Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jesper knew he shouldn’t be watching the news, his Da always lectured him on why it was bad. He’d catch Jesper reading or watching something about a horrible situation involving the second army and tell him for the hundredth time why he kept Jespers abilities a secret. 

“Do you really want to be used as a weapon?” Or “Your mother would have hated this.” And “That Jurda Parem is dangerous, it’d be a horrible idea to consume. It’s a drug.” 

Jesper was well aware of all this, of course he didn’t want to be taken away to the second army, he was only twelve. He was just curious sometimes. He was Grisha, but it had apparently been proven years ago that Grisha were ‘biologically inhumane and made to serve as methods of defense and destruction.’

Jesper had never felt any different from anyone else, maybe he was a little self centered occasionally but he’d met much worse people. 

He knew he wasn’t all that smart, but these experts had to be wrong. All the Grisha he’d known beforehand were wonderful people. Leoni was the first person to come to mind- she was sweet although an Alkemi. 

Once she’d started taking those pills to suppress her abilities, that was when she started acting less human. Grisha in the army were the only ones who had access to the Parem that could stimulate magic.  

Of course Jespers mother wouldn’t want him to join the army and become some emotionless monster, but she wouldn’t want him to hide his abilities either. The headline from two weeks that Jesper had managed to swipe read: Van Eck/Rollins corporations begin Jurda Parem mass shipments

Right, Jesper had heard about that. People wondering if they could strengthen themselves or even obtain Grisha abilities with the use of Parem. Why would anyone want that? Didn’t they know what Grisha magic would cost them. But of course, no one was thinking twice about whatever might happen to them. By now, people have probably been consuming it by the bottle. It had all happened so quickly Jesper wondered if anyone even knew what they were doing. 

Jesper made a silent vow to never take that, any of these stupid Grisha drugs weren’t any good. There had to be some other Grisha that knew or resisted these things. He flipped through the article. 

"We can assure that Jurda Parem is 100% safe, I myself have taken it and feel stronger each hour.”

A quote from Rollins. What did he need to be more powerful for? He was one of the richest men in the world. He didn’t understand why his father didn’t like him reading the news. It was just the same things about rich people getting richer. 

Jesper tossed the newspaper under his bed and finally got up. His Da should have been home by now, which meant he would be returning from work soon anyway and start to ask Jesper about his homework. He always finished it in time, even though no one believed he could sit still long enough to focus, but he got good grades and participated in what he could. Jesper turned on the tv so there’d be some background noise while he worked. 

Tap tap tap.. 

Jespers head turned toward the window, it was covered up by curtains so he couldn’t see anything. It was probably just a bird. 

Tap tap tap.

Jesper could still hear this tapping as he took his math binder out of his backpack. Hopefully it would go away soon. 

Scratch scratch..

“Saints..” Jesper muttered. Just as he got up to go look through the window, the channel on the tv switched. Directing his attention back towards it, the words Emergency Broadcast were written at the bottom. The scratching at Jespers window was getting louder and he didn’t know what to pay attention to. His mind was only able to sharpen at two moments:

The broadcast saying “Stay away from anyone acting odd, wait for the authorities, and don’t let anyone into your home-” 

And the window of his room shattering. 

Jesper heard a groaning noise coming from the window. A pale, rotting hand pulled the curtains away. Jesper could barely register the sickening face of his neighbor before he ran out of his room. 

It was horrible, Jesper had seen them all yesterday, and they were fine, jittery but fine nonetheless. Now he was staring at a decaying looking version that launched itself at Jesper. What the hell was happening? 

Jesper had slammed his door shut as the thing in his room nearly reached him. 

He rushed downstairs only to find the horrifying sight of more.. things banging at the back door of his house. He heard a beeping noise that sounded like his Da’s car. Jesper pushed through the front door, thankfully no monsters were out there. Only his Da, in his car, there to help him. 

Jesper jumped into the passenger seat. “Da, there’s these weird things outside.. they kinda look like people-”

“I know, Jes.” Colm quickly drove away from their home. Going too fast for comfort. 

“What do you mean you know?” Jesper looked over his shoulder. The creatures were still trying to get into Jespers home. Would they leave? Would Jesper ever be going back home? Jesper looked back at his house, he could still see his mothers cherry tree in the yard. Hesitantly, he waved goodbye, praying he’d be able to see her again. “Da, where are we going?” 

“After work today we were all warned about the- crawlers.. whatever they’re calling them and I tried to get home to you as fast as I could but this person came up to me and-” 

“What are you talking about?” Jesper shouted. The car had made it into the downtown area. “Oh no..” Jesper muttered. They were everywhere, how’d they all appear so quickly? Jesper then watched it horror as a thing grabbed a hold of someone trying to run away and bite their shoulder. The person fell to the ground and started twitching. 

“Da someone just got attacked by that thing!” Jesper unbuckled his seatbelt. “Someone needs to help-”

Colm grabbed Jespers arm and pulled him back. “No- it’s highly infectious, we can't go near them.” 

“How do you know that?” Jesper asked, pleading at this point. How did he know so much about the things that seemed to have just popped up? 

“I thought I had gotten those men that tried to take you away off our backs but they let you go because they knew they might need a Grisha who’d never taken their pills before-” 

Grisha? Colm never brought that up. Jesper grabbed Colms arm and shook him. “What are you talking about?” 

“These things are dangerous and I know a way to keep you safe, you’ll understand it if you just stay in the car.” 

Jesper looked carefully at his Da, who was looking forward to the road. Jesper pulled his knees to his chest, breathing in and out, like his mom taught him. 

Just as Jespers breathing was helping him calm down, a thing launched itself on the windshield. Colm was so focused on driving he only pushed faster on the pedal until the thing fell off. 

Jesper had never seen his Da like this, what did he know and why did he know it? Colm Fahey was a normal person, he taught anthropology at a college, he was a gardener, he was Jespers Da. What was happening? 

— 

After driving for ten minutes, Colm stopped the car in front of a large group of people and got out. Jesper hadn’t dared to look up from the car floor on the way, he didn’t want to see anymore things happening, even though he could hear enough. 

Colm opened the door beside Jesper and pulled his son out. Jesper scanned the crowd of people, there was a helicopter at the end of the crowd. People were begging to be let on.

“Da everyone here wants to escape, why would they let us in?” Jesper said, his voice was only a squeak. 

“They will.” Colms grip on Jespers arm was tight as he pulled him through the crowd. There was a man standing by the helicopter, he was covered entirely by his clothes and helmet. 

“Is this your son?” The man said over the shouting voices of other people. 

Colm nodded and pushed Jesper forward. “Yes, he’s a fabrikator- please keep him safe, he’s only a boy.” 

Jespers eyes widened. His father had never wanted to admit to anyone about that, why was he doing it now? Why, why was all this happening?

“Can he prove it?” The man spoke again.

Colm reached into his pocket and pulled out a Jurda flower. “Jesper, you can bleed the colors from this still, right? You used to do it all the time when you were little.” 

Jesper looked carefully at the flower, then to Colm. His Da still had to bend his knees a little bit to be eye level with Jesper, but he’d said so many times Jesper would be his height soon. Of course he could bleed out the colors. “But wh-” 

The look in his eyes told Jesper to not ask any questions and do it. Jesper pinched the petal and concentrated until it turned white. 

The man shrugged. “Good enough.” 

Jesper suddenly felt his Da hug him tightly. “I love you, Jesper. Please stay safe.” 

“What?” Jesper shouted as the strange man grabbed his arm and pulled him through the door of the helicopter. The door shut so quickly he barely had time to register what was happening. “No- no! You have to take my Da too, please don’t leave him behind.” Jesper had never sounded so desperate in his life, why on earth couldn’t they take his father in this stupidly big helicopter? There was another man sitting behind them and still enough for one or two more people. 

“We can’t risk any of the infected to get on.” The man said as he started the engine. 

“He isn’t infected- wouldn’t you be able to tell? Please just bring him with us.” Jesper was screaming now as the helicopter started the rise. He hit the door, he didn’t want to go anywhere if his Da wasn’t with him. He tried opening it but it wouldn’t work. He looked out the window, Colm was looking up towards him but seemed unphased. He waved up at Jesper- he was waving goodbye. No no no no. 

“Kid, if you let us do our job and are lucky enough that your dad isn’t infected, we can find a solution to this in a matter of months and you’ll be back home.” Jesper really hated this man, whoever he was. 

“What job? What is all this?” Jespers eyes were going from the man to the window of the helicopter. 

“They think unused Grisha might be immune to the sickness, so we need to round a few up.”

”Immune to what? Those things? Are more people going to turn into that?” Was something going to happen to his father? He was given no response. 

Jesper didn’t want to be ‘rounded up’, he didn’t want to be Grisha, he wanted to be at home doing his stupid math homework and waiting for his Da to come home. “How long have they known that Parem shit is bad for people?” Jesper shouted as he looked down at Colm standing in the crowd of desperate people. 

“That information is classified.” 

Bullshit. If they had to use Jesper for an experiment why couldn’t he have any of his questions answered? Why couldn’t his Da come with him?

“I’m not going to leave him while those monsters are out, let me out of here please.” Jesper shouted once more. He couldn’t just be brought to some horrifying place and use powers he barely knew about without his Da there. 

“Maybe you’ll understand when you aren’t so young.” Was the last thing Jesper heard when the man behind him stood up and knocked him out over his head. 

All Jesper could hope for while his consciousness slipped away from him was that these men were right about this all being over soon. Whatever this was.

Chapter Text

8 Years Later…

Jespers map was now fucking useless. He’d lost Kaz and Inej and now he’d dropped the map that he could just barely understand enough into the mud. Who does that? Inej probably would have sensed the paper falling the moment Jesper dropped it and aerodynamically caught it. Kaz wouldn’t have trusted Jesper with the map in the first place. 

This map has gracefully survived Jesper throwing himself into a rushing river and flowing down the stream due to a little plastic baggie, and was now soaked in mud. At least there were no crawlers to be seen. It didn’t really matter- crawlers couldn’t do anything to Jesper as long as he was able to run, he should really be worrying about dying of hunger or thirst. It didn’t look like there was much out in the woods for miles, it was pretty at least, Inej would like it. 

She found an old camcorder years ago and used it to film anything she found fascinating or beautiful. She would say that someday when everything was back to normal- or a new type of normal maybe, someone could find the old videos she’d taken to learn about what it had been like. 

Jesper had been someone she’d been excited to interview, unfortunately it had ended with Jesper breaking down in tears- what a good first impression in the people you're trying to prove yourself useful to. 

Four years of confinement in a prison that kept a hold of “pure” Grisha in an attempt to find a cure for the infections. It took Jesper a matter of months to realize the men working there had no clue what they were doing, it took him a year to accept what that meant for him. 

After the not very unfortunate accident with the Parem facility, Jesper had been discovered and taken under the wing of the wonderful Inej Ghafa. Kaz had been more reluctant, if Jesper wasn’t a Grisha he probably wouldn’t have ever cared. He had more knowledge than either of the two had on the crawlers due to living in that saints-awful prison. They’d all become friends in the end, Inej called them family sometimes. Jesper might have done that, but he couldn’t accept his Da was gone just yet. There was always a possibility. 

Good friends who’d risk their lives for one another, so when one of those weird mutated crawlers got close to Inej, Jesper had attacked it. He’d be fine, Inej wouldn’t have been. Unfortunately wrestling with a crazed undead thing had gotten Jesper to fall into the river he and Inej had been getting water from. 

Jesper rubbed the back of his head. He’d hit it on a rock when he’d fallen, it was a miracle he didn’t drown. He pulled up his sleeve to inspect the bite on his arm, it actually wasn’t bad at all. It would heal in a matter of days by the look of it, and most importantly, it was on Jespers arm and not Inej’s. 

Jesper emptied his soaked satchel. Compass was fine- too bad it was nearly useless without a map. The small string of prayer beads Inej had gave him were fine- he never used them but Inej had given him and Kaz them for protection. His revolver- his wonderful, trustworthy revolver, was in perfect condition. The food he had was ruined and inedible now. At least his water bottle was fine, the filter and everything was still intact. At least Jesper wouldn’t die of thirst. 

He crouched down to the stream he’d washed up in and filled the bottle with water. Jesper spent the next thirty minutes drinking and refilling- he hadn’t realized how thirsty he was. When he finally felt alright he flopped down on the ground and looked up. 

It was getting too dark for comfort- whatever could be defined as comfort these days, the crawlers always got really bad at night, they saw better. Looking around, it didn’t seem like there’d be any car or shed to spend the night in for miles. He could always climb in a tree and sleep there, crawlers could climb a bit, but not so fast Jesper couldn’t shoot them down. Really bad cases- volcras, could fly, thankfully volcra had shit vision and as long as Jesper found a tree with enough leaves and shade he most likely wouldn’t be seen. Barren areas like this didn’t typically have many infected people anyway. 

He walked for a bit until he saw a fairly stable looking tree to climb. 

Inej had taught him a bit, but unless the saints placed a blessing upon him, he would never be as good as her. He cut his hand whilst climbing but managed to pull himself up to a big enough branch. One he could tie himself to and not fall. He knew it was dangerous to sleep, but floating down a river can be tiring. He would be fine, all he’d have to do was follow the river back to where he’d started. And then find his way back to the safe house. Unfortunately he did know if at any point the river split, or how fast it had gone at all time, it’s a hard thing to retain when you’re passed out. 

It had been early in the morning when he’d fallen, and now it was getting dark. He’d just need to find some food to eat so he could make it back. 

Jesper let his head rest on the tree and stared at the unfamiliar sky of stars 

He’d survived the apocalypse this long, no way he was dying now. 

— 

Jesper had only been woken up once in the night, from a squirrel. A cute little thing that had tried to eat Jespers shoe. Maybe the universe felt bad from separating him from the only friends he had and decided to let him live that night. Maybe a lucky streak was coming. 

He began to untie himself from the tree as he stepped down and looked out at the forest starting to be lit up by the early morning. He noticed something odd. 

A strange inconsistency in one of the trees. Was that a treehouse? Lucky streak indeed. Jesper thought to himself. He pinpointed where the tree was and climbed the rest of the way down. The treehouse's condition looked too good to have been something from before everything. Maybe someone lived there, or maybe there were resources Jesper could use there. 

He’d probably have to steal, it wasn’t like he didn’t feel bad whenever he stole from people, but it was the way everything was now. Unless you were one of those rich assholes who have made a big fancy safe area for themselves in which they claimed to be “finding a way to put an end to this all”. 

Of course, after eight years they had made no advancements and had helped no one but themselves. 

