The After part ten *completed*
Pairing: Jongup-centric
Rated: PG13
Length: 3K
Part Nine
Songs Again
Jongup shivered as he remembered tying up his brother in the shed, the calm instructions Daehyun gave him on the correct way to tie a knot strong enough to hold him.
How he had dragged his father’s body inside when Daehyun started shivering and staring longingly at the blood smeared across his little brother’s body. Watching Daehyun crawl to it, hands tied behind his back and face buried inside their father’s flesh.
And the teeth.
It was always the teeth that got him.
---
They hid in their apartment for the rest of the day, taking turns on watching out the crack in the curtains. Yongguk could barely walk from the gash in his leg but he tried to keep up with the rest and do his part until Youngjae ordered him to the bedroom to rest. “You’re no good to me dead.” He told him flatly as he helped him into the bed.
Himchan refused to speak to Jongup or even look him in the eye, not that Jongup was trying very hard either. They both had so much to say to each other but neither wanted to be the one to start it.
“There’s at least three dozen of them dead.” Youngjae craned his head over the ledge and tried to count the bodies still on the sidewalk. “I think some of them have been taken. Probably for food.”
He didn’t know how many were left but Jongup knew how smart Daehyun was and he probably didn’t have his whole army out at once. There had to be more. “This is all my fault. If you had just let me leave with him then you three could have stayed up here for at least a few more months before you ran out of food. They never would have found you!”
Youngjae had kept his patience with Jongup all day but he was nearing the point where his calm demeanor snapped. “It’s not going to happen. End of discussion.”
“But-“
“I said end of discussion, Jongup.”
It wasn’t until nightfall that the outside started to show signs of life again. Hoots and cheers and banging sounded below them but they were so high up they couldn’t tell where it was coming from. They could be in the building for all they knew.
“He’s coming.” Jongup sat up straight and pressed his ear against the cold glass. “They’re trying to distract us so Daehyun can get upstairs.”
They waited quietly, barely breathing. Yongguk stumbled out of the bedroom, eyes thick with sleep and his gun held tightly in a shaky hand. His face was flushed and sweaty, the wound infecting his blood and making him delirious.
“What happened?” He fell against Youngjae’s side and buried his face in his neck. “I’m just sick.” He mumbled as he tried to get back onto his feet. “I have a cold or the flu.”
Youngjae’s face was pale. “He’s burning up.” He helped Yongguk to the couch and settled him down with a pillow and a mound of blankets. “Jongup those metal pieces must have been coated with something!”
Himchan quickly wet a rag with some of their collected rain water and wiped his face clean of the sweat. “Shh, it’s okay.” He opened the tied rag around Yongguk’s leg and grimaced. “It’s really really red. His whole leg feels like it’s on fire.”
Their worry over Yongguk made them momentarily forget what was happening outside. All they could do was fret over Yongguk and hope he was stronger than the poison.
A knock on the wall had Youngjae jumping away from the couch with his gun pulled from the back of his jeans. Knuckles continued to drag down the hall, a soft humming barely audible through the thick wood.
“Jonguppie! Come out come out wherever you are!” Daehyun sang. “You all didn’t think you were invisible up here did you? We could see your yummy little heads in the window for days!”
“There’s no way he can figure out where we are.” Himchan’s voice was both soothing and distracting in his ear. “If Youngjae couldn’t do it then there’s no way one of them can.”
The loud boom down the hall was the only sound save for their hearts pounding out of their ribs and breaths gasping in the quiet. Another boom, then another.
“He’s tearing the rooms apart. One by one.” Jongup hung his head and scrubbed his face clean of the escaping tears. “Let me go.” He turned to Youngjae and shook his head. “Just let me go, Jae. I’m all he wants.”
Youngjae’s jaw was clenched tightly, the corner ticking as he thought. “We need to get Yongguk hidden. He can’t defend himself like this.” He stood up and grabbed the older man under the knees swinging him up into his arms. “Himchan go clear out the corner of your parent’s closet. We can throw some clothes over him.”
They left Jongup alone in the living room, his eyes darting towards Himchan’s room where the escape was. This was his chance to get out of here free and clear. Lead Daehyun away with the promise of a willing victim. The only stipulation would be if he made the rest of his followers come too. Youngjae and Himchan would have to stay put for a couple more weeks just to be on the safe side, but they had been there for months, a few more weeks shouldn’t have been a big deal.
