Rating:

Mature

Archive Warning:

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category:

M/M

Fandoms:

Heated Rivalry (TV), Game Changers | Heated Rivalry - All Media Types

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander

Additional Tags:

Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Zombie Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Non-Linear Narrative, Action, Whump, Grief/Mourning, Guns, Panic Attacks, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, very light suicidal ideation, Implied/Referenced Torture, Murder, i mean it's the end of the world, this shouldn't be too surprising, Hurt Ilya Rozanov, Hurt Shane Hollander, ilya is an incredible shot i just feel like he would be, Ilya Rozanov Needs A Hug, Shane Hollander Needs a Hug, Protective Ilya Rozanov, Ilya Rozanov Loves Shane Hollander's Freckles, svetlana vetrova haunts the narrative, Original Character(s), POV Ilya Rozanov, POV Shane Hollander, POV Outsider on Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, Minor Character Death, Shane and Ilya do NOT die i want to be clear, Protective Shane Hollander, David Hollander haunts the narrative, Nausea, Vomiting, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD

Language:

English

Stats:

Published: 2026-08-13 Completed: 2026-08-14 Words: 33,040 Chapters: 6/6

summer cicadas sing

Summary

Just over four years after a zombie virus destroys the world as he knows it, twenty-five year old Ilya Rozanov is so rattled by trauma and grief that even when he's found a community to call home, he keeps everyone at an arm’s length. That is, until Shane Hollander shows up looking like death itself.

A story about the end of the world, and how to pick up the pieces.

Notes

hello! if you are here from my other works, i must warn you that this one is thematically much darker (re: the tags). that being said, i am all about a happy ending.

It will become clear through the story, but if you are curious ahead of that, zombie apocalypse first started during the boys' rookie year, after the All Stars weekend where Shane and Ilya hooked up and exchanged phone numbers

Chapter 1

Rifle slung over his back, Ilya climbs the ten-foot ladder to the top of the wooden outpost tower. He doesn’t usually work guard duty on the outposts, because they're further from camp, and his right leg never quite healed correctly, which makes him a slightly slower runner. But the community’s general consensus is that Ilya’s quick enough on his feet to pick up the occasional outpost shift.

It didn’t use to be that way – originally, he was only allowed to work security on the wall around camp, not the outposts. But slowly, over the year and a half he’s been here, the safety of the region has improved. There’s hardly anyone or anything out there nowadays. Plus, despite his shit leg, Ilya’s an incredible shot, so running isn’t even a critical ability. As a result, Ilya's been deemed an adequate back-up for outpost shifts. He's planning to continue building this trust, to demonstrate his worth, to show how his leg won’t hold him back. Working the occasional outpost shift is the perfect way to make that happen.

Macie had begged him to take her shift, though she hadn’t needed to (he would have said yes anyway); she was desperate to have the night off, to celebrate her daughter’s second birthday. She promised to make it up to him, to take one of his other work shifts. This was, again, not necessary at all. Ilya likes working, it keeps his mind busy, focused on survival. It’s in the lax moments where he starts to panic.

And what would he be doing otherwise? Re-reading one of the camp’s few library books (he’s on his second re-read of the Percy Jackson series), swimming down at the creek, and, most significantly, trying to distract himself from the emptiness in his chest that sought to consume him. Spending time with the other residents would probably help, maybe playing board games in the mess hall like the rest of the off-duty residents, but Ilya decided long ago to keep his distance. It’s better that way. It will hurt less when he inevitably loses them all. Or, if it happens that he dies first, he can spare them the pain. If the end of the world has taught Ilya anything, it’s that you cannot protect the people you love.

Besides, he hasn’t worked an outpost shift in months, and it’s the type of terrifying work that makes him feel like he’s actually contributing to the camp’s safety in a meaningful way. Obviously his other work is important too – the wall security detail is the last line of defense if something bad did actually happen, and his other miscellaneous jobs, like kitchen clean-up and the farming crew, are solidly essential. Regardless, it really bothers Ilya that his bad leg prevents him from joining the others on supply runs outside the state park, and the more risky security positions. He’s never in any real danger nowadays, secluded behind the walls of the camp, not like the other young, healthy adults. They all do their part, pull their weight to keep the camp safe. Ilya hasn’t even seen one of those brain-dead fuckers in months, not since he shot a single one down from the cushy safety of the sniper’s nest along the camp wall. It was almost too easy.

It’s all jarringly different from his life before he arrived at the camp. But Ilya tries not to think about before.

Macie’s outpost is set in the woods, near a dirt path that years ago must have been a service trail for the park rangers. And while Ilya is technically by himself, it doesn’t really feel like that. Mike is at the outpost closest to him, about a five minute walk to his right. And, of course, they have their walkie-talkies, and Mike is a chatterbox. So Ilya hardly feels alone.

“Hey Lilia, did you hear that Simone wants to plan a big party for the end of August? I’m like, and who’s going to get all the loot for your big fucking shindig? Unbelievable man, she is so entitled with that. But like, yeah, I mean, I want to have a party. I just hope she doesn’t ask for, like, hyper specific decorations. Last time I got a nasty cut trying to retrieve baby blue balloons from Walmart. I told you about this I think – some stupid fucker drove his pickup into the Walmart. Right into the fucking party decorations, just my fucking luck. Was worth it though, the color was much better for the theme, but still I–”

Ilya mostly tunes it out – he learned early on that was the best strategy with Mike. He’s a young guy, a couple years Ilya’s junior, from the local area. “Tennessee born and bred!” he told Ilya when they first met. And while Mike is always talking, he doesn’t say much about his life before the world fell apart. Mike also never asks about Ilya’s history, where he was before the camp, and what his life was like before everything went to shit. Ilya is always thankful for that. His least favorite conversation topics are anything to do with before.

“Hey, Lilia, I’m going to check in on Harry’s channel, see how things are going up front. Talk to you later, bro,” Mike ends his monologue, his voice cracking through the static of the walkie-talkie.

In the silence, Ilya’s brain doesn’t do well. He wishes Mike would come back, talk more about Simone’s party plans, the pickup truck in Walmart, the best color of balloon. Literally anything at all.

Beyond the weak range of the floodlights attached to the outpost, there is only pitch black night, and every small sound in the woods demands Ilya’s full attention. He finds himself angling his rifle into the darkness, breathing heavy, even though there’s nothing there. Maybe he can’t do this. It’s just been so long, since he had a gun in hand and the wilderness in front of him. Working guard duty on the wall is different; there are about three levels of security before anyone could get to him there. This, on the other hand, is the first line of defense (if you don’t include the motion sensors and security cameras they’ve rigged throughout the surrounding area, which Ilya doesn’t); he is responsible for the camp right now. For Macie’s two-year-old daughter, for the elderly couple who live in the cabin next to Ilya's, for sixteen-year-old Abdul, an orphan who seems to idolize him for whatever reason (an attachment Ilya actively tries to discourage, as kindly as he can. He’s not cut out to be a role model). If Ilya messes up, misses a movement in the woods, and fails to alert the rest of camp before it takes him down, it will cost all those people their lives. And it will be his fault. It will always be his fault.

Ilya forces himself to take a deep breath, to release the tension coiled in his limbs. He needs to get it together or he’s going to end up firing a round that they cannot afford to waste. Their armory is limited as it is without Ilya being fucking trigger-happy into the darkness.

“расслабляться,” he whispers aloud to himself. Relax.

“Hey, Lilia.” Mike’s voice crackles through the handheld radio, making Ilya jump out of his skin. “Something tripped the sensors a half-mile out. Probably a rabbit again, but keep your head up. Might have some company. Harry says to switch to five-minute check-in intervals, no chatter inbetween.”

Ilya shakes his head, willing his jumpiness to subside. He clicks the walkie-talkie receiver. “Okay, Mikey. Talk to you in five.”

“Aye-aye, brother,” Mike says, and the line goes quiet again.

Ilya waits and watches. Five minutes pass, Mike checks in. Another five, another check-in.

Ilya thinks he sees something move in the darkness. He studies it without raising his weapon, because he really doesn’t trust his trigger-finger now, not with all the memories that are rushing around loudly in his mind.

But there’s definitely something out there. Ilya lowers himself below the height of the outpost wall so only his eyes are exposed, just in case it’s a person. The brain-dead fuckers wouldn’t be able to see him – they would be able to hear him though; Ilya switches the walkie-talkie off so Mike’s staticky voice doesn’t alert anything to his presence – human or not. Just in case. He watches the movement, and breathes in and out carefully. It’s still far-off and difficult to discern, but the shape seems to be humanoid. The figure stumbles, and falls. A zombie, then?

It suddenly releases a sound that is almost unmistakably a sob. Zombies don’t sob. They make disgusting clicking noises, and classic undead groaning sounds, and terrifying screams sometimes when they’re really revved up and on the hunt, especially in a pack, but Ilya has never heard a zombie cry, not like this – not like how a person sobs in abject agony. Fuck, is it a person? An injured person. Or someone who wants Ilya to think they’re injured. A trick.

The figure stays down on the ground, not attempting to get back up, and another guttural sob rips through the night air, somehow louder than the first.

Ilya remember the camp policy. Protect the camp. Alive or undead, eliminate the threat.

Is it a threat? He’s too far away... Fuck. He’s going to have to get closer to investigate. He clicks his radio back on.

“Mike,” he hisses into the speaker, as quiet as he can. “Unidentified figure. Standby.”

“Heard,” comes Mike’s reply, lower than his conversational volume earlier. Ilya switches the walkie-talkie off again.

The figure doesn’t move. Ilya stretches his bad leg, trying to warm it up a little in case he needs to make a run for it. Wincing slightly, he slings his rifle onto his back, and carefully climbs down from the safety of the outpost. At the base of the tower, he takes a tight breath and clicks on the flashlight attached to his gun. If it’s a person, they should see the light as he gets closer. They probably would’ve already seen the weak floodlights attached to the outpost; maybe that’s why they approached. Or maybe it’s a zombie, attracted by intermittent noise. Or maybe it is a person, but it’s a trap. Like how he and Sveta got caught in West Virginia.

Ilya’s blood is freezing cold at the thought of West Virginia. He swings the rifle to his front; his finger isn’t actually on the trigger, but it could be the blink of an eye.

The sobbing sound is gone now, replaced by an eery silence. He can’t see the figure now that he’s on ground-level, but he forges ahead anyways, towards where he saw the figure from above, stepping very carefully as to not break a twig or crunch a leaf underfoot.

As he approaches, his flashlight illuminates the figure even more. It’s laying on the ground, curled over on its side. At first glance, it doesn’t look like one of the older zombies – the ones with tattered, extraordinarily dirty clothes (or no clothes at all) – but Ilya can’t see the skin or face, which is the real litmus test. And the clothes are definitely not clean, so it could still be a younger zombie…or a person. People who are traveling in the woods are not usually wearing freshly laundered shirts and jeans.

Closer now, he tilts his gun to shine the light over the figure’s head. Reflexively, it jerks its head up, reacting to the light. The sudden movement causes Ilya to tighten his grip on his weapon, even though the light-reactivity is a sure sign that this is a living person. The man puts his arm up quickly to block the light in his eyes, before Ilya can really look at his face.

Not a zombie. But Ilya still isn’t sure if this person means their camp harm.

“Who are you? What do you want?” He spits out, trying to sound as intimidating as possible.

The man lowers his arm, light flooding his features. Ilya almost drops his gun in shock.

There’s no way. It can’t be.

But it is. He has a bloody gash on his face, dirt and grime and grease set into his skin in a way that’s reflective a long, hard journey. His hair has been shaved down to a buzz, and he looks like he hasn’t eaten properly in a very long time, his cheeks slightly hollow, dark circles under his eyes. But it’s him, freckles and all. It’s Shane Hollander.

Hollander blinks hard, adjusting to the light, eyes unfocused. And then he registers Ilya, eyes widening, blinking rapidly, like he’s sure he’s imagining Ilya in front of him. Hollander opens his mouth to speak, but chokes on his words; the same horrible, awful sob from before, coming from his throat.

“Fuck,” Ilya swings his gun to his back, quickly detaching the light so he can hold it instead. He drops to his knees, hands quickly palming over Hollander’s body, checking. “Are you bit?” Hollander shakes his head ever so slightly. Ilya’s hands, at first purely assessing Hollander’s condition, soften reflexively as they reach his face, cupping Hollander’s cheek as Ilya examines the wound across his forehead. Hollander leans into Ilya’s touch, closing his eyes and whimpering softly.

Up until this very moment, Ilya had assumed Hollander was dead. It was the only reasonable assumption in this day and age. Now, he's flooded with questions. What has Hollander been through? Hadn’t he been in Canada when everything started? He must have walked all the way here – did he go through West Virginia? Ilya hopes not. It hurts Ilya’s heart in a complicated way to imagine Shane suffering through the types of horrors Ilya himself has experienced.

“You are okay,” Ilya says, even though he’s not sure if it’s true. “You are going to be okay. Yes? Stay with me, Hollander.” Hollander, eyes still closed, nods ever so slightly. Fuck. Ilya has no idea what injuries he might have, how bad the damage is. If it’s fixable. If Shane will survive. He needs to get Shane back to the camp. Now.

He fumbles for the walkie-talkie. “Mike, come in.”

“Copy, Lilia. What you got?”

“One person, alive. Injured, unsure how. No bites. Need medical,” Ilya says into the mic. He shines the light over Shane’s body, searching for any signs of what his injuries may be, even though he already knows from his bite-check once-over that there doesn’t seem to be any obvious wounds, besides the gash on Shane’s face.

“Shit, okay. Copy. Standby,” comes Mike’s reply.

“Lilia,” Hollander mumbles, the first word Ilya has heard him say, his voice scratchy and cracked, but real.

Ilya is so, so scared. Ilya’s already lost so much. He thought he had run out of people to lose. He’s realizing, right now, that it might happen again. It’s his worst fucking nightmare. Ilya wants to cry, but he doesn’t.

He’s too scared to hope.

“Yes, yes, is me. I am here. It’s okay. You are okay, Shane,” Ilya thumbs over Shane’s cheeks, trying to get him to open his eyes again. But they are firmly shut, and Shane is lolling towards unconsciousness, his limbs growing heavy and limp.

“Rozanov, come in. Over.” It’s Harry’s voice that crackles through the other side.

“Here, yes,” Ilya cannot hide the panic in his voice. “Over.”

“Security assessment? Over,” Harry asks, militantly rigid.

Ilya takes a breath and sputters out the clinical facts that he knows Harry is asking for. “Alone. Minor visible injuries. Malnutrition and exhaustion, probably. Uh, emotional distress, I think, too. Maybe could suggest security issue in the area, but unclear,” Ilya hopes he’s said enough for Harry to move this situation along, so Hollander can be taken into camp. “Over,” he adds a moment late, forgetting. Harry responds instantly.

“Heard. We’ll double guard for the night. Friend or foe? Over.”

“Friend, friend, he’s a friend,” Ilya says frantically. “He’s unconscious. I think I can carry him to Simone’s. Over.”

“We don’t have time for this, Ilya. How do you know he’s a friendly if he’s unconscious? Over.” It almost makes Ilya’s blood boil, but with the vulnerable, practically half-dead Shane Hollander curled up at his feet, and the dark, dangerous woods at their backs, Ilya must stay focused.

“I know him!” Ilya replies urgently, trying not to shout. “I know him from before the end of things. His name is Shane. Please, Harry, I fucking swear, I know him. He’s friendly. He’s nice. Always, he’s nice. Fuck. Please. Over.”

There’s a pause that is a little too long. Before Ilya can consider what he might have to do if Harry says no–

“Fine,” Harry’s voice crackles through the walkie. “Wait for your security relief, then carry him to the medical cabin.”

Ilya swallows the lump in his throat. “Understood,” he replies. “Thank you. Over.”

“Walkie Mike for back-up if anything changes. Over and out.”

Ilya clips the walkie to the strap on his chest and moves to slide his arms under Hollander’s body, testing how difficult it may be to lift him.

Hollander’s body is not at all like Ilya remembers it. He recalls Shane Hollander as muscular and firm, thinking of Hollander in the showers after the CCM shoot, Hollander naked in the hotel room, Hollander gliding across the ice at All-Stars. Now he is skin and bones. While Ilya himself is not anywhere close to the perfect shape he had been as a professional athlete, he’s strong. He has to be, to compensate for his shit leg. To survive. But he remembers, before he came to the camp, when he and Svetlana were on the road, he was scrawnier than he is now, from the lack of reliable food and the constant walking, running, fighting. The stress of barely surviving each day.

Hollander seems even smaller than could even be possible for the memory Ilya has of his body before everything fell apart. Ilya has no problem at all lifting Hollander, even with his slightly unstable leg. Cradling Hollander against his chest, Ilya carefully and quickly retraces his steps to the floodlights of the outpost.

Shane’s so lightweight, Ilya debates not setting him down, just standing there holding him until someone comes to relieve him of his post. But then Ilya hears a snapping sound in the woods behind him, and he hurriedly moves to lean Hollander against the ladder of the guard tower. Hollander moans, distress wrinkled into his features, but his eyes stay shut.

Ilya swings his rifle around and scans the forest. Was there something chasing Hollander?

Another snap, the sound of a branch being broken.

“ебать,” Ilya curses to himself. He climbs into the outpost for a better vantage point; it fucking terrifies him to leave Shane, defenseless, at the base of the tower, but he doesn’t have time to figure out how to carry a limp Shane Hollander up the ladder.

At this height, Ilya can see the dark outline of what’s causing the snapping branches: a zombie. Piece of shit. Ilya takes aim. It’s too dark. He breaths carefully, waiting for it to step closer. It feels like a century, but it can’t be more than ten seconds.

Ilya fires. Headshot. The zombie falls with barely a sound.

Quickly, he swivels, scanning the area for more. Not immediately sensing further movement in the trees, Ilya glances behind him, and then to the ground where Hollander’s propped up. No threats.

He faces the forest again, keeping a sharp eye focused as he reaches for the walkie-talkie.

“One fucker, down,” he rattles off into the mic. "Seems clear for now, but could be more. Over.”

“Heard. Will report to Harry, see if he wants me to come back you up, over,” Mike’s voice comes through the other side of the walkie.

Now that the imminent threat has passed, Ilya’s not okay with Shane being on the ground below him where he can’t keep eyes on him. Sacrificing the height of the outpost in favor of being closer to Shane, Ilya does one more scan of the woods, and descends the ladder.

With one hand, Ilya desperately presses his fingers to Shane’s neck, searching for a pulse. He finds it, thank god, but it’s much too rapid, and so weak.

Suddenly, Shane’s eyes open wide, panicked and unfocused, not registering Ilya. “No, no, stop, stop, please,” he cries, his voice hoarse, straining, his arms swinging wildly.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, it’s okay Hollander,” Ilya attempts to soothe him, swallowing his own overwhelming urge to cry. “It’s me, remember me? Rozanov? It’s me.”

Hollander doesn’t seem to digest this information, but his momentary surge of frenetic energy seems to die as quickly as it came on; he whimpers, face contorted in distress, and slumps back against the side of the outpost, eyes shutting once again.

God, this is bad. Bad, bad, bad.

The walkie sparks back to life. “En route to you,” Mike says, and Ilya is overwhelmed with gratitude. For Mike, who’s on his way, for Harry, who must have approved it.

“Hold on, Hollander. Hold on.”

