Fic: It Would Take An Apocalypse
Title: It Would Take An Apocalypse
Pairings: Kes/Alex, Kevin/Lappy
Rating: Like nothing; Zombie!Fic!
Summary: Ryan's not sure if he's dead or undead or what the hell it is, but he knows he feels completely different when he meets Alex.
This is a birthday present for xornej! And the plot is based entirely on the "Warm Bodies" trailer.
Ryan’s not a huge fan of being dead.
Dead, or maybe it’s undead. Or maybe half dead. He’s never really been able to figure that one out. Which is pathetic, because it’s not like he has much else to think about, now that he’s - dead? Undead? For something that comes up so often, he should really have an answer.
“Am I - dead?” he asks Kevin, gets a glare in response. Whatever, Kevin’s busy eating someone, Ryan doesn’t care. Kevin spent all his time eating when he was alive, too, because he’s a bottomless pit, and Ryan’s not surprised that’s the same now that Kevin’s - he really needs a good term for it.
“You’re a zombie. Did you forget?”
“No.”
“Well, good.” The guy Kevin was biting staggers away, but it’s already too late for him anyways. Kevin still looks irritated at the escape of his dinner. “Thanks a lot.”
“Fuck you. Look, we’ll go - there, over there.” Ryan nods across the street; there’s enough commotion that he’s pretty sure there would be humans over there.
“Fine,” Kevin huffs. They head over, and it’s an old school building, rundown and ruined by now. They shove through the zombies in the hallways, go upstairs, because people always seem to go up, illogically. On the third floor, Ryan hears human screaming, and Kevin perks up and starts down the hallway. There’s the sound of running footsteps, and a little group of humans suddenly appear around the corner, two guys and three girls. They run back in the direction they came at the sight of Ryan and Kevin, screaming and running, and based on the abandoned shotguns around, Ryan would guess that they’ve been attacked before, made it out but didn’t find any new weapons yet.
“Fuck yes,” Kevin grins, starts after them, beckons Ryan to follow. A few keep dashing down the hall, the others ducking into a room on the side. It’s a big room, full of tables and chairs; there’s already a zombie in the other corner, one of the girls shrieking. There’s a girl and a guy left, and Kevin’s catching up to the girl, who seems to be putting more work into screaming than running, so he’ll do fine. Ryan starts towards the other guy, a brunette twenty-something, who yells and bolts for the other door.
Ryan follows him across the hall, to a lab he must have thought would have another exit, and it’s chaotic, two girls screaming under the assault of three zombies. The human ducks under a table, scrambles around a chair, and makes the mistake of looking back, trips on a knocked-over chair and goes flying. They always wear themselves down, so Ryan just follows. The guy’s fallen and ended up in a corner, blocked on one side by a knocked-down shelf, Ryan on the other, and he’s on the floor pressed up against the wall.
When Ryan gets closer, though, he just - pauses. The guy’s got his head in his hands, crying from the despair and terror, because this, there’s no escape from this, and he looks up, so much abject fear on his face, dark eyes filled with desperate tears.
“S’il te plait, non, non,” he’s whispering, trembling when he looks at Ryan.
And Ryan - he stops. This guy, he’s terrified and crying and - and he’s beautiful, even whimpering in tears, and Ryan just - he can’t hurt him.
Ryan drops to his knees, looks over at the zombies in the corner warily, but they’re all busy. The guy in front of him is trying to scramble backwards, the wall already at his back, and he’s gasping and pleading in half-words.
“Shh,” Ryan tells him, touches his cheek gently. The guy’s eyes go wide, and he whimpers. “’s okay.”
One of the other zombies starts to wander over, having lost the fight for the girl in the corner, and Ryan snarls warningly, knows he’s perfected this; the zombie’s slight and smaller than him, and this is all it takes to make it go shuffling off, well warned. When he looks back, the human is still trembling, tears spilling over his cheeks, and when Ryan looks at him, he feels the absurd need to protect him, like, inexplicably, something in him is saying you’re mine, and I’ll take care of you.
Ryan gets back up, grabs the guy’s sleeve and pulls him across the room. The guy breathes in sharp jags, clearly terrified, but lets himself be led away. The hallway is empty, and Ryan presses him back against the lockers.
“What’s your name?” he whispers. Usually, getting words out can be hard, but it’s getting easier, maybe just because he knows that if he doesn’t say something, this human will cry from terror.
“A-Alex.”
“Alex,” Ryan says, and it makes him forget what he was about to say for a moment. “Um - okay. C’mon. Be quiet, and - no sudden moves. Okay?” He expects Alex to ask am I going to die, where are you taking me, something like that, but Alex just nods.
“Will they - get me?” he asks, as if he doesn’t count Ryan among the they for some reason. Ryan shakes his head no; he can hear zombies coming around the corner, and if they hurry, they can get to the staircase before the zombies get close.
