Among The Ruins (1/2)
Title: Among The Ruins (1/2)
Pairing: Daehyun/Junhong (Daelo)
Rating: PG for use of ammunition and vague zombie description
Length: 5100w
Type: Two shot
Genre: Supernatural, zombie AU
Summary: He searches and searches, unable to know what he had been looking for all this time. Until he played the hero.
Author's note: genre aka Post Apocalypse Dystopian Romance (wat)
Daehyun watches Junhong's hunched figure next to the broken bricks of the wall serving as a window to the painful reminder of what was once an outside world buzzing with energy. Now what could be seen through it are the ruins, the damaged city of Seoul due to its hundreds of failed attempts of survival to free itself from the constrictions of the infection that has spread out like wildfire and took thousands of lives, only to turn them into the living dead. With the realization that they had been fighting a war they had long lost in, the people eventually gave up from saving themselves. And now as the number of the living is gradually subsiding, the current population of the city now consists more-greatly-of the living dead or Infects, as the people have referred to them.
Junhong is leaning against what's left of the crumbled brick walls, a far away look in his eyes as he hugs his knees that he's pulled up to his chest. The bitter glow of the moon minutely bounces off Junhong's facial features from a certain angle and Daehyun thinks that Junhong is beautiful, the solemnly tragic kind of beautiful that has Daehyun's heart wrenching and his hands closing to fists.
Junhong takes notice of Daehyun's presence and turns his head to look at the other standing in the darkness of their makeshift apartment. Daehyun holds his breath as Junhong gazes at him for a second, a minute, before looking up at the full moon again.
"Why do you still choose to live hyung?" He asks bleakly and it takes Daehyun a moment to realize the younger is addressing him.
Daehyun tenses.
"How come you're still struggling to keep yourself alive with all the useless effort, running away from death when it's the easiest way out of this... this hell?"
Daehyun furrows his eyebrows, gaze fixated on the younger's lean figure. "Wouldn't it be the same for you?"
A humorless chuckle leaves Junhong's lips, its melancholy doesn't appeal Daehyun. "I'm afraid of death, hyung," Junhong answers, as if amused by the inquiry. "I want to leave but I don't want to die."
The night Daehyun meets Junhong is the same night he ends his aimless wandering.
The weather is harsh and cold, strong winds adding up to the eeriness of the empty streets. The sun is setting, casting a dust of orange in the skies overhead indicating that darkness is about to cave in and Daehyun has to be more careful about his surroundings so he hovers his hand just above the gun in his back pocket in case the need of its use arises. He walks in careful steps, keeps his senses on the alert as he maneuvers along the clusters of reeking lifeless bodies spread out in the high rise area.
He's been doing this for months, traveling from one ruined town to another to scavenge for anything consumable to keep himself from starving. That's what happens in the morning though, but what he does after his daily feed is something of no purpose. He would hop off his motorcycle, assure that his gun in his pocket and would scurry off to survey a certain area.
He encounters dead, gruesome bodies a lot, they're everywhere decorating the city in a tragic manner. But the occurrences of him coming across an actual infect, simultaneously an actual person, are far and few in between fortunately, but at the same time it ineptly refutes his gun shooting accuracy skills to improve and to be practiced constantly so when he hears a distinct sound from one of the street alleyways he almost unprofessionally loses his grip from the gun as he hoists it out of his pocket for self-defense. He curses himself as he wraps his fingers tight around the gun and raises it in front of his chest.
This time the shuffling sounds are louder and continuous, and there is apparent but familiar growling. Daehyun slowly ambles toward the peak of the entrance of the alleyway, unsure of himself, but what he sees is something that almost makes his pulse stop. Two creatures were standing at the end of the dark alley. One, with its back facing Daehyun, is undoubtedly an infect.
The other is human.
A tall boy. Trembling in fear, a knife enclosed in his fist, slowly backing up against the alley wall as the disgusting infect snarls at him. He's its next meal in a matter of seconds.
Daehyun is too shocked to have his reflexes respond faster and before he knows it, the infect has closed in on the boy and he emits a sharp wail that echoes throughout the entire city.
But the boy has stabbed the infect out of impulse, minutely paralyzing it from any other movement. It gurgles, resumes to groan up at him as it crouches. He stares back, frightened, his cheeks streaked with tears.
