Nicky eventually sighed as she both finished her breakfast and gave up glaring at the window at the same time. She flopped backward and I growled faintly as her head rested on my leg. She ignored my faint protest. Her eyes closed as she pulled a blanket over herself. How can she sleep again so soon after waking up? Honestly, it shouldn't be possible...

I exhaled slowly as I suppressed my instincts. They did not like any kind of contact. I had never really been the huggy kind of person as a human either. I didn't like it, but I could probably tolerate it if it meant that Nicky would sleep. I could only imagine how she would react if I shoved her head off my leg. I really didn't feel like dealing with any more drama today.

The hours passed by far too slowly. It was easier than when Liz had sat on my lap and I had battled the bloodlust, but it was still no walk in the park as my instincts objected to the contact. They were slightly confused though, and I knew why.

Zombies were normally very touchy about their heads and necks, and yet Nicky had her head resting on my leg while her neck was exposed as she slept. I watched the scenery go by as I wondered which was worse, sitting in the back of a truck with Nicky using my leg as a pillow or arriving at a new Stronghold filled with strangers.

In the end I decided that the Stronghold was the greater evil. I glanced at yet another normal zombie as we passed by it. There were quite a few on this road. If I needed any proof that this was a commonly used highway, then the number of zombies around would suffice. Lots of zombies usually meant larger Strongholds. Oh goodie... Just what I needed to make this day go even peachier...

I wasn't even sure how large the biggest Strongholds were. I knew that most ranged between a hundred and four hundred. The air swirled around me as the truck kept driving and it brought me the slowly increasing scents of civilization and humans. We were approaching our next target.

I nudged Nicky awake as the walls came into view, "Rise and shine sleeping beauty. We are to be dignitaries in this new kingdom, so you must look the part."

She blinked sleepily at me, "Since when do you attempt to crack jokes?"

"You must have been dreaming if you think you heard me making jokes."

She sat up and rubbed at her eyes, "No kidding. It must have been part of my dream. I initially wondered if someone else had joined me back here. A growl, sure; a snarl, fine; but a joke? That is so not Trinity."

I chuckled at her view of things. Leave it to Nicky to be more worried about a joke than a growl or a snarl...

Nicky yawned, "It is far too early to be smiling."

Considering it was almost noon, it could not be called early. I shrugged, "Life is short. Smile while you still have teeth."

She gave me a funny look before scooting away and knocking on the cab window. Nina opened it a crack and Nicky wasted no time warning them, "Guys we got a problem."

Daniel glanced in the mirror while Nina looked concerned, "What is it?"

"Trinity is cracking jokes back here and it is freaking me out."

Daniel rolled his eyes, "She is yours to deal with. For once you can have a taste of your own medicine. Now you know how your mood swings make us feel sometimes."

Nicky sat up straight in an attempt to glare at Daniel through the rear view mirror, "My mood swings are not weird. They are limited edition."

He snorted, "Then consider Trinity's jokes a rare change from her growling."

I narrowed my own eyes at that comment, "I have been attempting to be polite and have not growled that much. I think you need to go hang out with ferals for a while to get your perspectives straight."

Nicky sighed, "And she's back to normal, thank goodness..."

"Just for that I may have to try and recall some lame knock-knock jokes that my sister told me."

Nicky looked intrigued, "You had a sister?"

The words had left my mouth before I thought about them and I regretted it now as it felt like a knife was twisting in my heart. I clenched my jaw and growled lowly before looking at the scenery. This was not something I was ready to talk about. Not now, and possibly not ever.

Nicky wisely turned to inspect the Stronghold that we were approaching. I mentally berated myself for letting my guard down so far. I had occasionally joked in a similar way with my light-hearted sister as she had always teased me about being too serious.

I had no idea why I had done something similar with Nicky. I had never let anyone else ever see that side of me other than my sister and parents. The memories that this was unburying were painful and not something I wanted to deal with as we were about to enter an unknown place. I raised my mental walls once more to levels that they had not seen for quite some time. I had not realized that my shields had slowly been slipping and coming down until they had been too far down to protect me.

My reflective dark gray sunglasses turned toward the wooden palisade that this place sported in the name of a fence.

~

Our stop at the large place was mercifully brief. There was a small dog at this place that barked incessantly at any zombie or infected person, so those who were infected had been forced to leave. They gave us a quick tour, but none here were infected.