He tugs Alex along by the sleeve, down the hallway. He doesn’t get why he’s doing this, doesn’t understand this new instinct, but he knows he’s supposed to follow it; when they pass a room with a group of zombie going after a shrieking girl, Alex flinches, grabs Ryan’s wrist. They manage to get out of the building, a back staircase that leads out to a side street.
“Act dead,” Ryan tells Alex, who just nods. Ryan left a streak of blood on his cheek when he touched his face, and he reaches out to touch Alex’s neck, his arm, just to complete the look, not because his skin’s soft and warm. It’s weird, though; normally, any human in close proximity kicks off that awful need to eat, and here he is touching Alex, only feels things he forgot a long time ago. Come to think of it, the idea of any of that, biting anyone, it suddenly makes Ryan feel kind of sick, which doesn’t make any sense, given why he was in the building in the first place.
Alex still doesn’t let go of his wrist as Ryan takes him around to the front of the building to find Kevin. He finds Kevin easily, waiting for him.
“You fucking moron,” Kevin says the moment he sees Ryan. His gaze is on Alex, and Ryan knows Alex didn’t fool him for a second, because Ryan wouldn’t bother bringing another zombie to their little group, and somehow, Kevin must be able to tell that Ryan didn’t bring Alex here to hurt him.
Kevin takes a step towards Alex, and Ryan shoves him back, growling. “Don’t.”
“Fucking knew it.”
“Don’t.”
“Why-” Kevin still tries to get past him; Ryan feels Alex’s fingers clench in the back of his shirt.
“I. Said. Don’t,” he snarls, and Kevin puts up his hands.
“Stupid.”
“Fuck off.”
“Jeeze, Ryan,” Kevin mutters, shakes his head and starts away.
“Ryan,” he hears Alex whisper behind him, almost like it’s a revelation.
0o0o0o0o0o
Ryan and Kevin found an abandoned house this morning, and they head back there now; Alex’s zombie impression is much better by the time they arrive. He doesn’t seem terrified anymore, holding onto Ryan’s wrist and proving himself not too scared but, rather, too lively to really be a zombie. He’s not shaking with terror, but has to keep cutting himself off from what he’s about to say. By the time they get there, Ryan really wants to hear what kinds of things he keeps almost saying.
“What are you?” Alex asks, the second the front door’s closed behind them. Kevin’s gone to find something - someone - else to eat, and it’s just Ryan and Alex, and he finds he’s been looking forward to this.
“Um. A zombie?”
“Are you sure?” Alex asks. He sits on the kitchen counter, looking at Ryan curiously.
“I - yeah, I think I’d - know?”
“You are not - like one.”
Ryan sinks down into one of the kitchen chairs, just watches Alex for a moment. He’s - fuck, he’s really adorable, even when there’s blood smeared on his face and dirt everywhere, and he’s got this thoughtful look on his face.
“I - I was this morning,” Ryan says. He feels distinctly different from how he felt this morning. Less - slow? Or something? Maybe it’s just the excitement of having something new to focus on. He could almost swear Alex is making his heart race, except that he doesn’t have a heartbeat, so. That’s out. “Anyhow - what were you doing?”
“Um, trying not to die, I guess,” Alex sighs out. He swings his legs a little, hands on the edge of the countertop. “I was with my friend, and then - I got lost, and we got separated, and then I found some people who seemed to know what they were doing, but - well, obviously not.” He shrugs, looks up at Ryan. “I mean, it’s not like - I really knew what I was doing before, but. I’m really - lost, with - everything.” He circles a hand through the air, to somehow indicate the zombie apocalypse. “I wish things were back to normal,” he mumbles, sniffles a little. Ryan reaches out and touches his ankle, and Alex smiles at him.
“Maybe they will,” he says, and he knows this is stupid, because he’s proof that the whole world’s fucked up now, but Alex smiles like he believes Ryan, so maybe Ryan’s proof of something else entirely.
0o0o0o0
Kevin shows up the next afternoon, rolls his eyes when he sees Alex wandering around the living room rearranging things.
“’s not even our house,” he mutters, collapses on the couch beside Ryan to watch. Alex is going through the bookshelf, making thoughtful little sounds. He casts nervous looks over at Kevin, like he’s still not entirely sure Kevin doesn’t consider him food, an anxiety that inexplicably doesn’t carry over to apply to Ryan, too.
“Hey,” Alex says, comes over to sit on the coffee table in front of Ryan. “We have to - my friend, we have to find him.”
“I… I dunno.”
“Please?” Alex pouts out his lower lip, “I’m really worried about him. We - the people we follow around, they don’t even like us. They wouldn’t protect him at all, he’s the last person I still know - please?”
Kevin groans, gets up and crosses the room to the door like he already knows Ryan is powerless to resist this human. “I guess,” Ryan says, and Alex smiles brilliantly.
Alex isn’t sure where his friend has ended up. They check a couple buildings, end up in a hotel; Alex finds a jacket that he recognizes as belonging to his friend, and they start searching the rooms.
“There’s so many rooms,” Alex says in despair, and Ryan catches his hand, squeezes it gently.
