Chapter 1 âźâË Afterthought.
âSince when is any day a good day?â
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Summary; After the fall of the safetown, whatâs left is held together by duct tape and sheer will. Many things have changed in the few weeks since, the survivors included, and everyone is on high alert. But even inside the walls, survival demands more than strength; it demands whatever light you can still keep burning.
a/n; a few notes just to start out. this is an alternates fanfiction, with a few of my own tweaks. in this fic, Katelyn survives instead of KC. along with that, Nekoette (renamed Nash) was around in this universe, until her death. i feel like this evens out a few things for Travis and Dante's characters backstory-wise, and i wanted to give Dante a more front-facing role anyways since this is told from Gene's POV. there is also an OC, who you won't see much of in this chapter, but she will be more relevant soon.
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cw; swearing, brief mentions of blood/injury/death but nothing substantial (yet), aftermath of a mass casualty event. this is an apocalypse fic, ppl r gonna die bro. itâs not gonna be pretty. more intense triggers might be present in later chapters.Â
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They held the meeting in the old gym because it had four intact walls and a door that stayed on its hinges. Someone had scrubbed blood off the basketball court, and the smell of bleach had its claws in the place. Folding chairs stood in uneven rows like crooked teeth. Half of them were empty.
Gene lingered near the back with his shoulder to the cinderblock, pretending the peeling boards on the wall had his full attention. He wasnât a meeting guy even before the world went feral. Now he showed up because Travis would dock his hours on the wall if he didnât. And he wasnât about to give that brat an inch.
Travis was at the front, propped on his crutches, ledger on a card table, whiteboard behind him. He wore the expression heâd learned since that night in the minesâcalm, squared, a little numb around the mouth. It worked. People listened. And now they called him their leader. He was the youngest of the group, but you always seemed to be looking up at him.
âOkay,â Travis said, voice steady enough to pin the room together. âWeâre calling this official. Iâll coordinate assignments, schedules, supplies. Dante has perimeter and the wall. Aphmauâs still handling external scouting intel when sheâs in.â He didnât look at the empty chair near the aisle where she used to sit, old habit. âQuestions before we start?â
The handful of survivors left in town exchanged glances, as if questions were contraband. Theyâd been like this for weeksâsilent, too careful, walking around the hole the ambush had punched through them. You could hear emptiness now. It had a sound, like a building settling after a fire.
Geneâs eyes slid across the room and stuck where they always seemed to end up: Scarlet and Laurance, side by side in the second row, knees touching, whispering like idiots. Scarlet had a smudge of charcoal on her fingers and a strand of dark red hair stuck to her lip. Laurance pretended not to notice as he tugged it free for her, all courtly-like, as if the apocalypse hadnât spit on their shoes. Attached at the hip, both of them. Gene wanted to be annoyed and managed it for three seconds before the exhale turned warm in his chest. They were the only two people here whoâd figured out how to look at each other without flinching.
Travis flipped a page. âFirst order: we keep the generators cold except at dusk. No more all-night burns. Leif was stripping tech for a reason.â He didnât have to say the name. Everyone remembered. Mister Mayor, Mister Safety, Mister âLetâs Stay Dark.â Leif had been an Alternate all alongâcopy, parasite, mimic. Whatever word made it easier to sleep. The whole time, heâd been here with a borrowed smile, making sure the lights stayed low so his friends could crawl closer. The slow infiltration had been a patient animal. It waited until they thought the quiet meant theyâd done something right. Then it chewed.
Gene rubbed his thumb over the ridge in his palm where a burn had healed, sheened and shiny. He still caught himself looking for Leif at these things, the way you look at a missing tooth with your tongue. Habit was a stupid animal, too.
Travis droned through assignments. Katelyn was there, dirt under her nails, blue-yet-graying hair roped back, arms crossed like a barricade. Gene wanted to be annoyed at her, too, but couldnât find the muscle when she was the only reason they still had a functioning farm. When Travis tapped the column labeled LABOR, she nodded once, already calculating how to stretch one body into two jobs.
âClinic?â someone asked.
Gene didnât raise his hand, but his voice echoed in the empty gymnasium. âIâve got it,â he said. âWeâre low on sterile. If anybodyâs hoarding unopened gauze, bring it by.â He got a nod from Katelyn, yet the room didnât move around his words.
Travisâs green eyes cut to him, gratitude flickering. The moment held a beat too long, and Gene looked away first, because he always did. He could still feel the heat of Travisâs calf under his palms, the metal taste in the back of his throat, the sound a bone made when you cut it free from the body. He hated that he remembered the steps like a song. An EMT before the world went to shit, and now everybodyâs lives seemed to be in his hands.
