Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The world had ended without ceremony.

There were no sirens, no grand flashes of light. Just a slow unraveling; systems collapsing, cities burning, people turning. And silence. So much silence where once there had been life.

Dae-Jung didn’t remember the last time he’d slept without waking in a cold sweat. He didn’t remember what he’d dreamed about, either, only the feeling: fear soaked into the marrow. It clung to him, even now, as he stood before the fence.

The thing was massive. A jagged monstrosity of steel and wire, thrown up around the perimeter of a decaying town. It didn’t belong. Not here, not in this stretch of nothing between ruined cities. Someone had built it fast. Too fast. And that made him nervous.

Dae-Jung squinted up at it, one hand brushing sweat-damp bangs from his eyes. His pale blue hair, once styled to perfection, now clung in disheveled waves to his cheeks and brow. He wore a hoodie several sizes too big, sleeves nearly covering the old scars on his wrists. His backpack sagged with the weight of supplies, his bat strapped tight against the side.

He didn’t trust towns. Not anymore.

The last one nearly got him killed. Or worse.

He skirted the fence for nearly forty minutes, searching. Always searching. For food. For safety. For somewhere the past couldn’t follow. The sun beat down like judgment, and his legs ached with every step.

When he finally found a narrow break behind the brittle husk of a bush, he didn’t smile. Didn’t sigh in relief. He crouched low, eyes darting, ears strained for even the faintest sound. And then he slipped through.

The town was dead.

Not quiet. Dead.

Buildings sat like corpses, caved in and gutted. Signs hung from rusted bolts. Vines had begun to take everything. But not in that peaceful way people romanticized. This was hostile. A chokehold.

Dae-Jung walked slowly, each step calculated. The baseball bat unstrapped and rested in his hand, its chipped wood worn from use. He moved like a shadow, sticking to walls, ducking under broken beams, never staying in the open for long.

Zombies were a threat, sure. But people were worse.

He knew that now. He knew it from the way his boyfriend, his ex, had smiled when he murdered their friends.

Even now, the image burned like a brand on his memory.

He found the grocery store near the edge of the plaza. Or what was left of it. Shelves ravaged. Glass shattered. The place stank of mildew and age, but it was cooler than outside, and he was tired. So tired.

He slipped behind the counter, legs folding beneath him like a marionette with its strings cut. His hands trembled as he peeled open a protein bar, gnawing through it with the numb hunger of someone who’d gone too long without trust or comfort.

Sleep came not because he wanted it, but because his body gave up.

⸻

Time passed. Dae-Jung kept his eyes closed, despite being awake.

Until the groans started.

Low. Wet. Close.

Dae-Jung’s eyes flew open, every muscle locking in place. Panic surged like acid up his throat. He froze. Then slowly, so slowly, shifted back, heart hammering as the sound grew louder. He hit a shelf. Cans crashed.

Fuck.

He clamped both hands over his mouth, praying to anything that might still be listening that they wouldn’t smell him, wouldn’t hear him.

The groans outside the glassless storefront twisted into a frenzy. Shapes moved past. Limbs dragging. Eyes vacant and hungry.

He fumbled for his bat, but it was too late.

And then, gunfire.

Loud. Unmistakable. A rapid rhythm of shots that tore through the silence like thunder. Zombies shrieked. Bones cracked. Flesh hit pavement.

And then... nothing.

Dae-Jung didn’t move.

Even after the echoes faded, even when his ears rang with silence again, he stayed still.

Waiting.

And that’s when he saw the shadow.

A man stepped into the doorway, framed by the dying light. He looked like he hadn’t slept in weeks. Rough around the edges. Hair long and damp with sweat, mostly tied back, beard patchy and uneven, sun-kissed skin. His clothes were scavenger-thrown: practical, dusty, stitched at the seams. A shotgun rested against his shoulder like a warning.

Dae-Jung didn’t breathe.

“I know you’re in here,” the man said, voice low and dry with a Portuguese lilt. “Heard the cans.”

He took a step forward.

“You don’t move like them. They don’t hide.”

Still, Dae-Jung didn’t answer. Didn’t move. His heart screamed inside his chest.

“Look,” the man said, less threatening now, more tired. “If I wanted you dead, you’d be dead.”

That… was true.

Dae-Jung rose slowly from behind the counter, bat still clutched, eyes narrowed.

“Don’t come closer,” he warned, voice hoarse from disuse. “I’ll break your jaw.”

The man raised both hands in peace.

“Alright. Fair.”

A beat. The stranger tilted his head.

“Name’s Javier.”

Dae-Jung didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. Not yet.

“You hurt?”

He shrugged stiffly. “No thanks to you.”

“I just saved you.”

“I didn’t ask you to.”

Javier let out a dry chuckle. “You’re welcome anyway.”

They stared at each other, two survivors, both worn, both carrying ghosts.

“Look,” Javier finally said, lowering his voice. “I’ve got a camp. Not far. One night. That’s it. Shelter. Fire. Some food. You can leave in the morning.”

Dae-Jung didn’t reply.

“I’m not gonna drag you,” Javier said, turning back toward the street. “But staying here? You won’t last till morning.”

The silence after his words was heavy.

Eventually, Dae-Jung followed.

But not because he trusted him.

Only because he trusted the dead even less.

Chapter Text

The gas station wasn’t home.

It smelled like oil and mildew and the stale memory of cigarette smoke, even after all this time. The air was thick with the kind of silence that only followed catastrophe. Dae-Jung stood in the doorway for a long time after Javier stepped aside to let him in, his shoulders tense beneath his hoodie, his eyes scanning every shadowed corner of the station like they might sprout teeth.

“This way,” Javier muttered, gesturing toward the back room.

Dae-Jung didn’t move until Javier had walked ahead.

He stayed two steps behind as they passed the firepit in the center of the main room, down a hallway lined with broken vending machines and graffiti-scrawled walls. The cot Javier offered was tucked in a small storage room. The shelves were bare except for a few bundled rags and a single rusted toolbox in the corner.

“Doesn’t look like much,” Javier said. “But it’s quiet. I’ve kept it clean.”

Dae-Jung didn’t sit. He kept his backpack on and his bat in hand, muscles coiled with uncertainty.

“I don’t need much,” he said quietly. Then, like a test: “Don’t expect anything, either.”

Javier gave a dry grunt of acknowledgment, already turning back toward the firepit. “Good. That’ll make two of us.”

That first night, Dae-Jung didn’t sleep.

He lay on the cot with his boots still on and the bat pressed close against his chest. His hoodie was zipped all the way up, the drawstrings pulled tight around his face.

The blanket Javier had given him stayed folded at his feet. Too soft. Too intimate. Too much like something a friend would offer.

The fire crackled in the next room, the sound faintly comforting, even from a distance. Javier moved around for a while; boiling water, sorting through salvaged batteries and bent screw, but eventually, even his footsteps faded.

Silence crept back in.

Dae-Jung stared at the ceiling. The shadows there looked like reaching hands.

Every time he closed his eyes, he saw blood. Not just the red, though there had been plenty of that, but the slick sheen of it on a rundown apartment floor, the sound it made underfoot. The way Byung-ho's head had hit the mirror. The way Han-gyeol’s voice had gone silent mid-scream.

And Ye-Jun. His smile. His hands. The last word he ever said: “I did it for us, Dae-Dae.”

Dae-Jung jerked upright, panting.

His pulse thundered in his throat. Sweat clung to his back despite the cold. The room was still empty. The shadows are unchanged. Outside, wind scraped across the window.

He stayed like that until the sun began to rise.

⸻

Days passed. Or at least, enough time to lose count.

Javier didn’t ask him to stay, but he didn’t kick him out either. That was about the best Dae-Jung could hope for.

They ate in silence. Javier never offered to cook for two, and Dae-Jung never asked. He sat on the opposite end of the room each night, picking through protein bars or dry crackers, back pressed to the wall, always facing the door. Always within reach of his weapon.

Javier didn’t seem to care.

He came and went on his own schedule, slipping in and out of the camp without explanation. Sometimes he returned with salvaged wires or tools; sometimes with nothing at all. He didn’t offer stories, and Dae-Jung didn’t want them. They were strangers clinging to the same driftwood, nothing more.

Still, Dae-Jung watched him. He noticed the way Javier always checked the perimeter when he came back, the way he paused before unlocking the barricade like he expected something—someone—to be waiting for him. He noticed the faint limp Javier tried to hide, the way he rubbed his shoulder after heavy lifting.

And he noticed that Javier never asked questions. Not about Dae-Jung’s past. Not about the nightmares that dragged him out of sleep night after night, trembling and drenched in sweat.

One night, Dae-Jung had woken up gasping, a sharp cry lodged in his throat, only to find Javier still asleep across the hall, arms folded under his head, face slack with exhaustion.

He didn’t stir. Not even when Dae-Jung choked back the sound and stumbled to the sink to splash cold water on his face.

It was almost worse than if Javier had asked.

Almost.

On the fourth morning, Javier threw on his pack and pulled his shotgun down from its resting place near the door.

“Going back to the town,” he said, not looking at Dae-Jung. “Need tools. Might take a while.”

Dae-Jung didn’t reply. He was crouched near the firepit, staring into the embers. His hoodie sleeves were pushed halfway up his forearms, exposing the faint scars that traced the inside of his wrists. He tugged them down before Javier could glance over.

“If you’re gone when I get back, that’s your choice,” Javier added as he adjusted the straps on his pack. “I won’t chase.”

Dae-Jung lifted his gaze. “Good.”

Their eyes met for a moment. A quiet understanding passed between them—blunt and jagged.

Then Javier was gone.

The gate clanked shut behind him.

The silence that followed was different than before.

It wasn’t the usual oppressive stillness of post-collapse life. It was lighter. Hollow. A vacuum.

Dae-Jung didn’t move for a long time. He sat where Javier had left him, listening to the wind snake through the cracks in the boarded-up windows, the quiet clicks and pops of the dying fire.

No footsteps. No conversation. No watchful gaze from across the room.

No one to stop him.

Eventually, he stood. His knees ached. He hadn’t eaten yet, but hunger had become a background hum these days—constant, dull, easy to ignore when the mind was louder.

He wandered the camp. Not like a guest. Not even like a squatter.

Like a thief. The supply room wasn’t locked. Nothing was. That surprised him.

Inside, shelves lined with scavenged goods offered a modest bounty—cans, water bottles, rolls of medical tape. He touched none of them at first, just stared. One hand rested on his bat, the other trembled slightly as he reached out to pick up a can of peaches.

He held it for a moment. Thumbed the rim. Turned it over.

He thought of the other camp, his camp, the one Ye-Jun had burned from the inside out.

He thought of the half-finished song he’d been writing with Han-gyeol, the one they never got to record.

He thought about how easy it would be to slip away now. Take what he needed. Head east. Disappear.

Start over.

Start alone.

He stuffed the can back on the shelf and walked away.

⸻

Instead of running, Dae-Jung cleaned.

Not because he cared about Javier’s space. Not really. But because his hands needed something to do, and the silence was unbearable.

He wiped soot from the corners of the firepit. Swept up shards of broken tile. Rearranged the water jugs by size. At some point, he found an old rag and began scrubbing the dirt from the counter near the sink.

He didn’t know why he was doing it. Maybe because it made him feel like a person again. Or because it reminded him of backstage rooms—of ritual. Something to keep the nerves at bay.

When night crept in, he finally sat down with a tin of cold beans and forced himself to eat. One bite at a time. Chewing until the texture faded.

He was halfway through the tin when the tears came.

He didn’t sob. Didn’t wail. Just let the water slide down his cheeks, quiet and constant, like rain on a window.

He didn’t wipe them away.

And Javier didn’t return that night.

Dae-Jung lay in the cot, his bat pressed against his stomach, eyes wide in the dark. Every creak of the barricade. Every gust of wind. Every rustle of weeds outside made his pulse spike.

He hated that. Hated the hope that tried to bloom every time footsteps didn’t come.

Better to expect no one.

Better to assume you’re always alone.

When he finally drifted off, the dreams came hard and fast.

Ye-jun's face, half-rotted and smiling, lips stained red. Han-gyeol’s voice echoing through an empty hallway. Hands on his throat. Blood in his mouth. The sound of an audience screaming his name, but no one came when he cried for help.

He woke to silence.

Shaking.

Javier came back the next morning.

Dae-Jung heard him before he saw him—boots crunching over gravel, the scrape of metal against concrete. He stood in the center of the main room when the gate opened and Javier stepped through, weighed down with a heavy pack and smudges of grime across his face.

He blinked at Dae-Jung.

“You’re still here,” he said simply.

Dae-Jung’s mouth was dry. “I didn’t feel like dying alone in the woods.”

A grunt. “Reasonable.”

They stared at each other for a long moment. Javier looked around; noticed the swept floor, the organized shelves, the absence of anything missing.

“You cleaned.”

“I was bored.”

Javier slung his pack onto the counter and started unloading parts. “You didn’t take anything.”

“Did you expect me to?”

He didn’t answer.

Neither did Dae-Jung.

They moved around each other the rest of the day like ghosts in the same ruined cathedral—always aware, never touching.

But that night, when the fire burned low and Javier lay back on his cot without speaking, Dae-Jung watched him just a little longer.

And when the nightmares came again—teeth, blood, screaming—he kept the sounds buried in his throat, knuckles white around his bat, alone in the dark as always.

Chapter Text

Before the world burned, before the dead started walking, before blood dried black in the seams of concrete, Javier lived in a small apartment above a bakery in Lisbon. The walls always smelled faintly of sugar and yeast, and in the mornings, the scent would drift in before the sun did. He used to wake up to it, wrapped around Nuno’s bare back, with one leg slung lazily over his boyfriend’s hip. Life was slow there. Intimate. Imperfect.

He had a channel then— OdiumHorizon—  Not the biggest ghost-hunting account on social media, but known enough to get recognized at cafes or invited to niche horror conventions in Porto or Madrid. He’d started it in university, bored and broke and desperate for something to keep him sane. His early videos were mostly shaky flashlight tours of crumbling sanatoriums and grainy, overedited subtitles about “EVPs” no one else could hear. But eventually, he found his voice.

His best videos came from telling stories. He would stand in front of the camera, lit only by the glow of a lantern or the streetlights behind him, and recount forgotten tragedies: the house where a girl vanished mid-prayer, the morgue where the dead didn’t stay put, the train station where the clock always stopped at 3:06 a.m. His accent softened the edges of each word, and people liked the way he told the truth like a myth.

Nuno was always behind the camera. Always grumbling about the cold, always telling Javier to stop pacing so much during takes. He had a quick smile, a voice like smoke, and eyes that made silence feel like safety. Nuno never believed in ghosts, but he believed in Javier. That was enough.

They had a routine. Shoot on weekends. Edit over pizza. Upload every other Wednesday. Fight over dumb things, how Javier refused to use a script, or how Nuno always cut his monologues too short in posts. Make up quickly. Kiss in the editing suite. Fall asleep with laptops whirring and fingers entwined.

There was a time, before everything soured, when they talked about traveling more. Japan, for the shrines. Mexico, for Día de los Muertos. The U.S., maybe, to hunt ghosts in abandoned malls or decrepit mental hospitals. Just them, the camera, and the road.

Javier still remembers the last real meal they had together. Pasta with fresh tomatoes and olives, Nuno’s favorite. They had wine. Argued about which urban legend to film next. Laughed when Javier got sauce on his shirt. Fell asleep curled on the couch, too lazy to move. It was a warm night. The window was open. They could hear music from the bakery downstairs.

It was so ordinary. That’s what made it cruel.

The first headlines came the next morning.

A strange flu in Spain. No, not a flu, maybe a bacterial infection. High fevers, hallucinations. Aggression. A few deaths. Then dozens.

At first, it felt distant. Another virus, another panic. People panicked over monkeypox, over bird flu. He remembered swine flu when he was still in school. Most of it passed. Nuno bought masks, just in case. Javier rolled his eyes. The bakery owner joked they’d start baking bread shaped like biohazard signs. They were still laughing then.

But the laughing didn’t last.

By the end of the week, flights were grounded. By the next, stores were emptying. People didn’t just panic, they scattered. Lisbon became a ghost town in days. The last video Javier ever uploaded was filmed from their building’s rooftop, looking out over a city drowning in sirens.

