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Alfred hated boarding school.
A lot of things were lost after the apocalypse of the twenty-first century. Everything from bits of historical culture and entire races to the ability to enjoy a hot cup of coffee by a cafe window on a rainy Sunday afternoon. Thousands of years of knowledge and advancement whittled back to survival instincts and the ability to pull a trigger or jam a knife into an infected’s skull.
“Yet, of all the things they could’ve preserved, they kept boarding school,” he grumbles into his mouthful of cold oats. “Boarding school, Kiku!”
“Complaining will not do anything but fester the negative feelings inside of you.” Kiku’s reply - as most of the things that escape his mouth - is calm, unfazed by Alfred’s rant yet with the right amount of practiced interest that kept Alfred from whining about how he wasn’t even listening in the first place. “You will be graduating this year and will join the local militia, will you not?”
Shoving the rest of the slimy rations down his throat in a worryingly large mouthful, Alfred frowns. “But that’s still seven months, dude! The next math test will kill me before I can even set foot in the training barracks!” He decides to stifle his frustration with the remainder of his water, hoping Gilbert has some spares at the rationing station. “Besides, Gil’s telling me that it’s boring as hell anyway - all you do is guard the outside and shoot whatever infected you see.”
“Is that not what you were expecting?”
“Of course not!” Alfred exclaims, as if offended that Kiku would dare suggest such a thing. “That’s super boring, dude. I thought we’d get to go out into the world, you know, explore and all that shit - maybe even try to find a cure for this horrib—“
“You mean like the Allies?” The instant the words leave his lips, Kiku immediately regrets them.
Alfred however, seems captivated by the mention, setting his water bottle down. “Yeah, like the Allies.”
The topic of the very well-known rebel group has come up multiple times. The Allies are known as wanted outlaws in almost every reservation established, hopping through various supply lines and backdoor deals that’ve warranted them a label as high as the infected themselves. Nobody knows what they do with all the supplies, or if they’re really doing anything at all, but if what they preach is true, then Kiku knows one thing for sure.
Alfred’s perfectly suited for a the fresh new line of recruits.
But not for the reasons one might think.
“Alfred,” Kiku begins, his following words being chosen carefully, “I know it’s been over a year, but I strongly believe that there’s no sufficient proof of Arth—“
“You don’t know that,” Alfred interrupts, effectively cutting his Japanese friend off. “I’ve known him for years, Kiku. You should’ve seen the way he looked back then. There’s no way he would’ve just left without a good reason. He’s always had his eyes on them - and who knows, maybe he did do the right thing, maybe he’s off working on the cure right no—“
“Alfred.” His voice is harsher, firmer than Alfred’s ever heard him before. “You cannot let your unresolved feelings cloud your judgement. I am unable to make your decisions for you, but as your friend I am strongly suggesting that you take this decision more seriously.”
He’s about to make a retort, but - upon seeing the empty tin can denting in Kiku’s grip - Alfred closes his mouth before a sound can escape. Kiku’s being dead serious about this.
Before Alfred can draw up an apology, a voice calls out from a distance. “Kiku!” Alfred immediately recognizes him as Kiku’s roommate, Yao. “Where have you been? We must work on our History project together!”
A flicker of realization flashes in those black eyes before he gets up from the stairs, wiping the dust from his pants. “I apologize,” he replies with a short bow. “I will see you during dinner, Alfred - do not forget my advice.”
After a short exchange of goodbyes, Alfred’s left alone by the schoolyard’s staircase with a tin of empty oat rations and a crumpled up bottle of water.
Alfred exhales a sigh, getting up himself and heading towards the school gates - he needs a walk.
The reservation’s streets show no change from before, yet Alfred can’t help but feel like there’s something incredibly wrong with the entire place.
The streets are dirty and grey - ration cans piling up in every unoccupied corner, empty water bottles being exploited by cats and dogs for any spare droplet, Alfred can see a few tell-tale blood splatters from whomever got their heads blown off by the patrollers.
Looking above only seemed to darken the mood even further. The apartments overhead were about as worn down and dirty as the skies around them, most of their windows boarded shut with several nails to spare. Nobody took any chances in this place. Nobody trusted the world to look after them anymore.
Even if this is where Alfred grew up, he couldn’t help but be sickened to the bone.
