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Series: No Day But Today
Title: Fair Trade
Pair: Kurt/Blaine (and they’re actually featured in their own fic, shockingly)
Includes: The Zombies!
Word Count: 6175~
Summary: Santana encounters someone in her scouting. Kurt finds a use for Cooper. People are lost and gained.
The horizon bled streaks of orange and red as the sun began its ascent. The hum of her bike in her ears, Santana sharply eyed the sky, the road ahead, the green untamed grass on either side of the asphalt. Then, a flicker. In the distance, Santana saw something moving. Her eyes narrowed into slits, and she leaned forward, slowing her bike to a halt. The figure was indistinguishable. Her lips twisted. She pulled out her crossbow anyway and held it aloft, waiting.
When the figure stopped walking, frozen in fear, she knew it wasn’t a walker. Just a different breed of danger, then. She weighed her options. If she left her bike... it could be a trap, or someone waiting to steal her ride. Or following the person who had caught her attention.
She turned her head around, looking for others, but the landscape was bare. She looked back to her first visitor and sighed.
That person was still frozen, but a walker was coming up from behind. By the time Santana got a clear shot at the thing, it would have its teeth deep in the person’s flesh. She whipped her head around once more, then dismounted from her bike, and began to approach.
The person-- from the size, a kid-- started to back up, frightened. At this rate, they would run right into the walker’s jaws.
Santana pulled her gas mask back and bellowed with all of her strength, “BEHIND YOU!”
The kid went still, then slowly turned, startled, and started to run in Santana’s direction. Then fell hard into the dirt.
“Oh, fuck.” Santana jogged forward, pausing every few steps to gauge her shot. She stopped in front of the person, spread her feet, and unleashed an arrow. The first missed, the second lodged deep into the side of its head. The thing fell to the ground, bones snapping audibly as it did so.
“Huh.” Santana looked around for more walkers and listened closely. “Are there others?” she asked the heap of laundry at her feet. When she got no answer, she toed the person with her boot. “Hey. Are there any more of those things?”
A bit of face appeared, peering up at her. A bright green eye. Freckles on caramel skin. The body shook, just as if a walker was breathing right down the person’s throat.
“I just fucking saved you, okay? I’m not going to hurt you. I need to know if you’ve seen any more around here so I can call for back up.”
“I-I don’t think so.”
The head lifted a little more. Santana could see the face was young. Lips cracked for want of water.
“C’mon. Tell me about the area, and I’ll give you a ride, kid.”
***
When Pippa finally went to sleep, Kurt went soon after. It had been a long trip so far. There was no sleep training a baby when you were on the move like this. He felt a bit like a bad parent for not even considering how Pippa would take what was happening, but... really. She’d just been a newborn for the last road trip, and slept most of the time anyway. And before that, she’d been snuggled inside him, and had seemed to like the bumps in the road back then.
Too soon, Kurt felt someone shaking his good shoulder, and he opened his heavy lids to see Santana’s face. They’d stopped, and the back of the tank had been emptied out, except for Nick and Saffire, who was making a bed of blankets.
“We need you,” Santana said.
Kurt nodded. He touched Pippa’s back, then moved slowly, slowly, taking her into his arms, and putting her down onto the blankets. She made a soft gurgly noise, but didn’t wake. Out cold.
“Thank you, guys,” Kurt said.
Nick laid down by Pippa and stared at her in amazement. Saffire rubbed Pippa’s tummy and sat back to watch them. Kurt nodded to them, then pushed himself up, waving off Santana’s help.
Outside, he leaned on his cane and approached the small cluster of people who had gathered by the road.
“What’s going on?”
“We found someone. There’s a settlement,” Santana explained. “He’s just a kid. He got lost from his group, but there is a group.”
“Probably one of the ones the Wastelanders have on their map,” Tianna pointed out, coming up beside them.
“Well, hon, I don’t think they’re gonna make it this far.” Santana tapped her gas mask.
“We don’t know that. I don’t know how long it will take for the air in that area to be safe again-”
“But it sure as hell isn’t now,” Santana argued.
“Kurt.” Tianna crossed her arms and looked at him.
Kurt licked his lips and continued forward.
“We have to warn them.”
“Do we? What if they’re awful?” Santana said. Tianna raised a brow at her.
Reaching the others, Kurt spotted Blaine talking to Mike and Tina. He caught Kurt’s eye and deepened the corners of his mouth in an ambivalent expression.
“Give me the full story,” Kurt asked.
“I ran into this little bean sprout on the way-” Santana pointed to a scruffy boy tearing into a sandwich under Burt’s watchful eye. “-and he said that he’d gotten lost. He’s from a settlement down the road.”
The boy wiped his mouth and looked up at Kurt. Thick, fuzzy black hair bobbed into his eyes.
“Does he have a name?” Kurt pressed, his lips curving.
“Jake.”
Kurt nodded, then came over to the boy, who stood and straightened himself, fearfully.
“Jake. Why don’t you tell me about the group of people you were with? Are they family? Did you really get lost?”
The boy touched the back of his neck, then sucked in a full lower lip. “I’m... I’m not really part of them. They don’t really want kids there.”
“I saved your ass and you lie to me? That’s not very friendly,” Santana sneered.
Jake’s brows shot up.
“So what do you know about them?” Kurt set his cane aside and leaned back against a dark blue mid-sized van. “Are they good people? Would you want to join them, if you could?”
“I mostly...” Jake looked down. “I would mostly want their... stuff...”
Kurt drew in a breath. “You steal their supplies.”
A few murmurs came from the onlookers. Kurt could hear his father talking to Carol in sympathetic tones. Others were not so sympathetic.
“If you stay with us, Jake, you have to promise to never steal,” Kurt said in a soft, but slightly chiding voice. “We have kids here. We have people who have to be protected. And we have some of the best fighters, I believe, alive in this world. If you’re going to stay, you have to understand that we are all in this together. We need a stable group to protect ourselves.”
“Are you the leader here?” The boy’s eyes had been darting around to the others all while Kurt had been speaking. “How old are you?”
Kurt screwed his lips to the side. “That’s hard to remember, sometimes. I feel ancient, actually.” He stared into the boy’s sharp green eyes. “I’m seventeen.”
Jake screwed his brows together and looked Kurt up and down. “I don’t think they’d take you either.”
“Are they violent? Do they hurt people?”
“No. Well, not unless they attack them first. They built up a fence... but I can always get in and out. But the fence keeps biters out, mostly. That’s what it’s for.”
“They should stick some walker bits by the fence. That’s a pretty good means of keeping people away, I’m told,” Tianna said dryly.
“So, we have a settlement of adults,” Kurt said. “All men? Women?”
“Just anyone who can fight,” Jake answered. His hand tightened on the sandwich, squeezing peanut butter out of the sides. “Are you gonna attack them?”
“No.” Kurt pressed his lips together in a line. “I’m gonna go say hi.”
“Kurt!” Deirdre protested.
There was some noise behind Kurt, but he ignored it, and with one look to Blaine, made his decision. They could convince the others that it was a small, and acceptable, risk. “Can someone wake our actor? You’re all going to be glad we kept him alive, now.”
***
“I hate this plan. Just so you know,” Santana said.
Blaine smiled, almost imperceptibly. She’d been reluctant to leave the group unprotected, but Blaine knew that they had to keep aware of other survivors. Where they were, how likely they were to try to take what was theirs-- ignorance wasn’t something they could afford.
“We know,” Andre answered. “Shut up.” He pulled the car up to the wall around the town and eyed it dubiously. “Shit. Get one good herd blowing through here, and these people are done.”
“I guess they didn’t pick up any construction workers,” David said. He turned to Cooper, who, despite being pale and having bandages hidden under his shirt and jacket, looked just fine, and stupidly handsome as ever. “Ready for your close up?”
“It’s the least I can do. Though I wasn’t the best leader back at my last group, if you remember,” Cooper said.
“You’re not the leader,” Blaine cut in. His smile had faded. “You’re Kurt’s proxy because these people are more likely to listen to someone who looks like you.”
“And I’m expendable,” Cooper added without sentiment. He turned slightly to look at the wall. “Only one look-out, that I can see. You think they have more?”
