ABOUT ME: Call me B! New-ish to the tumblr scene, and lover of all things Formula One!
Full time Kimi Antonelli and Oscar Piastri defender.
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╰┈➤ As of now, I’ll only be writing driver x driver!
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Summary: Under a sky turned blood-red by distant wildfires, the group’s final vehicle gives out just as the infected begin behaving in terrifying, unpredictable ways. Forced to take shelter in a towering skyscraper, they quickly realize the night isn’t just dangerous—it’s changing the rules of survival entirely.
They saw the sky change before they understood it.
At first, it was subtle—just a strange tint bleeding into the horizon, like sunset had arrived hours too early and didn’t quite know how to behave. The clouds, already low and swollen with storm weight, began to take on a dull, bruised color. Not orange. Not pink.
Red.
Wrong red.
The kind that didn’t belong to anything natural.
Max noticed it first from the driver’s seat, squinting through the windshield as the Suburban rattled along the empty stretch of highway leading into Dallas.
“…That’s not normal.”
Charles leaned forward from the passenger side, following his gaze. “No.”
Behind them, the group shifted, murmurs spreading as more people noticed the sky.
Liam pressed his face to the window. “Is that… fire?”
“It’s too far out for us to see flames,” George said, though his voice carried uncertainty. “But that color—yeah. Wildfires, maybe.”
“The whole sky?” Isack asked.
No one answered.
Because it wasn’t just the sky.
It was everything.
The light itself had changed, turning the world into something unreal. The road ahead looked like it had been dipped in diluted blood, buildings in the distance silhouetted against a glowing red haze that pulsed faintly with the movement of clouds.
It made distance hard to judge.
Made shadows stretch strangely.
Made everything feel… off.
Kimi shifted slightly in his seat, glancing toward Ollie beside him. Ollie hadn’t said anything, but his posture had gone tight again, fingers tapping lightly against his knee in a rhythm he probably didn’t realize he was keeping.
“You okay?” Kimi asked quietly.
Ollie nodded too quickly. “Yeah. Just… weird lighting.”
Kimi didn’t look convinced.
But he didn’t push.
The wind picked up as they got closer to the city.
At first it was just a steady push against the side of the Suburban, enough to make the vehicle sway slightly on the road. Then it grew stronger, curling between buildings as the skyline loomed closer, turning into a low, constant howl that threaded through broken windows and hollow streets.
By the time they reached the outer edges of Dallas, the air itself felt alive.
The red clouds hung low over the skyscrapers, trapping the glow beneath them so the entire city seemed submerged in it. It reflected off glass, bounced between steel and concrete, pooling in corners and alleyways like something physical.
“Feels like we’re driving into hell,” Oscar muttered from the back.
“Not helpful,” Lando replied, though he didn’t sound like he disagreed.
The Suburban lurched.
Hard.
Everyone jolted forward slightly as the engine gave a sharp, choking sound.
Max swore under his breath. “No, no—come on—”
The vehicle stuttered again.
Then again.
Charles looked at him. “Max—”
“I know.”
The engine made a grinding noise that didn’t belong to anything good.
Then it died.
Not a slow fade.
Not a struggling stall.
It just—
Stopped.
The sudden silence was jarring, broken only by the wind screaming through the empty streets around them.
The Suburban coasted forward on momentum before Max steered it sharply toward the side of the road, bringing it to a rough stop near the base of a cluster of towering buildings.
For a moment, no one spoke.
Then—
“…That’s it, isn’t it?” Franco said quietly.
Max tried the ignition again.
Once.
Twice.
The engine clicked.
Nothing.
He exhaled slowly, leaning back in his seat.
“…Yeah.”
The weight of that settled over them fast.
They had known it was coming.
The Suburban had been holding on through sheer stubbornness for days now, coughing, sputtering, threatening to give out every few miles.
But knowing something is going to happen didn’t make it easier when it actually did.
“Okay,” Charles said, already shifting into problem-solving mode. “We expected this. We have supplies. We—”
A sound cut him off.
Sharp.
High-pitched.
Not mechanical.
Not wind.
Something else.
Everyone froze.
Then they heard it again.
A shriek.
Not quite human.
Not quite anything else.
And it wasn’t alone.
More sounds followed, echoing between buildings, bouncing off glass and steel in a way that made it impossible to tell where they were coming from.
Kimi’s head snapped toward the street.
Ollie went very still beside him.
“What is that?” George whispered.
No one had to answer.
They all knew.
Infected.
But—
Different.
They spilled out of the Suburban quickly, grabbing what they could carry without slowing themselves down. Bags were slung over shoulders, weapons checked and rechecked in hurried motions.
The red light made everything harder.
Depth felt wrong.
Movement felt exaggerated.
Even each other looked unfamiliar for a split second when they turned too quickly, faces shifting under the crimson glow.
“Stay close,” Lewis said firmly. “We find shelter. Now.”
Another shriek echoed.
Closer this time.
And then they saw them.
At the far end of the street, figures stumbled into view.
Infected.
But not like before.
Their movements were sharper. Faster. Erratic in a way that didn’t follow the usual patterns they’d learned to recognize. They jerked suddenly, heads snapping toward sounds that didn’t exist, bodies twitching like they were reacting to something invisible.
One slammed into a car hard enough to dent the metal.
Another spun in place, clawing at the air.
“They’re—” George started.
“Agitated,” Charles finished.
“Or confused,” Oscar added.
“Or both,” Max said.
One of the infected suddenly turned.
And locked onto them.
Its head tilted.
Then it screamed.
The others followed.
“Run,” Max said.
No one argued.
They moved as one, sprinting down the street as the infected surged forward behind them.
The wind howled louder between the buildings, funneling through narrow gaps and whipping debris across the pavement. Papers, glass shards, loose metal—everything became a hazard underfoot.
Ollie grabbed Kimi’s sleeve without thinking when a sudden gust nearly knocked him sideways.
Kimi steadied him immediately, not even breaking stride.
“Left!” Liam shouted, pointing toward a narrow entrance between two towering buildings.
They veered toward it, boots pounding against concrete, breath coming fast and uneven.
The infected followed.
But something was off.
They didn’t move in a straight line.
They staggered, hesitated, reacted to sounds that weren’t there—slamming into walls, tripping over debris, changing direction suddenly as if chasing something just out of sight.
“It’s the noise,” Pierre called out. “Or the light—something is—”
A loud metallic crash echoed from somewhere above them.
The infected shrieked in response, several of them veering sharply toward the sound instead of continuing straight.
“They’re distracted!” Isack shouted.
“Good,” Max said. “Keep moving!”
They burst through the entrance of the nearest skyscraper, slamming the door shut behind them as the echoes of the outside world dulled slightly.
Inside, it was darker.
Quieter.
But not safe.
The lobby stretched out in front of them—wide, open, filled with overturned furniture and broken glass that crunched underfoot. The red light still filtered in through the tall windows, painting everything in that same unnatural glow.
Everyone paused for just a second.
Breathing hard.
Listening.
The sounds outside continued—distant, chaotic—but muffled enough now to give them a thin layer of separation.
“We go up,” George said. “Higher is safer.”
“Stairs,” Charles added immediately. “Not the elevators.”
“No argument there,” Lando muttered.
They moved quickly, heading toward the stairwell at the back of the lobby.
The door creaked open.
Darkness waited on the other side.
Max glanced back at the group.
“Stay together.”
And they stepped inside.
The stairwell swallowed them whole.
The heavy door slammed shut behind Isack, the echo reverberating up the concrete shaft like a gunshot. For a split second, everyone froze—listening, waiting, bracing for the sound to trigger something outside.
But nothing came.
Or at least, nothing immediate.
The distant shrieks still filtered through the walls, warped and stretched by distance and structure, but they no longer felt like they were right on top of them.
It was enough.
Barely.
“Go,” Max said, already moving.
They started climbing.
The stairwell was dim, lit only by faint emergency strips that flickered inconsistently along the walls. The red glow still seeped in through narrow windows at each landing, painting the concrete in streaks of dull crimson.
It made everything feel enclosed.
Airless.
Like they were climbing inside something alive.
Lando kept one hand on the railing, the other pressed briefly to his temple as he moved.
“Tell me when we stop,” he muttered.
“You okay?” Oscar asked, just behind him.
“Yeah,” Lando said quickly. “Just—hate heights. And stairs. And enclosed spaces. So this is—great.”
“Good timing, then.”
“Shut up.”
Despite everything, Oscar smiled faintly.
Then his foot slipped slightly on the edge of a step.
He caught himself immediately—but not before his knee twisted awkwardly.
“Ah—” He hissed under his breath, grabbing the railing harder.
Charles turned instantly. “Oscar?”
“I’m fine,” Oscar said quickly. “Just—strained it a bit.”
“That is not ‘fine.’”
“It’s workable.”
Max glanced back, assessing. “Can you keep moving?”
Oscar nodded once. “Yeah.”
Max didn’t argue—but he slowed slightly, adjusting pace without making a big deal out of it.
No one said it out loud, but they all felt it:
They couldn’t afford to stop.
They made it up ten flights before anyone spoke again.
“Here,” George said, pushing open the stairwell door onto a mid-level floor.
They stepped out cautiously.
The hallway stretched long and empty, lined with office spaces—glass walls cracked or shattered, doors hanging open, furniture overturned or left exactly where it had been abandoned.
The red light filtered in through the massive windows at the far end, turning the entire floor into a dim, eerie corridor of shadows.
“Clear?” Liam asked quietly.
“Looks it,” Isack replied, though his grip tightened on his weapon.
Max nodded. “We stay here. For now.”
No one argued.
They spread out slightly, checking rooms, clearing corners, making sure nothing else had claimed the space before them.
For a few minutes, it was quiet.
Not peaceful.
Just… less chaotic.
And then—
A sound.
A crash.
From somewhere down the hall.
Everyone froze.
“Lando?” Oscar called quietly.
No response.
Max turned sharply. “Where are they?”
Liam looked around. “They were right behind me—”
Another noise.
Closer.
A scraping sound.
Then a muffled curse.
“—here!” Lando’s voice called, strained and disoriented.
Max didn’t wait.
He moved first, Charles right behind him.
They found them at the far end of the corridor.
A side office had partially collapsed inward, blocking part of the hallway with fallen shelving and broken partitions. Lando stood just beyond it, one hand braced against the wall, breathing unevenly. Oscar was crouched nearby, gripping his knee, clearly trying not to show how much it hurt.
“You two good?” Max asked immediately.
“Yeah,” Lando said, though his voice wavered. “Just—lost the group for a second.”
“You didn’t answer,” Charles said, sharper than intended.
Lando blinked. “I—didn’t hear you.”
Max frowned slightly.
Didn’t hear?
That didn’t sit right.
Then another noise echoed through the building.
Not from the group.
Not from inside.
From outside.
A high-pitched screech, distorted by distance and structure.
And then—
Movement.
Not in the hallway.
But beyond the windows.
Max turned toward the glass.
Down below, the street churned with motion.
Infected.
Dozens of them.
Maybe more.
But they weren’t moving like before.
They darted suddenly.
Stopped.
Turned toward nothing.
Reacted to sounds that didn’t exist.
Or sounds too faint for the group to hear.
One slammed into a wall hard enough to stagger back.
Another sprinted in the wrong direction entirely, chasing something unseen.
“They’re reacting to something,” Charles said quietly.
“Sound,” Max said.
“Or light.”
“Or both.”
Another shriek echoed.
And the entire mass shifted.
Like a school of fish.
Chaotic.
But connected.
Lando swallowed hard. “That’s worse.”
“Yeah,” George said from behind them. “That’s worse.”
They regrouped fully after that.
No one drifted off again.
Not even by accident.
They moved into one of the larger office spaces, clearing it enough to create a temporary resting point. Desks were pushed aside, chairs repositioned, anything that could be used as a barrier stacked loosely near the entrances.
It wasn’t safe.
But it was better than exposed.
Oscar sat down carefully, stretching his leg out with a quiet exhale.
Charles crouched beside him immediately. “Let me see.”
“It’s fine,” Oscar insisted.
“You are limping.”
“I’ve limped before.”
Charles didn’t look convinced, but he didn’t push further—just stayed nearby, watching.
Across the room, Lando leaned back against the wall, eyes half-closed.
“Hey,” Liam said, dropping down beside him. “You good?”
Lando nodded once.
Then paused.
“…Everything’s spinning a bit.”
“Vertigo?” Isack asked.
“Yeah.”
“From the height?”
“From everything,” Lando muttered. “The stairs, the drop, the—” He gestured vaguely toward the window. “That.”
Liam followed his gaze.
The red sky pressed against the glass, the city below still shifting with erratic movement.
“Yeah,” Liam said quietly. “Fair.”
Hours passed like that.
Slow.
Uneven.
The night stretched, filled with distant noise and the constant, low hum of wind threading through the building.
Every so often, a louder sound would echo—metal shifting, something falling, a distant impact—and each time, the infected below would react instantly.
Sharp.
Violent.
Wrong.
“They’re not just hearing,” George said at one point, watching through the glass. “They’re reacting to changes. Patterns. Disruptions.”
“Stimulus-based,” Charles added.
Max nodded slowly. “Which means…”
“They’re predictable,” Kimi said quietly.
Everyone looked at him.
Kimi shrugged slightly. “If you understand what they’re reacting to.”
A pause.
Then Max gave a small nod.
“…That helps.”
It didn’t make things safe.
But it made them make sense.
And right now—
That was enough.
Eventually, the noise outside began to thin.
Not disappear.
Just… change.
The erratic spikes became less frequent. The sharp reactions dulled slightly, like whatever had been triggering the infected was fading.
Or shifting.
“Morning soon,” Isack said quietly.
No one corrected him.
Even though the sky didn’t look like morning.
Max stood near the window, watching the horizon.
The red glow had dimmed slightly, replaced by a heavier, smoke-choked gray that settled low over the city.
Not better.
Just different.
Behind him, the group stirred—slowly gathering their things, preparing to move again.
“We head back to the street at first light,” Max said.
“And the Suburban?” Liam asked.
Max didn’t look away from the window.
“We strip it,” he said. “Take anything useful.”
“And then?”
Max exhaled.
“Then we find something else.”
No one said it out loud.
But they all thought the same thing:
They had to.
Dawn didn’t arrive so much as it pressed in.
There was no clean horizon, no soft gradient of light breaking over the skyline. Instead, the darkness thinned unevenly, replaced by a heavy, gray-red haze that settled over everything like ash. The sky lost its violent crimson glow, but it didn’t return to normal—it became something duller, suffocating, choked with smoke that turned the sun into nothing more than a dim, diffused circle somewhere behind the clouds.
It felt like breathing through cloth.
Like the world itself was tired.
Max was the first to move.
“Up,” he said, voice low but firm.
No one needed convincing.
They were already gathering their things, shaking off what little rest they’d managed, shoulders stiff and minds still half-caught in the tension of the night.
Lando pushed himself up carefully, pausing as the room tilted slightly around him.
“Still bad?” Liam asked quietly.
“Less spinny,” Lando muttered. “Still hate everything.”
“Understandable.”
Across the room, Oscar tested his weight on his leg.
It held.
Barely.
“Good enough,” he said, more to himself than anyone else.
Charles watched him, clearly not convinced, but didn’t argue. Not now.
Not when they needed to move.
They made their way back down the stairwell slower than they had climbed it.
More careful.
More aware.
Every sound felt amplified again, even without the chaos of the night pressing in around them. The building creaked occasionally, metal shifting as the wind threaded through broken windows and hollow spaces.
At the bottom, Max paused at the door leading back into the lobby.
He held up a hand.
Listened.
Nothing immediate.
But that didn’t mean safe.
It never meant safe.
“Same as before,” he said quietly. “We move fast. Stay together.”
A chorus of small nods followed.
Then he pushed the door open.
The lobby looked worse in daylight.
Or whatever passed for daylight now.
The red glow had faded, but the gray haze filtering through the glass made everything look washed out and brittle. Dust hung in the air, disturbed by their movement, catching in their throats as they stepped carefully through the debris.
Outside, the wind had softened—but not stopped.
It whispered now instead of screamed.
Which somehow felt worse.
Max moved first, scanning the street as he stepped out of the building.
Empty.
At least at first glance.
But the evidence of the night was everywhere.
Scratches along car doors. Broken glass scattered across the pavement. Dark smears that no one looked at too closely.
“They’re still around,” George said quietly.
“Yeah,” Max replied. “Just… not here right now.”
“Which means we don’t wait for them to come back,” Charles added.
No one argued.
The Suburban sat where they’d left it.
Still.
Silent.
Done.
For a moment, no one moved toward it.
It had carried them through too much to just be—
Left.
But there wasn’t another option.
Max broke the pause.
“Grab everything useful.”
And just like that, it became practical.
They moved in quickly, opening doors, pulling out bags, stripping anything that could be repurposed—tools, spare parts, fuel containers, even bits of wiring and fabric that might come in handy later.
Ollie hesitated for half a second before climbing in, his hand brushing over the worn seat like he was saying goodbye to something that had kept them alive longer than it should have.
Kimi noticed.
He didn’t say anything.
Just stayed close.
“Max.”
Liam’s voice cut through the movement.
Max looked up.
Liam stood a short distance away, near the edge of the street, pointing toward something partially obscured between two buildings.
“…You might want to see this.”
Max stepped over, the others gradually following.
At first, it just looked like another shadow.
Another abandoned structure swallowed by the city.
Then the shape resolved.
Large.
Boxy.
Intact.
A van.
Not just any van.
A Ford Transit 350—high-roof, extended body, the kind built for hauling cargo… or people.
A lot of people.
It sat slightly angled, one tire partially deflated but not destroyed, the exterior dusty but undamaged. The back doors were shut. The front windshield cracked—but not shattered. Only two seats up front, but they could make do.
“Tell me that works,” Oscar said, almost disbelieving.
Max didn’t answer immediately.
He approached it slowly, scanning for signs of damage, movement, anything that might make it unsafe.
Nothing obvious.
He reached for the driver’s door.
Paused.
Then pulled it open.
No sudden movement.
No hidden danger.
Just—
An empty seat.
Keys still in the ignition.
Max stared for a second.
Then let out a quiet, almost disbelieving breath.
“…You’re kidding.”
Charles stepped closer, peering inside.
“That’s—”
“Luck,” George said.
“Or bait,” Isack added cautiously.
Max slid into the seat anyway.
“If it’s bait,” he said, “it’s very well designed.”
He turned the key.
The engine hesitated—
Then roared to life.
Everyone froze.
Then—
“Okay,” Liam said. “That’s a good sound.”
A real sound.
A living sound.
After everything—
It felt unreal.
They didn’t linger.
Couldn’t.
As soon as everything was loaded, Max pulled the van into motion, steering it carefully back onto the street.
The city stretched out ahead of them again.
But it didn’t feel the same.
The red was gone.
The chaos had settled.
But something lingered.
Something learned.
They drove in silence at first.
Watching.
Waiting.
And then—
Movement.
Up ahead.
A small cluster of infected emerged from between buildings, slower now, less erratic—but still not right.
They paused.
Turned.
Reacted to the low rumble of the van.
Not instantly.
But deliberately.
“They’re tracking differently,” Charles said.
“Yeah,” Max replied. “Less chaos. More… response.”
“Like they adapted,” Lewis added.
No one liked that.
The van picked up speed.
Not reckless.
But steady.
Confident.
They passed through the last stretch of the city without stopping, weaving around debris, avoiding blocked streets, staying just ahead of anything that might decide to follow.
Lando kept his eyes closed for most of it, leaning back against the metal walls with slow, controlled breathing.
“Almost out,” Oscar murmured.
“Good,” Lando said faintly. “Wake me when we’re not vertical.”
“We’re not vertical now.”
“You know what I mean.”
Eventually, the buildings thinned.
The skyline faded behind them.
And the open road stretched out ahead once more.
Gray.
Empty.
Alive in a quieter, more familiar way.
Max didn’t slow down.
Not until the city was nothing more than a shadow in the distance.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
Summary: Stranded on a desolate farm road as their only vehicle begins to fail, tensions rise and truths slip out—especially the ones neither Kimi nor Ollie are ready to face. But as the engine sputters back toward life and a quiet moment in an abandoned shed changes everything, survival becomes tangled with something far more fragile: the risk of letting someone in.
It started small—subtle enough that at first, no one said anything. A slight stutter in the engine. A hesitation when Max pressed the gas, like the vehicle itself was second-guessing the decision to keep going. Then came the sound. Low. Uneven. Not quite a knock, not quite a whine, but something in between that didn’t belong.
Charles noticed first.
Of course he did.
He leaned forward slightly from his seat, eyes narrowing as he listened past the wind and the tires grinding over the dirt road. “You hear that?” he asked.
Max didn’t answer immediately, but his grip on the wheel tightened just enough to give him away.
“Yeah,” he said finally. “I hear it.”
From the back, George groaned. “If this is another ‘normal car noise’ conversation, I swear—”
“It’s not normal,” Max cut in.
That shut George up.
The engine coughed.
Once.
Twice.
Then the Suburban lurched.
“Okay, that’s not great,” Ollie muttered.
“Not great?” Pierre repeated from the passenger seat. “That is significantly worse than ‘not great.’”
The vehicle shuddered hard, the sound deepening into something rough and grinding, and then—
It died.
Not dramatically. Not explosively.
Just… stopped.
The sudden silence hit harder than the noise had.
Max cursed under his breath as the Suburban rolled the last few feet forward on momentum before settling into stillness in the middle of the narrow farm track. Dust drifted lazily past the windows, carried by a wind that felt far too warm for the color of the sky.
For a moment, no one moved.
Then George broke it.
“…Well,” he said slowly, “that feels bad.”
The hood came up ten minutes later.
And stayed up.
The Suburban sat half-disassembled in the middle of the dirt track, its front end exposed like something mid-autopsy. Tools had been dragged out and scattered across the ground in a loose, chaotic perimeter, and Charles and Oscar were already elbow-deep in the engine bay.
Or, more accurately—Oscar was elbow-deep.
Charles worked one-handed beside him, movements practiced but slightly slower, compensating for what he no longer had. He held a flashlight awkwardly tucked against his shoulder while using his remaining hand to point, adjust, and occasionally smack Oscar when he reached for the wrong thing.
“You are not touching that,” Charles snapped, accent thickening as his patience thinned.
Oscar grinned, entirely unbothered. “Relax, mate, I know what I’m doing.”
“You do not.”
“I absolutely do.”
“You are about to dismantle the only functioning part of this engine.”
“That’s dramatic.”
“That is accurate.”
They bickered like this constantly—sharp, fast, but never truly hostile. It had a rhythm to it, something almost comforting in its predictability.
Max sat a few feet away on an overturned toolbox, arms folded across his chest, watching them with the detached focus of someone observing a particularly questionable nature documentary.
Kimi wandered over after a minute, hands shoved deep in his pockets, kicking absentmindedly at the dirt before dropping down beside him.
Neither of them spoke right away.
The wind shifted.
Somewhere far off, a siren wailed—faint, warped, wrong. It rose and fell without urgency, like it had forgotten what it was supposed to warn people about.
Kimi stared out at the empty fields.
Too flat. Too open. Too quiet.
Max didn’t look at him, but his attention shifted anyway. It always did.
After a while, he exhaled slowly, the sound shaped like mild disappointment. “Charles has no idea what he’s doing.”
Oscar’s head popped up immediately. “Oi, I heard that.”
“You were meant to,” Max called back without missing a beat.
Charles didn’t even turn around. “Ignore him. He knows nothing about engines.”
“I know enough to know you’re improvising,” Max replied.
“That is called problem-solving.”
“That is called guessing.”
“It is educated guessing.”
Oscar leaned slightly toward Charles. “He’s got a point.”
Charles elbowed him.
Silence settled again, softer this time.
Kimi watched them work—or try to work. Watched the way Oscar leaned in too close, the way Charles adjusted automatically, the way they moved around each other like they’d practiced it a hundred times before the world fell apart.
Like it was easy.
Like it made sense.
Kimi’s chest tightened.
He didn’t understand why.
His fingers found a loose thread on his sleeve, worrying at it until it frayed further.
“Max…” he said finally.
Max didn’t look at him. “Yeah?”
Kimi hesitated, then nodded faintly toward Charles. “How did you know?”
Max blinked, slow and unimpressed. “Know what?”
Kimi shifted slightly. “About him.”
There was a pause.
Then Max shrugged. “He’s my boyfriend. You just… know.”
He said it like it was obvious. Like it didn’t require explanation. Like it had never been confusing or messy or terrifying.
Kimi nodded, but his foot started tapping against the dirt, restless energy he couldn’t quite contain.
Max tilted his head, finally glancing over. “Why?”
“No reason.”
Max raised an eyebrow. “That was immediate. Suspiciously immediate.”
“It wasn’t.”
“It was.”
Kimi scowled faintly, looking away.
Max leaned back on his hands, gaze sharpening just slightly. “It’s Ollie, isn’t it?”
Kimi’s head snapped toward him. “No.”
“Liar.”
“I’m not lying.”
“You’re terrible at this,” Max said flatly. “If you deny it again, you might actually combust.”
Kimi stiffened. “I don’t have feelings for him.”
Max hummed, thoughtful. “You’re gay.”
Kimi choked. “I—what—no—Max—”
Max shrugged. “You’re gay. It’s fine.”
