fic: Help, I'm Alive (Mark/Eduardo, Prompt 59)
Title: Help, I'm Alive
Recipient: thisissirius
Prompt Number: Prompt #59
Characters/Pairings: Eduardo/Mark, Chris/Dustin
Rating/Warnings: R, violence, gore, sexual content, and non-major character death
Word Count: 5,600
Disclaimer: This fanwork is based on fictional representations of the characters in The Social Network; I make no claims of ownership of the characters or concepts.
Summary: Harvard is overrun by zombies; it would be easy enough for Mark, Chris, and Dustin to just barricade themselves in Kirkland, but Eduardo's still out there. That won't do at all.
Notes: so thisissirius asked for a Zombieland AU, but (with her permission!) I adapted the prompt a little bit, so it's canon movie verse, with zombies! Yay. Thanks to S for the beta!
Help, I'm Alive
It is Chris’ idea to just barricade themselves in Kirkland and not leave until, as he puts it, “This whole zombie mess is over.”
Dustin is readily on board with this plan, visibly eager to fall in line with Chris after his own level of zombie preparedness had proved inadequate upon discovering that the zombie survival kit he’d stashed under his bed had been raided by somebody, probably Billy Olson. He is still grumbling about the empty Cheetos packets and ripped-up boxes of cheese crackers even as he starts planning to stack furniture in front of the suite door with Chris.
Mark watches this planning, and this grumbling, and though he agrees that it’s a solid plan and affords them the most chances of surviving “this whole zombie mess”, something is holding him back. Maybe it’s the screams of students dying out on the quad, the continuous sound of chopper propellers flapping overhead, or the somber news that, to the outside world, “this whole zombie mess” is so far just a “Harvard problem” that needs to be contained, instead of actually solved.
All of this is definitely contributing to the uneasy, unhappy roiling in his gut, so much so that the sight of the piles of stolen food from the Kirkland dining hall strewn all over the suite is making him slightly nauseous. But it takes him a few moments to realize the true source of that feeling, and it hits him like a bucket of ice water. He snaps his head up to where Chris and Dustin are bickering over how best to move Dustin’s desk and says, “Guys.”
They both look at him, eyes wide and concerned. This is probably because this is the first time he’s spoken a word since Billy Olson had attempted to rip his throat out with his teeth, causing Mark to have to bash his head in with his laptop.
But that story is not important right now. What’s important is that there is an essential flaw to Chris’ plan, and Mark absolutely has to point it out. “Guys. What about Wardo?”
Chris and Dustin blink. Then they look around the suite, as if surprised that Eduardo isn’t actually there (as if Mark would have had to lift a finger, never mind a whole laptop, to fend off Billy Olson had Eduardo been there).
“Well, shit,” Chris says eventually; Dustin is still looking around, like he’s expecting Eduardo to materialize out of thin air. Mark will concede that it is fairly uncommon for Eduardo to not to be at the Kirkland suite; of course he’d pick the middle of a campus-wide zombie infection to go against the norm.
It had started in the Science Center. Mark still doesn’t know how, and doesn’t quite care to know, but he does know that this is why it was able to be contained to campus so quickly; people in the Science Center rarely come and go from the Science Center. Unless they’re zombies, of course, staggering out in search of brains to feast on.
It seemed the zombies had little interest in venturing out into the greater Cambridge area, anyway, perhaps seeking the best brains for their trouble and deciding, therefore, to stick to Harvard brains. But those that had tried to leave were stopped by the CDC, apparently, and now all of campus was on a quarantine lockdown.
So it’s not quite the zombie apocalypse Dustin had claimed to be so prepared for. But to Mark, it’s almost worse, because here he is, reasonably safe in Kirkland (barring the Billy Olson incident, of course), while Eduardo is still out there, possibly already a member of the undead, or maybe just food for the undead. Either of those options are unthinkable but fairly likely, and yet neither of them deter him from leaving the Kirkland hiding spot to go find Eduardo, whatever form he might be in.
“There’s no reason for us all to go,” Mark says hurriedly, waving down Chris and Dustin’s immediate protests and talking right over them. Apparently, once words had come back to him, his brain hadn’t stopped wanting to spit them out furiously, as fast as possible, which is sort of comforting. It’s normal, and nothing about this has felt normal for a long while. “It’s just too dangerous, and really impractical. I’ll go, and you two can make sure that Kirkland stays a safe zone, and-”
“That’s insane, Mark,” Chris tells him, shaking his head incredulously. “You can’t go alone, you don’t even have a proper weapon-”
“I have a plan for that,” Mark says, already calculating how long it should take him to get to the hopefully abandoned campus police office. Surely there will be guns there; he ignores the way his stomach flips to think about actually using one on somebody, but rationalizes that it’s better than getting blood and gray matter all over his laptop again.
“Still, whatever the plan is, it’s crazy to think you can get to Eduardo, if he’s even-”
“Eduardo will be fine,” Mark insists, contrary to the fact that his fairly logical brain is telling him that there’s no sense or probability in that. Mark doesn’t care about sense or probability right now.
Chris glares at him, shooting a look at the pale, drawn Dustin next to him, as if upset at Mark for giving Dustin false hope. Mark glares back. “Look, you can go off on a crazy, hopeless rescue mission if you want to, but I’m not going to let you go alone. I’ll go with you, and Dustin can stay here and-”
“Hey!” Dustin says suddenly, furrowing his brow. “I’m the zombie expert here, okay, so if anything, I should go-”
“No way in hell,” Chris says, at the same time Mark says, “Yeah, well, I’ve killed more zombies than you have, Dustin.”
Chris and Dustin stare at him, back to looking worried. Mark rolls his eyes and tries not to feel uneasy. “What? I can’t joke about it yet?”
“Okay, now I’m really going with you,” Chris says, frowning hard, and Mark huffs impatiently.
“No, okay, that’s just-that’s not practical, Chris. You’re right, it is a crazy rescue mission-though I’d definitely argue with the hopeless part, come on-and so I really think that the best option is for me to go alone.” He meets Chris’ stubborn, protesting eyes fully and tries to make him understand. “It’s stupid to risk more than one of us out there.”
He knows when Chris gets it; his eyes widen, just slightly, and he throws a glance at Dustin, still frowning, but the set of his shoulders starts to give a little. Mark knows it won’t take much more to make him budge, now that he understands what Mark means by this-that he doesn’t see it as hopeless so much as completely necessary, whether he makes it back alive or not. He knows it’s not the same for Chris, and nor should it be.
Indeed, it isn’t long before Chris has occupied Dustin with trying to sort their supplies to distract him from the fact that they’re letting Mark out of the suite to face likely death. He is helping arm Mark with the few weapons they’ve managed to cobble together out of crap lying around the dorm: a dusty baseball bat they’d found rolled all the way under Dustin’s bed, long forgotten about, and a Becks bottle with the bottom broken off, tied by the neck to a long string hanging down from the strap of his backpack for quick access. His backpack is being packed with some food and just a few water bottles, just in case this takes a while, or in case Eduardo needs food when Mark finds him, but not so much food that he’ll be weighed down.
