The sun had risen about halfway above the horizon when I gave an owl-like proximity call. Regan shook his head and slipped into the bushes, still unsure about inviting Daniel out. Even though he'd won two of our three wrestling matches, it hadn't boosted his confidence levels.
"If it helps, he doesn't care about making his footsteps silent, so you can usually hear him coming," I told the shrubs where Regan hid.
The shrubs gave me about as much of a reply as I expected, so I picked a hiding place where the dirt trail entered a clearing. It was a toss-up whether Daniel would use the path that allowed him more space and time to react or if he'd opt to walk beside the trail in case we had set up a trap.
We had circled this area for almost an hour while using various plant extracts to amplify our trails. At this point, our scent was ingrained in this part of the forest and would make it impossible for Daniel to determine which trail was more recent.
I doubted Regan would try ambushing Daniel first, which would also explain why he chose the spot he did. His position would let him watch and give him openings to join in. I just hoped he didn't wait too long, because Daniel wouldn't waste much time before pinning me.
A few dry leaves ahead crackled. I peered between the dense leaves as Daniel walked through the bushes to the side of the trail. He gazed around without any obvious concern, as if he were just taking a leisurely stroll instead of trying to trigger a Nightstalker's ambush.
When he faced the other way, I moved my sunglasses away from the tiny gap. My warning to Regan hadn't been in jest. I knew from past experience just how keen a Terror's vision was during the day. If the half-risen sun hadn't been fighting to dissipate the predawn gloom lingering under the canopy, he probably would have spotted my furtive peeking.
I remained crouched out of sight as he strolled past my hiding spot. This was the best opening I was going to get... I darted between the shrubs and soundlessly launched myself at his back. Midair, I saw the barest traces of my shadow flicker across the trees in front of him.
Daniel spun out of the way as I flew past him with a frustrated growl. He sidestepped into the clearing to give himself more room—right in front of Regan's hiding spot.
When I charged forward, Daniel shifted to the side, light on his feet and knowing his knees and ankles were my usual target. A dark grey form lunged out of the shrubs at Daniel's back. He caught the movement out of the corner of his eye and pivoted, avoiding Regan's ambush.
I immediately lunged at Daniel's knees with a sharp growl, forcing him to skip back as he eyed up his two adversaries. Regan disappeared into the greenery, leaving me in the middle of the meadow. How thoughtful of him.
But his invisible presence still gave me some leverage and a few new tricks. I circled closer, barely out of arm's reach, and turned my head slightly to the side. Daniel immediately dodged the non-existent attacker. I took the opportunity to tackle him.
He twisted away from my hands and snagged my wrists. I snarled as I realized he had been waiting for such a trick and used it to lure me into his trap. When he started to pull me closer, I swung my legs up, actually connecting with his ribs.
As I fell to the ground, he dropped to one knee to avoid forfeiting his grip on my wrists. My back hit the grass, and I struggled against his greater strength as he tried to get proper leverage to pin me. Footsteps raced out of the bushes behind Daniel. His eyes widened, and I paused as we both realized they were too fast for Regan.
A furious snarl split the air, and Daniel barely had time to skip to his feet before a blonde-haired zombie crashed into him like a freight train. I scrambled off the ground as Daniel managed to free himself from his attacker and kicked away, regaining his footing quickly enough. He barely had time to brace his feet before the Terror from Yersin Stronghold charged again.
A dagger flew out of the canopy above, courtesy of Regan, but the zombie avoided it without his concentration even wavering. Like the only other fight I'd seen between Terrors, they locked hands. Only this time, the newcomer was pushing Daniel back without much effort. Dirt and grass furrowed around Daniel's shoes before he finally braced a foot against the base of a tree.
The zombie bared his teeth and pulled, throwing Daniel in my direction. He windmilled his arms to try and right himself. I knew from first-hand experience that there wasn't much you could do midair, and his attacker was already starting another charge.
Even if my backpack hadn't been hidden a hundred feet away, my weapons were useless against this particular zombie. I could only think of one thing that would allow Daniel enough time to recover.
I dashed closer to Daniel's line of flight and slid into a defensive stance, snarling fiercely at the attacking zombie as Daniel landed nearby, the grass sliding under his feet and sending him rolling past me.
The zombie skidded to a stop, raising a lip in a snarl before pausing as recognition dawned in his eyes. He stared at me—not in challenge—but as if seeing something out of a dream.
