ER/Stand Crossover




" I'm so sick of canned food." Jeanie muttered as she wiped the dust off of a display. " Something fresh would be nice."

Unfortunately, Kerry thought, they were for the most part a group of ex-city dwellers. Something fresh would entail a lot of work, though fresh meat *was* readily available. It was Iowa, the corn state and more importantly, the cow state. Granted, her own hunting experience had been long ago and in Africa, but she suspected the only real difference would be fewer poisonous snakes to watch out for. Steak for the evening meal would be difficult to produce on short notice though. Bad enough she had gotten suckered into making biscuits, and enough for Carter, a ravenous wolf. Still, she understood where Jeanie was coming from and it didn't hurt to be supportive. " Maybe we can look in a few backyards. These people must have gardens."

" And corn!" Jeanie's eyes lit up with excitement. " We've been driving by it for the last week, but it should be ready to eat. It's almost August."

" Wouldn't all this corn be feed corn, for the cows?" Kerry recalled one of her father's more disastrous attempts at a garden. Jeanie waved off her concern with a brilliant smile.

" Even if it is, its still good at this point. Its all in how you prepare it." Jeanie said. " So lets get something for dinner and breakfast. Then we'll pick some corn." With that, she trotted down the darkened aisle, her flashlight shining along the shelves.

At least she cheered up a little, Kerry thought tiredly as she walked over to the next aisle. Jeanie had been down for some time, though the exact reason escaped Kerry. It wasn't as though there weren't a lot of things to be depressed about in their brave new world.

Stop it, she told herself as she started looking over the cold medicine, things *are* getting better. Really. No matter how bad the nightmares are, you haven't let on about it. They think you're ok, and they'll keep thinking that as long as you keep the wall up. She let herself visualize the wall. It was much as it had been before the plague, sturdy with concrete blocks. Fortified with rebar after the plague, and crumbling in a number of places. No matter how hard she tried, it kept crumbling and sometimes, late at night after she'd awakened from the same nightmare for the nth time, biting on her hands to stop from screaming, she knew it was going to fall. But it was still daylight and she could safely place those thoughts behind the wall where they belonged. She knew it wasn't healthy. Sometimes she wondered if the bad dreams were really just a reaction to her hiding all of her emotions and feelings behind her mental wall, but sometimes she thought the dreams were real.

That was another thought to keep hidden, that she was even considering her dreams to be real. To dream that dark forces were gathering in Las Vegas and the troublemakers were being crucified on telephone poles, that was bad. To think it was real was psychotic. I'm not psychotic, she told herself, I know what's real and what's not. The plague was real. My dreams are not. Now put those thoughts away, behind the wall, before Jeanie sees you looking upset and thinks you've lost it again.

She browsed through the cold medicine, picking up more than enough to last Lucy, all the while fighting back the cold sense of unease she felt. Her ears strained to listen but all she heard was the sound of Jeanie rooting around. Stop it, she told herself again, there's no one here. If you keep acting like a nut, they're going to start to wonder about the medication. She felt the collection of Prozac pills that were accumulating in her jacket pockets and shuddered. She had stopped taking it, almost as soon as they had left Chicago. It hadn't helped, not really. The first few days, yes, it had made her feel calm but if anything the nightmares had intensified to where she literally hadn't been able to sleep. So she started palming the pills. It wasn't hard. Though her companions made a lot of noise to themselves about keeping an eye on her, it was simple to avoid them and their concern. She had a gun, for example. A mall .22 pistol that she kept in her jacket pocket just in case her daily keeper decided to take off and she found herself in a bind.

And that was the real fear wasn't it? The thought reared itself from behind her mentally imposed wall of avoidance and forced her to think about it. The fear that at some point her companions were going to get tired of being held up by the crippled psychotic in their midst. She was a drag on the group, a liability. They didn't trust her by herself because of the incident with Walker (what "incident", her inner voice asked, you went crazy and shot the man fifteen times for kicks) and she wasn't able to help with much of the work. They didn't need her for her medical skill, and sometimes the fear that they would decide to leave her overwhelmed her thoughts. Then she would be alone, and if she was alone, keeping all of her stray emotions and odd notions behind the wall would be impossible.

She fingered the small gun. Using the gun was a bad idea, she thought suddenly. The bullets were too small, and it was underpowered. If she didn't hit exactly the right spot, she might live. Or at least linger on for a while unpleasantly. Pills would be better. No chance of survival if she took the pills at night before going to bed. None of them would catch on until the next morning and by then it would be too late. The Prozac she had been saving would do the job.

After a moment, she shook her head. Stop it, she told herself. That's not the answer. Things are getting better. So they don't trust you, that's to be expected. They *are* getting over it. They aren't going to leave you behind somewhere, not without some warning at least. They weren't very good at hiding their plans, and it seemed clear that Doug was going to face their wrath first. She had already overheard some serious talk of an ultimatum. It was a plan doomed to failure, not that anyone had bothered to include her in the discussion.

