by T. S. Frost
More frustrating still was that by that point Casey was really starting to catch on, and regarded Alexa's continual insistence that she was 'totally fine' with more and more skepticism.
“You don't sound right,” the clone observed out loud once, with his usual bluntness. “Your breathing sounds... different. You look paler, but your face is flushed.” Great–if he was right then Alexa was developing a fever, too. Not good.
But out loud all she said was, “We've been walking a while, I'm tired, of course I'm breathing different. And it's hot out, so no wonder I'm flushed.”
“It's never happened before.”
“Have I ever told you it's kinda weird that you're this aware of any changes in me? I mean, don't get me wrong, I guess I'm flattered, but keep it up and I'm gonna start getting the wrong idea about you, y'know?”
Casey scowled at her, but didn't pursue the topic further. Alexa thanked her lucky stars she could run her mouth off as easily as she did even when she was perfectly healthy, and the deflection had done the trick–this time, at least.
She hoped it would hold, although she noticed that Casey kept glancing her when he thought Alexa wasn't looking, as if surreptitiously trying to check on Alexa's progress and keep an eye on her without letting on that he was. Alexa grit her teeth and tried hard to ignore it.
Her deflection lasted another day, as she put near super-human effort into keeping herself moving despite being as drained as she was; choking her coughs down, and fighting back unnatural shivers in the late-August heat.
Unfortunately for her, the arrival of yet another pack of zoms in the afternoon, the inevitable precursor to several hours of grueling running, dodging, and evading, finally exposed her secret in full to her traveling companion.
They'd barely been pushing themselves for twenty minutes, it was broad daylight, and they were at a comfortable distance from the zoms trailing them, with reasonable probability that they'd be able to ditch the walking dead safely before nightfall–in other words, superb conditions for this neck of the woods.
So there was really no excuse for Alexa to be breathing as hard as she was, especially when she'd proven she could run for hours with no trouble in the past. And there was no avoiding the way she crashed to the pavement and could not make her shaky, weak limbs push herself back up again.
Casey jogged a good ten paces ahead before he realized Alexa was no longer behind him and shot back to her with a frown on his face, which deepened when he caught sight of Alexa's pretty pathetic attempts to haul herself to her feet. The zoms were far enough back that Casey actually had the gall to pause and cross his arms angrily over his chest, glaring down at Alexa as he stood over her.
“Don't give me that look,” Alexa rasped at him, although speaking was difficult at this point, when breathing was practically impossible. “Just help me up or something, must've twisted my leg, I can manage from there–”
“You're a terrible liar,” Casey growled at her–it was that same warning tone he typically took right before smashing a zom, or when sizing up a potential threat. Alexa had never hid it focused on her before, and her attempts to rise fell still in surprise.
Before she could regain her voice, Casey hauled her up completely, carrying her bridal style, and snapped, “I knew something was wrong with you!”
Alexa tried to protest, but Casey's glare was vicious–even scarier than the look Blake gave her when she was about to do something monumentally stupid. So she snapped her mouth shut meekly, and didn't protest when Casey began running again, this time carrying her.
She felt much too tired and weak to fight back anyway, and there was certainly no way she'd win against him. But that didn't stop her from feeling guilty any, as something dark and heavy rolled around in the pit of her stomach at the thought that she'd screwed up yet again.
Casey was paying for her weakness, forced to cover for both himself and Alexa and risking himself in the process. As if she wasn't already enough of a burden as it was–now she was literally weighing him down!
The guilt only increased when Alexa realized that, they were moving at a remarkable pace, faster than usual. It only confirmed Casey had always been holding himself back to keep pace with her. Casey outpaced the zoms with a speed so impressive it made Alexa dizzy–or maybe that was just the illness.
Either way her head was spinning when Casey set her down an hour and a half later, in a small town that the clone had clearly judged to be devoid of zoms. She staggered for a moment when her feet touched the ground again. Casey held her steady by the shoulders until she could stand under her own power.
“You're sick,” Casey said flatly.
Alexa was about to argue that she wasn't, but Casey gave her that same I can break you in half and we both know it so you'd better tell the truth look, and she sighed. “Okay fine, I'm a little sick.”
“You collapsed.”
“I'm just tired! It's fine. I'll be fine.” Another spectacular coughing fit arrived at the worse possible moment, completely destroying her argument as she bent over and valiantly attempted to hack up both her lungs.
“You haven't been fine for days. You're getting worse,” Casey accused, as he hovered nearby. He looked like he was preparing to catch Alexa again if she collapsed after that fit.
“These just aren't very good conditions for getting better, okay?” Alexa said, fighting to keep the defensiveness out of her voice and substituting it for placating. Casey didn't like the unknown and he didn't like things he couldn't fight, and it tended to make him aggressive when he came up against them.
It would be a bad idea to trigger that aggression, verbal or otherwise, so best to take a more honest route now. “I'll be fine when we get to the settlement. They should have better medicine there and we'll be able to rest. That's all I need.”
