Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It's mile Twenty-seven, maybe. He’s been counting in his head, but the numbers have started to blur — half-lost in the sound of shoes hitting pavement.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Dozens of feet move together, a steady heartbeat under the mid-afternoon sun. It’s already in his ears, constant and low, like the rush of blood when he’s run too long.

He drifts forward until he ends up beside Pete. The guy walks easy, loose-limbed, like he’s done this forever. When he glances over, he gives Ray a quick smile — small, a little crooked — then looks back to the road.

And for some reason, that smile stays.

Pete’s beautiful. Ray doesn’t mean to think it, but once he does, it won’t leave. There’s something in the way the light hits his skin — warm and dark, catching on the sweat along his jaw. His eyes look kind, still holding a spark of humor even with all this heat pressing down on them. And that scar — the one that cuts down his cheek — should make him look hard. It doesn’t. Somehow it softens him, gives him a gentleness that feels almost out of place here. Like the world already tried to ruin him once, and failed.

Ray shifts, arms crossing loosely over his chest. His fingers find the edge of the strap on his pack and hold there, like he needs something to do with his hands. He can’t help the thought that creeps in though — that Pete’s mouth looks like it’s made out of kindness.

And some quiet part of him thinks that if he had forever — a lifetime of roads and all the miles left in the world — he’d walk every one of them just to find a taste that matched that mouth. Something that would tell him what it might feel like, the way kindness would taste pressed against his own skin.

It’s funny, though, thinking about it.
This is his lifetime now — roads and miles and nothing else.

Yet he knows he won’t get to search the world for the flavor of Pete’s lips. Because sooner or later, he’ll have to stop. He’s only human, after all.

“Warning Number 47. First warning.”

Ray flinches at the sound of it. The voice cuts through the haze in his head like cold water. A reminder: oh, shit. Keep walking.

He gives a small shake, as if that’ll scatter the thoughts loose — the warmth in his chest, the ache in his throat. It’s only mile twenty-seven. He has plenty of miles left to go.

Plenty of miles left to think about flavors like cinnamon and charcoal, almond and cedarwood. Or maybe that’s just what Pete McVries tastes like in his head.

He catches up again, falling into step beside Pete. Pete glances over, grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“Come on, big guy,” he says. “Can’t lose you so soon.”

Ray laughs under his breath. “Yeah, yeah. Was just daydreaming.”

Olson, a few steps behind, chimes in. “Oh yeah? Daydreaming about what? Pretty ladies? I always daydream about pretty ladies.”

Pete snorts. “Real poetic, Olson.”

“What?” Olson says, grinning. “I’m being truthful. In a game of walking, it’s all psychological. Truth hurts less in the end than lies. Don’t want no lies messing me up psychologically.”

Ray shakes his head, smiling despite himself. “Then you keep dreaming about pretty ladies, man.”

Pete chuckles beside him, low and warm. The sound rolls through Ray’s chest, soft as the wind brushing across the asphalt. He mumbles after a while, voice rough from the heat. “So what were you daydreaming about, anyway?”

Ray glances at him, the corner of his mouth twitching. He tightens the loose cross of his arms around his chest — the small comfort of pressure, of holding himself together.

“The taste of almond and charcoal,” he says finally.

Pete snorts. “Yeah? What the hell for? Didn’t take you for a guy with unique taste buds.”

Ray almost laughs. Almost.

“And I didn’t take you for a man who judges them,” he says instead, a faint grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I’m hungry, we’ve been walking for hours. Let me dream what I want to dream.”

Pete chuckles, shaking his head. “Fair enough, big guy. You dream your almonds and charcoal. I’ll stick with peanut butter.”

Ray laughs quietly with him, the sound thin and brief. The road swallows it whole.

But when the laughter fades, the thought lingers — heavier now.

It was a half-truth. The kind that sits behind his teeth like a secret, sweet and sour all at once. He’s not about to tell Pete the rest — that the flavor he’s been imagining isn’t just something to eat, it’s him. It’s Pete, and the impossible thought of knowing what his lips might taste like.

That kind of truth doesn’t belong here. Not on this road, not under the eyes of soldiers and rifles and a dozen dying boys pretending to be alive.

No, the whole truth will stay locked behind his ribs where it’s safe.

If he wins — if he makes it all the way to the end and somehow lives — he’ll take it with him, keep it buried under the noise and the prize money and the ghost of every boy who fell before him.

And if he dies before that?
Then the truth dies with him.

He glances at Pete again — the sunlight catching on his skin, on that scar that somehow makes his face look gentler, not harder. Pete’s still smiling a little, eyes far ahead, like he’s already somewhere beyond this mile.

Ray looks away first.

He tells himself it’s just the road that makes his chest hurt, not the thought that he’ll never get to taste the thing he’s already named.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The sound of feet keeps time with the lie he’s chosen to live.

It’s mile thirty-four when Ray starts to feel the first shivers.

Call him a bit of a baby, but he’s always struggled with the cold. That’s Maine for you. Even with the advantage of knowing the landscape, being the state boy and all, nights have always made him shiver and suffer. The Walk is no different.

It’s probably his momma’s fault — though he doesn’t really blame her. The world being what it is, she’s never seen a reason for him to be out late. Not with the dangers that come with the dark.

And truthfully, there was never much to do out there anyway.

Sure, he had his girl.

Had.

But they’d never made it that far — never past the soft stuff, never to sneaking out for a quick fling. Just two kids pretending they understood love. So really, he’s never had a reason to be out at night or out in the cold.

Now, here he is. Shivering under the dying sun, the road turning gold and gray at the edges, his breath coming in thin puffs that the air eats up fast.

He tries to hide it, but the tremor runs through him anyway, and Pete notices.

Pete stares for a second — that mix of curiosity and disbelief — before rolling his eyes.

“What?” Ray asks.

“Oh, nothing.”

“No, come on,” Ray says, grinning a little through chattering teeth. “I saw that look.”

“What look?”

“That look!” Ray points at him.

Pete raises an eyebrow. “You just pointed to all of me.”

“Exactly!” Ray says. “You’re judging me for something.”

Pete huffs a laugh, glancing back down the road. “Didn’t think Maine boys got cold this easy.”

Before Ray can fire back, Barkovitch pipes up from the line beside them, his voice sharp and cutting. “Yeah, you’d think with all that weight you’d have enough fat to keep warm.”

Ray feels the heat rush to his face instantly — an embarrassed flush burning against the chill. He stares ahead, jaw tightening.

“Aw, shut up, man,” Art Baker says, shaking his head.

“What?” Barkovitch snaps. “It’s true! He shouldn’t’ve signed up if he couldn’t take it.”

Olson turns around, his voice already rising. “Yeah, well, some of us didn’t have a choice, man!”

Barkovitch snorts. “Everyone’s got a choice.”

“That’s enough,” Ray cuts in, his voice low but firm. The tremor in it isn’t from the cold this time. “I don’t need you all fighting my battles for me.” He swallows hard, staring at the line of the road stretching ahead. “He’s right, anyway. I’ve got the advantage — state boy and all — and I’m still too much of a wimp to handle the cold.”

The words taste bitter as soon as they’re out, but saying them quiets the air. The group falls silent again, just the rhythm of their steps filling the space.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Pete finally sighs, rubbing the back of his neck. “Alright, enough fighting, man. Come on, give me your pack.”

Ray blinks. “What?”

“I know you ain’t dumb enough to not pack a jacket,” Pete says, half-smiling. “So hand it over. Don’t need you getting a warning over something as simple as putting one on.”

Ray hesitates, studying him for a second — the easy confidence in his voice, the way he’s somehow both bossy and kind in the same breath. Then he huffs, shaking his head. “Fine.”

He shrugs his pack off his shoulders and tosses it toward Pete, who’s already speed-walking ahead, turning just in time to start walking backward. Pete catches the pack cleanly, grinning like it’s all a game.

He digs through it fast, rummaging past rations and a baseball until he finds the worn flannel near the bottom. “Knew it,” he mutters, and throws it back.

Ray catches it against his chest, the fabric still faintly warm from being stuffed away. He gives Pete a small, grateful smile before pulling it on, the softness instantly taking the edge off the cold. The air still bites at his face, but it’s a better kind of bite now — gentler, something he can stand.

He jogs a few steps to catch up, slipping back into rhythm beside Pete. “Thanks,” he murmurs, grabbing his pack from him.

Pete just reaches out, resting a hand on Ray’s shoulder as they fall into step again. He gives a small squeeze. “Better?”

Ray hums, the sound low in his throat. He squints against the wind, eyes drifting — just for a heartbeat — to Pete’s mouth, the curve of it when he smiles.

“Yeah,” he says softly. “Better.”

Pete’s hand lingers for a second longer before dropping away, and they keep walking. The sun’s gone now, replaced by the faint blue of twilight, and their shadows stretch thin across the road — two shapes moving together, steady as heartbeat.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

It’s mile forty-one when he wakes to a warning.
His warning.

The sound cuts through the fog of sleep before he even realizes he’s drifted off. A voice over the loudspeaker, flat and sharp: “Number forty-seven, warning. First warning.”

His stomach drops. The air burns cold against his lungs as he jerks upright, legs stumbling into motion. His feet find the rhythm again, shaky but there.

He’s been dreaming of his mother.

God, he misses her.

He misses a lot of things — warm food, quiet mornings, the sound of her humming under her breath when she cooked — but her, yeah, her most of all. That steady voice, those hands that always smelled like soap and bread. The way she’d look at him like he was worth something, even when he didn’t believe it.

And for a second, he misses the touch that woke him too. A warm, calloused hand against his back, patting him lightly. Not rough, not urgent — just enough to say keep going.

He knows it was Pete. It had to be.

He shakes the thought away, tries to shake the sleep from his head too, along with the flash of anger that follows close behind.

Yeah, she’s beautiful — but too beautiful for any of them to talk about her like that.

He bites the inside of his cheek, focusing on the road, on the crunch of gravel underfoot, on the dim line of the horizon that hasn’t changed in miles. The anger keeps him awake, at least. Keeps his legs moving.

The moon’s out now, pale and watchful. Around him, the boys are quieter — some whispering, some just breathing hard. The world feels stripped bare.

Freeport.
He just has to make it to Freeport.

That’s what he tells himself over and over, a rhythm under the one in his feet. Just make it to Freeport.

Beside him, Pete’s voice breaks through the fog.
“You got a girl, Ray?”

Ray blinks, forcing the sleep out of his eyes. The image of her flickers — quick, fragile — her face caught somewhere between memory and regret.
“Yeah,” he says slowly. “Uh, yeah. I did. But, uh… you know, I had to end it because of this.” He gestures vaguely toward the road ahead. “So there goes that.”

His girl.

Beautiful and smart. The kind who could see through him in a second. The kind who begged him not to do the Walk. If you love me, you’ll drop out, she’d said.
He’d told her goodbye anyway, because fate doesn’t belong to boys like him.

Pete’s quiet for a second. “That’s… that’s too bad,” he says finally. “But it’s smart.”

“Yeah,” Ray murmurs..He glances sideways. “What about you, Pete? You got a lady?”

But Pete doesn’t answer right away. He’s staring at him — steady, unblinking — and Ray’s mind trips. Cinnamon and charcoal. Almond and cedarwood. The strange, impossible thought of taste and warmth and the way Pete’s lips move when he speaks.

Pete shakes his head once, slow.
“No, Ray,” he says quietly. “No, I don’t.”

And for a moment, the road stretches into eternity — a thousand miles of breath and silence and everything Ray doesn’t have words for. Cinnamon and almond and charcoal and cedarwood. An endless road to find it, and all the steps it would take just to taste it once.

He slows without meaning to. The rhythm slips.

“Number forty-seven, warning. Second warning.”

The voice slices through the air, cold and mechanical.

“Uh oh!” Barkovitch crows from somewhere behind them, his voice loud and grinning. “Dreaming about your boyfriend’s dick in your mouth?!”

Laughter ripples, sharp and nervous.

Ray exhales hard through his nose, turns his head just enough to look at Pete — steady, calm, still beside him — then back toward Barkovitch.
“That’s what you dream about, isn’t it, Barkovitch?” He then mutters, “I hate that fucking guy.”

Pete huffs a laugh beside him, quiet but sure. “Yeah. Me too.”

And Ray — he feels something loosen in his chest at that. Feels seen, maybe, in a way he hasn’t since before the Walk started. It’s stupid, really. Just two words. But they settle in him like warmth.

His tongue prickles. He can almost taste it — the sting of cinnamon, the faint nuttiness of almond, sharp and sweet at once. The taste of being understood.

Then his foot catches on something — a crack, a stone, maybe nothing at all — and he stumbles forward.

The loudspeaker cracks to life.

“Number forty-seven. Third and final warning.”

His heart slams against his ribs.

Oh fuck.

He jolts upright, legs scrambling, breath tearing through his throat. The cold night air bites hard, cruel. He can feel his pulse in his ears, the sound roaring over the steady thud, thud, thud of the others.

Oh fuck. Oh fuck.

Pete’s voice cuts through the panic — firm, close. “Ray! Eyes up. Keep walking.”

Ray stares ahead, forcing his body back into rhythm. One foot, then the other. Don’t stop. Don’t think. Just move.

“Three hours,” Pete says, voice low but urgent. “Just three hours, and then this is all wiped clean. Come on, man. Come on.”

Ray can feel it — the heat of Pete’s hand pressed firm against his back, steady, pushing him forward. It’s real, grounding, too close.

He can taste it now — charcoal and cedarwood. Dirty. Dark. Burning.

He’s burning. He’s losing.

He’s going to die.

“Shut up!” he shouts suddenly, the words raw and cracking. “Just—shut up!”

Pete jerks back, both hands raised in surrender. “Hey, hey—”

“No!” Ray yells again, stumbling as his breath comes in hard bursts. “Don’t—don’t act all—” He can’t find the word, his throat dry, his lungs clawing for air. “I know you don’t care! You want me to get my ticket just like everyone else! You don’t… you don’t care!”

“Ray—”

“Stop! Stop pretending you don’t want to see a bullet in the back of my head!”

The words echo out, sharp against the night. A few boys turn to look, faces pale and hollow in the moonlight.

Ray’s chest heaves. He forces his feet to move — one after another, faster, harder — pushing ahead of Pete, ahead of the pack, ahead of everything.
Just keep walking. Just keep—

Then he looks up.

An upline.

The realization hits him like a gunshot. “Fuck—fuck me!” Ray yells, voice tearing through the dark.

The road hums beneath him, endless and cold. He keeps moving, because if he stops — even for a breath — he’s finished.

Behind him, Pete calls his name, but Ray doesn’t look back.

Keep going. Keep going.

He cancels out the noise. Cancels out Stebbins and his damned statistics about how many boys die on this hill. Cancels out the warnings blaring in the background, the rhythm of thud, thud, thud—boots, breath, then bodies falling.

“You aren’t going to fucking make it, Garraty.”

And he’s right. God, he’s fucking right.

The panic crawls through him, settles heavy in his chest. His lungs burn; every breath feels scraped raw. The charcoal taste fills his mouth—bitter, dry, like his throat’s turning to dust. The cedarwood burns deeper, spreading heat through his ribs, fire and ash and smoke curling inside him.

This is why he shouldn’t dream. Why he shouldn’t chase after flavors that don’t belong to him.

Because it’s going to kill him.

He slowed down because of the truth—because Pete doesn’t have a girl. He stumbled because Barkovitch saw that vulnerability, because he looked too long, felt too much.

And now he’s at three warnings. And now he’s going to die.

His legs tremble with every step. The road tips slightly upward, cruel, endless. His vision starts to tunnel; the edges of the world smear into gray and noise.

Barkovitch’s voice is a knife. “You’re gonna fucking die tonight. I can fucking feel it, man. You’re gonna fucking die.”

The words land like stones. Panic claws him harder, a thing with teeth. It’s there — a hot, furious animal under his ribs — and Ray knows, with a cold clarity that makes his teeth ache, that it’s true. He’s dying. All because he wanted to taste something impossible. All because he let himself want.

“Don’t look behind you, Garraty,” Barkovitch sneers. “There’s a gun to your head. There’s a gun to your fucking head.”

Ray looks.

And there it is. A black muzzle, glinting in the moonlight, the barrel leveled with a boy’s temple. A soldier two lines back, steady as death. Ray’s lungs collapse. The world narrows to that metal and the impossible noise behind it — footsteps, breathing, someone’s stupid, small prayer.

His legs go soft. His hands fumble at air. His breath stops like it’s been stolen. Jed — a kid just ahead, pale and thin — stumbles on an uneven patch of asphalt and goes down with a sound that is all wrong in the quiet. A boy falls and makes the world louder. Ray sees Jed’s face twist, hears the sick crack as his head meets the road. He smells copper.

Oh God.

Everything spins. He can’t think. He can’t breathe. He thinks of cinnamon and charcoal and almond and cedarwood and then he thinks of nothing but the barrel of that gun. He thinks of a soft hand on his back that once meant safety and now means he’s been marked.

Pete’s hand is there before the thought finishes. Firm, calloused, warm. It slaps hard on Ray’s shoulder and then clamps on his upper arm like an iron band, steadying him.

Ray wants to collapse into the grip. He wants to kneel and weep and beg and stop the world. Instead his legs obey the hold and go. One foot in front of the other. He forces the rhythm into his bones.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Barkovitch laughs, sick and bright. “Run, Garraty! Run like you’re wantin’ to live!”

A soldier shifts his aim, thumb twitching on the stock. The muzzle points, then shifts again toward the nearest walker who’s lost pace — a warning made real. 

Ray can feel his heart slamming like a trapped bird. He tastes iron, and the smoke and cedarwood stack like a pyre in his throat.

Pete’s hand stays firm on his arm, steadying the rhythm..“How you holding up?”

Ray’s breath stutters. “Not good. I feel… I feel faint.”

“Mmhmm.” Pete’s voice stays even, the same rhythm as the steps. “You keep moving. Pour your canteen over your head.”

Ray obeys before he even thinks about it. The shock of cold water splashes down his neck, soaking the collar of his flannel. It steals his breath, but it wakes him.

“There you go,” Pete says, still close. “There you go. Now—one foot in front of the other.”

Ray nods, trying to find the rhythm again.

“Now refill,” Pete adds.

“Canteen, forty-seven, canteen.” The soldier’s hand passes him another. Ray takes it automatically.

“There we go,” Pete says, his hand pressing against his back again. “That’s my boy.”

My boy.

The words echo through him, louder than the trucks or the pounding feet. He feels Pete’s hand still there—warm, sure—and he tastes the cinnamon and almond again, bright and sweet, overwhelming the bitter charcoal that had been burning through him.

“There we go,” Pete murmurs. “We did it. See that? Top of the hill.”

Ray breathes, long and shaky.

“No, no, no,” Pete says quickly, seeing him slow. “Don’t slow down. Keep moving.”

They link arms without thinking, holding each other steady as the ground starts to even out.

Ray glances at him—he just has to look—and there it is. Pete’s face flushed in the half-light, those lips he’s already named in his head a hundred times. He could walk forever just to know what they taste like.

“Pete,” he says, voice low and rough, “what I said back there—I didn’t mean—”

“Forget it,” Pete cuts in.

“No, you don’t understand. I owe you, and I—”

“Ray,” Pete says, firmer this time. “I said forget it.”

“No, Pete. No. I owe—” The words fracture in his mouth. The panic’s back, clawing up his throat. Fuck, he’s panicking. He almost died. He almost died with Pete thinking he was angry at him, without seeing his momma again, with a gun to his head like his pops.

He can’t breathe. “I—I owe—”

“Ray.” Pete’s voice drops low, almost a whisper. “You’re okay. You’re okay.”

“You—you know I didn’t… I didn’t mean it right,” Ray gasps.

“It’s all good,” Pete says. “It’s all good. Now don’t be fucking gone, alright? Keep the pace. Keep the pace.”

And then Pete’s hand is gone.

The absence hits like cold air. But he can still feel where that warmth was, burned into his skin like memory. He wants it back. He needs it back.

The road stretches out ahead—dark, endless, alive with the sound of boots—and he keeps walking, chasing the heat of a touch that’s already gone.

It’s mile fifty-seven when his brain starts to give out.

Every thought feels like static — broken, half-formed, fluttering in and out like a bad radio signal. His legs move on instinct now, not memory, not will. Just motion. 

Thud. Thud. Thud.

He blinks, and the world stutters. The horizon bends. The sun is rising just slightly, a gray light that could be dawn or nothing at all. He doesn’t know. 

At some point, he feels himself lean sideways, his shoulder bumping something solid and warm. A voice murmurs low beside him, distant but steady.

“Hey. I got you, big guy. Just keep walking.”

Pete.

Ray doesn’t answer, but his body does — folds slightly, giving in. Pete’s arm comes around his waist, firm and sure, holding him upright when his knees threaten to go.

“Easy,” Pete whispers, the word barely louder than breath. “You can rest a little, just not your feet. I’ve got you.”

And somehow, he does. Pete’s weight keeps him steady, his stride guiding Ray’s without breaking pace.

Ray’s head tips forward, forehead almost brushing Pete’s shoulder. He thinks he says something — maybe “thanks,” maybe nothing — but the words drown in the thud of boots and wind.

His eyes close for a second too long. Then another.
The line between dreaming and walking blurs completely.

He drifts in and out of consciousness — one moment aware of the road under his feet, the next floating somewhere far away. But through it all, there’s the warmth of Pete’s arm around him. A pulse against his side. The faint scent of sweat and dust and something that could almost be cedarwood.

He lets go of the noise in his head and just follows the rhythm of Pete’s breathing.

One breath. One step.

Pete.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Pete.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The name and the sound melt together until there’s no difference — just the steady rhythm of survival, a heartbeat pressed into the road.

His body’s on autopilot now. He’s not sure where his feet end and Pete’s begin — they move like one creature, one pulse. Every step feels carved into the dirt. Every breath a small victory.

Pete.

He thinks the name instead of saying it, over and over, the way someone might whisper a prayer they no longer believe in.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

It’s the only rhythm that keeps him upright. The only thing louder than the ache, louder than the voice in his head counting the ones who’ve fallen.

Pete.

He breathes it out again, the sound lost somewhere in the wind. He doesn’t even know if Pete hears it — doesn’t care, maybe. Because it’s all he has left.

Just Pete.

And the road.

And the rhythm that won’t stop.

It’s mile eighty-three when it settles in—not a thought, not even a feeling, but a weight. Heavy. Certain.

He’s going to lose.

Maybe not now. Maybe not next. But soon. There’s no escaping it.

He won’t chase the flavor anymore. He won’t get to taste it.

He will die, or his friends will die.

There’s no other way.

He will be the blood, or he will watch the blood.

He’ll lose Art. Olson. Stebbins. Collie. Hell, even Barkovitch. All of them, one by one, peeled off by the miles.

And Pete.

God—Pete.

He’ll lose Pete. Or he’ll lose himself.

Either way, the road ends covered.

Covered in what’s left of them. Covered in what’s left of him.

He keeps walking.

Because that’s all there is left to do.

It’s mile one hundred and ten when the taste of charcoal comes back.

Bitter. Unrelenting.

It coats his tongue, crawls down his throat, fills his lungs. It’s there, it’s there, and he’s going to choke on it.

He won’t taste Pete’s lips. He won’t find the flavor. He won’t reach whatever it is he’s been chasing through all these miles.

He’s going to die before there’s ever a name for it.
Before there’s a diagnosis for what he is, who he is.

Queer—
No.

Or maybe..Maybe there’s something in between. A somewhat queer. A pick-and-choose queer. Something that slips through language the way his breath slips through his teeth.

But it doesn’t matter.

He’ll be gone before any definition is given, before any term fits. It’ll stay hidden—buried under the miles, buried under everything he never said.

It’ll flood him from the inside out. Turn him dry again.
A drought made of charcoal and cedarwood.

He breathes it in. He breathes it out.

Pete pats him lightly on the cheek, the way you’d wake someone without scaring them.

“Daydreaming of charcoal again?” he says, voice rough but teasing.

Ray blinks at him — at the curve of his mouth, at the stretch of road ahead, then back at that mouth again. The world narrows to those two things: the lips and the miles.

He keeps walking.

Step after step.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Hoping to find the taste, even though he’s already drowning..Drowning and drought, both at once.
Nothing and everything.

Queer and not.
Both and none.

He’ll die before he ever knows which.

He swallows, the air sharp in his throat, and says, “No, actually… I’m dreaming of peanut butter.”

Pete snorts, shaking his head. “Yeah, sure you are.”

Ray forces a small smile. The lie sits warm on his tongue — not sweet, not kind, but bearable. It doesn’t burn like the charcoal does.

And so he keeps walking, the taste of it — false and steady — carrying him another mile.

It’s mile two hundred and one when it hits him—
not exhaustion, not pain, but the sheer, unbearable truth that he wants out.

Out of his skin.
Out of his body.
Out of this.

Out. Out. Out.

Olson is dead. Or dying.

He doesn’t know which anymore; the line between the two blurred yards ago. Olson’s still back there, somewhere behind them, his breath rattling, his blood pooling dark and slick on the asphalt.

And they’re still walking.

They have to.

They keep walking while Olson bleeds out behind them. Ray’s stomach twists. His lungs seize. He wants to stop, to turn around, to do something.

But he doesn’t.

He saved Art.
He left Olson.

He left Olson.

The thought claws at him, over and over, tearing at the thin seams holding him together.

He left Olson to die.

Why?

Why?!

He can still see Olson’s hand reaching out—just for a second, just long enough to look like hope. Then the sound.

Thud, Thud, Thud.

Ray’s vision burns. His throat closes around air that won’t stay down.

He left Olson.

He wants to crawl out of himself, peel off his skin, tear the guilt out by the root. He wants to stop hearing that thud, thud, thud of their feet on the road because it sounds too much like a heartbeat that isn’t Olson’s anymore.

He keeps walking.

Because he has to.

But every step feels like it’s taking him further from who he was and deeper into something he’ll never escape.

It’s mile two hundred eighty-six when they reach Freeport.

The word barely means anything now — a place he used to think of as home, now just another strip of road lined with ghosts and strangers.

He loses his shoes on the way in.

The sole of the right one tears apart, flapping uselessly against the ground until it finally rips free. He tries to limp through it, but it throws him off balance, and he knows better. Art saying one bad step could cost you everything.

Not wrong.

So he kicks them both off.

Instant regret.

The pavement eats at his feet. Blood blossoms on the concrete, warm against the cold air.

“Number forty-seven, first warning.”

He barely hears it. Because then he sees her.

His mother.

Standing at the edge of the sidewalk, hand over her mouth, tears streaking down her cheeks. She looks smaller than he remembers. Softer. Terrified.

“Hi, Mom,” he whispers, voice cracking.

He kisses his hand and raises it toward her.

She gasps, eyes moving from his bloody feet to his face. He can see her shaking her head, mouthing something — maybe no, maybe please, maybe Raymond, stop.

He has to bite back the tears that burn his throat. His chest aches with something too big to name.

Pete’s voice cuts through the blur.
“Don’t slow down, Ray. You can’t stop.”

Ray looks ahead for a second — the road, the trucks, the soldiers.
But—
It’s his mom.

And he’s always been a momma’s boy.

He stops.

“Number forty-seven, second warning.”

He runs.

“Mom! Please!” he cries out. “Mom, please, just give me a hug! Mom!”

He takes a step toward the sidewalk, toward her, but someone grabs him from behind — arms locking around his chest, dragging him backward.

Pete.

Pete’s shouting now. “Ray! Ray, don’t—”

His mother’s screaming, voice breaking, “No! No!”

“No,” she says again, louder this time — no to hugging her only child, no to seeing him like this, no to the boy she raised being pulled away by Pete and fate.

“Come on, Ray!” Pete’s voice is right in his ear. “Come on!”

“I’m sorry!” Ray sobs. “I’m so sorry, Mom!”

He realizes then, too late — he should’ve listened to his girl. He should’ve never signed up. He should’ve dropped out. He should’ve gone home.

He should’ve.

But he didn’t.

And now he’s here.

He looks back once more — his mother reaching out, sobbing — before Pete yanks him hard.

“Don’t do it!” Pete shouts, voice breaking. “Don’t do it here! Don’t make her see!”

And Ray, barefoot and bleeding, is dragged back into motion, the sound of his mother’s cries fading into the wind.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

He keeps walking.

It’s mile three hundred twenty-six when he knows.
Knows it deep, clear, and certain, like a truth he’s been walking toward his whole life.

He’s going to let Pete have it.

All his life he’s been scared of dying — the idea of it, the waiting, the not knowing when. But these last three hundred and twenty-one miles… that fear’s been his shadow. Always just behind him. Breathing down his neck.

But now — now there’s something else.

How lucky is he, really, to know?
To see death coming up the road toward him and not run?

How lucky, to be a human being aware enough to make something useful out of his ending.

Stebbins showed that. That asshole, with his gift of pretending not to care, who only ever wanted someone to say he mattered.

He went out the way he wanted — in the rain, head high, still talking about the Major, about fate, about how this was never really a game.

And Ray — he’s lucky, too.

Because for once, he gets to choose.
He gets to decide how.
And why.

His heart beats at the thought.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Like rain on the pavement. Like the miles behind him.
Like their steps have always sounded.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The rhythm that carried him this far, that’s going to carry Pete even farther.

He breathes. The air feels cleaner, sharper, almost kind.

Yeah. He’s lucky. Because death — that’s the one guarantee they’re all born with. And somehow, impossibly, he gets to meet it on his own terms.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

It’s mile three hundred and thirty-one, and the thud, thud, thud disappears.

Drowned out by noise — by cheers, by screams, by the electric hum of a crowd that’s come to watch history end and begin in the same breath.

A crowd for blood. A crowd for glory. A crowd for death.

The rain comes down harder, soaking through his flannel, his skin, his bones. The pavement shines under the floodlights like liquid glass, slick and dark, reflecting the boys that are left — what’s left of them.

Shadows of what used to be human.

Pete turns first.

Ray turns back.

And the world stills.

Just them, walking in the storm.

Pete’s eyes meet his — warm brown and burning with something he’s never been able to name. His beautiful skin gleams under the downpour, and that scar — the one that should have ruined his face — looks holy under the lights. A mark that says, I lived through it.

Ray stares. At the rain dripping down Pete’s chin. At his lips, soft and trembling with exhaustion. At the rise and fall of his chest, the stubborn rhythm of a boy who refuses to fall before the world makes him.

He can almost taste it.
Cinnamon and almond.
Charcoal and cedarwood.
All of it. Everything.

He swears he can taste it.

But he blinks, and it’s gone. He looks away, cheeks flushed with heat that has nothing to do with fever. Pete has a way of doing that to him — of making the world too big and too small all at once.

Then—

“Number twenty-three, second warning.”

Ray’s head snaps up. His stomach twists.

No.

No, no, no—

Pete.

His name pulses through him like a heartbeat. Pete.

He barely registers the sound of his own warning over the loudspeaker, somewhere distant, barely audible over the roaring in his ears. None of it matters.

Because Pete’s down.

On one knee.

Rain splashing against the cracked pavement, soaking his hair, his clothes, the blood pooling beneath his feet.

Pete looks up at him and smiles — that small, tired smile that always felt like the beginning of something. “You’re gonna win this, darling.”

The word hits him like thunder.

Darling.

It lodges itself somewhere deep, in his chest, in his throat, in every part of him that’s still trying to survive.

Darling. Darling. Darling.

It echoes through him like a prayer, a curse, a goodbye.

He moves before he knows he’s moving — feet pounding against the slick asphalt, legs shaking but still holding.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

He reaches Pete, heart hammering out of rhythm, lungs raw from the cold. He grabs him by the shoulders. “No. Get up. You get up!”

Pete looks dazed, blinking rain from his eyes. “You’re winning for your mom.”

Ray shakes his head so hard it makes his vision spin. “No. Get up, Pete. Please. Get up.”

He thanks every muscle in his body, every scrap of strength left in him, because he grabs Pete by the chest and hauls him upright, both of them staggering.

“Number twenty-three, third warning.”
“Number forty-seven, third warning.”

The voice over the loudspeaker sounds almost gleeful now, almost human. The guards raise their rifles, cold and patient.

Pete’s shouting now, rain mixing with tears on his face. “What the fuck are you doing, Ray!? You’re gonna get yourself killed!”

Ray’s hand fists in his shirt, pulling him close. His throat burns, his breath breaks, but he says it anyway.

“Being your—”

The words falter. Lover. Boyfriend. Darling. They all feel too fragile, too alive for a road made of ghosts.

So he chooses one that feels truer. He presses a hand flat against Pete’s chest, over the frantic beat beneath it.

“Being your partner.” He swallows. “My partner.”

Pete’s breathing ragged, staring back at him, face soft in the stormlight. “You’re an idiot,” he says, voice cracking.

Ray almost laughs, the sound breaking in his throat. “Yeah,” he says. “But I’m your idiot.”

Pete’s hand finds his shoulder again, the same spot it always does. That warmth again, even now.
They both know what’s coming. They don’t say it.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The sound starts again, matching the beat of their hearts and their feet.

Ray’s voice comes out small, cracked by rain and blood and everything he’s lost along the way.
“Come on,” he breathes. “Just walk with me a little more, okay?”

Pete’s arm is still slung across his shoulders, heavy and trembling. The weight of him feels human, real, something Ray can still hold on to. The rain keeps falling, cold as glass. It hits their faces, their lashes, their open mouths. They taste salt and metal.

Ray remembers Barkovitch — his laugh, that cruel bark of a voice: You’d think with all that weight you’d have enough fat to stay warm.
And he almost laughs now, because if he’s heavy, if he’s slow, if he’s too big for this world, then at least his weight is good for something.

It keeps Pete standing. It keeps him moving.

Pete saved him — a hundred times, maybe more. Woke him when he slept. Talked him down when the fear got too sharp. Caught him when he stumbled. Held him up when his legs gave out.

Now it’s his turn.

He owes him that.

This — this is the debt he’s been walking toward since mile one.

