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Frank could tell that Gerard’s skin was just about to vibrate off of his body.
“Are you sure?” Gerard asked, leaning over the counter of the booth in the makeshift market, eyes ablaze. “It’s the real thing?”
“You can come back and blow this whole joint up if it isn’t,” the woman said, bending down to pick up a small plastic bag, which she then placed on the counter in front of them.
“Holy shit,” Frank murmured.
“I can’t believe it,” Gerard echoed, his hand ghosting over the bag. “A copy of Link’s Awakening? How the fuck did – ”
She cut him off with a firm “stop” motion. “You don’t ask where I get shit, I don’t ask where you get shit. It’s a whole thing of not asking.”
Frank blinked. “...It’s just a video game.”
She glared at him while Gerard rested a hand on his shoulder. “It’s alright, Ghoul.” He turned to the woman. “We’ll take it. What do you want in return? We’ve, ah, got some purifiers back in the car, and – “
Waving away his offers, she shook her head. “Y’all are the Killjoys, right?” she asked, voice lowered. “Those boys over there are with you?”
She nodded to where Mikey and Ray were eyeballing different battery packs and cords at another booth.
The two of them tensed up but nodded. Frank saw Gerard’s hand slowly reaching toward his gun.
“You saved my kid a few weeks back.” They frowned. “Tall girl, short black hair? Her name is Kelsey. You saved her from a drac, she told me. Take it. You don’t pay for shit here.”
Gerard began to protest but she fixed him with a steely look. “Take it and go . Unsavory types come around here pretty often, and you shouldn’t be here when they do. Go, so you can live to save someone else’s daughter.”
Frank nodded at her, while Gerard stuffed the bag into his pocket. Frank thought if this were long ago – if this were before , then Gerard would be misty-eyed, his throat choking around his words as he thanked her. As it stood, he wasn’t Gerard anymore, he was Party Poison, and this was the fucking apocalypse, and in the apocalypse you take what you can get, especially around strangers.
After confirming with Mikey and Ray that they’d wait at the Trans Am, they left the outpost. Gerard let out a small giddy sigh of relief. “I can’t believe those rumors were true. That place was a goldmine.”
“Glad that Jet and Kobra are taking care of the real issues while we pick up a fuckin’ Zelda,” Frank replied, but there was no heat in his voice.
The truth was they had been searching for something like this for God knows how long. They’d picked up an almost functional GameBoy Color – the transparent purple one, naturally – a few months back that they’d since repaired. Because Ray was a genius sent from heaven above, he’d scavenged around 10 Better Living AA batteries. Everything was working out.
They’d just needed a game. Badly.
Honestly, it had been a rough couple of months. With Gerard almost getting ghosted twice on a trip between zones and Mikey losing his gun for a few weeks, morale really, really needed boosting. When they’d heard of this electronics bazaar that boasted everything from HDMI cords to replacement laptop screens to, yes, old video games, they knew they had to check it out.
“I just...” Gerard started, shaking his head as he pulled the bag out of his pocket and looked at it. “I don’t know. It’s stupid.”
Frank shook his head. “You know I won’t think that.”
Gerard was silent for a moment, his face unreadable. Then: “It’s just, like, I played so much Zelda when I was a kid. Me and Kobra. And I never – I never thought I’d ever be able to ever again.”
Frank’s brow knit and a lump threatened to form in his throat. “Yeah,” he said quietly.
They didn’t speak for a while. Frank was overcome with gratitude – not just that they found this game, but that he had someone here, when it seemed like nothing was right and everything was dying, who could be open and sad and vulnerable, even if it was usually only when the two of them were alone.
“I love you, Gee,” he said, letting his head fall on Gerard’s shoulder.
“I love you, too.”
Their time was cut short by Mikey and Ray approaching the car, toting a few cloth bags that seemed to be full.
“Alright, everybody ready to get a move on?” Mikey said, glancing sidelong at them as he crossed to the driver’s seat while Ray climbed in on the passenger side.
Gerard nodded and slid in the backseat with Frank following close behind.
“What all did you guys find?” Frank asked, leaning up in between Ray and Mikey.
