Chapter Text
“Hey, don’t eat that.”
I caught the kid’s hand just as she lifted a chunk of gold toward her mouth.
This wasn’t exactly the ideal environment to raise a child.
I shoved her back with my leg just as infected villagers came flooding up the stairs and through the busted window. One of them snarled something in Spanish. Another swung a sickle hard enough to split the wood beside me. I grabbed the kid by the arm and pushed her into the closet for safety before turning and firing. My body a shield, so no one would try and open the door.
The room flashed white with every shot.
I could kill the bastards. That part was easy. Shielding her eyes from it, hiding the blood, the sounds, the bodies hitting the floor, that was harder.
By the time the house went quiet again, my ears were ringing.
This was only level two of hell, and for some goddamn reason, there was a kid in it.
I lowered my gun and opened the closet door.
“Hey, kid.”
She looked up at me, still clutching the gold.
“I said don’t eat that.”
I took it from her before she could try again. She stared at me, wide-eyed and silent, not really understanding a word I said. Of course she didn’t. The kid only spoke Spanish. Why wouldn’t she? And I could barely manage hello, goodbye, and how I liked my tacos. Should’ve taken those classes more seriously.
What the hell was I supposed to do with her?
She was small, filthy, and barefoot, with a mess of unnatural silver hair hanging around her face. Her eyes caught the dark wrong, faint and strange, almost glowing when the moonlight slipped through the broken window.
Something was off about her.
But a kid was still a kid. Right?
“Okay. Tuck in.”
I sat on the floor with my back against the wall, close enough to the window for a fast escape and far enough from the stairs that nothing could rush me blind. The bed in the corner looked soft and still threatening, all stained sheets and flea-bitten mattress. No way in hell was I touching it.
The kid stood there for a second, watching me, ’trying to decide if it was safe. Then she climbed into my lap the choice had already been made.
I kept the gun in one hand and pulled her in with the other. She weighed almost nothing. Light, easy to carry, and just as easy lose...
At least she was quiet.
A minute later, she was out cold against my chest.
The correct move would’ve been getting her out of here. Handing her off to someone. Anyone in the real world outside of this place. But there was no one out here except infected villagers, rotting houses, and whatever was waiting for me deeper in.
She wasn’t my mission.
I was here for Ashley Graham, the president's daughter, my top priority.
I also wasn’t heartless enough to leave her behind.
I pulled the child closer, making a mental note to keep an eye out for shoes. Maybe a coat too. If I had to, I’d rip one off a corpse.
I closed my eyes and remembered it all, how I got into this mess in the first place.
I had a lead on the president’s daughter. Ashley was supposed to be somewhere in the church, hidden away where no one was meant to find her. Figures that while stumbling around in the dark, calling Ashley’s name and flashing my light at every sound, I’d find the wrong kid first.
I had been looking for a glimmer of gold hair.
Instead, the beam caught silver.
I didn’t hesitate once I saw a child was involved. They had kidnapped the president’s daughter. Who was to say they hadn’t taken someone else’s kid too? And this one was barely more than a baby.
“Hey, hey. It’s okay, kid. I’m gonna cut you loose.”
She had been tied up tight.
Rope around her wrists. More around her ankles. A blindfold knotted over her eyes, and a gag shoved into her mouth hard enough to make my stomach turn. I crouched in front of her and undid the blindfold first.
Then she looked at me. And my blood ran cold. Her eyes weren’t right.
They caught the dark wrong, pale and shining, too bright, too still. Inhuman.
Infected.
My hand nearly slipped.
For one ugly second, every instinct I had screamed to put her down before she turned, before she lunged, before she sank her teeth into me and made this nightmare even worse.
But when I pulled the gag free, she didn’t snap at me.
Didn’t thrash.
Didn’t bite.
She just dragged in a shaky breath and stared at me like she was terrified I was going to hurt her. So I didn’t.
“I’m Leon,” I said quietly.
The kid blinked at me.
Then, slow and careful, like she already knew loud noises got people killed, she leaned into my hand. She stared at me, confused.
Fuck. She didn’t speak English.
I pointed to myself. “Le-on,” I said slowly.
Maybe she couldn’t speak at all. I hadn’t exactly run into infected kids before. Maybe they were different. More docile. Less... obvious.
The girl blinked up at me.
“Le...on?” she repeated carefully, head tilted. Then her face lit up. “Leon. Leon, Leon,” she said, looking absurdly pleased with herself.
I let out a breath through my nose. “Yeah. You got it, kid. Now you?”
I pointed at her.
“Leon!” she said again, even happier this time.
“That’s me.” I pointed at her once more. “Your name.”
“Leon!”
Great.
She was smiling like she’d just solved the mystery of the universe, bright as a flashlight in this miserable place. So maybe not fully infected. Maybe half. Maybe something else entirely. I still had no clue what the hell I was supposed to do with her?
She wasn’t part of the mission.
I untied her anyway.
Leaving her there was out of the question, so I brought her with me. Let her cling around my neck, way too close to my throat for my comfort, while I kept moving through the dark.