Their steps fall back into rhythm.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Rain against the pavement. Blood against skin. Heart against ribs.

Pete’s voice comes quiet. “Okay.”

That one word is enough.

Ray exhales. He squeezes Pete’s shoulder, firm, steady — the way Pete once did for him. It means I’ve got you. It means keep walking. It means goodbye.

And then he stops.

It’s so easy — just one skipped step, one breath not taken.

For a second, the world goes silent.

Pete keeps walking. Thud. Thud. Thud. “You convincing motherfucker—”

The shots come before he finishes the sentence.

Two. Both to the chest.

The impact rips the breath from Ray. The sound is enormous — a thunderclap inside his ribs. He was right, and he was wrong, and he understands now.

Pete isn’t the charcoal and cedarwood.
It’s the bullets.

It’s always been the bullets.

They bloom through him like fire. He’s burning. He’s ash. He’s smoke and drought and rain and blood all at once. It hurts — God, it hurts — and it’s beautiful, in that terrible, final way pain sometimes is.

He falls. The world tilts. The road catches him hard.
He tries to hold himself together, hand pressed to the wound, but his fingers are slippery with blood. It keeps coming, warm and endless.

Pete is there. Of course he is.

He’s shouting his name, voice raw and splintered.
“Ray! Ray! What did you do?! What did you do, you idiot, my idiot, what did you—” his voice breaks, almost a sob — “what did you fucking do?!”

Ray blinks, his vision washed in red and white. The lights blur like halos, the crowd a distant roar. Pete’s face hovers above him, rain streaking down his cheeks, and Ray can’t tell if it’s water or tears.

He doesn’t want Pete angry. Not now. Not in his last moments. He doesn’t want that to be what he leaves behind — anger, grief, the sound of someone he loves breaking apart.

He wants to say he’s sorry. He wants to say thank you. He wants to tell him that it’s okay, that he did what he had to, that he’s glad it’s him — glad it’s Pete who gets to live.

He wants to tell him everything — how the road wasn’t so lonely because of him, how the miles meant something, how love can exist even here, even like this.

He reaches up, fingertips brushing against Pete’s wrist — the same hand that’s steadied him through miles and miles of hell. He curls them there weakly, as if trying to memorize the warmth.

His voice is barely there, no louder than the rain.
“Hey… it’s okay.”

“What did you do?” Pete shouts. His voice cracks, splinters. “What did you do, Ray?! What did you do?!”

He keeps saying it, over and over and over, until the words lose shape, become something raw and wordless—a prayer, a curse, a plea.

“What did you do, what did you do, what did you—”

Ray’s vision is dimming at the edges, the world around him flooding in and out of focus. The lights above blur into long streaks, the crowd into nothing but sound. He can taste iron and rain and something bitter on his tongue.

He wants to reach for him, to stop him from saying it again. He wants to tell him it’s okay, that it was always going to end this way. He wants to tell him the truth that’s been sitting behind his teeth since mile twenty-seven.

“I…” His voice is rough, shredded by blood and breath. “I can’t see it,” he whispers. “I can’t… I can’t see it, but you can.”

Pete’s hands still. His eyes are wide, terrified, too bright in the rain.

Ray swallows hard. “And that’s why I…” He feels his chest tighten, feels something inside him give. His throat burns, the words catching like fire. “That’s why I love you.”

He says it again, quieter this time, because he needs Pete to hear it, to believe it. “I love you.”

It feels like falling and flying all at once. Like every mile he’s walked was just to reach this moment. And in his head, there’s a thousand thoughts—fast, chaotic, crashing against each other.

He thinks about the first time he saw Pete.
He thinks of mile twenty-seven, with that scar that looked too gentle for the story it told.
He thinks about the nights Pete steadied him when he shook from the cold.
He thinks about the hand that found his shoulder, the voice that told him to keep walking.
He thinks about his mother, and how Pete saved his mother from seeing her lose her son.

He thinks about every moment since has been building to this—this stupid, beautiful ache in his chest that feels like home and heartbreak and heaven all at once.

He knows he’s selfish. He knows it deep in his bones.

“I’m selfish,” he says, voice trembling. “I’m a selfish bastard. And I’m going to hell, Pete. I know it.”

A breath. A cough. Blood in his mouth.

He lifts his hand—shaking, bloodied—and cups Pete’s cheek. It’s so warm. Too warm. He can feel Pete’s pulse beneath his fingers, steady and strong and alive. He hates the blood smearing across that skin, marking something so good with something so final.

“Ray,” Pete breathes, but Ray doesn’t let him speak.

He leans in.

And kisses him.

It’s messy and wet, and there’s too much rain, too much noise, too much of everything—but somehow it’s perfect. The only thing that’s ever felt right.

Pete’s lips are trembling against his, and Ray can’t tell if it’s from the cold or from crying. He doesn’t care. He just knows this—this—is what he was walking toward all along.

And he was right.

He tastes like almond. And cinnamon. And every warm, human thing Ray’s been too scared to want.

He tries to hold on—to the taste, to the heat, to Pete—but the strength leaves him fast. His hand slips from Pete’s face, dragging faintly across his jaw as he’s pulled back. The soldiers are shouting, the crowd screaming, but none of it touches him now.

Pete’s voice is still there, still calling his name, breaking apart with every word.

Ray’s heart doesn’t beat right anymore. It’s stuttering, stumbling, like it’s trying to remember how. His vision swims, the light fades, and the pain returns—sharp, cruel, alive.

The charcoal seeps in again—thick, choking, heavy.
The cedarwood burns behind it—hot, tearing, spreading through every inch of him.

It hurts. God, it hurts.

But even as the bullets dig deeper, even as the world goes white around the edges, he still tastes it—the cinnamon, the almond, the sweetness that doesn’t belong in a place like this.

Pete’s warmth fades from his skin, replaced by the cold rain.

His fingers twitch, trying to reach him again. He exhales one last time, voice faint, a ghost on the wind.

“I love you, Pete.”

And then—

Thud… thud… thud…

It slows.

Thud… thud…

Then quiet.

The rain doesn’t stop. It just keeps falling—steady, endless—washing over him, carrying the blood and the miles and the pain away. Pete’s still calling his name somewhere far off, but Ray can’t hear him anymore.

There’s no road now, no crowd, no hurt. Just the soft sound of water hitting the earth, cool and clean and forgiving.

And for the first time, Ray thinks that maybe Stebbins was right.
The rain is nice.

It cools the fire in his chest, quiets the burn of cedarwood and smoke. It soaks into him, gentle as a touch, soft as a voice saying rest now.

He breathes in once more, tasting the sweetness that lingers— almond, cinnamon, and something almost like peace.

"I'm sorry, momma."

And as the last bit of warmth leaves his body, the rain takes him— not with cruelty, but with mercy— back down the road, back home.

Chapter Text

Pete knew he was a goner the moment his eyes met Ray’s.

It happened so simply, so stupidly—Ray sticking out a hand, a small, crooked smile on his face.

“Ray Garraty,” he said.

And Pete, against all better judgment, took his hand. “Pete. Peter McVries.”

Just like that. Done. Over. Hooked.

Wrapped around his finger like a school crush.

He’s never been fond of the word queer. It’s ugly, heavy, always tossed like a stone. But that’s… well, that’s what he is, he guesses. He likes men. Always has. A few short flings here and there, some names he’s long forgotten. He’s always found men more fascinating than women—not just the looks, but the ways they break, the ways they try not to.

So call him a queer, or a slur, or whatever the hell else they whisper under their breath. It doesn’t change what’s true.

Because the moment he shook Ray Garraty’s hand, his heart just—
melted.

All that swagger, that sharpness he keeps tucked behind his grin—it fell right out of him, quiet as rain.

And that’s silly, isn’t it?

The Walk hasn’t even started. The soliders aren’t even lined up yet, and already Pete’s chest feels like it’s got a second heartbeat in it—Ray’s.

“You ready for this?” Ray asks, nodding toward the endless stretch of road ahead. There’s a lopsided grin on his face, a mix of nerves and curiosity.

Pete shrugs, trying to play it cool. “A little jumpy,” he admits, his voice lighter than he feels. “Maybe that’s good.”

He glances at Ray again, eyes flicking over his shoulders, his jawline, the way his hair lays. He swears he almost swoons. Christ. What a time to develop a crush.

“Hey,” Pete says, voice casual, “what do you weigh?”

“Hundred seventy-eight,” Ray replies without hesitation.

Pete nods, smirking. “I weigh one-seventy-seven. They say heavier guys get tired quicker.”

He means it as a joke—like that single pound could change anything—but Ray laughs anyway, head tipping back. The sound does something warm and stupid to Pete’s insides.

“Shit,” Ray says, and without warning, he drops his bag onto the asphalt and sits down right there in the middle of it all.

Pete blinks. Then laughs, quiet and breathy. 

And so, against all reason, Pete follows. He drops down beside him, cross-legged on the pavement with the other boys scattered around, trying not to look like he’s already picked his person to stick close to.

But he has.

He stays near Ray—this boy he just met, this boy with tired eyes and a smile that’s already starting to feel like home.

Whatever home is supposed to feel like.

Pete realizes it somewhere around mile five—when the novelty’s worn off, when the joking has just started, when the exhaustion is starting to creep in at the edges, just barely.

That’s when Ray Garraty proves what kind of boy he really is.

Curly, the youngest of them—fifteen, maybe—cramps up hard. One minute he’s walking fine, the next he’s folding in on himself, face twisted in pain, his leg refusing to move. Everyone else just stares. Some look away. It’s cruel, but that’s how it is.

You can’t stop for anyone.

"Number Seven, Warning. First Warning."

But Ray does.

Without a second thought, he grabs the kid by the arm, steadying him, and starts walking backward to match his staggering pace. “Come on,” Ray says, voice calm but firm. “Put your weight on me. Put your weight on me, okay?”

"Number Seven, Warning. Second Warning."

Curly hesitates, panic wide in his eyes, but he listens. He leans into Ray, both arms braced over his shoulders. Ray grips him tight, steps controlled, steadying them both.

“There you go,” Ray says, gentle but sure. “You’re gonna keep walking, okay? You’re with us. You’re with us.”

Pete watches, silent at first. He’s never been the kind to encourage anyone—not here, not in a game where kindness doesn’t buy you anything but heartache. But something about Ray’s voice cuts through that logic, soft and stubborn all at once.

Stupid him and falling so quickly.

So Pete joins in.

“Come on, kid,” he says, his tone awkward but sincere. “Keep walking. That’s right, that’s it. We’re out in the sunshine, just having fun, right?”

Curly huffs a shaky laugh, and Ray smiles at that. “You alright? You good?”

“Yeah,” Curly breathes, still leaning heavy on him.

“Okay,” Ray says, nodding. “You gotta promise me you’re gonna keep walking. You promise?”

Curly nods. “I promise.”

Ray smiles again, that small, quiet kind smile. He lets go of the boy slowly, carefully, giving him space but staying close. “Stick with me, okay? Come on. Stick with me.”

Curly tries.

God, he tries.

Pete can see it on his face—the grit, the terror, the hopeless fight of a boy who knows exactly how this ends but still refuses to give in. His steps hitch, his breathing’s ragged, and every muscle in his leg looks like it’s screaming, but he keeps going because Ray’s there, walking backward, coaxing him like this whole thing isn’t doomed from the start.

“Come on, kid,” Pete finds himself saying, even though it feels wrong, even though his throat’s thick. “Come on. You can do it.”

Curly lifts his head, jaw trembling. He’s crying. Tears mixing with sweat, streaking through the dust and sunburn on his face. “I—I’m trying,” he says, voice broken. “It’s not fair.”

Ray’s right there, voice cracking with something raw and human. “Come on, Curly! Come on, you got it! You’re still in it, come on!”

But then Curly’s legs buckle.

He drops to his knees, sobbing. 

“Number Seven, Warning. Third and Final Warning.”

Ray’s voice hits higher, desperate. “Come on, Curly! Get up! Come on, kid, please—”

The boy’s shaking his head, still crying. “It’s not fair,” he keeps saying. “It’s not fair.”

Then the sound—sharp, echoing, final.

POP.

And he’s gone.

Ray flinches so hard it sends a full shiver through his body, eyes wide, breath caught mid-gasp. Curly’s body crumples to the pavement, and for a second, even the wind feels like it stops.

Pete closes his eyes. Just for a heartbeat. The nausea rolls up his throat, bitter and heavy. He forces it down, because if he looks—if he really looks—he might stop walking, too.

He turns forward again. Keeps his eyes fixed on the road. Keeps breathing.

And then—

“Number Forty-Seven. Warning. First Warning.”

Ray.

Pete’s head snaps up. Ray’s pace has faltered—his steps slow, uneven, shock written all over his face. He’s stuck in the moment, frozen there beside what’s left of the kid he tried to save.

Trying to be a hero in a game where there are none.

“Shit.” Pete doesn’t think. He just moves.

His boots hit the pavement hard, faster now, faster until he’s beside Ray, grabbing him by the shoulder.

Another warning blares—Pete’ —but he doesn’t care. He just keeps pushing, walking shoulder to shoulder with him, his hand a steady anchor against Ray’s back.

"Number Twenty-Three. Warning. First Warning."

Fuck the warnings.

“Ray! Move!”

Ray doesn’t respond, eyes still glassy, still somewhere else.

“Move!” Pete yells again, giving him a hard shove, forcing his legs into motion. “Don’t you stop,” Pete mutters through clenched teeth, voice rough with fear. “Don’t you dare stop now.”

And slowly, painfully, Ray starts walking again.

The thud, thud, thud of their boots finds its rhythm once more.

Two sets of steps, steady and trembling.

Two boys still moving forward, because the road won’t let them do anything else.

It’s mile seventeen when Pete realizes he’s in trouble.

Because Ray Garraty is cute.

Like really fucking cute.

He tells himself it’s the heat, the exhaustion, the monotony of the road—but, really, he knows better. Ray’s walking a few paces ahead, the brim of his sunhat bobbing with every step, strawberry-blonde hair curling out from underneath. Freckles dust his face like stars someone scattered there on purpose. He’s got the kind of look that shouldn’t belong in a place like this—soft, almost gentle, the kind of face you want to look at twice just to make sure it’s real.

The sunhat especially does him in. It’s ridiculous, oversized, probably borrowed from his dad—but it suits him. Makes him look boyish, kind, human. And Pete, sweating under the pitiless Maine sun, finds himself smiling.

Terrible time to form a crush, isn’t it?

They’re seventeen miles in—barely a dent in what’s coming—and Pete’s heart has the audacity to skip every time Ray glances his way. He should be conserving his energy, counting his steps, doing anything but watching the way Ray’s shoulders move when he walks.

But can you blame him?

It’s Ray Garraty.

Seventeen miles, and Pete already knows—there’s something different about him. Something good. Someone worth spending however many miles he’s got left beside.

Which is why, around mile seventeen and a half, Pete decides he needs to get a handle on it—on himself, on this ridiculous flutter that keeps tripping through his chest every time Ray smiles or looks his way.

Because if he doesn’t, Ray Garraty is going to be his downfall.

So he says it. Out loud.

“I like you,” Pete mutters, not looking at him, eyes fixed straight ahead on the endless stretch of road. His tone’s half teasing, half warning, and all nerves. “But if you fall over, I won’t pick you up.”

Ray laughs—of course he does, that soft, bright sound that somehow makes Pete feel lighter and heavier all at once. “That a promise or a threat?”

Pete shrugs, kicking at a loose pebble as they walk. “Both,” he says, trying to sound casual, even though his pulse is hammering.

Because the truth is, he doesn’t mean it. Not even a little.

He knows, deep down, if Ray ever fell—if he so much as stumbled—he’d be there in a heartbeat.

It’s right after the first incline when Pete feels it for the first time—real fear.

Ray’s at three warnings. Three.

The hill damn nearly killed him.

He’d gone quiet, the color drained from his face, his breathing short and sharp. There’d been that look in his eyes—distant, unfocused—the same look Pete had seen before.

But Ray did make it. Barely. And now he’s walking again, scared but steady, the panic still hovering in the back of his throat like a ghost that refuses to leave.

Pete walks a little closer, matching his pace. He tells himself it’s practical—if Ray collapses, he’ll hear it first—but really, it’s selfish. He just needs to make sure Ray stays.

It's selfish. He knows it is.

But he likes Ray.

He likes the way he keeps going even when his legs are shaking. The way he mutters to himself under his breath when he’s trying to focus. The way he still smiles sometimes—tired, crooked, but real.

He likes his kindness, the quiet kind that doesn’t ask for attention. The same kindness that got him three warnings already. He likes that stubborn streak that flares when anyone tells him to quit. He even likes the sass—the little comments he tosses out to cover the cracks in his fear.

And Pete—God help him—likes all of it.

It’s the selfish part of Pete that makes him do it.

They crest the hill—Ray gasping, and shaking—and before Pete can think about rules or pride or the eyes of the other walkers, he slips an arm around Ray’s waist. Not just to hold him. Not just to comfort him. To keep him upright. To keep him here.

Ray doesn’t fight it. He leans into him, heavy, and Pete has to force the blush down.

“Speak to me,” Ray mumbles, voice thin as thread. “I’m fading.”

Pete lets out a small, broken laugh that doesn’t sound like him. “Yeah, well, don’t you dare. If you fall asleep again, you’ll slow down, and if you slow down…” He stops himself. No. Don’t go there.

So instead, he says the first thing that comes to mind. “Okay,” he says, squeezing Ray’s waist a little tighter. “What’s the deal with the charcoal?”

Ray blinks at him, dazed. “What?”

“The charcoal,” Pete says again, a ghost of a grin tugging at his mouth. “I know there ain’t no man on this road looking forward to eating charcoal, so what’s that all about, huh?”

Ray hums, eyes glassy, half gone with exhaustion. He glances up at Pete, and for a second—just a second—Pete swears he sees his eyes flicker down to his lips. Maybe it’s just the fatigue, maybe it’s wishful thinking, but it hits him like a heartbeat anyway.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

“Mmm,” Ray says, voice lazy, slow. “It reminds me of someone.”

Pete raises a brow. “Yeah? Your girl?”

Ray’s head jerks up, a flush in his cheeks. “What! No. No, not—uh—” He laughs, embarrassed. “Tell you what— we make it to Freeport, and I’ll tell ya, alright?”

Pete grins, though his throat feels tight. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright, well,” Pete says, pretending to shrug it off, “thinking someone’s charcoal’s pretty weird, my boy.”

The words are out before he can catch them.
My boy.

It’s soft, instinctive, too tender to take back. His stomach flips. For a second, he prays Ray’s too far gone to have heard. Luckily, he is.

Ray just hums, slow and sleepy, his gaze fixed ahead. “Mmm… not just charcoal, though.”

Pete looks at him. “No?”

“Almond and cinnamon too,” Ray murmurs.

Pete chuckles under his breath. “Yeah? Cinnamon? What, are they bossy or something?”

Ray turns his head, blinking tiredly, eyes meeting Pete’s for just a moment before drifting back to the road. “More so sassy,” he says, a faint smile tugging at his mouth. “But sure. Bossy works.”

Pete laughs softly, the sound low and fond. And for a moment—between the ache and the rain and the warnings—he forgets about death.

All he can think of is Ray Garraty, warm against him, walking on.

It’s when his head starts to droop—when the road goes soft around the edges and the sky above him becomes a blur—that Pete realizes something he’s not sure he knows how to name.

He feels… cared about.

And that’s strange. Weird, even. Foreign in the way warmth feels after too much cold.

He doesn’t know if it’s the weight of Ray’s arm still brushing against his, or the quiet sound of his voice every few minutes—checking, asking, you good? He doesn’t know if it’s the way Ray slows his pace just enough to keep beside him, matching his stride like it’s second nature.

But he feels it.

It sits heavy and gentle in his chest all at once, that feeling of being looked after. Protected, maybe.

And it’s weird because Pete can’t remember the last time he felt that. Or if he ever really did. His life’s always been about bracing—about toughening up, walking off pain, pretending that no one needs to care because no one ever does.

But here, with the sky starting to fade and the road humming beneath their boots, he can feel it. The quiet concern in every word Ray says. The steady rhythm of someone who doesn’t want to see him fall.

Loved... Almost.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

“Gonna sleep, Pete?”

Ray’s voice drifts through the thick air—soft, careful, like he’s afraid to wake him even though Pete’s still awake.

Pete turns his head toward the sound, blinking slow. His body aches, but it’s a distant kind of pain now, drowned out by the rhythm of their steps and the steady weight of the boy beside him. And when he looks at Ray—really looks—he feels that flutter again, the one that’s been haunting him since mile seventeen.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

He’s exhausted. Probably half-delirious. But there’s no mistaking it.

He likes Ray Garraty.

Maybe too much.

The freckles on Ray’s face are brighter up close, scattered like constellations across his nose and cheeks, glowing faintly under the fading sun. His hat’s gone, shoved somewhere in his pack, and his hair’s a wild mess from the wind. He looks soft and warm and utterly human.

Pete swallows. He’s selfish, he knows he is, because instead of keeping his distance—like he should—he leans closer. Lets his head rest against Ray’s shoulder.

Ray doesn’t pull away. Doesn’t flinch or joke about it. Just… breathes. And then, quietly, wraps an arm around Pete’s shoulders.

“I gotcha,” he murmurs, voice barely above a whisper. “Rest awhile, yeah?”

The words hit Pete harder than he expects. He doesn’t even know why. Maybe because no one’s ever said something like that to him before—I gotcha. It’s simple, but it’s everything. A promise that someone cares enough to mean it.

He looks at Ray again, really studies him this time. The mess of his hair. The curve of his mouth. The freckles. Those damn freckles. They look like they were drawn there by someone gentle, someone who wanted to make sure the world had something kind to look at.

“I always loved freckles,” Pete murmurs before he can stop himself.

Ray turns his head slightly, confused but smiling. “What?”

“Freckles,” Pete says again, and the corners of his mouth twitch up in a sleepy grin. He lifts a hand and pokes Ray lightly in the stomach, just enough to feel the soft give under his shirt. “They’re little kisses from heaven. Least that’s what I think.”

Ray’s laugh comes out quiet, breathless, and it shakes his shoulders a little. Pete can feel it where their bodies touch. “you are ever the poet, Pete.”

Pete hums, pretending to be smug even though his chest aches in that weird, unbearable way. “Mmhmm. Poet and songwriter and fuckin’ tired.” His voice dips low. “Now tighten your grip so I can doze off and not die.”

Ray laughs again—God, it’s such a good sound. Like warmth in the artic. Pete thinks if heaven has a sound, it probably laughs like that.

He feels Ray’s arm tighten around him, firm but careful, pulling him a little closer. “Bossy,” Ray mutters under his breath.

Pete’s lips curve into a lazy smile. “Mmhmm…”

His eyes flutter closed. He’s too tired to keep them open, too content to fight the weight in his bones. But as he drifts, he lets himself think—just for a moment—that this is what safety feels like. What it feels like to have someone see you, to care without asking for anything back.

And in that liminal space between waking and sleep, Pete catches the faintest whisper of memory—
charcoal and cinnamon—
and the thought of Ray’s laugh, the freckles like stars, the warmth of his arm around him.

He doesn’t mean to fall asleep. He just does.

Head against Ray’s shoulder, held steady by a boy he’s only known for miles and lifetimes all at once

It happens so fast, Pete almost doesn’t process it until it’s already over.

Olson’s bleeding out.

He doesn’t fall at first—he staggers, listing sideways, hands pressed against his stomach like he can hold it all in if he just tries hard enough. And then he does fall, hard, hitting the pavement with a wet, final sound that makes Pete’s stomach twist.

And then—Art runs.

“Art!” Pete yells, but Art’s already breaking formation, his pack bouncing against his back, sprinting toward Olson like he can will him back up again.

“Jesus Christ,” Pete mutters under his breath.

“Number Six, Warning. First Warning.”

“Hank!” Art cries, voice cracking into something childlike. “Hank, I’m here! You’re okay, you’re okay, you just—fuck—come on, man, come on!”

Olson’s eyes roll toward him, unfocused. His lips move, his voice broken and slurred and bloody. "Art,” he gasps, his chest heaving. “Art—I did it wrong—I did it wrong!”

“Art!” Ray’s voice cuts through the air, sharp and terrified.

Pete turns, but Ray’s already moving. Don't. Please, Please don't.. But Ray's running.

“Ray, don’t!” Pete shouts, his voice hoarse, but Ray doesn’t listen. Of course he doesn’t. It’s who he is.

By the time he reaches them, Art’s lost it completely. Olson’s eyes are half-lidded, his breathing wet and shallow, and Art’s sobbing, hands covered in blood.

“Number Forty-Seven, Warning.”

The sound of his number through the speakers makes Pete’s blood go cold. Ray. Ray. Ray.

His heart beats erratically.

Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud Thud.

When Ray reaches them, Olson’s gasping for air, his words looping, breaking. “Art—I did it wrong—I did it wrong—”

Art’s sobbing, tears streaking down his face, trying to lift Olson, shaking his head like if he refuses hard enough, death won’t take him. “You didn’t, Hank! You didn’t! Come on, you’re okay, you just gotta stand up, come on—please!”

“Art,” Ray says, voice sharp. He drops to his knees beside them, grabbing Art’s arm. “You can’t stay here.”

Art shakes his head violently. “No! No! We can’t leave him, Ray!”

Ray glances at Olson—just long enough to see the terror in his eyes, the blood on his chin—and his chest aches. “I’m sorry, Olson,” he whispers, voice shaking. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

Then he pulls.

Art jerks back, screaming. “No! No! We can’t leave him!”

“They’ll kill us next!” Ray shouts, yanking harder, his voice breaking apart. “They’ll fucking kill you if you don’t move! Come on!”

“Number Six, Warning. Second Warning.”
“Number Forty-Seven, Warning. Second Warning.”

The words slice through the air like bullets.

Ray drags Art backward, their boots scraping the asphalt. Olson tries to grab at them, but his hands miss, hitting the pavement instead. His voice cracks open with grief and panic.

“I DID IT WRONG! Art! Art!”

Art’s screaming too, clawing toward him, but Ray doesn’t let go. He can’t. He tightens his grip, pulling with everything he’s got until Art’s feet start to move.

They keep walking. They have to.

Art’s still sobbing, his words broken, falling out between gasps. “He called my name,” he says, voice trembling. “He called my name.”

“I know,” Ray breathes, his hand gripping the back of Art’s neck, half to steady him, half to keep himself upright. “I know, man. I know.”

“I couldn’t save him! I couldn’t—” he keens, hands still trembling, eyes wet and vacant with the memory of Olson on the asphalt.

Ray’s arms tighten around him, pulling him so close for balance that their breaths mix. “I know, I know,” he says, voice soft but urgent, like a hand over a flame.

Art shakes his head, the sound ragged. “No—no. I couldn’t.”

“Shhh,” Ray hushes, fingers pressing at the back of Art’s neck, burying his face against the damp collar. “I know. I know.”

They walk like that—slow, backward, then forward again—feet scraping the road. Ray’s arm is looped around Art’s neck, holding him so he can’t bolt back the way he came. He keeps one palm braced at Art’s ribs, steadying him, keeping him from collapsing into whatever need is pulling at him.

“You did a good thing,” Ray murmurs, though his own voice is frayed. 

Art hiccups a laugh that breaks instantly into another sob. “No. No.”

“You did,” Ray says, firmer now. “You did a good thing.”

Art’s face crumples. “He called my name,” he whispers, the memory shattering him all over again. “He called my name and I—”

“I know.” Ray’s voice is almost nothing, the admission a bone-deep thing between them. “I know, Art. I know.”

When they finally get close enough that Pete can see them clearly again, something inside him breaks loose.

Ray’s pale, flushed face; Art’s blank, horrified stare. The two of them moving slow, barely keeping pace.
Pete’s chest tightens until it hurts to breathe.

He’d watched Olson fall. He’d heard that shot, that awful wet sound, and for a moment the world had tilted. And then he’d seen Ray run back—run straight toward it.

Every step since has been a blur of pounding fear and raw, useless anger.

He doesn’t know what terrifies him more—that Ray might not come back, or that he might.
He pictures both of them sprawled on the road beside Olson, their blood running together.
He tastes bile. His hands won’t stop shaking.

Please don’t die, he thinks. It’s not a prayer, it’s a demand.
Please, God, don’t let him die too.

By the time they reach him, Pete’s head is ringing. His heart feels like it’s going to split open from everything he hasn’t said—every inch of grief, panic, aching, love, all tangled together.

And then Ray is there. Alive. Walking right in front of him.

Pete doesn’t think. He grabs Ray, spins him roughly, and slaps the back of his head hard enough that Ray glares.

“What the fuck, man?!” Ray snaps, blinking in shock.

“Don’t you ever—ever—fucking do that again,” Pete spits, voice raw and trembling with everything he’s been holding in: fury, fear, relief, love—probably all of it. “You hear me?!”

Ray’s jaw tightens. “I had to! I had to!” he fires back, the plea of it raw. “He was—”

“I don’t care!” Pete cuts him off, the words tearing out. “I ain’t losing you and Art and Olson! Not all three! You hear me?!”

Art, still half-shocked, presses his hands to his face and tries to blink the world back into order. The tremor in his voice is small but fierce when he whispers, “He called my name.”

Pete turns to Art then, voice dropping into something steadier but no less intense. “Art—man, I love you. I do. But don’t you ever—you hear me? Don’t you ever run back like that.”

Art nods, hollow-eyed and broken, the nod like a promise he’s not sure he can keep. “Yeah,” he says, throat thick. “Yeah, I hear you.”

Pete looks back at Ray, rage and relief and something softer tangled in his expression. He presses a hand—gentle this time—to Ray’s shoulder. “You don’t get to die for anyone,” he says, voice low and fierce. “Not for him. Not for me. You understand?”

Ray doesn’t answer with words. He just gives a small, trembling nod—his chin dipping once, barely there.

But that’s not enough. Not after what just happened. Not after watching him disappear into gunfire and panic and luck.

Pete grabs him again, both hands this time—fingers digging into Ray’s shoulders, shaking him once. “No, man! No half nods!” Pete shouts, his voice cracking down the middle. “I need you to fucking promise me, Ray! Promise me!”

Ray flinches at the desperation in his voice, tries to look away, but Pete won’t let him. His grip tightens, not angry, but pleading—like holding him still is the only way to keep him alive.

“I had to!” Ray bursts out, his voice frayed and thick. “I wasn’t losing Art too!”

Pete scoffs, breathless, half laugh, half sob. “And I almost lost all three of you!” he fires back, his throat burning. “You hear that? All three! So fucking promise me you won’t do that again! You hear me?!”

Ray opens his mouth, shuts it, and Pete keeps going, the words tumbling out like he’s been choking on them for miles. “No running back, Ray! No one! Not for Art, not for me, not for your momma, no one! You hear?!”

Ray’s breathing hard. He nods again, this time sharp, fierce, final. “I hear you,” he says, barely above a whisper. “I promise.”

Pete lets out a long, ragged breath, still shaking, his pulse pounding against his ribs. He keeps his hand on Ray’s shoulder, feeling the tremor in his body, the quick thud of his heartbeat slowing just enough to prove he’s still there.

The road doesn’t care. It stretches on ahead of them, blank and endless. The soldiers don’t care. The world keeps being terrible, mile after goddamn mile.

And behind them, Stebbins coughs out something that sounds halfway between amusement and disgust. “This,” he wheezes, voice sharp and dry, “this is why you don’t make friends.”

Pete turns, eyes wild, every nerve still on fire. “You got something to say, Stebbins? Huh?!”

Stebbins looks back at him, unblinking, his mouth twisting into a smirk that doesn’t reach his eyes. “Yeah,” he says, low and even. “You make friends, and the harder it gets. You die slower that way.”

Pete laughs—a humorless, broken sound. “Well, fuck me then,” he snaps, “for wanting to have some friends on my last days on earth!”

Collie, walking a few paces ahead, throws his hands up, his voice cracking with exhaustion. “This is shit!” he shouts to no one and everyone. “This is all shit!”

And maybe he’s right. Maybe it is.

The road keeps swallowing them, mile by mile. The rain’s coming in now, light and cold, sticking their shirts to their skin. 

But Pete’s still got his hand on Ray’s shoulder, steady, stubborn, alive. And in that small, rain-slicked stretch of road—where grief hangs heavy and the world keeps marching them toward death—one thing burns clear in his chest, solid and furious and human:

He will not let Ray Garraty say goodbye.

It’s mile two hundred eighty-six when they reach Freeport— and that’s when Pete feels it.

Heartache and love. Both at once.
It hits him like a blade, sharp and deep and sudden.

Because here’s Ray Garraty—bloodied, exhausted, yet still walking. And Pete loves him. God help him, he does. Loves him so much it hurts.

Because everything about this boy is built for heartbreak—his stubbornness, his softness, his goddamn need to save everyone but himself.

The name Freeport doesn’t sound like freedom anymore. It sounds like the place he’s going to lose him.

He might lose him.

Ray’s limping now, favoring his right foot. Pete notices first—the sole of his shoe flapping loose, slapping against the asphalt. And then, without warning, Ray stops.

“What the hell are you doing?” Pete calls out, his voice already cracking from exhaustion.

Ray doesn’t answer. He kicks one shoe off. Then the other.

“Number Forty-Seven, First Warning.”

Pete’s stomach sinks. “Jesus Christ, Ray…”

Ray’s barefoot now, the pavement already tearing into his skin. Pete can see the blood. Can see him stumble. Can see that same goddamn determination that’s going to get him killed. Ray doesn’t even flinch. He just keeps walking.

And then—he sees her.

Pete follows his gaze, and his breath catches.

A woman stands near the sidewalk. One hand over her mouth, tears streaking her face. She’s trembling, and even from here Pete knows—knows from the way Ray’s shoulders falter, the way his chin quivers.
It’s his mother.

“Hi, Mom,” Ray whispers, his voice cracking on the word.

