Archive of Our Own

He runs up-hill at full sprint, his lungs fit to burst. His throat burns, his legs tremble and almost give way, but he races on, the sound of his own breathing splitting his eardrums. He's running so fast he's at that point he's almost flying. His feet barely touch the ground, hitting it so rapidly he feels he's losing all connection to it, his body tipping dangerously forward with the motion, his balance only retained by a hair's breadth.

Only the sight of Mithian sprinting ahead of him, gun blazing in her hand, her hair flying wild in the breeze, and the fear gnawing at his guts keep him moving.

He concentrates on the former, on Mithian's strength and determination, on their need to make this rise in the ground, find temporary safety. He ignores the sounds coming from behind him, the animal grunts, the rattled breaths, the guttural moaning noises.

Sweat seething from his scalp, running into his eyes, he blinks. He blinks against the fast fading light limning the horizon. He blinks against the floaters that mar his sight.

It's between one breath and the next, his vision impaired by the continuous blinking and the encroaching darkness, that he trips, his face smacking the mud, a flat slab of rock striking his right kneecap. The fall robs him of his breath, makes his heart skip a beat with primal panic. He groans, though he shouldn't make any noise.

“Arthur!” Mithian yells.

He pushes himself up onto hands that smart from the impact, thoughts scattered by the flair of pain in his knee, a bright hot lance of it that spears him through. He tries to bend his leg, thinking 'fast, be fast', but can't quite.

Instead of going on all fours he rolls over.

Birds fly out of their nests in the trees, their caws jarring Arthur's ears, the span of their dark wings dotting the sky black.

And then Arthur's being pulled in by something. A look tells him it's one of them, one of the ghouls, its rotting black hand, the flesh moulting off its skin, making a grab for his ankle. For the span of a long moment, Arthur can't breathe, can't swallow, can't think.

“Arthur, they're at you!” he hears Mithian scream.

Arthur grabs his knife from his shin guard, stabs at the arm, pinning it to the ground, the fingers still trying to make a grab for flesh, to dig in.

Arthur's pulse jack-hammers, and he pushes off his heels as he crawls backwards

But another ghoul's on him, a man, all twiggy arms and gaping maw. It lurches for his throat. It's so close Arthur can smell death on it, that unforgettable stench of decomposition Arthur's come to know so well. There's nothing for it. Arthur kicks him in the jaw, hard, shoving him back. Regardless, the teeth try to sink into the leather of his boot. Arthur smashes his other foot against the ghoul's head, the bone beneath crunching sickeningly.

It's not enough. You can't injure ghouls. They're invincible by the very fact that nature has already bested them.

Fingers swollen with the rot of decay make a go for him. They belong to the first ghoul. Arthur feels them search his skin, tear at his clothes. Blackened lips close around the soles of his boots. Arthur shoves at the twiggy 'man', punches at the other creature coming at him.

But there's more coming from where these two originate. Arthur can see a group of slow shuffling ghouls make for him, slowly but surely. He can see their bloated limbs, their broken bodies, their sagging shoulders and craned heads. What's worse, he can hear their gurgling noises and knows them to be the rattles of hunger.

The hunger he can satisfy.

A swollen, grey-white tongue licks at his calf. That's it; they've torn clothing. He's dead.

Heart thundering in his chest, Arthur braces for the pain, the bite.

None comes. Two shots echo in the night. The two ghouls that were on him fall limply backwards, red blooming on their foreheads. More shots resound. The group of ghouls that were making for him drop on the spot.

Arthur spins his head sharply. Mithian stands there, gun held in her hands, one foot placed before the other. A burst of love for her hits Arthur hard. It courses through his body and makes him long to touch her, make sure she's okay.

He doesn't have to wait long. Mithian comes loping to him, sinking on her knees beside him. She drops her gun, her hands busily searching his body. “Were you bitten?” she asks with a sharp breath, even as she keeps inspecting his skin.

“No.” He smiles stupidly at her. “You dispatched them just in time, Calamity.”

She ruffles his hair, says, “Only two more bullets left.”

Arthur seeks her lips with his, caressing them hungrily. His tongue laps at the corners of her mouth. When they part, their kiss deepens and becomes frantic with pent up emotion, the close call bringing primal needs to the surface. His fingers curl around her neck, knuckles brushing against the satiny fall of her dark hair.

Before ending the kiss he bites her chin, slides his lips around her mouth, and pulls her to him so he can inhale her scent.

“Can you walk?” she asks.

The corners of Arthur's mouth pull in a grimace. “My knee hurts. I can probably shift, not run.”

“Well, then,” she says, yanking at him as she gains her feet. “I'll have to help you.”

“Mithian,” he says, her name catching on his breath.

She freezes, eyes narrowing sharply, her lips sticking out. “No, I'm not leaving you here. I'm not. This area is crawling with them.”

“I can't run,” he points out, making a clear show of being unable to put his foot down. “You can. You're the marksman. You're the one who's got a chance.”

“Curse you,” Mithian says, shaking him sharply by the shoulders. “Curse your stupid chivalry. That's not the way you want to die.”

“I want you to live more,” he says quickly, words volleying out of his mouth half formed.

She stills, and her eyes soften so much he's almost convinced she'll agree and save herself. But then she crosses her arms and sits down. “You evidently think I value my life more than yours, that I'm ready to run off without you and let you sacrifice yourself for me while you wouldn't.”

“Mithian!” he says, scowling at her while still keeping an eye out for ghouls. “You know that's not what I meant.”

She tilts her chin up at him. “That's exactly what you meant. You thought I could leave you here and go on my merry way, accept that.”

Arthur looks away, letting out a breath. “It's not like that and you know it. You have the better chance to make it to Father's camp than I have. That's all.”

Mithian picks her gun up. She checks the gun's chamber, then snaps it back in place.

“Oh, all right,” Arthur says, hands on his hips. This is just like arguing over what show to watch of a night, except the scales have turned and the outcome's far more deadly. “I'll be coming.”

“With you slowed down, we'll have to change our plans.”

“We must make it to the Arbroath camp, Mithian. It's our only chance of survival.”

Mithian nods. “Yeah, I agree.” She picks herself up and dusts her knees. “But you can't run. This means no open roads. We must travel along the coast.”

“It'll take us longer, two days at least.”

“Yes,” Mithian says, liberating Arthur's knife from the body of the ghoul and cleaning it on a blade of grass. “But if we walk along the shoreline we'll muffle our scents.”

A grin tugs at Arthur's mouth. “Is this your SRR training coming to the fore?”

Mithian hands him the knife. “No, back in the military I didn't make the plans. I executed them.”

Arthur accepts the knife, strapping it to his boot, smiling all the while. He enjoys listening to Mithian talk about her job, her former job. It was always a secret before for obvious reasons. You couldn't be special forces without withholding a lot of information. But that world's gone now, so she can talk about secrets that hold no more value. Her stories make him think of times past, rather better times. They're good.

“Pfft,” he says, tilting his head at Mithian. “I should've married general what's his name then.”

“Pity you didn't,” says Mithian, walking round him and putting her shoulder under his arm. “On the other hand though he's dead. Bitten by a ghoul on day four.”

Arthur bursts out laughing. When he stops he says, “Lead on.”

They start again, following the path Mithian has chosen. The closer they get to the coast, the more the wind bites at them. But it's all good. The chill keeps them awake and allows them to make good pace. They find a cave on a rock rampart with a fine view of the roaring sea, the early sun tinting the water a pale gold.

“It doesn't look like the apocalypse,” Arthur says, breathing in the salt air, tasting it on his tongue.

Mithian kisses him, laves the taste off him, till all Arthur can sense is her. “It isn't,” she tells him. “Not for as long as we fight.” And then she takes his mouth again, backs him against a boulder he can half sit on.

Her hands are fast on his zip and belt. His cock grows fat, despair notwithstanding. Her touch is slow and smooth, sliding, enveloping. Stroking the full length of him, she brings him closer and closer to his peak. Breathing heavy, he takes her in his arms, his hands sliding down to lower her jeans, twisting the line of her panties aside so he can pleasure her with the heel of his hand and with his fingers.

She's hot inside, moist. She's convulsing around his fingers, moaning, shuddering. When she straddles him, the tip of him touches her and pushes the merest fraction of an inch inside her. He doesn't penetrate her. It's the last thing they need. So he slips out as fast as thought, 'til he's cradled between her legs, rubbing himself against her clammy thighs. But it's enough. He burns up, consumed with a fire that laps at his guts. It's been so long her wetness makes his tightly wound body react. As he comes he strokes over her body, kneads her breasts, her arms. He lays his head on her shoulder.

To the crash of waves and the cries of the seagulls, they fall asleep. There's daylight outside. It's safer, relatively.

Hungry, but less tired, they start again around midday. They gain a few miles and can spot the Arbroath harbour breakwater. It being too late by the time they actually reach it, they have to make camp again. They have no fire. It would attract them. They have no food. They make do with the pangs of hunger. Though there's no ghouls in sight they make sure to sleep in shifts, one guarding the other's sleep.

Although they're in the open, in the dark and sitting prey, nothing happens. All night long Arthur feels something must give, that their luck can't hold. Every sound is a harbinger of death to him. But it's only the sounds of nature.

“Having a hard time coping, city boy?” Mithian says when she wakes, leaning her face on her hand.

“No, I can deal fine.” He pouts.

“Liar.”

Emboldened by luck Arthur starts to think they might make it to Arbroath before darkness falls on the second day. But they're attacked. It's three of them this time, a man, woman and child. Arthur has only time to consider they might have been a family once before he's on the defensive, planting his knife in the man's cranium, right through the occipital orbit.

Mithian guns down the woman, though she hesitates when the child grabs her.

“Mithian,” he shouts, fear blocking his lungs.

The child tears at her jumper, nearly sinks its curved nail in her forearm. She shoots.

So it's dark when they make it to the Arbroath's checkpoint. Bonfires are blazing all along the route to the perimeter wall. Arthur knows they're there to light the way, to highlight lingering ghouls coasting too close to the ramparts.

But the stench tells him they're burning their corpses too. Two birds with one stone.

Hands up in the air, they approach the first checkpoint hut in a row, red lights blazing on and off throwing them in relief.

Rifle up, one of the soldiers shouts, “Identify yourself!”

“I'm Arthur Pendragon,” Arthur says, slowly approaching the man without forgetting to keep his hands up. “Son of General Pendragon and this is my wife, Mithian. We've come to rejoin my father.”

Semi-automatic trained on them, the soldier studies them from head to foot. “Your clothes,” he says, mouth pinched.

Arthur looks down at himself. Sure enough, his trousers are torn and his shirt his blood spattered. Mithian's jumper is lacerated where the child ghoul ripped it, and her arm is crimson with his blood, its gore. Mouth drying he says hurriedly, “We had an encounter but—”

“Were you bitten?” the soldier shrills out, pointing the muzzle of his rifle at Mithian.

“Look,” Arthur says, “we're fine—”

Her words coming out one on the heels of the other, her voice trembling in a way Arthur's never heard it, Mithian says,“I know it looks bad, but I wasn't bitten. No scratches, see.”

She holds up her arms to offer proof.

The soldier's eyes whiten and he raises his rifle to level the muzzle with her head.

“Mithian, get down!” Arthur shouts.

The soldier fires, hitting Mithian between the eyes. Her body ricochets backwards, hitting the ground. Her eyes stare empty at the heavens, a trail of crimson marring her candid skin.

Roaring, Arthur crashes to his knees besides her, shakes her, gathers her to him and calls her name. Then he grunts at the soldier, a veil of red descending before his eyes. He wants to kill. He's never wanted to kill so badly before.

The soldier turns the butt of his rifle on him, smashes him in the temple.

****

Five Years Later.

The Jeep trundles up the road, jostling Arthur, his side hitting the door at metronomic intervals. The potholes are plenty and maintenance non existent. Another road sign comes up, half a mile. Arthur drums his fingers on the rifle's barrel, watches out the dust smeared widow at the path beside. It's lined by trees, lots of wild shrubs. Behind them plots of fallow land stretch away in squares leading up to the old motorway. As it drives over a deep rut the Jeep trembles, not helped by the many layers of gravel sand coating what was once even tarmac. The road lifts. Before they get to the top, it curves. Arthur lets his eyes slide over an upturned car, its windscreen spattered with blood.

He tips his head downwards, beats a faster rhythm on the barrel.

Percy grunts, he must have seen it too. Neither of them say anything. What is there to say? There's always more proof of carnage to behold. Nothing can be done about it.

Between one breath and the next there's a loud bang and the Jeep seems to tilt to one side. It shudders and careens across the carriageway.

“The tyre must have burst,” Arthur says, placing a foot against the dashboard and clinging from the grab handle.

“Yeah,” Percy says as he wheels furiously, trying to control the car. “Might be it.” The Jeep veers into the other lane. Once this would have been enough to cause a head on collision, but streets are emptier now, so the car bumps off the road, and hits a tree.

As the vehicle settles Arthur and Percy bounce in their seats.

Smoke and steam hiss from the engine; the car coughs one last time and stops rumbling.

“Shit,” Arthur says, opening the car door to go have a look at what's happened.

Silently but glumly Percy follows him. Together they check the engine. It's salvageable but it'll take awhile. The tyre must be changed too. Arthur exchanges a look with Percy.

“It's open country,” Percy says.

Arthur acknowledges that with some solemn humming. “We'll get at Camp Ealdor by nightfall.”

Percy tips an eyebrow but doesn't argue with Arthur's calculation. He sets to work on the engine. Since one of them has to play sentinel, they can't both work on the car. They divide labour on the basis of skill. Since Percy's better with engines and wires it's up to him to get the car running. It's Arthur who changes the burst tyre.

Percy puts the Jeep in reverse before patrolling with his rifle at the ready; Arthur sets to work. Before long he has the jack in place and the hub cap removed. Loosening the nuts and removing the flat is child's play, but of the kind that takes time.

The sun is already going down by the time Arthur has aligned the rim of the spare and put on the lug nuts.

“Are you done?” Percy asks tersely, eyes on the line of trees, the shadows and the dark corners.

“Just need to tighten these,” Arthur says with a moue of fatigue.

“Leave the hubcaps,” Percy says, training the gun the moment he hears a noise.

Though he tenses, Arthur makes sure to continue working on fixing the wheel. The background noise intensifies. Arthur gives the penultimate nut one sharp turn, looks Percy's way and sees a squirrel dart past.

Percy lowers his rifle with a sigh.

“The car is worth more if we keep the hubcaps.”

Percy grunts softly, gravel crunching under his boots as he moves. “We're selling the crates, not the car.”

Arthur replaces the hub-cap. “You never know when you may need more cash to buy more credits.”

“Mmm,” is what Percy says, staring at his toes.

Lengths of barbed wire coil around a makeshift brick wall. A steel mesh fence continues it where the wall ends, circling the camp. In the middle of the wall a steel gate stands, young people in civvies guarding it. Two machine guns are placed behind sandbags on a concrete terrace slightly behind this gate. They look so rusty Arthur doubts they can fire; even so Arthur signals Percy to halt at the gate.

The guard stops them, her hand held high. “Who're you?” she says instead of the more formal 'identify yourself.'

Percival starts explaining, saying, “We have a delivery for the elders.”

Arthur lowers his sunglasses and says, “There'll be trouble if you don't let us in.” It's not exactly true but after the afternoon he's had he doesn't want to idle in a sitting car that makes him prey to any errant ghoul.

The girl signals the boy who's her counterpart; he opens the gate. The Jeep stops in the middle of the camp's central square.

Just as Finna, the elder leader, comes up to him, Arthur jumps out of the Jeep and goes to open the boot.

“Have you got it?” Finna says, trying to look over his shoulder despite being decidedly shorter than he is.

“I do,” Arthur says, extracting one of the crates from the boot. He hands it to Finna. “This one contains meds, those you said. The other one is food stuff, but most of what you wanted was impossible to find.”

Finna wobbles under the crate's weight before putting it down. “Did you find the insulin?”

Arthur unloads the second crate. “No, there was no getting it. Even on the black market.”

Finna's eyes become murky, as if the life's been drained out of them. “We have two diabetics and we're running down on it.”

Arthur compresses his lips. “I'm sorry. There's nothing I can do about that.”

“But their lives...” Finna starts.

Arthur knows, or at least can figure it out, but this is out of his hands. He's not responsible for this, not this. “The hospital in Reading is overrun.” Arthur will never forget the sight either, ghouls feasting on the last patients, those who couldn't be moved.

“Why not try London?” Finna asks, her tone much more gentle when she realises Arthur hasn't got the nicest memories of this run. “There must still be places there.”

Arthur turns his face aside, closes the boot's lid. “London is unapproachable.”

Percy comes to the rescue. “They're starving. So they gather around the bigger cities, where's there more prey.”

Finna's back curves even though she's put down the cradle by now. “Here's the credits,” she says, clearly admitting defeat but positing a new problem.

They agreed the price for this trade would be money to buy credits, not the credits themselves. Until they're exchanging them for stuff there's no way of establishing whether credits are fake or real. Old banknotes are different. Arthur wants to argue that this wasn't part of the bargain but the fight goes out of him. He jogs to the passenger door and waits for Percy to join him. Percy nods, silently agreeing there's no reason to make a fuss.

Finna must be feeling bad about changing the terms of their bargain because she says, “Why don't you stay? It's almost night and we can't in good conscience let you travel outside.”

“I'm used to being outdoors,” Arthur says flatly. It's not a lie although it's not something he wishes to discuss.

“The group will offer you protection.”

Arthur's looking at his own face in the rear-view mirror, at the scruffy beard he's let grow, the lines around his mouth, the set expression on it. He doesn't like himself. Even less when he says sharply. “No, thank you.”

Percy coughs. “Arthur, she isn't wrong.”

Arthur perks up an eyebrow. Percy crosses his arms, tapping fingers on the swell of his biceps.

They get a tent each. A boy of about fifteen who shows them inside. “They were Kat and Oswin's,” he says, referring to the tent's previous owners.

When Arthur grimaces at the still unmade bed, at the traces of recent habitation, the boy says, “We can heat hot water for you.”

Arthur wants to be out of here as soon as he can. He doesn't want to stay. The attempts that had been made to make this place look homely — the little dresser to the side, the knitted tea cosy on top, the books sitting by the head of the bed in a neat stack — give him the creeps. But there's no point trying to leave before dawn now. So he says, “Thank you, I suppose we could both do with some washing.”

The bathtub is made of tin and looks like a gigantic tin of sardines. Arthur has no idea where they got it from but it does its job and he has to admit that the warm water soothes his aching joints and muscles. It washes away the grease and grime from the road. These past few weeks he's washed in streams and rivers, used pails lowered down wells. But cold water isn't quite the same. Sculling his hands, he plays a game with the waves that lap at his body. Out of cupped hands he pours water over his head and back, causing his hair to stick to his skull.

Slowly, following the lines of his face, he shaves until he no longer feels prickly skin.

Though it's death to, he makes himself relax, lets his mind wander. He doesn't allow himself the luxury of basking in memories of the past, but he does luxuriate in simple thoughts, in how he can stop for a moment and breathe freely. How good it is to feel as though your body is responding once more, alive. His cock pokes out of the water, demanding attention in the least subtle of ways, his body free of the worries of his mind.

He brings himself off, hand on his prick, thrusting until he's spurting warm, sticky fluid.

Water now marred, he gets out, uses a linen blanket to dry himself. Not much later he rejoins the others around the camp-fire. He has little desire to, but he can't avoid the company either. The food is scarce; beans and nuts, some herbs Arthur doesn't recognise, a few tinned goods he does. He remembers raiding that Reading supermarket for them.

There's more variety than he's enjoyed in a while, what with having spent the last week or so hunting down contraband goods.

The camp-fire throwing their features in relief, the Ealdorians entertain each other with tales. Some of them are just fables, old myths, legends. A few Arthur has heard before, though an overwhelming number of them are brand new, featuring magic, a messianic character undoing the curse — i.e., defeating the taint turning people into brainless ghouls — and a future that's too bright to contemplate. Others are tales of the past and make Arthur's jaw glue itself shut.

Stomach lurching, he puts his bowl down and makes his way to the tent. He sits on the narrow trundle bed and holds his head in his hands.

Finna finds him there some ten minutes later. She says, “May I?”

Arthur only presses the heel of his hand against his head. “You already have.”

She isn't fazed. “You didn't like tonight's entertainment.”

“I do find the stories counterproductive,” Arthur says, lifting his head to meet Finna's eyes.

“How so?” Finna asks.

“You're allowing them to bask in a past that can't come back.” Arthur is fairly quick to pinpoint what's so disturbing about these people. “And to dream about a future where they're all saved by some sort of redeemer.”

Finna hangs her head to the side. “And what's so wrong with hope?”

Arthur's muscles contract in an involuntary spasm. “Everything!” Then more calmly, he repeats. “Everything.”

“What if I told you that there is some hope though?”

“I'd say that that's your newfangled Druidic philosophy speaking,” Arthur says, remembering his previous interactions with Finna and the other elders. They seem to run their camp on odd tenets based on beliefs such as communing with nature, finding safety there.

“Maybe,” she says, her eyes sharpening with something, something Arthur can't put his finger on.

He huffs.

She's silent for a while in the way of people who think you don't need talking to communicate do. When that fails to impress Arthur in any way, she says, “What if I told you there's hope for a cure?”

Arthur's head snaps up so fast he almost gets whiplash. A few seconds' thought makes him slump. “A cure? It's impossible. There's no more hospitals, no more research centres. And a cure isn't going to whip itself up.”

“But what if I told you a miracle is feasible,” Finna says with fire to her tone.

“I'd say these what ifs are annoying.”

Wringing her hands, Finna inches closer to him. She starts speaking. “A month ago a group of five came to our camp.”

Arthur snorts. He has no doubt people still trickle into the camp from time to time. It can't be a new occurrence and Arthur doesn't see how the survival of a few more people can give anyone any hope. “This is riveting, but really—”

“They were on the run,” Finna ploughs on, “had been for a while.”

“Like most of humanity,” Arthur says, irritated by Finna's words of comfort.

“One of them had a broken leg, another hadn't eaten in days,” Finna says, telling her tale at her own pace. “The third... The third had been bitten.”

Arthur's muscles turn to steel they lock so tight. “And he—”

“He was feverish. The wound was bleeding a lot,” Finna says, her face paling with the power of the memory. “Three of his four companions dragged him out to...”

“Execute him,” Arthur guesses. There's nothing else that could have been done in the circumstances.

Finna nods. “They had him on his knees; his head was bent.” She mimics holding a gun. “I ran out to them to say something but even while I was running I knew there was nothing I could do about it.”

Arthur bobs his hand in understanding. That was the reason why he'd made sure to insulate himself from situations like these in so far as he could.

“But then the boy's friend stepped up,” Finna continues, a new warmth flooding her tone. “He stood before the boy and said they'd have to kill him too if they wanted to take the life of his friend.”

“Very moving but ultimately fruitless,” Arthur says, imagining the scene despite his best efforts not to. He pushes the thought away and adds, “I'm sorry you had to witness that.”

“It wasn't what you think,” Finna says. “The friend protected the boy. He said he'd put a bullet to him the moment he turned himself but that he deserved to die like a man, not a beast.”

“Did they wait?” Arthur asks, not even knowing why he is going after details. This is none of his business.

“Yes.” A smile freshens Finna's face. “He was bitten two months ago and he's still alive.”

Arthur startles, hitting his elbow against the dresser. “That's impossible.”

“I saw it with my own eyes.”

