Work Text:
“Come on, man!”
Voices light with laughter carried through the dim, warmly lit hallways of the house.
“Okay- That’s not even fair, bro, I had that round!”
The washed light of the TV bathed the boy’s faces in a warm glow, light trickling along the smile lines and wrinkles of their eyes. The one lamp in the room seemed to bring so much light to it, illuminating the little dust particles floating through the air. It smelled like pizza and soda and warm clothes and everything that falls under familiarity. It felt like home. They all felt like home.
“Man, I hate you, Matt. Genuinely the third round in a row, dude! This is why you’re ugly.”
“Jesus, you’re one to talk. The hell is that mohawk situation you got going on, dude. Looks like you got licked by a horse.”
Laughter floated around the room contagiously as Matt ruffled his hand into Frank’s hair, spiking up the uneven mohawk into as many ugly shapes as possible. They all giggled, and even Ray joined in, sticking a hand in and twirling Frank’s bangs into ridiculous strands that stuck out from the sides. Frank swatted their hands away and the three of them lay on the couch, rolling with laughter and their controllers long discarded on the floor.
The warm light seemed to flow from every crack, door, and window in the house that night. It seemed to seep into the old wooden floorboards and linger in the dusty white walls of Frank’s parents house, and then spill out the sides and fade into the warm summer night air. The most comforting time in the most comforting place. Friends.
Frank smashed open the rusty, cracked vending machine with a crumbling brick. He winced at the echo of the horrendously loud crash as it snapped him out of his train of thought. The noise seemed to travel through the entire empty, lonesome mall.
Man, fuck those flashbacks. He hated when he remembered them. It was honestly too painful to think about. The warm night air had dropped dead and the laughter had long since settled to dust, gathering in a hollow pit in his stomach. It made him so fucking sick he could hardly stand it. He wanted it back.
Frank shook his head and decided that talking to himself in his head isn’t about to fix any of his real life problems, like the hunger gnawing in sharp pangs in his gut. How long has it been since he last had a filling meal? Two weeks? Three? Jesus, it must’ve been since he found that old supermarket, and that was like…Three and a half. Everything else inside was stale and sticky, save for a lot of canned Spam, a couple cans of cooked vegetables, and a sealed bottle of lemonade. And shit, at the time, it felt like the grandest five course feast. Best day of his life. Since then he’s been living off of whatever scraps he can find. It’s not easy work.
He reached eagerly past the broken shards protruding around the hole in the glass, and pulled out the intently awaited pack of peanut butter crackers and two bottles of water. Score.
He stashed the bottles in his bag and was about to greedily tear into the pack of crackers until-
Crash.
Frank’s head shot straight up and it felt like cold water was suddenly dumped down the back of his neck.
Zombie.
Faster than his brain could even process, he reached down and tore the jagged and stained machete off of his belt. He took cautious steps back and wielded the knife in front of him, his hands white knuckle gripping the fabric wrapped hilt. His stare never left the dark, ominous room on the other side of the once operating escalator. They used to sell clothes inside once. Now the lights are out permanently and rubble litters the space. That’s how the whole plaza is has been ever since-
He hears footsteps shuffle from the corner of the room. The darkness is too thick to see through, not even the sunlight is reaching inside. But he knows he isn’t crazy. He heard what he heard. Frank waited for what felt like an eternity with bated breath, although it was definitely barely even twenty more seconds. He waited because he knew something was going to come outside, and when it did, he would strike that fucking thing down. Cut off its head and take away the last rotting, pathetic excuse for a life that it clings to.
How do you kill the undead? Frank doesn’t know, but he sure as fucking hell tries.
It’s time.
A figure emerges from the shadows, and Frank takes sudden, fast lurching steps forwards, raising his machete up in the lethal position that he knows will only take one strike to kill. This ugly corpse is about to-
Oh.
Oh.
He pauses. He lowers his blade.
He stares.
He stares into the seeing eyes of another. Clear eyes. Clear, working, vivid hazel. Alive. Alive eyes.
Him and the living man stare at each other in complete silence, breathing heavy and completely, completely still.
“I…” Frank tries to make a sentence, but words seem to fail him. He hasn’t had the need to speak out loud for seven months. Seven grueling months since the outbreak got out of control.
“I almost killed you.”
Frank lowered his machete, the blade nearly slipping from his sweating hands. He wasn’t paying attention.
The man who was very much not a zombie wielded a bat with jagged, rusted nails sticking out from it at all angles. He too held it with a white-knuckle grip, and he was not as fast to relax as Frank was. He had shoulder length black hair that was stringy and plastered to his forehead with sweat and grime, but you could tell that when it was healthy it might’ve been almost pretty. His gray hoodie was torn and dirty and the long cargo shorts he wielded looked like they were soon due to disintegrate. But Frank couldn’t judge, he looked even worse probably. The man took a deep breath and exhaled shakily, and opened his mouth like he was about to speak, but he couldn’t decide on what to say. “I’m sorry for scaring you” maybe? Or perhaps “I thought you were a zombie too?” Or, even more appropriate, “Holy shit, I’m not the only one left!”
“Your hand is bleeding.”
“What? Oh. Oh…oops.” Frank stuttered and held his hand up. He hadn’t really realized that he had nicked his finger on the vending machine glass. But- you know, he kinda didn’t really care about that right now. More important matters to deal with, he’d say.
There was another beat of silence before the man cleared his throat and took a step forward, further out of the darkness. Some of the tension from his shoulders dissipated and he fastened his bat back on his backpack.
“I, uh…Sorry, I’m…sorry. I haven’t spoken to anyone in like…a long time. Like, at all. I didn’t plan what I’d say if I met anyone else alive.” He looked back up, their shared, wild stare meeting once again. “I didn’t really…think that I would.”
The two didn’t break eye contact. It was like their intent stares were now a lifeline stringing them together. The tense air hummed with a new energy. Survival. They weren’t…alone anymore.
“I didn’t either. I’m Frank. Shit…it sure is nice to meet you.”