The Blind Leading The Lame (Cee)

[Stefan Spencer]

It was really all Cee's fault to begin with. Well Cee and scotch.

Stefan had been thinking about the younger man while trying to find a movie to watch on TV. Coming across a newer zombie flick, he remembered their last adventure at the bar and Cee's comments about them. So he decided to watch it. If nothing else, it might give Stefan an excuse to start up a conversation with the younger man. Over diner perhaps.

What he hadn't excepted was for the movie to completely freak him out. And halfway though he was starting to ask himself all sorts of what if questions. Questions that the scotch was telling him needed to be answered. And right now. Who better to ask that Cee?

So after checking that Sebastian was safe he tucked his bottle of scotch in one hand, clutched his cane in the other, and started wobbling off in the direction of the other man's apartment. He was sure he heard moaning in a dark alley at one point. And he started to wonder which if his cane or the glass bottle would be more useful as a weapon.

When he finally reached Cee's apartment, he was slightly out of breath and sweat covered his brow. He banged on the door until he heard movement on the other side.

"What can you tell me about zombies?" he asked as soon as the door swung open.

[Cee Cohen]

“Mmph.”

Cee’s eyes opened blearily to an eyeful of keyboard. A blurry eyeball of keyboard with half of a glasses lens in the middle of it. Oops. He’d fallen asleep in the middle of a… His eyes flickered up to the screen and skimmed the text. Oh. Grading. “Defecation.”

There was someone banging on his door. Cee had been fairly good about his experiments as of late—nothing had gone BANG in a very long time, so he suspected it wasn’t his landlord. As for who it was—well, at about 11 PM, he couldn’t think of anyone who would come to bang on his door, so it was with a bit of hesitation that he made his way stumbling to the door and managed to open it.

And there was Stefan. Even though he was sleepy and a little incoherent, Cee brightened up considerably at the sight of the man, and then even more at the topic.

“Well, it isn’t exactly the type of conversation you have outside,” he said. “My place isn’t as, ah, well-stocked as yours with liquids, but come in anyways.” He offered Stefan his hand, as the other man was panting in a worrying way, even to Cee’s half-blurred (he’d never managed to straighten his glasses) vision. Once Stefan was inside and seated—quite a feat as there were a frightening amount of computer parts scattered over the floor and, indeed, over the rather Spartan furnishings—Cee settled next to him with a beam.

“So! What did you want to know?”

[Stefan Spencer]

Stefan was glad when his young friend invited him indoors. For a second he felt bad about having woken Cee up. But it passed the moment Cee's face brightened. Stefan enjoyed that for a moment, his brain spinning about why the the young man was so gladden to see him standing at his doorstep at this late hour.

But his fantasies were quickly pushed but the paranoia that had been creeping into his brain. He stepped into the house, reaching his hand out to cling to Cee's. He tripped a few times on the way to his seat since his bad leg, current condition, and Cee's decorating style weren't the best combo. Once he had sat down, he leaned towards Cee.

"They're real aren't they. I mean really really," Stefan said, more than asked. His voice was a little slurred from the scotch, but his eyes held conviction and fear. "What can we do?"

[Cee Cohen]

Cee was happy to see him for a couple of reasons. For one, he really did like Stefan’s company. He thought the man was a good guy, and he liked spending time with him. Plus, Cee wasn’t particularly fond of sleeping, He would much rather hang with other people.

And talk about zombies! Of course!

He slowed his pace slightly to help Stefan over the worst of the obstacles, apologizing profusely for the items. “See, I have gotten used to it over the months, but this is the least severe of most times, to be completely honest.” Normally, the room was much fuller of stuff.

But now onto his favorite topic.

“They are really real,” he said, eyes wide. “And I don’t know! The government seems to be hushing it up, and until we get out how bad the epidemic is, we don’t know what we can do. But how did you find out about it?”

[Stefan Spencer]

Stefan sat, his eyes also wide, as Cee confirmed his fears. He let out a sigh, almost a whimper. It was true then. For a moment the information sat in his head, too big for his drunken mind to digest properly. He took a long drink from the bottle he'd carried in with him and held it out to Cee as well. After all, what better way to deal with the idea of zombies than to get wasted?

At Cee's question he perked up a bit, and turned to make sure Cee's front door was well shut. "I think I was followed," he said, hoping that his friend wouldn't blame him for leading the monster here. "Sorry, I didn't know where else to go."

"We should warn people though," Stefan said, taking another swig for courage. "What if they're out there right now. We have to warn people!" Stefan's hands were getting more and more animated as he talked. It seemed obvious to him. If the government wanted to hush it up, then it had to be true. And if it was true, there could be zombies out there right now trying to get into the homes of those he loved and cared about.