And Yongguk… He bit down sharply on his tongue to direct his pain somewhere else.
Yongguk wasn’t going to make it, that was clear. They had no antibiotics and no hope of acquiring them in time. Whatever they had infected him with was quickly rushing through his system.
Jongup was quiet as he slipped out of the living room and into Himchan’s bedroom. He made sure the coast was clear before exiting from Himchan’s hidden apartment to the real one next door. The only way Daehyun would be able to find them was if he really did tear the floor apart room by room and hopefully he could be convinced to leave before that happened.
“Dae?” His head popped into the hallway. The floor was a mess covered in chunks of the wall and dusty bits of plaster all over the carpet. “I’m right here. You can stop now.”
Daehyun turned the corner, his lips pulled down into a frown and eyes dark. “I should rip you apart for what happened outside.” He continued walking even when he was close, his body slamming into Jongup’s and shoving him against the wall. “But I’m a good brother so instead I’ll just eat your friends whole while you watch. Does that sound better?”
Jongup lifted shaky hands to his shoulders and tried to push him away. “Stop Daehyunnie. I’m here so let’s just leave.” He stroked his bare arms soothingly as he led his brother towards the stairs. “We’ll go wherever you want. Just you and me again.”
The dominant part of his brain that was pulsing wildly with the infection was trying to win, Daehyun’s eyes darting hungrily towards the room Jongup had exited. “They won’t be able to leave. Not with all of the ones outside.” He turned pleading eyes towards Jongup and pouted. It jolted Jongup that they had always assumed once the disease took you over that you had no more humanity inside of you but a monster wouldn’t be poking his lip out and batting innocent eyes. His brother wasn’t a monster.
“I’m glad you found me.”
Daehyun blinked confused eyes at him. “I’m glad I found you, too.” His smile was wide, but Jongup focused on the darkness of his eyes, not wanting to see his teeth so close. “Let’s go, Guppie.” His cold calloused hand braided effortlessly with Jongup’s. It was like they had slipped back in time and everything was the way it should be.
They were together. Daehyun and Jongup.
“Stop!”
Beside him Daehyun suddenly grunted in pain, his fingers reaching behind him to grab at his shoulder blade. Jongup was held still with sharp nails and a deep growl until Daehyun had pulled out the knife buried into his skin making dark liquid blossom across his shirt.
“Don’t move.” Youngjae had his gun raised, eyes locked onto Daehyun as he flipped the knife around in his fingers playfully. “I’m sorry, Jongup. I never wanted to do this to you.”
He turned to his brother and placed his palms on his cheeks. “This can’t end with my friends dying, Daehyunnie. The real you, the one that I love and that loves me, he’d never be okay with what you’re doing.”
His reply was choked and full of pain that Jongup never knew they could feel. “But I don’t want to be alone anymore.”
“I know, I know, I’m so sorry.” He pulled him closer and wrapped warm arms around his brother’s shivering body. “I don’t want you to be alone anymore either. But I don’t think Youngjae will let me go.”
Youngjae clicked the safety off of his gun and squared his shoulders. “I’m his brother now. I promise to take care of him, Daehyun. Just like you tried to. Let me have him.”
“But I’m tired.” Daehyun’s hot breath rolled across his neck and Jongup could feel tears dampening his shirt. “What do I do without you, Guppie?”
“Take us instead.”
Their heads snapped towards the quiet murmur coming out of the doorway to the apartment. Himchan emerged with Yongguk clinging to his shoulder, eyes rolling back in his head and rivers of sweat twisting down his dark skin. “Yongguk isn’t going to survive for very much longer and if you infect Jongup I’m just going to walk out and let you bite me, too. So let them go and take us instead.”
Jongup and Youngjae shook their heads in unison. “I’m not giving him Yongguk. Yongguk would never want to be one of them.” Youngjae tried to grab at them but Himchan batted his hands away.
“Are you going to watch him die then?” Himchan took a deep breath and managed a few more steps with the heavy man in his arms. “At least he’ll still be breathing, Youngjae! I know you care more about him then you let on. Are you willing to just sit him in the apartment until the poison kills him?”
“We have medicine.” Daehyun’s eyes disappeared as he smirked. “We’ve always had the medicines. You just never asked.”
