets any worse.” Face put his hands on his hips and tilted his chin upwards.

“I have to agree with the big guy here, Hannibal. I mean, we’ve got the means to defend ourselves but don’t you think…”

Face was interrupted by a smash, the tinkling of broken glass hitting a concrete floor and they all looked to one another before staring out into the hall. Hannibal tensed, B.A. moved to his feet, squaring his shoulders, fists clenching and Face crouched, unzipping his duffel as quietly as he possibly could, grabbing the first gun he could, feeling cold against his fingers. He glimpsed at Hannibal, as if awaiting his approval to react but Hannibal held up a finger and they waited.

The seconds passed by like hours and Face barely moved, his chest aching as he held his breath, knees sore from keeping in the same awkward position. There was a thud, thud, thud like someone was walking with only one workable leg, the other dragging like a wet rag behind them and it was followed by more feet, thundering and tapping and heavy breathing and Face stood, pulling the shotgun up to his shoulder, swallowing and taking a small step towards the door. Hannibal reached out though, holding him back, shaking his head and Face wasn’t in the position to protest, watching as B.A. stepped out in front, pushing a large hand against the wooden door, letting it swing gradually, quietly.

Face’s grip tightened but nothing happened. He could still feel Hannibal’s hand on his arm, lightly touching him, ready to seize harder in case he tried to be too much of a hero. There was a screech, a ghastly, lung squeezing, stomach churning screech and a thin, bony woman, hair greasy and falling out appeared from nowhere, launching herself towards B.A. and B.A. instinctively reached out, slamming a fist squarely in her face, bringing his hand back covered in dark blood, a tooth sticking out between his knuckles. He growled and grimaced, shaking his arm until it fell out and rolled away. The woman bounced back up, her jaw off-kilter and undeniably broken but she tried to make sounds anyway, the noise coming out gargled and shredded. Face didn’t think, barely flinched and, taking in a shaky inhale, shot her clean in the head.

She dropped faster than anybody could snap their fingers and Face gaped, lowering his weapon, disbelief that he had even done that without any other kind of consideration. He could hear the others coming, could hear Hannibal pulling firearms out of his bag, tossing one to B.A. and keeping one or two for himself but Face was stuck, his arms and feet full of lead. Hannibal grabbed his shoulder and shook him until they were gazing at one another.

“It’s not the first time you killed someone, Lieutenant,” he said, moving his cigar to the other side of his mouth and Face studied his eyes, searching, somewhere for any kind of disquietude, agitated at how collected he appeared to be. Face could feel the ‘yeah, but…’ on the tip of his tongue but he didn’t have time to say it because Hannibal was pushing him out of the room, commanding him to fire, to run and Face did both because when Hannibal told him to do something he sure as hell was going to do it.

A hand – fingers long and gnarled, nails yellow and broken – flailed towards his face and, somehow, Face managed to duck out of their path, spinning and delivering a perfect blast to the back of his head, blood spraying across his once clean white shirt. Somehow, they managed to make it outside, Hannibal getting what was, hopefully, the final infected (for now) and they paused on the sidewalk, out of breath, their pulses racing. Hannibal approached Face, placing a gloved hand first on his chest and then on his shoulder.

“Take your car,” he said, “and go pick up Murdock.”

. . . .

It was on fire.

Or, at least, it had been on fire. By the time that Face managed to arrive at the VA hospital, not bothering to make sure he was evenly parked, the building was smoky and black, windows burst open from the inside, singed curtains floating in the breeze, and areas of the structure were still smoldering, the yellow-orange of flames swaying and lifting. People inside were shouting, wailing, and it was like whatever was happening in there was in an entirely different universe as to what was going on anywhere else.

Face tentatively crossed the street, making his way up the steps, almost colliding with a nurse who fell into his arms as she went sprinting out the front door. She gave him a wild-eyed look, red hair every which-way and she clung to him for a moment, just breathing before shaking her head and wriggling away, tripping over her own feet as she stumbled down the slight incline and down the sidewalk, disappearing into somebody’s backyard.

The door was wide open and he stood completely still once in the lobby, just taking everything in, hands clammy and his grip on the gun he had forgotten he was holding marginally slipping. There was paper of every kind scattered along the brown tiled floors, bottles of medication, some still completely full, littered and melting under the heavy heat and Face undid his top button.

Murdock, he reminded himself, he was here for Murdock.

He had the layout memorized, knowing exactly which way to turn and he forwent the elevator, jogging up the stairs, nearly falling over a body that was definitely uninfected and completely human and he jolted back, thought about leaning down to make sure he was alive but there wasn’t time, he had an objective, so he leapt over the corpse, taking the rest of the stairs three at a time until he had reached Murdock’s floor.

Pandemonium was really the only word to describe it. Patients were everywhere, hiding in corners, running in circles, some of them attempting to battle with the infected and more than once Face lifted his arms, ready to help but it was always too late and there were too many. Even if he got two there would be three more waiting around a corner and it was overwhelming. He ran down the hallway, passing by the check-in desk, not listening as a doctor, still doing his job, rushed after Face, asking who exactly he thought he was.

Murdock’s door was tightly shut and Face banged on it repeatedly, shouting in through the little, barred window, calling for his friend and his heart dropped to his stomach for a minute when he wasn’t getting an answer but then Murdock popped up from nowhere and the relief that washed over his face was palpable.

“Face,” he said quietly. His forehead was dotted with sweat, his eyes large, pupils concentrated and dark. He unlocked the door, squeezing outside and practically throwing himself into Face’s arms, not giving it a second thought as he wrapped an arm around Face’s waist, using the other hand to grab onto his shoulder, “I knew you’d come for me.” Face should have said something but all he could do was shake his head and smile just a little. The doctor caught up to them, winded and flustered.

“Who the hell— where do you think you’re going?” and Face wasn’t entirely sure who the doctor was speaking directly to but he retaliated anyway.

“I have to get him out of here,” and he could have come up with something better than that but he was in a rush and it was all he could manage to scramble out. Murdock was still embracing him like any second now the two of them would go sailing out the window on a vine and Face thought about lying, about telling the doctor he worked for some form of the government or other – he didn’t have his badge but he felt as if anybody would have believed him in this situation – but, in the end, there was no point. The doctor was beginning to get angrier and he moved closer, stretching out his arms in an attempt to pry Murdock away from Face and Murdock slapped the doctor’s hand. “I’m sorry about this,” Face said to the now perplexed man and, without another word, Face curled his hand into a fist and let it collide precisely with the doctor’s nose. Blood gushed and the doctor stumbled backwards, out of it, cursing and in pain and Murdock grinned.

“My hero.”

“We really do have to go,” Face said, pushing on Murdock’s arms, “you have to let go of me, Murdock.” Murdock frowned but complied and the two of them went bolting down the halls and the stairs but skid to a complete stop in the lobby, frozen at the sight of a swarm of the infected that was advancing (and where the hell were they coming from?), making a beeline towards the hospital and, more specifically, towards everyone still alive inside.

“Backdoor,” Murdock said, finally noticing Face’s gun as they spun around, making the journey to the rear of the building, “Hey. Hey, Faceman. You bring me one of those?”

“No.”

“Man,” Murdock complained, tsk-ing and gently moving his head back and forth. They exited out into the parking lot where a single infected man was perched atop somebody’s car, digging at the metal, and it was difficult to tell from where they were if there was even anybody inside the vehicle. The man noticed them, twisting, bouncing on his heels, head bobbing from one side to the other as he tried to comprehend what he was seeing. Murdock was whispering under his breath and Face hadn’t even noticed he had stuck an arm out to keep Murdock from going any further until he felt Murdock leaning against him.

The man jumped down, ankles cracking and, like he had been electrocuted, practically flew in their direction and Face shot him in the leg just to slow him down, exhaling a shuddery breath as he watched him jolt with the impact, bending backwards as the bones in both his thighs pulverized, but he persevered. Murdock was still mumbling, faster and faster, words meshing together to sound like gibberish and Face waited for the man to get just a few steps closer before distributing the kill shot. Face still couldn’t get used to it and he licked his lips, mouth dry, and he felt a hand rest on his shoulder, right by his neck. Murdock’s hand was warm and careful and Face just let it sit there as he allowed a moment for the fog in his head to clear. Saying nothing, he just kept going, listening for Murdock behind him, pausing so he could catch up. They laid flat against the outside wall of the building, peeking around the corner at the diminishing hoard of the undead and it was then or never and, giving himself a few encouraging words, Face darted out into the open, assuring both of them that they would make it to the car alive.

Despite their best efforts, they attracted attention and Face caught Murdock as he stumbled, holding onto his wrist the rest of the way just to keep themselves in synch and Murdock jumped into the backseat, getting his footprints all over the leather but, for once, Face didn’t care. He fumbled with the keys, hands uncharacteristically quavering – most likely out of adrenaline – and he went to a complete stand still when the unmistakable shot from a pistol went whizzing past his head, making his ears ring and he shifted his eyes past his own shoulder, unwilling to move anything else, just in time to see an infected woman plummet to the pavement. He gawked at Murdock who still had the weapon raised and resting against his knee, mouth hanging open, brow furrowed and Face had seen that look too many times; it was one that showed just a few minutes before Murdock was about to completely lose it so Face patted him on the chest a few times, finally turning the key in the ignition and speeding away down the pleasant, tree-lined street.

. . . .

“Your shirt,” Murdock said later, once they had pulled into a seemingly abandoned gas station to gather themselves before finding Hannibal and B.A.. Face was reclining against the car door, Murdock walking around to stand in front of him, inspecting the article of clothing, reaching out to touch at it, staring at his fingers as if he expected the red to still be wet. Face didn’t say anything. “You don’t look so good, Faceman.”

“I don’t?”

“You’re lookin’ a little green around the gills if you get what I’m sayin’.”

“I’m fine.”

“Funny thing,” Murdock said, “I don’t believe you.” He flopped down next to Face, copying his stance right down to how far apart his feet were from each other. “This is like those monster films that they make us watch at the hospital every Friday.”

“Oh, really.” Face inspected Murdock’s profile until he stared back at him, their eyes locking. “Any suggestions?” Murdock put a finger to his lips as he thought, peering up at the sky, regarding Face again after a moment of silence.

“Just keep doin’ what we’re doin’.”

“Of course,” Face said, returning his gaze back to the road, watching as a truck trundled by, one of it’s rear wheels deflated. “This is really happening,” Face heard himself say. Murdock put an arm around him and squeezed.

“This is really happening,” he agreed.

. . . .

Face finally thought to check the clock that sat, snug and a couple minutes too fast (something he always meant to fix), on the dash and was surprised to see that only three and a half hours had passed since he had packed up and abandoned the apartment that was never really his in the first place but some doctor named Jerry Something who was somewhere off in another country, probably a lot better off than Face currently was. Either that, or it hit there too and he was dead.

He kind of liked to think the guy was out by the beach, fixing broken bones when he had to, sipping on fruity beverages when he wasn’t saving lives.

Murdock was sitting next to him instead of behind and the trip back to the city (and really, if either of them had enough sense between them, they’d be going in the opposite direction) was spent mostly in an awkward but pleasant sullenness (unexpected from Murdock, whom he thought would be rambling non-stop, just like he always did when he was stuck in circumstances he didn’t know how to control). They proceeded past far too many abandoned cars, some of them beaten and trashed, flung into telephone poles, mailboxes and fences, all the others intact but utterly empty, as if the drivers had just given up and decided they’d get farther by walking. This was spreading faster than Face thought anybody could have predicted.

They were less than half a mile away from the city limits when they could already see the flashing red and blue lights, spinning and blinking, casting an odd glow on the trees in the slowly fading twilight. Face reduced his speed to a modest forty and bent forward over the steering wheel, squinting ahead of them, attempting to figure out exactly what was going on. They were five feet away before he finally understood: it was a road-block. He flashed back to the so many times before that he and the others had just ran through one of these but this time he wasn’t in the van. This time it was just him and Murdock.

And this time, there were more than twenty cars, parked at angles, lining the street on both sides, gaps filled in with standing people and orange cones. He stopped because he had no choice and he and Murdock sat there for what felt like forever, just waiting for one of the officers to acknowledge them and offer an explanation without them having to ask for one. Eventually, a thin officer with wisps of damp, red hair sticking out from under his hat began walking over, hand on his gun, just in case and Face didn’t blame him.

“You can’t come in,” the officer said, as if they were hovering on his front doorstep.

“Can’t come in?” Face parroted, not knowing how else to properly respond. The officer made sure to keep a couple feet away from Face’s vehicle, his partner – a broad shouldered man – keeping a very close eye on him.

“No civilian vehicles are to enter or leave the city at this time,” the policeman replied, speaking in a monotone like he was struggling to remember what his superior had practically seared into his brain just in case he ran into this situation. Face glanced to Murdock but Murdock was too busy glowering at the officer to notice.

“Look,” Face tried, “our friends are still in there. We have to—”

“I’m sorry, sir. But you’re gonna just have to turn back around.”

He and Murdock probably could take them, Face hypothesized. Just a few jabs to the stomach, to the kidney, to the nose and they could get through them, they could run the rest of the way if they had to because the last thing Face was going to do was leave Hannibal and B.A. stranded (not that they’d be entirely helpless, Face admitted. It had more to do with a sense of loyalty than anything else). Face knew that Murdock would do anything that Face told him to, would jump on anybody’s back and beat them senseless if Face gave him the okay. Maybe, Face thought even further, they could get into the city if they got arrested.

“Sir?” The policeman said, concern in the back of his throat, reminding him that they were all still there and that he had to make a decision.

The steering-wheel spinning madly under his hands, Face pulled on the gearshift and watched the sky-scrapers get smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror.
. . . .

They wound up back at the gas station, mostly out of convenience but also because it was the only place that Face could think of that remained – for now, at least – completely untouched. He felt claustrophobic and cramped and he exited his car, stumbling forwards and doubling over, running hands through his hair and he heard the scuff of Murdock’s sneakers against the pavement, not flinching as he felt Murdock’s hand begin to rub gently against his back. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? It should have been Murdock practically having a panic-attack, Face doing his best to comfort him, to form a plan, to say that everything was going to be okay.

“It’ll be alright, Facey,” Murdock was saying, still moving his hand in circles over Face’s spine and Face felt like he couldn’t breathe, “we’ll figure it out.” This wasn’t right, this wasn’t him, this wasn’t how he reacted to stress. If this was any other mission, he would already have a plan. He found himself drifting back to the news, the images of the anchor being ingested snapping like photos from one of those cheap, red, plastic viewfinders that you could only find at tourist shops in cities that were now probably shut down too. This wasn’t any other mission. This wasn’t a bigger guy picking on the smaller guy. This was prey versus a myriad of predators, with no definite win at the end.

Face swallowed back bile, sour and acid dripping down his throat and he straightened, brushing invisible wrinkles from his rolled-up sleeves, doing his best to act as if what just happened never actually did.

“Let’s find a phone,” he said, heading for the single story building that served as nothing but a space to put a cash register, a display of a few over-priced maps and a fridge that clunked and rattled behind the counter. The heavy glass door was unlocked and there was nobody inside, not even a sign that there had been anybody in there for a very long time and Face made straight for the black phone attached by rusty screws to the faded, wallpapered walls. Murdock busied himself by flipping through the maps, trying to locate their whereabouts, dragging a finger along roads and random red lines. Face knew the mobile phone number by heart, the one they had installed in B.A.’s van once they began getting more requests, and he dialed it hurriedly, having to hang up twice before he managed to not screw it up, fingers sticking and slipping in his haste.

“Pick up, pick up,” he mumbled, drumming his fingers on the flat surface and then picking at the tape that was still stuck from placards that had long since been taken down.

“I’m sorry,” said a robotic, feminine voice from the other end, “but the number you are trying to reach is out of service.” Face felt his cheeks flush red and he slammed the receiver back down to it’s cradle, repeating the gesture a few more times for good measure. First they couldn’t get into the city and now their only means of communication was dead. Murdock hopped over the counter and put an arm tentatively around Face’s shoulders, seizing his wrist to make him stop. Face hated himself in that moment for unraveling so quickly. He was a solider, Hannibal’s second-in-command. He was Templeton Peck, for Christ’s-sake. So what the hell was going on?

“What happened?” Murdock belatedly queried, letting go and balancing on the edge of the counter, toes just brushing against the floor.

“Out of service,” Face said, tucking his hands deep into his pockets, fingertips brushing against the lonely two shotgun shells he had forgotten were in there and it clicked: he had left his arsenal with Hannibal. He and Murdock were just two guys with a shotgun and a pistol, four shells hiding in the barrel of one, fourteen clean bullets biding their time in the other. “I’m sure they’re fine,” Face chuckled lightly, “just… out of service.” It was getting darker and darker by the minute, the sun sinking like it couldn’t leave fast enough and even if Face came up with a workable plan in the next couple hours, there was no way they could follow through with it until morning.

Morning, which was still over ten hours away. They needed to find somewhere to hide, somewhere to sleep until then and normally this was his forte, this was where he towered above the rest, but these were extenuating circumstances. The closest motel could already be overrun. It could be shut down. It could be full. It could…

“You’re thinking too hard,” Murdock said and Face looked at him, really looked at him and it was obvious he was distressed, just two wrong words away from cracking and Face could virtually feel Murdock containing himself, like a rubber-band pulled around a too-tall stack of newspapers. Face was going to ask him why he was bothering, it was just the two of them, but then Murdock just smiled lightly and Face got the idea.

“Not thinking hard enough,” Face disagreed, sighing, “we have to find a way to get into the city without arriving…”

“In body bags?” Murdock suggested. Face raised an eyebrow.

“I was going to say ‘in handcuffs’ but, yeah, those too.”

“We’ll come up with somethin’, Face,” not ‘you’, we. Murdock yawned and stretched and Face wondered how in the world he could be tired this early, especially with everything they just went through.