“No,” says Arthur, shaking his head. This goes against everything he knows. “Maybe he took a scare, thought he was bitten, but wasn't.”

“I saw the tooth imprint,” Finna tells him with a conviction Arthur wants to doubt but can't. “I saw the ripped flesh.”

“There must be another explanation,” Arthur says, rising, pacing. “Maybe it was some kind of other predator...”

“In Wales?” Finna asks. “That's where he comes from by they way.”

“I—” Arthur picks his brain for a possible key to this conundrum. But comes up wanting. “Um.”

“A doctor checked him; it was a human bite,” Finna says, evidently wanting to persuade Arthur she's right about this. “Don't you see? This matches with what the elders have been saying for years.”

Arthur stops short, eyes wide, breath coming in little gasps. “Those are tales. No one, ever, gets bitten and escapes unscathed. Two days at most and everything that once made you human is gone.”

“And yet he's a vibrant, very human young man who's doing his best to further this camp's interests.”

Hands on his hips, Arthur shakes his head. “That's very good of him, but he can't have been bitten.”

“And yet he was.”

Arthur goes back to sit on his bed. He kicks off his heavy shoes. “Believe what you want. I don't see how this has anything to do with me.”

Finna raises an eyebrow as if Arthur knows how this relates to him, which of course he doesn't. “There's news of an NIHR lab that hasn't closed its doors. If we get Merlin — that's the boy — there they might use him, create a vaccine, save mankind.”

This seems all rather far-fetched to Arthur. He points out the fallacies in Finna's theories. “First you can't even be sure it was a ghoul bite. There's never been a survivor before. Secondly, vaccines aren't that easy to make. It takes time. We don't even know whether this plague is a disease or whether this Merlin person would make a difference.”

“But can you be sure of the contrary?” Finna asks. “How can you deny humanity a chance?”

“I'm not denying humanity anything,” Arthur says, lying back down, his arms cradling his head. “You can send Merlin on his merry way to that lab, or continue sheltering him, or see if you can get one of those researchers down here. I, meanwhile, will go my way.” He closes his eyes to declare this conversation over.

“The testing will need to be done some place where they have all the right equipment.”

Arthur smacks his lips together and concentrates on images he considers sleep inducing. He flashes back to images of death and fear, to the past. “Then send him on his way.”

The sound of steps resounds within the tent. Finna's moving closer. “Merlin is a brave lad, we've found,” Finna says, “but sending him all the way up to Edinburgh alone equals to getting him killed.”

“I thought he was immune from bites,” Arthur says, opening his eyes to stare at the tent flaps. “I thought that that was what it was all about.”

“He's not immune from being eaten alive,” Finna says. “And not immortal.”

There's a thud, but it's just a muted noise. When Arthur turns his head it's to see that Finna's on her knees. “Take him there, you have the experience, the know how.”

Arthur sighs. “Get up, Finna, please.” He sits up himself.

Finna stays where she is. “You've been on hundreds of missions; you've smuggled goods successfully.”

“That's in and out,” Arthur points out. “I never stay long, especially in city enclaves.”

“If there's anyone who can, it's you.”

“No,” Arthur says, stopping himself from even thinking about how he could help. That way lies madness. “I can't do this. I'm sorry. I did my job here.”

“Arthur, please.” She takes his hand. “What have you got to go back to in such a hurry?”

Arthur shakes Finna's hand off. “Nothing. And that's why I'm not doing this. There's no point.”

Finna must have read the determination in his eyes for she picks herself up. “Very well,” she says. “I must have mistaken you for someone different.”

Arthur doesn't contradict her or comment. He watches her duck out of the tent.

Despite the more comfortable bed and the heightened security the camp offers, Arthur doesn't sleep well at all that night.

****

The next morning Arthur marches to Percy's tent. He puts a hand on his shoulder and shakes him. “Time to go,” he says.

Percy sits up and blinks at the gap between tent flaps. “It's barely dawn.”

“We'd better get moving,” Arthur says, yanking the blanket off Percy. “We'll get more daylight hours that way and then I can drop you at your homestead.”

At first Percy makes a try for the blanket, but when he realises that Arthur's adamant, he says, “I suppose you're not wrong.”

Given the scarcity of food, they don't skip breakfast, but as soon as that's over they make for the Jeep. Someone has moved it to the centre of the camp. It's sitting there with the boot open even though Arthur has the keys. Arthur is given little time to wonder which urchin got to it. The answer stands before his eyes in the shape of a young man.

He's tall and reedy, dark haired, jittery in his movements. But his eyes are what strikes Arthur first. In this sea of death they look alive, bright. There's a sad pall to them, true, but those eyes aren't unresponsive. This young man still harbours hope.

Arthur doesn't even give himself time to consider how stupid a life outlook that is. He stalks up to the man and says, “Who gave you the right to tamper with my Jeep?”

The man shifts, revealing the shape of a basket sitting in the boot. “Finna told me to find you some provisions.”

Arthur barks a laugh. “Of course,” he says.

The young man struts up to him, chest out, eyes flashing. “You could say thank you. There's not much in the way of provisions. Anything we give you is food off our tables.”

“I'm sorry if I don't sound grateful over guilt food.”

The young man snorts. “There's no such thing. You're just an ungrateful bastard, that's what you are.”

“Oh but there is,” Arthur says, curtailing the distance between them so they're chest to chest, stags about to lock horns. “There is when the food's designed to induce a guilt trip.”

The young man scrunches his nose up in confusion more than defiance. “What guilt trip?”

“Me not escorting Finna's saviour boy to that lab in Edinburgh.”

Fire flashes across the young man's eyes. “Oh, that's it then.” He sneaks a defiant smile at him. “I'm perfectly capable of getting there on my own. So you can shove that attitude up your—”

A multitude of screams rends the air, stopping Merlin from finishing. He sends Arthur an alarmed glance, but Arthur has already moved into action mode. His hand is on the gun at his belt. A quick look at Percy tells him he's dived for the rifle they kept in the boot overnight.

A group of six to eight Ealdorians comes crashing into the main camp square, stamping towards the Jeep, panic in their faces. A pack of ghouls runs them into the ground, grabbing at the stragglers. A boy trips and falls, landing hard on his belly, his chin coated in blood. One of the ghouls rips into his calf before he's able to drag himself up.

Two ghouls latch onto the same man, taking one arm each. They tug at their prey, biting at the seam of the limbs and yanking them out of their sockets.

“The camp's overrun,” Percy shouts, taking down two ghouls out of a multitude.

Squinting, Arthur takes aim and downs a third ghoul, but there's too many. For the one he's topped there's more coming. This is like trying to empty the ocean with a teaspoon. “Get the Jeep into gear,” he growls, gunning down a third ghoul.

Shooting still, Percy backtracks towards the car. At the same time Merlin takes off at a run towards the dead centre of the mayhem. “Where the hell are you going?” Arthur shouts, unable to process how crazy Merlin is being. He may be immune —doubtful, but one never knows —but, as Finna said, he's as liable to be snacked upon as any of them. “Merlin!”

Merlin keeps sprinting ahead, past a ghoul he kicks in the gut to make way, and shouts, “Got to save Will!”

Arthur looks back to the Jeep. Percy is already behind the wheel, the Jeep rumbling. He pokes his head out the window. “Arthur, come on.”

Arthur's head swivels to Merlin, though his answer's to Percy, “I've got to get him.” He points the gun in the general direction of Merlin's back. “I'll explain later.”

“Christ, Arthur,” Percy says, but Arthur can't waste anymore time listening to his all but reasonable complaints. He's got an idiot to save. He sprints after Merlin. The moment he does, two bloody ghouls close in on him. He elbows one in the face, which is enough to cause him to step back. He shoots the other.

All around him the ghouls are feasting on whomever they can land their mangled hands on, eating their way up the human herd. The shouts decrease if only because the people out of whose throat they're torn are dying, being eaten, their innards devoured by scavengers that were once human.

Arthur makes himself ignore this. He searches for Merlin in the heaving, screaming crowd. He can't see him. In the milling sea of agitated individuals seeking a way out he can't see him. He pushes past a girl running in the opposite direction, and sees him, the dark hair, the gangly body. It's Merlin and he's made it halfway down a lane with tents pitched on either side.

Between them there's possibly thirty ghouls, pulling their victims towards their open mouths, savaging them bite after bite. Behind Arthur an exit back to the Jeep opens up.

But Merlin's half disappeared down the road of tents.

With a curse involving Merlin's parentage, he fights his way to him. He's come to the side of the central square when a ghoul jumps him. No sooner has he caught a glimpse of pockmarked, mottled grey flesh than he's on his back. With the impact he loses then gun. The ghoul takes a hold of him by the shirt, trying to rip at it.

Adrenaline spiking, lighting up Arthur's bones, they wrestle. As the ghoul strains for his flesh, Arthur grabs him by the neck and pushes him away, the snapping, clicking fangs closing on air. With a swift jab, he elbows the ghoul's maw closed. Blindly, he searches for the gun. His hand closes around a fistful of soil and gravel that inches up his nails.

He heaves with his back, dislodging the creature. His hand finds the gun. Sitting up, he fires without even aiming properly. The bullet takes off the ghoul's jaw. It's not enough to kill him —again —but what's needed to inhibit him. With the ghoul momentarily stunned, and trying to find a way to bite without the wherewithal to, Arthur picks himself up and sprints. One more bullet saved.

Avoiding other ghouls and moving against the current, he lopes off in the general direction he saw Merlin go. He's mid way down the tent lane when he pauses to reassess. There's fewer people here but Arthur can't see Merlin.

Screams and growls come out of the tents he's closest to. The tent shakes and ripples, the sides filling as if they've been blown fat by a gale. But it's dark shapes that move within. The movements become more frantic and the tent collapses with the rush of the ongoing fight. When it's down, Arthur's vista expands. And there Merlin is steaming towards one of the tents.

Without thought, Arthur darts towards him. Merlin's hand is out, grabbing for someone's outstretched hand. “Will!” he shouts, desperate.

When Arthur reaches him and peers through the gap of the tent's folds he realises that the worst is going on. Two creatures are at Will's neck and back. One has gouged a chunk of flesh out of the man's throat, blood spattering down his arm in rivers. The other creature has its curved rotten digits sunk into Will's side.

All the while Merlin screams 'Will' and tries to get a hold of his hand. Closing in on their prey, the ghouls drag Will further inside.

Arthur sees Merlin and, holstering the gun, leaps forward. He tackles him at a run, causing them to skid forwards a few yards. With his weight, Arthur pins Merlin down. Merlin fights him, bucking and arching his hips to get Arthur off. “Let me go,” he yells, his eyes all spirited. “I've got to help Will.”

Using a move he learnt wrestling as a kid, Arthur forces himself forward, forcing Merlin's wrists down. “He was bitten,” he says, needing Merlin to see reason. “It's done, Merlin, it's done.”

Nearly dislodging Arthur, Merlin lifts his hips off the ground, “So was I and I'm not done.”

To the chorus of Will's shouts, which he tries to block out hard, Arthur says, “He was bleeding out. He won't live.”

Merlin gives him no answer. He knees him in the side, hips rocking in wild stallion mode in an attempt to buck Arthur off. “I need to try,” he groans.

“No,” Arthur says, out of breath because Merlin caught his spleen with his knee. “You can't be put at risk.” Words out, Arthur freezes. His and Merlin's eyes meet in the pause between their breaths.

Arthur's grip easing down allows Merlin to topple him off. The savage kick to the side has, of course, also helped.

Eyes slanted nearly close, Arthur's coughs and bites dust. He spits, props a hand down, takes a few reinvigorating breaths, then goes after Merlin. When Arthur finds him he's in the tent, frozen in shock and horror.

The ghouls have left little that is recognisable of Will, and are still gorging on his entrails. They grunt and growl without paying attention to Merlin. They only will, Arthur knows, when there's no more to be had. “Don't look,” he says, placing a hand on Merlin's shoulder.

But Merlin looks till his eyes have narrowed and his mouth has thinned into a severe line that knows no softness. Just a few minutes ago Arthur had noted how Merlin's eyes still shone with hope. There's none of that now. It's taken this to quench the shimmer. Arthur should have known that nobody makes it untouched.

His heart goes to lead.

Without asking if he can, Merlin takes Arthur's gun from its holster. Two rounds of shots crack past Arthur's ear. Their strings cut off, the ghouls crumple forwards, a black substance smelling like the fires of hell oozing out of the bullet the holes.

The cries from outside bring Arthur and Merlin back to reality. “Come,” Arthur says, hiding behind the tent flap to observe what is going on outside. “I've got to get you out of here.”

There's much less opposition from Merlin now. He comes when Arthur tugs and doesn't say much when Arthur tells him to stay put. Arthur can recognise shock when he sees it and realises he should do something to shake Merlin out of it. But as things stand it's better this way. If Merlin does what he's told there's a chance they can make it out of this camp alive —and unbitten.

While Merlin stands stock still behind the flap, Arthur takes in what's going on. A girl, otherwise unharmed, is holding onto her arm, cupping an already festering wound with the palm of her hand. Over and over she says, “It's nothing. Just a scratch. It's nothing.” And then she grins, lightly, softly, looking for all the world like an angel painted on an altarpiece.

Arthur shifts his gaze to the centre of the tent aisle. A pack of four ravening ghouls fight over the remains of a corpse. Over grunts and groans, organs get scattered and strewn around. The droppings are fought over.

In spite of everything he's seen, Arthur's stomach roils, a small part of him still rebelling at being compelled to watch this, more of this, this sickening waste of mankind's potential. Still, the situation offers an out. With those snivelling monsters distracted, Arthur and Merlin can make it down the lane, in the direction opposite the square and go back to the car by rounding the camp's perimeter.

His fingers close around Merlin's wrist and with a sharp pull he basically wrests him out of the tent. Probably because he hasn't crashed landed on planet reality yet, Merlin adapts his pace to Arthur's. Together they jog down down the little avenue bordered by tents, making it towards the high ridge of ground that rises beyond. They skip over a crawling, legless ghoul, and careen to the end of the lane.

It dissects in two paths that go in opposite directions. Though there's no ghouls either way, Arthur's not about to let himself be fooled. Without a proper sense of how the camp's laid out, he can't make a rational decision as to where to go that's likely to keep them alive. With a little lurch he stops short and rounds on Merlin. “Which way goes to the square?”

Merlin doesn't answer, not until Arthur gives him a proper shake he even feels guilty for. “They both do.”

“Which is the quickest then?”

Lines form across Merlin's brow. “The left. But there's more tents that way.”

Arthur can see Merlin's reasoning. More tents means more people. More people means more ghouls attacking. “Okay, right,” Arthur says, yanking Merlin right.

“What about Finna?” Merlin asks, starting to put up some resistance against Arthur's tossing him around.

“Believe me,” Arthur says at a pant, “the last thing she wants is for you to die here. She went on her knees for you.”

Merlin's resistance melts to the point he moves at Arthur's pace. Relief floods Arthur. They're going to make it quicker now that Merlin's no longer opposing Arthur's flight plan.

The sensation doesn't last long. A second pack of ghouls appears at the bend in the lane. These ones don't seem very active. They're rolling forwards, true, but their bodies are wasted, all sinew gone, until there's only a scant layer of parchment-like grey skin covering what's essentially a sack of bones. That's what famish looks like on the undead.

Not wishing to relieve their hunger, Arthur veers northwards towards the rise, making sure Merlin is running in tow. He makes it to the well and then tells Merlin, “We're redoubling back to the square where the car is.”

“You mean to give up the camp entirely!” Merlin says, sounding both winded and appalled. “No saving people and regrouping?”

“Do you have a better plan?” Arthur cranes his head to yell. “Even if we managed to kill all the ghouls, which is impossible, this camp would be overrun again in two days tops, by those who turned.”

As he runs, Merlin grits his teeth. Arthur can see that his words have made an impact, even if only for the moment. It's of little import now; if they don't make it to the car, they're as good as dead. So Arthur pushes Merlin down the narrowest alleyways between the tents, those where the ghouls are fewest. Smashing the head of one in with a piece of wood he finds lying on the ground gets them almost as far as the square, just a cordon of alleyway left to traverse.

But just as Arthur is pushing for the mouth of the pathway a group of ghouls turn into their little alley. Arthur uses his heels to stop himself from ending right into their arms. “Shite!”

Behind him, Merlin says, “What the he—”

Arthur whips his head around. The path back is getting crowded with more creatures and these ones seem to be on attack mode. They're bottled up.

Arthur mentally calculates how many bullets he has left. He's lost count but he has an inkling they're not going to be enough to despatch all the ghouls blocking their way. It's not as if they have a choice though. Arthur's about to take aim when two creatures crumple before his eyes. With them down he can see that Finna is standing behind them.

“Finna,” Merlin gasps, starting towards her in spite of the ghouls squirming towards him.

Arthur grabs him by the neck just as Finna shoots another round, taking out two more ghouls. “Arthur, take Merlin to Edinburgh, I know he won't listen. Make it count.” And with that she eliminates one more ghoul.

But Merlin does listen. When Arthur yanks him forwards and helps him slither past the assemblage of undead, he comes willingly, although he looks back towards the alley from time to time. Arthur doesn't reprimand him for that. In fact he does the same, checking on Finna. The last he sees of her she's alive and fighting still.

When he reaches the square Arthur can no longer think of her, has no leisure to. The area is a shambles. Ghouls are everywhere, milling about in search of more prey, grabbing those humans that, in their search for safety, slink past them. A twitching extremity gropes across the back of a man. Before the latter has shaken it off the ghoul is on him properly, rending the man's side open.

Something similar goes on closer to Arthur. In this case it's a woman with dark flowing locks who gets latched on as she runs. Before she's even finished screaming the ghoul's on her.

Deviating from his already zigzagging path to the Jeep, Arthur runs towards her and shoots the monster in the head. But it's too late, the woman's not only down, but marked by teeth. There's no saving her anymore. She catches his eyes, lets go of the cutlass she's been holding, and nods.

Slowly, Arthur pulls the trigger back.

“Arthur,” Merlin says, sounding uncertain but not horrified.

In a move that reminds him of Mithian, she sets her jaw.

Arthur fires. “Get her cutlass, Merlin.”

Without a word Merlin goes. He's almost done prying the hilt out of the dead woman's hands, when a creature, her face mottled and covered in a tracery of blackened arteries, flails towards him. As if already sure of her prey, her jaw drops in that lose way typical of the dead. Her arms move quickly though.

Arthur aims, but Merlin pre-empts him, slicing her head in half with the cutlass. When he's done, looking sickly and horrified, he shares a silent moment with Arthur. Not entirely loath to curtail it, Arthur says, “I can see the Jeep, come on.”

He forces his way through a cluster of undead. The cutlass coming in handy, Merlin helps by cutting a path down to the Jeep. When they reach the car, there's no ghouls around it but the windscreen is smashed, jagged glass stalactites hanging from its frame. They're crimson shards, looking like fangs.

The roof's caved in. The driver seat is soaked a deep red. Percival's arm, recognisable by virtue of its bulk, lies across the upholstery. Arthur's face twitches. A bad taste like battery discharge coats his tongue and he has to bend over the bonnet so as not to puke then and there. A hand before his mouth, he waits for the first wave of nausea to go, then lifts his chin and swallows against the second oncoming surge of bile.

The sound of Merlin's footsteps is faint, but the weight of Merlin's hand on his shoulder is solid. “I'm so sorry,” he says, “about your friend.”

Arthur smacks his lips together and runs his hands across them once more. “He wasn't my friend,” he says.

His answer to Merlin's, “There's nothing wrong in mourning our dear ones,” is silence. He wrenches the Jeep's door open, throws out the arm and sits in the still warm, sticky seat. “Get in, Merlin,” he says, tapping the car roof. “Or I'll dump you here.”

The car's already rumbling into reverse when Merlin hops on, slamming the door on the fingers of a snivelling ghoul, severing them clean.

As soon as the car's into gear Arthur floors the accelerator, and drives the Jeep forward, irrespective of what's in front, mostly a churning, seething mass of the undead. He ploughs right through the now useless gates and only slows a little once they're well past them.

*****

It's mid afternoon when the Jeep gives a jolt and jerks all the way into a ditch only to die on them. Evidently Percy's patch up could only go so far. Arthur tries to restart it multiple times, cursing and hitting the wheel as he goes, but barring one minor sputter, nothing happens.

His whole upper body sags when he says, “Get the stuff from the boot.”

“You want to walk?”

“No, I want to sit here till tea time and wait and see if I can become ghoul fodder.”

Merlin gives him a nasty look, crosses his arms and says, “The car's cover.”

“Unfortunately,” says Arthur kicking at the pedals, “the car is not going to take us anywhere.”

Merlin turns his head to stare ahead, his lower lip jutting out.

Just to see if he can irritate Merlin as much as Merlin's irritating him, he mimics his pose, arms folded across his chest, lips couched in a pout. It's not as if he has to go far to summon the right amount of disgruntled indignation to make the pose realistic.

The sun blazing mockingly up ahead, they stay like that for what looks like the better part of ten minutes. At last Merlin says, “What's the plan?”

“According to the last sign we passed we're three miles south of Guildford.”

Merlin looks at him sceptically. “Guildford?”

“Yes,” Arthur says, without letting himself be bothered by Merlin's incredulity. “It's a ghost town by now but that doesn't mean there's nothing to scavenge. We'll get car parts there, sleep in some empty house and then come back here.”

“It's a town,” Merlin points out and Arthur has to give it to him, towns are dangerous because they attract scavengers.

There's something Merlin doesn't seem to know. “When I said ghost town, I meant it. There's no one left alive. No prey.”

Merlin's jaw slowly slackens in understanding. “Oh, okay. I get it now.”

“Good,” Arthur says, opening the car door, “because there's really no other option.” He opens the boot and starts to take out the essentials, namely rifle, ammo, some of the food from the camp, and a change of shirts for himself and Merlin. He stuffs everything in a rucksack and secures it on his back.

Holding on to his cutlass, Merlin comes up to him. “You get the rifle and the gun, don't I get a weapon?”

“Not if I'm not sure you can fire it,” Arthur says, starting his trek down the empty motorway. “I don't want you to accidentally maim me, thanks.”

Merlin trots up to him. “Why do you think I would be useless with a weapon?”

Arthur mentally sighs and grits out. “Told you until I'm sure of you I'm not giving you a weapon.”

“I can fire a gun,” Merlin says, swinging his cutlass from side to side and nearly hitting Arthur in the leg. “I learnt.”

“If you use a gun as well as you do a blade than I'd rather not.”

“I can look after myself,” Merlin says rather testily.

“And yet were bitten,” Arthur says, having come to accept this as a fact somehow.

Merlin snorts under his breath, a little choking sound of sorts. “It's a matter of time, you know. Getting bitten.”

Arthur can't object to that, and yet there's more Merlin's not taking into consideration. “That's one risk,” he says. “But not the only one.”

“What do you mean?” Merlin asks.

Arthur would much rather not have to chat all the way to Guildford and could entirely do without Merlin's nattering but he must set Merlin right. “There's more to fear than ghouls. You need to fear the living as well.”

Merlin makes an understanding noise. “You mean the smugglers? With all due respect—”

“I mean the military,” says Arthur, making his tone so final there can be no doubt the conversation is over.

“I read about it,” Merlin says, casting his eyes on the road. “What they had to do to keep the infection in check. It's horrible but I suppose—”

“You know nothing about it!” Arthur speaks so harshly he finally manages to shut Merlin up.