He kisses his hand and lifts it toward her, and Pete watches her crumble—her lips moving silently, mouthing words Ray can’t hear. No. Please. Stop.

It breaks Pete’s heart right open.

“Don’t slow down, Ray!” he shouts, panic rising. “You can’t stop!”

But Ray doesn’t listen.
He never does.

And then—he stops.

“Number Forty-Seven, Second Warning.”

Pete’s chest seizes. “Ray, no!”

But Ray’s already running. “Mom! Please!” he screams. “Mom, please, just give me a hug! Mom!”

Pete runs before he even thinks about it. His legs just move. He hears his own number called—doesn’t care. Doesn’t stop. All he knows is that Ray’s about to die, and he’s not going to let it happen. Not like this. Not in front of her.

“Ray!” he shouts, lungs burning. “Ray, don’t!”

He reaches him just as Ray hits the edge of the road—just as his mother’s scream cuts through the air. Pete grabs him from behind, arms wrapping tight around his chest, dragging him backward.

“Ray! Ray, stop!”

His mother’s voice breaks, high and sharp and unending. “No! No!”

Pete doesn’t know who she’s yelling at—Ray, him, the soldiers—but it doesn’t matter. All he hears is no, and it’s the kind that comes from somewhere deep, where love and terror live.

He's going to die. He's going to die. They're going to die.

“Come on, Ray!” Pete shouts, choking on his breath. “Come on!”

“I’m sorry!” Ray’s sobbing now, thrashing weakly. “I’m so sorry, Mom!”

Pete’s crying too, though he doesn’t notice. His tears blend with the sweat. He tightens his hold until he can feel Ray’s heartbeat hammering against his own chest.

“Don’t do it!” he shouts, his voice breaking apart. “Don’t do it here! Don’t make her see!”

Ray stumbles, his feet dragging, his body heavy as lead. Pete pulls harder, yanking him back step by step, ignoring the pain tearing through his own legs.

“Keep walking,” he gasps. “You hear me? Keep walking.”

Behind them, Ray’s mother’s cries fade into the wind, into the blur of the wind, into memory. And as Pete steadies him again—his heart breaking wide open—he realizes what this is.

It isn’t just fear anymore.
It isn’t pity.

It’s love. And it hurts like hell.

He looks at Ray, trembling and exhausted and still moving, and something in his chest twists so hard it almost drops him. Because he knows, deep down, he’d run through every warning, every bullet, every mile—just to keep this boy breathing.

“Keep walking, Ray,” he whispers again, voice shaking. “Just… keep walking.”

“She was right!” Ray’s voice is ragged, breaking apart with every word. “They were all fucking right! I shouldn’t have signed up—I shouldn’t have even gone here! I could’ve dropped out, I could’ve—oh God—” his voice shatters, his breathing jagged, his chest heaving. “I almost— I almost died! And she—she almost saw—she almost saw me die!”

Ray’s shoulders are trembling, his face streaked with sweat and dirt and tears, his breath catching. And Pete—he can’t stand it. He can’t stand watching him come undone like this, can’t stand that guilt sinking its teeth into him.

He doesn’t even think before he opens his mouth.
That’s what love does, right? It makes you reckless. Makes you say the things you swore you’d never say.

“Damnit, Ray!” Pete blurts, his voice raw, sharp enough to cut through the chaos. “You’ve been walking five days! I’ve been walking my whole fucking life!”

The words hit harder than he means them to. They taste like blood and truth, and once they’re out, there’s no taking them back.

“My…” Pete swallows hard, his throat tight. “My parents both died when I was little. And you know what the hardest thing is?” He laughs, but it’s a hollow, cracked sound. “I don’t remember a single goddamn thing about them.”

Ray’s eyes widen, still glassy from panic, but he stays quiet. Listening.

He's always fucking listening.

“I was taken in after that,” Pete goes on, his voice trembling as he talks, “lived with this man for a while.” He hesitates—his jaw tightens. “I ain’t gonna give him credit by saying his name. But I lived with him until I was ten. And then one night… He died in his own pile of puke.”

The silence between them stretches, heavy and endless. The sound of their steps fills it—thud, thud, thud—like a heartbeat.

“After that,” Pete says quietly, “kids like me… we didn’t have homes. We had places. Couches. Basements. Backyards, when we were lucky. Foster homes when we weren’t. And every one of those places, Ray, I was picking fights. Stealing shit. Anything to feel like I was in control of something. And then one day…” He shakes his head, chuckling bitterly. “One day, I picked a fight with the wrong guy. A guy who knew his way around a hunting knife.”

He grabs the edge of his torn shirt and yanks it down under his shoulder. The scar is long and ugly—puckered and pink against his skin. It stretches down his collarbone, carved deep.

“You see this, Ray?”

Ray’s eyes flick down, and his breath catches. “Jesus, Pete.”

Pete doesn’t blink. “You see it?”

Ray nods, still stunned. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

Pete lets go of his shirt, the fabric falling back into place. “That’s what walking looks like, Ray,” he says quietly. “That’s what surviving looks like. It’s not clean, it’s not fair, and it sure as hell ain’t pretty. But you keep moving, even when the world tries to cut you open. That man,” he says, low and rough, staring at the road instead of Ray, “he left me for dead.”

“I woke up in the hospital two days later,” Pete continues, his tone distant, hollow. “And you know what, Ray? I wasn’t even upset about it. Not at him. Not at what he did.” He laughs under his breath, a sharp, broken sound. “Because it wasn’t his fault. It was mine.”

He looks at the pavement, his steps heavy and guilt written. “I thought I was invincible, that I could handle anything the world threw at me. And then I learned the truth: I couldn’t. None of us can.”

His throat works as he swallows. “So I made myself a promise that day. I told myself that if I ever got a second chance—and I did, somehow, I fucking did—then I’d always try to find the light in all this darkness. Because what’s the point of a second chance if you don’t use it to see something good?”

The words hang there, and Pete feels insecure for a second, before Ray speaks. His voice is quiet, almost a mumble. “You do find the light, Pete.”

Pete glances over, a half smile in his face.

Ray’s eyes glisten, his voice barely a whisper now. “You do. I don’t. I don’t have that in me. I would’ve been fucking dead if it wasn’t for you."

He shakes his head, fierce and trembling. “You think this is easy, Ray?” he shouts suddenly, his voice breaking open with anger that sounds too much like love. “No! It’s not fucking easy! It’s hard! It’s so fucking hard!”

“You think I’m some kind of saint, walking around finding light in all this?” He lets out a harsh laugh, shaking his head. “No, Ray. I just don’t have much to lose. That’s the difference. I got nothing left—but I got everything to gain. That’s why I’m here.”

He exhales hard, his voice dropping to a near whisper. “Because no one would miss me, Ray.”

Ray’s head jerks up at that, his eyes wide. “I would.”

Pete’s turns his face away, staring at the horizon like it can save him. “No, Ray. You wouldn’t.”

“I would,” Ray says again, firmer this time.

Pete shakes his head, the corners of his mouth twitching in something halfway between a smile and a grimace. “Not in the way you should.” His voice cracks, quieter now. “A mother would miss you. Your girl would miss you. The state, your neighbors, your friends. People know who you are, Ray. People love you.”

He swallows, staring down at his feet. “No one would miss me. Not really. So that’s why I’m here. Because if—if I somehow win, maybe I can do something good with it. Help some kids like me. Ones who don’t got anyone. Ones who need a roof, a name, a goddamn chance.”

His eyes drift somewhere far away, voice softening, almost fragile. “Maybe I could be a brother to them. Or something. I could’ve used that, once. I need a brother,” Pete says finally, quieter than before. “Or a friend. Or…” His words trail off, the rest dying on his tongue.

He doesn’t say partner.
He doesn’t say lover.
He doesn’t say boyfriend.

“Ray,” he says, quiet at first, the name almost a breath. Then louder—truer. “Ray, that’s why I… that’s why I went back for you.”

Ray blinks, still unsteady, still lost somewhere between guilt and exhaustion. “What?”

Pete exhales shakily, dragging a hand down his face. “That’s why, when you fucking promise you won’t run back—and you do—I run with you.” He laughs, but it’s hollow, broken. “Because I had nothing to lose, Ray. Had. But now I do.”

The silence that follows feels like gravity, pulling everything tight between them. Pete’s chest aches, his throat burns.

“I could lose you,” he whispers. “And I can’t… I’m not ready for that. Not yet.”

Ray’s eyes go soft, shining in the light, but he doesn’t interrupt. 

Always the best goddamn listener.

“I’ve shown you the light, bit by bit,” he says slowly, “but you’ve also shown it to me. You think you don’t got it in you, but you do.”

He shakes his head, smiling faintly through the ache. “You didn’t have to help Curly, but you did. You didn’t have to drag Art out of that mess, but you did. You have. You keep doing it. You say you don’t have the light, Ray, but you do. It’s right there.” He presses a hand to Ray’s chest, just over his heart. “It’s right fucking here. And I ain’t—” his voice catches— “I ain’t ready to lose that. I ain’t ready to lose you. Not yet.”

“So if you win,” Pete says, each word a plea now, “if somehow you make it to the end—I suggest you choose love. Not vengeance. Not hate. Not violence for the Major. But love.”

And in another universe, that love could have been us.

He laughs again, softly this time, like the word itself is fragile. “I suggest you take that prize and go home to your momma. Because that’s love, Ray. She loves you. You have her. You have something worth going back to. You have stuff to lose, people who’d grieve you if you’re gone. So don’t… don’t fucking run again, man. Don’t give up. You hear me? You deserve that love. You have that love. So hold it. Hold onto it, man.”

Ray looks at him for a long moment, the kind of look that feels like a hand reaching through to his heart, the miles, the ache. His eyes are glassy but sure when he finally says, softly—
“Thanks, Pete.”

Pete blinks, caught off guard. He looks away, drags a slow breath into his lungs, his hand moving up to rub at the worn fabric over the scar on his shoulder. “Yeah… man,” he murmurs, voice rough around the edges. “Yeah…”

But Ray doesn’t stop there. He’s quiet for a moment, then says, “You’re wrong, though.”

Pete glances at him, brows knitting. “About what?”

“About people not caring,” Ray says. “About no one loving you.”

Pete scoffs lightly, shaking his head, trying to brush it off before it can settle too deep. “Ray—”

“No, no,” Ray interrupts, firm this time. “I would. I’d grieve you.”

I'd love you, goes left unsaid.

Pete's mouth opens like he’s going to argue but nothing comes out. The air between them shifts, goes still.

Don't argue with this stubborn bastard, Pete.

Ray looks at him, steady now despite the exhaustion in his face. “I don’t care if it’s been five days,” he says. “I care.”

Pete swallows hard, trying to keep his voice from shaking. “Not enough to grieve me.”

And Ray—Ray just laughs softly, almost tenderly, even with tears clinging to his lashes. “That’s where you’re wrong,” he says. “I’d grieve you, man. I would.”

Pete’s lips part, his throat tight. “…Yeah?”

Ray nods. “Every damn day, I would.”

There’s a long pause. Then Pete lets out a breath that sounds almost like a laugh, small and disbelieving. His smile creeps in slow, sad but soft.

“And you’d miss my cravings for peanut butter, huh?” Pete teases quietly.

Ray grins, a faint spark of light returning to his face. “Only if you miss my cravings for charcoal.”

That makes Pete laugh—really laugh—deep and unrestrained, the sound of it echoing against the asphalt. Big, warm, and real. He throws an arm around Ray’s shoulders, giving him a squeeze, and pats his chest fondly.

“Yeah, about that,” he says through a grin. “Where’s my promise on you telling me what that’s about, huh? We’ve made it to Freeport.”

Ray groans dramatically. “Aww man, I was hoping you’d forget.”

Pete chuckles, shaking his head. “No way, man. I take my promises seriously.”

Ray nudges him with his elbow, laughing now too. “No shit. I think you gave me a concussion from hitting me after what happened with Olson and Art.”

Pete smirks, playfully defensive. “Serves you right.”

Ray sticks his tongue out at him, and Pete bumps his shoulder in return, grinning like an idiot.

Ray’s quiet for a while after that, his shoulders are trembling a little, but not from the cold this time. Then, after a long beat, he says it.
“It’s you.”

Pete turns his head, brows pulling together. “What?”

Ray keeps his eyes on the road. His voice comes out low, almost shy. “The charcoal. It’s you.”

Pete stares at him, dumbfounded. “Me?”

Ray nods once, small but certain.

Pete huffs a laugh that sounds more like disbelief. “I remind you of charcoal? What the hell for? I thought it’d be like, I don’t know, strawberries or sunflowers or some pretty shit!”

Ray’s face goes red instantly, color flooding up his neck, and for a second—it’s almost as if he didn’t just see his mother cry, didn’t almost die in the middle of the street. He looks like any thirteen-year-old boy caught in a crush, all warmth and nerves and unspoken words. Not the young man he is.

“See, this is why I didn’t want to tell you,” he mutters, voice tripping over itself.

Pete laughs again, softer now, the teasing fading into something almost tender. “I just didn’t think you’d… think about me like that.”

Ray glances over at him, his eyes tired but bright in the dim light. “It’s hard not to,” he admits quietly.

Pete’s chest tightens. His breath catches just a little. “…Yeah?” he says, voice rougher than he means it to be.

Ray nods, gaze fixed on the horizon. “Yeah, man. Real fucking hard.”

Pete lets out a slow, shaky breath through his nose, a faint smile tugging at his mouth. He just looks at Ray, at the boy who’s bleeding and blistered and still somehow kind enough to blush in a world that’s trying to kill them both.

“Well,” Pete says finally, his voice gentling into something that sounds a lot like hope. “That’s only more reason to keep walking, then.”

Ray glances sideways at him, a small grin ghosting across his lips. “Only if you keep walking too.”

Pete chuckles under his breath, soft and fond. “I still got some heart left,” he says.

And Ray—Ray smiles faintly, looking back down the long, endless stretch of road ahead of them. “Then I guess I do too.”

Their steps fall back into rhythm—thud, thud, thud—
two heartbeats syncing somewhere between exhaustion and something that might almost be love.

It’s mile three hundred and who gives a fuck, and Pete feels it before he hears it—the world breaking open.

The thud, thud, thud of their boots fades under the roar of the crowd. Cheering. Screaming. Hungry for an ending.

Pete can’t help it.

He knows he’s selfish. He’s known that from the start—the kind of selfish that keeps you walking when your feet are bleeding, that makes you want something soft in a world that’s made of knives. He’s known, deep down, that this was always going to be the end. He can feel it in his bones, in the air, in the way the road hums like it’s already digging his grave.

And still—he can’t stop himself. Can't help himself.

Because it’s Ray.

And he likes Ray.

No—he loves him. He thinks maybe he’s been loving him since the start, since that first mile when Ray smiled at him like the world hadn’t ended yet. Maybe even before the mile, right there on the road, shaking hands.

So he turns to him now, because he knows the end’s coming. Because he knows he won’t get to look for much longer. And if he’s going to go, he wants to go looking at something that makes the world feel worth saving.

He stares.

And Ray stares back.

There’s the freckles—like kisses from stars scattered across his face. There’s his strawberry-blonde hair, matted to his forehead, dripping with rain and sweat. There’s his ridiculous, cheesy upturned smile—the one that’s somehow still here after three hundred something miles of hell.

There are his soft eyes, the ones that saw kindness in everyone. The ones that thought Curly could make it. That grieved for Olson. That promised he wouldn’t turn back for Art. That told Stebbins it was nice walking with him, even when no one else would.

And Pete—God, Pete—he’s so gone.

He’s a selfish man, he knows that. But in his heart, it was always Ray. Always this boy who walked with too much heart and too little sense.

And when Ray finally breaks the stare—when he looks back ahead, blinking through the rain—Pete knows. He knows the moment it happens. The ache. The pull. The quiet certainty that this is it.

His breath catches, and his feet slow, and for the first time in his life, he stops. Fully, completely, stops.

And his warning blares through the rain like thunder. He doesn’t care. Because he’s already made his choice.

He gets down on one knee, the cold water soaking through his jeans, the road biting at his skin. The crowd’s roar fades into nothing.

No—Ray isn’t saying goodbye to his momma this time. Or the world. Or anyone.

Especially not me.

Ray found the light. He really did. Against all odds, in all this horror, he found it—found hope, found love, found something worth walking toward.

And Pete?

Call him a romantic. Call him a fool. Call him selfish.

He just wants his moment to matter. To mean something. And to matter—to really matter—means saving Ray Garraty.

He hears it then, faint through the roar of rain and the crowd’s hungry noise—
“Number forty-seven, second warning.”

And his stomach drops.

Ray.

Pete’s head jerks up, water pouring into his eyes, stinging, blinding, and still—he sees him.
Ray. His Ray.
Running.

Running like he always does. Like the stubborn, reckless, bleeding-hearted fool he is.

His face is wild, desperate, soaked through with rain and something rawer, something close to grief.
And God help him, Pete smiles. He can’t stop it. Because of course it’s Ray. Of course it’s him.
Even now, he’s still trying to save somebody.

Stubborn Bastard.

“You’re gonna win this, darling,” Pete breathes, the word tumbling out before he can catch it—soft, cracked open, truer than anything he’s ever said.
Darling.

It’s not even a thought; it just comes out of him, soft and helpless, like a secret that’s been waiting on his tongue for miles.

Darling.

His darling.
His daring darling who can’t give up, who never listens, who keeps running toward the fire just to drag someone else out.

And he’s not even upset about it. Not embarrassed. Not scared.

Because this is it. This is his last moment, and hell, if he’s going to die, he wants to die with a pet name on his lips. He wants to die loving someone.

And it feels right. It feels like truth leaving his body. If feels like heaven has finally reached him.

Then Ray’s there, crashing into him—hands clutching his shoulders, his shirt, anything solid.
“No,” Ray gasps, voice raw. “Get up. You get up!”

Pete blinks through the water in his eyes, heart pounding too hard, too fast. “You’re winning for your mom,” he says, because it’s easier than saying I love you.

But Ray’s shaking his head, soaked and shaking and furious. “No. Get up, Pete. Please. Get up.”

He’s crying, or maybe it’s the rain. Pete doesn’t know. He just knows that look—that fire. That unstoppable, maddening, heartbreaking light in him.

That’s Ray Garraty, through and through.
His darling who doesn’t know when to stop.

And Pete knows then—knows deep in his bones—that he was never going to be mad about it. Not really. Because how can you be angry at the thing that makes you believe the world isn’t all bad?

Ray hauls him up with strength that shouldn’t exist anymore. Pete stumbles with him, their bodies close, their hearts pounding out the same frantic rhythm—broken, human, alive.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The loudspeaker cuts through:
“Number twenty-three, third warning.”
“Number forty-seven, third warning.”

The rifles rise. The crowd gasps. The sky doesn’t care.

Pete’s shouting before he even knows what he’s saying. “What the fuck are you doing, Ray!? You’re gonna get yourself killed!”

Ray’s so close Pete can see every drop of rain clinging to his lashes, every tremor in his mouth, every heartbeat pulsing beneath the hand still gripping Pete’s shirt.

“Being your—” Ray starts, and Pete feels it—the word he’s never had the courage to say himself, hovering there between them. Lover. Boyfriend. Mine.

But Ray swallows, pushes a hand flat against Pete’s chest—right over his heart, right where it matters.
“Being your partner,” he whispers. “My partner.”

Partner.

That word—Christ, that word—it digs deep.
It lands somewhere he didn’t even know was still alive.

Pete’s chest aches with it. Because maybe—just maybe—in another universe, where the world isn’t cruel and the sky isn’t always gray and boys don’t have to die just to matter—they could’ve been that. Partners. Or something close to it.

He can almost picture it—Ray’s sunhat hanging by the door, the smell of burnt coffee in the morning, maybe arguing over something stupid like who gets the last slice of pie. He can almost see it: a life that’s theirs. A life where they get to be.

But this isn’t that universe.
This is the road.
This is blood and rain and endings.

Pete shakes his head, forcing the thought down, walking beside Ray—no, being pulled beside Ray. He doesn’t have much control over it anymore. Ray’s arm is around him, his grip firm and unrelenting, keeping him upright, forcing him forward. Always forward.

Pete’s breath catches, heart squeezing tight, like something inside him is folding in half. He feels it pull—sharp, deep—and then break.

“You’re an idiot,” he says, voice trembling, cracking right down the middle.

Ray almost laughs, the sound thin and fragile, like rain hitting glass. “Yeah,” he says, smiling faintly through the blood and the storm. “But I’m your idiot.”

Pete closes his eyes, just for a second, breathing in the sound of it. My idiot. He’d hold that, if he could. Tuck it away somewhere the world can’t ruin it.

Ray’s voice comes out small next, cracked open by the cold, by the blood, by everything he’s lost along the way. “Come on,” he whispers. “Just walk with me a little more, okay?”

Pete says it before he can think.
“Okay.”

The word barely leaves his mouth before Ray exhales, like he’s been waiting for it. Like it’s all he needed to hear.

Pete feels it then—the squeeze on his shoulder, firm but gentle, the kind of touch that means I’ve got you. It’s steady. Familiar. Too familiar. He knows that squeeze. He’s done it himself a hundred times when Ray needed grounding, when the road tried to take him.

Only now it’s Ray’s hand, and Pete doesn’t realize soon enough what it really means.

They keep walking.
Just walking.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Pete lets out a tired laugh, breath fogging in the cold air. “You convincing motherfucker,” he mutters, shaking his head.

Because that’s what Ray is—always convincing. Always has been. He could talk you out of anger, out of logic, out of giving up. He could make you believe in things again. Make you forget where you are and why the world wants you dead.

And for a second—just a second—Pete lets himself believe him.

He lets the fantasy in. The one where they just keep walking. Past the end, past the warnings, past the blood. Where the road doesn’t stop. Where maybe there’s a future waiting for them somewhere that doesn’t smell like death.

He can almost see it—Ray next to him, still smiling, freckles catching sunlight instead of stormlight. They’d get off the road, get a drink, maybe find a place to rest. Maybe they’d even laugh. Maybe they’d get a chance.

But it ends too soon.

The world snaps apart.

Two gunshots.

Pete flinches hard, the sound tearing through the air, through him. His heart stops for a beat—maybe two.

Then he turns. And everything inside him caves in.

Ray’s there, stumbling backward, his shirt blooming red, his face frozen mid-breath. His body jerks once, twice—then drops.

For a moment, Pete can’t move. Can’t breathe. The noise of the crowd fades into static. The rain hits the ground in slow motion. His world narrows down to one unbearable truth—

Ray.

Ray’s down.

No.

“Ray—?” he croaks, but it’s already happening. Ray’s knees buckle. His hands fall uselessly toward the wound. His lips part like he’s trying to say something, but no sound comes out.

Pete’s running before he realizes it, boots slipping on the wet pavement, lungs burning.
“Ray!” he screams. His voice cracks like lightning splitting the sky. “Ray!”

He’s down on the ground beside him a second later, the road biting into his knees, his hands shaking as they reach for him.

Blood. So much blood. Warm even against the cold rain.

“Ray!” he shouts, voice cracking. “Ray! What did you do?! What did you do, you idiot, my idiot, what did you—” His voice breaks completely. “What did you fucking do?!”

It pours out of him—rage and grief and terror, every mile they’ve walked collapsing into this one, brutal second.

Ray blinks up at him, the lights haloing his face, the rain washing the blood into thin pink streams. He looks so tired. So small.

"What did you do!? What did you do!?"

Ray’s hand lifts weakly, fingertips brushing Pete’s wrist—the same hand Pete’s used to steady him through miles and miles of hell. He curls his fingers there, fragile, barely holding on.

“Hey…” Ray breathes, his voice paper-thin. “It’s okay.”

But it isn't. Nothing about this is. Nothing.

I…”Ray coughs, and Pete flinches at the sound — wet, heavy, final. Blood drips down the corner of his mouth, staining his teeth, his chin, everything Pete’s been trying so damn hard to keep clean.

“I can’t see it,” Ray whispers. His voice trembles like a candle on its last bit of wax. “I can’t… I can’t see it, but you can.”

Pete’s breath stops. His hands still where they press over Ray’s chest. He doesn’t understand — doesn’t want to. “Ray—”

Ray’s chest stutters, a shallow rise, a smaller fall. “And that’s why I…” He gasps, the sound cracking apart. “That’s why I love you.”

Pete’s world breaks open.

It’s like hearing gunfire again — but inside his ribs, not outside. The words hit him harder than any bullet ever could. They tear through him — clean, cruel, and holy.

He feels it everywhere.
In his lungs, that refuse to draw breath.
In his heart, that skips, stumbles, and then just hurts.
In his head, where every memory of Ray — his stupid smile, his freckles, his voice when he said I’m okay, — comes rushing back like floodwater.

Ray says it again, quieter, like a confession. “I love you.”

And Pete—
God, Pete wants to say it back.

He feels it. Every inch of it. Every mile they’ve walked, every second he’s spent pretending it wasn’t there. But the words catch in his throat, strangled by the fear that if he says them now, they’ll become a eulogy.

So he doesn’t speak. He just holds on tighter.

His hands shake where they rest on Ray’s chest, pressing down hard, to stop the bleeding and to feel — to feel that faint, flickering heartbeat, that last bit of proof that he’s still here.

He’s terrified to lift his palms, terrified to find stillness beneath them.

Ray’s eyes flutter. He’s smiling again — that small, boyish smile that always makes something in Pete ache.

“I’m selfish,” Ray murmurs. “I’m a selfish bastard. And I’m going to hell, Pete. I know it.”

Pete shakes his head violently, his voice breaking. “Don’t—don’t say that, Ray, don’t—”
He can barely get the words out. He can barely breathe through the panic climbing his throat.

But Ray just gives that same weak, soft smile, like he’s already made peace with something Pete can’t. His hand lifts — trembling, bloodied — and for a second Pete almost pulls away, can’t bear to see what goodbye looks like.

But then Ray’s fingers touch his face.

And Pete breaks all over again.

His hand flies up, catches Ray’s wrist, tries to keep him there, tries to hold that touch in place, like maybe if he never lets go, the world won’t either.

Ray’s hand is warm. Sticky. Human. The warmth of it sears against Pete’s skin, and for the first time in his life, he hates it — because warmth means alive, and it’s fading fast.

Pete’s voice comes out raw, barely air. “Ray—”

But Ray doesn’t let him finish.

He leans forward.

And then—

They kiss.

Pete freezes. The world disappears. The rain, the shouting, the rifles — they all fall away.
There’s only this.

Only Ray.

It’s wet and messy and desperate — a kiss born of pain and panic and five days of walking through hell together. It’s wrong and it’s right and it’s real.

And Pete shatters beneath it.

He kisses back because he can’t not. Because he owes Ray that much — because love deserves to be answered, even here, even now, even when the road ends in blood.

Ray tastes like rain. Like metal. Like something sweet buried under all the ruin. And Pete knows, with every fiber of him, that this is it — the first and the last.

So he holds on. He kisses him like it’s a promise, like it’s an apology, like it’s all the words he never said.

It ends to soon. His happiness always ends too soon.

They’re dragging Ray back.

Pete barely sees who’s got him—soldiers, the Major, hands, boots—it’s all a blur of movement and rain and blood. Ray’s body is limp and trembling, and then he's grabbed too. He's fighting, kicking, screaming, his voice tearing through the thunder.

“Let him go! Let him go!”

The road is chaos—floodlights turning the rain into streaks of glass, the crowd roaring like some monstrous ocean. He can barely hear his own breath over the sound of rifles being cocked.

The Major steps forward, gun raised. 

He's going to kill Ray! Ray's going to die just like his father. By the same man, too.

And then Ray—
Ray’s head turns in the grip of the soldiers, his face pale and bloodied and beautiful even now.

“I love you, Pete.”

It isn’t loud. But it hits like a lightning strike to the chest.

Pete stops breathing. Stops thinking. 

Thud....Thud.... Thud....

Something in him snaps.

He lunges—blind, wild, animal. “NO!”

Pete doesn’t think. He moves on pure animal, on grief and panic and a bruise-deep, terrible love that’s been coiled in his chest for three hundred miles.

Hands are on him—hard, efficient—soldiers hauling him back, but he wriggles, twists, everything he learned in basements and alleys and fights coming up like a dark, necessary muscle. He snaps his elbow into a jaw, hears bone crack or teeth clack, feels the warm hit of blood on his knuckles. A boot comes for his ribs; he takes it full and keeps going.

The world is a storm of rain and fists and shouted orders. He’s a clawing animal in the middle of it. He slams a shoulder into a man’s chest and the man stumbles; he connects a straight right to a face, taste of copper filling Pete’s mouth for a second. Another soldier goes down beneath him, cursing, glove-slick and surprised, and Pete doesn’t stop to savor it. He scrabbles like a thing that’s been cornered, tearing at belts and straps until metal slides free and slicks across the pavement.

A dropped pistol skitters near his boot—someone’s black shape glinting in the floodlight. Pete snatches it, fingers closing around cold steel. He doesn’t cock it. He doesn’t think of the mechanics. He thinks of Ray—of a chest rising and falling that should not stop—and everything else recedes to a tunnel.

“I WIN!”

His fingers slipping on metal slick with rain, forcing it toward the ground, the sky, anywhere but Ray. Never at Ray.

“I’m the last walker!” he yells, voice raw. “You hear me?! I win!”

For a breath the Major’s face is nothing. Then, very carefully, he looks past the muzzle to Ray—the boy bleeding out on the pavement, his chest a ruin—and back to Pete. Around them the soldiers shift, tense, waiting to shoot him and Ray in a heartbeat.

A man grabs at Pete’s arm. Pete swings. The punch lands, bone on bone, and the gun jerks. Someone swears. The pistol clatters free for an impossible instant, then is snatched up again.

Pete doesn’t let them have a moment..He collapses forward, every scrap of him between Ray and the rifles, and drags Ray’s body toward him until his own chest is a blanket over Ray’s bleeding shirt. He presses himself down, arms spread, the pistol clutched uselessly in one fist, pulling Ray close like he can smother the world with his own body. He covers him with his own coat, his own warmth, anything to make it harder for hands or metal to reach that soft, merciful space.

“Hands off,” Pete hisses, voice a rasp. He can feel the blood soaking through his jeans where they press together. He tastes iron, rain, desperation. He hears a boot by his ear, feels a shove to his shoulder, and he answers with a howl—half-prayer, half-dare.

“My wish—” he spits the word like a curse, like prayer. “My wish is he lives!”

He swings again, connects. A soldier grabs him from behind; he thrashes, howling.

“That’s my wish! He lives! You hear me?!” His voice cracks. “He fucking lives! So don’t you dare shoot him!” His scream rips through the storm. “Don’t you dare! He dies, then I die! And then there’s no winners, you hear me?! No winners!”

The Major cocks his head and moves impossibly closer to Ray.

Pete’s voice breaks into something like a sob. “He’s my wish,” he chokes out. “He’s my fucking wish!”

Pete’s hands are shaking as he lifts himself from Ray and his bloody body, every muscle screaming, every breath tasting of rain and copper and rage. He forces his weight up just enough, enough to raise the pistol, enough to level it at the Major.

The Major’s own gun is already drawn—steady, merciless—pointed straight at Ray’s head. The world narrows to two barrels, two men, one heartbeat.

Pete’s throat burns. His voice comes out shredded, torn raw from screaming. “I win! I was the last one walking! So I get my fucking wish!”

The Major’s expression doesn’t move. His finger twitches near the trigger.

Pete snarls, his voice cracking, “He’s my wish! You don’t shoot him! You hear me?! He fucking lives! Two winners! That’s my wish! Starting now—two winners! Me and him!”

A soldier tries to move toward him, but Pete spins, pistol snapping toward the motion. “You move and I swear to God, I’ll blow your goddamn brains out first!”

The Major doesn’t move. His face is stone, unbothered, almost entertained.

“Do I need to fucking ask again?!” Pete screams, his whole body trembling, the gun wavering between them. “You say we get one wish! One! And mine is this!”

He gestures wildly to Ray, sprawled out on the slick road beneath him, blood mixing with rain. “You break it, you break the whole goddamn show! You got the whole crowd! You got the media! Everyone’s watching, Major! You don’t honor it, then I’ll just—” he presses the muzzle to his own temple, teeth bared, “—I’ll blow my fucking brains out, and then you got no winners! None! No wish granted! No goddamn parade for your sponsors!”

The soldiers freeze, their rifles half-raised, uncertain. Even through the floodlights, Pete can see one of them pale, see another lower his aim just slightly.

The Major finally exhales through his nose, a sharp, tired sound—half annoyance, half disgust. His mouth twists. “Such a waste on a wish,” he mutters, lowering the gun.

Pete doesn’t dare move until he sees the barrel tilt fully to the ground.

Then, slowly, like a man walking out of a dream, the Major turns. “You got what you wanted,” he says flatly. He nods to his men. “Let’s roll out.”

The soldiers begin to pull back, boots slapping against the drenched pavement. One of them glances over his shoulder at Pete—hesitant, almost human—before falling into line.

Pete doesn’t hear them anymore.

Because Ray—his Ray—gasps out a sound, soft and small, the kind that sounds like a prayer through blood. “I’m sorry, Momma.”

Then nothing.

“Ray?” Pete’s voice breaks. He drops the pistol, grabs Ray’s face in both hands. His palms leave streaks of red. “No, no, no, no—Ray, come on. Keep your eyes open, darling. You gotta open your eyes.” He shakes him lightly, voice trembling. “Come on, please. Please, Ray.”

But Ray doesn’t stir. His lashes flutter once, then still. His chest rises—barely. A thin, weak breath. But the warmth is fading.

Pete turns, eyes wild, voice raw as broken glass. “You said you’d keep him alive!”

The Major pauses mid-step, looks back over his shoulder. His expression is all disdain, not even a hint of sympathy. “He’s breathing, isn’t he?”

Pete glares through the rain, his knuckles white where he grips Ray’s soaked shirt. “You call this breathing?!”

“My job’s finished,” the Major says.

Pete’s world is ending in pulses—rain, blood, light, Ray.