“We don't know if it’s a virus, or a parasite,” he said to the camera. “But the dead aren’t staying dead. I know how that sounds. But it’s true.”

He tried to keep the fear out of his voice, but it bled through. Nuno’s fingers were on his wrist the whole time, off-frame.

Javier’s mother called two days later. She lived in Porto, still working as a school nurse. She told him to stay safe. To keep Nuno close. To come home if things got worse.

He tried. God , he tried.

They packed light. Took what they could: food, water, a bat. Javier hated guns. He still does. They drove north, past checkpoints and burned-out cars. Past men with rifles and children walking barefoot. They slept in the car, once in a barn, once on the roof of a gas station.

They never made it to Porto, at least, not on time.

By the time they arrived, his mother was already gone. His sister, too. The building where she lived had been burned down, intentionally. He never found out why. Whether it was an infection or just fear. The neighbors wouldn’t speak. The military had already pulled out. He found their rings in the rubble. Just the rings.

He didn’t cry. Not then. He couldn’t afford to.

The weeks after Porto blurred together. Hunger blurred them. Grief. Guilt. Constant motion. Javier stopped checking dates. Time became something vague and brutal; measured in how long they could go without being seen, how many minutes passed before they heard another groan in the distance, how long a can of beans could stretch between two people.

Nuno didn’t talk as much anymore. He was always watching. Listening. He kept the camera bag out of habit, even though they hadn’t recorded anything in weeks. Once, Javier asked him why.

“In case we need to remember this,” Nuno said.

Remember what? The screams? The smoke? The bodies with their chests torn open like fruit?

But Javier didn’t argue. He let him carry it.

They found a church one night, a chapel on a hill, gated and cracked. No signs of death. No scent of rot. Just dust and silence. They stayed there for four days. Ate sparingly. Slept in shifts.

On the fifth night, it happened.

They had argued earlier that day. About a noise. Javier thought it was nothing. Nuno insisted they move.

He was right.

The thing that came through the church doors wasn’t quite a man anymore. Its face was peeled back, lips split and trembling. Its teeth clicked when it breathed. It was fast. Javier didn’t have time to think, just swung the bat, again and again. Bone crunched. It didn’t stop.

Nuno did. He pulled Javier away, screamed something he still can’t remember.

But it got him. Bit deep into his shoulder.

Tore.

The next twelve hours were a blur.

Javier tried to stop the bleeding. Bandaged him with cloth from his own shirt. Held him as his skin went hot, then cold, then hot again. He talked to him, about dumb things. Their first date. The time they thought they saw a ghost in a supermarket basement and it turned out to be a drunk teenager. The worst video they ever made; the one with the forest noises that turned out to be raccoons.

Nuno smiled, once. It was small. Faint.

“Don’t film this part,” he whispered.

Then he stopped speaking.

Javier didn’t sleep. He sat by Nuno’s side with the rifle across his lap, knuckles white.

At sunrise, Nuno opened his eyes. They weren’t the same. They were blank. Hungry.

Javier didn’t run.

He cried for the first time in weeks, and he didn’t stop crying, not even when the blood dried under his nails.

⸻

He buried him behind the chapel.

Used his bare hands. No stone to mark it. No camera to witness it.

That was the day Javier stopped being a storyteller. He didn’t want to remember anymore. Didn’t want to explain, or document, or find beauty in the horror. He just wanted to survive.

Chapter Text

The town was quiet, but that meant nothing. Stillness didn’t promise safety—it was often the prelude to something worse. Javier moved through the streets like smoke, soft-footed and silent, the shotgun strapped to his back weighing heavier than usual. The sun pressed down through a veil of cloud cover, giving everything a bleached, brittle look.

He kept to the shade where he could, slipping between door frames and narrow gaps between buildings, his eyes sweeping rooftops, corners, alley mouths. He didn’t like the way this place breathed—it felt held, like something was watching. But he had come here for supplies, and he wouldn’t leave until he’d scouted the block fully. A few more buildings, then he’d call it.

The grocery store was already picked over when he’d arrived earlier that day, its windows busted in, shelves looted, corpses long gone. But sometimes people missed things—cans rolled beneath display racks, water bottles stashed behind the counter. He crouched now behind that very counter, rummaging under a snapped plank of wood.

Found one. A tiny bottle of multivitamins. Half full. He turned it over in his fingers, the rattle oddly comforting. He’d take it. Couldn’t hurt.

A scuffle. The faintest shuffle of something—feet? Fabric? He froze.

Then, unmistakable: groaning. Wet. Familiar. Close.

He didn’t have time to think. His instincts clicked in. Javier slid to the edge of the counter and peered out. Three of them, maybe more, drawn to something inside the store. Not him—yet. They moved slowly, uncoordinated. Still dangerous.

He stepped out, raised the shotgun. Two blasts in quick succession. One went down. Another stumbled. He stepped right, fired again.

The third lunged, and he ducked behind a shelf, the thing’s fingers scraping the metal as it followed. One more shell, one clean shot. Head gone. Silence again.

Except it wasn’t. There—behind the counter. Movement. Something small.

Not a walker. Too quick. A person.

He moved slowly now, cautious, weapon raised but not aimed.

“I know you’re in here,” he said, voice low, firm. “Heard the cans.”

Nothing. Then, from behind the shelf, the faintest shift. Breath caught.

“Not one of them,” Javier muttered to himself, then, more loudly, “You don’t move like them. They don’t hide.”

He stepped in further, less a hunter now, more like a tired man asking for honesty. “Look, if I wanted you dead, you’d be dead.”

Still nothing. Then he softened, just a touch.

When the figure finally emerged, it was not what he expected.

Blue hair, messy and sweat-plastered. A roundish face that didn’t look hardened by the new world they lived in. He looked like a doll, it got under Javier’s skin, putting him on edge.

“Don’t come closer,” the kid said, voice shaky, “I’ll break your jaw.”

Javier blinked. He hadn’t heard a voice like that in years.

“Alright. Fair.”

A beat of silence, tension filling the air uncomfortably.

“Name’s Javier.”

“You hurt?” Javier took a small step back, gave space. The kid was young—no, not that young. Something older in the eyes.

“No thanks to you,” came the reply; dry, defensive.

“I just saved you.” Javier bit back, his eyes narrowing.

Their eyes held, something wary stretched thin between them. Then, the man replied in a hushed whisper, “I didn’t ask you to.”

A pause. Then a dry chuckle from Javier. “You’re welcome anyway.”

Javier’s gaze lingered on the boy, his gut screaming at him to walk away. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t turn another person away, not when this was the first civil interaction he had in years.

“Look,” Javier started, almost hesitant, “I’ve got a camp. Not far. One night. That’s it. Shelter. Fire. Some food. You can leave in the morning.”

The man didn’t reply.

Javier huffed. He would have been amused, if not given the circumstances. “I’m not gonna drag you.” He grumbled, turning back towards the street outside. “But staying here? You won’t last till morning.” He warned.

There was silence after Javier started to walk, but he couldn’t help the small huff of relief he let out when he heard footsteps following behind him. Maybe, just maybe, he could save at least one person, if only for a night.

⸻

The walk back was long, and Javier didn’t say much. He didn’t want to scare him off. He wasn’t sure why he even made the offer. Maybe it was instinct. Maybe he’d seen something in the kid’s face he couldn’t walk away from.

The camp wasn’t much—just a small gas station he found that had a better layout than the other stores and buildings in the town.

The kid didn’t speak much when they arrived. He was always on edge, always throwing dirty glares at Javier, even after a few conversations. But he didn’t pry. He wasn’t intending on letting him stay long. He only had so much to share.

Javier kept his distance.

He stayed by the fire, poking at embers long after they died. He didn’t sleep. He didn’t try.

In the early hours, he heard it—muffled cries. Not loud, but clear enough. A nightmare.

He didn’t move. Didn’t say anything. He’d learned not to interfere. People needed to feel like they were alone, even when they weren’t.

Morning came, gray and dry.

He stood up, stretched his back, and looked toward the town.

“I’m heading out,” he told him.

The kid blinked at him, still sitting against the far wall. “Why?”

“Need tools. Might take a while,” he said. “If you’re gone when I get back, that’s your choice.” Javier stated, looking back at the kid. “I won’t chase.”

The kid nodded, his eyes narrowed. “Good.”

Javier turned and left.

⸻

The walk was slow, not because he was tired, but because his head wouldn’t shut up. He retraced steps from the day before, moving through the town without really looking.

He checked an old pharmacy. Empty. A bookshop. Nothing useful.

He wasn’t looking for supplies.

He just needed time.

To breathe. To not be watched. To not think about the way the kid had flinched in his sleep. The way his hands shook when he ate.

He found a mirror in the back of a destroyed salon. Looked at himself.

He barely recognized the man looking back.

His beard had grown wild. Eyes sunk in. The scarf around his neck was torn. He hadn’t shaved in weeks. Hadn’t smiled in longer.

He remembered the studio apartment. The ring on his boyfriend’s finger. The camera lights. The way they used to laugh. The way he’d held him the night the power went out for good.

He pressed a hand to the mirror. For a second, he let the grief come close.

Then he pulled back.

He returned to camp at dusk, unsure what he expected.

Whether Dae-Jung would be gone.

Whether he wanted him to be.

He stepped past the tripwire.

The fire was dead.

The camp was silent.

He moved forward slowly.

Everything was cleaned. As close to perfection as one could get without clean water and proper supplies. He readied his gun, hesitating, before turning the next corner. He felt his gut coil, feeling something akin to confusion settling in his mind. He blinked once, then again, lowering his gun before he spoke.

“You’re still here,” he said simply.

“I didn’t feel like dying alone in the woods.” Came the quick reply, still guarded and unsure.

Javier grunted a laugh. “Reasonable.”

They stared at each other for a long moment. Javier looked around—noticed the swept floor, the organized shelves, the absence of anything missing.

“You cleaned.”

“I was bored.”

Javier slung his pack onto the counter and started unloading parts. “You didn’t take anything.”

“Did you expect me to?”

He didn’t answer.

Neither did the kid. Finally, Javier broke the silence, his voice tinged in caution; as if he were handling fine glass. “What’s your name?”

The kid looked up, and for the first time, he saw a small smile on his lips. As if this was the first time someone had asked him that question. “Dae-Jung.”

Chapter Text

Dae-Jung sat on the worn cot by the corner of the room, knees pulled to his chest. The bat was within reach, just where it always was. It never left his side.

The food in his hands was lukewarm and tasteless—some kind of rehydrated stew Javier had boiled over the firepit. Dae-Jung didn’t like the texture, didn’t like that it was Javier who made it, but he ate anyway. Hunger didn’t wait for trust.

Across the room, Javier moved with deliberate silence, as if they both understood the rules of their strange arrangement. Two ghosts cohabiting. Two survivors playing house in the hollow remains of a world long dead.

Javier didn’t speak, didn’t glance at him, didn’t intrude. He never did. And yet somehow, Dae-Jung always felt watched. Not in a threatening way. Not anymore. But like a presence he couldn’t shake. Javier didn’t loom, didn’t press, but he was there. Always there. Tending the fire. Cleaning a blade. Loading a gun. Fixing one of the barricades with his broad, scarred hands.

Dae-Jung chewed slowly, listening to the crackle of wood and the low hum of wind outside. He used to be able to eat in silence without his mind unraveling. Now it felt like each bite loosened something inside him.

He wasn’t glaring anymore. That had stopped after the third night when Javier left a tin of canned peaches next to his cot and walked away without a word. Dae-Jung hadn’t thanked him, but he hadn’t thrown the tin across the room either. That counted for something.

⸻

Supplies were getting low.

Javier stood at the map, muttering under his breath, tracing fingers over routes he’d scouted a dozen times. Dae-Jung listened from the window, pretending not to, eyes on the skeletal tree line.

They hadn’t found much on the last run. Some batteries. A half-used medkit. Two cans of soup with expired labels.

“This town’s drying up,” Javier said finally.

Dae-Jung said nothing.

“We’ll have to push farther out. Maybe northeast.”

Still, silence.

“You could stay,” Javier offered, voice neutral. “If you don’t want to risk it.”

Dae-Jung’s head turned slowly. “You mean you’d leave me here?”

Javier looked up. Something flickered in his gaze—uncertainty, maybe, or calculation. “You’ve done fine before.”

The implication stung more than it should’ve. Dae-Jung lowered his eyes.

“I didn’t say I wanted to stay,” he muttered. “I just… don’t know yet.”

Javier gave a short nod and returned to the map.

That night, Dae-Jung couldn’t sleep.

The fire had died down to soft embers. Shadows danced across the room like restless spirits. He lay on his side, facing the wall, the bat tucked against his chest. He could hear Javier breathing evenly on the other side of the room. Calm. Like none of this was strange. Like sharing space with a stranger wasn’t a constant balancing act.

His dreams were worse that night.

They came like floodwaters; fast, suffocating. The faces of friends he’d loved. The one who’d turned on them. The blood. The betrayal. The crack of bone against tile.

He woke with a gasp, hand clutching the bat, drenched in sweat.

Javier didn’t stir.

Dae-Jung sat up, wiping at his eyes. His throat burned. His chest ached.

He could leave. Now. Tonight.

But he didn’t.

The next morning brought bitter cold and a broken silence.

Javier handed him a cup of coffee—instant, weak, but warm. Dae-Jung took it. Their fingers brushed. He didn’t flinch.

They sat near the fire.

“I’ve been thinking,” Dae-Jung said quietly. “If I left… it might help. You’d have one less mouth to feed.”

Javier stirred the embers with a stick. “Is that what you want?”

Dae-Jung didn’t answer.

“You’ve survived alone before.”

“So have you.”

Javier didn’t argue.

They sat in silence again, the kind that stretched long and brittle.

When Javier stood, getting ready to go on his daily portal of the perimeter, Dae-Jung impulsively went alone with him. He didn’t want to be alone, even if that meant being in the company of a man he didn’t trust. But in this world, trust was the rarest thing out there, so Dae-Jung settled. 

⸻

Dae-Jung walked the perimeter of the camp that afternoon with Javier, bat in hand. His thoughts were louder than the crunch of frost beneath his boots.

Why was he still here?

He didn’t trust Javier. Not really. But the man hadn’t hurt him. Hadn’t tried to control him. Hadn’t even asked questions. He offered food, protection, and silence.

Sometimes silence was a kind of mercy.

Dae-Jung stood at the edge of the clearing, staring into the woods.

He could walk into them now and disappear. Be gone before the sun dipped. He knew how to move. How to survive.

But the thought of sleeping alone again, of watching shadows that might never become human again, shadows that might belong to Ye-Jun, made something inside him curl up tight.

He wasn’t ready. Not yet.

And maybe that meant he wasn’t as alone as he thought.

⸻

They didn’t talk about rationing, but it was happening all the same.

The portions were smaller now. Javier split everything equally—always did—but Dae-Jung noticed the little things. He caught Javier scraping the bottom of the pot before serving himself. Saw him passing over the last piece of dried fruit, pretending he didn’t want it.

The camp had settled into a rhythm that felt almost domestic, and that unnerved Dae-Jung most of all. He’d stopped flinching at Javier’s presence. Had stopped glaring. That should’ve made him feel safer, but it didn’t. It only made the question loom larger.

What was he doing here?

Comfort was a dangerous thing. He’d once let himself believe someone cared for him, and that illusion had ended in blood. He was still picking the shards out of his chest. Still waking in sweat with the sound of breaking glass in his ears.

That afternoon, he sat on the porch of the gas station, staring at the trees. He sipped from the tin mug Javier had handed him. It was more hot water than tea, but the warmth helped. His bat rested against the railing.

From inside, he heard the low clatter of metal—Javier checking weapons again, probably. Or counting bullets. Dae-Jung never asked. And Javier never offered.

The quiet between them was no longer sharp, but it wasn’t warm either. It was a space filled with things unsaid. He wondered what Javier saw when he looked at him. A burden? A threat? A ghost?

Did he think about asking him to leave?

Was he waiting for Dae-Jung to go on his own?

Dae-Jung rubbed his thumb against the lip of the mug. He’d grown used to the silence, but not the stillness. And not the way he found himself listening for Javier’s footsteps.

⸻

The next day, Javier returned from a solo supply run with less than he’d hoped.

