Fracking Apocalypse - a ZNation 10K/Tommy Fanfiction

S1E04: Part 1

"I'm telling ya, there ain't nothing there." Doc said, "No thoughts, no memories, no soul. Nothin'."

"Well they're not dead. They want something." Cassandra rebuked.

"Yeah brains." Doc deadpanned.

"You can't want something if you're not conscious, if you don't have a soul." Cassandra said taking a sip of water from her canteen.

10K was staring at his knife as he played with it in his hands slowing spinning the sharp tip against his thumb but not pressing hard enough to cut himself when he joined in the conversation, "When my Pa was wounded, he told me to tie him up before he turned." 10K said and Bailey looked up from her notebook watching him play with his knife while he talked, then he glanced up at them, "Made me promise to show him mercy when he died. Kill the brain, you know." He said before looking back at his knife, "I couldn't do it. I couldn't hurt my Pa. . . no matter what he'd become. I stared into his eyes for the longest time, just looking for some sign he was still in there."

"Did you see anything?" Cassandra asked softly and 10K looked up at them and only shook his head.

"What'd you do?" Doc asked.

"I killed it." He said sternly his voice cold.

"Damn, Kid." Doc said in awe, "You had to put down your own dad?"

"I didn't kill him." 10K snapped, "I killed it."

"But if it's not alive, how did you kill it?" Cassandra asked.

"Piked it. Right here." He tapped his knife to the center of his forehead. "My first kill." Then he looked back down at his knife again, "I always wish he knew, you know, somehow, knew that I kept my promise." Then he turned to look over the side of the truck clearly not wanting to make eye contact with anybody. He caught Bailey staring at him in his peripheral vision and turned to her.

"What?" he asked not as coldly as before and she looked back down at her notebook, but he noticed that she didn't write anything, just stared at a blank page.

After hearing 10K talk about his father Bailey couldn't help but look at the sniper differently. So far 10K hadn't shown much emotion other than a drive to kill zombies. Bailey had tried to figure him out, it was something she exceled at, but no matter how hard she tried she couldn't get a read on him, which is what led to her suspicious attitude toward the boy. She was always cautious when she couldn't easily find other people's motives for their actions, usually those people always had something to hide and that made them dangerous. But when 10K talked about his Pa and having to kill him and the promise he'd made Bailey could see the pain in his eyes, even though he'd tried to hide it. He hadn't made eye contact with anyone since, leading Bailey to believe that 10K had had no one to confide in before meeting them. Many people who'd lived this long in the post-apocalyptic world all shared a lot, like understanding what it was like to lose people you cared about, having to go sometimes days without food, or having to walk for miles with no hope in sight. But being alone, as alone as 10K had been, was an experience Bailey never had to endure. She'd had Addy from the beginning, she'd always had Addy, even in the worst of times her red headed best friend had been there, supporting her, mourning with her, helping her any way she could. 10K had none of that, all he'd had was himself, his rifle, a slingshot and the Z's. The only other person with him was his father and the world had taken that from him too. Bailey looked back over to him in the bed of the truck, he was watching the landscape – no doubt checking for zombies to add to his kill count – and just by looking at him Bailey would never have guessed he'd kept so much pain bottled up inside. It made her wonder, in a good way, what else was 10K hiding about himself?

Not much later Doc slammed the side of the truck, "Humans, six o'clock." He called to the others as a small breaking down orange clown car appeared behind them on the road. It didn't keep up with them though, their truck was in much better condition so none of them were too worried about it, that was until the road block. There were several zombies milling around the road in front of them and as they slowed down the truck the clown car was starting to catch up. 10K hopped out of the truck before it even came to a halt and took off.