“I’m glad you think so.” A street lamp flipped on and then fizzled out a few moments later, it’s companions following suit, only a few remaining dim and buzzing. The blinding white lights surrounding the station turned on without warning as if they had been on some kind of timer and Face searched around for a switch because the last thing they needed was for some people traveling by to think they were open for business. “Help me find a…” and he moved his finger up and down, not being able to find the correct word but Murdock seemed to get it and jumped down, looking everywhere a switch probably wouldn’t be. Face rolled his eyes and made his way to a door in the back, a hand-written ‘employees only’ sign nailed to the cracked, blue-painted wood. He jiggled the falling apart knob, hands on his hips in frustration when it wouldn’t budge. He tried again, straining as he pulled harder, the rust rubbing his palms raw and, finally, sluggishly, it grated against the bare floor and opened.

The smell was so awful Face fell backwards against a shelf, arm immediately darting over his nose and mouth but it was too late, he had already gotten a face-full and his eyes watered. A single light-bulb swung from the ceiling of the small room and Face didn’t have to go any further inside to know what that stench was from. His stomach churned with heavy threats and it had been years since he had been this close to a dead body in this stage of decay and he heaved, turning away, only just making it to an almost full garbage can (mostly papers, bottles and leftover food containers like the person had just holed himself inside here and vowed to never leave) and Murdock was finally walking over, asking what was the matter, pushing closer towards the room and Face wiped his mouth, spitting onto a still half-full soda can and stuck out his arm, waving it with a silent no.

“Don’t, Murdock,” but Murdock had already gone so far or perhaps he hadn’t heard him because he was making noises of mixed disgusted and shock and just standing there in the doorway and Face joined him, the two of them squeezed into the entryway. Murdock took off his hat, pressing it to his chest and Face could feel him vibrating.

“What…” Murdock started, pointing a finger at it like he thought maybe he was the only one seeing it.

“Come on,” Face began walking away, realizing that Murdock wasn’t following and tapping him a few times until he turned, moving his hand in ‘let’s get away from there’ gesture. They went back to the counter, but Face couldn’t stop staring, the light still swinging, catching glimpses of red and green and tan bones. It didn’t make sense – not that anything really made sense anymore; if the patient had only escaped, as the news anchor (he blinked and could only see her, falling out of her chair and he vigorously shook his head) had reported, then who was the dead guy? “He’s been there at least a few days,” Face said. Murdock didn’t retaliate. “You alright?”

“I… I had a bowl of cereal this morning.”

“…Okay.” Face just let him go where he was going. He learned a long time ago (a lesson that B.A. never did quite pass) that it was easier to just let his stream of thought flow without rocks in the way.

“I had a bowl of cereal with milk. It was something sweet, covered in sugar.”

“What’s so terrible about that?”

“What’s so…” Murdock launched, hooking his fingers in Face’s collar and Face didn’t try to pull away, “I never eat sugary cereal. I eat cornflakes. And I never put milk in it.”

“You eat cornflakes without milk?”

“You’re not listening,” Murdock shook Face, tugging him a bit closer, “I had a bowl of sugary cereal with milk and… and…”

“Murdock. If you’re suggesting that you having a breakfast you would normally never eat is the cause of the world ending…” the world ending. Where the hell had that come from? Murdock let Face go, but didn’t move out of his personal space.

“It’s not a cause. It’s a symptom.”

“I still don’t think I’m getting it.”

“Me neither.”

“Right.”

“What’re we gonna do about…” Murdock nodded his head at the room, “that?”

“There’s nothing we can do. We don’t even know who he is or why he’s here how he died or… you get the point. God,” he dragged a hand over his face, rubbing his eyes, “I know what you’re going to say. He probably has family, right?”

“Everyone has family,” Murdock said solemnly.

“I don’t,” Face said, mesmerized for a moment by the light-bulb’s back and forth, back and forth, his internal voice, a whisper in the back of his head, accidentally spitting out. Eyes wide with embarrassment, he peeked at Murdock who looked genuinely upset, a mixture of concern and sympathy.

“Sure you do. You’ve got Hannibal and B.A.,” he paused to blink, his jaw set, eyes softening, “and me. You’ll always have me.”

“Thanks,” Face went to go around the other side of the counter to check outside the abnormally large windows to make sure that nobody was lurking around, to make sure his car was inconspicuous enough for any cruising policeman but Murdock stopped him as he tried to brush past, holding his arm, and Face peered down at Murdock’s hand before looking back up at his face.

“I mean it, Faceman,” and, for just a couple seconds, Face thought that Murdock was going to try and kiss him and Face wasn’t sure what it meant when he realized he wouldn’t say no if it happened. But Murdock let go and stepped aside and Face laughed nervously, going to do exactly what he had planned to all along.

Nothing. He should have been more relived than he actually was that they were still okay but the desolation was enough to make his skin crawl. It was heading, he checked his watch, for 10pm and, sooner or later, they would have to figure out somewhere to rest until it got light out again. The overt choice would be to just stay where they were; they could camp out behind the counter, remain unseen to anyone moving by and the lack of curtains would prove to be the exact wake-up call they would need to keep them from oversleeping (if, in fact, any sleeping got done). He explained this to Murdock who told him he could find no faults in the plan whatsoever.

“Maybe one of us should stay awake, keep a look-out,” Face suggested once the two of them had seated themselves on the concrete floor, backs propped up against the bottom of the formica counter, “I’ll do it,” he offered when Murdock lazily yawned.

“We should split,” Murdock said, “you take the first and then you wake me up for the next one.”

“Sure,” Face watched as Murdock got up, turning the lights off to make it easier for one of them to drift off and he sat back down, hustling nearer so their shoulders and legs were touching. Face stared outside and still, there was nothing. It was going to be a long night.

. . . .

Face awoke to a startlingly bright beam of sunlight burning into his left eye. He took a moment to really open his eyes, instantly feeling the stiffness in his back that he would probably not get rid of for the rest of the day. His head had fallen sometime during his sleep and was resting heavily on Murdock’s chest and he could tell that Murdock was awake because he could feel his arms tensing and loosening as he moved his hands in his lap. He didn’t recall falling asleep, nor did he remember waking Murdock up at any point to take over the watch. He finally sat up, twisting his neck to work the soreness out of it.

“Mornin’,” Murdock said softly.

“Yeah. I don’t…” Face began and Murdock gave him a sidelong glance and a small smile.

“You fell asleep almost twenty minutes after I turned the lights off. You were out,” he put his hand flat, horizontal, and slid it across the air, “like that,” he snapped his fingers, “I stayed up, made sure you didn’t get eaten in your sleep.”

“You stayed up… all night?” What was he, insa— well, yes, he was.

“Not a big deal,” Murdock shrugged, “I do it all the time.”

“You do?”

Murdock gazed off at somewhere in the distance before looking down at his lap, “nightmares,” he responded, barely above a whisper, thinking that Face didn’t hear him (but he most certainly did).

“Oh, well. Thanks. For letting me sleep.”

“Sure,” and Murdock was looking at him in that way again where he might just lean over and… and Murdock rose to his feet, thrusting his arms over his head and letting out a loud roar as he stretched. Face followed, but didn’t make as big of a show out of it and he rolled his shoulders, studying the area around them as if he had expected it to change when he wasn’t looking. But everything was relatively normal. The boxes were still stacked, the maps still lopsided in their stands, and the body was still melting in the room just a few feet away from them.

His stomach growled, suddenly very aware that it had been since lunchtime yesterday when it last ate, any remainder of digested food sitting in the bottom of a trash can. Face eyed the fridge, still whirring and thudding in it’s little corner and took in a deep breath.

“Let’s see what we’ve got here,” he said, yanking on the door, the light taking a bit too long to flicker on and Face wrinkled his nose, the only thing inside that probably wasn’t covered in mold was a large, gallon jug of water the he carefully removed, setting it down on the counter, checking to see if anywhere were any kind of cups. Of course not. He did his best to lift it, wiping off the lip before putting it tentatively to his mouth and he managed to get enough that he didn’t accidentally spill and drown himself. He called Murdock over – and lord knows what he had been doing in the meantime – and offered him the container.

“Now what?” Murdock inquired once he was finished and Face exhaled like he was a balloon somebody was letting the air out of. He had hoped that maybe a plan would come to him as he dreamt but he hadn’t been that lucky, his mind drifting, once again to vague metaphors of his childhood. The fact that he could understand them worried him.

“If we’re lucky, there could be new policemen. I could try to convince them I’m from the government but if they’re being overly cautious… of course, we could also try to find another way into the city that might not be as guarded as the direct route but…” Face felt like slamming his head against the nearest wall. There were too many strings and not enough hands to hold them all. Any of his ideas required three or more people to accomplish and he had to keep reminding himself that this was it, just him and crazy Murdock (Dammit, he was better at this. He was the best. How could he be slipping this quickly?).

“We could pretend to be infected,” Murdock said and Face bit his lip to hold back his laughter.

“We’d get shot on sight if they believed us, Murdock. No, we have to find a way in either completely invisible or right under their noses.” They lapsed into silence until Murdock slowly pulled out a devilish grin.

“I’ve got an idea.”

. . . .

“You sure about this?” Face asked, hand resting on the receiver of the black phone, finger poised on the ‘9’ button, thumb ready to follow it quickly with two ‘1’s. Murdock nodded and Face cleared his throat, taking a moment to gather himself and get into character. “Okay,” he said more to himself than Murdock and he pressed the phone to his ear, listening to the dial tone.

“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?” He was surprised that anybody answered, expecting them to be busier, machines filled with people from across the county phoning in, thinking they could get assistance from a higher authority, “hello?”

“Yes, yes, hello?” Face strained his voice, put on heavy breathing, adding an edge that either sounded like he had just finished crying or that he was just about to start, “I… I… oh god, oh god…” Murdock gave him a double thumbs-up.

“Sir? Sir, just calm down and explain what happened.”

“Okay. Okay… there’s… there’s a body here.”

“A body, sir?”

“Yes, a body,” Face whined, “I think… I think it’s been here awhile. He’s… oh god, oh god,” he started to lose control and snorted when Murdock tried to signal him to turn it down a bit, “he’s got bite marks all over him. I think he’s moving oh god, you have… you have to help me!”

“Alright, sir, calm down. What’s your name?”

“My name? My… uh… Ethan. Ethan Harding.”

“Alright Ethan, where are you?”

“I’m… I’m at a gas station just a few miles outside the city. Brightstar Gas Station. You have to help me, please,” he cried into the phone, letting out a hopeless wail and Murdock cringed at how real it sounded. The woman asked him to stay on the line but he told her it wasn’t such a good idea, that he had to go and then he hung up.

Murdock applauded politely and Face bowed slightly, tilting his head downwards, sweeping one arm out to the side. All they could do now was wait and, if they were holding any aces at all, the station would actually send somebody out instead of offering false reassurance and that it would only be a single car. In the free time that they had between making the call and hanging tight until their knights in shining armor decided to show, Face went outside, moving his car so it looked as if it hadn’t been sitting there since yesterday while Murdock busied himself by running through the inside, making as much of a mess as he could to make it look like there had been some kind of struggle.

Face sat on a heavy plastic box outside the front door, smelling gasoline and the faint whiff of possible oncoming rain and Murdock paced in front of him, hands behind his back like a professor preparing to give a lecture.

“It’s a good plan,” Face told him and Murdock went to a standstill.

“You think so?”

“Better than anything I was coming up with, that’s for sure.”

“Aw, shucks,” Murdock waved a hand at Face and smiled sheepishly and Face snickered. He wondered how long this good mood was going to last (or, ‘good’ in the sense that it was minimally better than it had been) and figured that, as long as things kept going their way, he would have some kind of faith that they would get out of this intact.

A car siren broke their silence and they stood, heading for the side of the building, hiding themselves, readying to start and quickly finish the second part of their three part plan. A single police car came tearing down the road, making a sharp turn into the gas station, tires squealing as the driver pressed roughly down on the brakes. Two men eventually exited, hands already holding their guns and it was just a few steps closer and Face jumped out first, latching onto the bigger of the two and he began hitting, delivering punches wherever he could, counting on the man’s surprise as leverage. A fist collided with his side and he let out a rush of air just as Murdock leapt out of the shadows to tackle the second man, wrestling the gun from his grip and pointing it back at it’s owner. With Face’s guy distracted, he sent a final blow to his jaw and borrowed his weapon.

“What the hell are you doing!” Murdock’s man exclaimed, holding onto his hat, eyes furious.

“Sorry,” Face said, “we had to,” and he bent over, pounding the butt of the gun into the side of his head, knocking him out cold, watching as Murdock did the same. “Come on.” With some over-exerted effort, they dragged the two men inside, Murdock apologizing for them again after they had stripped them of their uniforms and locked them away in the same room as the corpse (that was really more a puddle than anything else).

Face’s fit almost too perfectly but Murdock’s was just a little too big – not that Face was surprised that much – but he knew that it didn’t matter since they would be shedding them as soon as they passed into the midst of towering buildings and winding streets. Face thought about trying the mobile phone again but knew he’d only get agitated if there was still no response.

Before they left, Face went back to his car, staring longingly, promising that they’d come back for it once they were finished and, tucking his shotgun under his arm, the policeman’s handgun in his belt, he joined Murdock in the other car, the interior smelling of sweat and leather.

“Now, here comes the hard part,” Face said, putting the car first in reverse and then drive, making sure to not go too fast so he had some time to think about what to say.

. . . .

Approaching the roadblock was like stepping into a tank of water that may or may not have had sharks swimming just at the bottom. Murdock kept assuring him, giving him encouraging nods and Face wanted to tell him that it wasn’t actually helping, just putting added pressure on the already boiling pot and he inhaled through his nose, rolling down his window in anticipation, fingers crossed that the car number wasn’t recognizable, cursing himself that he hadn’t thought of attempting to change it before they shoved off. But nobody questioned them. No one asked who they were or where they had come from or why they had seen a car with the same license plate go by earlier with different people inside. A couple worn-out looking men in blue picked up the orange cones to let them by and Face almost felt refreshed (a voice just in his ear kept telling him it was too good to be true but he promptly told it to shut the hell up).

Apparently, this was all just the calm before the storm.

Face slowed to a crawl and all he could do was looked out the windshield in horror. The streets were crammed with deserted vehicles, most of them involved in accidents with one another and they drove by one that was practically cut in half by how fast it had driven into a pole. Smoke was billowing out of windows, thick and black, and glass was everywhere, mostly fallen from the very tops of buildings and Face’s throat closed up when the very visible remains of people who had found their only solution to be jumping were splattered on the once clean sidewalks. There was hardly any noise, save for the distant whine of a stuck car horn and the crackle of fire. Something fell off a building behind them and Face pretended that it was just stone.

He felt a hand nudge his, fingers entangling with his own and Murdock was holding his hand and in any other situation before when he’d try this Face would drop it, make him let go but this time he couldn’t find it in himself to pull away. He stopped the car when he realized he couldn’t go any farther and then he just stared.

Yesterday. This had all started yesterday. He rubbed his eyes with his free hand, pinched his skin to make sure he was definitely still awake. It was ludicrous, unreal, that everything could have fallen apart this quickly. It was like they had been gone for weeks, not hours.

“Do you think…” Murdock faltered, “maybe we’re in a parallel universe or something. I read about those a few months ago and…” Face squeezed his hand to make him stop talking, not being able to make any words climb out yet.

“We should…” Face suggested, opening his door, yanking on Murdock a bit to remind him that he had to let go if they were both going to be able to leave the vehicle. He removed his hat, slicking back his hair, throwing everything off that was weighing him down until he was, once again, in his dark pants and blood-splattered shirt. Murdock copied, fishing around in the backseat for his jacket, wrapping it up in his arms instead of putting it on. “This is…” Face said soberly, not finishing the sentence, “here,” he tossed one of the handguns to Murdock, keeping the other to himself, tucked in the back of his pants and he shouldered the shotgun, hoping it would be enough to intimidate so he wouldn’t have to use it.

All Face could recall was where Hannibal had promised they would meet up the day before, when Face had gone to pick up Murdock, and he knew that the chances of them still being there at that specific address were dwindling by the minute but Face wouldn’t put it past Hannibal to pick one spot and defend it with his life.

“Where’re we going?” Murdock was still standing on the other side of the car, hands wringing into the leather of his coat, mouth twisting into a deeper frown and Face wondered if Murdock was seeing this any differently, if, in his head, everything was so much worse.

“1056 East 3rd Street,” Face said, repeating it to himself, under his breath, just to make sure, “that’s where we were supposed to meet Hannibal and B.A..” They started walking, the silence whistling in their ears as they overstepped debris and car parts, “let’s just hope they’re still there.”

. . . .

They were moving past a diner when Murdock requested they stop. Face was confused until Murdock pointed to his stomach and even though Face put out an air of being inconvenienced, he couldn’t deny that he was also ridiculously hungry, something he felt he shouldn’t even be thinking about.

But Murdock had this way of looking at him that made Face want to do what he asked, just so he’d stop with those affectionate eyes and slightly down-turned mouth. He dropped his shoulders and sighed, motioning for Murdock to follow, putting a finger to his lips even though the gesture was most likely unnecessary. A bell still hanging from the door jingled as they opened it and they paused, the inside appearing as if a tornado had whirled through a little while before.

Taking a step forward, Face’s foot slid against something greasy and he took a moment, considering if he really did want to look, peering with only one eye, confirming his worst fear: blood. Swallowing, he moved around it, silently warning Murdock just as the man pushed his heel against something that crunched (but, thankfully, turned out to only be a shard of a broken coffee mug).

“Look, can we just get this over with and get out of here,” Face said, pulling his gun closer to himself, finger rubbing against the trigger, just in case. Murdock disappeared into the kitchen, a few seconds of quiet followed by the loud banging of pots and pans and a clatter of silverware. Face furrowed his brows, “you alright?”

“I’m fine, fine,” Murdock’s voice wandered out from the kitchen, sounding disinterested and distracted. Face could visualize him, staring intently at whatever he was so focused on, waving a hand like Face was standing right next to him. Something – or someone – shifted back by the bathrooms and Face felt his heart begin to race.

“Murdock…” Face yelled.

“Alright, alright, keep your pants on,” Murdock said, appearing behind the counter with a cracked plate stacked with three sandwiches, the fourth already in his teeth, “hope you like ham.”

“I hate ham,” Face said, taking his food anyway, sniffing at it and grimacing before shoving the white bread and pink meat into his mouth.