Jesper had missed the first few years of desperate attempts, but heard plenty about them. Different kinds of quarantines, security systems, and even a supposed drug that would make people immune had been enforced. Nothing worked, it only left people with less money and less hope. 

Jesper eventually found a ladder built into one of the trees, there was a water pump nearby. A perfect place to build a sanctuary for yourself. 

Jesper carefully climbed up the ladder and peaked his head over into the house. 

There was a clutter of things everywhere, a white board with a couple equations Jesper couldn’t bother to understand, chemicals and powders, but more importantly, food and maps. Jesper creaked in the rest of the way and almost jumped when he saw a boy sleeping in a hammock in the corner. Jesper stood frozen for a few moments until he could clearly hear the faint breaths coming from the boy. 

Jesper very carefully stepped over to a small crate with a rolled up map in it and carefully put it into his satchel. 

Nearby there was also a backpack that seemed to be full of food. Jesper very carefully, very quietly unzipped it and saw a couple cans of food, a few bags of nuts, and some dried fruit. It was enough to last Jesper. 

He looked guiltily over at the boy, he couldn’t be much older than Jesper. His face wasn’t burnt or scarred, his hair was a bit long, but other than that, there wasn’t any sign that he had been out here for that long. Jesper didn’t want to think too much about how the boy had gotten here or what Jespers stealing might do to him. 

He took out a can of food and left it. Hopefully this strange boy had a supply somewhere Jesper just wasn’t finding. The boy stirred almost as if he could hear Jesper thoughts. 

Jesper quickly creeped out of the treehouse and back down the ladder. He’d felt safe when he stepped on the ground until he turned back, stepped forward and heard a click sound. 

Shit. Jesper winced as the realization hit him, that sounded familiar. Maybe he was just being paranoid and overthinking the noise. 

He looked over his shoulder and suddenly could see a carving on the tree, one that wouldn’t be noticeable by anyone more than a few feet away. 

The carving consisted of an arrow pointing at the ground and a cartoonish looking drawing of a person exploding. 

Jesper had stepped on a landmine. That young looking boy who looked like he’d been living a normal life then suddenly dropped into this hellish world had planted landmines around his home. Jesper gritted his teeth, he should have been more careful when he saw the elaborate 

Jesper looked around and tried to identify any options. If there were several landmines planted around this boy's home, then they probably weren’t strong enough to reach him, maybe Jesper could take his chances and hope he wouldn’t die from the explosion. Then of course he’d probably just be to incapacitated and the boy would find him struggling to walk and kill him anyway. He could wait until the boy woke up and hope he wouldn't kill Jesper.  

Maybe he should shut accept dying by a fucking landmine because he was too idiotic to think twice. Maybe dying wouldn’t be so bad, he could finally stop running from everything. 

Jesper was about to accept his fate when he heard a voice from behind him. “Good morning.” 

Jesper looked back at the tree. The boy was climbing down the ladder, smiling like he’d won the lottery. 

The boy hopped off the ladder and carefully stepped across the grass, Jesper then realized that patches of grass looked a lot faker than others. Maybe if noticed that he’d have been more careful. The boy simply walked to the water pump and started filling his bottle. Jesper didn’t know what to say. 

He leaned against the pump and looked at Jesper, tilting his head to the side. “Are you thirsty?”  The boy asked.

Jesper felt like he was being taunted. “A bit.” He said sheepishly. He pushed his satchel behind his back, like that would do any good. 

The boy looked at him, confused. “Well the water pumps free, you could use it.” It was obviously fake confusion. 

Jesper hands balled into fists, he probably looked stupid, he couldn’t do anything if he couldn’t risk stepping forward. “I can’t…” 

“Why is that?” 

Jesper really hated this boy, he then remembered that he had, in fact, stolen from him. The boy leaned forward after Jesper didn’t respond. “Is it because you're standing on one of my land mines?” He whispered teasingly. “Are you standing on a land mine because you weren’t thinking about your fitting after you stole my maps and all my food?” 

“I didn’t steal everything.” It was a stupid thing to say, but Jesper was prone to saying stupid things. 

The boy put a hand over his heart. “Oh yes- thank you for graciously leaving one can of my food for me, and taking the rest for yourself.” 

Jesper didn’t respond, he was right, but everyone and to steal, he was sure this boy wasn’t an angel. Especially since he kept taunting Jesper. “It looked like you were about to step off, don’t let me stop you.”

Jesper didn’t want to die, maybe this kid was taunting him to make his death more unbearable, or maybe he was nice enough to let Jesper go and just wanted to get a kick out of it. “Can you diffuse the land mine?”

The boy snorted. “Of course I can, I made it.” 

Jesper didn’t look at him when he spoke. “If I give you your things back, will you let me go… please?”

He couldn’t see the boy's face, not that he wanted to. He probably looked smug. “Well since you asked so nicely..” 

He held out a hand. Jesper pulled the backpack off his shoulders and handed it to him. 

“And the map.” 

Jesper handed him the map.

“And would you mind tossing your gun off to the side so I know you won’t shoot me the moment I diffuse it?” 

Jesper grumbled, he didn’t want to, he also really didn’t want to die at the hands of some freckled boy a head shorter than him. He took out his revolver and tossed it to the side. 

“Don’t those kinds usually come in pairs?” 

“I lost the other one.” Jesper had been trained to use the revolvers at the facility. He was able to control the movement of the bullets easily. It was one of the only things he enjoyed about being there, that and the lovely Nina Zenik. The revolvers were the kind his mother used to own, they reminded him of her. After the facility was destroyed, he never saw Nina or one of his revolvers again. At least he had the one. 

“Am I supposed to believe that?” 

Jesper took off his satchel and tossed it to the side angrily. “Feel safe now?” 

“Yes, actually. Isn’t it shocking that it feels safer when the man that just tried to rob me is unarmed?” 

This brat. 

The boy took out some strange device and hit a few switches. “They aren’t exactly like the land mines you're thinking of, those are nearly impossible to diffuse. I can turn these ones on and off if I please.” 

“I don’t fucking care, can I step off?” Jesper was getting tired of this, he wanted to get back to his friends. 

“I’m holding the thing that could save your life, don’t be such a dick.” He said. “Go ahead, step off.” 

Carefully, as if stepping off more slowly would help, Jesper stepped off the mine and stepped over any fake looking grass that presumably had more mines underneath. 

The boy approached the spot Jesper had just been standing and ripped back a fake patch of grass. “I do have to diffuse it before I can turn anything back on. I hope you’ve learned a valuable lesson.” 

Jesper wanted to strangle the kid, it was probably his intention to make Jesper feel that way. Only thing more annoying was that this boy was pretty. Jesper would never put down an opportunity with a pretty person wherever he went. He might have taken an opportunity if this man wasn’t such an asshole. 

Jesper rushed over to his bag and threw it over his shoulder. He twirled his revolver in his hands before putting it away. The boy he’d never learned the name of was climbing back up into his house. It looked like he was struggling to pull himself up a bit. Maybe he’d hurt his ankle. 

Jesper wondered how long he’d been living up there alone. He didn’t worry about it too much, maybe there was a reason that boy was alone. He must be smart at least, Kaz would have found a good use for him if he were here. 

—

Jesper had walked along the river for about five minutes before it split off into three different directions. Dang it. 

He had no recollection of doing any way at all, he didn’t know if the split river joined at some point or was a dead end or split again. This was hopeless. 

He sat down on the ground and stared out at the water. It was much calmer now after the storm from when he’d fallen in had cleared. 

Jesper picked up a flat stone and skipped it across the water. It only skilled once, maybe his luck had run out. It seemed to be a pattern for him. 

He flopped on the ground dramatically although there was no one to see him. He sighed, sat up, and looked back towards the tree where that saints forsaken treehouse was. 

He needed a map. 

Chapter Text

Wylan hated being alone. Really. It was getting more awful by the day. He’d stopped counting the days when he realized there was nothing to count down to. 

He thought maybe an annoying interaction with someone trying to steal from him would help, it didn’t. He had found himself wanting to give the boy a can of food or at least the map back just for the possibility of seeing some sympathy or graciousness in his eyes. 

Wylan was still holding on to the moment a few years back when he’d almost found some companions. Then he’d lost them both, he could only hope that Nina and Matthias had found each other later on. 

Wylan finally had been able to take apart the landmine to begin diffusing it. He obviously didn’t want it blowing up in his face. An awful thought that it didn’t matter if Wylan died came to him. 

If Wylan accidently knocked over some chemicals or stepped on one of his own mines and died there. No one would care, no one would even know. It was only a matter of time, Wylan was running out of resources and places to go, he’d give up soon enough and end up rotting out here. 

He could obviously leave on his own- but with little knowledge of the crawlers and nowhere to go he’d probably die vaguely soon. The last time he’d left on his own he’d immediately twisted his ankle whilst escaping a volcra the moment he’d gone farther than he usually did, he took that as a sign. 

There was of course, one other time he’d gone very far, that was right before he ran all the way back in fear of being caught and killed. 

Wylan put the landmine to the side and picked up his sketchbook, maybe he could try drawing that boy from earlier, he’d been drawing the same things for years, some change might do him some good.  

Wylan started sketching him, it was a bit difficult, he had to do it from memory and had only seen the boy for a few minutes. But it didn’t take all that long to make a rough sketch. 

He stared at the rough sketch for a moment and made a decision. He stood up and grabbed the map the boy had been trying to take. Maybe he could run after him and give it to him- it wasn’t doing Wylan any good anyway. He’d already marked all the areas on a seperate map that covered more space. 

He could do one good act, have one person think about him just a little longer. 

To his surprise- the moment he looked down over the edge of his treehouse he saw the boy climbing the ladder upward. 

Wylan crouched down and waited for him to realize he was being watched. The boy looked up at Wylan and narrowed his eyes. 

“Miss me?” Wylan asked. 

That earned Wylan a glare and no response as the boy finished climbing the ladder. Wylan studied him as he pushed himself up. He would be a nice subject to draw. He had short coily hair and a handsome face, there were old burn scars on his neck and jaw. 

“I really need that map.” Was all he said. Wylan could just give him the map of course..

“Why?” Wylan liked to know about the subjects of his art. He took a step towards the boy. 

The boy sighed. “I really just need to get back to my friends- I’m a good person I promise you can trust me with it.” 

“A good person who is prone to stealing?” 

The boy hunched his shoulders. “Everyone steals- it’s the only way to survive since money is useless. How’d you get all this stuff?” He motioned back behind Wylan. 

Wylan looked back at his things and stepped back into his house a bit more. “I found old abandoned buildings and took those resources. It doesn’t count as stealing if it’s nobodies.” 

The boy narrowed his eyes. “A bad person would have held a gun to your head and said to hand over the map.” 

Wylan took another step backwards. “That’s not a very nice threat to make.” He desperately hoped he wasn’t playing with his life here. “If you shoot me, then I’ll fall into a table of highly reactive and explosive chemicals and you’ll be taken down with me.” 

The boy raised an eyebrow. “Murder-suicide is great and all but I’m not going to shoot you, I just want that map.” 

“What do I get in exchange?” 

Wylan would have probably just handed him the damn map in a few moments but the boy got angry. “I don’t have anything! I made a stupid decision and got caught in the river- most of my shit is soaked and I just need to get back home. How long have you even been up here alone anyway?” 

The question struck Wylan hard. A part of him thought about the marks under his desk he’d been tallying since he started living out here. The marks had gotten smaller and smaller as Wylan started to lose hope of finding anyone or a cure being figured out. 

He’d run out of space at least a year ago. Maybe he’d forgotten how to talk to people- not that he’d been any good before his father kicked him out. 

“…sorry.” Maybe that was the only thing Wylan remembered how to say correctly. “The map is already in your satchel, I was just teasing.” 

Wylan walked back over to his desk, kicking his sketchbook out of view. The atmosphere around the two of them had shifted drastically. 

The boy seemed to have found the map. “When did you- thank you.” 

Wylan looked over at his face- shit he’d made him feel bad, that wasn’t Wylan’s intention. “And if you really need it you can take some of the food- I didn’t know you’d fallen in the river… there was a big storm so it probably took you kinda far.” 

Wylan looked down at the ground. 

“Do you have any other supply of food?” He asked. 

“Well.. no..” He didn’t want to make the boy feel any worse. “I think I’ve taken everything within an hour of here.” Wylan laughed to himself. It wasn’t really funny to him. 

A long stretch of silence caused Wylan to think the boy had already left. He looked up towards the entrance, he was still there. “Uh.. l could try to find something to give you in return for it. I don’t wanna leave you with nothing. Most of my stuff’s back at the safe house I live in though.” 

“You could take me there-” No. Wylan thought. He’d said that in desperation to be less lonely for a little bit and to maybe possibly find some resources. “Sorry, that's ridiculous- and stupid. I’ll just find things somewhere else.” 

“You could come with me. We have a garden with seeds and stuff, you could take some of those and bring them back, then you’d have plenty of stuff.”  No no, Wylan had no clue how to act around people. He’d probably annoy this boy into leaving Wylan alone and Wylan would spiral and everything would go horribly wrong. 

“You don’t have to do that just because you pity me or something.” 

The boy coughed. “Well- pity makes it sound bad, but I do feel for you. Are those marks on the wall how long you’ve been up here?”

“Yes- well I ran out of room ages ago so more I guess. I’ll probably just be a bother if you take me with you.” 

The boy took a step towards Wylan. “Not if you can build landmines you won’t- my friend could really use that actually.” Wylan felt a shiver at how genuine this boy sounded. “And… you know how to understand maps right?” 

Wylan smirked. “Did you go through so much trouble to get a map you wouldn’t be able to understand?”

The boy went back to glaring, this time it didn’t make Wylan feel awful. “My friends hardly ever trust me with maps- I never learned how to use them.” Wylan snorted. “Maybe I shouldn’t let you come with me..” 

Wylan strolled smoking but rolled his eyes. “No- you already said you would- let me get my things.” Wylan plucked the map from his hands. “If your friends didn’t trust you I have no reason to.” 

Wylan grabbed his backpack from off the ground. Carefully, he took a few.. necessary objects and put them in the safest part of his bag. He also grabbed his sketchbook, binoculars, and a first aid kit he hardly knew how to use. 

The boy was leaning on the wall, looking annoyed again, but he was waiting for Wylan. Wylan was finally going to go somewhere outside of this stupid fucking forest. Wylan- even if it was only for a little bit- wasn’t going to be so lonely. Even if it was with some bratty boy who wanted nothing to do with Wylan. 

As they climbed down from the house, Wylan heard the boy mumble that it was probably safer for him to travel with someone else anyway. 

“Oh!” Wylan responded. “So you’ll be safe and sound and I’ll probably die on my way back here?” He said as he hit the ground. 