“A few cans. Some gauze. A knife.”

Dae-Jung watched him sort through the items on the table. His hands were steady, movements methodical. As if disappointment didn’t weigh on him. As if the limits of survival hadn’t started pressing in.

He waited for Javier to sigh or mutter, to show some crack. But the man only lined up the cans and turned away.

That night, they ate quietly. Dae-Jung caught himself studying Javier’s profile in the firelight—the curve of his nose, the tension in his jaw. His hands, calloused and still.

Javier didn’t look up. Didn’t speak.

And for a moment, Dae-Jung felt something he didn’t want to name. Something akin to the fleeting feeling of a forming friendship. But friendships never lasted long.

He stood and took his tin to the basin. Rinsed it with the smallest trickle of water.

When he glanced over his shoulder, Javier was still staring into the fire. Only then did Dae-Jung see it. The ghost of a man, the weight of carrying so much on his shoulders, the heartache. It was the first time Javier looked truly human to Dae-Jung; and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to see something so real again.

⸻

Dae-Jung dreamed again.

This time, it wasn’t screams or betrayal—it was music. Echoing through a tunnel. His own voice, soft and young and full of hope. Then the music cut off, like a wire snapped, and he was back in that hallway. Blood smeared on tiles. A familiar hand, cold and limp in his own.

He woke in the dark with his breath caught in his throat.

The fire had long since died. The room smelled like damp wood and stale smoke.

Javier was turned away, deep in sleep or faking it. Dae-Jung couldn’t tell.

He sat up, hugged his knees, and stared at the sliver of moon through the cracked ceiling.

Maybe he should go. End the tension before it turned to something uglier.

But every time he imagined walking into the woods alone again, he heard the sound of that final scream. The one that had never stopped echoing in his head.

The one that belonged to someone he’d loved.

He closed his eyes and forced his breathing to slow.

In the dark, he felt the shape of the bat beneath his hand and the unbearable comfort of another body sleeping nearby.

He hated how human that made him feel.

Chapter Text

The world narrowed into a single path.

Javier made the choice without a word. One morning, before Dae-Jung had fully stirred, he was already on his feet, rolling the tarp, zipping the packs, strapping the rifle to his back. It wasn’t abrupt so much as inevitable.

Dae-Jung sat up, dizzy from too little sleep, too many nights spent chasing shadows in dreams. “You’re leaving?”

“We’re leaving.” Javier didn’t look at him. His voice had no room for argument, just urgency pressed flat by fatigue. “There’s nothing left here.”

Dae-Jung looked around the skeleton of the church, their makeshift shelter. The broken pews. The wax-stiffened altar cloth. The ash pile where their fire had died in the night. It felt like betrayal. Like exhaling after holding breath for too long. But when he reached for his bat, his fingers curled around the handle like instinct.

He followed.

By noon, the snow had begun again; light, but constant. It coated the backs of their jackets and clung to Dae-Jung’s lashes like dust on a forgotten photograph. They walked single-file along an abandoned railway, boots crunching over rusted tracks. Neither spoke.

When they reached a narrow tunnel through a hill, Javier signaled a halt. Dae-Jung leaned against the cold wall, breath rattling in his lungs. His legs were trembling. Every step now came with a choice: fall or keep going.

“Eat this,” Javier said, tossing him half a protein bar. Dae-Jung caught it with numb fingers. He chewed in silence. It tasted like cardboard and desperation.

“How much farther?” he asked, voice thin.

Javier’s eyes flicked to the dim map in his hands. “There’s a ranger station maybe ten miles ahead. If it hasn’t been stripped.”

“And if it has?”

“Then we keep walking.”

There was no fear in Javier’s answer. Just resignation.

They reached the outskirts of a town by dusk. It wasn’t marked on the map, which didn’t surprise either of them. Most places weren’t anymore. The signage had rotted, weathered blank or clawed off. The air here felt wrong; quiet in the wrong way, like a house after screaming.

Dae-Jung’s skin prickled. He tightened his grip on the bat.

“We’ll check two buildings,” Javier said, sweeping the area with his rifle. “Then out. We don’t rest here.”

“Why not?”

Javier didn’t answer. But he didn’t have to. Dae-Jung could feel it too—something was off. The snow here hadn’t settled right. The windows were too clean. A curtain moved where no one should be.

Inside an old pharmacy, they found little. Broken shelves. Water-damaged pill bottles. A torn-open first-aid kit with nothing but a used syringe left behind.

Dae-Jung turned away, stomach tight. “This place is already picked clean.”

“Yeah.” Javier’s eyes didn’t leave the shadows. “And not by the dead.”

They made camp that night in a collapsed garage half a mile outside the town.

Dae-Jung’s dreams came fast and hard.

He was running, barefoot on broken glass. Behind him: screams. Ahead: more screams. The sky bled the same gray-red as the blood on his hands. The voice called again; his name, again and again, soft and cruel and sweet.

He woke with a start, bat raised, heart slamming.

Javier was crouched nearby, watching him. “It’s just me.”

Dae-Jung didn’t lower the bat.

“I wasn’t gonna hurt you.”

“I know.” His arms dropped. His body felt hollow. “It’s not that.”

Javier hesitated, then sat back. The fire between them was weak and flickering. “You said his name last night.”

Dae-Jung flinched.

“You don’t have to explain,” Javier said quickly. “But you’re not sleeping. Not really.”

Dae-Jung rubbed his eyes, fingers trembling. “It’s worse now. I keep… seeing them. Hearing them. I know they’re dead, but…”

His voice trailed off. He didn’t want to say what came next.

Javier finished it for him. “But you’re not sure they are. Not really.”

A beat of silence.

“I keep thinking I’ll hear my sister,” Javier murmured. “Or my mom’s laugh. Just out of sight.”

Dae-Jung blinked. It was the first time Javier had spoken of his past. He almost asked, but didn’t. He didn’t think he could survive another answer tonight.

⸻

The next day, they passed a corpse slumped beside a burned-out van.

It hadn’t been killed by infected—no visible bites, no damage to the skull. Just a knife wound at the belly. Quick and quiet. Someone desperate.

Dae-Jung stared too long. Javier pulled him away.

“Don’t look at that.”

“I already did.”

Javier didn’t reply.

They moved on.

By afternoon, the wind picked up, slicing through their layers like needles. Dae-Jung’s lips were blue. His fingers burned with cold, then went numb. Javier had stopped speaking entirely. He pointed instead, leading them toward a shallow gulch where a fallen tree bridged a river.

Halfway across, Dae-Jung slipped.

His feet skidded on ice. His bat fell into the gushing water below. For a breathless second, he dangled, one hand gripping the bark, the other scrabbling for purchase. He stared at the water crashing against the jagged rocks, knowing that if he let go, he could die. He almost considered it.

But then, Javier was there in a second, on one knee, reaching. “Take my hand!”

Dae-Jung hesitated, then grabbed hold.

Javier pulled hard. Too hard. They tumbled backward together onto the snowy bank, gasping.

Dae-Jung rolled onto his back, chest heaving.

“I lost it,” he said numbly.

Javier frowned. “What?”

“My bat. It’s gone.”

The words felt like death. He’d had it since the outbreak. Since the studio. Since the betrayal.

Javier said nothing. Just sat beside him.

They stayed like that for a long time, both of them staring down into the river; where the rushing water swallowed everything, and Dae-Jung’s soaked clothes clung uncomfortably to his damp skin.

⸻

They didn’t talk about the bat again.

Javier lended him clothes he had, but as soon as he could, Dae-Jung changed back into his own after they dried. He didn’t want to owe Javier any more favors.

Days passed. Snow fell. Snow melted. Snow fell again.

Their pace slowed, not because they chose it, but because their bodies gave them no choice. The soles of Dae-Jung’s boots were worn thin. His blisters had split open, bled, then froze. Every morning he woke up colder than the night before. He didn’t remember the last time he’d been warm

.

Once, they passed a broken sign on the highway, half-buried in the snow. Javier stopped just long enough to brush away the ice and squint at the faded letters.

“We’ve come nearly seventy miles,” he said.

Dae-Jung didn’t answer. He just kept walking.

That night, they found a rusted car with intact windows and dry seats. It wasn’t shelter, not really, but it was enough to stop moving. Javier took the backseat, rifle clutched to his chest. Dae-Jung curled up in the passenger seat, arms around his knees, breath fogging the glass.

He didn’t sleep.

He didn’t even close his eyes.

In the deep dark, with only the tick of the wind through cracked door seals, he finally spoke.

“I’ve never walked this far in my life.”

Javier didn’t answer right away.

Dae-Jung kept going, his voice rough from disuse. “Before all of this… I barely went outside. My manager drove me everywhere. Even when we were training, we rehearsed in the same building. Same dance studio. Same four walls. I used to complain if I had to walk two blocks.”

He let out a breath that was almost a laugh, but too bitter to survive the full shape of it.

“I remember once I canceled a date because the café was too far from the subway. Two stops too far. I said I was tired. I wasn’t. I just didn’t want to sweat through my makeup.”

Javier shifted, the sound of his coat rustling faint in the stillness.

“I don’t know how I’m still alive,” Dae-Jung said quietly. “I should’ve died a dozen times already. Probably more.”

“You didn’t,” Javier murmured.

“I know. But it doesn’t make sense. I wasn’t built for this. I was built for stages. For mirrors. For applause.”

His voice cracked. “I’m not supposed to be here.”

Silence swelled between them, thick as the frost on the windows. Then Javier leaned forward, his voice low.

“None of us were.”

Dae-Jung’s shoulders trembled.

“I feel like I’ve been walking since I left them behind,” he whispered. “Like I haven’t stopped moving since… since they screamed.”

Javier didn’t ask who. He didn’t press.

He just said, “You can stop for a while. You don’t have to talk. Or explain. Just breathe.”

Dae-Jung nodded. He wasn’t sure if Javier could see it in the dark, but the motion helped steady him.

He let his head fall back against the window, eyes heavy. The cold had finally dulled the worst of the ache.

His voice came softer now. “Do you think we’re close?”

“I don’t know,” Javier admitted.

Dae-Jung closed his eyes.

“Then just wake me when it’s safe.”

Chapter Text

Several weeks had slipped by since they’d left the ranger station behind, its memory lingering like a sour taste in Dae-Jung’s mouth. The place had been a disaster; overrun with the dead, their bodies strewn across the floor and slumped against blood-smeared walls. Rot clung to the air in heavy, choking waves, and the stench of decay had been so thick it felt alive, curling into their clothes and skin. Dae-Jung hadn’t been able to stomach it, he’d barely made it past the entrance before doubling over in the grass, heaving violently. Even now, just thinking about it made his stomach twist. They hadn’t lingered. There’d been nothing left there but death.

Silence had become less of a burden and more of a companion. Not a comforting one, just familiar. Dae-Jung clung to it like threadbare cloth, worn but dependable. The quiet had its own weight now, pressing down on his shoulders with every step.

He’d stopped asking where they were going. Javier never showed him the map. Never explained the turns or detours. And Dae-Jung, too stubborn, too proud, never asked. He followed like a begrudging shadow, feet dragging, head bowed against the bite of wind and exhaustion.

His boots scraped over gravel, the weight of his pack dragging against his spine like punishment. The setting sun cast long streaks of gold across the lake beside them, its frozen surface glittering. Dae-Jung blinked against the glare. His body screamed for rest, but the tension in Javier’s shoulders kept him upright. They were always moving. Always running from something, even when they didn’t know what.

Every night, the nightmares returned sharper. Hungrier. The ghosts in his mind seemed to follow his pace, nipping at his heels, whispering in voices that no longer belonged to the living. He couldn’t tell if it was sleep deprivation or something darker, but sometimes he saw movement in the corners of his vision; shadows that vanished the second he turned his head.

He didn't say anything about it. What was the point?

His legs burned with every step now. Blisters had formed and split days ago, and the skin around them had turned raw and angry. It made him slower, made him fall behind. He hated that. Hated the way Javier would pause, subtly, just enough to let him catch up without making it obvious. The small kindness made Dae-Jung’s skin itch with guilt and resentment.

As the sun finally dipped below the horizon, painting the sky in ash and fire, Javier stopped abruptly. Dae-Jung nearly collided with him, catching himself with a huff and a wince.

Javier turned his head slightly, the set of his jaw tense. “We’re setting up camp here tonight.”

His voice was curt, sharp enough to slice through Dae-Jung’s fatigue. It wasn’t cruel, but it wasn’t gentle either.

Dae-Jung stared at him for a second too long before nodding, tight-lipped. He let his pack drop to the frozen ground without care. The muscles in his back twinged at the release, but he didn’t complain. Instead, he wandered a short distance away and sat beneath a bare-limbed tree, back pressed to the trunk. The bark scraped cold against his coat. He exhaled slowly, his breath clouding in the dusk.

Just for a moment, he thought as his eyes slipped shut. Just five minutes.

⸻

A warm hand on his shoulder stirred him from the dark.

He blinked, disoriented. It took him a second to realize where he was, or when . The cold was sharper now. Night had fallen fully.

Javier stood above him, warm light from the fire licking across his features. His hand lingered a second longer than it had to. His mouth tilted in something soft. Not quite a smile, but close.

“I heated up some soup,” he said. “Caught something too. It’s got meat this time.”

For a moment, Dae-Jung just blinked at him.

Then the words registered.

He straightened so quickly he nearly toppled sideways, catching himself with a shaky laugh. “Meat?” he echoed, disbelief coloring his voice. His stomach twisted, eager. “Are you serious?”

Javier didn’t answer, just turned and walked toward the fire pit he’d built. Dae-Jung followed, plopping down beside him like a child who’d been promised cake.

The food was hot. Salty. Greasy. The best thing he’d tasted in months. He devoured it like an animal, not caring that he spilled some down his chin.

Beside him, Javier made a sound—low and amused. “Are you always this messy, or is this your way of accusing me of starvation?”

Dae-Jung froze mid-bite.

He blinked.

Was… was that a joke?

The absurdity hit him like a blow to the chest. A snort burst out before he could stop it, then laughter spilled free—real, raw, unguarded. His nose scrunched, eyes crinkling at the corners. He tried to cover his mouth with one hand, half from embarrassment, half because he wasn’t used to the sound anymore.

It echoed strangely in the stillness. Too loud. Too alive.

When he glanced sideways, Javier wasn’t laughing.

He wasn’t even smiling.

He was staring at him, eyes distant, hollow. No, he wasn’t looking at Dae-Jung, he was looking through him; like he was seeing something else entirely. Something from another time.

The change in him was immediate. Subtle, but sharp.

Dae-Jung’s laughter faded.

He swallowed hard, gaze flicking to the man beside him. Javier’s fingers curled tighter around the tin mug in his hand. His knuckles went white.

Dae-Jung looked away.

Neither of them said anything.

Javier didn’t explain the look in his eyes, and Dae-Jung didn’t ask. Instead, he pushed his food around with the spoon, appetite suddenly dulled. The warmth of the fire couldn’t chase off the chill that had settled between them.

A quiet settled. Not like before, but heavier. Filled with things unsaid.

Javier shifted eventually, setting his mug down with more force than necessary. His voice, when it came, was flat.

“He used to laugh like that.”

Dae-Jung froze.

He didn’t look at Javier. Didn’t move.

But his throat tightened.

“He?” he asked quietly. Just to be sure.

“My boyfriend,” Javier said, matter-of-fact, like he was reciting something from a ledger. “Nuno. He used to snort when he laughed. Covered his face like you just did.”

Dae-Jung didn’t respond. He couldn’t. The grief in Javier’s voice wasn’t fresh, but it was deep. Hardened like old bone. And Dae-Jung recognized it too well. They were both full of ghosts.

“He died in the first wave,” Javier added, eyes still fixed on the flames. “Didn’t even make it through the first month.”

Minutes passed.

Eventually, Javier stood and walked away to check the perimeter. Dae-Jung stayed behind, staring into the fire until the flames blurred.

He didn’t ask for more details. Didn’t try to press the subject. Javier had offered more than he ever had before.

When the man returned, they lay down with their backs to each other, wrapped in the same threadbare blanket, and didn’t speak another word.

But that night, for the first time in weeks, Dae-Jung didn’t dream.