“I think I saw some roast beef, if you want,” Murdock replied while he chewed, “it smelled… questionable but I’m sure it’s fine. I could…”

“It’s okay.”

“I…”

“Murdock,” Face gripped his shoulder and leaned over, “it’s fine.” Murdock went easily into a smile, stuffing the rest of his first sandwich into his mouth, making Face laugh and spit out crumbs as he watched Murdock attempt to ingest it. They ate the rest in taciturnity, Murdock fishing around in the still-working fridge, drawing out two cans of orange soda. There were more sounds of movement, the feeling of being watched bearing down on them, but they did their best to ignore it. It was just easier that way.

. . . .

Murdock started complaining of a stomachache twenty minutes after they had begun walking again.

“I shouldn’t have eaten that beef,” he whined, rubbing his stomach and pouting.

“I don’t get you, Murdock,” that was, Face realized, an understatement, “you tell me the roast beef smelled… what was the word you used?”

“Questionable.”

“Right. Questionable. You tell me it smells questionable and then you eat it anyway.” Face checked over his shoulder, feeling eyes burning into his spine. But nobody was there.

“I thought maybe it was the body in the kitchen that was… was…” he wiggled his fingers in front of his nose, “affecting my sense of smell.” Face froze, a look of bewilderment flooding over his concern.

“There was a body in the kitchen? Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I don’t know,” Murdock wavered when he finally noticed that Face wasn’t moving alongside him anymore but he refused to twist and meet his friend’s gaze, instead lowering his chin to his chest, eyes averted to his feet, “didn’t think it was worth mentioning.” Face closed the gap between them after a moment of deliberation, finding himself putting a hand on Murdock’s waist.

“Murdock…” Face began, ready to ask him what was wrong (besides the usual) because this wasn’t ordinary. Sure, Murdock had a weird way of handling any kind of situation, stressful or not, but this was just all too… normal. He’d expect this from some regular guy who didn’t know what to do, but not Murdock. He should have invented a character by now, should have been harder to supervise. The words had barely left his mouth when, from just off to the right, from inside a falling apart clothing store, was a monstrous snarl. Face’s solution was to keep marching – and march fast – and it took a moment to shake Murdock out of whatever reverie he had thrown himself into but soon they were both going, their sauntering quickly turning into sprinting.

The growling seemed to pursue them, getting louder and louder the further they felt like they had moved away and Face started to think that, maybe, the sound wasn’t coming from next to them but above. He scanned the tops of the buildings as he ran, nearly tripping over his own feet once or twice, but there was nothing there so, once they had hit a four-way intersection, placing themselves directly in the center, they stopped.

“You do hear that, right?” Face asked urgently and he heard Murdock laugh.

“I hear a lot of things. You’ll have to specify.”

“Growling,” Face breathed.

“Oh, yeah,” Murdock confirmed, “I hear it.” Face wasn’t sure if he should have felt appeased or not.

“I can’t… it’s like it’s coming from everywhere,” Face lamented, bending this way and that as if he could pinpoint exactly where it was coming from.

“Maybe it is.”

“We can’t stay here,” Face said, searching around them, eyes falling on a car that seemed to still be in one piece, “Murdock. You remember how to hotwire one of these things, right?”

“Sure, sure,” and they piled inside, Face taking the passenger seat, fingers wrapping around the handle, knuckles white as he both kept guard out the windows and examined Murdock as he worked. It took him a few tries but he finally got it, the engine sputtering and coughing. Murdock pulled on the gearshift, hitting a car directly behind them as he tried backing out of the awkward angle the car had been left in, tires screeching and the pair wincing as the vehicle protested to the treatment. He eventually straightened it and they began traveling down the dirty street, swerving around any obstacles, speeding up once it seemed they were both free and clear and close to the towering office building Hannibal and B.A. were, hopefully, hiding out in. “See,” Murdock said turning to grin at Face as if he had questioned any outcome other than failure, “piece of cake.”

“Murdock!” Face shouted, pointing ahead of them at a trio of infected that had accumulated over a body and Murdock faced back where he should have been looking, veering, foot hitting the accelerator instead of the brake in his panic and their car collided with something hard and immovable and, because of their momentum, instead of just crashing into a sudden halt, they went flying, the vehicle flipping a few good spins, landing heavily and loudly upside-down on the sidewalk.

Face’s vision momentarily blurred, going dark around the edges. His head was pounding, the seatbelt digging into his skin and he clawed at it, trying to unlock it but he couldn’t find the mechanism. His scalp tingled as his hair brushed against the roof of the car and he convulsed, heart beating so rapidly he could feel it in his feet, his lungs burning.

“Murdock,” he said weakly, only getting a groan in response and he twisted in his seat best he could, blinking the dust out of his watering eyes, trying again, “Murdock,” but Murdock repeated the noise, making a sound like he wanted to respond but just couldn’t, “hold on,” he searched for the button to release him, finding it and pushing furiously, kicking the dash when it wouldn’t work. He was in the middle of trying to squeeze himself out of it when he heard familiar dragging footsteps from a couple feet away. Face would have to have been a certified idiot if he thought that the infected they had worked so hard to avoid wouldn’t abandon their carcass for some fresher meat. He fumbled for his gun but couldn’t find it and going for the one still tucked in his belt was impossible. A broken and bleeding face with an eye falling out of her socket appeared at the fractured windshield.

Murdock moaned gradually and Face reached out to just touch him, wanting to say a lot but not knowing where to start because this was probably it. He wasn’t one for giving up so quickly but he was, once again, blank for ideas and he was just so damn exhausted. He shut his eyes, felt Murdock try to move closer to him and their fingers grazed one another just as the gunshots echoed around them.

Face jumped, watching as the infected woman who had been inspecting them flinched and then fell, blood and brain matter drenching across the glass. Two more shots came soon after, the sound of bodies dropping to pavement filling in the empty spaces and he saw the boots first, Hannibal’s face slowly appearing at his broken window, cigar clenched between his teeth. He pulled it out with his thumb and index finger and sighed.

“Took you long enough,” Hannibal said, smiling, but it didn’t last long as he quietly observed their current condition, “you alright, Lieutenant?”

“I… I think so. I can’t get my seatbelt…” but then he paused, shaking his head, “go help Murdock. I’ll be okay.” Hannibal nodded once and disappeared over to the other side of the vehicle. Face couldn’t see properly so he only listened as Hannibal loosened Murdock from his seat and pulled him out and Face was about to think he was being left there alone when B.A. seemingly showed up from nowhere, “you think you could…” B.A. grunted, yanking on Face’s seatbelt until it finally popped open and then reached his arms inside to drag Face out into a somersault onto his back.

“You should’ve just hit them,” B.A. said, brooding over him before offering a hand to help Face to his feet, a hand which he eagerly accepted, and Face limped slightly as a spasm rocketed through his left leg. B.A. led Face towards an unassuming, grey building, it’s walls made of some kind of rough concrete, allowing him through the door first and directing him to a room just off a narrow corridor, which turned out to be the employee break room. Water and various food items were piled near the sink, the small, short table in the center of the room overtaken by guns, ammo and grenades. Hannibal was standing, arms crossed, leaning against one of the sharp edges of the counter and Murdock was sprawled on the couch, eyes heavy as he rested his head on a pillow. Finding no other place to sit, Face went to the couch, picking up Murdock’s upper half with intent to make him stay up but Murdock took that to just mean he was being moved temporarily and instead lowered back down, replacing the scratchy pillow with Face’s lap and Face couldn’t force himself to move the guy. Hannibal looked like he definitely noticed but he didn’t say anything about it.

“What happened?” Hannibal asked sternly like one of them broke a lamp and he knew they had done it, he just had to know how it happened so he could deliver proper punishment.

“I think we’re okay,” Face said, not answering the query that was asked of him and Hannibal’s eyebrows shot up but Face continued anyway, “no broken bones. I think I twisted my ankle and Murdock,” he glanced down at the man currently trying to get more comfortable on Face’s thighs, “he might have a concussion.” Hannibal blinked, an obvious ‘are you finished?’ look spreading across his face.

“What happened?” He inquired again.

“Where do you want me to start?”

“The beginning.”

“I went to get Murdock and the place was crawling with infected people. We got out and when we tried to get back into the city…”

“The roadblock,” B.A. interrupted and Face concurred.

“We hid out in a gas station a couple miles away. I knew we wouldn’t get anywhere until morning so we stayed there.”

“And how’d you get in?” Hannibal smirked. He always liked to hear about Face’s scams after he had completed them. Sometimes Face got the idea that Hannibal was writing them all down but for what purpose he couldn’t fathom.

“Called the police. Knocked them out and stole their uniforms and car,” Face explained and Hannibal chuckled, “they let us right in.”

“Well, this wasn’t exactly the way I was planning we all meet up again, but it’ll have to do,” Hannibal said, finally diverting his attention to their injuries, “Face, I want you to keep an eye on Murdock, keep him awake, just in case.”

“What’re you gonna do?” But Face knew the answer before he even asked the question.

“I need to come up with a plan.”

. . . .

Hannibal’s plan, it turned out, was strikingly similar to Face’s plan to find them earlier: go outside, get in the van and make a run for it, hopefully not getting ambushed along the way. And, if they were? It was as simple as one, two, bang. Face had agreed that, really, it was their only option and that anything more convoluted would just leave them in a worse predicament but Hannibal seemed to be in such a rush to put it into action and Face wasn’t sure how ready he was to just leave.

“You’ve been hiding out in here, safe, with every weapon we ever owned,” Face said, speaking in hushed tones to Hannibal, who had been on his way to hand a box of bullets the length of his middle finger to B.A. who was loading up the van.

“And…?” Hannibal lowered the box back on the table, getting that this wasn’t going to be a short conversation.

“And we,” Face gestured first to himself and then to Murdock, who was still on the couch, awake but looking grumpy and in pain, “we got into a car accident trying to get back here. Can’t we just wait a couple hours and rest?” Just standing there was making his ankle ache even though he was barely putting pressure on it. If they, god forbid, had to surrender the van, the last thing he thought he could do was run.

“Listen, kid,” and Hannibal hadn’t called him that in over five years, the last time being when they were stuck on the roof of a forty story building with hardly any means of escape and Face had suggested just yielding, “the government? The military? They’re coming this way and any person still left alive and hiding? Who knows where they would take us. It may not look a lot like any of the other ones we’ve been in, but we’re fighting a war. We’re still soldiers and if we even have a chance of getting out of this in one piece but a little worse for wear? We’re going to take it,” and he lifted the cardboard, signaling that he was done talking about this and he walked out. Face hobbled over to where Murdock was still sitting, head in his hand, and fell down next to him.

“We’re leaving.”

“Leaving? But we just got here,” Murdock deplored.

“I know. You should have heard the speech Hannibal just gave me. Very… rousing. You know, Murdock,” Face said once Hannibal had come and gone a second time, “we should… I mean, you and I…”

“It’s okay, Faceman,” Murdock interrupted, giving him a gracious smile and patting him on his leg and Face was going to protest, was going to say that Murdock couldn’t possibly know what he was trying to say but then Hannibal was popping his head around the corner and telling them it was time to go.

. . . .

“Where is it?” Face asked, staring around them once they were all standing outside and Face blinked, glancing up at the grey sky when he thought he felt a drop of water fall into his eye. Because what they really needed right now was rain. The van was nowhere to be seen.

“Parked it around the corner,” Hannibal said, speaking around his cigar, “didn’t want to give anybody going by any ideas. Come on.”

“Hannibal. Can’t you bring it to us?”

“No,” Hannibal said plainly, already starting to move away and B.A. threw Face a ‘walk it off, fool’ look and Face grumbled but complied. As it happened, ‘around the corner’ actually meant ‘a block or so away and then around a corner’ which Face supposed answered his unspoken question as to why it had taken them so long to load it up earlier. Out of all the times Face had needed assistance and an escape, this would have to top the list of times he was overjoyed to see this giant black rectangle. Murdock clambered inside first, the others following and it was like entering an old family home. Hannibal tossed B.A. the keys and Face knew that there was no way that things wouldn’t start looking up from here on out.

Sometimes, Face thought, he shouldn’t be allowed to be optimistic.

. . . .

They were fifteen minutes from taking a back road out of the city, a road that Hannibal had promised wasn’t going to be as cluttered with police as the more direct routes, something he laughed about for a good few minutes, saying how the police never really did understand how it worked. They were fifteen minutes from, for once, not having to shoot at anything or anybody when the engine started smoking.

B.A. tried to ignore, tried to peer through it but, after a minute, he couldn’t just let it be so, stopping right in the middle of the thick white line that separated the two lanes, he turned the key, telling them all to stay put as he exited, heaving up the hood and disappearing behind metal and smoke.

“Dammit!” B.A. roared and Hannibal kicked open his door and jumped out, Face and Murdock following only because they felt they had no choice. “Man,” B.A. said, motioning towards the car, walking away from it and walking back like he was trying not to beat it up, “I thought I had fixed that two weeks ago.” The only thing Face could recall happening two weeks ago that required car repair was when they had gotten into a gunfight and the van’s engine had been shot to pieces. B.A. had sworn that it was as good as new then but he must have missed something.

“Can you fix it?” Hannibal asked and B.A. tsked.

“Course I can.”

“How long will it take?”

“I can make it drivable in half an hour,” B.A. said, going around to the driver’s side, lifting his box of tools out from behind his seat.

Murdock said something, but loud, frightful growls masked his words. Hannibal asked him to repeat himself as if he hadn’t heard the other sounds.

“I said,” Murdock said weakly, “you might have to make it work a little faster.”

About a quarter mile away and getting closer by the second, a herd of what looked to be over thirty infected were quickly heading their way.

“Alright, B.A.,” Hannibal ordered, springing into action, “get this fixed and get this fixed fast. Face, you and Murdock take either side of the street,” he tossed them weapons and sent them on their way, Face sharing a look with Murdock.

“What’re you gonna do?”

“I,” Hannibal said, climbing on top of the van and shouldering a heavy artillery rifle, “am going to take the high ground.”

Picking them off was easier than it should have been, moving quickly and without stopping, fingers sore on their triggers as they delivered one shot to the head after the other. The bodies kept falling but they also kept coming as if they were growing out of the sewers and not once did they think that their adrenaline and gunfire was what was attracting them in the first place.

“How’s it going B.A.,” Hannibal hollered as he reloaded.

“Almost done, Hannibal, almost done!” B.A. yelled back but the clattering of a fallen wrench was replaced by the sound of bullets and Face saw Hannibal spin around and say something that none of them needed to hear:

“They’re coming from all sides. I’ll cover B.A., you two stay where you are,” Hannibal ordered and if Face even wanted to challenge that command he knew he couldn’t. Face watched as Murdock switched to a smaller gun, his larger one empty and, with a shorter range it meant he had to get nearer, something Face thought of as incredibly stupid and he tried to warn Murdock, to get him to stop trying too hard to prove himself but the guy wasn’t listening and, before Face could even take in another breath, Murdock was surrounded.

Murdock cried out and Face took off, reaching out and waving his arm.

“Murdock, grab my hand,” and Face moved closer, pausing to get a balding woman with a missing lower jaw directly between the eyes, his muscles burning as he stretched, “come on.” He felt Murdock’s hand close into his and he started to pull, shooting the entire time, dropping his shotgun to replace it with the pistol that Murdock had forsaking when he was overcome. His heels dug into the solid ground and he felt himself sliding and he fell hard to his knees along with Murdock but he just kept straining and hauling and it was down to a single infected man who would not give up. Murdock was hysterically saying Face’s name as he fought to release himself from the infected man’s iron grip and Face was grunting and yelling, telling him to hold on, that all he needed was to get a clear vision of it’s head and it was over.

But the infected man was either more aware of what he was doing or incredibly stubborn because he kept his head right behind Murdock’s shoulder, gaunt and broken arms encased around Murdock’s hips and Murdock flailed, falling away from Face for a moment before frantically grasping him again. The only way, Face realized in a moment of clarity, to neutralize this was to shoot through Murdock or to just let him go, but he’d rather let himself get bitten than do the latter.

Murdock seemed to understand, started nodding his head, still fighting against the man, trying to hit it wherever he could strike him to keep him from lodging his teeth deep into Murdock’s skin but Face shook, his head swimming, hands sweating. He knew he was a good shot but if he screwed this up he could wind up killing the wrong person and he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to get over that.

“I can’t do it,” Face voiced, “I can’t do it.”

“You have to,” Murdock replied in an attempt to calm at least on of them down but the quaver in the way he spoke wasn’t doing well to hide how terrified he was.

“I might…” and it was like Murdock could read his mind.

“You won’t, Face,” he didn’t use any of the stupid nicknames, just his name, “I trust you. Do it,” and Face hesitated until he saw how exhausted and ready to give up Murdock was and, when his hand started to fall away from his own again, arm going slack, Face took in a hard inhale, didn’t let it out and pulled the trigger.

Blood freckled Face’s face and Murdock let out an awful sound upon impact, slumping forward as the back of the infected man’s head exploded and Murdock collapsed under the weight of the now completely dead body. Hands shaking so badly he could barely hold onto the gun anymore, Face crawled over, panting as he pushed and shoved until the body had rolled off into the gutter and he grabbed Murdock, forcing him to sit up, only vaguely soothed when he saw that Murdock was, indeed, alive. He fretted, shifting Murdock’s jacket off; the wound was small and round, a clean through and through that would require nothing but stitches but he couldn’t stop, couldn’t make himself not apologize or try to patch it up or at least stop it bleeding.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Murdock was repeating, breathless and tired and Face could feel his pulse moving faster than a hummingbird. Face didn’t believe him because he wasn’t okay so how the hell could Murdock be alright and he reached up, holding Murdock’s face between his two hands and Murdock somehow found a way to smile, “I’m fine, Face. I’m fine.”

Face pushed their mouths together with such force that he nearly knocked Murdock over backwards and Murdock didn’t hesitate to respond, like he had been waiting for this for years. Murdock squawked when Face hit too hard against his wounded shoulder but when Face went to move away, to say he was sorry, Murdock only pulled him back.