The rest of the walk to Guildford is uneventful if not short. But when they get into the town proper it's to witness the usual scene of death and destruction that accompanies any jaunt to any urban settlement these days.

They hit the high street. Once it would have looked like any village street in Southern England. Georgian buildings share the space with wattle and daub Tudor houses, the hills outside the town already visible from the top of the main thoroughfare.

Today years-old rubbish lines the length of the street. There's a bit of everything: suitcases, help packages of the kind the army used to distribute in the early days of the infection, furniture. The frame of a bed lies smashed in the middle of the road.

Along the street several cars have been abandoned. Some are sitting top down; some have been stripped of everything that made them a car once. Some were long ago shelled out.

“Do you think we'll find what we're looking for?”

“Those have been cleaned of anything we might need,” Arthur says, pointing at the burnt out cars. “But if we take a less frequented road, maybe we'll be rewarded.”

Before long they find themselves an old Land Rover Arthur loots for spare parts. He stashes as many as he can in his rucksack and bids Merlin carry the engine. “It weighs a ton,” Merlin protests.

“It's not optional,” Arthur says, before looking around to find a place to sleep. He zeroes in on a small house at the end of the road, one that comes with a drive on either side of it. The fact that the house is isolated bodes well. A place like that is more easily defensible. The windows are boarded up and the door seems locked but Arthur's sure that there's a way in.

“Who went and made you the leader?” Merlin asks, his voice sounding with the first wave of true resentment that's come from him all day.

Arthur doesn't bother answering. “Come,” he says, “We'll sleep there.”

“Inside that creepy house?” Merlin asks, bobbing along, hobbled by the weight of the engine.

“That creepy house looks like it's perfectly located.”

They saunter over. After Merlin's put down the engine, they both work at jimmying the lock. “Pity credit cards are so passé,” Merlin bemoans, soliciting a snort from Arthur.

“Yeah,” he deadpans, “if only the economy hadn't crashed because of the end of the world.”

Thanks to their joint efforts they manage to force the door open. The house is dark and a tentative flick of the light switch tells Arthur that all power was long ago cut off. “Leave the door open,” he says.

Merlin trails after him, his voice hushed for some reason when he says, “Smells terrible.”

“Let's hope there's no corpse in here.”

“Nah,” Merlin says, making the floorboards squeak as he moves, “that's not a-decomposing-corpse- is-in-here level of terrible. It's more musty terrible.”

“And how have you learnt to differentiate?”

Merlin grunts. “I'm younger than you but I hope you don't think I haven't squatted and lived with corpses and the like? We all have.”

It's not that Arthur previously thought Merlin hadn't survived some horrors the way everybody else has. It's more that he doesn't connect him with them. “I guess,” he says, and lets that thought trail off.

Whoever once owned this house, it becomes clear after a thorough inspection, has long ago left. Whatever valuables were there are gone. Since the door was locked when they entered, Arthur guesses this is one of the few homes to have been spared the massive looting of '15. Still, the original owners must have taken care to take everything with them when they left.

The house isn't bare of furniture, but anything of interest — canned food, thick clothing, communication devices — have been taken. All perishables have gone rotten or dried up so much they look like stone. Even the rats have died and decomposed. “Shit,” Merlin says, “close the door, close the door.”

It's not a bad idea, so Arthur quickly seals the kitchen. It's not as if he wants to see more of the spectacle. Both he and Merlin move on with their inspection. Since nothing's alive around here, the house is secure. After having retrieved the engine they left on the lawn outside and parked it in the lounge, Arthur busies himself to ensure the door will stay closed. To make it so, he pushes at a tall dresser that cumbers the hall and shoves it at the door.

“Hey, I can help,” Merlin says, dropping his cutlass, to which he's stuck all this time, and comes to help him.

“Why, I—” Arthur clears his throat. “Thank you.”

With Merlin's aid they get the door firmly shut in no time. After that, each of them goes their own way to explore the premises. Merlin gets to scout out the downstairs rooms while Arthur goes for the ones a floor above.

One of the positive surprises the house offers, apart from temporary shelter, is a couple of water cisterns. The water may no longer be any good to drink, but that means they can wash. When Merlin learns of the news, he sheds his dusty, blood stained jumper then and there, revealing a thin but shapely torso that makes Arthur's mouth go dry, and trots to the tub.

It's been a long while, Arthur tells himself, since he saw bodies as anything other than corpses. That's why Merlin's does that to him. It can't be the physicality of him. It must be his aliveness that's doing the trick, exciting him.

“Mind helping me?” Merlin says, bracing his arms on the rim of the dirty bathtub, his body bent over, head down. His biceps do bulge some in that position, his body wiry though obviously underfed. To Arthur he looks for a moment like a supplicant squire waiting to be knighted, something out of an old painting, or like a wrongly accused prisoner waiting for the fall of the axe. He's... riveting. “Arthur?”

Arthur startles, coughs. “What with?”

Merlin rolls his eyes, Arthur can see him do that even in profile. “The water. Can you pour some water over my head and neck?”

If for no other reason than to take his mind off his previous train of thought, Arthur complies. He pours water and watches as Merlin uses the scant quantity to rinse his face and neck, arms and hands. So as not to waste precious water, it's slow going, droplets clinging to Merlin's skin, and making it shine perfectly, rosily clean for the first time since Arthur clapped eyes on him.

“I can do you,” Merlin offers when he straightens.

Arthur's jaw locks. “No, thank you.” Not after how long it's been and the thoughts that came over him a minute before. “I can manage.” Arthur gets a better grip of the water tank.

“Okay,” Merlin says, shuffling backwards towards the door. “I'll go see if there's any beds. There must be right?”

After Merlin's left him blessedly alone, Arthur strips down to his trousers and gets down to washing. Even though he had other priorities before, he's wanted nothing better all day than to be able to wash away the blood, Percy's blood. It shouldn't be there. It makes him feel dirty to the bone.

Using an old towel he finds on the rail he scrubs and scrubs, scratches at his skin till rose perpendicular lines appear along the length of his muscles and he's positive there's no more of Percy's blood on him.

When he's done he puts his trousers back on, but leaves the shirt on the floor as a goner. So as not to waste the water, he stores it back where he found it, in the hall cupboard. He'll think of a way to pour it into smaller bottles they can take with them.

This done, he wanders down the corridor. The pictures that line the walls belong to the family who lived here: the people in them appear hostile. His skin prickles at sight of them. The more they stare at him out of their frames the more he feels like a trespasser who's about to be haunted by the tutelary spirits of this place, their chant a denunciation of his presence here, of his invasion of this private sanctuary, of his continued survival.

It's his survival that's made it possible for him to violate the peace of this home. Squeezing his eyes shut so that he won't take in the faces of the happy couple this house belonged to, Arthur ploughs ahead, following the noises Merlin's making.

Arthur finds Merlin in the bedroom at the end of the corridor; he's wearing a clean shirt from Arthur's rucksack and frayed underwear clearly bought moons ago. “There's no other bed but a cot,” he says, slanting his head at its frame. “I checked. We can sleep in shifts.”

“No,” Arthur says, leaning against the wall, his gaze falling on the musty but perfectly made bed. “The house is safe for tonight. We should make the most of it. No shifts.”

“So?” Merlin prompts, fluffing a pillow and coughing when a cloud of dust flies up and into his nose. “We do what exactly?”

“Find a linen change,” Arthur says curtly, “And sleep.”

Half an hour later they have the bed remade. The turned down corners and the floral pattern of the new duvet — which still smells like mothballs — makes the whole space look preposterously homey. Arthur experiences a jarring sense of both reality and unreality. He remembers something like this; it belongs to his past.

He remembers Mithian saying that she'd never understand bed linen floral designs, 'too granny-like, give me white sheets any day.' He remembers her long dark locks spread on the white pillow case, the light of the bedside lamp softening the angles of her features. He recollects how much he wanted her then.

“Arthur?” Merlin asks, waving a hand before his face. “Is everything okay?”

“Absolutely,” Arthur says, stacking up the pillows one on top of the other for something to do. “Now go to sleep. We're on the march as soon as we get daylight tomorrow.”

“So we're really doing this?” Merlin asks, lying on the outermost edge of the mattress.

With Merlin's legs bare Arthur can see what he didn't before, the gouge in Merlin's calf. It's some seven inches long, jagged like the imprint of teeth and blackened around the edges like any other ghoul bite he's seen. And yet here Merlin is, living and breathing, perfectly human. “Of course we are.”

Yanking the covers down, Arthur joins Merlin on the bed. The springs creak but the feel of a proper mattress on aching bones isn't bad at all. It's not something he should get used to but it isn't bad. He turns a little; Merlin's out like a light, the covers pushed at his feet, his head thrown back and his mouth slightly open as breath, steady and regular, whooshes out of his mouth.

The corner of Arthur's mouth lifts.

Telling himself that doing the same as Merlin would be wise, he closes his eyes. He concentrates on sleeping but sleep won't come; only thoughts do, a myriad of them going round and round in his mind. He wonders whether he'll manage to stay alive for as long as it takes to get Merlin north. If he does he must get to Freya and tell her about Percy, how she's all alone now, how Arthur failed them both. He wonders if he'll find the words to soothe her. He's not a friend so he doubts he'll be able to give any comfort. If anything he'll be the one who's taken Percy from her, the one that got her partner on that fatal run.

He shuts that thought out. Any day can be their last. That went for Percy too. He must remind himself of that.

He's busily quashing all memories of Percy when Merlin whimpers. He doesn't toss and turn. He doesn't even thrash his head. He just emits this low wailing noise and scrunches up his forehead, where big drops of sweat form. No intelligible words pass his lips but Arthur knows he's having a nightmare. It looks like a bad one too.

Arthur puts a hand to his forehead and finds Merlin's skin cold and clammy to the touch. This isn't a nightmare. This is a night terror. With a hand on his shoulder Arthur shakes Merlin. “Merlin, come on, wake up. You've got to wake up!”

Merlin moans softly, then somersaults in bed, saying, “Will.”

Arthur says gently, “Not Will, Merlin.”

In the darkness Merlin's eyes shine with a sheen that might come from tears. “It was this morning all over again.”

Arthur exhales, hard and harsh, “You must learn to put these things past you.”

“You mean friends?” Merlin questions, with a little dismissive snort.

“Yeah. In this world,” Arthur says, his words violating the quiet of the night, “there's no such thing as friends, family, or lovers. All those bonds... they hold no value anymore.”

“You don't believe that,” says Merlin, his eyes flaring bluer than before. “Or you wouldn't be mourning your own friend.”

“Percy wasn't that,” Arthur is quick to answer. He was only responsible for him and failed him utterly. “We just went on runs together.”

“Again I don't believe you,” Merlin says, lying down and on his side. “Anymore than I believe this cold smuggler façade you've got going. Otherwise you wouldn't be doing what Finna wants you to. You'd have dumped us all and left us to fend for ourselves and fuck humanity.”

“Go to sleep, Merlin,” Arthur says, pulling the covers up to his chest to signal that the conversation is over.

This time Merlin doesn't fail to catch him on the uptake. He sighs and flips on his other side. “Good night, Arthur,” he says and doesn't get nightmares or wake again.

*****

“How far is it yet?” says Merlin, each word punctuated by the squelch of his boots.

“You're sounding suspiciously like a child, Merlin,” Arthur says, tramping across the undergrowth. “We're not far.”

“Why didn't we walk along the motorway?” Merlin asks, tripping in his haste to catch up with him. “Like we did when we came.”

“Because we can lay traps for animals this way,” Arthur tells him, though he wonders how Merlin's made it years living in the conditions they all do when he seems not to have the slightest survival instinct. “A rabbit would be a good lunch.”

“Oh,” Merlin says as if that comes as a surprise. “Good idea.”

Half a mile later Arthur thinks he's spotted traces of life, smaller fauna, when Merlin says, “We need to stop.”

Arthur's hunched over to inspect a print in the mulch. “Stop? Now? For whatever reason?”

“I need to pee,” Merlin says quickly, looking the other way.

Arthur curses. Merlin's doing his level best to behave like a fractious four-year-old. “For God's sake, go find yourself a tree and do it. I promise I won't watch.”

A blush spreads across Merlin's feature. “Tree, right,” he says and, dumping the litter with the engine, stomps off, to find himself a tree that's to his taste.

Clearly being the only one with the know how, Arthur forges a trap. Since it's made of blades of grass woven together to form a loop, it's not as effective as those he would build around his own home base.

Arthur's testing yield and give when something comes barrelling into him, snarling. Arthur doesn't need a clear picture of the situation to know what the weight on top of him is. Its breath is mephitic. Its teeth snap a hair's breadth from Arthur's jugular. With his arm bent, Arthur pushes it away but he doesn't know how long he can keep the creature from biting.

Gravity is against him and this bloody faceless ghoul surprised him. Arthur bucks and shoves at the monster on top of him, turning his neck when drops of the creature's saliva trickle one by one on his body, burning layers of his skin like acid.

In that moment there's nothing but the blind terror of panic. Fingers dig at his sides and will soon make holes in them. The monster's teeth graze his skin, not opening it yet. Their cold touch is enough to signal Arthur's death knell. He yells; channels all the power in his sinews to repulse the ghoul, but it's smelt his blood, and there's no dislodging its smothering weight from on top of him.

With his fist, he pummels at the ghoul but it's bloody useless. His hand pounds into rotting decaying flesh like it would into decomposed meat and of course it does no damage. He ought to shoot the thing in the head, but he can't reach for gun or rifle. They're too far away and groping for them would prevent him from hitting the creature. His other arm is put to better use where it is, braced between himself and the ghoul. The moment he removes it those teeth will sink into him.

So instead he strains. His lungs ache. His body feels like it's burning out all his energy. For all of Arthur's writhing, the ghoul's face gets closer and closer. Fear turns his body to lead. Keeping up any opposition becomes harder and harder. Pushing out the littlest breath seems to be past the abilities of his lungs. And his arms... his arms, despite his muscles bulging, feel heavy, so heavy.

He's about to give up, even though this isn't the way he wants to go, when he's showered in stinky, black blood.

The twitching and jerking of the ghoul stops entirely and its body goes completely lax, not with the bonelessness of the slowly shuffling undead but with the utter absence of movement of real death. When he looks up, squinting through his eyes, he sees that the ghoul's head has been cloven in two.

Merlin's cutlass has done it.

“Merlin!” he says and rolls the ghoul off him.

Merlin's panting. “I heard you scream. I came at a run.” He sinks on his knees at Arthur's side, his hand cupping his neck, his thumb moving in soothing little circles across Arthur's skin.

Arthur fetches up backwards. “Don't touch me,” he says, though he's loath to part with Merlin's human, life-affirming caress. “I might've drunk his blood. And he slobbered his saliva all over me.”

Merlin keeps smiling firmly, gently. “On my way into the forest I found a stream. That's what took me so long. I sort of deviated from the path...”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, then trails off because he hasn't got it in him to tell Merlin off.

“You can have a wash, come on.”

“Merlin, I'm dangerous. What if I've been infected?”

“Come and have a wash.”

Arthur feels rage churn his guts, twisting his insides and heating his face. “Didn't you listen to a word I said? You're immune, not invulnerable. I might sneak up on you when you're sleeping and kill you.” People have died for less.

“I know,” Merlin says, “but I'm sure you didn't drink any blood and the saliva only burnt your skin a little; it's not as if you drank gallons of it.”

Arthur's not sure whether Merlin believes what he said or whether he's taking a risk. Arthur's no idea why anyone would be so reckless. Maybe Merlin feels extra powerful because that bite didn't turn him. Or maybe he's so lonely he's sticking to the last person he knows. Either way it's stupid and Arthur tells him.

“Shall we go?” Merlin says, freeing his bloody cutlass from the ghoul's skull. “I'll clean this too. I suppose we don't want it to rust.”

Arthur goggles at Merlin.

Since there's no trace of anyone alive in the vicinity and the ghoul's not running away with it, they leave their looted engine where it is with the intention of picking it back up later. Then they set to tramping in the direction of the stream Merlin sighted.

They wash in its waters. Arthur's dripping in foul, smelly dark blood he doesn't want to have on him a minute longer than necessary, so he's the first to approach the torrent. Merlin might not have come into such close quarters with the ghoul but his arms are blood spattered too.

There's little they can do about the clothes; the last change they have is in the car. So Arthur merely sheds his outer shirt and makes do with wearing befouled trousers. He crouches on a boulder by the stream where the water's deep and the shadows have allowed the water to become a reflecting pool. He cranes his neck from side to side to be sure he can see it from all angles. A leaf from one of the branches overhanging the pool falls and mars the surface, creating eddy upon eddy.

Arthur clenches his hands tight.

Merlin's voice startles him. “Let me check for you.”

Arthur's objecting even before he's chanced upon the right words to do so. “I—”

“Come on,” Merlin says. “It's either that or finding a mirror to go all 'who's the fairest of them all' over.”

“Merlin.”

Merlin's lips twist in a soft toothy smile. He reaches a hand out to him.

Arthur grabs it. He comes to stand chest to chest with Merlin, who tips his face from side to side with gentle hands. Equally gently, he frowns, and Arthur would almost fear what it is he sees but for the calm Merlin exudes. At last Merlin smiles deeply and tells him, "I see no cuts and the irritation from the zombie saliva is only skin deep."

Arthur barks a short laugh. "Young as you are, I seriously doubt you were a doctor before the apocalypse broke out. Besides, zombies, Merlin, really?"

Merlin harrumphs a laugh. "Yes, zombies. I think that's as appropriate a name as any other." Merlin tears his gaze away, goes a bit red about the jowls and a bit pinched, then adds. "No I wasn't a doctor before. I was in uni. I wanted to become a teacher. Obviously that ceased to be a priority after the first big wave of infection overran us."

Arthur can actually see Merlin doing that, subjugating pupils into listening to him by way of ingratiating grins and a passion for his subject. Well, if the world was completely different, if it was what it once had been. Then he thinks Merlin would suit the profession in other ways too. Despite the guilelessness, there's something deep and mature about Merlin too. He chooses not to say that and harp on the serious issues between them instead. "So your verdict is nothing more than wishful thinking?"

“It's what I do know." He turns and starts for the path that will lead them back to the engine. "Trust my guts, will you?"

Arthur plods heavily after Merlin. "I can't endanger the only chance humankind has."

Merlin doesn't stop trudging forwards. "I was sure you didn't believe that I was."

Arthur doesn't say that his perception has shifted. He just says, "I didn't. But what if it's true?"

"To find out, we need to get to that lab," Merlin says, feet making quick work of the treacherous ground. "And I can't make it alone. I need you so you will have to stick with me even if you want to throw in the towel."

With things put like that, Arthur can only escort Merlin to the car they were bent on retrieving.

****

It's on the next day that the Jeep runs dry on fuel, leaving them four miles short of the nearest and most dangerous petrol retrieval point. Merlin must have read how clouded Arthur's features are, for he asks, "Is this going to be a problem?"

"You can say that," Arthur says, jaw tight. "We either go ten miles out of our way to find one of the few abandoned petrol stations that can still be plumbed for petrol or we'll have to go to Sigan Town."

"Is that the new checkpoint?" Merlin asks as though he's confused as to the true nature of the place.

"Yes," Arthur says, wishing places like that hadn't cropped up wherever the ex-military had taken control of and cleared a particular area. "The one close to what used to be Stratford. It's not a place I would want to steer too close to."

“Why?” Merlin asks “If we can get what we need without going out of our way than I think we should try the checkpoint.”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, pressing his fingers at his sinuses. “The military aren't what they used to be in times of peace. They have the weapons and the fire power that justifies them in thinking they can lord it over survivors.”

“Arthur,” Merlin says, in a dead serious tone, “I wasn't suggesting things haven't changed. It's just that we want to get to Edinburgh, right? And everyday on the road is one more day we can end up as zombie toasties. As I see it, we won't be helping anyone that way. So I suggest we take the risk.”

Arthur is more inclined to accept this reasoning than Merlin's faith in everything turning out well.

It's because Merlin is that convincing that Arthur finds himself standing in the queue that forms before the checkpoint wall. The wall isn't really a contiguous structure. It's rather a fraction of a fortress with turrets built on either side of it, a tall brick containment partition running for miles on either side. Search lights are pointed at the streams of people trying to pass through. (These asylum seeking voyages have dwindled since Year 1 but are still apparently constant.) Their glare hides the presence of sub machine guns trained at the gates.

“The hot gates,” Merlin says, putting up his hand to shield his eyes from the glare of the lights. “This is my idea of what hell looks like.”

The queue advancing, Arthur shuffles forwards. “Mine too,” he says, keeping all memories of his past at bay. Then not quite able to suppress some choice images from it surfacing, he tells Merlin, “Whatever happens, keep calm, don't talk too quickly. Don't move too fast. Do nothing that may come across as an act of aggression.”

Merlin side-eyes him. “You sound like you're talking from experience.”

Behind a famished, weary crowd, they both move forwards. “In a way,” he says, not wishing Merlin to undervalue what he's saying but not ready to unburden himself. “My father... My father was one of them, in the military I mean.”

“Was?” Merlin asks, folding his hands under his armpits to better brave the cold, which is heightened by their standing semi-immobile in a queue buffeted by the wind. “Did he...”

“Die?” Arthur finishes Merlin's thought for him. “Yeah, like your family I suppose.”

“Well, I only had one family member to lose,” Merlin tells him, gaining another inch in the queue. “And I lost her.”

Arthur has no time to reply. They're getting closer to their goal, the checkpoint itself. Four people are being questioned by two men in fatigues. They show their papers. Though not many people have held on to them for obvious reasons, they seem to have. Everything is going smoothly until a third officer, this one barely clinging to the dregs of a uniform, comes along, tugging a dog on a leash.

The dog approaches the party of four, gives the younger people a cursory sniff, and proceeds to the other two. When he chances upon the old man of the group he starts barking like mad. At first Arthur doesn't get it, not until the dog latches onto the old man's trouser leg and the man shouts, “I'm fine, I'm fine. I wasn't. I wasn't.”

The old man fights as one of the soldiers grabs him. He puts up even more verbal opposition than physical though, yelling, “You can't do this to me. I'm a refugee. I'm seeking refuge.”

Dog still barking aggressively, the soldiers don't listen to a word the man has to say. They tear at his clothes in a way that doesn't even resemble a strip search, until they unveil a bandage. They rip the layers of this bandage off and what shows is a sizeable bite, grown lumpy at the centre and darkening at the edge.

The dog whines, long and desperate.

It's only then that the soldiers tear the man away from the rest of his family and push him into one of the side buildings standing on the outside of the perimeter wall.

The scene is enough to let Arthur say to Merlin, “Okay, let's go.”

“You think?” Merlin whispers, almost right into his ear, his breath hot and lighting a desire in Arthur he hasn't had to face in his years. “I mean, ” he winks at his lower leg.

“Yeah,” Arthur says as quietly as when he started, trying not to attract the guards' attention.

It avails him nothing. Before he and Merlin can set off, the guards shout, “Next,” and they're forced to advance. With his eyes on Merlin, he offers the first soldiers his bunch of fake papers. The soldier flips at the pages with little attention then waves him on. Arthur turns his head to check that Merlin's following, when the bleeding barking starts again, growing in pitch.

Like before two soldiers take a grab of Merlin and nearly rip the clothes off him. Arthur whirls round and says, “You can't do that.”

An inspection of Merlin's torso yields nothing, of course. So Arthur marches up to the highest ranking officer, or rather the one who looks like he might once have been such, and with an air of command he's taking right from his father, says, “You have no right to do this. He's fine.”