⸻

The next morning, the sky was low and gray, threatening snow. The kind that didn’t fall in soft flakes but in hard, icy needles that cut across the skin and made travel a quiet hell. They broke camp without speaking, same as always.

But something was different.

Javier had said his name. Nuno.

And now, Dae-Jung couldn’t stop thinking about him.

He imagined what kind of person Nuno had been; how he must’ve looked when he laughed, how easily Javier must’ve touched him without hesitation. There was something sacred in the way Javier had said his name, something brittle and carefully buried that had cracked open just enough to show the grief underneath.

Dae-Jung hated how it made him feel.

Not jealousy, not exactly. It was more like… guilt. As if his laughter had somehow stepped on something holy. Like he had trespassed without meaning to.

He found himself watching Javier more now. The subtle quiet of his movements. The way he always walked just far enough ahead to keep watch but close enough to pull Dae-Jung out of trouble if needed. He was steady, like stone—solid and silent. But every now and then, his fingers twitched. His jaw tensed. His eyes lingered just a little too long on Dae-Jung’s face when he thought he wasn’t looking.

Dae-Jung stopped smiling at the little things after that.

He didn’t smile when they found a small stream still trickling under the ice. He didn’t quietly giggle when Javier cursed under his breath trying to start a fire with damp kindling. When a squirrel darted out of a bush and nearly made them both jump, Dae-Jung only blinked. His lips stayed flat, expression unreadable.

Javier noticed.

He didn’t say anything at first, but his eyes narrowed whenever Dae-Jung turned away too quickly. He started making more comments. Half-jokes. Half-offers. Trying, maybe, to coax something out.

But Dae-Jung stayed quiet.

Because now he knew what his laughter reminded Javier of. And it made his throat ache.

They walked for three days like that.

On the second night, as they sat beside a fire that barely crackled, Dae-Jung stared into the flames, pretending he didn’t feel Javier’s eyes on him. He stirred the soup in his tin slowly, waiting for it to cool, though he wasn’t hungry.

“You’ve been quiet,” Javier said finally.

Dae-Jung glanced at him. “So have you.”

“I’m always quiet.”

Dae-Jung shrugged and said nothing more. He didn’t want to ask the questions pressing at the back of his throat. He didn’t want to talk about the things that made Javier look like he was somewhere else entirely.

“I didn’t mean to make things weird,” Javier said, his voice lower now. More careful. “About what I said the other night.”

“You didn’t.”

“You stopped smiling after that.”

Dae-Jung didn’t answer right away. He poked at his soup, chewing the inside of his cheek.

“I just don’t want to remind you of someone you lost,” he said eventually, not looking up. “That’s all.”

Javier was silent for a long time. The wind moved through the trees like a warning.

“You don’t,” Javier said at last. “Not really.”

Dae-Jung finally looked at him.

“You reminded me of a moment,” Javier clarified, the words coming out too quickly. “Not a person. I just… forgot what it felt like to hear something real. That’s all.”

Dae-Jung studied his face. The set of his jaw. The dark circles under his eyes. He looked older in that moment, worn down not just by the road but by the weight of memory.

“I didn’t mean to laugh,” Dae-Jung said quietly. “It just… happened.”

“I know.”

And that was the end of it.

Javier didn’t push. He just leaned back against the log behind him, closing his eyes briefly, and for a moment—just a moment—Dae-Jung thought about what it would feel like to lean into someone again. To not always be the one watching for danger. To rest.

But he didn’t move. And neither did Javier.

Instead, they let the silence settle again. Not friendly. Not cruel. Just… quiet.

But that night, when Dae-Jung curled up beside the fire, he realized something had shifted.

He wasn’t afraid of Javier. Not anymore.

But he was afraid of what he might become to him.

Chapter Text

Days bled into each other, indistinguishable and gray. The cracked pavement, the collapsed buildings, the hollow silence that echoed even when there were no threats; Javier could hardly tell one ruined town from the next anymore. Every place promised shelter, and every one of them failed to deliver. Roofs leaked, doors refused to lock, infected clawed at windows by nightfall. There was no rest. No peace.

Javier was beginning to wonder if he'd made a mistake bringing Dae-Jung with him. The thought crept in quietly, like the cold that settled in their bones each night. He’d try to push it down, rationalize it. He wouldn’t have survived on his own. But sometimes, when they hadn’t eaten in a day and Dae-Jung limped behind him with a blistered gait, the guilt cut deeper than hunger ever could.

And yet... he kept remembering the way Dae-Jung had laughed that night by the fire. Unrestrained. Light. Briefly free of all the horror they'd survived.

Javier had been chasing that sound ever since.

He tried now and then—clumsy jokes, sarcastic quips—but Dae-Jung never laughed again. He smiled. Small, polite things that never reached his eyes. It felt like Javier had accidentally broken something delicate that night he brought up Nuno. And now that part of Dae-Jung, whatever warmth had cracked through the armor, was sealed tight again.

Javier didn't blame him. But it tore at him all the same.

⸻

A month passed before they found it.

They'd been walking all morning when Dae-Jung spotted the wall through the tree line. Twelve feet tall, made of stone and steel, flanked with lookout towers. Javier's gut immediately clenched. Anything fortified meant people. And people meant problems.

He glanced at Dae-Jung, who had stepped forward toward the wall with a tired sort of hope in his eyes. It softened something in Javier’s chest, enough that he sighed and followed.

The closer they got, the more impressive the structure looked. The bricks were well set, sturdy, not like the rushed jobs he'd seen in other places. Someone here cared about security.

Javier paused at the base, throat tight. “Hello?” he called, voice rough from disuse. “Is anyone there? We’re just wanderers. Looking for a place to stay.”

Silence. Then a rustle. A girl appeared at the top of the wall, head tilted like a bird watching strangers approach. She was young, maybe seventeen, eighteen, with a loose ponytail over one shoulder. She squinted down at them, then turned back, clearly speaking to someone unseen.

Minutes passed. Javier shifted his weight, scowling. His instincts screamed to walk away. He’d seen too many “welcoming” places turn into death traps. He was about to tell Dae-Jung to forget it when he felt a hand rest gently on his arm.

Dae-Jung didn’t look at him. Just kept his eyes ahead. But the touch was deliberate—asking him to wait. Just a little longer.

Javier swallowed the irritation. Nodded once. And stayed.

Eventually, a rope ladder was tossed over the wall. Javier muttered something under his breath but motioned for Dae-Jung to go first. He kept his eyes on him the entire climb, ready to react if anyone above got too close.

When he reached the top, he was surprised. It wasn’t chaos. It wasn’t a prison or a trap. It was... organized. Quiet. People moved around like this was normal. Like the world hadn’t ended.

A woman passed with a basket of clean laundry. Children kicked a soccer ball across cracked pavement. Watchmen lined the wall with rifles, but their attention was outward. Not on him.

It made his skin itch.

He turned, realizing too late that Dae-Jung had already started talking to the girl and a man standing beside her. The man was tall, with tan skin and messy black hair. Sunglasses rested on his head despite the cloudy sky. He watched Dae-Jung with a look Javier didn’t like; measured, suspicious.

Javier moved in closer, instinct pulling him to Dae-Jung’s side.

“-stay?” Dae-Jung was saying, his voice more open than Javier had heard it in days.

The girl hesitated, but the man’s gaze narrowed further. Javier stiffened.

Just as he opened his mouth to tell the man to back off, the girl interjected, her voice bright and rushed, like she felt the tension too. “You can stay! In exchange, you’ll have to work. If you want to make it long-term, that’s up to Jun. But for now, there’s some empty apartments in the center of town.”

Javier didn’t move right away. He looked to Dae-Jung, who glanced at him quickly; hesitant, cautious, but undeniably hopeful.

That look did something to Javier. A memory surfaced, Nuno with that same expression the first time they found a real bed after weeks on the road. That flash of hope, like a flicker of life in a dead world.

He exhaled.

“All right,” he said finally. “We’ll work.”

⸻

The apartment was small. Two beds, one window, no curtains. But the door locked. The radiator groaned to life when Dae-Jung fiddled with the knobs. Javier sat on one of the beds, watching the younger man quietly go through his bag.

“Don’t unpack everything,” Javier murmured. “We might not stay.”

Dae-Jung froze. Then, slowly, nodded. “Right.”

Javier hated how his voice had sounded. Cold. Distant. But the truth was. He didn’t trust this place. Not yet.

That night, they lay in their separate beds, neither sleeping. Javier stared at the ceiling, listening to the soft rustle of Dae-Jung turning over and over. Restless.

“Do you think they’ll kick us out?” Dae-Jung asked eventually, voice barely a whisper.

Javier hesitated. “If they do, we’ll move on.”

“But what if I can’t?” Dae-Jung sounded small. “I don’t think I can keep going like we were. I don’t think I have it in me.”

Javier sat up slowly. Looked over. The shadows carved harsh lines into Dae-Jung’s face, made him look older, worn thin.

He didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know how to make promises he might not keep.

But he said this: “Then we stay. As long as we can.”

Dae-Jung looked at him, searching his face like he was trying to believe him.

Then he rolled over, facing the wall.

Javier didn’t try to make him laugh. Didn’t try to fill the silence. He just sat there, staring into the dark, wondering when the quiet between them had become so heavy.

The second morning in the apartment came with light drizzle and a draft that wouldn’t go away. The windows rattled when the wind picked up, and every noise outside echoed louder than it should have.

Javier sat on the edge of his mattress, elbows resting on his knees. He hadn’t slept much. The bed was better than the ground, sure, but his body had gotten used to the cold and the dirt. The silence of walls made him more alert, not less.

Across the room, Dae-Jung stirred, his face turned toward the wall. His blanket was wrapped tightly around him like armor. Javier wasn’t sure if he was asleep or just pretending. Either was understandable.

Javier stood and stretched, his shoulders cracking from the stiffness. He crossed to the window, wiped a patch of fogged glass clear, and looked out at the settlement’s center. A few people were already walking around in raincoats or patched-up gear. It felt strange watching life go on around him, normal life, or something close to it. He couldn’t remember the last time he stayed in one place for more than a night.

A faint rustle made him glance back. Dae-Jung sat up slowly, hair messy, blanket sliding down his shoulders. He blinked blearily, then glanced at Javier.

"Morning," Javier said.

Dae-Jung made a quiet sound that might’ve been a greeting. He stood, stretching with a soft wince, then padded barefoot toward the kitchen. He pulled open one of the cabinets and stared inside like he’d forgotten it was still mostly empty.

“We should try and trade for more supplies,” Javier said, watching him.

Dae-Jung nodded without looking at him. “Do you think they’ll let us?”

“We’ll find out.”

It was the first real conversation they’d had since arriving.

Javier stepped away from the window and went to his pack, rummaging for their remaining rations. He found two protein bars, handed one to Dae-Jung without comment. The younger man took it, his fingers brushing Javier’s, brief but warm.

“Thanks.”

They ate in silence. Javier leaned against the wall, watching the rain streak the window. Dae-Jung sat by the window, knees drawn up, gaze distant.

After a while, Javier spoke again.

“You sleep okay?”

Dae-Jung hesitated. “Better than outside.”

Javier nodded, but didn’t say more. He didn’t want to press, didn’t want to hear the real answer; he already knew Dae-Jung still woke up tense, still jerked at every creak in the wall or knock from a distant neighbour.

The worst part was the absence of his smile. The small, involuntary ones that used to flicker on his face when something amused him. Those were gone. Now, Dae-Jung only offered polite, hollow curves of his lips. Nothing real. Javier caught himself missing that soft crinkle at the corners of his eyes, the way his laugh used to catch him off guard.

Javier wasn’t stupid. He knew he had a part in that loss.

“I was thinking,” Javier said, clearing his throat. “We could take turns talking to people today. See if there’s any work that doesn’t involve manual labor or being outside the walls.”

Dae-Jung looked at him, brows furrowed. “You don’t want to leave?”

Javier shrugged. “Not if we don’t have to. You seemed like you wanted to stay.”

Dae-Jung didn’t answer right away. Then, softer: “I do. But I don’t want to... I don’t want to be a burden.”

“You’re not.” It came out harsher than he meant. Javier caught himself and rubbed the back of his neck. “Look. You’ve been pulling your weight. I wouldn’t have brought you along if I thought otherwise.”

That seemed to surprise Dae-Jung. His lips parted, but he didn’t speak. Instead, he looked down at his hands.

Javier wanted to say more; wanted to ask what was going on in his head, why the laughter had stopped, what he was holding back, but the air between them was too fragile. One wrong word, and it might all crack open again.

So instead, he said, “We can check in with the girl who let us in. She seemed to be the talkative type. What was her name?”

“I think she said Yan.”

“Right. And that guy with the sunglasses?”

Dae-Jung hesitated. “She called him Nathan. I think he’s someone with power here.”

Javier made a mental note. “You want to come with me? Or wait here?”

After a beat, Dae-Jung stood. “I’ll come.”

They layered on jackets, still damp from the previous day, and stepped outside together. The rain had softened to mist, clinging to everything. The cold made Javier’s joints ache, but Dae-Jung didn’t complain. He never did.

They walked side by side, quiet. Javier kept his eyes moving, scanning rooftops and alley corners, even though they were supposed to be safe here. Habit.

They hadn’t said it out loud, but both of them knew this place wouldn’t last forever. No place did. But for now, it was a roof. A place to breathe. To recover, maybe. And maybe, just maybe, to rebuild something broken between them.

Javier glanced at Dae-Jung as they reached the center of the settlement. The younger man’s face was pale, but alert. No smile. No warmth. But he was still walking beside him. Still choosing to.

That was something.

⸻

They reached the center of the settlement where people were already setting up small stalls or hauling carts stacked with scavenged goods: clothes, tools, makeshift medicines. The drizzle hadn’t chased anyone inside. These people were used to discomfort. That made Javier trust them more, but like them less.

Javier kept close to Dae-Jung as they wove through the narrow street between buildings. Not touching, not saying much, but near. It had become a kind of silent ritual between them: never too far apart.

They found Yan near the old municipal building, arguing good-naturedly with a lanky man over a stack of tangled wire. Her grin widened when she spotted them.

“Morning!” she chirped, brushing wet strands of hair from her face. “Settling in okay?”

Dae-Jung gave a small bow of acknowledgement, polite and measured. Javier nodded once, crossing his arms.

“Yeah,” Javier said. “Wondering if there’s anything you need help with.”

Yan looked between them, then leaned on her crate. “Nathan  said you’d be checking in. We’ve got jobs if you want ‘em. Nothing glamorous, but we’re always short on hands. You good with an axe?”

Javier shrugged. “Better with a gun.”

“Well, lucky for us, you might get to use both,” she said, half-joking. “We’ve got a busted fence on the west side. Jun’s picky about who he lets near the perimeter, but if you’re serious about staying, it’ll look good if you offer.”

Dae-Jung shifted beside him. Javier noticed it, barely a twitch in his posture, but it was enough.

“What about something inside the walls?” Javier asked. “He can help with sorting, inventory, cooking. He’s quick.”

Yan raised an eyebrow, glancing at Dae-Jung. “You any good with a knife?”

Dae-Jung nodded, quiet but sure. “Yes.”

Javier saw her appraising him. His frame was slim, delicate at a glance, but there was strength there; survivor’s strength. Yan must’ve seen it too, because she grinned.

“We’ll set you up in the kitchens. Don’t let the old man in charge scare you off, though. He just yells because he’s hard of hearing.”

Dae-Jung let out the barest huff of amusement, almost a laugh, but not quite. Javier’s chest tightened.

They walked away with their assignments, and the silence between them stretched again. Javier didn’t mind silence, not usually. But this one felt heavy. Like words wanted to be said and didn’t know how.

Back in the apartment, the stillness returned the moment the door closed behind them. The walls were beige and chipped. A few old paintings still clung to nails like they were trying to pretend it was still a home. It wasn’t. Not yet.

Javier took off his jacket and hung it on the doorknob, glancing toward the small table in the kitchen. Dae-Jung had already gone there, pulling the tin cups they'd used last night from the counter and rinsing them with clean water from the settlement’s supply bucket.

“You don’t have to do that,” Javier murmured.

Dae-Jung looked over his shoulder. “I know.”

Javier stayed quiet for a moment, then stepped over to sit down at the old wooden table. The wind outside was stronger now. The building groaned faintly.