B.A. started to say something from behind them, something that sounded a lot like he had fixed the van and that there were more coming, that they didn’t have time for whatever was going on, but his tirade was cut short, probably by Hannibal, whatever he said muffled by his hand.
. . . .

After that, actually getting out was easiest part. With B.A. behind the wheel and Hannibal shouting directions the entire way, bursting out onto the highway was like being welcomed into the open arms of a loving mother after being beaten by your no-good, abusive father. Hannibal laughed the way he did whenever they had gotten out of something with everything still attached.

“I love it, I just love it,” Hannibal said, pulling a fresh cigar from his inside pocket and lighting the match, striking it against the dashboard, much to B.A.’s dislike, “I love it when a plan comes together.”

Face was barely listening, head resting against the wall, an arm wrapped around himself for no reason. He could tell Murdock was next to him, grinning and staring but he didn’t look back because he thought if he did he would start smiling too and he just wasn’t in the mood yet to switch off from guilt. He felt positively wrecked, hardly unable to believe that everything he kept replaying over in his head happened in less than two days.

A finger poked his leg and he batted it away. B.A. actually giggled about something Hannibal said. Murdock was surprisingly silent but, for once, Face wasn’t too worried.

They traveled for a good half hour, not stopping once, not even for red lights and wound up in a small town where the houses were far apart and isolated enough that nobody would think to come knocking unless it was an emergency. They found a small place, a grey two-story house up on a small hill, it’s paint peeling and wooden steps old and sagging. It had been abandoned, probably yesterday before things really started to get out of hand, and Hannibal told B.A. to pull up in the driveway, that they had a long way to go and it wouldn’t hurt to stop here for one night. They needed time to heal.

Inside was pastels, dark, rich furniture, an uncovered fireplace and garish fixtures hanging from the walls. There was a small kitchen and no door to a basement, the mahogany stairs to the second floor directly in front of them as they entered. They crowded into the livingroom, still tense and unorganized and Hannibal told B.A. to look for a first aid kit, that they had to get Murdock patched up before the injury got any worse. It took him awhile but B.A. returned, asking what kind of people would leave a first aid kit in the most inconvenient place, what purpose that served anybody and Hannibal offered it to Face but Face declined, saying that Hannibal knew more of what he was doing when the truth was that his hands were still quaking so hard he knew he’d mess up with the first stitch.

He moved into the kitchen instead, grabbing four bottles of water from the back of the fridge, looking around for food that he wouldn’t screw up in making. Face handed the bottles off to B.A. and B.A. raised an eyebrow, peering down at the tremor in the hands that were in front of him.

“It’s… ah… it’s nothing,” Face said, trying a smirk and B.A. didn’t believe him but he let it go and just thumped him on the back, walking away.

The next few hours were spent coming up with an elaborate plan that encompassed the next five years of their lives. Things, Hannibal commented, were changing and they needed to adapt, just like they always had before. They discussed what would happen if this virus got better and what would happen if it got any worse and what they would do, agreeing that, despite the hit it would take to all of their bank accounts, they would begin taking on more cases for free.

“Even if this subsides,” Hannibal said, “they won’t entirely go away. We need to be prepared to be surrounded by these… people for a long time.”

They talked about where they would live, how they would feed themselves and what they would do with Murdock. Face asserted that they couldn’t bring him back to the hospital, that the last time he was there it was already half burnt to the ground and full of more dead people than alive. Nobody argued.

Sometime around eight that evening, they paused from writing and debating for dinner. Murdock insisted that he take over in that area, cooking with one good hand, hiring B.A. – and not Face – to be his other arms. He used whatever he found in the vegetable drawers and freezer and they crowded around in the livingroom, sitting on the floors and the arm chairs, shoveling the meal into their mouths, Face doing his best to get more of it past his lips than on his clothes, cursing his hands that just wouldn’t stop, hoping he was being careful enough to hide it.

Somebody reached for the television remote but they could only manage to watch ten minutes before Hannibal was telling them to turn it off. Face startled everyone by offering to clean up, saying he’d prefer to do it alone and none of them got in his way.

“You and Murdock,” Hannibal said around eleven o’clock, “you go upstairs and get some sleep. B.A. and I’ll stay down here, keep watch.” B.A. started to bellyache but Hannibal shut him up with a fleeting look. Face could have said something but then Murdock was gripping him around the wrist and dragging him upstairs. The mattress was too hard, the pillows far too soft and all Face managed was to kick off his shoes and shirt before collapsing, eyes shutting as soon as he pulled the covers over his legs.

It was three in the morning and Face's eyes shot open at the loud bangs and squealing of tires that vibrated through the entire house, shaking the windows. He lifted his head, carefully removing Murdock's arm from around his waist (wondering how in the world he could have slept through the noise) and slipped out of bed, not bothering to slide on his shoes or button up his shirt. He snatched up the rifle that Hannibal had rightfully insisted he keep with him and tip-toed out into the hallway, the stairs creaking as he leapt down, taking them two at a time and he walked right past the front door, making it most of the way into the livingroom before doubling back, realizing that the breeze he had felt wasn't from a draft but because the door was wide open.

He hustled outside, the grass wet under his bare feet, spotting the van still parked neatly in the driveway. He circled the entire perimeter, checking the tiny backyard, finding himself back on the sidewalk, looking up and down the road before reentering the house and taking his time searching every single corner.

But Hannibal and B.A. were gone.

Face hated to wake Murdock from the obvious deep sleep he desperately needed, but this was so much bigger and he bounded back up the stairs, kneeling by Murdock’s side of the bed, gently shaking him awake.

“What is it,” he mumbled, rubbing a hand over his face, “whatsa’matter?” When Face told him, it was like somebody had snapped a rubber-band the size of a football against Murdock’s chest. He gasped and struggled to sit up, wincing as he leaned too heavily on the wrong elbow. “What… what do ya mean gone.”

“I don’t know they’re just…” but Face couldn’t finish the sentence and Murdock started talking and talking and talking and wouldn’t stop, eyes wide, words blending together, throwing out so many ideas, none of which made a lick of sense, “Murdock. Calm down, alright? This is Hannibal. We’ll find them.” Murdock stammered like a fish struggling for air and, in a moment of out-of-character tenderness, Face leaned over and kissed his cheek, pulling him into an awkward hug.

. . . .

Face went back out to look once the sun rose but all he found just left him more confused. There were bullet casings littering the front walk like more than the two shots he had heard had been fired. Black tired treads curved along the pavement and disappeared a few feet away from the house. At least, he thought, they knew which direction they had gone in.

He went back inside to see Murdock sitting, sloppily dressed, at the dining room table, sipping on a glass of milk, a bowl of plain cornflakes plopped down, untouched, in front of him.

“They had a good reason,” Face commented, “they wouldn’t have gone with them unless they had a good reason.”

“What if…” Murdock started but Face shushed him.

“This is Hannibal,” he said again, pulling up a chair and maneuvering it until he was sitting right next to Murdock, “he’s always got a plan. Finding them will be the simplest thing we’ve ever done. Besides, you really think B.A. would go very far and leave his van behind?” He helped himself to some of Murdock’s cereal, trying to act like this wasn’t a big deal. He dropped a few pieces because his hands were shaking too much. Murdock noticed and held them in his own.

“Did I do that?” Face didn’t want to say that it started when Murdock told him to shoot him or that it only got worse after he pulled the trigger, so he just forced out a laugh and shook his head. “You really think we’ll find ‘em Faceman?”

“I know we will,” he handed Murdock his spoon, thrown off when Murdock laid his head on Face’s shoulder.

(we don't believe in) you and your wrecking crew
face/murdock, hannibal, b.a. (the a-team tv show!verse)
r, ~18,200 words
A week ago, everything was pretty much okay. Seven days ago, there were only mumbles or rumors of a new virus that arrived from seemingly nowhere. There were sirens. There was the Journalist in the Tweed Jacket. There was leaked information, there was disproved information and then… there was this.
blood. gore. some harsh language and scary imagery/situations.

notes:: when I saw this request over at a_team_kink I nearly stopped breathing with joy because it was exactly everything I love: the a-team, zombies and apocalypses. I knew there was no possible way I could let this slip through my fingers so I did what some may see as a stupid thing and scooped this baby right up into my loving arms. I also knew that the chances of this being anything under 10,000+ words was inconceivable and that taking this prompt under my wing would mean pushing off to the side everything else I needed to get done. but, you know what? IT WAS WORTH IT. other things you should know before reading: this is focused on the tv show and not the movie. that's important to remember as you read this (although, if you really wanted to pretend, I won't have to know). this story isn't funny (because zombie apocalypses are serious business, gdi) although I did try to keep some of the light-heartedness of the show intact. bad things happen to good people. and, depending on your favorite characters and who you ship, you may or may not like the way this ends. whoever you are, anonymous, I hope this is what you wanted. (also: I read through this a couple times before posting and, as far as I could tell, I fixed all glaring grammar, etc. mistakes. I can't guarantee that I got all of them however. i'm sure that, upon going over it again and again like I tend to do after I post fic, i'll find and correct others).




PROLOGUE.

In the beginning, there were only sirens.

Low, howling, wailing sirens that made your insides ache and vibrate, made you lose more sleep than you were comfortable losing, made you sit in a corner with your ears covered after a week of it droning over and over and over and over and begging for it to just stop.

People did what people did best: they panicked. But not the kind of panicking you saw in the movies, the kind where everyone is screaming and tripping over themselves and each other and crashing over bridges (not yet). It was a quiet seething, a bubbling under the closed lid of a metal pot. One day, the highway was just a little more packed and crawling than usual. And then a couple days later, the airport had to put signs out that they were full for the next six months. The next year.

The radio, crackling even if you sat right on top of the antennae, told everybody it was safer to stay inside. Lock the doors and eat away at that canned food you had been secretly hoarding away for the unlikely situations exactly like this one. The canned food and jugs of frozen water that business partners, coworkers and family members made fun of you for piling away and now look who the hell was laughing.

A reporter said the CDC was involved. Another reporter, a journalist in a tweed jacket, rumpled and exhausted, said that there were reports of an infection, a virus. He made his last television appearance exactly two hours after he had uttered those words. Nobody ever saw or heard from him again.

It was too late though, the entire country had heard what the Journalist in the Tweed Jacket had to say. The man became famous, infamous, his words typed in newspapers, spray-painted on brick walls, hung like streamers off trestles that the trains clicked and thudded over, still moving but this time only moving cargo.

“It’s a virus,” the Journalist in the Tweed Jacket had said, “it’s a virus. We’re all going to eat each other alive.”

. . . .

“Well?” a man in a white lab coat paced, heels scuffing and squeaking against the only slightly blue tile, flecked with bits of brown. He looked up when another man, a short, squat man with a government haircut and a government suit spoke to him, hands in his pockets, trying to cover up how badly he was shaking.

“Well what?” The doctor said, stopping in his motions, straightening his back and tightening his jaw. He hadn’t slept in over three days and he smelled of perspiration and cigarettes.

“You know what. Is he infected? I just need a simple yes or no. A yes or no and I can leave, walk out of here and give the people an answer,” the government man said, pulling a hand out from his thousand dollar pants to gesture as he spoke. The doctor advanced, lifting his arms as if considering grabbing the man by the collar but he restrained himself. Barely.

“Give the… give the people an answer?! What you’re going to do is tell them not get themselves into a frenzy, that you’re already working on a solution, right? Am I right?”

“Well, I mean, we can’t…”

“Tell them the truth?” The doctor finished for him, his voice rising, “have you seen that man in there? Have you?”

“N-no, I haven’t seen first… first-hand, no…” the government man yelped when the doctor grasped him firmly around his upper arm, dragging him towards the steel door he had been, only moments before, wearing a hole into the floor in front of. He thrust the man against it, turning him around, holding him down so he could stare only through the supposedly shatter-proof window. Nobody spoke, not even a whisper, and everyone just inhaled, exhaled, the man’s breath from his mouth and his nose fogging up the glass.

SLAM. Everything rattled as a body cracked against the other side, the obvious sound of bone splintering radiating through the metal. Blood splattered on the window and the man tried to move, fight or flight kicking in and he grunted and whimpered but the doctor only shoved his face closer, skin smudging the clear surface.

“This,” the doctor said, pushing harder as the person inside the room, the white and fluorescent lit room, kept pounding themselves against the walls and the door, “this is what you’re going to lie to everyone about.”

“Please…”

“Please what? Please make it stop? I can’t make it stop. I’ve been trying to,” he squeezed the government man’s neck when he tried to flail out of his grip, “make it stop for the past three days.” The person inside howled and he bashed his face against the glass, eyes yellow and wild, skin sagging, dry and pale and his teeth shattered, falling out like they were never properly attached in the first place. Black blood leaked past his pink lips. The government man may have whispered something that was close to a prayer. “Fucking look at him,” the doctor said and he opened his mouth to keep speaking but then the glass shattered.

The supposedly, shatter-proof window exploded into a million pieces.

And two thin arms shot out from the now wide open space.

. . . .

“I’m getting confirmation that the virus,” a nervous news anchor said, padded shoulders quivering, her permed, blonde hair slightly blowing in an invisible breeze, a fan tucked away in the corner to battle the heat of the lights, “thought to be contained has… has…” she stumbled, she paused, swallowing, patting at her face with a cloth she kept in her pocket, “it has breeched containment after a… after an infected man escaped the facility from which he was being treated earlier this morning.” Treated was, at least, a better word than ‘being held prisoner’. Somebody whispered from behind the camera when the woman took too long to continue speaking but all she did was keep her head down, eyes averted to her lap, fingers dug in as claws against the shiny desk she was propped up behind. Her breathing was laboured and, even if you weren’t really paying attention you could tell she was silently crying. “I don’t know what to do,” she said, most likely attempting to utter to herself, forgetting the tiny microphone still clipped to her collar, her tiny, choked fear broadcasting across the airwaves.

There was a crash of a door being forced down, the sound of heavy footsteps, of screaming erupting like bats from a cave. The camera shook and twisted, searching for the source but everything was happening upstairs, downstairs, out in the hallway. A man said the news anchor’s name, followed by a string of curses nobody bothered to censor.

“What the hell is going on out there?” he said to someone next to him, the only thing visible the woman’s hands and arms as she nervously shrugged. The entrance to the studio flew open without warning, the metal doorknob slamming against the plaster wall. The shrieking was delayed, as if they all needed a moment to really figure out what was happening and, like the flick of a lever, there was hysteria. The single camera swung around, bobbing left and right, up and down, finally settling on the anchor, head still hanging like she had absolutely no idea anything different was happening around her.

That evening, at exactly 6:23, the entire audience was treated to watching a woman with soft curls in her blonde hair get eaten alive.

If all hell hadn’t broken loose before, it sure as heck was starting now.

. . . .

OUR STORY.

Templeton Peck, also (and mostly) know as Face, had seen (along with the million others scattered in the city alone) that poor woman get devoured. It had been an odd day for him overall, really. He had awoken later than usual, covered in sweat, only to find that the central air in the entire building had been shut off or, as he heard when he called down to the front desk, temporarily broken. His normally busy schedule had been so often tampered with (meetings scratched off either because they were too afraid to leave their homes or because they had successfully managed to exit the country, as if that was their only possibility of survival) that he soon found himself running out of plans. His date for later that night – a lovely brunette by the name of Jeannine, whom he had run into somewhere in between picking up a few new shirts and gathering enough food to last him until the weekend – cancelled, calling him seven hours before he was to pick her up. She told him, voice quaking (and he could just see her fingers twirling in and out of the phone cord) that she couldn’t make it, that she didn’t think it would be a good time.

When he asked her when it would be a good time she twittered anxiously and just repeated herself, saying it just wasn’t the best time to be doing something. Together. And then she hung up.

Face found himself both utterly confused and with a completely free agenda. He considered calling up acquaintances (anybody really, even the guys he only kept around in case he needed a favour) because this wasn’t something that happened to him, he didn’t wake up and get dressed only to find out he had nowhere to go. It really couldn’t hurt though, he thought to himself as he refilled his glass with cold water from a slender bottle he kept in the back of his fridge, finally loosening his tie and then removing it altogether, tossing it onto the counter, to just stay in.

Sometime a little bit before five in the evening, after he had spent most of the afternoon attempting to read, drinking more liquids than he usually did in a week and accidentally falling asleep once or twice on his borrowed couch, he groggily decided to turn on the television, his mind wandering as he pondered what Hannibal and B.A. were up to and why he hadn’t considered telephoning them earlier.

Nearly every channel – except for a channel that showed only cartoons and another station that aired constant reruns of a soap opera one of his foster parents had on twenty-four/seven, the same person who had smacked him across the face for even asking if he could just watch some Looney Tunes one Saturday morning – had something on about this new virus. If it wasn’t ceaseless updates about The Situation it was a panel of experts – or one, single, stuffy man with a short-cropped beard and red bow-tie – discussing The Situation. Face knew he would benefit from being as concerned as everybody else and, while he had been keeping tabs, it just hadn’t been something that he could be bothered investigating any further than a few simple facts.

After flipping around for almost half an hour, not being able to stay on one show for longer than a few minutes, getting a horrible twisted feeling in his stomach every time he passed that soap opera (”I said no, you little twerp, you can’t change the fucking channel. This is my house and you follow my fucking rules, you understand me?”), he finally settled on the last half of a game show he was pretty certain he had seen before, rolling his eyes and shaking his head when the contestant got the wrong answer, which happened far too often than not for it to even be slightly entertaining. When it ended, cheesy music jingling along as the credits rolled against a black background, he lazily picked up the remote, pausing when, after a short commercial break for some kind of dish-soap he didn’t need, he heard the obtrusive theme song of the local news.

He thought the anchor was pretty, even though she was obviously terrified and wanted nothing more than to not be there, and came to the decision to settle there until he at least got to hear what the weather was supposed to be like for the rest of the week. Ten minutes elapsed and then fifteen and it was, as he could have predicted, nothing he hadn’t heard before. He stood up, about to turn it off and make himself a drink when things started to get interesting.

Face didn’t even remember sitting down, or putting his hand to his mouth, or dropping his empty glass onto the hardwood floor, right by his bare feet. He didn’t recall flipping the television off, then on, then off, then on, as if each time the picture would flicker back and it would have just been some unnerving joke gone just a little too far.