“Maybe.” Blaine checked his weapons before opening the door.
The one guard raised his gun and started toward them. “Hey! Step back!”
“You need more than one guard on at all times,” Blaine advised. “At least enough to cover the line of sight for the area around your fort.”
“I said stop!” The guard wasn’t a child, but he wasn’t old, either.
Not that many old people these days, Blaine mused. In their camp, it seemed like Forest Carol, and Burt were the old people. The thought was ridiculous. To be in your forties, and be one of the elders.
Cooper emerged from the car with a wide, easy smile and no weapons in sight. “Why don’t we all just put our weapons down for a minute? We come in peace, I promise you.”
The man looked at him, furry brows creased, and seemed to think about lowering his gun. Cooper slowly walked around the others. Blaine motioned with his head to them, and Santana, Andre, and David lowered their weapons, but didn’t put them away. They had to actually do what Cooper said, if anyone was going to believe he really was a leader.
“What do you want?” the man asked.
“To give you some information.” Cooper was close to him now. Charisma rolled out in waves from him. “To get some information. And if we can trade any surplus goods, that would be just swell. Understand, though, the information we have is more important right now. My people didn’t feel right, when they realized there was a little group out here, to just pass on by without telling you what was coming this way.”
Cooper stopped. “Could I talk to your leader? Would that be okay?”
“I um...” The man looked behind him at the shoddy fence. Then he scanned the area, like there might be more armed bodies out there ready to attack if he opened it.
“Why don’t you go inside and ask? We have a car and weapons. We can wait here, and if any undead monsters come along, we’ll blaze out and return when we’ve driven them off from your settlement,” Cooper suggested.
The man let out a slow breath, but then started to back up to the gate. He knocked on it, and a minute later, he disappeared inside. Cooper strolled over to the others.
“They’re meat,” he said bluntly.
“Don’t be rude,” Blaine said. “I mean, it’s true, but don’t say that.”
“Why not? No security, crappy wall...” Santana rolled her eyes. “How have they managed to stay alive in there?”
“If what Jake says is true? Luck and good fighters. They have people coming out whenever walkers come by,” Andre speculated.
“How many people are they losing that way?” David said. He shook his head and scanned the horizon.
“Andre, Santana, get back in the car,” Blaine said. “I want us to be ready to peel out of here if they decide not to be friend-”
The gate opened, and a tall man with a shaved head strolled out with six armed people behind him.
“Great,” Cooper said quietly. He strolled back over, giving each of the people a judging eye. Then he said brightly to the tall man, “How’s it going? Nice day.”
“Hm. Sergio says that you wanted to have a chat with me,” the tall man said, suspicion underlying his voice.
“It would be nice to be invited inside.” Cooper never stopped smiling. “I’m Cooper Anderson.” He motioned to the others. “That’s my baby brother Blaine-”
Blaine scowled at him.
“Santana, Andre, and David.”
“Alright,” the tall man replied.
“Do you have a name?”
“They call me Axel.”
Cooper tilted his head to the side. “I ran a camp that didn’t share names, once. I found I couldn’t trust the people who wanted to join a place like that.”
“Is that what you wanted to tell me?”
“Not particularly. Just sharing information, from one leader to the other. Being betrayed by your own isn’t my idea of a good time, not even these days. What you need to know is that you have two threats coming in from the east-”
“The bombs on the major roadways. I know this.”
Cooper held up a hand. “We ran into one of those destroyed roads, but this isn’t that. Have you heard of the Wastelanders?”
A few of the people behind Axel started to look uncomfortable, a few frightened.
“Right. So you have. Well, while my sister was being held captive by them, she heard them talking about settlements further west that they planned to strip. You should shore up these walls as much as you can. It should be a priority.” Cooper rubbed his fingers over his mouth and studied the fence more closely. “It’s not going to keep them out like this. We got rid of them by having a strong enough wall that they couldn’t just overrun it. They had to come in through the front, and we had our sharp shooters hiding in the tops of houses, taking them out.”
“And you think that will work a second time?”
“Well, they don’t know the strategy. None of them escaped. They were shooting off their guns, and it attracted a herd. The ones we didn’t kill, the walkers did.”
Axel lowered his gun slightly. “You’re really here just to give us information.”
“We really are.”
“And your people are waiting for you? Letting you leave, just to give us a heads up.”
“Well, that’s only the first part, but yes. Some of them are scared. Obviously. They wanted to keep going, but when the group was gathered together and given the options, many thought that we really had to let you know.”
“And...?”
“And of course, I wanted to see whether we had another group of Wastelanders out here to worry about. I see that we don’t.”
Axel made a scoffing sound. “We can hold our own.”
“Wastelanders don’t hold their own.” Cooper’s voice grew dark. “They steal your weak to rape, they strip your body of flesh to eat, they burn and destroy whatever they come into contact with. Not for survival. Because it’s fun. We took out a good chunk of them, but they have more at their compound. They must be getting desperate for flesh these days, to send that many for a little camp like ours. But everyone is wanting for food, I suppose.”
Axel considered this. He looked at the three standing by the car. Blaine realized that while Sergio looked young, had probably been in his twenties, every person here had to be in their late twenties to thirties. No variation. They were strong. Not young, not old. Those that had come for this mission.... well Cooper was the oldest by some. Andre next, and then three teenagers.
“I bet it hurt their pride to be taken out by a bunch of kids,” Axel said with a gruff laugh.
“We didn’t really stick around to find out. I suppose they’ve figured it out by now.” Cooper put his hands on his hips.
Blaine tilted his head to the side and marveled at his brother. Unarmed, and very careful to keep his body language open and friendly at all times. He was a better actor offscreen, really.
“Is your camp wanting for food?” Axel asked suddenly.
“We’re... okay. Not to the point of cannibalism, but we have some good runners who raid as we travel,” Cooper answered.
“And your people can build better walls?” Axel looked at Cooper directly.
“Are you offering something?”
“Maybe. Come talk with me about your other warnings, and we’ll see what we can do.”
Blaine’s brows raised as Cooper followed Axel on a stroll away from both groups, well out of earshot. Cooper wasn’t authorized to make huge decisions on the part of the group. For a reason. He looked to Santana, who pursed her lips.
“Your husband, I swear,” she said.
“You love him.” Blaine rubbed his thumb along the edge of the crossbow. “And we need to know what kind of people are out here.”
The remaining people from Axel’s camp spread out across the gate, as though that would keep the kids off their lawn. Blaine had to force himself not to laugh. Any single one of them could break into that place. And it was a large encampment. He couldn’t really even see how far it spanned, and he wasn’t sure why they’d choose to have such a large space to defend, anyway. It seemed like too much of a risk, just for more elbow room.
By the time Blaine was stretching and getting uncomfortable on his feet, Cooper and Axel came walking back, still chatting. Axel looked spooked. He must know about the gas now.
Axel signaled to his people to clear away from the gate. Blaine hurried to Cooper’s side before he disappeared again.
“What are you doing?” he whispered.
“Securing you people dinner.”
“No one is going to want to stop here to rebuilt this huge ramshackle fence just for some canned-”
“Enough. Put a muzzle on it already.” Cooper ruffled his hair. “Just trust me, okay? I won’t promise anything we can’t give.”
“I guess I should trust that you won’t team up with anymore rapist cannibals?”
“Not if you or Tianna aren’t on the line,” Cooper shot back. “Look, we’re going to do some more talking, but they’ll let you inside once it gets dark. Get on the walkie and let the camp know we’ll be back by tomorrow, and I’ll be on tonight to talk to Kurt about our alliance here.”
He turned to Axel and followed him inside. “Kids.”
Blaine raised his bow and pointed it at Cooper. The gate closed, and a few of Axel’s people laughed.
But it wasn’t a joke to Blaine. If this went south, they would have to run, these people would know where they were, and Kurt’s credibility as a leader would be undermined. Trusting his husband was easy. Trusting his brother... Blaine wasn’t sure he could do it.
***
It was some time later when the gate opened again, and Cooper came out by himself. Their guards went back inside, and Cooper approached them, shaking his head.
“It went badly?” David asked.
“What did you say?” Blaine demanded.