He feels Ray’s heartbeat under his palms, faint and fluttering like something that’s already half gone.

Thud..... Thud...

Thud.

His chest seizes, his breath catches, and when the Major starts to walk away, when that smug shadow of indifference turns its back on him—
Pete snaps.

“No!”

His voice tears out of him, jagged and shaking. He grabs the pistol off the slick pavement, his fingers barely working through the tremor, and raises it again—both hands this time, his knuckles bone-white.

“You make sure he lives!” Pete yells, his whole body vibrating with it. “You hear me?! You get him the best damn doctor in this country, in this world, whatever it takes! You don’t let him die!”

The Major stops. Turns slowly. Rain slides off the brim of his hat.

Pete’s voice cracks, the rage breaking into something raw, pleading. “I’ll do it—whatever you want! You can have me, you can use me! I’ll do your interviews, your speeches, your fucking commercials—whatever circus you want, I’ll dance in it! I’ll be your goddamn hero if that’s what you need. Just—get him a doctor.”

The Major exhales through his nose, a tired sigh, then mutters, “Christ.” He turns to two soldiers at his side. “Get him an ambulance.”

Pete freezes. 

The soldiers hesitate only a second before one barks into a radio. A siren flares to life in the distance, faint but real, a sound Pete didn’t realize he’d ever hear again.

He lets out a breath that sounds like a sob and throws the pistol as far as he can into the mud, the clatter lost in the thunder. He drops to his knees by Ray, shaking, breathless.

“Thank you,” he says—once, twice, again and again, like a prayer. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

He presses his hands to Ray’s wounds again, blood seeping warm between his fingers. He counts every slow, precious thud under his palms. One. Two. Three. Four.

He only gets four.

Because rough hands grab him by the arms, yanking him backward, tearing him away.

“No!” he roars, thrashing, heels digging into the wet road. “Let me go! Let me go!”

The Major steps closer, eyes cold but steady. “Son,” he says, voice low and iron. “Don’t be a fool. I’m doing my end of the bargain.”

He gestures with the tip of his chin—toward the flashing lights cutting through the dark. The ambulance.

“So you do yours.” He nods toward the camera.

Pete stops fighting. His chest heaves. His soaked hair sticks to his forehead, rain and tears running together. He stares at Ray—his Ray—motionless but breathing, chest rising the smallest bit.

Pete swallows hard, forces himself to let go, to let them pull him back. His lips tremble.

“Charcoal,” he whispers hoarsely, voice barely there. “Ray… just think of charcoal, yeah? Just think of that.”

His arms fall slack. The soldiers drag him away, his head turned over his shoulder the whole time, watching Ray’s still body until it blurs into the rain.

Thud.....Thud.... Thud....

The sound of his breaking heart, haunting him.

Chapter Text

It’s after the interviews, after the cameras and the lights and the endless noise of celebration that doesn’t feel like celebration at all, that it starts to sink in.

He’s alive.

He won.

And yet, all he can think is—he didn’t say it back.

In his last moment with Ray—his Ray, bleeding out on that rain-soaked road—he didn’t say it. Didn’t say I love you too.

He just screamed and fought and begged the world to give him a miracle. And now the miracle’s over, and all that’s left is paper.

They hand him a pen first. Still trembling, still half in shock, he signs his name on the dotted line of a document that declares, in block letters, THE LONG WALK—VICTORY CLAIM AGREEMENT.

And right under that, the clause that makes his stomach twist:

In the event of two winners, both participants must consent to share the grand prize equally. Should one or both refuse to divide the award, the Walk continues until a single winner remains.

Pete stares at it for a long time. The words blur together. Two winners. His wish written in government ink. The price of mercy turned into a line item on a form.

He laughs—a hollow, broken sound that earns him a few uneasy glances from the officials around the table.

Two winners. But no wish. No final mercy, no miracle request. Just money. Split down the middle, like the country, like the boys who bled for it. He supposes that’s the trade. Win together, share the pot. Win alone, get the wish. It’s poetic in that bureaucratic, cruel kind of way.

He thinks it’s stupid.
But he’s not going to complain.

He got what he asked for. Ray’s name on the page beside his. Two winners, signed and sealed. Ray’s breathing—he has to be breathing, because if he’s not, then the whole thing means nothing. Every punch, every scream, every plea—it all means nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

So he signs again. Pete McVries. Winner. Survivor. The man who rewrote the rules.

Rules that saved Ray.

Ray. Ray. Ray.

He’s thinking about Ray’s lips, pale and blood-slick, whispering I love you, Pete.
He’s thinking about the sound of the rain when it swallowed the gunfire.
He’s thinking about how the papers may say two winners—but really, there was only ever one wish.

And he got it.
He saved Ray.
He should be happy.

What happens next—the next Walk, the next batch of boys, the next round of blood and fame—that’s on them. Not him. He did his part. He changed something. He won.

So why does it feel like losing?

He presses his palm against the page, smearing a bit of ink with the sweat from his hand, and stares at the names side by side—his and Ray’s.

If Ray wakes up, they’ll split the money.
If he doesn’t…

Pete’s jaw tightens.

If he doesn’t, then Pete swears he’ll burn the whole damn world down. Brick by brick, he’ll take it down. Eye for an eye and all that shit. If the world wants to be a furnace, he’ll find the dark to burn it with. Light be damned — he’ll learn how to make the shadows work for him if that’s what it takes to keep Ray breathing.

“Am I good to go?” he asks, throat thick. “You got the footage you need, the pictures, the interviews, my signature—done.”

The Major gives him a single, slow nod. For a second Pete thinks maybe, impossibly, it’s over. Then the man steps closer, hand heavy on Pete’s shoulder.

His whisper is colder than the rain. “You ever try to go against this, you ever try to rebel, I know your weakness. I’ll know where you live, and I’ll know where to find Ray. You hear me?”

Pete tastes the words like iron. He clamps his jaw until his teeth bite the inside of his lip and hot blood wells up — the stupid, private sign of sticking to something he’ll regret later.

He swallows it down and says, flat, “I know where my allegiance is, Major. It’s with you.”

Lie. Lie. Lie. All a fucking lie.

“Don’t make it not be,” the Major says, voice even. “Because you won’t get warnings this time around.”

The words land like a cold hand on Pete’s back. For a beat he almost believes the lie he’s fed the room.

"The hospital?"

“Freeport Hospital.” The Major says.

“That’s such bullshit,” Pete snaps before he can stop himself. “That’s fucking miles away from—”

The Major’s glare shuts him up like a lid. Pete tastes the iron of his own lip again and clamps his mouth. Allegiance. He forces a smile he doesn’t mean and takes the Major’s offered hand — a wet, formal press that feels like sealing a contract with a noose.

“Pleasure,” he says. The word is thin; it slides off the room like smoke.

He turns away then, out the door, and the corridor hits him with the same cold wind as the road. He walks. Once. Twice. Again.

The movement is muscle memory; walking is everything he knows how to do. He keeps walking until the hallway blurs, until the memory of Ray’s last look burns so bright it hurts, until the rain in his head sounds like a hammer.

Walks. Walks. Walks.

He'll walk an eternity if it means finding Ray.

Twenty miles out of Freeport a woman in a blue truck slows and pulls over.

Pete almost doesn’t see her at first — gray hair, a cardigan two sizes too big, a face mapped with lines the world left there. She squints, takes him in like a stray animal: the mud, the ripped cuffs, the smell that’s stuck to him like a second skin. “Jesus,” she says, not unkind. “You smell like you rolled through a coal fire, boy.”

He snorts, a sound that’s half laugh, half sob. “Wouldn’t be surprised,” he says.

She opens the passenger door and gestures. “Get in,” she says. “You look like you could fall over.” Her voice has the blunt comfort of people who’ve seen too much to waste tenderness on strangers.

Like our country now.

He climbs in because his legs are jelly and stubborn and because she’s the only moving thing on that road he has seen besides soldiers or a camera in days.

When he slides into the seat she hands him a sandwich wrapped in wax paper and half a bottle of water with the cap already loosened. “Eat,” she says. “You look like you’ll faint.” She glances at the scar on his face— the one he’s spent years not telling stories about — and blinks.

She doesn't comment. Thank God.

She just hums to the radio as she drives like she does it every day, and the hum mends a little of something in his chest. This is what it would feel like to have a grandmother.

He calculates miles on the inside of his head like a private ledger — twenty miles out, and if his math’s right that means he walked twenty-five more miles. Twenty-five miles so that he can get to Ray. It registers, cold and heavy: he walked more. He let himself be the one to go the extra mile.

It's a thought that shouldn't be bitter, but is.

He shakes the thought out of his head, instead deciding he needs his strength. He needs fuel so he can help Ray, so he can keep walking, so he can keep holding onto him. He eats the sandwich like he’s stolen it — greedy, grateful — and the water tastes like ice on his throat. Heaven, in another life, maybe.

The stillness of the drive almost knocks him out though. He's been walking, walking, walking and now he's sitting, sitting, sitting.

It makes him itch, and the exhaustion of not letting his body rest for five days is there, desperate and pleading. His mind tries to go there — into the place where the walk is a memory and not a living thing — but his body has different plans. His muscles are screaming in knots of adrenaline and exhaustion, his feet stinging with blisters, his shin singing with a sharp, steady pain that might be a stress fracture. He can count the ways he’s bruised: a harvest of purple and black mapping his ribs, the slow ache behind his eyes where sleep was supposed to live.

Still, he stays awake the whole drive. Love and fear and pain keep him taut, a string pulled to the breaking point. Every familiar turn he thinks it’ll be the turn to the hospital, that they’ll slide him out into fluorescent light and he’ll be swallowed by the machine that might still spit Ray out.

Please be alive. Please fucking be alive.

The woman hums again and doesn’t pry. Once, when the road opens and the rain thins a little, she reaches back and pats his knee. “You’re going to be alright, boy."

Pete wants to tell her she doesn’t understand. No one understands. But there's no use in arguing. She showed him light, he'll be damned to burn it out.

When the hospital finally appears, he doesn’t even notice his legs complaining. He steps out and his knees ask for mercy.

They don’t get it.

He limps.

He has a fucking limp? That's new. Doesn't matter, anyway. Nothing else in the world matters right then except finding Ray and making sure the last thing that touched him was breath.

His feet trail blood onto the linoleum and he doesn’t care who sees. Ray. Ray. Ray. Just find Ray.

He drags himself to the front desk, his voice rough when he speaks. “Pete McVries,” he says. “A man came in—Ray Garraty. Two gunshot wounds. He was brought in a few hours ago.”

The woman behind the counter looks up, eyes steady but tired, her expression barely flickering at his state. “You were with the Walk,” she says shocked, almost to herself.

Pete nods, impatient. “Yeah. Glad to know you watched. Just tell me where he is.”

She stares, before grabbing at file after file, after file, until she stops, glances at some paperwork, and looks up. “He just got out of surgery and hour ago. He’s not awake yet.”

Pete grips the edge of the counter hard enough for his knuckles to turn white. “But he's alive?”

She hesitates, then nods. “Yes. Stable for now.”

He exhales shakily, like the air has been locked in his chest since the gunfire.

“He’s been moved to recovery,” she continues. “Room B14, down corridor three, second door on the left. Only one visitor allowed for now.” She tears off a visitor sticker and slides it toward him.

Pete takes it with shaking fingers, slaps it onto his shirt, and mumbles a thank-you before turning away.

Corridor three. Second door on the left. That’s all that matters.

When he reaches it, he stops, hand hovering over the handle. For a moment, he just stands there, breathing hard, the hum of machines somewhere behind the door. His chest feels too small for everything inside it—fear, relief, hope, love.

Then he pushes the door open.

The room is dim, soft light spilling across the floor. A heart monitor hums in slow rhythm. Ray lies in the center of it all, pale against the white sheets, tubes running from his arms and chest. He looks smaller somehow, fragile in a way Pete never thought possible.

Pete steps closer, the sound of his boots swallowed by the steady beeping. He stops beside the bed, looking down at the boy who once smiled at him in the rain, freckles like stars across his nose, lips parted. Lips he kissed.

Pete leans down until his lips are a breath from Ray’s ear and whispers, “Hey, darling. Sorry it took me so long. Had to walk a few extra miles—imagine that.”

He tries to shove a joke into the air, half-expecting some sarcastic smart-ass comeback, the way Ray always does, but the room answers with nothing but the soft hiss of the ventilator and Ray’s shallow wheeze.

He wants—instinctively, fiercely—to summon every doctor in this building and make them stitch and fix and swear the world right again. He wants to yank the curtains closed and plant himself in the surgeon’s throat until they promise Ray’ll live.

But he can feel the limits like a hand on his back. The Major got him here. The deal’s been done. He can see the papers in his head, the signatures that mean Ray’s life is now wrapped up in somebody else’s ledger.

What can he actually ask for? He doesn’t know. He’s not sure what they’ll allow beyond the operation they were told to perform. If Ray succumbs to the wounds, the Major can write it off easy—too injured, too tired from the Walk—and history will file him away like a footnote. Forgotten, the way the Major wants them to be.

Pete won't let that happen. He won't let anything bad every happen again.

Not to Ray, who's eyes are sunken in, skin pale and tight over the bones of his face. The sheet’s been pulled low, covering just above his belly button, his chest and stomach bound in fresh white bandages. There are goosebumps on his arms, freckles dull against the cold light.

He reaches out and grabs the edge of the sheet, lifting it higher, pulling it up until it sits just below Ray’s chin. “You’re always chilly, aren’t you,” he mutters, voice cracking on the edges. “Would’ve thought Maine would’ve hardened you up to the cold.”

He tries to laugh, but it dies in his throat. He smooths the sheet down instead, tucking it around Ray’s shoulders like it’ll help. “That’s okay, though,” he whispers. “You wake up, and I promise—I’ll always keep you warm.”

Nothing. No smartass reply. No twitch of the mouth. Just the faint, uneven wheeze of Ray’s breathing.

He turns, grabs the chair behind him, and drags it closer to the bed until the legs screech against the tile. He kicks his boots off with slow, heavy thuds—mud flaking, blood dried along the seams—and sinks into the seat.

His body protests the movement, bones aching from miles that refuse to leave him. He leans forward, elbows on his knees, and reaches out until his hand finds Ray’s. It’s cold. Always cold. He rubs his thumb over Ray’s knuckles, tracing the little scars there, the lines that tell stories he never got to hear.

“I’m gonna rest a bit, darling,” he says softly, voice worn thin. “You keep resting and healing, yeah? If you wake up… just squeeze my hand, and I’ll be up.”

No answer. Just the wheeze. He slouches back in the chair, still holding on, thumb still moving slow over Ray’s hand.

For the first time in what feels like forever, Pete lets his eyes fall shut. His grip doesn’t loosen, not even a little.

He tells himself it’s just a rest. Just a moment.
And as the room hums soft and steady around them, he finally, finally lets himself drift—his hand around Ray’s, both of them suspended between exhaustion and hope.

When Pete wakes, the world’s gone dark.
The blinds are half-drawn, city lights bleeding thin through the cracks. He blinks the blur out of his eyes, turning toward the clock on the far wall.
9:13.

He squints. Does the math in his head.
Seventeen hours.
“Fuck,” he mutters under his breath.

Every inch of him aches. His spine pops when he stretches, his neck crackles when he rolls it. He pushes off the chair, groaning, trying to stand—but his legs, traitorous and weak, give out the moment he puts weight on them.

The fall happens fast—too fast for thought. His hand, the one that had been holding Ray’s, shoots forward to catch himself and lands on Ray’s stomach.

Ray’s body tenses instantly. Even unconscious, his face twists in pain.

Pete jerks his hand back like he’s touched fire, heart lurching. He lets himself hit the cold tile hard, a sharp grunt leaving him. The pain in his knee flares, but he doesn’t care. Better him than Ray. Always better him than Ray.

“Shit—shit, I’m sorry,” he breathes, even though Ray doesn't respond. His palms sting, his back aches, but all he can do is look up at the still form in the bed—the steady, fragile rise and fall of his chest—and whisper, softer now, “I’m sorry, darling. I didn’t mean to.”

When he again, gets no response, he stares down at his feet.  No better time than the present to see the damage.

For a second, he doesn’t even recognize them.

His socks—what used to be white—are soaked through. Red, brown, black in places where the blood’s dried thick. The fabric sticks to his skin like a second layer, stiff and foul, and for a brief, dizzy moment, he thinks he might throw up. He presses the heel of his hand to his mouth, swallowing the bile that crawls up his throat.

He tries to stand—grabs the chair, grits his teeth—but his legs won’t listen. They shake under him, give out like they’ve decided the walking’s finally over. Maybe his body’s realized what his mind hasn’t caught up to yet: he’s not on the road anymore. There’s no gun pointed at his back. No reason to move.

If it weren’t for the pain—deep and throbbing, every nerve in his feet screaming—he might’ve thought they’d quit on him for good.

He’s just about to call for help when the door swings open.

A nurse stops mid-step. Her eyes flick from the bed to him, sprawled on the tile. Pete feels the heat of embarrassment creep up his neck, but before he can say a word, she sighs.

“Thought everyone was lying about two winners. Guess I was wrong.” And then she’s moving—quick but careful—sliding her hands under his arms. “Up you go.”

Pete grunts as she hauls him back into the chair, his knees feeling locked. “Thanks…” he breathes, still winded.

“Byers,” she says, straightening the blanket at the foot of the bed. “But April works just fine.”

He nods, glancing toward Ray. “You his nurse?”

April gives a small, distracted smile as she checks the monitors. “I am. For night shifts, at least. And yours now too, looks like.”

Pete shakes his head fast. “Oh no, I’m fine—”

“Don’t even try lying, honey,” she cuts him off. “If you were fine, you wouldn’t have been kissing the floor a minute ago. Let me just get his vitals and clean the bandages, and then I’ll take you to your own room and—”

“No!”

It bursts out of him sharper than he means, enough to make April flinch. Pete’s face falls immediately. “Sorry—sorry, I didn’t mean to yell. Just…” His voice softens to a rasp. “Please. No separating us.”

April studies him for a long moment—the wild eyes, the shaking hands. Then she exhales, quiet but understanding.

“Fine,” she says finally. “No separate rooms. But you’re getting X-rays, and those feet are getting cleaned up. Deal?”

Pete nods, slow and grateful, eyes drifting back to Ray. “Deal.”

Pete watches as April nods once, brisk and quiet, before moving to Ray’s side. She pulls the sheet back from his chest with careful fingers. The bandages there are red—deep, wet red. Pete notices the faint pink freckles on the sheet too, tiny bloodstains that look obscene against the sterile white.

His stomach twists. “Will he be okay?”

April glances up at him, the question catching her off guard. “I really shouldn’t disclose his condition to a stranger,” she says, professional but not unkind.

Pete scoffs, shaking his head. “Do I look like a stranger to you? Him and I just walked five days straight together.” His voice cracks a little. “He knows more about me than anyone.”

April studies him for a moment—his ruined socks, the dried blood under his nails, the look in his eyes. She chews the inside of her lip, then sighs softly. Without another word, she crosses to the door, shuts it, and twists the lock until it clicks.

When she turns back, her voice is quieter. “He’s stable."

Pete grips the armrest tight. "But?"

April pulls the chart from the foot of the bed. “He’s got extensive dermal loss—first and second layers of skin on both feet are gone. That alone puts him at a high risk for infection. We’re keeping him on IV antibiotics and fluids, but…” she exhales.

Pete’s jaw clenches. “What else?”

She flips a page on the clipboard, eyes scanning. “He’s got a stress fracture in his left tibia—shinbone. It’s not a full break, but he’s not walking on it anytime soon. His cardiovascular system’s taken a beating too; heart rate’s been unstable since surgery. It stopped twice on the way here.”

Pete’s breath hitches. “Stopped—”

April holds up a hand gently. “We brought him back both times. But his body’s been through more strain than it should’ve survived. Prolonged exertion like that—it causes rhabdomyolysis. Basically, his muscles started breaking down and leaking protein into his bloodstream. That puts stress on the kidneys. If we can’t flush it fast enough, there’s a risk of acute kidney failure.”

Pete swallows hard. “So… what does that mean?”

“It means,” April says softly, “he’s alive. And right now, that’s a goddamn miracle.”

Pete’s eyes fix on the bandages across Ray’s stomach—the way the red keeps blooming through, faint but steady. He can’t stop staring. Can’t stop thinking about the sound of the shots, the way Ray fell, the way his name broke out of his throat like it was being ripped from him.

He swallows, jaw tight. “The gunshot wounds,” he says quietly. “Tell me about them.”

“They were low,” she says finally. “Both of them. Lower abdomen.”

Pete nods once, urging her on. “How bad?”

“Bad enough. The first bullet went in just under the ribs—left side. It tore through part of his small intestine and caused a lot of internal bleeding before he even reached the ambulance. The surgeons repaired what they could."

Pete shuts his eyes briefly, trying to breathe, trying not to picture it. “And the second one?”

“That one hit lower,” April says softly. “Grazed his liver, close to the artery. If it had been a hair deeper, he wouldn’t have made it to the operating table.”

He drags a hand down his face, muttering a curse under his breath. “Jesus Christ…”

April’s voice softens, careful, but steady. “They stopped the bleeding, repaired the damage. He’s got two transfusion lines and a broad-spectrum antibiotic drip running to fight off infection. But—” she pauses, looking at Ray with something close to awe, “he’s holding on. Most people with that kind of trauma don’t make it through surgery. But he did.”

Pete stares at Ray’s pale face, the faint twitch of his eyelids. “He’s stubborn like that,” he says hoarsely. “Always has been.”

April gives a small, tired smile. “Then he’s got a shot.”

Pete nods slowly, his throat thick. “Yeah,” he murmurs, his thumb brushing over the back of Ray’s hand. “You… the hospital has to know he doesn’t have the kind of money to pay for this,” he mutters, nodding toward Ray—toward the IV lines, the heart monitor, everything that probably cost more than Ray’s whole house.

April doesn’t look up right away. She’s moving towards the other side of Ray, adjusting one of the drips, checking the line for air bubbles. Her voice is calm when she finally answers. “Like I said, I thought they were lying about two winners. Guess I was wrong.”

Pete straightens, his heart skipping. “What do you mean?”

April glances at him now, arching a brow like she’s surprised he doesn’t already know. “It was all over the evening news,” she says. “Your Walk. It's making History. I guess whoever came up with the idea of two winners should be quite pleased.”

Pete’s stomach turns cold. “What are you talking about?”

April hums, casual as she starts refilling a syringe with clear fluid. “They’re saying it’ll bring in more entries next year. Gives the men hope, you know? More chance of winning. More spectacle for the crowds.”

He stares at her, the words catching somewhere between disbelief and fury. “What exactly was shown?”

April’s movements slow. She puts the syringe in Rays IV, the sets it down gently on the tray. “Not much, really. The cameras cut right after he was shot” She gestures faintly toward Ray. “They showed you running to him, trying to keep him up. Then nothing. Just a wide shot of the rain, the road, and a voice-over saying: ‘In an unprecedented event, The Walk has ended with two winners.’”

Pete’s throat tightens. “That’s it?”

She nods. “That’s it."

Pete bites the inside of his cheek until the metallic taste of blood spreads across his tongue.

They cut everything. Every goddamn thing.

The fight. The chaos. The truth. The kiss. The moment he tackled the soldier and tore the gun from his hands. The moment he pointed it back at The Major, shouting until his throat was raw, begging, demanding—promising—that Ray would live. Gone.

All of it, erased.

The world would never see him shaking in the rain, screaming that he’d trade his life for Ray’s. They’d never see him standing over Ray’s body, trembling, wild, with a gun pressed to the chest of the man who started it all. They’d never hear the panic, the threats, the madness in his voice.

They’d never know he won because he refused to let go.

Pete drags a hand through his hair, his chest heaving. “Have they—have they given credit to whoever changed the rules?” he asks, though he already knows the answer.

April gives a small, humorless laugh. “They’re saying The Major changed it.” She’s quiet for a beat, then turns her gaze to where Pete’s hand is wrapped around Ray’s—two bruised, bloodstained hands locked together. “But I don’t really believe in that bullshit.”

The Signature. All a fucking lie.

Lie. Lie. Lie.

Pete stares at her, something fragile flickering behind his eyes. “But the doctors…"

April’s lips press together, and she looks away from him, focusing on undoing Rays bandages. “You’d be surprised what men do to follow orders from The Major,” she says finally.

That fucking bastard.

He’ll get all the credit. He’ll stand there with that smug little smirk, shaking hands with sponsors, taking praise for being merciful, for changing the rules.

The Major will be the hero.

And Pete and Ray—their pain, their fight, their love—will be nothing but a story. A headline. A marketing pitch to sell the next Walk. Two winners.

More hope. More men. More death.

He can already see the cycle starting again. Posters. Interviews. News anchors smiling like it’s something to celebrate. “History made. Two victors, for the first time ever.”

Pete squeezes Ray’s hand tighter, jaw trembling.

They’ve turned them into symbols. Not men. Not survivors. Just proof that even if you crawl through hell, you can still be owned by it.

Pete’s voice comes out hoarse, quiet. “So when you said you thought they were lying…”

April exhales through her nose, grabbing a wipe and wiping blood away from Rays skin. “I hoped they were,” she admits softly. “Sorry, lad, but… two winners.....it gives the men who didn’t sign up… hope.” she pauses, struggling for the right words, “—in some sick, twisted way, I hoped something happened once the cameras cut. Maybe a reason. Maybe an ending that made sense.”

Pete just stares at her. “What do you mean, something happened?”

April swallows, beginning to bandage Ray again. “I don’t mean this in any ill sense,” she says carefully, “but I thought maybe if you’d… shot yourself, that would make Ray the true victor. And that was why The Major gave us all orders to keep him alive.”

The air leaves Pete’s lungs all at once. “You thought I—”

April cuts in, her voice trembling. “Not because I wanted you dead. God, no. I just thought maybe it’d make sense of it all. That the reason the Major cared so much about keeping Ray alive was because he was the only one left standing.”

Pete stares down at the floor, his jaw working, throat tight. “And then you saw me,” he says after a moment, the words heavy.

April’s eyes soften. “And then I saw you,” she says quietly. “And I realized the Major wasn’t doing this out of mercy. He was doing it because he needed you both alive. Proof that his game still works.”

Pete nods slowly, eyes flicking toward Ray again. His voice cracks when he speaks. “He needed us alive so he could sell the next one.”

April gives a tired little smile, taping off the bandage and moving the sheet up again. “What’s that saying?” she murmurs, half to herself. “All’s fair in love and war?”

Pete lets out a rough exhale, somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “Guess it is.”

April hums, nodding like she’s seen too much truth in that line to argue. “Well,” she says, "you rest a bit, alright? I have another patient to check real quick." She pauses by the door, turning back to level him with a knowing look. “And when I get back, I expect you to keep your end of the deal and get checked up. Yeah?”

Pete opens his mouth to argue, but the words die on his tongue when she raises a brow at him. He nods instead, mumbling, “Yeah. Sure.”

“Good.”

And as she leaves, Pete stays there in the chair, thumb brushing circles against Ray’s knuckles, thinking about how love and war don’t feel all that different anymore. Both of them take. Both of them scar. Both of them leave you half-alive and still holding on.

He looks at Ray’s face—pale, bandaged, but peaceful—and whispers, more to himself than anyone, “Yeah… all’s fair, huh?”

It’s mile sixty-nine when Pete opens his mouth and says something he probably shouldn’t.

Maybe it’s the heat. Maybe it’s the boredom. Maybe it’s that talking is the only thing keeping him sane. Their voices, music to his ears—the rhythm between the miles, the only thing to drown out the thud of boots on pavement and the whispers of who might fall next.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Ray’s got his sunhat back on, tilted just enough to shade the freckles that scatter his nose. His hands are busy with his baseball, flipping it between his palms, tossing it up a few inches, catching it again. Over and over. Steady. Rhythmic.

Pete watches him for a while before giving in to the impulse—he reaches over and pokes Ray in the side.

Ray lets out a startled sound, halfway between a yelp and a laugh, jerking away. “Hey! You’re gonna get me a warning.”

Pete smirks. “You were slowing down.”

Ray huffs out a small laugh, his breath catching in the air. “You sure that’s all it was?”

Pete shrugs, eyes on the horizon. “Maybe.”

There’s a pause—comfortable, then not. The road hums beneath their feet. The air tastes like sweat and tar and dust.

And then, before he can think better of it, before reason can stop his tongue, he says, “You ever been in love?”

Ray nearly drops the baseball. “What?”

Pete’s face burns hot under the sun. He stares straight ahead, pretending the question isn’t already out there, alive and dangerous. “I said—” he clears his throat— “you ever been in love?”

The silence that follows stretches long, pulling tight like the space between heartbeats. Ray’s quiet for a good few steps. Just the sound of feet hitting asphalt. Thud. Thud. Thud.

Pete almost wants to take it back, to laugh it off and make some dumb joke about killing time, but something in him wants to know. Needs to know.

“Getting into the deep shit now, huh?”

“The sentimental stuff,” Pete says, smiling a little. “Sure. I mean—might as well, right? It’s the last we’ll ever get to talk about the stuff that matters.”

Ray face stills at that, eyes fixed somewhere down the road. The sunhat hides most of his expression, but Pete can see his jaw tighten, just a little.

“I mean,” Pete keeps going, because he can’t stop now, “you said you had a girl, yeah? You were in love with her, I reckon…”

Ray doesn’t answer right away. He just tosses the baseball up twice, catches it the third time, and then—without a word—holds it out to Pete.

Pete takes it, confused, feeling the weight of it in his palm.

“I don’t know, Pete,” Ray says finally, voice quiet. “I just don’t know.”

The baseball stays in Pete’s hand, warm from Ray’s touch, and the road stretches ahead of them.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Ray finally sighs. “I mean, sure, Pete,” he starts, voice slow, careful. “She was pretty and all. Nice woman. Smart. Stronger than me when it really came down to it.”

Pete listens, watching the way Ray keeps his eyes fixed on the horizon, like if he looks at him, the truth might sting too much.

“But she was also my first relationship,” Ray continues, a small, self-deprecating laugh escaping him. “Which, at twenty, is kind of embarrassing to admit. I don’t know. I think maybe I was just… following the script. You know? The societal expectations or whatever. Settle down, get some job, and if I’m lucky — which I probably wouldn’t be — it’d pay enough to keep a roof over our heads. Maybe even a porch light that actually works.”

Ray rubs his eyes, shoulders rising and falling with a tired shrug. “So I just… I don’t know. Got in a relationship and hoped for the best.”

Pete hums quietly, voice low. “And that was love?”

Ray shakes his head, messing with his bag straps. “An idea or expression of love, maybe. But if I’ve ever actually been in love…” He trails off for a beat, glancing toward Pete, the ghost of a smile playing on his lips. “Probably not.”

Pete glances at him, a grin tugging at his mouth. “Yeah? That’s too bad, Ray,” he says. “I think you’d make a mighty good husband.”

Ray looks at him, eyebrows raised, and then huffs out a laugh. “You flirtin’ with me, Pete? Seems a bit queer.”

The words hang there, not sharp, but not gentle either. Pete’s smile falters just a fraction. He looks away, his hand tightening around the baseball — the one still warm from Ray’s touch.

He turns it once, twice in his hand before offering it back. “Oh, you know me,” he says, trying for lightness, voice a little too even. “Ever the flirt.”

He walks a few paces ahead, pretending to study the cracks in the road, pretending the air doesn’t feel different now.

It takes two, three, four seconds before Ray catches up again, falling into step beside him like he always does. His voice is softer this time. “You really think I’d be a good husband?”

Pete looks at him then — really looks — at the sunhat, the freckles, the faint blush rising under the dirt and sweat. And he smiles, slow and sure.

“In another universe, Ray,” he says, “I think the Greek gods wrote the stars to have your name down as the best damn lover there is.”

Ray goes quiet, face burning red. He looks down, mumbling, “Thanks, Pete.”

Pete laughs under his breath, the sound low and fond. “Don’t mention it,” he says.

And for a while, the silence between them isn’t heavy at all. It’s soft. Almost kind. Like maybe — just maybe — the universe really did write something for them after all.

Pete wakes up to the faint sound of movement—soft, slow, uncertain.

At first, he thinks it’s part of the dream. Ray’s laugh, the sunhat, the stretch of endless road. But then there’s another sound: fabric rustling, a low groan, the scrape of skin against sheets.

His eyes snap open.

Ray’s hand is moving. Trembling, but moving.

“Ray?” Pete’s voice comes out hoarse, rough from sleep. He blinks hard, leaning forward, heart already hammering in his chest.

Ray’s eyes are open — unfocused, darting around the room like he doesn’t recognize where he is. He tries to sit up, hands pushing weakly against the mattress before his face twists in pain. A deep, guttural sound tears from his throat as his hand flies instinctively to his bandaged stomach.

“Hey—hey,” Pete says quickly, reaching out, steadying him. “You’re fine, Ray. We’re fine. You’re in a hospital, yeah? You’re safe.”

But Ray’s not hearing him. His breathing spikes fast, sharp, panicked. His gaze jumps to the corners of the room like he’s searching for something—someone.

“No,” he mutters, voice breaking. “No, they’re gonna shoot us. They’re gonna shoot us. We have to keep walking. We have to keep walking—”

“Ray—”

Ray jerks when Pete’s hand presses gently on his shoulder, trying to keep him still. He flinches hard, staring down at the touch like it’s a weapon. His eyes widen in pure terror.

“Why are you holding me back?” he shouts, the sound raw, almost feral. “You’re gonna get me killed! That’s what you wanted, right? A bullet to my goddamn fucking head?!”

Pete’s throat closes up. “What? No—Ray, no, I’d never—”

But Ray isn’t listening. He’s looking behind Pete now, eyes wild, like he can see soldiers lined up against the wall, rifles raised. His breath comes in fast bursts, body shaking as his hands fumble to rip the IVs out of his arm.

“Ray—stop!” Pete grabs his wrist before he can pull again. “You’re hurting yourself!”