“Get down!” A voice thunders from behind him, startling him from his thoughts. “On your knees and hands above your head!”
Without a second thought, Alfred complies with the patroller’s demands, worn-out pants making contact with the gravelly sidewalk and hands reaching behind his bent head. He can hear other patrollers shouting the same commands at some other passerby, one going so far as to shove a person up against a cement wall with a firm hold around his wrists.
Alfred doesn’t have time to feel sorry for the guy when a hand yanks his head upwards, and one of his eyes is scanned by one of those radar guns. After a few tense seconds, the device beeps out the “safe” signal, and he can’t help but feel intensely relieved as the nuzzle pointed against his forehead withdraws.
“Curfew’s in an hour, kid,” one of the patrollers says, her voice thick and cold - which is only customary, since they hold people at point blank at least three dozen times a day. “Don’t stay out too long.”
Alfred nods. He knows it’s only a rehearsed warning, but he can’t help but want to sock the patroller right in the jaw. Before he can indulge in a temporary fantasy, however, he hears a shrill beep that sends a shiver up his spine.
An “infected” noise.
“No, no! No!” begs an even shriller voice from the group of people across the street, followed by an immediate order of “Hold him down!” and what sounds like a harsh thump against the pavement. “I’m not infected! This must be a mistake I’m not infected I swea—“
There’s not a moment of hesitation before two shots ring through the avenue.
Alfred slaps a hand over his mouth, swallowing the bile that’d made its way to the back of his throat. He dives into a nearby alley and sprints down its length, not knowing where he’s heading - anywhere but there - but not caring as his throat burns with every heaving pant. He kicks up empty cans and bottles along the way, leaving a trail of indistinct clattering in his wake.
He doesn’t know how long or how fast he sprinted, but eventually he finds his way out of the alley and onto another street - this one looking no less dirty than the one he’d just left. But none of that matters as he falls back against a brick wall, clenching his eyes shut in a desperate attempt to forget what he’d just seen.
It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, really - these kinds of things happened every day. Hell, the kids in fourth grade even bet on how many they’d hear in a day. It was normal, it was part of everyone’s lives. They’re just doing this to keep us safe, is what the teachers would say, better safe than sorry after all.
He hated it. Hated, hated, hated it.
He can’t stand it. He can’t stand how cruelly the militia treats the people here - their own people. As if they’re just pigs waiting in line to be slaughtered at the slightest misstep. It’s disgusting, it’s vile, it’s inhuman, it’s—
The sound of a kicked ration tin echoes down the alleyway behind him, and Alfred’s fished back into the present.
His heart rate begins to kick in, and he slowly shifts into the defensive position he’d read about in one of Kiku’s books - suck on that, Survival Techniques 101 - scanning the darkness of the alley. “Who’s there?” The question rings out into an echoing silence with no reply.
However, that doesn’t matter as a figure steps into the light in a pair of ripped, worn-out jeans, t-shirt, and a pair of striking green eyes Alfred would recognize anywhere.
“Long time no see, Alfred.”
“Have you seen Alfred?” Kiku’s question is directed toward Alfred’s roommate, Matthew, who was actually wondering the exact same thing. “It’s ten minutes past curfew.”
“Nope, I haven’t seen him,” admits Matthew. “He probably forgot his ID by the gates again.”
Kiku frowns.
Amidst the falling dust of an empty shopping plaza, the sounds of a plate of metal being kicked from its place and rattling as it crashes against the floor echoes through its halls. From the now-opened air vent, two teenage boys come crawling out.
“Wow, Arthur Kirkland just broke into a mall,” Alfred muses, finding the role reversal quite funny, “and a year ago you wouldn’t let me sneak an extra ration or two past Gilbert’s nose.”
“Now that,” retorts Arthur, wiping the dust from his jeans, “is a completely different situation. People need those rations, food’s scarce these days, after all.” He jogs out of the shop and onto the main lobby, stopping by some kind of machine - one that Alfred’s sworn he’s seen before. “Now this.” He pulls a lever on the contraption, and a few other things as well. “This is all ours.”
For a couple of seconds, Alfred’s confused as to what Arthur meant by that. But when he gets his answer, it’s everything but a disappointment.