“I have to be fast,” Mark tells Chris, who looks even graver at this. He gets especially grave when Mark consents to borrowing a pair of sneakers; running in flip flops just isn’t practical at this point.
“Jesus Christ,” Dustin says when he sees the sneakers. “It really is the end of the world.”
Mark doesn’t correct him, just shrugs and stretches to limber up.
Dustin, despite the careful attention he gives to his food-sorting task, still insists upon hugging him before he leaves, and he whispers in his ear, “You sure you won’t let me come?”
Mark doesn’t even have to shoot that down; Chris grabs Dustin away and barks at him to get back to the food-sorting, and Mark knows that he’s not letting Dustin out of his sight, never mind out of this suite.
“Don’t die,” Chris says solemnly, and Mark smirks even though it’s not actually a joke. He shrugs again, giving in and nodding when Chris glares at him. He’s not going to make any promises, isn’t that kind of person, but he knows he has to try; Chris is way scarier than any brain-hungry zombies can be.
The halls of Kirkland are eerie and deserted; his footsteps echo off the walls as he hurries through and heads down the stairs.
Once the mad rush of everyone who didn’t have the sense of Mark, Dustin and Chris not to flee Kirkland and run for the blocked-off campus exits ended, they had locked the front door and bolted it, probably for the first time in Kirkland history. Since the mistake of letting in Billy Olson (“That’s Billy!” Dustin had cried from his spot at Mark’s window seat, and in the hurry to get down to him, Mark had taken his laptop with him. He’s very, very glad he did), they hadn’t let in anybody else. Though, to be fair, only zombies had actually attempted to get in; Mark is sure Chris wouldn’t allow Mark to bar any healthy people from entrance, though he understands his reluctance since the Billy incident.
Now, Mark pushes the bolt aside and takes a deep breath. The sounds of screams and helicopters still seem far off, and he tightens his hand around his baseball bat for some reassurance, but he’ll still admit, at least to himself, to being scared. He supposes it’s a natural response to an environment like this, a situation that seems so dire.
But he doesn’t think that all the fear in the world could keep him from unlocking the door and slipping out of it, because the longer he waits, the less chance he has of making it to Eduardo.
His first instinct, upon seeing the bloodied, broken remains of Harvard, is not to run back into Kirkland. It’s to run as fast he can to Eliot, where he’s praying Eduardo is. Mark knows that’s not practical, though. He knows his best chance of actually making it there is to get to the campus police office, hopefully encountering as little zombies as possible. He takes another deep breath, makes sure that the Kirkland door is locked behind him (he has his key card, a comforting relic from Before, and hopes that he’ll get to use it), and starts off.
It only takes five minutes before he has to start running.
His first encounter happens, unfortunately, by an athletics center; there’s some poetic justice in the idea that the Science Center zombies had managed to make the entire lacrosse team undead, but it’s bad news for Mark. Apparently the undead lacrosse team didn’t lose any of their athleticism in the transition from humans to zombies, and only gained a strong affinity for tasting Mark’s brain. Mark doesn’t blame them; he’s sure that his brain is excellent.
But Mark likes his brain where it is, thank you very much. So he runs as fast as he can, heart pounding and lungs straining after a while, terribly aware of how close they are on his heels, and yet more determined than he thinks he’s ever been in his life to outrun them.
One zombie makes a good grab at him, and Mark swings unseeingly with the bat, only aware that it’s connected when it comes back bloody. He ignores the subsequent churning of his stomach to keep running; apparently, it’s going to take killing more than two zombies to make him comfortable with it, and he’s kind of frustrated about that. This would be so much easier if he could kill things without wanting to hurl immediately afterwards.
After a while, it’s clear that he’s not going to be able to wear down or lose the lacrosse team; they’re persistent in their bloodlust, and Mark imagines that that’s leftover from their human days, too. But the campus police office is in sight, and so Mark runs as fast as he can for it, desperate to put enough distance between him and the lacrosse team that he can get into the office and arm himself more effectively without them descending upon him immediately.
He barely makes it. The office door is made of glass, so he doesn’t bother to lock it, just slams it shut and runs for where he thinks the guns might be as the glass shatters behind him. The building is blessedly empty but for one police officer zombie who is easily downed with the bat; Mark helps himself to the officer’s gun, clicks the safety off using video game logic, cocks the gun, spins around, and fires at the first zombie he sees behind him, glass from the front door sticking in shards out of his face. He doesn’t stop to think that it’s the first time he’s ever actually held a real gun, or that he doesn’t even know what kind of gun it is. He just runs.
Mark keeps running. There are still zombies behind him, tripping over chairs that Mark knocks down behind him, stumbling into walls but still fast, still determined to take Mark down. Mark follows a sign to an artillery room and locks the door after him, knowing it’ll only hold for so long but needing the small time it does give him.
The bad news is that there aren’t a lot of guns; Mark guesses that most of them are out with the campus police, probably useless if they’re zombies now. But there’s more good news than bad news, and there are three Glock 19s he recognizes as standard issue for most police forces, plus a handful of extra loaded magazines. He slides one of the magazines into place and puts the safety on for Eduardo, then sticks the extra magazines and the guns into his backpack.
The other good news is that there’s a window in here, as well as a wealth of other useful weapons he quickly scoops up. Soon, as the artillery door starts to waver on its hinges and break down, Mark’s backpack is stuffed with mace, a few tasers, an air horn and a few tear gas bombs, and he picks up another bomb as he readies himself to break the window.
The door breaks down just as the window shatters. Mark deploys the bomb as the zombies descend, hoping that it will actually have an effect; he has no idea about zombie physiology yet, and really hopes he never has the opportunity to find out more. He doesn’t waste any time shoving his backpack out the small window and scrambling after it as the artillery fills with tear gas.
His legs feel rubbery and sore by now, but he runs anyway, not knowing how much the tear gas will have stopped the zombies. After a while of running, though, it’s clear he’s not being followed, and he gets some satisfaction out of the image of the zombies still stumbling around the artillery, blinded and lost.
Dustin’s bat was left behind, and the replacement gun feels even more reassuring, even while it gives him chills to think about using it. Mark uses the comfort of the gun to stop and rest on the steps of a building he doesn’t even recognize, has never had class in; his heart gives a stupid, unhappy lurch to think that he probably never will now.
He doesn’t know where this sentimentality for Harvard is coming from. This is the same Harvard that had given him 6 months of academic probation, the Harvard that had only stopped spitting on him or glaring at him because of TheFacebook. He had even started seeing TheFacebook as his ticket out of here; depending on how big it might get, Mark was thinking he’d have to drop out to devote himself to it full time, and he had been excited to think of that.
Perhaps that’s what’s feeding the melancholy weighing on his shoulders; without Harvard, TheFacebook isn’t really anything. They haven’t expanded yet, haven’t even seen how big TheFacebook could get. Now, unless he renames it TheZombiebook, he’s not sure if that’ll ever be possible.
