Page 31 of Immune

“What I mean is,” I start, pointing a finger at him, “you stay there and try not to bleed on anything important, and I’ll stay here, armed, mildly irritated, and deeply annoyed.”

Kaito stares. “Pretty sure that still sounds like a we.”

“It sounds like you’re itching for a bullet to your forehead,” I volley, glaring hard enough that the Alpha would have split in two if I possessed such a power.

He nods solemnly, dropping his eyes even as his mouth looks as though it’s begging to smile, and says, “Never mind, then. Definitely not we.”

I only look away when Zeds outside scrape uselessly at the siding below, reminding myself that they can’t reach us from down there. It’ll be a really scary day in this hell when or if they learn how to use ladders, critical thinking, or pure emotionalmanipulation. Hell, they might as well be human again when that happens.

Night has fallen around the house by now, cold and dreary. Stars have started littering the sky, dark clouds washing past after another long, tedious day of survival.

Kaito leans carefully against the wall behind him, one hand pressed near his bandage. I keep my gun loose in my hand, eyes firmly planted on the door, as I tell him, “We’ll sleep in shifts.”

He looks over at me, dark eyes steady despite the pain he must be in, and readily agrees. “Okay.”

“You sleep first,” I insist, wriggling only a little so I’m comfortable.

“You sure?” he asks again, and his thoughtfulness pisses me off as much as it warms something weird inside me.

“No,” I answer honestly, shaking my head for emphasis. “But of the two of us, you’re the one who looks most likely to pass out at any second. I’m not interested in dealing with an incredibly inconvenient corpse, thanks.”

His mouth twitches again. “Fair.”

I grab the nearest pillow and point it at him like it’s a worse weapon than the gun still in my hand. He lifts his free hand in surrender and mutters, “Sorry, sorry. It’s a reasonable line of thought.”

“Better,” I say, throwing the pillow back from where it came from. That almost-smile of his returns, somewhat softer this time, and I force myself to look away before my face gets any ideas. Rolling my eyes, something I’m finding myself quite good at these days, I mutter, “Go to sleep, Alpha. I’ll wake you when it’s time to switch.”

For the first time since our encounter, he actually listens. Or, at least, he gives me the grace of pretending.

I remain in the corner with my back to the wall, weapon in hand, and watch the room long after dark settles thick enough to swallow all the corners in the room. I stay awake as Kaito’s breathing eventually evens out, watching his chest rise and fall as he appears to sleep soundly, knowing that rest won’t come for me.

Because by morning, I’ll be long gone.

He just doesn’t know it yet.

SEVEN

KAITO

I’m not asleep. Not really. I’m just out here faking it.

I let my breathing even out because Stranger in the corner told me to sleep. That, and because there are way worse ideas than allowing someone with a gun to believe I’m actually capable of following instructions. What is painfully obvious, though, is that my body needs the rest Stranger is providing by acting as a lookout.

They sit rigidly in the corner, upright and alert with their back against the wall, one knee bent, the other stretched slightly in front of them as if it aches. Which is no surprise, after their fall earlier. It hasn’t slipped my notice how they’re favoring one leg over the other, but I didn’t feel safe enough to probe on the topic. Their gun stays loose in their hand, a knife clutched in the other, prepared for anything and everything. The backpack with the broken strap rests against their hip, tucked in tightly with the useful strap wrapped around their wrist.

Even cornered by their choices, they look ready to bolt at any second.

I lie on the bed with my eyes closed, my side burning fiercely under the badly wrapped bandage, the job I did on it earlier so bad that I can feel warm blood seeping through it and trailing down to my back. Despite it and the pain, I keep my breathing even and slow. Well, I try to keep it that way, because I’ve learned enough about dangerous people over the past six years to know panic carries sound. Pain does, too. If I let either one of those escape, the masked stranger in the corner will absolutely hear it.

Stranger hears everything.

Stranger even heard me breathing suspiciously earlier.

How the fuck does someone breathe suspiciously? And how does someone stop? Because I feel like I’m on edge, and a single breath will have me killed faster than I can hiccup. I’m starting to finally understand that Stranger seems to consider existing anywhere near them a hostile act of rebellion or something. I could line dance right through the house we’re hiding in and Stranger would think of it as something nefarious, like a weird little tactic to steal their weapons and backpack I haven’t once thought of taking. Not when they need them.

And so I lie here, on the mattress that stinks of damp fabric and unsettled dust while rain starts to tap against the roof and window softly, turning the room into a cramped little bubble of sound. Somewhere outside, the Biters have long since lost interest in the walls, even though I can still hear one groaning every now and then, stubbornly offended that dinner escaped upward.

My wound throbs uncomfortably, and I do my best to ignore it. A shitty plan, if we’re being honest, but that seems to be the theme of my life today. Not a single thing has gone according to plan today, so what’s more shit heaped on a mountain of it already, right?