But another problem arises almost too soon. Daehyun looks around the pavement and watches with horror as a few, a couple, almost a hundred of the supposed lifeless bodies stir and stumble up one by one, the ground shaking noise of the boy's cry causing them to wake.
Something in Daehyun's brain clicks and he bolts toward the unnamed boy, promptly kicking the infect in front of him to the ground and shooting it through its skull for a sure kill. The boy stares at Daehyun with wide eyes, chest heaving, the situation barely registering in his head. Daehyun looks right into the other's eyes in hopes that through it, they can build up a tacit agreement within two seconds. You need to trust me.
Daehyun grabs the boy's wrist and runs off the alley toward the main road, blindly shooting at the forming crowd of infects that were making their way to the meaty humans. Daehyun's legs grow weak but he flashes past the gruesome dead with a strong hold on the boy's arm.
They hoist themselves up on Daehyun's motorcycle and the boy wraps his arms around the elder's waist without second thought as the other zips off away from the sudden onslaught of infects in that certain town, promising himself that he'd never come back there again. The boy is crying, crying against the back of Daehyun's shoulder and he doesn't mind.
The night Daehyun meets Junhong is the same night he ends his aimless wandering.
Yongguk was one of the first few victims of the virus outbreak, and Daehyun had been there to witness it all.
It started with the headaches, frequent ones that Yongguk would whine about every time he'd get home from work. Within a week, fever came and Yongguk couldn't get up from bed and Daehyun had to skip classes because the older was blazing with heat and having breathing difficulties. Sometime between the period of coughing blood out, untimely wheezing and his stomach rejecting food, Daehyun rushed the older to the hospital.
The doctors said his lungs were starting to fail. Yongguk got vitiated by an unnamed epidemic that, one by one, were rendering his internal organs useless. In other words, or as Daehyun understood it, Yongguk was slowly but painfully dying. Since then, all Daehyun could see was the digital clock over Yongguk's head counting down the days he had left to live.
Daehyun promised himself that he wouldn't cry. But when you no longer have a family to call your own aside from your brother, the situation tended to hurt more than necessary, Yongguk was the only one Daehyun had left.
By the twelfth week, Daehyun was next to Yongguk's deathbed, watching, waiting for the life to be completely seeped out of him like a sponge. The life support system was the only thing keeping his brother alive. And the tests indicated that the virus was climbing its way up to his brain. It's about to ruin the rest of him, they said.
By the time the doctors had given up on trying to lengthen Yongguk's life and were personally asking Daehyun if he wanted cut the life support, Daehyun had long found the answer in what's left of the hold of his brother's gaze. He didn't want Yongguk to suffer anymore.
Daehyun left his brother's corpse in the mortuary, trudging home to weep over his own loss alone. His brother had been the closest thing he had to a father after his parents immediate death a few years into his birth, Yongguk took care of him, raised him, became his bestest friend. With him gone, Daehyun really had no idea what to do with himself anymore.
The news announced the virus outbreak a month after Yongguk's death. There were the repeated cases for hospital patients, with the same exact symptoms and effects that had appeared during Yongguk's burden. There was the sudden rapid death rate in the district, and then there came the unthinkable rise of the ghouls. Some sick fuck scientist had been trying to generate a medicine to keep the dying from permanent deterioration. His first test subject? Himself. Apparently, what’s supposed to heal your failing organs come to worsen their condition and that’s when the virus would come alive to eat you up from the inside. For people who had low immune systems, the aerial contaminations were what would kill them. For the people who were particularly resistant? The people who had low immune systems, if they couldn't be too careful. Daehyun thought he'd only see zombies in Hollywood movies.
Daehyun takes his jacket off and sends it flying toward the sofa as soon as he enters his apartment, the boy he has saved from the infects trailing on his tail. The younger hesitates, backing up to the door and causing it to close shut, carefully eyeing the place with his bloodshot eyes.
Daehyun heads for the fridge, producing a small bottle of water and pointing it at the boy's direction. "Drink?"
The other looks down, eyebrows furrowed.
