Chapter Text
The apocalypse was different from your regular zombie story. There wasn't as much gore as you would expect, it wasn't even caused by some weird virus but something more… brain-wired. Some people have said that it was God's punishment of the new generation, since they are so unreligious. Other people have said that teens under 18 have not yet developed the natural shield the brain needs to ward off the electromagnetic radiation that causes the symptoms. Anyway, some big solar flare in the sun's atmosphere basically caused anyone with an underdeveloped brain to turn into a brain-dead zombie here on earth. Now I know what you're thinking: children zombies can't be that scary. You're wrong, because these zombies can be fast and aggressive. Yes, luckily if you get bitten you don't turn into one yourself, but if you get mauled by one you might meet a fate just as brutal: death. These zombies were basically killing machines, with no guilt, no remorse and no stop button. Scary shit. On top of that, the un-zombified adolescents still got affected by the solar flare in the form of long-term memory loss (or some imitation of it since lost memories are proven to return after being exposed to the right trigger).
You can probably imagine what happened to the world. Even though every single adult was left un-zombified, ¾th of the world got wiped out in the span of half a year. Not only because of the zombies, but wars broke out everywhere, there were multiple mass suicide incidents and most people simply starved inside of their homes, too scared to even move.
Now luckily since some people had actually foreseen this event, there were communities being built between premade walls and watchtowers, but there was only so much to go around. They mostly have a very strict leader and some malicious shit going on in the background, but they can also mean well.
Nagi Seishiro, a fairly tall 19 year old boy with white, fluffy hair and gray eyes got rescued by a peaceful community a while back, this one was called 'the Blue Lock' and was run by an intimidating man named Ego Jinpachi, together with his wife Anri. Nagi actually got caught in one of their traps while scavenging out alone, so he himself wouldn't call it being rescued as much as being taken hostage. Although he can't complain too much, life within the walls was safe and Nagi liked sleeping with both eyes closed. After a while his life got so normal, he even felt social pressure return, although that could have also just been Anri. Since he lived here he had to help the community, so hold a job. Nagi's skills mostly consisted of guarding and hunting which wasn't of much use within the walls, and he wasn't allowed to go on scavenging missions because he's young and thus valuable. He's terrible at socializing and insisted he didn't know how to cook, so Anri wrote him down as a nurse since it was kind of the last option. Lucky for him, he only has to come in whenever there's too many injuries and too few nurses, but that rarely happens. When it does though, he mostly just has to keep watch and check their vitals from time to time, which is a piece of cake. He also likes how quiet the hospital is, it’s also the best reinforced building with the least amount of windows which makes it the safest building on the community grounds.
Nagi woke up feeling like shit, he barely slept a wink last night because of the full moon and the people yelling outside in the early morning. That mostly indicates that outsiders that are caught in the traps are being brought in. Nagi unfortunately knows that this also means Anri will be at his door within the next 15 minutes telling him to get up and go to work. He opens the curtain to watch the sun coming up from behind the wall and yawns.
It's a 5 minute walk to the slightly bigger one story building that they call the hospital. The rest of the buildings surrounding it are all construction offices and recycled shipping containers (/tiny homes) that people sleep in. The ground now holds around 60 people in total, with 20 small bungalows and 40 offices. All bungalows are occupied by max 4 people at once, so the housing capacity of the community is realistically at around 100, maybe even 120. Because of this reason the scavenging squad decided to bring in everyone they meet, under the condition that they have a personal meetup with Ego before being assigned a house and a job.
When Nagi arrives at his job without having eaten breakfast, Anri is at the reception desk filling in some papers when she catches him.
"Nagi! Listen, you're assigned to room 12, the one in the back. The patient has had a scratch on the face and just seems to be fast asleep so nothing to really worry about except for the fact that he seems to be a Mikage, which could be quite promising to our community. Ego would love to have a word with him, so we can't have him running away or anything."
Nagi raises an eyebrow. "Mikage?"
Anri nods enthusiastically. "Yes, this is probably their only son, the heir to the Mikage corporation. Very powerful people."
Nagi furrows his brows, something lit up inside him as he heard that name. He probably just remembered the name from TV or something.
