(Untitled)

[whipfist]

Who: Alex & Desmond.
When: Thursday night.
Where: Sector 4.
Summary: Desmond gets caught outside while the sirens go off. Alex runs across him.
Warnings: Violence?!

Comments

[bleedaffected]

It wasn't something that had happened on purpose. Lacking a job or anything to really do with his life for the time being, Desmond found that he was slowly falling back into the same old habits he'd had the last time he'd lived on his own. That was to say that his day happened at night and his night was the daytime. At any other point in his life, this hadn't been an issue at all. And so, when he'd traveled out to pick up a few things that his apartment had started to severely lack due to excessive reclusivity on his part, it hadn't even occurred to him that he should have just waited until tomorrow.

Then the sirens had gone off. And Desmond got a very loud, very grim reminder of where he was.

Of course he'd been warned about the sirens, and the Darkness, and all of the terrible things that lurked within it. But none of it had seemed real until this moment, now that he was walking in it. To be fair, he hadn't really seen anything yet that confirmed the truthfulness of the stories he'd been told. It was the feeling. It was the

[whipfist]

Alex kept his eyes on the figure, fairly conspicuous in a white hoodie - stood out against the dark swaths everywhere. Couldn't tell if he was a civilian or another Newcomer. He looked fairly normal, something one couldn't say for a good amount of the new arrivals. Came from different time periods, countries, universes even. Yet whoever was walking down there could have walked right out of Manhattan. And maybe he was. From his Manhattan, specifically - there were others here who'd apparently come from New York yet never heard of the outbreak

[bleedaffected]

There was something in front of him, just beyond the next building. Waiting for him. Any other person probably wouldn't have seen it looming in the darkness, but when Desmond caught sight of the faintest blur of red, he stopped in his tracks immediately. His chest froze, and every breath became a pained rationing for air in an attempt to prevent any sound from escaping his person. A second passed. And then another. And through all of the blood rushing to his head, Desmond was able to finally discern that this thing was, indeed, waiting for him.

With a flick of his wrist, his hidden blade snapped out and into place. He let out a breath and took a step forward.

The thing lunged from its hiding spot and headed in his direction at full speed-- too fast for him to see who or what the hell it could've possibly been. It was all he could do to roll out of the way at the last second, to dodge in the same direction the thing had come from. Before he even had time to think, or the thing had time to turn around, Desmond was already up on his

[whipfist]

It was interesting, seeing how others dealt with these things - Alex was always curious of the inhuman abilities of others, though the man below didn't seem to have much on his side apart from - a knife? It was hard to see, but there was the glint of something metal in a streetlight. And then the stranger was going up, climbing to a roof with relative ease. A quick scan would reveal the man wasn't infected, though must have had some agility skills of his own. Either way, it had Alex's attention

[bleedaffected]

As Desmond got close enough to the other man to tell that he was, indeed, a man, he slowed his gait and eventually stopped. He wasn't so far as to not be able to talk to him, but far enough that he couldn't make out any distinctive features on him. A sense of trepidation touched at the back of Desmond's mind then, and it took him a second to realize that this guy, whoever he was, hadn't been waiting for him just to say hello. It took him a second longer than that to realize that the reason for it was probably that he still had his hidden blade out and at the ready. He retracted it immediately and held his hands up in a passive way and took a few steps forward in an attempt to reveal himself as being a person and not a monster

[whipfist]

His fists balled as the figure came closer, slowing to a stop a good amount of feet away. Eyes never left the shine of the blade on his wrist, figuring it couldn't do much more damage than a rocket exploding in his face, but Alex was wary nonetheless. He did attempt to avoid injury in the first place, despite his resilience. Brow furrowed, though with the darkness the way it was and the angle he stood it was unlikely the other man could see any of his facial features, and he waited. Didn't have to wait too long, though, as the stranger was immediately coming at him in a passive way. And... talking

[bleedaffected]

Desmond let out a breath that he hadn't realized he'd been holding and dropped his arms. There was something about this guy that was deeply unsettling, to be sure, but when his stance and demeanor shifted, Desmond felt at least a little better. And, really, in this kind of situation, he really couldn't afford to be picky about who he reached out to for help. If anything, he knew he should've felt grateful that this guy actually was willing to help at all.

"Not far," he told him, speaking quickly, but not too much as to not be understood. "It's a mile and a half up the road, maybe, if that. Normally, this wouldn't be a problem, but I think I might've pissed off the nighttime populace."

A terrible screech sounded off in the distance behind him then, as if on cue. Desmond turned halfway in its direction as an immediate reaction, but kept his muscles tight and his expression steady. His heart sank. Out in the darkness, it was impossible to see anything.