“It didn’t go badly, and I didn’t say anything stupid. A few of them recognized me.” Cooper pushed a hand through his hair and leaned back against the car. He looked tired.
“Recognized?” Blaine leaned in. “What are you known for? Because that’s usually not a good thing.”
“Not for stealing people’s supplies or raiding camps,” Cooper said with a bit of irritation. “They recognized me from television. It was a bonus.” He settled his hands on his hips, with his elbows hanging loose. “They have a better fence on the inside, blocking and guarding what might be the most precious resource in all of what was once Canada.”
“What’s that?” Santana crossed her arms. “Food? Stashes of supplies?”
“Not stashes. Fresh. They have a working farm. Growing food. Some livestock.” He paused to let that sink in. “I told them I’d confer with my advisors, but in essence, they want better security on the outside. A way to keep that farm safe. In return, Axel would be willing to trade food with us whenever we come by. I don’t know how much, but-”
“A regular trade? As in...” Blaine tried to wrap his head around that. “As in bartering. Between settlements. For fresh food.”
“Yes.” Cooper licked his lips. “The people who came out are armed. Inside, they don’t seem to carry. They have an incredible thing here, but they don’t know how to properly defend it, except to have people who can go outside of the camp and fight.”
“Well, let’s get the bossman on the walkie. See what he thinks.” Andre reached inside the car. “It’ll slow us down, to help them, but if they can hold this place...”
“We’re not thinking of joining them?” David asked suddenly. The others looked to him. “They have food. And a good trained force. Why is that not even an option?”
“Kurt was smart,” Cooper said. “They wouldn’t have taken him as a leader seriously, and they don’t take you guys seriously. They wouldn’t take in most of our people, even though, frankly, I think we have the better defended camp, overall. Even moving.”
“But...” David looked at the fence... the farm that lay beyond it.
“We’re not that far from where we need to be anyway. We wouldn’t need to join them. Just send runners in to get food and trade what we have,” Santana said.
“Where we need to be,” David muttered. “As if any place is gonna be safe.”
Andre handed the walkie to Cooper. “Let’s make a deal.”
***
Kurt tested the weight on his leg. He didn’t have to worry about appearing weak, not really. With the farmer-warriors convinced that Cooper was the leader, there was nothing at stake, other than them having further pity for their encampment of children and injured. These people were safe because they believed they didn’t need anything from them, aside from construction know-how, apparently.
David and Andre had taken the lead while waiting on the others to come. Now that they were here, they’d applied as many as they could of those who had worked on the wall of their former town. The others had been taken in and given a place to rest. The houses weren’t that particularly well kept, but a bed was a bed, and getting Pippa into a real-nonmoving bed was priceless. It had taken him and Blaine some time to get her to settle, but once she had, Kurt was free to join their fearless ‘leader’ and take a look at the kinds of trade they would be able to get from these people.
“We need a catchy name for them,” Kurt said, almost to himself.
Blaine chuckled.
“What? We have the Wastelanders, walkers...”
“What are we?”
“We’re the heroes.”
Blaine took his arm and snuggled his head against Kurt’s shoulder. “I’m so glad you’re mobile again.”
“More or less.”
“It made me worried. You not being able to run. It worries me that we still have people unable to, but...” Blaine shrugged. “You’re always my first priority. You and her.”
“I know.”
“I’d be a bad leader.”
“You’re perfect at what you do.”
Kurt turned to Blaine and touched his chin delicately. Blaine lifted his head and smiled. An old gentleness was touching his eyes. There were times that Kurt felt like he was a thousand years old. That he’d been a father and warrior for as long as he had ever been in this world, and their trials were simply endless. One fight after another after another.
Fight, mend, run, rest, fight, mend, fuck, run.
“What is it?”
“I’m just eager to be on our way.” Kurt kissed him softly. “But I miss touching you.”
“We sleep together every night,” Blaine teased. He wrapped his arms around Kurt’s waist.
Their noses nuzzled together. Saccharine sweet. Like the front of a sappy card. Kurt reveled in the moment, then their lips were drawn toward one another again, and Kurt couldn’t resist sucking in a lip, a brief slip of tongue, hot breath shared...
“Um...” Cooper’s voice interrupted them.
Kurt broke away first. He wiped the corners of his mouth, feigning innocence, and followed Cooper into one of the sturdier looking buildings with Blaine just behind them both. There was Axel. The size of the man struck Kurt first, both now and when he’d seen him upon entering the camp. The shaved head could be frightening, or just practical. His nose was broad, his brows thick, but not utterly untamed. Kurt wondered who had the time for proper plucking.
Maybe these people did. They were a little off the beaten path.
Cooper led the introductions, and Kurt kept looking around the room, considering what Axel might want out of this meeting beside details and strategy.
“I’ve been wanting to ask you something,” Kurt said.
“Have you?”
“The hills around this area. They keep the walkers from coming at you in force, don’t they?”
Axel’s eyes widened momentarily, and then his expression settled and grew friendly. “I’d never thought of that before,” he admitted. “It’s possible.”
“The fresh ones can probably make it up, and the crawlers can do it, very slowly if they’re motivated. But if you kept quiet, used weapons other than guns, they might just pass around you entirely here. It’s a good location. You need to defend it.” Kurt reluctantly parted from Blaine’s side. “So Cooper said you wanted to talk to me?”
“He said you might be the one to give us details about how you survived the Wastelander attack with minimal casualties,” Axel said.
“Oh.” Kurt touched his chest and shook his head. “Oh, God. They didn’t feel casual.”
Axel’s soft smile seemed strange on his face. “I’m sorry to hear that. I don’t think our group is as close as yours.”
“It’s too bad. The hits are harder, but we defend each other with everything we have. You’ve heard of the Spartans, right?” Kurt walked over to the table that had been laid out for them. He picked up a pen and started to draw.
“I’m familiar with the Spartans. Yes.” Axel came up behind Kurt, watching closely.
He’d been drawing intently for several minutes when Axel jerked away from him suddenly. Kurt turned to see Blaine facing him, lips curled back and his fists at the ready.
“Baby! No.” Kurt slipped in between them and wrapped an arm around Blaine’s chest, pushing him back.
“Your men follow you devoutly,” Axel noted. His big arms crossed as he looked down at Blaine.
“He’s not just my man. He’s my husband,” Kurt said shortly.
The meaning of Axel’s words sunk in a moment later, as Axel’s eyes had gone to Blaine’s hand, resting over Kurt’s arm. The ring there, the display of intimacy. This man had guessed that Cooper wasn’t their leader. Had he said anything to the others? Would it matter?
“You’re too young to have a husband,” Axel said. “How old are you?”
“Just this side of thirty-five,” Kurt replied automatically. Axel smiled again. He looked at Cooper, whose uneasy stance was clearly readable. Then he turned his eyes back to Kurt and Blaine.
“He was looking at you.” Blaine sounded a little ashamed. “And his hand...”
He knew he’d reacted badly in a touchy diplomatic situation. No need to scold him, now or later (unless it was for fun). The room remained quiet, and Kurt focused on Axel’s face, trying to read him for what would happen next.
“My apologies. I didn’t notice the rings,” Axel said finally. “If we could forget this incident, I would like to hear more about the battle.”
“I wasn’t the only one coming up with that strategy. I had the initial idea.” Kurt took Blaine’s hand and kept him close as he returned to the table. “You’ll want to talk to Andre and David, too.”
“David and I have already talked, a bit.”
Kurt returned to his drawing. “Our response to their attack was borne out of necessity. They outnumbered and outgunned us.”
“Our people are all well trained. Even our medics know how to fight,” Blaine said, a bit defensively.
Kurt petted his arm. “I see you have a well-trained group here, too.”
“We do. Not everyone really likes it here, though.” Axel peered over at the drawing, then moved himself to the other side, to avoid Blaine’s death glare. “I was wondering how much you would like to trade”
Kurt looked up.
“You’re not interested in staying. I can see that, and I’m not interested in taking on infants, cripples, pregnant women, and old men. But we do have some people who might prefer your way better, and one of our doctors expressed interest, seeing that you have a baby in your camp, and one on the way. I’ve had a few people from yours who wanted to come over to us.”