They search the first floor, then the second, broken-open doors everywhere; Ryan pulls Alex into the stairwell when he hears a group of zombies from down the hall, and Alex gives him this look of sweet gratitude.
The fourth floor yields nothing, and when they get to the fifth floor, Ryan hears running footsteps.
“Non merde s’il te plait ostie-” someone is gasping, far off down the hallway.
“That’s Max!” Alex says brightly, and then a look of horror appears on his face when he puts two and two together. He takes off, looking down hallways and into rooms, and suddenly, he freezes in a doorway. Ryan looks over his shoulder, ready for the worst.
He sees Kevin first, in front of a closed door, and he’s going to yell at Kevin, but then he hears Kevin saying something, and - Kevin sounds more like his human self than he has in so long, voice clearer and more human.
“Yeah, I promise,” he’s saying, “it’s okay.” The door opens, and when Ryan sees the look on Kevin’s face, he thinks he understands.
“I don’t understand,” he hears someone say, and then Kevin leads a guy around the corner by the hand. “Alex!” the guy says when he sees them, lets go of Kevin’s hand to throw his arms around Alex. Alex hugs him back, and Ryan sees the jealous look on Kevin’s face, and he definitely understands.
“I thought you died,” the guy says, lets go of Alex.
“No, I - no. I’m here,” Alex replies, and he looks back at Ryan. “He - saved me.” He tugs on Ryan’s sleeve, and Ryan’s absurdly glad he isn’t touching the other guy anymore. “This is Ryan. And - this is my friend, Maxim.”
“What’s going on?” Maxim says, but he turns to address this to Kevin, who smiles. It’s been a really long time since Ryan’s seen Kevin smile.
“The headline is that I don’t want to kill you, I guess,” he says, “sub-heading says we’re in a hotel.” This makes Maxim laugh, and he shakes his head, fist over his mouth.
“This is so fucking bizarre,” he says, “well - let’s go, I guess.”
“Where?” Alex asks, but he’s already heading off down the hallway, Maxim following him. They start arguing about what cities are close to here.
“I-” Kevin starts to say to Ryan, quiet and unsteady. “Do you feel weird?” Ryan nods, watching Alex glance back to make sure he’s following.
“Not… bad weird.”
“Yeah,” Kevin muses, a softness to his voice that Ryan can’t even remember anymore. “Not bad at all.”
0o0o0o0
By the time it gets dark, they’re far out of the city. Alex and Maxim decided that heading west would be a good idea, and Ryan and Kevin didn’t care one way or the other, so here they are, a ways off the highway by an abandoned SUV, with a campfire; Kevin says they need tents and s’mores, and it’s a minute before Ryan realizes he’s joking, because they haven’t done that in forever.
Kevin and Maxim are sitting in the backseat of the car, talking too quietly for Ryan to be able to hear. Beside Ryan, Alex is lying on a blanket on the ground, head on his arms.
“Can I ask you something?” he says. Ryan nods. “How’d - how’d you die?”
“It was really early on.” This is the last thing Ryan remembers clearly. “Everything was still normal, it was all still a rumour. I was leaving hockey practice, and it was really late at night and - I didn’t even see it coming.” It had hurt, too, that was the part that had surprised him. That was his last thought as a human - pain, just pain.
“Oh.” Alex reaches over, puts his hand over Ryan’s and squeezes gently. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not so bad.” Ryan wouldn’t have meant this just the day before yesterday; today, though. Today, it doesn’t seem so bad.
“Can I ask you something else?”
“Yeah.”
“Why’d you save me?” Alex asks. He’s just looking up at Ryan, still holding his hand, and suddenly, Ryan’s heart is racing.
Suddenly, it’s beating again. Looking at Alex, so perfect and trusting and his, something Ryan feels with everything he has left, with everything he lost, suddenly, Ryan doesn’t only feel human.
“Alex,” he gasps out, brings Alex’s hand to his chest, presses it over his heart.
“Do - do zombies have heartbeats?” Alex asks, and Ryan smiles.
“No,” he says, “no, they don’t.”
He does, though. His heart’s beating again, and when he looks at Alex, his pulse races, and it’s only when his breath catches at the sight that Ryan realizes he’s breathing again, too.
“What’s that - be meaning?” Alex asks, hopeful and soft.
“I don’t know.”
Alex still hasn’t let go of his hand, and he brings it to his lips, kisses it gently. “Me neither,” he says, and the look on his face says that there must be something he’s hoping for.
Alex doesn’t let go of Ryan’s hand even after he’s fallen asleep, and it’s only when Ryan’s nearly asleep himself that he realizes he doesn’t remember the last time he did this, the last time he slept.
He wakes to Alex saying his name, an incredulous, confused Ryan…?
“Hmm?” Ryan turns his face further against his arm, only to feel Alex’s hand on his shoulder, nudging him onto his back. Ryan blinks up at him, bright sunlight overhead. Alex is kneeling beside him, and he touches Ryan’s cheek gently, his eyes wide with surprise.
