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The rain falls in torrents over the whole city.
It feels like the clouds had cried for him when not a single tear escaped his face.
Augustus walks alone. Just like he always has.
But every single step away from Thomas felt like pinpricks of needles stabbing into his ribcage.
He wanted to turn, to run to him and take his hand and finally, finally, leave the city that haunted his waking memories. Leave all of his past and pain behind and maybe start over again.
With Thomas.
With...
Well, nothing ever goes according to what Augustus wanted.
Ever since the apocalypse started it's like this higher being had always toyed with him, tormenting him in ways he can't even afford to think about when all he could think about was survival.
It's like the universe is handing him a big middle finger and saying fuck you and your life.
In the grand scheme of things, maybe he didn't even matter. He's just one depressed person who happens to be in this fucked up situation along with everyone else.
He's not special, he's not someone the universe would go out of its way to torment. But it brought him company in those lonely nights, the thought that something out there cared enough for his existence to fuck his life up.
Maybe that's why the universe goes and introduces him to Thomas.
Sweet, innocent, naive Thomas.
Who was only in the city for a fucking college presentation. Writing notes on that little journal of his happily. With a fucking bright smile on his face and calls his name like he was the one who hung the stars.
Tells him that he is home.
Looks back at him in a crowd.
Maybe all of those were lies too.
Augusts could feel the cold water now seeping through his clothes, making his skin feel disgusting.
He was drowning in his thoughts, moments overlayed with color now blur at the edges. Like a photograph catching fire. It burns around memories of himself sat upon his tree on the hostel, watching, waiting, for the others to notice him.
Waiting, but not feeling worthy enough to insert himself into the family the four people had found themselves in.
The edges of those memories blackened, thick with ash and soot, as it takes over everything in his mind.
The laughter, the smiles, the sobs, the hugs.
Thomas.
Augustus gags, he bends over and lurches. The little food he had earlier now expelled into the pavement.
He feels sick.
Standing shakily on his legs, Augustus wipes the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand. The disgusted look on his face replaced with nonchalance as he carefully stepped over the mess he made. It will be washed away by the rain eventually.
Just like his ashes when he eventually succumb to the apocalypse. Or his presence in Thomas' life.
Don't think about him. Don't think about him. Please, don't think about him. Not now.
One step, then another, then another.
The movement feels monotonous and boring but his body knows what to do, basic motor functions still up and running. And he's fine.
He's fine, he repeats it to himself like a mantra. Like if he had thought it many times over it would come true.
He's fine.
But.
He had yearned for that life. For that life outside of Paradise City and what could have been.
Had wished it with the entirety of his being, albeit subconsciously, that maybe he can be normal. Maybe he can live a life that does not involve him running away from the undead.
Maybe he can sleep with both of his eyes closed because his life is no longer in peril, his adrenaline no longer pumping constantly inside his veins that he ends up jittery and anxious.
That he can go to college and get a degree. That doesn't have to scavenge for measly bites of food or that he doesn't have to think if he can even have food.
That maybe there's not a single drop of blood on his hands.
Sometimes, most times, Augustus' mind would wonder what could have been.
And then the dream is shattered by a growl in the distance and he's pulled back down into his reality that he cannot have that life. Violently shaking him in the shoulders that this dreams like that gets you killed.
Dreams like that doesn't have a place in Paradise City.
Then came Thomas.
His arrival made Augustus dream again. Like he was a ray of sunshine in an otherwise long and dark and fucking scary tunnel.
Thomas had been the epitome of his dream. The life he yearned for.
But all dreams come to an end. An alarm clock screaming at him that history will always repeat itself.
Over and over and over.
Augustus cannot get out. He has to get out. He has to run away. He had to get out.
Get out. Get out. Get out. Getoutgetoutgetout--
"Augustus!" Thomas' voice cuts through the haze inside his head. A hand grips his forearm and for a moment, he teeters over the edge of the overpass, the drop beneath him yawning over like a mouth wanting to swallow him whole.