“You can’t just say that.”
“Why not? It’s true.”
“It’s not true.”
“It is.”
Kimi dragged both hands down his face. “Oh my god…”
Max patted his back, the gesture awkward but not unkind. “Relax. The apocalypse is not exactly enforcing social expectations.”
“That is not helping.”
“It should be.”
Kimi stayed like that for a second, hands pressed to his face, ears burning.
Max’s voice softened—not dramatically, but enough to matter.
“You look at him,” he said, “the same way Charles looked at me before we got together.”
Kimi peeked through his fingers. “…I do?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Max considered it. “Like you’re trying not to. Which makes it worse.”
Kimi made a small, miserable sound. “He’s going to notice.”
“He already has.”
Kimi froze. “What?”
“Ollie likes you,” Max said, as casually as if he were commenting on the weather. “It’s painfully obvious.”
Kimi stared at him, wide-eyed. “He—he does?”
Max turned toward him fully now. There was no teasing in his expression, no smugness—just a blunt, steady kind of certainty.
“Kimi,” he said, “you held his hand for an entire minute last night.”
Kimi’s brain stalled. “That—doesn’t mean—”
“He almost passed out.”
Kimi’s heart slammed against his ribs. “He didn’t pull away.”
“He wouldn’t.”
The simplicity of it hit harder than anything else.
Kimi looked down at his hands again.
“What if I mess it up?” he asked quietly.
“You won’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
Max huffed a quiet laugh. “I do. Because Ollie looks at you like you hung the moon.”
Kimi swallowed.
“And you,” Max added, nudging his shoulder lightly, “look at him like you’re terrified he’ll disappear.”
That landed.
Hard.
Up front, something clanged loudly.
Oscar swore. Charles snapped something rapid-fire in French. A second later, there was a sharp hiss that made everyone collectively flinch.
“Did something just—explode?” George called.
“No,” Oscar said.
“…Are you sure?”
“No!”
“Confidence inspiring,” Max muttered.
Kimi let out a small laugh despite himself.
Max gestured lazily toward the front of the car. “See that?”
Kimi followed his gaze.
Charles and Oscar were shoulder-to-shoulder, arguing over a wrench, faces too close, both smiling despite themselves.
“That,” Max said, “is love.”
Kimi huffed. “That looks like a disaster.”
“It is,” Max agreed. “Those things are not mutually exclusive.”
Max leaned forward slightly, elbows resting on his knees. “So,” he said, “what are you going to do about Ollie?”
Kimi hesitated.
Then, for the first time, he actually thought about it without immediately shutting the idea down.
“I…” he started, then stopped.
Tried again.
“I think I like him.”
Max grinned. “There it is.”
Kimi groaned, dropping his head into his hands again. “Stop.”
“No. I earned this.”
Kimi shoved him lightly, but there was no real force behind it.
Max nudged him back, gentler this time. “You’ll be fine,” he said. “Just talk to him. Or let him talk to you. He’s been trying.”
Kimi nodded slowly.
Nervous.
But steadier.
Up front, the engine coughed.
Once.
Twice.
Then fell silent again.
Oscar leaned back, wiping grease across his face. “Yeah… that’s not fixable right now.”
Charles exhaled sharply, frustrated but unsurprised. “We will need time.”
Pierre stepped closer. “How much time?”
Charles glanced at the engine, then at his hand, shaking his head slightly. “Not for a few hours.”
Max stood, stretching slightly as he looked out over the empty fields.
“Then we’re staying put,” he said.
No one argued.
The daylight was starting to thin out, not quite sunset but close enough that everything took on that stretched, uneven look—shadows pulling longer across the dirt, the sky dimming in slow, reluctant gradients. The Suburban still sat where it had died, hood open, its insides exposed and half-disassembled, but something had shifted.
It wasn’t fixed.
Not yet.
But it was… closer.
Oscar had grease smeared across half his face and both arms, sleeves shoved up past his elbows as he leaned deep into the engine bay, muttering to himself in a steady stream of commentary that no one else fully followed. Charles stood beside him, directing more than doing, his one hand moving quickly between flashlight, tools, and whatever part he could reasonably reach.
“Non, non—stop,” Charles snapped, nudging Oscar’s wrist with the back of his hand. “You are tightening it too much.”
“I’m not—”
“You are going to strip the thread.”
“I know how threads work.”
“Clearly, you do not.”
Oscar huffed, but eased off slightly anyway. “You’re bossy.”
“I am correct.”
“That’s debatable.”
“It is not.”
The engine gave a low, uneven cough when Oscar adjusted something near the lower housing.
Both of them froze.
Oscar slowly looked up. “…That sounded promising.”
Charles tilted his head, listening. “Again.”
Oscar turned something—carefully this time.
The engine sputtered.
Not alive.
But not dead, either.
Charles’s expression sharpened. “We are close.”
That word traveled.
Close.
It wasn’t much, but it was enough to shift the air around them.
Ollie sat cross-legged in the grass, boots stretched out in front of him, elbows propped on his knees and chin resting heavily in his hands. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days—eyes distant, shoulders tight, expression caught somewhere between overwhelmed and completely lost.
And, unfortunately for him—
Not subtle.
Isack noticed first.
He glanced over, frowned slightly, then leaned closer. “What’s wrong with you?”
Ollie didn’t even look up. He just made a small, miserable noise. “I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do,” Lando said from where he sat nearby, carefully dragging a cloth along the edge of his knife. He didn’t even bother glancing over. “He held your hand last night.”
Ollie immediately slapped a hand over his face. “Oh my god.”
Liam perked up instantly, interest lighting up his entire expression. “Wait—he held your hand?”
“We were trying to escape,” Ollie groaned, words muffled through his fingers. “It was dark. He probably didn’t even realize—it just happened—he was just there—”
Isack snorted. “So you’re in love with him.”
“I’m not—”
“Mate,” Lando cut in calmly, still focused on his knife, “you literally say his name in your sleep.”
Ollie went completely still.
Then: “I DO NOT.”
Lando shrugged. “Ask Oscar. He woke up and thought you were being murdered.”
Isack tossed a small pebble at Lando. “Stop winding him up.”
But he was grinning.
Liam was already laughing.
And Ollie looked like he was about three seconds away from dissolving into the ground.
He dropped his head back against the fence post with a dull thud. “I hate all of you.”
“No, you don’t,” Liam said cheerfully.
Ollie groaned. “I like him, okay? There. Great. Fantastic. I like Kimi Antonelli and he definitely does not like me back and that’s fine, I’m fine, everything’s—”
He made a vague, helpless gesture.
“—fine.”
Isack blinked. “Wow.”
Liam leaned closer to him, whispering loudly, “He’s spiraling.”
“Full meltdown,” Lando agreed.
Ollie dragged both hands down his face. “He doesn’t think of me like that,” he muttered. “He probably thinks I’m— I don’t know—annoying, or—”
Ollie peeked at them through his fingers. “How do you know?”
Liam grinned. “Because he looks at you like you’re a puppy someone told him he’s not allowed to pet.”
Ollie froze.
“…That is the worst possible analogy you could have chosen.”
“It’s accurate,” Isack said.
“It’s not helping.”
Then Isack’s gaze flicked past him.
His expression changed instantly.
“Oh my god.”
Ollie straightened slightly. “What?”
“Don’t turn around,” Liam said quickly.
Ollie immediately started to turn.
“Don’t—okay, you’re turning—”
Behind them, a short distance away near the Suburban, Max had shifted positions. He was sitting beside Kimi now, angled just enough that he could see both him and the group near the fence.
And he was very obviously paying attention.
Max looked directly at Liam.
Then pointed, very deliberately, at Kimi.
Then mouthed, slowly and clearly:
“HE. LIKES. HIM.”
Liam choked on his own breath trying not to laugh. He pointed back at Ollie, barely containing himself as he mouthed:
“HE LIKES HIM TOO.”
Max nodded once.
Firm.
Aggressive.
Kimi, caught somewhere in the middle of this silent exchange, looked between them with growing suspicion, like he could feel something happening but had no idea what.
Ollie blinked rapidly. “What are they doing?”
Isack pressed his lips together, failing to hide a grin. “Communicating.”
“About what?”
“Nothing,” Liam said quickly.
“Everything,” Lando muttered under his breath.
Franco wandered over just in time to see Max point again—Kimi, then Ollie, then forming an exaggerated heart shape with his hands like he was performing for the back row of a theater.
Franco lost it instantly.
He doubled over, laughing so hard he had to brace a hand on his knee.
Esteban walked up behind him. “What are—”
He followed Franco’s line of sight.
Paused.
Then started laughing too.
Carlos arrived a second later, took one look at the unfolding silent drama, muttered a quiet, reverent “Jesús,” and immediately joined in.
George glanced up from retying his shoelace, confusion flickering across his face before he tracked what everyone else was looking at.
He lasted all of two seconds before breaking.
“Oh my god—” he wheezed. “What is he doing—”
“OI,” Ollie hissed, scrambling to his feet. “Stop laughing! This is not funny!”
Lando clutched his stomach. “It is incredibly funny.”
“I’m going to die,” Ollie said, horrified.
“No, you’re not,” Isack said. “You’re going to talk to him.”
“No I’m not.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No—”
Behind them, Max pointed again, then made the most obvious kissy-face gesture anyone had ever seen in their life.
Kimi looked like he wanted the ground to swallow him.
Liam made a sound that was somewhere between a snort and a choke.
That was it.
Ollie snapped.
“I’m going to go check that shed,” he announced abruptly, voice cracking as he gestured wildly toward a half-collapsed structure near the tree line. “Alone. By myself. No one follow me.”
Isack smirked. “Subtle.”
Lando gave him a lazy salute. “Good luck, lover boy.”
Ollie grabbed the nearest stick and threw it at him before turning and marching off, dignity hanging by a thread.
A few seconds passed.
Then footsteps approached from behind.
Everyone went quiet.
Kimi.
He didn’t look at them.
Didn’t acknowledge the laughter still barely contained in the group.
Didn’t react to the way every single person was suddenly pretending to be very interested in anything but him.
He just paused briefly.
And said, calm, even, unmistakably himself:
“…Me too.”
Then kept walking.
Following the same path Ollie had taken.
The reaction was immediate.
Lando clapped a hand over his mouth.
Isack smacked Liam’s shoulder with a quiet, delighted “No way—”
Carlos crossed himself. “I have seen enough. God is real.”
Franco whispered, awed, “Oh, that is going to be so good.”
George dragged both hands down his face. “Max is going to be insufferable about this.”
Back at the Suburban, Max watched Kimi disappear toward the shed, completely unbothered.
Satisfied, even.
He leaned back slightly, arms folding across his chest.
Charles glanced over at him, narrowing his eyes. “What did you just do?”
Max shrugged. “Fixed something.”
Charles followed his gaze toward where Kimi had gone, then back to Max.
Understanding dawned.
A slow grin spread across his face. “You meddled.”
Max grinned back. “Yeah.”
Charles huffed a laugh. “Good.”
Oscar straightened suddenly. “Wait—wait—try it now.”
Charles turned back immediately, focus snapping into place. “Again.”
Oscar adjusted something, then reached inside.
The engine coughed.
Stronger this time.
It sputtered—stuttered—
Then almost caught.
The sound didn’t last more than a second, but it was enough.
Oscar lit up. “Did you hear that?”
“Yes,” Charles said, already reaching for another tool. “We are very close now.”
Max glanced at the engine, then back toward the tree line where Kimi had disappeared.
“Good,” he said.
The shed sat crooked against a patch of overgrown grass, its tin roof slanted at an angle that made it look like one strong gust of wind would finally finish knocking it over. Vines had wrapped themselves around the wooden walls, creeping through cracks and broken windows, reclaiming the structure piece by piece. The farmhouse itself had already felt abandoned, but the shed looked like it had been forgotten long before the world ended.
Ollie reached the door first.
Mostly because he was trying to escape.
He pulled it open with slightly more force than necessary, the rusted hinges protesting loudly as the door swung inward. Dust floated through the beam of fading sunlight behind him, turning the tiny space into a cloud of gold and gray.
He stepped inside and immediately stopped.
Because now that he was alone, without everyone laughing, without Lando making comments, without Isack encouraging the chaos—
There was no distraction.
His hands were shaking.
Actually shaking.
Which was ridiculous.
He was not nervous. He was not panicking. He was not standing in an abandoned shed because Kimi Antonelli had followed him after half the group basically announced their relationship before either of them had even admitted there was one.
No.
Obviously not.
He was just tired.
That was it.
Tired.
Stressed.
Traumatized from the apocalypse.
Completely normal reasons.
The sound of footsteps crunching through the grass made his entire body freeze.
Kimi appeared in the doorway a second later, framed by the orange glow of the dying sunlight behind him.
Ollie hated that he noticed things like that.
The way Kimi looked calm even when everything around them was falling apart. The way his expression always seemed unreadable, like there was an entire conversation happening behind his eyes that Ollie could never quite catch.
“Hi,” Ollie managed.
His voice came out embarrassingly small.
Kimi nodded once. “Hi.”
That somehow made it worse.
Because Kimi acted like this was normal.
Like Ollie wasn’t internally screaming.
Ollie immediately looked away, hoping Kimi wouldn’t notice the heat crawling up his neck.
“Sorry,” he mumbled. “I just… needed space.”
Kimi stepped inside, letting the door swing shut behind him with a loud creak.
“It’s okay,” he said simply.
Ollie glanced back.
Kimi shrugged slightly. “I needed space too.”
“Really?”
“People were loud.”
A pause.
Then Kimi added, “About us.”
Ollie’s entire brain stopped functioning.
“Oh my god,” he whispered, dragging a hand over his face. “I’m sorry.”
Kimi tilted his head. “Why?”
“Because everyone was—because they were making it weird and—”
Ollie stopped himself before he said something humiliating.
Kimi stepped closer, not enough to overwhelm him, just enough that Ollie could tell he was paying attention.
“You looked like you wanted to disappear,” Kimi said quietly.
Ollie laughed awkwardly. “I did.”
Kimi watched him for a moment.
He always did that.
Watched.
Like Ollie was a puzzle he wanted to solve.
“If you want to disappear,” Kimi said, voice softer, “you can disappear with me.”
Ollie forgot how breathing worked.
His heart did something violent and embarrassing.
“I…” He swallowed. “Yeah.”
A tiny smile tugged at his mouth.
“That’d be nice.”
The silence afterward wasn’t uncomfortable.
That was the strangest part.
Normally, Ollie filled silence. He joked. He talked. He rambled. He hated quiet because quiet gave his thoughts too much room.
But with Kimi, it felt different.
Like the silence didn’t need fixing.
Eventually, Ollie cleared his throat and looked around the shed.
“Let’s just… look for supplies.”
Kimi nodded.
“Okay.”
They moved around the small space, searching through old shelves, wooden crates, and rusted equipment. The shed smelled like dried hay, old oil, and years of dust settling into forgotten corners.
Ollie opened a cabinet.
“Nothing.”
Kimi moved a stack of cracked gardening pots.
“Nothing.”
Ollie pulled open a wooden chest.
“Actually—”
He frowned.
“Still nothing.”
“Useful.”
“Extremely.”
For a few minutes, they worked side by side.
Then Kimi stopped.
“What is this?”
Ollie looked over his shoulder.
Kimi had pulled something from underneath an old tarp.
And then Ollie froze.
Because Kimi was standing close.
Really close.
Close enough that Ollie’s shoulder brushed his back when he leaned over to look.
He immediately stepped away like he’d touched a hot stove.
“Sorry,” he blurted.
Kimi blinked.
“For what?”
“I—nothing.”
Kimi looked confused but didn’t push.
Instead, he lifted the object.
A camera.
An old Polaroid camera.
The paint was chipped, the edges worn, but somehow it had survived.
Ollie stared.
“No way.”
Kimi wiped dust off the lens.
“Does it work?”
Ollie took it carefully.
“Only one way to find out.”
The film inside was old. Probably ruined.
But somehow, when Ollie pressed the button—
The camera whirred.
Both of them stared.
“It works,” Ollie whispered.
Then he looked up.
At Kimi.
And before he could overthink it, he lifted the camera.
“Smile.”
Kimi looked offended.
“I don’t smile.”
Ollie grinned. “You do.”
“I do not.”
“You do,” Ollie said softly. “Just not for a lot of people.”
Kimi went quiet.
For a second, Ollie worried he’d crossed a line.
Then something impossible happened.
Kimi smiled.
Small.
Barely there.
But real.
Ollie forgot everything else.
The world.
The infected.
The fact that they were standing in a collapsing shed in the middle of nowhere.
He clicked the camera.
The flash went off.
The photo slowly slid out.
Kimi stared at it.
“Your turn,” he said.
“My turn?”
“Yes.”
Kimi took the camera gently.
“Look here.”
Ollie tried to act normal.
He failed.
Because his smile was huge.
Soft.
Impossible to hide.
The flash went off.
“I blinked,” Ollie said.
“Yes.”
“Can we try again?”
“Yes.”
They took more.
Five.
Maybe six.
They stopped counting.
There was one where Ollie made a ridiculous face just to make Kimi react.
It worked.
Kimi actually laughed.
A quiet one.
But Ollie heard it.
There was one where Kimi raised an eyebrow at the camera and Ollie immediately started laughing because somehow that expression was extremely Kimi.
Eventually, the film ran out.
They sat on the dusty floor, sorting through the pictures.
Splitting them.
Keeping pieces of something that felt normal.
“I want the one of you smiling,” Ollie said.
Kimi nodded. “Okay.”
Then he picked up another photo.
“I want the one where you look happy.”
Ollie looked down.
“Do I look happy?”
“Yes.”
The answer came immediately.
No hesitation.
That somehow meant more.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
They weren’t touching.
But they were close.
Close enough.
“Kimi…”
Kimi looked up.
“Ollie.”
Something shifted.
Something almost happened.
Something neither of them knew how to name yet.
Then—
“HEY!”
Max’s voice exploded from outside.
Ollie nearly launched himself across the floor.
“YOU TWO DONE MAKING OUT?”
“We were not—” Ollie shouted.
Kimi closed his eyes.
“Max.”
Charles’s voice followed immediately.
“Max, leave them alone!”
George added, laughing, “Let them develop feelings in peace!”
Ollie covered his face.
“I’m going to die.”
Kimi stood and brushed dirt from his jeans.
“You’re not going to die.”
Then he held out his hand.
“Not from this.”
Ollie looked at it.
Then took it.
Warm.
Steady.
Familiar.
They walked out together.
Outside, Max was leaning against the Suburban looking unbearably pleased with himself.
Charles, Oscar, and George stood nearby, all watching the two of them return.
Max crossed his arms.
“Well would you look at that.”
Everyone looked at him.
“I successfully launched a gay.”
Charles immediately choked.
“Max. What does that even mean?”
“It means I helped Kimi.”
Oscar laughed. “Are you saying you’re Cupid?”
“Yes.”
George stared at him.
“Oh brilliant. We’ve weaponized Max.”
Charles grinned. “Did you really tell Kimi he was gay?”
“Yes.”
“Max.”
“What? He needed honesty.”
Oscar shook his head.
“You are unbelievable.”
Max looked toward Kimi and Ollie walking back together.
“Results.”
George sighed.
“Can’t believe I’m saying this, but…”
He paused.
“Good job, Verstappen.”
Max looked genuinely pleased.
“Thank you.”
Charles leaned over and kissed his cheek.
“You menace.”
Max smiled.
“To be fair, I did a public service.”
Oscar threw a rag at him before turning the key again.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
I ended up taking a very impromptu hiatus due to some important things going on in my life that needed my full attention. Everything is okay, but I needed to step away for a bit—and I really appreciate everyone’s patience while I did.
I’m back now, and getting into writing again. Posting should hopefully return to the usual schedule soon along with the other fics I had planned.
Thank you for sticking around, seriously. It means a lot more than I can properly put into words ❤️
Summary: They don’t talk during the day—not really. But past midnight, when the world quiets and the truth slips out too easily, Liam and Isack start saying all the things they’ve been avoiding and realize they might not be able to stop.
Liam’s phone buzzes against the hotel nightstand, loud in the kind of silence that only exists after a race weekend. The kind where everything finally stops moving, but your brain refuses to.
He stares at the notification for a long second.
Isack (1:46 AM)
voice message (0:12)
Liam exhales through his nose, already tired in a way sleep doesn’t fix, and presses play.
There’s a rustle first. Sheets, probably. Then—
“…you up?”
A pause.
“…stupid question. You’re always up.”
Another pause.
“You drove like shit today, by the way.”
The message cuts.
Liam stares at his phone.
Then he huffs a quiet laugh, scrubbing a hand over his face.
“Yeah, alright,” he mutters.
He taps record.
Liam (2:02 AM)
voice message (0:19)
“Oh, brilliant. First message of the night and you come for my driving? That’s bold, mate. Really bold for someone who nearly binned it in Turn 3.”
He hesitates.
Then, softer—
“…I didn’t drive like shit.”
A beat.
“…it was just… messy.”
He stops the recording before he can say anything else.
Sends it.
Immediately regrets it.
The typing bubble appears.
Disappears.
Comes back.
Then another voice note.
2:05 AM.
“…messy’s a generous word,” Isack says, voice quieter this time. Not teasing—well, not just teasing.
There’s a faint hum in the background. Air conditioning, maybe.
“You looked… off.”
A pause.
“…you alright?”
Liam’s chest does something annoying at that.
Because that’s the thing.
They don’t do this during the day.
During the day, it’s jabs and eye-rolls and passing comments that mean nothing and everything at the same time. It’s you talk big for someone who cares this much and pretending it’s a joke.
But at night—
At night, Isack asks questions like that.
And Liam answers them.
2:11 AM.
He doesn’t send a voice note this time.
He types.
Yeah. Just tired.
Three dots.
Gone.
Then—
You?
The reply is instant.
Obviously not tired enough to sleep.
Liam snorts.
Then his phone buzzes again.
Another voice note.
2:13 AM.
“I hate post-race nights,” Isack admits, voice rougher now. Less filtered. “It’s like—everything finally shuts up, but your head doesn’t.”
There’s a soft thud, like he’s dropped his phone onto the pillow and picked it back up again.
“…keep replaying everything.”
A pause.
“You do that too, right?”
Liam closes his eyes.
Yeah.
Yeah, he does.
2:20 AM.
voice message (0:31)
“Yeah,” Liam says quietly. “Yeah, I do.”
He shifts, staring up at the ceiling.
“It’s like… you know exactly where it went wrong, and you can’t fix it anymore, so your brain just… loops it.”
A breath.
“…it’s annoying.”
He almost ends it there.
Almost.
Then—
“…I hate that I care this much.”
Send.
This time, the reply takes longer.
Three minutes.
Five.
Liam almost convinces himself Isack’s fallen asleep when his phone buzzes again.
2:27 AM.
“…you always say that,” Isack murmurs.
There’s something softer in his voice now. Something that makes Liam’s chest tighten in a way he doesn’t want to examine too closely.
“Like it’s a bad thing.”
A pause.
“…it’s not.”
Liam swallows.
They fall into it after that.
Like they always do.
Half-sentences. Half-thoughts. The kind of honesty that only exists when you’re too tired to keep your guard up.
They talk about the race.
About the stupid things.
About the important things, without ever calling them that.
2:41 AM.
“…I thought you were going to overtake me in Sector 2,” Isack says.
“I was going to,” Liam replies a few minutes later. “You defended like your life depended on it.”
“It kind of does,” Isack sends.
Another message.
“…you were good today.”
Silence.
Liam presses record.
“…so were you.”
3:08 AM.
The conversation drifts.
It always does.
From racing to everything else.
From everything else to… them.
It happens slowly.
Almost accidentally.
“…you didn’t talk to me much today,” Isack says.
Liam frowns. Hovers over the button before pressing it.
“We talked.”
“Not really,” Isack sends back instantly.
A pause.
“…you avoided me.”
Liam opens his mouth.
Closes it.
Because—
He did.
3:17 AM.
There’s a shift.
Subtle.
But it’s there.
“…why?” Isack asks.
Liam sits with it.
The question.
The honesty of it.
The fact that it’s 3:17 in the morning and somehow this feels like the easiest time to answer.
“…because it’s easier,” he says finally.
He waited.
And waited.
And right before he shut his phone off, Isack responded.
“To what?”
He thought for a minute.
“To not—” he cuts himself off, frustrated.
“…to not make it weird.”
Silence.
Then—
“…weird how?”
Liam laughs quietly. Records.
“Don’t do that.”
It was a constant back and forth after that.
“Do what?”
“Make me say it.”
“…I think you want to.”
Liam’s heart stutters.
Because—
He might.
3:26 AM.
He doesn’t send a voice note this time.
He types.
Deletes it.
Types again.
Deletes it again.
Then—
You know what I mean.
Three dots.
Nothing.
Then—
Say it anyway.
Liam stares at his phone.
Then locks it.
Throws it onto the bed beside him.
“Yeah, no,” he mutters.
It buzzes again.
And again.
And again.
He ignores it for a full minute before grabbing it again.
Three new messages.
One voice note.
He presses play.
“…you’re so dramatic,” Isack says, and Liam can hear the smile in his voice.
A pause.
Then, softer—
“…you like me.”
Liam freezes.
“…don’t go to bed,” Isack adds quickly. “Or—don’t ignore me. Whatever you’re doing.”
A breath.
