Work Text:
One day Zak woke up and couldn’t smell the air.
Maybe that’s not the first thing someone would notice upon waking up. Maybe it would be the weighted object on their face that obstructed their vision. Soon upon realizing that, he had come to the conclusion that it was simply a gas mask. Memories from previous mornings had told him that it was simply his Mom being paranoid once more. Somehow, every night after Zak had fallen asleep, his mother would creep in quietly, and shift the gas mask onto his face. Lord knows how he never woke up afterwards, but he never did. Granted Zak was a heavy sleeper. Though, even the heaviest of sleepers should wake from that. He always told his mother that it was weird. He also told her that his friends said he was weird for bringing such equipment to school. But his Mother had told him, “The government says to be cautious. So I’m cautious Zak, that’s all.”
But rest assured, nobody thought he was weird now. Not for something that was such a common item. The threat of nuclear war was still on the horizon, and seemed to worsen every year after those mornings. His mothers meaningless paranoia had changed once he began listening to the radio, or watching the news on the television. Although some of that paranoia had been handed down to Zak, it wasn’t as horrible as his mothers. Even though he did have his own makeshift bomb shelter, and enough food to last for weeks. But everyone had that now, it was common. He currently weeded his front yard, on the porch sat one gasmask…. So perhaps he was more paranoid than he thought. It was better to be safe than sorry, though. At least he wasn’t actively wearing it. Forget the threat of a nuclear bomb, Zak would probably suffocate with that thing on while weeding. The task at hand already was hard enough. Not to mention the blazing sun beating down on his already burnt skin. He sat back on his knees for a minute, wiping the beads of sweat from his forehead. “Sure looks like you’re working hard over there!” Came his neighbors voice, vocalizing the obvious sarcasm. Zak whipped his head around, catching the culprit, Darryl, in the act of trying to humiliate him. “At least I’m working.” The comeback wasn’t great, but it got the point across. The reply came out sour, as Zak had intended it to be. His neighbor seemed to mentally take a step back at that.
It was clear their relationship was strained, even Darryl’s wife noted that the interaction was strange. Granted, she stood at the window unable to hear the conversation, but by the way Darryl tightened his posture and his grip on the fence. It gave her a hint on how it was going. She had expressed to him that she was worried; Something was clearly eating away at him. But he refused to admit it. Darryl would shake his head and assure her that everything was fine, and that she was just looking too much into it. After all, best friends had fights from time to time. Right? “I was just joking, Zak.” Darryl reminded, watching intently as Zak continued to now aggressively weed his front yard. “Just like last night's joke? That was pretty funny.” Zak suddenly spat out, immediately going quiet after. He was never this hostile. Darryl frowned, recalling the night before. He hated leaving things off on bad terms, but that is exactly what he had done. What a hypocrite, Zak thought. Darryl gathered whatever dignity he had left, before taking another mental step back. There was no way they could be conversing about last night openly. “Zak.” Darryl hissed, “We can talk about this later.” He reminded him, trying to be vague as to what he was referring to.
What followed was a long, strained silence before Zak decided that enough was enough, and stood up. He brushed the dirt off his knees, his eyes catching the attention of the green pair that stared back from beyond the fence. As hesitant as he was, Zak begrudgingly nodded his head, the eye contact they once had breaking. Zak then returned inside, not bothering to pick up the remaining garden tools on his lawn. What followed was as expected. He cleaned himself up before going to make dinner. He could still catch the lingering scent of soap in the kitchen as he sat down to eat, although he wasn’t all that hungry. The only reason he sat down was to catch a good glimpse of his neighbors in their living room. His interest was piqued when he noticed the distressed expressions on both of their faces as they looked to be yelling at each other. Could it be that they were fighting? His suspicions were confirmed when he heard the argument through the opened windows of their home. So maybe him and Darryl would be speaking later on.