The locals were not sure where those four people had gone, but most had headed further south and had likely banded together for safety. Nina had promised to try and find them while taking notes of places that they may be staying.

We were now approaching a much smaller Stronghold. I had never seen such a small Stronghold before. If there were even a hundred people behind that tall solid fence, then I would be surprised. Daniel came to a stop outside the gate and I could see him frowning at the closed doors. He honked the horn lightly to let them know we were here.

I stilled as I waited to see how the locals would react. I had never seen a place without visible sentries or people coming to check who was approaching their home. They had to know we were here, so they were just hiding. But why?

A man's head popped over the wall and his distasteful expression showed that they knew we were here. They were not entirely happy to see us though. He called down, "Who are you and what do you want?" A very faint growl slipped out of my throat at his disrespectful tone.

Daniel leaned out of the driver's window, "We are travelers from Ironwind Stronghold the north. As you know, the third wave is coming. We have a few ways to detect who is infected and we also have a cure with us."

"And just how do we know that you aren't lying bandits?"

Daniel took a deep breath as he kept a handle on his temper. The insults would not be doing his instincts any favors. "Feel free to search us, but other than a few knives and a sword, we have no weapons. Four mostly unarmed people should not really pose much of a risk to an entire Stronghold even if I am a zombie. Even from here I can smell that two inside are infected, although you will likely find that out for yourself in a week."

Several more heads appeared above the fence as more residents tried to get a look at the zombie. Daniel had let his eyes go red when we pulled up. People above discussed the matter, not realizing that Daniel and I could hear parts of it, or at least I could only hear parts. Daniel probably heard almost everything since they weren't exactly whispering. I wondered if those inside realized that Daniel was quite capable of destroying their wooden fence within minutes.

A voice to the side called out, "I am not sure about the other three, but I will vouch for the woman with sunglasses."

That was the absolute last thing I had ever expected to hear, especially when I didn't recognize the voice. I turned my head to examine the man that everyone was now looking at. You have got to be kidding me... In theory, I knew that I should have expected it, but the thought of coming across the man who had been lurking by the zombie pit had not crossed my mind.

The first man didn't seem happy, but called out to the second man, "If you are willing to take responsibility for them, then we can let them in. Three are women and I can't see them getting into much trouble even if they tried. I don't trust that zombie though."

This guy is so wrong that he could build a bridge to the moon on his assumptions. Nicky would probably chase him across the entire thing as well if she got into the coffee... The man who had originally planned to kill three Nightstalkers to avenge his brother shrugged, "Fine. Let them in."

Daniel, Nina and Nicky were glancing at me in surprise as they wondered who had vouched for me. I murmured, "Keep an eye open."

I was seriously confused and also quite suspicious. I had met this man once, and for less than two minutes. I had scared the crap out of him by sneaking up behind him and then had practically interrogated him. Yet he vouched for me. That action had my hackles rising in distrust and suspicion.

He had laid in ambush for weeks waiting for three murderous Nightstalkers to return so he could kill them. If this was another ambush, then I didn't want us to blunder into it blindly. I took a deep breath of the air. It wasn't surprising to smell guns in a Stronghold, although they were almost strictly used by sentries and guards as the limited ammo was carefully rationed.

The gates slowly opened with a groan, and Daniel let the truck slowly roll through the now-open gate. I looked around cautiously, but saw no weapons pointed at us. Several held bows in their hands though. I wasn't entirely sure if I could manage to grab an arrow midflight or not. I seriously hoped that I was never put into a position where I had to find out.

The man was climbing down the ladder and coming over. He was the only person to actually approach the truck. I could pick up his scent now and analyzed it as he came closer. I took a deep breath as I focused on his personal scent and swiftly dug through the layers as best I could at this range.

Surprise. Caution. Some distrust. Curiosity. Bizarrely enough, an undertone of hope. None of the scents were those of someone on a hunt or contemplating aggressive actions. It gave him some leeway, but it wasn't going to get him far until I knew what he was up to.

The first man whom I suspected was the local leader was watching the mystery man and me. His eyes narrowed as it became apparent that we were not long lost friends like he had assumed, "Logan, why did you vouch for her when you do not seem to know her?" He did not sound impressed.