“Take him to transport E,” says the soldier right over Arthur, ignoring his words completely.

“You don't know what you're doing,” Arthur says, pulling all the stops. “This is not—”

“Take him to Transport E,” the soldier says again, and the other two drag Merlin away even though Merlin jabs at the guards restraining him, kicking and biting about so they can get no proper hold of him. But the men are twice Merlin's size, big and burly, with muscles that look positively unnatural such is their bulging.

With a hit to the back of the neck they curb all further attempts at fighting on Merlin's part.

Without even working out whether his behaviour is going to be helpful or not, Arthur yells, “Merlin,” and elbows the guards closest to him right in the stomach. This doesn't get him any closer to Merlin. It just gets him a kick in the guts that robs him of all breath and a gun to the face.

“I have something to trade,” he says between gritted teeth.

“That's what everybody says,” the soldier says, the glint in his eyes telling Arthur he's going to pull that trigger.

But nobody shoots. Pain flares in the back of his head, dull, then so sharp his vision blackens. And then he loses his hearing too.

His last thought is that he should have known. He always loses them like this.

****

When Arthur wakes, he's in what he thinks might be a container cell. The walls are all ridged white aluminium. There's a rectangular metal table standing in the centre of this unit and a filing cupboard empty of all files propped against the shorter length of the wall. A rusty, probably disused coffee machine sits on top.

At least this place doesn't look like an execution area, and though Arthur is manacled, he's otherwise free to move.

Arthur doesn't. He can't see the point in trying and anyway his head throbs too much for him to take active part in his destiny.

With a grunt he leans against the cool surface behind him.

Arthur has barely managed to master the sharper waves of nausea that almost trigger vomiting, when the door opens. In files a reedy man who's all greasy, long, mousy hair and beak of a nose. His blue eyes glint malevolently above the curve of it. He's dressed in fatigues like the guards at the checkpoint but there's little of the military about him, not his posture, not the way he carries his gun, and most certainly not his physique. He has the kind of build that would have never been let loose in the army.

“My name's Cedric,” the man says in a tone that's a cross between friendly and sycophantic.

Arthur acknowledges that with a grunt that would do a Neanderthal proud and the words, “Where's Merlin?”

Cedric takes one of the chairs surrounding the table and straddles it. He puts his chin on its topmost back rail, both hands holding onto the metal structure. “Tush,” Cedric says, “and here I was trying to make conversation.”

“I highly doubt it,” Arthur snarks. “Where's Merlin?”

“Why should I answer?” Cedric asks, kicking at the floor with the tip of his combat boot, making this thud, thud, thud sound.

Arthur can't say the man doesn't have the upper hand. He does and he's clearly aware. But there's something Cedric hasn't thought to take into consideration. “You're talking to me. You wouldn't be talking to me if I you didn't want something from me.” Arthur tips an eyebrow. “Let's say I'm not listening till you tell me Merlin is alive.”

“What if he isn't?” Cedric asks, squinting his eyes in a way that has something of the tic about it.

"Then I'd have nothing more to say," Arthur says, dipping his head in a way that announces the conversation's over.

"He's not dead," Cedric says in a tone Arthur's not sure is trustworthy.

"You'll have to do way more to convince me that's true."

Cedric seems to need him or want his collaboration quite a lot for he answers. “At the moment he's been detained in Block C. Normally that's the opposite of good news," Cedric says conversationally. "But let's say his execution has been stayed, until he turns into a jaw snapper, that is."

Is Cedric on to what Merlin is? Arthur doesn't let on that he suspects or that there is anything untoward going on with Merlin aside from their arrest. "And what do you want from me?" Arthur asks.

"Let's say that I recognised you," Cedric says with false nonchalance. "You're Arthur Pendragon, son of the late general, the great smuggler who poisoned his da's last days with all his underground activities."

Arthur guesses that Cedric knew someone that was in the military before, maybe under Uther, but that doesn't explain what he wants now. "So?" he asks without bothering with any denials. If Cedric knows of him from before than he must already be aware of having hit on the truth. "What has that to do with Merlin?"

"Nothing and everything," Cedric says, buffing his nails on his camo gear. "Mostly you're his ticket out of here and out of the jaws of a death squad."

"What do you want me to do?" Arthur grits out.

"I want you to get your hands on a shipment of weapons for me," Cedric says and now his eyes are positively shining with greed. "I want you to find it and hand it to me personally. In the meanwhile I'll keep Merlin alive for you."

Arthur sees the energy Cedric is emanating. "You want to organise a coup. You want to take control of the base without the others knowing."

Cedric is so stupid as not to deny that. If Arthur wanted he could rat him out to the others. Then Cedric wouldn't be playing any more games. But if he did that Merlin would die.

"If that's the case then you are on your own; you're alone against the leaders. This means that you have no pull to interfere with what is going on with Merlin."

"You'll have to trust that my palm greasing powers are working just fine," Cedric says, waggling his eyebrows.

Cedric is right. Arthur can't get Merlin out of here on his own but he can if he uses Cedric. The rest doesn't matter at all. He doesn't care about Cedric taking power or the justice of it. He doesn't give a fuck about that at all. "All right," Arthur says, holding his manacled hands up. "Free me and you'll get the cargo of your dreams."

Cedric squints at him as though weighing whether he can trust him to deliver against the risk of letting him flee. Once he's done with his appraisal, he roots in the pockets of his fatigue and takes out a small silvery key. He bends over Arthur and turns the key in the tiny lock.

****

Arthur looks back to the perimeter wall, the night air stabbing at his lungs. He has three days, the keys to a battered old bike and, and only a few resources to help him free Merlin. After that, as Cedric says, Merlin's case is out of his hands, and by proxy out of Arthur's too.

Gripping the keys tight he walks to the motorbike. He stabs the kickstand down with his foot, pulls in the clutch, gets into gear, advances the throttle a little, and lets the clutch lever out. When he feels it bite he lets it all out and shoots forward.

He drives through the night. At one time he drives right into a pack of ghouls, who run after him. Seeing them, Arthur turns the bike round and, though this wastes precious time, speeds away along an alternate route. A little before daybreak he makes it to the cottage.

It sits alone and desolate on top of a hill overlooking rolling countryside over which not the shadow of an animal moves. At this precise moment in time it's washed out by the early sun's rays; they're mixing with the white of the wash to play trick or treat with shadows.

Arthur leaves the bike on the grass and knocks on the door. With a smile on her face, Freya opens it. When she only sees Arthur, she pushes on her toes to spy behind his shoulder. Of course, there isn't anyone behind him. It takes a solid minute for her to take this in. Once the truth has sunk in she cups her mouth and releases a sob.

“How—” she asks.

Arthur can't decide which part is the worst, that he doesn't know how it happened or that he can't do anything to change the outcome of what did. Telling her about the rest of the gruesome details is out of the question too. So he says, “Car broke down, we slept at the camp. The camp got overrun.”

“Oh my god,” she says, falling to her knees.

It's Arthur who picks her up, fastens the door behind them and leads her downstairs, into the cellar Percy and Freya turned into a bunker of sorts. He lays her down on the bed, pours her some water and puts it on the crate they use as night stand.

With his hand on her shoulder, her knees curled up to her chest, she sobs and shakes. It takes a while for the manifestation of her pain to subside but Arthur is ready to wait her out and do his best to stand by her in her grief. At last, though, Merlin's situation makes him speak out. “Something else happened,” he says, trying to find ways to sum up what had. “There's this person,” he finds himself saying. “And he's special. He...” 'He can save us' sounds too absurd to Arthur's own ears and 'he's in danger' is too little, so he settles for, “There's something about him that makes him invaluable, his blood, he...”

Freya sniffles and Arthur's not positive she's listening at all. “He could be instrumental to finding a cure against the ghoul plague. But he's in danger, which he doesn't deserve at all, and the only way I have of saving him is to find a cargo of weapons for the man who's holding him hostage.”

“You want to save him but didn't help Percy out,” Freya says with a bitterness Arthur has never heard from her before. “Percy's been on so many runs with you... And he... And you.” She chokes up.

Arthur doesn't know what to say. There's simply no justification. “I know. I know. I'm sorry.”

“He said,” Freya continues, “that you were scarred, that that was why you never hung around after a job, but the truth is you never cared.”

Arthur's tongue feels as though paralysed, bigger and clumsier. No words come to his aid. Needing some distance, he starts upright, walking along the length of the bunker, observing all the items belonging to Percy, lying there as though waiting for their owner to pick them up. “Merlin, the man I was talking to you about, was bitten. Months ago. He's still wonderfully alive.”

Freya's sobs cease. “Myror,” says Freya, “that's the man you want to be talking to.”

Using Percy's radio and passwords, Arthur contacts Myror. He says, “I have rations coupons to exchange for weapons. You want to deal with me the way you did with Percy.”

“Uh, uh,” Myror's voice come over the radio. “You're not Percy. I don't see why I should trust you.”

The old grandfather clock Percy shifted close to the door of the bunker ticks away the remaining minutes of Merlin's life. “Because food is more valuable than weapons nowadays, so this trade's favourable to you.”

“So then why would you trade?” Myror asks, pointedly. “There's a scam in this somewhere.”

“There's no scam,” Arthur radios, nearly crushing the receiver in his palm. “I know a bloke who needs weapons; you have weapons. I have ration credits.”

“Fake ones surely,” Myror says.

“Genuine ones,” Arthur tells him. It's no lie. Smuggling and trading for coupons has been his main activity for years. He prides himself on never doing anything badly. “You can see them for yourself. If you're satisfied the trade can proceed.”

Myror gives him an appointment. “Tomorrow night, at eleven,” he says, relaying him the coordinates.

Arthur wants to press for an earlier meeting, but Myror's not to be moved. So he resigns himself to a partially sleepless night spent in the unsecured part of the cottage — the bunker he leaves to Freya — hoping Merlin's heart is still beating.

The time spent waiting seems to stretch to infinity, especially since Freya is walled in her shell of pain and Arthur doesn't know what to say, so silence reigns between them. Merlin would probably tell him he's a bastard, step in and find something to touch Freya's heart with, but Arthur can't. He isn't any good that way.

“I'll be back,” he tells Freya the next morning before leaving. “When this is over we'll have a proper funeral.”

Freya doesn't answer, and though it's dangerous, she watches him go from her threshold.

Myror, as could have been expected, doesn’t turn up alone for the trade, but accompanied by a band of four gorillas. They're armed to the teeth and all their weapons are trained on him. Arthur counts at least six rifles and four guns. These gorillas would all appear very menacing if they didn't look famished too, thin like they're competing with the ghouls for the best living dead look of the year. The skin beneath their eyes is gouged with lines.

Arthur can see why Myror agreed to the exchange now, but he plays by the rules all the same. Merlin's life is at stake here. He holds his hands up and says. “I have a bag full of ration coupons here.” He waggles his eyebrows. “You can live for two months off them.”

Myror says, “Come here. Let me see them.”

Hands still up, Arthur shakes his head. “No,” he says. “I go there, you verify the coupons are the real deal, you signal, one of your boys to shoot. Not falling for that.”

“I'm not a murderer,” says Myror, shrugging his shoulders at his company.

“That's your reputation,” Arthur says, ready to cite instances that have tarnished Myror's good name. Percy was good at keeping records.

“I have killed,” Myror admits then, “but I play by the rules. I'm not going to have you killed. What do I gain by your death? I lose a contact who's been shrewd enough to amass the one commodity everyone's seeking. Not smart.”

Arthur is very nearly tempted to believe that. “You come to me,” he says, however, not willing to put his life on the line when he's the only one who can save Merlin. “Put yourself in the line of fire. Your boys, I'm sure, will never misfire if you risk getting caught in the middle.”

Myror spreads his empty hands out. “All right,” he says. “I deal fairly. No problem behaving like it either.”

The bulwark of the old port behind him, Myror walks towards him, the lights of the lighthouse built behind it throwing his advancing figure into relief.

As Myror approaches, Arthur's heartbeat fastens. Myror has no weapons about him, at least that Arthur can see, but Arthur isn't about to trust anyone these days, not when survival means someone else's death.

When Myror is positioned in front of him if a little to the side, thus shielding him from his men, Arthur releases the clasp that holds the leather bag he has around his neck. He fishes out a pack of ten coupons, enough to receive a month's rations from the Provisional Emergency Government.

Myror studies them one by one, checking the corners, the back (most counterfeiters only have time for an half arsed job and forget doing it as carefully as the front) and the filigree. Going by his humming he seems content with what he sees, as he should be, since Arthur isn't trading in fakes, not this time. Continuing his inspection, Myror turns.

At the same time pain like fire spreads across his shoulder, nearly knocking him backwards, the ricochet sounding only after the almighty lance of fire in his joint registers.

As Myror shouts, "No need, he's clean!" Arthur fights a wave of nausea that almost sends him under. He must concentrate hard on staying astraddle his motorbike, the temptation to just fold strong. He makes himself breathe and keep upright. His fingers clutch at the bike's start button, ready to hightail it, but Myror waves his hand and Arthur aborts his flight attempt. He needs those weapons.

"We can take them from him," one of Myror's young hirelings shouts, his sights still on Arthur. Arthur studies the situation. Judging by the dampness of his shirt and jacket and how dizzy he feels, he's wounded, the world sort of swirling around him. This means he has little chance of success. He can't yield though. If he dies, Merlin does too.

But there's an opening that he can see. To protect Myror all his gorillas but one have come out of the woodwork to level their weapons at Arthur. Only one of them is actually guarding the weapon's lorry.

There's only one thing for it. Not trusting Myror's boys one second longer than necessary, Arthur shoots the bike forward, takes his gun out, and shoots the man inside the van. The second he slumps, Arthur leaps off the running bike, hitting the ground hard and rolling with the motion. A volley of shots follows him, but, pain tearing at his shoulder, Arthur makes himself jump on his feet and into the van. Once insides he manhandles the dead driver aside and slips into his seat. A turn of the key and the lorry's engine vibrates.

Pistol shots shatter the rear-view mirror and crack the windscreen. But by then Arthur is almost out of the old harbour.

*****

Before the mirror of an old petrol station, Arthur dresses his wound. He looted the essentials for this impromptu bit of health care in a vet clinic in a suburban area. He fought off three zombies that were clearly lured in by the temptation of fresh blood to get what he needed. After he'd killed them off — or whatever passes for such where ghouls are concerned — he did manage to get his hands on a handful of supplies.

Now as he fishes the bullet fragments out of his shoulder with a pair of pincers, he grimaces, his eyes reduced to pale slits that do nothing to give him clear visibility of what he's doing.

The fingers of his other hand gripping the rim of the dirty basin, Arthur forces himself to seek the last bullet shard. When the pincers scrape against the bone, he almost passes out, pale lights and white noise swirling into one another till his sense of reality is both heightened and diminished.

After the last wave of dizziness has passed, Arthur grunts, but sets to work again. He pushes against a flap of skin, works the ends of the the pincer around a piece of glinting metal that shines amidst strata of blood and muscle, and wrenches it free. The moment it's clear of the skin, Arthur vomits, right into the filthy basin, the remains of his last meal mixing with the bile lining his stomach.

Breathing through his nostrils, he lets oxygen act as a painkiller, then straightens, and grabs the rest of the equipment in the bag. It's only after three tries that he manages to get a limp piece of thread through the eye of the needle. And it's only after a few swigs of a vile bottle of whiskey he retrieved behind the random counter of a random ghoul infested pub that he manages to sew the skin together.

Not too long after Arthur secures the margin of a sticky plaster patch against his skin, then changes into a fresh shirt got off the boot of an abandoned car. Two groans later he's back into his own jacket. Bullet hole and all, he likes it; it was one of Mithian's last gifts and he's not about to give it up. He'll patch it up when his hands are steadier and Merlin's free.

With the clock still ticking and him back in one piece, he drives the lorry back to the checkpoint. He locks the lorry and proceeds on foot towards the rendezvous point.

Cedric and a man he must have recruited for the purpose of this encounter stand there, waiting. Merlin is between them held at gun point. “Merlin,” Arthur starts when he sees him, his heart flipping in his chest. So far he's told himself that the objective was getting Merlin back. The way Mithian told him: 'a mission has an objective, Arthur, and it must be clear, or you'll lose men.' But despite his faith in the objective, his sticking to it, he hadn't really dared believe that Merlin could survive.

Certainly he looks the worse for wear; thinner, hollower, and there's a large bruise at his temple Arthur wishes to repay someone in kind for. But he's otherwise fine. He's fine. For a second, a moment as brief as the spark of a thought, Arthur smiles. Then he dangles the keys to the lorry in front of Cedric. “Here's what you want.”

“Throw the keys to me,” Cedric shouts across the distance separating them. “And I'll release Merlin.”

Arthur shakes his head. “No way! Who's to say you won't kill him once you have the keys?” After Myror's lads, Arthur's not trusting anyone else. “Let him go first and then you'll get what you want.”

Cedric and his friend exchange a glance, the click of the gun's safety being released the only sound.

“Merlin, duck!” Arthur shouts, as he throws the keys in the air.

Cedric and his friend dive for them.

A they do, Merlin runs at full tilt towards him.

As soon as Merlin's close, Arthur takes his hand and they run.

Shots plough the ground where their feet were but a second before, still Arthur yanks Merlin behind him and dives for cover behind a rock crest. Rolling downwards and behind the natural bulwark, he hits his shoulder. The agony is so undiluted he sees black.

****

When Arthur opens his eyes, his back is to a stone wall, there's a roof over his head and no danger seems to be in sight. Merlin's hands are on his naked shoulder, with their palms down, probing the muscle tissue. Those big hands of Merlin's are warm and gentle, soothing. When Arthur blinks, it's to focus on Merlin's gnawed lower lip and wet eyes.

The bad taste in his mouth fusing with the throbbing at his temples, Arthur groans softly.

When Merlin realises he's awake, he says, “You were shot. You didn't tell me you were shot.”

“I had a misadventure on the way,” Arthur hedges, not willing to go into particulars. “Where are we?”

“Somewhere safe,” Merlin says, as if that is of no importance compared to the fact Arthur was shot.

Arthur begs to differ. He knows the wound isn't lethal, or shouldn't be, at least if no infection spreads. What he doesn't know is where he is — but he trusts Merlin on the safety issue — and what happened to the idiot when he was in Cedric's care. “How were you treated?”

Merlin looks away. If he's trying to deflect, it's a bad idea because that's the side of his face that's bruised. “I was thrown around a bit the second day but it doesn't hurt at all.”

Arthur runs the pads of his fingers up the side of Merlin's face, tracing the skin under his eyes and the curvature of bone that spans into his forehead. “I bet it does.”

As if to prove him right, Merlin winces. His eyes close, lashes going down and tickling the pads of Arthur's fingers. “Not like being shot.”

Merlin bends down again, probing at the wound. “This is a hack job,” he says, brow knit. “I mean I can darn my socks better than this.”

“I did it myself,” Arthur says, head lolling against the stone wall behind him. “It's not as if there's many doctors left alive to tend me.” Arthur's breath hitches at the latest pass of Merlin's fingers on his pec. “Besides I had a count down to get you.”

“You could have left me behind.”

Arthur winces when Merlin puts a clean bandage on the wound. “N-no I couldn't,” he says, breath shuddering fast out of him, and leaves it at that.

“Because now you're persuaded that I'm invaluable to mankind?” Merlin tuts, fussing with the corners of the bandage he applied. “Is that it?”

Merlin's eyes are cast down; his words hide a trace of annoyance. “Merlin,” Arthur starts.

“It could be all for nothing,” Merlin says, adjusting the gauze pad covering the margins of Arthur's wound. “Maybe my blood won't be the cure.”

Arthur pushes up, and, Merlin's face in the cradle of his hands, he fits their mouths together. He's not certain what he meant by this kiss when he started it. Maybe he wanted to reassure Merlin. Maybe he wanted to reassure himself. But when their lips collide, Arthur feels his heart give a sharp thump and then he can't stop.

He pulls his lips against Merlin's, touching them in waves that come and go like a tide, until Arthur opens Merlin's mouth with his. Their tongues slide together, slow at first, wet, their kiss tentative, like asking permission, like a shaky, fragile salute, dipping in timidly only to draw back and start again, meeting in the space between their mouths. It's warm and soft and Arthur wants to crush Merlin to his chest, wrap him in his arms and shield him with his body. And even more he wants to inhabit his mouth and his skin, smell the smell of him, and feel the weight and breadth of him, muscle, bone, sinew, that grace of his that transcends all that, that heart of his that is beating against all odds.

Arthur's hands slide up, mapping as much of Merlin as he goes. Cupping the nape of Merlin's neck, he threads his fingers into the tangled shock of dark hair, tilting his head to position Merlin the way Arthur wants him.

A knot unfurls within him, making him feel more alive than he has any right. Their kiss deepens. Their teeth clash and they bite at each other's tongues, sharp little nips that set everything on fire, as though the world is burning.

Breath coming faster, Merlin's hands roaming his body, Arthur puts his mouth to Merlin's throat where his shirt opens. He runs his lips across the flesh, sucks at the hollows, traces the sharp end of his teeth along the tendons, feeling the racing of Merlin's pulse against his lips, raising shivers.

With all that he has, he reaches up to pull Merlin into him, running his hands up and down the sharp planes of him, down his back, at his sides. The backs of his fingers brush over hot, naked skin where his shirt slips out the waistband of his trousers.

With a gasp, Merlin straddles him, his cock a hard line between them. Arthur wants to touch it, palm it, feel its weight in his hands.

“Arthur,” Merlin says, putting kisses to Arthur's face that fall like burning raindrops, along his jaw, under his eyes, across the jut of Arthur's cheekbones. Merlin's lips soften around the corners of Arthur's mouth and Arthur can taste his breath where it fans quick and sharp against him.

With hands that tremble, Arthur finds Merlin's belt and yanks sharply to work it open.

When he realises what he's doing, Merlin moves to help. He opens his trousers and drags them down, his cock standing up.

Arthur reaches between his legs, curls his fingers around Merlin.

Body locking, Merlin throws his head back, a swallow throwing in relief the stark column that is his throat.

When Arthur moves his fist upwards, Merlin lets out a long slow breath that Arthur wants to hear again. Eyes on Merlin, on the shifts of expression that travel across his features as Arthur touches him, he strokes him from base to tip. This way Arthur learns how Merlin enjoys sex.

He's not sure he's any good at this anymore; he hasn't had anyone since Mithian. But he wants to be. He wants to learn how to give this again, how to be with someone, how to be with Merlin. He wants to be able to gather him in his arms and give and give and give. So he watches the byplay of Merlin's pleasure on his face, the way his cheeks colour, his eyelids slide down, his hips stutter in jerks.

When his hands swipe sharply on the down stroke, Merlin keens. The sound pumps Arthur's blood through his veins quickly, the knowledge that he's driving Merlin to orgasm — giving him something good on this godforsaken earth — makes him harden too.

Merlin says, “Arthur,” digging his nails in Arthur's shoulder and sides as he rocks astride him. “Arthur.”

In one swift move, Arthur shifts them, lying Merlin down, hovering over him, one hand undoing his own trousers. He takes his cock out, hot like fever in his own hands, damp at the tip he's so keen to spill inside Merlin, on top of him, wherever. He wants and wants. He trembles.

With a hand at his side, Merlin pulls him down. At the same time he sheds his shoes and arches his hips so he can slip off his trousers easily. Bottom bared, Merlin touches his cock, pulls him on top of him, his legs spread either side of him. “"It's lotion,” he says with a sharp breath, finding a jar in the bag and passing it to him “It can work."