"You were quiet back there,” Javier said, not accusing, just stating.

Dae-Jung wiped the cup dry with the hem of his shirt and set it on the counter. “I’m tired.”

Javier didn’t believe that was the whole truth. “You don’t have to be scared of them, y’know. This place is better than most.”

Dae-Jung turned to face him fully now. His expression was unreadable. “It’s not them I’m scared of.”

That shut Javier up.

The air between them changed, cooler now, heavier. Dae-Jung crossed the room and sat on the floor, back against the far wall. A quiet sort of retreat. Not a full withdrawal, but enough.

Javier watched him, chewing the inside of his cheek. He wanted to say something; wanted to bridge that growing space. But all that came to mind was stupid, selfish shit. So instead, he said the truth.

“I shouldn’t have brought up Nuno.”

Dae-Jung looked at him then. Really looked. “You loved him.”

“Yeah. I did.” Javier forced himself to meet Dae-Jung’s eyes. “But I shouldn’t have made you feel like... like I was putting you in his place.”

“You weren’t,” Dae-Jung said. His voice was soft. Barely audible over the wind. “But I think... I laughed, and you remembered someone else. That’s what hurt.”

Javier felt that like a knife. “It wasn’t just that you laughed. It was the way you did it. It hit me like a memory I didn’t ask for.”

Dae-Jung gave a small nod. “I understand.”

They didn’t speak again for a while. But this time, it didn’t feel like a wall between them. More like... space. Breathing room.

Javier eventually got up and lit the small camping stove they’d bartered for. The hiss of the flame filled the apartment. He poured water into a dented pot, the metal clanking softly. Dae-Jung watched him, silent.

When the water was hot, Javier brought him a cup.

“Tea,” he said.

Dae-Jung accepted it without a word. Their fingers touched again.

Javier sat back down across from him, the two of them bathed in pale gray light filtering through the dusty windows. The rain had stopped. Somewhere outside, a child was laughing, high and bright.

Dae-Jung didn’t smile.

But he took a sip of tea, and he didn’t look away from Javier. That was enough, for now.

Chapter Text

The sun hadn’t yet climbed over the wall when Javier stirred awake. The air was still, thick with the scent of old wood and something soft; cleaner, like dried herbs. It wasn’t what woke him. It never was. His eyes blinked open to gray ceiling tiles and dim shadows shifting gently in the early light. A moment passed before his gaze drifted.

Dae-Jung lay on the other side of the small bed, it had beed pushed closer to Javier's own bed to give the place more room . Javier observed Dae-Jung, the way one arm curled over his chest, breathing even and slow. His lips were slightly parted, lashes brushing his cheek like dark ink on paper. For a brief, jarring second, Javier felt the past threaten to claw its way up through his chest.

He found himself staring. That wasn’t rare these days.

A strand of Dae-Jung’s blue hair had fallen over his eye, swaying slightly with each breath. Without thinking, Javier reached out, brushing it away with the back of his knuckles. The moment was unbearably tender; and unbearably real.

His hand recoiled before it could linger.

“Stupid,” he muttered under his breath and swung his legs out of bed, sitting there for a second. The floorboards creaked like bones underfoot.

He didn’t glance back.

Thanks to Yan, they’d gotten more clothes, hand-me-downs, but clean. There were heavy-duty work pants, a worn-out utility shirt with the sleeves already rolled, and gloves that still bore the calluses of someone else’s life. Javier changed quickly, hands moving with practiced efficiency, as if speed could outrun the emotion lodged in his throat.

He found the small bathroom tucked in the corner of the apartment. The mirror on the wall was cracked, a web of lines branching from the top-right corner, distorting reflections like a bad dream. But it still worked well enough.

Javier stared at himself.

The beard had gone scraggly. Too long. It didn’t suit him anymore, not here, not now. Maybe it never did. Maybe it was just armor. He took a breath, unsheathed his pocket knife, and set to work. The blade was duller than he’d like, and the cold water from the jug Yan left didn’t help, but eventually, the beard gave way to coarse stubble.

A ghost stared back at him—eyes sunken but clearer now. He looked younger, but there was something else. He was... more exposed.

“Better,” he muttered.

The water had gone tepid by the time Javier finished rinsing his face. He leaned in toward the cracked mirror again, inspecting his reflection.

There were faint lines at the corners of his mouth, deeper ones near his eyes. His cheeks looked hollow in a way they hadn’t a year ago. His jaw, still strong beneath the scruff, carried the weight of a hundred unspoken things. He ran his fingers along it, then down to the hollow of his throat, where his pulse beat out the truth he didn’t want to face.

He wasn’t trying to look good. He wasn’t doing this for anyone.

He was trying to remember what it meant to be human.

That was the lie he told himself, anyway.

The truth was softer. More fragile.

He’d seen the way Dae-Jung had looked at him, back when things had been… lighter. When they could be considered friends. Before they’d both admitted too much and too little at the same time. Back when a smile meant something. Before silence became a wall between them.

Javier breathed out slowly and wiped his hands on the towel, grimacing. The bathroom mirror reflected him in broken shards, fractured angles, but one thing was clear: this wasn’t the man he’d been before the world ended.

It wasn’t even the man who had pulled Dae-Jung off that bloodstained floor. Albeit metaphorically.

He turned away, opened the bathroom door quietly, and stepped out into the main room of the apartment.

The air was still, heavy with the scent of laundry soap and old wood. Their few belongings were folded in neat stacks along the wall. Dae-Jung had made a habit of keeping the space clean, as if order could hold the chaos outside at bay.

Javier paused.

Dae-Jung was still asleep.

Curled on his side on the thin mattress in the corner, one hand tucked beneath his cheek. The blanket had slipped slightly, revealing the curve of his shoulder and the pale, quiet line of his neck. His chest rose and fell in shallow, steady rhythm. In sleep, he looked soft again. Not guarded. Not holding everything back.

Just… vulnerable.

Javier didn’t move. He just stood there for a long minute, watching the gentle rise and fall, the way Dae-Jung’s lashes fluttered against his cheeks. Blue hair spilled over his face in a soft tangle, casting shadows across his brow.

Javier cursed silently, looking away.

He moved away from the mattress, walking with a little too much purpose as he grabbed his bag, stuffed his gloves inside. Anything to focus on. Anything but the softness still lingering on his fingertips.

He didn’t look back.

Didn’t let himself.

⸻

Javier found the lumberyard near the west wall, where the scent of sap and sawdust hung thick in the air. It was quieter here than in the gardens or kitchens, but there was a steady rhythm; axes sinking into trunks, saws grating through bark, and the occasional grunt of effort. Logs were piled in neat stacks, sorted by size and dryness. Smoke curled up from a controlled fire nearby, likely for boiling sap or sterilizing tools. It all felt raw, honest, and grounded.

He approached two men by a sawhorse. One was thickly built, with a powerful frame and a jaw dusted in stubble that was just a little darker than the shaggy hair beneath his cap. Parker. His beard had been trimmed messily, but it suited his no-nonsense look. His arms were roped with muscle, sleeves shoved to the elbows, revealing calloused hands and dirt-stained skin. He looked up first.

Beside him stood an older man, Ryder, Javier assumed, leaner but still strong in the way of someone who’d never stopped moving his whole life. His salt-and-pepper hair was pulled back into a stubby ponytail, and a deep scar crossed the bridge of his nose, giving him a perpetually stern expression.

“You the new guy?” Parker asked, lifting his chin in greeting.

Javier nodded, glancing between the two of them. “Yeah. Javier.”

Ryder didn’t smile, but he gave a short nod. “You ever swing an axe before?”

“Used to chop firewood back home. Not professionally.”

“Good,” Parker said. “We’re not professionals either.” His voice was rough, but there was a kind of humor buried under the sarcasm.

Javier cracked a dry smile. “Would’ve fooled me.”

The three men didn’t waste time. Parker handed Javier a worn pair of gloves and pointed toward a stack of freshly felled trunks.

“Help us strip the branches, then we cut. Clean the area before noon, get the loads back before sundown.”

Javier took up an axe and started working, the weight of it oddly comforting in his hands. It gave him something to focus on. Something that demanded precision, effort, rhythm. Every thunk of the blade into wood felt like cutting away at the noise in his own head.

He worked quietly for a while, sweat forming along the back of his neck despite the cool spring air. Ryder barely spoke, moving methodically through each tree, and Parker hummed under his breath while hacking through limbs with mechanical ease.

Javier talked to himself sometimes, murmuring under his breath when a branch didn’t come loose easily or when he had to shake out his arm. “Damn thing’s stuck... alright, fine, be that way.” He cursed softly in Portuguese at one particularly gnarled branch, shaking it free with a grunt. “Damnit, just snap already...”

Parker shot him a sidelong glance, amused. “You always talk to yourself?”

Javier paused, wiping his brow with the back of his glove. “Only when people aren’t talking to me.”

“You’re not bad,” Ryder offered, unexpected. His voice was gravelly, but not unkind.

Javier looked over. “For someone who’s not a professional?”

Parker let out a dry snort.

They worked for hours in that rhythm, sweat mixing with sawdust, their boots crunching over uneven soil. After a while, Javier shifted closer to Parker while they stacked wood.

“So,” Javier started, glancing toward the wall where guards patrolled in slow intervals. “How long’s this place been here?”

Parker didn’t look up from the log he was adjusting. “Since the second winter. Five years, give or take.”

“And people just... came together?”

“Mostly.” Ryder spoke now, dragging another log toward the chopping block. “Some of us were here from the start. Some came later.”

Javier nodded slowly. “And the girl at the gate, Yan? She mentioned Jun. Who is he?”

There was a pause.

Not the kind of pause that comes from someone thinking. This one was deliberate. Parker’s jaw flexed. Ryder’s eyes flicked up briefly, then down to the log.

Neither of them answered.

Javier felt the shift, quiet and sharp like a blade nicking skin.

He almost said something else, but the tension in the air warned him off. He nodded once instead, muttering, “Right,” as if it had been a rhetorical question all along.

He went back to his axe, swinging harder now. Let the silence be. Let the question hang. He didn’t need the answer yet.

But he would find it eventually.

Jun.

Whoever he was, the name held weight.

Javier could feel it settle in the marrow of the town, in the way everyone said it softly or not at all.

⸻

The sun crept westward, pulling the shadows longer across the clearing. The rhythm of axes had slowed, not out of fatigue, but from a silent agreement between the men that the day was stretching thin. Javier leaned his weight on the handle of his axe, watching the breathless flutter of wind through the treetops. Sap clung to his gloves. His shoulders throbbed with dull heat.

Parker had taken a break to haul a bundle toward the cart, and Ryder was sharpening a blade nearby, the scraping of stone on steel a soft, steady rhythm.

Javier stayed where he was, jaw clenched.

He glanced toward the high walls of the settlement beyond the trees, just barely visible through the thinning brush. Somewhere past them, Dae-Jung would be... what? Sitting on the apartment floor, folding their few shirts with that careful precision he did everything with? Pacing, maybe. Watching the window. Waiting for something, or nothing. Waiting for him.

“Shit,” Javier muttered under his breath, dragging his gloves off and wiping his face on his sleeve.

There was a kind of guilt he couldn’t shake. Not the kind that came from doing something wrong, but the kind that came from not knowing if he was doing anything right.

He wasn’t made for this, settling down, fitting into the bones of someone else’s system. Everyone else here had a place. Parker knew how to cut and haul and bark orders. Ryder, even with his silence, moved like someone whose hands always knew what to do.

But Javier? He was still a guy who used to sit in front of a camera and make ghost stories out of flickering lights. He’d tell himself that gave him an edge, a sharper eye; but out here, surrounded by real weight, by sweat and survival, it felt like smoke and mirrors.

The axe thudded against a stubborn knot in the wood, jarring his arms.

“You alright?” Ryder’s voice came low, almost grudging. Not gentle, but not unkind, either.

Javier nodded, though he didn’t look up. “Yeah. Just... been a long time since I had blisters.”

Ryder said nothing. That kind of nothing that came from someone who’d learned to survive without asking why anymore.

“Do you ever think about what comes next?” Javier asked suddenly, not sure why. “After all this?”

He heard the stone pause, then resume with a slower drag.

“No such thing as after,” Ryder muttered.

“Yeah,” Javier said, almost to himself. “I figured.”

He dropped another branch into the pile. The ache in his back had settled into something familiar now. He could keep going, but for what? For a meal, a roof, a few quiet hours before it all started again? That was what this place offered: repetition. Safety in the cycle.

But Dae-Jung...

He hadn’t smiled in weeks. Not really.

Not since Javier said what he did about his laugh; stupid, selfish, thoughtless, comparing it to Nuno's.

It kept replaying in his head, over and over, like a tape that wouldn’t eject. Dae-Jung’s voice, quiet and tight. That mask of calm he wore, as if it were glued on too tight to take off anymore. As if he knew the world didn’t have space for softness, so he buried his.

Javier swung again, harder than necessary.

“You bring someone with you?” Parker had returned, arms full of chopped wood. He dropped it near the cart and raised a brow, nodding toward the direction of the settlement.

Javier stiffened. “Yeah.”

“That little guy. Blue hair.”

Javier frowned. “He’s got a name.”

Parker shrugged, unbothered. “Didn’t catch it.”

Javier said nothing.

“He yours?”

The question hung there, heavy and casual all at once.

“No,” Javier said after a moment. Too quick. Too sharp. “He’s not mine. Just some kid I decided to help.”

Parker only raised an eyebrow, like he’d seen this kind of lie before and didn’t care enough to challenge it.

They fell back into work. Ryder didn’t comment. The only sound was the echo of chopping and the shuffle of boots on pine needles.

But the silence felt different now. Heavier.

Javier adjusted his grip on the axe, trying to shake the weight building behind his ribs. He shouldn’t have brought Dae-Jung here, not without knowing what kind of place this was, what kind of people ran it. He didn’t know these guards. He didn’t know Jun.

And he didn’t know what Dae-Jung was thinking anymore.

He used to. He could read him in small movements, in the soft curve of a smile or the way his fingers tensed just before he spoke. But lately, Dae-Jung kept those things buried. As if he’d decided Javier wasn’t safe anymore; not safe to trust, not safe to confide in.

Maybe he wasn’t.

Maybe he’d never been.

⸻

By the time they loaded the last of the wood, the sky had shifted from sharp blue to a hazy gold. The kind of light that stretched everything thin and made the edges of the world feel soft and distant.

Parker wiped his hands on his pants, glanced toward the horizon. “Let’s call it.”

Javier didn’t argue.

He followed behind them, silent on the walk back, sweat drying cool against his neck. His legs ached. His fingers were sore. The axe handle had left impressions in his palms. The skin red despite the gloves he wore.

But all he could think about was Dae-Jung’s hands.

Small. Careful. Delicate.

He wondered if they were trembling again. He wondered if Dae-Jung would even look at him when he walked through the door.

He wondered, stupidly, if the blue in his hair had faded a little more.

He wondered when he started noticing things like that.

And why it was starting to hurt.

Chapter Text

The bed was cold beside him.

Dae-Jung stirred, face half-buried in a pillow that still carried the faint scent of woodsmoke and sweat; Javier. For a fleeting second, he imagined the man had only gotten up to use the bathroom, maybe to get water. But when the silence stretched too long, when the air in the room sat too still, he cracked one eye open and found the space empty.

 He didn't remember getting up. He didn't remember getting into Javier's bed. Was the man still there when he did that? His breath left him too quickly.

It wasn’t panic, not quite, but something thinner, quieter, and harder to name. Like a thread being tugged inside his chest. That strange ache again. The one he’d been carrying ever since he followed Javier out of that gas station weeks ago. The one that only seemed to grow heavier the more nights they shared under the same tarp, the more times he caught Javier watching him like he was some unsolvable riddle. And now, the same Javier was gone. Just for the morning, surely, but it still left a hollowness that sat behind his ribs.

He sighed, sat up slowly, and rubbed at his face with both hands. The apartment was small, spare, but not terrible. The bedding wasn’t dirty. There were clothes folded neatly by the dresser, thanks to Yan, and for once in weeks, his stomach didn’t feel like it was trying to eat itself.

Still, the quiet without Javier was almost unbearable.