Logan glanced over at the leader, "I said I would vouch for her, not that I knew her."

He frowned, "Are you saying you don't know her? Why the hell would you vouch for her then?!"

Logan shrugged dismissively, "I met her once. If she had wanted me dead, she had a golden opportunity then."

The leader clasped both hands in his hair and tugged the short strands in frustration, "I am surrounded by idiots! How this place is still standing, I will never know!"

I dropped my opinion of this leader by a few more rungs on the jump bar. Logan shook his head at the display, but didn't seem surprised. He stopped about ten feet away, "You mentioned that there were several ways to locate those who were infected?"

The question had been directed at me, so I replied, "Yes. Daniel can sniff them out. If you don't trust him, simply try to hand someone a cat. If they are infected, you will see what I mean."

Logan knew I was a zombie since he had seen my eyes glowing that night. I would prefer if the others never learnt of that detail. The last thing I needed was for insane vigilantes coming out to kill me just because I was a zombie. Let someone else have that dubious public honor.

He nodded thoughtfully before looking around, "Ah, Trent, please go locate a cat and put it in one of those animal carriers. We can see how it reacts once that zombie finds one of the people who are infected."

I got to my feet and jumped lightly out of the truck. The others also got out. Daniel came over to our side of the truck and tilted his head as he inspected Logan. Logan blinked as he realized that Daniel was nowhere near as short as me and he also just so happened to discover that Daniel stood taller than he did.

Daniel watched him, "I assume you want me to track down the two infected now?"

Logan shrugged, "Might as well. Trent will catch up once he corners one of those felines."

Logan seemed like a quiet and easy going person, but I wasn't about to jump to any conclusions. Daniel glanced around while taking a deep breath. I rolled my eyes and murmured, "To the left, toward the chicken coop."

Daniel took the lead as we and quite a few spectators followed. Daniel was keeping a subtle eye on our surroundings, although I was doing the same thing. I hastily revised my guess of the population here. No wonder they had felt uneasy about letting four strangers in. There weren't even fifty people in here.

Logan walked beside me while leaving a generous distance between us. Nicky and Nina walked behind us. It didn't take us long to locate the man grinding grain into flour with a large hand-crank grinder. Logan was clearly dubious, but Trent showed up with a meowing cat in a pet carrier before it got awkward.

Logan tilted his head inquiringly at me. I sighed gustily as I was forced to explain, "You walk up to the cat and wave your hand in front of it, then let that guy do the same."

Logan waved his hand in front of the carrier. The cat kept meowing plaintively, clearly unhappy with its confinement. The infected man approached the carrier and his hand didn't even come close to the wire door when the cat let out a shrieking battle cry before practically losing its mind in the plastic carrier.

Those watching were surprised and started murmuring amongst themselves. The guy holding the cage backed up to try and calm the cat down. The infected man turned to me with an almost despairing expression.

I jerked my chin toward Nina, "She can offer you either the cure or something that will help you remain sane if you decide to become a zombie."

The man shook his head, "The cure... I don't want to be a zombie..."

If I hadn't known he was terrified of the thought of becoming a zombie, then his words might have slightly offended me. Nina pulled out her supplies and injected him with the specified drug. It was a good thing that Nina had made so much up before we had left Ironwind Stronghold. We have injected probably a hundred or so people over the last 6 days. Not a single one had even considered the other drug.

I refrained from growling at how our audience had grown and was blatantly staring, pointing and whispering during the entire process. Nina put her stuff away, "There you go. You can try approaching a cat tomorrow morning after showering thoroughly. It should be fine and prove that you are truly cured. I will leave a few vials of the cure here just in case, but it has been 100% effective in every case we tried."

The man was quite grateful. Daniel sniffed the air while subtly glancing at me. I wondered if my hearing and sight were as inferior to his as his sense of smell was to mine. Probably. I murmured, "To the left."

My lips had barely moved and the words had been far too quiet for any human to pick up, but I was pretty sure that Logan had noticed. He was sharp. I was going to have to keep an eye on him. Our group followed Daniel as he pretended to track down the last person. Once he got closer, he would be able to track the infected person among the hundreds of scent trails left today by about fifty people in a small area.

I couldn't wait for Nina to dose the last person so we could put this Stronghold behind us.