Arthur's not sure it's going to be good enough, so he voices his concerns.

“Trust me," Merlin says.

Tentatively, slowly, Arthur slips a slicked finger inside Merlin. When Merlin accepts it with no signs of major discomfort Arthur continues, opening him up, wondering at the secrets of his body, the way he's alive, the way he's Merlin.

When it's enough Merlin grabs him, guides his cock between his legs. Arthur thrums in his skin with the anticipation of it, his arms shaking and not holding him as they should, prop him up above Merlin, his breath rushing fast out of his lungs.

Moving on opposite axes, they try to get the angle right. Blind, Arthur seeks Merlin's hole with the pad of a finger, drives the tip of his cock in.

With a snap of his hips and a series of grunts, Arthur's cock penetrates Merlin, his forward rocking pushing him deeper in, where it's tight and it's hot, where it's Merlin cradling him with his own body. And oh god that's nearly enough to make him gush out his orgasm. As it is, Arthur struggles for breath. But he grits his teeth, and leans forward, going deeper.

With a gasp, his mouth falling silently open, Merlin pulls at Arthur's buttocks to yank him close, his knees draped around Arthur's middle.

Needing him closer, to smell him, mark him, touch him, Arthur slips an arm under Merlin's shoulder, pulling him closer. Merlin sobs, one of his fists closing around Arthur's forearm.

Merlin's fingers digging into the small of his back, Arthur presses forward. He plants a kiss on Merlin's open mouth, his tongue slipping between his teeth as he sinks in and withdraws.

Without ever breaking contact with his lips, Arthur fucks into Merlin, strokes long and snappy. Their bodies seeking each other, they clutch at one another.

Arthur arches his back, stomach pushing forward and against Merlin's belly, grazing his prick.

Merlin reaches between them to stroke himself, pulling hard on his erection, peeling back his foreskin over the reddened head. Knowing that Merlin can't be too far from his climax, Arthur speeds up. Faster and faster he moves, pleasure clouding his senses, till all his world is Merlin and nothing else.

Orgasm surprises him blunt and fast, spreading warm through him, coiling around his spine, building and building. His heart juggernauts to his throat; his chest tightens. He spills until he feels like there's no more of himself he can give.

When he's done, he withdraws from Merlin's body with a sigh, head down, shoulders sticky with sweat. Now he's finished, he lies atop Merlin, gasping for breath. Upon realising Merlin hasn't come yet though, he slides downwards, even though his body wants to shut down.

Fighting the languor, he nuzzles Merlin's body, gently kissing and biting his thighs, awakening sounds from Merlin, sounds Arthur wants to hear forever and ever.

Though memories of doing something like this belong to a very distant past, Arthur slips Merlin's cock into his mouth and sucks at the head, his lips sealing around it.

Wild now, Merlin grabs his hair and hitches his hips in little shimmies that feed Arthur more and more of him. Restraining him with a hand on his soft lower belly, Arthur circles the end of Merlin's prick with light strokes of his fingers. His mouth tightens with each downward stroke, lowers still, while he works his tongue against the shaft, fluttering it along the path of a raised vein.

Merlin's soft little cries have a sharp edge to them. He arches and thrashes on the stone floor. He bucks, thrusting his hips harder and faster, driving into Arthur's mouth. A shudder, one last jerk of his hips, and Merlin comes.

Mouth flooded with the sour taste of Merlin's come, Arthur half swallows, half spits. When he's clean of the taste more or less, Arthur gropes at his trousers, pulling them up without fastening them. He crumples on top of Merlin, his head on his belly, putting random kisses to the skin even though he doesn't have it in him to move an inch.

“Arthur,” Merlin says, once he's got his breath back. “I—”

“Sh, sleep,” Arthur says. His body spent, he needs the peace of sleep, and he needs to postpone the conversation Merlin wants to have with him by a few hours.

“Right, but I—”

“Merlin, whatever it is can wait.”

Arthur flicks a glance up. He can tell the moment Merlin decides that talking later will do because Merlin closes his eyes, and his body eases, his muscles going limp under the onslaught of sleep.

Arthur follows him into slumber right after.

****

When he wakes again it's dark but for the light given out by an upturned torch. It brightens the corner of a stone hallway. The air is cold but still. Quiet reigns around them. No ghouls, no human threats.

It occurs to Arthur that he didn't ask Merlin to tell him where they were exactly, contenting himself with being assured they're somewhere safe. Ever since the infection outbreak he can't remember being this stupid, taking his safety for granted, indulging himself because he just wanted to. But he has.

Looking at Merlin's sleeping form, his parted mouth, his innocent resting expression, the way he's hugging himself through his sleep, Arthur can't tell himself he regrets it.

He's been ready to die every day for years, resigned to being one day bitten. At times, right after he lost Mithian, he'd nearly wanted to shuffle his bloody mortal coil. He'd passively waited for something to take his life. It had never happened. Considering how easy he'd found it to accept that death would come, he'd rather take risks for a cause now, for Merlin.

That doesn't mean however that he should continue being stupid. Merlin must be protected. With a view to that, Arthur picks himself up, arranges his clothes, and goes to explore the place Merlin brought him to while unconscious.

Arthur takes a few paces down the stony corridor and can already tell the place is huge. He can't see the end of this hallway, and his footsteps resound as if in an echo chamber.

When he gets to the end of the corridor, he chances upon a slit in the wall. He peeks out and, thanks to the moonlight, he can see the view. Stars shine, though mist is exhaled from the pores of the earth. Green hills unfold in the distance. A moat snakes around the construction, its waters murky and deep. The drawbridge can't be spotted, so Arthur concludes it's up.

This means Merlin chose a castle as their refuge. In the distance he can see lonely undead figures shuffling brokenly round and round the moat. Few try the water and those that do get stuck in the mud, get swept under, or fruitlessly flail at the towers.

Arthur smiles, appreciating Merlin's thought processes. Comforted by the thought that they're temporarily safe, Arthur hurries back to Merlin. He lies there where Arthur left him. He's still sleeping, though he has rolled onto his side and made even more of a ball of himself. Sliding down next to him, Arthur shrugs off his jacket and drapes it over Merlin.

Arthur's fussing wakes Merlin though, who slowly blinks and smacks his lips together. When he sees the jacket and that Arthur's dressed again, he says, “Were you gone?”

“Yeah,” says Arthur, laying his head on his good arm. “I wanted to reconnoitre.”

Merlin huffs a laugh but nods all the same. “We're safe.”

“Yeah, I noticed,” Arthur says, a smile pulling at his lips. “A castle, Merlin?”

Merlin ducks his head into the crook of his own arm. “Yeah, it's called Bodiam.”

“How did you even come to think about it?”

Merlin shrugs and reddens. “Did I say I was studying history before? First year... I thought to myself if moats were enough to keep feudal armies at bay then it's enough for a few dumb zombies.”

Arthur can't help himself. He leans forward and kisses Merlin's mouth chastely in a soft brush.

Merlin blinks, shifts slightly, and brings his face closer in a clear invitation.

“I didn't know you were insatiable,” Arthur says before parting his lips over Merlin's, watching him sigh and close his eyes, a lost sound escaping from deep within his chest. Arthur pushes his tongue in Merlin's mouth and Merlin responds eager yet slow.

Arthur runs his hands down Merlin's face and shoulders, down his arms, loving the shift of muscle, the quickening of Merlin's breath. He presses into this kiss that strikes a chord deep within him, because doing this with Merlin feels right and perfect.

Their kiss is sexual but tender and right; in this moment Arthur doesn't want to pretend it's anything but. He doesn't remind himself that he should be thinking of something else, like survival or the ghosts that haunt him from his past. He doesn't want to. They both could have been dead but they have this moment to enjoy. It'd be a crime not to.

So Arthur touches his mouth to Merlin's neck, his fingers reaching down to hold Merlin's prick, pressing firmly.

Merlin hardens under his touch, and Arthur stiffens too, pressing his body into Merlin's, rolling him over so Merlin lands on his back with Arthur on top.

Breathing hard, Merlin flattens his palm against his chest. “You need to rest,” he says softly, nodding at Arthur's shoulder.

“No, no way,” Arthur says, yanking his shirt off. “It doesn't hurt.” It's not an untruth. Before Merlin reminded him of it, he had completely forgotten about his injury. “I want you.”

Merlin narrows his eyes. “Because you think we have no tomorrow.”

Arthur shuts him up by fitting their lips together. It works. “Because I want to have you, because you make me feel alive.” He shakes Merlin. “Because you're you.”

At that, something shifts in Merlin; a new light comes over his eyes. He places a hand on Arthur’s hip and yanks him closer by the neck, touching him all the while. Tension smooths itself out of Merlin, his body relaxing, as Arthur initiates another kiss.

Merlin's fingers move up his side in slow, deliberate, arousing circles. “Because I'm me?” he asks, lips swollen with Arthur's kisses.

Wearing a smile, Arthur roams his hands over Merlin's naked chest, lets himself look fondly at him. “Stop probing,” he says, “or I'll take that back.”

“You can't,” Merlin says. “You can't take it back.” But he doesn't press and doesn't ask why it is that Arthur thinks him a miracle of nature, pure and bright like some kind of primal magic, his haven in a wilderness of folly.

Arthur stretches under his touch, under the weight of Merlin's hand. He smiles, then he touches Merlin’s lips with his, parting them with his tongue. “Maybe I won' t then."

Merlin opens for him, welcoming Arthur's tongue in. He pulls Arthur closer, front to front, hooking his leg over Arthur's thigh, as if he needs the momentum this position gives him.

Arthur chuckles against Merlin's lips, pushes himself up on his arms, and looks at Merlin, at the play of shadows on his face. Merlin doesn't hide away from the clear scrutiny, rather he touches Arthur some more, reads his face with his fingers, as if he's learning everything there is to know about him this way. Massaging and kneading, he runs his hands up the back of Arthur's upper thighs.

Leaning down, Arthur sucks on Merlin's throat, pulling the skin into his mouth till it reddens under his puckering lips. As though overwhelmed, Merlin turns his head to the side. When he's got the skin properly worried, Arthur lifts his head. "Like this?" he asks, wondering whether he's giving Merlin what he needs, what he wants.

"Doing fine," Merlin says, hoarse. "Just fine." As he expresses his judgement of Arthur's teasing skills, he strokes Arthur's hips and back, tracing its lines. His hands mould themselves to the curve of Arthur's hip, tracing muscle, sinew and bone. Merlin's touch is so good, so tender, so sensual, Arthur trembles.

To still the shocks of his body, he dives back to Merlin's neck, sucking kisses, burrowing teeth and lips where his flesh is the palest, the most delicate. He cups and palms the flesh his lips arouse.

With a sigh Merlin closes his eyes, digs his fingers into Arthur's neck, the pressure increasing when Arthur does something right. Arthur, for his part, wants him so much he's shaking in his own skin, willing to go as slow or fast as Merlin wants.

Arthur moves his body downwards, nosing, tickling the skin with parted lips.

Merlin’s voice is quiet when he says, “I want to have you.”

Arthur's heart races at the question. “You do?” he says, and he knows it's not an answer, not to the roundabout question Merlin asked, but it's what he wants Merlin to consider. Irrespective of whether Arthur gets alive to the finish line, he needs Merlin to ask himself if he really wants him.

“Yep, most definitely,” Merlin says, hands coursing up Arthur's front.

Standing quickly, Arthur drops trousers, underwear and shoes. Out of wide open eyes Merlin watches him as Arthur stands there naked and continues doing so when Arthur gives himself a pull or two to full hardness.

Because catching Merlin's eyes while opening himself is too hard, he turns his head.

“Arthur,” Merlin says and when he does Arthur half-catches sight of him. When Merlin reaches out to him what he wants is so clear Arthur's lungs stop with it. “Okay, right,” he says, handing Merlin the lotion they used as lube a few hours before.

“Turn around,” Merlin asks him, hands on Arthur’s hips, urging him down and around, so Arthur's lying on his side. “Want to feel you inside,” he murmurs in his ear and fuck if that doesn't travel to Arthur's cock bullet fast.

Arthur grits his teeth to sound normal. “Have away at me.”

Slow, deliberate, intimate in ways he isn’t used to anymore, not since marriage, Merlin touches him, slowly, deep inside.

“I want to take my time,” Merlin says, pulling his body closer to Arthur's back, his cock a presence behind him as he moulds himself close to the arch of Arthur's buttocks. “I want to make you feel cherished, not like... not the way you do when you're on the road.”

Once Arthur would have objected that life on the road, harsh survival, is the only thing people like him have left. But Merlin's changed the score and not just because of the magic his body can do against the infection that ravaged mankind, but because of the positive person he is.

Merlin's thighs touching the back of his, his knees wedged against the crook of Arthur's, and his chest pressed along the length of Arthur's back, Merlin embraces him, holding him tight, fingers splayed across his pecs.

“You're so hot inside,” Merlin says, his lips and tongue tracing patterns behind Arthur’s ears. “I— love your body.”

Arthur sighs at the touch and at the shivers of Merlin's breath against his nape. Wanting the touch to spear him deep, Arthur pushes back. His own hand drifts on top of Merlin's as it moves across his chest and skims his lower belly.

Merlin lets his hand be moved where Arthur wants it, but when Arthur directs it to his cock Merlin evades, fanning his fingers across Arthur's abs. Squirming, he shifts behind him. “You'll have to give me my hand back,” he says with a voice choked with laughter. “I can't get my cock in you without my hand.”

Arthur should find this funny but can't. Even while Merlin laughs quietly at Arthur's futile attempts to get Merlin's hand on him, Arthur's cock hardens spectacularly. “Arthur,” Merlin whines. “Assistance, please.”

Arthur's smile stretches from ear to ear. “Just,” he pants. “Just get on with it, Merlin.”

The slap of flesh suggests that he's stroking himself, maybe stroking himself wet with lotion, before pushing into Arthur. The heft of Merlin's hot, heavy cock grazes the back of his thighs, causing Arthur to push a leg forward. “Come on,” Arthur grits out. Merlin's tongue laves the back of Arthur's neck, leaving wet trails that tickle and distract. “Merlin.”

“Arthur,” Merlin says, his cock nudging Arthur's soft skin, teasing, catching at the rim, without gaining entry. The position they're in, with Arthur on lying on his side, doesn't allow much leverage or ease for entrance at all. Merlin's cock is merely teasing. It's just a warm, slick, maddening presence, the promise of something Arthur wants and wants and wants. He groans low.

Merlin opens his lips at Arthur's neck even as Arthur feels the initial broaching pressure, blunt, but fulfilling, a thing of fire. As they adjust they don't make a sound, don't speak a word. They're just breathless. Slotting in, breaching through the muscle, Merlin rocks forward.

With his hand, Merlin pushes Arthur's leg further up and Arthur accommodates him, relishing the sensation of being filled, willing to do anything to make it possible, to reach completion.

“It’s...” Merlin says, evidently at a loss for words, “I— You're.” Whatever it is, whatever they are, Merlin doesn't say. It's just as good. Arthur doesn't think there's anything to say about what they're doing, what this is. Words would diminish it.

Not an inch of skin between them, Merlin takes hold of Arthur's hip. As Merlin goes all the way in, pressure mounting and mounting till it becomes the only thing that matters, the only one he wants, Arthur nearly stops breathing. He wants to feel it all, raw and physical. Merlin's slow pace makes Arthur's hands clench into fists. His back arches and he doesn't care how it must look, he wants it.

For the first time in years he's not in control. Rather he's pinned down by Merlin's weight as it's plastered onto his back, rendering him unable to push back they way he otherwise might. It's fine like this though. Mind threatening to go completely blank, Arthur can only feel and register every little thing about his body, about Merlin's.

Merlin's breathing hard, for example. As for himself, he can feel more of Merlin's prick enter him, till he's buried in to the hilt. Arthur breathes through his nose.

“Arthur?”

“I’m alright,” Arthur says, voice going rough.

“I don’t think I am,” Merlin whispers. “I think it's too much.”

“It's all right if you want to come,” Arthur tells him, only to give a gasp the moment Merlin's hand finds his cock, his grip hard, giving way to a squeeze that makes Arthur thrust. A moment later Merlin changes it up, turns to stroking him softly, the rhythm slow and deliberate as his movements are, his hips rolling with lazy wave-like surges. Merlin's good at this.

To see him is to think of him as a good natured young man who's still got something of the boy about him. Before this Arthur didn't think Merlin'd make love the way he does, like a man, not a boy, with full commitment to the other person, his body trembling but giving and giving. Arthur's heart cracks into jagged little pieces.

Merlin goes slow and tender, taking his time, sending Arthur into a space of mind he hadn't been in for a long time. “Not like that,” Merlin says, his slow thrusts merely small, smooth advances when Arthur nearly forces his pace. “I don't want this to be fast. Over. At all. In any way.”

“Mmm,” Arthur grunts.

Voice low and husky, Merlin says, “Stay here, to recover. Let me go on alone.”

“No, no way,” Arthur says just as a wave of white pleasure obscures everything, even his power to form words. “No.”

“Because,” Merlin says, groaning low in his ears, “I've got more of a chance than you and... if you die, I don't know why I would be doing any of this.”

Even though but a while ago he would have said the contrary, that the well being of the multitude doesn't trump that of the individual, he finds himself telling Merlin, “You're doing this for humanity, not me.”

“But I love you,” Merlin says.

“Fuck,” Arthur breathes. It's not as if he can't tell that Merlin does feel for him. If he focuses on Merlin's motions, on the pattern of his breaths, then he can. Arthur can feel Merlin cradling him, can feel the pulse of him inside him, the warmth of him along his back. All these little clues are telling, and fuck it, Arthur can bloody well see that Merlin's not lying. “You c-can't tell me that and expect me to stay here and watch you go.”

“I need you to live,” Merlin says brokenly, the sound slipping out of him as he moves into him, slow, lighting fires along Arthur's back. “If you don't, it doesn't make sense. Nothing does.”

Because of the sex, Arthur feels as though he's floating in space. It's hard to make sense of anything that isn't Merlin's body. But his words do need attention. “I'm getting you there. I'm getting you there, and there's no way I'm— I'm staying behind. Get that in that — in that thick head of yours.”

“Arthur—”

Arthur shifts his hips, modifying the angle, forcing Merlin to go faster. Deep-throated need envelops Arthur and then there's really nothing more he can say, no more declarations he can spit out, but for a vow he makes then and there to protect Merlin with his life.

He's still not able to vocalise it because it's even better than before.

Seeking relief, Arthur pushes into Merlin's hand; slams back onto his prick, wishing there was a physical way that would allow him to spread further, to get Merlin deeper, so he can never forget him.

Their pace mounts as they move close together. “Come on,” Arthur grits out, reaching behind him to spur Merlin on, grabbing his flank.

Merlin gets him and his tempo gets brutal. Arthur forces himself to breathe through it but all he can do is take the burn that shakes his nerve endings and makes everything around him look like it's softer at the edges.

“Merlin,” Arthur says, pressing his forehead against his arm, eyes slitting against the constant pressure that builds and builds and threatens to liquefy him from the inside out. His breathing gets ragged, but he almost can't hear the straining of it for the pounding of his heart.

His head is swimming, all thoughts bleeding into need, need that Merlin satisfies as he strokes him faster, harder, still tender, but with much more friction. “Arthur,” Merlin says, and Arthur's there, mumbling little breathless exclamations, the repetition of the same few words, Merlin's name among them. Like it's easy, as if he hasn't been trying to get where he is for a while now, he topples over, coming without warning, his climax drawing out with abrupt force.

It's intense, all encompassing; it's as if something is being torn from his groin and being replaced with a sense of Merlin. His orgasm never seeming to stop, rippling through him in continuous waves, he shakes, feeling and needing to feel.

Arthur guesses Merlin comes when his grip tightens and he gets breathless, deep sounds coming out of his throat like a rasp. Arthur feels Merlin's body clench, and Merlin's come inside. The feeling, how wet it is, how hot, makes him feel vulnerable, at Merlin's mercy, bared to the point of no return. The sensation lasts briefly and just vanishes when he realises that the actual physical proof of their coming together is of no more importance than what Arthur promised Merlin.

Sweat still burning his forehead, Arthur breathes out, trying to normalise his intake of oxygen. Behind him, Merlin shifts, evidently intending to pull out, his cock already softening in a way Arthur can feel. “Don’t move,” Arthur says, reaching back to palm Merlin's upper thigh to hook him in place, stop him from withdrawing. “I want to feel your weight. It's good.”

Merlin's arms hold Arthur tight, tighter than before, crushing Arthur to him. “I'm not going anywhere.” Merlin gives a tiny little snort. “If I could I'd stay in this castle forever, forget about the rest of the world, and the zombies and the apocalypse.”

“But we can't.”

“I thought you were the one who wanted out,” Merlin says, his breath moving the hair at the nape of Arthur's neck. “I thought you were bailing when we met.”

Arthur pets the hand Merlin has splayed on his belly. “Things have changed.”

Merlin's breathing slows in his ears. “Not really. There's still zombies all around. You could still die if you step out of here. The same goes for me. I don't see the difference.”

His breathing slowing to a normal pace, Arthur locks their fingers together. “There is a difference. You are the difference. You can save a whole lot of people.”

“But that's only a possibility,” Merlin says, slipping out of him and kissing the back of his shoulder. “One that was there before.”

Pent up tension bleeding out of him, Arthur kisses Merlin's knuckles one by one. “We're going to go do this thing, together, and hope that it works. If I changed my mind about this mission of yours, it's for a good reason.”

Merlin's lips move against his shoulder. “Okay, all right. This means that I will have to coddle you into better health so that we can get to Scotland safely.”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, shoulders rising with renewed tension. “Every day we linger someone new dies.”

“Yeah,” Merlin says, voice sad but determined somehow. “I know. Do you think I don't miss Will and the rest of my family? Those who went before? Don't you think that I would wish for others out there who've still got someone not to lose their loved ones?”

Arthur doesn't answer that; it sounds like a rhetorical question couched as a question.

Merlin goes on, “I'm not losing you, though. So If I'm going to be responsible for more deaths, even assuming I can stop this, then so be it.”

Arthur turns. He needs to look Merlin in the face for this. There's a fire in his eyes, now that Arthur looks, that belies his post coital slump. His teeth are sunk in his lower lip and his brow is all furrowed, so much so Arthur runs his thumb against the lines in a futile attempt to smooth them out. “Merlin,” Arthur says, with a smile. “Merlin.”

“What?” Merlin frowns.

Arthur chuckles and wraps an arm around Merlin, wishing they had a blanket to burrow under. “Nothing, just go to sleep. It's still late.”

For a moment there, it seems like Merlin will object, but then he lowers his head on his arms, shifts his body and closes his eyes. “Happy?” he asks.

“Happy,” Arthur says.

It's only when Arthur's fingers find the tip of Merlin's ear to gently trace that Merlin's body truly relaxes, suggesting he's dozed off. When Merlin's far gone, Arthur places a kiss to the top of Merlin's head. “Sleep, you brave, lovely fool.”

*****

The next morning Arthur wakes feeling sweaty and hot to the touch; his cheeks most definitely feel like coals. He's alone, Merlin's jacket draped on top of him, the draughty corridor looking empty and dismal now that he's by himself.

He deduces he has a fever because he emanates heat. He also assumes that they've somehow — or rather that Merlin unilaterally has — decided to take a break from the road, whitout continuing the debate from the night before. If that hadn't been the case Arthur would have been woken before this. But Merlin's absence rubs him the wrong way, especially after an hour has passed and Merlin hasn't turned up.