Kurt’s heart started to pound. “Really.”
“I feel that if we had deeper ties, a more longstanding trade arrangement might be reached. It’s easy not to trust people who you don’t know. Having people you do know in each camp...” Axel shrugged his head to the side. “It makes it harder to villainize them.”
Touching his neck anxiously, Kurt stared down at his drawing. He was almost afraid to ask. Blaine’s hands touched his shoulders.
“Who?” Cooper asked for them. “Who told you they wanted to come here?”
“David. Deirdre. Myra. I can give you strong, smart people in their place,” Axel said. “I know it might come as a loss, since your group is so close.”
“David?” Blaine choked on the word.
Kurt shook his head and closed his eyes. “He can’t stand to see Nick that way. Nick’s going to get better, but he can’t stand it, Blaine. You see how this has been driving him crazy.”
“Nick is his...?” Axel asked.
“His friend. One of his last, oldest friends,” Blaine supplied.
Kurt let out a slow breath. Loss and gain. “I’ll have a talk with ours. You talk with yours. I’ll want to meet these people before they come into our house.”
“House?” Axel asked.
“Moving or not,” Kurt replied in a clipped tone, his voice a little high for his own liking, “we’re creating a home. Deirdre has been miserable for a while, since Mikhail blew his brains out. Myra just never fit, and she’s lonely. We should ask Erica, too. It might be easier for her to start over with strangers.” Kurt found his words growing more detached as he thought about which people might want out of their group. “But Deirdre and Erica will need more weapons training. They can shoot, but they aren’t sharpshooters or melee experts.”
“That’s actually about all they’d need, if we choose to use them in the farms,” Axel said.
“But David.” Kurt gave Axel a hard look. “He’s an engineer. He would have been, if he’d been able to go to college this year. He has medical training, and shoots well. He’s a prize.”
“If you want to convince him-”
“We’ll talk to him, but if he wants to go, I want you to know what you’re getting here. Not just some stupid kid.”
“We’ll treat him well. We’re not the cold place your stand-in thinks we are. We just require a certain kind of force to protect what we have.” Axel looked at Cooper and pinched his lips to the side.
“When did you know?” Blaine asked. “About Kurt.”
“I suspected when Cooper started deferring questions. I knew when Kurt walked in the room, sized me up, and had your battle strategy from memory.”
“That’s not something easy to forget.” Kurt shifted his weight.
“It worked, initially. For short encounters, it would be wise to use your actor that way.” Axel suddenly grinned. He had so many big white teeth showing, it was a little unnerving. “I’ll admit, your group has thought of a lot of things we haven’t.”
“Hopefully, the ones who join you will be able to help with that. There’s no putting a price on this kind of alliance. And if we can get to the coast, and work out what we need... Maybe we can bring you back things you wouldn’t be able to get yourself, here.” Kurt shook his head. “I never thought we’d run into a group that actually wanted peaceful negotiations.”
“We had to get lucky once, hm?” Axel said.
“With your outer wall like that, you’ve gotten lucky more than once. I think I’ll call you guys the Lucky Farmers.”
Axel threw his head back and laughed.
***
Blaine’s throat was tight and his stomach threatening to spill bile everywhere. He watched as David held Nick tightly. Nick hugged him back, a little frown on his face, the way he often did lately when he knew something was going on, but couldn’t figure it out.
“You listen, okay? To Rafe, and Blaine, and Kurt. They’ll help you while you...”
“I’m getting better,” Nick muttered. “Why are you hugging me? It’s not Hugsgiving.”
Blaine covered his mouth as the memory of Hugsgiving, a Warbler tradition before everyone went home for Christmas break, sprung involuntarily to his mind. It sounded a lot more ridiculous, and gay, than it actually was. Just a potluck in one of the study rooms, and they all connected before leaving one another for a month.
“It’s a little Hugsgiving...” David looked down.
Nick blinked at him. Rafe started to move towards them, but Blaine touched his arm and shook his head.
“It’s not winter yet. It was just winter. Wasn’t it? It’s not...” Nick stared at David hard. “Where are you going?”
“I’m sorry. I’m... I’m staying here.”
Nick looked up at the place they’d stayed for the past week and shook his head. “Why? Why would you? They don’t have anything. They don’t have anything worth having.”
David moved to hug him again, and Nick pulled back. He turned and retreated to Rafe’s arms.
Blaine pressed his lips together, hard, and walked over to David. The others who were leaving had already gone inside. Myra had already hit it off with one of the women from the Lucky Farmers and hadn’t even stuck around to say goodbye. Kurt was right. Some people were just unhappy there, and it was better to be part of a group that was mostly self-selected. The new people who had joined them seemed strong and stable. Blaine had sat in on Kurt’s interviews with them, as had Burt and Van. Good additions. He hoped.
Now as he looked at David, Blaine found himself unable to even speak. He wanted to joke. He wanted to tell David that he wasn’t getting out of Hugsgiving with him... But that wasn’t that funny. They wouldn’t be seeing each other again at the end of winter break. They might not see each other again at all.
“I hate you,” Blaine said finally.
David sighed and gave him a half smile.
“I really do. I really hate you. But when you decide that these people aren’t nearly as good as sticking it out with your friends and family-” Blaine’s eyes filled up with tears. His throat choked on the words.
“Thanks.”
David stared at him for a moment, then initiated the hug himself. Blaine stood there, stiff and sulky. Nick had handled it better than this. Saffire, too. Blaine was like a five year old.
“We’ll be sending people, when we get settled. And if you change your mind...”
“I know.” David smiled. “I know. I’ll miss you guys.”
“Then don’t leave,” Blaine tried to joke. The laugh got caught in a half-sob.
“It’s not you, okay? That’s not why...” David sighed. “I’ll keep this place safe, okay? But I have to go. For me. I really do. I’m so sorry.”
“Stop being nice,” Blaine muttered. “I’m trying to hate you.”
Nick appeared by their sides suddenly and hugged them both together. “You’re so dumb, Dave.”
David laughed. “I am. I really am.”
“Don’t die here. Don’t,” Nick ordered.
“Don’t you guys, either. You find that magical safe place that Kurt thinks is on the coast,” David said.
“Off the coast,” Nick said.
“Off the coast? Whatever.”
“It’s not there, yet.” Blaine took a deep breath and just held onto them. Even though Kurt had explained it, he couldn’t grasp David leaving his friends, the last people he knew in the world, for strangers.
Then Blaine let go. David gave them each an individual hug, and a kiss on the head for Nick, then breathed deep and turned away.
As he disappeared into the Lucky Farmer fort, Blaine felt that whatever claim he’d still had left to childhood had just walked away.
***
There was blood splattered everywhere. Corpses littered the dock. Pippa was squalling.
But the boat was theirs. And they hadn’t lost anyone. It was an unprecedented victory. They always lost someone.
Kurt strolled along the wooden pier. The sun was setting. They needed to either get back in the cars or start clearing out the boats. But right now, he just wanted to see the colors bleeding into one another. The wide, uncluttered horizon, and the vast expanse of the ocean that reminded them that the world was just so much bigger than their personal horror here.
The hope of something free of this.
Blaine’s arms circled him from behind. Kurt leaned back into his embrace.
“I can’t believe we’re here,” he said. As the leader, expressing his doubts with a plan like this to anyone else was not an option. He’d had to tell people it was something he was keeping close to his chest, then later, that he and the builders of their group were absolutely confident would work, under the right circumstances.
He’d been not at all sure that their defenses would keep the many threats to them at bay. Walkers, yes. Psychotic deadly brain-exploding gas, maybe. Pissed off Wastelanders, no.
“It’s beautiful. Is it strange that the world can still be beautiful?” Blaine murmured into Kurt’s neck. “Other than you of course.”
Kurt laughed. “And the Peanut.”
“The Peanut is all that’s right and good in this world.”
Kurt turned his head and kissed Blaine. Kissed him aggressively, hungrily, letting his hands grab just as greedily, utterly uncaring if any of their people were staring. Their mouths joined and their bodies pressed together as though desperate to merge as they stood together on this blood-soaked pier that led the way to their salvation.