That makes him way too sad to really think about, so Mark makes himself get up and keep moving. TheFacebook is, for the first time in weeks, not at all his first priority right now; Eduardo is. Mark can’t forget that.
Mark passes more zombies along the walk to Eliot, but luckily doesn’t draw their attention. Most of them seemed engrossed in eating the bodies that litter the walkways, the ones Mark has been trying to ignore. He drinks some water to stay hydrated, Chris’ disapproving glare flickering through his mind, and has to fight to keep it down as he passes more and more death. He had never imagined himself to be squeamish before now, and finds it incredibly inconvenient.
Harvard has never seemed so big to him, but Eliot comes into sight before long without any other huge incidents. The front entrance is wide open, though, and that makes Mark’s blood run cold, but he rationalizes that Eduardo could have blockaded his dorm room the way Chris and Dustin have probably done with the Kirkland suite.
Mark takes another deep breath, suddenly struck with fear at what he’s going to find in Eliot. He starts forward, his hand on his gun, and has only taken a few steps when he hears a yell.
“Mark! No!”
He only has time to recognize the voice as belonging to Eduardo before a pack of zombies is pouring out of Eliot, eyes locking on Mark and advancing quickly. Mark freezes, unsure of where to go-if Eduardo is in Eliot, he can’t run away from it, but he can’t exactly run into the pack of zombies, he doesn’t think he could shoot them all fast enough. A hand on his elbow jolts him into action and he turns abruptly with his gun, finger on the trigger, but stops when he sees Eduardo’s wide, fearful eyes set in an uncharacteristically dirty face. There is a cut high on Eduardo’s cheekbones and his grip on Mark’s arm is tight enough to hurt, and Mark has never been so happy to see him in his life.
“Wardo,” he breathes out, and Eduardo answers him by tugging him so hard that he nearly yanks his arm from his socket.
“Come on, we have to go!”
They’re barely in motion before a loud boom and a flash of heat knocks Mark to the ground, nearly dragging Eduardo, who had apparently known to brace himself, with him. Mark turns to see Eliot up in flames and half of the zombie pack burning, the rest of them driven wild by the blast. To their left, two boys and a girl similarly dirty and cut up to Eduardo burst out of some bushes, and one of the boys yells, “You ruined it, Saverin!” before running off in the opposite direction that Eduardo is dragging Mark toward.
“What the hell,” Mark gasps out, eyes tearing from the smoke streaming out of Eliot. “Did you blow up your dorm?”
“It was Christy’s idea,” Eduardo says; he hasn’t let Mark go and is keeping pace with him easily, though he looks totally exhausted. “I had no choice; I could either leave the dorm or get blown up with the zombies. She thinks if we kill as many as possible the CDC will let us out.”
It’s not a bad plan, even if Mark doesn’t know who Christy is, and rather resents her for nearly blowing him and Eduardo up along with all those zombies. Mark has little interest in actually killing zombies, though, even the ones who are running after him and Eduardo again.
It’s only two, and one of them seems to be so badly burnt that he falls halfway through the chase and leaves Mark and Eduardo with one pursuer, a female zombie Mark has a terrible feeling he recognizes from somewhere. That stops mattering, though, when, with a screeching cry, she surges forward and leaps at Eduardo, hands forming claws that go straight for his throat.
Mark doesn’t hesitate to shoot her in the head.
“Holy shit,” Eduardo says, arm raised up where he’d been clutching Mark so tightly, fingers flexing a little. Mark takes his hand and kicks the zombie off him, pulling Eduardo to his feet and trying not to shake.
“Are you okay?”
“Mark,” Eduardo says lowly, staring down at the zombie. Mark hopes that the person who just conspired to blow up a dozen zombies isn’t about to have a crisis of conscious, and tries to ignore the fact that he’s starting to develop one, too.
But Eduardo just looks at him, with those wide eyes and in his wrinkled, unkempt three piece suit, and says, “Mark, you just killed Natalie Portman.”
Mark is quiet for a minute. Then he starts to laugh, because he’s not sure what else he can do.
“You should’ve worn a coat,” Eduardo whispers furiously on the walk back to Kirkland. “It’s freezing out here.”
“Eduardo,” Mark says flatly, eyes rapt and wary of their surroundings, but relieved to find no zombies in sight. “The weather was sort of the last thing on my mind when I left Kirkland. I was more concerned with all the zombies trying to eat my brain. Speaking of, do you want another sandwich?”
“I’m fine, you have it,” Eduardo says, probably automatically, which is ridiculous because Mark had already told him that there’s plenty of food back in Kirkland. He’s also not sure if he can keep any food down right now, but doesn’t want to admit that and draw more of Eduardo’s insane concern. “Seriously, though, even I had the sense to grab a jacket. Do you want mine?”
“No,” Mark tells him as sourly as he can. “I had the sense to grab all the guns I could. I think I win for sense.”
“I guess,” Eduardo says doubtfully, looking uneasily down at the gun Mark had given him. He’d frowned over all of Mark’s weapons and had asked for a taser instead, but there was no way Mark was going to let Eduardo defend himself with just a taser, not without knowing what electricity did to zombies. He’s already proven that 9mms work for zombie takedowns; he’s not in the mood to experiment with either of their lives now.
“Are you sure you don’t want my jacket?” Eduardo asks when he mistakes Mark’s shudder of disgust for more shivering. Mark glares at him as balefully as he can, but Eduardo apparently takes this to mean yes and takes his jacket off to drape it over Mark’s shoulders.
Mark sighs. “Wardo, please, we are not on a date at the drive-in, okay, and I do not need-”
The appearance of a zombie makes Mark lose his train of thought, understandably, but before he can raise his gun, Eduardo pulls another tear gas bomb out of his pocket and shouts, “Run!”
He throws the bomb, and Mark doesn’t run, instead grabbing Eduardo and forcing him to run with him. He holds on to the stupid jacket as it flaps after him, and he keeps holding on to it as the run the rest of the way to Kirkland.
“Thank God,” Eduardo breathes out, and Mark has to agree with him, feels the sentiment in the warmth running through him at the sight of his house. It’s in the way Eduardo slings an arm over his shoulder, warming him up more effectively than any jacket ever could.
He uses his key card with a thrill and no small amount of relief that the front entrance seems undisturbed. Even so, he’s still quaking slightly with nerves as he heads up the stairs-what if Dustin and Chris had let another zombie friend in? What if they hadn’t been as quick as Mark had been with the laptop?
Eduardo takes his hand at one point and says, “It’ll be okay, Mark, keep going,” and Mark hadn’t realized he’d stopped on his floor, staring at his white board that still has a message from Eduardo from three days ago, telling him to meet at 10 for breakfast.
Mark swallows hard and knocks on the door.
There is blood-chilling silence on the other end, and then some shuffling noises that don’t manage to comfort him all the much. Then, though, there is the high, slightly tremulous voice of Dustin, calling from the suite. “Zombies? You can’t come in!”
