The Eden Projects (Book I)

Chapter 30. Soul, meet body.

- Zak -

"God." Zak left the truck. It sat huddled in a silent murk between two buildings. He had driven in and opted to go by foot when he heard the clicking that echoed in the darkness. "God if you really care... don't take him away. Not him too." The sound of his boots slapping against the pavement in rubbered thuds caught up with him. His mind was abuzz. "I know you're listening." He wasn't a believer, but for this, he would be. He would do anything. He would be anything. He would give everything. "Don't do this." He remembered Kaspers face; the feeling of trust he harbored and he thought in that moment, that maybe he didn't know his friend like he thought he did. This, he pushed away.

First he checked the buildings, shot down a flicker that drew too close, it got to its feet and ran into the night.  Then he made for the tower. The streets were a quiet sort of empty and the air felt alive and electric. The city was as loud as a birthing room, it was a sacred space. Things writhed and pressed at him. Even when he thought the creatures would attack, they didn't. It was as if they were waiting for input. To be told what to do and he wondered if it was because the Alpha had been culled. Were they a hive mind? Zak knew he was covering less ground than he could have if he had allowed Ace to come along but now that didn't matter. He had chosen.

He would go it alone.

When he reached the tower, he stopped short of entering. Blood soaked the floor and streamed out in rivulets into the downpour. Glass was whipped in all directions. One look and he knew. "He's alive." A sureness he couldn't explain filled him. A shudder ripped at his resolve and he turned back. It was all that mattered. He's alive and he's out here somewhere.

Moments stretched into minutes, minutes to the hour, and even then, he didn't stop. He searched cars, under outcroppings, in the rubble, upper floors and basement levels until his light had reached every recess there was to the small town. When he had circled back to the truck, slowly, he started it up. Time was a thing that slipped from his fingers. "As long as it takes." Time couldn't touch him. His hands shook as he turned the wheel and crept slowly down the streets. "Tell me where to go- just tell me where to go." His hand hovered over the radio. "I'll do anything. Anything." His headlights cut at the dark with a fostering warmth. Like the mere draft of it would coax the shadows into giving way.

He rounded the bend back to the churchyard, passing it in a crawl.

Please. His eyes cleared.

"Oh-" Zak's chest heaved and he threw the truck into park. For a moment he lingered. Watching the slump at the edge of the stairway. It didn't move "He came back-" so he moved instead and with a swing the door opened sharply. His feet carried him across the sidewalk so quickly that he battled the threat of tripping over himself through the grass, and over the fence. "God-"

He had found him.

Or what was left of the friend he had known.

"Kas- Kasper-" His knees met the step with a painful smack and he rolled the body over. "Oh God no-" Zak felt along the cuts and deep gashes that streaked Kasper's chest before resting his palm over his mouth. Trying to feel for anything that counted as a breath. "-you're alive. You're alive. Come on-" His breath was warm on Zak's palm. He cradled his head on his lap as he worked his own jacket off, throwing it over Kaspers waist. "You're alive-" He whispered. "I'm so sorry- I got here as soon as I could."

If it was possible, Zak had never seen someone alive, in the state Kasper was in. Black burns covered his back as if he'd been laid over a blaze and left to cook. The cuts laced around him like ropes were so deep that at their trenches, nicks in the surface-level bones were visible. Bruises covered him like violet blossoms against his already ghostly skin. It wasn't that he hadn't died, Zak surmised. It was that whatever made Kasper the way he was wouldn't let him die. That would have been mercy. The edges of the wounds writhed against the rain, trying their best to heal with tiny wiping tendrils that pulled against each other like zip-ties.