Page 115 of Immune

So… probably.

A great little word. Probably. It’s like a verbal grenade wearing Crocs.

“One at a time,” I inform him. “Slow. Stay near the center. No dramatic hero stomping.”

Ewan sighs. “Well, there goes my whole personality. I’m staying here.”

Fletcher ignores him, going across first, because apparently being a wall includes testing bridges. He crosses with measured steps, rifle slung over his shoulder, and boots landing carefully on the slick metal.

When the bridge creaks, I stop breathing.

It holds.

Xeon follows with the pilot’s upper half while Fletcher takes his weight from the other side. They move slowly, awkwardly, the pilot’s boots dragging once with a metallic scrape.

A Zed below tilts its face upward. And then another follows.

“Move quieter,” I whisper.

Behind me, Ewan murmurs, “Oh yeah, because dragging an unconscious man over wet metal was our first choice.”

“I will throw you off this bridge,” I warn.

“Quietly?” the cheeky bastard pushes.

“Dramatically,” I assure, and he’s very quick to shut up.

But then the pilot coughs halfway across the bridge, and the sound echoes. Below, several Zeds turn toward the sound and my scent spikes. It’s not fear exactly, because fear has become such a constant background noise in my life that I should consider charging rent. This is worse. It’s hotter. Lower in my body. My skin tightens, too small over muscle and bone, and for one dreadful second, the bridge seems too open, too wet, and too exposed.

The wind tears through the broken glass frame, and it catches my scent and pulls. Every Alpha head turns toward me. Not by much, not dramatically or theatrically, but enough.

My stomach drops.

Kaito still stands behind me. I know without looking because his scent sharpens, burning wood flaring through the rain. He doesn’t step closer or touch me. He only speaks low enough that it barely reaches me. “Breathe out.”

I want to tell him to choke on a filing cabinet. Instead, because apparently survival instincts have decided betrayal is acceptable if it’s practical, I breathe out. Slowly. Through my teeth.

The scent spike fades fast enough to let me move, and I hate that it works. I hate how he knows it works. I’m so tired of hating things.

I cross the bridge with my knife in hand, my body screaming old, stupid things at me.

Safe.

Alpha.

Shelter.

Scent.

No, no, no. Nope.

The last few steps are the hardest. My knees wobble and my hand snaps to the metal frame before I can stop it. Pain flares through my injured arm when my weight pulls at the bandage, and I grit my teeth through it.

Kaito moves behind me. It’s only one fast step, then he stops himself. I hear the sound of his boot hitting the metal, and I hear the restraint after. The pause, the choice. I don’t look back, though. Because I know if I look back, I might see his hands open again. Honestly? I’m not surviving that twice in one day. I’m barely surviving it now.

I manage to make it across only barely. The far side of the skybridge opens into another office floor, this one darker than the last. Rows of desks sit abandoned under dust, rainwater, and ceiling tiles that quit on life sometime before the world did.

Ewan steps through behind me, reaches into his pack, and tosses a half-full bottle of water onto the nearest desk as if it’s offended him and he’s getting rid of it. It rolls, bumps into my boot, and then stops.