Title: Fair Trade
Pair: Kurt/Blaine (and they’re actually featured in their own fic, shockingly)
Includes: The Zombies!
Word Count: 6175~
Summary: Santana encounters someone in her scouting. Kurt finds a use for Cooper. People are lost and gained.
The horizon bled streaks of orange and red as the sun began its ascent. The hum of her bike in her ears, Santana sharply eyed the sky, the road ahead, the green untamed grass on either side of the asphalt. Then, a flicker. In the distance, Santana saw something moving. Her eyes narrowed into slits, and she leaned forward, slowing her bike to a halt. The figure was indistinguishable. Her lips twisted. She pulled out her crossbow anyway and held it aloft, waiting.
When the figure stopped walking, frozen in fear, she knew it wasn’t a walker. Just a different breed of danger, then. She weighed her options. If she left her bike... it could be a trap, or someone waiting to steal her ride. Or following the person who had caught her attention.
She turned her head around, looking for others, but the landscape was bare. She looked back to her first visitor and sighed.
That person was still frozen, but a walker was coming up from behind. By the time Santana got a clear shot at the thing, it would have its teeth deep in the person’s flesh. She whipped her head around once more, then dismounted from her bike, and began to approach.
The person-- from the size, a kid-- started to back up, frightened. At this rate, they would run right into the walker’s jaws.
Santana pulled her gas mask back and bellowed with all of her strength, “BEHIND YOU!”
The kid went still, then slowly turned, startled, and started to run in Santana’s direction. Then fell hard into the dirt.
“Oh, fuck.” Santana jogged forward, pausing every few steps to gauge her shot. She stopped in front of the person, spread her feet, and unleashed an arrow. The first missed, the second lodged deep into the side of its head. The thing fell to the ground, bones snapping audibly as it did so.
“Huh.” Santana looked around for more walkers and listened closely. “Are there others?” she asked the heap of laundry at her feet. When she got no answer, she toed the person with her boot. “Hey. Are there any more of those things?”
A bit of face appeared, peering up at her. A bright green eye. Freckles on caramel skin. The body shook, just as if a walker was breathing right down the person’s throat.
“I just fucking saved you, okay? I’m not going to hurt you. I need to know if you’ve seen any more around here so I can call for back up.”
“I-I don’t think so.”
The head lifted a little more. Santana could see the face was young. Lips cracked for want of water.
“C’mon. Tell me about the area, and I’ll give you a ride, kid.”
When Pippa finally went to sleep, Kurt went soon after. It had been a long trip so far. There was no sleep training a baby when you were on the move like this. He felt a bit like a bad parent for not even considering how Pippa would take what was happening, but... really. She’d just been a newborn for the last road trip, and slept most of the time anyway. And before that, she’d been snuggled inside him, and had seemed to like the bumps in the road back then.
Too soon, Kurt felt someone shaking his good shoulder, and he opened his heavy lids to see Santana’s face. They’d stopped, and the back of the tank had been emptied out, except for Nick and Saffire, who was making a bed of blankets.
“We need you,” Santana said.
Kurt nodded. He touched Pippa’s back, then moved slowly, slowly, taking her into his arms, and putting her down onto the blankets. She made a soft gurgly noise, but didn’t wake. Out cold.
“Thank you, guys,” Kurt said.
Nick laid down by Pippa and stared at her in amazement. Saffire rubbed Pippa’s tummy and sat back to watch them. Kurt nodded to them, then pushed himself up, waving off Santana’s help.
Outside, he leaned on his cane and approached the small cluster of people who had gathered by the road.
“What’s going on?”
“We found someone. There’s a settlement,” Santana explained. “He’s just a kid. He got lost from his group, but there is a group.”
“Probably one of the ones the Wastelanders have on their map,” Tianna pointed out, coming up beside them.
“Well, hon, I don’t think they’re gonna make it this far.” Santana tapped her gas mask.
“We don’t know that. I don’t know how long it will take for the air in that area to be safe again-”
“But it sure as hell isn’t now,” Santana argued.
“Kurt.” Tianna crossed her arms and looked at him.
Kurt licked his lips and continued forward.
“We have to warn them.”
“Do we? What if they’re awful?” Santana said. Tianna raised a brow at her.
Reaching the others, Kurt spotted Blaine talking to Mike and Tina. He caught Kurt’s eye and deepened the corners of his mouth in an ambivalent expression.
“Give me the full story,” Kurt asked.
“I ran into this little bean sprout on the way-” Santana pointed to a scruffy boy tearing into a sandwich under Burt’s watchful eye. “-and he said that he’d gotten lost. He’s from a settlement down the road.”
The boy wiped his mouth and looked up at Kurt. Thick, fuzzy black hair bobbed into his eyes.
“Does he have a name?” Kurt pressed, his lips curving.
“Jake.”
Kurt nodded, then came over to the boy, who stood and straightened himself, fearfully.
“Jake. Why don’t you tell me about the group of people you were with? Are they family? Did you really get lost?”
The boy touched the back of his neck, then sucked in a full lower lip. “I’m... I’m not really part of them. They don’t really want kids there.”
“I saved your ass and you lie to me? That’s not very friendly,” Santana sneered.
Jake’s brows shot up.
“So what do you know about them?” Kurt set his cane aside and leaned back against a dark blue mid-sized van. “Are they good people? Would you want to join them, if you could?”
“I mostly...” Jake looked down. “I would mostly want their... stuff...”
Kurt drew in a breath. “You steal their supplies.”
A few murmurs came from the onlookers. Kurt could hear his father talking to Carol in sympathetic tones. Others were not so sympathetic.
“If you stay with us, Jake, you have to promise to never steal,” Kurt said in a soft, but slightly chiding voice. “We have kids here. We have people who have to be protected. And we have some of the best fighters, I believe, alive in this world. If you’re going to stay, you have to understand that we are all in this together. We need a stable group to protect ourselves.”
“Are you the leader here?” The boy’s eyes had been darting around to the others all while Kurt had been speaking. “How old are you?”
Kurt screwed his lips to the side. “That’s hard to remember, sometimes. I feel ancient, actually.” He stared into the boy’s sharp green eyes. “I’m seventeen.”
Jake screwed his brows together and looked Kurt up and down. “I don’t think they’d take you either.”
“Are they violent? Do they hurt people?”
“No. Well, not unless they attack them first. They built up a fence... but I can always get in and out. But the fence keeps biters out, mostly. That’s what it’s for.”
“They should stick some walker bits by the fence. That’s a pretty good means of keeping people away, I’m told,” Tianna said dryly.
“So, we have a settlement of adults,” Kurt said. “All men? Women?”
“Just anyone who can fight,” Jake answered. His hand tightened on the sandwich, squeezing peanut butter out of the sides. “Are you gonna attack them?”
“No.” Kurt pressed his lips together in a line. “I’m gonna go say hi.”
“Kurt!” Deirdre protested.
There was some noise behind Kurt, but he ignored it, and with one look to Blaine, made his decision. They could convince the others that it was a small, and acceptable, risk. “Can someone wake our actor? You’re all going to be glad we kept him alive, now.”
“I hate this plan. Just so you know,” Santana said.
Blaine smiled, almost imperceptibly. She’d been reluctant to leave the group unprotected, but Blaine knew that they had to keep aware of other survivors. Where they were, how likely they were to try to take what was theirs-- ignorance wasn’t something they could afford.
“We know,” Andre answered. “Shut up.” He pulled the car up to the wall around the town and eyed it dubiously. “Shit. Get one good herd blowing through here, and these people are done.”
“I guess they didn’t pick up any construction workers,” David said. He turned to Cooper, who, despite being pale and having bandages hidden under his shirt and jacket, looked just fine, and stupidly handsome as ever. “Ready for your close up?”
“It’s the least I can do. Though I wasn’t the best leader back at my last group, if you remember,” Cooper said.
“You’re not the leader,” Blaine cut in. His smile had faded. “You’re Kurt’s proxy because these people are more likely to listen to someone who looks like you.”
“And I’m expendable,” Cooper added without sentiment. He turned slightly to look at the wall. “Only one look-out, that I can see. You think they have more?”
