They built a small bit of shade with rope and a tarp, not willing to step foot inside of another farmhouse.

Just in case this one had people from the Fold, or frogs, or spiders. At this point in time, they weren’t chancing anything.

Lachlan fussed at the knots like he’d been a sailor in in a past life while Alexei flicked a corner and the whole thing found perfect tension with a single irritated tug.

Sera stood in the half-shadow with the sun shining off the brass buttons down her ribs and watched the fabric around her swaying gently in the wind.

"How are you feeling? Do you want to get some sleep?" Elias offered, his head cocked to the side, studying her.

"Even if we don’t need it right at this moment, we still should," Alexei replied, his voice flat. "We don’t know when we can get a chance to sleep again."

Lachlan snorted. "Speak for yourself, comrade. My eyes are planning a mutiny, and nothing is keeping them from closing."

"Then rest them," Zubair answered, settling to a crouch and letting his weight settle onto feet that never seemed to tire anymore. He pulled the rifle into his lap with a practiced ease and didn’t bother to hold back the slight smile on his face. "I’ll keep watch."

Luci relocated himself to the exact spot that allowed him to touch all of them with the least about effort. His nose pressed against Sera’s boot, his flank pressed to Zubair’s knee, his tail lay across Elias’s foot like an anchor.

Seemingly content, the wolf’s eyelids sank and rose with enviable simplicity.

The sound of a single frog somewhere in the distance caused him to become stiff again before Sera laughed softly and stroked his head. "Don’t worry. Zubair won’t let any of the scary frogs near you."

Luci let out a long huff before settling down again. But before he closed his eyes, he made sure to give Zubair a look that said, ’if one frog touches me, I am going to eat you for lunch’.

Still on top of the truck, the canteen started to sweat with condensation.

Meltwater ran down the canvas in thin silver lines and pooled in the cup Alexei had placed with insulting precision.

He lifted it, gave the metal a small, dissatisfied squint, then carried it to Sera like a waiter who’d had trained for royalty. "It should be warm by now," he said, his accent becoming heavy.

Sera nodded her head and washed her hands to the side of her body so she didn’t get too much water on Luci.

The water ran clean over lavender skin and didn’t leave so much as a speck of frog slime on her skin. Again, she cupped a palm and poured over Luci’s ridiculous crown, scrubbing behind one ear in soft circles making sure that she didn’t miss a spot.

The enormous head leaned harder into her hand until he nearly pushed her off balance. Zubair’s fingers landed at her spine and kept her upright. But even when she steadied, he didn’t remove them.

"Better now?" she asked the dire wolf.

Luci exhaled like a bellows and blinked slow approval. His tongue fell out a fraction and refused to be dignified about it.

A wind came up just a bit. It wasn’t the kind that heralded a storm, just soft enough to move the heat from one place to another. It ran its tendrils through the uncut grass and worried at a loose shingle.

But as much as the breeze itself was nothing short of a relief from the heat, it also brought with it the smell of blood and decay.

Ignoring the scent as something that didn’t need to be dealt with at the moment, Elias’s shoulders eased. Lachlan let his head knock against a porch post and stared at nothing with a smile that had missed his face lately.

Not willing to ignore any sign of danger, Alexei prowled the edge of shade, checking shadows with that surgical patience he wore when he wanted to pretend that he didn’t care.

"Next stop," Lachlan mused into the quiet. "An outlet mall. I need sunglasses no one asked for."

"Military surplus," Elias countered, seriousness reborn. "Tourniquets, filters, cold packs, salt tabs."

"Guns," Alexei added, not a suggestion. "And knives big enough that no one has to wonder what killed them."

Sera turned in the light and the half-skirt followed around her like an obedient train. "Clothes," she decided. "I want pockets that I can put things in."

She glanced at the torn panel in Lachlan’s lap and wrinkled her nose. It wasn’t that she didn’t love the outfit that Mae had given her. In fact, she stole a couple before the other woman could notice so that she could wear them later.

But that skirt was covered in slime, no matter if it had dried and flaked off or no. And she wanted some thing new... something clean. "And a jacket with more brass," she added as an after thought, fully knowing that the style she seemed to gravitate to the most went out over 220 years ago.

"You look like a general already," Lachlan teased, basking. "A very bossy, very shiny general."

Her shoulder bumped his as she passed, casual, affectionate, and automatic. "Behave."

"Never. If you can’t define it, I can’t do it."

Zubair’s palm found her hip as she stepped down from the porch and away from the makeshift shade. His palm not heavy or intrusive, just enough to guide the long back hem of her back skirt over a loose board.

The fabric slid, the leather showed, and the sun beat down on both until the slime was no longer wet and no longer smelled.

Zubair told himself the pressure of his palm against her was only to help her. 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

And it was.

But it was also more than that.

He guided her back to the truck as the other men tidied up behind them.

Lachlan picked up a piece of the jerky she had taken out of her space and bit into it like a man starved.

Only he wasn’t hungry in the least.

"I could have sworn this tasted better before," he muttered under his breath as Alexei and Elias took down the tarp.

"Maybe it went bad," shrugged Elias, not really giving it much thought.

"Sera’s jerky doesn’t go bad," pointed out Alexei, snatching a piece of his own and putting it into his mouth. "She knows how to do it properly, and her space keeps everything fresh."

"Maybe he lost his ability to taste?" shrugged Elias, walking over with the tarp neatly folded under one arm. "Or maybe he didn’t have any to begin with."

"Look at you making jokes," Lachlan sneered at the other man. There was a bit of heat and accusation to his voice, but both Alexei and Elias ignored it. "Is this the case of the tin man getting a heart? Or was it a brain?"

"Careful," advised Elias, ripping off another piece of the jerky with his front teeth. "We might have gotten along all this time, but who knows what will happen in the future. Or are you scared of what is to come?"

"I will never be scared of you, tin man," replied Lachlan, the smile long gone off his face. Rotating his neck in a way that shouldn’t be possible for the man, Lachlan stepped up in front of Elias, looking him in the eyes. "I think you have an issue with my taste because we seem to share it."

He opened his mouth to say more, but before the words managed to come out, Sera’s voice called out to the three of them. "Are you three ready?" she asked, her voice as refreshing as the wind around them. "I want to go on a shopping spree."

"If that is what you want, then a shopping spree is what you’ll get," Lachlan promised, spinning around and away from Elias. His trademark smile was back on his face as he lightly jumped down the three steps of the porch. "We’ll put it on Captain Zaddy’s tab."