[whipfist]

Feeling slightly more at ease, Alex took some steps closer, keeping his eyes on Desmond. The arm where that blade had slipped out, and then his face. Well, if this stranger was in a state of nervousness, Alex could probably afford to chill out, yet at the same time - panic made people do some pretty stupid things. He listened to the directions given, a blink at the last bit.

Despite the sudden screech Alex continued to look at Desmond, barely taking note of it as he did so. After hearing such things every night for months, it was as insignificant as a bird singing.

He spoke up again, voice steady yet low as if to not draw more attention to themselves - "Then lead the way." A pause as he finally glanced into the stretching Darkness. Couldn't see much either, but he wasn't terribly worried.

"We might have some problems along the way, though."

[bleedaffected]

There was a tiny part of Desmond that really wanted to act on every one of the suspicions and feelings of paranoia that'd crept up on him regarding this strange man, but he squashed it for the time being in favor of survival instincts. He turned back towards his newfound companion, hoping that the gratitude he felt could be seen in the darkness

[whipfist]

He was silent. There was no need for small talk, at least not initiated by him; it would only make things awkward. A short nod was the only indication that Alex had heard him, and suddenly the other man was off, running across the roof. Not as fast as the virus could move, but not bad if he was just a regular human

[bleedaffected]

Desmond hesitated a bit, but held his ground all the same when Alex appeared in his face. The sudden closeness took the wind out of him a bit, as he hadn't been expecting the other man to be as fast and able as he was. At least, he thought that was what it was. Truth be told, there was something about the way this guy looked at him that unsettled him the most. Just knowing that this guy's eyes were on him like this made the entire nightmare of the Darkness that much more intimate, that much more personal. But it was that very on-edge feeling that kept Desmond locked into the awkwardness of that moment. When Alex apologized, it only made his heart pound faster. If Desmond didn't think he sincerely needed the other man's help to stay alive, he would've turned and ran as far as he could away from him

[whipfist]

At least he seemed ready to continue onward, and Alex had no problem with that. Watching him glance over at something prompted Alex to follow his stare, right upon another horde of monsters. Typical mutations, spitters, long-tongues. Alex would have gladly stopped to get rid of them but the stranger seemed to want to keep going; he followed. Attempting to keep himself from running too fast, to keep from raising any suspicion or

[bleedaffected]

The world was a blur around Desmond as he traveled, jumping lithely from rooftop to rooftop in hopes of outrunning whatever doom was chasing him down. There were things coming at him; something sizzled on the ground behind him just as he lifted his step. He decidedly ignored it in favor of focusing on the "road" ahead of him. The monsters that could climb buildings were doing just that, and Desmond cursed under his breath as the hidden blade came out again. He didn't want to stop moving, not even for a second, in fear of becoming completely overwhelmed.

There was one coming at him. Right at him. It was too far away yet for Desmond to discern what the hell it was, but it didn't matter. He steeled his nerves and readied himself for a jumping assassination, like he'd performed as Ezio so many times--

--until the very next second when something wrapped around his ankle and pulled, throwing Desmond to the concrete and dragging him towards the edge of the building to his right. Panic flared in his chest. He couldn't see whatever the thing

[whipfist]

Alex blew past him and had to skid to a stop as his current companion was latched onto and subsequently slammed to the ground. For a few beats Alex only stood and watched, pondering if he should help. Yet it seemed the man had it under control, despite obviously being on the receiving end of some pain as he stumbled back up. Contemplating then asking if he was all right, Alex was interrupted by a warning to "look out" - he turned directly toward the creature that had been running toward them, pulled his hand into a fist and punched it square in the face. With a squeal it flew backwards, some feet away from the impact and laid in a twitching, dying mass as it apparently bled out

[bleedaffected]

"Holy shit

[whipfist]

Well, at least they were close. Apparently. Alex was silent in contrast to Desmond's talking - he talked a lot. The irreverence was odd to Alex, though after months spent in the Port he could say he was growing more used to hearing the random shit people were wont to say aloud. He continued to follow, keeping aware of the relentless monsters that approached and hoping the stranger would survive the trip to his apartment. The pain he was feeling was rather obvious, written all over his body language - Alex himself had a fairly high threshold and thusfar in the Port he hadn't experienced any real physical pain. So there wasn't much empathy to give.

Still, it'd be preferable that this man didn't die on their little escort mission, so Alex kept his guard up. And good thing, as another mutation approached along the way - Alex simply kicked its head off in the most literal sense, barely breaking the speed of his run as he did so. Standard monster fodder, really, he'd just have to hold off consuming them until he was alone.