Daehyun sighs sympathetically and drops the bottle on the dining table in case the boy changes his mind. "My name is Daehyun. And I know I'm a stranger but you're the first actual living person I've seen in, what, six months?" Daehyun studies the younger, takes note of his porcelain white skin, the dark circles underneath his puffy eyes, a pair of chapped lips. "Can you tell me your name?"
It takes a few more seconds of silence before the younger can look back up at Daehyun again. "Junhong," he responds. "Choi Junhong."
"Junhong," Daehyun begins again. "Do you need company?"
Junhong nods.
Daehyun needs company too.
"I stock my apartment with food almost everyday, but when it's running out and when I can't find anything more in the area, that's when I move places. If we'd be lucky we can find another dorm like this one, it still runs water, have tolerable furniture, and free from deceased bodies, but I tend to survey a whole apartment complex before deciding to live in any for reassurance of our safety. You are not to go out alone by yourself without my permission, you understand? I'd give you a gun but right now, I only have one."
Junhong listens blankly to the rapid fire of Daehyun's words as the older of the two shuffles in and out the bedroom and the living room, tossing certain papers and newspapers and notebooks on the coffee table right in front of where Junhong is sitting.
"Hey, did you get what I said?" Daehyun asks Junhong when he's done, standing from across the table and placing his hands on his waist.
"I did."
"These are articles, clip outs and written accounts from either facts or my own experience in terminating infects. I've also got a few South Korea maps for... directions and reference. These aren't much but it helps."
"Can I ask you one thing?" Junhong interrupts, looking at Daehyun with such remarkable innocence that for some reason makes the latter straighten his posture.
"What's that?"
"Can I sleep with you in your bed?"
Daehyun hates mornings. In more specific terms, he hates waking up. This especially when the clock says eleven and his body remains to say six and when his dreams have been a little too surreal that drifting into consciousness everyday are entangled with severe disappointment like Oh, right, I live in the zombie world, almost forgot.
Today, he shuffles awake on a, what, Sunday, Monday morning? He's not really aware anymore. Daehyun has long stopped caring enough to pay attention, much less keep track. What's the use of that when each day continues to contain the same shit it has had for months straight anyway?
Daehyun rolls around on his right for a little limb-stretch movement and faces the figure beside him with a tiny jolt and minutely realizes that there might just be a little modification to this morning. (And silently, he hopes this modification will remain for the rest of all of his mornings.)
Junhong's facial features are gentler during slumber, in comparison to its seeming hardness when he's awake; Daehyun prefers the younger like this. The kid's keeping his guard, Daehyun understands, he's young and the worldly situation on hand has got him-is continuing to render him-traumatized. He's lost people too, that's for sure. But just the thought of the poor boy wandering alone in the ghoul filled streets of Seoul before Daehyun found him is enough for the older to suddenly possess a sudden sense of protectiveness over the kid but he commends Junhong as well because how could he have been surviving on solely his own accord? He must've been pretty darn smart.
But what's his story? Daehyun wonders as he stares at the younger's face a few inches away from his. What was his life before the apocalypse? Who was he before the living dead corrupted him emotionally?
It doesn't take long for Daehyun to find out.
It's been three days but as much as they've grown accustomed to each other's presence, they still aren't comfortable enough to actually mingle because what in the world can two strangers talk about during the era of the ghouls?
It's pretty ironic though, in Daehyun's humble opinion, that he and Junhong can share a bed, can share a bathroom, can share clothes, can share the same zombie contaminated air yet they can't even look into each other's eyes for more than three seconds. Daehyun is close to the assumption that he can properly acquaint a stray infect down the road faster than he can with Junhong. Maybe those seven months without human interaction has completely, utterly drenched out Daehyun's human interacting capabilities. He isn't too sure.
Daehyun hasn't gone out of in two days thinking that he can't really leave Junhong alone at home and he can't make the kid come with him outside either. Daehyun can handle himself well out there but the last time when he's actually trying to save a person other than himself from a sea of infects... well... let's just say his grip on Junhong's wrist almost broke the younger's arm into half because Daehyun's been too unsure yet too aggressive as well. At the moment, he's pretty much avoiding impulse decisions. Junhong probably might have enough skills but what if he had just been a hundred rounds lucky before? They have no idea as to what could happen and Daehyun can't lose Junhong, he just got him.