 

---

 

Mike must have run, because he’s there in three minutes. But it feels so much longer than that; Ilya staring out into the pitch dark night, more terrified than he has been in a very long time that something will catch him off guard.

Hollander doesn’t stir again, and Ilya doesn’t know if that’s a good thing or not.

Finally, he spots Mike’s outline coming through the woods. Ilya immediately swings his rifle to his back, pulls Hollander back into his arms. Hollander whimpers at the movement.

“С тобой всё в порядке,” Ilya murmurs to him, unable to muster the English. You’re okay. And maybe, subconsciously, Hollander will know the Russian means it’s Ilya there with him, even if he can't understand the words.

Mike is breathless, sweat pooling on his brow. He gawks, mouth hanging open. “Dude–”

“Harry said you can be my security relief?” Ilya asks frantically. He probably looks wild right now. He feels fucking insane. He literally does not know what is happening, how he can possibly reckon with finding Shane Hollander and then maybe, probably losing him. This can’t– he can’t– it’s Hollander. He can’t even think straight.

“What? I–”

“Please, Mike,” Ilya begs desperately, shifting Hollander slightly so he can grip him tighter. “This is– I know him. From before. Please. He needs help. Please. I can’t–” Ilya’s voice cracks, so he just stops talking.

“Oh,” Mike’s eyes widen. I know him – Ilya hasn’t told anyone much of anything about his life, including hockey. And now, he is fucking crazed, holding a limp man to his chest and begging, pleading, for help. And Mike doesn’t even know the half of it. This isn’t even just “someone Ilya knows,” this is Shane fucking Hollander.

“Yeah,” Mike says, nodding aggressively. “Lilia, of course, I’m your back-up, I can take over. Go, man. Go to Simone’s.”

“Thank you,” Ilya has never been more grateful for anything in his whole life. If he could, he would hug Mike right now. Instead, he takes off towards camp, running as fast as his leg will let him.

 

---

 

Abdul and Harry are at the wall; Abdul anxiously pacing back and forth, Harry standing, stance wide, calm in the storm. Catching sight of Ilya, Harry, pushes his glasses into place and frowns.

“Lay him down, “ Harry instructs, pointing to the clearing in front of him. “We have to check for bites.”

“I already–” Ilya starts, but there’s no use in arguing with him. The faster he complies, the sooner he can get Hollander medical attention. Ilya lowers him to the ground, and Hollander whimpers and tries to cling to Ilya, but his grip is too weak to be effective.

“I know, I know, it’s okay Shane, it’s okay, я здесь,” Ilya murmurs, I am here, completely ignoring the wide-eyed shock from Abdul. Hollander’s brief spell of semi-consciousness subsides, his breath evening in a way that both relieves Ilya and sends a panic rushing in. What’s wrong with Hollander?

He’s dying.

Setting aside his darkening thoughts, Ilya gets to work gently pulling off his clothes, exposing more and more of Hollander’s ragged body. God, he looks so awful, his body covered in various scars, the remnants of a hard life, or something much more sinister. Ilya wants to throw up. He can’t take this. He has done everything he could to avoid this again – seeing someone he cares for in such a state. And the scars... who, or what, is responsible for inflicting all of this lasting damage? And for it to be Hollander…

Harry stands overhead, eyes raking over Shane’s skin to check for punctures, wounds, anything out of sort. Abdul is a pace farther back, looking apprehensive.

When Hollander’s down to his briefs, Ilya so, so softly rolls him onto his side, holding Hollander’s head carefully in his hand, so Harry can examine his back. Ilya has to look away, the criss-crossed scars remind him too viscerally of his father with a belt, all those years ago. He swallows back nausea.

“Clear,” Harry announces, and Ilya has never moved so fast in his fucking life to gather Hollander back into his arms. “Open up!” Harry yells, projecting so the guards on the other side of the wall can hear.

“Who is he?” Abdul asks curiously, peering at Hollander. Ilya is not answering that – he’s much to focused on a million other things, like the speed of the gate opening, or making sure Shane’s chest is still rising and falling, or how fucking malnourished Shane is, which is even more obvious and concerning now that he’s down to his underwear. He doesn’t even bother trying to gather up Shane’s clothes on the ground – they’re dirty and ragged, and not anywhere close to important right now.

“Shane Hollander,” Harry provides. Ilya blinks at him, bewildered. Abdul is just confused, but clearly with no idea of the stakes. Harry shrugs, like it’s no big deal that he knows the full name of the random man in Ilya’s arms.

“My ex was from Quebec,” he says. Before Ilya can digest the full weight of this information (Harry knows hockey? Does Harry know Ilya was a hockey player? Had he known all along?), the gates are open and he’s racing inside.

If Ilya has any luck at all, it is that this gate into camp is much closer to Simone’s medical cabin than any other entrance. He runs as fast as he can, but the pain in his leg increases with every step, slowing him near the end even as he stubbornly refuses to acknowledge it. Evidently, Harry told Abdul to follow, because he catches up to Ilya just as he’s approaching the medical cabin. Abdul, despite his age, is tall and muscular, and definitely beyond capable of holding the half-dead Hollander, so Ilya doesn’t protest when Abdul eases Hollander out of Ilya’s arms; racing ahead with him.

Simone meets them outside the medical cabin, several paces away from the small structure. Her eyes dart rapidly from Abdul-holding-Hollander to Ilya before she extends an arm to Ilya, offering him support to walk the rest of the way to the cabin.

“No,” Ilya grits out. “Help him, not me. Help him.” Simone isn’t leaving Ilya’s side, she’s not listening. “Please, Simone, please,” Ilya begs, overwhelmed by physical pain and the absolute torrential downpour of emotions washing over him. Simone scoffs, indigently ignoring Ilya’s pleas. By the time they reach the cabin, Abdul has already laid Hollander out on the bed. He looks so fucking weak and small. Simone settles Ilya in the chair by the door before pacing towards Hollander, whipping out her stethoscope and pressing it to his chest.

“Is he dying?” Ilya doesn’t recognize the shallow, timid sound of his own voice.

“I don’t know yet,” Simone says somewhat impatiently. “Abdul,” she continues. “Go get ice from the mess hall for Ilya’s leg. Ilya, tell me what you know.”

By some miracle, Ilya manages to recount the short series of events, Shane in the forest, Shane on the ground, no bites on Shane. Simone nods and examines Hollander as Ilya talks.

“You know him?” Was it not fucking obvious? Ilya maybe left that part out of his retelling. He nods aggressively, feels tears welling up in his eyes. “Please, Simone, please…” Ilya feels like his mind is unspooling, loose brain waves twisting onto the ground. Simone frowns.

There’s the pounding of feet on the cabin’s front porch, and then Abdul reappears, panting hard like he had sprinted, a bag of ice in his hand.

“Abdul, get Ilya out of here,” Simone orders. “I need space.”

“No, Simone, please–”

She raises her hand sharply. “Ilya, listen to me. You’re hysterical. I need to care for– Shane, was it?” Ilya somehow nods, tears streaming down his face now. “Shane. Okay,” she continues. “Let me do what I can, okay? Abdul will take you back to your cabin, you ice your leg. If anything changes, I’ll send someone to get you.”

Ilya doesn’t have any fight left in him. Lip trembling, he keeps his eyes on Shane’s unmoving body in the bed.

If Shane does die, Ilya’s not sure he can handle being here when it happens. He’s too much of a coward to go through that again. So he puts an arm over Abdul’s shoulder, and leans on him for support as Abdul diligently leads Ilya back to his lonesome cabin, all the way across camp.

Abdul helps Ilya to his bed – one of the lower bunks amidst the four bunk-beds shoved into the little cabin, and awkwardly teeters over him for a moment before retreating, leaving Ilya by himself in his cabin.

Alone, Ilya curls over on his side as he comes completely undone, sobs heaving from his chest, wracking his body completely. It all comes out – all of the pain and sorrow and grief that he’s been trying to tamp down ever since he arrived at this camp, all pouring out. He reaches up to touch his mother’s necklace, but of course, he’d lost it long ago, and the comfort it would have provided.

He’s so, so, so fucking scared.

Chapter 2

Hollander stands at the foot of the bed, hands in his sweatpant pockets, looking agonizingly awkward and beautiful. God, he's irresistible.

“So I know we talked about meeting up in two weeks, but…” Hollander doesn't finish his sentence, just standing, waiting, apparently, for Ilya to speak.

Ilya rolls his eyes, scoffing. “Oh my god, Hollander, you are so boring." Ilya’s on his feet, circling around the edge of the hotel bed, extending in hand. “Give me your phone.”

Hollander hesitates, his big beautiful dark eyes staring back at Ilya blankly. “What?”

“You have phone? Give.”

A small smile curves into Hollander’s lips. He rolls his eyes to cover it up, sets his phone into Ilya’s hand. Ilya clicks into it, navigating to the contacts. He puts his cell phone number under “Lily,” proud of himself for his genius. No doubt it will get a reaction out of Hollander. He sends himself a number so he can have Shane Hollander’s number without a doubt.

“Lily? So what’s my name gonna be?”

Ilya smirks, “Jane,” and he looks up, ready to see a giddy smile, a slight blush on Hollander’s cheeks. But what he sees is not the Hollander he remembers, not the freshly-fucked, eager, nineteen-year-old Hollander. Instead, Shane’s cheeks are sunken in, a bloody, gushing gash on his forehead, slicing into his right eyebrow. His hair is shorter than it’s supposed to be; it doesn’t fit, makes Shane look like a military rat. Or a prisoner.

His eyes are full of pain and agony and he stares into Ilya’s soul and Ilya is fucking overwhelmed with panic and fear and rapid terror.

“Lilia.” It’s Mike’s nickname for him, not right, and Shane’s voice comes out strangled and wrong, and then blood comes pouring out of his mouth, like a waterfall of red.

Ilya manages to catch him before he collapses onto the hotel floor – but then they’re not in 1221 anymore. They’re in the woods, in the dirt, and Ilya hears the groans and shrieks of the undead closing in around them.

“Lilia,” Shane gurgles through the blood, choking. Ilya’s screaming and crying, shouting for help and his mama. It only draws the undead closer.

Shane’s eyes close and Ilya shouts one final time before the undead finally reach them. No escape.

 

---

 

Ilya wakes to the snapping of the cabin screen door hitting the wood frame. He sits bolt upright; ripped from a sleep so deep that for a brief moment he has no idea where he is, let alone what time it is.

Abdul stands in the doorway, wide-eyed, like he is as surprised as Ilya to be here. The kid seems to remember why he’s there, blinking himself back to reality, and opens his mouth to explain.

“Harry and them want to talk to you in the mess hall. Sent me to get you. Said you prolly slept enough. Uh,” Abdul’s demeanor shifts to awkward nervousness. “Sorry I scared you. The, uh, screen– I forgot. That it slams shut like that.”

Ilya tries to blink himself back to reality. Morning light is streaming into the cabin, birds chirping peacefully in the background. He lightly taps the spot at the base of his neck where his mother’s crucifix used to sit. Memories flood back to his mind.

Shane.

“The man,” Ilya stands without thinking, paces across the small room to Abdul. His bad leg throbs in protest. “Is he…” Ilya can’t bring himself to say it, choking on the word. Dead? Shane’s dead.

“Oh,” Abdul blinks. “He’s still asleep. Or unconscious.” Not dead. Not dead. Ilya finds himself gasping for air. He’s not sure what he’s feeling – relief? No. Dread. Shane’s not dead now, but he will be later.

“What did Simone say?” Ilya sets his hands on Abdul’s shoulders, searching the boy’s face for answers. Abdul flinches. “I–” Abdul clears his throat, and Ilya drops his hands; he’s scaring the boy. He won’t get answers like that. Sure enough, without Ilya staring him down, Abdul continues. “I think she said she wouldn’t know until he wakes up. Something about internal something, or psych-o-something. I don’t remember exactly. Sorry.”

If he wakes up, Ilya thinks. His heart twists uncomfortably. Abdul keeps talking. “Everyone’s…everyone’s pretty worked up. I think you should get up there.”

Ilya turns away from Abdul, rubbing his temples in attempt to stave off the ache forming behind his eyes. Ilya takes a breath and turns to the small wood dresser in the corner where he keeps the few belongings he’s collected since he started living at the camp. He retrieves a fresh shirt – one of the Tennessee State Park tees they have dozens of at the camp. He swipes off the shirt he slept in – the same one he wore while cradling Shane Hollander against his chest. In the dresser underneath the stack of clothes, he sees the edge of the paper, pulling it out carefully. It’s a page torn from a magazine, something he found back when he was traveling. Him and Shane, nineteen and innocent and glaring at each other menacingly in a face-off position. It always reminds Ilya of how the day actually went, how they couldn’t stop laughing. Fuck.

He sets it on top of the dresser, smooths it out, swallowing back the lump in his throat. Turning, he finds Abdul still standing by the cabin door, eyes glued to Ilya’s bare, scarred chest.

“What?” Ilya cocks an eyebrow questioningly, finally easing on the fresh shirt.

“It’s–” Abdul blushes furiously, averting his vision to stare at the floor. “Sorry. Um, I– I think they’ll be mad if I show up without you.”

“I will go to see Shane first.”

Abdul blinks back surprise at this statement, his expression quickly shifting to panic. “No, you don’t understand–”

“You do not understand,” Ilya can’t help the lilt of desperation in his tone. “I must see him. I have to–”

“Ilya, you seriously need to go to the mess hall. People are saying he can’t stay–”

“нет,” Ilya says without thinking. No, fuck, no, they cannot do that.

Abdul, not processing Ilya’s interruption continues, concern etched into his eyes, “–something about security risk and I–” Ilya steps past him, the squeak of the screen door opening cutting Abdul off.

Ilya realizes, as he descends the two steps down from the cabin porch, that his leg definitely needs extensive rest after hard he pushed it yesterday. And it will need even more recuperation after this, because Ilya hobbles as quickly as he can manage up the path. Abdul catches up to him easily, offering his arm out in support; Ilya accepts wordlessly.

He should have anticipated this, but he hasn’t had a spare moment to think. The camp is notoriously risk-averse; of course they are hesitant about a strange, half-dead man who shows up with unidentifiable injuries, and no way to explain how he got there since he’s, again, half-dead. Ilya doesn’t even manage to come up with an argument, or a plan at all for what he’s going to say, he’s too focused on moving as fast as possible up the gravel path, past a few other cabins. They can’t fucking kick out Shane Hollander. If they do, Ilya will go too. That much he’s decided on.

The shortcut through the woods, the most direct route to the mess hall, is more difficult to maneuver than the gravel. He has to pay close mind not to trip on roots and stones; attention that Ilya cannot seem to muster. Abdul manages to catch him from falling flat on his face, twice.

He can see the mess hall through the trees, wills himself to get there faster, so he can explain it all, sooner, better, enough to save Shane from expulsion. Ilya must do this.

The full flight of stairs is the worst, but it’s the final stretch, and then, at last, he’s in the belly of the beast.

The mess hall is chaos. Everyone is arguing, pointing, upset, looking for answers. It must be all the able-bodied adults in the room, besides those on guard, of course – some thirty people. Ilya glances frantically around the room, catching snippets of the debate around him.

“We can’t just let some random guy–” Ilya can’t tell who says this, their voice a low grumble. Ilya feels frustration eek into his already-present desperation. Shane Hollander isn’t some random guy.

“He’s injured! What, you want to leave him for dead?” Macie is standing at the hearth across the room, waving her arms emphatically.

“No,” Ilya whispers. Abdul is maybe the only person who heard him – his eyes whipping from Ilya to the rest of the room like he’s not quite sure what to do.

“Yes! Why the fuck not! Better him than us!” Emmett, the big, burly guy who manages the armory answers, his voice booming.

“No,” Ilya’s voice cracks, slightly louder this time, stumbling forward, wincing at the pain in his leg that follows. Still, no one seems to have heard him.

“We don’t even know if there’s any threat–” Mike speaks up, his voice calm.

“But there could be! We already killed at least three undead fuckers who must’ve followed him here. Are you willing to risk your kids’ lives?” Emmett spits. Several people are nodding in agreement, a chorus of “yeah’s,” and “he has a point.”

No. Ilya thinks. He’s not sure if the thoughts turn to words or not. No no no no no no. Panic is rushing in, his vision bending. He can’t stand; someone (Abdul, probably) guides him to sit at the mess hall dining table.

“Breathe, Ilya,” Mike appears in front of Ilya, reaching across the table to grip his wrists lightly. “Take a deep breath, buddy." Mike exemplifies what he means; he sucks in air slowly, releases it steadily. Ilya tries to recreate it. In. Out. In. Out. Things come into focus again.

The room around them has calmed. Ilya must have shouted or – or something. Because everyone is aware of him now, eyes on the quiet, stand-offish Russian man who’s only lived here a year and a half and has never once shown this level of emotion to literally anyone at camp.

“What the fuck is this?” someone grumbles. Probably Emmett.

“Shut the fuck up, Emmett,” Macie’s voice comes through, clear and recognizable.

“Don’t–” Emmett starts, but another person cuts in quickly.

“Stop. Enough of this. This is why we have protocol.” It’s Harry who speaks, his monotone voice grounding the room in civility. “We listen to what Ilya has to say, we pitch a course of action, or multiple. And we vote. This is an impromptu town hall – we are missing half our eligible voters that are currently on guard duty – and therefore not our final decision. We are gathering information. We listen. We agree on a preliminary plan. This is how we do things. We are a community.”

Most of the room nods in agreement. Emmett crosses his arms over his chest, lip curled in disgust, but he doesn’t argue further.

“Ilya,” Harry turns to Ilya, his voice less commanding, but still firm. “Explain. Tell us what you know.”

“I–” Ilya’s first attempt at words gets caught in his throat, cracking again. He takes another deep breath and looks up at his neighbors. What will be enough for them to allow Shane Hollander to stay? Can they be convinced? He decides quickly, that he’ll tell them as much of the truth as it requires for them to understand.

“His name is Shane Hollander, and he’s a hockey player,” Ilya starts slowly. “Was a hockey player. I was a hockey player too.”

“We know that,” Macie pipes up from the other side of the room. “Harry just told us.”

Startled, Ilya blinks at Harry, who simply shrugs. “What did you expect? I had to tell them.”

“Ah– no, I–” Ilya struggles to explain why exactly he’s shocked. “You knew? That I was a hockey player?”

Again, Harry shrugs. “I didn’t realize it at first. You look pretty different, and it’s not like I watched any games recently. But yeah, I figured it out awhile ago. Wasn’t important until now.”

“Why the fuck are we talking about Ilya playing fucking hockey? Who gives a fuck?” Emmett speaks up again, jumping to aggression in a way that Ilya’s seen with this type of weak, sniveling man. (Like his father. His brother. And– more. Many more. The people in West Virginia…)

“Yo, chill,” Mike cuts in, standing up from his seat in defense of Ilya.

“Shut your fucking mouth, Mike. You never know when to shut up,” Emmett spits, extending an accusatory finger pointed in Mike’s direction. Mike opens his mouth, but Harry interrupts with a firm, calming hand on Mike’s chest.

“Stop. Let’s listen to Ilya. He has the information.”

Emmett doesn’t look happy about it, seething, but he shuts up. Mike seems to drop the whole thing immediately, turning back to Ilya like the whole exchange never happened.

Everyone’s attention, in fact, is on Ilya again.

“Continue,” Harry prompts.

