Abandoned Roadside

#1

((Some time later, Katelyn woke up.))

She sat up, groggy, yawning and rubbing her eye. The basement was pitch black, and utterly silent. Only the biting cold and the faint, familiar scent of copper greeted her return to the land of the living.

"Kai?" she called out, absentmindedly.

No response.

How long had she been asleep? Had night fallen? If so, he was presumably asleep himself. She spent a few moments feeling for her flashlight in the dark, eventually finding it and flicking it on. She blinked, grimacing as the light's glare pierced both her good eye and the darkness engulfing her. Her vision slowly adjusted, and with spotlight in hand, she began to scan her surroundings.

Nothing beside remained, save the same musty cardboard boxes. Kai wasn't anywhere to be seen.

"Kai?" she called out again, this time louder and more uncertain.

No response.

A cloying uneasiness started to spread through her, just beneath the skin. She swallowed, trying to tamp down her rising tide of anxiety. Had he left to get some fresh air again? Why would he do that without telling her where he was going? He might get hurt, or lost, and she wouldn't know where to look.

No, he was- he was probably fine. He had the shotgun, and she hadn't been woken up by any gunshots. He could handle himself well enough, and he didn't need her around to protect him all the time. If she let her panic overtake her and went looking for him, it was more likely they would end up separated that way. Better to stay put and wait for him to come back, wherever he was.

A pang of hunger distracted her from her anxious thoughts, and with a small sigh she turned her flashlight beam to her supplies. Immediately, something odd came to her attention. Her bag had been moved a few feet from where it originally rested, and Kai's bag wasn't there with it. Another wave of uneasiness passed through her, but she dashed it away. He might've left his bag the last time he went to get fresh air, but there was no reason he wouldn't take it the second time. And, besides, Kai's umbrella was resting next to her bag, alongside her heater. He had kept that umbrella with him the entire time they were together, he wouldn't have abandoned it.

He wouldn't have abandoned her, either. That wasn't like him.

Ignoring the dread creeping up her spine, Katelyn crawled over to her bag, unzipping it to get at the rations inside. Once more, she noticed something was odd. The billhook wasn't there. Ever since the encounter with Mitch, if it wasn't in her hands, then she had kept it at the top of her bag, for easy access in an emergency. Maybe it had gotten buried underneath everything else?

Carefully, she rooted through her supplies, looking for the great curved blade, but it was nowhere to be found. Not only that, but the revolvers were gone too, along with their ammunition. She looked around in the dark, twisting her head to either side to try and see if there was something she missed.

"Kai?!" she hollered, eye now wide open.

No response.

That rising panic finally hit her, and both her heart rate and breathing picked up. She jumped to her feet and began searching her surroundings again, more frantically and thoroughly this time. The spear was gone too, as were both Meena's and Ren's guns. Not a single weapon remained, save the two that had been on her person: the grenade launcher and the knife. Now that she was properly looking, she noticed that a lot of the surrounding boxes had been moved around. Sheets that had previously covered the piles were missing.

"KAI?!" she cried out, desperate to hear his voice again, to tell her he was alright, and she had gotten herself worked up over nothing.

No response.

No, no no no, he hadn't- he hadn't abandoned her. That wasn't like him, he would never, he would never-

"KAI!" she yelped, like a small scared child begging her parents for comfort.

No response.

A little voice in the back of her head chimed in, telling her that this was far too strange, and far too much to be an accident.

The realization felt like something sharp stabbing itself into her ribs, carving her chest open and ripping her heart out in front of her. Kai had taken it all, all her weapons, everything he could've gotten his hands on without waking her, and he had left. He had left. He had abandoned her.

He said he didn't hate her. Had he lied to her? He said- he said- Why would he lie? Why would he- why would he?

"KAI!" she screamed, already crying again. "KAI, PLEASE. PL-PLEASE, I-"

She had gotten left behind, like old trash. She didn't care about the weapons. She cared about him. If she had woken up and all of them were gone, but he was still there, she wouldn't have been so upset, but he had left her. Why? She would never have abandoned him, but he had abandoned her, and that meant- that meant-

He didn't love her the same way she loved him.

"KAI!" she wailed, losing all composure and crumpling in on herself, clutching her head to contain her shaking.

No response.

Whatever love he had for her before, she had killed it the same way she had killed everything else. He had lied. He had lied because he hated her, but he couldn't bring himself to tell her that to her face. What other explanation made sense? It wasn't like she had deserved him, anyway. She was a curse, a killer, a monster. She destroyed everything that was ever good in her life, so why would this be any different?

Tears streamed down her face, dotting the concrete below as small, pathetic whines escaped her lips. She had to find him- she had to. She needed to hear it from his mouth, why he had done this. Why he had lied to her. She would've preferred the truth. That would've made it easier, would've made it so she could- she-

In a fugue, Katelyn gathered and forced what remained behind into her bag, zipping it up tight and throwing it over her shoulder. Without knowing where she was going or why, she rushed out of the basement and into the open air of the outdoors, just outside the research station. Cold winds and snow blasted her face, but she didn't care.

"KAI!" she screamed, over and over again, between sobs.

No response.

She saw footprints in the snow, relatively fresh, and leading away. Without thinking, she followed them, all the way to the research lab. There were more footprints there, at least three sets she could make out. She couldn't tell which were Kai's, not with all the fresh snowfall beginning to cover them.

One set led away, back into the wilderness.

Those had to be Kai's, she thought. They had to be his. She couldn't lose another friend. She couldn't lose him.

((Taking a wild gamble, Katelyn sprinted down the path trod before her, chasing the only lead she had.))