After a few sputters, the entire plaza seems to spur into life. Dozens of lights blinking into unmatchable brightness and dozens of other contraptions beginning to move clunkily with a gusto worthy of contraptions that’ve been asleep for over a decade. Somewhere in the distance, Alfred could hear the sounds of chiptune music and various voices advertising products he’s never heard of using words he’s never learnt.
From the dirty, grey slums of the streets outside, Alfred has been brought to paradise.
And Arthur was right by his side.
“Come on.” Arthur reaches a hand out towards Alfred, an almost giddy smile on his face. “There’s a lot you have to see.”
Alfred nods, taking that hand without hesitation.
Their first stop is some strange, horse-thing that’s seems to be constantly spinning like some kind of oversized top. Alfred stares at it, waiting for it to do something - anything else but spin, really - until he hears Arthur chuckle beside him. Confused, Alfred follows Arthur as he gestures to get on the spinning machine and sit himself on one of the horses. The concept itself is strange to him, but after a good five minutes on it, he found it pretty fun.
“That was pretty weird, but it was kinda fu—whoa you okay, Artie?”
Arthur staggers a bit, waving off Alfred’s attempt to support him. “I’m—ugh—just dandy, just a bit under the weather, that’s all.”
Next, Arthur drags him into a room filled with some kind of large painted boxes with blinking screens plastered onto them. Telling Alfred to wait for a moment, Arthur reaches behind one of the boxes, tinkering with a few things before slamming a button and sputtering the thing to life. Alfred recognizes them as arcade machines, awestruck at the fact that he was about to actually play one for real. It took them both several minutes - and a lot of button mashing - to get use to the mechanics. But they spent a good half an hour or two in that place hopping from game to game, growing no less enthusiastic with every starting screen.
“Let’s move on,” says Arthur abjectly as a mocking ‘P1 Wins!’ flashes on the screen.
Alfred laughs heartily, a sound Arthur’s grown to miss over his year of absence. “You’re just bummed out because I totally kicked your ass at all of these games.”
Arthur scoffs. “That’s entirely untrue. I got a higher score than you on that game where you hit a white ball with a stick!”
Heeding Arthur’s insistent plea to leave - what a sore loser - they head over to the shop on the right. This one, Alfred can recognize as a toy shop - overflowing with all kinds of stuffed toys (like the one his roommate, Matthew keeps) and what looks like a dazzling array of plastic guns.
Alfred takes a closer look, inspecting the fine print on one of the boxes. “Wait, these guns shoot…water?”
His reply comes in the form of a splash of water on his face, momentarily filling his vision with specks of water before he wipes his glasses on his jacket. It takes a moment to process what’d just happened, but when it does get through he picks up a gun of his own, approaching a bucket of water Arthur’s gesturing to with a blank expression.
Once he’s locked and loaded, he turns to Arthur with a devilish smirk.
“Oh you’re going down, Kirkland.”
Arthur chuckles. “We’ll see about that, Jones.”
And so the battle begun.
They sprinted around the mall like madmen, ducking and jumping over barriers and abandoned stalls as if they were little kids again. Spurt after spurt was thrown, and the occasional bucket of water (had Arthur planned this out beforehand?) proved to be a great aid to whomever got to it first and tipped it over once they were done reloading. Their laughs echoed through the halls, bouncing off every cement wall and illuminated panel until the entire plaza was filled with ringing felicity.
Minutes, hours, maybe even decades later, they collapsed onto the floor, soaking and exhausted.
“You put up a good fight,” Arthur admits in between heaving pants, “but then again you were always more on the athletic side so I say you’re at an unfair advantage.”
“Whoa hold on, what about you?” Alfred musters his strength and sits up, watching Arthur’s chest heave up and down with every winded breath. “You could barely jog half a mile last year without panting like crazy afterwards, and just now you outran me. Talk about an unfair advantage.”
For a while, Arthur is silent. It stays that way until his breaths manage to calm down into a slight steepness, sitting up himself.
“Listen, Alfred, while I was away…”
The words have Alfred’s full attention. It’s a topic they surprisingly they (avoided) haven’t breached since their initial encounter, simply falling into a casual routine as if the last ten months had never occurred. As if Arthur hadn’t disappeared into the rain after curfew that one afternoon, chasing after some unknown figure as Alfred called out for him to come back.