“Oh, a lot of cool shit,” Ray said excitedly, digging in one of the bags. “They had, uh, lots of AV cords, and some HDMI ones, too, so if we ever end up finding a TV, or – you know, I’ve been thinking maybe I could try and make one…”
Frank grinned as Ray listed off the dismembered innards of various electronics he could wrangle together in order to build a makeshift TV as Mikey peeled the car away from the bazaar.
Sometimes, he thought, sometimes if he closed his eyes and breathed deeply he could pretend he was just in his apartment with Mikey in and they were all fucking around with lyrics for “Cemetery Drive” or chord progressions for “Helena,” and Gerard was brewing a pot of coffee, and Ray was writing furiously on any scraps of paper he could find, and Bob was still there.
Frank could almost taste it. When he got to remembering shit like this, he felt like he could time travel back to those days by sheer force of will. Everything would be okay.
But he still had to open his eyes, and when he did he was 37 and he hadn’t played a guitar in what felt like a lifetime, and the landscape whizzing past them was desolate and cracked and bright.
2003 was gone. This was what he had now.
They were going back to the diner for the night, and Frank was beyond thankful he wasn’t driving because, to be quite honest, he was fucking exhausted. It would be a complete and utter letdown to teenage Frank, but being an apocalyptic freedom fighter kind of took it out of you and really all you ever wanted to do was sleep.
He shifted slightly in his seat so he could lay his head on Gerard’s shoulder.
“Hey,” Gerard muttered, turning to kiss Frank on his forehead.
“Hey,” Frank parroted. “How’s it going?”
Gerard snorted. “Fuckin’ peachy, thanks.”
“You excited to play your Zelda?” His head bounced up and down in time with Gerard, who was nodding furiously. Giggling, Frank grinned. “I’m glad, man. You deserve it.”
“We all do,” Gerard agreed. “It’s been a shit couple of months.”
“It’s been a shit couple of 10 years,” Mikey chimed in from the front.
“Y’know, I’m just glad we’re all alive,” Ray said placidly, ever the pragmatist.
“Yeah, yeah, we all count our blessings every night,” Frank said, rolling his eyes. “Dear Lord, thank you for almost but not quite getting me killed today.”
“Thank you for the minimal amount of maggots in our food,” Gerard continued, his mouth quirking up at the edge.
“Thank you for the scorpions in my boots not stinging me... this time,” Mikey finished up.
“Amen,” the three of them concluded simultaneously before dissolving into peals of laughter.
“Yeah, yeah, you laugh, but you motherfuckers know life could be a lot worse,” Ray said, smiling a bit in spite of himself as he pointed at each of them in turn. “Could be much, much worse.”
Frank knew Ray was right, but it was so fun to rile him up. His hand found Gerard’s and squeezed as they settled back into a comfortable silence for the drive home, the static of the radio softly lulling him to sleep.
The next few weeks were blessedly uneventful – or as uneventful as life can get when you sleep with your gun under your pillow and your shoes right by your feet in case anyone comes to steal your shit or your life. No big news from their contacts in Battery City, no deaths of note, no one they knew turned into dracs. All told, things were okay.
Ray and Mikey were out, meeting with one of their food guys to trade. Frank hoped they made it back before dinnertime – the first meal after a trade for food was always one of the best. They’d feast like kings on canned vegetables and chunks of meat in somewhat decently flavored sauce (for Frank they’d manage to find tofu that he would season himself), and if they were lucky, old-fashioned biscuits made from a packet of powder that Mikey somehow always managed to taste incredible.
“Fuck!” Gerard swore from where he was posted up in one of the booths. He was bent over the Game Boy, and he let it drop to the table, his head falling into his hands.
“Sup, Poison?” He crossed to sit next to Gerard.
“I keep fuckin’ dying at this boss,” he replied woefully, his voice muffled. “I can’t do it, Frankie.”
Frank laughed softly, grabbing the console. “Want me to try?”
“Mmhm.”
Gerard was trying to space out his playing, making sure he wasn’t tearing through the game at an unreasonable pace. Frank understood – as someone who had read every piece of written word in the diner at least 40 times each, he knew the benefit of spreading out a good thing.
Heh.
“So what’s this game about, anyway?” Frank asked as he started in on the boss battle. “Never played this one. More of a Zelda 2 guy myself.”
