Chris had woken up in less than ideal circumstances. Not only did the world seem to be succumbing to a zombie apocalypse – even Snowpiercer hadn’t been this bleak – but he’d been buried under rubble of a collapsed wall, a beam laying heavy on his leg and another across his back. He dimly remembered begging Sebastian to run, and was grateful at least that it seemed Seb had listened to him. As long as his boys were safe, he could hold on to a slim sliver of hope, use it to stave off fear about Scarlett and Emmy and Jeremy, and all the other people he loved. The new friends he’d made in Royal held just as much worry for him as the people he’d known and loved for years, but he didn’t have time to focus on that right now.
It took him almost an hour to free his leg, and more than once he had to lay there for what felt like an eternity, a mixture of pain and exhaustion stalling his efforts. Even when his leg was free, Chris still had to contend with the one across his back – that was the one which had caused the most damage, he thought, at least a couple of ribs. Considering he could still move, he was fairly comforted by the certainty that it wasn’t any worse than that, wasn’t his spine.
When he was finally free of the beams, Chris grabbed a nearby piece of debris – a long piece of wood, nicely sharpened at the end – and made his way out into the street. For better or for worse, the streets were deserted. He remembered he and Seb had been making their way to NSV, so he decided to try there first. Moving slowly and carefully, taking time to hide when he was tired or sensed danger, it took Chris hours to find the bar. He pushed the door open with a grunt, now using his weapon more like a walking stick than anything else. He looked around hopefully, his face white except for the blood caked at his temple. “Seb?” he croaked.
There was more or less only one way to get through this. By shutting off his emotions as much as he could. Two days ago, he had woken up by kissing Chris and the to the gurgling sounds of his son and now, he lived in the middle of an apocalypse that was so ridiculous it had, until recently, been a pop-culture phenomenon. Now it was reality and it was dirty and bloody and the one mantra he allowed himself was “make sure Zander survives”. And so he pushed forward, for his son, when all he wanted was to curl up into a ball and ... not do anything. He had no idea if his mother was still alive, his friends in New York. All he knew was that Zander was fine, that Candice was okay as well as Scarlett and that ... that was what he was focusing. Not the tear that had ripped his heart in two when Chris ... and not the sounds of Blake, who he loved fiercely even if “only” as a friend, dying across the room. Did you even die when you got bit? He should be with her. But he couldn’t. He just couldn’t. So instead he paced a lot and hardly slept and kept thinking of better ways to barricade the doors to the bar and sometimes, he went out and killed things. Because that was his life now and it was the only way he knew how to not scream until his lungs gave out.Â
At some point, he had fallen into a dazed slumber, exhaustion and a talking to from Can making him sit down for more than five minutes. He had Zander on his chest as the only real source of comfort he could allow and zapped in and out of consciousness, waking every few minutes to noises or from half-remembered dreams of Chris shouting at him to leave. He had left him ... he fucking loved the man and he’d left him like a coward, like the piece of shit human cadaver that he was. Not something he would ever, in any way, get over. If he even made it out of this thing ... another thing he didn’t really deserve. Sebastian bit the inside of his cheek, sharply until he drew blood, used the pain to seal it all away again. Later. Reflexively, he held Zander closer, breathed in his smell and his innocence and only focused on that. Zander had to survive. Zander and Candice, that was what he would focus on. She would take care of him and yes, he was a fucking martyr now but he didn’t care. He had a goal and ... he had always been good with goals.Â
There was a commotion at the door, it was making Zander cranky and a cranky baby meant a screaming baby. A screaming baby could mean death these days. And so Seb was on his feet, passed the whimpering infant to the first awake person he spotted with a kiss to the forehead and strode to the front of the bar, hissing as soon as he was within distance. “Get your shit together, there’s ...” and then the words dried in his mouth. Silence, thick and heavy all around him, pressing in on him with hard, hot rods of steel that felt like they were ripping his insides apart.Â
“No,” because how. Because he had seen. He had ... “Iubita mea, no, oh god.” Sebastian stumbled forward, body moving toward the only thing that mattered before his mind was caught up, rebooting from the shock. Arms reaching, tears hot in his eyes and ... “Chris, oh my god, Chris.” A hug so fierce he knew it had to be painful but he couldn’t not ... he was real. He was dirty and bloody but he smelled real, felt real, felt ... “I thought you were dead, you fucking asshole I thought you ... I ... oh fuck.”
pixelskylines
snowghoul
s-u-f-j-a-n-s-t-e-v-e-n-s
titsay