So Nagi has been instructed to keep watch on this rich kid as all nurses are needed in different rooms. Even though he really didn't feel like working today, he would like to be alone with someone who won't keep nagging him for once. Assuming the kid stays asleep, of course.
Now he's made himself comfortable in a big armchair on the rear end and in between the bed and the window. Even though he looks real comfortable, his right leg is a bit bouncy which indicates his annoyance with what Anri said just five minutes beforehand.
"Now, I know you don't feel like doing this, but since the kid is your age I want you to try and make friends with him. It's good to have someone looking out for you during this time. I know I'm not your guardian but I do know what's best for you."
Nagi gave her a look for this. He has tried this before with the one other boy of his age living here, Chigiri. And both he and Anri know how badly that went. Anri has tried to blame it on Nagi because, to be fair, it was Nagi who was extremely uninterested in the other one, but Nagi just couldn't bring himself to try. Chigiri also wasn't the best in dealing with unresponsive assholes and too decided to just stop trying.
Nagi has since thought about having a friend and how nice that could be, but even before this all went down he didn't have any so he just doesn't know how to make friends. The only people he cared about were killed in front of his eyes in the beginning of the end, so after that he seemed to have given up on everything. Anri noticed this and has really tried to push him in the right direction, just like with what he's been instructed with this time around. Although he cannot help feeling like this is also more in the interest of the community.
Right now he just has to wait until his patient wakes up. Luckily, Anri had given him a book to read and some crossword puzzles. He proceeds to spend four hours engulfed in a boring book and making crossword puzzles with a bouncy foot to keep himself somewhat awake and alert.
The bouncing of his foot suddenly stops as the door opens again and wakes Nagi up from his daze. It's Chigiri, he's carrying a drawing pad under his right arm.
"Hi, Nagi. I came to take a look at the heir of the Mikage corp. I heard he was a total stud." He looks at Nagi as if he was expecting an answer, so Nagi shrugs at him. He grins, "You haven't even looked at him, huh."
Nagi sighs, "His hair's purple."
Chigiri rolls his eyes. "I could literally see that from my bedroom window when they were being brought in. Well, whatever." He walks over to the bed with big steps and slightly hunches over to take a good look at him, tilting his head to look at him from different angles.
Nagi had started staring out of the window as soon as Chigiri approached the bed but glances towards the bed again since the silence got stretched a bit too long, something he isn't used to with Chigiri. The redhead's eyes look filled with something he himself would call inspiration. His mouth is agape and he's clutching the drawing pad against his chest with both arms, which gets Nagi a bit curious. Chigiri notices him looking and snaps out of the trance, clearing his throat. "He's a looker for sure. I wonder if he was actually an idol? His hair color is also one in a million, so pretty. Maybe he also came from royalty, like me. I think me and him will get along just fine!"
Nagi regrets showing the redhead a hint of curiosity, now he won't stop rambling. He sees Chigiri positioning himself in front of his drawing pad and turns his focus back on his puzzles so as not to accidentally distract Chigiri from his drawing.
Even though Nagi and Chigiri aren't friends, he doesn't mind the guy in his presence. It was actually more Chigiri who had to warm up to Nagi and his unresponsiveness since the redhead loves talking. They just seem way too different to both their liking. When Nagi got all depressed after the outbreak, Chigiri saw it as an opportunity to pick up drawing and found everything inspiring and beautiful. It's all he could talk about at first so of course he wouldn't get much out of Nagi regarding that. Nagi really didn't care. Chigiri found this quite frustrating but after learning about Nagi's circumstances from Anri, he showed more respect. This also goes the other way around, Nagi seems to respect Chigiri more after learning about the severity of his memory loss. The guy doesn't even remember the people he used to be close to, so what does he have to grieve?
"You should really look at the kiddie band aid they put on his cheekbone. It's all pink and cute, it matches his violet hair."
Nagi thinks that this is more Chigiri thinking out loud than actually telling Nagi to get up and look, so he remains unresponsive.
"This guy's the perfect model for me to practice my realism…" and "I hope I have a purple pencil with me…" he mumbles to himself.
Since Chigiri is keeping a real good eye on the rich kid, Nagi takes this opportunity to secretly doze off. "I wonder what the color of his eyes is…" he hears Chigiri say before he gives in to his sleepiness.