“You,” Alex says helplessly, just staring. Ryan sits up, and Alex’s gaze follows him, only more shocked. “You’re,” Alex tries again.
“Could you, um. Finish that sentence before I have a panic attack?” Ryan says, and Alex throws his arms around Ryan’s neck; all Ryan can do is catch him, hold him tight.
“Humanhumanhumanhuman,” Alex is saying, holding onto Ryan, so happy Ryan thinks he might be crying. He catches sight of his own arms wrapped around Alex, and - oh. His skin’s not deathly pale anymore, and that dead slowness is gone, he’s - he’s human again.
He doesn’t wonder why. The reason is right in front of him, in his arms and clinging to him, his reason is the boy he fell in love with so deeply, it made his stopped heart race.
“This is why I saved you,” he says, “because - I fell in love with you, Alex, and - and only humans can do that.”
“I knew you are being special,” Alex says, draws back to look at him, and his eyes are filled with tears, just like the first time Ryan saw him but happy this time. “I love you, and I knew it.”
All Ryan can do is kiss him, and oh, it’s the most perfect thing he’s ever, ever done.
It’s a while before Ryan can even think about doing anything but kissing Alex. It seems impossible, being alive and having Alex, that he can love someone this much - of everything, though, there’s one thing that makes perfect sense, and it’s that Alex is what brought him back, Alex enough to make him human again.
When he decides that he can last a few minutes without kissing Alex again, they go over to the car, and it seems like the impossible is catching; Ryan finds Kevin human for the first time in three years - how could he forget, how long it’s been, how long they’ve been dead, because that’s what it is, Ryan knows now, dead because he wasn’t alive like this - oblivious to them because he’s so caught up in kissing Maxim in the backseat.
“He saved me,” Kevin says when he notices them, even though he doesn’t look up, just strokes Maxim’s cheek gently, leans down to kiss him again. “I don’t even know how you did it, Maxi, but is it crazy I’m not even surprised?”
o0o0o0o0o
This is how the zombie apocalypse ends, because it’s as contagious as the original virus was. It spreads and spreads, and five years later, Ryan’s watching a documentary about the whole thing that has their names in it.
“I didn’t discover end-ro-pheins,” Alex scoffs when he hears them say this.
“Weren’t you asleep?” Ryan kisses the top of Alex’s head; Alex had been asleep, at least, sprawled mostly on top of Ryan on the couch. He tends to end up here, like he knows that not only does he fit here, but belongs here. “And yeah, I think everyone knows that was bullshit. Mostly because you couldn’t say endorphins.” This was the story the media presented, credited them with some miracle cure involving endorphins, even though Ryan distinctly remembers telling someone very high up that no, I fucking fell in love with him, aren’t you listening?; Maxim had said he’d thought it would be Kevin that mouthed off to the head of national security.
“En-dre-phins.”
“Close, babe.” Alex is no closer than he was five years ago, of course. When they were interviewed about it, they were given things to memorise to say, and Alex stumbled through his, nervous in front of so many people. He was holding Ryan’s hand the whole time, under the table because he was also clutching a cue card with his supposed findings written on it in case he forgot. The whole ordeal was pretty much the cutest thing Ryan had ever seen.
Originally, they’d tried to make Kevin and Maxim the spokesmen for the whole thing, but it didn’t work out; Maxim couldn’t be bothered, and Kevin, when asked what the best part of being human again was, said having sex with him, obviously, and they aren’t allowed to do live interviews anymore. It wasn’t so much the answer that bothered the interviewer as it was the way Kevin made out with Maxim afterwards. Most of the interviewing fell to Ryan and Alex instead, and last year, Kevin said that it was on purpose. It was you guys that started it, after all, he’d said, where would the whole world be, if you hadn’t fallen in love with Alex? He’d looked even more concerned before adding, where would I be without Max? Fuck, Kes, thank God you fell in love with Alex.
“You know,” Ryan says, as he’s carding his fingers through Alex’s hair gently, Alex nearly asleep again. “You saved the whole world.”
“I saved you,” Alex says, like he’s agreeing, what he replies every time Ryan says this.
“The whole world,” Ryan stresses this time. Alex looks up, kisses Ryan’s jaw.
“I know. I knew that as soon as I saw I’d saved you.”
“But-” Ryan starts to say, because they didn’t know it would be possible to pass the effect on to someone else then - but then, then he gets it. You’re the whole world to me, Alex is saying. Ryan hugs him tight, blinking back sudden tears.
“You’re worth the whole apocalypse it took to find you,” he says hoarsely, and Alex leans up to kiss him for it. Ryan just - loves him. He went through so much to find Alex, and it’s worth it, it’s worth everything. He’s always scoffed at the idea of falling in love, said it’d take an apocalypse to make him do that, and - and it did. It’s worth it though, because he now he has Alex, and Alex - Ryan would die for him, did die for him, and here they are, survived past the end of the world, and it’s all worth it. Ryan has Alex; the apocalypse it took to find him was nothing compared to how much Ryan loves him.
