“What are y—“

“Shhhh,” Trent shushes me quietly, his eyes steady on mine and his finger pressed to his lips.

With his creepy, all seeing eyes the gesture is just about the scariest thing I’ve ever seen.

“I’ll get you next time,” someone says from down the hall.

“You say that every time,” Ryan replies, his voice laughing, “and every time, who wins?”

“I will beat you.”

“Every single time.”

“Jerk,” the other person grumbles.

“See you at dinner.”

“Yeah.”

The doorknob turns with a creak. I watch Trent’s hand clench on the handle of his knife, the knuckles going white. Every other inch of him looks completely calm. I look around for a weapon of my own. Something to attack Trent with before he can get to Ryan. There’s nothing. Dirty, holy socks and a worn out muscle tee. Worthless. Who doesn’t sleep with a knife by their bed?!

As the door swings open, I hold my breath, my body going rigid on the bed.

Ryan steps into the room. His face is flushed like he was just running. His hair is standing at odd angles, wet around the edges from his sweat. He looks a mess. A vibrant, broad, beautiful mess.

“Hey, Trent, you’re back. Where did you go—“ Ryan’s voice dies out the second he sees me. Then it bursts to life again, far too loud. “What the f--!!! How did--?!?!”

He cuts himself off both times, biting down on his knuckle and dropping into a crouch in front of the door. He isn’t looking at me anymore. He’s staring at the ground, reining himself in.

Hurried footsteps run back up the hall, heading toward us.

“Ry, you okay?” someone asks. They try the doorknob but Ryan quickly throws the lock. He presses his weight harder on the door. “Open the door, man. What happened?”

“Nothing,” Ryan says, his voice tight. “Trent scared the hell out of me, that’s all. You don’t want to come in. He’s naked.”

I frown, glancing at Trent. He’s grinning.

“Why is he naked?”

“To mess with me. Seriously, it’s fine. I’m good.”

“Alright,” the voice replies. He sounds relieved to be kept on the other side of the door. “Tell Trent to put his gear away.”

“Yeah.”

Ryan stays crouched down, his back to me, as the footsteps fade. When they’re gone, when we all hear the click of a door closing down the hall, he stands up slowly. I watch his shoulders rise and fall quickly with a sharp breath, then he turns to face me. His brown eyes lock on mine.

“How are you here?” he whispers roughly.

I grin, feeling myself glow inside just seeing him again. “It wasn’t easy. Your buddy here got me most of the way.”

He looks at Trent, his eyes falling on the knife and ignoring it. I relax a notch. “You saved her from the Colonists?”

“Just the Risen,” Trent corrects. He lays the knife on the plastic crate serving as a nightstand beside his bed. It makes me more nervous unattended than it did in his hands. “She did the rest herself.”

“And the Eleven,” I correct him.

Trent nods slowly in agreement. “But the Colony, that was all you.”

“You escaped from the Colonists alone?” Ryan asks incredulously.

I shift in the bed, wincing in pain from my arm. Ryan takes another step closer to me. It’s a small room. Two more and he’ll be sitting on the bed with me. I hope he has the sense not to do that.

“Did they do that to you?” he asks, gesturing to my arm, his eyes tightening in the corners. “The Colonists, did they hurt you like that?”

I shake my head. “No, I did this to myself while I was running from them. They gave me pie.”

“What?”

“Pumpkin. It was really good.”

“Then why’d you run?” Trent asks.

I look at him, not sure if he’s making a joke or not. His face is stone.

“You are painfully hard to read,” I tell him.

“Maybe you’re not a strong reader.”

“Is that an insult?”

“It is if you take it as one. Perception is—“

Ryan groans loudly. “Trent, come on. It’s not a great time for a philosophy lecture.”

“Or it’s always a good time and you think otherwise due to your perception.”

“No, just stop. Joss, we need to do something about that arm. It looks rough.”

I nod, fighting the urge to look at it again. If I puke, there’s nowhere to do it in this room where I won’t saturate something he owns. Something he uses on a regular basis and no matter how many times he washes it he’ll remember, always and forever, that this was the thing Joss vomited on.

“I don’t know what can be done,” I tell him. I’m trying not to sound like I’m terrified of the idea of him touching it. Of anyone touching it or moving it, even breathing on it. Why can’t we all just pretend it isn’t there?

Ryan comes closer, closing that meager gap between us. I’m aware of his smell and his heat, the same smell in the bed only stronger. Closer. Warmer.

He frowns at my arm.

“It needs to be set or it will never heal right. We should splint it too.”

“What do you mean by ‘set’ it?” I ask. I know the answer and I know it’ll hurt like crazy, but I have to ask.

He meets my eyes. They look sorry. He’s apologizing already for this thing he hasn’t even done yet. This things that’s going to make me cry again.

I nod my head in understanding.

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” I lie. I’m angry at him that he’s going to do this to me. It’s not his fault, but I’m still angry.

“I’m also sorry we can’t do it here.”

“Why not?”

“I doubt you’ll be able to keep quiet.”

I take a deep, shuddering breath, but I don’t flinch and I don’t look away. “It’s going to be like that, huh?”

He grins but it looks more like a grimace. “Yeah, it’s gonna be like that.”

Chapter Three

Trent has to go to work up in the Crow’s Nest overseeing the world, so it’s just Ryan and I leaving the building. We go the same way Trent and I came in. Ryan is efficient and agile leaving out the window, like he’s done it a hundred times, and I start to wonder if these guys even use the front door to this place.

When we first start walking, Ryan puts his arm around my waist, pulling me in close to him to either support me, guide me or just remind himself I’m really there. Whatever his motives, it makes me nervous and a little scared. I feel trapped. Small and broken beside his strength. When I gently shake off his hold, he doesn’t say a word. In fact, we both stay silent the entire trip to my home.

Although when two Risen cross our path I get a taste of how Ryan fights. I saw it once before, but it was brief. I was too busy doing my own thing to really worry about his. But now that I’m tucked away in a doorframe again, just as Trent did to me, I get a chance to really see him.

It’s impressive.

He has a weapon I’ve never seen before. It’s like brass knuckles with a spike coming out the middle. When he holds his hand up with all of his fingers curled into his palm around the handle, the spike stands up proudly over his middle finger. Like it’s flipping the entire world the bird. There are only a few spots on the body that this weapon can be used for an instant kill, but Ryan knows them all. He doesn’t hesitate, not one second. He dances around the Risen, looking for the opening he needs, then he strikes like a viper into the eye, the ear. Fast, accurate, brutal. He’s like Trent, quick and efficient, but there’s something so much more fluid about him and his fight. It’s almost like watching a dance.

When he’s done, breathing heavily surrounded by a circle of rotted, mutated bodies, I give him a small round of applause. It’s faint and frail, the best I can do with the hands I have at the moment, but he smiles and bows theatrically. It’s an ugly scene; all death, blood, gore and everything macabre. But there in the middle is this boy. This vibrant, living, breathing, resilient, relentless boy – and he’s smiling. At me.