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[cactusy]

[For running across her in person.]

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for Chloe

[cactusy]

[She walks slowly but steadily through the wood, sticks and crusty snow and bones all crunching underfoot. She doesn't avoid any of them, nor does she dwell on why walking on the remains of dead things doesn't bother her. It feels fitting, after all: she's a dead thing too, or she will be soon. A ghost walking on ghosts.

And when she sees another walking ghost, one who's approaching from a different angle but heading in roughly the same direction, she just lifts a hand. Wiggles her fingers in a half-wave. Continues on.]

[desperate_times_right]

[There’s something familiar about the sound of it, walking over old bones, that tickles the back of her mind in a way that's hard to explain. It's a strange thought to be the first one you remember thinking. Nothing should be familiar when she doesn't know anything.

When she sees a flicker of movement a few feet ahead of her, she adjusts her angle to jog toward it.]

Hey! Do you know how we got here?

[cactusy]

[She looks at the other woman with a blank lack of recognition - studying her for a moment, and then shaking her head.]

No. Come on; we should keep walking.

[And she turns to go, motioning for the other woman to follow.]

Do you know who we are?

[desperate_times_right]

I don't remember anything except walking and the bones.

[It's a bit disappointing to not have her memory jogged at all by this other woman, especially since presumably they'd arrived here at the same time.]

What's the rush? What's the difference between one direction and another at this point?

[cactusy]

[She opens her mouth to respond, but instead, something interrupts: a disembodied voice, quiet but audible, drifting through the trees.

"What kind of survivor are you?"

The answer she gives is an answer to both questions.]

I'm the kind of survivor who keeps walking. One direction's as good as any other right now, as long as I'm moving.

[desperate_times_right]

[She scoffs, somehow more irritated at this stranger’s hard-headedness than the disembodied voice asking questions that she doesn't think she can answer until she does.]

I always know where I want to be, even if I have to figure out how to get there on the way. We could be walking away from where we need to be!

[cactusy]

Doesn't matter. Just keep walking, sunshine.

[To drive her point home, she quickens her own pace. Crunch, crunch, crunch.]

[desperate_times_right]

[She sighs, but being alone is worse than walking in the wrong direction right now.]

If we end up wandering into whatever killed all these people, I'm blaming you.

[cactusy]

You don't think we're already dead?

[It could just be dark humor - her voice is dry and sardonic enough. But there's a note of seriousness to it too, a genuine question that she hadn't realized she was asking until the words were already out.]

[desperate_times_right]

This may be the end of all things, but I think we’re still breathing. That voice called us survivors. Doesn't that feel true?

[cactusy]

Yes.

[Yes, it does. There's still so little that she remembers, but she does remember this.]

Other people die, but I don't. I am a survivor. I keep walking. But--

[She exhales, her breath visible in the air in front of her.]

Things aren't always what they seem.

[desperate_times_right]

[She scoffs.]

It's not magic. I keep myself alive. I've been on my own for a long time, and you can't count on anyone else to put you first.

[Surely this woman understands that if she's really such a rolling stone.

The voice comes again soon afterward: When you lost everything you knew and loved, how did you keep breathing?

What does that mean? She kicks a small skull.]

I was a kid. What else was I going to do?

[cactusy]

You can sometimes.

[She says this slowly, trying to drag a name out of the ether. After a beat:]

Parents do - or at least good ones. Partners sometimes do. Teammates.

[desperate_times_right]

Not me. [When you lost everything you knew and loved.] My father sent me away, and then he was… killed. Left to rot in the jungle for weeks. As soon as she knew he was gone for good, mum dumped me at the boarding school and that was that.

[cactusy]

[That was absolutely not her experience. She can't conjure up any details - not now, not when she can't even conjure up her own name - but she knows that she had a stable, secure childhood.

Except--]

My father died, too. But not in a jungle, I don't think. No, he... he died in a car accident. I was there.

[Her mom had held her so tightly afterwards, squeezing her for what felt like hours.]

Okay, so your parents sucked. What about later, when you grew up?

[desperate_times_right]

[It's weird, like watching episodes from someone else’s life. She knows all these things are true, but can't remember her parents’ names, or the name of the school. Her father died because he cared too much, but she can't remember what about.]

Sorry. About your dad.

I don't remember how old I was now, but I ran away from the school eventually. Did shady jobs with shadier guys, and I couldn't count on any of them either. I learned that it's easier to rely on people if they want something from you.

People will support you for a while, sure, but there's always the next thing.

[cactusy]

There is always the next thing.

[That much they can agree on, even if they're coming at it from different angles. People always let you down isn't at all her experience, but Nothing and nobody lasts forever... that rings true.

The disembodied voice breaks in again - not so much interrupting the conversation as continuing it. "When you lost everything you knew and loved, how did you keep breathing?" ]

[desperate_times_right]

That's exactly why I try to never have anything I can't afford to lose.

“Sentimentality in this line of work’ll get you killed.”

[She’s quoting herself but she can't remember why she’d said it.]

[cactusy]

[She glances at the other woman, but the frown on her face is directed at the question itself.]

You keep breathing because you keep breathing.

[She says, her tone slightly frustrated.]

It's a bodily process, not a conscious choice. Does that question actually make sense to you?

[desperate_times_right]

It's just melodramatic bullshit. She means what keeps you from killing yourself when things get bad.

[cactusy]

I get the analogy, I just think it's a stupid one.

[Her fingers flex, frigid in the air, and she pulls her hands into the warmth of her parka.]

It's happened to me a couple times over.

[desperate_times_right]

Lost everything you knew and loved? That's rough. You remember it now?

[cactusy]

I remember I have small sample sizes.

[She says it slowly, the information coming to her only shortly before she voices it.]

'Everyone' is only ever a few people at a time, if that.

[desperate_times_right]

That's normal, I think. [Says the woman who can't really remember whether she has friends or not.] Smart.

You got a group now, you think? Looking for you?

[cactusy]

[She shakes her head, slowly.]

I did. They're all dead now.