Pairings: Kes/Alex, Kevin/Lappy
Rating: Like nothing; Zombie!Fic!
Summary: Ryan's not sure if he's dead or undead or what the hell it is, but he knows he feels completely different when he meets Alex.
This is a birthday present for xornej! And the plot is based entirely on the "Warm Bodies" trailer.
Ryan’s not a huge fan of being dead.
Dead, or maybe it’s undead. Or maybe half dead. He’s never really been able to figure that one out. Which is pathetic, because it’s not like he has much else to think about, now that he’s - dead? Undead? For something that comes up so often, he should really have an answer.
“Am I - dead?” he asks Kevin, gets a glare in response. Whatever, Kevin’s busy eating someone, Ryan doesn’t care. Kevin spent all his time eating when he was alive, too, because he’s a bottomless pit, and Ryan’s not surprised that’s the same now that Kevin’s - he really needs a good term for it.
“You’re a zombie. Did you forget?”
“No.”
“Well, good.” The guy Kevin was biting staggers away, but it’s already too late for him anyways. Kevin still looks irritated at the escape of his dinner. “Thanks a lot.”
“Fuck you. Look, we’ll go - there, over there.” Ryan nods across the street; there’s enough commotion that he’s pretty sure there would be humans over there.
“Fine,” Kevin huffs. They head over, and it’s an old school building, rundown and ruined by now. They shove through the zombies in the hallways, go upstairs, because people always seem to go up, illogically. On the third floor, Ryan hears human screaming, and Kevin perks up and starts down the hallway. There’s the sound of running footsteps, and a little group of humans suddenly appear around the corner, two guys and three girls. They run back in the direction they came at the sight of Ryan and Kevin, screaming and running, and based on the abandoned shotguns around, Ryan would guess that they’ve been attacked before, made it out but didn’t find any new weapons yet.
“Fuck yes,” Kevin grins, starts after them, beckons Ryan to follow. A few keep dashing down the hall, the others ducking into a room on the side. It’s a big room, full of tables and chairs; there’s already a zombie in the other corner, one of the girls shrieking. There’s a girl and a guy left, and Kevin’s catching up to the girl, who seems to be putting more work into screaming than running, so he’ll do fine. Ryan starts towards the other guy, a brunette twenty-something, who yells and bolts for the other door.
Ryan follows him across the hall, to a lab he must have thought would have another exit, and it’s chaotic, two girls screaming under the assault of three zombies. The human ducks under a table, scrambles around a chair, and makes the mistake of looking back, trips on a knocked-over chair and goes flying. They always wear themselves down, so Ryan just follows. The guy’s fallen and ended up in a corner, blocked on one side by a knocked-down shelf, Ryan on the other, and he’s on the floor pressed up against the wall.
When Ryan gets closer, though, he just - pauses. The guy’s got his head in his hands, crying from the despair and terror, because this, there’s no escape from this, and he looks up, so much abject fear on his face, dark eyes filled with desperate tears.
“S’il te plait, non, non,” he’s whispering, trembling when he looks at Ryan.
And Ryan - he stops. This guy, he’s terrified and crying and - and he’s beautiful, even whimpering in tears, and Ryan just - he can’t hurt him.
Ryan drops to his knees, looks over at the zombies in the corner warily, but they’re all busy. The guy in front of him is trying to scramble backwards, the wall already at his back, and he’s gasping and pleading in half-words.
“Shh,” Ryan tells him, touches his cheek gently. The guy’s eyes go wide, and he whimpers. “’s okay.”
One of the other zombies starts to wander over, having lost the fight for the girl in the corner, and Ryan snarls warningly, knows he’s perfected this; the zombie’s slight and smaller than him, and this is all it takes to make it go shuffling off, well warned. When he looks back, the human is still trembling, tears spilling over his cheeks, and when Ryan looks at him, he feels the absurd need to protect him, like, inexplicably, something in him is saying you’re mine, and I’ll take care of you.
Ryan gets back up, grabs the guy’s sleeve and pulls him across the room. The guy breathes in sharp jags, clearly terrified, but lets himself be led away. The hallway is empty, and Ryan presses him back against the lockers.
“What’s your name?” he whispers. Usually, getting words out can be hard, but it’s getting easier, maybe just because he knows that if he doesn’t say something, this human will cry from terror.
“A-Alex.”
“Alex,” Ryan says, and it makes him forget what he was about to say for a moment. “Um - okay. C’mon. Be quiet, and - no sudden moves. Okay?” He expects Alex to ask am I going to die, where are you taking me, something like that, but Alex just nods.
“Will they - get me?” he asks, as if he doesn’t count Ryan among the they for some reason. Ryan shakes his head no; he can hear zombies coming around the corner, and if they hurry, they can get to the staircase before the zombies get close.
He tugs Alex along by the sleeve, down the hallway. He doesn’t get why he’s doing this, doesn’t understand this new instinct, but he knows he’s supposed to follow it; when they pass a room with a group of zombie going after a shrieking girl, Alex flinches, grabs Ryan’s wrist. They manage to get out of the building, a back staircase that leads out to a side street.