He dressed slowly, pulling on the clean work shirt Yan had given him, the fabric stiff but dry. The pants didn’t fit perfectly, but they would do. He caught sight of himself in the mirror, cracked, dulled with age despite being only twenty-two, but it still reflected enough. The bruised shadows under his eyes, the way his hair had started to grow wild again, curling around his ears and eyes.

He looked smaller in the mirror than he remembered. Less than he used to be. Or maybe just more real.

Brushing his hair aside with trembling fingers, he muttered under his breath. “Get it together.”

There was no use wallowing.

Javier would be back, probably out trying to make himself useful. He always was. Dae-Jung had seen the guilt in him, even when he tried to hide it behind sarcastic remarks or grunts. Maybe he was chopping wood. Maybe fighting zombies. Or maybe he was just putting more distance between them.

Fine.

Let him.

Dae-Jung made his way to the kitchens. Yan had suggested he try helping there, and he wasn’t about to waste a chance to be useful. He found the space easily enough, just past the row of raised planters and the makeshift greenhouse. The building was smaller than he expected, but it smelled like warmth and salt and garlic. His stomach clenched, eager.

The head cook, an older woman with cropped silver hair and a smile that was more stern than kind, welcomed him with a nod. “You know how to peel potatoes?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

And just like that, he was given a spot near a window with a large bowl of tubers and a dull paring knife. Dae-Jung got to work, fingers moving methodically, letting the rhythm of it lull his thoughts into a hum.

He didn’t realize how much he missed routine.

Halfway through the bowl, the door creaked open and a girl entered, carrying a bundle of carrots and squash in her arms. She was older than him, early thirties, maybe, with freckles dusted across her nose and honey-blonde curls tied up in a high knot. Her hands were stained with soil, her cheeks flushed from the sun. She smiled as she placed the vegetables on the table, wiping her brow with the back of her arm.

The cook grunted. “Iris. Good haul?”

“Decent,” the girl replied, voice light. “The squash is thriving, but the cabbage is still struggling. I think it’s the soil near the south wall.”

She looked over then, and caught Dae-Jung’s eye.

He froze, hand stilling on a half-peeled potato.

Iris smiled. Not a polite smile, not forced or wary like the kind he’d been getting from strangers for months. This was the kind of smile that made Dae-Jung feel… safe. Familiar. Like he wasn’t just another passerby waiting to die.

“You’re new,” she said, tilting her head.

Dae-Jung nodded slowly. “Yeah. Just got here yesterday.”

“I’m Iris.”

He swallowed, fingers tightening around the knife. “Dae-Jung.”

“Well, Dae-Jung, you’re peeling those too thick. Want me to show you how to save more of the potato?”

A beat passed. Then, without meaning to, a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

“Sure,” he said, and handed her one.

She sat beside him, brushing a curl from her face as she demonstrated a more careful motion. Her hands moved with practiced ease, and she made quiet conversation as she worked. What parts of the garden grew best, which days they rotated compost, how the water had to be boiled twice because of the old pipes.

Dae-Jung listened.

And he responded.

He didn’t know why, but it was easy; easier than it had been in months. There was no pressure behind Iris’s questions. No pity in her gaze. Just a shared rhythm between two people who’d survived enough to understand quiet without it being awkward.

By the time lunch rolled around, Dae-Jung found himself offering to help wash the vegetables she’d brought in.

Later, when Iris returned with another basket of greens, he made a quick excuse to the head cook.

“Would it be alright if I helped in the gardens instead?” he asked, voice quiet. “I think I’d be more useful out there.”

The cook looked at him with a raised brow. Then, surprisingly, she smiled.

“Go on, then. Try not to scare the squash.”

Dae-Jung almost laughed.

Almost.

But it didn’t matter. He left the kitchen with a small curl in his chest, something warm and unfamiliar.

By the time he was out in the gardens, sleeves rolled to his elbows and hands deep in the dirt beside Iris, the ache from that morning, the empty space where Javier had been, had faded to something smaller.

Not gone. But quieter.

And for the first time in what felt like forever, he didn’t feel alone.

⸻

The garden was different from the kitchens.

Out here, everything felt slower, deliberate. The wind moved through the tall grass behind the stone walls, and bees buzzed lazily through the air. There was a soft rhythm to the way Iris worked beside him, kneeling in the dirt, her fingers sifting through soil with care like it was something sacred. And maybe it was.

Maybe, in this world where everything could rot or break or turn on you, growing something green felt like defiance.

Dae-Jung knelt beside her, gently pinching weeds out from the base of a squash plant.

“You’re good at this,” Iris said after a long stretch of quiet, brushing her dirty hands on her thighs. “You’ve got a soft touch.”

He blinked at the praise. “I used to be good at keeping houseplants alive,” he said, voice low.

She grinned. “That counts. Houseplants are dramatic little things.”

That pulled a small, amused breath from his chest. Not quite a laugh. But close. It surprised him how easy it was, how little he had to think around her. She didn’t ask what he did before the world ended. Didn’t prod or poke or tilt her head in that way people do when they’re trying to dig something out of you.

She just... let him be.

They worked in tandem, side by side. Iris talked about the names she’d given the garden beds: The Cabbage Kingdom, Carrot Alley, The Tomato Riots of ‘24. Dae-Jung didn’t contribute much, but he listened, and that seemed to be enough for her. Every so often, she’d glance at him with that same bright warmth in her eyes, like she was just glad he was there.

The sun shifted overhead, creeping past noon.

Dae-Jung wiped sweat from his brow with his sleeve. The work wasn’t hard, but it was the most he’d moved in a while, at least without the looming threat of violence or hunger. His back ached in that dull, satisfied way that meant he was earning his place. And still, underneath it all, that empty space in his chest pulsed dully.

Where was Javier?

Had he gone far? Was he okay?

He hated that he noticed how long it’d been.

He hated that he cared.

He busied his hands again, trimming the dead leaves off the squash vines, careful not to damage the fruit. Iris moved down to another row, humming softly to herself, a tune he almost recognized. Something from before. It twisted in his chest, bittersweet and strange.

“Iris,” he asked, finally breaking the quiet, “do you ever... get used to it? Being here?”

She paused. Sat back on her heels, brushing a curl out of her face.

“You mean after the world went to shit?”

He nodded.

She shrugged. “Sort of. Some days are easier than others. I think being useful helps. And having people.”

Dae-Jung looked back down at the squash leaves, his throat tightening slightly.

“I don’t really have people,” he said quietly.

Iris looked at him for a moment, not saying anything. Then she reached for a small hand rake and nudged him gently with it. “Well,” she said lightly, “you’ve got me now. That counts.”

It was said casually. Breezily.

But it lodged itself deep in his chest like a hook.

He bit the inside of his cheek. Swallowed around the sudden sting in his eyes. He’d spent so long bracing for betrayal or rejection that kindness always hit harder than cruelty.

“Thanks,” he whispered. “I mean it.”

They didn’t talk much after that.

Not because the conversation ended awkwardly, but because it didn’t need to continue. They kept working, side by side in the sunlight. Sometimes her shoulder would bump his, and neither of them would move away. At one point, she passed him a tomato, plucked fresh from the vine, and he bit into it without thinking; sweet, acidic, messy.

He wiped the juice from his mouth with the back of his hand and smiled for the first time in a long while.

A real smile.

He didn’t know if Javier would come back before dark. He didn’t know if this settlement was truly safe. He didn’t even know if he could stay here permanently. But right now, none of that mattered.

Right now, there was sun on his face and dirt under his nails and someone beside him who didn’t ask anything more than his company.

And for the first time in months, he didn’t feel like a burden.

⸻

The sun had dipped lower by the time Dae-Jung returned to the apartment.

His body ached in the good way. His hands were stained with soil and the remnants of crushed herbs, and he carried the scent of fresh tomato vines and wild mint clinging to his sleeves. For once, he didn’t feel like he was carrying the weight of the day behind his ribs.

He unlocked the door, nudged it open quietly, expecting stillness. Maybe Javier asleep on the couch. Maybe silence and a cold draft from the cracked windows.

What he got instead was movement; frantic, sharp.

Javier was pacing.

Hard, deliberate steps back and forth across the worn floorboards, arms tight across his chest, jaw clenched. His eyes snapped to Dae-Jung the second he stepped inside, and the door hadn’t even shut before the man was speaking.

“Where the hell were you?”

Dae-Jung froze. “What—?”

“I went to the kitchens,” Javier snapped. “You weren’t there.”

His voice was tight. Not raised—but strained, like someone trying very hard not to raise it.

“I—” Dae-Jung’s mouth opened, then closed. “I was in the gardens. The chef said it was okay.”

Javier stepped forward, just a few feet, but it made Dae-Jung instinctively take half a step back. Javier saw that, and stopped.

There was a beat of silence. The kind that thudded behind the ribs.

“I didn’t know where you went,” Javier said, softer now, but still on edge. “You didn’t leave a note. You didn’t tell anyone. For all I knew, you were—” He cut himself off. Swallowed hard. “Gone.”

Dae-Jung blinked, still caught in the whiplash. “I didn’t think it mattered,” he said carefully. “You were gone when I woke up.”

Javier rubbed a hand down his face. He looked exhausted. Frayed.

“I went to work. With the lumber crew,” he muttered. “I left water. Thought you’d be fine. But when you weren’t where you said you’d be—”

“I didn’t think I had to ask to go outside,” Dae-Jung said. It came out more defensive than he meant, brittle around the edges.

“I’m not—” Javier ran both hands through his hair. “I’m not saying you do. I just—”

He cut himself off again. Pacing resumed.

Dae-Jung shifted near the wall, unshouldering his light bag. He placed it gently by the door.

“You thought I ran,” he said softly.

Javier stopped.

The air between them stretched thin.

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.”

A flicker of something passed over Javier’s face—regret, maybe, or guilt, or something heavier.

“I just…” he finally said, voice low, like he hated the words as they left his mouth, “I came back and you were gone. And it felt wrong. I don’t know how else to explain it.”

Dae-Jung watched him, unsure what to do with that honesty. With the subtle weight behind it.

“I’m not going to disappear,” he murmured, not entirely sure if it was true. “If I was going to, I would’ve already.”

Javier looked at him like he wanted to believe that. Like he was trying to.

But Dae-Jung could see the hesitation in the lines of his brow. In the way his shoulders didn’t fully relax. There was something cracked open between them now. Not trust. Not yet. But something raw and real.

“I’ll tell you next time,” Dae-Jung offered quietly. “Okay?”

Javier nodded, just once. A sharp tilt of his head. He glanced away, jaw tight again, like he was angry at himself for the whole thing.

Dae-Jung slipped past him, his shoulder brushing lightly against Javier’s arm. The contact made him flinch—not from fear, but from something deeper. Unsettled. He didn’t want to leave things so tense, but he also didn’t know how to smooth it out.

After a moment, he glanced over his shoulder. "You should shave more, you look... nicer, without the scruffy beard." He stated, almost shyly, before disappearing into the bathroom. Javier was silent.

As he washed the garden soil from his hands in the bathroom sink, he caught his own reflection in the mirror; flushed cheeks, soft blue hair messy from the wind. He looked… alive.

And for a second, he wondered if Javier saw that too. If that was what scared him.

That he might come back one day and find that spark gone.

Chapter Text

By the time Dae-Jung finally stepped into the garden, the sun had already climbed high overhead, casting a golden sheen over the rows of budding vegetables and tangled vines. The morning heat clung softly to his skin, but he welcomed it, it meant another day without running. It had been a few quiet, almost surreal weeks since he started working alongside Iris, and in that time, a fragile but precious rhythm had begun to form. The steady ritual of watering soil, pulling weeds, and listening to Iris’s gentle humming had rooted him in a way he hadn’t thought possible anymore. With dirt under his fingernails and sunlight on his face, something that resembled peace, however fleeting, had begun to take hold.

The soil was warm beneath his palms as he crouched beside a row of leafy greens, sweat starting to gather at the nape of his neck. It was only his third day helping Iris, but something about the rhythm of the work; plant, pat, water, made his chest feel a little less heavy. He had woken up that morning with the quiet hush of the apartment around him. Javier had been gone already, the bed cold on his side.

He didn’t know why that mattered.

And he didn’t want to ask himself why he had stared at that empty bed for so long before forcing himself to get up and pull on his clothes.

It was easier to focus on the work. The garden was tucked just behind the east wall, away from the sound of clanking tools and hammering repairs that always echoed from the west. Here, the world felt muted. Peaceful. Rows of tomatoes and carrots lined the ground, broken up with leafy kale and hardy beans that climbed carefully stitched trellises. Iris had greeted him with a soft smile and a quiet nod, her hands already stained with soil.

“Morning,” she said, pulling her hair into a tie at the back of her neck.

“Morning,” he murmured, smoothing his sleeves as he knelt beside her. The words still felt foreign, unused muscles pulling to form them. But it was getting easier.

They didn’t talk much at first, just worked. The scrape of tools against dirt, the rustling of leaves, and the occasional chirp of birds overhead filled the silence.

But then Iris glanced sideways at him. “You sleep okay?”

He hesitated. Then nodded. “You?”

“I always sleep fine after working out here.” She grinned. “Helps to be too tired to think.”

Dae-Jung let out the smallest breath of agreement, then shifted to the next patch of soil, his hands steady as he began to dig.

He liked that Iris didn’t pry. She never asked about where he came from or why he flinched when people raised their voices near the kitchens. She never asked about Javier, either. Though he caught her watching the two of them sometimes. Curious, maybe. Or cautious.

But today, she seemed softer around the edges, more talkative.

“I used to hate dirt,” she said, brushing her hands on her pants. “My mom used to chase me around with a scrub brush if I came inside looking like this.”

Dae-Jung’s lips twitched. “I was the opposite. My manager used to yell if I so much as got a wrinkle in my shirt.”

That made her laugh. It was a bright sound, not unlike his own once had been.

“You had a manager?” she asked, clearly intrigued now.

He nodded, not meeting her eyes. “Before. I used to sing. Perform. I was an idol.”

Her eyebrows rose, but to her credit, she didn’t look surprised for long. “Makes sense,” she said with a shrug. “You’ve got the looks for it.”

That startled a real smile out of him, small, but genuine. “Thanks. I think.”

They worked in tandem for a while after that, the conversation trickling in naturally. Iris introduced him to the names of plants he didn’t recognize and showed him how to distinguish the healthy sprouts from the ones that needed to be culled.

“This one,” she said, brushing her knuckles against a thick-stemmed weed, “looks like a tomato at first, but it’s no good. You have to check the leaves.”

Dae-Jung leaned in closer, frowning. “What happens if you let it grow?”

“Chokes everything else out.”

He nodded, absorbing the lesson. It felt symbolic in a way he didn’t want to unpack.

As the morning slipped into afternoon, more people drifted in and out of the gardens. A boy in his teens helped carry in compost, while an older woman with silver-streaked braids worked quietly in the herb bed. Each offered him a polite nod, but none pressed for more. It felt like the settlement had its own rhythm, and slowly, Dae-Jung was starting to move in sync with it.

When they stopped for a break, Iris handed him a water canteen and leaned against the fence with a sigh. “You’re good at this,” she said.

He blinked. “I’m just following instructions.”

“Still. Some folks try to act like they’re above this kind of work. Like it’s beneath them. But you don’t.”

He wasn’t sure what to say to that. There was nothing about him left to hold above anyone else. Not anymore.

Instead, he said, “I like the quiet nowadays.”

“Me too,” she replied, glancing out toward the open sky. “Though… sometimes it gets too quiet.”

He glanced at her sideways, studying her expression. “Yeah.”

Their silence stretched comfortably then, until she cleared her throat.

“Would you want to keep working here? Like, long-term?”

He looked down at the worn gardening gloves on his hands. “I think so.”

“Good,” she said, a smile in her voice. “I’ll talk to Jun. We can make it official.”

At the mention of that name, something in Dae-Jung shifted. He had heard it now from multiple people, but never seen the man himself. And yet… something about the way others reacted to it, the weight that name carried, it made his stomach knot.

“I’ve never met him,” he said quietly.

Iris shrugged. “Not many people do, unless they need something serious. He stays busy.”

Busy. That was the word people always used for those who didn’t want to be seen.

⸻

The sun started to dip lower, casting long shadows through the plants. Dae-Jung stood up, brushing the dirt from his knees. His muscles ached in a good way, earned, not chased. He felt tired, but not heavy. The way he used to after a long rehearsal. Like maybe there was something still inside him worth building back.