He gets woken up by the calling of his name approximately 20 minutes later. He had slid down further into the chair during his nap and now has to clumsily pull himself back up to breathe properly again. "Hm?"
"Behold my masterpiece." Chigiri demands, holding his notepad in front of him.
Nagi rubs his sleeve over his eyes and yawns before leaning forward to inspect the drawing as requested. The drawing is well done, he thinks. Chigiri used soft strokes and colors, making it nice on the eye. The boy in the drawing has nice soft features, long eyelashes and violet strands of hair gently brushing over his forehead and cheek as his head is turned slightly to the left. The band aid on his cheek is colored pink which matches the hue on his nose, lips and ears.
Nagi gently takes the drawing pad from the other guy to have a better look at it. Chigiri seems to take this gesture as praise as he gives a satisfied hum.
"Um…" Nagi begins, searching for the right words. "It's very pretty."
Chigiri puts a hand on his hip. "That's because he is pretty. I tried my best with the realism in this one, how did I do?"
Nagi's no art critic in the slightest, but right now he stands up from his chair to take a look at the rich boy as if it's his job. He gets closer to the sleeping boy and hunches over a bit just like Chigiri did. "Huh…" he says out loud. Rich boy really is that pretty.
Chigiri glances at him expectantly for a short while until his patience wears thin. "What, have you fallen in love or something? Did I do well on the realism or not?"
Nagi forgot he was supposed to compare them, so with a warmth in his ears and neck he starts to actually look at the drawing as well. "Yeah, looks pretty much the same."
"And..?" Chigiri asks with raised eyebrows.
Nagi does not know what the other boy wants to hear. "Well done?" He just says.
That seemed to be the right answer since he got a satisfied smile back. The redhead proceeded to take his artwork back and go out to show it to some more people.
Nagi's left alone with the purple haired boy again. Now that he has actually taken a good look at him he seems to find his face more interesting than anything going on in his puzzlebook. He did not only find himself bewitched by the guy's pretty face, he feels like he has definitely seen him before. Not from TV either… might this actually be someone from his high school? He does remember a popular kid in his class having a vivid hair color…
Not long after Chigiri has left, Anri comes through the door with some unchecked force that makes Nagi jump.
"Oh, sorry I didn't mean to scare you. I just ran into Chigiri and heard Mikage hasn't woken up yet, so you're off for the day." She pauses and raises her eyebrows at the observation that Nagi was standing next to the bed and not sitting or laying down as she was expecting. "Unless you want to stay, of course."
Nagi immediately opens his mouth in defense of anything strange Anri might've been suggesting, but decides to just shake his head instead.
"Alright, I might need you here tomorrow morning again, if you don't mind."
Nagi nods and quietly leaves the room.
Next day he's back in the hospital around 7 AM to resume the same job. Some of the other new people that were being treated have woken up and are lucid enough to have conversations with Anri, who's in charge of explaining to them where they are. Nagi notices this when walking past the rooms, until he arrives at the last one.
His patient has moved to laying in more of a fetus position, having gathered most of the excess blanket in his arms. Nagi also notices the band aid has been switched from pink to a lime green one.
He makes himself comfortable in the arm chair again, preparing for a long day of (probably) nothing, wishing someone would invent a magic gameboy that didn't need juice or batteries (these are very scarce right now).
He had been trying to remember his years of high school last night, and it frustrated him to find out his memory had been affected quite strongly too and he slept terribly again because of that. He did find himself a little excited over getting to talk with this Mikage kid to see if it would trigger any memory response.
He pulls his hoodie over his head and listens to the other boy's heavy breathing and subconsciously mimicking it until he dozes off himself.
"Excuse me…" Nagi hears as he is slowly waking up from his nap. Through his blurry vision he sees a bundle of violet hair and pretty blue-ish purple eyes looking up at him. He rubs his eyes and clumsily corrects his sitting position with a low groan. "...Mmyeah?"
He answers the rich kid that has now woken up. The guy in question gets up from his squatting position and looks around carefully.
"Where am i?"
Nagi slowly takes the situation in as he's still waking up and everything hurts from the position he was sleeping in. The boy in front of him is only wearing a white shirt and pink boxers. He looks to the side to avoid his eyes wandering.