After the subtle snooping session on his neighbors, he finished his dinner, cleaning up afterwards. The scent of soap once more spread through the air as he began to wash his dishes. Zak hummed to the radio he had turned on prior to getting his hands wet, listening to some station. He reached over,shaking the water off of his hands to gently turn the dial, switching the station before getting back to work. Unfortunately, the music was soon interrupted by something completely unpleasant. “We have just received word from government officials that an unknown plane has been spotted in our country's territory. We advise all citizens to be cautious. Remember, in the event of a nuclear explosion, most of the damage and death is caused by the shockwave the blast creates, not the fireball–” That alone sent Zak into a spiral, sending him scrambling to the window to look outside and around the yard. “Darryl! Radio!” He shouted, his hands cupped around his mouth with a hope that his neighbor would hear. “–Which has a comparatively small radius. You may find yourself looking out a window to see an extremely bright flash, as bright as if you were staring straight at the sun.“
Zak's nightmares were coming true. The event his mother had stressed and warned him about was happening. And it was terrifying. The radio continued blare in the background, “An indefinable object has been dropped looking to be a nuclear weapon. Citizens have 20 to 40 seconds to respond if you’re far enough away from the explosion. Remember to lay face down on the ground and put your thumbs in your ears and fingers over your eyes. Breathe through your teeth. Once the shockwave passes over you, you need to find shelter immediately!” He had no clue what he had done first. Maybe it was slamming his head down onto the floor. Or maybe it was covering his eyes and ears. But he didn’t think twice about doing it. His eyes were shut tight as he braced for whatever may happen. He hoped and prayed it wasn’t what they said it was. And that maybe he was far enough to not receive the consequences of a foreign country.
The last thing he could recall though was an ear piercing ring that could’ve practically split his head open. But alas, it didn’t. Part of Zak wished it did. He would have preferred that over sitting in a cramped closet in his basement. The only thing Zak could really do now was wait 48 hours and think about everything he could’ve done wrong in his lifetime. But he couldn’t stop thinking about Darryl. He had been bitter with him beforehand, even angered. His stomach now churned with guilt. With the unresolved conversation still boiling in his mind, that’s all he could think about. That, and whether Darryl was still alive. He hoped he was. He hoped Darryl was okay. Zak didn’t feel concerned about Darryl’s wife being alive, or his boss and coworkers at the office. He didn’t know if he could live with himself if they left off things like they did. With that in mind, the first thing on his to-do list was to find him. Well, first he had to actually leave his house. Something he was unwilling to do as of now. Thankfully, after being wide awake after the first twenty four hours, he had decided rest was much needed. So, with thoughts of what the outside was like, whether Darryl was alive, and the immense fear he had induced for the situation, he allowed himself to sleep.
He had been unpleasantly awoken by the sound of something. His ears still faintly rung, so he couldn’t put his finger on it. Zak sat up, shook his head to relieve his ears of some of the ringing, before turning his head to look at the clock he had stored in his shelter. It had been more than twenty-four hours since he had been last awake, he noticed. So, with that in mind, and the undefinable sound outside, he cracked open the narrow closet door. The first thing he saw was something bright, and he had assumed that he was dead. That he hadn’t missed the nuke and this was it. He quickly came to realize it was the sun. He needed to calm his nerves, but the state of his house was not helping with that. He had stepped out from the door, taking in his surroundings . There were cracks and holes scattered across the roof, so he could only imagine what his upper floor looked like. Before he could think too much about it, he heard the noise again. Although it wasn’t a noise, rather it was a voice. Oh my God, Zak thought. It was Darryl. “Zak! Zak?!” Came Darryl 's voice. Words slurring and breaking as he desperately looked around. Darryl hoped to God or whatever god was left that he was okay. Darryl needed Zak as much as Zak needed Darryl. “Darryl?! Holy shit– Darryl!!” Zak practically screamed, making his way over an opening in the floor above. He would have taken the stairs but they seemed rather unstable. “Language!! And I- I thought you had like- disintegrated!” Darryl laughed, carefully kneeling down by the hole in the floor to look down at Zak. “What?! I thought you died!” Zak replied, laughing along with his neighbor. He glanced around before reaching up for Darryl, being given a hand in return, leading to Darryl pulling him up. Darryl carefully pulled him up, stumbling back as he did so. The result wasn’t pretty. Leaving Zak with a cut open knee and scuffed arm. But it didn’t seem like he cared, or even that it even mattered. His grip on Darryl’s hand was still incredibly tight as he yanked him forward. His smile reached from ear to ear before he tipped his head forward, softly planting his lips onto Darryl’s mouth, connecting them once more. Darryl squeezed Zak's hand reassuringly before pulling back, returning the smile Zak had given him.