“That's it,” he says, picking himself up. When a dizzy spell comes over him he leans against the wall, the stone cool under his palm. Once he's suppressed the nausea and fought into clothes — his shoulder being worse off than the day before, red and swollen around the bullet entry point — he's ready to go looking for Merlin.

He makes it all the way down the corridor, albeit with his legs feeling less than supportive, when a thunderous footfall alerts him to a new arrival. Arthur gets his pistol out only to lower it when he sees Merlin.

“You're up,” Merlin says, his smile falling. “You shouldn't be up. You should have a lie down and recover.”

“You went,” Arthur says, gesticulating with the gun even though he knows he oughtn't. “It isn't safe out of the castle. I watched out the arrow slits: there's zombies around.”

Merlin sticks his jaw out. “You needed food and some medicine. I went out on a foraging expedition.”

“Foraging expedition?” Arthur repeats though there's no need to; they're both clear on the issue of what it was Merlin was doing. “Alone? And you left me the only weapon we have? Merlin, that's...”

Merlin takes to picking stuff out of his rucksack to show him. “There's berries and roots and I found a stream so at least we have water.”

“That could have waited till I woke, couldn't it?” Arthur points out, securing his gun.

“Can you tell me how you're going to recover if you're not properly fed!” Merlin snaps, dropping the rucksack and waving his hands over his head. “I had to go!”

“Not alone,” Arthur says, stepping over and grabbing Merlin by the arms. “That's too dangerous for words.”

“I'm not an idiot,” Merlin says, slow and angry. “I've survived this long because I'm not stupid.”

“We've already discussed it,” Arthur says, blood rushing to his temples and making him feel dizzy. “It's a matter of time and chance; it's—” A hand going to his brow to stem the wooziness, Arthur wobbles.

Merlin's fury dissipates and his arms go round Arthur, holding him up. “That's why I went alone. You're great on the road, top notch shooter, great fighter, but you're not a robot. You couldn't have possibly gone out today.”

Arthur wants to argue the point. He has a mind to tell Merlin that the same goes for him. But momentarily all he wants is to lie down. Merlin appears to sense it too, for he walks him backwards and sits him down where he has wall at his back to prop him up. Then Merlin slides down by his side, his arm going round Arthur's shoulder, all the fight and prickliness from before entirely gone from his attitude.

“Before the infection, I wasn't any of that,” Arthur tells him, closing his eyes against the light. “I led a sedentary life.”

“I suppose most of us weren't used to these Far West shoot outs before,” Merlin says, leaning his forehead against the side of Arthur's. “What counts is that you've become good at surviving.”

Arthur chuckles softly, opening and closing his fist. “Mithian would laugh at hearing you say that.”

Merlin shifts back, eyes asking questions even though his lips aren't.

“My wife,” Arthur says, hand brushing over his finger ring. “She was the tough one. In the military and in the only special forces regiment that accepted women.”

“Oh,” Merlin says, gathering his knees up and circling his arms round them. “Your wife.”

“Yeah,” Arthur says, needing Merlin to know. “She was the one you'd have expected to survive. I worked for The Telegraph. Wrote art reviews. She had the training.”

“I'm sorry you lost her,” Merlin says, putting his chin on his knees, drumming a rhythm by tapping his thumbs on the top of his boot. “I can't begin to imagine. I—”

“And that's why you need to watch out, Merlin,” Arthur says, stopping his hand. “Because out there everything is dangerous. One false move, one misstep, and you're dead.” Arthur swallows against the bad taste in his mouth. “I don't want that to happen.”

“Yeah,” Merlin says, looking away and into the shadows of the draughty corridor. “I know. I owe it to the world to at least give Edinburgh a try.”

Arthur grabs Merlin by the neck, pulling him in against him and ruffling his hair. “It's not because of Edinburgh, you idiot.”

Merlin's smile blooms like nature in May. “No?”

“No.”

With Arthur recovering, the next three days they lie low in the castle. Merlin looks after him with a care that has something of the maternal about it, checking his bandages, redoing them, preparing concoctions with ingredients he's hunted down himself.

When asked, he says he had an uncle, Taliesin, who was a pharmacist that taught him a lot of things. Arthur should be more wary of Merlin's preparations, after all how much can he have learnt by hearsay, but he swallows everything Merlin gives him, settling down on a thin blanket they found in the old administration offices.

His sleep is fitful, because he still has a fever and the shoulder makes him feel uncomfortable. So when he's not sleeping he turns to Merlin, kisses him and touches him, till they're too far gone to stop or be careful anymore, a kind of need taking over, like a subliminal voice in their heads that says, 'Take this now that you can'.

They have sex. Sometimes they go hard and fast, especially after they've heard the shouts of animals attacked by ghouls. At other times they go at it slowly. After they finish, they start again and again, as if they are new at this, at finding out what a body can do to another.

They end up on their blanket with either one of them on top, teasing each other mercilessly. They make it last for what seems like forever. One memorable time they draw it out until they can hardly stand it and climax is inevitable and a little bit painful.

There's little else they can do. Little in the way of pastimes. Merlin feeling better than Arthur does, he has more freedom to roam the place. He finds a library, grabs a few books and reads them out to Arthur. It's mostly medieval fare written by monks, and particularly boring. Merlin also goes hunting for more supplies. Arthur tells him again and again that he wants to come with, but Merlin resists, saying that he can look after himself and that they will be on the move much more quickly if Arthur doesn't strain himself.

And so it is. It's been days, but Arthur's stronger, the fever's gone, and he can definitely stand travel. They have no more excuses to stay cooped up where it's safe. They have a mission to accomplish.

“So,” Merlin says, eyeing the lever that will lower the drawbridge. “It's time.”

“It is,” Arthur says. “Let's go save the world.”

****

They're a few days away from their destination, trekking along the A1, branches serving as their walking sticks, when Merlin stops and says, “I need to drink.”

They've been going without water for hours and what is easily borne when well rested and under no duress becomes unbearable after a long taxing journey like theirs.

“I know,” Arthur says, his own tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth. “We need water.” He scans the area, but as far as the eye can see there's only longer stretches of abandoned motorway, and heather strewn hills. Of water there's no sign though a look to the map they filched at an abandoned petrol station tells him that they're not too far from Durham.

Merlin must have studied the same map as he has because he says, “Let's go into the city. We'll find water.”

“No,” Arthur says, grinding his teeth. “It's too dangerous.”

“Arthur, we passed the Trent a while ago and there's no more rivers till we get to Durham,” Merlin says, not wholly unreasonably. “The thirst is doing me in, truly, Arthur.”

Arthur considers their options. The closer they get to any city; the closer they are to danger. On the other hand, they can't sustain their pace on no water and the little food they've found on the way. During their trek, Merlin's lost weight and he looks less and less like himself. As for Arthur, he's under no illusions. He's weakening too. If they run into ghouls while they're like this, they won't put up much of a fight.

“Okay,” Arthur concedes, looking at the road ahead with a mixture of anxiety and downright dread. “We're in and out though.”

“Fine,” says Merlin, smiling a little. “It's not as if I'm looking forward to meeting an assembly of ghouls.”

Durham turns out to be something of a ghost town. The spires of the cathedral visible from afar look like sickly arms reaching for the sky. “It looks like it must have after the black death,” says Merlin, taking in the bare trees, the silent empty roads, and the dilapidation of buildings that haven't been occupied in a long, long while.

Their footsteps echo as they move down the road, the sound amplified a thousand times. Puddles shake as they run past. Rats and stray cats venture forth at the noise, their noses picking out from behind old rubbish containers at blind alley mouths.

Without getting deep into the city, they locate a dusty old pub whose entrance is covered in cobwebs. “It seems quiet,” Merlin says, putting a hand on the handle. “I say we try it. We can be in and out in a few minutes.”

Arthur nods but takes his gun out first. “Okay, but at the first sign of it being infested we run.”

“Don't worry, I don't want to end my days in a run-down pub.” Merlin opens the door slowly, beaming his torch at its interior. It doesn't shed much light but it's enough to show them part of the locale.

This pub looks like many other similar venues, or the way such places used to look before destruction came. There's a long wooden counter behind which the bar shelves spread. Bottles covered in thick layers of fleecy dust still stand on top of them. Table and chairs dot the floor.

“It looks like a bad Western,” Merlin says, stalking across to the counter. “There's lots of beers here.” He inspects the back of the bar.

“Leave them,” says Arthur. “They won't hydrate you and you don't want to fight with alcohol in your system.”

Merlin puts the bottles back down. “I didn't really mean to take them with me. It's that it's still strange, you know, thinking that you can walk away with all this stuff and nobody to shout the house down on you.”

The floorboards creak as Arthur moves to the kitchen. It's as dark and dank as any place Arthur's been in lately but even though the area is disgusting and the fridge is not working, there's plenty of water bottles in there. None of them has expired either.

Arthur drops the bottles in the sack he brought along for this purpose and closes it by tying up its strings. He must refrain from loading it till it's too heavy. For as much as he wants to have provisions with him that would last until they reach Edinburgh, he doesn't want to weigh himself down too much.

Speed, he's learnt, is essential when you're on the run.

“I filled my sack,” Merlin yells from the bar. “I think we're done.”

“Drop a few,” Arthur shouts back. “We don't need ballast.”

“Okay,” Merlin says, though you can tell by his tone that he's less than happy with the concept of giving up their water. “Let's get going.”

His rucksack back on his shoulder, Arthur joins Merlin on the bar floor. Together they make it to the pub door when horrid, mutilated faces poke their noses at the glass. “Yikes.” Merlin jumps back, doing the exact opposite of what he should, which would be rushing to the door to keep it closed. “It's... there's lots of them.”

Arthur hasn't exactly bothered to count. He darts backwards, making for the kitchens. He opens doors at random, finding a rat infested cupboard, access stairs to the cellar, and a broom cupboard in that order. He grabs one of the brooms and makes a run back towards the main floor.

He finds Merlin leaning against the door, both arms braced against it. Through the windows he can see hands batting at the glass, dark and gnarled and curved over. He rams the broom into the lock and makes a bolt of it. “It won't last long,” he says.

Merlin nods, eyes fastened on the hands grappling the door. “What do we do?”

“We have two solutions,” Arthur says, listing his ideas in the order they've come. “We hide in the cellar.”

“How long for?”

Merlin's hit the nail on the head. If they barricade themselves in there they might survive for a few days and then they'd make this place their tomb. “I don't know, depends on how obstinate they are.”

“And if they don't let go?”

Arthur doesn't answer that one; Merlin can surely imagine what would happen in that case. “Or we can make a dash for the back entrance and hope these ghouls are so stupid they don't notice we're hightailing it from there.”

“What if there's fresh ones?”

Arthur doesn't know what to say to that either. He's not looking forward to dying in a dilapidated old pub. If he has to, he'd rather it be in the open. “Come on, we come to that when...”

“We come to that,” Merlin finishes for him.

Before opening the back door, Arthur assures himself there's no ghouls hanging around it. It's not as though he can tell how many creatures are crawling around the area, because the back door opens onto an alley and any view of the street is impeded from there. At least he's got the certainty they won't be attacked the moment they stick their noses out.

For the time being, the coast seems clear, the alley looking as deserted as the streets of Durham seemed to be when they first trod them. He slips out first, Merlin clamouring to come after. When he establishes they're safe enough, he drags Merlin out.

They take the alley at a jog and stop there. There's a tiny metal gate closing it, but it's not locked, Arthur can see that. They make a rush for it. At least they're not walled in.

Out of the blue, ghouls appear, hands tightening around the gates' bars. When Arthur veers too close to see if he can get a shot in, hands tighten round his ankles, scrape their nails over his skin.

“Fine thing they haven't figured out the gate isn't closed,” Merlin says, approaching it to shut it.

“Merlin, no,” Arthur yells. “They'll bite.”

“So what?” Merlin says with fire in his eyes, in his voice, in his body language. Arthur's never seen him more determined. Even as he's trying to latch the gate closed, ghouls jerk at Merlin's flesh, digging their fingers in. Merlin's quick to secure the gate but he bleeds too.

Arthur can't shoot; not without getting Merlin first. He has no clear shot at all; all he can see is Merlin and a sea of flailing limbs. They make smacking noises with their lips as though they're about to get dinner. His stomach heaving, Arthur shouts, “For god's sake, duck, Merlin!”

But the ghouls have a grip on him, blood around their mouths. “Christ, Merlin!”

Arthur is busy trying to find the opening for a shot when a bike guns down the street and hits the group of ghouls. It ploughs down two before the front tyre flips up in the air, engine combusting. The ghouls surge and swarm towards it, giving Merlin an out to fall back.

He's cradling his arm.

At the same time, a loud noise whips Arthur's ears. It takes him a few seconds to catch up and see that there's been an explosion. A grenade was detonated.

Whipping around to find the person who's thrown the grenade, Arthur's sight latches on two people. One is a lad of about eighteen or thereabouts on a bike he's using to divert the ghoul's attention away from them. Taking a sword swipe at the arms that reach upwards to get him, he dances his bike on top of a wall. Unable to pull him down, the ghouls hiss and groan, baring decaying teeth and black holes for mouths.

Arthur shoots, downing two ghouls, and hauls Merlin in by the neck just as the gate gives. Arthur is squeezing off rounds when a guy, all dark mane of hair and handsome face, pulls the fuse-wire of a grenade and throws it in the midst of the zombie gathering.

“Down, get down!” he shouts at Arthur and Merlin. Despite him being slightly taller, Arthur splays a hand on Merlin's head and yanks him down, making sure to land on top of him to shield him from the debris and limbs shower that follows. Merlin fights him, tries to wiggle out from under him but before he's quite managed the rain of projectiles stops.

When Arthur looks up, a swathe has been cut among the ghouls, and a path has been cleared for them to run. Arthur stands, helping Merlin up. Merlin's barely started wiping his knees, and glaring at Arthur, when the grenade thrower places a hand on his shoulder. “Are you alright?” he asks, when he catches sight of the new bite on Merlin's arm.

His eyes go wide with fear and pity, his hand finds the back pocket of his jeans where Arthur's sure he's got a weapon stashed.

Arthur is quick to say, “He's immune.”

“No, that can't be,” the man says, his mouth flapping.

Merlin looks between the two of them with great alarm and Arthur can't say he wouldn't be doing the same if it were him. If the grenade thrower believes them, then he could be thinking of getting his paws on Merlin and trading him to whichever person bids on him for a cure. If he doesn't, he might randomly shoot.

“Is that true?” the grenade thrower asks, raking his eyes over Merlin, looking as though he wants to check his mouth for signs of health as though Merlin were a horse. “How is that even possible?”

“We'll show you the old bite,” Arthur says, hoping this seems like a rational explanation for something none of them is fit to explain. “It's clearly months old. He's a survivor.”

The grenade thrower doesn't take his eyes off Merlin as though Merlin could either be his salvation or his undoing. “Right,” he says, looking over his shoulder, probably for the lad he came with. “This is probably a bad idea, but I believe you. You can come with Daegal and me, but cover that bite up. You don't want to incite a panic.”

Arthur tears a strip of his shirt and despite Merlin's protestations binds the wound. “So you're not on your own?” Arthur asks, needing to gauge the potential threat the man poses.

“God no,” the grenade thrower says, checking over his shoulder for the few remaining ghouls that are still cowering behind. “I would never have survived on my own.”

Arthur is sure that the man is about to explain what sort of group he's with and who he is, but the lad from the bike comes trotting back, swinging a bat as he goes, cracking ghouls' skulls.

At that the grenade thrower says, “Come on, I'll take you back to the DU.”

For lack of anything better to do, given that the town is more infested than they thought, they follow the grenade thrower and the bike lad.

*****

As it turns out, the grenade thrower is actually called Gwaine and Bike Lad's name is Daegal. They're both part of a group they familiarly call the DU or Durham Underground.

“It's a bit of a joke,” Gwaine says, crossing a road and opening a manhole. “Because we live underground and we fight the zombies—”

“See, Arthur,” Merlin says by way of random commentary, though Arthur suspects there's something wrong with him he's trying to cover by way of humour. “Someone else calls them zombies too.”

“Ah, yeah, a man after my own heart,” Gwaine says, lips wavering into a grin.

They climb down into a gutter that opens into the sewers under the street. Needless to say it smells rancid. On top of that the air is both stale and damp, so damp it enters your bones. They are calf deep in water and their eyes — Arthur's, at least, do — have a hard time adjusting to the darkness.

Even though Gwaine and Daegal have torches, it doesn't help much in that they just shed light over a limited radius.

If that wasn't bad enough, a rush of water comes down the sewer and traps the door shut. “Don't worry,” says Daegal leading the way. “It does that every day at around five. It's normal.”

Arthur doesn't vent his feelings, doesn't express panic at the idea of being shut underground with tons of stone and mortar on top of his head and between him and fresh air. He makes himself focus on the important stuff instead. “And you're sure there's no ghouls down here?”

“From time to time one wanders by,” Gwaine says, throwing light across the tunnels. “But we flush them out.”

“Yeah,” Daegal agrees. “Most of them haven't figured out how to get down the ladders.”

Arthur's mouth thins. He catches Merlin's eyes. He's wearing the same expression Arthur is, but he doesn't say anything as Arthur thought he would. Rather he hugs himself tight, holding his mouth shut and his jaw closed. It's only after he takes in this last feature that Arthur truly guesses. The bite. Merlin's fighting off the infection.

As subtly as he can, he takes to walking at Merlin's side, brushing their hands. Even his knuckles burn. Shit. Arthur shouldn't have allowed Merlin to try and close the gate. This could cost them.

“... quite stupid,” Gwaine finishes for his friend. “It's not as if eating cerebral matter's made them more clever.”

After a long tramp in stinky puddles, they make it to an opening leading to a wide chamber. It's bricked all around and has a vaulted ceiling. It's drier in here. It's perhaps for this reason that twenty to thirty people are barricaded around this very spot.

“Gentlemen,” Gwaine says, “let me introduce you to the Underground. Underground, these are Merlin and Arthur. They, um...”

As Merlin shivers and makes himself less conspicuous, Arthur answers. “We're just passing. On our way north.”

“What for?” a buff guy with a clearly Scottish accent says. “There's nothing left there.”

Arthur shrugs his shoulder, his eyes resting furtively on Gwaine before landing back on the Scot. “Is there any place left that can truly offer shelter?”

Silence greets his question.

“So we'll have to feed them too,” someone puts in after the silence has strained long enough.

“It's not as if we didn't lose three,” Gwaine says.

Arthur would very much like to know how on earth they did if they think this place is safe, but he's got other things to think about, namely Merlin. Because Merlin is now visibly shaking and he's standing with his knees slightly bent. It looks as though a breeze could easily pitch him forward.

Arthur puts an arm around his middle, squeezing his hip. Outwardly, this must look like affection. Truth is that while it partly is, the real reason Arthur is keeping so close to Merlin is because he's supporting him. Without him, he's not certain Merlin would be able to stand. Once he has Merlin steady he can worry about placating the group. He says, “We'll be gone tomorrow.”

“You're joking, right?” says Gwaine, waggling his eyebrows at Merlin. “You must stay longer.”

While hitting the road with Merlin in this condition isn't something Arthur is looking forward to, he is even less willing to explain what ails Merlin or to be questioned by others. Besides, he doesn't trust any member of this crowd, not even the brown haired girl who says, “Surely we can spare the food for a few days.”

“No, we can't, Sefa,” the burly man from before says. “This is survival.”

“But what kind of survival it is if we lose all humanity?” Sefa asks, standing up to the burly man even though she barely reaches his shoulder. “Just tell me that.”

“Sefa is right,” a second man says. “We should nourish the soul, the spirit, as well as the body.”

The burly man objects to that, “Lancelot, you're only backing her because she's your wife, but that's not sound.”

“Come on,” Gwaine pitches in, “I say we put their staying to the vote.”

Though Arthur wants to remove himself from this situation and look after Merlin, their presence is put to the vote. Gwaine's group's response is that they can stay, though for no more than a week. After that, any other additional day will be put to the vote.

Since Arthur doesn't mean to stay, he's fine with that. Merlin is hugging himself to stop shivering, Arthur leads him to a silent to a secluded corner and Merlin slides down against the wall, jaw set, face pallid. He's silent and wan, lifeless even. The dark smears under his eyes make him look like death.

Arthur hunkers down next to him. His eyes stay on the members of the Underground while his words are addressed to Merlin. “Is this what happened the last time?”

“Yeah,” Merlin says, blood seeping through his sleeve. “Just like it.”

“Is it going to get worse?” Arthur asks though he doesn't think he truly needs to. Merlin looks bad. He looks thoroughly sick with pain, lines in his forehead and pouches under his eyes. He sits there staring with no expression on his face bar one of utter rigid control.

“Yes,” Merlin says, his voice rocky but not feeble. “Some.”

Arthur doesn't believe Merlin's being totally honest with him. “Specify.”

“Last time I was a bit delirious,” says Merlin, like someone who has a hard time coming up with unimpeded speech. “And my temperature ran higher too.”

“You mustn't let anyone understand.”

Merlin nods, his face drawn tight with the need to contain the pain he certainly must be feeling. “I know. I remember what...” Merlin licks dry, chapped lips. “... what they were trying to do to me when they learnt I was, you know.”

“Right,” Arthur says, knocking his foot against Merlin in a cheering gesture. “It's the same here. We can't trust them not to kill you.” Arthur lowers his voice when he says that, taking care to barely enounce the words. “I'll get you out of here by morning but we must stay the night. Nights are too dangerous.”

“Okay,” Merlin says, easing down on the floor, turning on his side with his knees up and his hands joined. “I'll pretend I'm sleeping then.”

“Yeah,” Arthur says, a hand going to Merlin's skull, fingers threading through his hair in a soft, hopefully calming motion. There's not much else he can do lest he advertise Merlin's condition, but this gesture he allows himself. “Maybe that's for the best.”

“Mm.” Merlin closes his eyes but his facial muscles don't relax, cheeks twitching, forehead puckering every time a spasm travels through him. “I'll pretend.”

“I'll be here for real though,” Arthur says, fighting the urge to tend Merlin the way he wants to, the way that would out them. “I'll be here for you.”

“I know,” Merlin says. “And I don't regret it. Not even if I turn,” Merlin whispers. “I'd die to protect you.”

Arthur's heart expands and contracts with a rush of blood that nearly splits it in two, as if it were trying to burst from his body with the momentum Merlin's words give it. He doesn't say anything, finds that he can't quite. And it's not as if there is much that he can say. Unlike most people, Merlin wears his heart on his sleeve. And unlike most who'd use words such as his to manipulate, Merlin is devastatingly honest about them in a way that scares Arthur.

Merlin should learn to put himself first. But he hasn't, and in this circumstance he's suffering for it.

That he's suffering becomes ever more clear as time passes.

Merlin lies shivering on his side, his body seizing from time to time. If you weren't close to him you probably couldn't tell, but Arthur senses it when his body locks, when he whimpers and strains. He wants to do something, anything, to help Merlin, but any action would draw attention to the situation. So all he does is shift closer, making sure Merlin can feel his presence, his touches.

It gets bad when Merlin loses it, when, eyes open but unseeing, he talks gibberish, his legs jerking, his body coiling. He makes soft strangled noises that are clear indicators of how much he's suffering. The noises get much more audible and snag some attention. Arthur can see suspicious looks sent their way; people scrambling to sit as far as possible from Merlin.