Daniel appeared beside me, once again on his feet, with his eyes glowing furiously, but a particular kind of hesitance was also present—the same type a zombie felt when facing off against a higher-ranking zombie. The feral Terror's gaze barely flickered to him before returning to me.
His behavior wasn't something found in ferals.
But I'd seen him eat an entire mouse. I'd smelled the human blood on his breath.
My mind warred with the contradictions and impossibility of what I was seeing and had seen.
And...when had he changed into clean clothes?
It should have been impossible, but despite that, despite how such a thing would completely shatter the last unbroken zombie rule, I asked, "Can you understand me? Are you sane?"
His gaze moved between Daniel—who stood in a protective stance beside me, clearly ready to attack him if he charged me—and back to me with a growing expression of confusion. He slowly stood out of his crouch.
I wracked my brain as I tried to recall the name Nina had mentioned. Ethan. I must have been paying attention to have remembered it. Then again, he had been rather memorable, although not in what I'd call a positive sense.
"Ethan," I said, making him straighten in surprise and stare at me, "can you understand me? Or are you feral?"
"I-I'm not sure."
I wasn't entirely sure that was the response I wanted, but it answered at least some of my questions. "Okay... Why did you attack us?"
He gestured to Daniel, sounding more and more confused. "He was attacking you."
"It was a wrestling match," I clarified, still coming to terms with the strange twist of events. How was he sane? He'd eaten raw flesh and human blood! That was an instant one-way path to losing your mind in the zombie world.
"With daggers?" He sent a pointed look at the bushes beside him, which was almost certainly Regan's current hiding spot.
I shook my head and stood up out of my fighting stance. "Let's back up a second. You're from Yersin Stronghold, right?"
"Yes. You stopped there. My memories are blurry, but I remember you."
Daniel remained tense beside me, his eyes narrowing as he connected the dots and realized exactly what he had been tackled by.
I tilted my head, trying to make sense of things. "You were feral when I saw you. How did you end up all the way over here?"
There was no way he could have run this far, even at super Terror speed. And out of all the Strongholds in existence, how did he turn up here? The odds of that happening were right up there with a flesh-eating feral regaining their sanity. It was like this guy had found every scrap of luck that had evaded me all these years.
He took a deep breath and released it slowly, traces of grief now drifting on the air. "I lost control shortly after turning. I can only remember small flashes. The most recent memories were of you. I know you did something that helped me regain control, so I decided to try finding you."
"How did you find me?"
"After the...changes stopped, I started a truck and followed your tire tracks in the mud. I lost the trail not far from a Stronghold, but when I asked them, they recognized your description and told me you were currently staying here. I parked the truck down the road and was circling the area to see if you were around, then I saw him"—Ethan jerked his chin toward Daniel—"knock you to the ground as you fought against him."
Ethan's eyes glowed slightly brighter at the end in a silent warning that he probably wasn't even aware of. Seeing Daniel supposedly attacking me had definitely rubbed him the wrong way.
"Daniel is my friend," I said firmly. "He's helped me more times than I care to admit, and that was just a wrestling match." His lips pressed together, not entirely convinced, so I added, "Check the air. I'm not bleeding, and he's a hell of a lot faster than me. Besides, I would have drawn my weapons in a real fight."
"And where does he fit into this?" Ethan asked, looking at a clump of bushes that happened to be on the opposite side of the clearing from Regan's previous hiding place. Regan was clearly not getting a break in his attempts to be our backup.
I walked over to the dagger, not overly worried about an attack at this point, even though I couldn't completely take my eyes off the stranger. "I was trying to teach him the fine art of wrestling with higher-ranking zombies." I tossed the dagger to the indicated bushes. With his skulking rendered useless, Regan stood up to catch the weapon.
"I don't recall ever seeing zombies wrestle," Ethan said. "But now that I think about it, it definitely wasn't a First Strike match, nor had he been growling." His gaze returned to me. "What's your name, anyway? I don't think we've met, but you seem to know me."
"We only met once. I'm Trinity. That's Daniel and Regan. We found your name in the notes at the lab. You said you stopped at a Stronghold—how has your control been the last few days?"
"The bloodlust disappeared two days ago. Was it the controlex?"
"Yeah. It was the only thing I could think of. I'm still trying to figure out how you regained your mind. I would have hung around if I thought it was possible."
He shrugged.
Daniel finally joined the conversation. "I still recall my first week after turning and how hard it was. If you don't mind me asking, how did you lose control?"