His body shivers, the rain pelts his face.
And then he's yanked back.
Augustus falls backward into Thomas with a thud. The force of him being pulled back making them tumble into the pavement--Thomas underneath him, catching his fall with a small hiss of pain.
Before he could say anything, before he could run away again, Thomas was sitting up, taking Augustus' body with him and turning him around by the shoulders.
"Are you okay? Are you hurt? Are you okay?" Thomas asked in rapid succession. His warm eyes darting all over Augustus' body, inspecting for cuts or bruises or bites.
Augustus stares and sat there numbly as Thomas fusses over him. The irony of him saying to everyone that listened how Thomas doesn't care for him as much as he did for Thomas now being overshadowed by the obvious concern swimming inside those brown eyes.
Augustus feels a fire slowly starts to burn inside his ribcage. An ember of wanting to be somebody to someone licking at the edges of the muscles of his heart.
Then the weight of Thomas' confession pulls at his chest. Stops his heart just for a second before he's being pulled in.
The hug felt like a warm scarf on a cold winter evening. The rain continues to fall in torrents around them.
Augustus felt the fight rush out of him, his tired bones wanting to rest against Thomas' warmth.
But then again, nothing ever goes according to what he wants.
Sobs, silent at first, wracks his body. Thomas' arms just holds him a little bit tighter.
He was shaking now, breaths coming in a little harder, as he tried to push Thomas away. Punching, scratching, pushing, as his cries goes louder and louder. The thought of his outburst attracting a horde shivers up his spine but he doesn't care.
He doesn't care. He's done caring.
This is what he gets for caring. For wanting. For dreaming.
The ideal person he longed for, now feels like sands between his fingertips. Who was he even trying so hard for anyway? He had been wanting to die just days ago. But the thought of leaving Thomas alone had made him swim up the sea desperately, inhaling lungfuls of air as he weakly moves his arms through the surface.
Why had he even bothered trying?
Thomas holds him through it all. Taking everything Augustus was throwing at him while he just held him a little bit tighter.
"Why would you do that?! Why are you putting people's lives in danger?! Why are you so selfish?! I trusted you." Every word is emphasized with a punch to the shoulder. Thomas doesn't say a word, just lets him vent out his anger at him. "I trusted you."
A punishment he was willing to take just to keep him close.
As his anger ebbs into a simmer at the pit of his stomach, Augustus' fists clench at his side. His cries now subsiding into small sniffles as tears replace what was once rain on his cheeks.
"I'm sorry." Thomas whispers. "I'm sorry."
Augustus breathes a little bit harder. The smell of Thomas, warm and inviting, invading his senses. Even in an apocalypse, Thomas still manages to smell like the home Augustus never had. If he hadn't had the heart to confess about his sin, would Augustus have continued to be blinded by his want? Would he have taken Thomas' hand and run away with him?
The answer to those question alluded him now. He wasn't so sure why he's still breathing.
"I'm sorry. I was wrong. I'm sorry." He repeats. Augustus wasn't sure which of it were sincere and which of it were lies. If Thomas was just telling him these words out of necessity. "I know I was wrong."
"Please don't leave me." He whispers, a lot closer now. Tightening his hands around Augustus enough to hurt. Augustus is a weak man. A weak, pathetic, desperate man.
And his forbidden fruit had just dangled itself in front of him.
The tremor in his arms increases as he slowly wraps them around Thomas. Softly at first, then desperately. His being craving the warmth that Thomas offers, the companionship that his presence means.
Augustus is tired. And angry. And he just wants to rest.
He doesn't even care if Thomas is sincere in his apologies now. He doesn't even care if he's being strung along in this little game of his. Maybe he does want this. Maybe he doesn't.
Maybe, it's whoever it is in the universe telling him that this is his curse. His own personal purgatory.