“So, ah,” Ilya clears his throat. Details. He needs to share details, humanize Shane, emphasize their connection. “He is a hockey player. One of the best. The best. I– I met him when we were teenagers, playing in the junior league. Canada. And then we were drafted to the MLH–”

“Oh shit,” someone mutters from the back. Even Emmett looks a little impressed.

“–and Shane, he played for Montreal. In Canada. I played for Boston. And we were…ah, friends.”

Harry squints his eyes like he’s going to ask a question about that, so Ilya sputters to add the nuance. “The league, they made us rivals. In the media. But we were, ah, friends.”

“Not rivals?” Harry questions.

“No. Not…not rivals. Not in real life, anyway,” Ilya confirms with a steady nod.

“How did he end up here? Did he come looking for you?” someone asks, Ilya’s not able to place the voice in the crowd, but it doesn’t matter. It’s the question on everyone’s mind.

“Ah, I do not know how he is here,” Ilya says uneasily, glancing around at the residents around him. “But I– I have not seen him in years. Not since…ah, before. Everything – the infection.”

The room, in a trance, digests this. A person he hasn’t seen since before.

“And there is no one who knows I am here. I, ah, do not have anyone left. Or, I thought–” But now Hollander is here. Someone. “I thought he was dead,” Ilya admits. “And he might still…but if he doesn’t…” Ilya doesn’t know what to say next. It hurts so bad to imagine Shane dying. It hurts too much, maybe more, to hope that Shane will survive. He can’t say any of it out loud.

“We can’t expel a sick person that one of our own knows personally. Especially not while he’s unconscious,” Macie fills the stretching silence as it becomes clear that Ilya can’t continue. Her eyes dart to Emmett as she keeps talking. She infuses her voice with strength and authority, and Ilya wonders what he’s done to deserve this support from her. Take one shift?

“We don’t know how he found us, if it was an accident, or on purpose. We don’t know if something or someone is following him. And we won’t know until he wakes up, and we can ask him. If we kick him out now, we lose our best chance at understanding what we might be up against, if anything. Even if we did banish him, if something is on his tail, they could still track him to us, even if he’s not here anymore. And–” Macie softens, her eyes on Ilya. “And we protect our own. And one of our own is asking us to protect someone he cares about. Someone he assumed to be dead, but has come back. I think we can all understand those stakes. I think we can all admit we wish someone we cared about would show up, alive after all.”

Everyone in the mess hall sits with that thought. The tragedies they’ve been through to be alive today, the grief and guilt that haunts every moment of life lived, the unfairly difficult cards they’ve all been dealt in this life. And the hope, the hope that good things can still happen to them.

“He’s a friend, huh, Lilia?” Mike says, the first to speak, a goofy smile across his face. “That’s enough reason for me. I volunteer to scout and assess the area.”

“I’ll go too,” Abdul volunteers from beside Ilya.

“Same,” Macie calls from across the room, some others nodding in agreement.

“Hold it,” Harry splits in before anyone else can speak up. “No one’s volunteering for an unplanned scouting mission when we don’t know the threat level. We do this by the book. I propose Hollander stays for treatment. We keep the guards doubled-up. When he’s awake, we gather intel and reconsider proper security steps. Any other propositions?”

No one says a word. Emmett’s eyes are on the floor, his jaw tight.

“Okay,” Harry nods in acceptance. “All who agree say aye.”

A chorus of aye’s follows.

“All who disagree say nay.”

No one says nay, but there are some who abstain, neglecting to choose a side when the majority is already clearly in favor of one decision.

“Okay,” Harry nods again, solidifying the plan. “Proposition passed. Everyone back to it.”

And then everyone disperses, the white noise of conversational chatter spreading throughout the mess hall. Ilya realizes he’s been holding his breath, pushes air from his lungs as he rolls out the tension that had built up in his shoulders.

Mike reaches across the table again, tapping lightly to get Ilya’s attention. “You okay, bro?”

“Mm,” he winces. “I need to go–”

Ilya tries to stand; Abdul moves to help him up, but Mike is already on his feet, racing around to their side of the table. “I got him, kid. You get some breakfast.”

The idea of breakfast reminds Ilya of the day ahead, his responsibilities outside of this insane situation with Shane fucking Hollander appearing out of nowhere, looking like death. He doesn’t even know what time it is.

“What do you have today, Lilia?” Mike asks, reading his panic.

“Is fine,” he says dismissively. “I’ll just go check on Shane, and go to my shift after. Will be good distraction.” And if Hollander dies while I’m at work, at least I won’t have to witness it. It’s not a comforting thought.

Mike doesn’t look thrilled with this plan, and like he wants to press for details, but Ilya takes a step forward, forcing Mike to focus his efforts on physically supporting Ilya.

“Dude,” Mike starts. “I don’t think Harry’ll let you work the wall with your leg like this.”

“He will,” Ilya asserts. If anyone would, it’s Harry. Harry understands duty. Besides, Ilya can shoot a gun perfectly fine with a shit leg, and they’re on doubled-up shifts. They need all the bodies they can get.

“We’ll see what Simone says,” Mike scoffs. Simone, on the other hand, Ilya is less sure about. But it’s not like he needs her permission anyway.

 

---

 

“Dehydration, malnutrition, exhaustion, that much I know for sure,” Simone reports. “The cut on his face isn’t too bad, no signs of infection, should heal fine.” Ilya’s standing in the doorway to the medical cabin, frozen at the sight of Shane in the bed. Hollander isn’t awake, and despite what looks like Simone's best efforts to scrub the dirt and grime from his skin, he still looks fucking awful. They’ve dressed him in plain gray sweats, a state park shirt identical to Ilya’s except it’s a darker color.

Ilya is glad he didn’t have any food at the mess hall, because he's suddenly very nauseous.

"Sit down, Ilya,” Simone frowns at him, pointing to the chair. Silently, Ilya does as he’s told.

“And?” he prompts Simone. He keeps his eyes on Shane, terrified at what else Simone has to add.

“Not much else I can tell right now. He might have internal injuries we aren’t aware of, but I don’t have the tech to determine that. Based on your story, I’d guess he’s been out there awhile with no water or food. Probably just delirious. But we can’t confirm until he wakes up.”

Ilya figured as much. He chances a glance at Simone, finds her watching him, mild curiosity in her expression. “You can help him? Will he…” Ilya doesn’t finish the thought.

Simone smiles softly and nods. “Luckily, we have the IV equipment–”

From the state park welcome center. Apparently they had a small emergency medical bay with some supplies. Ilya’s been there; it’s all picked over now, as the camp has been drawing from it for years. But he's happy to hear Simone is an expert in resource conservation. And that she’s using those camp resources on Shane without a second thought.

“–so I have him on fluids. That should help.”

Ilya nods firmly. “Thank you,” he says emphatically, holding eye contact with Simone so she knows how much he means it. Simone looks slightly entertained at Ilya’s genuine gratitude. “Of course. It’s my job. Also it’s my job to tell you, the best thing you can do for that leg is rest and ice.”

Ilya winces. “I know,” he acknowledges. “But we are on double guard duty. And I had to convince everyone to let him stay…so I…need to.”

Simone tilts her head, studying Ilya in an intense way that makes him feel wrung out and exceedingly vulnerable. Like she can read this thoughts. “Just the wall?” she asks.

“Yes,” Ilya insists. “Just the wall. Sniper’s nest, so no leg use.”

Simone looks to Shane on the bed, causing Ilya’s eyes to shift there as well. God, Shane is so small. This is going to hurt.

“Okay,” Simone decides. “But eat before you go. And tape a bag of ice to it for the first fifteen minutes of your shift.”

“Yes, okay,” Ilya agrees.

“More ice after. And no more running. Walk slow. I’ll have Abdul find that old crutch you used to use. He can bring it to you on duty.”

“Yes,” Ilya nods intently. “Yes, okay. I will be careful.”

Simone nods one final time and turns back to her worktable. Taking it as a sign he should leave, Ilya pushes himself up to stand.

“Oh, and Ilya,” Simone adds without turning around Ilya pauses midway out the door. “I don’t know what the others said. But when it comes to my patients, I make the decisions.”

Simone shifts to lean her back against the worktable, now facing Ilya. Ilya is struck by the intensity woven in her expression.

“I would never allow anyone to kick him out while he’s not conscious. And you know Harry wouldn’t either.”

Ilya suddenly could cry.

He’s never really gotten to know Simone – he knows she’s been at the camp since its inception, sometime around a year after everything fell apart, that she, alongside Harry (who is maybe her husband, or boyfriend, or something), are among the founders of their camp. But now he realizes that beyond being a competent medical practitioner and a strong authority in the community, she’s also…a good person.

Ilya had all but forgotten the value of that, of being genuinely good as a person. Shane was a good person. Effortlessly, like he was just born good. Ilya had called him boring, back then – Ilya’s memory-melded nightmare from the night before strikes back to mind. Hollander, healthy and strong, Hollander, weak and dying, blood bubbling in his throat, calling Ilya the stupid nickname Mike gave him, which doesn’t even make sense. The undead all around them–

“Ilya,” Simone speaks, pulling Ilya back to the present. Her eyebrows are slightly pinched, mouth tight. “I– I can’t make any promises.”

“Yes, I know,” Ilya straightens up, wiping his face clear of whatever emotion was clouding it.

“I’ll have someone come get you when he wakes up,” she tells him.

If he wakes up.

He knows that if he tries to speak, he won't be able to keep it together. So he just nods once, and steps out of the cabin.

Chapter 3

It was a game day, or it was supposed to be. The Raiders were meant to fly out in the late-morning, shuttle straight to the Bell Center, start their warm-ups, and then promptly beat their rivals on the ice. It was the kind of jam-packed travel day that no one liked, but this time Ilya had been counting down the hours. Because tonight was the night he and Hollander had agreed to meet up, and probably Hollander would let him fuck that sweet little asshole of his. Fuck, he had been dying for it, for Hollander; to kiss him, and touch him, and make him blush with raunchy jokes and carefully-crafted innuendos.

Ilya woke up at two in the morning the day of the game in a cold sweat. He wasn’t sure why – but something felt off. Wrong. He couldn’t shake the feeling, even when he checked his phone and saw no new notifications, even after he went to get a glass of water from his kitchen, double checked the locks on his doors. Something was not right.

Was it something with his father? Svetlana? Was it some kind of sixth sense?

But he found nothing amiss, no missed calls or messages, nothing to indicate something was wrong. Could it be Hollander? If something was off, it was not like Hollander would text Ilya – his rival who he’s hooked up with twice now. There would be no way for Ilya to know, if that was the case.

Ilya disliked the edge of worry which crept in when he thought about that – about his distance from Hollander. What was he thinking? Why was he waking up at 2am and thinking such possessive things about a very-talented, very-boring freckled Canadian?

Ilya blamed it on being horny, even though that didn’t seem exactly it. He was just that insatiable, maybe. That’s why he couldn’t get Shane Hollander’s freckles out of his mind.

Too wired to sleep, Ilya stretched across his couch and scrolled social media. Anything to distract himself.

That's where he saw the video. At the time, he didn't quite calculate what it meant. But in hindsight, it was the moment everything changed.

It was shot in a nightclub, a dark, loud place, and it showed chaos, there was no other way to describe it. People attacking people, screaming, biting, running, crying, and then the camera froze on what looked like a man with half his face peeled off, the roundness of his eyeball exposed. He should be dead, the laws of science would demand it, but he was walking, moving, snarling.

Ilya was no stranger to zombies – he’d played Resident Evil. He'd seen 28 Days Later (multiple times). Hell, he’d watched every zombie movie there was, probably. He was maybe as close to a zombie expert as one could be. But zombies weren’t real, everyone knew that. So he thought the video was fiction. He wanted it to be fake, so he let himself believe that it was.

He had noticed the tagged location – Los Angeles. Far away, but not in terms of zombie-virus-spread math. But again, Ilya knew zombies were not real, and this video was just very well created animation. It had to be. So it didn't matter.

While he had gone to social media to escape his Hollander-related-thoughts, it had backfired, and now he needed to distract himself from the video. So, he turned back to his initial desires, and he texted Hollander.

Lily: Ready for me? ;)

He hadn’t expected a reply, not at two in the morning, but less than a minute later, Hollander responded.

Jane: Have you seen this?

Attached was a video; a different one. Not the nightclub, but an open street. It started the same, people running and screaming. A car swerved into a crowd of people, barely missing them. The camera zoomed in on rapid figure, a not-person-looking person-shaped thing. Then time seemed to narrow and fold onto itself: the creature snapped out, grabbed a woman as she tried to escape, and bit directly into the center of the woman’s face. Before she could even scream.

“Какого хрена?” Ilya threw his phone across the room in surprise and disgust. What the actual fuck?

Ilya blinked at the empty living room. It couldn’t be real. This was real life, not a fucking movie, not a video game, not that. It was not real.

In a state of shock, Ilya retrieved his phone, and saw another text from Hollander had come through.

Jane: It has to be fake, right?

Before Ilya could respond, his phone lit up with an incoming call from Svetlana.

“Света,” he said, feeling frozen and cold.

“You saw the video?” she said in Russian.

“I– yes,” he responded, his heart beating faster. “It can’t be–”

“It is. I have to get out of the city before–”

Sveta was in New York City – that was probably one of the worst possible places to be. Ilya would know, he was a zombie expert after all. Boston, he realized, was not going to be much better.

“I will meet you. Where?”

Ilya remembered the flurry of planning, how crazed and wired he had felt. He had started shoving things into bags, grabbing things he thought might be helpful in a survival situation. But he had only just moved into this apartment at the start of the season, only just moved to this fucking country, and he was a fucking rookie – he didn’t have much of anything. Still, Ilya managed to find things to pack.

He threw the bags – mostly food, clothes, blankets, coats, the handgun he kept in a safe by his bed (because it was America so why wouldn’t he buy a gun? There were crazy fans, and Ilya knew how to shoot it – his idiot cop father had made sure of that) – into the backseat of his sports car. Why did he not own anything more practical? Cursing himself for being the dumb nineteen-year-old he was, Ilya left his apartment, speeding into the night with the strange feeling that he might never go back again.

Or maybe, it was all a hoax, and by the sun came up, he would be on a flight to Montreal, his teammates teasing him relentlessly, telling him “Don’t believe everything you see on the internet!”

The roads were empty at first, everyone sleeping, no one aware of the world as they knew it was already starting to collapse around them. Ilya stopped for gas, and somehow convinced a man with a pickup truck to switch cars with him. The man seemed to think Ilya was crazy – and if Ilya did end up being the mad one, he would be okay with that.

He continued the drive in the truck, and by morning, he finally reached the rural New England town Svetlana had picked as their meet-up location, pulled into the empty parking lot of a shuttered strip mall. His adrenaline crashing and the lack of sleep catching up to him, Ilya was relieved to find Svetlana already there, waiting for him in a car she’d frantically rented to get out of the city – before everyone else realized they should too.

It was not until hours later, when he and Sveta had scoped out the area, barricaded themselves inside the shuttered Pizza Hut, that Ilya thought to text Hollander.

Fuck, why hadn’t he remembered to text Hollander? Fuck.

Maybe because if Ilya texted Hollander, it would be goodbye. It would make it all real. Because what was he going to to do, find his two-time hook-up buddy during the zombie apocalypse? Hollander would probably laugh in his face.

Ilya realized, with a sickening drop in his stomach, that would be the best-case scenario. Worst case, and most likely, Hollander was a fucking zombie. Fuck.

Ilya hated himself for how much it hurt, and how there was nothing he could do about it. He tried to send one more text, his goodbye, his hope bundled into three words, that Shane Hollander would be okay.

Lily: Get somewhere safe.

And Ilya’s phone had taunted him, reminding him of his failure, his inability to think straight in the midst of an unbelievable crisis: undelivered. Undelivered. Undelivered. What did that mean? Did it mean the cell tower was down, or did it mean Hollander’s phone had been smashed to the ground – and what did that mean?

Ilya did not have much time to think about it, given he was fucking living on the run. Everywhere he and Sveta turned, they had to fucking fight tooth and nail to survive. What was even the point?

Sometime, weeks later, Ilya’s phone finally lost its charge. Useless and only weighing him down, he chucked it aside, and tried to forget about Shane Hollander’s freckles.

 

---

 

Shane is back at the military base on the border, in his fatigues, frozen, looking through the chain link fence, watching helplessly as a massive pack of undead tear across the open field, right towards him. The chain-link fence won’t hold against their weight; he knows that. There’s too many of them. They’re going to overrun the base; everything will descend into chaos once again. Shane knows this because he’s lived it.

“Shane!” It’s his dad, beside him, grabbing him by the shoulders, shaking him harshly. God, his dad – Shane misses his dad, and he’s hit with a mixture of happiness and a deep, aching, longing to be with him for real – because this must be a dream. His dad is dead. ”We have to go!” Dad shouts.

Go? Go where? There was never anywhere safe to go. That was a fact of life.

“He is waiting,” Dad says, and he’s tugging Shane into the gap between the barrack buildings. Around them, there’s a flurry of movement as the rest of the soldiers mobilize. Or, run for their lives, as they realize there is no hope of defending the base. Even behind a fence and heavy artillery, there is no hope. And why defend such an awful place? Shane hates this place. He hates every place.

“Rozanov’s waiting,” Dad says.

Rozanov? “Rozanov is gone,” Shane tells his dad gently, breaking the news. It’s the reverse of how it actually happened, how Dad had comforted Shane. But this is a dream. Anything goes. “Remember?” he reminds his dad. “I found his–”

A dark-haired woman with a scar across her eyebrow steps out from behind one of the barrack buildings. Frankie. It’s strange – her being here on the military base. It’s a mix of his memories, time flowing all together without sequence, his mind pulling characters from any moment.

“No!” Shane tries to shout, because he knows what happens next, can place the exact series of events that’s come back to haunt him. His lungs don’t work – no sound comes. Frankie smiles devilishly, raises her jagged dagger, and slits Dad’s throat. His dad tries to breath, chokes on the blood. He crumples onto the ground – just like how it happened in real life.

“No!” Shane is frozen in place, forced to watch as Frankie tilts her head to one side, teasing, wiping the bloodied knife on her pants.

“I told you, you’re mine,” she speaks, and it’s like her voice has wormed its way inside Shane’s brain, unshakeable, parasitic. “You’re mine,” she threatens again in a low rumble, moving towards him smoothly, like a cat hunting its prey. Every step she takes fills Shane with terror and panic, her face getting closer and closer, her smile widening horribly. He needs to get away, he needs to get out, he needs to wake up, before the remainder of his memory seeps into the scenario.

Shane, he tells himself, wake the fuck up.

WAKE UP.

 

---

 

He’s not in the woods, not hidden in a bush to sleep like he had been for the past days – days? How much time has it been since he lost his way? Everything feels hazy and slow, and if it weren’t for the sharp departure from his nightmare, Shane might assume he was still dreaming. It doesn’t help that he has no idea where he is. He’s breathing heavy, tears pricking in his eyes, still petrified from seeing Frankie in his dream, from remembering his dad– Shane gasps for another breath, and a sob escapes him.

“Hey, hey, you’re okay,” the soothing voice comes from a woman standing over him. She’s maybe in her forties, curly gray hair pulled back in a low ponytail, wearing a plain black shirt, a stethoscope hanging around her neck. Her face is unfamiliar, but kind… maybe. "You’re safe,” she adds. Not convinced by a stranger’s attempts to calm him, Shane scans the room, trying to take stock of his surroundings.