âThen weâre set,â Travis said, and the ledger closed with a soft clap. âWeâll post shift lists by sundown.â
The ritual needed a benediction, apparently. Katelyn scraped a knuckle across her jaw, muttered, âDonât die,â and people took that for the prayer it was. Chairs creaked. Boots scuffed and squeaked against the floor. The town exhaled.
Gene didnât move. He watched Travis re-stow the markers, the careful way he slid the crutches under his arms. Pain had a way of teaching people to do everything slow. As Travis hobbled off the riser, Gene pushed off the wall and intercepted him by the door.
âAre you eating?â Gene asked, which was how he asked about everything.
âLater.â Travisâs smile was a tired hitch, something he would not have spared a few weeks back. âDo me a favor? Check on Dante. He started the south wall patch at dawn, and I donât think heâs stopped.â
âWhat a shocker.â Gene huffed, and then jerked his chin at the crutches. âAnything weird? Redness. Drainage. You know, the fun words.â
âFine.â Travisâs mouth twitched. âHurts like a bitch today. Cold air.â
âYeah.â Geneâs gaze dropped to the fit of the cuff, the clean line of the bandage under canvas. âCome by the clinic later. Iâve got a new wrap.â
Travis nodded, then leaned in, voice lowering. âAnd hey- donât pick a fight with him, okay? Heâs⊠todayâs not a good day.â
âSince when is any day a good day?â Gene let the barb sit a heartbeat, then softened it with, âI know.â He sighed, scratching the stubble on his chin. Blades were kept for more important things in this day and age.
He stepped out of the gym into a blue-cold afternoon. The sky looked just as sickly as the people below it, all cut by fog and grief. He grabbed one water bottle from the crate outside the center, then another, and went across the yard. The wall hacked the horizon into a blunt lineâplywood, pallets, sheet metal, the bones of cars. Ugly. Strong. Danteâs shape moved along it, a human metronome: step, lift, set, hammer; step, lift, set, hammer. The ladder creaked every time he moved an inch.
âHey,â Gene called, hands in his pockets, chin lifted to spot the mess of blue hair above him.
Dante didnât turn. He set the next board, eyes on the seam, and drove the nail with three clean hits that sounded like language.
âYou planning on stopping before you hit the lake?â Gene asked when he got close enough to smell the sawdust and sweat, and found himself in a much too precarious spot: having to actually look out for his brother.
Dante slid the hammer into his belt. His curls were damp, pasted to his forehead in commas. âSunset.â He glanced down, not with the eyes Gene knew from when they were kids, but older, like a man whoâd watched himself break. âDid Travis send you to babysit?â He huffed as he descended the ladder.
âTravis asked me to make sure you were hydrated, so you donât die, stupid.â Gene set one bottle on the wall cap, tossed the other to the nearby grass, and didnât comment when Dante took the first like heâd only just remembered water existed.
They stood shoulder to shoulder. On the other side, the world went on the way it didâsilent stretches, then sudden movement where you didnât want it. Wind rang through them in a song. The sound made Geneâs hands itch for a cigarette. The wonders of the free world.
âYou hear anything last night?â Danteâs eyes skimmed the treeline.
âOnly my own snoring,â Gene said. âAnd Laurance and Scarâs obnoxious fuckinâ flirting. Through the damn wall.â
âMm.â Danteâs mouth folded, eyes lost in some other time. He pressed the heel of his hand against the wall, as if holding the whole thing up by himself. Maybe he thought he could.
Gene didnât say KC. He didnât say Nash. He never did. Grief turned names into tripwires. Instead he said, âYou eating?â He seemed to be asking everybody that nowadays.
âLater,â Dante said, like his answer lived in Travisâs mouth, too.
âKatelyn said the squash is actually edible. If you drown it in salt.â
âThen itâs not edible,â Dante said.
Gene let the silence work. It had teeth, but you could ride it. He studied the new boards, the measured spacing, the way Danteâs lines stayed straight even when his hands shook at the edges. Working till you couldnât feel your fingers was one way to stop feeling anything else. It worked. Until it didnât.
âWhereâs Aphmau?â Gene asked, like he hadnât already scanned the usual high points for her silhouette.
âWhere do you think?â Dante scoffed, with an inch of a grin on his face. A muscle flicked in his cheek. âOutside. South Ridge, last I knew.â
âOf course she is.â Gene scuffed a boot. âShe ever think the wallâs here for a reason?â
âShe thinks the wallâs not high enough to see far.â Dante took another drink. âSheâs careful. Just⊠different careful.â
âDifferent carefulâ was one way to call grief a compass. It didnât point north, but it pointed somewhere. Gene had told her to stop looking a long time ago.
Boot steps came up slow behind them. Katelynâs shadow crossed the dirt before she didâsquare, steady, carrying more weight than her own. Her smock was slung over her shoulder now, dirt-covered, but the stripes of her shirt didnât seem any cleaner.