It's the dead of night and Merlin's at his worst yet, sobbing and sighing, when Gwaine comes to them, bearing a thick blanket. “Here,” he says, covering Merlin with it but rather searching Arthur's gaze. “I thought it could help with his cold.”

“Thank you,” says Arthur, helping Gwaine settle the blanket over Merlin. “We slept in a draughty castle just recently.”

“Ah, yes, castles,” Gwaine says, making sure Merlin's arm — the one bearing the bite — goes firmly under the blanket. “They do that to you.”

“Yeah.” Arthur nods his head Gwaine's way. “Again, thank you.”

It's when Merlin convulses, writhing and twisting under his blanket, that Merlin's condition gets thoroughly noticed.

The burly man from before says, “That's not a cold and not a fever.”

“He could be epileptic, Halig,” Gwaine says, but the burly man — Halig apparently — is having none of it. He rises to his feet and comes over to check on Merlin.

Arthur cradles Merlin before the man can get to him but one close up look evidently tells Halig all he needs to know. He makes to yank Merlin's blanket, saying, “Let me have a look at him.”

“Stay away,” Arthur says, hand going to his holster. He realises he'll be antagonising the whole group if he threatens or kills Halig but he won't let them touch Merlin. He won't let what happened to Mithian happen to him. He couldn't help it five years ago; he will this time. “Or there'll be consequences.”

“He was bitten, wasn't he?” Halig says, squinting maliciously. “I know the signs.”

“He wasn't,” Arthur insists, this time he makes a show of going for his gun, not caring what kind of volatile situation he's going to create. “He's fine, now bugger off.”

“He isn't fine,” Halig growls and makes a jump for Merlin, gun firmly in his hand and ready to fire.

Arthur can think of nothing better than throwing himself on top of Merlin, blanketing him with his body, hoping that Halig won't fire with an 'innocent' in between.

Merlin's so out of it he doesn't know what is going on; his eyes look uncomprehendingly on, the iris having turned gold. Arthur braces himself for the bullet Halig may fire after all when Gwaine bursts out with words that seem to have been punched out of his lungs. “He's immune! You can't kill him!”

“Wait, stay,” says Lancelot, from somewhere behind. “What d'you mean?”

“I mean that he survived a bite,” Gwaine says, voice less assured than before. “He's important. We can't kill him.”

“I say we put this to the vote,” Sefa suggests.

Thinking that maybe these people are willing to listen, to be merciful, Arthur shifts from on top of Merlin.

“I say we kill him,” Halig says curtly. “So he won't turn and kill us in our sleep.”

“I say we let him live but monitor him closely,” says Lancelot, “if what Gwaine's says is true then he'll get better.”

Sefa pinches her lips together; her hand goes to her belly. “As much as it pains me to say it, I agree with Halig.” She tilts her head at her husband. “Nobody has ever survived a bite without becoming a horrid monster and rationally we have to think of the Underground first. Curtail the losses to survive.”

It's when Sefa speaks that Arthur realises he may still have to gun his way out of here. Before, when she thought it was about offering them shelter, she'd been the most open to welcoming them. If she isn't now, then the situation's spiralling out of his control. “You'll have to kill me too,” Arthur says, his face setting into an immoveable mask. “That's the choice I'm giving you about this.”

Halig smiles, “Not a problem.” He points his gun at Arthur. “I don't like you anyway.”

“Halig,” Sefa chides him. “He's not infected. You can't kill a healthy man.”

“I can if he puts us in danger,” Halig tells Sefa, his eyes slitted into such small pinpricks Halig looks like a blind pig. “It was you who said it was okay to kill to protect the group.”

“Hey,” Daegal says, “I'm not comfortable with killing someone who's fine. The other one is up to you, but a healthy man, that's a no.”

“Wait, wait,” says Lancelot, his expression serious, his tone brimming with compassion, “we need to think. I want to protect Sefa and all of you but we mustn't be rash.”

Gwaine jumps into the fray. “I have a solution,” he says, both hands held up. “Nobody's ever turned in under two days, right?”

Lancelot and Sefa look to each other and nod their heads. Halig snorts, mumbling something about putting down the rabid man.

“Well,” Gwaine says with an unhappy twist of his mouth, “let's not compare the two, especially not when there's a way for all of us to get out of it.”

“What's your plan?” Sefa enquires and Arthur detects a note of hope in her voice. “Is there a way to protect the Underground while we let Merlin live?”

“As harsh as it might sound considering it's dark outside, yeah,” says Gwaine, trying to meet Arthur's eyes. “I say we leave them where we found them. Like that, Merlin's death, if it comes, is not on us. They're where they were before.” He scratches at his mane of hair. “With a few disadvantages, but hell, he'll be alive.”

“Yes,” says Sefa, inching towards Gwaine. “That's exactly what we should do.”

“I still say we kill him,” Halig says, but this time he's overruled by Daegal, Sefa and Lancelot as well as by ten others Arthur doesn't know the name of.

Merlin's execution is stayed.

Later, when the decision has been taken and Halig is no longer aggressively waving his gun about, Sefa comes to him with blankets and some food. “This is the best I can do,” she says, passing him the items.

“Thank you,” says Arthur, his eyes not reaching for hers.

“I want you to know that I hope and believe you're right and that he isn't going to turn,” she says, worrying her lower lip. “But I'm... let's be honest, in this world you've got to learn to look out for yourself.”

Arthur accepts the gift. “True.”

“And I'm going to be a mother soon,” she says, inadvertently, perhaps, stroking her belly. “I owe my baby a chance. If that's made me less than kind...”

“You're not sorry.”

“No.” Sefa sighs. “I'm not.” She bites her lip and plays with a loose lock, her eyes cast down. “I would have been different before, when there was room to be soft. But I can't be that fragile anymore.”

Arthur nods. He was feeling exactly the way she is now but a couple of weeks ago. “I get that.”

“For what it's worth,” she says, her tone vibrating with hope and conviction, “I hope that he's really immune and that he can save us all so I'll have all the time in the world to regret my decisions.”

“If he does it, Arthur takes a look at Merlin, at how even though in the grip of a fever racking him, he's fighting it. “And I believe he can, then we'll all have to regret something. I know the past few years have changed me, probably to a man my former self would have disapproved of. Let's just hope that we get a chance to pick up the pieces.”

Getting a limp Merlin out of the sewers is hard. He can't stand, let alone walk. Though his muscles are tense his body is so much dead weight. But for his whimpering and trembling and the way his eyelids quiver, Arthur would say he's gone. He doesn't get any help but Gwaine's to get him to the manhole leading back to the surface. Even though Gwaine offers to do more than lead the way, Arthur refuses his support, so he half fireman carries, half attempts to walk an unconscious man mostly alone.

“I can help,” Gwaine offers, slowing to lope at his side instead of showing him the way.

“I can manage,” says Arthur.

“Have it as you want,” Gwaine says. “I understand if you're angry. But you've got to understand them. It's a miracle we're all alive here. A true miracle. And Sefa, she keeps it secret but we all know it, she's preggo and she's got the little tick to think about.”

Arthur grunts as he wades through foul smelling water with a fistful of Merlin in his arms.

“Arthur, mate,” says Gwaine, but when Arthur glares at him, Gwaine finally gets a clue and shuts his mush.

When they reach the ladder with a lead in to the manhole Gwaine stops him, putting something in his pocket. “I'm sure Daegal's going to be right furious over this, but if he's it, if Merlin's the key, then I'm sure I'm doing the right thing.”

Arthur's not sure whether it's Gwaine not being direct as to what he means or if he's lost the ability to decipher speech, but he hasn't got a word of what Gwaine said. “What the hell are you talking about?” he asks, readjusting Merlin's arm across his shoulder.

“You've got the keys to a Prius in your pocket,” Gwaine says, with a wicked grin. “It's a shit looking car but the tank's full and I guess it'll get you where you need to go.”

Arthur's mouth dries. “I—” He takes Gwaine and his nonchalant shrug in and realises that the man's done the best he possibly can. He might be an obnoxious chatterbox, one that'd get along with Merlin at his most vivacious, but he's not done him a bad turn here. “Thank you.”

Gwaine pats his shoulder. “Just make it count, all right, mate?”

With those words, Gwaine toddles away, hands in his pockets, whistling a tune even though noises this close to the street are a sure danger.

Arthur thinks he'll never forget the man.

****

Arthur slings their gear over his shoulder. “You sure you're up to it?” he asks, studying Merlin for signs he's not ready yet, that he hasn't fully mastered the fever that took him. It's been a few days since Merlin's temperature went down, but Arthur doesn't think he's fighting fit yet. “Merlin, be honest. The way to that lab is swarming with ghouls and you need to be at the top of your game to make it.”

Fists clenched, Merlin says, “I am.”

Arthur levels a steep eyebrow at Merlin. “Merlin, please.”

“Okay, alright,” Merlin says, raising his shoulders, “maybe I'm not in top form, but the fever's gone and I feel strong enough.”

“Strong enough is not enough,” Arthur counters. “The lab building is over-run. I can get to the doctor alone just fine. And bring him to you.”

“And his equipment?” Merlin asks, sounding triumphant now he thinks that he's found the weak link in Arthur's reasoning. “I'm sure he'll need his equipment.”

“Merlin—”

“We have to go in and secure a space,” Merlin says, taking a gun and knife for himself. “That's the only way.”

They've come so far and Merlin is so determined that Arthur knows there's nothing he can say to change his mind. There's nothing he can do to take the burden on his own shoulders. “Okay,” Arthur says, “okay.” He's primed to fight, adrenaline pushing through his veins, but he takes a moment to open Merlin's lips without hesitation in a kiss that edges from nervous excitement to passion.

Tongues drag one over the other, tasting one another. Arthur reaches his arm up to curl it around Merlin's shoulders, wanting to reel him in and make sure he's always safe and sound as in this moment. Things are fleeting; people die. Arthur doesn't want Merlin to.

When they part, Arthur squeezes Merlin's shoulder. "You watch out."

"I wasn't planning not to."

Brushing aside his emotions, Arthur tears himself away from Merlin and prepares to act. He picks up the rifle, taking comfort in its solidity, and stuffs his pockets with a reserve clip, a knife, and a lighter.

On Arthur's three, they open the gate leading to the research centre, gate swinging outwards with a loud creak.

The ghouls swarming the courtyard and the ground floor of the building notice the arrival of fresh meat. His heart pounding ferociously, Arthur swings his metal bat this way and that, smashing a few heads in.

Like Arthur, Merlin cuts his way through as many of the undead as he can.

With this many ghouls around, the stench is overwhelming, even in the open. The victims' viscera still cling to the ghouls, swaying when they raise their arms. Blackened tongues loll out at Arthur as if to lick him.

Working the rifle bolt and squeezing in another round, Arthur fires. With a speed that's not usual for the undead, the remaining ghouls circling him lash out at him, clutching at the rifle barrel. Arthur releases the trigger. A hole forms in the ghoul's chest. It's not enough to stop him but it's definitely enough to make him pause. Arthur pulls the trigger and wreaks a hole in the head of the closest ghoul.

Attracted by the noise, more creatures pour into the courtyard, swarming the exit points.

Two drop to the ground when Merlin cracks some space around him free. But it's not enough. If they want to get into the building they need to clear a path towards it.

“Merlin!” Arthur shouts, looking over to Merlin who's busy kicking and cleaving the ghouls in two. “You need to run inside.”

“Not without you,” Merlin yells back, his voice laboured.

Arthur shoots at the ghouls that make it closer to him and picks his way through them, but there's too many. There's a sea of them between himself and Merlin and a sea of them between them and the lab building. Lots need to be felled before they can get where they want.

Fumbling for his rucksack he finds a lateral pocket; the grenade slips into his hand. His thumb slips into the spoon. The ghouls stampede around him, reach for him. Arthur pulls at the spoon the littlest bit, but then pauses to look to Merlin one last time. Only then does he pop it.

Merlin's fighting his way through, the dirty way, beheading ghouls, shooting them when there's no other choice but to make that much noise. He's a bit reckless about it but Arthur suspects that's because he's been holding back too long, his words often hinting at how fed up he was with the hiding and biding their time. Plus, Merlin's the one with the advantage, the one man who's not been overwhelmed by the disease the ghouls carry.

But if he's made it this far and with a likelihood of saving the doctor who can devise a cure to save mankind, Merlin's all good.

Arthur watches him for the last time and, having drunk his eyes full, he tears the pin off. It clicks ominously. Everything slows down for a second, two. A ghoul careens into him, sending him sprawling back. The grenade falls from his grasp; he hears it rattle across the courtyard's cobblestones. As teeth sink into his flesh, pain blooms on his arm.

The blast reverberates in the air, makes it tremble.

The ghoul sucks at his blood. Now that he's down, other ghouls stampede towards him. Arthur kicks and thrashes. A slug whines past his head. Arthur hopes Merlin will kill him first, then the ghouls. He doesn't want to be the one who kills Merlin. The ghoul that bit him slumps on top of him, its blood splattering Arthur's face.

As Arthur breathes through his nostrils, pain radiating from the bite and the torn flesh, Merlin fires a series of shots in quick succession, bullets slamming into and bearing through decaying tissue. Smoke pours from the gun's barrel as Merlin cuts his way through the mob, shouldering, kicking, decapitating.

At last, Merlin makes it to him, kneels by his side, his hands quick on Arthur's body.

Arthur scoots away. “Don't,” he says, fighting over the waves of nausea overwhelming him. “I was bitten. I'm dangerous.”

Merlin follows after him, kisses the top of his head. “That's fine then because we're close to the lab, to a doctor, and my blood is a bit magic. You'll be right as rain.”

Arthur pushes Merlin away. However much he wants to bask into his scent, he knows he can't. It'd just be for his own benefit, not Merlin's. “You don't get it. I'm a danger now. To you, to the doctor who can save the world. You need to put me down.” Wanting to let his last message sink in, Arthur cups Merlin's face, knowing full well he's playing on his feelings. “You have to kill me.”

Merlin's crying freely now. “No,” he says, shaking his head, his teeth sunk low in his bottom lip. “I'll put you right. I'll never let you go. I—”

Arthur uses Merlin choking up as an in. “If there's one thing I don't want,” he says, kneading Merlin's shoulder with too much force, his thumbs picking up tear tracks, “it's to become one of them.” He's seen too many of them to want to end up a ghoul. “If there's one thing about my wife's death that was a relief—” A sad smile takes over his lips. “It's that she died being herself. I want that for me.”

He picks up the gun and wrestles it into Merlin's hand, wrapping his fingers around his so they in turn curl around the trigger. “Please, Merlin, if you do care.” He takes Merlin's lips between his and tastes the tears. “Please.”

“No,” Merlin says. “I won't let you take the easy way out.”

“Merlin,” Arthur protests, willing the stubborn man to see that there's no other solution. “You must see this.”

“I'm not letting you check out now,” Merlin says, kissing him sweetly, slowly, his lips pushing and pushing at Arthur's until they open up and their breaths mingle. “What if Will had let them kill me when I was bitten?” he asks, passion firing his tones. “What then? What if that doctor in there can find a cure?”

His thumbs gently caress the skin behind Arthur's ears and despite the pain squeezing his guts, the nausea, and the burn in his arm, Arthur feels happy and human. A moment ago he was so ready to give in, his heart turning to dust in his chest, his hopes and those dreams he still had completely dead in the water, erased the way he was about to be. One kiss from Merlin, the touch of his fingers as they play gently on his skin, the strength of his embrace, one sad look from him and Arthur wants to be there for him. “Okay, he says. “Okay, I'll come with, but at the first sign of me turning, you put a bullet through my head, is that clear?”

Merlin nods but there's something about the way he jams his lower teeth in front of the upper set, that tells Arthur he isn't being honest about his willingness to comply. “Merlin.”

A tear tracking a path down his cheek, he says. “I promise I won't let you become one of them.”

This time Arthur believes him; that tear is a sign of Merlin mourning.

Pact made, they both spring to their feet, avoiding the creatures pouring in from the lab's ground floor. Merlin aims for the heads with every shot he fires. Cradling his pounding arm, Arthur does the same. This way they manage to clear a path to the lab's ground floor cafeteria.

They stagger into it to find it less overrun than the outside had been. Most of the ghouls came out to play after he and Merlin entered the compound. But here inside, neons flickering on and off hypnotically, the ghouls shamble around, eyes vacant, bodies listlessly sagging.

Very, very low, Merlin says, “See that door, we somehow have to make it there without attracting their attention.”

Arthur doesn't see how they can; the door Merlin's pointing to is on the opposite side of this sizeable room. Even if they make a dash for it, they'll attract the creatures' attention. And Arthur's bleeding, his is head pounding. There's no way he can be as fast on his feet as he wants to be. His mind coming untethered, he's not fit to think strategically. He's not at his best.

“We won't make it,” Arthur says, his mouth firming. “I could—”

“You're not sacrificing yourself,” Merlin says, no humour in his tone, no light in his eyes, which are a dull mirror to stormy feelings. “Don't think I don't know what you did there with the grenade.”

Arthur wants to tell Merlin not to be stupid, that he's the most easily sacrificed of the two of them, when some kind of light flashes across Merlin's eyes. “You have an idea, don't you?” Arthur asks through teeth gritted from the pain the bite's giving him.

Merlin hits his boot against some kind of stainless steel surface. “I bet this is a fridge.”

And right enough, behind them there's a counter and past it there's a wide range. Various electrical appliances in their dirty and rusted state still lie on top of it. They're in the kitchen area of the facility's canteen. The big stainless steel cupboard must be a fridge. “Right, so what do you propose?”

“There's still bound to be meat in there.”

Arthur huffs a laugh he stifles as soon as it's out. “It will be rotten. Now they're stupid but they do have a taste for fresh meat.”

Merlin's eyes become smaller. “Do you have any better ideas?”

Arthur can't say that he does. “No.”

“Well then,” Merlin says, opening the fridge. The second he does the smell of putrid meat hits Arthur's nostrils so powerfully his stomach roils. He pushes the bile down and makes a concerted effort to keep everything down. Even so, his vision clouds with images of death and decay. They're fuzzy but very vivid and Arthur has to blink to chase them away.

When he's managed to get the hallucinations under control, he sees Merlin throw congealed but putrefied masses of meat at the ghouls. The ghouls are listless at first but then they must catch a scent because they fling themselves at the meat. Twiggy fingers reach for it, scraping across the surface glazed by ice.

One or two look their way and aren't affected by the ruse. They stumble towards them until the satisfied noises coming from the other ghouls increase. They rejoin the others.

“Come,” Merlin whispers, “time to make a dash for it.”

His senses hyper-aware but more and more confused, Arthur follows Merlin into a dash to the door. When Merlin tries to open it it only swings a little way and gets stuck into something. Arthur can't tell what is — was. It's an unidentifiable red mass. Pale, bloated maggots wriggle all over it, worming their way about wasted flesh.

Cupping his mouth, Merlin whimpers.

Arthur himself is about to puke. He's two seconds away from it. His head is spinning already and the additional infliction of such a visual nearly does it. What stops him is Merlin sliding through the opening and jumping over the carcass. “Come, do it like I did.”

Seeing as Arthur must see to it that Merlin makes it to the doctor, he tells himself he needs to go. Balance shot, body pulsing with nausea, he brings himself to jump over the disgusting heap and to follow Merlin down a length of white-washed corridors.

“When we saw him from the window,” Merlin says, “which floor do you think was he on?”

Arthur tries to remember the doctor as he last saw him. The lonely man at the window, pale as a ghost, the white lab coat he was wearing making him look diaphanous, stared out for the longest time. “Third, third floor,” Arthur says, breath coming in waves that roll out like thunder.

“Right,” says Merlin, skidding down the corridor towards a dead end. “We're taking the lift.”

Arthur's tired eyes lock onto its doors. “You're crazy. Electricity's on and off. We'll be trapped.”

Merlin smiles fondly. “I didn't mean the old fashioned way.”

“Then how?”

“We'll climb the lift's well.”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, not entirely sure either of them can make it.

“Think about it,” Merlin says as he takes his hands. “If we take the stairs there'll be ghouls. We'll have to fight floor by floor. And let's be honest.” Merlin grimaces. “It's just the two of us here. I'm not Rambo and you're not at your best.”

Arthur scoffs at the understatement. His legs feel progressively more leaden.

“Ghouls are slow and dumb and, most of all, uncoordinated,” Merlin says, illustrating points Arthur's very well aware of. “There's no way they can follow us up the shaft. We'll have a direct in to the third floor.”

Arthur can see that; what he can't see is how they're going to make it. “Merlin, my arm hurts, my legs are heavy and as for you I don't think you have the training to do it either.”

“You'll be surprised,” Merlin says.

Arthur would object if a bunch of ghouls weren't shuffling towards them. “Okay, all right. Let's try it.”

They call the lift and there's enough power for it to respond. Its doors slip open with a ding. Merlin loops his arms around Arthur's and walks him into the lift. The doors close on the gaping mouths of a bunch of zombies, on black cavities that smell like death.

Arthur fights down a wave of panic at the thought he's soon going to be one of them. His heartbeat is already beating a punching rhythm; he's sweating. He weighs a ton. His arms and legs feel like hardy roots that have sunk deep into the earth, making movement impossible. His middle is made of stone. Leaning against the partition, he makes himself breathe. He closes his eyes. The ghouls are battering the lift's door; the noise of their fists on the metal is cadenced, entrancing, inspiring pure terror. It's a death beat announcing his doom, becoming louder and louder till it rams at his ears, his eardrums about to burst.

To avoid the loneliness of the dark, Arthur opens his eyes. Merlin has climbed his way to the trapdoor, legs braced either side of the lift's walls. His shoulder is pitted against a metal slab. He grunts with every shove.

“You have no purchase,” Arthur says, plodding heavily towards Merlin. “That's why you can't open it.”

“Yeah,” Merlin grits out. He produces a surprised squawk when Arthur settles him on his shoulders, his hands wrapped around his calves. “Try now.”

Feeling the trapdoor with his hands, Merlin finds its edges. “I think I've got it.”

He opens the little metal gate and sets it aside. It makes a clattering noise which excites the furious battering of the ghouls outside, but he's cleared the way to the shaft.

Arthur grunts when Merlin pushes up to squeeze through the bolt hole. Today it feels like Merlin weighs a ton; though he's as thin as a waif thanks to their peripatetic lifestyle. He's off though, disappearing to the side. Arthur almost wants to obey his legs and crumple down now that Merlin's made it that far, but then there's two or three thumps and Merlin peeks his head through the trapdoor, extending his hands to him. “Come on, Arthur.”

Arthur tips its head up at Merlin, to look at his encouraging smile, the worried light in his eyes. “Merlin, leave me here.”

“No,” Merlin says, wriggling his hands so Arthur will be enticed to grab them. “I need you. Please, Arthur.”

Arthur grabs Merlin's hands. To help him, he levers himself off the wall. Merlin still emits an inhuman grunt as he lifts him. But then Arthur's half way up and with a twist of his abs he comes to sit right opposite Merlin on top of the lift.

Merlin's breath comes fast but he smiles at Arthur. Then he looks up and his smile wanes. Arthur follows his line of sight and in the flickering neon light sees what it is they'll have to climb. The shaft isn't as big as one might imagine. For some reason — probably the building being large and modern — he'd thought it'd be wide. But it isn't. The lift doors are meant to open flush on the different floors. But for a few ledges, there's nothing but walls of concrete.

“It's gonna be tough, I know,” Merlin says, badly hiding a wince. “There are no ghouls in here, are there?”