Not that it was a new thing. She sighed again. Decisions were made around her, sometimes without even a perfunctionary " What do you think?" At first, it hadn't bothered her. She had, she was willing to admit, been in no shape to make good decisions. Plus, the Prozac had kept her from thinking. By the time she'd stopped taking the medication, they had already gotten into the habit of not including her. She tried to not let it bother her, knowing that there was more than a little reason to distrust her rational thinking, but as time wore on, it made her increasingly angry. She put those feelings behind her carefully reconstructed mental wall. Getting angry would be a "sign" that she wasn't coping. It was a sign that she was crazy still.

She shivered again. She couldn't shake the creepy sensation that someone was in the store with them. She spotted a few rats, and let out the breath she had been unconsciously holding. It's just more rats, she thought with relief.

" It's not just rats, Kerry." She spun around at the sound of the darkly masculine voice, but no one was there. Cold sweat broke out all over her body. The voice chuckled at her fright. I know that voice, she thought.

" Of course you know my voice." Again he chuckled, and Kerry realized who it was. The dark man, the man in her dreams. She knew him, if not by his looks, then by his voice and the ice cold sensation that made her ache. Flagg, she thought suddenly, that's his name.

" That's just one of my names, but please, feel free to call me that." He chuckled again. " I have many names. I thought we'd have a little chat. You may want to keep quiet though, since your HIV positive friend can't hear me. She'd probably think you were having another psychotic episode. And of course you wouldn't want that."

No, Kerry thought as she struggled to control her racing heart, Jeanie catching me talking to an aural hallucination would be bad. She took a deep breath and let it out. I'm just imagining this, she told herself, its not real.

" Oh you can tell yourself if you like." Flagg chuckled. Again, she looked around, hoping to find someone there, but instead she heard more laughter in her ears. " You don't really want to see me, Kerry. Or should I call you Dr. Weaver? I think I should. This is a professional negotiation after all."

I'm not hearing this, she told herself. I'm not listening to a demon from my dreams make me so me sort of job offer. She wiped the sweat off her brow with shaking hands.

" But you are hearing it," Flagg said simply. " And perhaps you should listen instead of turning my offer down. I'm amassing my forces. We need a doctor. I'm willing to... forgive your earlier turndown. The offer stands. Come to my side and you'll be a doctor again. A respected and *trusted* member of my high council. You'll never have that with these people, you know. Do you really think they'll ever let you practice medicine again? With your history of murderous rampage? I'm surprised they haven't dumped you by the road side yet, and of course, they certainly have considered it."

No they haven't, she thought, not yet at least. Doug was the big problem, with his drinking. They're more worried about that. But then, there was a part of her that wasn't that sure. She forced those thoughts back behind the wall.

" Of course they've considered it. You aren't fooling them." Flagg chuckled again and she felt the cold sensation running through body increase in intensity. " That brings me to your portion of the bargain. It's no longer a free ride. If you come to my side, you need to do something for me. I don't want the other side to have doctors."

There was no doubt in her mind what he meant. No, she thought.

Icy cold hands grabbed her shoulders, and she could feel his freezing breath next to her ear. She turned slightly, but the invisible hands held her still. " Oh Kerry, " he whispered into her ear, " Don't you see you'd be doing them all a favor? I'm going to win and their lives are forfeit. And really, what do they have to live for? Jeanie won't last more than a few years and she'll die painfully and slowly. Kovac has had a foot in the grave ever since he watched his family die by torture. Doug? He's been a dead man ever since his little chippy died. He just doesn't know enough to stop breathing. And the other three? Lucy, Carter and Randi? Do you know what I'll have to do to them? Do you want that? Their deaths could take days. You'd be showing them mercy by taking care of it for me. Just put a little rat poison in tonight's dinner..."

" No..." She whispered it but that didn't make it any less true. She couldn't do it. More importantly, she wouldn't do it. It went against everything she ever had believed in. " I'd... I'd kill myself first."

" Well, that is always an amusing option." She felt him let go and in seconds the only thing she could hear was the sound of her own rapid breathing. It wasn't real, she told herself again as she wiped her brow again. It wasn't and I'd never do that. She felt the pills in her pocket again. I won't do what he wants. I'm not going to kill anyone. They don't deserve that.

" Kerry?" She jumped at the sound of Jeanie's voice. She spun around. Jeanie looked at her worriedly. " Are you ok? You look flushed."

" I..." Her voice trailed off. Get it back under control, she told herself. You didn't hear anything. Only crazy people hear voices from their dreams telling them to kill. You didn't hear any voices. Just put this whole incident behind the wall and forget about it. Keep everything calm and cool and no one needs to know about the dreams and the dark man. Everything will be fine. " I'm fine. Just a little hot."

" You sure? " Jeanie asked, concern in her voice. " I hope you're not coming down with what Lucy's got."

" No, I'm just a little hot I think. Do we have everything?" She just wanted to get out of there.

" Everything but the corn." Jeanie's good mood seemed to return. " Let's get going." She made for the door. Kerry followed her. She mentally counted the pills she had saved. There's enough, she thought. If it comes to that, I have enough to do the job.



Part 18
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