Ray thrashes weakly against his grip, a sob clawing out of him. “Let me go! I have to keep walking—please, I have to keep walking—”

Pete tightens his hold, not rough, but firm, his voice breaking as he says, “Ray, look at me. It’s me, alright? It’s Pete. You’re safe, darling. You’re safe.”

But Ray’s eyes are glassy, far away — trapped in some place Pete can’t reach.

Pete pushes up from the chair so fast it nearly tips over behind him. He means to run — to get April, to get anyone — but his body doesn’t follow the thought.

The second his weight hits his legs, they give out. The pain hits next, sharp and white-hot, buckling him straight to the tile. His knees crash hard, the sound echoing through the sterile room.

“Shit—” he hisses through his teeth, trying to crawl, but before he can reach the door, he hears it.

The monitor.

The steady beep that had been keeping time for hours — gone. A long, high, unbroken sound fills the room.

Flatline.

“Ray,” he breathes, whipping around.

Ray’s upright now, half off the bed, the IV ripped from his arm. Blood streaks down his wrist, bright against his pale skin. The wires dangle uselessly around him. His chest heaves, bandages already seeping red.

“Get up, Pete!” Ray shouts, eyes wide with terror. “Fucking get up! They’re gonna kill you! They’re gonna fucking kill you!”

“Ray—no—” Pete’s voice cracks. He scrambles forward, dragging himself by the edge of the mattress, ignoring how every movement sends fire up his legs. “There’s no one here, Ray! You’re safe!”

But Ray’s lost somewhere else — back on that endless road. His hands tremble as he reaches for Pete, trying to pull him up, trying to keep them both walking.

Pete grips the edge of the bed, forcing himself up onto his knees. The ache in his joints roars, but he doesn’t care. He catches Ray by the shoulders, pushing gently, firmly, trying to guide him back down.

“Ray—listen to me, goddamn it!” he shouts, voice breaking. “We’re safe! You hear me? We’re safe!”

Ray thrashes weakly, panting, eyes glassy and wet. “No—no, they’ll shoot us if we stop—”

“Ray!” Pete barks again, pressing a trembling hand over the fresh blood on Ray’s side, desperate to stop it from spreading. “You’re not on the road anymore! You’re not walking! You made it, you hear? You fucking made it!”

The flatline wails on, shrill and merciless.

Pete grabs the call button, slamming it down with the heel of his hand, eyes never leaving Ray’s face.
“Help!” he yells toward the door. “Somebody, please!"

April bursts through the door less than a second after Pete hits the call button, three other nurses right behind her. The room explodes into motion.

One of the nurses freezes in the doorway for half a second, eyes wide. Ray’s upright in the bed, half the IVs torn out, the cardiac monitor cables dangling from his chest. His bandages are soaked through, deep crimson against white gauze, the incision sites already bleeding from where the sutures have torn.

“Oh God,” one of the nurses mutters under her breath.

April’s already at Ray’s side, hands steady and sure as she braces his shoulders. “Ray, hey—look at me, sweetheart.”

But Ray thrashes under her touch, eyes wide and glassy. “No—no, let go—please let go! I stopped walking first! I did, I did! Please don’t kill him! Please don’t kill him!”

“No one’s killing anyone, Ray,” April says softly, but her tone has the sharp edge of command. She glances over her shoulder and makes a quick nod to one of the nurses, who rushes to the drawers, frantically pulling out vials and syringes.

Pete grips the side of the bed and drags himself up into the chair, legs shaking, breath ragged. “Ray,” he says, voice desperate. “I’m not dying, you’re not dying. We’re okay, you hear me? We won the Walk. You remember that? We won. I promise you—we’re fine.”

But Ray keeps shaking his head, shoulders trembling under April’s hands. “I stopped walking first,” he cries, voice breaking apart. “I stopped walking first—I did, I did, I did!”

Pete shouts, voice breaking. “Help him! He’s bleeding out—help him!”

April snaps back, firm and steady. “I am helping him, Pete! He’s in a trauma response—his system’s gone full sympathetic override. His body thinks he’s still on that damn road.”

Ray’s chest heaves as he struggles, voice shaking. “I stopped walking first… I did… not Pete… not Pete…” His hands tremble, trying to push April away, nails scraping against the sheets.

April nods tightly. “Yeah—he’s in post-traumatic psychosis. His mind’s stuck in survival mode; he’s not seeing reality right now. Give me the sedative. He ripped the IV—no time to set another line.”

The nurse nods, quickly drawing the syringe and passing it over. April finds a clear vein in Ray’s arm and pushes the medication directly in, her voice calm as she speaks through it all. “It’s just a benzodiazepine, Ray. It’s going to help you rest, okay? You’re safe now.”

Ray doesn’t seem to hear her. His eyes dart around the room, panicked and unfocused. “Not Pete,” he keeps whispering. “Not Pete, not Pete…” His voice breaks on the last one, barely a breath left.

Then his body goes slack. His breathing evens out.

Pete jerks forward, panic flaring. “What happened—what happened!? Is he—”

April turns to him, placing the empty syringe on the tray. “He’s asleep, Pete,” she says firmly. “That’s all. He wasn’t supposed to wake up for another twenty-four hours at least.”

Pete stares at her, chest still heaving. “Then why—”

“His brain forced him out of sleep,” she explains quietly, checking Ray’s pulse at his wrist. “It happens sometimes. The trauma response overrides everything—sleep, healing, even pain. His mind thought he was still in danger, so it woke him. It’s the body’s last defense.” She exhales, softer now. “He’s safe again. Let him rest.”

Pete looks at Ray—at his still chest, the blood on his arm, the new puncture from the needle—and swallows hard. He sits back in the chair, legs aching, eyes heavy as he watches the nurses move with quiet urgency.

One is cleaning the blood on Ray’s arm, another wrapping fresh gauze around his abdomen, their gloved hands steady and practiced. The sharp scent of antiseptic fills the room.

Then he sees it—one of the nurses reaching into a drawer, pulling out a set of soft fabric restraints.

Pete straightens immediately. “Woah—woah, what’s that for?” His voice spikes, panic cutting through the exhaustion. “What the hell’s that for?”

April doesn’t look up right away. She’s taping down the new IV line. “Standard precaution,” she says evenly.

“Precaution for what? He’s asleep!” Pete snaps, half rising from the chair before his legs remind him they’re still barely working.

April sighs, finally glancing at him. “He’s not going to stay asleep forever, Pete. When he wakes up again, he might come out swinging, or worse—he might rip out the line again. His nervous system’s still in overdrive. Until his vitals stabilize, we need to keep him safe from himself.”

Pete shakes his head, jaw tight. “He’s not dangerous.”

“No,” April agrees, soft but firm. “But he’s scared. And scared people hurt themselves without meaning to.”

Pete looks from her to Ray—his hands twitching even in sleep, his brow furrowed, the faint tremor in his chest with every breath.

He hates it—the thought of Ray waking up confused, restrained, afraid all over again.

“Can you at least… not tie him down like an animal?” Pete mutters, voice rough.

April meets his gaze for a long moment, then nods. “I’ll make sure they’re loose,” she says quietly. “Just enough to keep him safe. That’s a promise.”

Pete sighs and nods, the sound catching somewhere between his chest and throat as he watches the nurses tying the soft restraints around Ray’s wrists. The fabric looks wrong on him.

Every part of Pete wants to rip them off—bite through the straps with his teeth if he has to—but he doesn’t. He just sits there, fists clenched tight in his lap, jaw locked until it aches. The nurses work quietly, bandaging, cleaning, checking vitals. When they’re finally done, the room falls into an uneasy kind of stillness.

April leaves without a word, and for a brief, fragile moment, it’s just him and Ray again. Pete leans forward, elbows on his knees, watching the slow rise and fall of Ray’s chest.

Then the door opens, and April’s back—with a wheelchair.

She sets it beside him and says, “Okay. Now it’s your turn.”

Pete blinks at her, brow furrowed. “My turn?”

April nods. “You need to be scanned and cleaned up. We’ll check for stress fractures, infection, muscle damage—see what we’re dealing with.”

Pete shakes his head, instantly defensive. “I can’t leave him. What if he wakes up while I’m gone and thinks—”

April cuts him off gently. “He won’t. Not for a few hours, at least. We gave him a heavy dose of sedative, Pete. You’ll be back before he even stirs.”

Pete looks down at the chair—cold metal, squeaky wheels, sterile as hell. “And you want me in that?”

April raises an eyebrow. “Yes. Unless you’d prefer I follow hospital policy and put you in a separate room.”

Pete’s mouth opens, then shuts. He bites the inside of his cheek hard enough to taste blood.

"Didn’t think so.”

She slips her hands under his arms and helps lift him carefully into the chair. His legs tremble, useless things, and he lets out a small, involuntary hiss when his heels brush the floor.

“Easy,” April says. “You’re not walking anywhere today.”

Pete doesn’t answer. He keeps his eyes fixed on Ray instead, on the pale curve of his arm against the sheets, on the faint movement of his chest. April starts wheeling him toward the door, the squeak of the chair echoing off tile and walls.

They’re almost out of the room when Pete hears it—soft, barely audible over the sound of rubber wheels.

Ray mumbles something in his sleep, voice slurred and fragile.

Pete tenses.

April stops too. “What is it?”

Pete shakes his head slowly, swallowing hard. “Nothing,” he says, even though his heart’s suddenly beating too fast.

Because he heard it.

He knows what Ray said.

One word, breathed like a prayer.

Cinnamon.

Chapter Text

It’s around mile one hundred and ten when Pete starts to notice the shift.

Ray’s quieter. Too quiet.

He isn’t firing back at Barkovitch’s queer jabs anymore—just letting them hang in the air, sinking into the space between them like a fog. The usual dry, steady humor that kept them both going, has dimmed into something duller.

His arms are crossed tight over his chest, hands gripping the straps of his pack like they’re the only thing holding him together.

Pete watches for a while, waiting for a comment, a joke, anything. But all he gets is silence. Ray’s eyes are on the road—miles and miles of it—and the muscles in his jaw twitch every now and then, like he’s chewing on a thought too heavy to swallow.

Pete shifts his own pack higher on his shoulders, trying to shake the feeling crawling up the back of his neck.

He tells himself it’s nothing. They’re all tired, all starving, all walking toward a finish line painted in blood. It’s natural to close up. To retreat somewhere in your head where it’s quieter, safer.

Still…

Still, he can’t help wondering if he said something wrong.

Maybe it was that comment about being a good husband. Maybe it was when he teased him for getting cold so easy. Maybe Ray’s just done with him, and Pete’s too damn sensitive to admit it.

He shakes his head, lets out a breath through his teeth. Stupid. He’s acting like a lovesick idiot in the middle of a death march.

But the thing is—he can’t stop looking.

At Ray’s shoulders, tense and hunched.
At the way his mouth moves, barely, when he whispers something under his breath.
At the shadows under his eyes, dark and deep as the road itself.

Pete doesn’t mean to do it — it just happens.

Maybe it’s the silence getting to him, or maybe it’s that goddamn look on Ray’s face — distant, too far gone, like he’s walking somewhere Pete can’t follow. Whatever it is, he lifts a hand and pats Ray lightly on the cheek. Not hard, just enough to pull him back. 

“Daydreaming of charcoal again?” Pete says, his voice rough but carrying that teasing lilt he hopes still works.

For a second, he swears Ray doesn’t even hear him. Then those brown eyes blink up at him — slow, dazed — like it takes effort to remember where they are, who they are.

Ray’s gaze flickers — from Pete’s mouth, to the endless stretch of cracked asphalt ahead, then back again. Pete feels it, that stare, like a weight pressing just under his ribs.

Then Ray swallows, his throat bobbing, and says, “No, actually… I’m dreaming of peanut butter.”

Pete huffs out a laugh through his nose, shaking his head. “Yeah, sure you are.”

Pete notices it, the lie. It’s small, barely there, but enough to set off every alarm in his head. He edges closer, and bumps Ray’s arm gently, just enough to get his attention.

“Hey,” he says, low and careful. “No, come on. What’s going on with you?”

Ray doesn’t answer right away. He turns his head slightly, staring at the spot where Pete’s knuckles brushed his sleeve. His steps — one, two, three steps — falter.

"Number forty-seven, warning. First warning.”

Ray's eyes drag up slow, unfocused, like he’s miles away even though they’re shoulder to shoulder. And Pete, his stomach drops, grabbing at Ray and forcing him into motion again.

“Alright… hey, keep your pace up, yeah? We’re good.”

“I only ever dated my girl,” Ray says suddenly, voice distant, “because it felt like I had to.”

Pete blinks, caught off guard. “Okayyyy?”

Ray shakes his head, too quick, his jaw tightening as he walks. “But it isn’t okay. That isn’t okay, Pete. I’ve been on this earth twenty years, and what am I doing? Wasting it away. Wasting it all. When I die—hell, there won’t even be a headstone because we’re broke. And I dated a girl I didn’t even want to date, just because I—because the world—thought she was pretty, and that’s what I was supposed to do.”

Pete's lost. Confused. He knows all of this already... but something about Ray’s voice has that edge — the kind that means this isn’t just about the girl.

Ray laughs once, bitter and breathless, his balance slightly uneven for a second before he corrects it. “Just thinking how it’s funny. I’m gonna die, practically a kid, and I never even got to figure out what I like.”

Pete glances sideways. “What you mean?”

Ray’s eyes stay ahead, on the road, but his voice softens to almost nothing. “What I like in things… in a possible career, if I ever got lucky enough to have one. In people…”

His breath catches. The wind carries his words, thin and fragile.

“In partners.”

The word slips out quiet, but it hits like a gunshot.

Pete’s throat goes dry. He doesn’t look at Ray right away — can’t. The soldiers pacing behind them, the whisper of boots on asphalt, the hum of death in the air — it all feels sharper now.

He risks a glance. Ray’s face is flushed from the sun, or maybe something else. His jaw’s set, his hands gripping his straps like he’s holding himself together.

Pete forces a shaky laugh, more out of habit than humor. “Heavy thoughts for mile one-ten, huh?”

Ray huffs through his nose, a sharp exhale that fogs the airs. “Forget it,” he mutters, tightening his grip on the straps of his pack.

Pete frowns. “No, no, that’s not—”

He grits his teeth. There’s too many ears nearby, too much noise and not enough privacy, but hell, they’ve got maybe ten feet of space between them and the next pack of boys. Just enough for honesty to breathe.

He exhales through his nose, a rough sound. “I’m sorry, Ray,” he says finally, voice low. “I just don’t understand it, is all.”

Ray glances sideways, frowning. “What do you mean?”

Pete bites the inside of his cheek, weighing the words. The soldiers’ boots crunch steady behind them. The sky looks bruised and heavy overhead.

He looks at Ray again — at his sunburned nose, the freckles scattered like constellations, the curve of his mouth when he’s too tired to hide how he feels — and something in Pete cracks open.

He keeps his voice barely above a whisper. “I haven’t dated women, Ray.”

Shit. Shit. He’s gone and done it. Said too much. Way to fucking lose the only friend he's got.

He can feel Ray looking at him now, and he wants to disappear. His throat burns. His palms are sweating. He should take it back. Say it was a joke. Say he meant something else. But his voice won’t move, his lungs barely work.

“Oh,” Ray says, quiet.

Pete laughs once — sharp and dry, like it hurts. “Yeah. Oh.”

He stares at the horizon, eyes stinging from sweat and panic and miles of exhaustion. If Ray says something cruel, he won’t even fight back. He’ll just take it. That’s what he deserves for opening his damn mouth.

But Ray just clears his throat, soft. “You have… dated before though, yeah? Done things?”

Pete hesitates. “A few dates. Some flings.” His voice cracks, and he hates it. “Nothing serious.”

He can feel Ray’s gaze again — steady, unshaken. And it makes him want to crawl out of his skin. Every muscle in his body feels tight, ready for impact.

Then Ray says, “Well, Pete, I think you’re wrong.”

Pete freezes. His throat goes dry. Wrong.
The word lands like a blade. He feels it cut through him, panic flooding fast and sharp. His breath stutters — shallow, uneven. He knows. He knows, and now he’s gonna say it. Now he’s gonna look at me like they all did.

He almost wants to laugh — it’s pathetic, really, how quickly fear can turn your blood to ice. He’s still walking, but his body’s shaking. Every muscle in him screams to brace for the worst.

“About what?” he manages, voice rough.

Ray glances sideways, eyes softer than Pete expects. “About the stars,” he says.

Pete frowns, confused. “The stars?”

Ray hums. “Yeah. I think in another universe, they’d have your name written out as the greatest husband there is.”

Pete almost stumbles. His chest squeezes, something breaking loose inside him that he’s not ready for. He tries to steady his breath, his voice, his everything. He squeezes his eyes shut, the ache blooming in his chest before he can stop it.

He swallows hard, whispering, “I wouldn’t have a wife, Ray. I don’t want a wife.”

And Ray — God bless him — doesn’t miss a beat. His voice comes quiet, steady, certain.

“I didn’t bring up no woman, Pete.”

Pete’s breath catches. For a second, the road disappears — the guns, the death, the endless asphalt — and it’s just that line echoing in his head.

He looks over, the corner of his mouth tugging into something small and real, and he whispers, almost disbelieving, “Yeah?”

Ray nods once, eyes forward, and Pete — fool that he is — smiles. Just a little.

And keeps on walking.

Always walking.

Pete blinks hard, dragged out of his thoughts by the snap snap of April’s fingers right in front of his face.

“Pete,” she says, tone crisp but not unkind. “Eyes on me. Follow the light.”

He squints, the flashlight dancing back and forth across his vision. The brightness makes him wince, and his eyelid flutters involuntarily. April hums, seemingly satisfied, and switches it off before setting it back on the tray.

Pete rubs at his eyes, still seeing little flashes of light. “Well, doc,” he croaks, “am I cured?”

April huffs a soft laugh, flipping a page on her clipboard. “You won’t be walking for a week, if that’s what you mean.”

Pete grins weakly. “So that’s a no.”

April shakes her head, the corners of her mouth twitching. “Your feet are a mess, Pete. You’ve got severe swelling and broken blisters all over the soles, maybe even a few second-degree burns from friction. But it’s your knee that worries me most.”

Pete frowns, his humor fading. “My knee?”

“Yeah,” April says, scanning his chart. “Left one. You’ve got a partial ligament strain — probably from the constant hyperextension and the angle you’ve been walking at. It’s not torn, thank God, but it needs rest."

Pete swallows hard, staring at his leg like it’s betrayed him. “That’s… bad, huh?”

April meets his eyes. “Bad enough that if you don’t rest, you’ll end up in surgery instead of a wheelchair. And I don’t think either of us wants that.”

He lets out a low sigh, running a hand through his hair. “You’re really killin’ me here, April.”

“I’d rather keep you alive,” she fires back easily, scribbling a note in the margin. Then, softer: “And since you’ve become quite the celebrity overnight, I’ll make you a deal.”

Pete raises an eyebrow. “A deal?”

April nods. “You and Ray can stay in the same room. But only if you stay off your feet. No walking, no pacing, no playing the hero. You use that wheelchair, or I swear I’ll sedate you myself.”

Pete chuckles under his breath. “You really know how to sweet-talk a guy.”

April gives a little shrug, flipping the clipboard closed. “I’ll even move you both to a bigger room — two beds side by side. Easier for me to keep an eye on you, and…” she pauses, “…I’m guessing it’ll make you a little happier, too.”

Pete looks down blushing slightly then toward the door that leads back to Ray’s room. His chest aches.

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “That’d make me real happy.”

April hums, satisfied as she tucks the clipboard under her arm. “Well then,” she says, that sharp nurse tone softening into something almost playful, “since that’s settled, I’ll wheel you into your new room, have one of the nurses help you bathe, and when you get out—” she pauses, glancing up at him with a knowing little smirk “—Ray will be there.”

Pete feels the heat hit his face immediately. It climbs fast, up his neck and into his cheeks, burning hot enough that he’s sure even his dark skin can’t hide it.

“Do I really need help bathing?” he asks, voice cracking halfway between indignation and embarrassment.

April gives him a look — one brow raised, lips pressed thin, pure authority wrapped in scrubs.

Pete raises both hands in mock surrender, wincing as he does. “Okay, okay, okay. No arguments, got it.”

“Good,” April says, spinning his wheelchair toward the door. “I like a cooperative patient.”

Pete mutters something under his breath about humiliation and dignity, but it earns him only a small chuckle from her as they roll down the hall, the sound of rubber wheels on tile, antiseptic in the air, and a blush he can’t quite shake.

It’s mile one hundred thirty-four.

Another rainy night.

Ray’s asleep. Or close to it. His body keeps moving — legs scraping cement, but still going. His head hangs low, chin nearly to his chest, little snores escaping between uneven breaths. Words tumble out too, soft and broken, like pieces of dreams he can’t quite hold on to.

Pete keeps him upright.

One arm slung tight around Ray’s waist, the other gripping his hand where it rests limp against his own shoulder. Ray’s arm is looped over him loosely.

It’s automatic now — step, catch, breathe, steady. He doesn’t even think about it anymore. Just walks, holds, guides.

The rain slides down their faces, their jackets, the backs of their hands. It runs into Pete’s mouth when he exhales too sharply, tastes like iron and road dust.

He glances at Ray. His hair’s plastered to his forehead, freckles nearly washed away, lips pale. Every now and then, Ray mumbles something — mom, no, please — and Pete feels it like a knife under his ribs.

He squeezes Ray’s waist gently, leans close enough that his breath fogs against his ear. “Easy now, sunshine,” he murmurs, quiet and rough. “You’re alright. Just keep moving.”

The nickname falls out before he can stop it. Sunshine. He almost laughs at the irony — nothing about this night is bright — but the word feels right, somehow. Feels like hope.

Thank God Ray’s asleep, because he doesn’t hear it.

Stebbins is too far gone in his own haze to notice. Barkovitch is rambling about something obscene to no one in particular. Art and Olson are talking about pasta flavors — arguing about whether ravioli counts as its own food group. It's a good argument all things considered, and seems to be keeping them awake.

Pete almost smiles at that. Almost.

The only one who might’ve heard is Collie, walking two steps ahead. He glances at Pete, just once, a faint flicker of recognition — then he turns back, keeps walking.

Pete exhales, shaky and wet when Ray stirs.

It’s small at first — a twitch of his shoulder, a shift in weight — then his free hand comes up, sluggish and trembling, rubbing at his eye like a kid waking from a nap.

“Pete?” he mumbles, voice slurred, thick with exhaustion.

Pete hums in response, still holding his waist steady, his arm aching but unmoving. “Yeah?”

Ray blinks up through the rain, dazed and unfocused. “You… you want me to, uh…” He doesn’t finish the sentence, too tired to remember what he was even going to say.

Pete cuts him off softly. “It’s okay,” he says, and there’s a gentleness in his voice that surprises even him. “I was sleeping with you.”

It’s a lie. But Ray doesn’t need to know that.

Ray nods faintly, his head lolling forward again. “Did I… did I get any warnings?”

Pete shakes his head, adjusting their pace just enough to keep him steady. “Nah. You walked them all off.”

A ghost of a smile flickers across Ray’s lips. “Thanks, Pete… I…”

Pete squeezes his side a little, enough to quiet him. “Just get some rest, yeah?”

Ray exhales — long, shaky, but peaceful. “Okay…” he whispers, already half-gone again.

Pete watches him for a second longer, the rain beading on his lashes, before turning back to the dark stretch of road ahead.

Mile one hundred thirty-four. Still walking. Still holding him up. And if Ray dreams again, Pete hopes it’s of something gentle.

When Pete gets rolled out of the bathroom, he feels like a new man — or at least, a man who’s finally remembered what it feels like to be human.

Clean. Finally. Hallelujah.

The nurse — a man, thank God — had helped him through the whole ordeal, quiet and professional, not a word more than needed. Pete had been mortified the entire time, cheeks burning hotter than the bathwater, but now that it’s over, he feels almost… peaceful. The grime’s gone, the blood’s gone, and for the first time since the Walk, he smells like soap instead of sweat and rain.

Human. 

The plaid pajama pants they gave him are a size too big, but they’re soft. The white T-shirt clings a bit at the shoulders. 

When the nurse wheels him back into the room, Pete can’t help the small grin that pulls at his mouth.

April kept her word.

Two beds.

Ray’s in the one closest to the door, still out cold, his chest rising and falling in slow, measured rhythm. The restraints are still there — one around each wrist, loose but firm. The sight makes Pete’s stomach twist, but he reminds himself it’s for safety.

He glances at the nurse and gives a small, sheepish nod of gratitude — a silent thanks that says more than words could. The man nods back once before leaving, the door clicking softly behind him.

Pete lets out a slow breath.

It’s quiet. Almost too quiet. Just the hum of the machines and the faint rhythm of Ray’s breathing. The thud, thud, thud of the road still haunts him though. He grips the wheels of his chair, pushing himself forward with slow, shaky arms. The floor squeaks under him, a small sound in a room full of silence.

His bed waits just beside Ray’s, clean sheets, the corner folded down.

Pete wheels closer, stealing one look at Ray’s face — pale but peaceful, freckles faint beneath the harsh fluorescent light — before whispering, “Guess we finally get some real rest, huh, big guy?”

Pete bites his lip so hard he tastes iron. Ray doesn’t stir. Not a sound, not a twitch. Just the steady hiss of the oxygen machine and the faint rise and fall of his chest beneath the thin sheet.

Pete tells himself it doesn’t bother him—that the silence is fine, that it’s better this way—but it gnaws at him anyway.

He drags himself out of the wheelchair using his arms, muscles trembling, trying to keep his promise to April about staying off his feet. It’s awkward, but he manages, hauling himself up onto the bed with a rough exhale.

He lays back, hands on his stomach, fingers pulling absently at the frayed edge of his shirt. His legs ache in dull, deep pulses, and his knee throbs with every heartbeat.

He stares at the ceiling for a while, until that’s too quiet too. Then his eyes drift to Ray.

Ray—Bandages where there should be skin. The faint, stubborn crease between his brows that never goes away, even in sleep.

Pete exhales hard through his nose. Closes his eyes. But it’s no use. The images come anyway.

Ray falling. The blood soaking through his shirt. The way his breathing caught—sharp, panicked, dying. The sound of the gunshots echoing through his skull.

Pete grits his teeth and rolls to his side, fists clenched in the sheets. He tries to swallow the anger, to bury it like he always does—but it’s no good. It’s all crawling to the surface now.

He won. He’s rich. He’s alive.

And he hates it.

Because he’s not free. Not really. He’s the Major’s trophy now—a pet to parade around. He’ll have to smile for cameras, sign his name under whatever story the Major dreams up, act like that version of the ending is true. He’ll have to live in the lie, over and over, while the Major cashes in on it—while more boys sign up, thinking they’ve got a real chance now.

It makes him sick.

He stares at Ray again—his Ray, his idiot, his reason—and it breaks something open, a whisper-shout slicing through the quiet.

“You just couldn’t let me die, could ya? You just couldn’t let me do one goddamn good thing in my life! You had to save me, you fucking bastard!”

He grips the sheet tight, knuckles white.

“You shouldn’t have done that! I would’ve died, and you would’ve won, and you could’ve killed the Major, and maybe—maybe this would all be fucking over! But you couldn’t,” he chokes out. “You selfless idiot.”

He wipes his face with the back of his hand and laughs once, a sound that’s all ache.

“Should’ve let me burn, darling,” he mutters. “Would’ve been easier on both of us.”

Then he looks at him again and despite everything, despite the fury clawing at his ribs, Pete reaches across the space between their beds and lets his fingers brush Ray’s wrist.

“Don’t make me hate you for it,” he whispers. “Not you.”

He hears a soft clearing of a throat and nearly jumps out of his skin.

Pete turns, heart stuttering, and sees April standing in the doorway, a metal tray balanced in one hand, an IV bag hooked over the other. The bag sways slightly, the needle clinking against the side of the tray with every small movement.

She doesn’t say anything right away—just raises an eyebrow, eyes flicking from him to Ray and back again. 

Pete jerks his hand away like he’s been caught doing something dirty, like Ray’s skin burned him. Shame floods his chest fast and hot, spreading all the way up to his ears. It’s so sudden it makes him dizzy. He can’t look at her.

He knows it’s not normal.

God, he knows.

He’s known since he was twelve and his foster father found a magazine under the couch. Since the sermons that said his kind were lost souls, broken things. Since the years he spent trying to pray it out, to starve it out, to fix it.

He’s tried. He’s tried so fucking hard.

But it never went away.

So maybe there’s no God. Or maybe there is, and Pete’s just not one worth saving.

April moves quietly to Ray’s bedside, her shoes squeaking faintly against the tile. She sets the tray down on the table with a muted clatter and starts adjusting the IV line, checking the tubing for air. She doesn’t speak, but he can feel her awareness of him—like she knows what she walked in on, even if she won’t say it.

Pete stuffs his hands into the sheets, knuckles tight against his thighs. He doesn’t know where to put his eyes, so he just stares at the floor, at his bandaged feet, at the way the tile gleams faintly in the low light.

It’s strange, he thinks. The way shame always comes back, even after everything. The way it still stings worse than blood or bone.

He clears his throat, the sound small and rough. “He, uh… he was twitchin’ in his sleep,” he mumbles. “Just makin’ sure he was okay.”

April doesn’t answer. She hangs the IV back on its hook and glances over her shoulder, that same unreadable look on her face.

“You’re dehydrated,” she says quietly. “You need some fluids in you—maybe a little sedative too, so you actually rest for once.”

Pete opens his mouth to argue, but he’s too tired to fight her. Too tired of fighting in general. So he just nods, eyes fixed on a crack in the tile as she ties the band around his arm.

The sting of the needle makes him wince. He looks away, jaw tight, pretending he doesn’t feel the cool burn sliding into his vein. The room’s quiet except for the faint ticking of the wall clock—three steady beats before April breaks the silence.

“I have a theory,” she says finally, her voice soft but edged with something cautious. “About what really happened at the end of that Walk.”

Pete stiffens. He doesn’t look at her, but she keeps talking, eyes still on the IV line.

“I don’t know the details,” she continues, “but I know a lie when I see one. And I know the Major’s type—military men with too much pride and too much power. Whatever happened out there…” She sighs, straightening up, her voice low now. “You’ve got to play along with whatever story he tells. You understand me?”

Pete finally turns to look at her, throat dry and eyes burning.

“Whatever you think is right, whatever really happened—it doesn’t matter now,” she says.

Pete swallows hard, nodding once.
“Yeah,” he says softly. “I hear you.”

She sets the clipboard down, grabs a syringe from the tray, and holds it up to the light, tapping the side until a single drop glimmers at the tip.

Pete clears his throat, voice low and rough. “I know you probably can’t tell me this,” he says, glancing at Ray, “but… has his mom been by yet?”

April exhales softly. “This is just a sedative,” she murmurs, inserting the syringe into his IV line. “She came when he was in surgery. Stayed until we lost his heartbeat the first time. I think it… triggered something in her. She left before we could say he was stable. Hopefully she’ll come back tomorrow.”

Pete swallows hard, his chest aching. “Right,” he mumbles. “Tomorrow.”

The sedative’s already creeping through him, making his eyelids heavy, his tongue thick. He tries to fight it—God knows he does—but April’s voice cuts through, quiet and firm.

“Don’t fight the meds, Pete. Just let yourself rest. Ray’ll be here when you wake up.”

He wants to tell her he can’t rest, not yet. Not until he knows Ray’s really okay. But the room’s already tilting, blurring at the corners. The clock ticks, faint and far away.

April turns toward the door, the tray in her hand again. The soft click of her shoes fades as the weight of sleep finally takes him under.

The last thing Pete sees before the dark swallows him is Ray—still, quiet, and breathing.

It’s mile one hundred forty-four, and the world feels almost normal for a moment.

The road stretches long and silver under the sun, steam rising off the rain-slick asphalt. Pete’s throwing the baseball back to Ray, Ray catching it, walking backward a few paces before tossing it again. The rhythm’s easy.

Catch. Step. Throw.
Thud. Thud. Thud.

It feels good—calm, even.

Art nearly got shot for taking a shit five minutes ago, and somehow that just makes the moment feel even stranger—this thin strip of peace after chaos, with a collar still tied around their throats.

Ray breathes deep, the air hot in his lungs, his hair plastered to his forehead. He tosses the ball again, then says, almost absently, “My dad… he was, uh… my hero.”

Pete catches the ball, still moving, eyes narrowing. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Ray says softly. “He always wanted to show me things. Teach me things. Not the kind you’re supposed to learn now. I mean, he had me reading banned books before I was even ten. Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Twain. He’d sit up late with me and play old records—real fucking inhabited music."

He catches Pete’s return throw, palms the ball, looks down at it like it’s a memory. “That was just the kind of guy he was. Guess I just wanted to know the old ways, and he showed them to me.”

He smiles faintly, and Pete has an idea where this is headed. “He used to say words were the most dangerous thing a man could own. Books, music, poetry—those were all weapons if you were brave enough to use ’em. I think he liked that danger. Maybe too much.”

Pete hums quietly. “You know that shit’s illegal now.”

“Yeah.” Ray laughs, short and hollow. “He thought he had a system going. Thought he was being careful. But…” He trails off, his voice thinning. “It caught up to him.”

“I don’t know how,” Ray says, quieter now. “Maybe he wasn’t as sneaky as he thought, going around buying banned books. Or maybe…” His throat tighter, "maybe… maybe I said something. I was young, or younger that is, I didn’t know what to keep quiet about. Maybe I repeated something he said about the government or about faith, and… maybe that was enough.”

Ray’s jaw sets. “They came one night. The Major and his men. Said my dad had a choice—pledge allegiance to the state, to the Squad, or die a traitor.” He lets out a low, bitter laugh. “You already know what he picked.”

Pete’s chest feels tight. “Jesus,” he says quietly. “I’m… I’m so sorry, Ray.”