Youngjae reached again for Yongguk, his fingers smoothing along the delirious boy’s eyelids. “I don’t want him to die.” His chin trembled and he pulled Yongguk away from Himchan. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
This was the first time Jongup had saw the amount of emotion in Youngjae’s eyes when he looked at Yongguk. He had noticed them growing steadily closer since Junhong died but it had never clicked in his head until he saw Youngjae’s quiet whispers against his lips.
“There’s no promises he’ll survive.” Daehyun told Himchan flatly, keeping Jongup firmly against him. “And Jongup would never let you sacrifice yourself just to save his life. He barely lived through it happening to me.”
Himchan reached the two of them and smiled softly at Jongup. He was frozen with fear and Himchan’s name was stuck in his throat but his jaw was clenched so tightly he couldn’t get it out. “Youngjae will help him through it just like he always does.” Fingers ran through Jongup’s dusty hair. “I know you didn’t mean the things you said earlier, Jongup. I know you were just trying to make it easier.” With a low whine Jongup let go of Daehyun’s waist and threw himself into Himchan’s waiting arms. “You must be pretty special to have two people give up their lives for you.”
“Himchannie?”
“If you changed into one of them and left me all alone without you then I would hate you until the day I died. This way is better.” He breathed in a final gulp of Himchan’s sweet smelling skin as he said goodbye to someone else he didn’t want to lose. “And now Yongguk gets to live.”
He could feel Youngjae pulling weakly on his sleeve but he didn’t want to let go, not of another person. He’d lost so many people he cared about, people he loved. Frail hands reached towards him and he finally saw just how bad his brother really looked. Bones poked through the thin skin and his cheekbones were gaunt and gray. There was no trace of the tan skin and warm eyes that he knew every fleck of color in.
“Come on, Jongup.” He had never heard Youngjae cry before but now his voice was thick with the effort at holding back his sobs. “We need to leave.”
His fingers scrambled for Himchan’s as he was being tugged away. All he could see was Himchan and Daehyun side by side as they silently watched him being dragged down the hall.
“Himchan!” His body twisted in Youngjae’s hold but the older boy had always been stronger than him and he was near exhaustion. “Daehyunnie! Don’t- Youngjae let me go! Don’t do it! Let me go!”
The last thing he saw as Youngjae forced him still screaming into the stairwell was Daehyun’s slow grin as he stepped towards Himchan.
---
Barely six months had passed inside the apartment. Six months and their whole lives had changed. They were Jongup and Youngjae again but this time things were different.
Their arms were tangled as they walked, both boys too scared to let the other one go. Their mouths were silent for fear that if they opened them they would start screaming and never stop.
Daehyun had ingrained Jongup’s protection so deep into his follower’s skulls that they didn’t even try to fight him when they emerged onto the street. Their hungry eyes followed them as they left the city and headed towards a new home. One where they could start over again.
Jongup couldn’t take it anymore. He was past the point of sane and covered in his own vomit and Youngjae’s blood as he fought him wildly to get back to Himchan. Youngjae had held tightly to him no matter what he said or did, his eyes clenched tightly and Yongguk’s name spilling from his lips.
“No more.” He managed to mumble as he dropped to his knees in the road. “Tired.”
They had been walking for two days with no end in sight. There was no food and the only weapons they had were Jongup’s pocketknife and the gun Youngjae had used to aim at Daehyun. This was going to be a starting over for them in more ways than one.
“Let’s look for some shelter in the next town.” Youngjae hauled him to his feet again and wrapped an arm around his waist to carry most of his weight. “There’s buildings up ahead.”
He managed to get them into the town but they had no idea what to do next. This was somewhere they’d never been before and they didn’t know if it was inhabited or empty. Youngjae chose an average house with a small garage in the backyard that still had the security bar attached. That was probably all the protection they were going to get until they found more guns. Food though was first on their list.
“I’m going to go search the house. You lock the door behind me and stay quiet.”
He had no reason to warn him. Jongup had barely made any noise since the screaming at Youngjae had taken his voice and left his throat sore and raw.
Youngjae came back with a can of vegetables and a bucket to use for rainwater. “We need something sharp to open it with. See if you can find a saw or something on your side.”
They searched for a moment before Jongup remembered his multi-instrument pocketknife. “Who knew this would come in handy someday?” He rasped out, throwing the knife across the shed to Youngjae. The can was old and the can opener was dull but after a few minutes Youngjae had it open. He immediately handed it over to Jongup and forced him to eat half before he did.
“Just us again.” Youngjae looked despondently around the walls of the slowly darkening shed.