Wylan’s response was met with a frown. “Not what I meant.” 

Wylan smiled and unfolded the map, he’d worry about how he’d make it back here alive later. “I’m Wylan by the way.” He knew it was stupid to tell a stranger his name, but at least someone would know it if anything were to happen to him. 

The boy crossed his arms, looking as if he was deciding whether or not it was worth responding. “I’m Jesper.” 

Wylan couldn’t help but grin a bit brighter. It had been three years since he’d heard a name other than his own. 

Chapter Text

“How’d you meet them?” 

“Nope.” 

“Alright then.” 

That was how the past hour had been going so far. Wylan would ask Jesper questions and Jesper would answer about one fourth of the time. Some things were just too personal and he had no interest in gaining a lifelong bond with Wylan. 

It was good they had the maps though, Jesper had no idea what insane kind of flood had moved him all the way out to where they’d started, but following the river would have gotten him nowhere. 

Jesper thought maybe he should ask Wylan something about himself. He decided not to do that. Jesper obviously felt bad for the kid, he couldn’t imagine being all alone and isolated for so long. He even understood why he was talking so much, Jesper knew he couldn’t keep quiet for that long, having no one to talk to for years would end up driving him insane. Hopefully- Wylan wasn’t insane. 

He seemed a little bit insane whenever he’d completely zone out and stare at some bird or bug. 

“What are you wearing?” Was the first question Jesper asked him after walking for a while longer. 

Wylan followed his eye gaze down to his ridiculous looking socks. You couldn’t see much of them, but if you did, it was obvious they were bright pink with a ridiculous amount of flowers on them. 

Wylan blushed a light shade of pink, “I found them in some old shack- I needed some sort of socks and my old ones I’d been wearing for too long. I also didn’t think anyone would see them.” 

Jesper almost laughed. “I think you’d be fine with your ankles exposed.” 

Wylan seemed to be trying to push down the socks with his foot. “I did that and then I started over thinking.. ‘what if a crawler grabs my leg and bites me’ and I die thinking ‘if only I’d worn those horribly ugly socks’.” 

Now Jesper laughed, “Better to live a flowerfull man than die a flowerless one.” 

Wylan looked at him funny. “What the hell does that mean?” 

Jesper shrugged. “Probably something Inej said one time to me.” 

Wylan’s eyes were flicking from the map to Jesper. “Call me crazy but I doubt she said that.” 

Jesper waved him off. “She says wise and nonsensical things all the time, she’s said something on the lines of that.” Jesper looked over at Wylan’s socks again. “Your ankle looks a bit swollen, is it alright?” 

Wylan had been walking forward with the map in hand, he looked down at his ankle. “Oh- it’s fine. I just hurt it a week ago, I’ll walk it off.” 

“You shouldn’t just be walking it off, that could make it worse.” Jesper spoke, obvious traces of Inej’s influence in his words. He caught up with Wylan and reached for him. “Can I see-” 

As soon as Jespers hand brushed Wylan’s arm he flinched away. “I’d prefer not- I’m perfectly capable.” He spat. 

Jesper stepped away from him. Maybe Wylan just wasn’t a fan of being touched, that was fine, neither were Kaz and Inej. “Can I see the map?” 

Wylan handed him the map without looking at him, now that Jesper was actually paying attention, it was fairly obvious Wylan was trying to hide his limping. “There volcra up ahead by the way.” 

Jesper nearly dropped the map. “What? How do you know?” 

Wylan pointed towards a tree a few feet away. “I marked that tree-” The tree had a blue X symbol on it. “It’s shady enough that the sun won’t hurt them and they don’t go looking for anyone during the day, so unless you make enough noise they won’t see you.”  

“How many times have you successfully gone through them?” Jesper scanned the map. Wylan had drawn a few landmarks he must have already gone to, unfortunately they were far, far away from where they were trying to get. 

“A couple of times, one time one noticed me but they’re fairly easy to outrun. They immediately get back when the sun hits them.” Wylan paused, “I won’t know much about our surroundings in like five more minutes, I won’t be of much use:”  

Jesper knew that, it kind of annoyed him that he would be walking through unfamiliar areas with this boy, he shrugged it off regardless. “It’s fine, just don’t think I’m risking my life for you if anything happens.” 

Being immune to the disease did not make Jesper invisible, he hated Volcra because they always attacked with their claws before biting. He could see the forest progressively getting darker even though it was nearly the middle of the day. 

“I didn’t expect you to.” Wylan responded, he suddenly stiffened and pressed his lips shut. 

Jesper followed his gaze to the volcra lurking on a branch, thankfully very far away and not looking towards the two of them at all. “I hate volcra.” 

Wylan elbowed Jesper, most likely telling him to shut up. 

They stayed in their place for a bit and two more volcra came into view. Jesper let his hand rest on his gun, volcra were also unfortunately incredibly hard to kill, but if worse came to worse it was always worth a shot. 

Wylan started walking, he seemed calm enough about it, so Jesper followed. Even though he was doing everything the exact same as Wylan, he still worried. Especially when a volcra seemed to hear something and started cocking its head in different directions. 

Wylan grabbed Jespers hand and gave him a look, Jesper then realized how sharp his breathing was. He stared into Wylan's eyes and tried to follow his breathing, slow and soft. When he was quiet enough, Wylan tugged on his hand and pulled him along. 

A few minutes ago Wylan had said the volcra only could spot you if you made “enough” noise. If loud breathing was almost enough, Jesper didn’t feel very safe. 

He looked around, there were some birds living in little nests in those trees, for some reason the birds weren’t terrified of the strange beasts living above them. Jesper felt Wylan squeeze his hand, he didn’t realize why until he took another step. 

One of those cute innocent little birds in the trees had gotten hurt and was lying on the ground. Jesper hadn’t been looking and stepped on it. Naturally when a random thing steps on you you start screeching, so that is what the bird did. 

One of the volcra slowly turned its head towards the noise, its scarily pale eyes looking right at Jesper. 

Wylan let go of his hand, this obviously meant “run”. So that’s what Jesper did. He didn’t dare look back at the volcra, he already knew what he’d see. He kept his eyes on Wylan. Thankfully, it did look like daylight was in view, they just needed to make it there. 

Jesper thought of Wylan’s ankle, he looked over at it, and almost as if he willed it into happening, Wylan’s ankle bent in a way it wasn’t supposed to. Wylan tripped and fell to the ground. He hissed in pain, if he was able to get up again there was no way he’d be able to run. 

Jesper didn’t really have any time to think. He had the map, he could easily just leave Wylan behind and peacefully continue the rest of his journey with the crushing weight of the knowledge that he left him there. Or he could help him- which would risk both of their lives. 

Saints above..

Jesper pulled up Wylan and put an arm around his torso. Wylan was putting in all he could to keep running. “It'll be okay! You don’t have to-” 

“No!” Jesper shouted. 

They were so close. If he let go of Wylan he’d see the volcra reach him and finish him off. He’d known Wylan for about two hours and he was a bit of a pest, but the thought of watching him be torn apart was just awful. 

When they were a few feet away, Jesper practically pushed Wylan forward into the lit up area. He fell, thankfully not doing any more damage to his ankle, and into the sunlight. 

Jesper followed and the moment he looked back he saw the volcra agonizingly close to him. The moment it hit the sun it hissed and stepped back. 

Jesper had never been safely close to a volcra before, it stared at Jesper, almost as if it was attempting to convince him to come back. 

Volcra were when the Parem in a person's body began to strengthen the outside of them. They were still soulless and pale, but not decaying like crawlers. 

Jesper hated the knowledge that this thing used to be a person, with crawlers you could easily tell the difference between them all but volcra tended to look eerily similar. 

He stepped backwards a few paces, just to be safe. The volcra stayed where it was, presumably having no concept of when the sun would come back out. 

Jesper grabbed Wylan's arm and pulled him up. 

“Is there any place we can go so I can look at your ankle?” 

Wylan stepped away, barely putting any weight on his other ankle. “I’m fine- really.” 

“You said that a couple minutes ago and we almost died. Do you always ignore your own problems because you don’t want to bother people?” 

Wylan stiffened. “There’s some old cottage- it might have been a library at some point.. it’s like thirty minutes from here I’ve only been near it once.” Wylan looked away from Jesper, he looked ashamed. “I could just go back on my own, I really don’t have to go with you.” 

As much as a part of Jesper wanted to accept that. The willing words of Inej and of being a good person would yell at him all the way back. “No way you’re walking back alone, your ankle is worse than before.” He reached out for Wylan, who finally was willing to let himself lean on Jesper. 

“Anyway..” Jesper started. “I can’t just not sleep for the whole trip back, we can take turns keeping watch at night.” 

Wylan nodded. “It’s difficult for me to sleep most nights, I don’t mind staying up the whole time.” 

Jesper sighed, “I won’t let you do that.” 

“Why not?” 

“The little voice in my head says that’s morally wrong.”

—

Once they found the (surprisingly nice) cottage, Jesper was able to bring Wylan inside and set him down in a chair. He pushed a coffee table by the chair so Wylan could put his foot up on it. 

“I just rolled it- you don’t need to baby me.” 

“Regardless, it’s supposed to be kept elevated. Jesper said. He laid the map out on the coffee table. “Do you have a first aid kit?” 

Wylan nodded and opened his backpack. He took out the kit and took off his shoe. 

Jesper took off his jacket- it was incredibly stuffy in this cottage, he picked up the first aid kit and started to look through it. 

“What are you wearing?” Wylan suddenly asked. 

Jesper looked down at his shirt- it was still a little wet from earlier. He loved this shirt. “What do you mean?” 

“You make fun of me for floral socks that I have to wear while you’re willingly wearing lime green and yellow?” 

Jesper pulled some bandages from the kit. “At least I can pull it off.” He crouched down to look at Wylan’s ankle. “You had bandages and didn’t think to wrap your ankle?” 

Wylan huffed. “I thought I could just walk it off- that’s the only first aid kid I have. I thought I should save it.” 

Jesper slowly wrapped the bandages around Wylan’s ankle, trying to remember the way Inej had shown him. Wylan’s face was riddled with guilt. 

“I um- I said earlier that it was your fault we’d almost died back there, I shouldn’t have said that.” 

“Why not? It’s true.” 

“Yeah well I stepped on the bird, you never would have needed to start running if it hadn’t been for that.” 

Wylan didn’t respond for a moment and let Jesper finish wrapping his ankle. “.. well, if you really think about it, it’s the fault of the assholes who decided to start giving Jurda Parem to ordinary people and the Grisha that caused them to turn in the first place.” 

Jesper smiled and nodded, although he’d like to say “it’s the fault of the assholes who decided to start drugging innocent people and make up lies about them being inhumane” and “Grisha didn’t do shit to anyone out of their own free will” but he didn’t say that. 

“How come Volcra can fly?” Wylan thought aloud. “I haven’t heard of any Grisha with the ability to fly.”

“I think there was one- once.” Jesper didn’t think, he knew. Zoya Nazyalensky was talked about constantly in the facility. She’d sounded so powerful Jesper often wondered if she’d swoop in and save them all, of course it never happened. 

“Where’d you hear about it?” 

“People would talk, say she was a saint that would save the world.” 

He didn’t feel safe telling Wylan he was a grisha, most people still didn't see grisha as human. The disease had only made it worse, rumors were spread rapidly about grisha being a cause of it. 

He looked up at Wylan carefully, studying his face. “Have we met before?” Jesper asked. 

Wylan squinted, seeming to ponder the question. “I don’t think so.” 

Hm. Some part of Wylan’s face rang a bell in Jespers mind. He stood up and looked around, 

“This is actually a really nice place.” 

It seemed like somehow, it hadn’t been run over by any crawlers, it just looked old and unkempt. Jesper started scanning over the shelves of books, he picked up one that was titled ‘The Home Medical Guide’, he put that one in his satchel. 

“You said you’ve only come here once, why would you wanna let such a nice place go to waste like that?” 

Wylan was looking at the bookshelves like they were the most awful things he’d ever seen. “Just didn’t like the atmosphere of it I guess.” 

Jesper continued looking around for anything that could be of use. He walked upstairs to see a little kitchen, a wonderful sight. In one cabinet all the food was crawling with bugs. In another there was a box of pasta- nearly expired, but that didn’t matter. 

There was one door that Jesper was hesitant to open, he feared there would be something waiting for him. He carefully opened the door and was thankfully safe from anything jumping out at him. 

It was a bedroom, a nice little room at first glance. Then Jesper saw the blood stains on the bed and desk, the window near the bed was smashed open. There was obviously a reason no one was living here anymore. 

Jesper approached the desk, there was a letter torn in a few pieces on top of it. Whoever had torn it obviously didn’t think of the very clear solution of just sliding them back together. The letter read:

       My Dearest Husband, 

Jurda Parem is dangerous, this fact has become more clear to me every day I am here. I feel myself losing control over my mind and body with every dose I take and I believe it is the reason other soldiers here never return home. I wish I could say I could resist it, but I believe they made it so that no one can. 

I know you have connections, if you wish to see me again, you will have to alert someone of this. It may be difficult to convince them, especially since it seems all this was intended. Van Eck is the one whose manifesting all of this, I doubt Rollins even realizes he’s easily disposable. 

Even though I may forget, I care for you dearly, if this letter makes it to you I assure you that confirms it. It is difficult to reach out to our loved ones here, mainly because no one believes we have any. Be safe, take care of yourself. 

Love, Anya. 

Jesper felt a bit of sadness grow in his chest, the letter must have been written before the Parem infections. He hoped whoever the letter was written to had made it out alright, that none of the blood here was his. 

At least Jesper wasn’t the only one who knew how horrible Parem was, if only this Anya woman hadn’t been too late. 

Jesper took the pieces of the note and shoved them in his pocket. He wasn’t sure if it would give him hope or fear. But he wanted to keep it. 

He went back downstairs after that. Hoping whatever he was feeling didn’t show on his face. 

“We’ll stay here a little while longer, hopefully you can walk on your own by then.” 

Wylan nodded. “Are you alright?” 

“Yes.” Jesper responded. “I’m fine.” 

Wylan had a solemn look in his eyes like he knew Jesper wasn’t completely fine. He didn’t ask about it, Jesper didn’t want him to ask about it. Maybe it would be nice to talk to someone about it, but not Wylan. He couldn’t become friendly with Wylan anyway, he’d be leaving the moment he got the things he needed from Jesper. 

If Wylan couldn’t run the next time Jesper needed him to, he wouldn’t go back for him. He had other things to focus on. 

Chapter Text

Wylan could almost put all his weight on his ankle now, which was nice because every time he felt an ounce of pain from it he felt worse and worse about what had happened in the forest. He wouldn’t let the guilt and pain distract him from the map. 