It took another entire fifteen minutes before somebody – or something – made it stop. He liked to think it was someone still alive who pulled a plug but, if he was being realistic, he didn’t doubt one of the infected had decided to gnaw on or trip over a cord. Multi-colored bars and a high, tinny whine replaced the sizzle and crackle of the snow and he left it there until it started giving him a headache.

Stepping over the fragments of glass he reminded himself to sweep up later, he opened a window – the distant howl of a siren he had forgotten about drifting into his ears – and shuffled over to his liquor cabinet, twisting upright a tumbler and pouring a (first half and then an entire) glass of a dark amber alcohol that burned his throat before he even sipped at it. Gathering a pad of paper and a pen from his discarded coat’s inside pocket, he flipped to a clean page and sat down at the tiny kitchen table, trying to sort as much out as he could.

A week ago, everything was pretty much okay. Seven days ago, there were only mumbles or rumors of a new virus that arrived from seemingly nowhere. There were sirens. There was the Journalist in the Tweed Jacket. There was leaked information, there was disproved information and then… there was this. Someone, an infected someone, apparently a man, had escaped. He had escaped that morning and, less than six hours later had managed, allegedly, to contaminate enough people to break into a newsroom in Los Angeles, killing practically everyone in sight.

That would mean, he surmised, underlining the words and numbers a few times until he had torn through the sheet of paper he had been scribbling on, that it took less than two hours from the moment the person got infected to when they completely changed.

The first thing he thought was that there was no way this was actually happening. The next thing that crossed through his mind was that if it was, indeed, happening, the sheer amount of chaos outside would be near unbearable. After that, he wondered if he had remembered to load that shotgun he kept in the back of his closet.

And then, by that point, he had no other option but to pick up the phone and call Hannibal.

. . . .

Face had parked his car on the street, more out of convenience than anything else, and it should have taken him only a few minutes to hop into the front seat and take off towards the office building Hannibal had suggested they meet at (their conversation had gone surprisingly calmly considering the metaphorical explosions happening around them) but he was waffling, unsure of what to bring with him – if anything – and he groaned, running a hand over his face, wiping the sweat off on his thigh. Pulling a duffel from under his bed, he shoved every weapon he had stored around the apartment – as well as a couple shirts and underwear – into it’s gaping hole and he zipped it shut, shouldering the now over thirty pound weight and not thinking to lock the door behind him.

He passed by one of his neighbors, an elderly gentleman who stopped to speak to him, to ask if he had seen what happened, to ask if he knew what exactly was going on but Face just shook his head, giving one sentence responses, shifting the bag from one arm to the other, bending sideways as the strap dug into his skin and pulled him down.

Outside was eerily quiet. Or, to be more exact, it was quieter than he was used to it being around this time, when the sidewalks would normally be packed by well-dressed men and women, just heading out for what Face thought he would be doing when he woke up this morning. Instead, there were only one or two scattered people, dressed sloppily and with a look of desperation, as if they had left their lofts and houses not knowing why they had done so or where they were supposed to be going in the first place. Face considered talking to one of them but he didn’t know where it would get him so he did his best to ignore their swaying and shuffling and floundering and jogged to his car, still pristine tires pushed against the curb.

He didn’t have to – he never had to – but he made sure to carefully open the driver’s side door, leaning over to toss his bag on the passenger seat floor, taking a moment to catch his breath and stretch the muscles in his arm. When he glanced up, he jumped slightly, not expecting a dirty-blonde haired woman to be standing just opposite him, staring, all wide-eyed and shaken. Neither of them spoke and, just as he was about to open his mouth and inquire if she was alright, she murmured:

“Take me with you.”

Face was, for lack of better words, momentarily stunned.

“But you don’t know where I’m going.”

“I don’t care. I need to leave.”

“You know, it won’t be any better wherever I’m going than it is right here,” despite being titled – amongst his team, at least – one of the best con-men to walk on solid ground (Face had requested if that meant there was a better con-man who could walk on water to which Hannibal only made a face that warned him not to go there) Face did appreciate the occasional instance of honesty.

“Where’re you going?” She seemed harmless enough, but instinct told him that specifics at this point were only a small part of the enemy.

“I’m not leaving the city,” he said. Not yet.

“You’re not? What’re you, crazy?”

Face couldn’t help but laugh. If he had a dollar for every time somebody asked him that…

“Probably. Look—” he started but she shook her head and lifted a hand, palm straight against the air.

“Don’t. I get it. I just thought I’d try,” she watched him sit, watched him jam the keys into the ignition and listened as the engine rumbled and whirred, “good luck,” she said, slowly wiggling her fingers in a goodbye that was only shared between two people who cared a lot about each other but didn’t want to admit how upset they were that they were separating.

“Thanks.”

. . . .

Face stopped counting at the twenty-first police car he passed in five minutes. The roads were packed, cars attempting to make turns onto closed streets, men exiting their vehicles to argue with the police officers, women and children cowering with fear and embarrassment in the passenger and back seats, trying to get their husbands, their fathers, their grandfathers, to just get back in the car. He clutched tighter on the steering wheel and glanced at his watch. They hadn’t set a definite time but Face knew Hannibal wasn’t going to just hang around forever, he wasn’t the kind of guy who would just stand there, arms crossed, chomping on his cigar and waiting. He should have, in retrospect, expected this. It wasn’t like he would have been the only person to think they could get out while there was still a chance.

He hadn’t been paying attention and nearly sped through a red light, jamming his foot on the brake just in time, tires jumping over the white line and he exhaled heavily, letting out a small sound of annoyance when he saw a police officer leave his post on the corner to meander in his direction.

“Everything alright?” he had a thick, distracting moustache and a round stomach, his hat to one side, belt crooked as if he had woken up from his day off and was told to get his ass into work. Face raised his eyebrows vaguely and blinked. Was everything alright. The officer seemed to get it and his mouth twitched. “You almost ran the light.”

“But I didn’t,” Face reminded him.

“No, you didn’t. But watch yourself,” he said, eyeing the light which had only just clicked to green. Somebody behind Face leaned on their horn but quickly halted when the policeman turned and pointed, “we don’t need another accident.”

“Another…?” Face began but the officer pounded with a flat hand on his trunk, which was his silent way of telling Face to get a move-on. Face saluted slightly and rolled away, only thinking to peek into his rearview mirror once he had driven a block or two. The officer had disappeared but Face had no reason to think it was for any other reason than he had somewhere else to be.

. . . .

The building was pale stone, tinted windows and a single door, which was exactly the kind of place that Hannibal found perfect to meet, but that Face had always said made it a little too obvious sometimes (not that Hannibal ever listened). He hadn’t realized he was looking for the van until he couldn’t find it but he parked around the corner anyway and had to double-back because he had forgotten his bag. The last thing he needed was to leave all his guns out in the open where people would have no problem in snatching them up, thinking they knew what to do with them. He leaned against the door, expecting it to just fall open and take him with it but he faltered when it wouldn’t budge. Without seeing if this was even the correct building or perhaps that he could pick the lock because he didn’t suspect there would be any kind of difficult security, he grabbed onto the knob and shook, as if that would be enough to force it loose.

“Dammit, Hannibal,” he said loudly, stomping a foot and facing towards the street, a woman with her window down giving him a strange look as she traveled by. Face nearly had a heart-attack when he turned around to see Hannibal standing, completely serious, on the other side of the glass. He was beginning to get really tired of people sneaking up on him today. Hannibal turned his head to one side and narrowed his eyes and Face mimicked him, signaling towards the lock. Hannibal nodded and fumbled with it eventually, finally, pulling the door open just enough for Face to squeeze inside. “What was that for?”

“You can’t be too cautious,” Hannibal said, not stopping to say anything more, giving Face no choice but to follow him down a hallway into a small room off to the right that was packed with unused tables and chairs coated with layers of dust. B.A. was sitting on the edge of one of the tables, perched as if he was waiting for it to collapse and he only dimly smiled at Face who waved. Murdock was nowhere to be found. “What’s in the bag?”

Face dropped it on the ground with a heavy thunk.

“Exactly what you think I’d have in there,” Face sighed, “I don’t like this. This… this isn’t the kind of stuff we’re used to dealing with here.”

Hannibal crossed his arms, “I’m aware. Doesn’t mean we still can’t have a plan.”

“Here we go,” B.A. grumbled, mouth twisting into a frown, “what we need to do,” he said, “is get the hell outta here before it gets any worse.” Face put his hands on his hips and tilted his chin upwards.

“I have to agree with the big guy here, Hannibal. I mean, we’ve got the means to defend ourselves but don’t you think…”

Face was interrupted by a smash, the tinkling of broken glass hitting a concrete floor and they all looked to one another before staring out into the hall. Hannibal tensed, B.A. moved to his feet, squaring his shoulders, fists clenching and Face crouched, unzipping his duffel as quietly as he possibly could, grabbing the first gun he could, feeling cold against his fingers. He glimpsed at Hannibal, as if awaiting his approval to react but Hannibal held up a finger and they waited.

The seconds passed by like hours and Face barely moved, his chest aching as he held his breath, knees sore from keeping in the same awkward position. There was a thud, thud, thud like someone was walking with only one workable leg, the other dragging like a wet rag behind them and it was followed by more feet, thundering and tapping and heavy breathing and Face stood, pulling the shotgun up to his shoulder, swallowing and taking a small step towards the door. Hannibal reached out though, holding him back, shaking his head and Face wasn’t in the position to protest, watching as B.A. stepped out in front, pushing a large hand against the wooden door, letting it swing gradually, quietly.

Face’s grip tightened but nothing happened. He could still feel Hannibal’s hand on his arm, lightly touching him, ready to seize harder in case he tried to be too much of a hero. There was a screech, a ghastly, lung squeezing, stomach churning screech and a thin, bony woman, hair greasy and falling out appeared from nowhere, launching herself towards B.A. and B.A. instinctively reached out, slamming a fist squarely in her face, bringing his hand back covered in dark blood, a tooth sticking out between his knuckles. He growled and grimaced, shaking his arm until it fell out and rolled away. The woman bounced back up, her jaw off-kilter and undeniably broken but she tried to make sounds anyway, the noise coming out gargled and shredded. Face didn’t think, barely flinched and, taking in a shaky inhale, shot her clean in the head.

She dropped faster than anybody could snap their fingers and Face gaped, lowering his weapon, disbelief that he had even done that without any other kind of consideration. He could hear the others coming, could hear Hannibal pulling firearms out of his bag, tossing one to B.A. and keeping one or two for himself but Face was stuck, his arms and feet full of lead. Hannibal grabbed his shoulder and shook him until they were gazing at one another.

“It’s not the first time you killed someone, Lieutenant,” he said, moving his cigar to the other side of his mouth and Face studied his eyes, searching, somewhere for any kind of disquietude, agitated at how collected he appeared to be. Face could feel the ‘yeah, but…’ on the tip of his tongue but he didn’t have time to say it because Hannibal was pushing him out of the room, commanding him to fire, to run and Face did both because when Hannibal told him to do something he sure as hell was going to do it.

A hand – fingers long and gnarled, nails yellow and broken – flailed towards his face and, somehow, Face managed to duck out of their path, spinning and delivering a perfect blast to the back of his head, blood spraying across his once clean white shirt. Somehow, they managed to make it outside, Hannibal getting what was, hopefully, the final infected (for now) and they paused on the sidewalk, out of breath, their pulses racing. Hannibal approached Face, placing a gloved hand first on his chest and then on his shoulder.

“Take your car,” he said, “and go pick up Murdock.”

. . . .

It was on fire.

Or, at least, it had been on fire. By the time that Face managed to arrive at the VA hospital, not bothering to make sure he was evenly parked, the building was smoky and black, windows burst open from the inside, singed curtains floating in the breeze, and areas of the structure were still smoldering, the yellow-orange of flames swaying and lifting. People inside were shouting, wailing, and it was like whatever was happening in there was in an entirely different universe as to what was going on anywhere else.

Face tentatively crossed the street, making his way up the steps, almost colliding with a nurse who fell into his arms as she went sprinting out the front door. She gave him a wild-eyed look, red hair every which-way and she clung to him for a moment, just breathing before shaking her head and wriggling away, tripping over her own feet as she stumbled down the slight incline and down the sidewalk, disappearing into somebody’s backyard.

The door was wide open and he stood completely still once in the lobby, just taking everything in, hands clammy and his grip on the gun he had forgotten he was holding marginally slipping. There was paper of every kind scattered along the brown tiled floors, bottles of medication, some still completely full, littered and melting under the heavy heat and Face undid his top button.

Murdock, he reminded himself, he was here for Murdock.

He had the layout memorized, knowing exactly which way to turn and he forwent the elevator, jogging up the stairs, nearly falling over a body that was definitely uninfected and completely human and he jolted back, thought about leaning down to make sure he was alive but there wasn’t time, he had an objective, so he leapt over the corpse, taking the rest of the stairs three at a time until he had reached Murdock’s floor.

Pandemonium was really the only word to describe it. Patients were everywhere, hiding in corners, running in circles, some of them attempting to battle with the infected and more than once Face lifted his arms, ready to help but it was always too late and there were too many. Even if he got two there would be three more waiting around a corner and it was overwhelming. He ran down the hallway, passing by the check-in desk, not listening as a doctor, still doing his job, rushed after Face, asking who exactly he thought he was.

Murdock’s door was tightly shut and Face banged on it repeatedly, shouting in through the little, barred window, calling for his friend and his heart dropped to his stomach for a minute when he wasn’t getting an answer but then Murdock popped up from nowhere and the relief that washed over his face was palpable.

“Face,” he said quietly. His forehead was dotted with sweat, his eyes large, pupils concentrated and dark. He unlocked the door, squeezing outside and practically throwing himself into Face’s arms, not giving it a second thought as he wrapped an arm around Face’s waist, using the other hand to grab onto his shoulder, “I knew you’d come for me.” Face should have said something but all he could do was shake his head and smile just a little. The doctor caught up to them, winded and flustered.

“Who the hell— where do you think you’re going?” and Face wasn’t entirely sure who the doctor was speaking directly to but he retaliated anyway.

“I have to get him out of here,” and he could have come up with something better than that but he was in a rush and it was all he could manage to scramble out. Murdock was still embracing him like any second now the two of them would go sailing out the window on a vine and Face thought about lying, about telling the doctor he worked for some form of the government or other – he didn’t have his badge but he felt as if anybody would have believed him in this situation – but, in the end, there was no point. The doctor was beginning to get angrier and he moved closer, stretching out his arms in an attempt to pry Murdock away from Face and Murdock slapped the doctor’s hand. “I’m sorry about this,” Face said to the now perplexed man and, without another word, Face curled his hand into a fist and let it collide precisely with the doctor’s nose. Blood gushed and the doctor stumbled backwards, out of it, cursing and in pain and Murdock grinned.

“My hero.”

“We really do have to go,” Face said, pushing on Murdock’s arms, “you have to let go of me, Murdock.” Murdock frowned but complied and the two of them went bolting down the halls and the stairs but skid to a complete stop in the lobby, frozen at the sight of a swarm of the infected that was advancing (and where the hell were they coming from?), making a beeline towards the hospital and, more specifically, towards everyone still alive inside.

“Backdoor,” Murdock said, finally noticing Face’s gun as they spun around, making the journey to the rear of the building, “Hey. Hey, Faceman. You bring me one of those?”

“No.”

“Man,” Murdock complained, tsk-ing and gently moving his head back and forth. They exited out into the parking lot where a single infected man was perched atop somebody’s car, digging at the metal, and it was difficult to tell from where they were if there was even anybody inside the vehicle. The man noticed them, twisting, bouncing on his heels, head bobbing from one side to the other as he tried to comprehend what he was seeing. Murdock was whispering under his breath and Face hadn’t even noticed he had stuck an arm out to keep Murdock from going any further until he felt Murdock leaning against him.

The man jumped down, ankles cracking and, like he had been electrocuted, practically flew in their direction and Face shot him in the leg just to slow him down, exhaling a shuddery breath as he watched him jolt with the impact, bending backwards as the bones in both his thighs pulverized, but he persevered. Murdock was still mumbling, faster and faster, words meshing together to sound like gibberish and Face waited for the man to get just a few steps closer before distributing the kill shot. Face still couldn’t get used to it and he licked his lips, mouth dry, and he felt a hand rest on his shoulder, right by his neck. Murdock’s hand was warm and careful and Face just let it sit there as he allowed a moment for the fog in his head to clear. Saying nothing, he just kept going, listening for Murdock behind him, pausing so he could catch up. They laid flat against the outside wall of the building, peeking around the corner at the diminishing hoard of the undead and it was then or never and, giving himself a few encouraging words, Face darted out into the open, assuring both of them that they would make it to the car alive.

Despite their best efforts, they attracted attention and Face caught Murdock as he stumbled, holding onto his wrist the rest of the way just to keep themselves in synch and Murdock jumped into the backseat, getting his footprints all over the leather but, for once, Face didn’t care. He fumbled with the keys, hands uncharacteristically quavering – most likely out of adrenaline – and he went to a complete stand still when the unmistakable shot from a pistol went whizzing past his head, making his ears ring and he shifted his eyes past his own shoulder, unwilling to move anything else, just in time to see an infected woman plummet to the pavement. He gawked at Murdock who still had the weapon raised and resting against his knee, mouth hanging open, brow furrowed and Face had seen that look too many times; it was one that showed just a few minutes before Murdock was about to completely lose it so Face patted him on the chest a few times, finally turning the key in the ignition and speeding away down the pleasant, tree-lined street.

. . . .

“Your shirt,” Murdock said later, once they had pulled into a seemingly abandoned gas station to gather themselves before finding Hannibal and B.A.. Face was reclining against the car door, Murdock walking around to stand in front of him, inspecting the article of clothing, reaching out to touch at it, staring at his fingers as if he expected the red to still be wet. Face didn’t say anything. “You don’t look so good, Faceman.”

“I don’t?”

“You’re lookin’ a little green around the gills if you get what I’m sayin’.”

“I’m fine.”

“Funny thing,” Murdock said, “I don’t believe you.” He flopped down next to Face, copying his stance right down to how far apart his feet were from each other. “This is like those monster films that they make us watch at the hospital every Friday.”