Jongup realized he was etching Himchan’s name into the dirt with his knife and quickly forced himself to stop. “Do you think they’ll come after us?” He closed his eyes and remembered Himchan’s smile the way it was and not the disgusting rotted mess it would soon become. “Like Daehyun did?”
Youngjae lowered himself to his back and crossed his arms behind his head. “I’m counting on it.”
---
He was fourteen when The After happened. The planet continued on the way it always had, the sun still warmed their faces and grew the green grass until it was taller than men and full of deadly surprises.
It had been five years since he’d lost his brother to the infection and one since the last time he had seen his friends. For so long he had been running and he knew that to stop meant the end.
For Moon Jongup, this was the rest of his life.
--------------------------------------------
A/N First things first: NO SEQUEL. This story was very draining and Jongup completely broke my heart every time I wrote on it and I really don't want to go there again. So before you all ask, this is the end. You have to decide for yourselves if they found them. *Realistically, I say yes though*
I had another ending chapter wrote, but it didn't flow very well so I deleted it and started over. It was going to end with Daehyun finding them and sneaking into the building and trying to turn Jongup but Youngjae found them and shot Daehyun. Then a few days later Jongup found out that Daehyun had bitten Himchan on his way in thinking that if Himchan was turned then Jongup would willingly come to him. Himchan had been hiding it so Jongup was forced to kill him. Then it ended with Youngjae, Jongup and Yongguk searching for a new apartment.
I know some people will be upset that there's no definite ending, but this honestly wasn't a cop-out. I really really thought long and hard on how to realistically end a zombie apocalypse. And then I realized, Jongup would never let anyone hurt Daehyun. No matter what he did, Daehyun was the most important person in his life and I couldn't end it with Daehyun dying because then Jongup would be irreversibly broken. So after I got that figured out the rest just kinda fell into place. I thought that ending it the way it began would be interesting. The same two characters doing the same things with the same opening paragraph only slightly changed up a bit. But yeah, in my head they were found eventually and turned because it was now three against two. A sequel wouldn't be very interesting because it would be basically a repeat of this story.
Thank you to everyone that read this and cared about my characters with me. This is one of my favorite things I've done (it took me an entire month to write) and it's my third longest fic so this Jongup kind of became my baby as I wrote it.
Rated: PG13
Length: 3K
Part Nine
Songs Again
Jongup shivered as he remembered tying up his brother in the shed, the calm instructions Daehyun gave him on the correct way to tie a knot strong enough to hold him.
How he had dragged his father’s body inside when Daehyun started shivering and staring longingly at the blood smeared across his little brother’s body. Watching Daehyun crawl to it, hands tied behind his back and face buried inside their father’s flesh.
And the teeth.
It was always the teeth that got him.
---
They hid in their apartment for the rest of the day, taking turns on watching out the crack in the curtains. Yongguk could barely walk from the gash in his leg but he tried to keep up with the rest and do his part until Youngjae ordered him to the bedroom to rest. “You’re no good to me dead.” He told him flatly as he helped him into the bed.
Himchan refused to speak to Jongup or even look him in the eye, not that Jongup was trying very hard either. They both had so much to say to each other but neither wanted to be the one to start it.
“There’s at least three dozen of them dead.” Youngjae craned his head over the ledge and tried to count the bodies still on the sidewalk. “I think some of them have been taken. Probably for food.”
He didn’t know how many were left but Jongup knew how smart Daehyun was and he probably didn’t have his whole army out at once. There had to be more. “This is all my fault. If you had just let me leave with him then you three could have stayed up here for at least a few more months before you ran out of food. They never would have found you!”
Youngjae had kept his patience with Jongup all day but he was nearing the point where his calm demeanor snapped. “It’s not going to happen. End of discussion.”
“But-“
“I said end of discussion, Jongup.”
It wasn’t until nightfall that the outside started to show signs of life again. Hoots and cheers and banging sounded below them but they were so high up they couldn’t tell where it was coming from. They could be in the building for all they knew.
“He’s coming.” Jongup sat up straight and pressed his ear against the cold glass. “They’re trying to distract us so Daehyun can get upstairs.”
They waited quietly, barely breathing. Yongguk stumbled out of the bedroom, eyes thick with sleep and his gun held tightly in a shaky hand. His face was flushed and sweaty, the wound infecting his blood and making him delirious.
