Fic: Infection
Title: Infection
Characters: America, Canada, and England.
Rating: T
Key Words: Angst, Apocalypse, and Zombies.
Summary: Nation!verse. Hiding in an apartment building, the place crawling with zombies, Alfred finds an outlet for all of his regrets.
* * * * *
Infection
* * * * *
‘Hey, Mattie,’ Alfred’s fingers punched the words out on the cell phone’s keyboard, his eyes closed as he imagined his brother making that small, disgruntled face of his at the nickname. ‘Remember that time we were supposed to go to one of those hockey games of yours, and I never showed up?’
In his head, he could hear Matt sigh. ‘Al, you never show up to half the things we have planned together.’
‘Yeah, but, this time! This time you called me at my house, wanted to know what I was doing and if I was coming or not. Sounded pretty fussy, too, now that I think about it.’
‘You left me standing in front of the stadium in the freezing rain waiting for you to show up. I missedthe game.’ In Alfred’s mind, Matt’s voice made the entire event sound just as bad as missing the Super Bowl, and over a year after the fact he wondered just how important that game had been to him.
He made a face at the box spring underneath the bed. ‘Hey, don’t blame me for that! You should have just gone in once it started instead of-’
With a soft, disgruntled sound, he tapped his thumb on the backspace key until he felt sure that the message in its entirety was gone, then stretched his legs out a bit. His fingers tapped the keys in thought, not hard enough to create words but hard enough that the letters he touched became ingrained in his mind.
‘Look, I…’
He took a deep inhale, held it as his head swam with the odors of must, human rot and decay, blood, and his own sweat. He’d have to find a place to shower soon if he wanted to be able to keep living with himself. End of the world or not, there was only so much B.O. a guy could get away with. He let out his breath in a slow, steady exhale. Maybe the apartment complex next door had running water. He’d have to lock the bathroom door, of course, and make sure that he had an emergency escape route, but…
In his mind, he kept reminding himself that he’d weathered wars worse than this.
‘Matt,’ his fingers typed, only to pause. After a moment, he deleted the name and mouthed ‘Matthew’ as he spelled it out on the keyboard. That’s the name his brother preferred to go by, wasn’t it? Matthew. Not Mattie or Matt or ‘Who are you agai-ow, Mattie, I was only joking, jeeze!’
Alfred wrapped the memories as they came to him around his heart like a blanket and continued.
‘Matthew, I just wanted to say… I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I missed all of those games you wanted to go to, I’m sorry for all those times I ignored your calls or said I was sick or working when I really was just playing video games. And… I’m really sorry for that time I missed your birthday, because that was a lousy move on my part, and… Yeah. Don’t really blame you for decking me when I came to pick you up for my birthday.’
Something shuffled down the hall. He heard it as it dragged its feet over the carpeted floor just by the closed bedroom door, and stopped with a thud against the thin wood to let out horrible retching sound. Seemed the occupant of Room 302 hadn’t been missing at all. Alfred waited for a moment, one of his hands leaving the cell phone to creep toward the handgun he had strapped to his thigh. It sounded as though there was only one thing-not person, his mind argued, not anymore-out there. If he had to, he could get a shot in from beneath the bed, then roll out and finish it off with a headshot.
The door shook with another thud, then stilled. He braced himself for the moment when that door would fly open and one of the undead would stumble through, prepared himself, even, for the quick draw. Thanks to the bed, he had some coverage; he wouldn’t even be seen until he had already taken the zombie out. All he had to do was twist his body like so, and… After a final shudder, the noise at the door fell silent and, if he held his breath, Alfred could hear the footsteps drag back toward the living room. He was safe, for now.
He fell back on his shoulders and let out a small sigh of relief, his grip on the cell phone tight. That had been a close one. Sure, he’d have to face the zombie eventually if he wanted to get out of the apartment complex anytime soon, but… He had been fighting off the undead all day, and this wasn’t a video game. He couldn’t just guzzle down a bottle of medicine and keep going forward like an unstoppable killing machine. At some point, he had to rest and since daylight was approaching and visibility would be up-for him and them-it made sense to do it now.
Almost as though the mere thought of sleep reminded him of just how tired he really was, Alfred found himself biting back a yawn as he loosened his grip on the phone. He’d be needing to get to sleep soon, once the first beams of sunlight stretched across the floor from the window. This time, he did yawn at the thought before he stretched and shifted to get himself comfortable. He propped his hands up, with the cell phone clutched between them, on his chest, and tilted his head back to stare at the box spring of the bed again.
His eyes fluttered shut for a moment, as the words he had typed into the phone marched across the back of his eyelids.