“Act dead,” Ryan tells Alex, who just nods. Ryan left a streak of blood on his cheek when he touched his face, and he reaches out to touch Alex’s neck, his arm, just to complete the look, not because his skin’s soft and warm. It’s weird, though; normally, any human in close proximity kicks off that awful need to eat, and here he is touching Alex, only feels things he forgot a long time ago. Come to think of it, the idea of any of that, biting anyone, it suddenly makes Ryan feel kind of sick, which doesn’t make any sense, given why he was in the building in the first place.
Alex still doesn’t let go of his wrist as Ryan takes him around to the front of the building to find Kevin. He finds Kevin easily, waiting for him.
“You fucking moron,” Kevin says the moment he sees Ryan. His gaze is on Alex, and Ryan knows Alex didn’t fool him for a second, because Ryan wouldn’t bother bringing another zombie to their little group, and somehow, Kevin must be able to tell that Ryan didn’t bring Alex here to hurt him.
Kevin takes a step towards Alex, and Ryan shoves him back, growling. “Don’t.”
“Fucking knew it.”
“Don’t.”
“Why-” Kevin still tries to get past him; Ryan feels Alex’s fingers clench in the back of his shirt.
“I. Said. Don’t,” he snarls, and Kevin puts up his hands.
“Stupid.”
“Fuck off.”
“Jeeze, Ryan,” Kevin mutters, shakes his head and starts away.
“Ryan,” he hears Alex whisper behind him, almost like it’s a revelation.
0o0o0o0o0o
Ryan and Kevin found an abandoned house this morning, and they head back there now; Alex’s zombie impression is much better by the time they arrive. He doesn’t seem terrified anymore, holding onto Ryan’s wrist and proving himself not too scared but, rather, too lively to really be a zombie. He’s not shaking with terror, but has to keep cutting himself off from what he’s about to say. By the time they get there, Ryan really wants to hear what kinds of things he keeps almost saying.
“What are you?” Alex asks, the second the front door’s closed behind them. Kevin’s gone to find something - someone - else to eat, and it’s just Ryan and Alex, and he finds he’s been looking forward to this.
“Um. A zombie?”
“Are you sure?” Alex asks. He sits on the kitchen counter, looking at Ryan curiously.
“I - yeah, I think I’d - know?”
“You are not - like one.”
Ryan sinks down into one of the kitchen chairs, just watches Alex for a moment. He’s - fuck, he’s really adorable, even when there’s blood smeared on his face and dirt everywhere, and he’s got this thoughtful look on his face.
“I - I was this morning,” Ryan says. He feels distinctly different from how he felt this morning. Less - slow? Or something? Maybe it’s just the excitement of having something new to focus on. He could almost swear Alex is making his heart race, except that he doesn’t have a heartbeat, so. That’s out. “Anyhow - what were you doing?”
“Um, trying not to die, I guess,” Alex sighs out. He swings his legs a little, hands on the edge of the countertop. “I was with my friend, and then - I got lost, and we got separated, and then I found some people who seemed to know what they were doing, but - well, obviously not.” He shrugs, looks up at Ryan. “I mean, it’s not like - I really knew what I was doing before, but. I’m really - lost, with - everything.” He circles a hand through the air, to somehow indicate the zombie apocalypse. “I wish things were back to normal,” he mumbles, sniffles a little. Ryan reaches out and touches his ankle, and Alex smiles at him.
“Maybe they will,” he says, and he knows this is stupid, because he’s proof that the whole world’s fucked up now, but Alex smiles like he believes Ryan, so maybe Ryan’s proof of something else entirely.
0o0o0o0
Kevin shows up the next afternoon, rolls his eyes when he sees Alex wandering around the living room rearranging things.
“’s not even our house,” he mutters, collapses on the couch beside Ryan to watch. Alex is going through the bookshelf, making thoughtful little sounds. He casts nervous looks over at Kevin, like he’s still not entirely sure Kevin doesn’t consider him food, an anxiety that inexplicably doesn’t carry over to apply to Ryan, too.
“Hey,” Alex says, comes over to sit on the coffee table in front of Ryan. “We have to - my friend, we have to find him.”
“I… I dunno.”
“Please?” Alex pouts out his lower lip, “I’m really worried about him. We - the people we follow around, they don’t even like us. They wouldn’t protect him at all, he’s the last person I still know - please?”
Kevin groans, gets up and crosses the room to the door like he already knows Ryan is powerless to resist this human. “I guess,” Ryan says, and Alex smiles brilliantly.
Alex isn’t sure where his friend has ended up. They check a couple buildings, end up in a hotel; Alex finds a jacket that he recognizes as belonging to his friend, and they start searching the rooms.
“There’s so many rooms,” Alex says in despair, and Ryan catches his hand, squeezes it gently.