As if Alfred hadn’t spent the last ten months utterly lost, falling asleep to thoughts of Arthur - where he’s been, why hasn’t he come back, if he’s okay, and if he’ll ever return.
Alfred doesn’t know what kind of expression he has on, but it seems to take Arthur aback when he turns to look at him, biting his lip soon afterwards in some show of guilt. “That person I chased after ten months ago, his name is Francis.”
Beneath those smudged lenses, Alfred’s eyes flash in recognition. “The leader of the Allies.”
“Y-Yes.” Arthur frowns. “How did you know tha—“
“You joined the Allies?”
A pause.
“Yes.” After a moment of hesitation, he digs into his jeans’ pocket, pulling out a silver pendant and holding it up for Alfred to see. “Francis accepted me in a month after I disappeared.”
An even longer pause.
“Listen, Alfred,” he begins firmly, an ache running through him as he sees Alfred turn his head away from him. “I’m sorry for just leaving like that, and I…know what you must think of them - but the Allies aren’t what everyone says they are.” He’s choosing his words carefully. “They aren’t the terrorists everyone thinks they are. They’re just trying to help - Francis is out there scouring the globe for a cure, he’s even recruited a team of doctors to help out. H-We just want what’s best for the world - and we know these animal cages dressed up as reservations aren’t it.” His voice grows more desperate. “Please, Alfred, you have to believe me just—“
Alfred doesn’t wait to find out what else he has to say before closing the distance between them in a kiss.
It lasts for a few seconds at most, and they were both still, unsure of what to do because of their mutual inexperience. But that doesn’t stop Arthur’s hands from tangling themselves in Alfred’s hair and pulling him back down for another kiss, a second, a third, a fourth until it’s too much to count.
Neither of them know what exactly they’re doing, but it just feels right and it seems like eons before they stop.
“I have one more thing to show you,” Arthur whispers as they pull away, breath warm against Alfred’s lips and eyes shimmering brighter than they have all day. “Come on.”
“What’s wrong, can’t sleep?”
Kiku jolts, looking down from his room window at the voice down below. It’s Gilbert, patrolling the school grounds with a hefty gun cocked and a lantern in his hands.
“I’m worried about Alfred, he hasn’t returned since this afternoon.”
“I see.”
For a second, the albino frowns, but it quickly dissipates as he leans against the brick wall beneath Kiku. They sit like that for a while, listening to the cricket-tuned silence of the night. Despite the constant march of guards across the streets and the occasional gunshot from somewhere beyond the walls, it’s the most peaceful this little reservation can get.
“Did you hear the news?” Gilbert asks, leaning his head against the wall and staring blankly at the sky.
“No,” Kiku replies curtly, noticing a strange increase in patrollers on the streets.
“There’s an Ally in town.”
They find themselves in front of a strange, brightly colored machine with a curtain by its door.
Alfred doesn’t have the slightest clue what it is, but the words around it give it the impression of something meant for a group of people. There are strips of pictures of people’s faces printed on the sides, with overbearing decorations drawn over them as if they’ve been scrawled on by a giant marker - did those exist back then too?
Taking Alfred’s hand in his, Arthur tugs them through the curtain and into probably the brightest little space Alfred’s ever been in.
While Alfred sits there, a bit dazed by the brightness of it all, Arthur fiddles with what seems like a control panel in the form of an electronic screen. A few seconds later, music begins to play, blaring out of the machine at an alarmingly loud volume.
“There.” Arthur points at the small circle on the panel in front of them. “That’s a camera, now follow the instructions that show up on the screen and smile.”
Still very confused, but understanding the instructions, Alfred nods.
The program cycles through five themes: Smile, Cute, Scared, Cat, and Wacky. Each of them flashed on screen with big, bubbly lettering, the music blasting away the entire time. By the end of it, Alfred was still about as confused as he was when he walked in - and the fact that the machine began humming and vibrating didn’t make matters and easier.
When the humming stops, so does the music, and he hears something light drop into the metal compartment Arthur’s been standing in front of.
“Here,” he says, holding out one of the thin paper strips that’d popped out, “look at them.”
Alfred takes one, eyeing it curiously before he realizes just what they are - photographs. Each little one of them, printed photos of him and Arthur in various poses, no doubt the ones they tried coordinate just minutes ago. But Alfred doesn’t have the time to be awestruck before he realizes something.