“Are you sure you don’t want to rest again?” Jesper asked from behind him. 

“I’m sure.” Wylan felt that Jesper was only asking because he felt that he had to, not because he really cared. After they’d needed to rest only an hour after they’d started walking, Wylan worried Jesper would take the next chance he had to get rid of him. 

A part of Wylan considered going somewhere else after getting what he needed from Jespers safe house, maybe he could try to find out where Nina and Matthias had gone. He had no idea where to start, but he had all the time he could get himself. 

Another part wanted to ask Jesper if he could just stay with him- not forever obviously, just for a little longer. 

No part of him wanted to go back to that awful treehouse, his father had dropped him in the forest hoping he’d either starve to death, get infected, or just get eaten before the infection could even take place. He’d taken an old shack apart and then put it up in that tree to stay safe, it was a nice, comfortable place. But Wylan always had a fear his father would return and finish what he started. 

“There should be a highway coming up, it’ll be easier to follow to the city.” 

Jesper ran up beside him. “Woah city? Cities usually are filled with crawlers. Is it gonna be okay?” 

“It’s Zelvar, they built those tunnels with Crawler safe spaces since they can’t hear anyone’s heartbeats through titanium.” Had Wylan ever been there before? Something about it seemed familiar.

Jesper nodded. “That was actually efficient right? But they stopped making them because it wasted too much of their precious riches.” 

Wylan nearly laughed but paused first. “How do you know about that?” 

Jesper nearly froze at the question. “Like I said- people talk. I’ve got friends that learned a lot.” Wylan figured that he was lying through his teeth, but he didn’t pry. “How do you know about it?” 

Wylan bit his lip. “Same as you- when I had friends.” Wylan rummaged through his pocket and pulled out a hair tie to put his hair out of his face. 

Jesper probably knew Wylan was also lying, neither of them cared. 

—

The road was easier to walk along at least. It wasn’t uneven or easy to trip on something. But although there were tunnels in the city, Wylan still feared them, they would definitely be in the tunnels. What if he and Jesper couldn’t find any safe rooms? What if Wylan’s stupid ankle somehow ruined everything and killed them both?

“Is that it?” Jesper asked. 

Wylan looked up from the map, the city looked to be about a mile away.  “Yeah,”

“Would you happen to know how to navigate the tunnels?” 

Wylan hit his head. “Fuck, right. Uh probably not.” He was very tired, it was getting dark. “I have binoculars and the ground gets lighter to show where the tunnels are. Aw can at least figure out how to get in.” 

Jesper, who didn’t seem to be tired at all, crossed his arms. “And what happens if there’s crawlers living in those tunnels?” 

Wylan looked over his shoulder at him. “I was just gonna hide and then blow them up.” 

“You can do that?” 

“Of course I can.” Wylan looked into his bag to check to see what he’d packed. “You thought I could build a bunch of landmines but not normal bombs?” 

Jesper shrugged and then stretched his arms. “Sorry for underestimating you, kid.” 

“I’m not a kid, we’re probably the same age.” Wylan grumbled as they kept walking. 

“How old are you?” 

Wylan thought for a moment. “What year is it?” 

Jesper laughed. “Saints, you've been isolated for a while haven’t you?” Wylan felt his shoulder bunch together, Jesper stopped laughing. “It’s 2025.” 

“Oh.” If it was probably spring or summer at this point.. “I’m nineteen. I was born in September.”

“Aw you are just a kid.” Jesper teased. 

Wylan rolled his eyes. “Oh please, how old are you?” Jesper didn’t respond, he just kept walking with the stupid teasing grin on his face. “You act like your six, I would be surprised if you were just a tall child.” 

Jesper sighed. “I’m twenty, my birthday is in May.” 

Wylan elbowed him in his side. “You're five months older than me.” 

“Doesn’t matter, I’m older and taller.” Jesper smiled smugly and walked ahead of Wylan. 

The feeling of annoyance somehow melted away in Wylan's stomach. Maybe they were arguing, but it felt more like friendly banter. Almost like having a friend… Wylan didn’t dwell on that too much, even if it felt nice, Jesper probably still hated him. 

— 

The tunnels had been fairly easy to get into, a few crawlers had noticed them but couldn’t figure out how to enter the tunnels themself. 

“I’m glad Parem infections made them stupid.” Jesper said as he climbed down to the floor of the tunnel. 

“You shouldn’t say that, they were people once too.” Wylan always was horrified that someday he’d see a person he once knew infected. He always had to remind himself that the body of the person was really all that remained- they were dead. Even if an antidote was made against the infections, there was no cure for death. 

Surprisingly, Jesper did look a bit guilty for saying that. He rubbed the back of his neck as he spoke; “Sorry, just trying to lighten the mood.” 

Wylan nodded. “It seems like the tunnels just go straight through the city, so as long as we just keep going forward we’ll probably make it out.” 

Unfortunately, after about a half hour of walking, there was a large metal door blocking the path. Wylan looked over to see a keypad over on the side. 

“Well shit.” Jesper said. “How the hell are we supposed to know what the code is?” 

Wylan walked over to the keypad, his father had built these tunnels, he’d also probably chosen the code. The paint on the keypad was slightly faded on four numbers Wylan recognized. He tapped the number 1202, December 2nd, his mother's birthday. The screen above flashed green. 

He could feel Jespers staring. “How did you-”

Thankfully, the doors opened before Jesper could finish. Unfortunately, there were about two dozen crawlers on the other side. 

Neither of them needed to say anything, they just started running. Wylan rummaged through his bag and pulled out one of his bombs and the button that would set it off. He had to shout over the sounds of the crawlers chasing after them. 

“We need to find one of the rooms before I can set it off.” His ankle was killing him, but he’d pull through. 

Jesper nodded and pointed ahead, the shape of a door was on the wall nearby. Jesper ran a bit faster, he was probably slowing down before to stay beside Wylan and his busted ankle. 

He figured out how to pry open the door and Wylan threw the bomb over his shoulder before running in after Jesper. The door was slammed shut but the crawlers were obviously attempting to claw at the walls on the other side.

Wylan crouched down to take the weight off his ankle before clicking the button that would trigger the bomb…

Nothing happened. “What the hell?” Wylan kept clicking it rapidly. 

“Did you use the wrong one?” Jesper asked. 

“No..” Wylan rubbed his head, this wasn’t normal. The bomb was fine, he hadn’t thrown it too far. “Shit-I know what’s happening.” Wylan realized. “It’s the wall, it probably won’t let electric transmissions through. What else can we do?” He looked around, the room was mostly empty let alone the ground littered with pieces of the ceiling and a few boxes in the corner. 

Wylan walked over to the boxes and started to look through them. Jesper crouched down beside him. “So if we just opened the door would the bomb work?” He picked up the button Wylan had tossed to the side. 

Wylan shook his head. “You’d have to stick your arm through probably- unless you have any interest in chopping it off with a knife that we don’t have..”

Jesper was walking towards the door, the only reason Wylan didn’t stop him immediately was because he had to wonder if Jesper had a death wish. 

Wylan pushed himself up and grabbed Jespers arm. “What are you-” That suicidal asshole pushed Wylan back, causing him to tumble into the boxes. 

Wylan watched in horror as Jesper pried the door open enough to push his arm through and click the button. Pale, rotting hands clawed at the door and the walls. The bomb exploded just as the door was shut once again. 

Jesper seemed to be focused on the explosion, all Wylan could see was the very obvious bite on Jespers hand. He was shocked, why had he done that? Didn’t he understand anything? 

“You built that?” Jesper asked, he looked amazed and painfully unaware at the fact he was going to die. Worse- he was going to turn into a horrible, ravenous thing. 

Jesper turned around and finally registered Wylan’s horror. He looked down at his hand. “Oh.. Wylan it’s okay I’m fine-” Jesper stepped forward and Wylan crawled back. Jesper would turn in a matter of hours. 

“Wylan, I’m Grisha.” Jesper said. He pulled up his sleeve to reveal another bite on his arm. “See? This one’s from two weeks ago, right before I met you. I’m immune to it..” 

This did not comfort Wylan at all. Grisha were dangerous, he knew that, it had been implemented into his brain just as much as his own worthlessness was. He got as far from Jesper as he could. 

“Grisha are weapons only aware of their ability to harm people.” Wylan said, reciting something that had been lectured to him years back by one of his tutors. 

“Because that’s all they’re taught.” Jesper snapped. “Imagine you were taken from your home when you were ten and taught your whole life that’s all you were good for? While they give you these stupid pills that don’t even-” Jesper breathed in and out carefully. “Am I scaring you?” 

Wylan thought it was a rhetorical question. 

“I-”

“Do I really seem dangerous to you? I wouldn’t want to hurt you- I don’t want to hurt any innocent people.” 

All that could come into Wylan’s mind were everything he’d learned about Grisha- he hadn’t started being taught until after the infections started to break out. He knew his father hated him, he knew he lied about things from time to time. But would he really lie when it came to a matter of life and death?

“Grisha are the reason for the infections, aren’t they?” 

Jespers shoulder sank. “Even if that is true- if an ‘ordinary’ person was the cause for it- would you start being scared of all of them?” 

Wylan felt himself soften. A Grisha had saved his life once, and Nina had been Grisha too- right? And Matthias, someone who had been trained to fear and keep Grisha captive had still fallen in love with her and begged Wylan for help. 

But Nina had been a heartrender- what if she’d manipulated Matthias? What if Jesper was doing that to Wylan right now? 

Jesper crouched down and reached for a scrap piece of metal on the ground and started shaping it- he was a Fabrikator. Nothing he could do to manipulate Wylan’s mind as far as he knew. 

Jesper was bending the metal in a way Wylan didn’t understand. “They didn’t try to teach us anything that couldn’t be used for self defense, but my friend did show me this.” 

Jesper bent and twisted the metal, he then slowly held it towards Wylan, who nearly flinched until he saw what it was. 

“It’s a flower.”

“A cherry blossom, my moms favorite. A girl in the facility showed me how to make one.” Right- the facility, Wylan would probably have to bring that up soon. 

Jesper looked right at Wylan, his gray eyes looking at him in a way Wylan had never seen. “I know I may be a pest- but I’d never do something horrible, and I’ve never met a Grisha who acts that way.” 

Wylan looked down at the bite marks. “If I touch one of those will I get infected?” 

Jesper looked back down at the bites and shook his head. “No, that was tested.”

Wylan nodded, then rushed forward and threw his arms around Jesper. “Sorry, I know we’re not friends or anything but I’m glad you aren’t dying-” 

Jesper hugged him back- it wasn’t the most shocking thing that had happened in the last ten minutes. But it was still surprising. Wylan hadn’t been hugged in years- even before he’d been abandoned, no one really cared about him. 

“I’m also glad I’m not dying.” 

Wylan laughed and moved out of the position he was in- even if he honestly could have stayed like that for a long time. He slowly stood up, Jesper was still crouched down, his hand was still holding on to Wylan’s wrist. 

“Are you ready to go face the horrific scene I created in the tunnel?” 

Jesper smiled and nodded, letting go of Wylan and standing up. “That was actually really impressive- the bomb. What else can you build?” 

Wylan smiled with delight- now he had something he could drone on about for hours while they walked. “I taught myself how to make them- You have no idea what you’ve just asked me.” 

Chapter Text

Jesper hadn’t expected to feel so much lighter after telling Wylan. Even though at first Wylan had been terrified of him, he seemed to slowly calm down, and then he just.. accepted it. 

That honestly meant a lot to Jesper, more than Wylan knew. His whole life had been defined by his abilities, Wylan had just been grateful he was alive. He’d also appreciated the hug. He cared about Kaz and Inej dearly and he understood why they weren’t fans of touch, but Jesper missed it. Kind, sincere touch was rare for him. Maybe he and Wylan bugged each other but if Wylan offered to hug him again, it’s not like he’d say no. 

Saints, what had he been thinking awhile ago? That he was going to leave Wylan if he got them in trouble again? There was no doubt Jesper would be the cause of trouble too, and Wylan showed no sign of wanting to leave. 

Thankfully they were able no other horrible run-ins with crawlers- only one where Jesper was easily able to shoot it down. He felt a little worse about it now that Wylan had reminded him they were people. Even if the only thing about that was alive was their corpses and the parem. 

Jesper prayed that the wall that looked like the end of the tunnel wasn’t another damn security door. That suddenly reminded him that Wylan had known the code to the last door. 

“Hey.. how did you know how to open the door?” 

Wylan paused, processing the question. “Oh- uh I noticed the paint was fading in some of the numbers and so I clicked the numbers that made sense..” 

“They just.. made sense?” Jesper couldn’t imagine something like that just clicking in his head. He overthought everything. 

“Like- like birthdays! Plenty of people use dates for their passwords so I tried out one that made sense.” Wylan said, very defensively. 

Jesper supposed it made sense, and he was no genius but it was a bit suspicious how it had all made sense to Wylan so fast. It didn’t matter, Jesper was too tired to care. 

Wylan stopped walking and looked up, Jesper followed his gaze. The entire ceiling of this area of the tunnel was a mirror.

“Do you think it’s a one way mirror?” Wylan asked. “So they could watch what was happening?” 

Jesper nodded. “Maybe.” He looked closer at the mirror and gasped dramatically. 

“What.” Wylan asked, his face shocked with worry. 

“I’m still wonderfully handsome, I just wanted to make sure.” Jesper grinned, he knew he looked fine. Although the burn scars on his shoulder and neck made him feel a little abnormal looking, and the bags under his eyes were very present, he was still him. 

Wylan was blushing now. “I haven’t seen my own reflection in awhile. I kinda missed it.” 

“I’d miss seeing that pretty face of yours too.” Jesper was now close enough with Wylan he could resort to flirting with him. He watched Wylans face turn red, maybe flirting with him would be more fun than teasing him. 

Jesper thought he might cry when he saw a ladder leading up. They’d been walking for hours at this point. Wylan was able to ramble about bombs and chemistry and explosives for a significant amount of that time. 

“After you.” Jesper motioned toward the ladder. 

Wylan stepped back. “No way. You’re the one who's immune to the crawlers.” 

That’s fair. Jesper wouldn’t admit to Wylan that although being immune, crawlers horrified him. Even though a bite couldn’t hurt him, the crawlers were still hungry. If it weren’t for Wylan’s bomb, the crawlers would have gotten both of them, and being resistant to becoming one didn’t make him invincible. He didn’t mind that everyone thought that though, he sort of already felt a bit like he was dead, so who cared. 