“I’m not saying it like it’s a bad thing.”
Another pause.
“…I like you too.”
The message ends.
Liam doesn’t breathe for a second.
Two.
Three.
Then—
“Shit,” he whispers.
3:31 AM.
He calls him.
It rings once.
Twice.
Then—
“Hi,” Isack says, voice quieter now. Real-time quiet. Not filtered through recordings and pauses and second-guessing.
“Hi,” Liam echoes.
There’s a beat.
“…you couldn’t just text that?” Liam asks.
Isack huffs. “Absolutely not.”
“Right.”
Another pause.
Then—
“…you meant it?” Liam asks.
“Yeah.”
“Even though I drive like shit?”
“Especially then.”
Liam laughs, breathless.
“…idiot.”
“Yeah,” Isack agrees softly.
They don’t rush it.
They don’t suddenly become something else.
They just—
Talk.
About everything they’ve been avoiding.
About the way they orbit each other during race weekends, always just a little too close, a little too aware.
About the way it’s easier to pretend during the day.
About how it’s impossible to pretend at night.
“…I thought it was just me,” Liam admits at one point.
“It’s never just you,” Isack replies.
“…that’s not comforting.”
“It’s not supposed to be.”
Liam smiles anyway.
4:02 AM.
They’re both quieter now.
Sleepier.
But neither of them hangs up.
“…we’re going to have to deal with this in the morning,” Liam says eventually.
A hum of agreement.
“…yeah.”
Another pause.
“…we won’t,” Isack adds.
Liam snorts. “Absolutely not.”
“Daytime us doesn’t exist for this.”
“Right.”
“Midnight only.”
“Midnight only,” Liam agrees.
A beat.
“…for now.”
“…for now,” Isack echoes.
4:15 AM.
They’re both half-asleep when it happens.
The shift.
Small.
Soft.
“…hey,” Liam murmurs.
“Yeah?”
“…I meant it. Earlier.”
“Which part?”
“…that I care too much.”
A pause.
“…I don’t think it’s a bad thing,” Isack says again, quieter this time.
Liam swallows.
“…not if it’s about you,” he admits.
Silence.
Then—
“…liam.”
“Yeah?”
“…go to sleep.”
Liam huffs. “You first.”
“Not happening.”
“Yeah, figured.”
A pause.
“…goodnight.”
“…night.”
Neither of them hangs up for another five minutes.
Morning comes too fast.
It always does.
And with it—
The daylight.
The noise.
The version of them that pretends none of that happened.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
So freaking late with this 😭. I can’t believe it’s already July! I feel like June flew by, but I’m really excited for what’s coming this month. Things are definitely picking up (in every sense), and I’m so excited about it!
Thank you again for all the love lately—it genuinely keeps me going. I read everything, even if I don’t always know how to respond properly <3
My posting schedule for the month of July is as follows:
Series:
PLOTD (zombie AU)
• Every Sunday + Wednesday (It’s getting worse. That’s all I’ll say.)
One-Shots
• July 13 — “Midnight, No Filter” (Lisack)
• July 30 — “After Midnight, Still Yours” (Lisack)
Other Notes:
Requests are open! Please refer to my request rules before making one!
Please keep checking tags—some upcoming PLOTD chapters are heavier
Reblogs and Likes are always appreciated ❤️
Thank you for being here, truly. I appreciate every single one of you more than I can say.
Summary: Beneath a sickly green sky in Hillsboro, a desperate search for supplies leads a group of survivors into towering grain silos hiding horrors far worse than silence. As dust, fear, and near-death close in, they’re forced to confront a brutal truth—there is no such thing as a safe place anymore.
The sky changed before anyone said a word about it.
It wasn’t sudden—not like a storm rolling in with thunder and wind—but gradual, creeping in at the edges until the blue above them was replaced by something… wrong. A sickly green hue stretched across the horizon, bleeding upward into the clouds like a bruise spreading beneath skin.
Franco noticed it first.
“That’s not normal,” he muttered.
Max followed his gaze, squinting slightly. “Storm system.”
Liam shook his head faintly. “No warning?”
“There’s no one left to give one,” Pierre said.
That settled it.
The road into Hillsboro felt different from the others.
Wider, flatter, surrounded by fields that stretched endlessly in all directions. Dead crops swayed in uneven waves under a wind that hadn’t quite picked a direction yet. It came in bursts—sharp, sudden gusts that rattled against the Suburban before disappearing again.
Then came the sound.
Low.
Distant.
Almost mechanical.
Ollie frowned, leaning slightly toward the window. “Do you hear that?”
Kimi tilted his head. “Yeah.”
It wasn’t constant.
It rose and fell, uneven, like something trying to function without the power to do it properly.
Lando leaned forward from the back. “Is that… a siren?”
They all listened.
There it was again.
A long, hollow wail that didn’t quite reach full volume before dying out.
Then starting again.
Pierre exhaled slowly. “Storm sirens.”
“But there’s no power,” Isack said.
“Backup systems,” Carlos replied. “Or… something left running.”
Max didn’t like that answer.
They saw the silos before they reached the town.
Massive structures rising from the flat land like something unnatural—too tall, too uniform, casting long shadows despite the muted light from above. There were dozens of them, clustered together near what used to be a processing facility.
Oscar let out a low whistle. “That’s… a lot of grain.”
“Used to be,” Liam corrected.
Now they just stood there.
Silent.
Watching.
Franco slowed as they approached.
“You want to check it?” he asked.
Max didn’t answer immediately.
His eyes moved across the structures, scanning for movement, for signs of life, for anything that might give them a reason to avoid it.
There was nothing.
Which somehow made it worse.
“We need supplies,” Carlos said quietly.
Pierre nodded. “And places like this… they store more than grain.”
Max finally exhaled. “We check it. Fast. Controlled.”
They parked at a distance.
Far enough to retreat if needed.
Close enough not to waste time.
The wind had picked up slightly now, carrying dust across the open ground in thin, shifting sheets. It scraped against their clothes, their skin, their eyes.
Ollie pulled his sleeve over his mouth. “This place feels wrong.”
Kimi glanced at him briefly. “Every place feels wrong now.”
“Not like this.”
Kimi didn’t respond.
Because Ollie wasn’t wrong.
The group split again.
Smaller this time.
More deliberate.
Max stayed back with Franco, Carlos, Lewis, and a few others at the nearby farmhouse to secure the perimeter and keep the vehicle ready.
Pierre took the lead for the search team.
With him: Kimi, Ollie, Liam, and Isack.
“Warehouse first,” Pierre said, nodding toward the largest structure near the silos.
“Why there?” Ollie asked.
“Processing plants usually keep tools, supplies, sometimes medical kits,” Pierre replied. “Better odds than empty storage towers.”
Kimi adjusted his grip on his weapon slightly. “Let’s make it quick.”
The walk to the warehouse felt longer than it should have.
The ground was uneven, cracked in places where heavy machinery had once rolled through. Now it was just dust and silence.
And that sound.
That low, broken siren.
Still echoing faintly across the fields.
Up close, the warehouse looked worse.
The metal siding was dented inward in several places, like something had hit it repeatedly from the outside.
Or tried to get in.
The large sliding door was partially open, just enough to slip through.
Pierre paused at the entrance.
“Quiet,” he said.
They all nodded.
Inside, the air changed immediately.
Cooler.
Thicker.
Filled with the scent of dry grain and something older beneath it—something that had settled into the walls over time.
The space was massive.
Open.
High ceilings with rusted beams stretching overhead.
Rows of equipment sat abandoned, some toppled, others frozen mid-function.
And everywhere—
Grain.
Spilled across the floor in uneven drifts, piled against walls, collected in corners like sand.
Ollie frowned. “That’s… a lot.”
“Storage overflow,” Liam said quietly.
Kimi stepped forward carefully, boots sinking slightly into the loose grain. “Watch your footing.”
Pierre nodded. “Stay close.”
The first sound came from above.
A faint shifting.
Like something settling.
They all froze.
“Wind?” Isack whispered.
Kimi listened carefully.
“No,” he said.
Because the wind didn’t move like that.
The second sound came from the grain itself.
Closer.
Subtle.
A faint rustling beneath the surface.
Ollie’s breath caught slightly. “Did you hear that?”
Pierre nodded slowly. “Yeah.”
Liam crouched slightly, studying one of the larger piles. “That’s not natural.”
Kimi’s grip tightened.
“Back up,” he said quietly.
The grain had shifted again.
This time, visibly.
A small ripple across the surface.
Then another.
And another.
Like something underneath was trying to move.
Isack took a step back. “Nope.”
Pierre raised a hand, signaling for silence.
They all held still.
Watching.
Waiting.
Then—
A hand broke through the surface.
Gray.
Decayed.
Twitching.
Ollie stumbled back immediately. “Oh—”
The rest of the body followed.
Slow.
Dragging.
The infected pulled itself free from the grain, movements muffled by the loose material still clinging to it. Its head jerked unnaturally, jaw hanging open as it let out a low, broken sound.
Not loud.
But close.
Too close.
The grain shifted again.
Multiple points now.
Multiple shapes rising.
Pierre swore under his breath. “They’re buried in it.”
“Why?” Isack asked, panic creeping into his voice.
“No idea,” Liam replied.
Kimi didn’t wait for more.
“Move,” he said.
They backed away slowly at first.
Trying not to trigger a full reaction.
But the infected were already stirring.
More hands.
More movement.
The grain itself seemed alive now, shifting in uneven waves as bodies forced their way upward.
Ollie turned. “We need to go.”
Pierre nodded sharply. “Now.”
They moved toward the exit.
Faster now.
Less controlled.
Behind them, the sounds grew louder—the rustling, the dragging, the low, broken calls of the infected struggling free from their grain-filled graves.
Kimi risked a glance back.
And immediately wished he hadn’t.
There were more than he thought.
Far more.
“Don’t run,” Pierre said, though his voice had tightened.
“Why not?” Ollie shot back.
“Because if we fall, we’re done.”
That was enough.
They kept moving.
Fast.
Careful.
The light from the entrance grew closer.
Almost there.
Almost out—
Then—
A loud crack echoed from above.
Everyone froze instinctively.
Kimi looked up.
The ceiling beams groaned under pressure, dust falling in thin streams as something shifted overhead.
Liam’s eyes widened. “That’s not good.”
“No,” Pierre agreed.
It wasn’t.
Not even close.
Another crack.
Louder this time.
The grain piles shifted violently.
And suddenly—
The entire structure felt unstable.
“RUN,” Pierre shouted.
The moment Pierre shouted, everything fell apart.
Not gradually. Not in pieces they could track or predict.
All at once.
The ceiling didn’t cave in entirely, but it shifted—violently, unpredictably. One of the upper support beams snapped with a deafening crack, sending a cascade of dust and loose debris raining down over the grain-covered floor. The impact rippled through the piles beneath them, triggering a chain reaction that made the entire ground feel like it was moving.
Kimi lost his footing first.
His boot sank deeper than expected into the loosened grain, slipping sideways as the surface beneath him shifted like water. He caught himself before falling completely, but it slowed him—just enough to matter.
“Ollie—go!” he shouted.
But Ollie didn’t go.
He turned back.
Which was exactly what Pierre didn’t want.
“Don’t stop!” Pierre snapped.
But the world had already tipped into chaos.
The grain piles were collapsing inward now, not outward. Whatever unstable balance they’d been held in before had broken, turning the floor into something treacherous and unpredictable. Each step sank deeper, dragging at their legs, threatening to pull them down.
Behind them, the infected surged.
Freed from their suffocating trap, they moved in jerking, uneven bursts—faster than they had any right to be after being buried. Their limbs were coated in grain dust, faces obscured, mouths open in those broken, hollow sounds that echoed unnaturally in the enclosed space.
Liam nearly went down next.
Isack grabbed him before he could fully fall, hauling him upright with a strained grunt. “Move!”
“I’m trying—”
“Try harder!”
Another beam cracked overhead.
This time, something heavier gave way.
A section of the upper structure collapsed partially, slamming down into one side of the warehouse with a thunderous crash. The force sent a shockwave through the floor, knocking all of them off balance for a split second.
That second almost killed them.
One of the infected lunged forward, arms outstretched, fingers clawing at the air—and caught the back of Ollie’s sleeve.
Ollie yanked forward instinctively, but the fabric held just long enough to pull him off-center. His foot slipped, sinking deep into the grain as he pitched forward.
“Kimi—!”
Kimi turned.
And didn’t think.
He moved back toward Ollie instead of forward.
Against every instinct.
Against every logical survival rule they’d built over the past weeks.
He grabbed Ollie by the arm and pulled hard, trying to drag him free from the shifting ground.
“Get up!” Kimi snapped.
“I can’t—!”
The infected was already closing in again, dragging itself forward through the grain with disturbing speed.
Pierre saw it.
“Leave it!” he shouted. “Kimi, MOVE—”
But Kimi didn’t.
The world narrowed.
To one thing.
One choice.
Kimi reached down blindly, grabbing the first solid object his hand hit—a rusted metal tool half-buried in the grain. He didn’t even register what it was, only that it had weight.
The infected lunged.
And Kimi swung.
The impact was wrong.
Too soft.
Too real.
The sound it made lodged somewhere deep in his chest, something he knew would stay there long after this moment passed.
The infected dropped instantly, collapsing into the grain with a twitch that faded just as quickly as it began.
For a second—
Everything stopped.
Kimi stared at it.
At what he’d just done.
At the stillness where movement had been seconds before.
His grip tightened unconsciously around the metal in his hand.
He didn’t move.
Didn’t breathe.
Didn’t think.
“Kimi!”
Ollie’s voice snapped him back.
Sharp.
Urgent.
Alive.
Kimi blinked.
Then grabbed Ollie again.
“Up,” he said, voice rough now. “Now.”
This time, Ollie got his footing.
Barely.
Together, they stumbled forward, pushing through the shifting grain toward the exit as the warehouse continued to come apart around them.
Behind them, more infected pulled free.
More movement.
More sound.
Too much.
Pierre reached the doorway first, turning immediately to help pull the others through.
“Go!” he shouted, grabbing Liam’s arm as he stumbled out into the open air.
Isack followed close behind, nearly tripping as he crossed the threshold.
Kimi and Ollie were last.
Too close.
Way too close.
Another section of the ceiling gave way.
This time directly above where they’d just been.
The crash sent a cloud of dust and debris billowing outward, swallowing the interior of the warehouse in a thick, choking haze.
“HURRY—” Pierre snapped, but the word barely had time to land before the floor dipped hard to the left.
Kimi staggered, boots sliding in loose grain that suddenly felt more like liquid than anything solid. The surface beneath him collapsed inward in a slow, horrifying sink, dragging him down inch by inch.
“Ollie—!”
He didn’t even realize he’d said it until a hand slammed into his.
Not a grab for balance.
Not an accident.
A grip—tight, desperate, immediate.
Ollie’s fingers locked around his, rough and shaking, hauling hard as the grain shifted again beneath them. For one suspended second, neither of them had solid footing. Just pressure. Just the force of holding on.
“Don’t—” Ollie started, voice strained, breath sharp. “Don’t let go—”
“I’m not—!” Kimi shot back, panic spiking as the floor lurched again.
Their hands tightened instinctively, knuckles grinding together as another section of the structure gave way behind them with a deafening crash. Dust exploded upward, thick and blinding, swallowing the air, clogging their lungs.
Someone shouted—Liam, maybe. Pierre barked an order.
But Kimi couldn’t process any of it.
All he could feel was Ollie’s hand in his.
Warm.
Alive.
There.
The world narrowed to that single point of contact as they stumbled forward together, half-running, half-falling across unstable ground that threatened to swallow them whole.
Ollie pulled. Kimi followed.
Or maybe it was the other way around.
It didn’t matter.
They moved as one uneven, desperate unit, hands still locked together even as they finally hit solid flooring near the doorway. Even as Pierre grabbed Ollie’s shoulder and shoved him forward. Even as Isack dragged Kimi the last few feet out into open air.
They didn’t let go.
Not until the collapse finished behind them in a thunderous roar of splintering wood and shifting grain.
Not until they were outside.
Not until the world stopped moving.
They didn’t stop running.
Not immediately.
Not until they’d put real distance between themselves and the warehouse, the sound of their own breathing loud in their ears, the wind cutting through the dust that still clung to their clothes.
Pierre was the first to slow.
“Stop,” he said, turning slightly. “Stop here.”
They did.
One by one.
No one spoke at first.
They just stood there.
Trying to breathe.
Trying to process.
Trying to understand how close that had been.
Ollie bent forward slightly, hands on his knees as he fought to steady his breathing. His arm stung sharply now, a thin line of blood cutting through the dust coating his skin.
Kimi noticed immediately.
“You’re bleeding.”
Ollie glanced down. “Just a cut.”
“It’s not just a cut.”
“I’m fine.”
Kimi didn’t argue.
But his hands were still shaking.
Pierre looked back toward the warehouse.
Or where it had been.
Now partially collapsed, one side completely caved in, the structure leaning at an angle that made it clear nothing inside had survived that fall.
“Those things…” Isack muttered. “They were just… buried there.”
“Trapped,” Liam said.
Pierre shook his head slightly. “Or stored.”
That thought lingered.
Uncomfortable.
Unanswered.
They started walking back toward the Suburban.
Slower now.
Each step heavier than the last.
The adrenaline was fading.
Leaving something else behind.
Halfway back, Ollie spoke.
Quiet.
Barely above the wind.
“Kimi.”
Kimi glanced at him. “Yeah?”
Ollie hesitated.
Then: “I thought you were going to die.”
Kimi didn’t respond immediately.
“I mean it,” Ollie continued, voice tightening slightly. “When you turned back—when you didn’t run—I thought that was it.”
Ollie shook his head. “That doesn’t mean you always will be.”
Neither of them spoke after that.
But the silence between them had changed.
The storm never quite broke, and somehow that made everything worse.
It followed them back from the silos like a threat that had changed its mind at the last second—like something that had decided to wait. The sky stayed that same nauseating green, hanging low and swollen over Hillsboro as if it were pressing down on the land, trying to flatten it. Even the wind felt wrong. It moved in uneven pulses, like breath stuttering in a dying chest.
No one said much as they trudged back toward the Suburban.
Grain dust clung to them in a pale, choking film, turning sweat into paste, turning skin into something foreign. Ollie’s arm was wrapped tight in a strip of fabric that used to be part of a shirt—George’s, judging by the faded pattern—and the blood had already started to seep through in dull, rusty patches. Kimi walked beside him, close enough that their shoulders brushed every few steps, his hands still trembling despite the fact that the immediate danger was long gone.
Or at least, far enough behind them to pretend it was.
Pierre led the way, quieter than usual, his earlier confidence replaced with something sharper and more brittle. Max hung back near the rear, scanning the horizon like he expected something to come boiling out of the fields at any second. The others fell into a loose, exhausted formation between them, too drained to argue, too wired to relax.
It wasn’t until the silhouette of the farmhouse came back into view that anyone finally spoke.
“…So,” George said, voice rough, trying for something normal and landing somewhere just short of it, “we’re all in agreement that barns are better than grain towers, right?”
There was a beat.
“Debatable,” Max muttered.
“Not even a little,” George shot back, shaking his head. “Barns don’t try to eat you from the inside out. Barns are honest. Barns are like, ‘hey, here’s some hay, maybe a raccoon.’ Not—” he gestured vaguely back toward the silos, “—that.”
“That,” Pierre said flatly, “had supplies.”
“And almost buried us alive.”
Pierre didn’t respond to that.
The silence that followed wasn’t tense so much as it was heavy—like everyone was carrying something they didn’t know how to put down.
Kimi swallowed, glancing at Ollie’s arm. “We should clean that again,” he said quietly. “When we get back.”
Ollie huffed a weak laugh. “Yeah. Add it to the list.”
“You’re not funny,” Kimi said automatically, but there was no heat in it.
“I’m hilarious,” Ollie insisted. “You’re just in shock.”
Kimi didn’t deny it.
They reached the Suburban, and for a moment, no one moved.
It sat exactly where they’d left it, dusty and dull under the sickly sky, looking almost absurdly normal in comparison to everything they’d just crawled out of. A piece of the old world that hadn’t realized it was supposed to be dead.
Pierre exhaled slowly. “Load up,” he said.
And just like that, they slipped back into motion.
Inside the farmhouse, the air felt different.
Not safe—never that—but contained. The walls, thin as they were, still created the illusion of separation from the outside world. The door shut behind them with a dull, solid sound, and it was enough to make a few shoulders drop, just slightly.
“Okay,” Max said, setting his pack down with a soft thud. “Inventory check. What did we actually get for almost dying horribly?”
Pierre dropped a small bundle of salvaged goods onto the table. “Canned food. Some tools. A couple of sealed bags of grain that aren’t… contaminated.”
George raised an eyebrow. “Define ‘contaminated.’”
Pierre looked at him.
George held up his hands. “You know what? Don’t. I don’t want to know.”
“Good call,” Max muttered.
Kimi hovered near the doorway for a second before stepping fully inside, like he was still half-expecting the ground to give way beneath him. His hands had stopped shaking as badly, but there was still a faint tremor there, something that lingered in his fingers no matter how tightly he clenched them.
Ollie noticed.
“Hey,” he said quietly.
Kimi glanced up.
“You’re good.”
Kimi hesitated. “I—” He stopped, jaw tightening. “I didn’t think it would feel like that.”
Ollie didn’t ask what he meant.
He didn’t have to.
Kimi’s gaze dropped to his hands again. “It was just… one,” he said. “Just one of them. And it still—”
“Yeah,” Ollie said softly. “That doesn’t really go away.”
Kimi let out a shaky breath. “Great.”
“Sorry.”
There was a pause.
Then, after a moment, Ollie added, quieter, “You did what you had to.”
Kimi didn’t answer right away.
When he did, it was barely above a whisper. “Doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
“No,” Ollie agreed. “It doesn’t.”
They cleaned up as best they could.
Water was still a luxury, even with the well, so everything was careful, measured. Cloth instead of full washes. Sips instead of gulps. The bucket shower from earlier sat abandoned outside, swaying slightly in the uneven wind like a relic from a different lifetime—one where they’d had the energy to joke about things like shaving and stubble and who got to go first.
Now, no one mentioned it.
Ollie sat on the edge of a chair while Kimi rewrapped his arm, hands steadier now that he had something practical to focus on.
“You’re gonna have a sick scar,” Kimi muttered.
“Cool,” Ollie said. “Chicks love scars.”
Kimi snorted. “There are no chicks.”
“Details.”
Kimi tightened the bandage a little more than necessary.
Ollie winced. “Okay, rude.”
“Stop talking.”
“You started it.”
“I did not.”
“You absolutely did.”
Kimi paused, then shook his head, a faint, reluctant smile tugging at his mouth. “You’re impossible.”
“And yet,” Ollie said, “here I am.”
Kimi glanced up at him, expression softening just slightly. “Yeah,” he said. “Here you are.”
Across the room, George was pacing.
“I’m just saying,” he was in the middle of explaining, “if we ever see another silo again, we don’t go near it. We just—keep driving. We pretend it doesn’t exist.”
Max leaned against the wall, arms crossed. “You say that now.”
“No, I mean it,” George insisted. “I am setting a boundary with the universe. No more grain towers. None. Zero. I’m done.”
Pierre, sorting through supplies, didn’t even look up. “Noted.”
“You’re not taking this seriously.”
“I am.”
“You’re really not.”
Pierre sighed, finally glancing over. “George.”
“Yeah?”
“If there is food in a silo, we will check it.”
George stared at him. “You’re unbelievable.”
“And you’re alive.”
“…Barely.”
Max smirked. “Still counts.”
George groaned, dragging a hand down his face. “I hate all of you.”
“No, you don’t,” Max said.
The storm sirens started again.
Low. Distant. Wrong.
They drifted in through the cracks in the walls, a hollow, mechanical wail that rose and fell without rhythm, without urgency—just there, like a ghost of a warning no one was left to hear.
Kimi stiffened.
Ollie glanced toward the window. “Still going,” he muttered.
“They don’t have power,” George said from across the room, frowning. “How are they still going?”
“Backup systems,” Max said. “Old infrastructure. Some of that stuff was built to last.”
“Yeah, well,” George muttered, “it’s creepy as hell.”
No one argued with that.
The sound filled the space between them, threading through conversation, through thought, through everything.
A reminder.
Not of what was coming—but of what had already happened.
Later, as the light outside dimmed into that strange, green-tinged dusk, they gathered near the table.
Not quite a meeting.
Not quite anything official.
Just… proximity.
Lewis leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees. “We move tomorrow,” he said.
There were a few quiet nods.
“Anywhere but here,” Charles said.
Lewis gave him a look. “Yes.”
Max shifted slightly. “We’ll stick to smaller stops,” he added. “No more… large structures unless we absolutely have to.”
George pointed at him. “Thank you.”
Pierre didn’t argue.
Kimi glanced toward the window again, then back at the group. “There’s no such thing as a quiet place anymore,” he said.
It wasn’t dramatic.
It wasn’t even particularly loud.
But it landed.
Pierre’s jaw tightened slightly. “No,” he agreed. “There isn’t.”
Ollie leaned back in his chair, wincing faintly as the movement pulled at his arm. “Guess that means we stop looking for one.”
Max exhaled. “Yeah.”
George rubbed the back of his neck. “Cool. Love that for us.”