“Maybe.” Blaine checked his weapons before opening the door.
The one guard raised his gun and started toward them. “Hey! Step back!”
“You need more than one guard on at all times,” Blaine advised. “At least enough to cover the line of sight for the area around your fort.”
“I said stop!” The guard wasn’t a child, but he wasn’t old, either.
Not that many old people these days, Blaine mused. In their camp, it seemed like Forest Carol, and Burt were the old people. The thought was ridiculous. To be in your forties, and be one of the elders.
Cooper emerged from the car with a wide, easy smile and no weapons in sight. “Why don’t we all just put our weapons down for a minute? We come in peace, I promise you.”
The man looked at him, furry brows creased, and seemed to think about lowering his gun. Cooper slowly walked around the others. Blaine motioned with his head to them, and Santana, Andre, and David lowered their weapons, but didn’t put them away. They had to actually do what Cooper said, if anyone was going to believe he really was a leader.
“What do you want?” the man asked.
“To give you some information.” Cooper was close to him now. Charisma rolled out in waves from him. “To get some information. And if we can trade any surplus goods, that would be just swell. Understand, though, the information we have is more important right now. My people didn’t feel right, when they realized there was a little group out here, to just pass on by without telling you what was coming this way.”
Cooper stopped. “Could I talk to your leader? Would that be okay?”
“I um...” The man looked behind him at the shoddy fence. Then he scanned the area, like there might be more armed bodies out there ready to attack if he opened it.
“Why don’t you go inside and ask? We have a car and weapons. We can wait here, and if any undead monsters come along, we’ll blaze out and return when we’ve driven them off from your settlement,” Cooper suggested.
The man let out a slow breath, but then started to back up to the gate. He knocked on it, and a minute later, he disappeared inside. Cooper strolled over to the others.
“They’re meat,” he said bluntly.
“Don’t be rude,” Blaine said. “I mean, it’s true, but don’t say that.”
“Why not? No security, crappy wall...” Santana rolled her eyes. “How have they managed to stay alive in there?”
“If what Jake says is true? Luck and good fighters. They have people coming out whenever walkers come by,” Andre speculated.
“How many people are they losing that way?” David said. He shook his head and scanned the horizon.
“Andre, Santana, get back in the car,” Blaine said. “I want us to be ready to peel out of here if they decide not to be friend-”
The gate opened, and a tall man with a shaved head strolled out with six armed people behind him.
“Great,” Cooper said quietly. He strolled back over, giving each of the people a judging eye. Then he said brightly to the tall man, “How’s it going? Nice day.”
“Hm. Sergio says that you wanted to have a chat with me,” the tall man said, suspicion underlying his voice.
“It would be nice to be invited inside.” Cooper never stopped smiling. “I’m Cooper Anderson.” He motioned to the others. “That’s my baby brother Blaine-”
Blaine scowled at him.
“Santana, Andre, and David.”
“Alright,” the tall man replied.
“Do you have a name?”
“They call me Axel.”
Cooper tilted his head to the side. “I ran a camp that didn’t share names, once. I found I couldn’t trust the people who wanted to join a place like that.”
“Is that what you wanted to tell me?”
“Not particularly. Just sharing information, from one leader to the other. Being betrayed by your own isn’t my idea of a good time, not even these days. What you need to know is that you have two threats coming in from the east-”
“The bombs on the major roadways. I know this.”
Cooper held up a hand. “We ran into one of those destroyed roads, but this isn’t that. Have you heard of the Wastelanders?”
A few of the people behind Axel started to look uncomfortable, a few frightened.
“Right. So you have. Well, while my sister was being held captive by them, she heard them talking about settlements further west that they planned to strip. You should shore up these walls as much as you can. It should be a priority.” Cooper rubbed his fingers over his mouth and studied the fence more closely. “It’s not going to keep them out like this. We got rid of them by having a strong enough wall that they couldn’t just overrun it. They had to come in through the front, and we had our sharp shooters hiding in the tops of houses, taking them out.”
“And you think that will work a second time?”
“Well, they don’t know the strategy. None of them escaped. They were shooting off their guns, and it attracted a herd. The ones we didn’t kill, the walkers did.”
Axel lowered his gun slightly. “You’re really here just to give us information.”
“We really are.”
“And your people are waiting for you? Letting you leave, just to give us a heads up.”
“Well, that’s only the first part, but yes. Some of them are scared. Obviously. They wanted to keep going, but when the group was gathered together and given the options, many thought that we really had to let you know.”
“And...?”
“And of course, I wanted to see whether we had another group of Wastelanders out here to worry about. I see that we don’t.”
Axel made a scoffing sound. “We can hold our own.”
“Wastelanders don’t hold their own.” Cooper’s voice grew dark. “They steal your weak to rape, they strip your body of flesh to eat, they burn and destroy whatever they come into contact with. Not for survival. Because it’s fun. We took out a good chunk of them, but they have more at their compound. They must be getting desperate for flesh these days, to send that many for a little camp like ours. But everyone is wanting for food, I suppose.”
Axel considered this. He looked at the three standing by the car. Blaine realized that while Sergio looked young, had probably been in his twenties, every person here had to be in their late twenties to thirties. No variation. They were strong. Not young, not old. Those that had come for this mission.... well Cooper was the oldest by some. Andre next, and then three teenagers.
“I bet it hurt their pride to be taken out by a bunch of kids,” Axel said with a gruff laugh.
“We didn’t really stick around to find out. I suppose they’ve figured it out by now.” Cooper put his hands on his hips.
Blaine tilted his head to the side and marveled at his brother. Unarmed, and very careful to keep his body language open and friendly at all times. He was a better actor offscreen, really.
“Is your camp wanting for food?” Axel asked suddenly.
“We’re... okay. Not to the point of cannibalism, but we have some good runners who raid as we travel,” Cooper answered.
“And your people can build better walls?” Axel looked at Cooper directly.
“Are you offering something?”
“Maybe. Come talk with me about your other warnings, and we’ll see what we can do.”
Blaine’s brows raised as Cooper followed Axel on a stroll away from both groups, well out of earshot. Cooper wasn’t authorized to make huge decisions on the part of the group. For a reason. He looked to Santana, who pursed her lips.
“Your husband, I swear,” she said.
“You love him.” Blaine rubbed his thumb along the edge of the crossbow. “And we need to know what kind of people are out here.”
The remaining people from Axel’s camp spread out across the gate, as though that would keep the kids off their lawn. Blaine had to force himself not to laugh. Any single one of them could break into that place. And it was a large encampment. He couldn’t really even see how far it spanned, and he wasn’t sure why they’d choose to have such a large space to defend, anyway. It seemed like too much of a risk, just for more elbow room.
By the time Blaine was stretching and getting uncomfortable on his feet, Cooper and Axel came walking back, still chatting. Axel looked spooked. He must know about the gas now.
Axel signaled to his people to clear away from the gate. Blaine hurried to Cooper’s side before he disappeared again.
“What are you doing?” he whispered.
“Securing you people dinner.”
“No one is going to want to stop here to rebuilt this huge ramshackle fence just for some canned-”
“Enough. Put a muzzle on it already.” Cooper ruffled his hair. “Just trust me, okay? I won’t promise anything we can’t give.”
“I guess I should trust that you won’t team up with anymore rapist cannibals?”
“Not if you or Tianna aren’t on the line,” Cooper shot back. “Look, we’re going to do some more talking, but they’ll let you inside once it gets dark. Get on the walkie and let the camp know we’ll be back by tomorrow, and I’ll be on tonight to talk to Kurt about our alliance here.”
He turned to Axel and followed him inside. “Kids.”
Blaine raised his bow and pointed it at Cooper. The gate closed, and a few of Axel’s people laughed.
But it wasn’t a joke to Blaine. If this went south, they would have to run, these people would know where they were, and Kurt’s credibility as a leader would be undermined. Trusting his husband was easy. Trusting his brother... Blaine wasn’t sure he could do it.
It was some time later when the gate opened again, and Cooper came out by himself. Their guards went back inside, and Cooper approached them, shaking his head.
“It went badly?” David asked.
“What did you say?” Blaine demanded.
