Work Text:
"Do you think not knowing is worse than knowing they're dead?"
"Maxine, you mean?"
"Yeah, and Sam and Mum and Dad."
Julia Yao sat next to Paula Cohen, turning her phone over and over in her hands. It was useless now -- the battery had gone flat long ago, and she had given it to the tech people to make better use of -- but she kept the case. It was comforting, flipping the screen up and down. She'd listened to her last voicemail so many times she could recite it perfectly -- Julia, it's Sam -- I hope you're having fun with your boyfriend, but I was wondering when you were coming home, because Aunt Denise is coming over. Stay safe, love you!
"Not knowing gives us hope, I suppose," said Paula, sighing. Despite the age gap, the two women had bonded over stories of the people they'd left behind. it was a ritual, now. Sharing snippets of their pre-apocalypse lives and wondering whether the people they cared about had survived.
"But I can't even -- I can't even mourn them properly, you know? My whole family, and I know nothing," Julia said, biting her lip and flipping the phone faster, faster. "I had to fucking do my own boyfriend in with a--" she swallowed, trying to compose herself, "--with a hockey stick, but at least I know what happened to him. But who the hell knows, maybe the runners will come across an undead Yao and maybe their next tally mark on their zombie kill list will be my brother or mother or father and I..." she trailed off, unable to finish.
Paula put her arm around the younger girl, sighing. "You've just got to assume they're still alive, though. I hope Maxine got the CD -- she'd try to get to the hospital to see what I was working on, I know she would. And she'll be disappointed there, but at least she has my last words. I'd like to think they weren't my last words to her, but I don't know how to find her, so they'll have to do."
They sat in silence, leaning slightly on each other as they thought their own thoughts.
***
"How'd you two meet?" Julia asked, handing Paula a mug of tea and sitting on one of the free chairs in the recreation hall. It wasn't tv hour, but it was still a good place to come when you were off-duty. (Paula, at last, had off-duty hours now -- there were a grand total of three doctors in the camp, which gave her a precious few hours to wind down and try to forget for a while. She never quite managed it.) "You and Maxine, I mean."
"At a conference for work, actually," Paula said. "It was something about the immune system -- I've forgotten, now. We got talking during one of the breaks, had dinner together, and...well, you know the rest. We kept in touch over Skype for a bit and then Maxine moved over here." They both stared at the television's black screen. "Did Sam have a favourite hobby?" They swapped questions like this whenever they had the time, reliving the old days.
"He really enjoyed working at the uni radio station," Julia said, tucking her legs underneath her and shuffling to get more comfortable. "He had a slot in the afternoons a few days a week, and I'd always tune in if I was on campus. We didn't talk about it much but he seemed so relaxed and happy when he was talking into that microphone, you know? He didn't seem to like uni much, but he loved that radio station. He could've made a good career out of it, I think. Pity he can't now, even if he is alive -- not many radio stations are hiring." She took a sip of tea. It was amazing how long a blank television screen could hold your attention -- and to think that she could hardly sit still before the apocalypse. "Hey, do you think Sam and Maxine would've got along? I know they'd never have met, but if they did. Would they have been friends like we're friends?"
Paula considered this for a moment, looking over at Julia. She imagined Sam -- a boy (no, a young man), taller than the girl in front of her, with ridiculously messy hair and an Aquaman t-shirt (Julia had said it was his favourite). A grin as he adjusted his headphones. "Yeah, I think they would've. Good friends."
***
"Thanks for listening with me," Maxine said, clutching the slightly chipped mug that Sam had brought her before she replayed the CD. "It means a lot."
"No problem," Sam said, giving her a small smile. "You have the comms shack for as long as you like, and I'll be here for as long as you want me."
They sat in silence for a while, not needing words. When Maxine spoke at last, it was a question Sam hadn't expected. "What was your sister like? You had a sister who was away when the plague broke out, didn't you?"
"Yeah, I did," he said, looking away. "Her name was Julia. She was the star of the family, really. First Year Law at the time of the outbreak -- she was doing really well, and everyone was so proud. Up with her boyfriend when it hit, and we couldn't--" his voice broke, and he coughed, hoping Maxine hadn't noticed. She had, but she didn't say anything. "--contact her or anything. We didn't want to freak her out -- we didn't know it was worth freaking out, not yet -- so I just bullshitted reasons for her to come home. Relatives visiting, stuff like that. I left her so many voicemails but I...I've no idea what happened to her."
"Maybe she escaped," Maxine suggested. "You said she was up? Scotland?"
"Not that far north. Maybe she did, though. Probably took a few zombies out with her law textbooks -- god, those things were massive."
"Maybe she and Paula both escaped and found each other," Maxine said, fiddling with a bracelet on her wrist. (Paula had given it to her as an anniversary present -- it was a gold band with an opal set in it and she was amazed she hadn't lost it somehow.) "If Paula escaped -- I mean, it's possible, right?"
"Of course it's possible," Sam said. Whether it was probable was an entirely different matter, but he knew better than to mention that. "Just as possible as us being here, isn't it?"