Mark’s whole body seems to sag, and his tongue doesn’t seem to want to work properly, so Eduardo has to call in, “It’s Eduardo and Mark, Dustin! We’re not zombies, I promise!” Mark lets out a laugh that feels (and probably sounds) a little hysterical, and Eduardo squeezes him into his side. Behind the door, Dustin is practically shrieking in jubilation, and there is more shuffling and then the groan of furniture being moved from where it’s presumably barricading the door. He can distinctly hear Dustin saying, “I told you so,” to Chris, and Chris is laughing, huffy and almost disbelieving, and Mark understands that. He wants to ask Eduardo to pinch him, to prove that they’re really here, whole and in one piece.
“Wardo, we did it,” Mark says, and Eduardo grins at him.
They are jumped on by both Dustin and Chris this time, and everyone ignores Mark’s protests and demands that they start putting the barricade up again. But he suffers the stupid group hug because Eduardo seems intent on holding him into it as tight as possible, and is equally reluctant to let go of him even when it’s over.
“They can handle it,” he says when Mark goes to help Dustin and Chris put the barricade back up again. “Why don’t we grab some more food and relax a bit?” Eduardo seems shaky, now, relieved but finally letting go of the adrenaline that had clearly been driving him after the Eliot explosion. Mark knows the feeling and consents to this, eyeing Eduardo’s dirty, cut cheek and then surprising him by suggesting he take a shower.
Eduardo’s eyes light up, but he seems reluctant to leave Mark’s side, and Mark has to reassure him that he’s going to heat up food, warm up and check if the Harvard network is still up before Eduardo is willing to head into the bathroom. Mark leaves him some clothes to change into, then reaches for food and his computer, in that inconvenient order.
Even the relief of being settled and safe at Kirkland isn’t enough to soften his disappointment over the fact that the Harvard network is down. He must look truly wretched, because Dustin comes over and tries to give him a hug.
“Is that a hickey?” Mark asks as Dustin nears him. He watches with some fascination, and no small amount of appreciation for the distraction, as Dustin stops in his tracks and turns bright red, then glances over at Chris, who is cleaning up after Mark’s mess in the kitchenette.
“Um,” Dustin says, and Mark starts laughing.
“We were very worried about you!” Dustin cries out, flailing a little and wringing his hands. Chris is now glaring over at them, practically daring Mark to say something. “We, like, found comfort in each other-”
“Dustin!” Chris yells, and Mark nearly falls over with laughter.
He is still laughing when Eduardo comes out of the bathroom, but has to stop when the sight of Eduardo wearing his clothes makes his brain sort of short-circuit. “What’s so funny?” Eduardo asks, looking sort of delighted, and Mark has to shake his head a little before he can answer.
“Um-while I was out risking life and limb, Chris and Dustin were hooking up-”
“Shut up, Mark, oh my God,” Chris says, and Dustin shoves him, still beet red. Eduardo gives them both a small smile, eyes sparkling.
“Wow, good for you guys. Poor Mark was out fighting zombie movie stars and-”
“We have to repopulate the Earth!” Dustin says, and Eduardo and Mark both crack up at that, while Chris hides his face in his hands.
“Whatever,” he mutters.
Pretty soon, teasing Chris and Dustin starts to get boring, and without the internet to keep him occupied, Mark suddenly feels exhausted. Eduardo must see this, because he loudly announces that they should all go to bed, and practically tucks Mark in as Chris and Dustin head for Chris’ room. Eduardo makes a motion to head to the couch and Mark sighs loudly and pulls back his own covers.
“Don’t be stupid. Get in.”
Quickly, Eduardo crawls into the bed, letting out a small sigh and curling up on his side next to Mark. “Thank you,” he says quietly, and Mark rolls his eyes.
“Goodnight, Wardo.”
“No, I mean-thank you for coming for me,” Eduardo says. “I wanted to find you, but Christy and those engineering majors said that our best chances were to kill all the zombies. I didn’t want to, but I didn’t want to bring you into it, either. I’m so glad I’m here now.”
“Me too,” Mark says, swallowing hard. “I like our plan better.”
“Yeah,” Eduardo says. “Let Christy kill all the zombies; you’ll be safe here-we’ll be safe here. That’s all I care about.”
Mark’s chest feels a little tight at that. He thinks of Billy Olson, who should’ve been safe here, too, and then feels so relieved that Eduardo’s here with him, he’s almost overwhelmed by it. Eduardo says again, “Thank you for coming for me,” and Mark says, “Of course.”
He should probably be more surprised that Eduardo kisses him then, but he’s not, not really. It feels natural, sweet and a little desperate, and Mark kisses back without really thinking about it.
It doesn’t feel like their first kiss, and a part of Mark hates that it’s happening now, without TheFacebook to build together anymore, with that future he had imagined painting for them both so uncertain now. But there is nothing discouraging or disappointed in Eduardo’s kiss, nothing uncertain in the swipe of his tongue along Mark’s teeth, or the softness of his fingers climbing up Mark’s shirt.
Mark squirms under his touch and sighs into the kiss, and decides to be grateful that, even if the future brings more zombies, he is alive to feel this and have this.
“You know,” Mark says, when Eduardo has shifted on top of him and released his lips to press kisses along his jaw. Mark swallows hard and stares up into Eduardo’s darkened eyes, before he forces out the rest. “Since Chris and Dustin got to have we’re so worried about our friend-sex, I think it’s only fair that we get to have thank God we’re alive-sex.”
Eduardo grins at him, and Mark has to lean up and kiss that grin, nuzzling at the cut on his cheek that makes Mark unspeakably angry. “I like this plan,” Eduardo mumbles, and he speaks more into Mark’s mouth. “You always have the best plans.”
“I really do,” Mark says, and Eduardo’s answering giggle is light and wonderful, good enough to forget about everything awful that’s still going on around them.
They fumble around to get each other naked, because, as Eduardo aptly points out, they’ll have a limited supply of clothes for a while. Mark rolls his eyes even as he’s secretly charmed that Eduardo can still think of things like that with Mark underneath him, rolling his hips up to rub against Eduardo’s.
“God,” Eduardo gasps as their dicks brush together; his eyes fly open, and they are wide and dark and beautiful, pinning Mark to the bed. “I am definitely, definitely happy we’re alive.”
“Good,” Mark says shortly, and he puts a hand on Eduardo’s ass to grind him down and grins widely when he squeaks.
“Me too,” Mark whispers in Eduardo’s ear as they move together, sweat pooling between them even in the chilly air, the blankets kicked down by their twined feet. Soon, the heat is spreading and lighting Mark up from the inside, and then there is more than sweat sticky between them, and Mark touches his hand to Eduardo’s belly and feels it quiver as he lets go, too. When they curl around each other again, they are messy and damp, breathing light, wheezing breaths, but Mark feels like he could outrun a thousand zombies.
But Eduardo is relaxed and sated next to him, his breaths starting to even out, and he kisses Mark’s hair and says, “We’re going to be okay.” And Mark has been telling himself this since the whole zombie mess started, trying desperately to make sure Chris and Dustin believe it, too. But now, lying with Eduardo wrapped around him and his breath on Mark’s neck, now, Mark can finally start to believe it.