A faint, humorless huff of laughter passed through the group.
Not real laughter.
Not like before.
But something close enough to echo it.
Outside, the silos stood unmoving against the horizon.
Dark.
Silent.
Full of things that would never truly be still.
And the storm above them lingered—waiting, watching, pressing down on a world that no longer knew how to breathe.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
Summary: In a nameless town scarred by a failed quarantine, the group discovers that the living can be far more dangerous than the infected—costing them one of their own in a sudden act of violence. As grief hardens into something colder, trust fractures and survival takes on a harsher meaning, reshaping who they are before they even reach Waco.
Warnings: Death (Major), Grief Reaction, Panic Attack, Human Hostility, Mild Gore
Word Count: 4.1k+
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Nov 1, 2025, 10:00 AM
The town didn’t announce itself the way towns usually did.
There was no sign on the highway. No welcome marker. No weathered billboard promising gas or food or anything resembling safety. Just a break in the road, a widening of space between trees, and suddenly—buildings.
Or what was left of them.
Max slowed the Suburban instinctively, even before Charles said anything.
“…That’s it?” Oscar muttered from the back.
“That’s it,” Charles confirmed.
Kimi leaned forward slightly, squinting through the windshield. “It doesn’t have a name.”
George frowned. “All towns have names.”
“Not anymore,” Pierre said quietly.
That landed heavier than it should have.
The road into the town was cracked and uneven, swallowed at the edges by weeds pushing through asphalt like the earth was reclaiming it in real time. The closer they got, the more wrong it felt—not abandoned in the way of neglect, but abandoned in the way of something hurriedly erased.
Like people hadn’t just left.
They’d run.
And then tried to make it look like they never existed.
The first building they passed had its windows blown outward.
Not broken inward.
Outward.
Lewis noticed it immediately. “That’s not infected damage.”
Carlos leaned slightly to see better. “That’s pressure.”
Max’s jaw tightened. “Explosions?”
“Or something contained inside,” Carlos added.
No one liked that option more.
They stopped near what looked like a main street, though the word felt generous. The storefronts were stripped of signage completely. Not even broken remnants—just empty frames where names used to be. Like someone had peeled the identity off the buildings.
Ollie frowned. “Why would anyone remove the signs?”
“Panic,” Liam said simply.
“Or control,” Kimi added.
That got a few looks.
Kimi shrugged. “If you don’t want people to know where they are… you erase the name.”
Silence followed that.
They split into two groups without discussion.
It was just what they did now.
Max led one side with Lewis, Carlos, Pierre, George, and Alex.
Franco stayed with the other group—Kimi, Ollie, Oscar, Charles, Liam, Isack, Lando, Esteban, and Gabriel.
The Suburban remained parked at the edge of the main street, angled slightly toward escape.
No one said it out loud, but everyone knew:
If something went wrong, they wouldn’t be staying to fix it.
The town felt empty at first glance.
But it wasn’t.
Not really.
There were signs if you knew how to read them.
A door slightly ajar.
A chair overturned too neatly.
Scratches along the inside of a storefront glass that didn’t match anything outside.
George noticed all of it.
And he didn’t like any of it.
“Too clean,” he muttered.
Alex glanced at him. “Clean?”
George nodded toward a row of buildings. “No bodies. No chaos. Just… aftermath.”
Max stopped walking. “Meaning?”
George hesitated. “Meaning someone cleared it.”
“Humans?” Pierre asked.
George didn’t answer immediately.
Then: “Or something pretending to be.”
That silence came back again.
Heavier this time.
They moved deeper.
The sun climbed higher overhead, turning the town into something harsh and exposed. No shadows to hide in for long. No cover that felt meaningful.
That’s when they saw the first message.
Carved into concrete.
Not painted. Not written.
Scratched deep into the wall of a collapsed convenience store.
NO SAFE ROUTE HERE
Kimi crouched slightly to read it. “That’s… recent.”
“How do you know?” Ollie asked.
“Tool marks,” Kimi said. “Not old rust. Not decay.”
Liam scanned the surrounding area. “So someone was here after it fell.”
“Or during,” Esteban added quietly.
The town stretched further than expected, block after block of stripped buildings and silent intersections. The silence wasn’t peaceful. It was alert. Like the place was waiting for something to happen again.
Then they found the church.
It sat slightly off-center from the main road, its doors partially hanging open, one of the stained-glass panels shattered inward.
Carlos slowed. “We should check it.”
Max looked at him sharply. “Why?”
“Medical supplies,” Carlos said. “Churches always have something.”
Pierre frowned. “That’s… oddly specific.”
Carlos shrugged. “It’s true.”
No one argued further.
Inside, the air was cooler.
Darker.
It smelled like dust and old wood and something faintly metallic that didn’t belong in a place meant for prayer.
The pews were overturned.
Not all of them.
Just enough to suggest movement had happened here recently.
Careful movement.
Controlled.
Lewis stepped forward slightly. “Basement.”
They all felt it before they saw it.
The drop in temperature.
The weight in the air.
The sense that the building went deeper than it should have.
Max signaled quietly. “Down.”
The basement stairs were narrow.
Too narrow for how many people were trying to move through them at once.
George went first, unusually quiet. Alex followed closely behind him, watching his back without needing to be told.
The light from above faded quickly.
Then—
Darkness.
Carlos flicked on a flashlight.
The beam cut through dust-heavy air.
And revealed them.
Three bodies.
Still.
Dormant.
Not moving.
Not yet.
“Infected,” Liam whispered.
“Don’t wake them,” Isack added quickly.
No one needed that advice.
They moved carefully around the basement perimeter.
Shelves lined the walls—some collapsed, some still holding remnants of old supplies. Medical kits. Bandages. Half-expired antibiotics.
Carlos exhaled softly. “Worth it.”
Lando shifted slightly behind them. “We’re not taking anything near those things, right?”
“No,” Max said immediately. “We’re in and out.”
The group moved quickly but cautiously, gathering what they could without making unnecessary noise.
And for a brief moment—
It almost felt manageable.
Until—
The gunshot.
It didn’t come from inside the church.
It came from outside.
Sharp.
Sudden.
Final.
Everyone froze.
Then—
A second shot.
Screaming followed instantly.
George moved before anyone else.
“Alex,” he said.
And he was already running.
The street outside had changed.
In the seconds they were gone, everything had collapsed into chaos.
A second group—strangers, armed, panicked—had appeared at the far end of the street. No one knew where they came from. No one had time to ask.
Alex was already there.
Trying to help someone.
A wounded man on the ground.
Blood pooling under him.
“Stop!” Max shouted.
Too late.
The strangers fired again.
Alex jerked violently as the bullet hit.
For a second, he just stood there.
Like he didn’t understand.
Then he fell.
George reached him as he hit the ground.
“No—no, no, no—”
Alex looked up at him.
His mouth moved.
No sound came out.
George pressed his hands against him immediately, like he could hold something in place that was already gone.
“Stay with me,” George said, voice breaking. “Stay with me—please—”
Alex’s eyes flickered.
Once.
Then stopped focusing.
George made a sound that wasn’t really a word.
Just pain.
Raw and immediate.
Max reacted next.
The shot that came after wasn’t hesitation.
It was retaliation.
Lewis followed instantly.
Carlos too.
Pierre didn’t move at first.
Then he did.
The street exploded into chaos.
Gunfire cracked through the air, echoing off empty buildings, turning the silent town into something loud and unbearable.
The strangers tried to retreat.
They didn’t make it far.
George didn’t notice any of it.
Not fully.
He was still on the ground with Alex.
Still holding him.
Still trying to get him to respond.
“Hey,” he said again, quieter now. “Hey—look at me.”
Alex’s hand twitched once.
Then stopped.
And that was it.
The gunfire ended quickly.
Too quickly.
Afterwards, there was only ringing silence.
Max stood over the scene, breathing hard, gun still raised slightly.
Pierre wiped blood off his sleeve without thinking.
Lewis stared at the ground like he didn’t fully understand what had just happened.
Carlos didn’t lower his weapon for a long time.
And George—
George didn’t move at all.
Alex was gone.
That much was obvious.
But George didn’t accept it immediately.
He just stayed there.
Still holding him.
Like if he stopped, it would become real.
Max took a step forward. “George…”
“Don’t,” George said sharply.
It wasn’t loud.
But it cut through everything.
Max stopped.
For a moment, no one spoke.
The town around them remained empty.
Quiet again.
Like it had been waiting for this.
And somewhere in the distance, the wind picked up.
Carrying the smell of dust.
And smoke.
And something else.
Something worse.
No one moved to collect the bodies of the strangers.
That decision didn’t need to be spoken out loud—it settled over the group naturally, heavy and immediate. Whatever those men had been, whatever reasons they might have had, they were reduced now to shapes on the pavement. Still. Silent. Irrelevant.
Max lowered his weapon first.
“Check the perimeter,” he said, voice quieter now but no less firm. “Make sure no one else is out there.”
Lewis nodded automatically, though his movements were slower than usual. He stepped past the bodies without looking down, scanning rooftops, alleys, broken windows—anywhere someone else might be watching.
Pierre followed him, though he hesitated for half a second as he passed Alex.
He didn’t stop.
He couldn’t.
George still hadn’t let go.
His hands were soaked through, red and slick, pressing uselessly against a wound that didn’t care how much force he applied. His breathing had gone uneven—too fast, too shallow—and every few seconds he tried again, adjusting his grip like there was a correct way to fix this.
“There’s pressure—there’s supposed to be pressure—” he muttered, voice fractured.
Carlos crouched beside him slowly. “George…”
“I’ve got it,” George snapped, not looking up. “I’ve got it, just—just give me a second—”
Carlos didn’t reach for him.
Didn’t interrupt again.
He just stayed there, close enough to step in if needed, far enough not to make it worse.
Max turned slightly toward the rest of the group, his expression tight.
“Get the supplies,” he said. “Everything we can carry. We’re not staying here longer than we have to.”
No one argued.
Even now—especially now—they understood.
This place wasn’t safe.
Not from the infected.
From people.
Inside the church, the air felt different when they returned.
Heavier.
Like the building had absorbed what just happened outside.
Kimi moved first, quicker now, less careful about noise. He grabbed what medical supplies he could reach, shoving them into his bag with practiced efficiency.
Ollie stayed near the stairs, eyes flicking constantly between the basement and the doorway above. “We need to go,” he whispered. “We need to go now.”
“We are,” Kimi replied, though his voice lacked its usual steadiness.
Liam exhaled slowly as he packed the last of the bandages. “This is why we don’t trust strangers.”
Isack didn’t respond.
He didn’t need to.
The three dormant infected in the basement never stirred.
Not once.
Even with the noise.
Even with the tension.
They remained still, frozen in that unnatural pause between existence and hunger.
For a moment, it almost felt like they were choosing not to wake.
And that was somehow worse.
Outside, the sunlight felt harsher.
Too bright.
Too real.
George was still on the ground.
Still holding Alex.
But something had changed.
The panic was gone.
Replaced by something quieter.
Colder.
He wasn’t speaking anymore.
Just staring.
Max approached again, slower this time.
“We have to move,” he said.
No response.
“George.”
Still nothing.
Max crouched slightly, lowering himself into George’s line of sight. “We can’t stay here.”
George blinked once.
Like he was coming back from somewhere far away.
“…I know,” he said.
But he didn’t move.
It was Lewis who stepped in.
Not forcefully.
Not aggressively.
Just… steady.
He crouched beside George and placed a hand on his shoulder.
“Hey,” Lewis said quietly.
George didn’t react at first.
Then his grip tightened slightly.
Lewis swallowed. “We’ll take him with us.”
That did it.
George’s expression cracked—not loudly, not dramatically—but enough.
A small fracture.
A shift.
He nodded once.
Slow.
Deliberate.
“Okay,” he said.
They worked in silence after that.
Careful.
Respectful.
Pierre found a blanket in one of the abandoned storefronts. It was dusty, worn, but intact. He didn’t comment on where it came from as he handed it over.
Carlos and Max helped wrap Alex.
George didn’t step away.
Not once.
The Suburban felt smaller when they returned.
Even though one person less should have meant more space.
It didn’t.
It felt tighter.
Heavier.
Like the air itself had thickened.
No one spoke as they loaded in.
George climbed in last, sitting near the middle, Alex’s wrapped body positioned carefully beside him. He didn’t look at anyone.
Didn’t acknowledge anything.
He just sat.
Hands still stained.
Shirt soaked through.
Max started the engine.
The sound broke the silence like a crack through glass.
“Where to?” Oscar asked quietly.
Max didn’t hesitate. “Waco.”
No one argued.
They drove.
And for a long time, the only sound was the road beneath them.
It was Max who noticed it first.
The second message.
Half-hidden on the side of a building as they passed through the last stretch of the town.
He tapped the dashboard lightly. “Stop.”
Franco slowed.
“Back up,” Max added.
The Suburban reversed carefully.
And there it was.
Cut deep into the wall.
Deliberate.
Clear.
NORTH IS NOT SAFE EITHER
Silence settled again.
Different this time.
Sharper.
More pointed.
Kimi leaned forward slightly. “So much for the safe route.”
Liam frowned. “Or it’s a warning.”
“Or a lie,” Pierre added.
Max stared at the message for a long moment.
Then: “We keep going.”
Carlos glanced at him. “Even now?”
Max nodded. “Especially now.”
They didn’t speak much after that.
There wasn’t anything left to say.
The town disappeared behind them slowly, swallowed again by open road and empty land.
But it didn’t feel like they’d left it.
Not really.
It stayed with them.
In the silence.
In the space where Alex should have been.
George didn’t look out the window once.
He didn’t speak.
Didn’t react.
He just sat there, one hand resting lightly on the blanket beside him.
Like he was making sure it was still real.
After an hour, the heat started to settle in.
The day had grown hotter, the sun pressing down on the vehicle with relentless intensity. Dust kicked up behind them in long trails, visible in the side mirrors like something chasing them from a distance.
Kimi shifted slightly, wincing.
Ollie noticed immediately. “Your arm?”
“Just a graze,” Kimi said.
Max looked back. “Let me see.”
Kimi hesitated, then pulled his sleeve back slightly.
The scratch wasn’t deep.
But it wasn’t nothing either.
Max nodded. “Clean it when we stop.”
“I will.”
Across from them, Max noticed something else.
“Max,” Carlos said quietly.
Max blinked. “Yeah?”
Carlos gestured to his side.
A thin line of red.
Barely visible beneath the dust.
Max exhaled. “Didn’t even feel it.”
“Adrenaline,” Carlos said.
Max gave a humorless smile. “Convenient.”
In the far seat, Lewis shifted uncomfortably.
Pierre noticed. “You good?”
Lewis nodded too quickly. “Yeah.”
“You sure?”
“…Yeah.”
But he pressed a hand lightly against his side anyway.
And didn’t move it after.
The only one who broke completely was George.
It happened without warning.
One second he was silent.
Still.
The next—
He was shouting.
“WHY WOULD HE DO THAT?”
The entire vehicle jolted with the force of it.
No one answered.
George’s voice cracked again. “WHY WOULD HE GO OUT THERE—WHY WOULD HE—”
His breathing spiraled, words collapsing into something less structured, less controlled.
Max turned slightly. “George—”
“I TOLD HIM—” George choked on the words. “I told him—just—just wait—just—”
His hands clenched into fists, shaking violently.
Then—
Silence again.
Abrupt.
Total.
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, head in his hands.
And didn’t move after that.
No one tried to fix it.
There wasn’t a fix.
Max exchanged a brief glance with Carlos.
Neither of them spoke.
But they both understood.
Something had shifted.
Not just grief.
Not just loss.
Something deeper.
Something that wasn’t going to go away anytime soon.
They reached the outskirts of Waco just before sunset.
No one announced it.
No one pointed it out.
But the shift was obvious.
The road widened again, splitting into multiple lanes choked with abandoned vehicles—some burned out, others left mid-turn like their drivers had simply vanished. The buildings grew taller, more structured, though just as hollow. Smoke hung faintly in the air, not fresh, but not entirely old either.
It smelled like something that had burned recently enough to matter.
Franco slowed the Suburban instinctively.
“Clear?” Oscar asked.
Max scanned the area, eyes sharp despite the exhaustion pulling at them. “Clear enough.”
It wasn’t reassuring.
But it was the best they were going to get.
They didn’t drive deep into the city.
Not yet.
Instead, they pulled into a partially collapsed parking structure near the edge of town—concrete levels sagging slightly but still intact enough to offer cover. The upper floors had caved in, but the ground level remained shaded, hidden from the open road.
It was defensible.
More importantly, it was quiet.
Franco cut the engine.
For a moment, no one moved.
The silence inside the vehicle had become something physical—thick, pressing against them from all sides. Even the usual sounds—the shifting of clothes, the quiet clearing of throats—felt absent.
Max finally exhaled. “We stay here tonight.”
No one argued.
Unloading was slower than usual.
More careful.
More deliberate.
Everyone moved like they were carrying something fragile, even when they weren’t holding anything at all.
George was the last to step out again.
He didn’t ask for help.
Didn’t look at anyone.
He just opened the door, stepped down, and stood there for a second—like he wasn’t entirely sure where to go next.
Then he reached back inside.
And lifted Alex.
That was the moment it became real for everyone else again.
Not the shooting.
Not the blood.
This.
The weight of him.
The way George held him—not like a body, but like something still worth protecting.
Lewis looked away first.
Pierre followed.
Carlos pressed a hand briefly to his mouth, then dropped it quickly like the gesture itself was too revealing.
Max didn’t look away.
He couldn’t afford to.
“Inside,” Max said quietly, gesturing toward a darker corner of the structure.
George nodded once.
And walked.
They set up camp without discussion.
It was muscle memory now—assigning spaces, organizing supplies, checking entry points. Kimi and Ollie took first watch near the entrance, their silhouettes barely visible against the fading light. Liam and Isack worked together to sort through the medical supplies they’d grabbed, their movements efficient but subdued.
No one joked.
No one filled the silence.
Even Lando, who usually had something to say, stayed quiet.
George stayed where he was.
Kneeling on the concrete.
Alex laid out in front of him, wrapped but not hidden.
Max approached slowly.
“You should rest,” he said.
George didn’t look up. “I’m fine.”
It wasn’t convincing.
Max hesitated. “We’ll take watch.”
“I said I’m fine.”
There was an edge there now.
Sharp.
New.
Max recognized it immediately, stepping back and sitting.
Carlos moved to sit beside Max after a moment. “He’s not going to sleep.”
Max shook his head slightly. “No.”
“You going to force him?”
Max didn’t answer right away.
Then: “No.”
Carlos nodded. “Good.”
Time passed.
Slowly.
The sun dipped lower, dragging shadows across the concrete floor until the entire structure was swallowed in dim, gray light. The air cooled slightly, though the heat of the day still lingered in the walls around them.
Somewhere in the distance, something metallic shifted.
Then silence again.
Lewis sat with his back against a pillar, one arm wrapped loosely around his ribs. Pierre noticed the tension immediately.
“You need that looked at,” Pierre said quietly.
Lewis shook his head. “It’s nothing.”
“You said that before.”
“It is.”
Pierre didn’t push further.
But he didn’t look convinced either.
Across the space, Kimi adjusted his grip on his arm again.
Ollie glanced over. “Still bleeding?”
“Not really.”
“Let me see.”
Kimi hesitated, then relented slightly, shifting his sleeve just enough.
Ollie winced. “That’s deeper than you said.”
“I said it was a graze.”
“That’s not a graze.”
Kimi gave a faint, tired smile. “It’s not a problem.”
Ollie didn’t argue.
But his expression said enough.
Max sat near the center of the group, eyes constantly moving.
On the far side of the space, George finally moved.
Not much.
Just enough to reach into Alex’s bag.
He pulled something out slowly.
A small object.
Simple.
Worn.
No one could see exactly what it was from where they sat.
But they could see the way George held it.
Carefully.
Deliberately.
Like it mattered more than anything else left in the world.
The night settled fully.
Darkness filled the parking structure, broken only by the faint, controlled beam of a single flashlight set low against the ground. It cast long, distorted shadows across the walls—figures that moved when no one did, stretching and shifting with every slight adjustment of light.
Ollie leaned slightly toward Kimi. “You think they’ll come back?”
Kimi didn’t ask who he meant.
“The others?” he said quietly.
Ollie nodded.
Kimi looked out toward the open entrance for a long moment. “No.”
“Why not?”
“They got what they wanted.”
Ollie swallowed. “Which was?”
Kimi’s voice didn’t change. “Control.”
That word lingered.
Heavy.
Liam sat beside Isack, hands resting loosely in his lap.
“This changes things,” Liam said after a while.
Isack nodded once. “Yeah.”
“No more helping strangers.”
It wasn’t a question.
Isack didn’t respond immediately.
Then: “We help each other.”
Liam exhaled slowly. “That’s what I meant.”
But it wasn’t.
Not entirely.
Max stood eventually, stretching slightly before moving toward the entrance. Kimi glanced at him but didn’t say anything as Max took position beside them.
“I’ll take next watch,” Max said quietly.
“You don’t have to,” Ollie replied.
“I know.”
That was the end of that.
Behind them, George finally spoke again.
Not loudly.
Not to anyone in particular.
“I should’ve stopped him.”
The words cut through the quiet.
Max turned slightly but didn’t approach.
No one did.
George continued, voice low, almost distant. “He always did that. Always—always tried to help first. Didn’t think. Just… moved.”
His grip tightened slightly around the object in his hands.
“I should’ve stopped him.”
This time, there was something else in his voice.
Not panic.
Not denial.
Something colder.
Sharper.
Max recognized it immediately.
And it unsettled him more than anything else that day.
Carlos noticed too.
He leaned slightly toward Max, voice barely audible. “He’s changing.”
Max didn’t look away from the entrance. “Yeah.”
“That’s not just grief.”
“No.”
Carlos hesitated. “You going to do something about it?”
Max’s expression hardened slightly. “Not yet.”
Because right now—
They needed him.
Even like this.
Especially like this.
The night stretched on.
No attacks came.
No movement broke the stillness beyond the occasional shift of wind or distant, unidentifiable noise.
But no one slept deeply.
Not really.
And sometime in the early hours—
George stopped looking like someone who had lost everything.
And started looking like someone who wouldn’t let it happen again.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
Summary: As the group pushes through the vast, wind-scoured plains of Texas, grief, doubt, and quiet fractures surface inside their overcrowded vehicle while unseen threats echo across the empty land. In the growing silence of night, they’re forced to rely on instinct, sound, and each other—learning that survival isn’t just about outrunning the infected, but enduring what’s left behind.
Warnings: Mention of Major Death, Grief, Emotional Distress, Confined Spaces, Mild Language
Word Count: 3.7K+
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Oct 24, 2025, 1:00 PM
Franco didn’t say anything at first.
That was how Pierre knew it mattered.
They were all moving—packing, checking, loading what little they had left into the Suburban with the same practiced urgency that had become second nature—but Franco stood apart from it. Not frozen, not exactly, but… paused. Like he’d reached a point the rest of them hadn’t yet.
Or maybe one they’d all been avoiding.
“I’m going back down,” he said finally.
It wasn’t loud.
It didn’t need to be.
The room stilled anyway.
Max looked up from where he was tightening one of the straps on the supply bag. “No.”
Franco didn’t even look at him. “I have to.”
“There’s nothing down there,” Carlos said, though his tone lacked conviction.
They all knew that wasn’t true.
“There is,” Franco replied quietly.
Silence stretched, thin and fragile.
Then Lewis exhaled, slow and steady. “He’s right.”
Max’s jaw tightened. “We cleared what we could.”
“Not all of it,” Pierre said.
That pulled Max’s attention. “Pierre—”
“I’ll go,” Pierre added, already moving.
Oscar stepped forward next, like it was instinct more than decision. “Me too.”
For a second, it looked like Max might argue.
Then he looked at Franco again.
At the way he hadn’t moved. Hadn’t wavered.
And something in his expression shifted.
“…Fine,” Max said finally. “Fast. Controlled. No risks.”
Franco nodded once.
That was all the agreement he needed.
The basement door hadn’t changed.
Still closed. Still quiet. Still wrong.
Pierre reached it first, hand hovering over the handle for half a second before he forced himself to grab it and pull.
The smell hit immediately.
Damp.
Rotting.
Something deeper underneath that none of them wanted to identify too closely.
Oscar grimaced. “God.”
“Stay sharp,” Lewis said.
They moved down together.
Careful. Measured. Controlled.
The water hadn’t receded.
If anything, it looked worse in daylight—murky and still, the surface broken only by the occasional ripple that made no sense given the lack of movement.
Pierre stepped down onto the first dry step, testing it.
It held.
“Flashlight,” he said.
Oscar handed one over.
The beam cut through the darkness, slicing across the waterline—
And stopped.
There were shapes.
They didn’t move at first glance.
But they were there.
Half-submerged. Still. Waiting.
“Infected,” Lewis murmured.
“Yeah,” Pierre replied.
Franco said nothing.
He was looking past them.
Further down.
“Clear them,” he said quietly.
It was slow.
Messy.
Controlled, but never clean.
The infected in the water moved differently—sluggish but unpredictable, their limbs dragging through resistance, their reactions delayed but not absent. One lunged too late and got caught halfway up the steps before Oscar brought it down. Another dragged itself along the wall, fingers clawing uselessly at stone until Pierre ended it.
