Kaitlyn had never seen stars until after the apocalypse.

With all the smog and light pollution that New York City used to have, the only things visibile in the sky at night were aircraft or the moon. Now, with the death of civilization nearing its third anniversary, the sky was alive with stars. On a clear night like this one, their light poured into the Amazon's fortress through the cracks between the warped bones used to build it.

While the rest of the Amazons slept, Kaitlyn was wide awake. She walked alone through the overgrown grass that characterized what was once known as Washington Square Park, now known as Amazon territory. Every time Kaitlyn saw the city's ruins silhouetted against this brilliant night sky, it flooded her chest with a mixture of awe and melancholy that never seemed to lessen with time, no matter how many times she went on this kind of errand.

In several days, the Amazons were going to ambush a convoy of townie traders, many of whom were affiliated with the Church, headed towards a colony of survivors in Connecticut called Collinstown. There were some healthy trade routes going between the two towns; Collinstown's produce tended to be a bit more irradiated than Georgetown's, but the former town had far better access to livestock than the latter.

As much as the Amazons would like to get their hands on the produce being transported in this convoy, it would be best if the traders knew to take a different route than their usual. Traders and growers were different things entirely.

Allison had always had a fairly variable sleep schedule. She could, and generally did, follow a regular schedule, but she hadn’t ever had issues with changing it. If she needed to stay up six hours later than normal, it wasn’t an issue, nor was it difficult for her to get back to whatever sleep schedule she wanted the next day. She also, whether relatedly or not, didn’t seem to need quite as much sleep as most people. She wanted it, certainly, but not having it didn’t cause the same problems that it seemed to for most people.

So, it wasn’t very unusual for Allison to spend some hours of the night sitting at a window, looking out at the night and what little could be seen of the landscape. It wasn’t something she did every night; maybe once a week she’d take the time to breath, listen, and think.

It was much more unusual for Allison to spot a figure sneaking away from the Amazon’s fortress. A small figure, with what looked like long hair, so not one of their captives. How those captives would have escaped their cages, Allison couldn’t imagine, but it seemed like the most logical first assumption for why someone would be sneaking away from the fortress. Long hair killed that idea, though, so Allison snuck out of her room, to the door and out of the fortress, following behind the figure as quickly and quietly as she could.

There was a time when such behavior would call for the frequent looking-over of shoulders, for a level of caution-induced awareness appropriate to the kind of treachery the girl was about to perform. If the Amazons knew what Kaitlyn had been doing – that those attacks from other raiders were ultimately her fault, as were many of their own failed raids – things would end badly for her.

But she had grown careless; her shoulder remained entirely un-peeked-over the entire way. This was, in a literal sense, just another walk in the park for her. A very high-stakes walk in a dilapidated, post-apocalyptic park, mind you, but a walk in the park nonetheless.

Though caution may have left her, she still remembered the importance of what she was doing. She was friends with one of the traders' sons. Or used to be, anyway. Peter was a quiet boy, just a few months older than Kaitlyn herself. They had even started to fall in love with each other, in that silly, shallow way that kids their age often tended towards. It wasn't meant to last. He would leave with his father on caravans for weeks at a time. When he came back, he would always be a little taller than when he'd left, leaving the price of Kaitlyn's continued immortality to become more and more pronounced. They were already growing apart when the rise of the Amazons sent Kaitlyn reeling into a web confused loyalties and constant struggles to get the best of two vastly different worlds.

She still saw Peter around the town, sometimes, on those occasions when she got to visit without having to pretend that she was about to kill anyone. He'd grown a lot over the last two years. That whole "puberty" thing probably had something to do with it.

They didn't talk much anymore. As far as she knew, he hated her, now that she lived with the Amazons. That wouldn't stop her from trying to save his life, or his father's.

The girl arrived at her destination: the massive, cube-shaped building that used to be a library for what used to be NYU. The edge of the building facing the blast had caved in on itself, and very few windows were left un-shattered, but the rest of the building held up surprisingly well.

Much of the ground floor was covered in rubble, but thanks to the light from the stars coming in through gashes in the bulding's architecture, one was able to see well enough to avoid tripping over anything.

A drawer in the front desk slid open. A pair of little hands retrieved a hastily-written note from within. A tiny immortal leaned against a nearby wall, tilting her newly-acquired note into a dust-lined ray of light bright enough to read by.

If anyone else was in the building with her, she wouldn't have noticed.

Allison had absolutely no idea what Lady Kaitlyn was doing sneaking away from the Amazon fortress at night. It was, however, clearly Lady Kaitlyn; a few minutes of following her was enough to clarify that. And to prove that Lady Kaitlyn was neither sleepwalking nor unused to this path; she didn’t hesitate, or trip over any of the rubble scattered along it. She wasn’t nervous either, though, so Allison followed only slightly more slowly, having to pick her way through half-seen rubble that she, at least, didn’t already know the way through.

The building that Lady Kaitlyn went into was vaguely familiar, but not enough to mean anything to Allison. The rubble around it, on the other hand, was both completely unfamiliar and distinctly problematic. Allison crept as slowly as possible through the first half of it while Lady Kaitlyn disappeared into the building, before finally stumbling over a rock, cutting her hand as she caught herself on a larger boulder. She hissed, and kicked the rock away so it bounced off a few others, before realizing that that was perhaps not the best option ever when trying to sneak.

Oh well. It wasn’t like she’d be keeping following Lady Kaitlyn secret from her for long anyway. She glared again at both rocks before continuing, slightly less quietly, toward the building.

Kaitlyn frowned at the note. The Crimson Devils – a really nasty sort of gang with territory in the Bronx area – had attacked another farm. The Church was almost certain that anyone who didn't die in these attacks was being taken in alive, and the Crimson Devils probably wouldn't be treating their captives as kindly as the Amazons treated theirs. And the Amazons weren't horribly nice to their captives.

Somebody kicked a rock. That somebody was not Kaitlyn.

Pop!

A small shockwave ripped through the air. It managed to take the note from Kaitlyn's hand and send it flapping into the darkness. It kicked up a thin cloud of dust and powdered building materials, making her eyes water. "Who's there?" she demanded. This was followed by a cough, a result of the dust that she'd just kicked into the air. Watering eyes scanned the entrance to the library, as that was where the noise came from, then the darkness to her left, which her note had floated into.

Meanwhile, the note, a torn piece of salvaged printer paper with writing scrawled in deep black ink, sat face-up by the foot of a particularly large piece of rubble, just waiting to be seen. Kaitlyn did not see it.

She did, however cough again. Freakin' dust.

In another lifetime he'd sat in this building and studied frantically for tests. Now Styx walked it in a haze of nostalgia. His purpose for coming here had been to pass a message to Kaitlyn. The fellow immortal had infiltrated the Amazons and was doing what she could to abate their destructiveness with targets that could fight back. Targets that wouldn't be missed. It was a goal he approved of. Not necessarily because it helped others. More because it ensured that the Amazons were less of a threat. He could care less about the people they hit so long as they weren't with the church.

But Death had been given the task of ferrying messages back and forth. Maybe it was because he was out of the church so often. Maybe Sebastian just thought he needed to help out a little more. Whatever the reason he'd made the journey to NYU to deliver the next target. Kaitlyn would be along soon to pick it up and he would leave after she left. Styx intended to check on the town on his way back. Gina was there and he wanted to make sure she was doing well.

Behind the crumbling ruin of a bookshelf Styx observed Kaitlyn as she retrieved the note and read about the group with the ridiculous name. Then again she was undercover in a group called "The Amazons". The sound of the rock bouncing caught his ears at the nearly the same time as Kaitlyn's. Styx frowned, though it wasn't visible in the darkness of his hood much less behind the scarf he always wore. Either it was an animal in the rubble or the younger immortal had been followed. Styx tensed for a possible confrontation and continued his observation.

The distinctive pop wasn’t a good sign. Any pop wouldn’t have been a good sign, really, because there weren’t too many things that could cause a pop, and most of those weren’t to be trusted. Lady Kaitlyn’s worried demand wasn’t any more reassuring. Allison got to the entrance as quickly as she could, managing to stub another toe on the way, and send several rocks clattering against each other. “Lady Kaitlyn?”

That was a lot of dust…. Enough, with the already bad lighting, for Allison not to trust her vision. She paused and squinted, attempting to see through the dust and broken shapes of light. “Lady Kaitlyn? Are you okay?”

That was Allison's voice. That was Allison's silhouette in the entrance.

Kaitlyn took a step back, too shocked to speak. Allison was here!

She should have been more careful. She should have watched her back. She should have made sure nobody was following her. She should have done all kinds of stuff to stop this from happening. But she didn't. And now Allison was here.

The younger Amazon took a deep breath to steady herself. It was full of dust. More coughing did very little to steady her nerves, but it did give her time to think. She needed to play it cool. Allison had no reason to believe that Kaitlyn was betraying the Amazons. If Kaitlyn acted natural and didn't give her a reason, there shouldn't be a problem.

"I... I'm okay," she managed to stutter. "It's just that, uh... this is kind of a creepy place at night. It's making me jumpy. That's all." Nervous laugh. This was not 'acting natural,' and Kaitlyn knew it; she needed to pull herself together.

The dust was starting to dissipate. After blinking a few times and wiping some dust from her face, Kaitlyn could begin to make out the shape of Allison's face in the dark. She didn't spend too much time looking at Allison, though; her eyes jumped around the room, looking for that note. If one of her fellow Amazons knew she was passing notes with the church, it was all over.

"So... uh, what are you doing here? It's late."

That voice...Styx had not realized that she'd survived, let alone joined the Amazons. Yet another remnant of his old life back to haunt him and she was still as strange as the day he'd met her in a park holding a funeral for a storm. Drew almost wanted to go down there and ask her how the apple gods were faring. However Styx thought it much better to remain where he was and observe, no matter how his heart twinged at the thought of having to hurt Allison to keep Kaitlyn's secret.

Lady Kaitlyn was visible, more or less, as the dust began settling and movement caught Allison’s eye. Not very clearly, but still visible. There were other shapes; desks, shelves, what looked like a chair, but none that seemed human at all, so Allison relaxed slightly, taking a few more steps into the building.

Lady Kaitlyn’s answer was… less reassuring. Allison may not have needed any of the skills she’d learned from her parents recently, but that didn’t mean she had lost them. She was perfectly able to recognize when someone was frantically searching for an answer.

That did not, however, necessarily mean she’d say so. She stayed relaxed, relatively. “I followed you. So… what are we doing in a creepy place at night?”

The dust was… annoying, really; it was making her mouth and throat feel try, and tickle as if they wanted to cough. It was also kind of pretty as it settled, though, catching and reflecting off dust like pale sparks in the moonlight. Allison let her eyes follow it, drifting across the room and down to the floor.

Huh. That looked like paper. Well, that could be useful. The step Allison took over toward the probably-a-piece-of-paper wasn’t particularly hurried, but was fast enough, and she leaned over to pick it up.

"Well..."

This wasn't going well. Her eyes wandered through the building, hoping to find some detail that she could use to explain herself. Something that didn't involve being a traitor who should be punished with death.

Oh. Books. "I've been looking for a good book," she began. "We have all kinds of stuff to do during the day, though, and– don't look at that!" Her eyes followed Allison's and she saw the note. And Allison was looking at the note, and she was walking right towards it. Kaitlyn reached it first, though. She bolted towards it as fast as her legs would carry her, dived for it, snatched it up, and crumpled it into a little ball. Crisis averted.

Except, it wasn't.

She looked up at Allison with big, wide eyes from her spot on the ground. Saying nothing, she scrambled to her feet and started backing away from her fellow Amazon, keeping the balled-up note behind her back. Her mind scrambled for a story that would make what she'd just done seem okay.

That… was far too much for Allison not to be suspicious anymore. The panicked dive for the paper was bad enough; the scared and guilty expression that followed it was beyond a guarantee that Kaitlyn was doing something she knew she shouldn’t. Or shouldn’t let Allison know about, anyway. Allison could think of a few things that fit into that category. None of them could really be classified as forgivable.

“Kaitlyn….” Not Lady, although she maybe should have used it anyway just to pretend not to be suspicious. It was possible her frown wasn’t obvious, with the dust and missing light. “What… is that? Keepsakes from an old boyfriend, or something?” That was an incredibly sarcastic thought, but Allison kind of really wanted it to be true. That would be forgivable. Kind of exasperating, but kids were supposed to be, anyway.

Books weren’t worth considering. That had been almost certainly a lie even when she’d said it; there was no chance it was true now.

She wasn't 'Lady Kaitlyn' at the moment. She was just 'Kaitlyn.' This couldn't be a good sign.

The girl stared at Allison the same way a deer would stare at a pair of oncoming headlights, frozen in place, wide-eyed, almost too stunned to save herself. Kaitlyn needed a story, now. 'Keepsakes from an old boyfriend' wouldn't quite work; it would be suspect if Allison had 'guessed' at the truth so accurately, and that story would be verifiably untrue – Kaitlyn had never had an actual boyfriend, nor, did it seem, would she ever. But the idea of a boyfriend being involved was too good to let go. It would explain her behavior perfectly.

"... Kinda," she squeaked, then cleared her throat. "It's, a note from my boyfriend, but... uh..." She took a deep breath, then looked at the ground. "It's more like a current boyfriend."

Styx had perked up as the encounter continued. Kaitlyn wasn't quite up to lying smoothly to Allison. It was easy to read the lies in her manner and speech and then she compounded it by diving for the note. Styx shook his head. He was loathe to attack Allison. Strange as she'd been she had still survived and that was something. He didn't want to attack her. However if his hand was forced he'd have to defend the church's interests somehow.

Kaitlyn's spur of the moment acknowledgement of Allison's undoubtedly sarcastic comment forced Styx's lips to tug upward at the corners for a moment. That was one way of going about it. Though he did wonder just who she thought she could use for the patsy in that scheme.

That… was not what Allison had been expecting. Or anything close to it, really. Kaitlyn had a boyfriend? Twelve-year-old, little kid Kaitlyn? Though that did explain why she wanted the note kept secret, at least….

Though, Allison supposed, Lady Kaitlyn wasn’t technically twelve. It could be that she matured, she just didn’t grow. Which only made the situation concerning for an entirely different reason; what happened when the boyfriend grew up and Kaitlyn didn’t?

Plus, Allison had mentioned a boyfriend. It would be a convenient lie….

“…Alright.” Allison sat cautiously down on the floor, ignoring the puffs of dust that flew back into the air. “Tell me about your boyfriend, then.”