He climbed up the ladder and pushed the hatch above him open part of the way. Jesper looked around for more crawlers, he saw nothing and pushed open the hatch the rest of the way. It was safe.

He pushed himself out and flopped onto the ground underneath him, it was good to see the sky again, it was dark once again, which meant they’d been there all day and hadn’t slept in around 36 hours. He rolled over and sat up to help pull Wylan up. 

“Do you think we’ll be able to find a place to rest soon?” He asked. Jesper stood up and looked at the city they’d just walked through. Just looking at it all made him want to collapse. 

Wylan was still sitting on the ground, Jesper grabbed his arms and pulled him up, only then noticing the look on Wylan’s face. 

Jesper looked over his shoulder and froze. 

“Is that the-”

“It’s the Grisha facility.” Jesper said. The horrible place he’d spent all those awful years in. It gave him a bit of comfort to see it destroyed, he hadn’t gotten to take it all in when it all happened. 

Jesper walked towards the rubble of the building, he wanted to see the damage up close. 

It was all throughout destroyed, whoever had blown it up must have been crazy. It was difficult to believe Jesper and the other Grisha had somehow survived all this with a few burns. 

He turned around to see Wylan still standing away from the building. “Don’t worry, no Grisha ghosts are going to rise from the dead and attack you for walking on their graveyard.”

“Haha.” Wylan said, looking petrified. 

“I am joking, I think all the Grisha actually survived.” Jesper kept looking around, there were no signs of anyone getting hurt. Of course- the remains of any people probably wouldn’t have lasted out here.

“Imagine that.” Wylan mumbled. He started to follow Jesper through the rubble of the building. “So- what happened?” 

Jesper was pushing through a pile of broken wood and bricks- maybe they were here. “Some maniac blew up the building out of nowhere. There was no warning or anything, I thought they were targeting Grisha but it seems like they left them unharmed for the most part.” The one part of the building that was still somewhat intact was the area that he had been kept in. 

“I can’t believe someone would do that.” Wylan didn’t sound like he was listening to Jesper. 

“It was crazy and it’s how I got these scars..” Jesper rubbed his neck as he spoke, “but it’s also the reason I’m not still stuck in there.” 

In that moment, it was as if the saints looked down upon him and decided to give him some nice luck. His beautiful revolver, the thing he honestly missed the most from this place, was on the ground in a pile of broken planks. It was a lovely sign to see.

“Wylan look!” He picked up the revolver and took his other one out, twirling them before pointing them at nothing. “Now I have both.” 

Wylan smiled. “That’s wonderful, now you can threaten to shoot me in both sides of my head.” He seemed off. 

Jesper continued wandering but kept his peripheral vision on Wylan. His foot kicked on something that wasn’t rubble. A small familiar looking tool. 

Jesper very carefully picked it up, “Hey, Wylan. I think this is the bomb that blew up the place.” 

Wylan looked incredibly shocked. “How’s it still there?” 

“No clue.. it kinda looks like the bomb you made.” Jesper looked closer. “It looks exactly like it- didn’t you say you taught yourself how to make them?” 

Wylan smiled sheepishly. “Yeah..” 

“But you didn’t make this, did you?” 

…

“Wylan. Surely you aren’t saying you blew up this building three years ago right?” 

Wylan rubbed his arm. “Well, at least it looks like none of the innocent Grisha died.” 

Jesper couldn’t breathe. No fucking way. 

“I am sorry about that burn in your shoulder.”

—

3 Years Prior

Wylan pressed his ear to the radio, praying it would finally work again. 

“Matthias, can you hear me?” He shouted.

After some feedback, he heard his friend's voice. “Yes, are you nearly here?” Matthias sounded agitated. 

“Sorry it took a minute for me to travel hundreds of miles.” Wylan was hiding in a building nearby the facility. “Are you sure it’s safe to be freeing so many Grisha, aren’t they dangerous?” 

“It’s fine, Wylan. I thought the same as you, maybe they’re not wrong about all of them, but I know they’re wrong about her.” 

Matthias had somehow made a connection between his walkie talkie and Wylan’s radio months ago. They’d been talking about the loneliness the two of them shared. Matthias was always talking about Nina, the apparent love of his life. 

A month ago he’d told Wylan that Nina was Grisha and living in the facility he worked at. He was supposed to hate her and run tests on her abilities, he’d never been able to bring himself to do so. And now he wanted to save her. 

Wylan feared Grisha, it was all he knew, but Matthias had begged for it, he had nothing he could use to save Nina. So obviously the only option would be for Wylan to blow up the building she lived in. 

It was a stupid idea overall, but the facility was very fortified, there was no way to get Nina in or out without destroying it, and Matthias didn’t have anything of his own he could use. Unless they took it all down, they’d end up being caught. 

It would also mess with Wylan’s fathers horrible tests that obviously weren’t doing anything. And piss him off in the process. 

Wylan was able to sneak into the building from below, Matthias was able to let him in. 

Wylan felt so happy to finally put a face to the person he’d been talking to for awhile. He wished Matthias had shared the feeling, but he was too focused on saving Nina. That was alright, they could be happy to have met each other later. 

Matthias only grabbed Wylan’s arm and pointed towards a hallway. “I’ve looked at the blueprints of the building, if you go down there and put the bomb on the corner of the ceiling, it should trigger the rest of that part of the building to fall. Then I can get Nina.” 

Wylan nodded and looked down the hall. “Where can I meet you after you find her? I can still come with you, right?” 

Matthias finally seemed to focus on Wylan. “Of course you can, Lamb. There should be a little candle shop close by. Nina always talks about it since she can see it from her window. Once you exit the building, you go right and keep walking, the shop will look different from every other building around it.” 

Wylan smiled. “Okay.” 

Matthias ran up the stairs of the building while Wylan walked down the hallway, he didn’t want to think about the things in the doors around him. He planted the bomb where Matthias told him to and then ran. If he kept running he’d be far enough from the bomb before it-

Wylan was thrown into the wall by the impact of the bomb. His head was hurting horribly, did something else happen? He might have been knocked out for a few minutes. There was destruction everywhere, he heard people screaming and shooting. 

Wylan rubbed his head, it hurt horribly, when he took his hands back he saw his whole hand covered in blood. Saints. He was going to die just as he had found a friend. 

Wylan forced himself to look upward, there was a red-haired woman standing above him. She was wearing Grisha garments. Oh no, another Grisha had escaped during the process. Was she going to kill him? It would only speed up the process of what was already happening. 

Wylan saw her reach forward and put a hand on his head, the awful pain stopped and his vision cleared. Wylan almost felt relieved, then he heard the sounds of crawlers groaning. Of course- they had those to test on too.

The woman leaned towards Wylan and softly whispered. “Run.” 

Obviously Wylan ran, what else was he supposed to do? There was a boy knocked out lying amongst the fallen building, Wylan felt horrible running past him. It looked like he’d been close to the bomb and had gotten burnt from it. 

Run! Wylan kept running, he made it out of the building, he was supposed to go right. 

On the right, there were men with guns shooting at the crawlers and Grisha that had escaped. One man looked right at Wylan and pointed the gun. 

Wylan was faced with the complicated choice of staying alive or going back to being lonely. Loneliness was a plague on him, it really didn’t seem worth it. 

In the end, Wylan did choose to live. A part of him always regretted that choice. He just hated being alone so much, the only thing that kept him ok for so long was the hope that Matthias had found Nina and gotten her to safety. 

Wylan had gotten so so close to having a friend, he’d stared at that stupid radio for weeks, hoping Matthias would communicate with him somehow, but he must have lost the walkie talkies. 

Wylan ended up going back to that horrible treehouse and continued scratching marks on the wall. Day after day, slowly but surely giving up hope. 

—

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” Jesper said. 

“You know, I think I just remembered a place around here we can stay for the night.” 

Chapter Text

Jesper was grateful it was dark outside, if the sun had been shining on his face whilst  he was so tired and having to listen to Wylan’s confusing story, he would have collapsed by now.

He’d be fine though, Wylan had been able to take in the fact that Jesper was Grisha, so Jesper could try to understand how Wylan blew up the facility he’d lived in for years. 

“Thank you.” Jesper blurted in the midst of Wylan’s dramatic retelling of the whole event. 

Wylan looked surprised, probably not expecting Jesper to be grateful for what he’d done. “For what?” 

“For getting me out of that shithole.” Jesper pulled a loose thread on his shirt. “I mean- it was scary and stuff but if you hadn’t done that who knows what state I’d be in?” 

Wylan twiddled with his fingers as he spoke. “Well.. you’re welcome? I’m grateful you aren’t angry.” 

“Angry?” Wylan had practically saved his life- he’d put it in danger as well but who cares. “I’m confused and trying to grasp everything but I’m not angry.” 

Wylan smiled, Jesper really liked making him smile so much. He couldn’t imagine that Wylan had that much to smile about while he was alone. 

“I think this is it.” 

“Oh! It’s so… cute.” Jesper hadn’t expected there to be an adorable little store in the middle of this horrible city, it sent a rush of relief over him, he’d fall asleep more easily here. “What is it?”

“A candle store I think.” Wylan cautiously went up to the door and opened it. Jesper readied his guns, feeling a bit guilty he wasn’t the one checking to see if it was safe. Wylan looked around for a bit before motioning that it was safe.

“Wasn’t this city only ever used for testing? Why would they keep a candle store?” Wylan asked. 

“Maybe the facility workers had a secret santa.” Jesper mumbled. The building smelled nice- obviously. It reminded him of the oils and perfumes his mother would wear and use around the house. 

He breathed in the scent. “How does it not smell like city and misery?” 

Wylan didn’t answer, he might have shrugged but Jesper wasn’t looking at him closely enough. He pushed open a door and gasped with delight. “Oh look! There’s pillows, we won’t have to just lay on the ground.” 

Wylan left the small room with his arms full of some old pillows, they were dirty and had a few holes, but they would bring a little comfort. 

“Do you want me to take first watch? You seem tired.” Wylan asked. Jesper had been tired, right now he sort of wanted to stay up and breathe in the scent of his mother. He didn’t want to tell Wylan that. Wylan had already tossed him a pillow. “I think it’s my turn anyway.” 

Jesper looked down at the pillow, it would be fine, he could enjoy the candles in a few hours. “Okay, wake me up in like three or four hours.” 

Jesper might have been distracted by the nostalgia he felt in that store, but he was very tired. It had been a bit difficult to fall asleep while Wylan was just standing there. It must have been difficult for Wylan too. In the last couple days they’d worked out a routine to make sure they could both get some sleep each night. Even if it involved using Wylan’s ridiculous looking mechanical watch, it was a good system. As long as Wylan woke him up, he could have a nice few peaceful hours with the candles. Maybe he could find the one that reminded him of his mama’s scent, yes he’d have to do that. 

Jesper lay back with his head on the pillow, hoping no diseased rat had used it as a bed. He looked over at Wylan, who was scribbling in his sketchbook, angled towards a broken window. Jesper let his eyes shut.

—

He woke up feeling far too refreshed, and Wylan hadn’t even woken him up. Jesper pried his eyes open and looked over at Wylan. He rushed over to him and grabbed his wrist with the watch. 

“You should’ve woken me up over an hour ago!” Jesper snapped. He could have found his candle by now. 

Wylan pulled his wrist back and put his hand over it protectively. Jesper might have grabbed it a bit too hard. “I’m sorry- you seemed so tired I thought I could give you another hour to rest.” 

“I didn’t want to rest! I wanted to-” Jesper stopped talking before he said anything he shouldn’t. “Are you afraid of me? Do you not trust me enough to put your guard down?” 

“Of course not-” Jesper had mostly said that to change the subject, but Wylan’s words sounded hesitant. 

“Whatever. Just don’t do it again.” Jesper stood up and walked back over to the pillow, he threw it at Wylan. Wylan muttered that he’d seen a crawler approach earlier and dealt with it before tossing the pillow on the ground and flopping down onto it, facing away from Jesper. 

He counted to sixty in his head fifteen times- maybe- or he’d lost count and gotten bored. Then he started looking for the candle. 

There were a few on display, he felt a bit silly and stupid just grabbing a bunch of candles and smelling them to see if they smelled like his Ma. But Wylan was asleep and no one was around so it didn’t matter. None of the ones out here were it, he didn’t want to keep Wylan out of his sight…

It would be fine. Jesper went into the rooms in the back, the scent of his Ma was overwhelming, how had he not found it?

He knew exactly how it was supposed to smell, why couldn’t he find it? Where was it where was it where was it??

“Is everything okay?”

Now Wylan was here, fabulous. “Go back to sleep.” Jesper didn’t bother looking at him or talking to him or begging him to help find this stupid candle. 

“You’re making a lot of noise.” 

No he wasn’t? When did he- Jesper looked around and finally registered the shattered candle on the ground. “Oh.. shit I’m sorry I didn’t realize.” 

He bent down to clean it up, what if this was the candle? It didn’t look like it. 

Wylan bent down to help him, he seemed to have found some rag to help gather the glass a bit more carefully. “Are you looking for a candle?” 

Jesper was just picking up glass, he might have gotten a cut but it didn’t matter, he just needed to find it. “Yeah- I’ll find it, just go back to sleep.” 

“What for? Do you need a certain one?” Wylan just loved asking questions didn’t he? 

“Go away Wylan.” 

“You could keep looking for it and I could clean this up.” He offered. Jesper stood up, maybe it was rude to accept the offer without actually saying anything, but he didn’t care at that moment. He started looking through another box. Jesper knew he looked stupid, but he’d make Wylan swear to never bring this up again. 

What if the candles all had a different scent when they were lit? Jesper looked around at the room overflowing with candles.. he just wanted a memory of his Ma, why couldn’t he have that?

Jesper shoved the box aside and slumped onto the ground. He put his hands over his face so Wylan wouldn’t be able to see if he started crying. He wouldn’t understand. 

“If I may ask, why do you need a candle?” Wylan said softly. Jesper absolutely wanted to tell him the truth, and at the same time thought he might strangle the kid. 

“I just miss her..” 

“Who?” 

“My ma.” Jesper sighed and finally looked towards Wylan. He couldn’t read his expression, it did occur to Jesper though, that he knew nothing about Wylan. For all he knew, Wylan could understand, maybe Wylan had lost his mother as well. It didn’t seem like he ever had any company in his old home. 

“I just miss her- and it smells like the candles she used to have around the house. I don’t have anything from her, so I thought it might be comforting to find it.” 

Wylan looked sympathetic. “I’m sorry.. when my mother passed, they wouldn’t let anyone go into her room, especially after I tried to break in..” He paused for a moment. “I started a small fire so that they’d be distracted enough so I could go in and take some of her old paintings.” 

“You started a fire?” 