“You heading home?” Iris asked.

He hesitated at the question. “Yeah. I think so.”

“If you want to come by tomorrow, just let me know.”

“I will,” he said.

He walked back alone, the gravel crunching under his boots. The apartment wasn’t far, just a few blocks past the well and the trading post. People nodded to him as he passed, and for the first time since arriving, Dae-Jung found himself nodding back.

It was a small thing, but it didn’t feel meaningless.

The settlement, with all its wary eyes and lingering scars, didn’t seem so foreign anymore.

And yet, as he turned the corner and saw the familiar door of the apartment up ahead, a familiar uncertainty tugged at his chest.

Would Javier be there?

Would he still be pacing?

Would he be angry again?

Dae-Jung gripped the door handle, steeled himself, and stepped inside.

The apartment was quiet when Dae-Jung returned.

No footsteps, no rustling. No creak of the couch frame or low, rasped voice humming under breath. The silence hung in the air, thick and oddly sharp, like the rooms themselves had been emptied of warmth.

He stood just inside the door, letting it close softly behind him. His eyes adjusted slowly to the dimness, following familiar shadows; the edge of the table, the slumped couch cushion, the curtain fluttering faintly at the open window. A small gust of late afternoon wind slipped in, carrying the smell of soil and ash and something faintly floral.

Javier wasn’t home.

Dae-Jung didn’t know why that made his chest feel tight.

He set the folded jacket Iris had given him on the back of the chair and toed off his shoes. His hands were still smudged with soil from the garden, the backs tanned faintly from hours beneath the sun. His nails were ragged where he’d scratched at roots too deep to pull gently. There was a spot of mint oil behind his ear where he’d brushed his fingers after crushing a stem between his palms.

He hadn’t planned to be gone all day.

The work had swept him away, hour by hour, until suddenly the sun was hanging low in the sky and his arms ached from harvesting and organizing. He had thanked Iris again, quietly, and she’d smiled at him like it was the easiest thing in the world to do.

A friend. Maybe. Or the start of one.

Dae-Jung moved slowly into the small kitchen and filled a chipped bowl with water from the jug Yan had given them. He sat on the edge of the couch, dipping a rag in the water and wiping his hands clean, one finger at a time. The motion was meditative, grounding. He stared at the faint brown smears blooming in the water and thought about the curve of Iris’s voice, the way she’d tilted her head when asking questions, not like an interrogation, but like she actually wanted to know.

It had been so long since someone asked about him , not what he could do or what he could offer. Just him.

He wasn’t sure how to carry that feeling yet. It made his chest itch in a way that wasn’t entirely unpleasant.

The apartment remained still around him. A creak sounded above from the unit overhead, but nothing else.

Javier still wasn’t back.

For some reason, that knowledge nestled into the space behind his ribs and stayed there.

Dae-Jung stood and carried the water bowl to the bathroom, stepping over the laundry pile near the doorway. The cracked mirror greeted him like a hesitant friend, worn and broken, but not gone. His reflection stared back, cheeks a little fuller now, lips pink from the sun, hair messy and too long at the bangs. He pushed them back, watching the movement more than the effect.

Without thinking, he reached for the small comb they kept by the basin. He brushed his hair into some kind of order, then rinsed his face clean, watching as water tracked down his jaw and pooled at his collar.

His eyes lingered on the mirror again.

He still didn’t look like himself. Or maybe he looked too much like himself and he didn’t know who that was anymore.

Somewhere in the hallway, a board creaked. Not Javier, he’d know the rhythm of that stride by now.

Just the building settling.

He moved through the apartment quietly, methodically, cleaning up little things. He folded the blanket at the foot of the bed, straightened the corner of the rug near the door. He poured himself a glass of water and drank it slowly, letting it ease the dryness in his throat.

Outside the window, the sounds of the settlement drifted up; someone hammering, the faint bark of a dog, distant laughter from the children that always gathered near the west gate.

He watched the people below, small figures in the late gold light. The town felt like it breathed, like it lived in a way nothing had for so long. It scared him, a little, how badly he wanted it to be real.

He didn’t know how long he stood there. Long enough that the sun slipped lower, casting sharp slants of amber across the room.

⸻

Eventually, the fatigue settled into his bones.

He stepped into the bathroom one last time to wash his hands again, then brushed his teeth with one of the small, worn brushes Yan had supplied. When he was done, he turned off the light and let the darkness creep in naturally, slow and quiet like the tide.

He curled up on the edge of the bed, blanket pulled just to his chin. His fingers played absently with the seam of the pillowcase. Across the room, the window glowed faintly from the last of the sunset, coloring the floor with a soft blush that made everything feel fragile.

The apartment felt too big without another body in it. Too empty.

It shouldn’t have mattered.

He had survived so long alone. Woken up with no one. Slept beside rot and silence, without flinching.

But here… now…

Dae-Jung shifted and turned onto his side, pulling the blanket tighter.

It was just a place. Just another temporary shelter.

He would not start thinking otherwise.

Still… in the quiet that followed, when the sun had truly fallen and the night began to creep in, he found his mind drifting to a voice, low and rough, tinged with dry humor. Found himself wondering where it had gone for the day. Wondering if it would return soon.

He scowled at himself, buried deeper into the pillow, and told himself to stop thinking about it.

He didn’t need anyone.

He never had.

⸻

It was nearly dark by the time the apartment door creaked open.

Dae-Jung sat up from where he had been curled on the bed, blinking slowly at the sudden sound. His heart leapt instinctively; first in alarm, then in recognition. The latch clicked back into place with a tired clunk, and Javier stepped inside.

At least, he assumed it was Javier.

The man that walked through the door looked like he had been carved from stone and then dragged through the earth. Mud streaked his boots, his shirt was darkened with sweat along the back, and there was a dull, heavy exhaustion hanging from his shoulders that made him seem older than he was. His jaw was shadowed with stubble, just enough to see the places he’d missed earlier with the knife.

His eyes flicked up once, just once, toward Dae-Jung.

Then he looked away.

Not a word passed between them.

Javier shut the door behind him, movements stiff, and unbuckled his belt with fingers that trembled with wear. The strap hit the floor with a dull sound, followed by the thud of his boots being kicked off. He didn't look at Dae-Jung again. Not even once.

Dae-Jung sat very still on the bed, the blanket pooled around his waist, watching every movement.

Javier crossed to the sink and dipped his hands in the water, rinsing his hands mechanically. The water splashed, but even that sound felt strangely distant, like it didn't belong in the same room as them. He dried his hands on his shirt, not bothering with the rag, then leaned against the counter with a weary slump.

Still, not a word.

Dae-Jung opened his mouth once, to ask where he had been, maybe, or if everything was alright, but the words caught. Stuck like thorns in his throat.

He didn’t recognize this kind of silence from Javier.

It wasn’t cold. It wasn’t angry. It wasn’t anything sharp or loud or dramatic.

It was... absence. A complete and hollow withdrawal.

Javier moved slowly past him, heading for the couch. His gait was uneven. His shoulder brushed the door frame without reaction, and he collapsed into the worn cushions like the weight of his own bones was too much to carry. One arm draped across his eyes. The other hung limp by his side.

He didn’t say goodnight. He didn’t ask how Dae-Jung’s day had gone. He didn’t ask where he’d been or what he’d eaten or if he was okay.

Dae-Jung didn’t know what to do with that.

He remained still for a long while, the silence filling every crack in the walls like smoke. He could hear the clock ticking on the kitchen counter, the far-off shouts of someone herding goats outside the walls, the steady rasp of Javier’s breath.

It wasn’t snoring. Just… tired breathing. Shallow and long, like even that was work.

Dae-Jung rose slowly from the bed. His bare feet made no sound against the wooden floor. He padded over to the counter and filled a small tin cup with water, placing it quietly on the table nearest the couch.

Javier didn’t stir.

He stood there a moment longer, watching him, as if something would shift.

He wanted to ask if he was okay.

He wanted to say I’m here .

But he couldn’t figure out where that urge came from, or what it even meant. What good would it do?

He returned to the bed without a word.

The blanket had cooled. He tucked himself beneath it again, curled tighter than before. Eyes fixed on the ceiling, unfocused. One hand rested on his chest, fingers spread wide over the thud of his heartbeat, which felt too loud in the silence.

He didn’t understand this ache in his chest. It wasn’t sharp. It didn’t hurt. It just… weighed.

Javier had come back.

That should’ve been enough.

But for some reason, it wasn’t.

Dae-Jung turned onto his side, facing the wall, his back to the couch.

He listened to the small sounds; the brush of Javier shifting slightly, the click of a tooth against his thumbnail, the soft intake of breath.

There were words under that silence. Dae-Jung could feel it, even if he didn’t know what they were.

And yet, neither of them said anything.

Tomorrow will come. And maybe they’d speak. Maybe they wouldn’t.

But tonight, the distance between them was not measured in space.

It was measured in everything neither of them knew how to say.

Chapter Text

There was a rhythm to labor that Javier could almost lose himself in.

Each morning began with aching silence, the kind that curled up beside him in bed and stayed even after Dae-Jung rose and left. Javier woke to it, washed his face with cold water from the metal jug, and dressed in the work clothes Yan had bartered for. He didn’t ask where Yan got them, he never asked anyone much of anything these days, unless it was about tools or safety protocols.

Parker was already there by the west wall when Javier arrived, boots scuffing over gravel, his breath puffing out in the morning chill. The younger of the two lumbermen, Parker looked older at first glance due to his weathered beard and thickset shoulders, but the way he rolled his sleeves up and cussed under his breath gave away a bit of youth. Ryder joined them soon after, his back stiff but his movements efficient.

“You’re early,” Parker said, glancing sideways at Javier while checking the straps of his axe.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Javier muttered, pulling on his gloves. “Figured I’d make myself useful.”

Ryder grunted his approval. “We could use more of that attitude around here.”

The praise didn’t sit comfortably with Javier. He wasn’t here to make friends or prove anything. He just needed to be tired enough at the end of the day not to think.

They left through the west gate, accompanied by two guards who peeled off after clearing the nearby tree line. The settlement’s perimeter was ringed by overgrowth, making the outer forest both a resource and a threat. The lumbermen knew which trees could be taken without compromising natural barriers. It was a science of survival, just like everything else now.

Javier fell into step behind the others, eyes scanning the surroundings, ears tuned to the sound of the wind. The woods creaked and whispered. He spoke only when needed, mostly asking about the tree types or how they handled wood transport.

“Why not use carts?” he asked, pausing to wipe sweat from his brow.

“Too loud,” Ryder said. “You want to advertise a supply run to any nearby walkers?”

Parker chuckled. “Besides, we’ve all got legs. Good ones, last I checked.”

Javier nodded. He appreciated their straightforwardness, even if he still didn’t quite trust it. These men talked to him, laughed sometimes, offered jerky or canteens. But he kept his eyes on the work, hands steady on the axe.

The repetitive thud of wood splitting was almost meditative. He counted the strikes in his head, kept rhythm, and let the vibration through the handle numb his thoughts. When one tree came down, they moved to another. It was brutal, thankless labor, but honest.

By midday, sweat clung to his back and his hands ached. Parker passed him a water skin, and Javier took it with a small nod.

“You’re quiet,” Parker said.

“Always am.”

“People usually open up after a few days. Ryder used to be a mute, too.”

Ryder scoffed. “You wish.”

Javier managed a half-smile. “I just don’t have much to say.”

They didn’t push him further, and for that he was grateful. Still, there was a lingering curiosity in their glances, like they were waiting for him to say something meaningful, to explain why he was really there.

But what would he say? That he dragged a stranger from a dead city because guilt sat like stone in his chest? That he didn’t know why he couldn’t let Dae-Jung go?

No. He wasn’t ready for that. Not even close.

⸻

By the second week, Javier had become a fixture among the laborers.

He wasn’t part of their inside jokes, didn’t join them in card games at lunch, and never stuck around after hours, but they knew him now. They trusted that when he was sent on a job, it would be done. Not always quickly, and never with a smile, but done well.

“Reliable but aloof,” Parker had joked one afternoon, stretching his back with a grunt. “You remind me of a stray cat. Keep feeding it, maybe it sticks around.”

Javier just gave a noncommittal shrug and went back to sharpening his axe. There were worse things to be compared to.

He found a kind of peace in the rhythm of labor. He helped fell trees, hauled branches, reinforced parts of the wall with repurposed wood, and replaced rotted support beams in abandoned buildings. His muscles screamed by the end of each day, but the pain grounded him. It meant he was here. It meant he was useful.

One day, while they were trimming a new batch of lumber, Ryder looked over as Javier measured lengths of timber.

“You ever do this kind of work before?”

Javier paused. “No. Closest I got was building IKEA shelves.”

Parker snorted. “You’ve got good hands for it.”

“Steady hands, sure. Not good.”

“You’re too modest.”

Javier didn’t answer. Praise still made his skin itch.

He found it easier to be around people when the expectation of conversation was low. Ryder, gruff and older, didn’t waste words. Parker was more talkative, but never overbearing. They let him exist in silence, which was more kindness than most had shown him before.

That afternoon, after hauling a load back to the lumber yard, Javier lingered while the others went to the mess hall. He was meant to follow but found himself sitting by the stacked planks, hands idle for once.

“Just you again,” he murmured to the quiet.

There were moments like this, unguarded fragments of time, where the silence felt too loud. Javier tilted his head back, watching the clouds shift overhead.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he asked the sky, voice low. “You don’t belong here. You’re not like them.”

He didn’t know if he meant the settlement… or himself.

His fingers fidgeted with a splintered edge of wood. He remembered Dae-Jung’s face that morning, still asleep, lips slightly parted, eyelashes fluttering against pale skin. He hadn’t meant to stare. Hadn’t meant to touch.

The memory of brushing those soft bangs away, of how natural it had felt, made him grit his teeth now.

“You’re losing it,” he muttered. “Don’t get comfortable. That’s how you get soft. That’s how you die.”

Even so, the gnawing thought remained: Dae-Jung was still in the settlement somewhere. Still breathing. Still alive.

And Javier didn’t know how to protect him anymore, because for the first time, there wasn’t a horde to fight or a shelter to run to. Just a quiet life trying to grow back from the ashes.

And quiet, Javier had learned, could be just as dangerous.

The sun sagged low in the sky by the time Javier was finished.

Ryder had offered him a drink from his flask on the walk back. He declined. The last thing he needed was liquor clouding his already fractured sense of judgment. Parker said something about joining a group for cards later, but Javier only gave a grunt in response. They were used to it by now.

Still, there was a nod from both men as they peeled off toward the courtyard, a quiet acknowledgment of his presence. A subtle shift from the suspicion of the first days, now replaced with something like respect.

He wasn’t proud of how that made him feel. But it was easier to be respected than liked.

⸻

By the time he reached the apartment, the ache in his legs had numbed into something manageable. The stairs were harder than they should’ve been, and his right shoulder throbbed from where he’d carried too many beams.

The apartment door creaked as he nudged it open with his boot.

He didn’t expect anything different. Maybe silence. Maybe the soft shuffling of Dae-Jung moving around in the other room. Maybe emptiness altogether.

But something smelled like food.

The scent of warmth and seasoning hit him first, simple, but real. Something cooked, something deliberate. He stepped in fully, and his eyes settled on the table: a modest plate set out, still covered with a scrap of clean cloth to keep the warmth in.

And on the couch, curled up tightly beneath the frayed edge of a blanket, was Dae-Jung.

Javier’s hand stilled on the doorframe. He didn’t speak.

He didn’t know how.

Dae-Jung looked so small like that, barely taking up half the couch, arms folded close, legs tucked in like a child bracing against the cold. His soft blue hair fell over his face, dimly lit by the last dregs of daylight pouring through the window.

Javier’s throat felt dry. Not from thirst, but from something harder to name.

The door closed with a soft click behind him.

He stared, unable to look away. He blinked once, twice, noticing how the blanket had slipped off one shoulder, and the room was just cold enough for it to matter. Javier didn’t even think, he just moved.

Kneeling beside the couch, he reached forward and gently pulled the blanket back up, tucking it in near Dae-Jung’s neck. His hand lingered there longer than it should have. Close enough to feel the heat of his skin. Close enough to remember how Dae-Jung had flinched from touch before… but now, even in sleep, he didn’t pull away.