Ray doesn’t answer right away. Just keeps walking, eyes glassy, the ball still clutched in his hand. Then he throws it again—too hard this time. Pete barely catches it, the sting burning through his palms.

Ray mumbles, “It’s alright. I’m alright."

“No, Ray,” Pete snaps, soft and sharp. “That’s not alright.”

They walk in silence for a beat, sun baking the road, the ball warm in Pete’s hand. Ray plucks it from him, flips it up once, twice, watching it spin. When it comes down he catches it, jaw tight.

“No,” Ray says, surprise in his voice now. “You’re right, Pete. It isn’t okay.” He tosses the ball up again and, as it hangs in the heat, his voice drops to a whisper. “Which is why I’m gonna kill him.”

Pete nearly laughs — an ugly, breathless noise, because it’s easier than hearing the words straight. “No,” he scoffs, because what else do you say to something like that? “You can’t. You can’t wish someone dead.”

"I can,” he says. “I have a wish. If I win — if I get close enough — there’s a way.”

“What way?” he asks.

Ray’s eyes are hard as flint. He cups his palm and whispers. “I’ll wish for the carbine. Simple as that. They give prizes. They give things. The Major promised. The rules say he has to grant it. I’ll get it in my hands and I’ll—” He swallows. “I’ll end him there. Right on the road.”

"You’ve got to win first,” Pete says, trying logic as a shield. “You know that, right? Be the last man standing.”

Ray shrugs like the rules are just another thing to be broken. “I know how to win,” he says, and the certainty in him is not bravado so much as an oath. “Nobody wants this more than me, Pete. Nobody needs it more than me.”

Pete swallows hard. “I’m not arguing about that, sunshine, but—” He’s cut off by Ray looking at him, then down at the ball, and the ordinary tenderness of the gesture makes Pete’s chest compress.

“My dad was the last true good person on this planet, I swear to God” Ray says, voice raw. “He taught me the old ways. He’d risk everything for them.” His knuckles go white on the ball. “This is my chance to change things the way he would’ve wanted. To cut the head off the dragon.”

Pete shakes his head. “Ray—he chose to leave you. How is that noble?” His voice is rough. “Garraty, do you have any idea how fucking hard it is to kill a man? I’ve gutted a deer; that was hard enough. Killing a person—that’s another thing. It’s only easy for a certain kind of person.”

Ray’s jaw tightens. “Then I’ll become that kind of person,” he says, flat and brittle.

“That would be fucking sad, not to mention pathetic,” Pete snaps, heat rising in his chest. “Those are the kinds of people who can’t see the beauty of the world. Their hands are always bloody, they never look up.” He jerks his chin toward the sky. “You ever look at the light over the road? The birds taking off from a wire? The trees? All of it’s there, Ray. It’s worth more than one shot of revenge.”

Ray laughs, a short, humorless sound. “What fucking beauty?” he spits. “You tell me that's beautiful but what beauty is left when they take everything. When they take that too.”

Pete watches him for a long second, then drops his hand and covers Ray’s and the baseball with his own. “You know what else is beautiful? Besides the nature, besides this earth.” he says, softer. “Us. This.” His thumb presses the leather of the ball. “Whether we’ve got three minutes or three decades, this moment—this right here—means something. It matters. Say it.”

Ray meets his eyes, slow to nod. “This matters. This moment matters.” He shakes his head, the edges of his voice fraying. “But does it really matter, Pete? Because when this moment ends, I’m still going to kill him.”

Pete exhales, hard and bitter. “Fine. Fine—do what you want. But understand what that will cost.” His voice goes quieter, steadier. “The second that gun goes off, you’re finished too. There’ll be rifles on you in a heartbeat."

“You don’t know that!” Ray snaps. “I’d be the winner — that’s uncharted territory!”

Pete stares at him a second, trying to find the sane in the madness, before he lets out a slow breath. “And what about your mom, Ray?” he asks, softer now, careful. “Have you told her this is the plan?”

“Don’t—” Ray’s hand snaps up. “Don’t fucking bring my mom into this, Pete.”

“No.” Pete’s voice goes harder. “No. I’m asking. Does she know?”

Ray’s jaw works; for a second he looks like a kid caught doing something wrong. “No,” he says finally. “She doesn’t. This is bigger than her… bigger than me.” He turns, pointing to a family watching. “Look at those pigs. They’re watching because they want to see our brains on the concrete.”

“No, sunshine,” he says, and there’s no humor in the nickname. “You’re wrong about them. Look harder. That’s a family,” Pete says. “A lot of them love each other. They’re not monsters — they’re people who’ve been taught what to cheer for. We can’t just hate everyone for being conditioned; we were raised in the same world.”

Ray’s hand tightens on the ball. Pete tightens his hand on Ray's. “Your wish — even if you get it — won’t change how they see it. They’ll call it violence, say it proved the Major right. Vengeance by itself doesn’t teach anyone anything. It doesn’t turn a crowd into allies or a state into something just. If you want to change things, it’ll take more than blood on the pavement."

"I don’t see it that way, Pete,” Ray says, jaw tight.

“Then start,” Pete snaps back. He breathes, collects himself. “Listen — I don’t know the whole of your life. I don’t know every hurt you carry. But I know what I see when I look at you: a good soul. And the others — Art, Olson, Stebbins — they have good souls, too. All of these boys do.”

"If you win, you’ll be the one left to speak for them. You’ll be the one who can keep their names alive, tell the stories nobody else will bother to remember. But if you make your wish true the way you’re talking about — if you pull that trigger — you die. And then what happens? Olson’s dead; Art’s memory fades; Stebbins and the rest become footnotes. I become a footnote. You turn every name into a chalk mark nobody cares about anymore.”

Pete’s hand tightens on the ball between them, knuckles white. “Vengeance doesn’t end anything, Ray. It just makes more bodies. Violence breeds violence. You’re too good for that. Don’t waste what you are on a single shot.”

Ray shakes his hand off and tosses the ball, and Pete catches it without thinking. Catch, hold, repeat.

“You think I’m good,” Ray says quietly, eyes fixed ahead, “but you don’t know. For all I know, my stupid mouth is what got my dad killed.”

Pete exhales through his nose, slow. He rolls the ball in his hands, fingers tracing the seams, before looking back at Ray. “Even if someone overheard you, even if what you said somehow reached the wrong ears… your father had a choice.”

Ray glances at him, but Pete keeps going. “He did, Ray. That was his decision to make. He chose what mattered most to him, and in his last moment, he chose pride over you. I’m not saying it was right or wrong—hell, I don’t know if there’s even a right or wrong anymore—but that’s the truth of it. His death… that was on him. No one else.”

Ray exhales, running a hand through his hair. “I don’t know what another wish would even be, Pete,” he admits, voice low, almost lost to the rhythm of their footsteps.

Pete glances at him, then reaches out and gives him a light smack on the back — firm enough to be grounding, teasing enough to earn a look. “Well, Ray,” he says, grin tugging at the corner of his mouth, “you wanna walk with me awhile?”

Ray huffs out a small laugh, shaking his head. “Yeah, Pete. Yeah, I do.”

“Then you’ve got plenty of time to think of another wish, yeah?” Pete says, and there’s something warm in his voice, something like hope, like the smallest spark of faith that maybe they’ll both live long enough to see it through.

Ray nods, and Pete hands the baseball back to him, smiling faintly, and their steps fall back into rhythm. 

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The sound of two boys walking toward whatever comes next — together.

Pete doesn’t like the normalcy—or maybe it’s the lack of it.

Every hour bleeds into the next. He wakes up. Checks if Ray’s awake. Finds out he isn’t. Falls back asleep.

Dreams of something—sometimes a mile marker, sometimes a face, sometimes the sound of shoes scraping pavement.

Then he wakes again.

Checks again.

Sleeps again.

It’s a cruel sort of rhythm, this limbo between life and death. And by the fourth time he wakes, he’s stopped expecting anything to change.

Except—it does.

There’s someone else in the room.

She’s sitting close to Ray’s bed, a small chair dragged up to the side, her hands folded around his like they’re made of glass. She’s whispering prayers. 

Pete freezes. He should close his eyes, pretend to be asleep again, but then—

beep.

beep.

beep.

The damn heart monitor betrays him, his pulse jumping with nerves.

The woman—Ginnie, he realizes, Ray's mom—turns toward him. The prayer stops mid-word.

Tears streak down her face, catching in the low light, and Pete feels a knife twist in his chest.

“I’m— I’m sorry,” he blurts, voice raw, hands gripping the sheets. “I’m so sorry. I tried— I swear I tried to—”

Pete doesn’t get to finish his apology.

Ginnie stands so suddenly that her chair legs scrape against the tile, the sound cutting through his stammered words. Before he can even process it, she’s crossing the small space between them, her hands trembling as she reaches him. Then—she’s hugging him.

It’s not gentle. It’s desperate. Her arms wrap around his shoulders like she’s afraid he’ll disappear too.

He goes still, the air caught somewhere between his lungs and throat. Her voice breaks against his ear, soft but shaking, “You saved him. You saved my boy.”

Pete swallows hard, his hands twitching uselessly before he forces out, “I didn’t. He—he got shot because of me. I should’ve turned around, or stopped, or made sure he didn’t—”

She pulls back just enough to shake her head, her face streaked with tears. “I saw you,” she says, voice stronger now. “I saw you go down. I saw you stop. You wanted him to win.”

Pete goes still, the words catching like gravel in his throat. “I’m sorry,” he says quietly. “I’m so sorry he’s like this.”

Ginnie shakes her head, her hand resting on his shoulder. “But he’s alive,” she says, her voice trembling, breaking around the words. “You saved him. Time and time again. You saved him back there—when he saw me. He was gonna get shot, and you saved him.” Her voice cracks, her breath hitching. “I can’t… I can’t thank you enough.”

Pete bites his tongue hard, trying to stop the shaking in his jaw. He wipes at his eyes, but it doesn’t do much. He doesn’t think he’s ever experienced anything like this before—a mother’s touch, a mother’s gratitude. It’s soft, warm, and terrifying all at once.

It’s… nice. It’s so fucking nice.

He clears his throat, searching for steady words. “I… he’s the best of us,” Pete murmurs. “He deserved to win. Had to keep him around.”

Ginnie smiles faintly through the tears, brushing her fingers across Ray’s knuckles. “Yeah,” she whispers. “He really is the best of us all.”

Pete nods, watching her, feeling something twist and settle in his chest all at once. The air feels too full, the walls too close. He clears his throat again, his voice coming out rough. “I’m… I’m gonna grab some breakfast. Lord knows I can’t sit still for long now, um… would you want anything, Ms. Garraty?”

She looks up at him, startled by the offer, then shakes her head gently. “Oh, no… that’s quite alright. Thank you, though.”

Pete nods once more, lifts himself into the wheelchair, and wheels toward the door. He doesn’t look back.

Truth be told, he doesn’t want breakfast. He just needs air. Needs space. Needs to get out from under the weight of all that love and grief pressing against his ribs.

It’s too much. Too many big emotions for one body that’s already carrying too much.

He blinks back the guilt and grief clawing up his throat, swallows it hard, and forces himself to breathe. The air feels thick in his lungs, but moving—doing something—helps.

So he wheels himself around the hospital. No destination. Just motion.

It’s strange, watching people live.

The nurses rushing past with clipboards. A kid in a cast laughing as his dad pushes him down the hall. Two orderlies arguing good-naturedly over the radio playing too loud.

Life.
Noise.
Movement.

God knows he needs some of that.

Eventually, he drifts into the cafeteria. The smell of burnt coffee and sugar hits him like a memory of simpler days. He buys himself a cup of tea—lukewarm but better than nothing—and grabs a cookie from the counter. It’s stale, dry, but he eats it anyway, because it feels like something normal people do.

When he looks at the clock, he realizes he’s managed to roam for nearly an hour. A miracle, really.

On his way back toward the room, he spots them—April and Ginnie—standing near the end of the hallway. Their voices are low, hurried, their faces tight with worry. April’s got a chart in her hand, and Ginnie's twisting her hands together like she’s praying again.

Pete slows, squinting. Then his stomach drops, and he wheels a little faster until he’s right beside them.

“Everything okay?” he asks, breath coming uneven.

April hesitates, her lips parting before closing again. “Um… well, Ray’s woken up.”

Pete’s eyes widen instantly. “Wait—really? That’s great!” He can’t stop the rush in his voice. “He’s—he didn’t hurt himself, right?” He’s already turning his chair, wheels squealing a little as he starts toward their room.

But April’s hand lands gently on his shoulder. “Pete—”

Something in her tone stops him cold.

He looks up at her, then at Ginnie, who’s already got her hand over her mouth, her chest shaking with a muffled sob. Fear crawls up his throat, slow and sharp. “What? What’s wrong?” He glances between them, his voice rising. “He’s… he’s fine, right?”

Ginny doesn’t answer—just shakes her head, tears slipping free.

“What’s going on?” Pete demands. “What’s wrong?”

April exhales hard, pinching the bridge of her nose like she’s steadying herself. “Pete… we’ve seen this happen before with trauma patients. The brain works in strange ways when it comes to coping mechanisms, safety responses—there’s still a lot we don’t understand about it, but—”

Pete cuts her off, his voice breaking. “Jesus Christ, just say it!”

April looks up, her eyes glassy, voice low and careful. “He can’t talk.”

Pete blinks once. Then twice. His mouth opens but no sound comes out. “What?”

“Ray,” April says softly, “he can’t—no, he won’t talk. He’s experiencing what we call traumatic mutism. His body’s healing, but his mind…” She trails off, shaking her head. “His mind isn’t ready to.”

The hallway goes still. The sound of distant footsteps, the beep of a monitor behind a wall—it all fades.

Pete’s voice cracks, raw and desperate. “Well then fix him!”

April flinches, taking a step back. “It isn’t that easy, Pete—”

“Like hell it isn’t!” he snaps, his voice echoing down the sterile hall. “I have all the damn money you could possibly need for treatment—specialists, machines, whatever the hell you want, just fix him!”

“Pete!” April’s tone sharpens, breaking through the anger. “This isn’t something that can be cured with a shot or a pill. His brain is in a fragile state—shocked, protecting itself. Until it believes he’s safe again, until it decides it’s ready…”

Pete’s voice drops to a whisper. “He won’t… talk.”

April’s silence is confirmation enough. She just nods.

And that’s when Pete’s world detonates quietly—like glass cracking beneath the weight of something it can’t hold. Because all he knows of Ray is his voice.
The rambling. The sarcasm. The small talk about nothing that meant everything.

Ray’s voice became the sound of living.

And now, in a world already emptied of mercy—
it’s gone.

Chapter Text

It’s mile thirty-five, and Ray thinks Pete has pretty eyes.

It’s a thought that leaves him pretty quickly— or at least, he tells himself it does. But it’s hard when Pete’s right there. Always.

The sun’s sinking low, spilling gold across the asphalt, and Pete catches it like he was born to. His skin glows bronze, his eyes burn amber, and for a second Ray swears the gods themselves would stop to watch him.

It's makes him think of a story his dad once told, very illegal teachings, but an important story with an important message that didn't follow societal laws. It's a memory that sticks like the taste of smoke in his throat—something about Achilles and Patroclus.

Some called them brothers. Others, lovers. But no one who ever spoke of them denied the bond that bound them—the way one’s heart beat in the rhythm of the other’s steps.

Achilles, the half-god son of Thetis, was born to be extraordinary. Stronger, faster, more beautiful than any man alive, and doomed by it too. His mother tried to cheat death by dipping him in the River Styx, holding him by the heel, but all it did was make him half-immortal and half-vulnerable. A boy destined to be remembered for the way he died.

And then there was Patroclus—quiet, thoughtful, gentle in all the ways Achilles was fierce. An exile, a boy who didn’t belong anywhere, until Achilles claimed him.

They trained together. Slept under the same furs. Fought side by side. And somewhere between boyhood and the battlefield, their souls twined.

When Patroclus went to war wearing Achilles’ armor, he wasn’t chasing glory. He just couldn’t bear to see Achilles hurt. He went to protect the world for him—and died for it.

And Achilles—Achilles, who could slay armies—fell to his knees and wept. He didn’t eat. Didn’t sleep. Didn’t breathe. He took Patroclus’ body and held it like something sacred, like his own heart had been carved out and laid before him. And then, when grief turned to fire, he went back to battle—not for honor, not for kings, but for love. He slaughtered Hector, the man who killed Patroclus, and dragged his corpse through the dirt until rage hollowed him out completely.

When his own death came, he didn’t fight it. He lay down beside Patroclus in the ashes, and the gods—perhaps out of pity, perhaps out of awe—let their names be carved into the same tomb.

Together in death, as they were in life.

Ray swallows hard, the story echoing through his chest like a pulse. Achilles and Patroclus. Two souls bound in a world that never gave them mercy. Two boys who loved too deeply and were punished for it.

He glances sideways at Pete—at the curve of his mouth, the soft line of his jaw, the stubborn tilt of his head—and something in him aches.

He sees it now—how easy it is.
Him, Achilles.
Pete, Patroclus.

It fits too well.

Pete, with his calm steadiness, the quiet strength that pulls Ray back from the edge every damn time. And him, burning himself alive for a cause that will never save him.

His Achilles’ heel isn’t flesh. It’s vengeance. It’s the rage that keeps him walking long after his soul’s gone tired.

And Pete—Pete’s the one who steadies him, the one he’d go to for guidance, for truth, for something that still feels human. But Achilles’ story doesn’t end with mercy. It ends with an arrow.

Ray knows that if Pete falls first—and deep down, he’s certain he will—then he’ll be the one left standing. And he’ll follow the path Achilles did. He’ll kill the Major. He’ll make it right. And when it’s done, when the smoke clears, he’ll fall too.

Maybe to heaven, maybe to hell. Maybe just to wherever Pete went.

Fuck, he’s thinking too much again. Dependant asshole. He shakes his head, searching for a distraction.

“You know the Trojan War?” he blurts.

Pete glances over, brows pinched. “Uh… no? Should I?”

Ray almost smiles. He wants to tell him how his dad taught him everything he knows about it, but the words catch in his throat. He swallows them down though. It's too soon to open up about Fathers.

“The Greeks fought the Trojans for years. The Greeks couldn’t win, so they built this massive wooden horse, pretended it was a peace offering. A gift. The Trojans thought they’d won, thought it was a symbol of surrender, so they dragged the thing inside their gates.”

Pete squints. “And let me guess, it wasn’t a gift?”

Ray smiles faintly. “Yeah. It wasn’t. It was a trick. Greek soldiers were hidden inside. When Troy was asleep, they came out, opened the gates, and burned the whole city to the ground.”

Pete whistles low. “Hell of a bedtime story, Ray. What made you think of that?”

Ray takes a breath, the air sharp in his chest. “I think that’s us, Pete. We’re Troy. And the Major—the State, the Squad—they’re the Greeks. They weren't winning, until they were. Until they now are. They hate us, but they give us this gift, this ‘chance.’ This Walk. They make it sound like victory. Riches. Freedom. A wish.”

He swallows, voice softening. “And we take it. We let it in. Even though we know it’s going to destroy us. We take it anyway, because they made us believe it’s ours.”

Pete’s quiet for a while. The only sound is the steady rhythm of their footsteps—thud, thud, thud—against the wet road. The sky’s turning amber and pink, the clouds burning slow.

“It’s just weird, isn’t it?” he says suddenly, breaking the silence.

Pete glances at him, brows lifted. “What is?”

“That we’re here,” Ray says, voice soft, almost wondering. “Accepting something we know is… well, this.” He gestures down the endless road.

Pete hums, a small sound of amusement in his chest. “You’re quite the smart lad, aren’t you, Ray?”

Ray huffs out a laugh, ducking his head. The compliment lands heavier than it should. He looks away—first at the clouds, then back at Pete, then to the clouds again.

Cinnamon and almond.
Charcoal and cedarwood.

“It’s just…” Ray murmurs. “I want it to be different. I want to make a change.”

Pete turns his head slightly. “And how would you do that, Ray?”

Ray swallows hard. He wants to tell him everything—about his father, about the wish, about what he’s planning to do if he wins. He wants to, but he can’t. That’s his Achilles’ heel. His secret. His undoing.

So he shakes his head and says, “I just know I can.”

Pete sighs, not unkindly. “That sounds naive.”

“Then it’s naive,” Ray mutters, jaw tight.

Pete shakes his head, a faint smile tugging at his lips. “No. That makes you just like Troy. Wouldn't you want to not be Troy?”

Ray frowns, the words landing heavy. “I’m not… I’m trying not to be Troy. I'm trying to be like the Greeks. Find a way to change things. To win. We keep losing and losing and losing and I've found the Trojan Horse. You just gotta trust me.”

Pete hums again, eyes on the horizon. “I think the heat’s gotten to you, Ray.”

“You’re not listening!” Ray snaps, voice rising, the strap of his backpack trembling in his hand.

“I am listening,” Pete says evenly. “I just think it’s naive—and frankly dangerous—to think like that, man. I don’t know much about Greeks or Trojans. I know about the gods and their stories—Achilles, Apollo, all that—from the songs and old poems here and there. But the details?” He shakes his head. “That’s your world, not mine.”

Ray looks at him, lips parting, some mix of anger and longing sitting in his chest.

Pete’s voice drops lower, gentler. “I don’t want to be Troy. Or a Greek god. I just want…” He trails off, looking at Ray with that soft, steady gaze that always undoes him. “I just want you to keep walking, Ray.”

Ray skips a step, before he mutters, “I am gonna keep walking… I just thought—” He stops himself, huffs a quiet laugh, shaking his head. “Never mind. It’s stupid. That was stupid.”

Pete’s voice comes fast, sharper than he means it to. “No! No, I’m not—sorry, I’m not trying to embarrass you.”

Ray glances over, uncertain, and Pete speeds his pace a little just to get back in line with him. “It’s just…” He exhales, running a hand through his hair. “You’re really smart, Ray. Not just with the history stuff, but… how you see things. The world. The people in it.”

Ray blinks at him, confused but quiet, his hands crossing over his chest, tightening around his backpack straps.

“I mean it,” Pete says, his voice softer now. “Your ideas about the Walk—about why we sign up, about how they trick us into thinking it’s worth something… I don’t know, it’s smart as hell. I just—” He cuts himself off, biting the inside of his cheek. “I just don’t want you doing something idiotic for heroism or whatever. You know? No one’s worth that kind of end.”

Ray looks down at his feet, his throat working as he swallows. The road hums beneath them, endless, the sound of their boots keeping time with the setting sun.

After a long moment, he says quietly, “Yeah… I know.”

But he doesn’t.
He can’t.

Pete doesn’t see it—the pull in his chest, the voice in his head whispering his father’s name, the promise that still burns behind his ribs. Pete doesn’t understand that it’s not heroism he’s chasing. It’s justice.

Ray looks down at the road, at the scuffed toes of his boots, then at Pete—his gold-lit skin, his soft brown eyes, his mouth that always speaks like it’s afraid of breaking something fragile.

Ray swallows, forces the words back down where they belong.

“Yeah,” he says again, quieter this time, eyes fixed ahead. “You don’t have to worry about me.”

He lies through his teeth and keeps walking.

When Ray wakes up, he tastes guilt.

It sits heavy on his tongue—metallic, sour, familiar in a way that makes his stomach twist. He doesn’t know how to explain it, doesn’t know why it’s there, but it is.

His eyes blink open slow, heavy with sleep, the world swimming into focus one blurry shape at a time. He tries to lift his hands, to rub the confusion away—but they don’t move.

His brow furrows. He tries again. Nothing.

A flash of fear sparks through his chest. His breathing quickens.

Why can’t he move his arms?

He blinks faster now, eyes darting to the sides, trying to make sense of the shadows and shapes around him. His heart kicks up, pounding against his ribs, too loud, too hard.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

The sound slices through the air, steady at first, then louder, sharper, relentless.

No.

No, no, no.

It’s a warning. He’s sure of it. Three warnings.

He’s gonna die.

The thought slams into him, and panic tears up his throat like fire. He tries to move, to stand, to run—but he’s trapped. The breath in his chest turns ragged, shallow. He can’t breathe, can’t think.

They’re coming for me.
They’re gonna shoot me.
I stopped walking. I stopped walking.

And then—hands.

On his cheeks.

He flinches hard, a sob choking out of him. No, no, he doesn’t want that—he doesn’t want Pete’s hands on him, doesn’t want this to be the moment, doesn’t want this to be goodbye.

But the hands don’t leave. They’re warm. Gentle. The thumbs stroke softly over his skin. He forces his eyes to focus through the tears, the blur, the confusion.

And when the world finally comes into view—it’s not Pete.

It’s mom.

Momma.

“Hey, baby,” she whispers, voice cracking with relief. “You’re safe. You’re okay.”

He jerks his head away, ripping her hands off his face, breath coming fast and uneven. His eyes dart everywhere—ceiling, walls, the window, the IV in his arm. White. Bright. Not the road.

No asphalt. No sky. No rain.

What the fuck—

His pulse hammers in his ears. He doesn’t understand. He can’t understand.

Where’s the crowd? Where’s Pete?

He looks down—his legs under a blanket, not moving, not walking— and his heart splits open.

Oh God. Oh God, no.

He stepped off. He stepped off the pavement. He can feel it—the panic rising like fire, the realization clawing at his chest. He already got his three warnings. This is it. He’s gonna get shot. They’re gonna line up their rifles and—

Tears rush down his face, hot and silent. His throat tightens until he can’t breathe, his body trembling, shaking, trying to move, to run, anything but stay here all silent.

He opens his mouth. Tries to say something. Anything.

I love you.
I’ll miss you.
I’m sorry.
Please don’t let me die.

But nothing comes out.

No sound. No words. Just air. His lips move, but it’s useless. His voice is gone—lost somewhere deep inside his ribs, where the fear lives now.

His mother’s voice is shaking, breaking. “Ray, sweetie—no, no, you’re safe. You’re safe, honey, you’re okay.”

He shakes his head hard, tears spilling faster. No. She doesn’t understand. He’s not safe. They’re coming. They always come.

She starts humming.

That lullaby.

The one he hasn’t heard in so fucking long. Not since before his dad was shot, before the house stopped feeling like home, before everything went quiet except for grief.

The sound cracks him open.

Tears spill down his cheeks faster, faster than he can even process why. He reaches for her—tries to lift his arms, to pull her close, to bury his face in her chest like he used to when he was small—but something stops him.

A tug. A sharp resistance.

His breath stumbles. He looks down—and freezes.

White elastic cuffs. Around both wrists. Fastened to the frame of the bed.

His breathing spikes again, wild and uneven. His eyes dart to his chest—bandages, thick and clean and wrong, wrapped tight around his torso, over the ribs, down to his stomach. The sight hits him like a punch, and the pain catches up with it all at once. A deep, burning ache that rises, spreads, devours.

His mind races—What happened? What the fuck happened?! Why can’t I move?! Why can’t I talk?! Why—

“It’s okay, baby,” she whispers, leaning close, thumb brushing his cheek. “You’re okay. You’re safe. You’re home, baby.”

Home.

The word barely registers.

She presses her forehead to his and breathes slow—deep, measured breaths—and he tries to follow, to match the rhythm.

“In,” she whispers. “Breathe in.”

He sucks in a jagged breath, his body trembling.

“Now out.”

He exhales, tears falling onto her arm.

“That’s it,” she says. “You’re back in Freeport, sweetheart. You’re safe now. You’re home.”

But if he’s home—

That means…

That means he won.

And if he won—

Pete.

His stomach drops, the realization slicing through him like glass. His pulse spikes, his chest tightening until it hurts to breathe. He looks around the room wildly, vision blurring.

No. No. No. That fucking idiot.

That fucking, selfish, idiot.

Flashes hit him—sharp, disjointed, blinding.

Pete’s eyes in the rain. Pete’s voice—Darling. Pete, dropping to one knee, smiling through the storm. Pete, taking the warning that should’ve been his.

No.

No, no, no, no, no.

He jerks against the restraints, the bed rattling, his wrists burning under the elastic. Pain stabs through his abdomen and he gasps, biting down hard on his tongue to stop the sound that won’t come anyway.

His mother’s voice cuts through the panic, trembling but gentle.

“Ray, baby, please sit still. I know you’re confused, but you’re safe, sweetheart, you’re safe. You’re hurting yourself.”

He doesn’t stop.

His mind’s screaming. He can’t stop searching, scanning the room as if Pete might suddenly appear in the doorway with that stupid half-smile.

“Ray,” she whispers again, and then she’s closer—her hands fumbling with the restraints, unfastening one, then the other.

The second his wrists are free, his hands fly to his chest—first pressing against it, trying to calm the frantic beating, and then—

His dog tag.

It’s gone.

His fingers fumble over the bandages, searching, clawing almost, but it isn’t there. The panic floods back in, hot and suffocating. He feels the tears burn behind his eyes again, and his throat convulses.

“Shhh,” his mom whispers, and she starts humming again. That same lullaby. 

And something inside him breaks quietly, completely.

He reaches for her, hands shaking, clutching at her shoulders like she’s the last thing tethering him to the world.

And she holds him.

Finally, after everything—after miles and bullets and ghosts—his mother’s arms wrap around him again.

His mother kisses his forehead—soft, trembling—and hums against his skin. The vibration of her voice settles somewhere deep inside him, grounding him just enough for her to pull back.

Ray blinks through the blur, forcing air into his lungs. He looks around the room. The white walls. The faint smell of antiseptic. The beep, beep, beep of the monitor beside him.

His mother.

And then—

The bed beside his.

He stares at it. The shape, the space. Almond and cedarwood. Cinnamon and charcoal.

His throat tightens, and he swallows hard, pressing a hand against the bandages on him. His fingers twitch, and he points to his throat, desperate for something, anything to help.

“You need water?” his mom whispers.

He nods fast, eyes wide.

She kisses his forehead again and brushes her thumb over his cheek. “Okay, baby. I’ll go get the nurse, and some water, yeah? I’m so glad you’re awake, sweetheart. Oh, I love you so much.”

She lingers there for a second, like she doesn’t want to leave him, and he doesn’t want her to either. But she does—finally, reluctantly—and slips out the door.

The silence that follows is heavy. Too heavy. It’s just him now. Him and the soft hum of the machines.

He stares hard at the empty bed beside him, chest tight, brain fogged. He tries to piece it together—to remember the road, the rain, Pete’s voice—but everything’s fuzzy, out of reach. His stomach burns. His feet ache. His head feels like it’s full of broken glass.

Inhale. Exhale.

He forces the rhythm, tries to match it to the monitor’s steady beeping. But then the door opens again, and he flinches hard, fingers gripping the bed frame until his knuckles go white.

Two figures step in. His mother and someone else.

Ray’s breath quickens. Scrubs. Not a uniform. Not military. He relaxes by inches, though the tremor in his hands stays.

His mom comes over, holding a cup, and lifts it carefully to his lips. “Here, baby. Slow, okay?”

He drinks greedily, water spilling from the corners of his mouth, running down his chin.

“Good morning, Ray,” the woman says softly. “How are you feeling?”

He stares at her, blank and guarded.

She smiles, trying for gentle. “I can understand that.” She glances at his mother, then back at him. “Glad to see you awake, though. I’m April. I’ve been one of your night nurses. You actually woke up right before my shift ended—guess that’s a small miracle, huh?”

Ray blinks once, twice, and gives a slow nod. His head hurts too much to do more.

April hums, flipping open a clipboard. “Alright, Ray. Can you tell me your date of birth?”

He frowns, confused. Of course he knows his birthday. He isn’t stupid. He opens his mouth—but stops.

He doesn’t want to talk. Doesn’t want to try. He just wants to walk. Walk and walk and walk until he finds the others. The boys. Pete.

Where are the boys?

April’s brow creases. “Okay… how about your full name, Ray? Can you tell me that?”

He opens his mouth again—his jaw trembles with effort—and then he closes it. He shakes his head.

April straightens, softens her expression, and steps toward him. “Ray?” she says gently. “I need to know you’re okay. I know it’s been… a rough few days. A rough week, really.” Her voice catches for a moment, but she steadies it. “We just want to make sure nothing happened to your brain while you were out, alright?”

Ray blinks up at her, eyes heavy and unfocused, a small huff leaving his chest. He doesn’t know how to answer, doesn’t even want to.

April hesitates, then exhales quietly and hands him a clipboard, and a pen. She sets them carefully in his lap. “Would you be willing to write for me instead?” she asks. “Just your date of birth, your full name, maybe a few facts about yourself… and the last thing you remember. Can you do that for me, Ray?”

He stares at the paper for a long moment. The pen feels heavy in his fingers. His hand shakes once before steadying.

'10 / 30 / 1953'
'Raymond David Garraty'

'No siblings
20 years old
Has widowed mother.'

'The Walk with Pete getting down on one knee.'

And then—below it, pressed into the paper so deep it nearly tears—

'Where is Pete?'

He stares at the words, breathing hard. Then he underlines Pete twice. Again. Harder this time.

April reaches forward, and takes the clipboard from his lap. Her eyes skim over the page—his handwriting uneven, pressed hard enough that the words bleed through the back.

“Okay…” she murmurs, nodding slowly. “Okay, that’s good, Ray. That’s real good.”

But Ray doesn’t relax. He points at his chest—then jabs his finger toward the clipboard, over and over, his lips moving soundlessly. 'Where is Pete?'

April hesitates, and something flickers behind her eyes. She clears her throat. “Pete’s okay, dear, I promise. He just went for a little stroll, I think.”

Ray freezes. Then glares.

Pete? On a stroll?

The fuck kind of lie is that?

He looks down at the bandages across his torso, the white wrappings rising and falling with every shaky breath, and the flashes come back— rain pounding against his face, the weight of him dragging down,
Pete pulling, screaming soundlessly, the echo of gunfire—shots.

He jerks upright, his breathing fast and uneven, heart monitor spiking in rhythm with his panic. Beep-beep-beep-beep—

“Hey—hey, Ray,” April says quickly, stepping closer. “You’re okay, you hear me? You and Pete are both okay.” Her voice is soft but firm, “You’re just bruised up, a little banged around, but you’re safe now. You’re safe here.”