‘Matthew, I…’ The words trailed off in his head, and his fingertips hovered over the keys. He struggled with all the things he wanted to say, all the regrets he wanted to voice-everything, really, that had surged up in him when he first found the cell phone discarded on the sidewalk outside. So many things came to his mind, none of which he could put a voice to.
He heard his brother sigh in that soft way of his before he would reach out and touch Alfred’s shoulder. ‘Go on,’ he encouraged.
‘Matthew, I…’ Alfred licked his lips, and mouthed the words as he typed them out with a slow, mechanical precision. ‘I’m sorry that I wasn’t there to protect you when the world fell apart. I hope you’re okay.’
The Matthew voice in his head didn’t say anything.
Alfred let out a sigh and dropped the cell phone over his heart. The joints in his fingers, especially his thumbs, felt stiff and almost numb from how long he had clung to the cell phone. Just how many messages had he typed? How much of his stress and worry and fear-and in the back of his mind, he could admit to himself that he was afraid of just what the world had become-had he pressed into those individual keys? He tried to think of an answer, but all his mind could come up with were all the things he still had left to say.
His jaw popped when he yawned again. He really needed to be getting to sleep, and yet… Alfred found himself picking up the cell phone again and typing away at the keyboard.
‘Yo, Artie! Have I ever told you this pick-up line I heard that actually mentions McDonald’s? I learned it from this guy who was trying to pickup chicks at the grocery store one day, and…’ In his mind, Arthur’s eyebrows bristled in annoyance as he continued typing and twin spots of red started darkening his cheeks until he looked ready to explode. Alfred gave the bed above him a lopsided grin.
‘I'll have it my way and you'll be loving it!’ He finished with a small, amused sound-not a snort, heroes didn’t snort, and ‘honestly, Alfred, must you try to sound so much like a barn animal?’
Alfred closed his eyes to the familiar, almost soothing sound of Arthur scolding him for his ‘inappropriate, tasteless humor’ and cradled the cell phone in his hands as he typed back a few counter jabs just to cause those eyebrows to bristle again.
‘You know, you might want to look out, I think those caterpillars on your face are becoming-‘
‘Those…?’ Arthur spluttered in outrage. ‘You-!’
Something warm hit Alfred’s face, but he didn’t have to open his eyes to know that it was sunlight spilling across the floor and reflecting off the blank, dead screen of the cell phone in his hands.
He gave the bed a dopey grin. ‘I what, Artie?’
Characters: America, Canada, and England.
Rating: T
Key Words: Angst, Apocalypse, and Zombies.
Summary: Nation!verse. Hiding in an apartment building, the place crawling with zombies, Alfred finds an outlet for all of his regrets.
* * * * *
Infection
* * * * *
‘Hey, Mattie,’ Alfred’s fingers punched the words out on the cell phone’s keyboard, his eyes closed as he imagined his brother making that small, disgruntled face of his at the nickname. ‘Remember that time we were supposed to go to one of those hockey games of yours, and I never showed up?’
In his head, he could hear Matt sigh. ‘Al, you never show up to half the things we have planned together.’
‘Yeah, but, this time! This time you called me at my house, wanted to know what I was doing and if I was coming or not. Sounded pretty fussy, too, now that I think about it.’
‘You left me standing in front of the stadium in the freezing rain waiting for you to show up. I missedthe game.’ In Alfred’s mind, Matt’s voice made the entire event sound just as bad as missing the Super Bowl, and over a year after the fact he wondered just how important that game had been to him.
He made a face at the box spring underneath the bed. ‘Hey, don’t blame me for that! You should have just gone in once it started instead of-’
With a soft, disgruntled sound, he tapped his thumb on the backspace key until he felt sure that the message in its entirety was gone, then stretched his legs out a bit. His fingers tapped the keys in thought, not hard enough to create words but hard enough that the letters he touched became ingrained in his mind.
‘Look, I…’
He took a deep inhale, held it as his head swam with the odors of must, human rot and decay, blood, and his own sweat. He’d have to find a place to shower soon if he wanted to be able to keep living with himself. End of the world or not, there was only so much B.O. a guy could get away with. He let out his breath in a slow, steady exhale. Maybe the apartment complex next door had running water. He’d have to lock the bathroom door, of course, and make sure that he had an emergency escape route, but…
In his mind, he kept reminding himself that he’d weathered wars worse than this.
‘Matt,’ his fingers typed, only to pause. After a moment, he deleted the name and mouthed ‘Matthew’ as he spelled it out on the keyboard. That’s the name his brother preferred to go by, wasn’t it? Matthew. Not Mattie or Matt or ‘Who are you agai-ow, Mattie, I was only joking, jeeze!’
Alfred wrapped the memories as they came to him around his heart like a blanket and continued.