“What happened?” He fell against Youngjae’s side and buried his face in his neck. “I’m just sick.” He mumbled as he tried to get back onto his feet. “I have a cold or the flu.”
Youngjae’s face was pale. “He’s burning up.” He helped Yongguk to the couch and settled him down with a pillow and a mound of blankets. “Jongup those metal pieces must have been coated with something!”
Himchan quickly wet a rag with some of their collected rain water and wiped his face clean of the sweat. “Shh, it’s okay.” He opened the tied rag around Yongguk’s leg and grimaced. “It’s really really red. His whole leg feels like it’s on fire.”
Their worry over Yongguk made them momentarily forget what was happening outside. All they could do was fret over Yongguk and hope he was stronger than the poison.
A knock on the wall had Youngjae jumping away from the couch with his gun pulled from the back of his jeans. Knuckles continued to drag down the hall, a soft humming barely audible through the thick wood.
“Jonguppie! Come out come out wherever you are!” Daehyun sang. “You all didn’t think you were invisible up here did you? We could see your yummy little heads in the window for days!”
“There’s no way he can figure out where we are.” Himchan’s voice was both soothing and distracting in his ear. “If Youngjae couldn’t do it then there’s no way one of them can.”
The loud boom down the hall was the only sound save for their hearts pounding out of their ribs and breaths gasping in the quiet. Another boom, then another.
“He’s tearing the rooms apart. One by one.” Jongup hung his head and scrubbed his face clean of the escaping tears. “Let me go.” He turned to Youngjae and shook his head. “Just let me go, Jae. I’m all he wants.”
Youngjae’s jaw was clenched tightly, the corner ticking as he thought. “We need to get Yongguk hidden. He can’t defend himself like this.” He stood up and grabbed the older man under the knees swinging him up into his arms. “Himchan go clear out the corner of your parent’s closet. We can throw some clothes over him.”
They left Jongup alone in the living room, his eyes darting towards Himchan’s room where the escape was. This was his chance to get out of here free and clear. Lead Daehyun away with the promise of a willing victim. The only stipulation would be if he made the rest of his followers come too. Youngjae and Himchan would have to stay put for a couple more weeks just to be on the safe side, but they had been there for months, a few more weeks shouldn’t have been a big deal.
And Yongguk… He bit down sharply on his tongue to direct his pain somewhere else.
Yongguk wasn’t going to make it, that was clear. They had no antibiotics and no hope of acquiring them in time. Whatever they had infected him with was quickly rushing through his system.
Jongup was quiet as he slipped out of the living room and into Himchan’s bedroom. He made sure the coast was clear before exiting from Himchan’s hidden apartment to the real one next door. The only way Daehyun would be able to find them was if he really did tear the floor apart room by room and hopefully he could be convinced to leave before that happened.
“Dae?” His head popped into the hallway. The floor was a mess covered in chunks of the wall and dusty bits of plaster all over the carpet. “I’m right here. You can stop now.”
Daehyun turned the corner, his lips pulled down into a frown and eyes dark. “I should rip you apart for what happened outside.” He continued walking even when he was close, his body slamming into Jongup’s and shoving him against the wall. “But I’m a good brother so instead I’ll just eat your friends whole while you watch. Does that sound better?”
Jongup lifted shaky hands to his shoulders and tried to push him away. “Stop Daehyunnie. I’m here so let’s just leave.” He stroked his bare arms soothingly as he led his brother towards the stairs. “We’ll go wherever you want. Just you and me again.”
The dominant part of his brain that was pulsing wildly with the infection was trying to win, Daehyun’s eyes darting hungrily towards the room Jongup had exited. “They won’t be able to leave. Not with all of the ones outside.” He turned pleading eyes towards Jongup and pouted. It jolted Jongup that they had always assumed once the disease took you over that you had no more humanity inside of you but a monster wouldn’t be poking his lip out and batting innocent eyes. His brother wasn’t a monster.
“I’m glad you found me.”
Daehyun blinked confused eyes at him. “I’m glad I found you, too.” His smile was wide, but Jongup focused on the darkness of his eyes, not wanting to see his teeth so close. “Let’s go, Guppie.” His cold calloused hand braided effortlessly with Jongup’s. It was like they had slipped back in time and everything was the way it should be.
They were together. Daehyun and Jongup.
“Stop!”
Beside him Daehyun suddenly grunted in pain, his fingers reaching behind him to grab at his shoulder blade. Jongup was held still with sharp nails and a deep growl until Daehyun had pulled out the knife buried into his skin making dark liquid blossom across his shirt.