Recipient: thisissirius
Prompt Number: Prompt #59
Characters/Pairings: Eduardo/Mark, Chris/Dustin
Rating/Warnings: R, violence, gore, sexual content, and non-major character death
Word Count: 5,600
Disclaimer: This fanwork is based on fictional representations of the characters in The Social Network; I make no claims of ownership of the characters or concepts.
Summary: Harvard is overrun by zombies; it would be easy enough for Mark, Chris, and Dustin to just barricade themselves in Kirkland, but Eduardo's still out there. That won't do at all.
Notes: so thisissirius asked for a Zombieland AU, but (with her permission!) I adapted the prompt a little bit, so it's canon movie verse, with zombies! Yay. Thanks to S for the beta!
Help, I'm Alive
It is Chris’ idea to just barricade themselves in Kirkland and not leave until, as he puts it, “This whole zombie mess is over.”
Dustin is readily on board with this plan, visibly eager to fall in line with Chris after his own level of zombie preparedness had proved inadequate upon discovering that the zombie survival kit he’d stashed under his bed had been raided by somebody, probably Billy Olson. He is still grumbling about the empty Cheetos packets and ripped-up boxes of cheese crackers even as he starts planning to stack furniture in front of the suite door with Chris.
Mark watches this planning, and this grumbling, and though he agrees that it’s a solid plan and affords them the most chances of surviving “this whole zombie mess”, something is holding him back. Maybe it’s the screams of students dying out on the quad, the continuous sound of chopper propellers flapping overhead, or the somber news that, to the outside world, “this whole zombie mess” is so far just a “Harvard problem” that needs to be contained, instead of actually solved.
All of this is definitely contributing to the uneasy, unhappy roiling in his gut, so much so that the sight of the piles of stolen food from the Kirkland dining hall strewn all over the suite is making him slightly nauseous. But it takes him a few moments to realize the true source of that feeling, and it hits him like a bucket of ice water. He snaps his head up to where Chris and Dustin are bickering over how best to move Dustin’s desk and says, “Guys.”
They both look at him, eyes wide and concerned. This is probably because this is the first time he’s spoken a word since Billy Olson had attempted to rip his throat out with his teeth, causing Mark to have to bash his head in with his laptop.
But that story is not important right now. What’s important is that there is an essential flaw to Chris’ plan, and Mark absolutely has to point it out. “Guys. What about Wardo?”
Chris and Dustin blink. Then they look around the suite, as if surprised that Eduardo isn’t actually there (as if Mark would have had to lift a finger, never mind a whole laptop, to fend off Billy Olson had Eduardo been there).
“Well, shit,” Chris says eventually; Dustin is still looking around, like he’s expecting Eduardo to materialize out of thin air. Mark will concede that it is fairly uncommon for Eduardo to not to be at the Kirkland suite; of course he’d pick the middle of a campus-wide zombie infection to go against the norm.
It had started in the Science Center. Mark still doesn’t know how, and doesn’t quite care to know, but he does know that this is why it was able to be contained to campus so quickly; people in the Science Center rarely come and go from the Science Center. Unless they’re zombies, of course, staggering out in search of brains to feast on.
It seemed the zombies had little interest in venturing out into the greater Cambridge area, anyway, perhaps seeking the best brains for their trouble and deciding, therefore, to stick to Harvard brains. But those that had tried to leave were stopped by the CDC, apparently, and now all of campus was on a quarantine lockdown.
So it’s not quite the zombie apocalypse Dustin had claimed to be so prepared for. But to Mark, it’s almost worse, because here he is, reasonably safe in Kirkland (barring the Billy Olson incident, of course), while Eduardo is still out there, possibly already a member of the undead, or maybe just food for the undead. Either of those options are unthinkable but fairly likely, and yet neither of them deter him from leaving the Kirkland hiding spot to go find Eduardo, whatever form he might be in.
“There’s no reason for us all to go,” Mark says hurriedly, waving down Chris and Dustin’s immediate protests and talking right over them. Apparently, once words had come back to him, his brain hadn’t stopped wanting to spit them out furiously, as fast as possible, which is sort of comforting. It’s normal, and nothing about this has felt normal for a long while. “It’s just too dangerous, and really impractical. I’ll go, and you two can make sure that Kirkland stays a safe zone, and-”
“That’s insane, Mark,” Chris tells him, shaking his head incredulously. “You can’t go alone, you don’t even have a proper weapon-”
“I have a plan for that,” Mark says, already calculating how long it should take him to get to the hopefully abandoned campus police office. Surely there will be guns there; he ignores the way his stomach flips to think about actually using one on somebody, but rationalizes that it’s better than getting blood and gray matter all over his laptop again.
“Still, whatever the plan is, it’s crazy to think you can get to Eduardo, if he’s even-”
“Eduardo will be fine,” Mark insists, contrary to the fact that his fairly logical brain is telling him that there’s no sense or probability in that. Mark doesn’t care about sense or probability right now.
Chris glares at him, shooting a look at the pale, drawn Dustin next to him, as if upset at Mark for giving Dustin false hope. Mark glares back. “Look, you can go off on a crazy, hopeless rescue mission if you want to, but I’m not going to let you go alone. I’ll go with you, and Dustin can stay here and-”
“Hey!” Dustin says suddenly, furrowing his brow. “I’m the zombie expert here, okay, so if anything, I should go-”
“No way in hell,” Chris says, at the same time Mark says, “Yeah, well, I’ve killed more zombies than you have, Dustin.”
Chris and Dustin stare at him, back to looking worried. Mark rolls his eyes and tries not to feel uneasy. “What? I can’t joke about it yet?”
“Okay, now I’m really going with you,” Chris says, frowning hard, and Mark huffs impatiently.
“No, okay, that’s just-that’s not practical, Chris. You’re right, it is a crazy rescue mission-though I’d definitely argue with the hopeless part, come on-and so I really think that the best option is for me to go alone.” He meets Chris’ stubborn, protesting eyes fully and tries to make him understand. “It’s stupid to risk more than one of us out there.”
He knows when Chris gets it; his eyes widen, just slightly, and he throws a glance at Dustin, still frowning, but the set of his shoulders starts to give a little. Mark knows it won’t take much more to make him budge, now that he understands what Mark means by this-that he doesn’t see it as hopeless so much as completely necessary, whether he makes it back alive or not. He knows it’s not the same for Chris, and nor should it be.
Indeed, it isn’t long before Chris has occupied Dustin with trying to sort their supplies to distract him from the fact that they’re letting Mark out of the suite to face likely death. He is helping arm Mark with the few weapons they’ve managed to cobble together out of crap lying around the dorm: a dusty baseball bat they’d found rolled all the way under Dustin’s bed, long forgotten about, and a Becks bottle with the bottom broken off, tied by the neck to a long string hanging down from the strap of his backpack for quick access. His backpack is being packed with some food and just a few water bottles, just in case this takes a while, or in case Eduardo needs food when Mark finds him, but not so much food that he’ll be weighed down.