[Cee Cohen]

Cee could think of a lot of reasons not to take the drinks that Stefan had offered. It was late in the night, he had to teach class…all sorts of silliness. But he hadn’t taken a day off, he could usually resist hangovers—he still wasn’t sure why—and he thought it might be fun. Besides, if Stefan wasn’t sober, then he should at least try to get himself to the same level. So he accepted it with a thanks and, after a moment of hesitation to think about all the things that he could be getting by doing this, shrugged to himself and swigged from it, coughed as it went burning down his throat, and then passed it back to him.

Cee shook his head. “No, please! I have methods of managing followers. It happens to me periodically, although all considered there are very few zombies around this particular area.”

On this topic, they were in complete agreement. He leaned forward and nodded earnestly, equally as animated without much liquor in his system. “Exactly, exactly! I have been attempting different methods of getting the word out, but for some reason no one appears to believe me! Well. Excepting you so far.”

[Stefan Spencer]

According to Stefan, there weren't many reasons to not take a drink. And even those could usually be overruled if the situation called for it. So even though he also had to work in the morning, he wasn't concerned with that. If a man couldn't drink while on the run from zombies, then when the heck could he?

He smiled at Cee's cough a bit. Although he didn't hold it against the younger man, he couldn't help but think it was endearing. Light-weights were so cute.

The long swig he took when Cee handed the bottle back, barely phased him though. He was beyond drunk at this point. And the alcohol was increasing his paranoia by the minute.

He was glad Cee wasn't too mad at the fact that he may have just led a horde of flesh eating creatures to his door. It was nice to know his friend could handle himself in this area.

"What have you tried?" Stefan asked, leaning closer as well. "And yes I do. I do believe you. But we have to warn people. There could be an invasion happening right now. We should call people." Immediately his mind picture those people in Pilot Ridge he cared about. His family, of course. But also Mike, Sean, Josh...there were countless friend who he would hate to see on the evening news with a zombie chewing on their neck.

[Cee Cohen]

Cee, in turn, had a lot of thoughts on that. There were a lot of things you shouldn’t drink before. School was one. Running from zombies was another. But right now he was tired and not really thinking straight, and as he liked Stefan, he thought there was no harm. Besides, he was decently sure that Stefan had lost them.

He was pretty embarrassed, however, at his cough. He’d never been very…well, very good at drinking. It had never bothered him before, but he was a little ashamed of it now.

And no, he wasn’t upset. After all, he had defenses!

It was just better not to ask what they were. The five or six locks on his door were a pretty good indication, though.

“Internet blogs,” he said. “I’ve attempted letters to the editors, but no one seems to really have an accurate grasp of the problems, you know?” Cee shook his head at the ignorance of the human race. “We should! Um.” He hesitated. “People tend not to give me their numbers.” And other than his parents and a few friends who already knew Cee’s feelings on the matter, Cee had no one to call. “Do you have any you would prefer to call? I will back up your case. I have pamphlets!”

[Stefan Spencer]

Cee didn't seem too bothered by the fact that zombies may or may not be storming down his door at any moment, so Stefan was starting to believe that his friend dealt with this kind of situation before. Of course, Stefan's own paranoia was ebbing as well. But that was mostly from the combination of the scotch and another human to be with. Things had seemed so much more horrific alone in his living room. Even though he had Sebastian, he felt that Cee was better equipped to deal with a zombie invasion than a cat. Or at least he hoped he was.

"The interent?" Stefan said. "No one believes anything on there, my good man. You've got to get the really important stuff in print." Of course, Stefan was a tad bias on this subject, working at a newspaper and all. Of course maybe even the newspaper wasn't enough to handle this information. Perhaps they should go door to door handing out flyers.

But in their current condition, or at least Stefan's current condition, perhaps the telephone would be better. He thought of calling his nephew, or perhaps Mike first. But he had a feeling those two could handle their own in a fight. Now someone like Josh on the other hand...

"Do you have Josh's number?" Stefan asked. "And you'd better grab some of those pamphlets. Politicians are usual facts and figures kinda guys." He took another swig, hoping Cee would be able to locate the number. He had the number for Josh and Sean somewhere, mostly likely on the cell phone he had left back at his place. Oh well, at least he'd remembered his pants.

[Cee Cohen]

Cee didn’t seem worried because he was certain he had the tools to handle a bad situation if one did go down. Sure, he didn’t have guns, but from what he’d seen they weren’t of much use. Instead, he had a small amount of things that exploded to see him through any problems that he might have. These weren’t meant for LARGE explosions, just small enough ones to let them get away. Perfectly reasonable.