Safe.

He shakes his head violently, eyes wild. His hand shoots out, grabbing the clipboard again from her grasp. He slams his finger against the words he wrote before—

'Where is Pete?'

Once. Twice. Three times.

Hard.

April exhales, eyes flicking to the heart monitor, then back to him. “Okay,” she says quietly, trying to steady him, her tone careful, measured. “Okay, Ray. I’ll find Pete for you, alright? I’ll go check. Just—”

She crouches a little so they’re eye level. “Promise me you’ll take deep breaths, yeah? Deep ones. In through your nose, out through your mouth.”

Ray’s hand trembles, but he nods. Once.

“In,” she says softly, breathing with him. “And out.”

He follows, chest still stuttering, but slowing—just barely.

April squeezes his shoulder gently. “Good,” she murmurs. “That’s good, Ray. Just keep breathing. I’ll be right back.”

He watches them share a look—April and his mom—something wordless but heavy, and then they’re both gone. The door clicks softly shut, and the quiet that follows is unbearable.

Ray stares at the cup on the tray for a long time before reaching for it with trembling hands. He brings it to his lips, the water sloshing against the rim, and takes a few shallow sips. It’s warm now. Tastes like metal.

He sets it down and clears his throat.

He opens his mouth.

But, nothing.

The air catches. His chest tightens.

Talking gets you in trouble. Talking means you could get distracted. Talking means you could stop walking. Talking and walking. Talking and walking.

His fingers dig into the sheets. Why isn’t he walking? Why isn’t he talking?

Somewhere, far down the hall, he hears shouting—someone yelling something indistinct—and the sound makes him flinch.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

He squeezes his eyes shut. He’s dreaming. That’s all. This—this isn’t real. He’s still out there. Still walking. Still trying to make it to the next mile. Pete’s there, always there, yelling at him to keep going, to move, to breathe.

He rubs hard at his eyes, willing himself to wake up.
When that doesn’t work, he smacks his temple with his palm once, twice, again—

The door opens.

And—

Pete.

His Pete.

Cinnamon and charcoal. Almond and cedarwood.

It’s like the air itself exhales. His whole body floods with relief and confusion all at once.

He's already fighting the sheets, trying to pull the IV from his arm, desperate to get up, to touch him, to make sure he’s real—to walk, just walk, walk and hold and move.

But then—he freezes.

Pete’s… in a wheelchair.

Why is Pete in a wheelchair?

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Pete says quickly, voice rough but kind. He wheels himself closer, hand out. “Slow down, big guy. You’re fine. I’m fine. But no walking for you for a while, yeah?”

Ray’s breaths come in sharp bursts as Pete reaches out, palm firm against his chest, easing him gently back against the pillow.

“Hey,” Pete murmurs. “Easy.”

Ray stares at him, wide-eyed, and the world tilts again. Pete looks tired, but alive. 

Alive.

Pete smiles faintly—trying, maybe, to make him laugh—and says, “Wasn’t expecting you to be in the mood to walk so soon, though.”

Ray opens his mouth to say something—anything—but the words don’t come.

He looks at Pete, then down at himself. The bandages across his torso, thick and stained faintly at the edges. His body foreign, broken, stopped.

Pete sits there—alive, solid, in that damn wheelchair—and it hits him all at once, the weight of it. The memory of the rain. The sound of gunfire. The moment Pete went down. The moment he went down.

It shouldn’t have ended like this.

His throat burns. His jaw tightens.  He blinks hard, but the tears keep coming anyway, hot and angry and humiliating.

Pete shifts slightly in the chair, frowning. “Hey,” he says softly. “You’re alright, Ray. No need to get angry at yourself, trust me.” He lets out a small, humorless laugh, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Hell, I probably wouldn’t be talking either if I was shot twice.”

The words hang in the air like smoke.

Ray’s eyes snap to him— to the steady rise and fall of Pete’s chest, to the strength still sitting in his shoulders, to the calm in his voice.

He looks down at the bandages again, trembling, and something in him breaks.

The sob that leaves him is raw and unrestrained, ugly, gasping, his whole body shaking with it. He tries to hide his face, but there’s nowhere to go. No road. No Walk. No distance between them anymore.

Just this room, this moment. And it matters. It fucking matters.

It’s mile one hundred and eighteen.

The last light is slipping out of the sky, all bruised purple and fading gold, and Ray’s thinking. God, he’s thinking.

Pete’s queer.

That’s all that’s lived in his head for the last eight miles. Eight whole miles of silence and footsteps and heartbeat.

Pete—beautiful, broad-shouldered, steady-voiced Pete —is queer.

No. No, queer isn’t the right word, is it?

He flinches at the thought. The word feels sharp, wrong, like a rock in his shoe he can’t shake loose. Is it judgmental? He doesn’t know. He’s trying not to be. He’s trying to think of what his father might’ve said once about that kind of thing—about people loving differently—but all that comes back is Sunday School.

“Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.”
Leviticus 18:22.

He bites hard at his lip, remembering that little white church, the fan blades slow overhead, the preacher’s voice rising like thunder when he talked about sin and lust and hellfire. He’d been what—ten? Maybe eleven?
Too young to understand anything but the fear.

He knows his father talked about it, though. He’s sure he did. His father hated the church by the end, saw through the lies in its sermons, but Ray—Ray’s mind has never been that cleanly divided.

He looks at Pete now, the shape of him caught in the fading light. Almond and charcoal, Ray thinks absently.
He wonders what sin tastes like when it looks that kind.

He clears his throat, hesitating before whispering,
“So… you’re queer?”

Pete’s shoulders tense instantly. He glances over, then shushes him—sharp, low, panicked.

Ray bites his lip again, stung. His eyes drop to the road, to Pete’s boots, then—inevitably—to Pete’s mouth.

“Pete?” he whispers again.

Pete sighs through his nose, fastening his pace, as if speed might outrun the question. Ray hurries a few steps to catch up, keeping his voice quiet.

“I’m not trying to be rude by it,” Ray says. “I just— I’m genuinely asking. Is that how you’d… describe yourself?”

Pete looks at him, eyes shadowed but steady, and murmurs, “Queer means odd and strange, Ray. That’s how the church uses it. That’s how they make it sound—wrong. Why do you think Barkovitch throws it around the way he does? It’s meant to hurt. It’s meant to make you feel less than others, to feel odd.”

He shrugs once, eyes back on the horizon. “But sure, Ray—if that’s the word you want to use, then—”

“No,” Ray blurts, shaking his head quickly. “That’s not—” He exhales, frustrated. “You know that kind of… that kind of talk’s banned now. The books, the articles—everything. I just…” His voice softens. “I just don’t know what else to call it. I never learned.”

Ray watches Pete’s shoulders rise high again—tight, guarded, like a dog waiting for the next kick—before Pete grits out, “This some kinda test? You mocking me or something?”

Ray blinks. “What? No—why would I?”

Pete throws him a look, jaw hard. “You. This… philosopher, or whatever. You’re more brains than not, and you’re telling me you don’t know what—” He stops himself, swallows, shakes his head. “Why are you making a fool out of me?”

Ray’s heart stutters. “I’m not,” he says quickly, reaching out and grabbing Pete’s shoulder before he can pull away. “I swear, Pete, I ain’t doing that. It’s just—” His throat feels tight. “It’s illegal. You know that stuff is. Anything on…” He grits his teeth, forcing the words out. “The queer. It’s banned.”

“Because it’s wrong,” he mutters. “That’s what society thinks, so just—leave it at that.”

But Ray doesn’t. He can’t. He shakes his head, breath hitching with something that feels like desperation. “If I’m gonna die, Pete… I want to know. I want to learn while I still can.”

The silence between them stretches, taut and fragile. Pete’s jaw works, the line of his scar catching the dim light as he looks anywhere but at Ray. And Ray—he wants to reach out. Wants to press a finger against that scar, trace it down to his jaw, say something to make it ease. But he doesn’t.

Pete finally exhales through his nose, quiet but firm.
“Gay,” he whispers.

Ray frowns. “What?”

Pete looks at him now, really looks. “That’s the word,” he says. “Gay.”

Ray blinks once, twice. “As in… happy? From the Old French word gai?”

Pete stares for a beat, then huffs a half-laugh—low, resigned. “Of course you know that,” he mutters, shaking his head. “Yeah, Ray. Gay as in happy.”

Ray studies him for a second, trying to make sense of it. The way Pete’s shoulders ease just slightly when he says it. The way his voice trembles like he’s still not used to hearing himself say it aloud.

“Oh,” Ray says finally, voice soft. “Well… that’s nice.”

Pete narrows his eyes slightly, voice careful. “You aren’t takin’ the piss out of me, are you?”

Ray shakes his head instantly, his voice a rough whisper. “No… I—” He exhales, searching for words that don’t sound stupid. His thumb moves absently up and down Pete’s shoulder, the motion small, almost nervous. “You didn’t have to tell me,” he says softly. “But you did. That means something. You trust me, and I trust you.” He pauses, swallows hard. “So… thank you. For telling me.”

Pete just looks at him then—really looks—and Ray feels that gaze in his ribs, in his throat. It’s too much, too close, so he drops his hand, clears his throat, and busies himself pulling his backpack off.

Without saying anything, he holds it out to Pete. Pete blinks, surprised, but takes it anyway. Gentle as ever. The sweetheart he is.

Ray smiles a little, before untying the jacket from around his waist. As he’s tugging one arm through the sleeve, Pete asks, “Do you believe in God, Garraty?”

Ray looks up, one arm caught in the sleeve. “What?”

Pete tilts his head, expression unreadable. “God. You believe in Him?”

Ray slips his arm free, looking at Pete with a faint, wary squint. “My mom believes in God, yeah. She sings hymns, does prayers before dinner every night. Always has. But my dad? He wasn’t much of a believer. Maybe he was when I was little, but once I hit my teens, he sort of stopped. Became more of a philosophy and science kinda guy.”

Pete nods slowly, waiting. “And you?” he asks after a beat. “Do you believe in God?”

Ray finishes pulling on the other sleeve, taking back his backpack when Pete offers it. He sets it on his shoulders, then shrugs Pete’s pack off him too so Pete can get his own jacket on.

“I went to church when I was little,” Ray says after a moment. “Every Sunday till I was twelve or so. Then I outgrew all my nice clothes and was still too small for Dad’s. Couldn’t exactly show up in pajamas—Mom said that’d be mocking the Lord.” He smiles faintly at the memory. “So I just… stopped going.”

Pete buttons his jacket up halfway, glancing sideways. “You didn’t answer the question, Ray.”

Ray sighs, his eyes fixed on the long stretch of road ahead. “Because I don’t know if there’s an answer to give,” he says quietly.

Pete tilts his head, eyes flicking toward him. “No?” he asks quietly.

Ray exhales through his nose. “I don’t—”

Before he can finish, a raindrop hits his cheek. Then another. He looks up and sighs, muttering, “Aw, hell, man. Really?”

Pete doesn’t say anything at first, just tilts his face up toward the sky like he’s testing how bad it’ll get. He looks steady even when everything else is falling apart, and that—God help him—somehow makes Ray’s chest ache.

He tries to focus on the rain instead, the rhythm of it. The way it hits the asphalt in quiet little bursts. But his thoughts don’t stay quiet. They never do.

“I guess I believe someone created us,” he says, voice low enough it barely makes it past the rain. He’s not sure why he’s saying it—maybe the drizzle makes confession easier. “I mean, I don’t think we just… appeared.”

Pete hums beside him, a sound that could mean anything. Go on. Or I’m listening. Or maybe just keep walking.

“So yeah,” Ray continues, fiddling with his buttons, moving forward, “I think there’s a God. Someone upstairs running things, creating everything. But…” He pauses, glancing down at his boots. “I don’t live the godly way, Pete. Not really. If you knew the things I’ve thought—” he swallows hard—“the things I’ve wanted, the things I still want… they’re not what a good man’s supposed to think about.”

He laughs under his breath, but it’s hollow. “So maybe I believe in God, but I just ain’t religious. I don’t know. I don’t pray. I don’t… deserve to, probably.”

The rain gets heavier, and Ray tugs his jacket closer around himself. 

“It scares me, though,” he admits. “Not knowing for sure. When I know there’s a chance I could die out here. Where do I go after that? Is there something after? Or do I just…” He gestures vaguely toward the horizon. “Disappear?”

Pete’s still beside him, silent, watching the road.
Ray looks at him—the calm lines of his face, his nice eyes—and thinks that if there’s a God, He sure as hell didn’t make something this human, this flawed, this beautiful just to let it vanish.

“I just hope it’s a nice place,” Ray murmurs, almost to himself. “Maybe I believe in Him. Or maybe I just like the idea of Him. Maybe it’s easier than thinking we’ve always existed, ‘cause that’s something people can’t really grasp, can they? Forever?”

He’s talking too much, thinking too much. He doesn’t want Pete to see what’s really behind his words—the fear, the doubt, the small, secret hope that heaven might look like a warm kitchen and a voice humming hymns. That maybe Pete would be there too, smiling like he does when Ray finally says something worth hearing.

He clears his throat, trying to bury it all. “I’m tired,” he mutters. “Think I’m gonna doze off for a bit.”

Pete’s hand finds his shoulder, firm but gentle, keeping him steady as they walk. “Yeah,” he says softly. “You do that, Ray.”

Ray lets his head fall forward, his eyelids flutter, the world narrowing to rain and footsteps and the steady heat of Pete’s hand anchoring him upright.

God or no God, he still thinks Pete's made out of all things kind and perfect.

Ray feels stupid for being embarrassed, but he is.
Embarrassed, frustrated, restless.

Traumatic mutism.

That’s what April called it, all soft-voiced and careful, like she was handling something fragile. Like she didn’t want to set him off.

Sounds like a load of bull to him. All of it does.

He doesn’t feel broken. He just feels… trapped. Like every word is there, jammed somewhere between his ribs and throat, and no matter how hard he pushes, nothing comes out. They keep saying he’s safe, that he needs to rest, that he’s home, but home doesn’t feel like this.

They just need to let him and Pete go.

Let them walk.

Who would’ve thought he’d want to keep walking after all this time? Certainly not him. But now, lying here in this too-white room, with the air smelling of bleach and quiet, he’d give anything for the road. The ache, the dust, the rhythm of boots against pavement. It’s better than this—this stillness that feels like dying with your eyes open.

It isn’t until his mother and April leave that his face finally falls. The polite, empty smile collapses, leaving nothing but the tired, raw truth underneath. He looks at Pete—sitting there in that damn wheelchair like some kind of ghost of the man he was—and he feels something crack open in his chest.

He reaches out and hits Pete’s arm. Hard.

Pete flinches. “Hey! Jesus, I knew you had an arm on you from baseball, but ow!” He rubs at the spot, trying to smile, but Ray doesn’t. He just keeps staring—silent, sharp, unblinking.

Pete shifts a little under the weight of it. “What?”

Pete’s still rubbing his arm when Ray suddenly looks at the door, then back at him, then the door again. He grabs the IV line, tugging hard at it, and Pete shoots forward, catching his wrist.

“Nope,” Pete says quickly, voice firm. “Nope, nope, nope. Sorry, Ray, but you’re staying right here.”

Ray glares at him—hard—and points between them, then toward the door. Pete furrows his brows, watching the gestures like he’s trying to solve a puzzle.

“What?” Pete asks. “Ray, what’re you—”

Ray exhales through his nose, frustration sharp and loud, and uses two fingers to mimic walking against the sheet.

Pete’s mouth parts slightly, like the realization hurts. “No, Ray. We’re done walking. Just like April and your mom said—we both won.”

Ray’s jaw tightens. He repeats the gesture—harder this time—two fingers pounding into the blanket like the rhythm of boots on asphalt.

Pete’s voice drops low. “I know you’re confused. I’d be too, waking up like…” He gestures faintly toward Ray’s bandaged stomach.

Ray follows his motion, sees the white wrappings stained faint pink where the stitches tug, and his breath catches. He looks away quickly, pressing his lips together until they tremble.

Pete leans forward. “You saved me, Ray. You really fucking saved me.”

The words sting. Saved him. That’s not how Ray remembers it. He remembers bullets. Rain. Darkness.

He grabs the notepad from the bedside and scribbles furiously:

'You. Me. We need to walk. Can’t be two winners.'

He underlines two winners until the paper nearly tears before holding it up, eyes pleading, furious, begging.

Pete shakes his head. “No, Ray. There are two winners. Me and you.”

Ray stares at him, disbelief pulling his face taut. His pulse is pounding, the heart monitor a frantic metronome.

Pete sighs, softer now, weary. “Look, I’ll tell you more about it later, okay? Just… not now. You should rest. You’re safe here.”

Safe. That word again. It feels like a lie every time someone says it.

Ray snatches the paper again and scrawls fast, his handwriting slanted, angry:

'The Major would never allow two winners. That’s rebelling.'

Pete’s eyes darken. “I know it’s rebelling, Ray,” he says quietly. “Trust me, I know. But I’m not ready to talk about what happened. Not yet. It’s… it’s too raw.” He pauses, voice cracking a little. “You’re safe, alright? The Major’s not gonna hurt you. We’ve got money now—he needs us. He can’t touch us.”

Ray blinks, the words barely sinking in.
Money. Safe. We.

He writes slowly this time, the two letters pressed deep into the paper:

'We?'

“Yeah, we,” Pete says gently, nodding toward the notepad. “I told you, Ray. We both won. Which means we’re pretty fucking rich right now.”

Ray just stares at him. Long. Hard. Searching his face for any sign of deceit. Pete’s eyes don’t waver—they’re steady, calm, soft in that way that always makes Ray’s chest ache.

Surely Pete wouldn’t lie to him. Not his Pete.

After a few seconds, Ray exhales and finally nods, scribbling the word down: 'We.'

Pete smiles—relieved, almost proud. “That’s right,” he says. “We. And since we’re rich now, I’ve decided what I’m buying you first.”

Ray raises an eyebrow, curious.

“A baseball,” Pete grins. “A nice one. I can see your hands fidgeting already, Ray.”

Ray blinks and glances down at his lap—and sure enough, his fingers are twisting with the pen and frayed edges of his bandages, tugging at loose threads until they curl. He freezes, sheepish, and looks back up at Pete with a shy half-smile.

He picks up the pen again, the scratching sound soft against the paper.

'What happened to my baseball? Where’s my stuff?'

Pete’s smile falters for a moment, the answer catching on his tongue before he forces a shrug. “Uh… they, uh… they took it. Yours and mine both.” He tries to keep his tone light. “Major said they’re putting them in some museum. You know how they are—always keeping souvenirs from the winning boys. But since…” He pauses. “Well, since there’s two of us now, I guess they wanted everything. It’s… a pretty historical moment, Ray.”

Ray frowns, tapping the pen against the page before writing slowly: 'We’re historical?'

Pete lets out a dry laugh, leaning back in his wheelchair. “Yeah. I’d say so. Unfortunately.” He rubs the back of his neck, eyes flicking toward the door. “Media’s going nuts right now. Whole country’s talking about us. But hey—good thing we’re stuck in here, right? Can’t have interviewers crawling in trying to get a piece of us.”

Ray sets the notepad down, staring at Pete for a long moment. Historical. The word sits heavy in his chest—unreal and wrong.

They aren't supposed to be historically. They're just supposed to keep walking until there's only one.

He grabs the notepad again, his handwriting a little shakier this time, and scrawls a single word across the paper in thick, dark strokes.

'TROY'

He underlines it once. Twice. A third time.

Then he slides it toward Pete, the pen clattering lightly against the floor. Pete looks down at the page for a long, quiet second before lifting his eyes to Ray’s.

And that look—God, that look—makes Ray’s stomach twist.

Because Pete doesn’t understand, not really. He’s looking at Ray with worry and that soft kind of fondness that feels like sunlight, and Ray wants to scream. He wants to shake him and tell him no, you don’t get it, you never will.

He tried to be the Greeks. He really did. He tried to rebel, to plan, to build his Trojan horse and slip it past the gates—to be clever, ruthless, divine in his defiance. But he wasn’t a hero. He never was.

He sees it now.

He wasn’t the Greeks. He was Troy.

He was Troy the whole damn time.

He let the horse in—believed in the promise, believed in the wish, believed in him. And he should’ve known better. Because the gods don’t make heroes out of boys like him. They make ruins.

He looks at Pete again, at the way the light hits the soft curve of his cheek, the scar on his jaw, the faint tremor in his fingers. Patroclus, he thinks, bitter and aching.

He didn’t find a way to win.He found Patroclus instead. And he was wrong. So fucking wrong.

His Achilles heel wasn’t vengeance. It was never vengeance. It was Pete. Always Pete. Always fucking Pete.

He’s just like Troy—foolish and naive enough to believe he could outsmart fate, that he could win, that he could be remembered for something other than burning.

But there was never victory here. There was never glory.

There was only the gun.

The Trojan horse was always the gun. And he, in his arrogance, thought he’d be holding it—not kneeling at its barrel.

Ray swallows hard, his throat burning, his chest tight. He looks down at the notepad again, at that word scrawled across the page—TROY—and feels it settle deep inside him.

That’s all they are now.
That’s all they’ll ever be.

Troy—the fools who thought they’d won, right before the fire took everything.

Chapter Text

It’s mile one hundred and fifty
And he should be thinking about his feet, his breathing, the ache in his thighs. He should be thinking about the line, the pace, the sound of the rifles somewhere in the distance. But he isn’t.

He’s thinking about Ray.

About the way the red in Ray’s hair glows under the sun—like it’s catching fire and oranges and strawberries. It’s not the bright kind of red, not loud or showy. It's the perfect gentle ginger that's making him swoon.

Pete’s never really thought he had a type.

Well—
That’s not true.

He has a type. Or at least, he thought he did. The people he’s been with before—thin builds, dark skin, quick mouths that knew how to make him laugh and how to make him forget. He liked easy warmth.

But Ray—Ray’s something else entirely.

Ray’s built from fire and freckles and a kind of tension that makes Pete’s chest hurt.

He’s got those freckles—tiny constellations scattered across his nose and cheeks, trailing down to his neck. Pete catches himself wondering if they keep going, down his chest, maybe all the way to the sharp line of his ribs.

He shouldn’t be thinking that. God, he really shouldn’t. But he can’t help it.

And his smile—when it comes—is the kind that splits Pete open a little. Upturned and uneven, one tooth slightly crooked, like imperfection decided to make itself home there and define beauty.

Pete wonders what it would be like to kiss him. Not out of hunger, not out of the desperate human need to have something, but just to press his mouth against all that hurt and violence and say 'it’s over, it’s okay.'

He wants to kiss every fear that’s ever made Ray flinch. Every scar he’s ever tried to hide. Every shadow his father’s words ever left behind.

He wants to kiss him like a promise. 

Ray seems to see his stare and breaks the silence first. “I think it was inevitable that we bonded,” he says suddenly, like it’s a passing thought, like he hasn’t just cracked the universe open with a sentence.

Pete looks at him, brows furrowed. “What?”

Ray shrugs, glancing at the horizon, that little half-smile tugging at his mouth. “Yeah. I mean—think about it. We, as humans, we’re social creatures. We crave connection, understanding. Even Adam and Eve—hell, even they formed a bond, right? Sure, God might’ve pulled the strings, but still. They wanted to know each other. That’s what matters, I think. What molds us. Connection.”

Pete stares at him, his words echoing somewhere deep inside him, louder than the steady rhythm of boots and breath.

Pete watches him talk and feels something heavy shift inside him. Because Ray isn’t just beautiful. He’s brilliant. He’s alive in a way Pete hasn’t seen in anyone for years—alive and thoughtful and aching for meaning in a world that’s tried to strip it away.

He’s such a smart fucking man.

And it kills Pete.

Because that mind, that fire, that fierce, restless hunger—it’s being wasted here, on violence and vengeance and pain. Ray sees the world so clearly, all its shapes and injustices, but he’s blinded by anger, trapped in his own need to make it right through ruin.

Pete wants to take that fury from him. He wants to hold it, crush it, dissolve it until all that’s left is the tenderness underneath.

He wants to kiss him to quiet him, to soothe the ache. To make him feel something gentle. He wants to kiss him until the anger melts off his tongue, until it turns into something else—something soft, something like affection.

Ray’s talking again. Of course he is. He’s always talking when the world starts to go quiet.

“I mean, if we really think about it,” he says, gesturing loosely with his baseball like it’s some philosopher’s stone, “isn’t that the reason for existing? Connection. Feeling. If we felt nothing at all, would we even be here?”

Pete hums beside him, half-listening, half-lost in the way the light hits Ray’s hair again—those embers still refusing to die out.

Ray keeps going. “God created love, right? And with love, He created patience. And with patience, He created understanding. If not for that, what would we be? Where would we be?”

Pete grins softly, shaking his head. “Mmhmm, I don’t know, but it sounds like you do believe in Him.”

Ray frowns at that, “Believing doesn’t mean following,” he says. “I mean, think about it, Pete—you were so hesitant to befriend us at the start. But now look at us. Four musketeers.”

Before Pete can reply, Olson snorts from behind them.
“Yeah, and what he saw in us is a load of bullshit.”

Art lets out a low laugh. “Speak for yourself, Olson. I find Pete’s need for connection endearing.”

“Or just queer,” Olson shoots back with a snide grin.

Pete bites hard on his lip at that word and shoves his hands into his jacket pocket, trying to ignore the sting. Ray looks at him and Pete can see the muscle in his jaw tense. 

Ray turns around instantly, eyes narrowing. “Oh, shut it, Olson. You’re always judging.”

Pete looks at Ray. Did he just try and protect me?

Olson shrugs. “What better to do than listen and judge at the end?”

Pete shakes his head, chuckling under his breath. “Maybe learn a thing or two?”

Olson tilts his head, eyes flat. “Why should I learn when I’m gonna die?”

Pete lifts his hands in mock surrender, pointing at Olson and then looking over at Ray with a look that says 'can you believe this guy?'

Ray can’t help it—he laughs.

Pete loves that laugh.

He wants to bottle it, keep it tucked away somewhere safe—like a secret flask he could pull out on bad days and take a sip from. Or better yet, roll it into a cigarette, light it, and smoke it until it’s buried deep in his lungs, until it’s part of him.

Ray’s still smiling when he says, “Regardless, we’re creatures of connection. I mean, I can even connect with you, Olson.”

He slaps Olson on the shoulder.

Olson rolls his eyes. “Oh, fuck off.”

Pete laughs, real and low and warm. The kind that sneaks up on him. Ray grins wider at that, looping an arm around Pete’s shoulders as they walk. The contact is light, almost careless, but it hits Pete like a jolt of warmth.

Ray sighs, “Maybe I’m getting too sentimental, but I just—” He pauses, glancing at Pete, then at Art and Olson ahead. “I like that even though we’re going through this hellish thing, we’re going through it together. It’s much better than doing it alone.”

Pete glances sideways, a small smile tugging at his mouth. “You’re quite the empath, aren’t you, Ray?”

Ray smirks, a little proud, a little shy. “My momma raised me to have a heart.”

Pete’s smile comes easy this time—too easy, maybe. It starts small, then grows until it feels like it could split his face in two. “Yeah? Well, you got a heart, Ray. A really good fucking heart.”

He says it like it’s a secret, like it’s something he’s been sitting on for miles. Then he glances sideways, half teasing, half wistful. “I just wish we met under different circumstances…”

Ray tilts his head, curious, lips twitching. “Yeah? Like how?”

Pete hums, pretending to think, but he already knows. “Maybe you came to one of my shows. Heard me sing.”

Ray lets out a small laugh, shaking his head. “Yeah? And after that?”

Pete’s grin widens. “You came up to me to chat. I bought you a drink. Maybe even shared a dance or two.”

Ray snorts. “I like all that besides the dancing part. I ain’t a dancer.”

Pete chuckles low in his throat, and if he weren’t so damn dark-skinned, Ray would probably see the blush spreading from his neck to his ears. “Oh, I can make you a dancer yet. Like I said before—come on, just go on dancing with me like this forever, sunshine, and I’ll never tire. We’ll scrape our shoes on the stars and hang upside down from the moon.”

Ray stares at him, eyes glinting with that soft gold of dusk, then huffs out a laugh. “Those are some mighty lyrics, Pete.”

Pete shrugs, feigning nonchalance, but the grin lingers anyway. “If we did meet under different circumstances,” he says, voice lowering, “the bars would know your name from lyrics alone.”

Ray looks at him, eyes glinting with something Pete can’t name. “Yeah?”

“Yeah, you’d be the song.”

And there it is—that look. The one that makes Pete feel both seen and skinned alive all at once. The one that makes him wish for things he shouldn’t be wishing for.

Ray laughs again, softer this time, but Pete hears the crack in it, the ache under the sound. He watches the way Ray looks forward after that, drops his shoulder and continues playing with the baseball, eyes somewhere far away down the road, and Pete swallows the lump forming in his throat.

Sure—he had a type.

Or at least, he thought he did. Leaner boys, soft voices, easy smiles. But that was before he met Raymond Garraty.

Now?

Now his eyes only ever seem to find him. Even when he doesn’t mean to—hell, especially when he doesn’t mean to. They just do. Like there’s a compass somewhere buried in his bones that always points toward Ray.

Sure, he had a type once. But that was before Ray.

If the world were fair—if fate had a little mercy left in her—they wouldn’t be walking toward their end.

They’d be dancing. Somewhere under warm lights, with a song and a smile, and Pete would still get to look at him the same way—like he’s the only thing left in the world worth saving.

It’s been a day and a half since Ray woke up, and Pete’s going to lose his fucking mind.

He never thought silence could hurt this much. Not after everything they’ve lived through. Not after the Walk. Not after the gunfire and the blood and the way Ray’s name used to echo in his chest like a heartbeat.

But this—this quiet—feels worse.

He misses Ray’s tangents.

God, he misses them so much it’s embarrassing. He’d give anything to hear him ramble about Troy again—about the Greeks and their gods, or why humanity’s need for connection is proof that we’re divine. He’d take any of it. Even the way Ray used to talk down on himself, that awful little habit Pete hated but would listen to now just to hear him.

Because the silence isn’t peaceful. It’s heavy. Dense. It fills every corner of the room until Pete feels like he’s drowning in it.

Ray’s awake now—fully coherent, aware—and that almost makes it worse. He knows about the two bullet wounds in his side. He knows he shouldn’t even be alive. He knows what happened. What really fucking happened. And Pete can see it in his face—the pain, the disbelief, the anger.

He’s closed off, folded into himself like a locked box. Doesn’t write much anymore. Doesn’t even look at Pete the same way. And Pete can’t take it.

He wheels closer to the edge of the bed, watching Ray trace his fingers over the gauze at his side, wincing at the contact. His jaw is tight, his breath shallow.

“You know, sunshine… you used to talk so damn much I thought I’d go deaf."

Ray doesn’t look up. Just stares at the ceiling, blinking slow.

“I know this is a psychological thing, Ray,” Pete mutters, trying not to sound as desperate as he feels. “But we’re bloody safe, yeah? Obviously if we weren’t, we wouldn’t be here. Obviously if we were meant to keep walking, we’d have gotten three warnings by now and be dead. I just…” His voice falters. He runs a hand through his hair and looks at Ray—really looks at him. “Can you tell me why you won’t talk to me?”

The question leaves his mouth before he can stop it, and the regret hits almost immediately.

Ray’s head jerks toward him, eyes narrowing, his lips pressing into a hard, furious line. He doesn’t need words for Pete to understand that he’s crossed some invisible line. His shoulders tense; his jaw clenches tight. The look he gives Pete could cut steel.

Pete’s breath catches. He’s not sure he’s ever seen Ray that angry before. Not even when Barkovitch ran his mouth. Not even when the Major’s guards raised their rifles.

He wants to take the words back—wants to swallow them whole, shove them down into the pit of his stomach where they can’t do any more damage.

“I didn’t mean—” he starts, hands raised slightly, voice gentling. “I just—Christ, Ray, I didn’t mean to sound like that.”

But Ray’s already turned away, eyes on the wall, his breath coming through his nose sharp and uneven. His fingers twist in the sheets, white-knuckled, and Pete feels that same ugly guilt claw up his throat.

“Forget I said anything, yeah?”

Ray doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink. Doesn’t forgive.

Fucking hell, nice going.

Pete exhales hard through his nose, his hands curl tight around the wheels of the chair as if the motion alone might keep him from unraveling.

“Ray,” he starts, his voice rough. “You’re just—the only friend I got, alright? The only person I’ve got left. And I hate seeing you like this.”

Ray doesn’t move. Just sits there, staring at the wall, his jaw locked, the faint rise and fall of his chest the only proof he’s still listening.

“Look, I know you hate it too,” he says. “I know you do. I can see it all over your face. And I don’t know if it’s just… the strain, or the pain, or if you’re mad at me, but—”

He lets out a choked laugh, harsh and humorless. “Well, I’m mad at you too, okay? I’m real fucking mad at you.”

That gets Ray’s eyes on him—narrowed, sharp, wounded. But Pete can’t stop now.

“You shouldn’t have helped me up,” Pete says, his voice cracking somewhere in the middle. “You shouldn’t have done that. I told you—I told you when I was ready, I was gonna sit down, and I did, and you—you wouldn’t let me. You asshole.”

“You got me up, and you made me promise to walk more, and I did, and then you stopped.” His voice trembles, the words tripping over themselves. “You stopped, and you got shot, and you—Jesus, Ray, you almost died. Don’t you fucking realize that? Don’t you get how close that was?”

Ray’s hands twitch in his lap. He looks down at the bandages across his stomach, and Pete sees his throat move, sees the tremor in his jaw.

“You almost fucking died,” Pete repeats, quieter now, voice cracking open like a wound. “And what was I supposed to do with that, huh? What the fuck was I supposed to do if you didn’t wake up?”

He laughs bitterly, dragging a hand down his face. “So if you’re not talking because of what happened at the end—if that’s what this is—then that’s on you, Ray. That’s not on me. That’s on you!”