“It didn’t go badly, and I didn’t say anything stupid. A few of them recognized me.” Cooper pushed a hand through his hair and leaned back against the car. He looked tired.
“Recognized?” Blaine leaned in. “What are you known for? Because that’s usually not a good thing.”
“Not for stealing people’s supplies or raiding camps,” Cooper said with a bit of irritation. “They recognized me from television. It was a bonus.” He settled his hands on his hips, with his elbows hanging loose. “They have a better fence on the inside, blocking and guarding what might be the most precious resource in all of what was once Canada.”
“What’s that?” Santana crossed her arms. “Food? Stashes of supplies?”
“Not stashes. Fresh. They have a working farm. Growing food. Some livestock.” He paused to let that sink in. “I told them I’d confer with my advisors, but in essence, they want better security on the outside. A way to keep that farm safe. In return, Axel would be willing to trade food with us whenever we come by. I don’t know how much, but-”
“A regular trade? As in...” Blaine tried to wrap his head around that. “As in bartering. Between settlements. For fresh food.”
“Yes.” Cooper licked his lips. “The people who came out are armed. Inside, they don’t seem to carry. They have an incredible thing here, but they don’t know how to properly defend it, except to have people who can go outside of the camp and fight.”
“Well, let’s get the bossman on the walkie. See what he thinks.” Andre reached inside the car. “It’ll slow us down, to help them, but if they can hold this place...”
“We’re not thinking of joining them?” David asked suddenly. The others looked to him. “They have food. And a good trained force. Why is that not even an option?”
“Kurt was smart,” Cooper said. “They wouldn’t have taken him as a leader seriously, and they don’t take you guys seriously. They wouldn’t take in most of our people, even though, frankly, I think we have the better defended camp, overall. Even moving.”
“But...” David looked at the fence... the farm that lay beyond it.
“We’re not that far from where we need to be anyway. We wouldn’t need to join them. Just send runners in to get food and trade what we have,” Santana said.
“Where we need to be,” David muttered. “As if any place is gonna be safe.”
Andre handed the walkie to Cooper. “Let’s make a deal.”
Kurt tested the weight on his leg. He didn’t have to worry about appearing weak, not really. With the farmer-warriors convinced that Cooper was the leader, there was nothing at stake, other than them having further pity for their encampment of children and injured. These people were safe because they believed they didn’t need anything from them, aside from construction know-how, apparently.
David and Andre had taken the lead while waiting on the others to come. Now that they were here, they’d applied as many as they could of those who had worked on the wall of their former town. The others had been taken in and given a place to rest. The houses weren’t that particularly well kept, but a bed was a bed, and getting Pippa into a real-nonmoving bed was priceless. It had taken him and Blaine some time to get her to settle, but once she had, Kurt was free to join their fearless ‘leader’ and take a look at the kinds of trade they would be able to get from these people.
“We need a catchy name for them,” Kurt said, almost to himself.
Blaine chuckled.
“What? We have the Wastelanders, walkers...”
“What are we?”
“We’re the heroes.”
Blaine took his arm and snuggled his head against Kurt’s shoulder. “I’m so glad you’re mobile again.”
“More or less.”
“It made me worried. You not being able to run. It worries me that we still have people unable to, but...” Blaine shrugged. “You’re always my first priority. You and her.”
“I know.”
“I’d be a bad leader.”
“You’re perfect at what you do.”
Kurt turned to Blaine and touched his chin delicately. Blaine lifted his head and smiled. An old gentleness was touching his eyes. There were times that Kurt felt like he was a thousand years old. That he’d been a father and warrior for as long as he had ever been in this world, and their trials were simply endless. One fight after another after another.
Fight, mend, run, rest, fight, mend, fuck, run.
“What is it?”
“I’m just eager to be on our way.” Kurt kissed him softly. “But I miss touching you.”
“We sleep together every night,” Blaine teased. He wrapped his arms around Kurt’s waist.
Their noses nuzzled together. Saccharine sweet. Like the front of a sappy card. Kurt reveled in the moment, then their lips were drawn toward one another again, and Kurt couldn’t resist sucking in a lip, a brief slip of tongue, hot breath shared...
“Um...” Cooper’s voice interrupted them.
Kurt broke away first. He wiped the corners of his mouth, feigning innocence, and followed Cooper into one of the sturdier looking buildings with Blaine just behind them both. There was Axel. The size of the man struck Kurt first, both now and when he’d seen him upon entering the camp. The shaved head could be frightening, or just practical. His nose was broad, his brows thick, but not utterly untamed. Kurt wondered who had the time for proper plucking.
Maybe these people did. They were a little off the beaten path.
Cooper led the introductions, and Kurt kept looking around the room, considering what Axel might want out of this meeting beside details and strategy.
“I’ve been wanting to ask you something,” Kurt said.
“Have you?”
“The hills around this area. They keep the walkers from coming at you in force, don’t they?”
Axel’s eyes widened momentarily, and then his expression settled and grew friendly. “I’d never thought of that before,” he admitted. “It’s possible.”
“The fresh ones can probably make it up, and the crawlers can do it, very slowly if they’re motivated. But if you kept quiet, used weapons other than guns, they might just pass around you entirely here. It’s a good location. You need to defend it.” Kurt reluctantly parted from Blaine’s side. “So Cooper said you wanted to talk to me?”
“He said you might be the one to give us details about how you survived the Wastelander attack with minimal casualties,” Axel said.
“Oh.” Kurt touched his chest and shook his head. “Oh, God. They didn’t feel casual.”
Axel’s soft smile seemed strange on his face. “I’m sorry to hear that. I don’t think our group is as close as yours.”
“It’s too bad. The hits are harder, but we defend each other with everything we have. You’ve heard of the Spartans, right?” Kurt walked over to the table that had been laid out for them. He picked up a pen and started to draw.
“I’m familiar with the Spartans. Yes.” Axel came up behind Kurt, watching closely.
He’d been drawing intently for several minutes when Axel jerked away from him suddenly. Kurt turned to see Blaine facing him, lips curled back and his fists at the ready.
“Baby! No.” Kurt slipped in between them and wrapped an arm around Blaine’s chest, pushing him back.
“Your men follow you devoutly,” Axel noted. His big arms crossed as he looked down at Blaine.
“He’s not just my man. He’s my husband,” Kurt said shortly.
The meaning of Axel’s words sunk in a moment later, as Axel’s eyes had gone to Blaine’s hand, resting over Kurt’s arm. The ring there, the display of intimacy. This man had guessed that Cooper wasn’t their leader. Had he said anything to the others? Would it matter?
“You’re too young to have a husband,” Axel said. “How old are you?”
“Just this side of thirty-five,” Kurt replied automatically. Axel smiled again. He looked at Cooper, whose uneasy stance was clearly readable. Then he turned his eyes back to Kurt and Blaine.
“He was looking at you.” Blaine sounded a little ashamed. “And his hand...”
He knew he’d reacted badly in a touchy diplomatic situation. No need to scold him, now or later (unless it was for fun). The room remained quiet, and Kurt focused on Axel’s face, trying to read him for what would happen next.
“My apologies. I didn’t notice the rings,” Axel said finally. “If we could forget this incident, I would like to hear more about the battle.”
“I wasn’t the only one coming up with that strategy. I had the initial idea.” Kurt took Blaine’s hand and kept him close as he returned to the table. “You’ll want to talk to Andre and David, too.”
“David and I have already talked, a bit.”
Kurt returned to his drawing. “Our response to their attack was borne out of necessity. They outnumbered and outgunned us.”
“Our people are all well trained. Even our medics know how to fight,” Blaine said, a bit defensively.
Kurt petted his arm. “I see you have a well-trained group here, too.”
“We do. Not everyone really likes it here, though.” Axel peered over at the drawing, then moved himself to the other side, to avoid Blaine’s death glare. “I was wondering how much you would like to trade”
Kurt looked up.
“You’re not interested in staying. I can see that, and I’m not interested in taking on infants, cripples, pregnant women, and old men. But we do have some people who might prefer your way better, and one of our doctors expressed interest, seeing that you have a baby in your camp, and one on the way. I’ve had a few people from yours who wanted to come over to us.”