But Cee really wasn’t better equipped to deal with a zombie invasion than a cat, despite the extra locks on the door. And it was slightly alarming that anyone would think so.

“Claims the journalist,” Cee sniffed. “Print is mortified. The internet is the way of the future.” Possibly both of them were biased on the subject, but Cee didn’t mean anything by it.

“I have Sean’s,” Cee offered. “I think. I am certain I have his office number. Hold on. I still possess a phone book.”

Why? Because Cee still hated cell phones, and if it was on paper it was harder to track things. Or so he believed. Besides, the buttons were too small on a cell. “Let me look.” He dived over the couch and surfaced, triumphantly, with a phonebook and a phone. With a dead battery. “Let me plug this in. Do you have the number memorized? And may I have more of that?” It had filled him with a warm buzz that was quite pleasant.

[Stefan Spencer]

Mortified? What was Cee talking about? Any yahoo with a computer could make it onto the internet. Stefan was about to further defend himself but stopped.

This was just what the zombies would want. To divide and conquer them. No he had to stay focused on the problem at hand.

Stefan had no clue what time it was, but he was fairly certain Sean would not be in his office this late. And this was an urgent matter. The zombies were out there right now. And only he and Cee could save the world.

Stefan smiled when Cee located the phone book and started flipping through it to find the Neville residence. "I...no." Stefan said after a moment of trying to remember the number. Phone numbers wasn't a very strong area of his memory. "If found the number though," he said, keeping his finger on the spot on the page.

"Of course my good man," Stefan said smiling, handing over the bottle. He understood the need for a drink in a situation like this. "Hand me the phone and I'll try to call them."

He listened to the ringing, hoping that they wouldn't be too late. "And maybe we should find a few glasses for that bottle." Because they might as well be civilized, even during an apocalypse.

[Cee Cohen]

This wasn’t something they’d ever agree on, Cee knew. He was a man of computers, internet, faked pictures and digital. Stefan was a man of print. And while Cee could and would argue for hours on how print was dead, he was feeling magnanimous and liked Stefan enough not to want to argue this point.

“Oh, wonderful!” Cee flopped down next to him. “So books can be beneficial for something. I’m content that I kept it.” He took the bottle and drank. Once he’d stopped coughing, it actually felt quite pleasant. He grinned, then nodded. “Okay.” He got up and rummaged through his cabinets. What he had a lot of, he noticed, was glasses that were charred around the edges. That wouldn’t do. Eventually he found some plastic cups and returned with them, waiting as the phone rang. As soon as someone picked up, he leaned over.

“Dr. Neville? Or Josh? Are you awake?”

[Joshua Bernstein]

Although Josh no longer was awake in the early hours of the morning, he wasn't always in bed early. And on this particular midnight he was still surfing youtube, having finished calisthenics but not feeling quite tired enough to head to bed. The ringing of his phone caused him to hit pause on viral sensation The Fox, and he sighed heavily. He wasn't entirely sure who would be calling him at this time of night, but he was sure that it would be for something important -- he just hoped it wasn't anything too horrible.

He placed his laptop onto the coffee table before heading to the kitchen for the phone. "Hello? This is the Neville residence, Josh Bernstein speak---yes, I'm awake. Who is this?"

Maybe he should have checked the caller ID before he picked up.

[Stefan Spencer]

Caller ID should have been invented for Stefan. He was the king of drunk dialing. Still this was the first time he'd ever called someone to warn them of the fact that zombies were about to tear them limb from limb.

At the sound of someone picking up on the other end, Stefan hit the speaker button on Cee's phone. After all, he needed both hands in case he needed to defend himself. Or if he needed to refill his drink.

"Josh, how are you handsome?" Stefan said, slipping into flirt mode before he could get to the reason he was really calling.

Still, he got there eventually.

"Josh, you need to lock the doors and windows and...umm...Cee how else do you defend yourself from an army of the undead?" He turned to his friend for help.

"Oh yeah, also do you have liquor, cuz Cee's running kinda low and could only carry over so much."

[Joshua Bernstein]

Josh furrowed his brow at Stefan's rather muddled explanation. Apparently there was some sort of danger, and also his friends required more alcohol.

"I do have liquor. How do you want me to get it to you if I'm locking the doors and windows?"

This was, in fact, a completely serious inquiry. If he could somehow transport the requested beverages to the other men, he would do so, even if that meant texting someone with meta transportation powers.

And he didn't even know anyone with meta transportation powers. But maybe Stefan did; the journalist seemed to know a lot of people.