“Oh, dude, it’s so cool.” Gerard immediately perked up. “Link crashes on this island and there’s this big egg on a mountain, it’s called the Wind Fish, and it’s sleeping, and you have to collect all the instruments, like a harp and a cello and shit, so you can play the Ballad of the Wind Fish and wake it up.”
Frank’s eyebrow quirked as he jammed the A button. “No shit? Does it have a Pansy?”
Snorting, Gerard shoved him gently. “No guitars to speak of. At least not where I’m at.”
“Worst game ever then,” Frank deadpanned, and Gerard laughed, loudly and brightly before continuing.
“It’s also super cool ‘cause, like, you aren’t really sure if any of it is real. Like, it might all be in Link’s head? Or it might be a dream, they keep talking about dreams.”
“D’you ever wish this were a dream?” Frank asked without thinking.
“Huh?”
Blanching, Frank cursed himself inwardly and floundered for a change of subject – but luckily, he was dying in the game.
“Wait, shit, I’ve only got three hearts left and I swear I’m close to beating this fucker,” he said, his brow furrowing as his grip tightened on the Game Boy. Gerard hooked his chin over Frank’s shoulder to watch.
“Oh, fuck yeah, dude, you’re so close! This is so unfair, I died like 3 billion times and it only takes you a few minutes to take him down.”
“It’s ‘cause I got magic fingers.” Frank wiggled his eyebrows but didn’t take his eyes off the screen.
Gerard shook his head softly, but Frank knew he was smiling. “I know you do, baby.”
After another minute or so, the tell-tale mechanical sound of the boss exploding chimed, and Frank took a deep breath.
“Jesus, that was tough,” he laughed.
“What were you saying about you wishing this was a dream?”
Shit, Frank thought, leave it to Gerard to not just drop it.
He sighed and shrugged. “I mean… like, don’t you wish you could just wake up and it’s 2005 again and we’re just a stupid band with stupid problems and the world hasn’t gone to hell in the worst possible handbasket?”
Gerard frowned. “Ghoul, you… you know it doesn’t do any good to think like that. Not out here.”
“Doesn’t mean I still do sometimes!” Frank countered, his hands raising in defense. “I know Ray’s right, we’re all lucky to be alive and together, but… God, Gee, I miss it. I miss it so much. I miss music.”
Swallowing thickly, Gerard nodded after a moment. “I do, too. But I’m glad I have you here, to miss music with.”
“Yeah,” Frank said, feeling a smile tug at his mouth even as he sighed. “Me too.”
Frank was shaken from sleep that night. He bolted upright, dazed, but before he could grab his gun and blindly shoot, Gerard’s face came into focus.
“Jesus, Poison, don’t fucking – “
“Do you wanna hear it?”
Frank blinked.
“... What ?”
“The Ballad of the Wind Fish. From the game. Do you wanna hear it?”
“Fucking hell, man, it’s gotta be like, 3 in the morning, and you woke me up to play me some video game soundtrack?”
“I’ll sing it for you,” Gerad said, his eyes sparkling. “Maybe it might help us not miss music so much.”
A breath caught in Frank’s throat. He hadn’t heard Gerard sing, really sing, in so long. He missed his boyfriend’s voice almost as much as he missed his own guitar.
“Yeah,” he said, slowly standing. “Yeah, okay.”
They quietly made their way past Ray and Mikey, who were sleeping like reasonable people, and outside the diner.
As Frank looked up toward the night sky, he supposed the best thing about the world ending was that there was much less light pollution, and you could see what felt like every star in every galaxy in the observable universe. It almost made up for everything.
Interrupting his reverie, Gerard started humming, his eyes closed. There were no words, but it was so beautiful Frank’s eyes started prickling with tears. He sang for about a minute and change, and by the end the tears were falling freely.
“Dreams end, you know,” Gerard said eventually into the night. “But Killjoys never will.”
Frank chuckled, sniffling, as he shook his head. “Dude, that was so fucking cheesy. What the fuck.”
Gerard just smiled and closed the space between them, cupping Frank’s cheek with his hand. “I just love you, Frankie,” he whispered. “I love you, and I know things are shitty, but we’re gonna be okay.”
As they kissed, Frank knew in his bones that he was right.