Chapter 295: A Them Problem
"We’re going to the craft store," I announced when I walked into the dining room the next morning.
I had made a decision last night, and now I was going to make good on it today.
All four men looked up at once. Lingyun stared at the jeans I was wearing, then glanced toward the windows as though he needed to confirm the sun was still rising from the right direction. Xu Zhenlan already had a map open across one end of the table, while Zhou Chenghai stood beside him with a set of SUV keys in his hand. Yuche was leaning against the counter with a cup of coffee, and the slight curve of his mouth told me that none of them were nearly as surprised as they were pretending to be.
"Today?" Lingyun asked, but he couldn’t hold off the smirk on his face.
"No," I said as I crossed the room to pour myself a coffee. "Next week. I only put on real pants at this hour because I wanted to sit on the couch and spend another day thinking about it."
His smile widened, but at least he had enough sense not to point out that I’d made up my mind and ended up agreeing with them that I needed to leave the house for a while.
I hadn’t verbally agreed to anything the night before. I’d gone to bed, stared at the ceiling, and decided sometime before morning that another full day of watching construction workers walk past the windows might actually end with me going insane.
Going to a craft store for a few hours seemed like the less troublesome option.
Apparently, the men had reached the same conclusion without me because the trip was already being treated like a military deployment.
I carried my coffee to the table and looked down at the three different routes marked across the map. "It’s twenty minutes away. Why are there backup routes?"
"Because it used to be twenty minutes away," Chenghai said. "We don’t know what condition the roads are in now." He disappeared for a few minutes down the hall before I could even reply.
He was being so irritatingly reasonable, especially when I wanted to complain about them turning a trip for embroidery thread into an expedition. Before I could find something wrong with the map, Zhou Chenghai returned carrying two rifles, a handgun, and enough knives to invade a small country.
I burst out laughing at the sight of him. Where did he even get the guns?!? "We’re buying thread," I reminded him when I could finally get my laughter under control. "Not starting a war."
"You’re buying thread," he said as he checked the strap across his shoulder. "I’m leaving the property for the first time in weeks, and I prefer to be prepared. The past two times we didn’t have weapons, and that was what lead to you and Wei Lingyun getting hurt."
I wanted to point out that him having weapons or not wasn’t the issue, but he looked so happy stroking the rifle, I didn’t have the heart to say anything. "You look ridiculous." Okay, so I really couldn’t help myself. Clearly, I had to say something.
"You’ll appreciate it when someone tries to steal your purple thread," shot back Zhou Chenghai, sounding a lot more like the bodyguard I had before the end of the world than whatever he had become after.
I almost missed that.
But if anyone tried to steal my thread, I wasn’t going to need anyone’s help. I would take them out myself. The baby vine wrapped around my wrist lifted both heads and hissed softly, clearly agreeing with me.
Yuche set down his cup and came closer. He wasn’t carrying his weapons openly like Zhou Chenghai, but that didn’t mean he was unarmed. Yuche could probably hide a knife while standing naked in an empty room. He stopped beside me and asked quietly, "Do you still want to go?"
The others didn’t interrupt or pretend they weren’t listening. I looked toward the hallway leading deeper into the mansion and knew that I could change my mind without anyone trying to stop me.
Yuche and Lingyun both thought I needed to get out for a few hours, but neither of them would push me through the front door if I decided I’d rather stay home. It was one of the things that I liked most about them.
Then I imagined another day of staring through the living room window while a mutant flower ate zombie rats in the yard.
"I want the purple thread," I announced like it was a matter of life and death. Then again, it just might be.
Yuche nodded once. "Then we’ll get the purple thread."
"But not until we establish the rules." My voice rang clear because I wasn’t willing to just roll over for the guys.
Lingyun let out a sigh, but he didn’t argue. He lowered himself into one of the chairs while I looked at the other three men in turn.
"All four of you are coming with me," I said. "No one stays behind to supervise the workers, rearrange furniture, or decide that one of my rooms would make a better office."
Xu Zhenlan folded the map while nodding his head, never once questioning me. "All four of us will go."
Without saying another word, I walked out the front door, ignoring everyone around me. The men filed out quickly after.
When I turned around, Xu Zhenlan and Zhou Chenghai were already standing beside the SUV. Lingyun held open the door and I climbed into the back seat beside. Lingyun sat on my other side, squeezing me between the two men. Zhou Chenghai settled behind the wheel, and Xu Zhenlan joined him in the passenger seat with the folded map.
Zhou Chenghai started the SUV before anyone could say anything, but I wasn’t finished. I made it clear that there would be no detours, no checking nearby buildings, and no stopping because someone heard a strange noise or saw something interesting.
If anyone attacked us, we would kill them and keep driving. If the craft store had burned down, was occupied, or was filled with survivors waiting to tell us their tragic life stories, we would turn around and come home.
"No helping strangers," I stressed, my eyes narrowing at the two Saints seated in the front seats. "No offering protection, no bringing anyone back to the mansion, and definitely, absolutely no offering supplies."
Zhenlan nodded. "Agreed."
"And we’ll be home before lunch."
"That depends on the roads," Chenghai said.
I raised an eyebrow at him. "Then I suggest you drive faster."
He pulled away from the house without answering.
The vines covering the gate slowly separated as the SUV approached, revealing the road beyond the property. Fang Lihua stood near the workers and watched us leave with an expression that suggested she couldn’t quite believe I was voluntarily going somewhere.
I wasn’t sure I believed it either.
The plants closed behind us as soon as we passed through the gate. I turned in my seat and watched the leaves fold across the entrance until the mansion disappeared behind a wall of green. Nothing collapsed. No one rushed inside. The house remained exactly where it belonged even though I was no longer standing inside it.
"You can still change your mind," Yuche said beside me, wrapping his arm around my shoulders and pulling me into his chest.
"I know," I agreed with a sigh. I rested my head on his shoulder and relaxed into his embrace.
The surrounding neighborhood was quieter than I remembered. There were abandoned vehicles lining the curbs, weeds had forced their way through cracks in the pavement, and old stains marked several driveways. For the first few minutes, the only movement came from the occasional zombie wandering between houses.
Then I noticed a piece of red cloth fluttering in the wind.
The first strip had been tied around a street sign. Another hung from the entrance to a side road, followed by several more fastened to utility poles farther ahead. They were too clean to have been there for long, and they appeared often enough that they couldn’t be random.
"What are those?" I asked.
Zhenlan studied the next strip as we drove past it. "Territory markers. Someone’s claiming the surrounding streets."
I looked out the window at the red cloth fluttering in the wind. Whoever had put it there clearly believed that tying fabric around a few poles made the neighborhood theirs.
"Well," I said as I settled deeper into my seat, "that sounds like a them problem."