They search the first floor, then the second, broken-open doors everywhere; Ryan pulls Alex into the stairwell when he hears a group of zombies from down the hall, and Alex gives him this look of sweet gratitude.
The fourth floor yields nothing, and when they get to the fifth floor, Ryan hears running footsteps.
“Non merde s’il te plait ostie-” someone is gasping, far off down the hallway.
“That’s Max!” Alex says brightly, and then a look of horror appears on his face when he puts two and two together. He takes off, looking down hallways and into rooms, and suddenly, he freezes in a doorway. Ryan looks over his shoulder, ready for the worst.
He sees Kevin first, in front of a closed door, and he’s going to yell at Kevin, but then he hears Kevin saying something, and - Kevin sounds more like his human self than he has in so long, voice clearer and more human.
“Yeah, I promise,” he’s saying, “it’s okay.” The door opens, and when Ryan sees the look on Kevin’s face, he thinks he understands.
“I don’t understand,” he hears someone say, and then Kevin leads a guy around the corner by the hand. “Alex!” the guy says when he sees them, lets go of Kevin’s hand to throw his arms around Alex. Alex hugs him back, and Ryan sees the jealous look on Kevin’s face, and he definitely understands.
“I thought you died,” the guy says, lets go of Alex.
“No, I - no. I’m here,” Alex replies, and he looks back at Ryan. “He - saved me.” He tugs on Ryan’s sleeve, and Ryan’s absurdly glad he isn’t touching the other guy anymore. “This is Ryan. And - this is my friend, Maxim.”
“What’s going on?” Maxim says, but he turns to address this to Kevin, who smiles. It’s been a really long time since Ryan’s seen Kevin smile.
“The headline is that I don’t want to kill you, I guess,” he says, “sub-heading says we’re in a hotel.” This makes Maxim laugh, and he shakes his head, fist over his mouth.
“This is so fucking bizarre,” he says, “well - let’s go, I guess.”
“Where?” Alex asks, but he’s already heading off down the hallway, Maxim following him. They start arguing about what cities are close to here.
“I-” Kevin starts to say to Ryan, quiet and unsteady. “Do you feel weird?” Ryan nods, watching Alex glance back to make sure he’s following.
“Not… bad weird.”
“Yeah,” Kevin muses, a softness to his voice that Ryan can’t even remember anymore. “Not bad at all.”
0o0o0o0
By the time it gets dark, they’re far out of the city. Alex and Maxim decided that heading west would be a good idea, and Ryan and Kevin didn’t care one way or the other, so here they are, a ways off the highway by an abandoned SUV, with a campfire; Kevin says they need tents and s’mores, and it’s a minute before Ryan realizes he’s joking, because they haven’t done that in forever.
Kevin and Maxim are sitting in the backseat of the car, talking too quietly for Ryan to be able to hear. Beside Ryan, Alex is lying on a blanket on the ground, head on his arms.
“Can I ask you something?” he says. Ryan nods. “How’d - how’d you die?”
“It was really early on.” This is the last thing Ryan remembers clearly. “Everything was still normal, it was all still a rumour. I was leaving hockey practice, and it was really late at night and - I didn’t even see it coming.” It had hurt, too, that was the part that had surprised him. That was his last thought as a human - pain, just pain.
“Oh.” Alex reaches over, puts his hand over Ryan’s and squeezes gently. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not so bad.” Ryan wouldn’t have meant this just the day before yesterday; today, though. Today, it doesn’t seem so bad.
“Can I ask you something else?”
“Yeah.”
“Why’d you save me?” Alex asks. He’s just looking up at Ryan, still holding his hand, and suddenly, Ryan’s heart is racing.
Suddenly, it’s beating again. Looking at Alex, so perfect and trusting and his, something Ryan feels with everything he has left, with everything he lost, suddenly, Ryan doesn’t only feel human.
“Alex,” he gasps out, brings Alex’s hand to his chest, presses it over his heart.
“Do - do zombies have heartbeats?” Alex asks, and Ryan smiles.
“No,” he says, “no, they don’t.”
He does, though. His heart’s beating again, and when he looks at Alex, his pulse races, and it’s only when his breath catches at the sight that Ryan realizes he’s breathing again, too.
“What’s that - be meaning?” Alex asks, hopeful and soft.
“I don’t know.”
Alex still hasn’t let go of his hand, and he brings it to his lips, kisses it gently. “Me neither,” he says, and the look on his face says that there must be something he’s hoping for.
Alex doesn’t let go of Ryan’s hand even after he’s fallen asleep, and it’s only when Ryan’s nearly asleep himself that he realizes he doesn’t remember the last time he did this, the last time he slept.
He wakes to Alex saying his name, an incredulous, confused Ryan…?
“Hmm?” Ryan turns his face further against his arm, only to feel Alex’s hand on his shoulder, nudging him onto his back. Ryan blinks up at him, bright sunlight overhead. Alex is kneeling beside him, and he touches Ryan’s cheek gently, his eyes wide with surprise.