So that makes it all go down to the last few edible objects in the dorm along with a brief "Do you like corned beef?" as Daehyun makes way toward the kitchen area.
Junhong-who's on the sofa, lying on his tummy like a domestic cat as he scans and reads through the tons of papers Daehyun has tossed on top of the coffee table the other other other other day-looks up. "Corned beef."
"Yeah, corned beef." Daehyun stretches his hand up to the cupboard hovering over the kitchen counter and pulls a can out. "Canned. Corned. Beefed. Very healthy?"
Junhong stares at the object in Daehyun's grip, questioning its existence. "You have corned beef."
"Yeah, what did I tell you about my daily city food rummage?"
"Do you even know when that would expire?"
Daehyun flips the can on its bottom side and squints at the numbers. "It says June twenty nine."
"Do you even know what month it is?"
"April?"
"It's the first week of May."
Daehyun blinks before reaching out for a can opener. "Geez, thanks for that enlightening tidbit. I'm still not getting your point."
"Have you ever thought of not dying because of the virus but of food poisoning?"
"If it's really May right now then we've got like a month more before this corned beef rots, so just chill."
"So you've been eating without checking the expiry date."
"Yep and I'm still alive yeeha-OW, GOD, FUCK-"
Junhong shoots straight up from the couch, eyes widening, the papers falling off from his fingers and scattering all over the living room floor as he hurries toward the kitchen counter beside Daehyun. "Christ, are you okay?"
"I sliced the skin off my finger with a freaking can opener, yup I'm totally fine," Daehyun manages to seethe through his clenched teeth as he grips on his left hand pointer, presses it to his stomach and crouches over it, wincing.
Junhong sighs and stirs Daehyun by the shoulder. "Let me see it."
"Go away."
"Goddammit, don't be such a girl and just show it to me before an infect could smell your stinky blood and run straight up our apartment."
Daehyun gives him an offended glare, stiffens up his posture and holds out his palm (and he swears it's not because the younger's height is pretty intimidating.) "There."
Junhong grabs Daehyun's outstretched hand and tugs him a bit forward as he studies the cut by the edge of the older's pointer oozing with slight blood. "Pussy," he snorts.
"Hey, hey, watch your mouth," Daehyun scolds. "I saved you from like a battalion of soulless creatures."
Junhong magically produces a band aid from the back pocket of his jeans and waves it in front of Daehyun's nose. "Exactly why someone who's so skilled in holding a gun can't put a proper grip on a can opener."
Daehyun makes a face. "Where did that band aid even come from."
"I always cut myself with a knife so I always have them in my pocket, it's been a habit to keep a few wads."
Daehyun watches as Junhong rolls the band aid around the edge of the older's pointer and flattens it expertly. A pregnant pause erupts in the air since they're both just left staring at Daehyun's cut and Daehyun tries to say "Thanks," just as Junhong does. Awkward.
Daehyun coughs. "For the band aid, I mean."
Junhong hums in acknowledgment along with a final swipe on the now-bandaged cut.
"What are you thanking me for, then?"
"Oh, nothing, just for-you know-saving me from a battalion of soulless creatures."
Somewhere between a full out duo coordination to fry the corned beef and to make rice by the gas stove, Junhong gradually shares tidbits about his past life.
He's sixteen. Orphaned at eleven. Wanted to major in performing arts. Had a pet dog. Went to school daily until an infect found its way inside his institutional premises which caused chaos as the news traveled across their town, Mokpo, resulting to everyone attempting to flee from the city but the trip to Seoul was long and the virus case in the capital was really pretty bad already then.
"The municipality provided these huge yellow school buses the civilians can ride in for town migration," Junhong says as he and Daehyun move toward the living room couch with their plates of food and corned beef. "I had my best friend with me and they brought us citizens to this facility, which is honestly just a poor excuse for an evacuation center. But then not everyone was strong enough for aerial contamination immunization. I've seen the news. So Jongup and I ran away to at least spare ourselves for a while longer." For a moment, Junhong hesitates on continuing, furrows his eyebrows the way Daehyun usually finds him doing. "We had a hard time finding a proper place to crash in without having to worry about our safety, I mean we really barely survived. And then sometime along trying to move into another place, I lost him... When you found me I've been trying to look for him for eleven days and... Well, he's probably dead now or something."