“I suppose not,” says Arthur over the loud throbbing of his heart.

Merlin stands. “Come on, wrap your arms around me.”

“No,” Arthur says, standing like Merlin has, securing the rucksack around his middle and stashing his weapons inside it. “You can't climb the cords and carry me. I weigh more than you.”

“Arthur, you're not up to climbing those cables on your own.” Merlin wrings his hands. “Not after—”

“Either we do as I say, or I'll sit primly here,” Arthur says, crossing his arms.

Arthur can see Merlin's weighing the pros and cons of leaving him here and dealing with whatever's coming his way alone. Arthur can also pick out the moment Merlin decides this well isn't safe enough and that he will have to concede and let Arthur do as he wants.

Silently agreeing on the course of action, they both start. With a leap, Merlin grabs at the metal cable and inches slowly up. Arthur follows. Holding onto the cable isn't hard because the cable offers some purchase but climbing is another matter. Arthur has little strength in his arms, his head pounds, and his legs won't propel him upwards, not even when they're properly wrapped around the cable.

Merlin, though, fares better than Arthur would have thought. He's nearly halfway to the first floor and moves forward steadily if not speedily. Arthur, on the other hand, can only concentrate on how heavy all his limbs feel, how unresponsive. The conditions of the climb make this mission even more difficult to fulfil. His side, back and elbows scrape the concrete often enough. The worst is when the his arm brushes against the shaft's walls, opening the bite wound further.

With every inch of ground gained, Arthur grunts at the effort and at the agony in his arm. His head gets soft, as if he can't take hold of a thought, a strategy, and he slows and slows until Merlin picks up on it.

“I'll stop climbing,” Merlin yells, doing exactly as he promised. “I want you to get to me and then grab my leg.”

“Dangerous,” Arthur says, blinking sweat off his eyes. “It's too dangerous for you.”

Even though Arthur said that in a low voice, Merlin must have heard him because he replies, “Never mind that. Do as I say.”

“Bossy,” Arthur says, but he needs to be there for Merlin, so he heaves himself upwards.

Little by little, he makes it, at last grabbing Merlin by the ankle and using his forward momentum to climb the rest of the way.

It's still tough. Every moment he fears he'll lose consciousness, his sense of distances shot, the shapes around him blurring and distorting, coming at him like quivering mirages. With his stomach roiling, he thinks he might pass out.

This enrages him.

He doesn't like being helpless. He doesn't enjoy having to have Merlin do all the work. But there's no other way out of this.

Merlin claws his way up the passage and at last he reaches the door giving onto the third floor. “You'll have to let go,” he says.

Arthur does let go of his grip on Merlin, reaching out for the big central cable instead. The moment Arthur releases him, Merlin swings and hops onto a little concrete ledge. With his fingers he sets to prying open the doors.

“Make it quick,” Arthur says, closing his eyes against the vertigo, the hammering in his head.

Merlin swears and shifts, curses some more. Finally, light floods the shaft and Merlin heaves himself through the door. Before Arthur can begin to squint against the influx of light, Merlin once again turns around and reaches his arms out for Arthur.

Arthur doesn't think he can make it; he doesn't believe he can climb some more and make the leap for Merlin's hands. But Merlin smiles and calls his name, so Arthur lets go of the cable and propels himself up with a twist of his body. His hand catch Merlin's; Merlin's fingers close around his wrists, so tight his grip is bruising. Legs against either side of the lift, Merlin pushes. The counter weight helps lift Arthur up. He lands on his hands and knees, his legs on either side of Merlin's ribcage.

His heart beats in his throat but this time Arthur doesn't think it's the illness. It's Merlin beaming up at him, eyes half misty, half shadowed with worry. The set of his mouth speaks of determination, stubbornness. It's an unyielding expression; it contrasts the one in his eyes. Because the latter is soft and beautiful, lit up from the fires of his soul. Arthur wants to kiss Merlin goodbye, taste the softness of his lips one last time.

But he can't. Footsteps ring out behind them and if there's one thing he's learnt in the six years since the world turned upside down it's that you don't stop paying attention to noises. He may be done for, but Merlin still has a fighting chance. He turns to look.

Something chitters from the shadows of the last section of corridor, where the neon fixtures don't work anymore. Out of the darkness, three creatures emerge, still wearing the garments that characterised their lives before they turned. One is dressed like a businessman, his polka dotted tie grazing a mottled throat, the bloated skin visible from under the tatters of his once elegant shirt.

The second's a woman wearing a lab coat, the white of her uniform spattered with blood and other fluids Arthur doesn't want to have to guess the source of. The third looks like a maintenance worker. The three of them are more alert than the ghouls from the canteen were.

The ghouls advance on them.

To get away from them, Arthur scrambles backwards. Something in his back tears at the sudden movement, muscles complaining against the strain Arthur is putting them through. The ghouls draw closer, getting momentum.

Grabbing him by the wrist, Merlin runs down the corridor. All doors at their sides are closed and a few yards ahead there's only a wall. “Merlin, we've got to try one of the doors.”

No sooner has he said this than one opens, and an old man in a lab coat shouts at them, “In here, quick.”

Merlin and Arthur take a dive into the room. The old man closes the aluminium door on the ghouls' noses and then punches in a code on a code pad. “On the bright side we're temporarily safe,” the old man says. “The door will hold. On the other hand, welcome. I think you've just joined me in my wait for death.”

The old man, the doctor they saw yesterday, Arthur hopes, leads them down a narrow white washed hallway and into a room that's still spotless and full of medical equipment like microscopes, sifters, and ampoule containers.

“Welcome to my kingdom,” the man says, slumping into a swivel chair that offers a view of the courtyard behind. “I'm Gaius by the way.”

“Merlin,” Merlin says, while Arthur leans against a desk for support. “And that's Arthur.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Gaius says. “It's been more than three months since I last talked to a human being.”

Arthur can't even summon enough enthusiasm to reciprocate the feeling but Merlin does. “So the facility was still working up til then?”

“Yes,” Gaius says, hands sweeping around to indicate the compound. “This place was secure. You needed access codes to be allowed inside.”

“What happened then?”

“One of the lunch workers from the canteen hid a bite, turned others before we could stop her.” Gaius' exhalation is long and belaboured. “In their panic, people opened the doors and we were overrun.”

“I see,” says Merlin. His jaw sets. “I think I have a bit of a solution to that.”

Gaius wings an eyebrow in a clear show of scepticism. “If you want to clear the building, I'll tell you that stronger men than you have tried. I'm the last survivor.”

“I'm immune,” Merlin says abruptly and Arthur's got to give it to him; this time he's been as direct as they come.

“You're what, young man?”

“I'm immune,” Merlin repeats, making sure to say it slow. “I was bitten. Twice. I always survived.”

Gaius' hand goes to his heart. “That can't be,” he says quite feebly. “We tried experimenting, boosting the human immune system with lab generated antidotes, but it didn't work. You'd be the only one.”

“Test me,” Merlin says, rolling up his sleeve. “Take my blood and test me.”

“It isn't as simple as that,” Gaius says. “It might not be your blood per se. It might be your genes.”

“Whatever it is, you've got to find a cure.”

Gaius shakes his head. “I can't,” he says. “I'm not a geneticist. I'm a lowly technician. And I have little equipment in this portion of the building, the one's that safe.”

Merlin shakes his head. “No, I haven't come all this way, risked Arthur, fought horrors for nothing. I'm going to get the equipment you need and you're going to make a cure, in under two days.”

Gaius protests. Pride swells Arthur's heart at the thought of Merlin being so obstinate about that deadline because of him. Merlin loves well and he's strong, likely to achieve the biggest, unlikeliest miracles. Arthur's got him here but Merlin's stubbornness will save people. He can feel it in his bones.

Like the darkness that eats away at his senses.

Now that Merlin is here and primed to do what he was meant to, Arthur can let his brain shut down. He accepts the darkness and lets it in.

****

Every bone in his body aches. His flesh is ripe with pains that dig their way inside, clawing at him. Arthur's brain is fuzzy, wrapped in cotton. His thoughts are pointless but thick, crowding upon him like monsters in the dark. The dark... Arthur is blanketed in darkness, under the cloak of it. It's a heavy coat, like snow, and he's buried under. He still hears voices echo in his ears, first loud then very far away, a running, frazzled dialogue that washes over him like waves from a distant shore.

Arthur tries to respond to them because one of the voices belongs to Merlin, but the information coming into his brain is too jumbled for him to. His synapses can't act fast enough to dictate speech. He can't process the words spoken to him and have them mean anything to him. He can pick out the tone though.

“I know you're listening,” Merlin says. He must be lifting Arthur's hand because Arthur can feel his heavy limb being moved, the point of contact with Merlin's own hand, the rough calluses at the back of it chasing round and round on Arthur's skin. “I know you're in there.”

How Merlin knows that when Arthur himself is not sure, is a mystery. But then again Merlin is a mystery unto himself.

“I got the equipment,” Merlin says, his touch pacifying, relaxing Arthur's nerve endings, his hand feeling warm in his. “Gaius had to point out what he wanted. Make drawings and stuff. But I think I've got everything. Maybe another run will do it.”

Arthur's not sure he's following the words. But Merlin's tone is reassuring.

“There weren't too many ghouls,” Merlin says and Arthur can hear the smile in his voice. “So I was in and out fast. You'd have been proud of me. I turned into a proper action man, shooting left and right.”

There's something sad in Merlin's tone and that's what makes Arthur concentrate on the words, run them through his sieve of a brain. He dispels the nightmares that prey at the edges of his consciousness, the images of death and decay that want to take over, and sifts Merlin's words. Equipment, he's completing the mission. And then shooting... The stupid idiot. He will get himself killed before there's a cure. Immune he may be, but if the ghouls have lunch on him he'll be as dead as the next poor sod who isn't.

Arthur wants to speak up and tell Merlin off for being stupid. But he's enveloped in this demi world of darkness. His mouth is thick with cotton and no sounds come out of him, however much he wants to spit them out and string up sentences.

He's a prisoner of his own body and can't escape.

“... way I realised there was something missing,” Merlin says, his voice now a strange croak. It's no longer as calming as Arthur wants it to be. “And then I understood why I felt like that.” Merlin must be smacking chapped lips together because the noise he makes is that of skin catching on skin. “You weren't there. Usually you'd be the one to go all action on me. And you weren't.”

Arthur tries to squeeze Merlin's hand, focuses very hard on the pressure he wants to exercise. He's not positive his hands are working as he wants them to, but he flexes his fingers and digs them deep in Merlin's skin.

In return Arthur feels the pressure of Merlin's fingers. “I know you're listening,” Merlin says, his voice both hard and scratchy. “I just know it. So listen to this. Gaius is working on a cure. It may not be perfect, as he says, but it will do its job once it's ready.” A little gasp, one that sounds like hope falls from Merlin's lips. “You just need to hold on long enough. Only a little while longer.”

Arthur wants to tell Merlin that he's doing his best but more of the nightmare figures come at him, displaying bloodied fangs that tear at his ears and he can no longer take in Merlin's voice. Bat wings spread out and make the darkness heavier. It's as though he's buried under a glacier, but instead of the coolness of ice he's wrapped into hot flames that sear his guts.

And always, always those looming figures haunting him, laughing at him, grabbing for him, their mouths gaping hollows smeared with blood. Blood everywhere, pumping through his body with a sickness his immune system can't contain. Blood battering his heart with its foul components.

As the torment soars, Arthur realises that he doesn't want to be trapped in his body anymore. It's dark and hot in here, and there's ghouls leering at him at every corner, suggesting he go with them, projecting images of another Arthur, one who's crouched over a body, tongue licking at its innards. When this second Arthur looks up Arthur can see his double's blackened gums and grey tongue, his bloodshot eyes and the clothes stained with the corpse's juices, a ring of blood around his lips.

When Arthur squints he can see who the corpse this second Arthur is feasting on is. It's Merlin's.

“You didn't love him enough,” Mithian's voice says. “You failed to protect him like you did me.”

“No,” Arthur says, tears of horror running down his face. “I— I loved you. I wanted to protect you with all I had but—”

“What about Merlin?” Mithian asks, as she moves to face him. Her eyes look darker than they did in life. “Why didn't you put a bullet to your brain when you knew you were ill?”

Arthur feels a tear run down his cheek. It's just one but it's as though he's drowning in a sea of them. “Because I wanted to live with him.”

Mithian says, “And you didn't want to live with me?”

Before he can say that yes he did want to, that she was his girl and he loved her very much, she disappears in a mist, leaving him to the horror of looking into himself, his new self, the beast, the monster he's become. “Stop it, please, stop it,” he says, holding a hand up towards his other self. “Please.”

But his ghoulish self doesn't stop cannibalising Merlin until... Until a second Merlin appears, a pistol dangling in his hand.

Arthur's heart soars at sight of him. He's whole and healthy, though sad looking. “Arthur,” he says.

Despite the happiness that clogs his throat, he says, “You promised to kill me.”

“I can't kill you because that's not who I am.”

“I know that,” Arthur says, taking a step towards this Merlin, the one who's standing and talking, alive. “But you've got to help me. You promised you would.”

“I won't be the one to.”

With those words, Merlin disappears just like Mithian did, leaving him alone with a vision of his self he doesn't want to contemplate.

“Sh,” Merlin's voice reaches out to him. His lips graze Arthur's forehead, cool like water from a stream, soft like a cushion. “Sh, Arthur, I know it's tough but Gaius has made a serum and he's going to inject you.”

Arthur feels the pinprick like it's feathers tickling him.

“You're the first patient to be treated,” Merlin says, putting more kisses to his forehead. “So you're going to make history.”

This time Arthur hears Gaius too. “Merlin, being a guinea pig isn't something to be proud of. It's rather horrible. Luckily, if one may say so, he can't hear you.”

“Oh but he can, Gaius,” Merlin says, leaning his brow against Arthur's. “Arthur's a warrior. I'm sure he can do what no one else can.”

“Merlin, I don't want to disappoint you but with the readings I have here, he's more dead than alive.”

“I just know he's listening.”

The clatter of glassy materials saturates the air. “I just want you to prepare for the worst. What we'll have to do in case this impromptu serum doesn't work.”

Merlin's voice is heavy with tears when he says, “It'll work. You're a genius, Gaius.”

“Yes, yes, thank you for the praise, Merlin,” Gaius answers him. “I'm sure I'm flattered.”

“You're a canny one, Gaius.”

Gaius harrumphs. “I suppose that's all good.” There's a pause. “Now you need to come away, Merlin. You donated too much blood for the purposes of making the serum. You need sleep.”

Merlin says, “I won't crash.” A chair — most probably a chair — rolls forwards. “I'll sit here but I won't go.”

“Merlin, that's not advisable,” Gaius says in a chiding tone. “You won't be helping him if you keel over.”

Based on the little he understands, Arthur agrees with Gaius. Merlin ought not test his body. Arthur doesn't care if he makes it or not as long as he hasn't done this for nothing. Merlin deserves his chance. Arthur moves his lips to pitch in, say as much, tell Merlin off for not sleeping when he should, but no sounds, let alone words come out.

Merlin takes his hand. “See, he was trying to speak. I can't sleep if he's trying to talk to me. I must be there for him.”

“It could have been a reflex,” Gaius says in the tone of someone who's pointing out the obvious. “I'm not a medical doctor per se but I do think that's the case.”

Lips touch Arthur's knuckles. “I made him a promise. I won't let go.”

Arthur's heart pumps hard at that, warming him this time, not scalding him like before. He wants to speak up and tell Merlin things. But he's trapped inside himself. There's a labyrinth of words that he can't release. As he chooses and separates them in his mind, he gets lost in the tangle.

Nothingness comes at him again, though this time warmth envelopes him like a cocoon, quenching the fires from before.

A while later — Arthur has no measure of how long — he blinks against the light piercing his pupils. He closes his eyes. He feels himself falling, unable to look at the brightness full on. But when he eventually does look around, things settle. The ceiling is painted a frosty white, neon dancing with a silvery, wild, scintillating quality. When he lowers his gaze he takes in the clean walls and the tech equipment shining like beacons. He remembers where he is. Sweat has dried to a clammy film along his brow. A residual soreness radiates from his chest. His extremities are heavy. He shifts.

The figure facing the wall turns at the noise he must have made. He puts down the cup he was holding though not drinking from. Merlin's eyes shine with affection and a note of mischief just before he walks over.

He's beside him in an instant. “Hi, Arthur,” he says, helping him sit upright, tucking a pillow behind his head. “Welcome back.”

Arthur rubs his lips together. “Hi.” His voice rattles across the room like chains against a wall.

“How are you feeling?” Merlin asks, smoothing Arthur's hair away from his forehead as if he knows that it's bothering him.

Arthur coughs, phlegm moving about in his chest. “Eh, like I was hung up to dry for a few centuries.”

Merlin laughs and sits on the side of his gurney bed. “It's to be expected,” he says, with an easy smile that contradicts the tears in his eyes. “You fought a hard battle.”

“How? What?” he says, though the questions he has in mind are many more.

Merlin's eyes scour his. “You were bitten, remember?”

“Yeah,” he says, his voice grating with a scratch. “I do.” He lifts a throbbing arm, the one bearing the bite he most certainly hasn't forgotten, whatever Merlin may think.

“Well,” Merlin says, clasping his hand. “That's all in the past.”

Arthur's won't win a prize for his originality when he asks, “But how?”

Merlin smiles and this time it's a much freer smile. “Gaius made a serum; it's not really at ready stages yet but it worked on you. It's been a week since you were bitten and you haven't turned.”

Arthur's breath stops in his chest. “So I—”

“Aren't about to turn,” Merlin says, the corners of his mouth stretching further. “You're cured. And once Gaius' made sure of side effects and everything we're going to inject people and save them too.”

“So you made it?” Arthur says, a rush of sensations coming back at him even though his battered body isn't ready for them.

“We made it,” Merlin says, snuggling up to him on the gurney. “We made it, yes.”

*****

Sunshine stretches over the fields and pastures. It bathes rolling hills with its golden hues. Tiny dots mark the labourers who're planting seeds in the soil. Some of the new crops are already shooting up, turning the countryside green and gold, tinting it with warmth. A brook, like a blue ribbon, idly meanders across the undulating swathes of greenery, rushing over and around the rocks in its bed, the deviations in its path.

Nature's taking over and it's so overwhelming you almost don't notice the caravans of people moving along the roads, making it slower for cars, their rucksacks on their backs, walking sticks at their beck and call.

There's sneaking cordons of them; Arthur almost can't take his eyes off these modern pilgrims.

“They're making their way back,” Merlin says, as though he's guessed the path Arthur's thoughts went down. “Making their way home.”

“Yes,” Arthur observes, the Prius — he'll have to find Gwaine if he's still alive and give it back to him — slowly rumbles past the rivers of walkers.

“Those that have a place to go to.”

Thinking back to the past makes Arthur see that most of these people probably have lost all claim they have to a home, their places likely looted or burnt down. And as for what makes the hearth home, friends and family, they're likely to be missing those too. “Yeah, I guess most of them are alone.”

“But it's a start,” says Merlin, watching them trail past. “I'm alone too but I'm glad I made it.”

Arthur taps restless fingers on the steering wheel. “You're not alone.” He clears his throat as though he's still in the lab compound and suffering from all sorts of side effects to the serum Gaius injected him with. Thank god it's been perfected. “That is, if you want to... you know. Share your... share a home with me.”

Merlin's not looking at him when he says, “I think I'll put up with you.”

The edges of Merlin's smile crack open, dimples showing in his cheek, even in profile. It's a sight that makes Arthur feel light, free of worry, but also excited, his body tight like drum skins, a charge zinging through him. “Only put up?”

“See, you think a little too well of yourself,” Merlin says, voice broken with merriment. “You're a cross to bear so, yeah, I'll have to put up with you.”

“I'll give you 'put up',” Arthur grumbles but it's not as if he does anything to 'show' Merlin. He's rather too happy with Merlin's mischievous expression and light hearted smile to do anything else but drink it in. Taking it in — and Arthur does do that when his eyes aren't on the road ahead —makes him lose his breath.

It's as if someone has reached into his chest and decided to give his lungs a fair squeeze.

“Oh my god, you're distracted, aren't you,” Merlin says, poking him in the side. “I can tell from your vacant expression.”

“I'm not distracted,” Arthur says, a smirk pulling at his lips.

“We're lost,” Merlin concludes, smacking his hands flat on his thighs. “You don't know where the camp is.”

“I know where the camp is,” Arthur tells him, his foot the slightest little bit heavier on the accelerator. “But with all these people taking to the roads it'll take us all day to get there.”

As it happens Arthur's evaluation was pessimistic. Despite the hordes of people redeploying themselves, some of the motorways are free from the crowds of pilgrims. They reach the camp when it's only afternoon and not night as Arthur had estimated.

By the warm but failing light of the afternoon they can watch the camp and see the changes ten months have wrought upon it. There's far fewer tents now and those that are there have been moved closer to the camp's centre. All traces of previous carnage have gone too. The hustle and bustle of people loading vans has substituted it.

They close the car doors and make for the central square. When she sees them, Finna drops her box and runs over to them. “Merlin,” she says, holding on tight to him before stepping back to look at him, rubbing his arms. “You look good, saviour of ours.”

“You look better than me, that's for sure,” Merlin says, smiling his dazzling silly smile, the one Arthur only begun to see when he was on the mend from the bite and Merlin truly took to grinning at life the way he must have done before the infection spread.

“Well, I've only had to look after the camp,” she says. “I didn't go on a journey to save the world. I had more leisure time.” She moves on to Arthur, hugging him too instead of giving him a handshake as Arthur expected. “And you too, it's an honour having you here.”

“I didn't do much,” Arthur says, coughing into his fist as soon as he's free of Finna's hug. “It was him who donated the blood and helped Gaius get the equipment to make the serum.”

“And you got me there alive,” Merlin says, bumping his shoulder with his.

“I agree with Merlin's assessment,” Finna says, the stepping back she sobers and adds, “I suppose you've come for the ceremony.”

“Yes,” Arthur says, feeling on firmer ground talking about this. “I thought we couldn't miss a tribute to the people we lost.”

“You've come just in time then,” Finna says, looking over the shoulder to a patch of ground on the hills. “Tonight's our last big commemoration.”

“Because you're dismantling camp?” Merlin asks, watching the toing and froing of the people about camp, the way they were moving poles and crates, chests and boxes.

“Yes,” says Finna, starting back towards the hill. “Since it's safer now with the rate of infection lowered and the illness under control many of us have expressed a wish to take up our old lives.”

“I can understand that,” says Merlin, his soul resounding in his words.

“I thought living communally had its perks but the others had their say.”

With her head lowered Finna leads them up the hill where standing stones have been erected to mourn the deceased. The slanted rays of the sun mellow their contours and tinge them orange, a golden shine seeping into the atmosphere.

It all glows, orange and purple, soft and smooth.

The camp members gathered around here for the commemoration strike up a chant that reaches into Arthur's soul, causing him to remember all the people's he's lost in the plague: his father, his wife, all his friends and colleagues, those he met after the infection had struck like Freya. She too mourned her husband after everything ended, with Arthur at her side, a heap of stones marking the place they chose to commemorate Percival in.

That was beautiful and this ceremony is too. Different but equally touching. Arthur's just glad —however selfish that may be — that this is the last one and that they'll start back on their lives afterwards. He sighs.

Merlin takes his hand and Arthur is forcibly reminded of the one person he found through the hell they all lived through.

Starting a brand new life with him will be something to look forward to.

The End.