“You seem like a- shapeshifter.”

“Fuck. How’d you know?”

“I didn’t! Hah!”

“You nearly died!”

“Oh dear, what a shame that would have been,” snarks the zombie “Not like I’ve done that before.”

“What if-”

“You died.”

“What- no. That’s not what I was going to say.”

“What’s wrong with dying.” asks the zombie “Are you saying dying is bad?”

“I- uh. Yes? Yes, dying is bad.”

“Yeah, it kinda is,” says the zombie “Sorry were you two discussing something important?”

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“Most humans prefer to simply ignore any kind of medical crisis and instead use the ‘hope it goes away’ method of managing illness.”

“Most humans are stupid.”

“Yes. Yes they are.”

“Why would you do that to yourself?”

“I’unno. Boredom?”

“You cut off one of your arms out of boredom.”

“It’ll grow back.”

“Let me in,” demands a voice from behind the door.

Xe opens it. There is nobody there, only a ludicrously fluffy black cat.

“Oh, thanks,” says the cat “You’re a life saver. It’s fucking raining!”

“You’re alive! You’re alive!”

“Yeah,” xe laughs, doesn’t say otherwise. There’s a zombie bite going necrotic on the back of xir calf- xe’s got hours maybe.

It’ll be fine. It’ll be fine. Xe’s going to be fine.

“I’d prefer not to have to kill you,” says the mercenary “Stand down.”

“Oh,” grins the bounty hunter, black teethed and bloody “You’re the fae-killer? Is that who you are? Protecting your little second-born heir from the big, bad, wolf? Haha. Try and kill me then. I dare you.”

“Why are you…” the botanist waved a hand at the asexual. “That?”

The asexual sighed. “Do you mean ‘talking to thin air’, ‘wearing two-day-old clothes’, or ‘hauling around a cauldron’?”

“I was kind of referring to being covered in blood, but those are good questions too.”

“You’re forgetting,” says the bounty hunter “I’m not human. I have no time for your squabbles.”

“So what,” says the mercenary,  standing firmly in front o the second born heir “You’re hunting us because you want to for no reason at all.”

“Money,” the bounty hunter grins “And a good fight.”