“A small, controlled fire! In which no one got hurt! And it was a good thing I did- all her stuff ended up getting burned- not by me- or stored away.” 

Jesper nearly laughed, it felt too serious of a confession to do so. “Why would they burn her things?” 

Wylan sighed, he was still holding the rest that contained all the glass, he put it aside before starting to talk again. “They thought she had been infected and that it would have rubbed off on her things- it was early on before they knew that that wasn’t how it worked.” 

“They thought she was infected?” Jesper asked. Would Wylan have risked his life for his mothers things? 

Wylan only nodded, probably not wanting to get into those details. “I was twelve, it was the first bomb I built and used. How long ago did your mother.. uh..”

“Before the infections- before they even started drugging Grisha. She would have hated all of it, she taught me everything I knew before I went to the facility.” Jesper could at least smile at the memory of his mother showing him how to bleed colors from flowers and clothes. Sometimes that got him in trouble, it was still fun. 

Wylan had a newly puzzled expression on his face. “I was told the pills they gave to Grisha were a good thing. But I suppose I never heard it from a Grisha.” 

Jespers fists clenched- he wasn’t mad at Wylan for the most part. “I never took the pills, do you think I’ll go rogue with power, Wylan?” 

“No.” Wylan said immediately. “Of course not..” 

“I had a friend- Leoni. When she was really little she could separate chemicals from water so easily, without even thinking that much. After she took the pills, she couldn’t. She’d forgotten how to do anything, she forgot who she was, last I saw her, she couldn’t even remember how to speak.” 

Wylan slowly nodded, hopefully he believed Jesper. “Sorry, there’s a lot I don’t know.” 

“Clearly.” When he said that Wylan flinched and Jesper felt horrible again. “Sorry. I just need to find this candle.” 

“I’ll help.” 

“No. You’ll sleep.” Jesper incisted, he didn’t want to owe Wylan anything for helping him all the time. 

“I’m not tired, what does it look like?” 

Of course, only minutes after Jesper finally told Wylan what he was looking for specifically, Wylan found it. Jesper took the candle from him, feeling a bit awkward, he somewhat also wanted to throw his arms around Wylan and thank him. 

He settled for just saying. “Thanks.” 

Wylan nodded and retreated back to his pillow, he didn’t go to sleep, he just sat down and started sketching again. 

“Please just go to sleep, Wylan, it’ll throw off the balance if you don't.” 

“We won’t need the balance soon enough, I’ll be out of your hair.” Wylan just hated sleeping didn’t he? “What did your mother look like?” 

“Why? Are you drawing her?” Jesper started to worry that he’d forgotten what his Ma looked like, he hadn’t seen photos of her in years. 

“I’m drawing my mother right now.. you’ve made me feel all nostalgic about it.”  

Jesper crouched in front of Wylan and tried to peer over at his drawings, Wylan flushed red and held the sketchbook over his chest. Jesper sighed, “Cmon, you have to let me see it.” He whined, he lightly grabbed Wylan’s arm and shook him. 

Wylan laughed, sighed, and put his sketchbook face up in his lap. He had already started sketching out a face- presumably of his mother, there was also an unfinished sketch of Jesper on the page. 

Jesper felt his face light up. “Found yourself a new muse?” 

Wylan’s face turned red, he slammed the book shut. “You’re the only person I’ve seen in years! I wanted something new to draw.” 

“No- no I like it! You’re a good drawer. You draw awfully small though.” 

Wylan shrugged, his face still slightly red. “It’s my only sketchbook, I don’t want to run out of room.”

“Well, maybe we can find you a new one.. then you can truely capture the beauty of my face.” If Wylan hadn’t already been blushing, Jesper was sure he would have. Wylan rolled his eyes but was still smiling. 

No matter how many times Wylan was planning to say he wasn’t tired, his eyes told a different story. “But before you draw anymore..” Jesper very gently put a hand on the side of Wylan’s face and pushed him into his pillow. “you will sleep.” 

Wylan looked like he was about to protest, he was betrayed by himself and ended up yawning. Wylan angrily turned over and finally seemed to settle into sleep. 

Would Wylan go from being a pest and then being someone so sweet every day? It was really messing with Jespers head. 

When Wylan’s breathing evened again, Jesper walked over to the window and set beside it, he stared at the sky, there weren’t as many stars given they were in the city. Still enough for him to make out constellations and let his mind drift a bit.

—

“And if you look under it, there is Lepus, the rabbit. Can you see its ears and foot, Jesper?” 

“Not really. Just looks like stars.” Jesper said. He had tried really hard to understand the star patterns his mother had been talking about, but they all seemed to be nonsense. 

“You’ll see it eventually, that one’s my favorite.” 

“It’s because I’m your favorite, right Ma?” 

“Yes Jesper, because you’re my little rabbit.” Aditi kissed the top of Jespers head and pulled him into her arms. He giggled, he was almost too tall for her to be able to hold him, almost. 

He buried his head in his Ma’s shoulder. “Are you gonna have to go back to the hospital again soon?” 

Aditi patted his back. “Yes, Jes. I'm very sorry, hopefully this will be the last time. And you can still visit me whenever you’d like.” 

“Okay.” Jesper hugged his Ma a little tighter, as if this might be the last time he’d see her. 

He wished he had known that it was. 

— 

“Are you alright?” Wylan asked.

Jesper snapped back into reality, he wiped his eyes and nose before responding. “Yes, fine. Is it morning already?” Wylan nodded. Jesper quickly got up and gathered his things- including the candle, then followed Wylan out of the store.

“If you ever do have time to draw my Ma- she looked kinda like me, I got told that a lot. Her face was shorter and she wore her hair back in braids.. you don’t have to but if you wanted to-”

“I will.” Wylan said. “I’ll do my best.” 

“Thank you, that would actually mean a lot.” Wylan smiles his sickeningly sweet smile at Jesper. It ties a knot in his stomach. 

Chapter Text

“You haven’t told me how you ended up in that treehouse.” 

Wylan tried to hide the horror that the thought of explaining that gave him, that was way too much to unpack. “Why does that matter?”

Jesper shrugged. “You just seem kind of reluctant about it.” 

“I don’t plan on going back.” He admitted. Wylan wasn’t really sure where he planned to go after he got Jesper back to his friends, he wouldnt dare ask to stay with them. 

“Why not? It was a nice looking place.” 

“Thank you, I made it myself.” Wylan said proudly. It was a terribly troublesome period of time where he’d found an old shed and took it apart then put it in a tree. He’d almost died a few times while doing so, but dying hadn’t mattered much to him. 

There was a wall in the distance, it had to help them in some way. Maybe it was a landmark or maybe there were people on the other side of it. 

Before Jesper could ask him another question they heard a noise from nearby. “Another one?” Jesper whispered. They’d seen about five crawlers in the last twenty minutes. The two of them stood close back to back to see the surrounding area. 

Sure enough, a crawler stumbled out from the bushes and lunged towards Wylan. Jesper threw an arm around Wylan’s middle and shot it before it got too close. 

“There’s been a few too many in the past half hour.” Jesper said with his arm still wrapped around Wylan. 

“Yes, you don’t have to snuggle up to me every time we see one.” Wylan teased, he felt Jesper quickly let go of him and step back. Wylan really wanted to see the look on his face but knew that would reveal how pink his own face was. 

“Do you think there’s a bigger group nearby? They sometimes all group together.” 

Jesper looked at Wylan, perplexed. “I know that, how do you know that?” 

Wylan put his arms around himself. “I just do..” 

“Cmon Wy-” 

“Shhh.” Wylan hissed, he heard more rustling, very faint, but very constant. 

“Wylan you can’t just steer the conversation away from-” Wylan pointed towards the noise, just barely through a grove of trees, they could see there were about five crawlers lurking. 

Jesper readied his revolvers but Wylan stopped him, “How many bullets do you have left?” He whispered. 

Jesper looked carefully. “Oh. Like, three.” 

“Like three?”

“Three. I have three left. Can’t you throw a bomb or something at them?” 

Wylan shook his head. “I could.. but if there’s a herd of them nearby all I’ll do is alert them all.” 

Wylan looked over at a tree, it was easy enough to climb. He motioned towards it and Jesper shook his head. 

“You do know they can climb?” 

“They’ll only climb if they see us.” Jesper looked reluctant, but he pulled the hood on his jacket over his head and followed Wylan up the tree. There was a branch big enough for Jesper to sit on and Wylan could stand beside him.
He took out his binoculars, but when he could see over the wall they had been coming up to, there was no use for them. 

“Do you have a bomb that could take care of that?” Jesper asked.

“Do I have a bomb that could take care of possibly hundreds of zombies? No, Jesper, I do not.” It was probably the most horrific sight Wylan had seen from crawlers. There were so many. And they were just wandering around the town.

“Then what the fuck are we supposed to do?” 

Wylan nearly flinched at Jespers tone, he needed to stop with that. “We’ll need to find another way, we can’t go through that town.” 

“And how long is that gonna take? Wylan, you’ve grown on me and stuff, but I don’t wanna spend forever wandering around here with you.” 

Wylan felt a pit of guilt in his stomach, then he just felt angry. “It’s not my fault. We don’t have any other options. You think I’m having a blast right now? You can be kind of a jackass.” 

“Don’t call me a jackass!” 

Wylan’s brilliant and witty response was interrupted by the unfortunate noises he’d learned to hate. The crawlers had probably heard them arguing. They were climbing the tree. 

“Shit- I don’t have enough bullets.” Jesper seemed ready to jump out of the tree. 

Wylan rummaged through his bag. “I might have one thing-” It was a stupid and dangerous idea, one Wylan really really didn’t want to resort to, but since Wylan was above the crawlers it might work, and he knew staying alive was more important.. 

He took the bottle that was made of its special glass out from his bag. He plugged his nose and watched Jesper do the same before scrambling to pour it onto the quickly approaching creatures. 

Jesper had thankfully grabbed Wylan’s arm to keep him from falling over. The acids Wylan had poured melted through the first crawler, and the next, eating through flesh and bone. Those two knocked the other ones down as they fell. Once they’d hid the ground the acid reached the other crawlers as well, until it was just a horribly disgusting pile of acid and flesh. Wylan had to stare at it for a long moment before Jesper pulled him back. 

Wylan grabbed onto another branch and retched over the side of the tree. He’d just melted people, even if they weren’t alive he couldn’t imagine how painful that must have been. 

“Sorry.” Wylan mumbled, his eyes were squeezed shut. He felt disgusted. 

Jesper put a hand in Wylan’s back and patted him comfortably. “What was that?” 

Wylan forced his eyes open and turned his gaze upward. “F-fluoroantimonic acid. I found it ages ago in an old building and I only took it because- because I was worried someone else might find it and get hurt with it- don’t inhale when we get down by the way.” There was a disgusting taste in Wylan’s mouth and it made him dizzy. 

“Okay- Wylan we’re gonna have to climb down so that you don’t fall out of this tree, okay?”

Wylan nodded, he tried to push down his emotions and climb down, on the opposite side of the tree where it was. 

His feet were touching the ground, he would be fine. “I don’t have any more of that acid, we still can’t go through that city.” 

Jesper agreed, he seemed to be averting his eyes away from the crawlers Wylan had killed, it made Wylan feel a bit better he wasn’t weird for being so uncomfortable at the thought of that. “Yeah- yeah that’s fine whatever.” 

Wylan also felt a bit guilty- but relieved his reaction had caused Jesper to feel bad enough for him. “Do you think you can find us a way?” 

“Of course I can.” Wylan said confidently, “Let’s just distance ourselves from that herd before they hear us.”  

Jesper nodded, and their argument from earlier never came up again.

—

The windows of the gas station they found were thankfully barred shut, and they could cover the door enough that the crawlers wouldn’t be able to open it. Unfortunately people had come to that gas station before they had and run it clean through. 

“Not a crumb of food in sight.” Wylan said as he emerged from the storage closet in the back. 

Something about this area made him feel uneasy, there were no crawlers in sight, he couldn’t figure out what was wrong.

Jesper was holding out his filtered water bottle to him. “I got some water for you while we were heading here.” 

Wylan stared at it. They didn’t usually do favors for each other unless someone’s life was on the line. “You can have it, you must be thirsty.” 

“You threw up back there Wylan, you need to drink water.” Jesper incisted. 

“I drank earlier today I’ll be-”

“Take the damn water, Wy.” 

“Fine! Fine.” Wylan snatched the water and drank, it did feel really nice to hydrate. “Thank you.” 

“No problem.” Jesper said as Wylan laid out the map. There had been a water tower that most certainly would not be useful now nearby, this tower was labeled on the map. So Wylan could easily figure out where to go from here. 

“And how long will that take?” 

Wylan sighed. “Just a bit longer than the way we were going before would.” Jesper didn’t respond. “It’s safe enough here we can both sleep through the night. Soat least there’s that.” 

“Yeah..” 

Wylan watched as Jesper walked around the gas station. He could trust Jesper, couldn’t he? They’d been stuck together this long. If he continued keeping Jesper in the dark their entire time together, they might not survive another argument. 

“I didn’t choose to live in the woods.. uh my father sort of just took me as far away as he could and left me there.” 

Jesper looked intrigued but seemed to shake it off. “Wylan you don’t have to-” 

“My father always hated me because I have a- uh.. learning defect and the month he got rid of me I suppose I had been acting out more than usual.” 

Jesper looked shocked. “What could you have possibly done?” 

Wylan shrugged. “Oh you know, getting angry, embarrassing him, getting caught snogging his coworkers son.” 

Jesper snorted before reverting his face back to seriousness. “Wait- he seriously left you for dead because of that?” 

“I also can’t read.” Wylan added. He hadn’t wanted to say that, but keeping it out felt like lying. 

Jesper looked even more shocked, that was good, he didn’t think Wylan was horrible for not knowing how to read. “What, like you’re dyslexic? Your dad sounds evil.”

You have no idea. “Yes I didn’t start to realize that until like a year ago. It’s become more obvious to me by the day.” 

“A year ago? He left you out there five years ago, didn’t he?” 

“No- well yes but he’s my father, it was difficult to see what he did was wrong. And I… I wanted him to love me..” He bit his lip to keep from looking too stupid. Wylan felt Jesper hug him suddenly. “Did it look like I was going to start crying again?” 

“A little. It’s okay, now I know everything.” 

Wylan laughed against Jespers shoulder. “Almost everything.. I can’t just tell you everything.” 

Jesper stepped back. “Saints Wylan what else could there be?” 

“You think my horrible father and commitment of arson is all that defines me?” 

“Precisely.” 