“Why’d you come here?” The question seems harsh, but he knows Arthur can tell what he actually means. “You’ve been an Ally for months now - if the military saw you they would’ve shot you on sight.” He takes a step closer, clutching the photos and almost dreading the answer. “Why did you risk all that to see me? Why now?”
Arthur, eyes wider than usual as they look up at Alfred’s desperate gaze, opens his mouth to reply before closing it feebly. “I wanted to see you.” That seems like a good enough answer on its own, but Alfred can tell there’s more. “Before I’m moved to another reservation. I just wanted to see you again.”
Feeling an ache well up in his chest, Alfred takes another step forward, hoping to close the distance between them again.
Amidst the falling dust of a near-empty shopping plaza, the sounds of a barred door being broken open boom and echo through its halls. From the now-splintered doorway, dozens upon dozens of infected - attracted by the music - come spilling into its halls in search of fresh meat.
Matthew gasps, his grip on his stuffed polar bear tightening to an almost damaging degree before he manages to calm down. He perks up, scanning the darkness of his room to see if his roommate has returned from his unprecedented trip to god knows where.
Upon seeing that he’s still absent, a lump of dread wells up in his chest, however he’s too sleepy and it’s too late in the night for him to act upon his gut, so he slumps back onto his pillow in defeat.
“I have a bad feeling about this, Kumajiro, I hope he’s okay.” Is all he manages to get out before he’s pulled back under by sleep.
Once they manage to get to safety - slathered in blood and panting like winded racehorses - they almost collapse against the roof of the building, instead settling for resting their arms against their thighs in a bent squat. It takes them several minutes to recover, and suddenly Alfred’s thankful for all those breathing techniques and all the times his coach made him run an extra lap whenever he was caught goofing around for PE.
“Holy fuck.” The words are barely coherent past Alfred’s heaving, but the obscenity is recognizable enough. “That was too close - who knew those fuckers were in there the whole time?” When Arthur doesn’t reply, Alfred assumes it’s due to his exhaustion.
But when he looks up to see him, Arthur’s frozen, almost deathly pale in comparison to the flushed red he was moments ago.
Curious, Alfred gives him a look, only to have Arthur’s finger point straight at him - more specifically, to a rather red patch of blood on his upper arm.
Not even a second passes before Alfred gets the hint, smudging all the blood out of the way and hissing at the pain in order to reveal what’d been lying underneath: a mangled, fleshy pink bite mark, puncturing the flesh hard enough to draw blood.
He’s been bitten.
“Fuck.” Is all he manages to choke out under his breath, the single syllable speaking volumes. “Fuck.”
Before he can do anything else, however, he sees Arthur rubbing at his shin. He can’t even think about being worried before Arthur freezes himself, lifting his hand to reveal his own bite mark - scraped right into the front of his leg.
The adrenalin must’ve prevented them from noticing all this time - they’d come all this way, jumped over all those barriers, climbed up all that scaffolding to get here.
Only to find out it was too late for them in the first place.
“By the looks of it,” Arthur manages after a decade of silence, voice raspy and trembling, “I’d say we’re both ‘fucked’ in this situation.” He collapses against an air vent, breaths now curling into the cold, night sky.
Alfred collapses down beside him, putting his hand over his. “I guess we are.”
For several minutes, they both just sit there, staring up at the twinkling, unpolluted night sky. For a while Alfred forgets what kind of a situation they’re in, just admiring the way the sky looks right now, Arthur’s breathing beside him, how warm Arthur’s hand feels beneath his.
At this rate - with all the blood pumping through their system and how fast the virus is probably spreading - they have at least until morning before the virus kicks in. From what he’d learnt in boarding school, it’d be best if they end it right now - save someone the trouble of killing them once they turn.
But fuck that - he’s always hated boarding school anyway.
“So what now?” asks Arthur, as if he’d sensed Alfred’s train of thought. “Only a couple of hours before we’re walking corpses.”
“I say we wait it out,” replies Alfred. “We’ll go all poetic and lose our minds together.” He squeezes Arthur’s hand, ignoring the blurriness of his vision. “What d’you say, Artie?”
Arthur’s head falls against Alfred’s shoulder, returning the gentle squeeze with one of his own.
“Sounds perfect.”