The Messengers of Sanctuary

24 - River

Chicory wouldn't be going anywhere for the next day, so even if they'd been ready to leave - which they weren't - River would still have had to be outside the fence with an unknown nightstalker for most of the night.

So River decided that it would be less awkward if he just did what he'd been doing before and explored the forest.

He contemplated just spending the entire night lurking in Chicory's room, but he didn't particularly like sitting in a room with a sleeping human for hours on end while his instincts tried to convince him to just eat the annoying girl. Perhaps they were backing off when it came to Chicory at the moment, but he didn't want to deal with it if they decided to be testy.

So River went outside the fence like a good little nightstalker and tried not to think too much about the fact that he was probably going to have to interact with someone during his leisure hours.

He found a rabbit to drain and left it for scavengers, and then he tried his hardest to stay as far from the stronghold as possible all night. Hopefully, the other nightstalker would get the hint and neglect to come and introduce herself.

River found a nice tree somewhere decently far away, it was easily climbable and it was good enough that even in the daytime no one would really be able to see him unless they knew he was there.

River stayed there for the rest of the night, half wondering if the other nightstalker would track him down after all, but it was quiet and serene.

He didn't return to the stronghold until after the sun had risen and Chicory was out on her morning run. He was quietly relieved to see that she was still fine, though his instincts were still rather cross with her for not being edible. It seemed that they did have a memory, though it was a very selective memory.

---

River sat beside Chicory once more, this time down in the lab. Chicory was no longer falling over herself with exhaustion, it was kind of impressive just how much her energy levels differed. Nina was currently holding them captive, grinning with unrestrained scientific glee as she described some weird parallels she'd found between heartfire and the zombie virus.

River didn't really care, he was mostly trying to figure out just from subtle hints that Chicory was dropping when they'd be able to leave already.

River was kind of wondering if she wasn't actually dropping any hints...that would be annoying if she wasn't since it was already getting his hopes up. If all went well they'd probably be leaving in just a couple of hours, which was admittedly sooner than he'd been afraid of.

The nightstalker walked in and River ignored her expertly, his instincts hadn't had a chance to size her up last time since he'd been forcing them to calculate the volume of a random cylinder, and so they did that immediately since he wasn't diverting them at the moment.

Apparently, the only thing they cared about right after that was the fact that he hadn't eaten all these humans before the other nightstalker appeared. As if they were saying 'Hey! See what I mean? Now you have competition!!! What were you waiting for idiot!!'

It wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been since the stupid things somehow remembered about the terror's presence, they were still salty about that. River simply shoved them to the back of his mind and sized up the nightstalker himself since his instincts hadn't done much besides scream at him for being slow.

The nightstalker held herself with experience, she clearly had been a zombie for a long time, possibly even since the outbreak. She neglected to look directly at him, but she was clearly studying him from behind her eye protection. She was older than him, but River would have been more surprised if she was younger than him. Zombies didn't quite age the same as humans, so River actually had no idea how old she was, just that it was more than himself. She had several weapons on her, probably a few more that River couldn't spot, and she wore nondescript dark clothing.

By the time River moved his attention back to the conversation, Nina had already finished talking about the similarities in the cells, in fact, she'd probably stopped long before the nightstalker appeared. Chicory focused on the new person to torment the moment she made the mistake of walking into the door, "Ooo, you're the nightstalker that everyone mentioned! Hi! I'm Chicory! Nice to meet you!"

She gave Chicory an odd look but didn't take much time to evaluate her, "yes, I'm Trinity. You seem...much more energetic than the last time I saw you."

Chicory nodded, "Well yeah, I had to make my blood glow, it takes a lot out of me every time. I don't think I saw you though?"

River sighed, "She was at the top of the stairs when I was dragging you to your room."

"Oh, did I ever thank you for that? I don't know if I did, well thank you, River."

River didn't respond.

Chicory glared at him, "You're supposed to say 'thank you' or at the very least acknowledge it."

She kicked his leg and he neglected to dodge it, but it connected with more force than he'd expected, stupid heartfire strength, it was throwing off his groove. River carefully didn't react other than to move his leg out of the way of any future strikes.

Chicory shook her head and focused back on Trinity again, "anyway, did Nina tell you why we're here?"

"Nicky spouted some nonsense about a different virus when I passed her on the way here. It doesn't really smell like anyone has a different virus." She glanced at River with a raised eyebrow, but he ignored the implied question.

Chicory answered for him. "That would be me and Zach," she gestured to the guy who was currently badgering Nina about something she'd mentioned. "We have heartfire. It's not a new thing, but Sanctuary never sent anyone this way so no one here's heard of it."

Nina gave Trinity a curious look, apparently, her conversation with Zach completed, "So you can't smell anything on them?"

River glanced at Chicory, but she simply seemed curious.

Trinity took a deeper breath and contemplated for a moment, River could tell the moment when she finally noticed it because she wrinkled her nose, her instincts probably noticing the inconsistencies. "It's faint, but it's definitely there."

Chicory blinked and tilted her head, "Oh, that's probably because the heat is really low right now, there's nothing for the heartfire to do. It probably reflects in my scent." Her eyes lit up, "River, did you notice anyone's scents increasing or anything when we were at Sanctuary?"

River leveled a stare at her, "I fail to see how you expect me to go around sniffing a bunch of people that smell very much human, all the while knowing thanks to your vivid descriptions, that if I lost control not only would I lose my sanity but my face would melt off. So no, I didn't notice anyone's heartfire scent increasing."

Chicory pouted, "Hey, we still don't know if heartfire blood would make you lose your sanity, maybe you'd just lose your face."

"We aren't testing that." River clarified, growling slightly.

"I find tests like that amoral, so I agree with River on this one." Nina interjected, "Chicory, you said something about the heat before? What's that?"

Chicory blinked as a pen and notebook materialized in Nina's hands. "Where'd you get those?!"

Trinity sat down, an amused scent coming off her, even though her face carefully betrayed no emotion. "Well, here we go again." 

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With every vote, Nina's notebook makes another appearance :D

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This chapter was a bit nonsensical to me while I was writing it since I was having a bit of trouble getting it down on the doc. But this was supposed to be the chapter where they finally left Ironwind. (River is very annoyed at me, as predicted)

But as our lovely author, Crystal Scherer always says "My characters frequently look at my plot/plans and go 'Nah. Let's go this way!' "

So really, the fact that they haven't left yet is their own fault.