spin_kick_snap | The Mount, Ex-Los Angeles

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The Mount, Ex-Los Angeles

The last time anyone from Fandom had been in Kathy's LA, the heroes had been living inside the walls that surrounded Paramount Studios, with the exes and the South Seventeens laying claim to everything else. Since then, they'd expanded; the Big Wall pushing the borders out almost a mile in all four directions. In some spots, it was hard to tell that there had ever been a zombocalypse; the streets were clean, the buildings repaired, the blood all scrubbed away. There was a proper school, lots of farms and gardens, several churches, and even a small library. The studio was still the heart of the community, but people had started to spread out and settle. It was still a tight fit, several thousand people into one square mile, but honestly not much worse than Los Angeles used to be, back before the world died and reanimated again.

Life had fallen back into a rhythm again. People got up, got ready for the day. Kids were sent off to school, adults took themselves to various jobs, though there were fewer sales people, baristas, and aspiring actors and a lot more guards, scavengers, and farmers these days. There was a brewery down on Larchmont and a still over on Monroe. Burns Park let people enjoy a bit of nature where the kids could run around and burn off steam and a Gold's Gym practically against the Big Wall. That was where the Unbreakables spent most of their free time, with curious gawkers watching them put more and more weight onto the machines.

It was a bustling little community of survivors, as safe as a place could be, surrounded on all sides by millions of undead waiting to find a way inside to devour them all.

[For them that are there! NFB, and ~~please wait for the~~ OCD is up! Previous entry Next Entry]

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"Try it and I'm gonna knock you out and drag you back to the Mount like a sack of potatoes," Dante said, letting go of his arm. "Do these things get bored, or do I need to go pick 'em off?"

"See if you get a kiss now," Max grumbled. "And--they're exes. They don't have a concept of boredom. Their whole existence revolves around eating and you and I are the only buffet for miles."

He turned slightly and pointed beyond Dante's shoulder. "There, by the way, is Koreatown," he said, pointing at a smear of ash and rubble a little over a quarter mile away. "If the buildings were closer, I'd say we just jump from roof to roof, but they're spread a little far for my ability to parkour."

Dante knew where this was headed and he had to take a moment to pinch the bridge of his nose.

"Okay," he said. "I can either take care of the mob downstairs or I can carry you over there."

... Right, he was walking to the edge of the roof to peer down at the exes. He could take those.

Hey now! Max didn't actually know about Dante's full Swiss Army Arsenal here!

"Carry me?" Max asked. "What, are you a superball, too?"

"Nah, something else," Dante said.

And then he was gone-- right off the roof, into the middle of the mass of exes.

Groping hands - not Max's - and seeking mouths - again, not Max's - waited for Dante, trying to drag him in, to get a taste of his flesh. They pressed all around him, grasping and clacking their jaws. Filmy gray eyes tracked his every movement.

Dante whirled Cerberus around, slamming the weapon straight into the exes all around him. Freezing, cleaving.

He wasn't concerned about the way their jaws snapped at him; just the way their flesh parted under the weapon.

He'd be fine.

What else was there for Max to do but take a seat on the edge of the building and call down random suggestions?

"Oooh, nice swing! Now get the ugly one! No, I said the ugly one! Don't let the cocksucker on the left get the jump on you!"

A sharp wind blew, carrying a cold bite with it. October was coming and a dead city was much chillier than a live one. Max abruptly stopped laughing, drawing his arms around himself and shivering.

It didn't take long for the exes to go down. By the time Dante found himself leaping back up the building, the worst of his own damage - a bite across his lower arm - was already fading.

"Guess we can get back to it," he started, except something about Max made him swallow back the insult that had wanted to come out next.

"Yeah, okay," Max said, his voice a little dull. "I mean, yeah. We should. My spell isn't going to last forever."

Dante took a hesitant step towards him.

"Are you okay--?" he asked.

"Just tired," Max said. "Keeping up a spell like this takes energy and I had to boost it while I was up here and you were down there."

He put an effort into smiling. "Looks like we'll just have to stay really close, I guess."

"Uh huh," Dante said. He looked skeptical. "Sure, I buy that."

"You caught me," Max said. "I just wanted to cuddle."

He deliberately stepped into Dante's personal space, trying to press himself against him.

"Hey!"

Dante shoved him back, one hand pressed against his chest.

"Back off."

"Ugh," Max said, obligingly backing off. "And here I thought we were finally getting somewhere. Like third base maybe."

Dante shook his head, his eyes narrowing.

"I'm not buying this either," he said, but he turned towards the edge of the roof. There was a fire escape; he figured Max would know how to use it.

"What, you think we've taken a walk and now we're best friends?" Max asked, heading for the fire escape. "I'm an asshole and a creep, remember? I'm just trying to live down to your expectations."

"Yeah, I'm starting to figure out why you have so many friends," Dante said, jumping down to the ground below.

"And how many friends do you have?" Max asked. "Are you going home to parades of cheering fans throwing panties at you? Or is it a quiet house waiting for you until someone decides you have something to offer in exchange for their attention?"

That last one glanced off a sore spot, though not hard enough to get much of a reaction. "You want me to count?" he drawled. "Or should I just point out I have a boyfriend and a girlfriend, while you got offed trying to french a decomposing actress?"

"Considering what my perceptions were being filtered through, that's still an amazing level of self-control," Max muttered. "And I could be dripping in pussy and dick right now, but I've been a little busy trying to keep a demon from eating every survivor here, including your girlfriend."

Beat.

"Didn't want you to get jealous. You're welcome."

"You know if you just fucking managed to like, take the asshole down even five percent," Dante said, walking around to find Max at the bottom of the fire escape, "You might actually get somewhere with people."

Beat.

"By the way, I saw Kathy right after she came back from the dead. You are probably so far from fucking okay, it's fucking ridiculous."

"If I took the asshole down five percent, we'd already be fucking in an alcove, so again, you're welcome," Max said, breezing right past that second comment. "Or, I dunno, maybe that's if I raised it up another five percent. You seem like the kind of guy who likes it when someone's a dick to you right before they slip their dick to you."

Dante was not going to punch him again.

Dante was not going to punch him again.

Dante was not going to punch him again because that was what Max was trying for and also he needed all that energy to step on a very old part of him that really wanted to latch onto that and speculate about what fucking Max would be like. (Sometimes he hated how expressive his face could be.)

"Whatever, suit yourself," he snarled instead. "I don't care."

Edited 2018-10-01 10:35 (UTC)

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