Two roads
Chapter 14
*That same morning, before the scavenge.*
The trucks meant for Quan City idled at the barricade's edge, engines running rough after three weeks of sitting mostly unused. Chase stood by the lead vehicle doing a headcount he didn't really need to do — he already knew the number. A hundred and ninety, give or take, choosing the shelter over staying. Ten choosing to stay.
"You're really doing this," Chase said, when Kaito came to see them off. It wasn't really a question.
"Somebody's got to hold the mall down. Might as well be the people who already know how to survive it."
"That's not what I meant." Chase glanced past him, toward the ten gathered near the entrance — Leo checking his sidearm for the third time, Jason pacing, a couple of the others he barely knew names for yet. "You could come with us. Whatever's waiting in Quan City, it's gotta be better odds than ten people against everything still out there."
"Maybe." Kaito didn't sound convinced, and didn't try to sound convinced either. "But somebody made twenty-five trucks worth of promises to build something here. Feels rude to just leave it half-built."
Chase almost laughed. Almost.
Cinna found him a few minutes later, by the loading doors, arms crossed against the morning cold. "You could've talked me into staying, you know. If you'd wanted to."
"Could've," Kaito agreed. "Didn't."
"Why not?"
He didn't answer that one right away, and when he finally did, it came out lighter than it probably should have. "Because you deserve better odds than what's staying behind here, Cinna Clover. Go find your better odds."
She studied him a second longer than the moment really called for, like she was deciding whether that was a real answer or just a well-dressed way of avoiding one. She didn't push it.
"Fine," she said instead. "But if you're still alive next time I see you, you owe me a real answer."
"Deal."
Lana didn't bother with a goodbye. Troy gave him a nod that was almost respectful, which was as close to a compliment as Kaito figured he'd ever get out of him. Brad — staying, not going, still nursing the memory of nearly losing a hand to a soccer ball display — clapped him once on the shoulder and said nothing at all, which somehow said plenty.
By the time the trucks pulled away from the barricade, kicking up dust and the last of the morning fog, the ten who'd stayed were already turning back toward the mall, toward the work still waiting for them inside it.
Leo fell into step beside Kaito, watching the taillights shrink into the haze.
"You think they'll make it?" he asked.
"I think," Kaito said, "that's not really something either of us gets to decide."
Leo didn't have an answer for that. Neither did Kaito, if he was honest. But there wasn't much use standing around waiting for one, so they went back inside instead, back to the only thing that had ever reliably kept his mind quiet: work still left to do.