Lewis moved with precision, conserving energy, watching angles.
They worked together.
Efficient.
Silent.
Until—
A sound.
Different.
Not the erratic, mindless noise of the others.
Something softer.
Closer.
Franco stiffened.
“…There,” he said.
Pierre followed his gaze.
And saw him.
Gabriel.
What was left of him.
It took a second to register.
Because it didn’t look like a person anymore.
Not fully.
His body was twisted at an unnatural angle, one leg bent wrong beneath him, his movements uneven as he dragged himself slowly through the water toward the stairs. His clothes were torn, soaked dark, clinging to skin that didn’t look like skin anymore.
And his face—
Pierre swallowed hard.
“Jesus.”
Gabriel’s head lifted slightly at the sound.
His mouth opened.
A broken, guttural noise escaped.
He started pulling himself forward faster.
Toward them.
Toward Franco.
Pierre stepped forward instinctively.
Franco’s hand shot out, grabbing his arm.
“No,” he said.
Pierre looked at him.
Really looked.
And understood.
“…We’ll hold the others,” Pierre said quietly.
Franco nodded.
Oscar and Lewis exchanged a glance, then moved without argument, stepping forward to intercept the remaining infected still shifting in the water, drawing their attention away.
Pierre hesitated for just a second longer.
Then he stepped back.
Leaving Franco alone at the top of the stairs.
Gabriel dragged himself up the first step.
Then the second.
Each movement slow. Labored. Wrong.
Water sloshed behind him, dripping from his clothes, his fingers scraping weakly against the wood as he climbed.
Franco didn’t move.
Didn’t speak.
Just watched.
Pierre turned away.
Not fully.
But enough.
Enough to give him something like privacy.
“Hey.”
The word was soft.
Barely audible.
But it cut through everything.
Gabriel stilled.
Just for a second.
Like something inside him recognized it.
Franco took a slow step down.
Not close enough to touch.
Just… closer.
“I’m here,” he said, voice steadier than it had any right to be.
Gabriel made another sound.
Quieter this time.
Broken.
Franco’s throat tightened.
“…Te extraño,” he whispered.
The words slipped out like they’d been waiting.
Like they’d been sitting there too long.
Gabriel dragged himself forward another inch.
Franco’s hand trembled slightly at his side.
“You’re okay,” he murmured. “I’ve got you.”
It wasn’t true.
None of it was true.
But it was all he had left to give.
“…Mi mariposa,” he added softly.
The nickname sat heavy in the air.
Pierre closed his eyes briefly.
He hadn’t meant to listen.
But he couldn’t not hear it.
“…I’m sorry,” Franco said.
And that—
That broke something.
Because it wasn’t just grief.
It was guilt.
Regret.
Everything he hadn’t said.
Everything he hadn’t done.
Everything that had ended too fast.
Gabriel’s hand reached the next step.
Then faltered.
Franco stepped down one more step.
Close enough now.
Close enough to end it.
He didn’t rush.
Didn’t look away.
His hand steadied.
“…I love you,” he said quietly.
And then—
He did what he had to.
The sound was small.
Compared to everything else they’d heard.
But it echoed anyway.
Because of what it meant.
Because of who it was.
Pierre didn’t turn back immediately.
He gave it a second.
Then another.
When he finally looked, Franco was still standing there.
Still.
Silent.
Gabriel wasn’t moving anymore.
They didn’t speak on the way back up.
Didn’t need to.
Some things didn’t require words.
The others were waiting outside.
Not watching the door.
Not directly.
But close enough.
Max straightened as they emerged. “Done?”
Pierre nodded.
Franco didn’t say anything.
He just walked past them.
Straight to the Suburban.
No one stopped him.
Pierre hesitated for a second before following.
He caught up just before Franco reached the passenger side.
“Hey,” he said quietly.
Franco paused.
Didn’t turn.
Pierre shifted slightly, unsure how to start, which was rare for him.
“I—” he began, then stopped. “I know what that’s like.”
Franco’s shoulders tensed.
Pierre kept going anyway.
“Losing someone like that,” he said. “It doesn’t… get easier. Not really.”
A beat.
Then, softer, “But you don’t have to carry it alone.”
Franco didn’t respond.
Not verbally.
But after a second—
He nodded.
Once.
Small.
But real.
Pierre took that for what it was.
And left it there.
They loaded up again.
One vehicle.
Too many bodies with not enough space.
Max started the engine.
Didn’t look back.
Didn’t hesitate.
The farmhouse disappeared behind them.
And with it—
Another piece of what they’d lost.
The road out of the farmhouse didn’t feel like leaving.
It felt like being pushed.
Like something unseen had taken hold of the back of the Suburban and was guiding them forward whether they were ready or not.
No one said anything for the first ten minutes.
Not because they’d agreed to silence.
But because there was nothing left to say that wouldn’t break something open again.
The Suburban rattled faintly as it picked up speed, tires crunching over gravel before finding the cracked remains of what had once been a proper road. Wind pushed against the sides of the vehicle in uneven bursts, rocking it just enough to be noticeable.
Bright afternoon light flooded the interior through dusty windows, harsh and unforgiving. It illuminated everything—every cut, every bruise, every hollow look that no one could quite hide anymore.
Max drove.
Hands steady.
Eyes forward.
Like if he focused hard enough on the road, everything else might fall into place behind him.
It wouldn’t.
But he kept trying anyway.
Kosse, Texas didn’t announce itself.
No sign.
No clear boundary.
Just… a change.
The trees thinned first, gradually giving way to wide, open stretches of land that seemed to stretch forever in every direction. The road cut through it like a scar—straight, exposed, with nothing to hide behind and nowhere to run if something went wrong.
The wind picked up.
Stronger here.
Uninterrupted.
It carried sound in a way that felt unnatural.
Too far.
Too clearly.
Ollie noticed it first.
“Do you hear that?” he asked quietly.
Kimi tilted his head slightly. “Wind.”
“No—not just wind.”
They all listened.
At first, there was nothing but the constant rush of air against the car.
Then—
Faint.
Distant.
A sound that didn’t belong.
A low, broken call.
Carried across the plains like it had nowhere else to go.
“…Infected,” Lewis said.
“Far,” Carlos added.
“Yeah,” Max said. “But not as far as it sounds.”
That was the problem.
Distance didn’t mean safety out here.
Sound traveled.
And so did they.
They drove for another hour without seeing anything.
No buildings.
No cars.
No movement.
Just open land and sky and the constant, relentless wind.
It should’ve felt peaceful.
It didn’t.
It felt exposed.
Like they were the only thing left in a world that had forgotten how to hold people.
George shifted slightly in his cramped seat, trying and failing to find a position that didn’t involve someone else’s elbow in his ribs.
“This is unbearable,” he muttered.
“You’ve said that five times,” Alex replied.
“And I mean it more each time.”
“Shocking.”
George huffed quietly, then fell silent again.
Alex watched him for a second.
Then another.
“Hey,” he said.
George didn’t look over. “What?”
Alex hesitated.
Which, for him, was rare.
“You’ve been… off,” he said finally.
“I’m sitting in a car with fourteen other people. I think I’m allowed to be off.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
George exhaled through his nose. “Then what do you mean?”
Alex shifted slightly, lowering his voice. “I mean you’ve been distant.”
That got a reaction.
George glanced at him briefly before looking away again. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not.”
“I said I’m fine.”
Alex frowned. “You’re shutting people out.”
“I’m not—”
“You are,” Alex cut in. “You barely talk anymore unless someone asks you something directly, and even then it’s like you’re halfway somewhere else.”
George’s jaw tightened.
“Everything is fine,” he said, more firmly this time.
Alex leaned back slightly, unconvinced. “Right.”
That was it.
Conversation over.
At least for now.
But the tension lingered.
Unresolved.
A few seats back, Lando nudged Oscar lightly with his shoulder.
“Hey.”
Oscar hummed in response.
“You okay?”
Oscar didn’t answer immediately.
He stared out the window instead, watching the endless stretch of land roll by like it meant something.
“I don’t know,” he said finally.
Lando shifted closer—not much space to move, but enough to be intentional. “That’s fair.”
Oscar let out a quiet breath. “Feels like we don’t get a second to catch up.”
“We don’t,” Lando said simply.
Another beat.
Then, softer, “You know I love you, right?”
Oscar nodded faintly.
“Yeah.”
In the back, Kimi adjusted slightly, wincing as someone’s knee dug into his side.
“Sorry,” Ollie said immediately.
“You’ve said that a lot today.”
“I mean it every time.”
Kimi huffed quietly. “I know.”
They sat in silence for a moment, the wind outside filling the gaps.
Then Ollie spoke again.
“I’m glad you listened to me,” he said, stopping himself briefly before continuing. “About not shaving, at least.”
Kimi glanced at him.
“I told you I wouldn’t.”
Ollie scratched the back of his neck awkwardly. “Good.”
“…Good?”
“Yeah. I mean—” Ollie stumbled slightly over his words. “It looks—good.”
Kimi raised an eyebrow.
Ollie immediately regretted everything.
“I’m just saying—like—you look less… dead.”
A pause.
Then—
Kimi snorted again.
It was quieter this time.
But it was there.
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” he said.
“You should.”
Another small silence.
Then Ollie leaned his head back against the seat, eyes closing briefly. “I was serious, though.”
“I know.”
“…Alright.”
Further forward, Liam shifted carefully, making sure Isack was still steady beside him.
He was.
Barely.
Isack’s breathing had evened out since the farmhouse, but there was still a tension in him that hadn’t fully gone away. Like he was waiting for something else to happen.
Something worse.
“You good?” Liam asked quietly.
Isack nodded.
Then shook his head.
Then sighed. “I don’t know.”
Liam adjusted slightly, letting their shoulders press together more firmly. “That’s becoming a theme.”
“Yeah.”
A beat.
Then Isack spoke again.
“…Do you think we make it?”
Liam didn’t answer right away.
Not because he didn’t want to.
But because he didn’t know how.
“I think we try,” he said finally.
Isack let out a weak laugh. “That’s not the same thing.”
“No,” Liam admitted. “But it’s what we’ve got.”
Isack leaned slightly into him.
Not much.
Just enough.
“Okay,” he said softly.
The road stretched on.
Unchanging.
Endless.
And then—
“Stop,” Lewis said suddenly.
Max reacted immediately, easing off the accelerator.
“What?”
“Listen.”
They did.
At first, nothing.
Then—
Closer this time.
Not one.
Several.
The sound carried across the open land, distorted by distance and wind but unmistakable now.
“Infected,” Carlos said.
“Yeah,” Max replied. “But where?”
That was the problem.
There was nowhere for them to hide.
No buildings.
No trees.
Just open plains and sound that moved faster than they could track.
“Left,” George said suddenly.
Max turned his head slightly. “You sure?”
Another call.
Louder.
Closer.
“Left,” George repeated.
Max adjusted the wheel slightly, angling the Suburban just enough to create distance.
“Don’t stop,” Lewis added. “We keep moving.”
Shapes appeared on the horizon.
Small at first.
Then clearer.
Figures moving unevenly through the tall grass, drawn by the sound of the engine.
“Keep your speed steady,” Carlos said.
“Not too fast, not too slow.”
Max nodded.
The infected adjusted their path.
Intercepting.
Anticipating.
“They’re tracking the sound,” Ollie said.
“Yeah,” Kimi replied. “So we make it harder.”
Max veered slightly to the right, then corrected.
The engine noise shifted direction.
The infected faltered.
Just slightly.
“Good,” Lewis said. “Again.”
Max did it again.
And again.
Small adjustments.
Subtle changes.
Enough to throw them off just long enough to pass.
The infected stumbled after them.
But they were too slow.
Too far.
Eventually—
They disappeared behind them.
The sound faded.
And the road opened up again.
No one spoke for a moment.
Then—
“…Okay,” Alex said. “That was terrifying.”
“Effective,” Carlos corrected.
“Still terrifying.”
Max exhaled slowly. “We can use that.”
“Sound manipulation,” George added.
“Didn’t think that’d be a skill we needed.”
“Welcome to the apocalypse,” Alex muttered.
The sun started to dip.
Slowly.
Almost imperceptibly at first.
But enough.
The light shifted from harsh white to something warmer.
Darker.
Long shadows stretched across the plains, turning the open land into something more ominous.
Something less forgiving.
And still—
They hadn’t seen another person.
Not one.
The isolation settled in heavier with every passing mile.
No one else in the world.
That’s what it felt like.
Even if it wasn’t true.
Carlos leaned his head back slightly, eyes closing for just a second.
“You ever think about what happens if we mess up?” Alex asked quietly from beside him.
Carlos opened one eye. “All the time.”
Alex nodded faintly. “Good. Not just me, then.”
A pause.
Then, softer, “I keep thinking I’m going to be the reason something goes wrong.”
Carlos didn’t respond immediately.
Then he turned his head slightly.
“You won’t be.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No,” Carlos admitted. “But I know this isn’t on one person.”
Alex let out a slow breath. “Doesn’t feel that way.”
Carlos studied him for a second.
Then said, “That’s because you care.”
Alex blinked.
Carlos looked away again. “It’s not a weakness.”
Another pause.
Then—
“…Thanks,” Alex said quietly.
Carlos nodded once.
Oscar shifted in the back, trying to find a position that didn’t make his leg go numb. “We’re gonna fuse together if we stay like this,” he muttered.
“Then stop moving,” Lando replied from somewhere near the center, not opening his eyes. “You’re making it worse.”
“I physically cannot stop moving,” Oscar shot back. “There’s a knee in my spine.”
“That’s mine,” Kimi said calmly.
Oscar twisted slightly. “Can you… un-knee me?”
“No.”
A few quiet laughs broke through the tension—brief, but enough to loosen something.
Pierre finally spoke.
“Franco.”
Franco didn’t look at him. “Yeah.”
Pierre hesitated, choosing his words carefully. “Back there… Gabriel.”
The name hung in the air for a second too long.
Franco’s grip on the door tightened, then relaxed again. “What about him?”
“I heard you,” Pierre said softly. “Not all of it. But enough.”
Franco exhaled slowly through his nose. Outside, the land rolled endlessly, empty except for skeletal fence posts and the occasional broken structure in the distance.
“He was… important,” Pierre added. “I can tell.”
Franco let out a short, humorless breath. “That obvious?”
Pierre nodded, even though Franco wasn’t looking. “Yeah.”
Silence returned, but it felt different now—less suffocating, more expectant.
Franco swallowed. “We used to joke about stupid things,” he said after a moment. “Little names. Dumb stuff couples do.” His voice dipped slightly, softer. “He hated most of them. Said they were embarrassing.”
Pierre allowed a faint smile. “But not that one.”
Franco shook his head. “No. Not that one.”
The Suburban hit a small bump, jostling everyone inside.
“What did it mean?” Pierre asked.
Franco hesitated again, like the answer carried weight. “Nothing special,” he said quietly. “Just… something that stuck. He liked butterflies. Said they looked fragile, but they weren’t. Survived things they shouldn’t.” He paused. “I guess I thought… he was like that.”
Pierre didn’t respond right away. He looked out at the endless plains, wind sweeping across them in visible waves.
“I get it,” he said eventually. “Losing someone like that.”
Franco finally glanced at him, just for a second. There was something unguarded in his expression, something raw that hadn’t been there before.
Pierre added, “The name doesn’t matter. It’s what it means to you.”
Franco nodded once, then looked back at the road. “Yeah.”
Behind them, conversation sparked again in quieter clusters.
Lando leaned back as much as the cramped space allowed. “If we don’t find somewhere bigger soon, I’m voting we throw someone out.”
“Pick carefully,” Oscar said. “We’ll remember.”
“I’m thinking you,” Lando replied.
“Unbelievable.”
Kimi, still calm, added, “Statistically, removing one person would improve comfort by approximately—”
“Don’t,” Oscar cut him off. “Don’t bring math into this.”
A small ripple of amusement moved through the group.
Night approached slowly, and with it came a different kind of tension.
Every sound felt amplified in the darkness—the hum of the engine, the shifting of bodies, the faint creak of metal. Outside, movement was harder to see, easier to imagine.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
Okay I need to know something and I need honesty. Who do you guys think is going to die next in PLOTD?
Not who you don’t want to die… who you genuinely think is on borrowed time right now. I’m not going to be confirming or denying anything, but I will be watching!
Vote in the poll below and feel free to explain your reasoning in the comments because I’m nosy and I want to see the thought process!
Summary: In the uneasy calm after tragedy, a simple discovery in a decaying barn spirals into chaotic attempts at normalcy, as the group clings to fleeting moments of humor and humanity. But even laughter echoes differently now, shadowed by grief and the quiet understanding that nothing—not even a shower—comes without risk.
Warnings: Grief Aftermath, References to Death, Crude Humor, Mild Language
Word Count: 1.7k+
Prev. Chapter Next Chapter
Oct 24, 2025, 11:00 AM
The morning after Gabriel died felt wrong in a way none of them could quite explain.
It wasn’t quieter—if anything, the farmhouse creaked and groaned just as much as it had the night before—but something underneath the noise had shifted. The kind of shift you couldn’t point at, couldn’t name, but could feel sitting heavy in your chest like damp air before a storm.
No one went near the basement door.
Not even by accident.
They moved around it instinctively, like it had become part of the structure itself—something dangerous and permanent and better left alone.
Still, morning came anyway.
And with it, the uncomfortable reality that they were still alive.
Which meant they had to keep moving.
Eventually.
Just… not yet.
George was the one who broke first.
Not emotionally. Not dramatically.
Just… practically.
“We should check the surroundings,” he said, standing near one of the windows and peering out at the overgrown field beyond. “Barn, perimeter, anything useful we missed yesterday.”
Max didn’t respond right away. He sat at the table, elbows braced, staring at nothing in particular like he hadn’t fully come back from somewhere else yet.
George glanced over at him. “Max.”
A beat.
Then Max blinked, like surfacing.
“Yeah,” he said, pushing himself up. “Yeah. Barn.”
No one volunteered to join them.
No one stopped them either.
So they went.
The barn stood about fifty yards from the farmhouse, half-hidden behind a crooked fence and a line of dying trees that rattled softly in the breeze. It leaned slightly to one side, roof sagging just enough to be concerning but not enough to have fully given up.
“Charming,” George muttered.
Max nudged the door open with his foot.
It creaked loudly, because of course it did.
They both froze.
Waited.
Nothing lunged at them.
No sudden movement. No guttural noises from the shadows.
Just dust drifting lazily through shafts of pale light.
“Clear,” Max said quietly.
“Clear,” George echoed.
Inside, the barn was mostly empty—old tools scattered across the walls, a broken workbench, a few rusted containers that might have once held something useful. It smelled like mildew and dry rot, layered over something faintly metallic.
George kicked at a loose plank on the ground. “Not exactly a goldmine.”
Max shrugged, already moving deeper inside. “Still worth checking.”
They split up without needing to say it.
Max headed toward the back, scanning shelves and crates, while George drifted toward the side wall where a collapsed ladder leaned awkwardly against a support beam.
“Hey,” George called after a minute.
Max glanced over. “What?”
George pointed toward the far corner. “That wasn’t there yesterday.”
Max followed his gaze.
A shape, partially obscured by shadow.
Round.
Low.
“…That’s a well,” Max said.
George blinked. “Inside the barn?”
Max stepped closer, boots crunching softly on debris. “Looks like it.”
George followed, curiosity overriding caution just enough to be dangerous.
The well was old—stone lining chipped and uneven, a wooden beam overhead with a rusted pulley system that might’ve once worked. The rope hanging from it looked like it would disintegrate if you breathed on it too hard.
Max leaned over slightly, peering into the darkness below.
George immediately grabbed the back of his jacket. “Absolutely not.”
“I’m just looking.”
“You’re going to fall in and die, and I’m not explaining that to the others.”
“I’m not going to—”
The rope creaked.
Both of them froze.
Very slowly, Max straightened.
“…Okay,” he admitted. “That’s fair.”
George exhaled. “Thank you.”
They stood there for a second, staring at the well like it might do something if they looked away.
“Think there’s anything in it?” George asked.
Max shrugged. “Water. Hopefully just water.”
“…Define ‘just water.’”
Max didn’t answer.
Which was answer enough.
By the time they got back to the farmhouse, they had a problem.
A very specific problem.
One that spread faster than infection ever could.
“There’s a well,” George announced.
That was all it took.
“What do you mean, a well?” Alex demanded, already halfway out the door.
“In the barn,” George said.
“Is there water in it?”
“Probably.”
“Define probably—”
“I did not climb inside the well to verify, Alex.”
“You should have.”
“Do you want me dead?”
Within seconds, the entire group had migrated toward the barn like it was the most exciting thing they’d encountered in weeks—which, to be fair, it kind of was.
Even Franco came.
He didn’t say anything, didn’t react outwardly, but he followed.
That was something.
They gathered around the well in a loose, uneven circle, all of them staring down into it like it might reveal the meaning of life if they waited long enough.
“…I can’t see anything,” Ollie said.
“That’s because it’s dark,” Isack replied.
“Thank you, Isack. Very insightful.”
Kimi crouched slightly, squinting. “There’s water.”
“How do you know?” Ollie asked.
“I can hear it.”
They all went quiet.
And then—
Faint.
Distant.
A soft, almost imperceptible drip.
“…Okay, yeah,” Alex admitted. “That’s water.”
“Or something pretending to be water,” Esteban added.
Everyone paused.
“…Why would you say that?” Ollie asked, turning to look at Esteban.
Esteban shrugged. “Just covering all possibilities.”
“Please stop covering possibilities.”
Max pinched the bridge of his nose. “We’re not drinking straight out of it.”
“No one said we were,” Carlos replied.
A beat.
“…We were all thinking it,” Alex admitted.
“Absolutely not,” Lewis said.
“Absolutely yes,” George countered.
“Focus,” Max snapped. “We can use it. Carefully.”
“For what?” Ollie asked.
Max gestured vaguely. “Cleaning. Washing. Something that doesn’t involve drinking it and dying.”
That shifted the energy.
Noticeably.
Because suddenly—
They all realized something.
At the same time.
“…We could shower,” Alex said slowly.
The silence that followed was deafening.
Then chaos.
“I CALL FIRST—”
“NO—”
“WE NEED A SYSTEM—”
“There is no system—”
“There is now—”
Within minutes, the barn had turned into a full-scale argument zone.
“Absolutely not, we are not doing a free-for-all,” Carlos said, trying and failing to impose order. “We need a rotation—”
“Rotation?” Ollie repeated. “What is this, a spa?”
“Yes,” Alex cut in. “Exactly that. A very exclusive, extremely limited spa.”
Max stared at them like they had all collectively lost their minds.
Which, to be fair, they had.
“Guys,” he said. “This is not—”
“We haven’t showered in days,” George interrupted.
“…That’s not the point.”
“It is exactly the point.”
Lewis crossed his arms. “We’re doing it. The question is how.”
And just like that—
It became a project.
The setup was… questionable.
At best.
They found a dented metal bucket in the barn, punched holes into the bottom with a screwdriver and a rock (a process that took far longer than anyone wanted to admit), and rigged it up to the old pulley system above the well.
The tarp came from the Suburban—one of the many things they’d shoved in without thinking.
“Privacy,” Alex declared, holding it up like a prize.
“Barely,” Pierre muttered.
“It’s symbolic privacy.”
“That’s not how privacy works.”
“It is now.”
They strung the tarp between two beams, creating a makeshift enclosure that swayed slightly with every gust of wind.
“It’s perfect,” Ollie said.
“It’s a disaster,” Carlos corrected.
“Same thing.”
Max stepped back, looking at the entire contraption with visible skepticism. “This is going to collapse.”
Carlos went first, because he insisted on “testing it for safety,” which everyone immediately called bullshit on but allowed anyway.
The water was cold.
Painfully cold.
His yelp echoed across the barn.
“…Okay, noted,” George said. “It works.”
Carlos emerged a few minutes later, shivering but visibly cleaner, running a hand through his damp hair.
“Next,” Max said.
And then it devolved.
“YOU SAID FIVE MINUTES—”
“I DID FIVE MINUTES—”
“THAT WAS TEN—”
“IT FELT LIKE FIVE—”
“That’s not how time works!”
Ollie burst out of the tarp enclosure, hair dripping, grinning like he’d just had the best experience of his life. “Worth it.”
“You’re banned,” Max said immediately.
“Unfair.”
“Completely fair.”
Kimi went next.
Or tried to.
He paused just outside the tarp, running a hand along his jaw thoughtfully.
“Wait,” Ollie said suddenly.
Kimi blinked. “What?”
“Don’t shave.”
“…What?”
“Don’t shave,” Ollie repeated, more firmly this time. “The stubble suits you.”
There was a beat.
Then another.
Kimi stared at him.
Ollie, realizing what he’d just said, went very still.
“I mean—not that—you can—I just—”
Kimi snorted softly.
Actually snorted.
It caught everyone off guard.
“Noted,” he said simply, before ducking under the tarp.
Ollie turned bright red.
Alex leaned over. “Oh, that was smooth.”
“Shut up,” Ollie muttered.
“Very smooth.”
“I hate you.”
“My little gay protégé.”
“I’m not gay”
George turned to look at Alex, absolutely exasperated. “Quit bothering people and get ready. You’re next after Kimi.”
Alex turned to grab a towel, but not before giving Ollie a wink.