Casey did not look particularly appeased by this, but said, “Fine. Let's find something to eat and look for shelter.”
“LS, it's barely mid-afternoon,” Alexa said disbelievingly. “We can still push for another couple of hours before it starts getting dark.”
Casey shook his head, and said firmly, “No. this place is safe. We don't know if there will be safe places ahead, and you can't keep moving like this anyway today, especially if there are more packs of dead heads down the road. A run like that one we had before will definitely make you worse. A siege won't help either.”
Alexa grit her teeth. Casey had a perfectly valid, practical point, and she could use the rest, and the food. It might even help her current condition. But it would also cut out valuable hours of travel time, and she didn't want to hold Casey up like this, not in the middle of no-man's land when they were getting closer to safety.
That dark, twisting ball of guilt in her stomach grew a little more, but Casey was clearly not taking no for a answer and he was more stubborn than a bull when he dug in his heels, so finally Alexa just nodded in agreement. “Okay.”
Alexa figured that giving in to Casey's demands would be enough to placate him for the moment. But apparently it wasn't enough to ease Casey's worries, because when they started scavenging in the town to look for something edible he decided to follow her.
Normally in a location like this, deemed zom-free by Casey, they tended to split up–it was extremely difficult to find anything of use or value, these days, but splitting up usually increased their chances of finding at least enough to eat.
They usually set up a meeting point and returned within a certain amount of time. If for whatever reason they came across unexpected trouble, both were good enough to escape from it, and Casey was still within hearing distance if Alexa got in over her head, so she could always call for help.
This time Casey abandoned the practice entirely, and stayed within viewing distance of Alexa the entire time as they hunted through buildings and the town outskirts for anything edible. That was when Alexa first started to realize that Casey was not just angry at her for attempting to conceal her illness, but worried for her too, and
sticking close so he'd be able to help right away if he had to.
Alexa wasn't really sure what to think about that. Part of her was relieved to have somebody there that actually cared about what happened to her, and very happy that she had this particular somebody. The rest of her just felt guilty, awkward, and more than a little insulted at the prospect of needing a babysitter after figuring out how to survive on her own for over three years now.
Still, by the end of the scavenging session Alexa supposed she couldn't really blame Casey for hovering nearby, because she'd been pretty much useless and spent most of her time coughing and wobbling about on exhausted legs and waiting for the world to stop spinning.
By the time an hour had passed they'd managed to scrounge up enough food for both of them, barely, and Casey carried it while quietly keeping his free hand curled around Alexa's upper arm, half leading and half holding her up as they made their way to a safe building that Casey had spotted.
Alexa's head felt foggy and thick by that point; she was exhausted and still cold and her throat hurt from coughing too much, and she barely even noticed when Casey seized her around the waist long enough to leap them up to a fire escape.
The door had been locked, but that was no real deterrence to Casey, and soon the lock didn't exist anymore. Alexa idly found herself wondering about how breaking and entering had become so easy and whether or not they would have been criminal masterminds if the world hadn't basically ended, and it took her a second to realize that she was laying on the floor. She hadn't even realized Casey had put her down.
“You should eat something,” Casey told her curtly, “And then you should rest.” Alexa blinked when she realized the clone was crouched in front of her, looking a little concerned.
He'd also put some of the dried rations and one of the four good, non-rotting apples they'd found down in front of Alexa, as well as her water bottle, and the smell was so heavenly Alexa wasn't about to argue with that first part.
She sat up, still a little dizzy, and began making her way through her share of tonight's scavenged meal, although not nearly as fast as she usually did. Casey sat across from her and quietly ate his own half, although he never took his eyes off Alexa for a moment.
“Sleep,” Casey repeated, when Alexa had finished what passed for dinner.
Alexa shook her head. “No way,” she muttered. She was exhausted, and her head felt muddled and slow because of it and the illness combined, but she wasn't about to be babied–or cut out of doing her half of the work. “My turn for first watch, 'member? You sleep first, LS, you've been doing more today anyway.”
“I'm not tired,” Casey countered.
“Well neither am I,” Alexa bluffed.
Casey snorted. “Liar,” he shot back. “You can barely stay awake. And you're sick. I take first watch.” And when Alexa looked about to protest, he added, “I'll wake you later.”
Alexa grit her teeth at that, but Casey was being stubborn again, and it was hard to make him do anything he didn't want to even on a good day, which this was not. “Fine,” she agreed finally, “But you'd better really wake me, okay? This is a joint effort.”
“Sure,” Casey said, and dug through one of the packs, pulling out both of the blankets and tossing them in Alexa's direction. “Now sleep. I'll keep an ear out for zoms.” Alexa didn't argue further; she was already halfway gone as it was, and a bit of rest would do her wonders.
She dragged the blankets around herself–still not feeling warm enough–and slipped into a fitful sleep. It wasn't perfect, and she spent most of it tossing and turning, coughing, and shivering, but it had some effect, at least.