Ethan winced and shifted his weight. "It was such a stupid thing. I had just turned and was on the way to the lab since I was having problems with the bloodlust. The kid had always been a brat, so I halfway expected it, but when he threw that cow pie at me, it was like I was hit by a wall of anger." He exhaled heavily. "I snarled at him, and he fell and skinned his knees. The smell of the blood... I don't think I'll ever be able to forget the look on his face, but even then, I couldn't stop myself." His hands closed into fists and jaw clenched as he stared at the ground, his face twisted in pain.
"Anger is unfortunately potent when newly turned," Daniel said sympathetically. "I also learned that lesson the hard way and killed without intending to, also shortly after turning. There isn't a way to undo it or make up for it, regardless of how much we wish we could or how much we try to help the Strongholds."
Ethan raised his head, blinking hard as if expecting tears that the zombie virus prevented. The two men looked at one another, and as if grounded by a common experience, they relaxed.
"Sorry about the scratches," Ethan said.
A quick glance at Daniel revealed shallow scratches on his arms where Ethan's nails had grazed Daniel's skin. Blood beaded to the surface in some spots, although most lines were just red marks.
Daniel shrugged. "No worries. They'll heal in a few hours."
Ethan rubbed the back of his neck. "There wasn't much I could do at Yersin, but I buried all the bodies and...parts I could find. I left the zombies there to keep people out and away from the lab."
"I think I grabbed most of the notes," I mused, "although I actually planned to go back today to double-check."
He frowned. "What are you doing with the notes? Don't make that new sanity serum. I just finished burying all my friends and family. No one else should have to go through that."
"Hell no. I gave them to Nina, Gerald's friend." I threw in the name since it would be someone he knew and continued to hammer my point home. "Nina is the one who created the original sanity serum, the controlex, the cure, and the vaccine. Those things didn't just materialize out of sparkles and unicorn farts. Besides, she's currently more interested in cleaning up the mess the airborne serum made."
"Mess? The serum calmed the zombies. It was a huge breakthrough."
"It calmed them for just a few days—then they went haywire. Did you happen to see that overrun stronghold on the way here? They got overrun by one—just one—of those unranked zombies. They've overrun a few other places as well."
He shook his head, not in disbelief, but like he was suddenly tying together a lot of things he had seen and was coming to an unpleasant conclusion. He looked troubled. "I saw that place and noticed some of the zombies seemed strange. One had a weird scream. Was it...?"
"Probably a regular zombie hit by the airborne serum. It messes up the virus triggers and makes them rather unpredictable. We've been calling them unranked zombies, and no, you aren't one."
He bit his lip. "Could I help? With the Stronghold gone, I don't really have any plans, and I'm not sure where I'm going. I wasn't able to find any survivors, and the two Strongholds I stopped at hadn't seen anyone."
"As far as I know, the only three that escaped didn't make it far," I said, leaving out the details. "We're not going to turn down that offer. Even with all of us here, we're sometimes hard-pressed to keep the unranked ferals away from the fence." Had I really just invited a stray to join our group? The world must have stopped turning or something.
"Nina is here too?"
"Yes. And considering you somehow regained sanity, there's a chance she will ask if you're willing to give her a few blood samples in hopes of helping the other ferals, although that decision is up to you." Normally I wouldn't have mentioned such a thing, but he had been willing to help the researchers at Yersin, and his blood probably held the keys to saving Wren.
He set his jaw. "I think that will lead to nothing but trouble."
I tilted my head. "What do you think we're going to summon that two Terrors, two Nightstalkers, and a very experienced and careful scientist can't handle?" I shrugged as if the matter were of no importance. "Either way, don't rush into it. You're welcome to tell her no. Others have in the past."
"Simply having another zombie patrol the area would be a huge help," Daniel murmured, getting the conversation back on track better than I had. "Trinity and I usually take turns guarding Nina while the other keeps an eye on the surrounding area. With you here, that would give us enough protection for one of us to check on the other Strongholds in case they got trapped inside by unranked ferals."
In the distance, a truck horn honked four times before music echoed through the trees.
"Where did she get this music?" I asked as some sort of rock and roll song started playing.
Daniel sent a wry look at the trees blocking our view. "I'm not sure, but I'm going to pull that wire if I find it."
I shook my head. "We might as well head over before they come looking for us." Glancing at Ethan, I asked, "Feel like meeting the others?"
"I guess..."
"Keep an eye on the redhead," I advised him. "She's clearly bored and probably has paperclips."
"Huh?"
I ignored the question and started walking. He'd learn soon enough.