The two of them laughed at that. They were able to talk and continue laughing for the next hour before they both finally got tired. Wylan went to sleep with a warm, bubbly feeling in his stomach, it was the nicest he’d felt in a long time. 

— 

Jesper wasn’t there.

Wylan had woken up, rubbed his head from its pain of sleeping on the hard floor, and saw no one else in the store. 

“Jesper?” He hadn’t left him, why would he do that? He looked around the store a bit and saw no one. Maybe he had gone to get more water, maybe he’d seen a crawler and went to go deal with it. 

Wylan backed himself up in a corner. No no no, he would not cry again. He would not bawl over being alone for a few more minutes, his only friend had not left him alone. 

That’s when Wylan realized all his things were gone.. the map, his bag, all that was left was his jacket he’d tossed aside the night before. So Jesper had left and taken everything with him. Wylan kept breathing deeply, he had to be wrong, he had to. 

—

It was  hours later when Wylan did cry. It was too much, too many reasons Jesper could be gone.. he could be hurt or just didn’t care for Wylan anymore. Because in the end, Wylan was only helpful for so long, he remained useless as he always was. Wylan hugged his knees to his chest. Maybe this was how it would always go, at least Wylan had felt like he mattered for a moment. 
He’d give himself another hour to be sad before figuring out where he had to go from there. He could at least remember the map a bit, he was good at remembering. 

Wylan was alone again, hardly any idea where he was, no food, no where to go. It felt even worse this time. 

Chapter Text

“Fuck..” Jesper rubbed the back of his head, it didn’t look like he was in that gas station. He felt.. oddly comfortable other than the splitting pain in his head. He was lying in a bed, when had there been a bed??

“So sorry.” A soothing voice said, Jesper felt someone’s hand on his head and the pain there ceased rather quickly. Jesper looked up to see a red haired lady with scars all over her face. “Hello Jesper.” 

Jesper sat up. “How do you know my name?” 

She smiled. “I’m Genya, we were both put in that horrible facility for Grisha at the same time. My partner and I have been trying to find Grisha who had been there.” Her voice was like honey, trying to keep Jesper calm and reassured. 

Jesper looked around, the room he was in seemed normal. “Why?” 

“To keep them safe, the world is cruel to Grisha, especially now. And who knows, maybe if we don’t use cruel methods we might find the cure.” 

Jesper wanted to scoff at that, wanting a cure was wishful thinking. He didn’t say that to the kind woman in front of him though.

“Wait- did you knock me out and take me here?” Jesper asked when he finally registered why his head had hurt so much. 

“We don’t like to reveal the location of this place to anyone, last time we did.. there were some unfortunate outcomes.” Genya looked over Jesper. “Do you have any other injuries?” 

Jesper shook his head, trying to process. “No but my-” Wylan. “Did you also kidnap my friend? There was someone with me in the gas station, is he here-” 

Another woman walked in as Jesper was speaking, Genya turned towards her. “Did the others bring in another boy?”

“We can’t take in every stray we find, Genya.” She responded. 

Jesper got up from the bed, his bag was there.. and so was Wylan’s. “Shit. You don’t understand- he’s so afraid of being alone and he’s going to think I abandoned him!” The woman looked uninterested. “How on earth were you able to take all his things and not notice him there?” 

Genya looked alarmed at her. “Why would you-”

She grabbed onto Genyas arm and pulled her over. She whispered something to her that Jesper couldn’t make out. Then he heard “I’m not letting that boy in.”

“Wylan isn’t dangerous.” Jesper spoke, “He wouldn’t do anything unless you threaten  him.” How long had he been sleeping? Wylan was probably already awake and looking for him. 

The woman was glaring daggers back at him. “How long have you known him?” As if that mattered. 

“About a month, maybe two.. I trust him though.” Did these women know Wylan? Jesper figured he didn’t know everything about him but he couldn’t imagine that was a reason to be scared of Wylan. 

“Does he know you’re Grisha?” Genya asked. Jesper could see Genya grab onto the other woman’s arm and squeezed. 

“Yes. He does.” Jesper spoke confidently, he couldn’t lose Wylan. 

She shook off Genya's hand. “And how did he react to that?” 

Jesper narrowed his eyes. “He was.. confused at first but I think he understands.” Jesper chose not to say that Wylan had scrambled away in fear at first. 

“You think?” This woman’s tone was nothing like Genyas, it was angry and not calming in the slightest. What was her problem? What had Wylan done to her?

“You can’t make me stay here. Unless I can get Wylan I’m leaving.” Jesper tried not to show he was a little bit scared. These two were trained Grisha, they probably could make him stay if they needed him to. 

The woman rolled her eyes and stormed out of the room, Jesper nearly followed but Genya stopped him. “You need to rest, I’ll speak to her.”

“He’s probably already left! I need to find him now.” These people had no right to keep Jesper from his friend.

“I will speak to her. And someone will bring you food.” Jesper wanted to argue, but felt a wash of sleepiness go over him. He knew it was probably Genyas abilities.. but he wanted to lay down now. It wasn’t like they’d hurt him.. Jesper stumbled backwards. “Promise you’ll talk to her.. I have no clue what you have against him but he really is.. great.” 

Genya nodded, she looked genuine, Jesper prayed she was. Even as his eyes were shutting, all he could hope for was that Wylan would be there soon. 

—

“Jesper..” He felt someone shaking him. He didn’t want to wake up, he’d have to face the fact that he’d left Wylan. 

“Jesper!” The person shook him more aggressively. Jesper kept his eyes shut tight, he knew it wasn’t Wylan so what would be the point of-

“Jesper Fahey wake up or I’m going to pour this water down your back.” 

Jespers eyes opened quickly. “Nina!” Nina was here! Nina was alive! Jesper sat up and hugged his friend. “You’re ok.” Jesper hadn’t realized how relaxing it would feel to know his old friend was safe. 

Nina handed him a glass of water and a sandwich. A sandwich that didn’t look old or dirty. Jesper took it and didn’t hesitate to take a bite. It wasn’t the safest idea to take strange food from someone you hadn’t seen in years, but he was hungry. 

“Your boyfriends here too.” Nina said. That almost made Jesper drop his really good sandwich. 

“Wylan’s here? He's not my boyfriend.” Jesper quickly corrected. “ Where is he?” How long had he been asleep so that they’d been able to find him?  

Jesper didn’t wait for Nina to respond and pushed open the door to the room. 

It was a town, a completely ordinary looking, well built town. Jesper looked behind him and saw Nina. “Where am I?” 

“I wish I could tell you, Zoya said it was stupid to give it a name, no one could agree anyway.” Nina sighed. 

Jesper was about to ask where Wylan was again, but then it finally hit him. “Zoya? As in the dragon?”

Nina only grinned, Jesper hated when his friends felt the need to be dramatic and mysterious like this. He promptly forgot about it when he saw a streak of red hair a ways away from him. 

Wylan was there, talking to a tall blonde boy. Wylan was here and safe and hopefully not angry at Jesper. 

Nina nudged him. “You find the only friend you had for years that you haven’t seen in forever is alive and well but all you care about is some boy who's apparently not your boyfriend.” 

“I just have to apologize..” Jesper muttered before he started walking towards Wylan. He may have started running a bit. He saw Wylan’s head turn over his shoulder and then felt Wylan’s arms around him. 

Jesper exhaled and squeezed Wylan’s waist. “I would never leave you alone like that y'know?" 

“Mhm.” Wylan said softly. His nose was pressed against Jespers neck. “It worked out anyway, I found my old friend.” 

Jesper backed up enough to look at Wylan’s face. “Yeah? I did too.” 

Wylan looked over at Nina. “I think our friends may have found each other first.” 

Jesper stepped away from Wylan and glanced at Nina. Nina put on a look of fake annoyance. “Your friend nearly blew us up a few years ago.” 

Wylan scoffed. “Matthias asked me to! And I did it specifically to not hurt any of you too much.” 

It took too long for it to click for Jesper. “Oh!” He looked towards the tall blonde. “This is the Matthias you knew who was trying to save Nina- who I knew.” He turned towards Wylan’s and put an arm over his shoulder. “We were destined to meet, sunshine.” 

Wylan’s cheeks turned pink but before Jesper could comment on it, Nina grabbed his other arm. “I want to show you everything, it’s amazing what they’ve done here.” 

“Not so fast.” Jesper looked over his shoulder to see Zoya (he thinks) glaring at them. He was plenty taller than her, but suddenly felt very small. “I need to talk to those two.” 

Nina sighed. “Zoya, they're harmless, no need to interrogate.” 

Jesper wouldn’t be surprised if the storm clouds that seemed to be miles away were a symbol of Zoyas increasing anger. “You’re really going to say that after what happened a year ago?” Zoya stepped toward Nina. “Or have you forgotten? We let people in and were robbed blind. We lost so many people, including Alina-” 

“Alina’s not dead, she's only missing.” Nina snapped. 

“I don’t mind being interrogated.” Wylan squeaked. Jesper felt intently grateful for that, he hadn’t wanted to see how much further this could go. 

Zoyas eyes snapped towards Wylan. “Smart decision.” Nina crossed her arms and stepped back. Zoya turned and seemed to expect Jesper and Wylan to follow her. 

They did of course. Jesper would prefer to hear what Zoya could do with her abilities rather than witness it first hand. 

“Did they knock you unconscious to take you here too?” Jesper asked his friend. 

Wylan’s jaw dropped. “No? They just wouldn’t let me look at the map. Did they knock you out?” 

“So you just followed a stranger blindly?” He knew Wylan was kind, but not incredibly trusting to everyone. 

Wylan shrugged. “They mentioned you, I just wanted to know you were ok.. and I really wanted to believe that you hadn’t left me behind.” 

Jesper had a slight urge to hug him again. But Zoya was looking at them pointedly and standing by another building, it appeared to still be in the process of being constructed. Jesper looked down at the ground beneath him, it appeared they were in the process of building a road from the buildings, they had built up their own little world out here. 

Jesper and Wylan followed behind Zoya, the inside of the building looked a bit like an office building. 

“Your maps are incredibly outdated.” Zoya spoke, she circled around a desk in the room and sat down. 

Wylan stiffened, Jesper looked over him before turning back to Zoya. “How can a map be outdated? It’s a map.” 

Zoya rolled her eyes. “Things change and a lot of things have gotten destroyed.” 

Wylan seemed to be caving in on himself. “I’m so sorry Jesper..” He whispered. “I had no idea, I thought they were new-” 

“We can provide you with new maps, clothes, food- you obviously need it. Then you can be on your merry way.” Zoya said, obviously not over the moon to be giving them anything. 

“Thought you needed me around.” Jesper said. It probably wasn’t the best thing to say knowing he needed to get back to Kaz and Inej. Saints, his friends probably thought he was dead by now. 

“I thought so, but that changed.” It almost seemed like Zoyas eyes flickered up at Wylan. “We will need a favor or two from you, but you can stay for a week before that’s all arranged.” 

Jesper scoffed. “We haven’t agreed to anything.” 

“We need new maps, Jesper.” Wylan whispered. “We can’t keep wandering around forever.” 

Jesper met his eyes, they looked riddled with guilt and pleading. “Yeah okay we’ll do whatever.” 

It couldn’t be that bad could it? Maybe they’d just want a blood sample or something like they used to take from Jesper at the facility. 

“Excellent.” Zoya said in a monotone voice. “I need to speak to him.” She pointed at Wylan. “Nina will show you where you two are staying.”

Jesper looked back at Wylan. “What the hell can’t you say in front of me?” 

“It’s fine, Jesper.” Wylan spoke. 

Jesper couldn’t understand what Wylan could have done that made Zoya so suspicious of him. Wylan seemed to be one of the kindest people he’d met in a long time. 

“Fine.” As he left, he lightly brushed Wylan’s shoulder. Wylan may have flinched slightly, Jesper left after that. 

Nina was standing outside, the look on her face must have meant that Zoya was typically like this. She took his arm and pulled him further from the office. “You smell awful, let’s find you some new clothes.” 

—

Wylan felt so strange in the sweater and jeans he’d been given. He hadn’t had the privilege of wearing something for comfort and not protection in years. He pushed open the door to the tiny cabin he was told he’d be staying in, Jesper seemed to have already made himself at home. 

“Don’t you love the feeling of an actual real live bed?” He was sprawled out as much as possible on one of the twin beds inside. Jesper was wearing jeans as well, only to match them with the brightest yellow shirt Wylan had ever seen. Even when he had a choice he wore the loudest outfit possible. 

Wylan sat down neatly on the other bed beside his things. “It is nice.” 

Jesper rolled over to look at Wylan. “What did Zoya need you for?”  

Wylan bit his lip. “Just about what we might have to help with soon. And making sure I won’t mess anything up.” 

Jesper sighed and got up from his bed to sit beside Wylan. “What does she have against you? Have you met before?” 

“No.” That wasn’t a lie at least, he’d never officially met Zoya. 

Jesper was sitting frightfully close to him, their knees were pressed together as he continued talking. “Then why is she acting like you aren’t trustworthy?”  

My father is the reason humanity is doomed. “I suppose it’s because I’m not a Grisha?” 

It’s not that Wylan didn’t trust Jesper, but his friend had lost so much from this apocalypse. How on earth would he react? 

Jesper rolled his eyes. “It doesn’t matter, we can’t stay too long, this is like a little vacation.” He gasped, “Nina said there’s a bar in town! I don’t know if you’re into that but I certainly am, you should come with me.” 

“Okay..” Hopefully Wylan wouldn’t do anything stupid and then be banished from his lovely town. 

Jesper rolled off the bed and got up. “You look good in that sweater by the way, suits you.” 

Wylan’s face burned. “Thanks. You look..” Really good. But why did it feel so different the way Wylan was thinking, “unfortunately yellow.” 

Jesper sighed and slung an arm over Wylan’s shoulder. “You have no taste, Wy.” 

— 

Wylan’s eyes wandered away from the bar immediately. “You have a piano?” 

Wylan hadn’t played piano or flute in years, he’d probably make a fool of himself if he tried now, but oh how he wanted to.. 

“Oh yeah..” Nina sighed, “it would be great if anyone here knew how to play it.” 

“I do.” Wylan found himself saying before he could stop himself. He loved music, he loved hearing it. He didn’t want to tear himself away from it. 

Jesper gasped. “You didn’t tell me that! Now you have to play.” He nudged Wylan towards the piano. 

Wylan looked around at the crowded bar, he didn’t want to play for the first time in years in front of so many people. “I don’t know.. I might mess it up.” 

Nina waved that away. “Wylan, these people haven’t heard good music in years, they’ll probably celebrate if you played twinkle twinkle little star.” 

Jesper was already dragging Wylan towards the piano and seated him there. Some people had noticed and were now watching expectantly. Wylan knew he must be turning red. 