When she woke again she felt marginally better, her head was a little clearer, and while she figured she wouldn't be running any marathons in the near future at least her limbs could support her own weight. Then she realized she was seeing the first smudges of light on the horizon as dawn approached, and turned to give Casey an accusing stare. “You said you would wake me for my watch!”
“I lied,” Casey said flatly, without a trace of regret. The shadows under his eyes were a little darker than usual, but besides that he didn't look or sound all that different from before.
“You were supposed to switch with me!” Alexa said in frustration, pausing long enough to cough again. “You need the rest too, LS!”
“Tough. I didn't, and you need it more,” Casey answered. He didn't even sound angry, which was the weirdest part; his eyes were narrowed, but he sounded more unyielding with a trace of concern than anything else.
“I'm not the one that has to get us out of tough spots–”
“Are we in a tough spot right now? No,” Casey interrupted. “It's been zom-free all night. And when we are in tough spots, what do you tell me? We need me at the top of my game to escape. Well we need you at the top of your game too so you can make it to the base. I'm fine. And now you're looking a little better.”
“LS, really, you don't need to go and stay up all night on my account–”
“Yeah I do,” Casey shot back, and now there was a bit of anger in his tone. “I promised I'd look out for you, remember? You want me to explain to Blake that I let you run yourself to ground 'cause you were too stubborn to admit you were sick and had to take it easy? You know he'd never forgive either of us for that.”
Alexa grit her teeth, and admitted grudgingly, “Yeah, I guess you're right. Sorry. I do feel a little better, at least.” But inwardly she was becoming more and more frustrated with that stupid promise. She hoped Casey wouldn't take it too seriously–she didn't want Casey putting himself in danger or making himself sick, trying to protect a much weaker person. This was already bad enough.
The rest did help a little bit, at least–that much Alexa hadn't lied about. She was able to keep going for another few hours without any assistance, despite Casey watching her like a hawk. But by mid-afternoon she was starting to lag again, with her coughing fits growing worse once more, and her shivering increasing.
Casey did not seem happy to see this; he'd probably been hoping a single night of rest would help more than it did. Alexa hardly wanted to disappoint, but it was difficult to keep going. After a while she was forced to lean on Casey for support as they walked, and she was barely on her feet at all by the time they reached another abandoned suburban complex in the late afternoon.
She hadn't even realized how badly she was holding onto awareness until she realized it was darker, and Casey was carrying her up the stairs in somebody's abandoned house, and setting her down on one of the dusty but mostly intact beds upstairs.
She tried to ask what was going on, but her coughing started up again, and it was difficult to breathe, so Casey told her to shut up for a moment. The clone set down their packs and vanished, and for one horrible moment Alexa was convinced the clone was finally being smart and abandoning her.
Then she heard a lot of thudding and banging, and the floor shook slightly, and Alexa registered rather distantly that Casey was ripping out the stairs, making the second floor impossible to reach without jumping or climbing–things zoms didn't do.
The clone returned minutes later, and crouched down next to the mattress, pulling their blankets out of the packs again and tossing them over Alexa's shivering form. “I'm gonna go scavenge,” he told the sick teen. “I'll stay close, so if something happens, yell, okay? I'll hear it. Otherwise, just rest. I'll be back.”
Alexa blinked in surprise. “What?” she said intelligently, coughing hard, and then followed up with, “Wait, LS, you shouldn't go by yourself, I'll come with you–”
“No way,” Casey vetoed firmly, and when Alexa attempted to roll out of the makeshift bed anyway and stumble to her feet, it was child's play for the clone to place one hand on Alexa's shoulder and hold her down. “You're sick. Stay here. I'll know if you leave, and you know it. I'll find something for us to eat and be back.”
Alexa couldn't have argued if she tried; she could hardly talk without hacking by now, and it wasn't like s
he could compete with Casey's strength at the best of times. She nodded tiredly and added, “Stay safe.”
“Sure.” And Casey was gone.
Alexa hadn't even realized she'd dropped off to sleep until she felt herself being shaken awake. It was some time later, and she only knew that because the last hints of light were vanishing out of the bedroom window. She blinked blearily, and could just make out Casey's face in the gloom, hovering over her.
“Need to eat,” the clone said. “I didn't find much, but we've got some left over from yesterday too. Then you can go back to sleep.”
“Need to watch,” Alexa muttered tiredly.
“No. You're sleeping.”
“You can't stay up two nights in a row on top of all this,” Alexa protested, finding herself waking a little more at the thought. “It's not good for you either!”
“I know,” Casey said. “I did a quick patrol around the area. This place is small, I haven't seen any signs of zoms recently, and it seems safe enough. I also ripped out anything that would let zoms get up here, so it should be safe. Even if they do show up I'll hear them long before they get to us, and I can be up in time to keep watch. So we'll both rest tonight.”