“Don’t move.” Youngjae had his gun raised, eyes locked onto Daehyun as he flipped the knife around in his fingers playfully. “I’m sorry, Jongup. I never wanted to do this to you.”
He turned to his brother and placed his palms on his cheeks. “This can’t end with my friends dying, Daehyunnie. The real you, the one that I love and that loves me, he’d never be okay with what you’re doing.”
His reply was choked and full of pain that Jongup never knew they could feel. “But I don’t want to be alone anymore.”
“I know, I know, I’m so sorry.” He pulled him closer and wrapped warm arms around his brother’s shivering body. “I don’t want you to be alone anymore either. But I don’t think Youngjae will let me go.”
Youngjae clicked the safety off of his gun and squared his shoulders. “I’m his brother now. I promise to take care of him, Daehyun. Just like you tried to. Let me have him.”
“But I’m tired.” Daehyun’s hot breath rolled across his neck and Jongup could feel tears dampening his shirt. “What do I do without you, Guppie?”
“Take us instead.”
Their heads snapped towards the quiet murmur coming out of the doorway to the apartment. Himchan emerged with Yongguk clinging to his shoulder, eyes rolling back in his head and rivers of sweat twisting down his dark skin. “Yongguk isn’t going to survive for very much longer and if you infect Jongup I’m just going to walk out and let you bite me, too. So let them go and take us instead.”
Jongup and Youngjae shook their heads in unison. “I’m not giving him Yongguk. Yongguk would never want to be one of them.” Youngjae tried to grab at them but Himchan batted his hands away.
“Are you going to watch him die then?” Himchan took a deep breath and managed a few more steps with the heavy man in his arms. “At least he’ll still be breathing, Youngjae! I know you care more about him then you let on. Are you willing to just sit him in the apartment until the poison kills him?”
“We have medicine.” Daehyun’s eyes disappeared as he smirked. “We’ve always had the medicines. You just never asked.”
Youngjae reached again for Yongguk, his fingers smoothing along the delirious boy’s eyelids. “I don’t want him to die.” His chin trembled and he pulled Yongguk away from Himchan. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
This was the first time Jongup had saw the amount of emotion in Youngjae’s eyes when he looked at Yongguk. He had noticed them growing steadily closer since Junhong died but it had never clicked in his head until he saw Youngjae’s quiet whispers against his lips.
“There’s no promises he’ll survive.” Daehyun told Himchan flatly, keeping Jongup firmly against him. “And Jongup would never let you sacrifice yourself just to save his life. He barely lived through it happening to me.”
Himchan reached the two of them and smiled softly at Jongup. He was frozen with fear and Himchan’s name was stuck in his throat but his jaw was clenched so tightly he couldn’t get it out. “Youngjae will help him through it just like he always does.” Fingers ran through Jongup’s dusty hair. “I know you didn’t mean the things you said earlier, Jongup. I know you were just trying to make it easier.” With a low whine Jongup let go of Daehyun’s waist and threw himself into Himchan’s waiting arms. “You must be pretty special to have two people give up their lives for you.”
“Himchannie?”
“If you changed into one of them and left me all alone without you then I would hate you until the day I died. This way is better.” He breathed in a final gulp of Himchan’s sweet smelling skin as he said goodbye to someone else he didn’t want to lose. “And now Yongguk gets to live.”
He could feel Youngjae pulling weakly on his sleeve but he didn’t want to let go, not of another person. He’d lost so many people he cared about, people he loved. Frail hands reached towards him and he finally saw just how bad his brother really looked. Bones poked through the thin skin and his cheekbones were gaunt and gray. There was no trace of the tan skin and warm eyes that he knew every fleck of color in.
“Come on, Jongup.” He had never heard Youngjae cry before but now his voice was thick with the effort at holding back his sobs. “We need to leave.”
His fingers scrambled for Himchan’s as he was being tugged away. All he could see was Himchan and Daehyun side by side as they silently watched him being dragged down the hall.
“Himchan!” His body twisted in Youngjae’s hold but the older boy had always been stronger than him and he was near exhaustion. “Daehyunnie! Don’t- Youngjae let me go! Don’t do it! Let me go!”
The last thing he saw as Youngjae forced him still screaming into the stairwell was Daehyun’s slow grin as he stepped towards Himchan.