Even Franco eventually took a turn.
No one commented on it.
No one made it a big deal.
But they noticed.
The way he moved slower. The way he didn’t look at anyone as he stepped behind the tarp. The way he stayed just under the five-minute limit, like he didn’t want to take up more space than necessary.
When he came out, his hair was damp, clinging to his forehead.
He still didn’t say anything.
But he looked a little more present.
By the time everyone was done, the barn looked like a war zone.
Water everywhere. Mud churned into the ground. The tarp half-falling off one side.
But—
They were cleaner.
Lighter.
“Alright,” Lewis said, clapping his hands once. “Back to work.”
Groans echoed immediately.
“You said we could rest,” Ollie complained.
“I said we could shower.”
“Same difference.”
“Not even close.”
Reluctantly, they filed back toward the farmhouse, the brief moment of chaos fading into something quieter.
Something steadier.
They moved through the house again, checking rooms, gathering supplies, packing what little they had left into manageable bundles.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
Summary: Isack Hadjar insists—repeatedly, stubbornly, and very loudly—that he does not like Liam Lawson. Unfortunately, everyone around him seems determined to prove him wrong—using his own behavior as evidence.
Pairing(s): Liam Lawson x Isack Hadjar
Warnings: Emotional Repression, Denial of Feelings, Mild Swearing, Yearning Idiots, Team Tension, Post-Argument Pining
Word Count: 1.5k+
Isack doesn’t like Liam Lawson.
This is a fact.
A well-established, frequently stated, aggressively defended fact.
“Don’t like him,” Isack says, arms crossed, leaning back in the Red Bull garage like this is a completely normal conversation to be having at nine in the morning. “Never have.”
Max doesn’t even look up from his phone.
“Right,” he says.
Isack narrows his eyes. “You don’t believe me.”
Max scrolls. “I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Max hums. “You’ve mentioned him six times in the last ten minutes.”
“I have not.”
“You have.”
“I was making a point.”
“About how much you don’t like him.”
“Yes.”
Max finally looks up.
“…You talk about people you don’t like that much?”
Isack opens his mouth.
Closes it.
“…He’s just annoying,” he settles on.
Max nods, like that makes perfect sense. “Mm.”
Isack squints. “What does that mean?”
“It means,” Max says, going back to his phone, “you should probably go focus on FP3 instead of thinking about him.”
“I’m not thinking about him.”
Max doesn’t respond.
Which is worse.
He’s not thinking about Liam.
He’s just—
Aware.
Of where the VCARB garage is.
Of when Liam walks past.
Of the fact that he hasn’t walked past yet, which is—
Irrelevant.
Completely irrelevant.
Isack pulls his gloves tighter, jaw set.
“Stop hovering,” a voice says behind him.
He turns.
Oscar stands there, calm as ever, like he hasn’t just appeared out of nowhere.
“I’m not hovering,” Isack says.
Oscar glances—not subtly—toward the edge of the garage, where the VCARB side is just barely visible.
Then back at Isack.
“You are,” he says.
“I’m not.”
“You’re waiting.”
“I’m not waiting.”
Oscar tilts his head slightly. “For someone who doesn’t like him, you spend a lot of time checking if he’s around.”
Isack scoffs. “I’m not checking.”
“You looked three times in the last minute.”
Isack freezes.
“…You’re exaggerating.”
“I’m not.”
Silence.
Oscar watches him for a second longer.
Then—
“You miss him,” Oscar says, like he’s commenting on the weather.
Isack laughs.
Actually laughs.
“Yeah,” he says flatly. “That’s it. I miss him. That’s why I think he’s insufferable.”
Oscar shrugs. “Both can be true.”
“No, they can’t.”
“They can.”
“They can’t.”
Oscar considers that.
Then nods slowly. “Okay.”
Isack frowns. “Okay?”
“Okay,” Oscar repeats. “You don’t like him.”
“Exactly.”
Oscar glances over his shoulder.
Then back.
“He’s here, by the way.”
Isack’s head snaps up before he can stop himself.
Oscar’s mouth twitches.
“…You’re unbelievable,” Isack mutters.
Oscar just walks away.
FP3 is fine.
Good, even.
Isack puts in clean laps, keeps it tight, doesn’t overpush.
He doesn’t think about Liam.
Not when he sees a flash of blue and white on track.
Not when he hears his name over the radio in the same breath as Liam’s during timing updates.
Not when he catches sight of him climbing out of the car across the paddock afterward.
Not once.
Not at all.
He’s focused.
Professional.
Completely unaffected.
“Mate.”
Arvid is grinning at him like he knows something.
Which, immediately—
Isack doesn’t like.
“What?” Isack says.
Arvid leans against the barrier, casual. “You’ve got a minute?”
“No.”
“Cool,” Arvid says, ignoring that completely. “So—Liam.”
Isack groans. “Oh my god.”
“What?”
“I don’t—” Isack gestures vaguely. “Why does everyone keep bringing him up?”
Arvid raises an eyebrow. “Because you keep reacting like that.”
“I’m not reacting.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
Arvid smiles, slow and knowing. “You are.”
Isack glares. “Say whatever you came here to say.”
Arvid shrugs. “Just thought you should know he asked about you.”
Isack’s stomach does something deeply unhelpful.
“…Why?”
Arvid watches him carefully.
“Because he cares?” he offers.
Isack scoffs. “Doubt it.”
“Right,” Arvid says. “That’s why he wanted to know how you were settling in. Totally doesn’t care.”
Isack hesitates.
Just for a second.
“…That’s normal,” he says. “We used to be teammates.”
“Yeah,” Arvid agrees easily. “Used to.”
There’s something in the way he says it.
Like he’s waiting.
Isack looks away first.
“…Doesn’t mean anything,” he mutters.
Arvid hums. “Sure.”
Then—
“He still looks for you, you know.”
That—
That makes Isack look back.
“What?”
Arvid shrugs. “In the paddock. Garage. Wherever. Not obvious, but…” He tilts his head. “You notice things like that when you’re around someone a lot.”
Isack’s chest feels tight.
Annoyingly so.
“…You’re making that up.”
“I’m not.”
Silence.
Arvid pushes off the barrier.
“Anyway,” he says lightly. “Good luck in quali.”
Then he leaves.
And Isack is left standing there—
Thinking about things he absolutely does not want to be thinking about.
By the time qualifying rolls around, Isack is irritated.
Not at anything specific.
Just—
In general.
At everyone.
At himself.
At the fact that Liam is currently P-something and that Isack knows that without even checking.
“Still don’t like him?”
Isack doesn’t turn this time.
He recognizes the voice immediately.
Lewis steps up beside him, easy, observant in that way that makes people feel like they’ve already been read.
“Nope,” Isack says.
Lewis hums. “Interesting.”
Isack exhales. “You too?”
“Just curious,” Lewis says. “You’ve got a lot of energy for someone you don’t care about.”
“I don’t care.”
Lewis smiles slightly. “Right.”
Isack presses his lips together.
“You ever notice,” Lewis continues, “how the things we’re loudest about are usually the ones we’re trying hardest to convince ourselves of?”
Isack glares. “That sounds like something you say to be annoying.”
Lewis laughs quietly. “Sometimes.”
A pause.
Then—
“You don’t have to make it complicated,” Lewis adds.
Isack frowns. “I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
Lewis glances at him.
Kind.
Too kind.
“You miss him,” he says.
Isack looks away.
Doesn’t answer.
Because—
He’s heard that already.
Too many times today.
And it’s starting to sound less like a joke.
He sees Liam properly for the first time that evening.
After quali.
In the paddock.
It’s accidental.
Or—
He tells himself it is.
They round the same corner at the same time.
Almost collide.
Stop short.
And for a second—
It’s just them.
No teammates.
No noise.
No buffer.
Liam looks the same.
Maybe a little more tired.
Maybe a little more careful.
But the same.
“Hey,” Liam says.
Simple.
Easy.
Like nothing’s wrong.
Like everything is.
Isack swallows.
“Hey.”
A beat.
“How’s Red Bull?” Liam asks.
“Fine.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Silence.
God, this is painful.
They used to be easy.
Used to be—
Not this.
“You look good out there,” Liam says after a moment.
Isack blinks. “You too.”
Another pause.
Then—
“You’ve been avoiding me,” Liam says.
Straightforward.
No edge.
Just… true.
Isack scoffs automatically. “I haven’t.”
Liam raises an eyebrow.
And yeah—
Okay.
Maybe he has.
“…Busy,” Isack amends.
Liam nods slowly.
“Right.”
That silence again.
Thick.
Heavy.
Familiar in the worst way.
“You could’ve said something,” Liam says.
Isack frowns. “About what?”
“About leaving,” Liam says.
Oh.
That.
Isack looks away.
“I didn’t think it mattered.”
Liam lets out a quiet, disbelieving breath.
“Yeah,” he says. “That tracks.”
Something in Isack’s chest twists.
“That’s not—”
“Isn’t it?” Liam cuts in, still calm but tighter now. “Because from where I was standing, it looked a lot like you just… didn’t care.”
“I did,” Isack says immediately.
Too fast.
Too sharp.
Liam stills.
“…Right,” he says quietly.
Isack exhales, frustrated.
“No, I—” He stops, runs a hand through his hair. “I just didn’t know how to say it.”
“Say what?”
And there it is.
The thing.
The whole thing.
Isack looks at him.
Really looks.
And god—
He’s missed him.
That’s the worst part.
The stupidest part.
“…That I didn’t want it to end like that,” Isack says finally.
Liam’s expression shifts.
Softens.
Just a little.
“It didn’t have to,” he says.
“I know,” Isack mutters. “I just—”
He cuts himself off.
Shakes his head.
“This is stupid.”
Liam huffs a quiet laugh. “Yeah.”
A pause.
Then—
“You talk big for someone who cares this much,” Liam says.
Isack freezes.
“…What?”
Liam’s mouth twitches.
“You heard me.”
Isack stares at him.
Because—
Of course.
Of course Liam would be the one to say it.
After a whole day of everyone else circling it.
He exhales slowly.
Then—
“…I don’t like you,” he says.
Liam snorts.
“Sure.”
“I don’t.”
“Okay.”
“I don’t.”
“Isack.”
“What?”
Liam steps closer.
Not much.
Just enough.
“You showed up to our garage three times this week,” he says. “You think I didn’t notice?”
Isack’s face heats. “I had reasons.”
“Yeah?”
“Yes.”
Liam nods. “I’m sure you did.”
Isack huffs.
Then—
Quieter—
“…I missed you.”
There.
Said.
Finally.
Liam stills.
Completely.
“…Yeah?” he asks.
Isack nods, just once.
“Yeah.”
A beat.
Then—
“Me too,” Liam says.
And just like that—
Everything settles.
Not fixed.
Not perfect.
But—
Right.
Isack lets out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
Summary: After a desperate attempt to cross the Black Bridge ends in catastrophe, the group is forced to accept that there is no clean path north—and nowhere in the world is safe from what is coming. Seeking shelter at a remote farmhouse, they barely survive the night before another loss in its flooded basement shatters what remains of their fragile stability.
At first, it was just a shape in the fog—something darker than the rest of the world, something too straight, too deliberate to be natural. The heavy morning mist still hadn’t burned off, clinging low over the riverbanks and swallowing distance whole. What should have been visible from miles away only revealed itself in fragments: a rusted railing here, the skeletal outline of a light post there.
Then, as they crested a shallow incline, it emerged all at once.
The Black Bridge.
Even without the warning, without the dying woman’s voice echoing in their heads, they would’ve known something about it was wrong.
It wasn’t just abandoned.
It was choked.
Cars littered the span in chaotic clusters—some angled sideways like they’d tried to turn around too late, others crushed nose-to-tail in desperate attempts to escape. Doors hung open. Windshields were shattered. A semi truck sat jackknifed across two lanes near the center, its trailer split open like something had clawed its way out.
And between it all—
Movement.
Slow. Unsteady. Endless.
“Infected,” Alex muttered from the back of the Suburban, though no one needed the confirmation.
There were hundreds.
Maybe more.
They wandered between the cars, bumped into one another, dragged themselves along the concrete. Some were caught in loops, pacing the same few feet over and over again. Others leaned against vehicles as if they’d simply stopped mid-escape and never started again.
And below the bridge—
The river churned, swollen and fast from recent storms, its surface broken by debris and something darker that none of them wanted to look at too closely.
Max slowed the Suburban to a stop a safe distance away. Behind him, Lando did the same with the Ram.
For a moment, no one spoke.
Then, quietly, through the walkie:
“Well,” Lando said. “That’s… bad.”
“That’s not crossable,” Pierre added flatly.
“No,” Carlos agreed. “Not like this.”
Silence stretched again, heavier this time.
They had come all this way for this.
Lewis leaned forward slightly from the middle row, eyes scanning the structure. “What about underneath?”
Max didn’t respond immediately. His gaze tracked along the side of the bridge, where the concrete supports descended toward the riverbank.
A narrow maintenance path. Steel beams. Structural supports crisscrossing beneath the main span.
Close.
Dangerously close.
“…It’s possible,” Max said finally.
A beat.
“That’s insane,” Charles said.
Max glanced at him. “You have a better idea?”
Charles opened his mouth—then stopped.
Because he didn’t.
None of them did.
Behind them, in the truck, the conversation mirrored itself.
“You’re joking,” Ollie said, staring at the underside of the bridge. “You want to go under that? That’s like—” he gestured vaguely, “—a horror movie.”
Kimi didn’t disagree.
But he also didn’t look away.
“It’s quieter,” he said. “Less visible.”
“Less visible to what?” Ollie shot back. “There are literally hundreds of them above us.”
“And fewer below,” Kimi replied.
That was the problem.
Fewer didn’t mean none.
Liam shifted his weight in the truck bed, eyes locked on the structure. “If it collapses—”
“It hasn’t yet,” Franco interrupted, though his voice lacked conviction.
Isack said nothing.
He was staring at the water.
At the way it moved.
At the way things seemed to drift just beneath the surface.
“No,” Lando said suddenly, louder than before. “No, we’re not doing that.”
Every head in the truck turned toward him.
“That’s suicide,” he continued. “We find another way.”
“There is no other way,” Max’s voice came through the walkie, sharp and immediate. “We turn around, we lose hours. Maybe days. We burn fuel we don’t have.”
“And we die if that thing comes down on us,” Lando shot back.
“Or we die out here,” Max countered. “Pick one.”
The argument hung there, raw and unresolved.
Then—
“We go under,” Lewis said.
Quiet.
Decisive.
Final.
Max didn’t argue.
Neither did Carlos.
And after a moment—
Neither did Lando.
They parked off the road, hidden as best they could behind a cluster of overgrown brush and a collapsed sign.
No engines.
No unnecessary noise.
Everything they didn’t need stayed behind.
Everything they couldn’t afford to lose came with them.
Weapons were checked. Straps tightened. Sleeves pulled down over shaking hands.
“Stay close,” Carlos said. “No sudden movements. No yelling unless you absolutely have to.”
“That’s reassuring,” Ollie muttered.
Kimi bumped his shoulder lightly. “You’ll be fine.”
Ollie gave him a look. “That is statistically unlikely.”
But he stuck close anyway.
They approached the bridge from the side, moving down the sloped embankment toward the supports. The ground was damp, soft underfoot, and more than once someone slipped slightly before catching themselves.
The closer they got, the louder it became.
Not loud in the way of a horde charging.
But constant.
A low, unending chorus of movement and decay filtering down from above. The scrape of shoes on concrete. The hollow thud of bodies bumping into metal. The occasional, wet, choking sound that none of them wanted to identify.
“Don’t look up,” George said quietly.
Of course, that made it impossible not to.
Through the gaps in the structure, they could see them.
Feet.
Legs.
Shadows shifting overhead.
So many of them.
“Jesus,” Alex whispered.
“Keep moving,” Max said.
They reached the first beam.
It was narrower than it looked from a distance.
Of course it was.
Steel, slick with condensation, stretching out beneath the bridge like a thin, unforgiving path. Below it, the river rushed past, fast and cold and full of things they couldn’t see clearly enough.
“Nope,” Ollie said immediately. “No, absolutely not.”
Kimi stepped onto it.
Ollie stared at him. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Kimi glanced back. “You coming?”
Ollie hesitated—
Then followed.
Because what else was he going to do?
One by one, they moved onto the beams.
Slow.
Careful.
Every step placed with deliberate precision.
Above them, the infected shifted.
A few sounds changed—subtle, but enough to make everyone freeze.
“Did they hear that?” Isack whispered.
“Keep moving,” Liam murmured.
The beam vibrated faintly under their combined weight.
Or maybe that was just in their heads.
The river below surged louder, the current slamming against the supports with a force that made the entire structure feel… unstable.
Alive, almost.
Wrong.
Halfway to the first support column, Ollie’s foot slipped.
“Shit—”
His arms windmilled for balance, body tipping sideways—
Kimi grabbed him instantly, fingers locking around his sleeve and yanking him back upright.
For a second, they just stood there, breathing hard.
“Okay,” Ollie said faintly. “Okay. That almost—yeah, I almost died.”
“You didn’t,” Kimi said.
“Great. Fantastic. Love that for me.”
Despite everything—
Kimi huffed a quiet laugh.
It was brief.
Fragile.
But it was something.
Behind them, Liam kept a closer eye on Isack, who hadn’t taken his gaze off the water.
“You good?” Liam asked softly.
Isack nodded quickly.
Too quickly.
“Yeah. Fine.”
He wasn’t.
But they didn’t have time for that.
Not here.
Not now.
“Stay with me,” Liam said anyway.
Isack glanced at him, something tight in his expression—
Then nodded again.
“Yeah.”
They kept moving.
Step by step.
Toward the center of the bridge.
Toward something none of them trusted.
And somewhere above them—
Something shifted.
Louder this time.
A metal groan, deep and resonant, echoing through the structure like a warning.
Everyone froze.
“What was that?” Esteban whispered.
No one answered.
Because they all knew.
And none of them wanted to say it out loud.
The sound didn’t stop.
That was the worst part.
It wasn’t just a single groan of stressed metal that faded into silence, something they could pretend hadn’t happened. It lingered—low and aching, vibrating through the beams beneath their feet and up into their bones.
Everyone stood frozen, balanced precariously above the rushing water.
“Keep moving,” Max said, quieter now but more urgent. “Slow. Don’t rush.”
“Don’t rush?” Ollie whispered hoarsely. “The bridge is literally—”
“Move,” Carlos cut in.
That did it.
They moved.
Not faster—if anything, more carefully—but with a tension now that hadn’t been there before. Every step felt like it mattered more. Every shift of weight carried consequence.
Above them, the infected reacted to the vibration.
A few stumbled closer to the edges of the bridge, their uncoordinated movements sending small bits of debris trickling down through the gaps. Dust. Rust flakes. Something wetter that no one wanted to identify.
Isack flinched as something landed on his sleeve.
“Don’t look,” Liam murmured immediately.
Too late.
Isack wiped it off quickly, jaw tightening, breathing starting to come a little too fast.
“Hey,” Liam said softly, adjusting his pace to stay directly beside him. “Stay with me, yeah? Just—focus on your steps.”
“I am,” Isack said, but it came out thin.
They kept moving.
The first support column loomed ahead—thick concrete rising from the river like a temporary promise of stability.
“Once we reach that, we can—” Alex started.
A shout cut him off.
Behind them.
“Wait—!”
It was Franco.
Everyone turned instinctively.
Too fast.
The beam shifted under the sudden, uneven movement.
“Don’t—!” George snapped, but the warning came too late.
Liam’s foot slipped.
It happened in a fraction of a second—one misstep, one patch of slick metal—and suddenly he wasn’t standing anymore.
He dropped.
A sharp intake of breath, a flash of movement—
And then he was hanging.
One hand barely caught the edge of the beam, the other scrambling for purchase as his body swung out over the river below.
“Liam!” Isack’s voice cracked, panic immediate and raw.
The current roared beneath him, loud and violent, close enough that if he fell, there would be no getting him back.
“Don’t move!” Max barked, already shifting carefully back along the beam.
Liam’s grip slipped slightly.
“Fuck—”
His fingers tightened, knuckles going white as he fought to hold on. His boots scraped uselessly against empty air, searching for something that wasn’t there.
“I’ve got you—” someone started—
But they didn’t.
Not yet.
Kimi moved first.
He didn’t hesitate. Didn’t think. He dropped down onto the beam, lowering his center of gravity as he edged closer, one hand braced behind him for balance.
“Kimi—” Ollie’s voice was tight with fear.
“It’s fine,” Kimi said, though it very clearly wasn’t.
He reached Liam.
For a second, it looked impossible—Liam hanging too far down, Kimi stretched too thin—but then Kimi lunged forward just enough to grab his wrist.
“Got you,” Kimi said, breath sharp.
Liam let out a strained laugh that didn’t sound like humor at all. “That’s—great—please don’t drop me.”
“Not planning to.”
“Good—good plan—”
“Shut up and hold on.”
Kimi tightened his grip, bracing his feet harder against the beam. “On three,” he said. “You’re going to kick up, okay?”
Liam nodded once, jaw clenched.
“One—”
Above them, the bridge groaned again.
Louder.
Closer.
“Two—”
The metal beneath their feet vibrated.
“Three.”
Liam kicked.
Kimi pulled.
For one terrifying second, it felt like neither would be enough—
Then Liam’s arm cleared the edge, his chest slamming hard against the beam as Kimi hauled him the rest of the way up.
They collapsed there for half a second, breathing hard, bodies pressed flat against the cold metal.
“Okay,” Ollie said faintly. “Okay, that was—horrible.”
“You’re fine,” Kimi said, though his own breathing was uneven now.
Liam nodded, pushing himself up carefully. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m—”
He stopped.
Because the sound was getting worse.
Not just a groan now.
A crack.
Deep. Splitting. Structural.
Max’s head snapped upward. “We need to go. Now.”
They moved faster.
Careful still—but urgency had taken over now, overriding the slow precision from before. The beam rattled beneath them with every step, the vibrations no longer subtle.
Above, the infected were reacting more noticeably now.
Some were drawn to the edges, clustering where the noise was strongest. A few stumbled too far, slipping between gaps in the broken railing—
And falling.
Bodies hit the water below with heavy splashes, immediately swallowed by the current.
Isack made a strangled sound.
“Don’t look,” Liam said again, more firmly this time.
But Isack had already seen.
The way they moved even after hitting the water.
The way they didn’t stay under.
His breathing hitched sharply.
“Hey—hey, look at me,” Liam said, reaching out, grabbing his sleeve just enough to anchor him. “Focus, okay? We’re almost—”
Another crack split the air.
Louder.
Closer.
The beam dipped.
Actually dipped.
“Go!” Carlos shouted. “Go, go, go!”
That did it.
They ran.
Balance be damned.
Careful steps turned into quick, desperate strides as they bolted back the way they’d come, the support column forgotten, the idea of crossing abandoned completely.
Behind them, something gave.
A section of the bridge above shifted violently, metal screaming as it tore against itself. The infected clustered there stumbled, collapsed into one another—
And then the entire segment dropped.
The sound was deafening.
Concrete and steel crashing down, taking dozens—hundreds—of infected with it as the structure caved inward toward the river.
“Run!” Max shouted unnecessarily.
They were already running.
The beam bucked under their feet, throwing off their balance. Alex nearly went down, caught at the last second by George. Esteban slipped, slamming a knee hard against the metal but forcing himself back up with a gasp.
Behind them, the collapse spread.
Not the entire bridge—but enough.
Enough to make it clear that staying any longer would kill them.
They reached the embankment in a staggered rush, scrambling up the damp slope with shaking hands and slipping boots.
Lando was already at the top, waving them on frantically. “Move, move, move—!”
One by one, they cleared it.
Kimi last.
He didn’t look back until he reached solid ground.
And when he did—
The sight stuck.
A massive section of the bridge had torn away, collapsing into the river below in a twisted mess of metal and concrete. The water churned violently around it, dragging everything down—debris, cars, bodies.
So many bodies.
The infected that hadn’t fallen still crowded the remaining sections, their movements frantic now, disoriented by the sudden destruction.
It looked like the world breaking.
Like something final.
“Nope,” Ollie said, breathless. “Nope, we are not doing that again. Ever.”
No one disagreed.
Max turned away first. “We’re done here.”
Charles nodded once, pale but steady. “We turn around.”
There it was.
The thing none of them wanted to admit.
“We go through Waco,” Lewis said quietly.
Silence followed.
Because they all knew what that meant.
More risk.
More unknowns.
But there wasn’t another option anymore.
The bridge had made that decision for them.
They ran back to the vehicles.
Adrenaline carried them the rest of the way, shoving aside exhaustion and fear just long enough to get moving again.
Doors slammed.
Engines roared to life.
“Go!” Lando shouted into the walkie, already throwing the truck into gear.
Max didn’t wait.
The Suburban peeled out first, tires spitting gravel as it swung back onto the road. The truck followed close behind—
Too close.
The abandoned cars near the bridge created a bottleneck, forcing them to weave sharply between rusted frames and shattered glass.
“Careful—!” Oscar started.
Too late.
The truck clipped one.
It wasn’t a full collision—just a hard, glancing hit against a half-crushed sedan—but it was enough.
A sharp crack.
A hiss.
“Shit,” Lando muttered, gripping the wheel tighter.
“What was that?” Oscar asked, bracing himself.