“I'm surprised you didn’t die.”, “Oh Shut up!” Zak laughed, pushing Darryl away, prompting him to stand. He pulled Zak up alongside him, steadying him as he stumbled forward. “Ow.” Zak frowned, looking down at his knee to realize the cut across it. “Oh yeah, Ouch. We need to get that patched.” Darryl commented, helping Zak along, to which Zak pushed him away, insisting he could walk. So Darryl let him walk. As much as he fell behind and had a limp to his step, he tried to walk besides Darryl. At some point during their walk into town, Darryl had had enough of waiting up for Zak. So, once he had gotten caught up, Darryl looped his arm under Zaks, supporting the others' weight. He received a half hearted thank you, to which Darryl rolled his eyes and carried him along.
“We’re gonna settle here.” Darryl decided, letting Zak sit down. He slid down a wall, letting out a tired, frustrated sigh. “For what? The night?” “Yes, the night. This is way better than what our houses look like right now.” Darryl pointed out, looking along the shelved walls of what looked to be an old pharmacy. “It really hurts Darryl, my leg.” Zak breathed out, lifting his leg up over his knee to inspect it. “It’s fine Zak, stop being a baby.” Darryl warned, not aware of how severe it was. As Zak inspected it, he couldn’t help but hold his breathe, the cut was minor, but it already seemed super infected. He hoped it was nothing severe, but he knew it was just by the way it looked, he assumed some sort of radiation or something from the bomb had made it’s way into it and it looked to be pretty spread out along his leg. “Okay.” Zak replied, letting out a breath he had been holding. Not wanting to worry Darryl or seem dramatic, he let his leg back down, sliding his pant leg back over it.
Zak should have probably listened to his instincts and told Darryl about the severity of the cut. How badly it hurt or how it looked. But he had a feeling Darryl knew, but just refused to bring it up. Well, until Zak had woken up with a fever in the middle of the night and looked about half dead. “Your leg! Oh my god- Oh my God! It looks like it’s going to fall off!” Darryl practically screeched, looking over the bloodied limb. “It might as well be. Can’t feel a thing from here down.” Zak commented, pointing down to his hip region. And at some point during their worthless back and worth, Zak had said it felt so bad they might need to cut it off. “Cut it off!?” Darryl screeched, playing his hands on his head in disbelief. “I couldn’t do that! Besides, what if you died!?” He added on, beginning to pace around. Who knew that after such a grand reunion such a horrible thing would happen.
“I can’t feel my leg, Darryl! And it’s getting worse and there’s absolutely no antibiotics around!” Zak shouted back weakly. As if he could shout. The pain was so unbearable he couldn’t help the feeling of shutting his eyes forever when it washed over him. But he didn’t. And unfortunately it got so bad they actually had to go through with the plan, resulting in a not so great ending. Darryl had been nauseous the entire time and Zak had clocked out the minute the equipment hit his skin. It had been an agonizing progress, and Darryl was for once happy for Zak's low tolerance to pain. He wouldn’t be able to bear the screams of his partner while he practically sawed his leg off. When it was done, Darryl had wrapped Zak's leg up, or at least what was left of it, and pressed a kiss to his forehead and whispered hopes of seeing him in the morning. But alas, as much as Darryl hoped and prayed for it to happen, it didn’t. When he had awoken, which was early, Zak seemed to be doing alright. His leg seemed to have stopped bleeding and he wasn’t running a fever anymore which was strange. But out of sheer nerves and Darryl’s own fears, he checked Zak's pulse and found nothing.
He went into a frenzy soon after, searching for his heartbeat or pulse or any sign of life to no avail. But after what felt like hours of searching for any life in Zak , it had set in that he hadn’t made it through the night. And that the man he had loved, the man he finally was able to be with, was gone. The sob Darryl let out was agonizing as he lay over Zak's dead body, shaking. He cursed whatever God was out there, if there was one. After the death of Zak he came to terms that there was simply no god. Because ultimately, he had caused the death of Zak.
Death was caused by him