“I have to be fast,” Mark tells Chris, who looks even graver at this. He gets especially grave when Mark consents to borrowing a pair of sneakers; running in flip flops just isn’t practical at this point.
“Jesus Christ,” Dustin says when he sees the sneakers. “It really is the end of the world.”
Mark doesn’t correct him, just shrugs and stretches to limber up.
Dustin, despite the careful attention he gives to his food-sorting task, still insists upon hugging him before he leaves, and he whispers in his ear, “You sure you won’t let me come?”
Mark doesn’t even have to shoot that down; Chris grabs Dustin away and barks at him to get back to the food-sorting, and Mark knows that he’s not letting Dustin out of his sight, never mind out of this suite.
“Don’t die,” Chris says solemnly, and Mark smirks even though it’s not actually a joke. He shrugs again, giving in and nodding when Chris glares at him. He’s not going to make any promises, isn’t that kind of person, but he knows he has to try; Chris is way scarier than any brain-hungry zombies can be.
The halls of Kirkland are eerie and deserted; his footsteps echo off the walls as he hurries through and heads down the stairs.
Once the mad rush of everyone who didn’t have the sense of Mark, Dustin and Chris not to flee Kirkland and run for the blocked-off campus exits ended, they had locked the front door and bolted it, probably for the first time in Kirkland history. Since the mistake of letting in Billy Olson (“That’s Billy!” Dustin had cried from his spot at Mark’s window seat, and in the hurry to get down to him, Mark had taken his laptop with him. He’s very, very glad he did), they hadn’t let in anybody else. Though, to be fair, only zombies had actually attempted to get in; Mark is sure Chris wouldn’t allow Mark to bar any healthy people from entrance, though he understands his reluctance since the Billy incident.
Now, Mark pushes the bolt aside and takes a deep breath. The sounds of screams and helicopters still seem far off, and he tightens his hand around his baseball bat for some reassurance, but he’ll still admit, at least to himself, to being scared. He supposes it’s a natural response to an environment like this, a situation that seems so dire.
But he doesn’t think that all the fear in the world could keep him from unlocking the door and slipping out of it, because the longer he waits, the less chance he has of making it to Eduardo.
His first instinct, upon seeing the bloodied, broken remains of Harvard, is not to run back into Kirkland. It’s to run as fast he can to Eliot, where he’s praying Eduardo is. Mark knows that’s not practical, though. He knows his best chance of actually making it there is to get to the campus police office, hopefully encountering as little zombies as possible. He takes another deep breath, makes sure that the Kirkland door is locked behind him (he has his key card, a comforting relic from Before, and hopes that he’ll get to use it), and starts off.
It only takes five minutes before he has to start running.
His first encounter happens, unfortunately, by an athletics center; there’s some poetic justice in the idea that the Science Center zombies had managed to make the entire lacrosse team undead, but it’s bad news for Mark. Apparently the undead lacrosse team didn’t lose any of their athleticism in the transition from humans to zombies, and only gained a strong affinity for tasting Mark’s brain. Mark doesn’t blame them; he’s sure that his brain is excellent.
But Mark likes his brain where it is, thank you very much. So he runs as fast as he can, heart pounding and lungs straining after a while, terribly aware of how close they are on his heels, and yet more determined than he thinks he’s ever been in his life to outrun them.
One zombie makes a good grab at him, and Mark swings unseeingly with the bat, only aware that it’s connected when it comes back bloody. He ignores the subsequent churning of his stomach to keep running; apparently, it’s going to take killing more than two zombies to make him comfortable with it, and he’s kind of frustrated about that. This would be so much easier if he could kill things without wanting to hurl immediately afterwards.
After a while, it’s clear that he’s not going to be able to wear down or lose the lacrosse team; they’re persistent in their bloodlust, and Mark imagines that that’s leftover from their human days, too. But the campus police office is in sight, and so Mark runs as fast as he can for it, desperate to put enough distance between him and the lacrosse team that he can get into the office and arm himself more effectively without them descending upon him immediately.
He barely makes it. The office door is made of glass, so he doesn’t bother to lock it, just slams it shut and runs for where he thinks the guns might be as the glass shatters behind him. The building is blessedly empty but for one police officer zombie who is easily downed with the bat; Mark helps himself to the officer’s gun, clicks the safety off using video game logic, cocks the gun, spins around, and fires at the first zombie he sees behind him, glass from the front door sticking in shards out of his face. He doesn’t stop to think that it’s the first time he’s ever actually held a real gun, or that he doesn’t even know what kind of gun it is. He just runs.
Mark keeps running. There are still zombies behind him, tripping over chairs that Mark knocks down behind him, stumbling into walls but still fast, still determined to take Mark down. Mark follows a sign to an artillery room and locks the door after him, knowing it’ll only hold for so long but needing the small time it does give him.
The bad news is that there aren’t a lot of guns; Mark guesses that most of them are out with the campus police, probably useless if they’re zombies now. But there’s more good news than bad news, and there are three Glock 19s he recognizes as standard issue for most police forces, plus a handful of extra loaded magazines. He slides one of the magazines into place and puts the safety on for Eduardo, then sticks the extra magazines and the guns into his backpack.
The other good news is that there’s a window in here, as well as a wealth of other useful weapons he quickly scoops up. Soon, as the artillery door starts to waver on its hinges and break down, Mark’s backpack is stuffed with mace, a few tasers, an air horn and a few tear gas bombs, and he picks up another bomb as he readies himself to break the window.
The door breaks down just as the window shatters. Mark deploys the bomb as the zombies descend, hoping that it will actually have an effect; he has no idea about zombie physiology yet, and really hopes he never has the opportunity to find out more. He doesn’t waste any time shoving his backpack out the small window and scrambling after it as the artillery fills with tear gas.
His legs feel rubbery and sore by now, but he runs anyway, not knowing how much the tear gas will have stopped the zombies. After a while of running, though, it’s clear he’s not being followed, and he gets some satisfaction out of the image of the zombies still stumbling around the artillery, blinded and lost.
Dustin’s bat was left behind, and the replacement gun feels even more reassuring, even while it gives him chills to think about using it. Mark uses the comfort of the gun to stop and rest on the steps of a building he doesn’t even recognize, has never had class in; his heart gives a stupid, unhappy lurch to think that he probably never will now.
He doesn’t know where this sentimentality for Harvard is coming from. This is the same Harvard that had given him 6 months of academic probation, the Harvard that had only stopped spitting on him or glaring at him because of TheFacebook. He had even started seeing TheFacebook as his ticket out of here; depending on how big it might get, Mark was thinking he’d have to drop out to devote himself to it full time, and he had been excited to think of that.
Perhaps that’s what’s feeding the melancholy weighing on his shoulders; without Harvard, TheFacebook isn’t really anything. They haven’t expanded yet, haven’t even seen how big TheFacebook could get. Now, unless he renames it TheZombiebook, he’s not sure if that’ll ever be possible.