The room goes silent except for the faint, steady beep, beep, beep of the heart monitor. Pete slumps back in his chair, guilt and anger twisting together until he can’t tell which is which anymore.

“Goddamn it,” he whispers, voice small and raw. “Why’d you have to save me, sunshine?"

Ray glares at him — really glares — that sharp, fire-eyed look Pete hasn’t seen since the Walk. It’s the kind of look that could stop a man mid-sentence, mid-breath.

He grabs his notepad from the bedside table, movements harsh and clipped, and scribbles something down so fast the pen nearly tears through the paper. Then he thrusts it out toward Pete.

'Don’t call me sunshine.'

Pete’s chest tugs. His jaw works as he stares at the words, the blocky handwriting full of anger and pain and something he can’t name.

“Sorry, darling. It just… comes out.”

He regrets it the second it leaves his mouth.

Ray’s glare sharpens, almost shaking with restrained fury. He snatches the pad back and writes again, harder this time — the scratching of the pen loud and violent in the quiet room. When he turns it around again, the words are heavy, each letter like a wound:

'No Darling. No nicknames. I’m not gay.'

The last word is underlined three times.

Pete just stares at it. At the trembling edge of the paper, the tightness of Ray’s fist still gripping the side. He can hear his own pulse pounding in his ears, feels the ache somewhere deep in his ribs.

He swallows hard. “Okay,” he says finally, voice low. “Okay, Ray.”

Ray huffs through his nose, glaring daggers at him. Then—slow, deliberate—he points at the thick bandages around his stomach and jabs a finger toward Pete’s forehead, shaping his hand like a gun. He shakes his head violently, eyes narrowing.

Pete stares for a second before scoffing. “Yeah, well,” he mutters, “you didn’t want to see me shot, so you went and got yourself shot instead. Really fucking selfish, man.”

Ray’s glare sharpens; he raises his middle finger without hesitation.

Pete blinks, then snorts. “Oh, real mature,” he says and flips him off right back.

Ray’s eyes narrow further, and then, slow as a challenge, he lifts both middle fingers this time.

Pete bites the inside of his cheek to keep from grinning. “Two, huh?” he says, and raises both of his in reply.

For half a second, neither of them moves. Then Ray's lips twitch, and a quiet little smile sneaks through the cracks. He sticks his tongue out at Pete like a kid, crosses his arms in mock defiance—then immediately winces when the motion tugs at his stomach.

Pete’s grin drops. “Still hurts?” he asks, all teasing gone from his tone.

Ray gives him the most deadpan look imaginable—eyebrows raised, eyes flat, the perfect silent duh.

Pete exhales, soft and worried, but there’s the faintest curve at the edge of his mouth. “Alright, alright,” he mutters. “Just checking.”

Pete watches Ray’s gaze drop to the bandages, the way his expression shifts from faint irritation to something quieter—ashamed, almost.

That spark in his eyes dims, and before Pete can say anything, Ray’s grabbing at the thin hospital sheet, pulling it up to his collarbone like a shield. His teeth find his lip, biting down hard enough to draw a little pinprick of red.

“I’m not actually mad at you,” Pete says finally, his voice low, steady. Then he sighs. “Well, that’s a lie. I am mad. I’m mad that you did that—because it really fucking sucked, Ray. Seeing you like that. I thought…” He pauses, his throat tight. “I thought that was it.”

Ray’s eyes flicker toward him, uncertain.

Pete swallows hard, his words catching. “But I’m not angry with who you are. You’re kind, and you saved me. You—God, Ray, you saved me. So thank you.”

For a moment, neither of them moves. The air hums with the steady beep, beep, beep of the monitor. Then Ray bites his lip again, harder, and grabs for his notepad with shaky fingers. He scribbles quickly, then turns it toward Pete.

'I’m not gay.'

Pete stares at the words, then looks back up at him. “I never said you were.”

Ray huffs through his nose, jaw tightening, and writes again.

'The kiss. I’m not gay.'

Oh.

Oh.

Right.

Pete exhales, pressing his palms to his knees. “That’s fine,” he says softly. “I’m not judging you for the kiss, Ray. Emotions were high, we thought it was the end…” He tries for a smile, but it trembles. “It’s fine. It doesn’t matter. I’ll—look. I’ll forget it if you want me to.”

It’s a lie, of course. He’ll never forget it—the way Ray’s breath had shuddered against his, the warmth of his lips, the way it had felt like life instead of death.

That was everything to him and nothing to Ray. Nice to know where he stands.

Ray hesitates before writing again, slower this time.

'Like the media?'

Pete forces a dry chuckle. “Yeah. I’ll forget it. Never happened—just like the media believes.”

Ray stares at him for a long moment, then nods once. He scribbles two more words.

'Thank you.'

Pete smiles faintly and looks away, hiding the crack in his chest behind a quiet laugh. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “Anytime.”

Lie. Lie. Lie.

Ray gives a little half-smile, the kind that only tugs at one corner of his mouth. He scribbles something quickly and tilts it toward Pete.

'Never change, Pete McVries.'

Pete can’t help but grin, that soft, crooked grin that crinkles the corners of his eyes. “Love you too, Ray,” he says lightly.

Ray sticks his tongue out in response, smug, and Pete rolls his eyes, already halfway to teasing him again when the door opens.

April steps in, clipboard tucked under one arm, and clears her throat. “Sorry to interrupt, gentlemen, but Pete, there’s someone here to see you.” She glances at Ray. “And Mr. Garraty, you need those bandages changed and cleaned up.”

Ray’s entire expression falls into sheer horror. His eyes widen, and he immediately shakes his head, clutching the edge of his blanket like it might save him. Pete has to slap a hand over his mouth to stifle his laugh.

Last night’s memory flashes through his mind — Ray being wheeled back in after getting washed up, cheeks blazing bright red, refusing to look at anyone. It had been hilarious, at least until Ray had smacked him in the arm hard enough to leave a bruise.

April sighs. “I know, I know. But we have to keep those wounds clean, and your feet especially need to be washed to prevent infection.”

Ray narrows his eyes, picks up his pen, and scrawls on the pad with dramatic irritation:

'When can I leave?'

April reads it, exhaling through her nose. “We’ve been over this, Ray. At least a few more days. We need to make sure your feet are healing properly, that your shin stays a fracture and doesn’t worsen—and frankly, I’d like to keep an eye on your brain, too.”

Ray scowls and writes,

'I’d be mentally okay if you let me leave.'

April laughs softly. “You’re sassy today.”

Pete smirks. “Oh, believe me, that’s how he always is.”

Ray immediately flips him off. Pete returns it without hesitation.

April pinches the bridge of her nose, fighting a smile. “Okay, okay, boys, enough of that. Pete, go see your visitor. And Ray…” She raises an eyebrow. “If you’re good for me, maybe I’ll sneak in some vanilla pudding later. I know you're tired of that IV.”

Ray rolls his eyes and scribbles,

'I like chocolate.'

April chuckles, “Chocolate it is, then.”

Pete grins after her, shaking his head. “See? She already likes you better than me.”

Ray just smirks, crossing his arms again, a silent little as she should flickering in his eyes.

Pete raises his hands in surrender, a little grin tugging at his mouth. “Okay, okay, I know when I’m not wanted.”

Ray rolls his eyes, unimpressed.

Pete huffs, leaning back in his chair before turning toward April. “You said someone wanted to see me?”

Something shifts in her face — a flicker, small but sharp. Her eyes soften with something that looks like worry… or pity. He can’t tell which, but it settles like a stone in his gut.

Still, she nods, businesslike, and moves toward Ray’s bed. “Yeah,” she says, looping her hands gently under Ray’s arms to help guide him into the wheelchair. “He’s in Room 3A. Should be the first corridor after the front desk.”

Pete blinks, uneasy. “Uh… okay?”

He glances at Ray, who’s watching the whole thing like it’s mildly entertaining, arms crossed, chin tipped up. “You be good, yeah?” Pete says. “If you need anything—”

April cuts him off, voice patient but firm. “We know where to find you, Pete. Ray can hold his own.”

Ray grins proudly at that, nodding his head as if to say, what she said.

Pete sighs, rolling his eyes but smiling anyway. “Right. Fine. Message received.”

He gives them both a quick nod before turning toward the door. The wheels of his chair creak softly against the tile as he pushes himself out into the hall. The door clicks shut behind him, and the sound seems to echo longer than it should.

He follows April’s directions, turning down the first corridor past the front desk, the linoleum gleaming too clean beneath the fluorescent lights. His hands grip the wheels, pushing forward until he reaches the door marked 3A.

He knocks once — polite, uncertain — and pushes it open. “You wanted to—”

The rest of his sentence dies on his tongue. Because standing there, hands clasped neatly behind his back, is The Major.

For half a second, Pete just stares. Then his instincts — the ones beaten into him by days of orders and fear — kick in. He rolls himself fully inside, shuts the door behind him, and with deliberate precision, reaches for the blinds to close them. The metallic click of the slats feels like the sound of a trap being set.

And then, because there’s no way in hell he’s going to let The Major see him looking weak, Pete grips the arms of the wheelchair and forces himself up.

Pain rockets up his legs immediately — a white-hot pulse that burns through the soles of his feet and straight into his bad knee. He nearly sways, but he locks his jaw tight and straightens to his full height, arms tense at his sides. He’s not going to give The Major that satisfaction.

“Sir,” Pete says finally, voice steady even as his body trembles, “what a…” he bites his cheek hard enough to taste blood, “…lovely surprise.”

The Major’s lips curl into a faint smile as his gaze drags slowly down Pete’s body and back up again, appraising him like a soldier in inspection.

“No need to play charades with me, boy,” he says coolly. “You wouldn’t have come in with a wheelchair if you didn’t need it.”

Pete’s jaw flexes, but he stays standing, refusing to move.

The Major hums softly, “I’ve heard Raymond is making a full recovery from those bullet wounds.”

Pete nods once. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “He’s lucky.”

“No, he’s not lucky. He’s thankful.” The Majors tone hardens. “Without my generosity, he’d be dead. And the same goes for you, boy. You should be thankful I didn’t have the firing squad on you the moment you pointed a gun at me.”

Pete bites down harder. Allegiance. He has to keep his allegiance.

His hands shake, but his voice doesn’t when he says, “I am thankful, sir. You saved not only me, but him. You gave us money to… to change our future.”

The Major tilts his head, that thin smirk tugging at his mouth. “Are you kissing my sack,” he says evenly, “the same way I’m sure you’ve been kissing Raymond’s?”

Pete’s fists curl tight, knuckles whitening. Every muscle in his jaw twitches, and he forces out through his teeth, “Lets just get on with this. To what do I owe the pleasure, sir?”

The Major hums, taking his time before answering, pacing the small room. “I’m here to discuss your Walk, Mr. McVries. Particularly the ending.”

Pete swallows hard. “Yes, sir.”

“I’m sure you’ve seen,” the Major continues, tone smooth but sharp as glass, “how the last few minutes of your Walk were broadcast. Or… edited, rather.”

Pete nods once, eyes fixed on the ground. “Yes, sir.”

The Major chuckles — low, humorless. “It took quite a bit of money to ensure that version stayed the only version. Paying off witnesses, silencing pedestrians…” he stops pacing and looks Pete dead in the eye. “A queer pointing a gun at a Major doesn’t exactly make for patriotic television.”

The word hits like a slap. Pete looks down, his throat closing, blood roaring in his ears. “Sorry, sir,” he says quietly. “Emotions were high.”

The Major’s smirk widens, cold and cutting. “I’m sure something else was too.”

Pete’s heart stutters, a flush of rage and shame and guilt crawling up his neck. He wants to hit him. He wants to drag that smug smile off his face. But instead, he stands there — feet throbbing, knee screaming, head bowed — and whispers, “Yes, sir.”

The Major’s smirk grows, that same practiced one he wears in every press photo — the kind that looks like charm from far away, but up close, it’s just another threat.

“Because of your wish, seems quite the turnout’s gonna happen next year. More people in the crowd. More sponsors. Already got reports of a few of the rich folk planning to enter — can you imagine that?”

Pete’s stomach sinks. He can imagine it. He can imagine the crowds swelling, the faces of boys who don’t know yet what this hell truly is — thinking they’ll be the ones to survive. Thinking there’s hope.

The Major leans against the table, lowering his voice. “Now, all I need to make sure of this bigger turnout, is that you don’t ruin it.”

Pete forces his shoulders back, forcing the tremor out of his spine. “No, sir,” he says quickly. “Of course not. My allegiance is to you.”

The Major hums in approval, the corners of his mouth twitching upward again. “Good boy,” he says, tone dripping condescension. “Then with that allegiance, you’ll follow the story I’ve cooked up.”

Pete stiffens. “Sir?”

“Oh, don’t play coy, McVries.” The Major takes a few steps closer, so close Pete can smell the faint trace of tobacco and expensive cologne clinging to his uniform. “You’re going to give them something to believe in. Something that keeps them watching, keeps them signing up. You and Raymond Garraty — the perfect pair of survivors. Courage. Sacrifice. The American spirit.”

“You’ll smile when you’re told. You’ll talk when you’re asked. And you’ll keep your mouth shut about anything that doesn’t fit the story. Because if you don’t…” He tilts his head, eyes narrowing. “…I’ll make sure that boy of yours stops breathing for good.”

Pete’s heart slams against his ribs, but he doesn’t move. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you.

“Understood, sir.”

“Then you’re going to follow the story,” The Major says evenly, a smile returning to his lips. “The one my beautiful, stupid son Stebbins told you on the first night, while Garraty was dozing off. You remember, don’t you? The rule change. The possibility of two winners.”

Pete frowns. “Sir—Stebbins never—”

"He did,” the Major interrupts, his tone slicing through the air like a command. “And that, Mr. McVries, is the story you’re going to tell. You knew about the change from the very beginning. You knew there could be two victors, and you decided to keep it to yourself.”

Pete stares at him, disbelief twisting in his gut. “But that makes me look like a traitor!”

Olson's wife will see him as a liar, a fake friend who during her husbands last moments didn't help but kept walking. Art's parents will see him as a disgrace, only keeping him close because he knew Art would keep him up if needed.

And poor, quiet Stebbins. The kid who’d walked like a shadow for half the damn journey, always on the edge of the road, always looking toward something no one else could see. The Major’s bastard son. The boy who just wanted to be seen by his father.

Pete can still picture him, the way he used to walk at night when the rest of them were half-asleep — back straight, head tilted up, like he was hoping the stars might talk to him if his father never would. The way he used to ask small questions about books, about people, about feeling things, like he wasn’t sure he was allowed to.

And now, even dead, the Major’s stripped him bare.

Stebbins’ name — the name of a boy who just wanted a cup of tea and a quiet talk and a little love — will go down in history as the traitor. The son who betrayed his own father. The liar who whispered forbidden truths to the other Walkers.

And Pete, he'll be seen to the country as a manipulator, a player, a puppeteer who used all these boys to help him get to the end because he knew the odds of winning were just that much higher.

He'll simply lose all pride he could of had.

The Major’s smile is thin, practiced. “Then simply, Peter, it makes you look like a traitor. That’s what will make it believable. You knew since night one there would be two victors — and guess what you did with that information?” He steps closer, voice dropping low, every syllable precise. “You used it for your own selfish good.”

“You watched Olson start to crack, and you didn’t help him. You let him go because one less competitor meant better odds for you and Garraty. You saw Art fading, and instead of lifting him up, you fed him hope you knew would never last. And poor Garraty—”

The Major stops pacing, facing Pete squarely now.

“You kept Garraty beside you the entire time. Not out of brotherhood. Not out of love. Because you knew there could be two winners. You knew, and you decided to make him your insurance policy. You encouraged him. You whispered to him when he doubted himself. Not because you cared, not because of brotherhood, but because you were thinking three steps ahead. You knew that when it came down to the two of you, Garraty would lay down his life for you if he needed. That’s the kind of boy he is — selfless, sentimental, stupid. So, when you fell to your knees, you weren’t collapsing. You were calculating. You knew he’d stop. You knew he’d take the warnings. You knew the crowd would weep for your friendship, for your tragedy, for your victory.”

Pete shakes his head, voice shaking. “That’s not how it happened.”

 “It’s how it will have happened,” the Major corrects, the corners of his mouth curving up. “You knew of the rule change. You manipulated the Walk. You turned it into a grand display of loyalty and sacrifice for your own popularity. You never told Garraty the rules had changed until the very end. Until after he was shot and in your arms, because you selfishly, needing him around because he'd lift you up again and again and again. You never gave him the choice. You let him bleed for you, and in the end, you both crawled across that finish line, broken but alive. It will be a miracle, the press will say. Two victors. One calculated, one tragic. And that’s what they’ll remember.”

He leans forward slightly, lowering his voice, like he’s sharing something almost tender.

“You see, Pete, this version is clean. It’s emotional. It’s palatable. The people don’t want truth — they want meaning. They want a story that makes them feel something noble about their cruelty. You’ll give them that.”

Pete swallows hard. “But why—why me? Why not just say it like it was!?"

“Because you’re marketable,” the Major says simply. “You’re young, articulate, and you have a face that makes people feel. You can stand beside Garraty’s mother and tell the world you’d have traded your life for her son, even as you hold your medal. You’re a contradiction, Pete. A sinner they can love. That’s what sells.”

He steps close enough that Pete can see the reflection of his own pale, stricken face in the Major’s eyes.

“So, when the cameras roll,” the Major continues softly, “you’ll tell them that Stebbins confided in you about the rule change. That you didn’t believe him at first. That you thought it was rumor. And then, when the end came — when the warnings started — you realized he was right. That there could be two. Unfortunately for you, Garraty’s sacrifice proved it."

Pete’s breathing grows shallow. “And if I don’t?”

“Then we tell the story anyway. Only this time, you’re not the clever strategist who lived — you’re the ungrateful cheat who stole a good boy’s victory."

He straightens his coat, turns for the door, and adds over his shoulder,

"History doesn’t belong to the ones who walked. It belongs to the ones who write it. So start practicing your lines.”

The door clicks shut — a quiet, final sound — and Pete’s legs give out beneath him.

He collapses back into the wheelchair, the breath knocked from his chest, and slams his fist down against his knee. Pain flares bright and hot, but it’s not enough. It never will be. He bites into the heel of his hand to choke down the noise that tries to rip its way out of him — the mix of rage, disgust, and disbelief clawing up his throat until it burns.

He knew the Major would twist the story. He knew that man couldn’t stand not being the author of every damn detail.

But this—This is something else.

To take what they had — what he and Ray were — and carve it into something ugly. To make the world believe he was a traitor, that every glance and joke and late-night whisper had been strategy. That his keeping Ray close wasn’t friendship, wasn’t the lifeline that kept him walking through the rain and pain and exhaustion, but cold, careful calculation. That he only held on because he wanted to win.

Pete presses his hands to his eyes until colors explode behind his lids. The Major’s voice still echoes in his skull: you made him your insurance.

Insurance. That’s what they’ve reduced it to.

Not love. Not loyalty. A fucking investment.

Now the country will see him as a conman — a manipulator, a playboy with a tragic edge. The kind of bastard who let his best friend take the bullets all for a good fucking show. They’ll call him charming on talk shows. Mysterious. Dangerous. And every time his name is mentioned, it’ll drip with the lie the Major built.

Pete grips the wheels of the chair so tightly his knuckles go white. All he wanted was to walk beside Ray — just walk. Now the world will believe he walked over him instead.

And the worst part? He can’t even tell them otherwise.

It’s mile one hundred eighty nine, and the air has that soft, dying warmth that only comes right before the sun slips under the horizon. The sky is a bruised pink and gold. 

They’ve lost two more boys. Two more names swallowed up by silence, two more sets of footsteps that will never match the rhythm of theirs again.

Pete looks over at Olson.

God, Olson’s still hanging on — barely. His steps are heavy, uneven, like the ground’s trying to take him. Sweat streaks down his neck, and his eyes are glazed, staring ahead but not seeing anything. Pete watches the tremor in his hands, the way his jaw tightens every few seconds, and something inside him twists.

He’s not a religious man. Hasn’t been for a long time.

If there was ever a God, Pete figures He stopped listening somewhere around mile ten. But still — still, he finds himself hoping. Praying, even, in a quiet, desperate way that makes him feel stupid.

He doesn’t pray for himself. He doesn’t even pray for Ray — not tonight. He prays for Olson.

Just a little longer, he thinks. Please, just let him hang on a little longer. Let him find a reason, any reason, to keep walking.

And if there is a God — and if that God is willing to hear from a man like him, a sinner, a fool, a gay — then maybe He’ll listen. Maybe He’ll show a little mercy to a boy who still believes, against all odds, that they might survive this.

“Please,” he whispers under his breath, not sure if it’s to God or the ghosts already walking beside them.

The wind brushes past his face — soft, fleeting — and then it’s gone. His prayer probably went unanswered.

Ray pokes him in the cheek, and Pete blinks at him, shaking his head as his gaze drifts — from Ray, to Olson, to the setting sun, and then back to Ray again. 

"You were thinking loudly." Ray jokes.

“Do you ever think about what people will say about you when this is all over? Like… how they’ll remember you?” Pete asks quietly.

Ray hums softly, thinking. “Um… a bit, yeah. Mostly what my girl Jan and my mom’ll think of me, if I’m being honest.” He pauses, eyes on the horizon. “I think my mom will — well, I hope she’ll still love me. Even for my flaws. For my anger. I hope she’ll see that I was doing the best I could with the cards I’ve been dealt.”

Pete nods, slow. “And your girl?”

Ray huffs out a short laugh. “I guess I just hope she sees that I’m strong. Not just the chubby guy she dated.”

Pete raises a brow at him — before smacking him lightly upside the head.

“Hey, fuck you,” Ray protests, rubbing the spot. “That hurt.”

“No, fuck you,” Pete fires back, grinning. “You’re talking down on yourself, asshole.”

“I’m just being honest!” Ray says, indignant. “Jan was sweet, but she and I both knew she was way too pretty for me.”

Pete gives him a look — one that says 'don’t even start with that bullshit' — and Ray shrugs defensively. “No, seriously! I weighed like twenty pounds more back three months ago, and when I found out I got into the lottery, well… that plus the fact we were broke…” He trails off, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yeah. I lost a bit of weight."

Pete exhales, the edge of a smile tugging at his mouth. “Well, then she’s an idiot.”

Ray laughs, a little embarrassed. “She’s actually incredibly smart, but yeah…”

Pete huffs a laugh through his nose, shaking his head. “No, I mean she’s an idiot for thinking that,” he says, voice soft but sure, like it’s the simplest truth in the world.

Ray snorts, glancing at him sideways. “You say that now, but you never saw me back then. I was all belly and bad posture.”

Pete hums, pretending to think about it. “Still are.”

Ray smacks him on the arm. “Asshole.”

“Truth teller,” Pete shoots back, grinning. Then, quieter, “And anyway, doesn’t matter how you looked, Ray. You’re here."

Ray sighs, shoulders rising and falling with the weight of it all. “Yeah, I’m here,” he mutters, a ghost of a smile flickering across his lips. “Hey, at least if this all fails—if my wish fails—at least I’ll go out a few pounds lighter.”

Pete groans and smacks him on the head again, not too hard but enough to make Ray yelp.

“Fucking abusive,” Ray grumbles, rubbing the spot.

“Ray,” Pete says, voice sharp but not unkind, “you weigh, what, a pound more than me? Do you think I’m chubby?”

Ray looks him up and down, squinting as if assessing him, then mutters, “Uh… no.”

“Exactly,” Pete says, crossing his arms. “So stop being so damn hard on yourself.”

Ray huffs, shrugging his shoulders. “You asked me what I want people to remember. I just answered honestly.”

“Yeah,” Pete says, softer now, his voice slipping into something gentler. “But if someone makes you think badly of yourself, why would you care what they think?”

Ray’s lips part like he wants to answer, but all that comes out is a quiet breath. His eyes are far away, lost somewhere between the sound of their footsteps and the horizon bleeding into dusk.

“I don’t know,” he says finally, voice so low Pete almost misses it. “I just do.”

Pete wants to tell him he deserves better — better than Jan, better than this walk, better than the guilt stitched into his bones. But he keeps it to himself.

Ray glances at him sideways, brows furrowing a little. “Uh… what about you?” he asks quietly. “Do you ever worry about how they’ll see you? You know — after.”

Pete lets out a slow breath through his nose, the kind that sounds almost like a laugh but isn’t. “Not sure many people remember me to begin with.”

Ray frowns at that. “What about your parents?”

Pete’s gaze drops to the pavement. The air between them tightens. He knows he should tell Ray — about the fights, about the silence, about the war, about the endless couches, about being unlovable — but the words stick like ash in his throat.

Ray watches him for a moment, then clears his throat softly. “Oh. Um… friends, then?”

Pete huffs a quiet laugh, the corner of his mouth twitching. “You, the four musketeers, are my only friends,” he says, trying to sound light, but his voice wavers at the edges. “I, uh… I’m not really a rememberable person, Ray.”

Ray looks at him with something soft and heavy all at once. “You’re rememberable to me,” he says simply.

Pete looks at him for a long moment before a sad smile tugs at the corners of his mouth. “Thanks, Ray… that’s, uh… that’s sweet.” His voice cracks just a little, and he clears his throat, trying to push the emotion back down where it belongs. “I guess I just want the world to see me as more than just a boy who walked until he couldn’t anymore. Hopefully they see me as good. Kind. Thoughtful.”

Ray doesn’t even hesitate. “You are all those things.”

Pete laughs softly, shaking his head. “I am, sure. But I’m also aware I’m a Black man with a scar on my face and muscle to my name. They could switch the narrative easy, make me look like… well, just another violent Black man who got what he deserved.”

The air goes still. The sky’s gone gold and blue at once, light slipping off the edges of the road like it’s listening too.

Ray looks at him — really looks — before saying, firm and steady, “I promise you this, Pete. If I end up winning, I’ll make sure that narrative never comes up.”

Pete’s head turns to him, eyes soft, almost disbelieving. “Promise?” he asks quietly, almost shyly.

“Yeah. Promise.”

And Pete swears for a moment, that word feels holier than any prayer he’s ever known. That's Ray for you, making you believe the unbelievable.

Pete clears his throat a little, trying to sound casual even though the question sits heavy on his tongue. “Have you, uh… have you figured out another wish yet?”

Ray doesn’t answer right away. His eyes drift over to Olson and Art — Olson’s limping a bit now, Art’s still talking like he’s trying to drown out the silence — and then back to Pete.

Ray nods slowly. “Yeah,” he says after a moment. “I think I’ve figured one out.”

Pete tilts his head. “You wanna tell me?”

Ray gives a small, crooked smile. “If I tell you, then it might not come true.”

Pete huffs, pretending to be annoyed but smiling anyway. “Okay, fine. How about this—if we end up being the last two, you tell me then. Deal?”

Ray raises an eyebrow. “And what do I get in return?”

Pete shrugs, that easy grin spreading across his face again. “I don’t know. Name your price.”

Ray pretends to think for a moment, tapping his chin with exaggerated focus. “A truth for a truth,” he says finally.

Pete blinks, then nods. “Sure. A truth for a truth.”

He reaches out, shaking Ray’s hand firmly — warm and solid, a small anchor in a world that keeps trying to take their footing. Then, without thinking much about it, he slings an arm over Ray’s shoulder, pulling him in close as they walk.

He sends up a silent prayer — to a god he doesn’t even know if he believes in anymore — that Olson makes it through another night, that Art keeps talking, that they all keep walking.

And that when it comes down to the end, he’ll still be beside Ray… to hear what new wish he’s been carrying.

When Pete wheels back into the room, he almost forgets to breathe.

Ray’s sitting up in bed — a half-empty cup of chocolate pudding balanced on his thigh, spoon tucked lazily between his lips. His hair’s still damp, curling at the edges, dark at the roots from the water. The new bandages around his chest and white and clean against his sunburned arms. Someone’s given him plaid pajama pants and fuzzy socks, both a little too big, both so Ray that Pete could scream.

And there’s that look — that half-shy, half-smug expression that says 'I’m fine, stop worrying about me', even though Pete knows damn well he isn’t fine. Not yet.

He just looks so warm. So alive. So… home.

Pete swallows hard, because he can almost see it — a morning somewhere quiet, coffee on the stove, light catching on the freckles dusting Ray’s throat. He can almost imagine reaching out, brushing a thumb along his cheek, feeling that warmth for real.

But no. He shakes the thought away violently. Ray isn’t gay. Stop it.

Ray sets the pudding down and reaches for his notepad, scribbling quickly before turning it toward Pete.

'You were crying.'

Pete stiffens. “Oh—no. No, I wasn’t. It’s just—uh, allergies." He forces a laugh, trying to steer them anywhere else. “How’s the pudding?”

Ray narrows his eyes. Writes again.

'Who spoke with you?'

Pete exhales, running a hand down his face. “It doesn’t matter, Ray.”

Ray’s already shaking his head, scribbling fast.

'Stop being an asshole. Tell me.'

Pete can’t help the little huff that leaves him. “God, you’re stubborn,” he mutters, before relenting. “Fine. The Major.”

Ray’s eyes go wide — real wide — and before Pete can say another word, he’s reaching for his IV, tugging at it with shaking hands.

“Hey, hey—no, stop that.” Pete wheels closer, catches his wrist gently.

Ray jerks away, his breath coming short. His fingers go for the line again, and Pete snaps without thinking, “Dammit, Ray!”

He grabs his hand before he can hurt himself, intertwines their fingers, firm and grounding, presses them both down into the mattress. “Stop. Look at me.”

Ray does. And it’s like the whole world slows. The panic in his chest, the wildness in his eyes—it’s too familiar. Too human. Too broken.

Pete’s voice softens. “He’s not here to hurt you, or me. Promise.”

Ray doesn’t look convinced. His breathing is still uneven, his eyes flicking toward the door like the Major might come storming in at any second.

“He could care less about us walking,” Pete says, quieter now. “He just… came to talk. About the Walk. About… the story they’re spinning.”

Ray’s brows pull together, and Pete feels his stomach twist.

“He…” Pete swallows thickly. “Ray, the media’s gonna start saying some things soon. About me. About what happened out there.”

Pete grips his hand tighter. “I just need you to know they aren’t true. Alright? Whatever they print, whatever that bastard says… it’s not true. I need you to believe me. Please.”

Ray stares at him, eyes glistening — soft and unsure and aching.

And Pete, still holding on, presses his thumb against Ray’s palm. “You’re the only one I care about believing me, Ray. You’re it.”

Ray’s lips part slightly, like he wants to say something — to write something — but nothing comes. Just a long breath.

Then, slowly, he squeezes Pete’s hand.

Pete smiles, but it’s the kind of smile that wobbles at the edges, too sad to hold steady. His voice cracks when he says, “I swear to you, Ray. None of what the media says is true, okay? They’re gonna twist it all up—make me out to be some violent, selfish bastard—but I promise you, every word of it’s a fucking lie.”

He squeezes Ray’s hand once before letting go, before Ray’s already pulling back and reaching for his notepad again. His hands still shake a little, but he grips the pen tight, scrawling quickly.

'What happened?'

He points at the question twice, sharp and insistent, eyes locked on Pete’s.

Pete exhales, dragging a hand through his hair, the motion trembling. “Just—” he starts, then bites it back. “The Major’s an asshole, Ray. That’s the short of it. An absolute jackass who wants to control the story.”

Ray’s brow furrows, waiting.

Pete looks away, jaw tight. “He’s already taken the idea of two winners and twisted it. He’s saying it was his rule—something new for this year—and that I knew all along.” He laughs once, bitterly. “That I kept it from you. That I used you.”

Ray blinks, stunned, his mouth falling open just a little.

Pete shakes his head hard. “He’s gonna make it seem like you were just… an insurance policy to me. That I kept you close because I knew you’d fall for it—fall for me—and stop walking when I did. That I planned all of it.” His voice breaks there, quieter. “But you weren’t, Ray. You aren’t. I swear to God, you’re not.”

Pete leans forward a little, the words spilling out before he can stop them. “You weren’t a plan. You were the point. You kept me walking. You kept me sane. You’re the reason I made it that far. And if they can’t see that—if they can’t understand it—then fuck them.”

Ray’s throat bobs. His eyes are shining, but he doesn’t cry. He just reaches out, resting his hand over Pete’s again, firm and grounding, his fingers curling slow around his.

Pete holds Ray’s hand for a moment longer than he means to — thumb brushing over the pulse there like it’s something sacred — before he exhales, forces himself to let go, and leans back with a crooked grin.

“You'll lucky, though,” he mutters, eyeing the half-empty cup on Ray’s tray. “You get pudding. I had to pay for mine. Think that’s racist or something?”

Ray blinks, startled — then snorts, shoulders shaking.

“I’m serious!” Pete says, jabbing a finger in his direction. “You think April’s being racist? I mean, hell, I’m rich as fuck now, right? I can buy my own damn pudding, but still. I never got no special treatment like that. I swear, there’s something there — she hates me.”

Ray’s grin breaks wider, teeth flashing as he picks up the pudding cup again. He looks Pete dead in the eyes, slowly scoops up a spoonful, and shoves it into his mouth with a smug little hum.

Pete narrows his eyes, fighting a laugh. “Now you’re just rubbing it in.”

Ray only hums louder this time, licking the spoon dramatically before taking another bite.

“Pretty rude,” Pete says under his breath, flicking Ray’s forehead lightly. “Thinking the Black guy wouldn’t want chocolate pudding.”

Ray bursts out laughing — an honest, unguarded laugh that fills the sterile hospital room and cracks it wide open. It’s warm, messy, real — alive.

Pete can’t help it; he laughs too, shaking his head and mumbling, “Whatever. Fuck off. I’m not jealous or anything.”

Ray, still grinning, takes one last bite of pudding — slow and deliberate — just to prove he doesn’t believe him.

And Pete, despite everything — the lies, the pain, the chaos — feels the smallest, truest kind of peace bloom in his chest.

We'll be okay, he thinks.