Javier exhaled slowly. The weight of the day dropped from his shoulders as he sat back on his heels, just w atching Dae-Jung breathe.

So much had changed in so little time.

He looked exhausted even in sleep, like his bones hadn’t yet caught up to the safety of this place. Javier knew that look too well, had seen it in the mirror more times than he could count.

Still kneeling, he finally whispered, “You shouldn’t have made dinner for me.”

His voice barely stirred the air.

“And I shouldn’t be grateful… but I am.”

He stood after a long moment, the creak of his knees muffled by the rug. His joints ached more than usual tonight, probably from the climb through the brush or the weight of the logs he’d hauled earlier. He’d have bruises tomorrow. Sore palms. Scratches lining his forearms like tally marks.

But he didn’t mind. Not really.

He walked over to the table and saw the plate waiting there, still warm. He didn’t sit, not yet. Instead, he looked back toward the couch.

Dae-Jung had shifted slightly, one hand curled into the fabric of his sweater like he was bracing against something. Maybe even now, two years  into the end of the world, he was still dreaming of running. Still expecting the people he loved to vanish.

Javier’s chest ached.

He couldn’t fix that.

Didn’t know how.

But maybe… maybe he could make sure Dae-Jung had something to come back to. A place that felt steady underfoot. Even if Javier himself still felt like loose earth.

He took a seat finally, letting the weight of his body settle into the wood. Took a slow bite of the food left for him, something simple, lightly seasoned, but warm. Comforting. Just like the gesture.

It wasn’t love, he told himself. It was survival. People looked after each other. That’s all this was.

Still, when he glanced back at the sleeping figure on the couch, something caught tight in his throat.

He whispered, more to himself than anything, “Sleep well, bluebird.”

And for once, the silence didn’t feel so heavy.

It felt… almost full.

Chapter Text

Chopping wood allowed Javier to fall into repetitive movements, no thoughts. Just effort. Swing, split, breathe. Reset. It was the kind of mindless repetition Javier preferred now, especially with the way things had been lately. The mornings were early, the work was long, and by the time he made it back to the apartment, Dae-Jung was usually already asleep or curled up in silence. Maybe it was on purpose. Maybe it wasn’t. Either way, neither of them had spoken much in the last few days.

The distance had grown slowly, like a crack in glass spreading with each hour apart. Javier wasn’t sure who had created it, only that he couldn’t stop looking at it.

“Swing again. Just like that,” Parker’s voice cut through the air, bringing Javier’s focus back to the log in front of him. Parker, burly and square-shouldered, was wiping sweat from his brow with a rag tucked into his belt. “Keep your shoulders relaxed, or you’ll throw your back out.”

Javier gave a nod, readjusted his grip, and brought the axe down again. The wood split with a dull crack. He exhaled through his nose, stepping back as Ryder ambled over, dragging more logs in a wooden sled they had salvaged from somewhere near the east wall.

“Still here,” Ryder grunted, squinting against the sun. He was older, lean where Parker was built, with a hard-lined face that never seemed to soften. “I figured you’d vanish after the first week.”

Javier shrugged, catching the axe on the downswing and planting it into the stump. “Not going anywhere.”

“Mm.” Ryder glanced at him, unreadable. “You’re dependable, I’ll give you that. Quiet, too.”

It wasn’t meant as a compliment, but it wasn’t an insult either. Just a statement. Javier didn’t answer. He crouched, grabbing another piece of wood and dragging it over.

Truth was, he liked the silence out here. The only noise was the buzz of cicadas and the occasional groan of undead in the far-off woods. In the settlement, there were eyes. Voices. People who asked questions he didn’t want to answer. But out here, working with Parker and Ryder, he could focus on something that made sense. A tree needed cutting? Fine. A cart needed fixing? Sure. No cryptic meanings. No feelings to untangle.

It was easier this way.

“Your guy ain’t the talkative type either,” Parker said after a while, loading wood into the cart. “Don't even look at most people.”

Javier’s shoulders tensed. He gripped another log too hard.

“He’s just… getting used to things,” Javier muttered, voice low.

Parker didn’t push, but Ryder watched him a moment longer before turning back to his own work.

The hours bled into each other. Javier’s shirt clung to his back with sweat, his arms sore but steady. He liked that, feeling his body ache because of something tangible. There was something grounding about labor. Something clean.

“Break time,” Parker called. “Ryder’s gonna check the traps.”

Javier nodded, grabbing a canteen from the cart and sinking onto a nearby rock. He didn’t talk. Just stared out at the tree line, watching leaves sway gently in the breeze.

He thought of Dae-Jung sometimes, out in the gardens. He’d caught glimpses of him with the girl… what was her name? Iris. They laughed once. Not loud, not carefree, but still. A laugh.

Javier hadn’t been the cause of that sound in months.

A long sigh escaped him. He rubbed a hand over his face, the stubble rough against his palm. Maybe it was better this way, this distance. Dae-Jung was safe. Alive. Eating. Sleeping. Javier had done what he came to do. What more could he expect?

Still, when he returned to the apartment last night and found the food left out for him, untouched by its maker, something in him twisted.

Javier tipped his head back and stared at the branches above. “You’re thinking too much,” he muttered to himself. “Just work. That’s what you’re good at.”

But even the trees didn’t seem to listen.

⸻

By midafternoon, the sun was blistering over the treetops. Javier’s shirt was soaked through, dirt and sweat clinging to his skin like a second layer. He worked steadily, barely pausing, lost in the rhythm of it. There was no room for thoughts, only the sound of splitting wood and the creak of trees under pressure.

He liked this kind of tired, the honest kind. Not the kind that came from not knowing how to speak to someone sitting three feet away from you. Not the kind that came from silence heavy with things unsaid.

Parker wandered over, slinging down a bundle of branches. “You ever do this before the world fell?”

Javier grunted a little, lifting another log. “No.”

“You’re quick. Good technique.”

Javier glanced at him. “Guess I learn fast.”

Parker didn’t press. Just nodded and handed him a flask of water. Javier took it with a quiet thank you, nodding once in return.

They worked until the trees began to cast long shadows across the clearing. Ryder returned from checking traps with two rabbits slung over his shoulder and a dead-eyed look that said he hadn’t found much else.

“Food’s still thin,” he muttered as he set the animals down. “But it’ll do.”

Javier looked at the rabbits. He thought of the meals Iris had made with the garden produce. He thought of the way Dae-Jung had started showing up with dirt under his nails and the faintest sunburn on his cheeks. A kind of pride, tucked into those quiet steps.

The thought should’ve comforted him. Instead, it left him aching.

He shook his head and turned back to the woodpile. The cart was half-full now, and they’d have to start heading back soon. His arms burned. His hands stung through the gloves. But he didn’t stop.

“Hey,” Ryder called as he sharpened a hatchet, “you gonna ask what everyone else does, or are you just here to swing an axe?”

Javier looked up slowly. “What do you mean?”

“Everyone new. They always ask eventually.” Ryder gestured toward the walls in the distance, the cabins scattered along the edges of the woods. “What this place is. Who built it. Why it’s still standing when everything else is ash.”

Javier hesitated. “I figured if I needed to know, someone would tell me.”

Parker chuckled. “Smart. A dangerous kind of smart.”

“But if you want to know,” Ryder added, tone shifting, “we can tell you what we know.”

Javier’s jaw ticked. He glanced down at the hatchet in his hand. “Maybe.”

They let it sit there, no pressure. Just a lull in the conversation while the wind shifted and a bird called from high above.

Then Javier asked, because he couldn’t help it, because it had been itching in the back of his skull since the first time he’d heard the name:

“Who’s Jun?”

Silence.

Parker turned toward the cart, adjusting the load like he hadn’t heard. Ryder stared at his hatchet.

Neither man answered.

Javier waited.

Still nothing.

Eventually, Ryder got up and walked back toward the trees without a word, and Parker busied himself with tying down the ropes to secure the wood.

That told him enough. Jun wasn’t just some other worker here. The name carried weight, and no one wanted to be the one to explain why.

Javier didn’t ask again, frustrated that his question was ignored for a third time.

⸻

The walk back was slow. The cart was heavy, the road uneven, and none of them said much. Javier welcomed the quiet again. He needed time to think.

He didn’t want to admit that the silence over Jun’s name bothered him, but it did. Not because he thought Dae-Jung was in danger here, not exactly, but because every new piece of mystery around him made Javier feel further away from understanding the truth. Further away from being able to protect him.

Was that fair? No. But it was how he felt.

The settlement came into view, its makeshift walls and guard stations catching the evening light. People moved like clockwork, carrying baskets, pulling carts, reinforcing fences. Everyone here had a role, a routine. Even Javier did now. But he wasn’t sure where that left him outside of it.

He didn’t stop by the kitchens. He didn’t look for Dae-Jung in the garden. He just helped Parker and Ryder unload the wood, nodded to them, and walked back to the apartment with boots heavy and breath thin.

Javier’s days began earlier than the sun now. He’d rise before dawn, bleary-eyed, throat dry, his muscles aching with a soreness that no longer felt satisfying. It wasn’t the honest kind of ache he used to value, the one that followed a good day's labor. No, this was something deeper, heavier, like his bones had been soaked in fatigue and left to rot slowly in the marrow.

He told himself it was normal. Just working hard. Just earning his place.

Every day, he joined Parker and Ryder at the west gate, sometimes even before they arrived. The two men had grown used to his silent presence, the way he nodded instead of greeted, how he shouldered more than his share of the load without asking for help. If they noticed the shadows under his eyes or the way he coughed behind his glove, they didn’t comment.

He wanted it that way.

He needed the solitude, the routine; the punishing, unrelenting rhythm of chopping wood and hauling it back. It dulled everything else.

The axe became an extension of him. He swung it over and over until his hands blistered through the gloves Yan had given him. When blood began to seep through the leather, Ryder tried to offer a wrap, but Javier shook his head without a word. The older man gave a quiet grunt, not pushing.

Javier didn’t even know what he was trying to prove anymore. He just knew he had to keep moving. The moment he stopped, the silence grew too loud. It pressed in, and all the unanswered questions echoed.

Was Dae-Jung still going to the gardens? Was he eating? Sleeping? Was he mad that Javier came home so late and left before dawn?

Was he happier without him around?

Why did he care? They were hardly friends, let alone anything more.

Javier wiped sweat from his brow, his chest heaving harder than usual. The sun wasn’t even at its peak, but already he felt like he’d run miles. He leaned on the axe, swallowing thickly, pretending to study the tree line so he wouldn’t have to admit how dizzy he felt. His breath came shallow, ragged.

“Hey,” Parker said, nudging him lightly. “You good, man?”

Javier nodded automatically. Too quickly.

“Sure.”

“You look pale.”

Javier grunted. “Sun’s bright.”

Parker didn’t press, but Javier saw the way Ryder glanced at him when they started packing up for the day. They were slower, almost purposefully lagging behind, watching him out the corners of their eyes.

He hated it.

⸻

By the time they returned to the settlement, his limbs trembled under the weight of the logs. He dumped the wood with a heavy thud near the communal pile, ignoring the way his vision tunneled at the edges. The walk to the apartment felt longer than it should have. Each step thudded dully, like his boots were filled with stones.

His head pounded, and the coughing came harder now; dry and unrelenting. He tasted blood, but didn’t stop.

The door creaked open under his hand. The apartment was quiet.

Javier staggered inside, peeling off his gloves. He blinked at the soft light of the space, at the warm scent in the air, something gently seasoned, comforting. On the table, a bowl of stew waited. Steam no longer rose from it, but it hadn’t been there long.

On the couch, Dae-Jung lay curled up, back to him, a blanket wrapped tightly around his frame.

Javier didn’t speak.

He stood there a moment, chest rising and falling too fast, trying to say something without opening his mouth.

Instead, he crossed to the kitchen sink, splashed water on his face. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror over the stove; sunken cheeks, red-rimmed eyes, pale and grim.

He sat heavily at the table, the stew untouched in front of him. His stomach rolled just looking at it.

Across the room, Dae-Jung didn’t stir.

Javier lowered his head into his hands, and for the first time since the settlement, he didn’t know what he was doing anymore.

The stew went cold.

Javier hadn’t touched it. The scent curled around him like a ghost of something domestic, something warm, something that didn’t fit in his chest anymore. He sat with his head bowed, fingers pressed against his temple, listening to the faint rhythm of Dae-Jung’s breathing from across the room.

It was steady.

Unlike his.

He didn’t know how long he sat there. The sky outside the a partment’s broken blinds turned from golden to gray, then deeper still, until shadows soaked into the walls and blurred the lines of everything. The town, even in its second life, seemed to quiet at night like it remembered what it used to be.

He couldn’t remember how to be anything anymore.

Eventually, he forced himself up from the chair, legs stiff and sore. His joints popped as he moved, a dull ache in his knees and lower back reminding him just how long he’d been pushing his body. He was running on fumes and pride.

Crossing the room felt longer than it should. He paused at the edge of the couch, looking down at the soft bundle Dae-Jung made of himself. A faint bit of blue hair peeked out from under the blanket, the ends mussed like he’d curled tighter in his sleep.

Javier’s hand twitched.

He wanted to reach out, to fix that strand. To let his knuckles brush against the softness of it, like he’d done that one morning before his senses caught up to him. But he didn’t.

Instead, he knelt by the couch. It was the only thing he could offer without breaking whatever fragile boundary they’d built around each other.

“Sorry,” he murmured, voice raw, the word swallowed by the dark. “Didn’t mean to disappear.”

Dae-Jung didn’t stir.

He didn’t expect him to.

Javier stayed there for a few seconds longer, just watching. Then he exhaled slowly, stood up again, and headed to the bathroom. He stripped out of his sweat-soaked shirt and washed up quietly, trying not to cough too loud as he did. His reflection looked worse in the dark glass of the medicine cabinet—grayer skin, cracked lips, the flicker of something tired and worn in his eyes.

He sat back at the table without another word, head buried in his arms. He didn't have the energy to face Dae-Jung again. Didn't have the courage, either.

And when he finally closed his eyes, sleep didn’t come easy.

His body was failing him.

But worse than that was the gnawing thought in the back of his mind: he was starting to fail Dae-Jung, too.

And he didn’t know how to fix it.

Chapter Text

Hey everyone. I know it hasn’t been too long since the last chapter, but I wanted to take a moment to talk honestly about where I’m at and why I won’t be posting any new updates for a while. This isn’t easy to say, especially because I care so much about this story and the people who’ve been following along with it. But I’ve been hitting a wall creatively, and it’s time I acknowledge that I need to take a step back.

Lately, writing has started to feel more like a burden than an escape. The excitement and clarity I used to feel when sitting down to work on this story have been replaced with a kind of dread I can’t shake off, something that feels like burnout. I’ve spent too many evenings stuck in front of the screen, hoping the words will come back to me, but they don’t, not the way they used to. It’s frustrating and disheartening because I still love these characters and the world I’ve built. But that love alone isn’t enough to carry me through the exhaustion I’ve been feeling. Between creative fatigue, mounting work stress, and just general emotional burnout, I’ve realized I’m not in a place to keep pushing forward like this. The ideas and hopes I had for this story are slowly dwindling the more I stare at a blank screen. It’s not that I don’t care about the story anymore. I do, deeply, but my connection to it feels frayed, like I’ve been trying to squeeze out inspiration from a well that’s simply run dry.

On top of that, I have also been losing interest in Daybreak and writing long stories. I still love and adore the characters, as well as where this story is going, but longer stories are difficult to write like this.

So, I’ve decided to take a hiatus; for my health, for my creativity, and for the sake of the story itself. I don’t want to force something that’s meant to be written with heart and care. This isn’t a farewell, just a pause until I’m ready to return with renewed energy and a better mindset. I want to come back when I can truly give this story the attention and love it deserves. Thank you for understanding and for sticking with me. I’m so grateful for the support, and I promise I’ll be back when the time is right.

I'm not sure if anyone will read this far, or particularly care, but I promise I'm not abandoning this story. I may start other works for other fandoms, but I will return to writing this story and developing the world I created around Dae-Jung and Javier. IF you would like oneshots or simply shorter stories (>10 chapters), please let me know!