He’s on a bed, in a little building (a cabin?), windows all around that are open, light and sound streaming in – the low buzz of cicadas, sweet chirps of happy birds, a breeze blowing through the trees. Strangely peaceful. Maybe he is still asleep.

The next thing he notices is how much his body hurts. His head is pounding, his limbs feel heavy and slow, like his blood is filled with sand. He looks down and realizes he has an IV in arm, traces back to a clear bag hanging on the bed post. His vision blurs slightly, dizziness hitting him.

“Whoa, whoa, let’s lay you back down, okay?” the woman moves quickly to ease Shane back into the bed. He lets her, because he doesn’t have the energy to do anything else.

“My name is Simone. You’re Shane, right?”

Shane hums, offers the slightest nod he can manage. She nods reassuringly at him and takes a half-step backwards to retrieve something – Shane can’t quite focus enough to see.

She presents him with a water bottle, uncapping it and holding it to his lips. “Small sips,” she instructs, and Shane obediently opens his mouth. The first sip reminds how fucking thirsty he is. When was the last time he drank water? It feels like eons ago, it feels like he’s never had water before in his life, like he could never drink enough. He needs more, he needs–

“Slow, slow,” the woman, Simone, says, pulling the bottle back as Shane tries to grab it, chug it. “If you drink too fast, it'll just come back up.”

“Please,” he croaks, desperate for more. She gives him a small, pitying smile. “I know, I’m sorry. But it has to be slow. Take another small sip, and then we’ll take a break. You can have more in a few minutes.”

Shane accepts the final sip eagerly, and when she pulls it away, he relaxes back into the bed, exhausted. The world vibrates around him; Shane closes his eyes as nausea rolls in.

“Do you remember how you got here?” Simone’s voice, soft, lays over the white noise of the cicadas outside.

“No,” Shane mumbles. “I…I was in the woods. But it’s all…unclear.” He opens his eyes; the world is less titled now, and nausea lessening, probably as his body processes the sips of water.

“You must have been out there awhile,” Simone guesses. She sits in a chair an arm’s length away, in front of a table littered with medical tools, turned towards Shane, studying him. Because it’s not just that she’s looking at him – she’s monitoring, assessing, it’s evident in her eyes, how they scan over him. “It’s lucky Ilya found you when he did. Apparently there were a couple undead right on your tail.”

Ilya? Shane blinks hard, trying to push himself up in the bed. He must have misheard. “What?”

Something flashes across Simone’s expression that Shane cannot decipher, and then her eyes soften. “Shane,” she reaches out, touches his wrist lightly as if tentatively about to tell him something. It draws Shane’s line of vision to his torso, where he notices for the first time that he’s in a strange shirt, the wrong pants.

“Where are my clothes?” He feels wild, desperate energy course through his veins. Simone pulls her hand away from his wrist. “My stuff–”

“It’s okay, no one will take your things. I can have them brought over, okay?”

Shane lets out a sharp breath, dropping his hands into his hands. He needs his stuff. He can’t lose it. It’s all he has left. His heart is beating in his head, so fast.

“I’ll check now, okay?” Shane can’t respond, his head still hung over in distress. “Shane?” Simone prompts, a hand on the bed. “Before I get your stuff– I– do you know Ilya Rozanov?”

Shane’s head snaps up, which is a sudden movement that he immediately regrets, wincing with a groan. Simone presses him back into the bed. “Relax, Shane, stop moving so quickly. Here have another sip.” She holds the bottle to his lips and Shane accepts it eagerly.

SNAP. The sound slams through Shane’s already sensitive head, he curls into himself instinctively, eyes wide and searching for the source, expecting Frankie, dagger in hand, to come towering over him. Even though that would be impossible, and he knows it. It still haunts him.

He finds the true cause; a tall, brown-skinned teenage boy, a shocked expression across his face, standing in the doorway, the screen door shut behind him. “Abdul, seriously, don’t let it slam like that,” Simone says sternly. The boy, Abdul, doesn’t seem to process her words. He just blinks, wide-eyed, at Shane.

“He’s awake. I have to–” Abdul turns on his heels without finishing his sentence, swinging the screen door open again. SNAP, it slams shut behind him. “Abdul, wait!” Simone starts to follow him, but gives up halfway across the cabin with an annoyed sigh.

“Sorry about him,” Simone says, turning back to Shane, vision raking over his curled up position, the fear that’s probably lingering in his features. “He never remembers to be careful with the screen door.”

Shane tries to hum his understanding, but instead a low whimper escapes him, and Shane realizes his chest is tight, like someone is squeezing his lungs, wringing them out like a sponge. He can’t speak, he can’t breath, and even though there was no danger, and the sudden sound has passed now anyways, the fear will not leave his body.

Distantly, he’s aware of Simone’s presence, of her voice telling him to breath slowly, to focus on her, but it’s like he’s underwater. It’s not until she grabs his hand, presses it to her own chest, mimics the deep rise and fall of breathing that Shane can finally pull his head above water. “Good,” he hears her say, shifting his hand from her chest to his own. “Keep doing that. You’re doing good. Feel your heart beat. Slow it down. In and out, Shane. Okay.” She keeps talking him through it, and then offers another sip of the water.

“You are okay, here, okay? Nothing can get in.”

He’s not sure he believes that; he doesn’t even know where he is, but he nods to appease her. Remembering their conversation before the interruption, Shane’s brow furrows; he’d misheard her, right? He’s not lucid, probably–

“Shane, did you hear me before? Ilya is here, he brought you here.”

Shane curls onto his side, burying his face in his hands. He needs to rest. Not sleep, god no more of that, but rest. He cannot deal with this emotional torment, overreacting to doors slamming, hearing false, made-up things from this woman that she’s definitely not saying. He needs this haze to pass, he can’t let himself fall into, believe these fantasies are reality. Then he might actually lose his mind. Like Frankie lost hers.

“Shane,” Simone says softly, close to his head. “Do you know–”

“Stop,” Shane snaps, tears pooling in his eyes. “Stop, stop, I can’t,” he blubbers, more desperate. Ilya is gone. Shane had grieved Ilya Rozanov, suffered through months of torture knowing that Ilya had experienced the same agonizing pain Shane had. That like Shane, he had withstood things that no one should ever have to go through, just up until the very end. That unlike Shane, who had been cursed to survive, Ilya had died there, lost his life in agony and despair, just like Shane’s dad.

He knows Ilya is dead, that Shane was too late to do anything about it. He cannot allow reality to bleed into insanity like this.

“Okay, okay, deep breaths, it’s okay,” Simone says. “I can get your things brought over, okay? Would that help?” Shane manages to nod.

“Okay,” she says. Shane keeps his eyes shut tightly, but he can hear Simone speak, not directed at him. “Abdul, you need to bring Shane’s things. They should still be at the back gate, I think Harry brought them in. He needs them. Do that first. Over.”

There’s a long pause, and then a voice crackles through what must be a radio, “Simone, I will get his things on my way. Over.” Whoever is speaking is not a native English speaker, their voice accented… Slavic, maybe, like– no. Shane’s mind is playing fucking tricks on him. It’s not Rozanov. He knows Rozanov is dead. He knows it.

“Do NOT run. I will kill you myself if you fuck up your leg any more,” Simone replies, her voice gets more distant at the end, and Shane registers the familiar snap of the screen door closing, much softer this time, as Simone steps outside. She’s saying something else, but he can’t quite catch the words anymore. That’s okay, Shane’s out of his mind anyway. It’s better if he’s alone here, no agonizing auditory hallucinations to mess with him.

 

---

 

Ilya’s leg was totally fucked; they’d wrapped it with old t-shirts to stop the bleeding, and at least the bone wasn’t sticking out, but it was very obviously broken. He couldn’t put any weight on it, and it throbbed with intense pain when he didn’t move it. But Svetlana was worse.

They’d dragged her out last night, and Ilya was helpless to stop them, though he tried. They had been gone all night. All night, in the darkness, Ilya could hear her screams from above. He shouted himself hoarse, hoping that the dark-haired woman in charge might get annoyed enough that she would turn her attention to Ilya instead. Or maybe Svetlana would hear Ilya, find peace in his voice.

At some point in the night, the sounds stopped completely, and that’s when Ilya got really fucking scared.

Logically, he knew they were both going to die. There was no escape, there hadn’t been before, and there definitely wasn’t now that Ilya’s leg was broken. His only hope was that Svetlana could get out – though he doubted she would ever leave him. And now…he’s not sure there is anything left to hope for, except a little more time with each other before the end. Dying doesn’t seem so bad, really, if they can do it together; the pain and suffering softening to a close. Ilya wasn’t exactly religious, but he held onto the notion that after this life, he would have the chance to see his mother again. That would be nice.

In the morning, two of their captors dumped Sveta back into the pit. She was bloodied and worn, but still alive.

“Света.” With great effort, Ilya dragged himself across the concrete ground, ignoring the shooting pain in his leg.

“Илюша,” she hummed his name, her voice thick and unnatural, gritted with pain. “Tell me a story.”

“What?” Ilya frantically examined her injuries – broken ribs, bruises all over, several of her fingernails were peeled off, the tender skin beneath exposed. And she was holding her stomach – a rag against it, already soaked with blood. “Oh, no, no, no, Sveta, no,” Ilya murmured in Russian. He realized with horror that there’s no way – she was going to bleed to death.

“Story,” Sveta insisted again, coughing and frowning deeply at the pain that comes when her body struggles to cough.

“Yes, okay, a story,” Ilya shifted to face her, close enough to touch her cheek, hold her hand. She would not be alone.

“Have I told you about Shane Hollander?”

Svetlana smiled weakly. “Pretty.”

“Yes, it’s true, he is very pretty. I thought so too.”

“Hm?” Svetlana hummed in question, her eyes fluttering shut.

“Yes, very polite too. Introduced himself to me.”

“You liked that,” Sveta croaked. Ilya laughed desperately, no humor in it, just borderline madness.

“Yes, I did. At the draft, I went looking for him at the hotel gym.”

“You found him?”

“Yes, I did. Am I telling this story or are you?” Ilya, crazed, grinned, and Sveta managed to smile weakly again.

“Keep going,” she said. Ilya caressed a thumb over her cheek; Sveta kept her eyes shut.

“He kept looking at me. Obvious, but like he thought I didn’t notice. Was very cute. And I could not stop thinking about him after that. So I set up that photoshoot in Toronto.”

“Oh yeah?” Sveta tried to smirk him. “Yeah,” Ilya laughed again, almost hysterical. “Yeah, that is when we took all those rival photos. You remember those?”

“Mm, yes,” Sveta said. “Very tough.”

“Yes, we looked very mean. But actually, we were laughing too much. Director got mad, I think. We just kept giggling.”

“Cute,” Sveta murmured.

“Yes, that was cute,” Ilya said, a devilish grin spreading across his face. “Afterwards though, Hollander got hard in the showers.”

Sveta let out a small gasp. “Shane Hollander! Ilyusha, are you serious?”

Ilya couldn’t help laughing, he just couldn’t find another way to cope. “Yes, yes, I am irresistible, I tell you this all th time.”

Sveta smiled, and then groaned, leaned over, and spat up blood. “Oh, no, Sveta, please–” Sveta just wove her hand, as if to say, keep telling the story.

“Ah, okay,” Ilya stuttered, wiping blood from the corner of Sveta’s mouth. “So, ah, then we hooked up. At the hotel. Was good, was…ah, different. He was…very intriguing. I– yes. So then we see each other during the season, played against each other. At All-Stars, months later, we hooked up again. I– Sveta, listen, listen, there’s more to the story, yes? You have to stay awake. You want juicy details, yes?”

She hummed, eyes closed.

“Listen, yes? We hooked up again. I wanted to fuck him, but he was scared, because other players were staying in rooms nearby. So we make a plan for two weeks later, when Raiders are in Montreal. I give him my phone number, I am in Lily in his phone, he is Jane in mine. Hear that, Sveta? How stupid is that, yes?”

Sveta hummed in response, not able to muster a further reaction. Ilya pet her hair, trying to soothe her.

“Ah, well, rest of story is not so good. It was game day when the zombies started. I texted him, he texted me. But was nothing. We were nothing. I thought… I tried to text him, once I was with you, to make sure he was safe, but was too late. Text did not– Sveta, open your eyes, please, Sveta don’t–”

Sveta’s eyes opened. “Ilyusha,” she croaked, a faint smile on her lips. “I will go be with your mama, yes? It’s okay.”

“No.” Tears streamed down Ilya’s face. “No, Sveta. Do not go.”

“Ilyusha,” she lifted her arm, reached out for his face. Ilya grabbed her hand, held it to his cheek like she intended. “It’s not up to me. Tell me another story. A happier one.”

“A happier story?” Ilya didn’t have any.

“Tell me about an imaginary life,” Sveta struggled to say. “With your Shane.”

“Sveta–”

“Imaginary,” Sveta insisted. “No bad stuff. Happy.”

Ilya sucked air into his lungs through his nose, thinking intently. “Okay,” he said. “Okay, in my story, Shane, and you, and me, we all live on a tropical island. We drink margaritas all day and we have a cute dog, and we swim in the ocean, and we fuck all the time.”

“Mm, you and Shane fuck, not me. I do not think he would like to share,” Sveta interjected with a frown. Ilya barked out a laugh.

“Yes, probably. Okay, so there is also a very hot man – besides me, of course – there on our island, and he is madly in love with you, and you can fuck him. He is very good in bed – again, not as good as me, but I am a taken man.”

“Can I have a hot woman, too?” Sveta asked, her voice slowing from the blood loss. “Like Rose Landry, she’s gorgeous.”

Ilya smiled fondly. “Yes, of course, Rose Landry can live on our island.”

“What about friends? Sasha?”

“Fuck no, Sasha is not allowed.”

Sveta giggled, like she already expected this answer and just wanted to hear Ilya say it. “What will you name the dog?”

“Anya,” Ilya came up with it on the spot, the name popping to mind and feeling just right. “She is a very good dog, and just like her papa, she loves the beach.”

“Can we have a wedding?” Sveta mumbled, eyes shut.

“For who? You and Rose?”

“No,” she said. “Me and Rose are not exclusive. You and your Shane. Can I give you away?”

Fuck. Ilya felt tears bubble up in his eyes, and soon as he spoke, they rolled over onto his cheeks. “Yes, Sveta, you can walk me down the aisle and everything.”

Sveta smiled sleepily. “Ilyusha, take my ring,” she fumbled for it, Ilya grabbed her hand so she would not have to complete the action herself. “Take it,” she said, her breathing growing labored. “For your wedding.”

The wedding was not real, obviously, just a figment of his and Sveta’s mutual imagination, the blabberings of a man trying to give his best friend peace and solace in her final moments. But Ilya slipped the ring off Sveta’s finger anyway – a gold band, a small round opal stone set in the middle. It was tiny, much too small for Ilya’s fingers, so he takes off his mother’s crucifix, and slips it on the gold chain. For safekeeping.

“Will you promise me,” Sveta choked out, struggling for each breath now.

“Yes, anything,” Ilya held onto every word.

“Do not give up on living just because I am gone.”

“I would not–”

“Yes, you would. I know you. So you must promise me. Now. I am dying, Ilyusha, promise me.”

Ilya swallowed hard, holding back the wretched sob which threatens to escape his throat. “Okay, Sveta. I promise. I will not give up on living.”

“Good,” Sveta smiled. “Thank you. Now tell me more about the island, Ilyusha. Can we have a Michelin Star chef?”

 

---

 

Shane keeps his eyes tightly shut, even when he hears the doctor come back into the cabin. It’s better if he doesn’t interact with anyone right now. But the woman, Simone, seems to have other ideas.

“Shane,” she says, coaxing his eyes open by saying his name. She’s pulled her chair closer to the bed so she can sit right beside him. Her hands grip her knees, like she has something to say, but she’s not sure quite how to say it. “Can I tell you a story? About where we are, and someone who lives here?”

Shane doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t close his eyes. She wants to tell him a story? He’s not really sure what she’s talking about, and he does not have any energy to argue.

“Okay,” she says, smiling at him kindly. “We are in east Tennessee, in what used to be a state park, at a community established about a year after the world fell apart. I have been here since then. We built a wall, all the way around. There are about fifty or so people living here. We grow our some of own food, have some animals – chickens, a cow – and a whole community with designated jobs, rules, systems in place. Some people go on supply runs for the things we can’t make ourselves.

“Our community, we sometimes accept new residents. Especially in the beginning, but the past couple of years we don’t get too many travelers. My story is about one of those travelers. About eighteen months ago, one of our supply expedition crews came across a group of travelers who were headed south, headed down to the Gulf. It was a larger group, mostly strong, healthy adults, and a couple of children.

“There was one man who was pretty badly injured – a leg that had never healed properly. He was straggling, and he was in pain from constantly traveling, never resting enough for his leg to recover. And he had no one – no friends or family with him. He was a loner, someone who had stumbled into this group of travelers, and they had kept him. Because despite his pain, and his lack of connection the other travelers, he always protected them. He was– is a good person. And an incredible shot, too. So our group deliberated, and decided to invite him to join our community here, where he could rest his leg, and start anew.

“The man was cautious. He didn’t trust easily. But when our supply expedition and the travelers were attacked by a horde of undead, and the man found himself pinned down and trapped – he thought he was done for. One of our community members, Harry, saved the man.

“After that, the man decided to trust the community, to stop traveling. So he came to live here. And he has been here since then. He’s still a bit distant. He doesn’t talk about his life before, or much of anything. But he’s one of us. And yesterday, he was on guard duty, and he found you out in the woods.”

“Okay,” Shane says. He doesn’t know why she felt the need to tell him all of that. It only makes him sad, to know someone else’s story, that they are all alone, just like him. Even when they’ve found a safe place to rest for the time being. It doesn’t comfort him in the way this woman seems to think it will.

Simone smiles sympathetically. “I’m telling you because you know him. He knows you. That’s why he brought you in here.”

Shane frowns, suddenly feeling like he’s been tricked. And if that’s the case, if she’s trying to manipulate him, then it means he can’t trust this woman. It must mean she’s out to get him, and he’s just here, letting her stick a needle in his arm and–

“Hey, whoa, it’s okay,” Simone says, eyes wide. Shane finds himself breathing heavily, pulling away from her sharply.

“Stay away from me!” he cries, fear coursing through his veins now. The memory of terror coming back to him easily, like it never left. It always returns.

“Shane–” Simone starts to say, and Shane hears Frankie’s voice, her sharp, twisted cadence, he sees the curl of Frankie’s lips as she reminds Shane, You’re mine. You’ll always be mine.

“Get away!” Shane, in his abject horror, shifts across the bed to put space between himself and the woman, but he runs out of surface – falling onto the ground, landing hard on his tailbone. He yelps in pain, his vision whites out for a brief, electric moment, and then he feels hands on him, reaching for him.

“No, no, no,” he pushes, hard, as hard as he can, which apparently isn’t all that strong, but the hands hesitate anyway. “Please, no,” he sobs, his chest heaving. He shifts his body backwards until he finds the wall, folds into himself there.

“Hollander.”

And fuck, the hallucinations are back. The voice, it sounds exactly like his, but Shane knows he’s gone. “Stop, stop, stop,” he buries his head into his knees, banging his hand against his head to shake the madness loose. Harder, and harder, he hits.