“Oh, really.” Face inspected Murdock’s profile until he stared back at him, their eyes locking. “Any suggestions?” Murdock put a finger to his lips as he thought, peering up at the sky, regarding Face again after a moment of silence.

“Just keep doin’ what we’re doin’.”

“Of course,” Face said, returning his gaze back to the road, watching as a truck trundled by, one of it’s rear wheels deflated. “This is really happening,” Face heard himself say. Murdock put an arm around him and squeezed.

“This is really happening,” he agreed.

. . . .

Face finally thought to check the clock that sat, snug and a couple minutes too fast (something he always meant to fix), on the dash and was surprised to see that only three and a half hours had passed since he had packed up and abandoned the apartment that was never really his in the first place but some doctor named Jerry Something who was somewhere off in another country, probably a lot better off than Face currently was. Either that, or it hit there too and he was dead.

He kind of liked to think the guy was out by the beach, fixing broken bones when he had to, sipping on fruity beverages when he wasn’t saving lives.

Murdock was sitting next to him instead of behind and the trip back to the city (and really, if either of them had enough sense between them, they’d be going in the opposite direction) was spent mostly in an awkward but pleasant sullenness (unexpected from Murdock, whom he thought would be rambling non-stop, just like he always did when he was stuck in circumstances he didn’t know how to control). They proceeded past far too many abandoned cars, some of them beaten and trashed, flung into telephone poles, mailboxes and fences, all the others intact but utterly empty, as if the drivers had just given up and decided they’d get farther by walking. This was spreading faster than Face thought anybody could have predicted.

They were less than half a mile away from the city limits when they could already see the flashing red and blue lights, spinning and blinking, casting an odd glow on the trees in the slowly fading twilight. Face reduced his speed to a modest forty and bent forward over the steering wheel, squinting ahead of them, attempting to figure out exactly what was going on. They were five feet away before he finally understood: it was a road-block. He flashed back to the so many times before that he and the others had just ran through one of these but this time he wasn’t in the van. This time it was just him and Murdock.

And this time, there were more than twenty cars, parked at angles, lining the street on both sides, gaps filled in with standing people and orange cones. He stopped because he had no choice and he and Murdock sat there for what felt like forever, just waiting for one of the officers to acknowledge them and offer an explanation without them having to ask for one. Eventually, a thin officer with wisps of damp, red hair sticking out from under his hat began walking over, hand on his gun, just in case and Face didn’t blame him.

“You can’t come in,” the officer said, as if they were hovering on his front doorstep.

“Can’t come in?” Face parroted, not knowing how else to properly respond. The officer made sure to keep a couple feet away from Face’s vehicle, his partner – a broad shouldered man – keeping a very close eye on him.

“No civilian vehicles are to enter or leave the city at this time,” the policeman replied, speaking in a monotone like he was struggling to remember what his superior had practically seared into his brain just in case he ran into this situation. Face glanced to Murdock but Murdock was too busy glowering at the officer to notice.

“Look,” Face tried, “our friends are still in there. We have to—”

“I’m sorry, sir. But you’re gonna just have to turn back around.”

He and Murdock probably could take them, Face hypothesized. Just a few jabs to the stomach, to the kidney, to the nose and they could get through them, they could run the rest of the way if they had to because the last thing Face was going to do was leave Hannibal and B.A. stranded (not that they’d be entirely helpless, Face admitted. It had more to do with a sense of loyalty than anything else). Face knew that Murdock would do anything that Face told him to, would jump on anybody’s back and beat them senseless if Face gave him the okay. Maybe, Face thought even further, they could get into the city if they got arrested.

“Sir?” The policeman said, concern in the back of his throat, reminding him that they were all still there and that he had to make a decision.

The steering-wheel spinning madly under his hands, Face pulled on the gearshift and watched the sky-scrapers get smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror.
. . . .

They wound up back at the gas station, mostly out of convenience but also because it was the only place that Face could think of that remained – for now, at least – completely untouched. He felt claustrophobic and cramped and he exited his car, stumbling forwards and doubling over, running hands through his hair and he heard the scuff of Murdock’s sneakers against the pavement, not flinching as he felt Murdock’s hand begin to rub gently against his back. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? It should have been Murdock practically having a panic-attack, Face doing his best to comfort him, to form a plan, to say that everything was going to be okay.

“It’ll be alright, Facey,” Murdock was saying, still moving his hand in circles over Face’s spine and Face felt like he couldn’t breathe, “we’ll figure it out.” This wasn’t right, this wasn’t him, this wasn’t how he reacted to stress. If this was any other mission, he would already have a plan. He found himself drifting back to the news, the images of the anchor being ingested snapping like photos from one of those cheap, red, plastic viewfinders that you could only find at tourist shops in cities that were now probably shut down too. This wasn’t any other mission. This wasn’t a bigger guy picking on the smaller guy. This was prey versus a myriad of predators, with no definite win at the end.

Face swallowed back bile, sour and acid dripping down his throat and he straightened, brushing invisible wrinkles from his rolled-up sleeves, doing his best to act as if what just happened never actually did.

“Let’s find a phone,” he said, heading for the single story building that served as nothing but a space to put a cash register, a display of a few over-priced maps and a fridge that clunked and rattled behind the counter. The heavy glass door was unlocked and there was nobody inside, not even a sign that there had been anybody in there for a very long time and Face made straight for the black phone attached by rusty screws to the faded, wallpapered walls. Murdock busied himself by flipping through the maps, trying to locate their whereabouts, dragging a finger along roads and random red lines. Face knew the mobile phone number by heart, the one they had installed in B.A.’s van once they began getting more requests, and he dialed it hurriedly, having to hang up twice before he managed to not screw it up, fingers sticking and slipping in his haste.

“Pick up, pick up,” he mumbled, drumming his fingers on the flat surface and then picking at the tape that was still stuck from placards that had long since been taken down.

“I’m sorry,” said a robotic, feminine voice from the other end, “but the number you are trying to reach is out of service.” Face felt his cheeks flush red and he slammed the receiver back down to it’s cradle, repeating the gesture a few more times for good measure. First they couldn’t get into the city and now their only means of communication was dead. Murdock hopped over the counter and put an arm tentatively around Face’s shoulders, seizing his wrist to make him stop. Face hated himself in that moment for unraveling so quickly. He was a solider, Hannibal’s second-in-command. He was Templeton Peck, for Christ’s-sake. So what the hell was going on?

“What happened?” Murdock belatedly queried, letting go and balancing on the edge of the counter, toes just brushing against the floor.

“Out of service,” Face said, tucking his hands deep into his pockets, fingertips brushing against the lonely two shotgun shells he had forgotten were in there and it clicked: he had left his arsenal with Hannibal. He and Murdock were just two guys with a shotgun and a pistol, four shells hiding in the barrel of one, fourteen clean bullets biding their time in the other. “I’m sure they’re fine,” Face chuckled lightly, “just… out of service.” It was getting darker and darker by the minute, the sun sinking like it couldn’t leave fast enough and even if Face came up with a workable plan in the next couple hours, there was no way they could follow through with it until morning.

Morning, which was still over ten hours away. They needed to find somewhere to hide, somewhere to sleep until then and normally this was his forte, this was where he towered above the rest, but these were extenuating circumstances. The closest motel could already be overrun. It could be shut down. It could be full. It could…

“You’re thinking too hard,” Murdock said and Face looked at him, really looked at him and it was obvious he was distressed, just two wrong words away from cracking and Face could virtually feel Murdock containing himself, like a rubber-band pulled around a too-tall stack of newspapers. Face was going to ask him why he was bothering, it was just the two of them, but then Murdock just smiled lightly and Face got the idea.

“Not thinking hard enough,” Face disagreed, sighing, “we have to find a way to get into the city without arriving…”

“In body bags?” Murdock suggested. Face raised an eyebrow.

“I was going to say ‘in handcuffs’ but, yeah, those too.”

“We’ll come up with somethin’, Face,” not ‘you’, we. Murdock yawned and stretched and Face wondered how in the world he could be tired this early, especially with everything they just went through.

“I’m glad you think so.” A street lamp flipped on and then fizzled out a few moments later, it’s companions following suit, only a few remaining dim and buzzing. The blinding white lights surrounding the station turned on without warning as if they had been on some kind of timer and Face searched around for a switch because the last thing they needed was for some people traveling by to think they were open for business. “Help me find a…” and he moved his finger up and down, not being able to find the correct word but Murdock seemed to get it and jumped down, looking everywhere a switch probably wouldn’t be. Face rolled his eyes and made his way to a door in the back, a hand-written ‘employees only’ sign nailed to the cracked, blue-painted wood. He jiggled the falling apart knob, hands on his hips in frustration when it wouldn’t budge. He tried again, straining as he pulled harder, the rust rubbing his palms raw and, finally, sluggishly, it grated against the bare floor and opened.

The smell was so awful Face fell backwards against a shelf, arm immediately darting over his nose and mouth but it was too late, he had already gotten a face-full and his eyes watered. A single light-bulb swung from the ceiling of the small room and Face didn’t have to go any further inside to know what that stench was from. His stomach churned with heavy threats and it had been years since he had been this close to a dead body in this stage of decay and he heaved, turning away, only just making it to an almost full garbage can (mostly papers, bottles and leftover food containers like the person had just holed himself inside here and vowed to never leave) and Murdock was finally walking over, asking what was the matter, pushing closer towards the room and Face wiped his mouth, spitting onto a still half-full soda can and stuck out his arm, waving it with a silent no.

“Don’t, Murdock,” but Murdock had already gone so far or perhaps he hadn’t heard him because he was making noises of mixed disgusted and shock and just standing there in the doorway and Face joined him, the two of them squeezed into the entryway. Murdock took off his hat, pressing it to his chest and Face could feel him vibrating.

“What…” Murdock started, pointing a finger at it like he thought maybe he was the only one seeing it.

“Come on,” Face began walking away, realizing that Murdock wasn’t following and tapping him a few times until he turned, moving his hand in ‘let’s get away from there’ gesture. They went back to the counter, but Face couldn’t stop staring, the light still swinging, catching glimpses of red and green and tan bones. It didn’t make sense – not that anything really made sense anymore; if the patient had only escaped, as the news anchor (he blinked and could only see her, falling out of her chair and he vigorously shook his head) had reported, then who was the dead guy? “He’s been there at least a few days,” Face said. Murdock didn’t retaliate. “You alright?”

“I… I had a bowl of cereal this morning.”

“…Okay.” Face just let him go where he was going. He learned a long time ago (a lesson that B.A. never did quite pass) that it was easier to just let his stream of thought flow without rocks in the way.

“I had a bowl of cereal with milk. It was something sweet, covered in sugar.”

“What’s so terrible about that?”

“What’s so…” Murdock launched, hooking his fingers in Face’s collar and Face didn’t try to pull away, “I never eat sugary cereal. I eat cornflakes. And I never put milk in it.”

“You eat cornflakes without milk?”

“You’re not listening,” Murdock shook Face, tugging him a bit closer, “I had a bowl of sugary cereal with milk and… and…”

“Murdock. If you’re suggesting that you having a breakfast you would normally never eat is the cause of the world ending…” the world ending. Where the hell had that come from? Murdock let Face go, but didn’t move out of his personal space.

“It’s not a cause. It’s a symptom.”

“I still don’t think I’m getting it.”

“Me neither.”

“Right.”

“What’re we gonna do about…” Murdock nodded his head at the room, “that?”

“There’s nothing we can do. We don’t even know who he is or why he’s here how he died or… you get the point. God,” he dragged a hand over his face, rubbing his eyes, “I know what you’re going to say. He probably has family, right?”

“Everyone has family,” Murdock said solemnly.

“I don’t,” Face said, mesmerized for a moment by the light-bulb’s back and forth, back and forth, his internal voice, a whisper in the back of his head, accidentally spitting out. Eyes wide with embarrassment, he peeked at Murdock who looked genuinely upset, a mixture of concern and sympathy.

“Sure you do. You’ve got Hannibal and B.A.,” he paused to blink, his jaw set, eyes softening, “and me. You’ll always have me.”

“Thanks,” Face went to go around the other side of the counter to check outside the abnormally large windows to make sure that nobody was lurking around, to make sure his car was inconspicuous enough for any cruising policeman but Murdock stopped him as he tried to brush past, holding his arm, and Face peered down at Murdock’s hand before looking back up at his face.

“I mean it, Faceman,” and, for just a couple seconds, Face thought that Murdock was going to try and kiss him and Face wasn’t sure what it meant when he realized he wouldn’t say no if it happened. But Murdock let go and stepped aside and Face laughed nervously, going to do exactly what he had planned to all along.

Nothing. He should have been more relived than he actually was that they were still okay but the desolation was enough to make his skin crawl. It was heading, he checked his watch, for 10pm and, sooner or later, they would have to figure out somewhere to rest until it got light out again. The overt choice would be to just stay where they were; they could camp out behind the counter, remain unseen to anyone moving by and the lack of curtains would prove to be the exact wake-up call they would need to keep them from oversleeping (if, in fact, any sleeping got done). He explained this to Murdock who told him he could find no faults in the plan whatsoever.

“Maybe one of us should stay awake, keep a look-out,” Face suggested once the two of them had seated themselves on the concrete floor, backs propped up against the bottom of the formica counter, “I’ll do it,” he offered when Murdock lazily yawned.

“We should split,” Murdock said, “you take the first and then you wake me up for the next one.”

“Sure,” Face watched as Murdock got up, turning the lights off to make it easier for one of them to drift off and he sat back down, hustling nearer so their shoulders and legs were touching. Face stared outside and still, there was nothing. It was going to be a long night.

. . . .

Face awoke to a startlingly bright beam of sunlight burning into his left eye. He took a moment to really open his eyes, instantly feeling the stiffness in his back that he would probably not get rid of for the rest of the day. His head had fallen sometime during his sleep and was resting heavily on Murdock’s chest and he could tell that Murdock was awake because he could feel his arms tensing and loosening as he moved his hands in his lap. He didn’t recall falling asleep, nor did he remember waking Murdock up at any point to take over the watch. He finally sat up, twisting his neck to work the soreness out of it.

“Mornin’,” Murdock said softly.

“Yeah. I don’t…” Face began and Murdock gave him a sidelong glance and a small smile.

“You fell asleep almost twenty minutes after I turned the lights off. You were out,” he put his hand flat, horizontal, and slid it across the air, “like that,” he snapped his fingers, “I stayed up, made sure you didn’t get eaten in your sleep.”

“You stayed up… all night?” What was he, insa— well, yes, he was.

“Not a big deal,” Murdock shrugged, “I do it all the time.”

“You do?”

Murdock gazed off at somewhere in the distance before looking down at his lap, “nightmares,” he responded, barely above a whisper, thinking that Face didn’t hear him (but he most certainly did).

“Oh, well. Thanks. For letting me sleep.”

“Sure,” and Murdock was looking at him in that way again where he might just lean over and… and Murdock rose to his feet, thrusting his arms over his head and letting out a loud roar as he stretched. Face followed, but didn’t make as big of a show out of it and he rolled his shoulders, studying the area around them as if he had expected it to change when he wasn’t looking. But everything was relatively normal. The boxes were still stacked, the maps still lopsided in their stands, and the body was still melting in the room just a few feet away from them.

His stomach growled, suddenly very aware that it had been since lunchtime yesterday when it last ate, any remainder of digested food sitting in the bottom of a trash can. Face eyed the fridge, still whirring and thudding in it’s little corner and took in a deep breath.

“Let’s see what we’ve got here,” he said, yanking on the door, the light taking a bit too long to flicker on and Face wrinkled his nose, the only thing inside that probably wasn’t covered in mold was a large, gallon jug of water the he carefully removed, setting it down on the counter, checking to see if anywhere were any kind of cups. Of course not. He did his best to lift it, wiping off the lip before putting it tentatively to his mouth and he managed to get enough that he didn’t accidentally spill and drown himself. He called Murdock over – and lord knows what he had been doing in the meantime – and offered him the container.

“Now what?” Murdock inquired once he was finished and Face exhaled like he was a balloon somebody was letting the air out of. He had hoped that maybe a plan would come to him as he dreamt but he hadn’t been that lucky, his mind drifting, once again to vague metaphors of his childhood. The fact that he could understand them worried him.

“If we’re lucky, there could be new policemen. I could try to convince them I’m from the government but if they’re being overly cautious… of course, we could also try to find another way into the city that might not be as guarded as the direct route but…” Face felt like slamming his head against the nearest wall. There were too many strings and not enough hands to hold them all. Any of his ideas required three or more people to accomplish and he had to keep reminding himself that this was it, just him and crazy Murdock (Dammit, he was better at this. He was the best. How could he be slipping this quickly?).

“We could pretend to be infected,” Murdock said and Face bit his lip to hold back his laughter.

“We’d get shot on sight if they believed us, Murdock. No, we have to find a way in either completely invisible or right under their noses.” They lapsed into silence until Murdock slowly pulled out a devilish grin.

“I’ve got an idea.”

. . . .

“You sure about this?” Face asked, hand resting on the receiver of the black phone, finger poised on the ‘9’ button, thumb ready to follow it quickly with two ‘1’s. Murdock nodded and Face cleared his throat, taking a moment to gather himself and get into character. “Okay,” he said more to himself than Murdock and he pressed the phone to his ear, listening to the dial tone.

“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?” He was surprised that anybody answered, expecting them to be busier, machines filled with people from across the county phoning in, thinking they could get assistance from a higher authority, “hello?”

“Yes, yes, hello?” Face strained his voice, put on heavy breathing, adding an edge that either sounded like he had just finished crying or that he was just about to start, “I… I… oh god, oh god…” Murdock gave him a double thumbs-up.

“Sir? Sir, just calm down and explain what happened.”

“Okay. Okay… there’s… there’s a body here.”

“A body, sir?”

“Yes, a body,” Face whined, “I think… I think it’s been here awhile. He’s… oh god, oh god,” he started to lose control and snorted when Murdock tried to signal him to turn it down a bit, “he’s got bite marks all over him. I think he’s moving oh god, you have… you have to help me!”

“Alright, sir, calm down. What’s your name?”