‘Matthew, I just wanted to say… I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I missed all of those games you wanted to go to, I’m sorry for all those times I ignored your calls or said I was sick or working when I really was just playing video games. And… I’m really sorry for that time I missed your birthday, because that was a lousy move on my part, and… Yeah. Don’t really blame you for decking me when I came to pick you up for my birthday.’
Something shuffled down the hall. He heard it as it dragged its feet over the carpeted floor just by the closed bedroom door, and stopped with a thud against the thin wood to let out horrible retching sound. Seemed the occupant of Room 302 hadn’t been missing at all. Alfred waited for a moment, one of his hands leaving the cell phone to creep toward the handgun he had strapped to his thigh. It sounded as though there was only one thing-not person, his mind argued, not anymore-out there. If he had to, he could get a shot in from beneath the bed, then roll out and finish it off with a headshot.
The door shook with another thud, then stilled. He braced himself for the moment when that door would fly open and one of the undead would stumble through, prepared himself, even, for the quick draw. Thanks to the bed, he had some coverage; he wouldn’t even be seen until he had already taken the zombie out. All he had to do was twist his body like so, and… After a final shudder, the noise at the door fell silent and, if he held his breath, Alfred could hear the footsteps drag back toward the living room. He was safe, for now.
He fell back on his shoulders and let out a small sigh of relief, his grip on the cell phone tight. That had been a close one. Sure, he’d have to face the zombie eventually if he wanted to get out of the apartment complex anytime soon, but… He had been fighting off the undead all day, and this wasn’t a video game. He couldn’t just guzzle down a bottle of medicine and keep going forward like an unstoppable killing machine. At some point, he had to rest and since daylight was approaching and visibility would be up-for him and them-it made sense to do it now.
Almost as though the mere thought of sleep reminded him of just how tired he really was, Alfred found himself biting back a yawn as he loosened his grip on the phone. He’d be needing to get to sleep soon, once the first beams of sunlight stretched across the floor from the window. This time, he did yawn at the thought before he stretched and shifted to get himself comfortable. He propped his hands up, with the cell phone clutched between them, on his chest, and tilted his head back to stare at the box spring of the bed again.
His eyes fluttered shut for a moment, as the words he had typed into the phone marched across the back of his eyelids.
‘Matthew, I…’ The words trailed off in his head, and his fingertips hovered over the keys. He struggled with all the things he wanted to say, all the regrets he wanted to voice-everything, really, that had surged up in him when he first found the cell phone discarded on the sidewalk outside. So many things came to his mind, none of which he could put a voice to.
He heard his brother sigh in that soft way of his before he would reach out and touch Alfred’s shoulder. ‘Go on,’ he encouraged.
‘Matthew, I…’ Alfred licked his lips, and mouthed the words as he typed them out with a slow, mechanical precision. ‘I’m sorry that I wasn’t there to protect you when the world fell apart. I hope you’re okay.’
The Matthew voice in his head didn’t say anything.
Alfred let out a sigh and dropped the cell phone over his heart. The joints in his fingers, especially his thumbs, felt stiff and almost numb from how long he had clung to the cell phone. Just how many messages had he typed? How much of his stress and worry and fear-and in the back of his mind, he could admit to himself that he was afraid of just what the world had become-had he pressed into those individual keys? He tried to think of an answer, but all his mind could come up with were all the things he still had left to say.
His jaw popped when he yawned again. He really needed to be getting to sleep, and yet… Alfred found himself picking up the cell phone again and typing away at the keyboard.
‘Yo, Artie! Have I ever told you this pick-up line I heard that actually mentions McDonald’s? I learned it from this guy who was trying to pickup chicks at the grocery store one day, and…’ In his mind, Arthur’s eyebrows bristled in annoyance as he continued typing and twin spots of red started darkening his cheeks until he looked ready to explode. Alfred gave the bed above him a lopsided grin.
‘I'll have it my way and you'll be loving it!’ He finished with a small, amused sound-not a snort, heroes didn’t snort, and ‘honestly, Alfred, must you try to sound so much like a barn animal?’
Alfred closed his eyes to the familiar, almost soothing sound of Arthur scolding him for his ‘inappropriate, tasteless humor’ and cradled the cell phone in his hands as he typed back a few counter jabs just to cause those eyebrows to bristle again.
‘You know, you might want to look out, I think those caterpillars on your face are becoming-‘
‘Those…?’ Arthur spluttered in outrage. ‘You-!’
Something warm hit Alfred’s face, but he didn’t have to open his eyes to know that it was sunlight spilling across the floor and reflecting off the blank, dead screen of the cell phone in his hands.
He gave the bed a dopey grin. ‘I what, Artie?’