Chapter Text
Infected bodies fell into the arms of the tall grass, disappearing from view one by one like whack-a-mole. Spike hadn’t even finished nocking his arrow.
Everything was quiet. The meadow sat still. Dangerously still.
Those two specks of red and blue, the ever-roaming runaways, Kelly and Spike, crouched side-by-side. They shared a look at this newborn silence for a drawn-out handful of seconds, like moving too quick would trigger a new wave to come barrelling after them. Kelly stood first, drawing her knife and rising above the grass tongues of the field. Her eyes darted east and west, like little turrets scanning for movement. There was none. Not even a single groan.
“Where did they go?” Spike whispered, his head still ducked and hidden amidst the flora.
“Don’t know. Something weird’s going on. Stay put and don’t get up.” Kelly mumbled back, slowly advancing through the field. That’s when she heard it.
“He-llo!” A masculine voice called out from the distance, the broadness and boom of it echoing out across the clearing. Kelly’s head snapped towards it, knife held tight.
Standing there, legs swallowed by grass, was a man. He seemed to be in his late forties, with a knit sweater, well-kept hair and clean skin. He looked like a professor from the Old Days who had just been plopped into the future. His crossbow sat prominently in his hands, though lowered, its presence was undeniable. It looked handmade.
“Seemed you were in a bit of a bind there. Just, uh, figured I’d help.” The man said. Kelly couldn’t quite see his face from where she was standing. Even so, an odd type of feeling began to burrow in her chest. Recognition. The man’s voice sounded like the distant murmur of a dream in her mind, fuzzy and unplaceable, though so familiar it felt like a sin to not remember.
“We were doing just fine as we were.” Kelly replied.
“I don’t doubt it,” the man added, still holding that crossbow like a rifle. By that point, Spike had already peeked his head above the grass, slowly rising to his feet and emerging from the grass.
“Are we trespassing?” Kelly then asked, twirling the hilt of her knife between her fingers as she faced the gnaw of impatient nervousness, that finicky feeling in her throat and guts that told her to keep it moving.
“No, no, not at all,” the stranger replied with a shake of his head. “Britain’s a no man’s land either way. No land’s nobody’s anymore.”
Spike then took a step forward, his legs parting the grass. Kelly stayed by his side, just a step in front, like she was waiting for the stranger to lunge at them, even though he was around four and a half meters away. “That cottage up there,” he pointed up towards a small, low house that sat on the very top of a hill above the fields, serving as a border between open fields and forest. “It’s yours?”
“That’s right.” The stranger answered. He then paused. “How old are you, kid?”
“Twelve.”
“I’ve got a daughter that age.” He confessed. “Twelve is an awfully young age to be travelling around the mainland.”
“I manage.”
“We’re not here to cause anything. We’ll be on our way.” Kelly chimed in once the pause between words had gotten too large.
“Hold on,” the man chimed, still not moving an inch. He stared at the pair for a few moments. “You two look like you’ve been travelling a while. I’ve, uh,” he gave a tentative look towards the cottage. “I’ve just served breakfast. Eggs and tea.”
Spike’s expression flickered. His stomach roared. Neither of them had had a bite to eat since the incident at the barn. Kelly hid her hunger much better than Spike did.
Kelly looked over at Spike. She knew the poor boy was starving. Finding another meal soon wasn’t a guarantee. If anything went awry inside, she figured, she could just kill the man. Spike was already a thin sack of bones, he didn’t need to get frailer. Not when his life depended on stamina.
“You’ve got food?” Kelly spoke.
“Fresh.” The stranger replied.
She waded through the grass again, stepping closer to the man. “How many people in your house?”
“None that’ll do you harm. Just my family.”
“I don’t know your family, I can't know that for sure.”
“I’ve got a kid too. I won’t harm your son.” The man reassured.
“He’s not my son.” Kelly corrected. “But I promise, to whatever god you believe in and mine, I will kill you if you touch him.”
“I won’t.” He then paused, letting his crossbow-holding hand go limp at his side before extending another. “I’m Jim.”
Kelly’s shoulders tensed. Taut like a pulled rope. And just like a rope, something pulled her forward. Maybe instinct. Maybe fate. Maybe that feeling that coiled in her chest, that pulsed like a second heart.
“Jim.” She echoed. She was two metres away, and something just clicked into place in her brain, so simple yet devastating, like a jigsaw puzzle made from fragmented memories. “Jim.”
It seemed as though Jim felt that pull too, because he started walking forward, slowly, like he was in some sort of trance, just like how the infected would walk, but without the shambling and gurgling. They were only a couple paces away from each other by that point.
“…Kelly?”
Kelly’s knife-holding hand began to tremble with the force she was gripping her hilt. She stood there unblinking, the dark brown expanse of her eyes shifting along his face, taking note of every change in his appearance. Every new wrinkle, every blemish, everything that her blurry memory of him didn’t account for.
“Oh my god…” Jim whispered, before reaching out very suddenly, wrapping his arms around her like she was still little. Still his precious baby girl.
Kelly stood frozen in that hug, arms stuck like marble at her sides. Her breathing began to shake. Her heart felt like it was tied up, like every ventricle was wrapped in a rope knot, pulled in every direction at once. It had been a very long while since she felt that sting in her nose, that precursor to tears. But she felt it, and it made a thick ball of words build up in her throat.
Jim pulled away, his own tears clogging his waterline. He set his calloused hands on either side of her face. He took in her new appearance. How much her face had changed and grown. He saw it all, the upside-down crucifix on her forehead, the scar across her lips and cheek, the tattoo that winded around her neck like a permanent choker, and that messy blonde wig that stood out to an almost parody-like degree. The only thing he could recognise was her face, that same, bright-as-sun face that would scrunch in focus over drawings during that wonderful time before she went missing.
“Where did you go? We- me and your mum, we looked everywhere for you. We searched half the mainland,”
Kelly couldn’t reply. She stood there, the words getting tangled in her throat, only coming out in half-baked sentences. Eventually, she managed something cohesive.
“I went to Hell, Da.” She croaked, her eyes filling with tears.
Jim’s eyes searched hers. He didn’t know what she had gone through, how much blood coated her hands, how much hellfire engulfed her mind, but looking into her eyes, he knew how much she was hurting.
Wordlessly, he let her sink into his arms, her face burying into his shoulder. He stroked her hair, that fake, finicky blonde hair, as he, after ten years, finally held his baby girl again.