“My name? My… uh… Ethan. Ethan Harding.”

“Alright Ethan, where are you?”

“I’m… I’m at a gas station just a few miles outside the city. Brightstar Gas Station. You have to help me, please,” he cried into the phone, letting out a hopeless wail and Murdock cringed at how real it sounded. The woman asked him to stay on the line but he told her it wasn’t such a good idea, that he had to go and then he hung up.

Murdock applauded politely and Face bowed slightly, tilting his head downwards, sweeping one arm out to the side. All they could do now was wait and, if they were holding any aces at all, the station would actually send somebody out instead of offering false reassurance and that it would only be a single car. In the free time that they had between making the call and hanging tight until their knights in shining armor decided to show, Face went outside, moving his car so it looked as if it hadn’t been sitting there since yesterday while Murdock busied himself by running through the inside, making as much of a mess as he could to make it look like there had been some kind of struggle.

Face sat on a heavy plastic box outside the front door, smelling gasoline and the faint whiff of possible oncoming rain and Murdock paced in front of him, hands behind his back like a professor preparing to give a lecture.

“It’s a good plan,” Face told him and Murdock went to a standstill.

“You think so?”

“Better than anything I was coming up with, that’s for sure.”

“Aw, shucks,” Murdock waved a hand at Face and smiled sheepishly and Face snickered. He wondered how long this good mood was going to last (or, ‘good’ in the sense that it was minimally better than it had been) and figured that, as long as things kept going their way, he would have some kind of faith that they would get out of this intact.

A car siren broke their silence and they stood, heading for the side of the building, hiding themselves, readying to start and quickly finish the second part of their three part plan. A single police car came tearing down the road, making a sharp turn into the gas station, tires squealing as the driver pressed roughly down on the brakes. Two men eventually exited, hands already holding their guns and it was just a few steps closer and Face jumped out first, latching onto the bigger of the two and he began hitting, delivering punches wherever he could, counting on the man’s surprise as leverage. A fist collided with his side and he let out a rush of air just as Murdock leapt out of the shadows to tackle the second man, wrestling the gun from his grip and pointing it back at it’s owner. With Face’s guy distracted, he sent a final blow to his jaw and borrowed his weapon.

“What the hell are you doing!” Murdock’s man exclaimed, holding onto his hat, eyes furious.

“Sorry,” Face said, “we had to,” and he bent over, pounding the butt of the gun into the side of his head, knocking him out cold, watching as Murdock did the same. “Come on.” With some over-exerted effort, they dragged the two men inside, Murdock apologizing for them again after they had stripped them of their uniforms and locked them away in the same room as the corpse (that was really more a puddle than anything else).

Face’s fit almost too perfectly but Murdock’s was just a little too big – not that Face was surprised that much – but he knew that it didn’t matter since they would be shedding them as soon as they passed into the midst of towering buildings and winding streets. Face thought about trying the mobile phone again but knew he’d only get agitated if there was still no response.

Before they left, Face went back to his car, staring longingly, promising that they’d come back for it once they were finished and, tucking his shotgun under his arm, the policeman’s handgun in his belt, he joined Murdock in the other car, the interior smelling of sweat and leather.

“Now, here comes the hard part,” Face said, putting the car first in reverse and then drive, making sure to not go too fast so he had some time to think about what to say.

. . . .

Approaching the roadblock was like stepping into a tank of water that may or may not have had sharks swimming just at the bottom. Murdock kept assuring him, giving him encouraging nods and Face wanted to tell him that it wasn’t actually helping, just putting added pressure on the already boiling pot and he inhaled through his nose, rolling down his window in anticipation, fingers crossed that the car number wasn’t recognizable, cursing himself that he hadn’t thought of attempting to change it before they shoved off. But nobody questioned them. No one asked who they were or where they had come from or why they had seen a car with the same license plate go by earlier with different people inside. A couple worn-out looking men in blue picked up the orange cones to let them by and Face almost felt refreshed (a voice just in his ear kept telling him it was too good to be true but he promptly told it to shut the hell up).

Apparently, this was all just the calm before the storm.

Face slowed to a crawl and all he could do was looked out the windshield in horror. The streets were crammed with deserted vehicles, most of them involved in accidents with one another and they drove by one that was practically cut in half by how fast it had driven into a pole. Smoke was billowing out of windows, thick and black, and glass was everywhere, mostly fallen from the very tops of buildings and Face’s throat closed up when the very visible remains of people who had found their only solution to be jumping were splattered on the once clean sidewalks. There was hardly any noise, save for the distant whine of a stuck car horn and the crackle of fire. Something fell off a building behind them and Face pretended that it was just stone.

He felt a hand nudge his, fingers entangling with his own and Murdock was holding his hand and in any other situation before when he’d try this Face would drop it, make him let go but this time he couldn’t find it in himself to pull away. He stopped the car when he realized he couldn’t go any farther and then he just stared.

Yesterday. This had all started yesterday. He rubbed his eyes with his free hand, pinched his skin to make sure he was definitely still awake. It was ludicrous, unreal, that everything could have fallen apart this quickly. It was like they had been gone for weeks, not hours.

“Do you think…” Murdock faltered, “maybe we’re in a parallel universe or something. I read about those a few months ago and…” Face squeezed his hand to make him stop talking, not being able to make any words climb out yet.

“We should…” Face suggested, opening his door, yanking on Murdock a bit to remind him that he had to let go if they were both going to be able to leave the vehicle. He removed his hat, slicking back his hair, throwing everything off that was weighing him down until he was, once again, in his dark pants and blood-splattered shirt. Murdock copied, fishing around in the backseat for his jacket, wrapping it up in his arms instead of putting it on. “This is…” Face said soberly, not finishing the sentence, “here,” he tossed one of the handguns to Murdock, keeping the other to himself, tucked in the back of his pants and he shouldered the shotgun, hoping it would be enough to intimidate so he wouldn’t have to use it.

All Face could recall was where Hannibal had promised they would meet up the day before, when Face had gone to pick up Murdock, and he knew that the chances of them still being there at that specific address were dwindling by the minute but Face wouldn’t put it past Hannibal to pick one spot and defend it with his life.

“Where’re we going?” Murdock was still standing on the other side of the car, hands wringing into the leather of his coat, mouth twisting into a deeper frown and Face wondered if Murdock was seeing this any differently, if, in his head, everything was so much worse.

“1056 East 3rd Street,” Face said, repeating it to himself, under his breath, just to make sure, “that’s where we were supposed to meet Hannibal and B.A..” They started walking, the silence whistling in their ears as they overstepped debris and car parts, “let’s just hope they’re still there.”

. . . .

They were moving past a diner when Murdock requested they stop. Face was confused until Murdock pointed to his stomach and even though Face put out an air of being inconvenienced, he couldn’t deny that he was also ridiculously hungry, something he felt he shouldn’t even be thinking about.

But Murdock had this way of looking at him that made Face want to do what he asked, just so he’d stop with those affectionate eyes and slightly down-turned mouth. He dropped his shoulders and sighed, motioning for Murdock to follow, putting a finger to his lips even though the gesture was most likely unnecessary. A bell still hanging from the door jingled as they opened it and they paused, the inside appearing as if a tornado had whirled through a little while before.

Taking a step forward, Face’s foot slid against something greasy and he took a moment, considering if he really did want to look, peering with only one eye, confirming his worst fear: blood. Swallowing, he moved around it, silently warning Murdock just as the man pushed his heel against something that crunched (but, thankfully, turned out to only be a shard of a broken coffee mug).

“Look, can we just get this over with and get out of here,” Face said, pulling his gun closer to himself, finger rubbing against the trigger, just in case. Murdock disappeared into the kitchen, a few seconds of quiet followed by the loud banging of pots and pans and a clatter of silverware. Face furrowed his brows, “you alright?”

“I’m fine, fine,” Murdock’s voice wandered out from the kitchen, sounding disinterested and distracted. Face could visualize him, staring intently at whatever he was so focused on, waving a hand like Face was standing right next to him. Something – or someone – shifted back by the bathrooms and Face felt his heart begin to race.

“Murdock…” Face yelled.

“Alright, alright, keep your pants on,” Murdock said, appearing behind the counter with a cracked plate stacked with three sandwiches, the fourth already in his teeth, “hope you like ham.”

“I hate ham,” Face said, taking his food anyway, sniffing at it and grimacing before shoving the white bread and pink meat into his mouth.

“I think I saw some roast beef, if you want,” Murdock replied while he chewed, “it smelled… questionable but I’m sure it’s fine. I could…”

“It’s okay.”

“I…”

“Murdock,” Face gripped his shoulder and leaned over, “it’s fine.” Murdock went easily into a smile, stuffing the rest of his first sandwich into his mouth, making Face laugh and spit out crumbs as he watched Murdock attempt to ingest it. They ate the rest in taciturnity, Murdock fishing around in the still-working fridge, drawing out two cans of orange soda. There were more sounds of movement, the feeling of being watched bearing down on them, but they did their best to ignore it. It was just easier that way.

. . . .

Murdock started complaining of a stomachache twenty minutes after they had begun walking again.

“I shouldn’t have eaten that beef,” he whined, rubbing his stomach and pouting.

“I don’t get you, Murdock,” that was, Face realized, an understatement, “you tell me the roast beef smelled… what was the word you used?”

“Questionable.”

“Right. Questionable. You tell me it smells questionable and then you eat it anyway.” Face checked over his shoulder, feeling eyes burning into his spine. But nobody was there.

“I thought maybe it was the body in the kitchen that was… was…” he wiggled his fingers in front of his nose, “affecting my sense of smell.” Face froze, a look of bewilderment flooding over his concern.

“There was a body in the kitchen? Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I don’t know,” Murdock wavered when he finally noticed that Face wasn’t moving alongside him anymore but he refused to twist and meet his friend’s gaze, instead lowering his chin to his chest, eyes averted to his feet, “didn’t think it was worth mentioning.” Face closed the gap between them after a moment of deliberation, finding himself putting a hand on Murdock’s waist.

“Murdock…” Face began, ready to ask him what was wrong (besides the usual) because this wasn’t ordinary. Sure, Murdock had a weird way of handling any kind of situation, stressful or not, but this was just all too… normal. He’d expect this from some regular guy who didn’t know what to do, but not Murdock. He should have invented a character by now, should have been harder to supervise. The words had barely left his mouth when, from just off to the right, from inside a falling apart clothing store, was a monstrous snarl. Face’s solution was to keep marching – and march fast – and it took a moment to shake Murdock out of whatever reverie he had thrown himself into but soon they were both going, their sauntering quickly turning into sprinting.

The growling seemed to pursue them, getting louder and louder the further they felt like they had moved away and Face started to think that, maybe, the sound wasn’t coming from next to them but above. He scanned the tops of the buildings as he ran, nearly tripping over his own feet once or twice, but there was nothing there so, once they had hit a four-way intersection, placing themselves directly in the center, they stopped.

“You do hear that, right?” Face asked urgently and he heard Murdock laugh.

“I hear a lot of things. You’ll have to specify.”

“Growling,” Face breathed.

“Oh, yeah,” Murdock confirmed, “I hear it.” Face wasn’t sure if he should have felt appeased or not.

“I can’t… it’s like it’s coming from everywhere,” Face lamented, bending this way and that as if he could pinpoint exactly where it was coming from.

“Maybe it is.”

“We can’t stay here,” Face said, searching around them, eyes falling on a car that seemed to still be in one piece, “Murdock. You remember how to hotwire one of these things, right?”

“Sure, sure,” and they piled inside, Face taking the passenger seat, fingers wrapping around the handle, knuckles white as he both kept guard out the windows and examined Murdock as he worked. It took him a few tries but he finally got it, the engine sputtering and coughing. Murdock pulled on the gearshift, hitting a car directly behind them as he tried backing out of the awkward angle the car had been left in, tires screeching and the pair wincing as the vehicle protested to the treatment. He eventually straightened it and they began traveling down the dirty street, swerving around any obstacles, speeding up once it seemed they were both free and clear and close to the towering office building Hannibal and B.A. were, hopefully, hiding out in. “See,” Murdock said turning to grin at Face as if he had questioned any outcome other than failure, “piece of cake.”

“Murdock!” Face shouted, pointing ahead of them at a trio of infected that had accumulated over a body and Murdock faced back where he should have been looking, veering, foot hitting the accelerator instead of the brake in his panic and their car collided with something hard and immovable and, because of their momentum, instead of just crashing into a sudden halt, they went flying, the vehicle flipping a few good spins, landing heavily and loudly upside-down on the sidewalk.

Face’s vision momentarily blurred, going dark around the edges. His head was pounding, the seatbelt digging into his skin and he clawed at it, trying to unlock it but he couldn’t find the mechanism. His scalp tingled as his hair brushed against the roof of the car and he convulsed, heart beating so rapidly he could feel it in his feet, his lungs burning.

“Murdock,” he said weakly, only getting a groan in response and he twisted in his seat best he could, blinking the dust out of his watering eyes, trying again, “Murdock,” but Murdock repeated the noise, making a sound like he wanted to respond but just couldn’t, “hold on,” he searched for the button to release him, finding it and pushing furiously, kicking the dash when it wouldn’t work. He was in the middle of trying to squeeze himself out of it when he heard familiar dragging footsteps from a couple feet away. Face would have to have been a certified idiot if he thought that the infected they had worked so hard to avoid wouldn’t abandon their carcass for some fresher meat. He fumbled for his gun but couldn’t find it and going for the one still tucked in his belt was impossible. A broken and bleeding face with an eye falling out of her socket appeared at the fractured windshield.

Murdock moaned gradually and Face reached out to just touch him, wanting to say a lot but not knowing where to start because this was probably it. He wasn’t one for giving up so quickly but he was, once again, blank for ideas and he was just so damn exhausted. He shut his eyes, felt Murdock try to move closer to him and their fingers grazed one another just as the gunshots echoed around them.

Face jumped, watching as the infected woman who had been inspecting them flinched and then fell, blood and brain matter drenching across the glass. Two more shots came soon after, the sound of bodies dropping to pavement filling in the empty spaces and he saw the boots first, Hannibal’s face slowly appearing at his broken window, cigar clenched between his teeth. He pulled it out with his thumb and index finger and sighed.

“Took you long enough,” Hannibal said, smiling, but it didn’t last long as he quietly observed their current condition, “you alright, Lieutenant?”

“I… I think so. I can’t get my seatbelt…” but then he paused, shaking his head, “go help Murdock. I’ll be okay.” Hannibal nodded once and disappeared over to the other side of the vehicle. Face couldn’t see properly so he only listened as Hannibal loosened Murdock from his seat and pulled him out and Face was about to think he was being left there alone when B.A. seemingly showed up from nowhere, “you think you could…” B.A. grunted, yanking on Face’s seatbelt until it finally popped open and then reached his arms inside to drag Face out into a somersault onto his back.

“You should’ve just hit them,” B.A. said, brooding over him before offering a hand to help Face to his feet, a hand which he eagerly accepted, and Face limped slightly as a spasm rocketed through his left leg. B.A. led Face towards an unassuming, grey building, it’s walls made of some kind of rough concrete, allowing him through the door first and directing him to a room just off a narrow corridor, which turned out to be the employee break room. Water and various food items were piled near the sink, the small, short table in the center of the room overtaken by guns, ammo and grenades. Hannibal was standing, arms crossed, leaning against one of the sharp edges of the counter and Murdock was sprawled on the couch, eyes heavy as he rested his head on a pillow. Finding no other place to sit, Face went to the couch, picking up Murdock’s upper half with intent to make him stay up but Murdock took that to just mean he was being moved temporarily and instead lowered back down, replacing the scratchy pillow with Face’s lap and Face couldn’t force himself to move the guy. Hannibal looked like he definitely noticed but he didn’t say anything about it.

“What happened?” Hannibal asked sternly like one of them broke a lamp and he knew they had done it, he just had to know how it happened so he could deliver proper punishment.

“I think we’re okay,” Face said, not answering the query that was asked of him and Hannibal’s eyebrows shot up but Face continued anyway, “no broken bones. I think I twisted my ankle and Murdock,” he glanced down at the man currently trying to get more comfortable on Face’s thighs, “he might have a concussion.” Hannibal blinked, an obvious ‘are you finished?’ look spreading across his face.

“What happened?” He inquired again.

“Where do you want me to start?”

“The beginning.”

“I went to get Murdock and the place was crawling with infected people. We got out and when we tried to get back into the city…”

“The roadblock,” B.A. interrupted and Face concurred.

“We hid out in a gas station a couple miles away. I knew we wouldn’t get anywhere until morning so we stayed there.”

“And how’d you get in?” Hannibal smirked. He always liked to hear about Face’s scams after he had completed them. Sometimes Face got the idea that Hannibal was writing them all down but for what purpose he couldn’t fathom.

“Called the police. Knocked them out and stole their uniforms and car,” Face explained and Hannibal chuckled, “they let us right in.”

“Well, this wasn’t exactly the way I was planning we all meet up again, but it’ll have to do,” Hannibal said, finally diverting his attention to their injuries, “Face, I want you to keep an eye on Murdock, keep him awake, just in case.”

“What’re you gonna do?” But Face knew the answer before he even asked the question.

“I need to come up with a plan.”

. . . .

Hannibal’s plan, it turned out, was strikingly similar to Face’s plan to find them earlier: go outside, get in the van and make a run for it, hopefully not getting ambushed along the way. And, if they were? It was as simple as one, two, bang. Face had agreed that, really, it was their only option and that anything more convoluted would just leave them in a worse predicament but Hannibal seemed to be in such a rush to put it into action and Face wasn’t sure how ready he was to just leave.

“You’ve been hiding out in here, safe, with every weapon we ever owned,” Face said, speaking in hushed tones to Hannibal, who had been on his way to hand a box of bullets the length of his middle finger to B.A. who was loading up the van.

“And…?” Hannibal lowered the box back on the table, getting that this wasn’t going to be a short conversation.

“And we,” Face gestured first to himself and then to Murdock, who was still on the couch, awake but looking grumpy and in pain, “we got into a car accident trying to get back here. Can’t we just wait a couple hours and rest?” Just standing there was making his ankle ache even though he was barely putting pressure on it. If they, god forbid, had to surrender the van, the last thing he thought he could do was run.