“The radiator,” Lando said. “I think—”
The temperature gauge spiked.
Fast.
“Yeah,” he finished grimly. “That’s bad.”
Behind them, the bridge continued to groan and settle, pieces still falling intermittently into the river.
They didn’t slow down.
Not until they were far enough away that the sound faded into the distance.
Only then did Lando ease off the gas slightly.
The truck shuddered.
Coughed.
And then—
Died.
“…No,” Ollie said from the back. “No, no, no—”
Lando tried the ignition again.
Nothing.
“Fuck.”
Ahead, the Suburban slowed, then turned back toward them.
Max already knew.
Of course he did.
They all did.
The truck was done.
Which meant—
“We’re all squeezing in,” Gabriel said, voice hollow.
Ollie let out a hysterical half-laugh. “Oh, that’s going to be fun.”
No one else laughed.
Because there were too many of them.
And not enough space.
And the day wasn’t even close to over.
The Suburban looked smaller the moment they all turned toward it.
It hadn’t changed, not really. Same scratched paint, same dent along the side panel, same worn seats inside. But with the truck dead on the roadside behind them and sixteen people standing in a loose, stunned cluster, it felt… insufficient.
“Right,” Alex said after a long, quiet second. “That’s not going to work.”
“It will,” Max replied flatly.
Alex blinked. “There are sixteen of us.”
“Fifteen seats if we get creative,” Carlos corrected.
“That is not how seats work.”
“We don’t have a choice,” Lewis said.
That ended the argument before it could even start.
Because that was the truth of it.
It always was.
Packing them in took longer than anyone wanted.
Not because they were being careful—if anything, they rushed—but because there were simply too many bodies and not enough space to put them.
“Okay, no, that’s my leg,” Ollie protested as someone shoved past him.
“I know,” Pierre said dully. “It’s still going there.”
“It absolutely is not—”
“It is if you want to leave before nightfall.”
“That’s a threat.”
“It’s a fact.”
In the front, Max had already reclaimed the driver’s seat, hands gripping the wheel like if he let go for even a second, something else would fall apart. Charles slid into the passenger side with a quiet grunt, carefully angling himself to avoid bumping his bandaged arm.
“Don’t touch it,” he snapped immediately as Max’s elbow brushed too close.
“I didn’t,” Max shot back.
“You almost did.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
“It is when I only have one hand left, Max.”
Max went very still for half a second.
Then, quieter, “I know.”
The tension didn’t disappear.
But it shifted.
Behind them, the middle row turned into a negotiation zone.
Carlos climbed in first, pressing himself as far to one side as possible. Lewis followed, then George, who took one look at the available space and let out a low, unimpressed exhale.
“This is ridiculous.”
“Sit,” Carlos said.
“I am sitting. I’m just… overlapping.”
“You’ll survive.”
“That remains to be seen.”
Alex squeezed in next, effectively eliminating any concept of personal space. “We’re going to have to stack,” he said.
“We are not stacking,” George replied.
“We are absolutely stacking.”
In the back row, things were somehow worse.
Pierre slid in first, expression distant, movements mechanical. Esteban followed, wincing slightly as he adjusted his bruised arm. Kimi and Ollie climbed in after them, the two of them immediately pressed shoulder-to-shoulder with no room to move.
“Hi,” Ollie said weakly.
“Hi,” Kimi replied.
“I can’t feel my left arm.”
“That’s probably fine.”
“I don’t think it is.”
“Too late now.”
They made it work.
Barely.
And then came the rest.
Franco hesitated before climbing in, eyes flicking once toward where the truck had been abandoned, like part of him was still stuck there. Then he forced himself forward, squeezing into whatever space remained, silent and distant.
Liam climbed in next, immediately turning to help Isack.
“Come on,” he said gently.
Isack stared at the vehicle for a second too long.
Too many people.
Too little space.
Too many ways something could go wrong.
“I—” he started, then stopped.
Liam didn’t push.
He just reached out, taking Isack’s wrist lightly. “Hey. It’s okay. I’ve got you.”
That seemed to cut through it.
Barely.
But enough.
Isack nodded once and let Liam guide him in, the two of them folding into the cramped space together. There wasn’t room to sit normally, so Isack ended up half-leaning into Liam’s side, their legs tangled awkwardly with everyone else’s.
No one commented.
No one had the energy.
Finally, Gabriel climbed in last.
He hesitated at the door, glancing back once at the road, at the direction of the bridge, at the place they’d just barely escaped.
Then he shut the door.
“Everyone in?” Max called.
A chorus of reluctant, overlapping affirmations answered him.
“Define ‘in,’” Ollie muttered.
Max ignored that and started the engine.
The Suburban dipped slightly under the weight.
But it held.
“Seatbelts,” Carlos said automatically.
There was a pause.
Then—
“…That’s funny,” Alex said.
It was uncomfortable immediately.
Not gradually.
Not something they adjusted to over time.
Immediately.
Limbs pressed into limbs. Shoulders jammed together. Someone’s knee digging into someone else’s back. The air inside the vehicle warmed quickly from shared body heat, fogging the windows despite the cold outside.
“This is a nightmare,” Ollie said.
“You’re alive,” Pierre replied flatly.
“Debatable.”
From the front, Charles shifted slightly, wincing. “We need to rotate seats.”
“No,” Max said.
“Yes,” Charles insisted. “Someone tall is going in the middle.”
“I refuse.”
From behind them, George spoke without missing a beat. “Wonderful. I volunteer Max.”
A beat.
Then, despite everything—
A few quiet laughs.
Even Max huffed once, shaking his head. “Not happening.”
“Coward,” Alex muttered.
“Driver,” Max corrected.
“Temporary.”
“Do you want to walk?”
“…Driver.”
The moment passed.
Small.
Brief.
But real.
The farmhouse came into view just as the light began to shift.
Not dark yet.
But heading there.
It sat off the road, partially obscured by overgrown trees and a sagging fence line. From a distance, it looked intact—weathered, but standing.
“Could work,” Carlos said.
“Or it’s already occupied,” Esteban added.
“Everything is,” Lewis replied.
Max slowed the Suburban, eyes scanning the property carefully. No immediate movement. No obvious signs of a horde.
“Let’s check it,” he said.
No one argued.
They couldn’t afford to.
The house creaked when they stepped inside.
Old wood. Settling structure. The kind of sound that might’ve been normal once, before everything meant something else.
“Clear,” Alex called from the main room.
“Upstairs clear,” George added a minute later.
“Kitchen’s fine,” Carlos said.
It was… quiet.
Too quiet.
But safe enough.
For now.
“Basement?” Pierre asked.
There was a pause.
No one liked that word anymore.
Not after the river.
Not after everything.
“I’ll check,” Gabriel said.
Franco’s head snapped up slightly at that, something flickering in his otherwise distant expression.
“I’ll go with you,” Liam added.
Gabriel shook his head. “It’s fine. I’ll just—quick look.”
“Don’t—” Carlos started.
But Gabriel was already moving.
The smell hit first.
Damp.
Rot.
Water.
“Gabriel?” Liam called after him.
No response.
Just the faint creak of steps descending.
And then—
A splash.
Small.
But wrong.
Liam moved immediately, crossing the room in two quick strides and yanking the basement door open.
“Gabriel—?”
What he saw—
Water.
The basement was flooded, murky and still, rising halfway up the stairs. The surface rippled unnaturally, disturbed by something beneath it.
And Gabriel—
Was slipping.
His foot went out from under him on the submerged step, his body pitching forward into the dark water with a sharp gasp.
“Shit—!”
He surfaced for half a second—
Then something grabbed him.
Not visible.
Not clearly.
Just movement.
A force pulling him down.
His hands broke the surface again, clawing at nothing, at air, at the edge of the step—
“Help—!”
The word cut off into a choked scream as he was dragged under.
The water swallowed the sound.
“MOVE!” Liam shouted.
He lunged forward, but strong hands grabbed him from behind—Max, Carlos, someone—yanking him back before he could throw himself in after him.
“There are infected in there!” Carlos snapped.
“We have to—!”
Another splash.
Then—
Nothing.
Just ripples.
Just dark water.
Just silence.
Franco didn’t move.
Didn’t speak.
Didn’t react.
He just stared at the surface like if he looked hard enough, Gabriel would come back up.
He didn’t.
He wouldn’t.
And everyone knew it.
The basement stayed still.
Like it had swallowed him whole.
No one suggested going down there.
No one suggested retrieving the body.
Because they couldn’t.
Because they wouldn’t make it back up.
“Upstairs,” Lewis said quietly. “We stay upstairs.”
It wasn’t comfort.
It wasn’t reassurance.
It was survival.
And it came at a cost.
Franco still hadn’t moved.
Kimi stepped closer slowly, careful, like approaching something fragile. “Franco…”
No response.
Ollie hovered nearby, unsure, eyes flicking between the basement door and Franco’s face.
“Hey,” he tried softly.
Nothing.
It was like something had shut off inside him.
Like the part that reacted had just… stopped.
Across the room, Isack’s breathing had gone uneven again.
Not loud.
But sharp.
Too fast.
Too shallow.
“I—” he started, voice breaking. “I can’t—he just—he was right there—”
Liam was there immediately.
“I’ve got you,” he said, pulling Isack close without hesitation, one hand steady against the back of his neck.
Isack didn’t resist.
Didn’t pull away.
He just grabbed onto Liam like he needed something solid to prove the world hadn’t just disappeared out from under him.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Liam murmured, low and firm. “Okay? I’m right here.”
Isack nodded against him, though his hands didn’t loosen.
Not even a little.
Around them, the group stood in the aftermath.
One more gone.
One more loss they couldn’t fix.
One more reminder—
That nowhere was safe.
Not the road.
Not the water.
Not even a house that looked untouched from the outside.
Especially not that.
Outside, the light continued to fade.
And inside—
No one felt like they could breathe properly anymore.
Night settled slowly, like it wasn’t sure it wanted to touch the house either.
The last of the light filtered weakly through the dirty windows, turning everything a dull, washed-out gray before finally giving in to darkness. No one turned on lights—not that there were any working ones left—but even if there had been, they wouldn’t have risked it. Darkness was safer.
Or at least, it felt like it was supposed to be.
They stayed upstairs.
No discussion. No vote. Just an unspoken agreement that no one was going anywhere near the basement again.
The door stayed shut.
Someone—Max, maybe Carlos—had dragged a heavy cabinet in front of it. Not to keep anything out.
To keep something in.
That thought sat with all of them, whether they admitted it or not.
They spread out as best they could across the upper floor, which wasn’t saying much. The house had maybe three rooms that were usable, all of them small, all of them too close together. The floor creaked with every shift of weight, every step, every reminder that the structure beneath them was old and tired and not entirely trustworthy.
Still better than outside.
Still better than the basement.
“Pair up,” Carlos said quietly. “No one alone.”
No one argued.
They didn’t need to be told twice.
Max took the spot closest to the stairwell.
Not sleeping.
Just sitting with his back against the wall, one knee up, something heavy resting across his lap like he expected to need it at any second. His gaze stayed fixed on the hallway, on the door at the end of it, on anything that might move.
Charles sat a few feet away, leaning against the opposite wall. His injured arm was cradled carefully against his chest, the bandage already needing to be redone, though he didn’t have the energy to deal with it now.
“You should sleep,” Charles said after a while.
Max didn’t look at him. “You first.”
Charles huffed quietly. “That’s not how this works.”
“No?” Max replied. “Feels like it is.”
A beat.
Then, softer, almost reluctant: “I’m fine.”
Charles didn’t call him out on it.
Didn’t point out that none of them were fine.
He just shifted slightly, letting his head fall back against the wall, eyes half-closing despite himself.
“Wake me in a few hours,” he murmured.
Max didn’t respond.
In one of the bedrooms, the rest of them tried to make something resembling sleep happen.
It was crowded.
Of course it was.
Bodies packed together on the floor, against walls, wherever there was space to sit or lie down without overlapping too much. Jackets and hoodies became makeshift pillows. Someone found an old blanket in a closet—thin and scratchy, but better than nothing—and it got passed around until it covered as many people as possible.
Ollie ended up wedged between Kimi and Alex, one arm trapped awkwardly under him.
“I can’t feel anything,” he whispered.
“You say that like it’s new,” Alex murmured back.
“I’m serious. If I wake up and it’s gone—”
“It’s still attached,” Kimi said quietly. “I checked.”
“Great. Fantastic. Reassuring.”
A pause.
“…Thanks,” Ollie added, softer this time.
Across the room, Franco sat against the wall, knees drawn up slightly, eyes open.
Unblinking.
He hadn’t spoken since the basement.
Hadn’t reacted.
Hadn’t done anything except exist in the same space as everyone else, like his body had shown up but everything inside it had stayed somewhere else.
Esteban sat near him, close enough to reach if he needed to, but not touching.
Not pushing.
Just… there.
“You should try to rest,” Esteban said quietly.
No response.
Franco didn’t even seem to register that he’d spoken.
Esteban exhaled slowly, glancing away.
There wasn’t anything else he could do.
Not tonight.
On the far side of the room, Isack hadn’t let go of Liam.
Not fully.
Even now, hours later, after the panic had dulled into something quieter but no less heavy, he stayed close—pressed into Liam’s side, one hand loosely gripping the fabric of his sleeve like he needed that point of contact to stay grounded.
Liam didn’t pull away.
Didn’t comment on it.
He just adjusted slightly so Isack could lean more comfortably, one arm draped loosely around his shoulders.
“You should sleep,” Liam murmured.
Isack shook his head against him. “Don’t want to.”
“Yeah,” Liam said. “Me neither.”
They sat like that for a while.
Listening.
To the creaks of the house.
To the quiet, uneven breathing of everyone around them.
To the occasional shift from downstairs—the kind that might’ve just been the water settling.
Or might not have been.
Isack’s grip tightened slightly.
“Liam?”
“Yeah?”
A pause.
“…You won’t—” He stopped, swallowed, tried again. “You won’t just disappear, right?”
The question sat there, fragile and heavy and too real.
Liam didn’t hesitate.
“Right,” he said, voice low but certain.
Isack sighed, the faintest laugh audible, though he didn’t lift his head.
“Okay.”
Liam’s hand moved slightly against his shoulder, a small, grounding pressure.
They stayed like that.
Closer than they’d ever been before.
Not rushed.
Not forced.
Just… necessary.
Eventually, exhaustion started to win.
Not fully.
Not peacefully.
But enough that people’s eyes closed, heads dipped, breathing evened out just slightly.
Sleep came in fragments.
In short, restless stretches.
In half-dreams that snapped apart at the smallest sound.
No one slept deeply.
No one slept well.
But they slept.
Max was still awake when the house finally went quiet.
Still watching.
Still listening.
The fog outside had thickened again, pressing against the windows like something alive. The world beyond the glass had disappeared entirely, swallowed whole by gray.
Behind him, he could hear the others.
Shifting.
Breathing.
Existing.
Fewer than before.
Always fewer.
His gaze flicked, just once, toward the door that led downstairs.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
Summary: After a brutal rescue and an even harder choice to let survivors go, the group presses forward, haunted by who they couldn’t save and what it cost them. With tensions rising and hope thinning, they turn toward the ominous promise of the Black Bridge—unsure if it leads to survival, or something far worse.
Warnings: Death (Minor), Graphic Injury (Amputation), Infection, Gore, Emotional Distress, Dark Humor, PTSD/Dissociation, Violence
Word Count: 4.8k+
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Oct 23, 2025, 9:00 AM
Morning came too clean for the kind of world they were living in.
The sky stretched out in a pale, endless blue, the kind that would’ve meant something once—would’ve been commented on, appreciated, maybe even photographed. Now it just felt wrong. Too bright. Too open. Like the world was pretending nothing had happened.
The abandoned roadside store looked even worse in daylight.
What had been shadowy and uncertain in the night was now fully visible—shattered glass glittering across the cracked concrete, shelves half-collapsed and picked through, the doors hanging crooked on bent hinges. The wind pushed through it in slow, hollow breaths, rattling something metallic deeper inside.
It didn’t look like a place people had simply left.
It looked like a place people had fled.
Still, it had given them walls. A roof. A few hours of sleep that hadn’t been constantly interrupted by movement or noise.
That was enough.
“Pairs,” Max said, already moving as he spoke, voice cutting clean through the quiet. “No one alone. Quick in, quick out.”
There were nods, murmured agreements. No arguments.
They were getting better at that.
Kimi ended up with Ollie without either of them really saying anything about it. It just… happened. The kind of quiet decision that didn’t need discussion anymore.
Liam and Isack peeled off toward the back storage area, while Kimi and Ollie headed toward the main aisles, stepping carefully over debris and broken glass.
The smell hit them almost immediately.
Not as bad as the dairy plant.
But close enough to make Ollie’s stomach twist.
“God,” he muttered under his breath, pulling the collar of his hoodie up over his nose. “Why does everywhere smell like something died?”
“Because something probably did,” Kimi replied, matter-of-fact.
“Yeah, thanks. That helps.”
Kimi glanced at him briefly, the corner of his mouth twitching. “You asked.”
Ollie huffed, but there wasn’t much energy behind it.
They moved slowly, scanning shelves more out of habit than hope. Most of what remained was useless—expired, crushed, or already torn open. A few cans here and there, a couple of sealed bottles shoved behind fallen boxes.
Kimi grabbed what he could, passing things to Ollie to stuff into a worn backpack.
For a while, it was just that.
Routine.
Quiet.
Almost normal, in a distant, broken way.
Until Kimi pushed open a half-jammed door near the back hallway.
“I’ll check—” he started.
And then stopped.
There was movement.
Close.
Too close.
Kimi froze, instinct kicking in immediately, his hand tightening around the edge of the door as he leaned just slightly to look inside.
For a split second, his brain tried to process what he was seeing.
It didn’t.
Because it wasn’t what he expected.
At all.
He blinked once.
Twice.
Then immediately stepped back out and pulled the door shut again—quickly, quietly, like he hadn’t seen anything.
Like nothing had happened.
He turned around—
—and nearly walked straight into Ollie.
Ollie’s eyes were wide.
Really wide.
“Oh my—” Ollie choked, clapping a hand over his mouth as if that would physically hold the reaction in. “I did not need to see that.”
Kimi stared at him for half a second.
“You saw that too?” he asked, incredulous.
“I—yes?!” Ollie whisper-shouted, voice cracking slightly. “Did you just—”
“I didn’t even mean to—” Kimi cut in, shaking his head, a disbelieving grin already breaking through despite everything. “I thought something was wrong.”
“Well, something was definitely happening,” Ollie shot back, his voice dropping on the last word like it might somehow make it less real.
That did it.
They both lost it.
Not loud—couldn’t be loud—but the kind of laughter that bursts out anyway, sharp and sudden and impossible to stop once it starts. Kimi doubled over slightly, dragging a hand down his face as he tried—and failed—to contain it, while Ollie leaned back against a shelf, shoulders shaking.
It was ridiculous.
Completely, utterly ridiculous.
In the middle of everything—of the world ending, of running and surviving and barely holding it together—
Franco and Gabriel were making out in a storage closet.
“For fuck’s sake,” Ollie wheezed, wiping at his eyes. “Like—really? Here? Now?”
“I don’t—” Kimi shook his head again, laughing under his breath. “I don’t even know what I expected when I opened that door, but it was not that.”
Ollie let out another strangled laugh. “I thought it was an infected or something!”
“So did I!”
“That is so much worse!”
Kimi snorted. “Is it?”
“Yes!” Ollie insisted, then paused. “Okay—no. But emotionally? Yes.”
That set them off again.
Quieter this time.
But just as real.
For a moment, it felt… lighter.
Not fixed.
Not okay.
But lighter.
Like something inside their chests had loosened just enough to let them breathe properly again.
Ollie dragged in a breath, still smiling faintly as the laughter faded. “We are never making eye contact with them again.”
“Agreed,” Kimi said immediately.
A beat passed.
“…Do we tell anyone?” Ollie asked, lowering his voice instinctively like the walls themselves might hear.
Kimi didn’t even hesitate. “Absolutely not.”
“Yeah, no, that stays buried,” Ollie nodded quickly. “Deep. Like—never happened.”
“Exactly.”
Another quiet laugh slipped between them.
Then, like a switch flipping, they both straightened slightly.
Because the world didn’t stay light for long.
It never did.
“Alright,” Kimi said, clearing his throat. “Let’s just—keep going.”
“Yeah,” Ollie agreed.
They moved on.
But the ghost of that moment lingered.
A small, fragile thing.
Something human.
Further back in the store, Liam stood awkwardly near a collapsed jewelry rack, turning a thin gold chain over in his hands.
It wasn’t worth anything anymore.
Not really.
But it was intact.
Clean.
Untouched.
Which made it rare.
Isack hovered a few steps away, watching him with a slight tilt of his head. “You taking that?”
Liam hesitated.
“Uh—” He glanced down at it again. “I mean. It’s not useful, but…”
He trailed off.
Then, before he could overthink it too much, he stepped closer and held it out.
“You should have it,” he said.
Isack blinked. “What?”
“It’d—” Liam stopped, suddenly very aware of how this sounded. “It’d look nice on you. I think.”
Silence.
Brief.
But loud.
Isack stared at him for a second longer than necessary, something unreadable flickering across his expression.
“Oh,” he said finally.
Then, softer: “Okay.”
He reached out, taking the chain carefully, their fingers brushing for just a second longer than needed.
Neither of them pulled away immediately.
“Thanks,” Isack added, quieter now. He turned the chain in his hand before unclasping it, putting it on.
Liam shrugged, looking anywhere but at him. “Yeah. No problem.”
The air between them shifted.
Not dramatically.
But enough.
The scream cut through the store like a blade.
Raw.
Sharp.
Completely unfiltered.
Everyone froze.
“What the hell—?!” someone shouted from the front.
Kimi and Ollie were already moving before the echo had even faded, adrenaline slamming back into place as they ran toward the sound.
“Charles!” Max’s voice—angry, panicked—rang out from near the entrance.
They skidded to a stop just short of the scene.
And for a second—
It didn’t make sense.
It didn’t register.
Because the human brain isn’t built to process something like that instantly.
Charles was on the floor.
Half-sitting, half-collapsed against a broken counter.
His face was pale—too pale—and slick with sweat, his breath coming in uneven, shallow pulls.
The hand—his hand—the one that had been cut in the river—
It wasn’t there anymore.
In its place was a jagged, hastily wrapped stump, fabric already darkening as blood soaked through it in uneven patches.
For a moment, no one spoke.
No one moved.
Because the reality of it lagged behind the sight.
Then everything hit at once.
“What the FUCK did you do?!” Max exploded, dropping to his knees in front of him, hands hovering like he didn’t know where to touch without making it worse.
Charles let out a strained, almost hysterical breath that might’ve been a laugh. “I wasn’t—taking chances.”
His voice shook.
Not from regret.
From pain.
From adrenaline.
From something deeper.
“It was getting worse,” he forced out, words tight. “It was spreading.”
“You don’t just—” Max cut himself off, dragging a hand through his hair, eyes wide with something dangerously close to panic. “You don’t just cut off your own hand!”
Charles met his gaze.
And there was something unsteady there.
But also something terrifyingly certain.
“I do if it means I don’t turn.”
Silence crashed back down.
Heavy.
Suffocating.
Because no one could argue with that.
Not really.
Not anymore.
Kimi swallowed hard, forcing himself to look away from the blood, from the reality of it, his pulse hammering in his ears.
Ollie didn’t.
He couldn’t.
He just stood there, staring, his face drained of color.
Because this—
This was new.
A line crossed.
A choice made.
And it changed something.
For all of them.
They left the store faster than planned.
No one said it out loud, but there was a shared understanding: they couldn’t stay there anymore.
Not after that.
Not with the smell of blood thick in the air.
Not with the image of it burned into their heads.
Charles was stabilized as best they could—bandaged tighter, arm secured, pain dulled slightly with what little they had left.
He didn’t complain.
Didn’t speak much at all.
Max stayed close.
Too close.
Like if he looked away, something else would go wrong.
The vehicles were loaded in near silence.
Doors slammed.
Engines turned.
And just like that—
They were moving again.
Heading northeast.
Away from Waco.
Or at least trying to.
No one said it, but the direction felt less like a plan and more like a gamble.
Because everything was now.
They hadn’t been on the road long when someone spotted it.
“Smoke,” George said over the walkie, his voice cutting through the static.
Lando frowned slightly, adjusting his grip on the wheel. “Where?”
“Distance. Northeast. Multiple columns.”
Kimi leaned forward slightly from the back seat, squinting through the windshield.
There it was.
Dark streaks against the clear sky.
Too thick to be accidental.
Too many to ignore.
Ollie shifted beside him. “That’s… not good, right?”
“No,” Kimi said quietly. “It’s not.”
The convoy slowed slightly.
Not stopping.
But not pushing forward blindly either.
Because smoke like that only meant one thing now.
And they all knew it.
They didn’t turn toward the smoke immediately.
That was the first decision.
It hung between them in the silence that followed George’s callout, carried in the low static of the walkies and the steady hum of both engines. The Suburban kept a consistent distance ahead, its dark shape cutting through the pale morning light, while the truck followed just behind, tires crunching over uneven asphalt.
No one said “go.”
No one said “don’t.”
But everyone was thinking it.