"I'm… supposed to call the higher-ups." He says before steadying himself in the chair. Before he could push himself up the other guy puts his hands on the armrests, effectively blocking his way. He bows above Nagi's lap, forcing him to meet his eyes. "What's your name?" He asks with a deep stare from eye to eye, followed by a little head tilt. Nagi feels his breath hitch, but keeps himself composed aside from the way he bounced back at first. "Nagi… Seishiro."
"Nagi..?" The one Nagi only knows as Mikage tilts his head down a little bit, showing Nagi his innocent blueish purple eyes. "Am i going to be in trouble, Nagi?" He says with a really sweet voice, his eyebrows turned upwards.
Maybe it's because his hood is still pulled over his head, but Nagi suddenly feels very hot. He knows what Mikage is doing is probably just some seduction tactic for survival or whatever, but he struggles with being the one subjected to it. He also doesn't know what he is and isn't allowed to say and doesn't feel up to another scolding by Anri, so he's kind of stuck. Should he just play into the tactic? His mind is racing for some reason, so he decides to try that.
"Can I know your name first?"
"My name is Reo Mikage, I'm pretty positive you already knew about my family name. You seem very familiar, for some reason."
'Reo' repositions himself a bit, leaning more into the chair and tilting his head to the other side while keeping eye contact. His voice sounds hushed and low.
"Listen Nagi, I've got a lot of bad people after me as you may know. If you could give me some information that would help me a bunch, I'd do anything…" As he tilts his head even more his gaze turns really flirty, with a slight lip bite and a hand moving down to Nagi's thigh. Nagi can't help but get sucked into the atmosphere, parting his lips instinctively and feeling his back get tense. Reo notices this, so he places his left knee in between Nagi's parted legs. The latter draws a breath but before he could say anything the door to the room swings open, Chigiri being the one to shatter the strange atmosphere.
"Oh!" He raises his free hand to hide his eyes from the view. "Sorry! I- uh-"
Reo stands up straight in caution and Nagi takes this opportunity to get up from the chair, giving Reo a polite nod as if thanking him for letting him through before shifting his attention to the other guy.
"Hey uh… Chigiri, can you go get Anri?"
"Wait-" Reo begins, looking a bit panicked this time. "What are you guys planning on doing to me? If it's money you want, my dad's dead so I'm not any good for ransom, and-"
Nagi raises his hands to calm him down and it works. "Anri is nice. We just want to help."
The purple haired slowly nods while trying to regulate his breath a bit more.
Chigiri has been gone for a good 2 seconds before returning with Anri, who then requested for the two boys to leave her and young Mikage.
As soon as the door closes behind them, Chigiri turns to Nagi, who's purposely looking the other way. "You rascal, what was that? Are you actually into men? Hey, look at me- I can see that your ear is red!"
Nagi sighs really deeply. "He was just doing that for survival."
Chigiri hums. "Yeah, being the Mikage's son he's probably had to do that a lot." He gets his smug look back on his face. "But he got you pretty riled up, yeah? Man, you're actually more interesting than I thought!"
Nagi can't really defend himself with that one. "He's just really good, I guess. Makes him more interesting than me."
The redhead nods in agreement. "Anyone's more interesting than you, but at least now I know you like guys." He raises his eyebrows in expectation of Nagi's agreement.
Nagi shakes his head in denial, a little too desperately for his own liking. "I don't know about that. Also, there's like… bigger things to worry about."
Chigiri rolls his eyes at that. "Well let me know when you do know so I can tell you 'I told you so'."
"I will not." The white haired boy says before walking away and earning one last groan from redhead.
"Pissbaby!" The latter yells at him before quickly making his way somewhere else.
The rest of the day Nagi has tried to find distractions that aren't purple or red haired since both colors had already overwhelmed him when it wasn't even 9 AM yet. He walked around the neighborhood, talked to some rescued elderly and even climbed to accompany the people on the watchtower while occasionally glancing towards the hospital. He even got to kill a zombie with a makeshift spear through the gaps of the main gate.