“Pleeeeeassee Wylan, for me?” Jesper batted his eyes. Wylan suddenly remembered that he’d been trying to guide Jesper with horribly outdated maps and had gotten him into horrible situations. It was the least he could do. 

“Alright, what should I play?” 

“Just something happy, something you could dance to.” Jesper patted his shoulders and stepped around on the other side of the piano. 

Wylan looked down at the keys carefully and plucked a few of them, remembering where his hands were supposed to go. 

Something you could dance to. Wylan thought for a moment to see if he could find the sheet music of the happiest song he could in the back of his mind. A couple notes appeared and Wylan played them, then it was like muscle memory. He thought he might just play one song, but when he looked up he saw Jesper grinning widely, he also saw people dancing together. Which meant he wasn’t horribly screwing it up, so he kept playing. 

After a bit, a boy who looked a bit younger than Wylan tapped his shoulder. “Would you be able to play something a bit slower?” His eyes flitted back to a girl with black hair. Wylan nodded, he hadn’t learned too many slow songs, but he had heard tons, he could just improvise. 

Minutes after he started playing he saw the boy and girl dancing together. Nina and Matthias had started dancing together as well. It made him especially happy to see them together. It was nice to know that they were happy and safe in this dangerous world. 

Jesper was dancing with someone too. Wylan’s hands almost fumbled when he noticed. He was with a pretty blonde girl who was giggling at something he said. 

Wylan should feel happy at that, Jesper is having fun and Jesper is his friend. Wylan felt his stomach turn slightly, but he tore his eyes away and turned them back to the piano. He thought of his mother, showing him what every note meant and what notes sounded well together. He missed her terribly, even if there was nothing he could do about it, he felt closer to her as he played. 

“Psst.” He heard after a bit, he’d been transitioning from the slow music to the upbeat ones for a bit. Jesper was there, looking incredibly smug. “I might not come back to our cabin until late.” He winked and looked back at the girl from earlier. “Just thought you should know.” 

Wylan smiled and nodded. “Have fun.” He looked around to see there weren’t many people still in the bar. He might as well go to sleep. Enjoy the bed. 

He got up and flushed when people thanked him for the music as he left. He pushed open the door to the bar and heard a thud.

A little girl had fallen on the ground, it seemed that she had been standing on a stool propped outside the window to the bar. 

“We’re you the one playing pretty music?” She asked excitedly.  

Wylan couldn’t breathe, it couldn’t be her, it couldn’t be- 

“I’m Plumje, what’s your name?” She waved hello and Wylan took her hand to pull her up. His sister looked remarkably the same as she did five years ago. How on earth was this possible? 

“I’m Wylan.” She was seven by now wasn’t she? She probably didn’t have any recollection of Wylan. 

“I like that name! Can you show me how?” 

Wylan turned his head, confused. “How to do what?” He was still in a bit of shock. 

“How to play the piano, duh.” She said, just as snarky as she always had been. 

“I- it’s quite late, where is your mother?” Wylan asked, was Alys here as well? If Zoya couldn’t trust Wylan for being the son of the man she hated, how on earth had she trusted Alys? 

“I don’t have a momma,” Plumje shrugged sadly. “Just a Genya, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind if you taught me piano.” She grabbed hold of Wylan’s arm, “Pretty please?” 

Wylan laughed, he was still a bit shocked by her being here at all, could he tell Plumje who he was? Would she even understand? If she didn’t know who her father was, did Genya as well? If Zoya found out.. 

“Sure.” Wylan said, “Tomorrow though, it’s too late right now.” 

Plumje sighed. “Ok, tomorrow! You can ask literally anyone where I live, everyone knows.” She yawned after that. “See you tomorrow Mister Wylan!” 

Wylan watched his sister leave, saints he had missed her. When she was born, it was almost expected of Wylan to resent her, given she was his replacement. But she was adorable, and she was his blood. By the time she’d learned to crawl, she’d followed Wylan everywhere. 

Wylan pushed open his cabin door and stumbled onto his bed. Prepared to have a wonderful sleep. Unfortunately every time he closed his eyes, he saw Jesper and the blonde girl dancing. It was hard to fall asleep with that image pasted on the inside of his eyelids. He took out his sketchbook and started drawing, when he had an image pasted in his brain, that was what helped. 

As he sketched he couldn’t help but wonder why this image was in his mind. It almost made his stomach hurt, almost in a jealous way. 

But he wasn’t jealous. He liked Jesper, sure. But he didn’t think of him in any other way, because catching feelings for Jesper would be the stupidest thing to do. Jesper would have no use for Wylan once he found his friend and the two of them would never see each other again. 

Wylan tossed his sketchbook aside and pressed his face into his pillow. If he didn’t acknowledge his feelings, they didn’t exist. 

Eventually Wylan forced himself to fall asleep, but the feeling in his stomach didn’t leave. 

Chapter Text

“Can you try the scale again?” 

Plumje did it again, this time without messing up. She grinned brightly, her front tooth was missing. Wylan wondered if they still told kids about the tooth fairies here. 

“Great! Now do the G scale.” 

Plumje did the G scale, she paused halfway through, but then finished. “Hooray!” 

Wylan smiled at her and opened up the frightfully old piano book they managed to find. “Can you write down what the notes are for this song?” 

She eyed the sheet music carefully. And scribbled in about half the notes. “Can you do the rest?” 

While Wylan knew what the notes were called and where they were on the piano. He still didn’t know how to form the shapes of each letter.

“Well, that one’s a B , and this one is a C..” 

“Oh!” Plumje seemed to understand now, she quickly wrote the rest of them in. 

“You’ve learned a lot in a few days! I’ve mapped out all the notes for you, so all you need to do is keep practicing- as much as you’d like but preferably every other day.” 

“How long until I get to play like you?” She said excitedly, her hand squeezed his arm excitedly. 

“Who knows.. it depends on how often you practice, I had a lot of help. But you seem very dedicated, and that is one of the most important parts of it all.” Wylan ruffled her hair, she giggled and threw her arms around him. 

“Do you really have to leave so soon, Wylan?” Plumje asked sadly, she hugged him tighter and Wylan fought the urge to cry. 

“Yes, Jesper needs to get back to his friends.” Wylan and him left tomorrow. It had been nice staying in this town, but Inej and Kaz meant the world to Jesper. 

Plumje looked up at him, still hugging his waist. “But do you?” 

Wylan opened his mouth.. but couldn’t respond. It was true he never had intended on staying with Jesper once he’d found them, and he could just give Jesper the maps and.. stay here. 

“Zoya would never allow me to stay.” He thought aloud. 

Plumje frowned. “She let me stay here.. I’m sure we can convince her! Why doesn’t she like you anyway?” 

Of course Wylan couldn’t tell her, not only because she was young but the same reason Zoya disliked him was something he and this little girl had in common. “I have connections to a.. very bad man. It’s understandable she wouldn’t trust me.”

“You aren’t a bad man though. Why don’t you ask?” She started to look hopeful, Wylan would never want to crush that, best to tell her no. 

“I don’t think so, I’m going to miss you very much Plumje.” Even though he could never tell her just how much, he hoped she knew. 

Plumje looked at him carefully, Wylan wondered if she was connecting the dots in her mind, he wasn’t sure if he wanted her to figure it out or not. “I’ll miss you too, Wylan, but I’ll always practice piano!” 

“I know you will.” 

—

Wylan took her home afterwards, she had taken his hand and skipped happily back to where she and Genya stayed. From what Wylan saw, Genya did a lovely job taking care of her. 

Plumje went inside without a care in the world once Genya opened the door. “Bye bye Wylan!” She said as she went up to her room. 

Wylan watched his sister leave, he’d probably never see her again. He felt Genya put her hand on his shoulder. “We’re very grateful for you. I know what Zoya thinks, but I can’t imagine any of it is true.” 

Wilma smiled sadly. “Thank you Genya.. would you happen to know anything about the favor Zoya keeps bringing up?” 

Genya only shrugged. “She doesn’t tell me everything.” 

Wylan nodded, he hadn’t spoken to Genya an awful lot this week, but he had nothing against her, that was certain. “See you tomorrow morning.” 

Wylan shoved his hands in his pockets- saints he’d missed having pockets- and walked back to the cabin. He half expected Jesper to not be there again, he’d spent most nights getting drunk with Nina and then wandering away with that same blonde girl- Madeline. 

Wylan groaned and tried to push down that feeling in his stomach that arose whenever he thought of the two of them together. He was actually starting to believe it might just be jealousy. 

He wasn’t so oblivious when he had a crush- but that’s all it was, a little crush on a pretty guy who’d helped him out. He’d just have to draw Jesper a few more times until his mind tired of it. 

He pushed open the door to the cabin and was surprised to see Jesper was there. 

Jesper rolled over on his bed and smiled at Wylan.  “Hii Wylan.” Not with Madeline, but still very drunk it appeared. 

“Hello Jes, I’m surprised you aren’t out having fun.” Wylan walked over to sit in his bed and Jesper sat up to look right at him. “I can have plenty of fun right here.” Jesper sat crosslegged on his bed. “We’ve known each other for what? Two months? I don’t think I know enough about you.” 

Wylan mirrored his position. “You’ll have plenty of time to learn.. you’ll see me after tonight.” 

Jesper shrugged. “Too impatient.. what’s your favorite color?” 

Wylan smiled, very thankful that Jesper meant getting-to-know-you questions like this.. he worried it had been a gateway to asking why Zoya seemed to hate him. “I suppose it’s probably blue, what’s yours?” 

“Green.” Jesper said proudly. Wylan had been able to tell that based on everything he’d chosen to wear while they had stayed there. “But I also like blue- like your eye color, you’ve got pretty eyes. Now you ask me something.” 

Wylan blushed and ducked his face to hide it, he couldn’t help but ask what he was wondering. “Why aren’t you with Nina or someone else right now? Did something happen with Madeline?” 

Jesper flopped down onto his bed. “No, we agreed it would just be a fling, not much you can do to ruin that.”

Wylan disagreed, but he supposed Jesper was probably better at casual flings than he was. “So why not tonight?” 

“Nope, my turn. What’s your favorite animal? Mine ‘s a rabbit.” 

Wylan felt himself smile. “I guess coyotes, it’s difficult to pick a favorite though.” Wylan waited patiently until Jesper realized his question was still about Madeline. 

“I’m just tired of flings I guess.. it’s difficult to be picky and kind of hopeless to want anything real with anyone.” Wylan’s heart beat a little faster and Jesper just picked at his blanket. “If you suddenly could read, what would be the first thing you do?” 

“Oh!”

“Was that a stupid question to ask?” 

Wylan looked at Jesper's confused and very tipsy expression. “Yeah kinda, but at this point probably just play scrabble or do a crossword puzzle.” 

“Scrabble? Really?” 

Wylan shrugged, that stupid game had been one of the only things any of the kids at his old home had been able to play. “I’d be really fucking good at crossword puzzles, and some games always looked interesting.. As much as I’d love to beg for forgiveness from my father, I don’t know where he is.” 

Jesper scoffed. “Who does your dad think he is anyway? You’re really smart. What does it matter if you can’t read?” Jespers words were slurred but sweet. 

“Thank you.. I don’t think it’s hopeless to want to find someone.” Jesper flopped down beside Wylan. “Nina and Matthias found each other didn’t they? They can’t keep their hands off each other.” 

Jesper laughed. “Nothing's impossible I guess.. but maybe I wasn’t made for love.” 

Ghezen, this was the worst possible conversation to have after Wylan realized how he felt about Jesper. He patted Jespers back. “I’m sure that’s not true.” He wasn’t sure what drunk Jesper wanted to hear, “You’re wonderful, Jesper. I mean that. I hope it’s just your drunk self talking when you say that.” 

Jesper looked up at him hopefully. “Thank you Wy, you have really pretty eyes.” 

Wylan felt himself blush, “Thank you. I’m glad you think so?” 

Jesper rolled over and put his head in Wylan’s lap. “I’m really glad I met you.” Wylan saw how Jespers eyes were closed and he wouldn’t see just how red Wylan was. 

“Are you tired?” Was all he managed to say. 

Jasper nodded before rolling off Wylan and stumbling into his own bed. “Who do ya think Zoyas gonna make us do before we leave?” 

“No clue, but she wouldn’t do anything too cruel.” Wylan reassured as Jesper lay down. “We’ll be fine, I know it.” He leaned over and turned off the light. 

— 

Wylan would miss those comfortable sweaters, but when it came to his life or his comfort he supposed he chose his life. 

They had new maps, more food, another water bottle filter, a few clothes, and a more secure bag for Wylan’s chemicals. Wylan waited patiently as Zoya looked over her own map once more. 

“I need you two to steal something from Jan Van Eck.” 

Wylan felt his heart stop in his chest. “What?” 

“Yeah, what?” Jesper asked, although he had no idea how horrifying that was for Wylan. Jes appeared to have forgotten anything they’d spoken about last night, either that or it just wasn’t important enough to bring up. 

“He lives relatively close, far enough he’ll never find out where we are. Even though that man is a scum he may know more about Jurda Parem that may be useful.” 

Jesper groaned. “Do you really believe there’s some miracle cure he’s hiding from us? If there was, he’d be selling it for as much as he can.” 

Wylan started breathing slowly, trying not to draw attention to himself. He didn’t want Jesper to know, he didn’t want anyone to know. He wanted to forget about his father and never think about him again. 

“If there’s a chance he knows anything useful, I’m going to take it. Bring me any documents you can find.” Zoya said, obviously not caring for what Jesper had to say. 

“Why can’t you do that yourself?” Jesper seemed angry. Of course he was angry, everyone alive in the world despised Van Eck. 

“I consider myself valuable, I don’t want to risk my life, and I believe you will work perfectly for this task.” Zoyas eyes moved to Wylan. Before Jesper could say something else Zoya grabbed both of their things. “You can do this, or I can leave you both for dead. It’s hardly a difficult building to break into, electricity hasn’t worked in years, barely anyone would take the time to protect him. And even though some did, Van Eck never really surrounded himself with the brightest.”

Wylan knew that wasn’t a purposeful dig at him, but it felt like one. 

Jesper looked down at their things, they needed them back, and Genya had thrown in a pair of coats, depending on how long they’d be out here, they might definitely need those. “Are you ok with this?” 

If Wylan said no, Zoya would make him explain why. He’d only have to face his father if they got caught… so they just wouldn’t get caught. “Yes. We just grab the documents and get out, right?” 

Jesper looked surprised. “I guess, maybe you could blast the building and that asshole to pieces before we go?” 

Wylan forced a smile onto his face. “I don’t see why not.”