He slumps forward, let's his body fall pliant on Thomas' arms and feels the ache in his bones. He's so tired of running. Of constantly overthinking about every little thing.
He's so tired of not being able to just…want.
To be completely honest, Augustus had thought Thomas would run after Mr. Flux, beg him to stay with him instead. Drop to his knees and apologize.
It was honestly, a little bit—okay a lot—suprising that Thomas had stayed rooted to his spot. Watched as Flux had disappeared from their sights and waited for Augustus to finish off his hysterical tirade of words meant to hurt him.
To make him feel how betrayed he felt when Thomas confessed it was him who had brought all those people to their eventual demise.
To destroy him the way his dream was slowly crumbling away into little shards of glass that embed themselves into his bone marrow.
You just lost your last friend.
He had said it with contempt, with sadness, with desperation.
Because he had been carving a space inside him that only Thomas can fill. Angling the knife little by little, his scar-covered hands gripping it tightly as he slowly chipped away at the walls he hand carefully built around himself just so he could let him in.
Then he shatters that with the reality that the person he had known as Thomas was built on deceit.
Yet, here he was. Still trying to hold on to his last bit of sanity left. The tether that held him to the ground when he's floating into the clouds. The hand that had pulled him from those rough ocean waves.
Augustus, just like Thomas, still wants.
The rain slows down and Augustus slowly pushes himself away from the hug. Thomas scrambles to tighten his hold but he just pats his shoulder, telling him without words that he won't go.
Maybe. Not yet, at least.
Reluctantly, Thomas pulls away. His right hand clutching Augustus' jacket. The curls of his fringes stuck into his forehead in waves. It looked like seaweed that has been washed ashore on the beach. Augustus think its cute.
He thinks he looks awful in comparison.
"You really," he begins, throat constricting and voice hoarse from his ealier outburst. "You really fucked up."
"I know."
"Do you? Cause I have a feeling you are just saying that so I won't leave."
Thomas flinches. Like Augustus had kicked him where it hurts. He meets his eyes and Augustus was quick to look away.
"Those are real people's lives, Thomas." He says, voice lowered. He was so tired already. More tired than he had ever been before.
If he had stayed in his camp, would he had ever been this tired?
"I know."
"People died here because of you."
"…I know."
"They will always be in you conscience. You will always carry their ghosts with you. You…" Augustus inhales. This is getting a little closer to where its scarring. Closer to where the lines blur between what he's making Thomas understand and what he wants to be said to him. "You will always, always, be haunted by the fact that you killed those people."
Thomas didn't respond then. Just clutches his jacket tighter, his knuckles turning white.
Like this, Augustus could close his eyes and see Thomas in a room, notebook open on the table in front of him as he waved at Augustus and offers the seat next to his.
Like this, Thomas looks like how Augustus had always pictured him in his dreams. Sweet, innocent, warm Thomas.
Augustus is tired. He wants to rest. To lay down on the ground and feel the weeds grow around him. To look up at the sky and see the clouds rolling lazily against the expanse of blue.
He is so, so, tired that his ears hadn't picked it up when it first sounded.
The way depression works is it eats away at your motivation to do simple thing. Devours your motivation to move, making you feel lethargic and essentially rendering you useless.
Augustus is tired and depressed and desperate.
So when he saw the ghoulish, green face of an undead behind Thomas, saw the jagged, yellow-y teeth closing in on the back of his head, saw the milky-white, unseeing eyes, honed in to bite, Augustus was suprised at how fast he had grabbed Thomas by his collar and twisted their body around.
There was a shout of surprise before he felt the knife he had on him drive upward into the undead's jaw. An amalgamation of blood, dead tissue, and pus, raining down on his arm. He wrenches it free, the metal glint disappearing beneath the viscera coating its blade.
"Augustus!"
The first thing he felt was the searing pain shooting to his head. The bite had taken off a chunk of flesh from his cheek.