“Hollander, stop!” Hands grab his hands, preventing him from continuing. “Shane, please. Look at me. It’s me.”

Shane does look, he can’t help it, he can’t stave off the insanity. Ilya Rozanov stares back at him. He looks more rugged and beaten down than Shane remembers. But again, it’s just a figment of his imagination. Ilya Rozanov is dead.

“I’m right here,” Ilya Rozanov’s ghost says, and for a ghost, his eyes are so sad. Shane shakes his head, trying to will the ghost away. He’s never lost it like this before.

“No,” Shane tells the ghost. “You are not here. You are dead. Please, leave me alone.”

Ilya Rozanov’s ghost looks so heartbroken that Shane immediately regrets it. “I’m sorry,” Shane blubbers. “It’s not your fault. I just – I can’t go crazy. I can’t. I can’t see ghosts. You have to leave me alone, please. I can’t– I can’t–”

The ghost’s eyebrows knit together, its mouth grows tight. Then, the ghost speaks, “You are not crazy,” Ilya Rozanov’s ghost says. “I am not a ghost. Ghosts cannot touch people. I show you?”

Shane tries to recoil, but his back is against the wall, there’s no where to go. But the ghost stops short, it doesn’t broach Shane’s space. “Please, let me show you? I will not hurt you. Even if I am a ghost, you think ghost of Ilya Rozanov would hurt you? No. I would not leave you like this.”

The line, it unlocks a memory. A lifetime ago, Shane on a hotel bed, nervous as fuck, turned on as fuck. Ilya Rozanov is there too.

“Okay,” Shane says, swallows a bit of his fear, lets it evolve into bravery.

The ghost reaches out, slowly, watching him to see if he pulls away. Right before the ghost’s fingers reach his cheek, Shane flinches. He can’t help it.

Ilya Rozanov’s ghost retreats instantly, expression forlorn. “Sorry,” Shane says, gulping for air. His throat is so dry. “I think you should go. I– I’m sorry. I just can’t talk to ghosts.”

Ilya Rozanov’s ghost frowns, staring at Shane like it’s thinking.

“What if I am a ghost? You would not want to comfort me?”

“Oh, I–” Shane hadn’t thought of that. “But you’re– you’re not a real ghost. I’m just…losing my mind.”

The ghost almost smiles. “Okay. That’s fine. But let’s just say, if I was a real ghost, what would you say to me?”

“Um,” Shane’s dizzy, a little lightheaded from all the commotion. His tailbone aches, his arm is sore – he looks down to realize he’s ripped his IV out, there’s a prick of blood on his forearm. What the hell is even going on?

But if he did see Ilya Rozanov, in the next life, he knows exactly what he would do.

“I would show you–” Shane starts, and then in a panic, he realizes he does not have it. He doesn’t have his most treasured possessions. “Where’s my stuff? Where–”

“Here, it’s here,” the ghost scrambles around, grabbing something, and presents Shane’s old clothes to him, like the clothes are what’s important. Shane snatches them, digs his hand into the pockets. First, he pulls out the watch.

“This is what you want to show me?” The ghost says. The way its voice tilts, it's just like how Rozanov’s used to be, teasing, mildly amused.

“No, not this,” Shane says, a little bitchily because fucking duh. Softer, he adds, “That’s my dad’s.” The ghost’s expression falls, unbelievably sad again. “Your dad…”

Shane frowns, and focuses on checking the other pocket. There. There it is. He pulls it out, holds it out on his open palm for the ghost to see.

“This is what I would show you, if you were real.”

The ghost’s expression goes totally blank for a moment. Then, a sharp, strangled noise escapes it, like an animal being kicked. Shocked, Shane almost yanks his open hand away, but then the ghost ever so gently cradles Shane’s hand, tracing its finger over the gold necklace, the opal ring.

Eyes glassy and wide, the ghost looks up at Shane with so much emotion that Shane starts to second guess himself. Maybe this isn’t a ghost after all. But it has to be… doesn’t it?

“Where did you– where did you–” Ilya Rozanov’s ghost gasps for air, something settling over him. Shane studies the face: the moles, the limp curls on his forehead, the glimmer in his eye, the shiny sweat in his skin. It can’t be…

“No, Shane, no. You were– not there. Please tell me they didn’t trap you there.”

“I can’t tell you that. That would be a lie,” Shane says matter-of-factly.

“You found– you found this–” The ghost that might not be a ghost can’t seem to catch its breath.

“On the ground. With your fucking bloody Raiders shirt. At the bottom of–”

“Niet,” Ilya Rozanov’s ghost interrupts with a whine, agony wrought in his eyes. “No, Shane, I didn’t die there. I didn’t.”

He didn’t...

“You didn’t?” Shane watches the man that looks like Ilya Rozanov closely. “You didn’t,” he whispers to himself, uttering the words in disbelief, in desire.

“You aren’t crazy, Shane,” the man says. “Just dehydrated and hungry, and maybe traumatized, I think. But not crazy, okay? Not crazy.”

“Not crazy,” Shane repeats. Time seems to slow down, his mind grinding to a halt. “Okay,” Shane processes, blinks at the ground, tries to reconcile all the details laid out before him.

When Shane brain starts to compute it, things clicking into place, he wildly whips his head to look to the not-ghost of Ilya Rozanov, a man whose bottom lip is trembling, his hand still cradling Shane’s open palm.

“Rozanov,” Shane states.

“Hollander,” Ilya says, voice shaking. Shane reaches out slowly, lets his fingers brush over the not-ghost’s moles, twists them into the not-ghost’s golden curls. It’s all real. Real, real, real.

It hits him all at once.

“Ilya,” Shane cries, his voice breaking, and as soon as he says the name, tears stream down Ilya’s face. There’s too much distance between them, Shane realizes, and he immediately needs to fix that, launching himself forward, wrapping his arms around Ilya’s neck.

Ilya seeps into the touch, his arms finding their way around Shane’s torso, holding tightly, desperately, like Shane might slip away at any moment. He won’t, Shane will make sure of it. Shane might never let go, now that Ilya’s in his grasp. If it was up to him, they would stay here in this moment forever.

Not a dream, not a ghost, just Ilya fucking Rozanov himself.

Chapter 4

The last thing Shane remembers before drifting off is being held, wrapped up in Ilya Rozanov. And the first thing he realizes when he wakes up is that he’s still tangled up with Ilya; his head resting against Ilya’s chest just right so he can hear the low, steady drum of his heart beating. Alive.

Shane curls his fingers tighter into Ilya’s shirt, clutching, listening, steadying himself. Alive.

The fucking screen door snaps, sending a sharp jolt through both his and Ilya’s bodies; they recoil as one. Instinctively, Ilya puts a hand on Shane’s head, keeping him pressed to Ilya’s heartbeat. The slow, sleepy drum of his heart is all sped up now, in reaction to the snap of the door. But at the sight of whoever is at the door, his heart slows; not as relaxed as while he slept, but not stressed.

“Harry,” Ilya says, and relaxes the hand pressing Shane into his chest. Shane picks up his chin now, eyes raking over the new person standing at the foot of the bed. The man who apparently one time saved Ilya’s life.

Harry is a tall, muscular Black man; he wears thick-framed glasses and a clinically neutral expression. “Ilya,” he says, eyes wandering over the pair of them curled up together in the bed, limbs tangled. Shane almost feels embarrassed, almost panicked in his realization that this stranger might think he and Ilya are together, like that.

It’s a fear Shane hasn’t had to face in a long time, not in years, not since before everything fell apart. And in this moment, with Ilya Rozanov’s skin touching his, his hand still lightly on Shane’s head – Shane realizes he is far from afraid. There are much more life-or-death things to occupy his terror than whether this man thinks Shane is gay.

“I need to ask questions. Simone said maybe now might be–”

Ilya turns to Shane, their faces are maybe an inch apart. “Easy questions, yes? Just to know what you remember. Will be quick, then you sleep again. We can stop at any time. Is up to you,” Ilya’s voice is smooth and soft, and his lips are so close… Shane swallows, ducks his head in hopes that it might hide the blush on his cheeks.

“Okay.”

“Okay,” Ilya smiles, looking back to Harry. “You can ask.”

Harry scoffs lightly, but he’s smiling. “Sure, Ilya. Okay. Shane, do you remember how you ended up in the woods?”

Shane chews his lip, nods. Ilya’s hand absentmindedly pets his head, soothing him.

“I was traveling south, by myself. And I got attacked by undead, had to leave my gear, ran out of ammo. Got lost in the forest, I think.”

“How long were you out there?” Harry asks.

“Er,” Shane hesitates. Ilya’s other hand twists itself into Shane’s fingers. “I’m not totally sure… it felt like a really long time, but it could have just been days, a week. I don’t know.”

“Were you being followed?”

“I– my memory is fuzzy. I couldn’t find water–”

“Okay,” Harry cuts him off before he can ramble. “What about before you got lost? Were there any people searching for you?”

Shane doesn’t know what to say, exactly. He doesn’t understand why this man is asking him that. His confusion must be evident, because Ilya clarifies, “He is asking if anyone might track you to our camp. Is security risk.”

“Oh,” Shane says, blinking. “I– no, I don’t think anyone was following me.”

The omitted details make Shane queasy, a little lightheaded. Because as far he remembers, no one was on his tail. But there was a lot of time accounted for in his memory.

“I think that’s enough questions,” Ilya states, his hand protectively pressing Shane back into his chest. There – there’s Ilya’s heartbeat again. Steady, real. Alive.

“That was the most important, anyway,” Harry says, but Shane isn’t looking at him now. He’s closed his eyes. God, he’s so relaxed. He didn’t know it was possible anymore, to feel so safe.

Harry is saying something else to Ilya, something about his leg, a shift, a meeting, Simone. Whatever. It doesn’t matter. Shane drifts off, unbelievably warm.

 

---

 

He’s at the cottage, his parents’ place that grew up spending summers at. The place he came to when the world fell apart, the place where he and his parents survived for nearly a year and a half before Shane had to learn exactly what he was capable of as a person.

It always starts like this. This fucking dream. He’s in the living room, alone. It’s dark – they’d boarded up the windows to keep the warmth in during that first winter. It didn’t work very well. Someone’s banging on the door. He already knows it’s his dad.

Shane’s body moves across the room without his effort, he opens the door: Dad, bloodied and hysterical, dragging Mom’s limp body behind him. Her body twitches, the virus already spreading rapidly through her veins. Shane cries. It hurts every time.

His dad shouts, sure that they can save her, demanding Shane do something, do something. Do what?

In the dream, it’s always faster, how fast she turns. In real life, it was minutes. Here, it is seconds. Shocked, he and Dad stumble back, no plan.

This time, the dream morphs. Frankie is back, waltzing in through the open front door.

“Gonna kill her like you killed me?”

“That was different,” Shane wants to say, but it’s not that kind of dream, he can't get the words out of his throat. Frankie grins, her lips coiled up her cheeks too far, unhuman.

Shane, frozen now (stupid fucking nightmare), watches helplessly as the zombie that used to be his mom pushes itself onto its feet.

“You better run,” Frankie taunts, her voice ringing in his mind. “But I know you won’t. You’ll just murder your own mother, huh?”

“She’s already dead,” Shane defends, but it still fucking hurts, no matter how much he tells himself it wasn’t her.

“I wasn’t,” Frankie spits, actually spits, saliva at Shane’s feet. “I killed him, you know. I killed Ilya Rozanov.”

No. No. No. “No you didn’t,” Shane feels himself grow taller, bigger, taking on the form of his former pro hockey self: strong, a force.

“Is that so?” And because this is a nightmare and Shane can’t seem to beat his fucking demons, he blinks, and they’re in the bottom of the pit. Him and Ilya. Frankie looks down at them from above, her voice echoing, “Already dead.”

Beside him, Ilya falls, like he's been shot down. Shane reaches for him, but he’s gone, vanished, all that’s left is the fucking blood stained Raiders shirt, the clink of the gold necklace as it hits the ground.

“You’re mine,” Frankie’s voice echoes.

“No, I’m fucking not,” Shane tries to yell, but his mouth won’t open.

 

---

 

Ilya’s gone. It’s the first thing be notices, maybe even before he fully realizes he’s awake.

“Hey, hey,” Simone comes into his field of vision, holding out the water bottle.

“Where’s–”

“Ilya had a shift. He’ll be back later. Drink.”

“No, I–”

“Drink, and we’ll call him on the walkie-talkie. Drink first.”

Shane obeys, mostly because he’s actually fucking thirsty as fuck, tilting his head back as Simone brings the water bottle to his lips. God, it tastes so good. Awakened, Shane’s stomach grumbles loudly. Simone’s eyebrows spring upwards. “Do you think you could eat?”

“You said we could call Ilya,” Shane can’t help the whine in his voice; after that fucking dream he needs proof of life, actually physically seeing Ilya would be best, but he’ll settle for just his fucking voice if he must.

“Okay, okay,” Simone huffs. She snags the walkie from the worktable, fiddles with it for a second and passes it to Shane. “It’s on his channel. Just click that side button and speak into it.”

“I know how a radio works,” Shane snaps. Simone puts up her hands in feigned innocence. Shane feels a little bad for letting the irritability seep in. Eating something probably is a good idea.

He clicks the button and speaks out into the void, hoping wildly that Ilya Rozanov will respond. “Ilya? Are you there?” His voice is timid and afraid. He clutches the radio with both hands, desperate for the crackle of sound.

It's only two seconds of waiting. “Shane,” Ilya’s voice radiates from the speaker; Shane lets out a sharp sigh in relief. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay,” Shane laughs, a little hysterical. “Just a dream. And I– I just had to check.”

“A dream,” Ilya says flatly. Shane imagines he’s frowning, mad at Shane’s dream on Shane’s behalf. “Is okay, I am okay,” Ilya affirms, his voice soft. God, just the sound of his voice…

“Your leg?” Shane asks, remembering the injury, unhappy Ilya is supposedly working if he’s in pain.

“It’s okay,” Ilya’s voice crackles through the speaker. “I am in sniper’s nest, is only accessible from inside the wall. Is no problem for my leg, totally safe. So you do not worry, yes, Shane?”

“Yeah,” Shane swallows the lump in his throat.

“I have to keep my channel open for security communication, but is okay for check-ins like this, yes? You get scared again, you call me, yes? And when I am done with my shift, I will come to see you.”

“Yeah,” Shane says, breathy and excited.

“Okay,” Ilya responds, sounding relieved. Ilya pauses, like he’s not ready to let Shane go, but he must. “I will see you soon, Shanya.” The nickname sends a shiver of joy down Shane’s spine. And, maybe, his dick twitches. That hasn’t happened in awhile.

“Bye Ilya,” Shane musters. He hates to say it. Embarrassingly forlorn, he can’t look at Simone as he drops the walkie-talkie into his lap.

Simone claps her hands together. “I made some juk I can heat up for you.”

“Juk?”

“Oh, I guess you’re not Korean then,” Simone laughs lightly, a genuine smile spread across her face. “It’s rice porridge, basically. Easy on the stomach.”

“You’re Korean?” Shane asks, surprised, trying to study Simone’s features again. She looks white to him.

“A quarter. My grandmother,” Simone says, still smiling. “She was born in Mexico, her parents, my great-grandparents, were contract laborers. Once the work dried up, they moved to San Francisco for a few years, then came down to Mississippi because my great-granddaddy got a job. Stayed in the South her whole life. She never had the chance to visit Korea, actually.”

“Oh, wow,” Shane says, distantly imagining what a life that must have been. To be so far from home, to restart life in another country, only to shift to another. And to be Asian in the South – during segregation, too. He doesn’t know much American history, hadn’t even considered that there were Asian people living in the South back then. And to never visit the place you were supposed to “be from,” the place your parents were born… it’s different, obviously, but Shane thinks about Ilya, who will probably never see Russia again. Ilya, who had only been living in Boston for half a year before everything fell apart. They were just kids back then. Did Ilya even know anyone besides his teammates? Did he have anyone?

Shane wishes he could go back in time, to that night when everything fell apart, call Ilya and tell him to come to Canada, to the Hollander family cottage. But if Shane had done that, would he have been able to protect Ilya? Or would Ilya have died, just like Mom and Dad?

“Did you ever go? To Korea?” he asks, remembering how to be polite. It’s been awhile since that was an important skill.

“Yes,” Simone says, getting a distantly fond look on her face. “My mother took me and my brother, after my grandmother passed. It was really lovely. I try to go back every couple of years now. Or–” Simone pauses, smiles sadly. “I used to.”

So many places they would never go again. Shane thinks about his own grandparents, who had moved back to Kobe when he was a teenager. They were probably dead now, but at least they were home.

Shane’s not sure where home is for him now. Up until yesterday, when he’d pieced together that Ilya Rozanov wasn’t an apparition, Shane hadn’t had much hope for life at all. It had been survival for so long. He had moved so often, so frequently. The last place he’d been for a long time was Frankie’s, and while it was better near the end, it was still not a place Shane would ever fucking consider home.

“What about you?” Simone says, watching him.

“What about me?” Shane asks, unsure of the question. Simone smiles again.

“I assume you’re Asian? What kind of Asian are you?”

“Oh,” Shane says, blinking. “Yeah. I am. My mom was Japanese. She moved to Ontario when she was seven. My dad’s from around there.”

“You’re Canadian,” Simone says with apparent surprise. Shane nods in affirmation. “I didn’t realize. How did you end up all the way down here?”

It is a fair question, but not one Shane wants to answer in great detail, if at all. “Uh,” he starts, trying to consolidate years of trauma and movement into something succinct, something graciously simple. “I guess I walked… not all at once, but over time. Never found somewhere to stay for long… and now I’m here.”

Simone’s eyes are pained, creased in thought. “I’m sorry, Shane, I shouldn’t have asked,” she says. “A lot of us here – we’re from the region. These mountains, the towns nearby, some from the cities, you know? We’ve been here a long time. We weren’t on the road, like you boys. And, don’t get me wrong, it’s not easy, we’ve all lost people we care about, had to do some tough things… but… we’ve been safe here for a long time now,” Simone says. She sighs, mouth tight.

“Listen, Ilya’s never been much of a talker. He hasn’t told anyone where he was before this, who he is – nothing. I thought he was just like that. Slavic, you know?

“Until you showed up. And now I realize… he was hiding himself from us. That whatever happened to him out there, it’s taken everything away from him.”

Simone’s eyes flick to Shane and she smiles warmly, touched by a spot of sunlight. “Well, not everything, apparently.”

Shane swallows, looking away because his eyes are embarrassingly glassy. He feels a little too exposed.

“Right,” Simone claps her hands together again. “I will get your juk from the mess hall. You stay put.”

 

---

 

“We have to leave,” Dad is saying, staring at him. Shane finds himself standing over the zombie that used to be his mom – he drops the bloodied baseball bat in his hands. It clatters to the ground loudly, the sound ringing in his ears. “We won’t survive the winter without Yuna,” Dad is saying. “We have to go south. We have to go south.”

“No,” Shane tries to argue. “No, this is our home. We can’t leave. We can’t go.” But no words come out, and Dad is determined, Dad is heartbroken. Dad cannot stand to look at Shane, even though Shane saved both of their lives with that baseball bat. It’s not fair. It fucking hurts.

Then, they are south, military vehicles descending upon them, catching them off-guard, completely in the open. “You ever think about enlisting?” the sergeant asks with a disgusting smirk. “Today’s your lucky day.”