Lando adjusted his grip on the steering wheel, glancing briefly at Oscar in the passenger seat. Oscar had one arm hooked loosely through the handle above the door, his posture still slightly curled inward despite the warmth of the heater blowing steadily toward him. He looked better than he had the night before—less pale, more present—but there was still a fragility to him that hadn’t been there days ago.
“You seeing it?” Lando asked quietly.
Oscar nodded once, eyes fixed on the distant horizon. “Yeah.”
The smoke columns were clearer now.
Thicker.
Darker.
Not just one.
Several.
And they weren’t drifting lazily like something abandoned.
They were active.
Alive.
Something was burning.
“Could be a distraction,” Ollie said from the back, though his voice lacked conviction. “Like—someone trying to pull infected away from somewhere else.”
“Or the opposite,” Kimi replied. “Could be drawing them in.”
“Either way,” Oscar murmured, “it means people.”
That word settled heavily in the space between them.
People.
Alive.
Maybe.
Lando reached for the walkie clipped near the dash. “Max, you seeing this?”
A crackle.
Then: “Yeah,” Max’s voice came through, tight but controlled. “We’re slowing. Not stopping yet.”
“Copy.”
Another pause.
Then Lewis’s voice cut in, clearer, more direct. “We need to decide now. If we’re going to check it out, we don’t circle for ten minutes thinking about it. That’s how you get caught out here.”
Carlos responded almost immediately. “And we don’t just drive straight into something like that either. You remember Austin?”
Silence followed that.
Heavy.
Because everyone did.
The chaos.
The noise.
The way helping had almost gotten them all killed.
“Different situation,” Lewis said, though there was less certainty in it than usual.
“Is it?” Carlos shot back. “Smoke, people in trouble, no clear exit—sounds familiar to me.”
From the truck bed, Franco’s voice crackled through faintly over a third walkie. “Could be a small group. Not a city.”
“Could be a trap,” Alex added from the Suburban.
“Everything’s a trap now,” George muttered, almost to himself.
That didn’t help.
Lando exhaled slowly, eyes flicking between the road and the horizon. “We don’t have to go in. We can just—get close enough to see what’s happening.”
“And then what?” Carlos asked.
No one answered.
Because that was the problem.
Seeing meant choosing.
And choosing meant consequences.
They compromised.
Or something close to it.
The vehicles veered slightly off their original path, angling toward the smoke but keeping distance, weaving through back roads and open stretches where visibility stayed clear. The terrain shifted as they moved—less abandoned highway, more scattered structures, remnants of what had once been a small settlement or outskirts of something larger.
The closer they got, the worse it looked.
Smoke wasn’t just rising now.
It was pouring.
Thick, black plumes clawing into the sky from multiple points, some lower, some spreading wider. The smell hit them next—burning wood, plastic, something chemical underneath it, and something else—
Something they didn’t want to name.
“Jesus,” Ollie whispered.
The road ahead curved slightly, dipping just enough to obscure the full view for a moment.
Then they crested it.
And everything came into focus.
The settlement—if it could still be called that—was collapsing.
Buildings—small houses, makeshift barricades, vehicles shoved together into crude walls—were already overrun. Fire had taken hold in at least three places, flames licking up walls and tearing through anything that could burn. The barricades had been breached in multiple spots.
And the infected—
There were too many.
They moved in waves, spilling through gaps, climbing over obstacles, drawn by sound, by movement, by chaos. Not scattered.
Focused.
Predatory.
People were still inside.
That was the worst part.
You could see them.
Running.
Fighting.
Trying.
“Fuck,” Lando breathed.
Over the walkie, Max didn’t say anything for a long second.
Then: “We’re not going in.”
Relief flickered—
Brief.
Because Lewis’s voice cut through it almost immediately.
“We can’t just leave them.”
Carlos swore under his breath. “We can’t save them either.”
“We can save some,” Lewis insisted. “There—left side, near that collapsed fence—there’s a gap. We could pull a few out.”
“And then what?” Carlos snapped. “We take them with us? Feed them with what? Protect them how?”
“We don’t just—drive away,” Lewis said, and there it was again—that edge, that refusal to let go of something fundamental even as the world demanded it.
In the truck, Kimi felt Ollie shift beside him.
Tense.
Watching.
Waiting.
“Lewis,” Max said finally, voice lower now, controlled in a way that meant he was holding something back. “Look at it.”
“I am.”
“No—you’re not,” Max shot back. “You’re looking at the idea of it. Not what’s actually there.”
A beat.
Then, quieter: “We go in, we don’t come out. Not all of us.”
Silence followed.
Because that was the truth.
And they all knew it.
Another voice—George this time, faint but steady—came through. “There’s too many.”
Then Alex: “Fire’s spreading fast. Wind’s picking up.”
As if to prove it, a section of one of the burning structures collapsed inward with a shower of sparks, sending a fresh wave of smoke rolling outward.
Time was running out.
For them.
For the people inside.
For everyone.
Lewis exhaled sharply over the line.
Then: “One pass.”
Carlos didn’t even hesitate. “No.”
“One pass,” Lewis repeated, firmer. “We don’t stop. We don’t get boxed in. We take whoever can reach the road and we go.”
“And if that turns into ten people?” Carlos demanded.
“It won’t,” Lewis said, though he couldn’t guarantee that.
“You don’t know that.”
“I know we can’t leave without trying.”
That landed.
Because it wasn’t strategy.
It wasn’t logic.
It was something else.
Something older.
Something harder to kill.
Max’s grip tightened on the wheel. Everyone could hear it in the way his voice came back, quieter now.
“…One pass.”
Carlos swore again—but he didn’t argue further.
Because that was the compromise.
And it was a dangerous one.
They moved fast after that.
No more circling.
No more debating.
The Suburban took the lead, angling toward the least congested side of the settlement, while the truck followed close behind, ready to pull out just as quickly as they went in.
“Windows up,” Lando said. “Doors locked. No one opens anything unless we say.”
In the back, Franco and Liam shifted in the truck bed, bracing themselves, while Isack tightened his grip on the side rail, eyes fixed ahead.
Kimi leaned forward slightly, scanning the edges of the road, tracking movement.
“There,” he said suddenly. “Left—two people, near the ditch.”
Lando saw them.
A man and a woman, stumbling, trying to move faster than their bodies allowed.
Behind them—
Movement.
Closing.
“Hold on,” Lando muttered, accelerating.
The truck swerved just enough to line up alongside them.
“Go!” Kimi shouted, already reaching back to yank the rear door open from the inside.
The man grabbed first, hauled up into the bed by Franco and Liam with a burst of desperate strength.
The woman stumbled—
Fell—
“Get her!” Ollie shouted.
Isack leaned out, catching her arm just before the gap widened too much, dragging her up towards the door with a strained grunt as the truck surged forward again.
“Close it!” Lando snapped.
The door slammed shut.
Behind them, the infected hit the space where they’d been seconds too late.
“Two,” Kimi said, breath tight.
“Keep moving,” Max’s voice came through.
They pushed deeper along the outer edge.
Another cluster appeared—three this time, one limping badly.
“Too many,” Carlos warned.
“We can take one more,” Lewis said. “That’s it.”
The Suburban slowed just enough.
George shoved the door open from the inside, reaching out.
“Come on!” he shouted.
One of them made it.
The other two—
Didn’t.
The door slammed.
The Suburban surged forward again.
“Go, go, go!”
They didn’t look back.
They couldn’t.
By the time they cleared the settlement’s edge, the smoke had swallowed most of it.
The road stretched ahead again—empty, quiet, wrong.
Inside the truck, the rescued woman was shaking violently, her breaths coming in ragged, uneven bursts. The man sat hunched forward in the bed, staring at nothing, his hands trembling in his lap.
“Hey,” Ollie said softly, trying to ground her. “You’re okay. You’re out.”
Her eyes snapped to him.
Wild.
Unfocused.
“No,” she rasped. “No, it’s not—it’s not safe—”
“You’re safe enough,” Kimi said gently.
She shook her head frantically. “You don’t understand—”
“Hey,” Ollie cut in, quieter but firmer. “Breathe first. Talk after.”
She tried.
God, she tried.
But something in her had already broken.
“They’re all gone,” she whispered, voice cracking. “Everyone—”
No one interrupted.
Because what was there to say?
Nothing that mattered.
They didn’t stop driving.
Not yet.
Not until the smoke was a distant smear behind them.
Only then did the convoy slow slightly, enough to breathe, enough to process what they’d just done.
What they hadn’t.
Over the walkie, Lewis spoke again, softer now. “We did what we could.”
In the truck, the woman’s breathing had started to hitch.
Wrong.
Too shallow.
Too uneven.
Kimi noticed first, shifting closer. “Hey—stay with us, okay?”
Her eyes found his.
And for a second, they cleared.
Focused.
“You can’t go to Waco,” she said suddenly, gripping his sleeve with surprising strength.
“We’re not,” Ollie said quickly. “We’re heading around—”
“No,” she cut him off, shaking her head weakly. “Not there. Not anywhere near it. It’s worse than you think.”
Kimi exchanged a glance with Ollie.
“We heard,” he said carefully.
She tightened her grip. “There’s a way around.”
“Yeah?” Kimi asked. “Where?”
Her lips parted.
Hesitated.
Then: “The Black Bridge.”
The name hung in the air.
Unfamiliar.
Ominous.
“What is that?” Ollie asked.
“A crossing,” she whispered. “Old. Not on most maps anymore. But it’s still there.”
“Where?” Kimi pressed.
Her strength was fading fast now.
“North… east,” she murmured. “Past the burned fields… you’ll see it…”
Her grip slackened.
Kimi’s chest tightened. “Hey—stay with me.”
Her eyes flickered once more.
Then stilled.
Silence filled the truck.
Heavy.
Final.
Ollie swallowed hard, his voice barely there. “She—”
“I know,” Kimi said quietly.
Over the walkie, Lando’s voice came through, low. “We’ve got… information.”
A pause.
“About a route,” he added.
Max responded after a second. “Send it.”
Kimi looked out at the road ahead.
At the unknown waiting for them.
“…Black Bridge,” he said.
The road didn’t feel the same after they left the settlement.
It wasn’t just the smoke fading behind them in the rearview mirrors, or the way the sky stretched open and empty again, pale blue cut with cold wind. It was quieter in a way that felt wrong, like something had been decided back there—something final—and now the world had settled around it.
They drove for nearly twenty minutes before one of the survivors spoke up.
“Stop here.”
Lando’s hands tightened slightly on the wheel of the truck. “Here?” he echoed, glancing out at the empty stretch of cracked road and low brush. “There’s nothing here.”
“That’s the point,” the man said through the back window, voice rough but steady. He was older than most of them, maybe mid-forties, with a limp that had slowed them down during the escape. “Less noise. Less attention.”
In the Suburban ahead, Max’s voice crackled through the walkie. “What’s going on?”
“We’ve got a drop-off request,” Lando replied, eyes flicking to Oscar beside him. Oscar was awake now, bundled in a blanket, still pale but more alert. He gave a small, uncertain shrug.
There was a pause on the other end, then a quieter, more controlled: “You’re stopping?”
Another voice cut in before Lando could answer—Lewis. “If they want out, we let them out.”
Carlos didn’t say anything, but the silence carried agreement.
Lando exhaled slowly. “Yeah. We’re stopping.”
The truck slowed first, gravel crunching under the tires as he eased it off the road. The Suburban followed, pulling in just ahead, both vehicles idling in the cold morning air. For a moment, no one moved.
The man climbed out of the truck bed, stiff and careful, testing his weight as he landed. The second survivor—a younger woman with a bandage wrapped around her forearm—climbed out of the suburban, eyes darting across the open space like she expected something to come tearing out of it at any second.
“Are you sure about this?” Oscar asked quietly.
The woman nodded immediately. “Safer than staying in a group that size,” she said. “No offense.”
“None taken,” Lando muttered.
It wasn’t even untrue.
Groups drew attention. Noise. Risk. They all knew it.
The man stepped back from the truck, giving a small, almost awkward nod. “You got us out of there,” he said. “That’s more than most would’ve done.”
No one responded right away.
What do you even say to that?
You’re welcome didn’t feel right.
Good luck felt worse.
So Lando just nodded back, jaw tight. “Stay off the main roads,” he said instead. “And—” he hesitated, then added, “if you see smoke again… don’t go toward it.”
The man gave a humorless half-smile. “Wasn’t planning to.”
The woman looked at them one last time, her gaze lingering—on Oscar, on Kimi and Ollie in the back, on the others she didn’t know the names of.
“Don’t die,” she said, blunt and quiet.
Then they turned and started walking.
No dramatic goodbye. No looking back.
Just two figures moving off into the open land until the distance swallowed them.
For a long moment, no one spoke.
Then, softly, through the walkie:
“Let’s move.”
Max again.
Always forward.
They got back on the road.
The Suburban took the lead this time, its dark frame cutting a steady line through the empty highway. The truck followed close behind, close enough that Lando could see the outline of George’s head in the back window, unmoving, like he hadn’t shifted since they started driving again.
“Feels wrong,” Ollie murmured from the back.
Kimi glanced at him. “What does?”
“Leaving people like that.”
Kimi didn’t answer immediately. He watched the road instead, the way it stretched out ahead of them, endless and uncertain.
“They chose it,” he said finally.
“I know,” Ollie replied. “Doesn’t make it feel better.”
No one argued with that.
Up front, Oscar shifted slightly, pulling the blanket tighter around himself. “We can’t save everyone,” he said, voice quiet but firm.
It wasn’t harsh.
Just… tired.
Lando glanced at him briefly, then back to the road. “We barely save anyone.”
Oscar didn’t respond.
Because that was true too.
In the Suburban, the silence sat heavier.
Charles leaned back in the passenger seat, his head tipped against the window, eyes closed. His sleeve was tied off tight where his hand used to be, the fabric darkened despite everything they’d done to stop the bleeding.
Max kept his eyes forward.
He hadn’t said much since the store.
Since the screaming.
Since the moment everything had tipped from bad into something worse.
“You should rest,” Carlos said quietly from the middle row.
“I’m driving,” Max replied.
“That’s not what I meant.”
Max didn’t answer.
Behind them, Lewis watched the road through the side window, his expression distant, unreadable. The events of the morning played over and over in his mind—the fire, the people they couldn’t reach, the ones they left behind.
The one they didn’t.
The woman’s voice still echoed.
The Black Bridge.
It sounded like a warning.
Or a promise.
Or both.
“We’re really doing this?” Alex asked from the back, breaking the silence. “Heading toward something that sounds like it belongs in a horror story?”
“It’s a route,” Lewis said simply.
“Or a trap,” Pierre muttered, his voice flat, detached.
Esteban shifted beside him, wincing slightly as his bruised arm pressed against the seat. “Everything’s a trap now.”
No one argued with that either.
George finally spoke, his voice quiet but steady. “We don’t have better options.”
All eyes drifted, almost unconsciously, to Charles.
To the bandage.
To the cost of their last “option.”
Max’s grip tightened on the wheel.
“No,” he said. “We don’t.”
The land began to change as they drove.
Less debris.
Fewer abandoned cars.
More open stretches of road, broken up by clusters of buildings that looked untouched from a distance—but no one trusted distance anymore.
The wind picked up, rattling loose signs and carrying the faint smell of something burnt, though the smoke itself was long gone.
In the truck bed, Liam adjusted his grip on the side rail, the cold air biting at his face. Beside him, Isack pulled his jacket tighter, the gold chain catching briefly in the light before disappearing again beneath the fabric.
“You okay?” Liam asked over the wind.
Isack nodded. “Yeah.”
A pause.
“…Thanks. For earlier.”
Liam shrugged, a little awkward. “It suits you.”
Isack huffed a quiet laugh, shaking his head. “We’re in the middle of the apocalypse and you’re still—”
“Still what?”
“…this.”
Liam smirked faintly. “Charming?”
“Annoying,” Isack shot back, but there was no heat in it.
For a second, something almost normal passed between them.
Then the truck hit a bump, jolting them both, and the moment slipped away.
Hours passed like that.
Driving.
Watching.
Waiting.
No one said it out loud, but they were all expecting something to go wrong.
It always did.
But for once—
Nothing did.
No hordes.
No sudden ambush.
No desperate radio calls cutting through the static.
Just the road.
Just the wind.
Just the low, constant hum of engines carrying them forward.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
Summary: The season is over, the garage is quiet, and there’s nothing left to hide behind. After one final meeting at the factory, Gabriel Bortoleto and Nico Hülkenberg are forced to confront everything they never said—until silence isn’t an option anymore.
The factory always felt different when it was empty.
Gabi noticed it the moment he stepped out of the meeting room.
Same hallway. Same lights. Same glass walls that had reflected a hundred versions of him over the past year—nervous, exhausted, wired on adrenaline, trying too hard not to be the rookie everyone expected him to be.
But now?
It was quiet.
Too quiet.
The final debrief had run longer than expected—end-of-season summaries, performance reviews, the polite corporate wrapping-up of a year that had felt anything but neat.
People had lingered at first. Handshakes. “See you next year.” Promises to stay in touch that may or may not happen.
And then, slowly—
They left.
One by one.
Until it was just…
This.
Gabi shoved his hands into his jacket pockets, exhaling softly as he walked down the corridor.
December 10th.
Season over.
Rookie year—done.
It should’ve felt bigger.
Instead, it felt like standing at the edge of something and not knowing what came next.
“Thought you’d have left already.”
Gabi didn’t need to turn around to know who it was.
Still, he did.
Nico leaned against the wall a few meters back, arms crossed, jacket slung over one shoulder like he hadn’t fully committed to leaving either.
He looked the same as always.
Calm.
Put together.
Like nothing ever really got to him.
Gabi swallowed.
“Yeah,” he said. “I was just… heading out.”
Nico nodded once, pushing himself off the wall.
“Good meeting,” he said.
Gabi let out a quiet huff. “Was it?”
Nico’s mouth twitched slightly. “As good as those things get.”
“Right.”
Silence slipped in after that.
Not awkward.
Not exactly.
But not comfortable either.
Not the way it used to be.
Gabi shifted his weight, glancing toward the exit doors at the end of the hall.
“You heading out too?” he asked.
“Eventually.”
Another pause.
God, this was ridiculous.
They had spent an entire season together.
Flights. Briefings. Hours in debrief rooms, talking through every corner, every mistake, every fraction of a second.
And now they couldn’t manage a normal conversation?
Gabi rubbed the back of his neck.
“Feels weird,” he admitted.
Nico tilted his head slightly. “What does?”
“Not having anything else to do,” Gabi said. “No simulator. No travel. No… next race.”
Nico hummed quietly, considering that.
“Yeah,” he said after a moment. “Takes a minute to get used to.”
Gabi glanced at him.
“You’re not used to it yet?”
Nico let out a soft breath through his nose. “You’d think I would be.”
Something in that—
Something tired.
Gabi noticed.
He always did.
That was the problem.
“Guess it’s different this year,” Gabi said, quieter now.
Nico’s gaze flicked to him. “How so?”
Gabi hesitated.
Because this was where it got complicated.
Where it stopped being about racing.
“…I don’t know,” he said finally. “Just is.”
Nico watched him for a second longer than necessary.
Like he was waiting.
For something Gabi wasn’t sure he could give.
“Right,” Nico said eventually.
And just like that—
The moment slipped.
Again.
Gabi exhaled, looking away.
“Anyway,” he said, forcing something lighter into his voice. “I should go.”
Nico nodded.
“Yeah.”
Neither of them moved.
Of course they didn’t.
Gabi let out a quiet, almost disbelieving laugh.
“This is stupid,” he muttered.
That got Nico’s attention.
“What is?”
“This,” Gabi gestured vaguely between them. “Whatever this is.”
Nico’s expression shifted slightly.
Careful now.
“Just feels like we’re… avoiding something,” Gabi added.
Nico didn’t answer right away.
Didn’t deflect, either.
Which was new.
“…And what do you think that is?” he asked.
Gabi let out a slow breath.
His heart was beating faster now.
Ridiculous.
He’d driven at 300 km/h this year and this was what made him nervous?
“Don’t do that,” Gabi said.
“Do what?”
“Make me say it first.”
Nico’s jaw tightened slightly.
“I’m not—”
“You are,” Gabi cut in, softer but firmer. “You always do.”
That landed.
Because it was true.
Nico looked away for a second, something unreadable flickering across his expression.
When he looked back—
It was still there.
Just buried.
“…You’re a rookie,” Nico said, like that explained everything.
Gabi blinked.
“What?”
“You had enough on your plate this year,” Nico continued. “Didn’t need… complications.”
Gabi stared at him.
“Complications?”
Nico exhaled, like he was already regretting this.
“You know what I mean.”
“No,” Gabi said, shaking his head. “Actually, I don’t.”
Another pause.
Longer this time.
He could feel it slipping again.
Feel Nico pulling back into something safer, something quieter, something—
Untouchable.
Gabi stepped forward.
Just one step.
But it was enough.
“No,” he said again, quieter now. “You don’t get to do that.”
Nico’s eyes snapped back to him.
“Do what?”
“Decide what I can and can’t handle,” Gabi said. “Without even asking me.”
Nico’s expression hardened slightly.
“That’s not what I was—”
“Then what were you doing?” Gabi pressed.
Silence.
Real silence this time.
Heavy.
Honest.
Nico ran a hand over the back of his neck, something uncharacteristically restless in the movement.
“I was trying,” he said slowly, “to not make things harder for you.”
Gabi frowned.
“You didn’t,” he said.
Nico let out a short, humorless laugh.
“Yeah,” he murmured. “That’s the problem.”
Something in Gabi’s chest tightened.
Because suddenly—
It was very clear they were talking about the same thing.
Had been, the whole time.
“You think this was one-sided?” Gabi asked, voice quieter now.
Nico didn’t answer.
Didn’t have to.
Gabi shook his head, a disbelieving smile tugging at his mouth.
“Unbelievable,” he muttered.
Nico frowned slightly. “What?”
“You really thought I didn’t notice?” Gabi said.
“Notice what?”
“Everything.”
The word hung there.
Heavy.
Nico’s jaw tightened.
“That’s vague,” he said.
Gabi huffed a laugh.
“Fine,” he said. “You want specifics?”
He stepped closer again.
Close enough now that it felt different.
Not teammates.
Not just that.
“Every time you stayed back in debrief longer than you needed to,” Gabi said. “Every time you checked in after a bad race like it wasn’t part of your job.”
Nico didn’t move.
Didn’t interrupt.
“Every time you looked at me like—” Gabi stopped himself, shaking his head.
“Like what?” Nico asked quietly.
Gabi met his gaze.
Held it.
“Like it wasn’t just about racing.”
That did it.
Something shifted.
Subtle.
But unmistakable.
Nico exhaled slowly.
“…And you’re saying it wasn’t,” he said.
“I’m saying it wasn’t,” Gabi confirmed.
Silence.
Then—
A quiet, almost disbelieving breath from Nico.
“Jesus,” he muttered.
Gabi huffed. “Yeah.”
Another pause.
But this one felt different.
Less like avoidance.
More like standing at the edge of something.
Nico looked at him again.
Really looked this time.
“You could’ve said something,” he said.
Gabi blinked.
“I could’ve?” he echoed.
Nico raised an eyebrow slightly. “You’re not exactly subtle.”
Gabi let out a short laugh. “Right. Because you’re so easy to read.”
Nico’s mouth twitched.
“Fair.”
That tension—
It cracked.
Just enough.
Gabi took a breath.
Steadier now.
“So what now?” he asked.
Nico hesitated.
Which, somehow, was more honest than anything else he’d done so far.
“I don’t know,” he admitted.
Gabi nodded.
“Okay.”
Another pause.
Then—
“We could start with not pretending it didn’t happen,” Gabi offered.
Nico considered that.
Then nodded once.
“Yeah,” he said. “That sounds like a good start.”
Gabi smiled slightly.
Small.
But real.
“Good.”
They stood there for a second longer.
Close.
Not touching.
But not distant anymore, either.
Then Nico shifted.
Just slightly.
Closing the gap.
Not all the way.
But enough.
“You’re going back to Monaco?” he asked.
Gabi nodded. “Tomorrow.”
“Right.”
“And you?”
Nico shrugged lightly. “Germany. For a bit.”
Gabi hummed.
“Okay.”
Another pause.
Then—
“You could come with me,” Nico said.
It slipped out like it surprised him too.
Gabi blinked.
“…What?”
Nico exhaled, running a hand through his hair.
“I mean—not right away,” he clarified. “But… if you wanted. After.”
Gabi stared at him for a second.
Then—
He smiled.
Slow.
Soft.
“Yeah,” he said. “I’d like that.”
Something in Nico’s expression eased.
Not completely.
But enough.
“Okay,” he said.
And just like that—
It felt decided.
Not everything.
Not all at once.
But enough to move forward.
Gabi shifted his weight, glancing toward the exit again.
“I should actually go now,” he said.
“Yeah,” Nico agreed.
Neither of them moved.
Again.
Gabi laughed quietly. “We’re really bad at leaving.”
Nico huffed. “Apparently.”
A beat.
Then—
Gabi stepped forward.
Closed the distance properly this time.
Close enough that there was no room left for doubt.
He hesitated for half a second.
Then leaned in.
The kiss was soft.
Careful.
Like something they’d both been holding back for months and didn’t want to break now that it was finally real.
All characters and real people depicted are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. No harm or offense is intended. Content may include mature themes—reader discretion advised.