He had been knocking on Death's door multiple times thoughout his life, this time though, it feels as though it was Death themself barging in through the flimsy plywood of his heart. Talons cold and unforgiving slowly squeezing the muscle that kept him alive.
The second thing he felt was the tight grip on his wrist.
Thomas.
The third thing, was the feeling of something being pushed into his bloodstream, the feelinng of something invading his senses and his consciousness getting pushed out of his head momentarily that he was floating overhead. Seeing his own body sitting there, while Thomas desperately rummages through his backpack for something.
"You're fine. You're going to be fine. You're going to be alright."
The loudest thing on his mind though was not the pain nor the thought that he will eventually succumb to the infection, but the thought that if he does die, will Thomas ever forgive him for leaving?
Will Thomas ever forgive himself?
Augustus was desperate for an answer but as he was about to say something, as he felt Thomas press a gauze into the gaping wound, a wet cough escapes his mouth.
"No." Thomas breathes heavily. One hand pressing into the wound to maybe stop the bleeding, to stop the infection from spreading, but its too late. Augustus knew, he can feel it inside him already. "No."
He shakes his head and takes the hand that Thomas had inside his bag, desperately trying to search for anything to stop the infection. To stop him from turning.
Thomas stops, eyes meeting his without the usual shine in them. Ah, he's finally being faced with the consequences of his actions.
"I'm sorry." Thomas says, tears racing down his face one by one. The body of the undead lay behind them, unmoving.
Augustus was suprisingly at peace with what's happening, his face devoid of any emotion as he watches Thomas clutch at his hand desperately.
Before his memory fades, before he forgets.
He guides Thomas' hands inside his backpack once more and the cold hilt of the revolver touches both of their fingertips at the same time. Thomas shakes his head vehemently, saying no over and over and over until it doesn't sound like a word anymore.
"Please." Augustus says, pulling out the gun and enclosing Thomas' fingers on its barrel.
"There's a cure. The doctor-the doctor can make a cure." Thomas grabs him by the shoulders the gun cluttering into the ground and the gauze fluttering towards it. Stained red with Augustus' blood. "You won't die on me. I won't let you."
"Yes you will." He replies, words filled with conviction that he can see Thomas' eyes wavering. "I won't leave you."
Augustus is selfish. He knows he is. He's cursing Thomas with the weight of ending his life. Haunt him with the guilt of what he has done, with his death. Keep the memory of his sin being the cause of his friend to die etched into his veins.
And the thought that his death would stay with Thomas for the rest of his life brings Augustus some morbid sense of fascination.
"The doctor-"
"He won't waste a cure on me if there is one!"
"He will. I-I will make him. I-"
"Thomas!"
"Augustus, please…"
"Fine."
Augustus stands up and runs. And when Thomas realized what he was trying to do, he cries for his name. Calling him over and over and trying to make him come back. Running after him before they reach the end of the road.
The gun shakes in Thomas' hand, his face pleading Augustus to not make him do this. But he's standing so close to the edge. He could easily give up, fall backwards, and split his head open on the pavement below.
But at the very least, he's still human. He'd still have his memories intact.
He'd still have his dreams.
"Pull the trigger, Thomas." He asks, begging. "At least let me be with you."
They stood there, and for a minute, Augustus thinks he would have to jump to his own death. But Thomas slowly raises the gun and points it at him. His aim was shaking but at this distance he wouldn't miss, tears still running down his face. His chest heaving up and down and up and down and his eyes pulls all of Augustus' focus.
I'm sorry I'm selfish.
"Please."
A loud bang reverberated across Paradise as the final thing Augustus felt was his body falling, and falling, and falling before being pulled against warmth.
He could feel his hearing being taken away as Thomas' cries fade out. He's being too noisy, he will attract a horde.
Before he took his last breath, there was one thought that ran constantly in his mind. The image of Thomas clutching his dying body burned forever in the back of his eyelids.
Ah damn, he really wished they had gone to school together.