“No,” Shane tries to say. “I don’t want to.” But just like real life, no one is listening. No one cares what he wants. Rough hands are grabbing him, tearing him away from Dad, buzzing his hair off, shoving fatigues onto him, and his dad is just distantly saying, “It’s okay, Shane, it’s okay, breathe.” As if that would fucking help. An assault rifle, shoved into his hands. Shane doesn’t want to be a killer, but everyone else seems to be fucking dying to see it, to see him lose himself at the end of the world.

“Soldier, this is good for you. This means you will survive,” the sergeant’s voice thunders in his mind, and Shane finds himself raining gunfire down on the undead.

As if he wants to survive.

He’s in the cafeteria, the one at the military base. “You want my ration?” The kid asks him with starstruck eyes. “No,” Shane says, because he’s not going to take this kid’s fucking food just because he knows hockey. Shane’s forgotten about hockey, and everyone else should too. There’s nothing good left in this world.

And then he’s sitting in front of Frankie, her hand planted firmly on his shoulder like he’s a fucking pet. He can’t see her, but he knows it’s her. “Mine,” she whispers into his ear.

He fucking hates this shit. Always the same. Same memories woven throughout his dreams, recycled, again and again. Trauma 1, trauma 2, trauma 3, rinse and repeat. Fucking kill him already.

But then, a twist. A change. He’s under a stream of water, white tile in front of him. He turns, and there’s Ilya Rozanov, completely naked, eyeing Shane’s dick, which apparently is growing harder by the second. “Not here,” he tells Rozanov, even though he doesn’t want him to stop, not at all.

Rozanov listens, giving his own dick a firm shake before turning away to finish washing himself.

“What is your room number?” Rozanov’s voice is thick and seductive, he stands over Shane in just in his towel. Fucking Christ.

“You died,” he reminds Rozanov. Rozanov just smirks, and fixes the loose fold of his towel.

“Well if I come to 1410 at… nine o’clock?”

“You didn’t die,” Shane corrects himself.

“I might knock,” Ilya says, and turns away, back to his locker at the other end of the room.

“You’re alive,” he says to Ilya’s back. “You’re alive.”

 

---

 

Working the sniper’s nest is boring. But since his leg pain is aggravated, Ilya can’t do much else. The only real use of his leg required is the climb up the ladder, but that isn’t even too bad. Plus, the sniper’s nest is set on the inside of the wall, only accessible from within the community. It overlooks the main drive into their camp, the road stretching far out in front before it disappears behind the bend. So even if there was a zombie lumbering around out there, Ilya wouldn’t have to run at all. Just aim and fire. Easy.

They could really use him on the farm, but apparently Simone and Harry had talked and decided it would be better just to keep Ilya in the nest where his leg could rest, and honestly, having Ilya there meant they could loosen security on this side of the wall, because Ilya’s marksmanship is just that sharp.

And he’s alone. So while he scans the road for any threats, Ilya can’t help that his mind wanders…

Subconsciously, Ilya reaches for the crucifix around his neck, his mother’s heirloom which had been lost to him, but now was found. And Sveta’s final parting gift, there beside it.

He hopes Shane is okay. He’d called on the walkie, maybe an hour ago, which had already let Ilya relax a little. He’d felt so fucking awful leaving Shane in the morning; Shane, who had somehow found his mother’s necklace and Svetlana’s ring, at the bottom of that fucking pit in West Virginia. Along with, what? His torn, bloodied Raiders shirt? Fuck, what a grisly nightmare. What an awful, horrible thing for Shane to have in his head, festering, while he was trapped down in that hellhole. How long was Shane down there? How… how did he get out?

Ilya’s own escape came from patience and luck: after Svetlana died, he waited, suffered, kept his head down, months he did this, while his leg slowly healed. When he realized he could walk without pain in every step, he pretended that wasn’t the case. When they pulled him up from the hole and put him to work doing whatever the fuck things, he limped more than he needed to, he winced more often, he acted like it was still very much holding him back – but not enough that he would lose his purpose to them, his slave labor. And then, one day, he saw his opportunity. They’d beat the shit out of him, taunting him, tearing his mother’s necklace off – ripping his shirt – all the remnants Shane had found. And then they’d dragged him up the ladder, continued their fun above ground. There were only two of them; two fucking slimy fucks who drunk out of their minds, tired of Ilya’s snide comments. But then they were too drunk, too forgetful, and they thought Ilya was down for the count, so they passed out. And Ilya got up, albeit a struggle, but he did it, Sveta’s promise pushing him upwards, forwards, and away.

And he was sure he’d be caught. But he wasn’t. No one came after him. So maybe the guys had tried to cover it up, told their boss that they accidentally went too far and killed him. And Ilya was free. Free, and long gone before he realized he’d lost his necklace and ring, somewhere on the floor of that pit.

And Shane? How did he get out?

Ilya’s thoughts are loud. When before, he’d done a fairly good job of silencing all the things he couldn’t bear to face, he has now completely lost control. He can’t stop thinking of everything… everything Shane. They had not even really gotten to speak yet. But Shane had melted into his arms, held him. Ilya hasn’t been held like that in a long time. Not since Svetlana died. Nearly two years ago. And it’s not like it’s some random person either – this actually is the living, breathing, smiling, Shane Hollander, who calls him Ilya.

What has Ilya ever done to deserve something so pure?

And then they’d slept, tangled up together. Shane, against Ilya’s body, the whole night. It was intoxicating, addictive.

But again – they have not actually talked about it. What does… what does Shane want?

Ilya’s struck with a new fear, that it might not be what Shane wants. That maybe Ilya wants too much, more than Shane is willing to give. They barely know each other after all (that doesn’t seem all that important to Ilya in how he feels about Shane, but then, maybe Ilya is just falling too hard too fast, maybe he had been already, all those years ago). Maybe, the final nail in Ilya’s coffin of an awful life full of suffering and loss and pain, will be heartbreak. Maybe it’s not luck, it’s nothing Ilya’s done right, it’s all that he’s done wrong, what he is being punished for. Heartbreak would be such the tragic end to Ilya’s life.

Or maybe, a voice pipes up in his head, something sounding like Svetlana Vetrova from beyond this life, maybe Shane does want.

He likes that thought. And how Shane looked at him, how he touched Ilya… could it be? Whatever happens, Shane cares about Ilya, that much is beyond obvious. So really… everything will be okay. Right?

He really wants to talk to Shane, see how he’s doing, if he’s more clear-headed.

Ilya’s radio crackles, his grip around it tightens. Shane? Is Shane okay?

“Ilya, head’s up, we got company,” Emmett’s voice comes through. The fuck? “Motion sensor picked up a big trigger. We think it could be cars. Headed our way. Over.”

“Cars? As in multiple? What the fuck do we do? Over.”

The walkie talkie remains silent. Ilya stares out at the road, and has a horrible, sinking feeling in his stomach that someone is coming to rip Shane away from him.

Chapter 5

Harry has always been the most practical man alive. His mom always said it, and he always believed it. It was maybe a crutch, at times, to avoid the more complicated, stickier things in life. For one, he avoided his attraction to people who were not women for years, through most of his adolescence. It wasn’t so hard, because he also liked women. But he had known, deep down, since high school, that he liked men just the same. Not just men, and not all men, obviously. People. Harry found himself drawn to all types of people, regardless of their sex.

After college, Harry went to Chicago for his master’s in engineering, and that’s where he met the Québécois boy of his dreams, the guy he literally could not stop thinking about from the first moment he sat down in the lecture hall. Louis.

Louis was very impractical and very sexy.

Louis came from a country with fairly affordable higher education, and yet, decided to go to both college and graduate school in the United States, where it was five times the cost. Louis bought movie tickets for midnight showings, knowing that he had an 8am lecture the next day. Louis bought coffee from the cafe where Harry worked, everyday, even though he didn’t even like coffee, just to get Harry’s attention. It was impractical, and it was intoxicating.

In their opposite natures, their starkly different outlooks on how to live life, Harry and Louis were helplessly drawn to each other. It was good for a long time, great even, and Harry felt a sense of love and security that outweighed the impeding dread of having to come out to his very Southern Baptist mama, of blowing up his whole life so he could be with Louis.

And then he had caught Louis cheating on him with some fucking random asshole, and it all came crashing down on top of him. The life he had envisioned for himself, one with Louis, where they move to New York or Montreal and do exciting things and maybe even adopt a dog or a kid, it was shattered. He left Chicago for home, and spent years listlessly pinging between bartending gigs in Nashville, out of touch with his practical side.

Then when the world devolved into madness, Harry found his old sense of practicality and rigidity was quite helpful. He made rules for himself, dictated how and when to move, where to search for food, who to talk to. That’s how he found Simone and her neighbors – he saw a light on in a house, and watched from afar to gauge the safety level. It seemed worth the risk. So he approached.

And from there, he quite reasonably suggested the group move somewhere more remote, maybe the state park twenty-two miles east. And then, when they found the camp, when they started to settle, he suggested the guard shifts, the shared work, the community rules, and importantly – the wall.

Life was really different. It was so far removed from silly Louis. And Harry realized lots of things were practical that people wouldn’t assume to be. Love, for example. It gives one a sense of safety, a purpose, warmth and comfort. It could be very unpractical as well, obviously, what with the risk of heartbreak (re: Louis), the time spent arguing over stupid shit just because you want to be heard. But Harry found that too, again, with Simone. Ten years his senior, widowed, and much smarter than him, Simone wasn’t a practical choice on paper – on Southern, traditional paper, that is. If Harry’s mama was alive, she’d probably disapprove of her, the older woman, and ask Harry why couldn’t he find a nice young black woman? But then again, his mama would probably disapprove of most anyone Harry chose. It didn’t matter. Because Harry loved Simone fiercely, more than anyone had ever loved anyone ever before. He loved her tenacity, and her empathy, her commitment to the community, her raw honesty, her sense of humor, her work ethic. He loved her when she pissed him off, and when she made him let his guard down. He loved her, and he really truly believed that if the zombie shit hadn’t happened, they would have found each other, somehow, someway. There was no world where he didn’t end up with Simone. It was practical yes, but also wildly impractical. Some things just weren’t meant to follow the rules.

And for all his rules, Harry also learned when it was best to break them. He’d done it before, in a split second. Like when he saved Ilya Rozanov’s life, back before Ilya had joined their camp, when he was just a traveler on the road, practically a stranger – Harry had put his own life on the line to save a man he believed to be a good person, because he saw the chance and took it.

And now, Ilya had surprised him – and Harry wasn’t one to be shocked easily. Ilya, the stoic, distant Russian, had never once mentioned that he was a professional hockey player – though Harry knew, because Louis had introduced him to the world of hockey years ago, and Harry kept a very distant, but curious eye on the new players. He had been drawn to the Hollander-Rozanov rivalry narrative immediately, despite his loose connection to the sport. It was so queer-coded, and yet so aggressively straight (weren’t all sports?) – it was quite fascinating, and also a little sad. And then Ilya had run to the community’s back gate with a devastatingly unwell Shane Hollander against his chest. Harry recognized something right away – the desperation. And then, Ilya just cracked open. Ilya, begging the whole mess hall to let Shane stay, divulging details about his life he had previously kept guarded. Ilya, tangled up on a twin sized bed with this new man – well, new to Harry, but definitely not new to Ilya. If all that wasn’t enough, it became abundantly clear when Harry stopped by to ask his questions: this wasn’t just a coworker, not even just a good friend. Shane Hollander was someone special to Ilya Rozanov, that much was pretty fucking obvious. Which made the whole hockey rivalry thing… less fascinating, and just downright depressing. It also made their reunion kind of poetic. Or tragic, depending on how things might turn out.

So now, as Harry meets these strangers in the road, a few miles down from camp in the community’s old pick-up truck (his backup hidden in the trees, watching quietly), he’s already distantly aware that they must be here for Shane, and he feels a fierce, protective desire to shield Ilya from a disastrous end, not when he finally has his person back in his life again.

Because there must be a correlation between the random man found in the woods two days ago and the pack of armed cars sitting just down the road.

“Hey,” one of the strangers gets out of his car, approaching Harry like they’re old friends. “We don’t mean you folks no harm, now, sorry if all the fan-fare's got you spooked. Just looking for someone is all.”

Harry’s face remains neutral. “Don’t worry, we’re not spooked.”

The stranger gives him a long, calculating look. He clears his throat, speaks again, “As I said, we’re lookin’ for a guy. Bad guy, you know the type nowadays? Killed our leader, in cold blood, I’ll add. He was one of us, then just fucking snapped. You get it, right? An eye for an eye and all that.”

Harry frowns. “What makes you think we know him? We don’t get a lot of travelers back here.”

The stranger grins, revealing a couple of missing teeth. “Got a little tracker on him, of course. Can’t let your pets wander too far from home.”

Well, okay then. Plan A, avoidance, was not going to be effective then.

“So we know you got him in there, or roughly ‘round these parts. Listen, like I said, we don’t mean y’all no harm. We just want the boy.”

Harry sighs. “Alright,” he says heavily. “Well, let me think of something to say, something reasonable–”

“Well, no need for that. We can just come right with you inside–”

Harry shakes his head. “That’ll just spook everyone. I’ll go get him, bring him out, easy, yeah?”

The stranger purses his lips. “Fine.”

It’s not fine, and Harry knows it. From the moment this man mentioned that they’d fucking tagged Shane, Harry knew what was up. It doesn’t matter if they hand Shane over or not, these strangers will ransack the whole camp, take everything they can, and probably kill everyone in the process. They’re cruel, that much is fucking obvious.

“Give me half an hour to get it sorted,” Harry says. To really sell it, he adds, “Glad you’ll be taking him off my hands. Don’t need another mouth to feed. Or another cripple.”

The stranger snorts in laughter, and Harry hasn’t been shot dead, so they must be in favor of the plan. It would be a lot easier for them if Harry returns with Shane, hand-delivered, and they can take him, and then stealthily invade the camp in a day or two when the community’s defenses aren’t on high alert. That’s not going to happen, none of that, but Harry’s glad the strangers seem to think it might still be a viable course of action. Because it means they won’t just outright kill him.

Harry gets back into the truck and turns it around, heading back to camp. When he can no longer see the strangers’ brigade in the rearview mirror, Harry grabs the walkie.

“Emmett, come in. Get everyone on channel one. Thirty seconds, spread the word.”

He counts in his head, waits for people to switch on. Then he clicks on the speaker again. “We got company, and they’ve got firepower. We’re implementing Operation Homefield Advantage.”

Harry takes a breath, letting everyone process that for a half-second.

“We’ve got a half an hour or less, if they’re paranoid, which they seem to be. Let’s move quickly. Everyone stay sharp, breathe, and remember your training. We can do this. Confirm message received. Over.”

In their assigned sequence, people check in. Harry checks off his mental list, no one missing. Time to get to fucking work, then.

 

---

 

“What the fuck is Operation Homefield Advantage?” Shane breathes, staring at Simone with wide eyes. He cannot mask the sheer terror that’s escalating inside him. Simone, her eyebrows knit together with concerned determination, opens her mouth to speak, but the walkie-talkie crackles again.

“Simone,” Harry’s voice comes through. “Switch to channel three, over.” Simone clicks the walkie, switching the channel, and raises it to speak.

“Harry? What’s going on? Over.”

“They put a tracker in Shane. I need you to get it out, and I need to know how many of them there are. Over.”

No. No, no. Fuck. Shane had led them here. Shane had doomed everyone in this camp. They would kill Ilya – they were going to murder Ilya, painfully, slowly, and it would be Shane’s fault. He should have known. He should have–

“Shane, take a deep breath, okay? I need you to tell me how many people they are,” Simone hovers inches from his face, both of her hands steady on his shoulder. Shane blinks, and clears his throat. Simone holds the talk button on the walkie and holds it out so he can speak into it.

“Twenty-three, um, I think, unless... something changed,” he says, holding eye contact with Simone in a way that keeps his mind focused. “Heavily armed, but not well-trained,” he adds.

Shane huffs to himself, breaks the eye contact for this next part. “The strongest thing about them was their leader. And… she’s gone now… I’m sorry, I didn’t know. I didn’t know about the tracker. I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.”

Simone puts one hand back on Shane’s shoulder, a comfort.

“Don’t be sorry,” Harry’s response comes through. “It’s not your fault. It’s theirs. And if what you say is true, they’re not prepared for the fight they’re about to walk into. Over.”

“I can help,” Shane insists. “I have to help. This is my fault. I have to–” Simone shakes her head at him. She’s released her finger from the talk button.

“You can help by finding that tracker and letting Simone get it out. Then you both go the mess hall and hide. Over.”

Something a little complicated hits Simone’s expression, and she holds the mic to her mouth, almost too close. “I love you,” she says to Harry, and Shane blinks back his shock. Though, should he really be surprised? It’s not like he knows these people. This isn’t his home. It can’t be, not after he’s led these monsters straight to them. And Ilya…

“I love you too, Simone. Over.”

Shane leans over the side of the bed and empties his stomach onto the floor.

 

---

 

Operation Homefield Advantage has never been used before, but Ilya remembers it well from when Harry explained it to him, because he always feared the day would come when they would need to defend themselves against hostiles of the non-zombie variation. The plan relies on traps outside the walls – some which are already prepped, and many which have to be be manually set, like the road spikes and the hidden motion-censored assault rounds. The fastest and closest community members would be doing that now, while everyone else retreats inside to take cover along the inside of the wall, ready to ambush the attackers if they broke down the gates, or climbed their way over (which were intended moreso to keep out zombies than people). The injured, elderly, and children, would all be scampering to the mess hall, which was the most centrally located building, furthest from the walls. That’s where Shane would be, if everything went accordingly. And Ilya, with his precision and poise, was meant to be right here, in the sniper’s nest. Ready to fire.

He has to actively suppress the urge to climb down from his perch and run to Simone’s cabin, or the mess hall, where ever Shane is in this moment, to be by his side. Fuck, because he could keep Shane safest from right here, right here. He’s not doing a very good job of convincing himself this is true.

“Expecting roughly twenty-three people, heavy firepower, but limited skills. Fractured leadership. Over,” Harry’s update crackles through Ilya’s walkie. He doesn’t dare change the channel and risk an update.

He is grateful for the daylight, and the scope attached to his rifle. Ilya scans the horizon, trying to breath, stay focused.

He sees the cars round the bend, five of them. Big, chunky cars – two pick-up trucks, two SUVs, and a Jeep, all with gun-wielding maniacs hanging out the sides. Ilya recognizes them immediately.The West Virginia gang.

Shane. They had followed Shane here. How? Why had they not struck when Shane was weak and alone in the woods, half-dead? And why hunt him down, follow him so far?

The truck in front hits the road spikes – fucking idiots didn’t even look. The second car – one of the SUVs, doesn’t stop in time, also hitting the spikes. The last three vehicles don’t make the same mistake. Ilya watches through the scope as they get out of their cars. They’re too far away for a good shot with this rifle, but with the scope Ilya can see them – recognize some of the fuckers. His blood begins to boil, thinking of Svetlana asking for a story, of Shane’s hysterical insistence that Ilya was a ghost.

He doesn’t see the leader – the dark-haired woman. Are there more of them, already hiding in the woods? Would they attack from behind?

The group in front fans out, spreading into the trees in both directions. Ilya dictates the update into his walkie. “Ilya reporting from the nest. We’ve got five cars, two now with popped tires. I count ten people, armed. Over.” He breathes, and watches, waiting for someone to step out into the open.

No one does, and he sees no movement along the side of the road. Where the fuck did they go? He knew they couldn’t be that smart, not without their leader.

Mike’s voice comes through the walkie. “Assault trap on the northeast side just went off. Too far away to confirm, but sounds like we got a few. Over.”

“Southwest side, inside the wall, we’ve got movement here. I think they’re trying to climb the wall. Over,” Macie reports, and Ilya’s heart freezes in his chest. If they got inside, they could get to Shane. If they got to Shane… they were here for Shane, weren’t they? They would be searching for him.

The road is still clear of people, the cars left abandoned in the center. Ilya sees no movement in the trees. Fuck, his chest is hollow, his fucking job is useless.

“Help!” His walkie snaps to life, Simone’s voice coming in too loud. “Cabin– we–there’s–.” Horrendously, the sound breaks up, muffled and incomplete. Nothing else comes through. Fuck this.

Ilya snaps off the unnecessary scope, which will only get in his way, swings the rifle onto his back, and descends the ladder. He carefully makes it to the ground, only to be met with the muzzle of a gun against the base of his neck.

“You again, huh?” a gruff voice says, amused. “Thought Sami and Kurt killed you. Musta been lyin’. Well, this is just too good. Two of our old boys here! The guys’ll never believe it.”

The aggressor grabs Ilya by the hair, someone else placing two hands on rifle on Ilya’s back, tearing it off. He recognizes the fuckers, both of them.

“Let’s take him back,” the second man says, holding Ilya’s rifle in his hands. “Think he’s earned something special.”

The man with the gruff voice nods and grins horribly. “Good thing we found you, huh?”

 

---

 

Simone finds the jagged incision scar on the back of Shane’s right shoulder, an inch wide. She says when she presses on the surface, she can see the little disc move.

It’s disgusting, and Shane feels so defiled, so violated, knowing that this little thing was inside him and he had no idea, that Frankie had tagged him, like a fucking animal. He gags again, only stomach acid coming up now. Simone rubs his back.

“I’m going to have to cut it out. Here,” she gives him a folded wash cloth. “Bite down on that.” She’s moving around the room quickly, gathering supplies and placing them on the bed, pulling on nylon gloves.

He can’t watch as she pours peroxide on his skin and her dagger, as she holds the blade under a lighter. “This isn’t ideal a sterile environment, so I can’t promise you won’t get an infection,” she warns, but Shane’s way past caring about that.

“Get it out,” he grits out, and stuffs the wash cloth in his mouth. It tastes stale and dry, and he almost throws up again, except then the blade pierces his skin.

It’s not that bad, all things considered. Shane has dealt with worse. Still, he’s glad for the wash cloth, especially when he feels Simone dig under under his skin, trying to grip the tracker, pull it out. That pain is much worse than the press of the knife. Shane feels dizzy from it, unsteady. Where’s Ilya? His mind supplies panic amidst the haze. Where the fuck is Ilya?

“Got it,” she says, and he feels her fingers pull away, the sound of metal hitting metal as she drops it into a tray on the work table. She presses a wad of gauze to the wound, and the pressure helps as the pain creeps in.

“Just going to give you some quick stitches.”

Shane forgot about that step. He tries to be patient as Simone disinfects the needle as best she can, but his heart is starting to beat too fast. He needs to find Ilya. He can’t lose Ilya. Not again.

Shane tries to stand, but the world tilts, dark spots across his field of vision. “Hey, whoa there, tiger,” Simone drops what she’s doing and grips his forearms with her own, managing to sit him back on the bed. “Okay, let’s take it easy, Shane. Here, have some water. You lost a lot of fluids just now.”

He’s grateful as she holds the familiar shape of the water bottle to his lips; Shane drinks, taking the bottle in his hands to chug it.

“Okay, I’m going to keep going now. Can you talk to me?”

“Yeah,” Shane croaks out. Simone nods and from behind him, he hears here shuffle around, finish preparing her supplies. She puts a steadying hand on his back, letting him know she’s about to thread his skin together.

“Okay, Shane, you’re doing great. Can you tell me… tell me about Ilya, yeah? How did you meet?”

The needle pricks into his skin. Shane’s brain feels so loose, so uncoordinated.

“Prospect Cup,” Shane’s tongue is so thick, he's not quite sure how he’s speaking. “Ilya was smoking…”

“Good, that’s good, you’re doing so well, almost there.” He winces from the pain, which still isn’t even that bad, nothing compared to the shit Frankie did, but his brain can’t seem to be reasonable.

“What team did you play for, in the pro league?” Simone asks.

“Montreal,” Shane hisses, trying to blink his vision into normalcy. He lifts his head to gaze out the window, hoping he can find something in the distance to focus on.

Sure enough, Something outside the window catches Shane’s attention, despite the numbness in his brain. A woman with a gun, her head shaved, a ratty jean jacket, and Shane knows her. One of Frankie’s.

“Simone!” he tries to warn her, and she seems to have already noticed, she’s grabbing the walkie, desperately yelling into it. It’s not enough, obviously. No one is close enough to help them.

Heavy boots thunder on the porch as the woman approaches, swings open the door, eyes narrowed on Shane. “You,” she snarls, face contorted viciously.

She takes a step forward and lifts her handgun, pointed at Shane. “Don’t worry,” the woman says. “I won’t kill you now. I promise you’ll be alive for much, much longer. Though you’ll probably wish you weren’t.”

“Okay,” Shane tries to keep his voice neutral, tries to move slowly as he shifts off the bed, onto his feet. Adrenaline coursing through his veins, the dizziness seems to dissipate. He takes a step, both forwards and sideways to partially block Simone from the gun. “It’s fine. I’ll go with you.”

“Of course you will,” the woman scoffs. “You thought you could get away, huh? After all that. Pathetic,” she spits. Shane steps a little more, all the way in front of Simone now. He moves forward, slow and steady.

“You have me now, so let’s go,” he says. The woman sneers, waving her gun-wielding hand slightly. “I’m in charge here.” Shane nods in agreement. “Clearly,” he says.

The woman frowns sharply, her lips twitching. “Smart mouth for someone who’s about to die.”

Shane swallows back the sassy retort: I thought you said I wouldn’t die for a long time? Instead, he takes another couple of slow steps forward, until the gun is hovering right in front of his face.

“I know what you’re doing,” the woman curls her lip is disgust. “Trying to protect your little friend over there, huh? Well tough luck.”

The woman shifts the gun to the left, right past Shane’s head, and Shane sees his opportunity. With both hands, he grabs for the gun, launching his body weight against the woman’s grip. Somewhere along the way, she pulls the trigger, and loses her hold on it. They’re both on the floor of the cabin now, Shane with the gun. He scrambles to face the woman, who is trying to pull a second firearm from her hip.

Shane aims and fires. He watches as the bullet buries itself in the woman’s skull, her eyes go blank, her body crumples to the ground. His mind is fuzzy and overwhelmed, and he gags, and only water and stomach bile come up. Did he really just do that? He’s never shot someone like that, aiming to kill. Has he ever even killed anyone? Not counting zombies, obviously. Does Frankie even really count? Fuck, the world is so bright.

“Shane,” Simone’s voice is shaky, reminding him immediately of the first shot. He whips his head find Simone standing above him, holding her ear.

“Did you–”

“Just grazed me. I’ll be fine,” she tells him, and Shane feels nauseous with short-lived relief.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Simone says. She grabs the tracker from the metal dish on table, throws it to the floor. “You do the honors.”

Shane smashes his foot on it, grinding and recoiling to stomp again, and again, until the little disc is a million pieces. He huffs, suddenly feeling totally pumped full of adrenaline, almost high on it.

“We have to get to the mess hall,” Simone says, grabbing her knife off the table. “There will be others there who can protect us.”

She brushes past Shane, steps over the dead body, and only then turns back to look at him, still frozen there in the center of the cabin. “No,” he says, fists balled at his side. “They’ll recognize Ilya. They’ll try to take him. And with his leg… I can’t– I can’t let that happen.”

“Recognize him…” Simone’s confusion is evident in her expression, and then she must put enough of the details together, because her face clears, and she nods. “Alright fine. But you don’t know your way around, so come with me now and I’ll point you towards the sniper’s nest, where he should be.”

“Yes, okay,” Shane agrees with a nod. He takes a step forward, retrieving the second, holstered gun from the dead woman’s hip, and hands it to Simone.

“Let’s go.”

 

---

 

It’s too quiet. There’s no one around, eery, like a ghost town, and the cicadas, whose song has been almost constant since Shane woke up here, are silent. He hadn’t even realized how accustomed he’d become to hearing their buzz until it was missing.

Simone’s medical cabin is just one of many, set half-way up a wide, hilly circle of decently spaced one-room cabins, trees and foliage spotted throughout.

“Stay low,” she whispers, even though that’s fucking obvious. They stick to the exterior wall of the cabin, both anxiously scanning the surrounding area for movement.

“There’s two more circles of cabins like this,” Simone explains, catching Shane’s curious eyes rake over his surroundings. “Ilya’s is through there,” Simone says, pointing back to the bottom of the hill where the gravel path linking the cabins disappears into the woods. “That way–” Simone points towards through the center of the circle, to the where the gravel road diagonal to their position breaks off and leads into the trees , “–is to the mess hall. Past the mess hall, down to the paved road to the right, you’ll find the wall and the sniper’s nest. Or you can go into the woods behind us, you’ll find the wall, and you can follow it around to the front.”

“Which…” Shane’s adrenaline is still pumping, but making a decision feels more clumsy. He train of thought is interrupted.

“Simone!” They both spin around to the sound of the voice; it’s a young, light-skinned Black man, looking relieved at the sight of them. He approaches from the woods, staying low and joining them at the back of the cabin. “You must be Shane,” the man says by way of introduction. And despite the circumstances, he grins. “I’m Mike. Might be one of Ilya’s only friends, not that he knows it. Nice to meet the guy who made that dude drop his cold-as-ice front.”

Rattled by having a piece of metal cut from his body and then subsequently killing a person (just the memory of it makes him want to hurl again), Shane has no idea how to be normal to this person. “Hi,” he manages to get out.

“There’s not as many as we thought,” Mike continues, breezing past Shane’s awkward introduction. “Like ten at the front, you probably heard, and then we had seven flank from the back. They must’ve looped around before they met Harry in the road.”

Simone’s waving her hand in a circle impatiently. “And?"

Mike shrugs. “Well, I don’t know. I think some are inside the walls now.”

“Yeah, no fucking shit, Shane just had to kill one of them,” Simone snaps, narrowing her eyes at Mike.

“Fuck, really?” Mike stares wide-eyed at Shane, like he’s wildly impressed. Shane swallows hard. Don’t throw up again, you can’t afford to lose anymore energy, he tells himself.

“Take Shane up front,” Simone orders Mike. “He needs to find Ilya.”

“Have you heard from him?” Shane asks, his voice shakier than he would like. Mike’s face falters, giving himself away. “You haven’t,” Shane reads between the lines, energy draining from his voice, despite the adrenaline still holding him upright.

“We’ll find him,” Mike puts a steadying hand on Shane’s arm, his voice just as affirming. “C’mon, I’ll lead the way.”

 

---

 

From his vantage point on the ground, Ilya can’t see which of the two guys is kicking him now, but it doesn’t seem to matter. He already tried defending himself, and it only resulted in three direct hits to the face, and then the terrifying cool metal the gun’s muzzle against his forehead. “Stay down, bitch!”

It was somehow scarier than he remembers it, to have so little control, to feel the barrel of death staring him down. Curling onto the ground and withstanding their hits is much less terrifying, much more predictable.

“Get up,” one of the West Virginia guys grabs him by his hair again, forcing him to his feet. “We’re taking you back with us, you piece of shit.”

They were still right at the foot of the sniper’s nest; these idiots seemed to have no sense of urgency in smuggling Ilya out of camp, only dead-set on beating him senseless. His whole body aches with impacts of their blows, but he doesn’t quite have the energy to take stoke of his injuries.

Surely, someone in the camp would come looking for Ilya? He hadn’t radioed in, which should be alarming to the others, but to be fair, there is a lot going on all of the community, what with them being attacked by ruthless, Shane-hunting thugs, so maybe no one would even have the time to notice that Ilya has stopped reporting in.

“Oh fuck,” the guy with the gruff voice says, enticing Ilya to twist his head slightly, trying to see whatever it is that’s caused this reaction.

And, oh fuck is right.

A shirtless, scrawny Shane Hollander stands, a few paces away, gun raised and trailed on the second guy. Shane has an intensity to him that’s shocking, given how nearly-dead he’s been since arriving here. But then his eyes flicker over to Ilya, and Ilya sees how clouded they are with anxiety, with fear, an edge of exhaustion. “Shane,” Ilya croaks, realizing it hurts to speak. They must have cracked a rib or two.

“Let him go,” Shane orders, voice commanding. Instead of doing that, the guy with the gruff voice raises his own gun and presses it to Ilya’s temple.

Fuck, not this again. Ilya closes his eyes. He can’t have Shane’s terror-filled eyes be the last thing he sees before the lights go out.

“Y’all know each other?” the gruff-voiced man snipes. “Thought we had y’all locked up at different times. Pretty crazy, huh?”

“Serendipitous,” the second man smirks. The gruff-voiced man frowns, looking frustrated. “Now what the hell are you saying? Making up fancy nonsense?” This fucking dumbass.

The second man scoffs, “It’s a real word, Jack, you’re just too dumb to know.”

“Don’t go fucking calling me dumb, you son of a bitch,” the gruff-voiced man, Jack, booms back at his comrade.

“Let him go!” Shane shouts, desperation seeping through. “It’s me you’re here for, right? So let him go.”

Ilya opens his eyes, looking at Shane in disbelief. “No, Hollander–”

“Well, shit,” the second man laughs. “Fucking theatrical, this is. Whadda ya think Jack? Take the Oriental and leave the commie?”

In a series of moves so fluid that no one seems to realize it’s happened, Mike materializes, as if from thin air, and presses his own gun to Jack’s head.

“Whoa! What the fuck, what the fuck!” Jack screams. “Easy!”

The second man spins, pointing his gun at Mike. “Dude, fucking put your gun down or he’s gonna blow my head off!” Jack sputters, voice panicked.

The second man looks offended. “You put your gun down, you fucking idiot! You’re the one with the hostage!”

“I am a hostage!” Jack argues.

“Okay, okay,” Shane says, a hand outstretched. “How about we all put our guns down and you let him go, yeah? Nice and steady.” Shane turns his gun to the side to show his finger is off the trigger as he slowly lowers it down to the ground. Jack only tightens his grip, the metal of barrel bumping Ilya’s skull in a terrifying way that makes him squeeze his eyes shut again.

“No, no, it’s okay, see, gun down? Mike, you too. No one needs to die.” Shane’s voice negotiates, but Ilya knows there's no point. Scared men with guns will fire them, it’s a fact of life. Ilya can only morbidly hope that Shane won’t be in the line of fire, that he can let Ilya go.

Ilya feels the cool metal of the gun leave his temple. He shudders out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding and opens his eyes. He’s still alive? He can barely make sense of what’s happening, how Shane has moved forward, only a few paces away now, his gun abandoned on the ground behind him. Somewhere behind him, Mike and the second man must have also set their guns down? The details are shaky at best, and not comforting.

“Ilya,” Shane says, reaching out a hand and waving Ilya towards him.

Jack pushes Ilya forward roughly, causing an unhappy grunt in reaction from Mike beside them. Ilya falls onto his hands and knees before scrambling up. Is he really letting Ilya go? It can’t be. Dragging his bad leg slightly behind him and holding his tender ribs, he limps towards Shane, expecting to be shot in the back at any moment. Shane still has his hand out, like he wants Ilya to take it, so when he’s close enough, he does just that. Shane uses the leverage to pull Ilya behind him, blocking him with his body. It’s fucking bullshit, but Ilya is too worn thin to argue or try to block Shane instead.

“Okay,” the second man frowns. “Great reunion. Now,” then dives to retrieve his gun, just steps away on the ground.

What happens next goes fast, like blur across Ilya’s vision.

 

---

 

When he sees Ilya there, battered and blue, vicious guns waving around his head, Shane’s brain rattles into hyper clarity, supplying him a lot of jumbled thoughts and emotions which result in one goal, one commitment: Rozanov is not dying, not today.

It feels a little more real when Ilya is behind him, alive and real and touching Shane’s skin lightly, his fingers coiled around Shane’s bicep, like it’s steadying him.

When the second man makes a move for his gun, many things happen at the same time. Mike, still right between the two aggressors, snags the dagger out of his belt loop and throws himself on top of the second man, one hand stabbing, the other trying to reach the gun before him. Jack, following his comrade’s plan of action, scrambles for his firearm in the dirt. Without a word, Shane pushes Ilya to down to the ground, charging forward. He reaches Jack just as his finger starts to close around the gun; Shane kicks it away and stomps on his fingers as hard as he fucking can. Jack screams at the of his lungs in agony.

There’s a shuffle of movement around Shane, Mike and the other man caught in a struggle, and then a shot rings out, unclear from where. Shane tries to look, distracted, to see what happened, if anyone was hit, but Jack, despite his crushed fingers, is reaching for his gun with his other hand, and Shane is noticing too late, only realizing as Jack’s hand wraps around the gun. Then a second shot pierces through the air.

For a moment, nothing happens. It’s one of those seconds where time seems to freeze, bend and wobble. The cicadas are silent for once, no background noise to break the scene.

 

---

 

After Ilya escaped from the pit, he spent a week directionless. Where the fuck was he supposed to go now? Away from West Virginia, obviously, but where? With who? He didn’t have anyone left. All he could do is ping from one relatively safe location to the next, licking his tender wounds and hoping he didn’t come across any aggressors (human or not) because he was definitely in no state to win a fight. He decided, loosely, to head south. He didn’t mind the winter, but it would be more difficult to survive if he had to worry about freezing to death. The problem was, Ilya didn’t really know anything about the American South. He’d only been to Florida, for the Raiders game against Tampa Bay, and it had been a mere forty-eight hours. In fact, Ilya realized, he didn’t really have a good sense of direction at all; Svetlana had mostly taken care of that before. But Sveta was gone now, and Ilya would have to fend for himself. He would have to figure it the fuck out.

After three days of listless travel, of never fully being able to fall asleep for fear of attack, of his stupid body aching with the reminder of his recent captivity, Ilya wandered into a gas station in search of a map, maybe even a compass.

The glass door was shattered, so he ducked under the push bar handle, stepping carefully onto the broken glass, which crunched under his feet. He hesitated, waiting to see if the small sounds rustle up anything sinister from within the building. Nothing happened. He took another step forward.

The store’s merchandise had been diligently picked over; there was not much in the way of food or drinks, but Ilya did mange to find a packet of peanuts under one of the display stands and a crunched Snickers bar that might still be edible. At the back of the fridges, he found singular electrolight drink, which seemed like a fucking miracle. He’d barely had anything to drink in the past three days (let alone before that), and he inhaled half of it without thinking. It tasted sort of sour, but his stomach didn’t reject it, so it must be fine. He decided to save the second half of the bottle for later. It was the smart thing to do, and for Sveta, he could be smart.

In a rack of magazines and assorted papers which stood near the check-out counter, Ilya snagged a map – and determined his location, which surprisingly turned out to be the southern tip of Ohio. It wasn’t exactly the right direction, but at least he wasn’t in fucking West Virginia anymore. Not that the state had really anything to do with it – surely there were nice parts, Ilya had just never had the ability to see them, seeing as he was trapped in a fucking hole in the ground for months.