Kurt’s heart started to pound. “Really.”
“I feel that if we had deeper ties, a more longstanding trade arrangement might be reached. It’s easy not to trust people who you don’t know. Having people you do know in each camp...” Axel shrugged his head to the side. “It makes it harder to villainize them.”
Touching his neck anxiously, Kurt stared down at his drawing. He was almost afraid to ask. Blaine’s hands touched his shoulders.
“Who?” Cooper asked for them. “Who told you they wanted to come here?”
“David. Deirdre. Myra. I can give you strong, smart people in their place,” Axel said. “I know it might come as a loss, since your group is so close.”
“David?” Blaine choked on the word.
Kurt shook his head and closed his eyes. “He can’t stand to see Nick that way. Nick’s going to get better, but he can’t stand it, Blaine. You see how this has been driving him crazy.”
“Nick is his...?” Axel asked.
“His friend. One of his last, oldest friends,” Blaine supplied.
Kurt let out a slow breath. Loss and gain. “I’ll have a talk with ours. You talk with yours. I’ll want to meet these people before they come into our house.”
“House?” Axel asked.
“Moving or not,” Kurt replied in a clipped tone, his voice a little high for his own liking, “we’re creating a home. Deirdre has been miserable for a while, since Mikhail blew his brains out. Myra just never fit, and she’s lonely. We should ask Erica, too. It might be easier for her to start over with strangers.” Kurt found his words growing more detached as he thought about which people might want out of their group. “But Deirdre and Erica will need more weapons training. They can shoot, but they aren’t sharpshooters or melee experts.”
“That’s actually about all they’d need, if we choose to use them in the farms,” Axel said.
“But David.” Kurt gave Axel a hard look. “He’s an engineer. He would have been, if he’d been able to go to college this year. He has medical training, and shoots well. He’s a prize.”
“If you want to convince him-”
“We’ll talk to him, but if he wants to go, I want you to know what you’re getting here. Not just some stupid kid.”
“We’ll treat him well. We’re not the cold place your stand-in thinks we are. We just require a certain kind of force to protect what we have.” Axel looked at Cooper and pinched his lips to the side.
“When did you know?” Blaine asked. “About Kurt.”
“I suspected when Cooper started deferring questions. I knew when Kurt walked in the room, sized me up, and had your battle strategy from memory.”
“That’s not something easy to forget.” Kurt shifted his weight.
“It worked, initially. For short encounters, it would be wise to use your actor that way.” Axel suddenly grinned. He had so many big white teeth showing, it was a little unnerving. “I’ll admit, your group has thought of a lot of things we haven’t.”
“Hopefully, the ones who join you will be able to help with that. There’s no putting a price on this kind of alliance. And if we can get to the coast, and work out what we need... Maybe we can bring you back things you wouldn’t be able to get yourself, here.” Kurt shook his head. “I never thought we’d run into a group that actually wanted peaceful negotiations.”
“We had to get lucky once, hm?” Axel said.
“With your outer wall like that, you’ve gotten lucky more than once. I think I’ll call you guys the Lucky Farmers.”
Axel threw his head back and laughed.
Blaine’s throat was tight and his stomach threatening to spill bile everywhere. He watched as David held Nick tightly. Nick hugged him back, a little frown on his face, the way he often did lately when he knew something was going on, but couldn’t figure it out.
“You listen, okay? To Rafe, and Blaine, and Kurt. They’ll help you while you...”
“I’m getting better,” Nick muttered. “Why are you hugging me? It’s not Hugsgiving.”
Blaine covered his mouth as the memory of Hugsgiving, a Warbler tradition before everyone went home for Christmas break, sprung involuntarily to his mind. It sounded a lot more ridiculous, and gay, than it actually was. Just a potluck in one of the study rooms, and they all connected before leaving one another for a month.
“It’s a little Hugsgiving...” David looked down.
Nick blinked at him. Rafe started to move towards them, but Blaine touched his arm and shook his head.
“It’s not winter yet. It was just winter. Wasn’t it? It’s not...” Nick stared at David hard. “Where are you going?”
“I’m sorry. I’m... I’m staying here.”
Nick looked up at the place they’d stayed for the past week and shook his head. “Why? Why would you? They don’t have anything. They don’t have anything worth having.”
David moved to hug him again, and Nick pulled back. He turned and retreated to Rafe’s arms.
Blaine pressed his lips together, hard, and walked over to David. The others who were leaving had already gone inside. Myra had already hit it off with one of the women from the Lucky Farmers and hadn’t even stuck around to say goodbye. Kurt was right. Some people were just unhappy there, and it was better to be part of a group that was mostly self-selected. The new people who had joined them seemed strong and stable. Blaine had sat in on Kurt’s interviews with them, as had Burt and Van. Good additions. He hoped.
Now as he looked at David, Blaine found himself unable to even speak. He wanted to joke. He wanted to tell David that he wasn’t getting out of Hugsgiving with him... But that wasn’t that funny. They wouldn’t be seeing each other again at the end of winter break. They might not see each other again at all.
“I hate you,” Blaine said finally.
David sighed and gave him a half smile.
“I really do. I really hate you. But when you decide that these people aren’t nearly as good as sticking it out with your friends and family-” Blaine’s eyes filled up with tears. His throat choked on the words.
“Thanks.”
David stared at him for a moment, then initiated the hug himself. Blaine stood there, stiff and sulky. Nick had handled it better than this. Saffire, too. Blaine was like a five year old.
“We’ll be sending people, when we get settled. And if you change your mind...”
“I know.” David smiled. “I know. I’ll miss you guys.”
“Then don’t leave,” Blaine tried to joke. The laugh got caught in a half-sob.
“It’s not you, okay? That’s not why...” David sighed. “I’ll keep this place safe, okay? But I have to go. For me. I really do. I’m so sorry.”
“Stop being nice,” Blaine muttered. “I’m trying to hate you.”
Nick appeared by their sides suddenly and hugged them both together. “You’re so dumb, Dave.”
David laughed. “I am. I really am.”
“Don’t die here. Don’t,” Nick ordered.
“Don’t you guys, either. You find that magical safe place that Kurt thinks is on the coast,” David said.
“Off the coast,” Nick said.
“Off the coast? Whatever.”
“It’s not there, yet.” Blaine took a deep breath and just held onto them. Even though Kurt had explained it, he couldn’t grasp David leaving his friends, the last people he knew in the world, for strangers.
Then Blaine let go. David gave them each an individual hug, and a kiss on the head for Nick, then breathed deep and turned away.
As he disappeared into the Lucky Farmer fort, Blaine felt that whatever claim he’d still had left to childhood had just walked away.
There was blood splattered everywhere. Corpses littered the dock. Pippa was squalling.
But the boat was theirs. And they hadn’t lost anyone. It was an unprecedented victory. They always lost someone.
Kurt strolled along the wooden pier. The sun was setting. They needed to either get back in the cars or start clearing out the boats. But right now, he just wanted to see the colors bleeding into one another. The wide, uncluttered horizon, and the vast expanse of the ocean that reminded them that the world was just so much bigger than their personal horror here.
The hope of something free of this.
Blaine’s arms circled him from behind. Kurt leaned back into his embrace.
“I can’t believe we’re here,” he said. As the leader, expressing his doubts with a plan like this to anyone else was not an option. He’d had to tell people it was something he was keeping close to his chest, then later, that he and the builders of their group were absolutely confident would work, under the right circumstances.
He’d been not at all sure that their defenses would keep the many threats to them at bay. Walkers, yes. Psychotic deadly brain-exploding gas, maybe. Pissed off Wastelanders, no.
“It’s beautiful. Is it strange that the world can still be beautiful?” Blaine murmured into Kurt’s neck. “Other than you of course.”
Kurt laughed. “And the Peanut.”
“The Peanut is all that’s right and good in this world.”
Kurt turned his head and kissed Blaine. Kissed him aggressively, hungrily, letting his hands grab just as greedily, utterly uncaring if any of their people were staring. Their mouths joined and their bodies pressed together as though desperate to merge as they stood together on this blood-soaked pier that led the way to their salvation.
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Date: 2013-01-11 06:10 am (UTC)From: