They'd set out in high spirits the next morning. Even Cygnus, as cynical and worried as he was about taking Sterling and Lyla with them to the school of all places, seemed rather upbeat. Virgil reckoned that his partner was just as excited as the rest of them were for the two new members of their expeditions to head out with them for the first time, especially since he knew that the two of them were looking forwards to it as well.

Virgil wouldn't have been surprised to find that Sterling or Lyla were just as worried as Cygnus was about their first time heading out, but just like Cygnus it seemed that their excitement would, in this instance, override their doubts. Besides, Virgil was sure they'd do just fine. They had good heads on their shoulders and had displayed a not-inconsiderable amount of aptitude and fortitude when it came to their training, so he didn't know what everyone was so worried about. He'd been shit scared the first few times he'd left the apartment to go galivanting across the city with Cyg, and in all honesty apart from a few scares here and there nothing that bad had ever really happened to them.

Leading that strange and shadowy creature back to their flat had been a less than pleasant moment, yes, but nothing bad had actually come of that. There was no reason to assume it would at all, to be honest. The first thing Virgil had noted when he'd woken up that morning was the complete absence of anything related to that strange feeling of dread and nervousness he'd felt before heading to the school last time, and in the absence of that feeling he instead felt a sort of tentative hope. Maybe that creature really had been scared off for good by Cygnus' rifle shot. Maybe its curiosity was sated and it simply didn't care about them anymore. Virgil didn't know, and he didn't really care either. The creature hadn't made an appearance, and that was that.

They passed near Cryer's Boulevard after a few hours spent walking on the road, and in that entire time they'd only needed to hide twice. Once it had been a false alarm because he'd been jumping at shadows, but even still the two new members of their expeditionary party had ducked into cover no questions asked. Yeah, Virgil figured they'd do fine.

It had been almost amusing to watch the amazement on the faces of Lyla and Sterling. It was easy to forget that the two of them had, with the very brief exception of being up on the roof every now and again, never really left the apartment since the disappearance of the world that was. Now they were out here, with the concrete buildings left to be consumed by ivy and the cars that were completely covered in a soft blanket of moss. The pavements were cracked and the roads were splintered, small tufts of grass and weeds poking their way up through the asphalt and slabs, and the horizon in every direction was shrouded in a thick foggy mist. The two of them, though still alert and attentive, had been enraptured pretty much this whole time.

"Alright, I think that's far enough for now. I make the time to be... somewhere around half past one. That makes it time for lunch, unless anyone here disagrees."

As Cygnus said that there was an almighty rumbling from Lyla's stomach, and they all turned to look at her with amused expressions.

"Well," Cygnus continued, "I'm going to take that as a 'no' and suggest we stop for lunch in that case. Come on, get comfortable, I can assure you that the benches and cars covered in moss aren't as uncomfortable as they look."

The four of them ended up sitting in the back of a moss-covered pickup truck, resting on the pair of small benches that lined the sides of the vehicle's storage space.

Lunch that day, as ever, basically consisted of sandwiches, strawberries, and baked goods. Sterling, bless his heart, was trying not to look too proud as they all ate the flapjacks that he had made the day before with contented looks on their faces. If it had been Virgil that made baked goods that tasted this delicious he wouldn't have bothered trying to hide his pride, but he supposed that Sterling was a more humble person than he was.

His sandwiches were a very simple affair of tuna with vinegar, and though it was a little difficult to eat without making a mess he had to confess that it was nice to have a change from eating sandwiches of ham and cheese everyday. Cygnus had his usual salad-based sandwich, only this time with beef instead of ham and cheese, whilst Lyla had a simple cheese sandwich and Sterling had opted for beef and mustard. Heathen. Who likes mustard on their sandwiches? There was something deeply wrong with the boy, Virgil was sad to admit. Anyone that liked mustard was simply wrong in his book.

"So," Lyla asked between mouthfuls of bread and cheese, "how much longer till we get there? It's like, another hour, right?"

Cygnus and Virgil both nodded, Sterling as well.

"If we go by the maps I looked at before we left then we're around two-thirds of the way there, yes."

Cygnus smiled at Sterling, and Virgil playfully rolled his eyes at Lyla. It seemed that the youngest member of their group had done his homework.

"That's about right, yes." Cygnus took another bite of his sandwich, chewed, swallowed, drank a little water, and then continued. "I apologise to the both of you, but today isn't likely to be all that exciting in terms of the outing. The vast majority of what we do today will simply be walking, broken only in the middle by a short time spent rooting through boxes and drawers in the office attached to the school's reception area. Normally we'd be walking a shorter distance than this, and be spending quite a bit more time at our destination, but not this time. Hell, you won't even be able to experience the joys of looting from the back rooms and warehouse rooms in the employee-only sections of shops! That makes up a good portion of the fun when it comes to being out here, by my estimation anyway."

Virgil snorted at his upstanding and well-composed boyfriend's casual admission of taking a strange sense of enjoyment in stealing from stores. In a way it made sense, since he'd spent a good portion of his life wishing he could afford what was inside but lacking the will to actually steal from people who were just trying to make a living. Now there wasn't actually anyone left to steal from and everything was fair game, so in this instance everything seemed as though it had lined up pretty well for his partner.

Sterling also gave a small and yet obviously amused smile, whilst Lyla openly cackled.

"HA! Don't worry Sea, you'll have us out and stealing properly in no time! We just gotta make this run for some meds for my brother, and for you of course Virgil, and then we can move on to your normal routine of looting and breaking shit."

"I do not 'break shit', Lyla."

"According to the fuck-off drawer of batteries in your room I'd say you've made a pretty good effort in making sure half the shit in this city doesn't work anymore, Sea. That counts as breaking some shit in my book."

Cygnus smiled and shrugged.

"Well it does all still work, the various items I've removed the batteries from just don't have a power source at the moment. They'd all still work fine if I put the batteries back inside properly. Probably, anyway."

"Probably?"

"Some of the items might have been damaged thanks to outside interference since the batteries were taken out of them. Others might have had faulty internals and as such were rendered permanently inoperable as soon as the power was removed. The only way for me to check would be to go back around to every light, door, alarm, and cash register that I've taken the batteries out of and put them back in. I'm not doing that."

Lyla gave Cygnus an exaggerated shudder.

"Ooh, long-winded and routine work? Of course, how silly of me to suggest that you might enjoy such things."

"Oi," Virgil replied before his boyfriend could speak, leaning forwards and flicking her on the forehead, "no insulting Cygnus for being boring sometimes. He can't help it."

His boyfriend turned to look at him with an incredulous look.

"An interesting thing to say for someone who consistently gushes to Madison about how much they enjoy hearing me ramble."

"She told you? That traitor!"

"No," Sterling interjected with something between amusement and vague annoyance, "she hasn't said anything. You're just nowhere near as subtle as you think you are when talking about Sea."

Virgil shut his eyes for a moment.

"Leave me here. I need to decompose in the moss now that my life has been so thoroughly ended."

"Love, please stop being dramatic. You and I both know that you state your need to decompose amongst the moss at least three times a week."

"Fuck you Cyg this time I mean it."

His boyfriend snorted a little, and Virgil couldn't help but smile as he leaned back where he was sat. Yes, there were probably better things he should have been doin gin that moment, things like planning out how he was going to find his testosterone tablets when he reached the school or what they should do if they did encounter that strange and malevolent creature again, but all he could think of right now was how much he enjoyed this sort of thins. It was almost like the world hadn't disappeared around them, as though they were just a couple of friends on an outing who were happy to spend time with each other. Well, he guessed that most of the last part was true; they were all friends on an outing and at the very least they all appeared to like spending time with each other. Virgil definitely enjoyed spending time with them at any rate.

He sat back up and tuned himself back in to whatever conversation had sprung up, something relating to cars or some other type of motor vehicle, and made sure to try and pay attention to what was being said. It was nothing important, but it was always nice to just listen to his friends act like normal friends every now and again and not a band of people who spent all day around each other thanks to the circumstances they'd been placed in. Did this count as post-apocalypse? Virgil was pretty sure it did. There hadn't been any great catastrophe or anything, but the world had ended and they were all still here. That was pretty much the definition of post-apocalypse as far as he was concerned.

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"So, we've got about another hour to walk then, huh?"

"Yes, about that much. We could probably cut through Cryer's Boulevard itself, but me and Virgil tend to avoid that area. It's too perfect an area for one or more creatures to ambush us along the way. We'd much rather stay in the open with the option of darting for cover where needed, so we stick to the roads mostly."

Sterling nodded.

"That makes sense. I never liked Cryer's anyway, not with how dingy it always seemed."

"From what I heard the reputation it had was well-deserved," Lyla cut in, "what with the constant string of drug-busts and assaults that seemed to take place in the area. It's a miracle the place wasn't torn down, if you go by what my parents used to say about it."

Sterling grit his teeth at the mention of her parents, but Cygnus just shrugged before he made to answer.

"They probably weren't all that wrong in that instance. The buildings on Cryer's either needed serious renovations or to be torn down completely and rebuilt from scratch, but the council were never going to do that. It would have been expensive and no-one would have seen the benefits until they'd already been voted out of office, so there was no real incentive for them. A pity about it though. It did have the potential to be quite a nice area, but it never quite lived up to that. A real pity."

There was a comfortable silence that settled on them after that, broken by the occasional question relating to their location or what exactly the small boxes containing his and Wesley's pills might look like, but aside from that there was little else talked of as they finished up their lunch. It was still a nice silence, the sort which didn't need to be filled with conversation, but sooner or later Virgil knew they'd all be chatting in a lively manner again as they began to walk from their little lunch spot out to the school. It was a long walk, yes, but one he had grown quite used to these last few weeks to be honest. At the end of the route would be the school, where he'd pick up his tablets and get the hell out of dodge. He hadn't felt that sensation of being watched, but that didn't mean he felt completely at ease going back to this place. After all, it was one thing to lead a monster back home once, but it was quite another to do it twice.

"Alright, I think we're all done here. Are we all finished with our lunches? Does anyone think they need a longer rest period?"

Cygnus stood up as he spoke, looking around at them expectantly. Virgil shook his head and stood, stretching his back and his legs.

"Nah, I'm good Cyg. What about you two? You good to keep on going?"

Sterling gave them both a firm nod and moved to clamber off of the back of the pickup truck, Lyla following close behind but not without a long string of toothless complaints and good-natured moaning.

"Well," Cygnus said as he hopped down off the back and held his arms out to help Virgil down, "in that case we'd better get a move on. In a little under an hour we'll be there, then we'll just have to worry about the walk back. You'll be starving by the time you get back to the flat I'm sorry to tell you."

"Cyg, they both probably already know that. I mean they sort of have to, what with having watched me and you demolish a pizza half the times we return from looting."

"True enough. Come on then, lets get moving. I want us to be done with this and back at the apartment long before nightfall."

Virgil nodded his agreement, and noticed Sterling and Lyla mimicking his action. He smiled a little. Yeah, those two would do just fine out here.

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The walk to the school had come and gone, and now they were stood inside the reception area. It wasn't a particularly huge area, just a desk with a few chairs acting as a sort of waiting room, but the office that they needed to get into was behind a locked door located behind the desk.

Annoyingly it was an electronic lock instead of a mechanical one, and as a result Virgil and the two newcomers had to stand around and just keep an eye on the place whilst Cygnus broke out his tools and got to work.

"Hate these locks," Virgil heard him mutter under his breath at one point, "what was wrong with a keyhole and a key? No wonder the school never had the money to look after the kids, they blew the budget on these bastard things."

Still, he knew that sooner or later his boyfriend would have the room open. He'd had plenty of practice breaking into the staff-only areas of shops across the town ever since everyone had vanished, so it was really just a matter of Virgil keeping himself entertained and alert whilst his boyfriend worked to open the door. It was only a matter of time.

Sterling appeared to be looking at a few of the old art pieces on the walls, the ones made by students and put up as a matter of pride by the school board, and for a moment Virgil wondered what exactly it was that had the boy so enraptured. Was it the art itself, or something else? Maybe he knew some of the people who'd made some of them. Maybe he was having memories of his art classes or something to that effect. Whatever it was, Virgil was content to leave him to it. Sterling would mention it on his own terms if he wanted to.

As for Lyla, she was just moving around prodding everything she could see to check if it "had any secrets", but alas she'd found no such secrets so far. A tragedy, Virgil was certain. As for Virgil himself, well, he really wasn't doing anything at the moment. True to what he'd said to Cygnus he just wanted to get into the office, grab his meds, and get back out again. He didn't want to be here one more second than he needed to be, not with both his poor memories of the school and the fact that the creature was probably somewhere in this complex right now. Yes, his bad memories weren't quite as overpowering as they once had been thanks to his previous visits here with Cygnus, but the creature was something that there really was no cure for being worried about.

Not until they found it and killed it anyway.

Still, that was something to think about another time. If such a beast were to show up right now it would find three pistols and a rifle levelled at it immediately, not to mention the fact that Virgil felt he had a pretty good understanding on how to avoid giving in to the fear the creature seemed to inspire in those around it. The trick was, as far as Virgil could tell, to recognise that the fear you were feeling was 'artificial'. It wasn't fear that was internally generated, rather fear that was planted there by the creature. Cygnus wasn't sure on that, but Virgil was adamant. If anyone was an expert on constant feelings of dread then it was him.

Still, there was a sense of unease about this place. It wasn't the fear of the monster, just a regular sense of unease. After all, he had no way of knowing if the monster was capable of 'turning off' its fear-snare or not. If it could turn if off then it was entirely possible that the monster was literally the next room over and none of them would have any warning. That was a fun thought. Best to keep that to himself and not think about it too much. He didn't want to give himself over to fear, and whether that fear had come from the monster or was a natural occurrence from his own mind didn't really make a difference in that context.

"Ah, there we are."

He was broken from his thoughts by his boyfriend's quiet voice, followed quickly by the buzz of the electric lock as it was unlocked.

"How is it, Cyg? Are we in?"

"Yes, we're in. Apologies that it took so long, I'm afraid that I made a bit of a mess of the first attempt at opening the door and made my subsequent attempts more difficult."

Virgil silenced him with a quick kiss and walked into the small office, vaguely aware of Lyla's fake-wretching in the background the eye-roll that Sterling and Cygnus shared in response. He couldn't help but smile even as he looked around the room and realised that this, whilst easier than he'd thought it would be, was still going to take quite a bit of time.

Getting the pills wouldn't be hard, since the various medicines were all stored alphabetically. At least that makes my job a lot easier. He had to admit that the sight of the well-ordered medicines fill him with a sense of relief, for he didn't want to be hear any longer than he had to. The problem was that there were just so many different medicines, and the writing on all of them was so small that he was going to have to read his way through them to make sure he picked up the right prescription. At least he'd be able to just make his way to the 'T' section, which would narrow it down a bit.

Lyla followed behind, quickly moving over to the pills that started with 'M'. Her brother's medication was modafinil, a stimulant designed to help him with his wakefulness throughout the day, and though of course it hadn't simply made his disorder disappear it certainly helped him live with it on a day-to-day basis. Arguably more importantly, though of course Virgil recognised he was looking at it from an outside perspective and so he couldn't pass judgement on what was really more important, it made Wesley far less prone to collapsing throughout the day. No-one held his collapses against him, of course they didn't, it was hardly his fault after all, but Virgil knew that every single one of them had been concerned at one point or another at the prospect of Wesley collapsing somewhere with a hard or tiled floor, because that could actually hurt him quite badly.

To cut a long story short, Virgil was glad they were grabbing Wesley's medication as well as his own.

As he was looking through the 'T' section trying to find the testosterone pills that had the right dose, Cygnus walked up to him. His body language was nonchalant, but his face was pulled taut with stress and he appeared to be trying not to seem worried.

"Cyg? You alright?" Virgil whispered, understanding that his boyfriend probably wanted the fact that he was worried to remain on the down-low. "Do you feel like you're being watched?"

His boyfriend shook his head, then leaned in close.

"I don't feel like I'm being watched, but I still feel slightly uneasy. It doesn't feel like the same sort of palpable uneasiness I felt last time, just a normal uneasiness, but I still don't want to linger here much longer. Do you think you're close to finding your medication?"

Virgil scanned through a few more boxes, then shrugged and began taking any box marked 'testosterone' and placing it in his bag. Cygnus made a noise of discontent, but Virgil ignored it this time. He wasn't just going to start taking random doses, he was just trying to save them a bit of time.

After perhaps another half a minute he came across his own medication, and very gently took it down from the shelf. Fuck, he didn't realise just how relieved he'd be to know that his medication would last just a bit longer. Hopefully it would last long enough for their little expeditionary group to make their way to the pharmacy or the hospital across town to scope them out and find some more over there. Now that he thought about it he should probably make his way to the pharmacy with Cygnus to tidy the place up a bit and sort out the medicine packets inside. That way they wouldn't need to spend hours rooting through nondescript white boxes of medicines that had names far too long to be remembered by someone like him.

"Yeah, okay, I've got it now. Hey Lye, you got your bro's meds?"

"Yep," came the response, "still sealed in its packaging. No wonder the daft bastard seemed more tired than normal recently: he's been cold-turkey for weeks now. I'm gonna be having a conversation with him and set him straight on that in no uncertain terms, make no mistake."

Virgil couldn't help but smile at her annoyed, almost angry, words at her absent brother. She wasn't angry at him, this Virgil knew, she would more be angry at the fact that she hadn't noticed the fact he hadn't been on his medication and that he hadn't told her. She cared for her brother a great deal, and on that matter there could be no doubt.

"Well then," Sterling said, looking at Cygnus, "if we're all done here then I suppose it's time for us to make our way back home?"

Cygnus nodded firmly.

"Indeed. Now then, let us be on our way unless there's anything else for us to do here. I don't want us here any longer than we have to be."