He didn't know exactly what he was trying to distract himself from, but when he arrived at the town gathering where they get served dinner every night and saw the color violet out of the corner of his eye, he remembered. This morning had given his body an energy boost that seemed to last him the whole day, and he was just trying to get rid of the excess energy that happened to linger and to not think of those pretty pink lips and soft thighs of…
"Hey." Speak of the devil. "Sorry about this morning, that probably looked a bit desperate. I'm only like that when I feel threatened."
Reo had put a hand on Nagi's shoulder before speaking to him, it felt warm and gentle just like his voice. He seems to have rinsed himself off and dressed up in mostly black comfy clothes which Nagi thinks suit him well. He does still seem to do this head tilt, little pout and intense eye contact thing, Nagi guesses that was not part of the act after all.
Nagi rubs the back of his neck and does his best to maintain polite eye contact with the shorter boy. "It's cool, I understand."
The shorter boy places himself next to the taller one to watch the somewhat rowdy lineup as dinner is being served. "I've never met a community this welcoming before, so I'm honestly still a bit wary." He turns to Nagi. "How long have you been here?"
"About three months." Nagi fails in keeping eye contact for more than a second since Reo seems to love staring into his soul.
"How did you end up here, if i may ask?"
"I was on my own for a bit, I lived off canned food in an old bunker but got caught in a hanging trap."
"Oh! I've lived in a bunker too for a bit. But we were with 6 people so we ran out of resources pretty fast." Reo's face slightly drops before continuing. "At some point you realize that being on your own is your best chance of survival…"
Nagi just looks at the boy, whose eyes are now looking away in thought while his brows slightly furrow. When Reo finally catches him looking he tries to compose himself.
"Oh, sorry I didn't mean to ramble, you have such a calming presence that i…" his cheeks flush as he runs his hand through his hair. "It's been a while since I've had a normal talk with someone, or talked to anyone in general."
Nagi nods with his eyes glued to the flustered ears next to him. "I've been there."
The shorter boy gives him a gentle smile and the taller one does his best to give one back, although he fears it probably looks like nothing.
"You seem so familiar." Reo suddenly says, so hushed it felt as if he was talking to himself. The white haired boy slightly widens his eyes and lowers the tone of his voice to match Reo's. "I actually thought so too. I might remember something but my memory has gone to shit."
Reo looks up at him, his eyes glistening with something that looks like both relief and disappointment.
At the same time Chigiri, who's standing in line for dinner with an empty plate, comes curiously shuffling by. His eyebrows are raised and he's clearly trying to act natural even though he's very curious about both Reo Mikage and why he just saw them whispering to each other like that.
The purple haired boy notices Chigiri's pathetic attempt and leans over to the one next to him.
"Should I also apologize to him for this morning or…"
Nagi actually smiles at this. (He sees Chigiri opening his mouth in awe but ignores it).
"Nah, he probably liked the sight anyway," He daringly whispers back, while keeping his eyes on Chirigi to make it very obvious he's the subject of their conversation, which makes the redhead visibly annoyed.
But still, Chigiri decides his food is more important and can occasionally be patient so he leaves them after giving Nagi one last nasty look.
The shorter boy chuckles at Nagi's joke, with eyes closed and a hand in front of his mouth. "Aren't you guys friends?"
Nagi shakes his head, and subtly puts his hood up after witnessing that dorky laugh to hide his ears. "We have nothing in common, but he's a good guy."
"I'll have a chat with him later."
"So have you met with Ego yet?" Nagi asks, while genuinely curious on how that might have gone (and not only to steer the conversation away from the blabbermouth).
Reo shakes his head. "I'm just waiting for that Anri chick to pick me up for that. She also kinda told me to go talk to you."
Nagi sighs, of course she did.
"I know Ego is kind of a weirdo and, like, talks in riddles and stuff." He shuffles around a bit. "So… keep that in mind."
Anri is waving at Reo from a distance, who picks up his feet. "I will." He walks closely past Nagi and playfully looks him up and down, "Thanks, Nagi Seishiro. Bye."
Nagi is left in a daze, ears flushed even redder at the way Reo said his name.
(That last word he said carried something heavy though, as if he would leave for good. But that's not something he can focus on right now).
He pulls on his hood strings and decides to go get some food himself.