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beach

"Mayb?" Maybe she hadn't heard him. That wasn't very likely at all, but he couldn't process why the alternative was even there, why she was still walking on or why Creedence was deciding now was the time to tail her still.

He'd taken one step forward and shakily began a second and third when Maebe's voice cut the distance. Once again, Dawson recoiled, but this time there was something wounded in his expression. "Why not?" he challenged.

Beach

Creedence was the fourth of six children and she was very, very experienced in tagging along even where she wasn't exactly wanted just to be a little s**t. Maebe received a bratty expression back and for a moment it wasn't the blonde she was thinking of but Jett. Pretty, popular, with a natural spotlight. Always a little unreachable, even and maybe especially to the younger sister that was so incredibly her opposite. Now, even more unreachable. She wondered if...

She tried to speed up a bit, limping as quickly as injury would allow.

beach

He'd only just found them again, and she wanted privacy in the middle of the goddamn zombie apocalypse? Dawson almost snorted but instead marched right after them, not quite as weighed down by his own injuries and easily able to keep up. All of them were, in their own right, stubborn as hell.

(Maebe's look of fear was a little too familiar.)

"Party Paladin," he reminded them as his reasoning, if a bit childishly.

He crossed his arms, as if somehow that would make him look both not so banged up and more confident than he honestly felt. "I can last," Dawson said with a shrug. "Ya'll the ones who need a doctor, so lemme know if ya need me t''carry ya or somethin'. Not sure f'the infirmary's really, uh, good place t'go right now, though..." There were too many infected hunters in the way, and for all they knew it was probably vine covered or worse. "Might wanna just take it easy fer a bit. I can fight off the biters f'they get too close."

Hopefully.

Beach

Something kicked Lex, but it was just Creedence as she passed, recognizing him from his icon as that one jerk.

When Maebe was close enough, she repeated, "I'm sorry." because whatever was wrong she felt acutely at fault and with no idea how to fix it. "Or whatever," and she rolled her eyes because who said guilt and sullen vindictiveness couldn't go hand in hand?

"I don't have any bandages, I haven't really done anything since getting here," she admitted to the sand at her feet.

"You're not carrying anyone." Maebe warned him, threatening to slap that wound on his chest if he so much as thought about it again. She rounded on Creedence, her eyes finally meeting the other girl's for a moment with a snarky wag of her finger.

"And you don't get to say sorry. You didn't do anything wrong. Except maybe walk away when you should have stuck by - wait a minute, I take it back. This is totally all your fault." She didn't necessarily accept her apology, but acknowledging it was enough for now.

"And neither do I. Get that guilty look off your face - I've been here two years. If anyone should have bandages, it's me. Which I don't! Tada."

Why was Lex on the floor? And where was her Orange Mocha Frappucino? It was TUESDAY!

[ Daycare Wonderland ]

Had anyone else chosen to touch Robert in any capacity at that moment, there was a high likelihood that Mimsy would have snapped and ruined everything she'd just tried to insist about her perception of good.

A hug from Alice, however, was something she both undeniably and infinitely approved of. It was also perfect, and became even more so when Robert's arms extended to wrap all three of them within it. She closed her eyes and smiled, so when Alice first spoke, there were only her words to focus upon.

'We all want to dream, but if everyone slept, then there is nobody to protect the dreaming.'

Something clicked within her then, so substantial that it was surprising when it was not audible. Choices that were made in denial of herself. Reasons she could not stay in Wonderland forever. The necessity of being a Hunter at all. Even the previous guidance that she felt certain came from Alice, which she followed without question in spite of the questions it rose, now fell into the realm of understanding: the drive to heal, the urge to protect, the strength to persevere for the impossible.

Believing that she was capable of more than destruction was much easier when she was granted the knowledge of a larger portion of the puzzle, a portion in which she had been creating and protecting for most of her life.

She opened her eyes to thank her for this, discovering that there was more that she needed to show them. Silently and respectfully attentive, she watched a world that had been swallowed by precisely the sort of destruction she feared she would cause, with death at every turn. The sight of it caused her to shrink back into the little huddle that Robert had created, concerned that it might very well have been something for which she was at fault.

Even when the importance of Deus Ex was reaffirmed, she did not quite come around - many of them so often seemed to oppose her, occasionally in ways she was not brave enough to confess, and it would not have been surprising if they opposed her again.

Then there was Robert, giving hope to the hopeless as he tended to, defending the life of their child, despite the approaching darkness. Her smile of appreciation was a bit pained, until she saw herself next to him; and when Alice appeared by her side, standing with them as they attempted yet another impossible thing, Mimsy smiled so wide that it split into a short, overwhelmingly happy laugh. Even Halloween joined them, reiterating their acceptance. And when the forces clashed, they proved to the swarms of the infected that they would not be overtaken, and that this battle would be won.

That she would be victorious in a battle against destruction that once seemed so hopeless.

'Fight to protect, not to destroy.' She memorized Alice's words, every sound and syllable, repeated them until she was certain that they would be permanently retained. She knew that she would need them, a reminder that would be sought in her moments of weakness.

"I will," she promised, drawing in a deep breath to steady herself. "I will protect and not destroy. I will no longer doubt that I am capable of this." Then, to Robert, whether or not he even needed the reaffirmation, "I will always be by your side."

She glanced behind them at the crib and watched him as he groggily reached towards the stars on the ceiling, and was smiling again when her eyes landed on Alice once more.

"I am immensely thankful for your continued guidance. I promise to endeavor to prove that you should never regret it, and--oh!" Wide-eyed, she clapped her hands together, and looked back and forth between the two of them. This is probably when she should have asked something first, but she blurted it out with confidence instead.

"Alice! I am naming you a godparent to our son. I simply must!"


Virus Count: 0
HP: 56

"It is a great honour," she reaffirmed, after Mimsy's outspoken proclamation, but I consider myself more a sister." It was meant innocuously, but it suggested for a moment, just perhaps, something else.

As they turned to leave, she took a white flower from her hair and gave it to Mimsy. "A good luck charm. May it protect you." Her form was tiny against the door and she would continue to watch them until the moved away from seeing distance.