Daehyun just stares at the food on his plate. "I'm sorry."
"Nah, it's cool." Junhong shrugs, bringing up a serving of spoon to his mouth. "One of us would always end up dead earlier than the other no matter what the case way anyway. Least I have you now."
Daehyun raises an eyebrow. "So what am I, like a best friend replacement of some sort?"
"No, I'm just saying that while our fates of turning into an infect hasn't arrived yet, I mean, we can like be around each other for now, right? We possibly could be the last two people on earth now."
Daehyun chews on a mouthful of corned beef. "Yeah, wouldn't want to be one in a million ghouls again."
"Me neither. So don't die."
"Don't turn into a zombie while I'm asleep."
Junhong snorts. "Yeah, you wouldn't want to wake up to that."
"It'd be gross."
Fits of laughter and chuckles bounce of the walls of the apartment, temporarily overpowering the nauseous atmosphere that the environment usually emits. And Daehyun thinks he can get used to this, thinks he wants to get used to this, thinks that it's a small grip to what's left of the previous world they once had. At least for a moment, he forgets about reality, goes back to the remnants of his nightly dreams where he's actually happy.
It's starting to convince Daehyun that Junhong really is a special modification to his everyday. And what more, their relationship is progressing.
They sure are ready to kick some zombie ass.
"I say rifle."
"Knife."
"Rifle can kill with one shot."
"I'm more accurate with a knife."
"How the hell have you been saving yourself with a knife?"
"Stab. Dodge. Run."
"Breathless. Exhausted. Dead."
"Shoot one infect. Attract a thousand more. Run out of bullets. Dead."
"Stab one infect. Attract a thousand more. Gets run over by infects. Dead."
Junhong indignantly emits a gurgling sound as he descends down the last few steps of the apartment staircase with Daehyun right behind him. Their flight down the stairs from the tenth floor acrimoniously continues to consist of an argument on whether should Junhong get himself a rifle or should he just stick with his knife. Daehyun strongly insists on the former, ranting about how Junhong is his protégé or some shit and that the younger must listen to him because he is a veteran in self armor. Junhong never groaned so much in his lifetime. It is a long, logistic battle to argue with Daehyun.
Junhong had told Daehyun that it is a Wednesday on the fourteenth of May, eight days since they met, eight days of ramen and corned beef and tuna and hotdogs which why Daehyun has worked up the balls to decide that he should really go hunt for food-with Junhong's participation. It's been eight days since the both of them set outside again, and the sky seemed to turn into an angrier shade of orange despite the fact that it's still pretty early in the morning.
"It's the goddamn civilization of the living dead, Junhong," Daehyun says as he walks next to Junhong who's practically bouncing toward the front of the building where the motorcycle's parked. "If there's any better time for dangerous risks, it's now."
Junhong slumps his shoulders and rolls his eyes. "If we're talking about strategic purposes, I ain't hearing you."
"There's a high chance that we might encounter a mass of infects again, dumbass, make that brain work."
"Hyuuuuuuuung," Junhong whines, shaking his shoulders at the same time to emphasize his own protest.
Daehyun narrows his eyes on the other, trying to ignore the screeching of his head because oh god that's the most adorable thing I've seen in centuries. He feels heat creep up to his cheeks. "Stop that. What are you, four?" He says as he grabs the helmet on the bike's handle and tosses it at Junhong who catches it with a slight oof. "Look, I'm just saying this because I want to keep you safe."
Vague surprise becomes imminent in Junhong's face. He stares at the older for a full minute, seemingly deadpanned, before snorting. "That's cheesy."
"I mean it," Daehyun presses.
Junhong groans for the hundredth time that day. "Ugh, fine fine, get me a rifle." He places the helmet on his head, climbing up the motorcycle as he fumbled with the straps. "But I'm telling you, I'm no gun shooter. The last time I held a gun was when I was playing House of the Dead 2 when I was thirteen and that wasn't even a real gun."
Daehyun fights a smile as he jumps on the seat in front of Junhong and ignites the engine. "Well here's your real life video game."