That makes him way too sad to really think about, so Mark makes himself get up and keep moving. TheFacebook is, for the first time in weeks, not at all his first priority right now; Eduardo is. Mark can’t forget that.
Mark passes more zombies along the walk to Eliot, but luckily doesn’t draw their attention. Most of them seemed engrossed in eating the bodies that litter the walkways, the ones Mark has been trying to ignore. He drinks some water to stay hydrated, Chris’ disapproving glare flickering through his mind, and has to fight to keep it down as he passes more and more death. He had never imagined himself to be squeamish before now, and finds it incredibly inconvenient.
Harvard has never seemed so big to him, but Eliot comes into sight before long without any other huge incidents. The front entrance is wide open, though, and that makes Mark’s blood run cold, but he rationalizes that Eduardo could have blockaded his dorm room the way Chris and Dustin have probably done with the Kirkland suite.
Mark takes another deep breath, suddenly struck with fear at what he’s going to find in Eliot. He starts forward, his hand on his gun, and has only taken a few steps when he hears a yell.
“Mark! No!”
He only has time to recognize the voice as belonging to Eduardo before a pack of zombies is pouring out of Eliot, eyes locking on Mark and advancing quickly. Mark freezes, unsure of where to go-if Eduardo is in Eliot, he can’t run away from it, but he can’t exactly run into the pack of zombies, he doesn’t think he could shoot them all fast enough. A hand on his elbow jolts him into action and he turns abruptly with his gun, finger on the trigger, but stops when he sees Eduardo’s wide, fearful eyes set in an uncharacteristically dirty face. There is a cut high on Eduardo’s cheekbones and his grip on Mark’s arm is tight enough to hurt, and Mark has never been so happy to see him in his life.
“Wardo,” he breathes out, and Eduardo answers him by tugging him so hard that he nearly yanks his arm from his socket.
“Come on, we have to go!”
They’re barely in motion before a loud boom and a flash of heat knocks Mark to the ground, nearly dragging Eduardo, who had apparently known to brace himself, with him. Mark turns to see Eliot up in flames and half of the zombie pack burning, the rest of them driven wild by the blast. To their left, two boys and a girl similarly dirty and cut up to Eduardo burst out of some bushes, and one of the boys yells, “You ruined it, Saverin!” before running off in the opposite direction that Eduardo is dragging Mark toward.
“What the hell,” Mark gasps out, eyes tearing from the smoke streaming out of Eliot. “Did you blow up your dorm?”
“It was Christy’s idea,” Eduardo says; he hasn’t let Mark go and is keeping pace with him easily, though he looks totally exhausted. “I had no choice; I could either leave the dorm or get blown up with the zombies. She thinks if we kill as many as possible the CDC will let us out.”
It’s not a bad plan, even if Mark doesn’t know who Christy is, and rather resents her for nearly blowing him and Eduardo up along with all those zombies. Mark has little interest in actually killing zombies, though, even the ones who are running after him and Eduardo again.
It’s only two, and one of them seems to be so badly burnt that he falls halfway through the chase and leaves Mark and Eduardo with one pursuer, a female zombie Mark has a terrible feeling he recognizes from somewhere. That stops mattering, though, when, with a screeching cry, she surges forward and leaps at Eduardo, hands forming claws that go straight for his throat.
Mark doesn’t hesitate to shoot her in the head.
“Holy shit,” Eduardo says, arm raised up where he’d been clutching Mark so tightly, fingers flexing a little. Mark takes his hand and kicks the zombie off him, pulling Eduardo to his feet and trying not to shake.
“Are you okay?”
“Mark,” Eduardo says lowly, staring down at the zombie. Mark hopes that the person who just conspired to blow up a dozen zombies isn’t about to have a crisis of conscious, and tries to ignore the fact that he’s starting to develop one, too.
But Eduardo just looks at him, with those wide eyes and in his wrinkled, unkempt three piece suit, and says, “Mark, you just killed Natalie Portman.”
Mark is quiet for a minute. Then he starts to laugh, because he’s not sure what else he can do.
“You should’ve worn a coat,” Eduardo whispers furiously on the walk back to Kirkland. “It’s freezing out here.”
“Eduardo,” Mark says flatly, eyes rapt and wary of their surroundings, but relieved to find no zombies in sight. “The weather was sort of the last thing on my mind when I left Kirkland. I was more concerned with all the zombies trying to eat my brain. Speaking of, do you want another sandwich?”
“I’m fine, you have it,” Eduardo says, probably automatically, which is ridiculous because Mark had already told him that there’s plenty of food back in Kirkland. He’s also not sure if he can keep any food down right now, but doesn’t want to admit that and draw more of Eduardo’s insane concern. “Seriously, though, even I had the sense to grab a jacket. Do you want mine?”
“No,” Mark tells him as sourly as he can. “I had the sense to grab all the guns I could. I think I win for sense.”
“I guess,” Eduardo says doubtfully, looking uneasily down at the gun Mark had given him. He’d frowned over all of Mark’s weapons and had asked for a taser instead, but there was no way Mark was going to let Eduardo defend himself with just a taser, not without knowing what electricity did to zombies. He’s already proven that 9mms work for zombie takedowns; he’s not in the mood to experiment with either of their lives now.
“Are you sure you don’t want my jacket?” Eduardo asks when he mistakes Mark’s shudder of disgust for more shivering. Mark glares at him as balefully as he can, but Eduardo apparently takes this to mean yes and takes his jacket off to drape it over Mark’s shoulders.
Mark sighs. “Wardo, please, we are not on a date at the drive-in, okay, and I do not need-”
The appearance of a zombie makes Mark lose his train of thought, understandably, but before he can raise his gun, Eduardo pulls another tear gas bomb out of his pocket and shouts, “Run!”
He throws the bomb, and Mark doesn’t run, instead grabbing Eduardo and forcing him to run with him. He holds on to the stupid jacket as it flaps after him, and he keeps holding on to it as the run the rest of the way to Kirkland.
“Thank God,” Eduardo breathes out, and Mark has to agree with him, feels the sentiment in the warmth running through him at the sight of his house. It’s in the way Eduardo slings an arm over his shoulder, warming him up more effectively than any jacket ever could.
He uses his key card with a thrill and no small amount of relief that the front entrance seems undisturbed. Even so, he’s still quaking slightly with nerves as he heads up the stairs-what if Dustin and Chris had let another zombie friend in? What if they hadn’t been as quick as Mark had been with the laptop?
Eduardo takes his hand at one point and says, “It’ll be okay, Mark, keep going,” and Mark hadn’t realized he’d stopped on his floor, staring at his white board that still has a message from Eduardo from three days ago, telling him to meet at 10 for breakfast.
Mark swallows hard and knocks on the door.
There is blood-chilling silence on the other end, and then some shuffling noises that don’t manage to comfort him all the much. Then, though, there is the high, slightly tremulous voice of Dustin, calling from the suite. “Zombies? You can’t come in!”