“You,” Alex says helplessly, just staring. Ryan sits up, and Alex’s gaze follows him, only more shocked. “You’re,” Alex tries again.
“Could you, um. Finish that sentence before I have a panic attack?” Ryan says, and Alex throws his arms around Ryan’s neck; all Ryan can do is catch him, hold him tight.
“Humanhumanhumanhuman,” Alex is saying, holding onto Ryan, so happy Ryan thinks he might be crying. He catches sight of his own arms wrapped around Alex, and - oh. His skin’s not deathly pale anymore, and that dead slowness is gone, he’s - he’s human again.
He doesn’t wonder why. The reason is right in front of him, in his arms and clinging to him, his reason is the boy he fell in love with so deeply, it made his stopped heart race.
“This is why I saved you,” he says, “because - I fell in love with you, Alex, and - and only humans can do that.”
“I knew you are being special,” Alex says, draws back to look at him, and his eyes are filled with tears, just like the first time Ryan saw him but happy this time. “I love you, and I knew it.”
All Ryan can do is kiss him, and oh, it’s the most perfect thing he’s ever, ever done.
It’s a while before Ryan can even think about doing anything but kissing Alex. It seems impossible, being alive and having Alex, that he can love someone this much - of everything, though, there’s one thing that makes perfect sense, and it’s that Alex is what brought him back, Alex enough to make him human again.
When he decides that he can last a few minutes without kissing Alex again, they go over to the car, and it seems like the impossible is catching; Ryan finds Kevin human for the first time in three years - how could he forget, how long it’s been, how long they’ve been dead, because that’s what it is, Ryan knows now, dead because he wasn’t alive like this - oblivious to them because he’s so caught up in kissing Maxim in the backseat.
“He saved me,” Kevin says when he notices them, even though he doesn’t look up, just strokes Maxim’s cheek gently, leans down to kiss him again. “I don’t even know how you did it, Maxi, but is it crazy I’m not even surprised?”
o0o0o0o0o
This is how the zombie apocalypse ends, because it’s as contagious as the original virus was. It spreads and spreads, and five years later, Ryan’s watching a documentary about the whole thing that has their names in it.
“I didn’t discover end-ro-pheins,” Alex scoffs when he hears them say this.
“Weren’t you asleep?” Ryan kisses the top of Alex’s head; Alex had been asleep, at least, sprawled mostly on top of Ryan on the couch. He tends to end up here, like he knows that not only does he fit here, but belongs here. “And yeah, I think everyone knows that was bullshit. Mostly because you couldn’t say endorphins.” This was the story the media presented, credited them with some miracle cure involving endorphins, even though Ryan distinctly remembers telling someone very high up that no, I fucking fell in love with him, aren’t you listening?; Maxim had said he’d thought it would be Kevin that mouthed off to the head of national security.
“En-dre-phins.”
“Close, babe.” Alex is no closer than he was five years ago, of course. When they were interviewed about it, they were given things to memorise to say, and Alex stumbled through his, nervous in front of so many people. He was holding Ryan’s hand the whole time, under the table because he was also clutching a cue card with his supposed findings written on it in case he forgot. The whole ordeal was pretty much the cutest thing Ryan had ever seen.
Originally, they’d tried to make Kevin and Maxim the spokesmen for the whole thing, but it didn’t work out; Maxim couldn’t be bothered, and Kevin, when asked what the best part of being human again was, said having sex with him, obviously, and they aren’t allowed to do live interviews anymore. It wasn’t so much the answer that bothered the interviewer as it was the way Kevin made out with Maxim afterwards. Most of the interviewing fell to Ryan and Alex instead, and last year, Kevin said that it was on purpose. It was you guys that started it, after all, he’d said, where would the whole world be, if you hadn’t fallen in love with Alex? He’d looked even more concerned before adding, where would I be without Max? Fuck, Kes, thank God you fell in love with Alex.
“You know,” Ryan says, as he’s carding his fingers through Alex’s hair gently, Alex nearly asleep again. “You saved the whole world.”
“I saved you,” Alex says, like he’s agreeing, what he replies every time Ryan says this.
“The whole world,” Ryan stresses this time. Alex looks up, kisses Ryan’s jaw.
“I know. I knew that as soon as I saw I’d saved you.”
“But-” Ryan starts to say, because they didn’t know it would be possible to pass the effect on to someone else then - but then, then he gets it. You’re the whole world to me, Alex is saying. Ryan hugs him tight, blinking back sudden tears.
“You’re worth the whole apocalypse it took to find you,” he says hoarsely, and Alex leans up to kiss him for it. Ryan just - loves him. He went through so much to find Alex, and it’s worth it, it’s worth everything. He’s always scoffed at the idea of falling in love, said it’d take an apocalypse to make him do that, and - and it did. It’s worth it though, because he now he has Alex, and Alex - Ryan would die for him, did die for him, and here they are, survived past the end of the world, and it’s all worth it. Ryan has Alex; the apocalypse it took to find him was nothing compared to how much Ryan loves him.