On the contrary, nothing looked like a real life video game except for the part where they get to kill the zombies-but even that somehow was so close to making its way to horrible failure. The two had broken in an abandoned gun shop uptown to get Junhong a rifle but the process had to make up of another round of arguments (-because Junhong couldn't make up his mind on whether he wanted a small rifle or a big rifle and Daehyun called him an abominable nugget-) broken glasses and wailing shop alarms that still unfortunately functioned which attracted infects far and wide. Daehyun and Junhong sprinted out the premises in a beat before the dead could pool up and corner them.
Close afterward, they ended up in a grocery store next to a gas station a few miles north of Seoul. After a few minute raid squinting through the darkness to read expiration dates and nutritious facts and barely being able to terminate two growling infects ("You shoot it!" "No you shoot it!" "Junhong, that's the wall." "I told you to shoot it it's getting closer!"), they succeeded in bagging packets plenty enough to last a week.
First day of food hunting with Junhong and Daehyun's convinced he's never had such close calls to death.
"Position the hilt against your shoulder."
"Right."
"I said against your shoulder not over your shoulder."
"Got it."
"Now shoot."
Junhong follows the order, pulling the trigger of the rifle and sending a bullet flying downward across the bridge barricade through the shoulder of a stray infect walking on the highway pavement below them.
The intensity of the impact almost pushed Junhong's body backwards and has his ears ringing but he's unable to suppress the smile of success forming in his lips.
"Congrats." Daehyun nudges the younger on the ribs with a grin taking up half of his face. "Your first unwasted bullet. Out of the twenty seven."
They're standing next to the barriers of a deserted flyover in the middle of the city after Junhong suggested that it'd be the best place to start on his gun shooting practice lessons with the so-called veteran of self armor as to how a few number of lone infects were limping in the streets below them, ready for shoot n' kill. Up until then, Junhong has killed a glinting number of zero ghouls in rapid firing succession.
"That is so cool," Junhong says, raising the large gun again and aiming it on another infect. "My brother used to tell me about all these weaponry stuff when we visit him in the army."
He shoots.
"You've got siblings?" Junhong slightly turns toward Daehyun to direct the inquiry, lowering his rifle.
Daehyun eyes the dead bodies on the pavement. "Yeah. One."
"Touchy topic?"
Daehyun shakes his head. "No, not really. I've got an older brother, too. Lost him before the outbreak got too viral."
"How did he get it?"
"He's kind of a weak old shit." Daehyun shrugs, stuffing his hands inside his pockets.
Junhong hums. "You sound attached. I don't know how my brother died. But as I said, he's in the army, works for the government. Remember they planted time bombs around Korea tryna dispatch all zombies? That shit's pretty dangerous if you consider the consequences."
"That governmental move, by the way, was very very ineffective," Daehyun remarks with a choked laugh.
Junhong nods. "It'd kill a few infects. But it won't stop the dissemination of the virus."
They fall into silence for a moment, reveling on the minimal gush of winds on their faces. It's been a while, but Daehyun doesn't really know enough about their current world yet. How come the skies always look as if the sun is setting all the time? Are he and Junhong really the only two people alive? How long will it take for them to become infected? What if they completely run out food and die of starvation? What if their ignorance could kill them faster than a speeding bullet? Will the world get to stand up on its feet again or is this really the peak of humanity?
Daehyun minutely glances at Junhong. The boy surely means something to him now.
Daehyun's reverie breaks when Junhong perks up, eyes trained on another lone ghoul in a hospital gown making a turn from the junction to the street across them and Junhong pulls up his rifle over the barricade again, pointing toward the infect's direction.
Junhong falters when Daehyun gasps beside him. He cocks his head to see that Daehyun has an utter look of shock in his face as he gazed at the infect and Junhong watches with confusion as the other's expression slowly morphs into severe anger and his hand flies to the gun in his back pocket.
"Hyung-"
Daehyun outstretches his arm and fires at the infect in a flash.
It topples down.
The older breathes heavily, pulse racing and chest heaving as he realized what he has done. He lowers his gun and takes his eyes off his new kill, only to meet Junhong's astounded gaze. Junhong doesn't miss the tears brimming on the edges of the older's eyes but Daehyun spins and hurries on his motorcycle on the other side of the barricade, leaving no room for Junhong's questions as the younger follows suit.
But it clicks.
The infect was his brother.
Part 2 coming soon. TuT