“Listen, kid,” and Hannibal hadn’t called him that in over five years, the last time being when they were stuck on the roof of a forty story building with hardly any means of escape and Face had suggested just yielding, “the government? The military? They’re coming this way and any person still left alive and hiding? Who knows where they would take us. It may not look a lot like any of the other ones we’ve been in, but we’re fighting a war. We’re still soldiers and if we even have a chance of getting out of this in one piece but a little worse for wear? We’re going to take it,” and he lifted the cardboard, signaling that he was done talking about this and he walked out. Face hobbled over to where Murdock was still sitting, head in his hand, and fell down next to him.

“We’re leaving.”

“Leaving? But we just got here,” Murdock deplored.

“I know. You should have heard the speech Hannibal just gave me. Very… rousing. You know, Murdock,” Face said once Hannibal had come and gone a second time, “we should… I mean, you and I…”

“It’s okay, Faceman,” Murdock interrupted, giving him a gracious smile and patting him on his leg and Face was going to protest, was going to say that Murdock couldn’t possibly know what he was trying to say but then Hannibal was popping his head around the corner and telling them it was time to go.

. . . .

“Where is it?” Face asked, staring around them once they were all standing outside and Face blinked, glancing up at the grey sky when he thought he felt a drop of water fall into his eye. Because what they really needed right now was rain. The van was nowhere to be seen.

“Parked it around the corner,” Hannibal said, speaking around his cigar, “didn’t want to give anybody going by any ideas. Come on.”

“Hannibal. Can’t you bring it to us?”

“No,” Hannibal said plainly, already starting to move away and B.A. threw Face a ‘walk it off, fool’ look and Face grumbled but complied. As it happened, ‘around the corner’ actually meant ‘a block or so away and then around a corner’ which Face supposed answered his unspoken question as to why it had taken them so long to load it up earlier. Out of all the times Face had needed assistance and an escape, this would have to top the list of times he was overjoyed to see this giant black rectangle. Murdock clambered inside first, the others following and it was like entering an old family home. Hannibal tossed B.A. the keys and Face knew that there was no way that things wouldn’t start looking up from here on out.

Sometimes, Face thought, he shouldn’t be allowed to be optimistic.

. . . .

They were fifteen minutes from taking a back road out of the city, a road that Hannibal had promised wasn’t going to be as cluttered with police as the more direct routes, something he laughed about for a good few minutes, saying how the police never really did understand how it worked. They were fifteen minutes from, for once, not having to shoot at anything or anybody when the engine started smoking.

B.A. tried to ignore, tried to peer through it but, after a minute, he couldn’t just let it be so, stopping right in the middle of the thick white line that separated the two lanes, he turned the key, telling them all to stay put as he exited, heaving up the hood and disappearing behind metal and smoke.

“Dammit!” B.A. roared and Hannibal kicked open his door and jumped out, Face and Murdock following only because they felt they had no choice. “Man,” B.A. said, motioning towards the car, walking away from it and walking back like he was trying not to beat it up, “I thought I had fixed that two weeks ago.” The only thing Face could recall happening two weeks ago that required car repair was when they had gotten into a gunfight and the van’s engine had been shot to pieces. B.A. had sworn that it was as good as new then but he must have missed something.

“Can you fix it?” Hannibal asked and B.A. tsked.

“Course I can.”

“How long will it take?”

“I can make it drivable in half an hour,” B.A. said, going around to the driver’s side, lifting his box of tools out from behind his seat.

Murdock said something, but loud, frightful growls masked his words. Hannibal asked him to repeat himself as if he hadn’t heard the other sounds.

“I said,” Murdock said weakly, “you might have to make it work a little faster.”

About a quarter mile away and getting closer by the second, a herd of what looked to be over thirty infected were quickly heading their way.

“Alright, B.A.,” Hannibal ordered, springing into action, “get this fixed and get this fixed fast. Face, you and Murdock take either side of the street,” he tossed them weapons and sent them on their way, Face sharing a look with Murdock.

“What’re you gonna do?”

“I,” Hannibal said, climbing on top of the van and shouldering a heavy artillery rifle, “am going to take the high ground.”

Picking them off was easier than it should have been, moving quickly and without stopping, fingers sore on their triggers as they delivered one shot to the head after the other. The bodies kept falling but they also kept coming as if they were growing out of the sewers and not once did they think that their adrenaline and gunfire was what was attracting them in the first place.

“How’s it going B.A.,” Hannibal hollered as he reloaded.

“Almost done, Hannibal, almost done!” B.A. yelled back but the clattering of a fallen wrench was replaced by the sound of bullets and Face saw Hannibal spin around and say something that none of them needed to hear:

“They’re coming from all sides. I’ll cover B.A., you two stay where you are,” Hannibal ordered and if Face even wanted to challenge that command he knew he couldn’t. Face watched as Murdock switched to a smaller gun, his larger one empty and, with a shorter range it meant he had to get nearer, something Face thought of as incredibly stupid and he tried to warn Murdock, to get him to stop trying too hard to prove himself but the guy wasn’t listening and, before Face could even take in another breath, Murdock was surrounded.

Murdock cried out and Face took off, reaching out and waving his arm.

“Murdock, grab my hand,” and Face moved closer, pausing to get a balding woman with a missing lower jaw directly between the eyes, his muscles burning as he stretched, “come on.” He felt Murdock’s hand close into his and he started to pull, shooting the entire time, dropping his shotgun to replace it with the pistol that Murdock had forsaking when he was overcome. His heels dug into the solid ground and he felt himself sliding and he fell hard to his knees along with Murdock but he just kept straining and hauling and it was down to a single infected man who would not give up. Murdock was hysterically saying Face’s name as he fought to release himself from the infected man’s iron grip and Face was grunting and yelling, telling him to hold on, that all he needed was to get a clear vision of it’s head and it was over.

But the infected man was either more aware of what he was doing or incredibly stubborn because he kept his head right behind Murdock’s shoulder, gaunt and broken arms encased around Murdock’s hips and Murdock flailed, falling away from Face for a moment before frantically grasping him again. The only way, Face realized in a moment of clarity, to neutralize this was to shoot through Murdock or to just let him go, but he’d rather let himself get bitten than do the latter.

Murdock seemed to understand, started nodding his head, still fighting against the man, trying to hit it wherever he could strike him to keep him from lodging his teeth deep into Murdock’s skin but Face shook, his head swimming, hands sweating. He knew he was a good shot but if he screwed this up he could wind up killing the wrong person and he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to get over that.

“I can’t do it,” Face voiced, “I can’t do it.”

“You have to,” Murdock replied in an attempt to calm at least on of them down but the quaver in the way he spoke wasn’t doing well to hide how terrified he was.

“I might…” and it was like Murdock could read his mind.

“You won’t, Face,” he didn’t use any of the stupid nicknames, just his name, “I trust you. Do it,” and Face hesitated until he saw how exhausted and ready to give up Murdock was and, when his hand started to fall away from his own again, arm going slack, Face took in a hard inhale, didn’t let it out and pulled the trigger.

Blood freckled Face’s face and Murdock let out an awful sound upon impact, slumping forward as the back of the infected man’s head exploded and Murdock collapsed under the weight of the now completely dead body. Hands shaking so badly he could barely hold onto the gun anymore, Face crawled over, panting as he pushed and shoved until the body had rolled off into the gutter and he grabbed Murdock, forcing him to sit up, only vaguely soothed when he saw that Murdock was, indeed, alive. He fretted, shifting Murdock’s jacket off; the wound was small and round, a clean through and through that would require nothing but stitches but he couldn’t stop, couldn’t make himself not apologize or try to patch it up or at least stop it bleeding.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Murdock was repeating, breathless and tired and Face could feel his pulse moving faster than a hummingbird. Face didn’t believe him because he wasn’t okay so how the hell could Murdock be alright and he reached up, holding Murdock’s face between his two hands and Murdock somehow found a way to smile, “I’m fine, Face. I’m fine.”

Face pushed their mouths together with such force that he nearly knocked Murdock over backwards and Murdock didn’t hesitate to respond, like he had been waiting for this for years. Murdock squawked when Face hit too hard against his wounded shoulder but when Face went to move away, to say he was sorry, Murdock only pulled him back.

B.A. started to say something from behind them, something that sounded a lot like he had fixed the van and that there were more coming, that they didn’t have time for whatever was going on, but his tirade was cut short, probably by Hannibal, whatever he said muffled by his hand.
. . . .

After that, actually getting out was easiest part. With B.A. behind the wheel and Hannibal shouting directions the entire way, bursting out onto the highway was like being welcomed into the open arms of a loving mother after being beaten by your no-good, abusive father. Hannibal laughed the way he did whenever they had gotten out of something with everything still attached.

“I love it, I just love it,” Hannibal said, pulling a fresh cigar from his inside pocket and lighting the match, striking it against the dashboard, much to B.A.’s dislike, “I love it when a plan comes together.”

Face was barely listening, head resting against the wall, an arm wrapped around himself for no reason. He could tell Murdock was next to him, grinning and staring but he didn’t look back because he thought if he did he would start smiling too and he just wasn’t in the mood yet to switch off from guilt. He felt positively wrecked, hardly unable to believe that everything he kept replaying over in his head happened in less than two days.

A finger poked his leg and he batted it away. B.A. actually giggled about something Hannibal said. Murdock was surprisingly silent but, for once, Face wasn’t too worried.

They traveled for a good half hour, not stopping once, not even for red lights and wound up in a small town where the houses were far apart and isolated enough that nobody would think to come knocking unless it was an emergency. They found a small place, a grey two-story house up on a small hill, it’s paint peeling and wooden steps old and sagging. It had been abandoned, probably yesterday before things really started to get out of hand, and Hannibal told B.A. to pull up in the driveway, that they had a long way to go and it wouldn’t hurt to stop here for one night. They needed time to heal.

Inside was pastels, dark, rich furniture, an uncovered fireplace and garish fixtures hanging from the walls. There was a small kitchen and no door to a basement, the mahogany stairs to the second floor directly in front of them as they entered. They crowded into the livingroom, still tense and unorganized and Hannibal told B.A. to look for a first aid kit, that they had to get Murdock patched up before the injury got any worse. It took him awhile but B.A. returned, asking what kind of people would leave a first aid kit in the most inconvenient place, what purpose that served anybody and Hannibal offered it to Face but Face declined, saying that Hannibal knew more of what he was doing when the truth was that his hands were still quaking so hard he knew he’d mess up with the first stitch.

He moved into the kitchen instead, grabbing four bottles of water from the back of the fridge, looking around for food that he wouldn’t screw up in making. Face handed the bottles off to B.A. and B.A. raised an eyebrow, peering down at the tremor in the hands that were in front of him.

“It’s… ah… it’s nothing,” Face said, trying a smirk and B.A. didn’t believe him but he let it go and just thumped him on the back, walking away.

The next few hours were spent coming up with an elaborate plan that encompassed the next five years of their lives. Things, Hannibal commented, were changing and they needed to adapt, just like they always had before. They discussed what would happen if this virus got better and what would happen if it got any worse and what they would do, agreeing that, despite the hit it would take to all of their bank accounts, they would begin taking on more cases for free.

“Even if this subsides,” Hannibal said, “they won’t entirely go away. We need to be prepared to be surrounded by these… people for a long time.”

They talked about where they would live, how they would feed themselves and what they would do with Murdock. Face asserted that they couldn’t bring him back to the hospital, that the last time he was there it was already half burnt to the ground and full of more dead people than alive. Nobody argued.

Sometime around eight that evening, they paused from writing and debating for dinner. Murdock insisted that he take over in that area, cooking with one good hand, hiring B.A. – and not Face – to be his other arms. He used whatever he found in the vegetable drawers and freezer and they crowded around in the livingroom, sitting on the floors and the arm chairs, shoveling the meal into their mouths, Face doing his best to get more of it past his lips than on his clothes, cursing his hands that just wouldn’t stop, hoping he was being careful enough to hide it.

Somebody reached for the television remote but they could only manage to watch ten minutes before Hannibal was telling them to turn it off. Face startled everyone by offering to clean up, saying he’d prefer to do it alone and none of them got in his way.

“You and Murdock,” Hannibal said around eleven o’clock, “you go upstairs and get some sleep. B.A. and I’ll stay down here, keep watch.” B.A. started to bellyache but Hannibal shut him up with a fleeting look. Face could have said something but then Murdock was gripping him around the wrist and dragging him upstairs. The mattress was too hard, the pillows far too soft and all Face managed was to kick off his shoes and shirt before collapsing, eyes shutting as soon as he pulled the covers over his legs.

It was three in the morning and Face's eyes shot open at the loud bangs and squealing of tires that vibrated through the entire house, shaking the windows. He lifted his head, carefully removing Murdock's arm from around his waist (wondering how in the world he could have slept through the noise) and slipped out of bed, not bothering to slide on his shoes or button up his shirt. He snatched up the rifle that Hannibal had rightfully insisted he keep with him and tip-toed out into the hallway, the stairs creaking as he leapt down, taking them two at a time and he walked right past the front door, making it most of the way into the livingroom before doubling back, realizing that the breeze he had felt wasn't from a draft but because the door was wide open.

He hustled outside, the grass wet under his bare feet, spotting the van still parked neatly in the driveway. He circled the entire perimeter, checking the tiny backyard, finding himself back on the sidewalk, looking up and down the road before reentering the house and taking his time searching every single corner.

But Hannibal and B.A. were gone.

Face hated to wake Murdock from the obvious deep sleep he desperately needed, but this was so much bigger and he bounded back up the stairs, kneeling by Murdock’s side of the bed, gently shaking him awake.

“What is it,” he mumbled, rubbing a hand over his face, “whatsa’matter?” When Face told him, it was like somebody had snapped a rubber-band the size of a football against Murdock’s chest. He gasped and struggled to sit up, wincing as he leaned too heavily on the wrong elbow. “What… what do ya mean gone.”

“I don’t know they’re just…” but Face couldn’t finish the sentence and Murdock started talking and talking and talking and wouldn’t stop, eyes wide, words blending together, throwing out so many ideas, none of which made a lick of sense, “Murdock. Calm down, alright? This is Hannibal. We’ll find them.” Murdock stammered like a fish struggling for air and, in a moment of out-of-character tenderness, Face leaned over and kissed his cheek, pulling him into an awkward hug.

. . . .

Face went back out to look once the sun rose but all he found just left him more confused. There were bullet casings littering the front walk like more than the two shots he had heard had been fired. Black tired treads curved along the pavement and disappeared a few feet away from the house. At least, he thought, they knew which direction they had gone in.

He went back inside to see Murdock sitting, sloppily dressed, at the dining room table, sipping on a glass of milk, a bowl of plain cornflakes plopped down, untouched, in front of him.

“They had a good reason,” Face commented, “they wouldn’t have gone with them unless they had a good reason.”

“What if…” Murdock started but Face shushed him.

“This is Hannibal,” he said again, pulling up a chair and maneuvering it until he was sitting right next to Murdock, “he’s always got a plan. Finding them will be the simplest thing we’ve ever done. Besides, you really think B.A. would go very far and leave his van behind?” He helped himself to some of Murdock’s cereal, trying to act like this wasn’t a big deal. He dropped a few pieces because his hands were shaking too much. Murdock noticed and held them in his own.

“Did I do that?” Face didn’t want to say that it started when Murdock told him to shoot him or that it only got worse after he pulled the trigger, so he just forced out a laugh and shook his head. “You really think we’ll find ‘em Faceman?”

“I know we will,” he handed Murdock his spoon, thrown off when Murdock laid his head on Face’s shoulder.

. . . .

EPILOGUE.

one month later

The hotel was slightly more expensive than they were used to but Face thought it wouldn’t hurt to spring for something a little nicer than the last place they had been forced to stay at. Murdock looked like a child given an oversized lollipop as he flopped down on a bed that didn’t smell like bleach, rolling around on the comforter. His shoulder was always stiff and still healing and Face warned him, just like he always did, to not put too much pressure on it. Murdock listened for about two seconds.

They were following a tip, just like all the other times, from a guy who owned a bar in Arizona who said that he was pretty sure he had seen two guys matching Hannibal and B.A.’s descriptions blow through a few days earlier. Normally, he said, he didn’t remember everyone he met but these guys were real characters. Face had tried to get more information from him but the guy had shook his head, saying that was all he got.

Arizona was arid and hot, a wind that provided barely any relief blowing night and day but the hotel was air conditioned so none of that really mattered. They were only staying one night, after all.

They stayed an extra two days when they ran into a woman and her young son who needed help. Her husband had been one of the infected and they were on their own, being bullied by a landlord who thought he could use other people’s fear and grief to swindle them out of too much money. Face had said he didn’t think they should, that if they ever planned on catching up with Hannibal that they had to stop helping people but then Murdock would just give him his look and Face couldn’t say no.

It was a tough one, especially with it being only two of them but, eventually, they managed to chase the guy out of town. The woman handed them a hundred dollar bill and Face tried to give it back but she moved her head back and forth. She said that they deserved it, that she couldn’t have asked for anything better. That evening, she invited them over and made them a real meal. Face flirted with her, knowing it would never get far and Murdock teased and played with the young boy. When it was time to go back to the hotel and pack, Face found Murdock racing toy cars around the livingroom.

In the morning, Face sent Murdock out with the bags to wait in the van, tossing him the keys and telling him it was his turn to drive. He smiled at the woman who stood at the front desk and said goodbye, fishing his wallet out from his back pocket, using the hundred from the mother as part of the payment.

As he handed the young woman the crisp bills, his hands shook.

Comments

[luckywitch]

Hi there! I know it's been a really long time, ok, it's been 10 years on DW, but I just read this fic and thought it was so good! I had bookmarked the version on lj way back in 2010, and this past week, I was like I should start clearing out my tbr fics, which is how I came across this one. It's a little surreal to be reading some of the things you wrote in 2021, as they ring so true today.

But yea, just wanted to say I really enjoyed this fic, thank you for writing it! Hopefully this puts a smile on your face instead of anything else.

I have my own little guess for what happened and I'm going to pretend it all ends happily. ;)