Mark’s whole body seems to sag, and his tongue doesn’t seem to want to work properly, so Eduardo has to call in, “It’s Eduardo and Mark, Dustin! We’re not zombies, I promise!” Mark lets out a laugh that feels (and probably sounds) a little hysterical, and Eduardo squeezes him into his side. Behind the door, Dustin is practically shrieking in jubilation, and there is more shuffling and then the groan of furniture being moved from where it’s presumably barricading the door. He can distinctly hear Dustin saying, “I told you so,” to Chris, and Chris is laughing, huffy and almost disbelieving, and Mark understands that. He wants to ask Eduardo to pinch him, to prove that they’re really here, whole and in one piece.
“Wardo, we did it,” Mark says, and Eduardo grins at him.
They are jumped on by both Dustin and Chris this time, and everyone ignores Mark’s protests and demands that they start putting the barricade up again. But he suffers the stupid group hug because Eduardo seems intent on holding him into it as tight as possible, and is equally reluctant to let go of him even when it’s over.
“They can handle it,” he says when Mark goes to help Dustin and Chris put the barricade back up again. “Why don’t we grab some more food and relax a bit?” Eduardo seems shaky, now, relieved but finally letting go of the adrenaline that had clearly been driving him after the Eliot explosion. Mark knows the feeling and consents to this, eyeing Eduardo’s dirty, cut cheek and then surprising him by suggesting he take a shower.
Eduardo’s eyes light up, but he seems reluctant to leave Mark’s side, and Mark has to reassure him that he’s going to heat up food, warm up and check if the Harvard network is still up before Eduardo is willing to head into the bathroom. Mark leaves him some clothes to change into, then reaches for food and his computer, in that inconvenient order.
Even the relief of being settled and safe at Kirkland isn’t enough to soften his disappointment over the fact that the Harvard network is down. He must look truly wretched, because Dustin comes over and tries to give him a hug.
“Is that a hickey?” Mark asks as Dustin nears him. He watches with some fascination, and no small amount of appreciation for the distraction, as Dustin stops in his tracks and turns bright red, then glances over at Chris, who is cleaning up after Mark’s mess in the kitchenette.
“Um,” Dustin says, and Mark starts laughing.
“We were very worried about you!” Dustin cries out, flailing a little and wringing his hands. Chris is now glaring over at them, practically daring Mark to say something. “We, like, found comfort in each other-”
“Dustin!” Chris yells, and Mark nearly falls over with laughter.
He is still laughing when Eduardo comes out of the bathroom, but has to stop when the sight of Eduardo wearing his clothes makes his brain sort of short-circuit. “What’s so funny?” Eduardo asks, looking sort of delighted, and Mark has to shake his head a little before he can answer.
“Um-while I was out risking life and limb, Chris and Dustin were hooking up-”
“Shut up, Mark, oh my God,” Chris says, and Dustin shoves him, still beet red. Eduardo gives them both a small smile, eyes sparkling.
“Wow, good for you guys. Poor Mark was out fighting zombie movie stars and-”
“We have to repopulate the Earth!” Dustin says, and Eduardo and Mark both crack up at that, while Chris hides his face in his hands.
“Whatever,” he mutters.
Pretty soon, teasing Chris and Dustin starts to get boring, and without the internet to keep him occupied, Mark suddenly feels exhausted. Eduardo must see this, because he loudly announces that they should all go to bed, and practically tucks Mark in as Chris and Dustin head for Chris’ room. Eduardo makes a motion to head to the couch and Mark sighs loudly and pulls back his own covers.
“Don’t be stupid. Get in.”
Quickly, Eduardo crawls into the bed, letting out a small sigh and curling up on his side next to Mark. “Thank you,” he says quietly, and Mark rolls his eyes.
“Goodnight, Wardo.”
“No, I mean-thank you for coming for me,” Eduardo says. “I wanted to find you, but Christy and those engineering majors said that our best chances were to kill all the zombies. I didn’t want to, but I didn’t want to bring you into it, either. I’m so glad I’m here now.”
“Me too,” Mark says, swallowing hard. “I like our plan better.”
“Yeah,” Eduardo says. “Let Christy kill all the zombies; you’ll be safe here-we’ll be safe here. That’s all I care about.”
Mark’s chest feels a little tight at that. He thinks of Billy Olson, who should’ve been safe here, too, and then feels so relieved that Eduardo’s here with him, he’s almost overwhelmed by it. Eduardo says again, “Thank you for coming for me,” and Mark says, “Of course.”
He should probably be more surprised that Eduardo kisses him then, but he’s not, not really. It feels natural, sweet and a little desperate, and Mark kisses back without really thinking about it.
It doesn’t feel like their first kiss, and a part of Mark hates that it’s happening now, without TheFacebook to build together anymore, with that future he had imagined painting for them both so uncertain now. But there is nothing discouraging or disappointed in Eduardo’s kiss, nothing uncertain in the swipe of his tongue along Mark’s teeth, or the softness of his fingers climbing up Mark’s shirt.
Mark squirms under his touch and sighs into the kiss, and decides to be grateful that, even if the future brings more zombies, he is alive to feel this and have this.
“You know,” Mark says, when Eduardo has shifted on top of him and released his lips to press kisses along his jaw. Mark swallows hard and stares up into Eduardo’s darkened eyes, before he forces out the rest. “Since Chris and Dustin got to have we’re so worried about our friend-sex, I think it’s only fair that we get to have thank God we’re alive-sex.”
Eduardo grins at him, and Mark has to lean up and kiss that grin, nuzzling at the cut on his cheek that makes Mark unspeakably angry. “I like this plan,” Eduardo mumbles, and he speaks more into Mark’s mouth. “You always have the best plans.”
“I really do,” Mark says, and Eduardo’s answering giggle is light and wonderful, good enough to forget about everything awful that’s still going on around them.
They fumble around to get each other naked, because, as Eduardo aptly points out, they’ll have a limited supply of clothes for a while. Mark rolls his eyes even as he’s secretly charmed that Eduardo can still think of things like that with Mark underneath him, rolling his hips up to rub against Eduardo’s.
“God,” Eduardo gasps as their dicks brush together; his eyes fly open, and they are wide and dark and beautiful, pinning Mark to the bed. “I am definitely, definitely happy we’re alive.”
“Good,” Mark says shortly, and he puts a hand on Eduardo’s ass to grind him down and grins widely when he squeaks.
“Me too,” Mark whispers in Eduardo’s ear as they move together, sweat pooling between them even in the chilly air, the blankets kicked down by their twined feet. Soon, the heat is spreading and lighting Mark up from the inside, and then there is more than sweat sticky between them, and Mark touches his hand to Eduardo’s belly and feels it quiver as he lets go, too. When they curl around each other again, they are messy and damp, breathing light, wheezing breaths, but Mark feels like he could outrun a thousand zombies.
But Eduardo is relaxed and sated next to him, his breaths starting to even out, and he kisses Mark’s hair and says, “We’re going to be okay.” And Mark has been telling himself this since the whole zombie mess started, trying desperately to make sure Chris and Dustin believe it, too. But now, lying with Eduardo wrapped around him and his breath on Mark’s neck, now, Mark can finally start to believe it.