âYou two gonna lean on this thing until it falls over?â She asked, and Gene turned with a smirk he didnât feel.
âWe were having a moment,â he said.
âGross.â She wiped a streak of sweat from her brow. âWhereâs Travis?â
âMeetings,â Gene said, rolling his eyes at the word like it was a rash. âBut heâll be out soon.â
âGood. He can tell Laurance ânoâ with his nice voice so I donât have to punch him.â Katelyn planted a wrist on her hip. âThose two are gearing up for a run.â
Gene didnât pretend he didnât know which two. And his whole body seemed to tense at the thought. âNow?â
âBefore sundown,â she said. âThey want to hit the pharmacy two towns over. Scarlet says she knows the route.â But Katelyn didnât sound as convinced.
âGreat,â Gene clapped his hands together in finality, and for a second the ground under him stopped feeling like it would fall. He also knew Scarlet had to be bluffing, but a slight chance was better than none at all. âI need syringes. And halazone if they find any left.â
âWrite it down.â Katelyn jerked her chin toward the gate. âTheyâre cocky today. Thought you might want to be the one to tell them theyâre not invincible.â
âI tell them every day,â Gene sighed, but he went anyway.
At the gate, light settled, soft, and slanted; the world framed, almost picturesque. Scarlet had her pack on, straps cinched tight across the battered jacket she refused to give up. Laurance was checking his knives, humming what sounded like the start of a joke. Somehow, the fog didnât seem to follow either of them.
Travis was already there, ledger tucked under one arm, one crutch planted, the other hovering in the dirt like a flag. âBe careful,â he said, which, coming from his mouth, was a contract. âCheck in at the Ridge, at the cemetery, at the water tower. If you miss one window, you turn around. No hero moves, I beg of you.â
Laurance offered a two-fingered salute, and a grin that made people forget they were in danger. âNo heroes here. Only handsome idiots.â
Scarlet elbowed him. âOnly one of those, actually. Iâm pretty fuckinâ smart if I do say so myself.â Her smile reached her eyes, bright enough to look like something new. She looked at Gene next, as if to make sure he was watching.
âBring me back a present,â Gene said, and when her nose crinkled because she knew he meant medical-grade saline, he reached in and hugged her anyway. It surprised both of them. She smelled of the bonfire from last night, and rain that hadnât happened yet. He squeezed once, quick, then stepped away before he could tug her back into safety and board up the gates forever.
Laurance leaned in, arms spread. âWhat, no hug for me?â
Gene smacked him upside the head, not hard. âDonât lose her,â he said. It came out too flat to be a joke, so he tacked on, âAnd donât be fucking dumb,â like a bandage.
âOw,â Laurance scoffed, rubbing his ear theatrically. âWould it kill you to be nice for once?â
âIâm nice. Just⊠during office hours.â Gene said. He looked at both of them and stiffened back up. The words tried to align behind his teeth; the ones that sounded like âbe carefulâ, only not so useless. Nothing better came up. âHit your windows. No shortcuts. Donât die.â
âGot it,â Scarlet said. She adjusted her strap, tucked into Lauranceâs side, then glanced at the open road. For a beat, the settlementâs noise fell away. The hammering, the murmur, the wind. It was just the two of them framed in the gate, all the stupid hope of two people who believed in each other more than they believed in anything else.
Travis hobbled aside. Dante stood a pace back from the hinge, eyes on the treeline, jaw set against something only he could hear. Katelyn folded her arms and said nothing, which was as loud as she got with goodbyes. Gene felt a bad taste form in his mouth and didnât swallow it.
He almost said donât. He almost said stay. Instead he said, âGo,â because that was the gig, and because telling people to stay alive had never worked before.
They walked out the gate like the world owed them a favor. Scarlet looked back once. At Gene, at all of them, and then forward again. Laurance whistled something light and breezy, bumping her shoulder just to get her to laugh.
The gate swung shut, iron rasping against iron. The sound crawled over Geneâs skin and settled behind his ribs. There was already an absence, even if they were only 100 feet away.
âThey looked ready,â Katelyn mentioned after a long minute.
âThey always do,â Gene said. His gaze remained fixed on the seam where the wall met the sky, on the thin line that pretended it could separate the living from the damned. He didnât believe in lines anymore. He didnât believe in walls.
Travis adjusted his grip on the crutch and exhaled through his nose. âCheck-ins on the hour,â he said to nobody in particular. âWeâll be here.â
âYeah,â Gene said, because that was true even when nothing else was. He shoved his hands in his jacket and headed for the clinic, already flipping through a list in his head. Things they needed, things he could fix, things he could not. Behind him, Danteâs hammer started up again. The sound counted the time.
Theyâd walked out like they could take on the world. Which meant, in Geneâs experience, the world was already sharpening its teeth.
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