---
Barely six months had passed inside the apartment. Six months and their whole lives had changed. They were Jongup and Youngjae again but this time things were different.
Their arms were tangled as they walked, both boys too scared to let the other one go. Their mouths were silent for fear that if they opened them they would start screaming and never stop.
Daehyun had ingrained Jongup’s protection so deep into his follower’s skulls that they didn’t even try to fight him when they emerged onto the street. Their hungry eyes followed them as they left the city and headed towards a new home. One where they could start over again.
Jongup couldn’t take it anymore. He was past the point of sane and covered in his own vomit and Youngjae’s blood as he fought him wildly to get back to Himchan. Youngjae had held tightly to him no matter what he said or did, his eyes clenched tightly and Yongguk’s name spilling from his lips.
“No more.” He managed to mumble as he dropped to his knees in the road. “Tired.”
They had been walking for two days with no end in sight. There was no food and the only weapons they had were Jongup’s pocketknife and the gun Youngjae had used to aim at Daehyun. This was going to be a starting over for them in more ways than one.
“Let’s look for some shelter in the next town.” Youngjae hauled him to his feet again and wrapped an arm around his waist to carry most of his weight. “There’s buildings up ahead.”
He managed to get them into the town but they had no idea what to do next. This was somewhere they’d never been before and they didn’t know if it was inhabited or empty. Youngjae chose an average house with a small garage in the backyard that still had the security bar attached. That was probably all the protection they were going to get until they found more guns. Food though was first on their list.
“I’m going to go search the house. You lock the door behind me and stay quiet.”
He had no reason to warn him. Jongup had barely made any noise since the screaming at Youngjae had taken his voice and left his throat sore and raw.
Youngjae came back with a can of vegetables and a bucket to use for rainwater. “We need something sharp to open it with. See if you can find a saw or something on your side.”
They searched for a moment before Jongup remembered his multi-instrument pocketknife. “Who knew this would come in handy someday?” He rasped out, throwing the knife across the shed to Youngjae. The can was old and the can opener was dull but after a few minutes Youngjae had it open. He immediately handed it over to Jongup and forced him to eat half before he did.
“Just us again.” Youngjae looked despondently around the walls of the slowly darkening shed.
Jongup realized he was etching Himchan’s name into the dirt with his knife and quickly forced himself to stop. “Do you think they’ll come after us?” He closed his eyes and remembered Himchan’s smile the way it was and not the disgusting rotted mess it would soon become. “Like Daehyun did?”
Youngjae lowered himself to his back and crossed his arms behind his head. “I’m counting on it.”
---
He was fourteen when The After happened. The planet continued on the way it always had, the sun still warmed their faces and grew the green grass until it was taller than men and full of deadly surprises.
It had been five years since he’d lost his brother to the infection and one since the last time he had seen his friends. For so long he had been running and he knew that to stop meant the end.
For Moon Jongup, this was the rest of his life.
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A/N First things first: NO SEQUEL. This story was very draining and Jongup completely broke my heart every time I wrote on it and I really don't want to go there again. So before you all ask, this is the end. You have to decide for yourselves if they found them. *Realistically, I say yes though*
I had another ending chapter wrote, but it didn't flow very well so I deleted it and started over. It was going to end with Daehyun finding them and sneaking into the building and trying to turn Jongup but Youngjae found them and shot Daehyun. Then a few days later Jongup found out that Daehyun had bitten Himchan on his way in thinking that if Himchan was turned then Jongup would willingly come to him. Himchan had been hiding it so Jongup was forced to kill him. Then it ended with Youngjae, Jongup and Yongguk searching for a new apartment.
I know some people will be upset that there's no definite ending, but this honestly wasn't a cop-out. I really really thought long and hard on how to realistically end a zombie apocalypse. And then I realized, Jongup would never let anyone hurt Daehyun. No matter what he did, Daehyun was the most important person in his life and I couldn't end it with Daehyun dying because then Jongup would be irreversibly broken. So after I got that figured out the rest just kinda fell into place. I thought that ending it the way it began would be interesting. The same two characters doing the same things with the same opening paragraph only slightly changed up a bit. But yeah, in my head they were found eventually and turned because it was now three against two. A sequel wouldn't be very interesting because it would be basically a repeat of this story.
Thank you to everyone that read this and cared about my characters with me. This is one of my favorite things I've done (it took me an entire month to write) and it's my third longest fic so this Jongup kind of became my baby as I wrote it.