Kid nearly gave me a heart attack every ten minutes, but she was useful.
At one point I hit a locked gate, all heavy wood and iron bars, built to keep someone like me out. The lever to open it was on the other side. I was still looking for a way over it, or around it, when the little brat ducked down and slipped through a gap near the bottom that I’d never fit through.
“Hey, wait!” I snapped as she disappeared.
Fuck.
My pulse jumped so hard it made me dizzy.
Then the gate creaked open.
“Leon!” she called, proud of herself.
I crossed the distance in two strides and scooped her up so fast she squeaked. “Don’t do that again, kid. You scared the hell out of me.”
She smiled like I’d just praised her.
Since she didn’t understand a word of English, she kept doing it. Slipping through gaps, squeezing under broken boards, getting into places I couldn’t reach. Helpful, sure. Real damn helpful.
i decided to call her y/n for now.
Didn’t stop me from feeling sick every time she vanished out of sight. The brave little idiot kept making me think each time would be the last.
Which is how we ended up here.
She stood near the window, shoving ladders back down whenever the infected managed to hook them onto the ledge. She had a strange sense for danger, but once she locked onto a task, she got completely absorbed in it.
Luis was busy slamming bookshelves in front of windows and doorways, trying to choke off the flow of infected pouring into the cabin. I was shooting anything that got too close.
And y/n...
Every single time, she let the ladder stay there until one of them was halfway up, fingers gripping the wood, body dragging itself higher, and then she shoved it back. The infected crashed down with snarls and broken limbs.
Then she would laughed. It was the most innocent sound I had heard in this entire hellhole.
Which somehow made it worse. This place was screwing with her head.
I kicked another ladder down myself, grabbed the kid, and shoved her into the closet before one of the villagers got too close to the window. Then I turned and put two rounds into the next thing that came through.
A few more shots.
More shouting.
Then, suddenly, silence.
Not true silence. Luis was still panting. My ears were still ringing. Bodies were scattered across the floor, fresh blood mixing with the stink of damp wood, smoke, and rot.
But the mob had finally pulled back.
I took another second just to make sure they were really gone before opening the closet door. The child practically tumbled out.
Luis glanced at her, then at me. “So that’s her? The president’s daughter? When you described her, I pictured someone a little older.” As he waved his hand at the child.
“Not her,” I said. “Found this one tied up. Couldn’t just leave her behind.”
Luis’s expression shifted as he looked at her properly.
He saw it too.
Something was off.
“Leon,” she said brightly. The only word she knew how to say.
I looked at Luis. “Can you talk to her? Ask her name? Why she’s here? Who’s missing her?” Someone had to be mourning over this kid. I just hope we both made it out so I could return her home.
Luis threw up one hand with a crooked little smile. “For you, querido, I suppose I can do one small favor.” Luis knelt in front of the child with an easy smile. “Hola, princesa. ¿Cómo te llamas?”
She only stared at him.
For a second, I thought maybe this was pointless. Maybe she did not even speak Spanish either. Then she held a hand out toward him with a hard, expectant look.
I sighed, dug into my pocket, and pulled out one of the cookies I had on me. I placed it in her hand.
She bit into it, chewed, then pointed straight at me.
“Leon.”
Luis laughed.
“Well,” he said, glancing up at me, “she’s telling on you. Says she belongs to you.”
“I don’t speak Spanish,” I muttered, “and I definitely don’t have some cult lady on the side.”
Luis smirked. “Who said anything about words for nighttime activities?”
“Luis.”
“Relax, compañero. She didn’t understand. Maybe” He looked back at her. “¿Cómo te llamas?”
The girl swallowed the last of the cookie and answered without hesitation.
“Mocoso. Bicho raro. Monstruo.”
Luis’s smile faded. I saw the shift immediately. One second relaxed, the next serious.
He asked more gently, “¿Cómo llegaste aquí?”
She shrugged. “No sé.”
“And your parents?” he asked. “¿Y tus padres?”
The girl looked at him, then pointed at me again with absolute certainty.
“Pertenezco a León.”
Luis stood up slowly. Then, without warning, he picked the child up and dropped her straight into my arms.
“Congratulations,” he said with a grin that did not quite hide the tension underneath it. “It’s a girl.”
She kicked her feet, delighted.
I tightened my hold on her and looked at him. “What did she say? Her name?”
Luis rubbed the back of his neck. “She doesn’t seem to have one. At least, not a real one. The words she gave me were insults. Brat. Freak. Monster.” His eyes flicked to the child, then back to me. “As for the rest, she says she belongs to you.”
I stared at him. “That’s not funny.”
“I know.” Luis’s tone stayed light, but only on the surface. “I have something to take care of. I’ll catch up.”
And just like that, I was standing there with a child in my arms, no answers, and somehow even more problems than before.
She looked up at me, calm as anything.
I exhaled slowly. “Y/n,” I said. “I’ll call you Y/n.” It had already been her name. For a while. Might as well not confuse her.
The girl smiled like I had given her the moon.