Something else grabbed his attention. A non-specific sports magazine – the cover is some basketball player that Ilya used to love, but now has no space for in his head. But he picked it up anyways, something drawing him in. He flipped the magazine open, and it fell to the centerfold, where Ilya is met with himself, and… Shane Hollander. Crouched into a face-off position, staring at each other with (mock) intensity.

No fucking way.

“Wow,” Ilya said aloud, despite himself. One of the benefits of being completely alone, he had recently realized, was the ability to talk to oneself without a second thought.

The CCM ad was spread across both pages, but Rozanov v. Hollander was only on the right side, the left side filled with one of the women’s league players looking really tough in goalie gear. So Ilya, a madman who was embarrassingly half-hard at the memory of Shane Hollander in the showers, carefully ripped the ad from the magazine, paying close mind not to tear into the image.

He stared at the picture another moment longer. Sighing heavily, he folded it, pressing it into his back pocket for later. Now, he needed to go South. For Sveta, and for Shane, Ilya would at least try to survive. It was the least he could fucking do, he thought.

Chapter 6

Chapter Notes

if you've read this far, i just want to say THANK YOU! I worked so so hard on this fic and I am happy you are reading :)

Shane collapses back on the heels of his hands, his eyes wide on Jack’s body. Mike too, is swallowing back shock, inching his butt away from the second man’s crumpled figure. Ilya clicks the safety on the weapon in his hands and paces over to Shane on the ground.

“Shane,” he breathes out, almost not believing that Shane came out unscathed, needing verbal confirmation, something.

“Are you okay?” Shane somehow asks, looking up at Ilya, his eyes unfocused and all spaced-out.

“Am I okay?” Ilya laughs with hysterical relief. “Holy fucking shit, Hollander, what about you?”

“I’m okay,” Shane lolls, his voice getting slow and thick. “You…how’d you…”

Ilya notices for the first time, that Shane has a bloody, half-stitched incision on the back of his right shoulder. “Shanya,” he finds himself saying as he falls to his knees beside Shane, tenderly examining the wound.

“Was a tracker…Simone had to…I think the… adrenaline is…”

“Hey, shh, is okay. Yes, adrenaline crash. You are okay,” Ilya eases Shane into his arms, presses Shane’s head into his shoulder. He glances up at Mike, who is staring in shock at the two bodies. “Mike,” he says, and Mike seems to snap out of it.

“Are you okay?” Ilya indicates to the two fallen bodies with his eyes. Mike blinks, and then nods.

“Shit, dude. You– you saved us.”

Ilya shakes his head. It was a massive risk, firing like that. It was stupid really. Ilya’s aim could have waivered, and he could have hit Mike or Shane. Shane could be dead, and then it would one hundred percent be Ilya’s fault.

It’s been a long time since Ilya had to kill a person. A living, not-undead person. Not since those first couple of years, when it was just him and Sveta against the world. But taking a life, it stays with a person, always. He remembers each one of them. When the shock wears off, he’s not sure how this will hit him. It’s been so long, so much has changed since those early days…

“There might be more out there,” Ilya realizes, nervously twisting his head around to check the surrounding area. “The gunshots will alert others to our location.”

Mike reaches over to pry the gun from the second man’s fingers, looking disgusted in the process. He looks back to Ilya. “I’ll radio Harry. Do you need–”

“Tell Harry,” Ilya insists. “Then help me get Shane over to that tree so we are not so in the open, yes?”

Mike nods, but doesn’t listen to Ilya about the order of things, instead opting to come straight over to Ilya and Shane. Ilya neglects to argue.

Shane, still semi-conscious, manages to put an arm over Mike’s shoulders, and limp slowly over to the foliage. Then Mike is back for Ilya, hoisting an arm under Ilya’s armpits in a terribly painful way. Ilya groans through the pain in his ribs. “It’s fine,” he insists when Mike pauses. Ilya needs to get over to Shane, the pain doesn’t fucking matter.

At the tree, Ilya succumbs to the ground again, reaching out for Shane. Mike stands above them, nervously. “Okay, hang tight, yeah?”

“Yes, Mikey,” Ilya puts on a half-hearted smile, which gains him a likewise lackluster chuckle from Mike.

With a final look, Mike paces away, and then up the ladder to the sniper’s nest.

“Ilya?” Shane murmurs.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“I shoulda called you.”

“What, Shane? What are you talking about?”

“That night, the last one. I shoulda…”

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Ilya wipes a sweaty thumb across Shane’s freckles, only to realize that his fingers are bloody, that he’s just smeared red on Shane’s cheeks. “I thought the same, yes? But is okay. We are here now. We are okay.”

“As long as we… die together,” Shane hums languidly.

“No one’s dying right now,” Ilya states resolutely. “You are just dehydrated again, yes? We will get you all watered, like a nice plant. You like plants? You need water, and rest, and food, and you will grow like a tree, be strong and hunky again.”

“Hunky?” Shane half-laughs, if it could even be considered that. Maybe a quarter-laugh, that seems more accurate, Ilya thinks.

“Yes, you are sexy hockey hunk, I think you know this.”

“No more hockey,” Shane says flatly, no emotion. With a little smile he continues, “But we have Ilya Rozanov.”

“No hockey, yes,” Ilya agrees. He’s a little surprised Shane is so chill about that fact, but then again, they’ve both been fucking traumatized to hell, so maybe hockey is a little less important, even to Shane Hollander, who always seemed a little more obsessed than most. More than Ilya, for sure. “No rivalry, too, hm?”

“Hey Rozanov,” Shane starts, a coy smirk forming in the corner of his lips. “We get outta this… you wanna fuck?”

God, fuck, and does that make Ilya laugh. It fucking kills his ribs, but it’s worth it. Shane giggles too, but then sobers, a little crease forming in the middle of his forehead. “I’m serious.”

“I know you are, sweetheart,” Ilya catches his breath, smiling down at his adrenaline-drained crush. “I would like this too. But is complicated, maybe we talk about when you are more clear-headed?”

“You don’t want to,” Shane grumbles.

“I do, Shanya, but I am little more concerned with your health first,” Ilya pets his head soothingly.

“I’ll be okay. You saved me, baby.”

Embarrassingly, Ilya thinks he might cry. He hopes Shane will not regret all of this when he is more alert and well-orientated.

“I think you are forgetting your hostage negotiation skills,” Ilya points out.

“True,” Shane hums in agreement. “I saved you.”

“Was very stupid,” Ilya says, trying to say it lightly, but his voice is thick and romantic without any effort at all on his part, it just flows out naturally. Shane smiles, goofy. “You’re the best, you know that?” Is Shane lucid? Does he mean everything he is saying right now? Ilya hopes so…but he wouldn’t hold Shane to it, if he changes his mind later.

“Next time I am in hostage situation, you do not run in almost get yourself killed, then you will be the best too, hm?”

Shane half-laughs in response. Ilya takes the hem of his shirt and rubs the blood smear from Shane’s cheek, but it’s not very efficient, given that it’s also bloody and dirty and gross.

“Then we are even,” Ilya says, wanting to keep Shane talking, mostly because the sound of his voice is the only reason Ilya isn’t losing his mind right now. “You save me, I save you.”

“No,” Shane shakes his head. “This one’s not a competition.”

Shane’s brain must really be broken, Ilya decides. He doesn’t have to formulate another reply, because Mike is back, bounding towards them. Words spill out of him all at once.

“Between these two, the other one Shane got, we also got four in the traps. That’s seven… and Macie injured one trying to climb over the wall, gunshot to shoulder, so I guess they got spooked and retreated. We’re still on high alert, but we’re sweeping the camp now, making sure there’s no one else inside. If we’re clear, Simone’ll come up and get y’all in the truck.”

“Sorry,” Shane murmurs, eyes half-lidded.

“If you apologize for a tracker you didn’t know was inside you, I am going to have to lecture you on the meaning of consent, and I know you know what consent is,” Ilya is saying so many things, it shocks him as much as it does Mike, who raises his eyes, but doesn’t interject.

“Hollander, I want to fuck you,” Shane mimes Ilya’s accent. Definitely not lucid, then. Mike’s expression breaks into a wild, excited grin. “Nice, man,” he says, and reaches out a fist to Ilya. It could come off gross, but from Mike’s tone, it feels more sweet. Still, Ilya’s not going give him a fist bump for that. Shane, on the other hand, raises a lazy arm, and Mike grins, extending his arm to bump their fists together. Ilya frowns, though it’s pretty fucking endearing.

“Shane, I think you will regret some of these things you are saying,” Ilya tries to point out gently. Shane snorts. “Won’t,” he argues weakly in reply.

“I’ll radio Simone to come check on you guys once the area is clear,” Mike says, still beaming.

“Thanks Mike,” Ilya tells him, and he looks to Shane, who despite his rough state, is gooey and smiling at Ilya.

Ilya bites the inside of his mouth to suppress his smile, but it’s hardly effective.

 

---

 

Simone finds Ilya and Shane clinging to each other, battered and beaten, but quite alive.

“Simone!” Ilya greets her in surprisingly high spirits. “Shane needs more of those fluids.”

She chuckles. “Yeah, I was there when he threw them all up. How’s the incision?”

Shane seems to be semi-conscious, because he frowns slightly. “Hurts.”

“Let me look.”

She squats down to a better vantage point, and Ilya shifts to be less in the way. It’s evident from the sharp groan and the careful way that Ilya moves that he’s injured beyond just his bad leg. He holds his torso; broken ribs? Simone is slightly encouraged by the fact that Ilya was a hockey player, he should know what to expect, be able to let her know if it begins to hurt worse.

Shane’s arguably going to be easier to treat, with a few more stitches, IV fluids, and mostly, rest.

“What is going on out there? Everyone is okay?” Ilya asks, his eyes wide and anxious.

“Couple of injuries, but nothing bad.”

“No one is dead?”

“None of ours,” Simone answers with a nod. “The camp is cleared. We’re working on the perimeter now.”

“Hm, good,” Ilya says with a hefty sigh. She examines his face; finds a split lip that won’t need stitches, and the beginnings of a nasty purple and blue bruise forming around his left eye. He’ll need ice.

“Okay,” Simone stands. “Let me get the truck over here and we’ll drive you boys to the medical cabin.”

 

---

 

Simone puts them both on bed rest, tells them that before they even arrive at the medical cabin, but Shane needs another IV, so he’s meant to stay cooped up in her cabin. Ilya begs, very determined, and convinces her that he also should stay in the cabin with Shane, in the second bed which has been shoved into the corner but can very easily be un-shoved.

But when they pull up in the truck, and see a couple of the community members clearing out the body, Shane heaves a choked out breath and gags again.

“С тобой всё в порядке, ты сильная, всё хорошо, ты такая смелая,” Ilya whispers to him in Russian, petting his head. You’re okay, you’re strong, it’s okay, you’re so brave. Simone looks less convinced.

“Mike,” she says, leaning over to him in the driver’s seat. “Take them to Ilya’s cabin. I’ll gather the supplies I need and meet you there.” She twists around from the front seat to look at Ilya and Shane. “I think Shane could use a change of scenery. You’ll both rest a little easier.”

“You will come to check on him?”

“On both of you,” Simone confirms with a steady nod.

 

---

 

It was the middle of the night when Shane finally killed Frankie. He’d been there so long, under the heel of her boot, that the rest of the gang seemed to forget that Shane wasn’t on their side, that he wasn’t one of them. They ignored him most of the time, of course, but they treated him with quiet acceptance, unwilling to risk being rude to their leader’s favorite thing. At first, people questioned Frankie’s decision to move him out of the pit, to a barred room in their hodge-podge of a camp, but she wrote them off, and continued to do over the following months as she slowly rolled out more and more accommodations for Shane. As his time in hell stretched on, Frankie grew more erratic, more unpredictable. Her fascination, her obsession with Shane only grew stronger as she became more unstable. “A hockey player, an orphan, a Canadian,” she chanted facts about him to him, like he didn’t know, like she was the one deciding.

Near the end, in the last weeks, she devolved even further. She was always talking, also saying things, and everything was directed to Shane, like he was the voice in her head, like she was talking directly to herself, her conscious. “I killed your dad,” she would say, and unlike the months earlier, when she would say this as a taunt, as a way to torment Shane, it took on a new meaning. She was hysterical, apologetic.

It was becoming dangerously clear to the gang that Frankie was unfit to lead. If that happened, if they realized they would have to cast her out or kill her or replace her otherwise, Shane knew he wouldn’t make it. The only reason he was still alive was because of Frankie, for better or worse.

“I used to work in an office,” she confessed to him one night. The night.

At an earlier time, Shane wouldn’t have dared to respond to her. He would avoid it, offered responses only when coerced by the threat of violence. But then, for the past week, she’d been so vulnerable, increasingly paranoid – so opposite from the woman who’d killed David Hollander in front of him, who took Ilya Rozanov away before Shane had even arrived. That Frankie was gone. And Frankie herself was slipping away. And now she was giving him a glimpse of who she was before all of this…

“Did you like it?” he asked curiously. She was laid out on her blankets; he was on his mat at the foot of her bed, sitting with one leg stretched out, the other bent and tucked into his chest. Frankie smiled at the ceiling, her eyes filling with unshed tears.

“What do you think happens when we die?”

Despite her new, innocent nature, Shane did not want to talk about death with the person who murdered two very important people to him, so he remained silent. Frankie didn’t even seem to notice, though that was hardly surprising.

“Shane,” she said, turning her head to the side to look at him. The tears spilled out, but her face remained neutral. “I want to go. I want to see my daughters, my mom. I want to go. Can I go? Will you let me go?”

Shane blinked at her. What did she want from him?

“You should see the beach again,” she drawled. “The girls always loved the beach.” Frankie sighed, a soft peace coming across her face.

Then, something sharp hit her, and she snapped her attention back to the present, to Shane.

“Shane, it hurts. Will you make it stop? Can I go?”

“Yes,” was all he could say. It was complicated, it was confusing, but he felt pity. He felt tired, really, exhausted from hating her, from wanting her dead, from seeing her as a monster. And now, in that moment, he saw her for what she was: just a person. Sick, definitely, and Shane wasn’t sure how exactly, what drove her earlier cruel actions, her barbaric behavior, if it had anything to do with whatever plagued her now. Whatever it was, her brain was broken now, but her body was still soldiering on. “Yes,” he told her again, and he moved to get up from his seated position, to cross the room to the medicine cabinet.

One container, half-full. An invaluable amount of medicine, really, long expired, but still effective. He brought it to her, handed her the glass of water from the table next to her bed. Wordlessly, Frankie downed all the pills, little hand-fulls at a time, sips of water to help her swallow. After, she sighed heavily, years of tension dropped from her shoulders, the pain seeping out of her.

He knew some version of Frankie might haunt him, the memories of all the horrific things she’d done to him, to his dad, the invasive thrum of her voice in his head. But this version before him…

“Thank you,” she said to Shane, and then she laid down, closed her eyes, and didn’t get up again.

And so, in the softness of night, Shane’s nightmare ended. He was free.

 

---

 

Shane likes Ilya’s cabin. He likes waking up in monster-truck themed sheets (“It was that or boring white. Yuck. I told Mike I want fun ones,” Ilya tells him), the way the shaded light filters through the windows, how this loop of cabins is larger than Simone’s – the small structures are more spread apart, the center oval is much wider, spotted with trees and foliage. Shane didn’t know it was possible, but the area feels even more serene. The cicadas buzz in the background, a sort of warm blanket of sound around everything. With all the windows open in Ilya’s cabin, the built in screens protecting them from the mosquitos, Shane feels this a safe place.

He likes Ilya’s Jaws poster (“Mike said Walmart had sharks or zombies, and he made executive decision, no zombies”), and the shaggy blue and white carpet on the floor. He likes that there’s four bunk beds (far too many), lined in pairs, head to foot against each wall. He likes how Ilya drags his bed, the one clad in Ben-10 themed green sheets, across the room to make one bigger surface they can share together. He likes that Ilya doesn't ask, he just moves it (“is medical necessity”), and he likes that as they recover to together, they just lounge there, sweaty in the humid summer air, basking in nothing but each other’s company.

He likes that Ilya’s little wood dresser has a photo on top, something ripped from a magazine ages ago – it’s them, young and dumb and clad in sparkling new CCM gear, facing off. He likes how shy Ilya gets when he asks him about it, how Ilya tells Shane how he found it in a gas station when he was traveling south, how he ripped out the page and kept it with him. It makes Shane want to burst into tears and kiss Ilya silly.

He likes how they spend the mornings and evenings out on Ilya’s front porch, how his cabin is set far back from the gravel path, giving them slightly more privacy. He likes to swing leisurely in Ilya’s orange nylon hammock, while Ilya sits in the red camper chair and watches Shane with languid desire, lazy satisfaction.

“You still smoke?” Shane asks when he’s first well enough to venture out to the porch, shocked by the side of a lighter on the metal wrought table. Ilya looks embarrassed. “Ah, yes, sometimes.”

“No, it’s fine,” Shane adds quickly, because he’s honestly not worried about it. Lung cancer is low on the list of things that might kill them nowadays. “I was just– how do you find cigarettes?”

“We grow some tobacco,” Ilya replies, sheepish. “Mike brings papers back from supply runs.”

“Oh,” Shane says. He should have considered that. “Do you go on supply runs?”

“No,” Ilya replies, staring at the ground. “My leg is unreliable. I am stuck here.”

“Where you’re safe,” Shane points out.

“While other people are not safe,” Ilya counters. Shane hums his understanding. “But your job is security, right? So that helps.”

“Sometimes, yes,” Ilya allows, tilting his head in thought. “I do other jobs too, usually, within the camp. But the security is not very hard. We are in a remote area. Not so many threats up here. A few zombies, occasionally. Maybe bears. Hardly any people. People are the biggest threat.”

“I know,” Shane says, his voice much smaller and more hollow than he intended. It catches Ilya’s attention, of course. They drop the subject after that. Shane isn’t quite ready to untangle all the complicated versions of Frankie that live in his memory.

 

---

 

Shane likes how one day, Ilya brings out a book (the first of the Percy Jackson series) and he reads aloud while Shane listens from the hammock, the cicadas singing in the background. He likes how it starts to become a regular thing, a daily activity for them, Ilya reading aloud.

He likes how people come to visit them.

Simone, every day, to check on their health. Harry, awkward but sincere, trailing behind her. (“They are together,” Ilya tells him. Shane considers it for a moment, recalling the walk-talkie interaction he witnessed. “I can see that,” he decides, and then every time they come, he sees it even more.) Harry tells them, on one of his visits, that the community has voted unanimously that Shane can be a member, join them officially, if he wants. (“Yes,” Shane says. Obviously.)

The kid, Abdul, who obviously worships Ilya and seems eager to impress him. He is also obviously nervous around Shane, but seems to loosen up over time, after about the fifth time Ilya calls Shane some pet name – Shanya, or sweetheart, or malysh. Abdul seems startled everytime Ilya is soft and caring towards Shane, like he’s never witnessed this side of Ilya. It makes Shane a little sad at first, to realize the extent of Ilya’s prior unhappiness, how guarded he had been even in such a welcoming community. But Shane likes how Ilya seems to be peeling back the layers now, opening up. Maybe it has something to do with Shane being here, or maybe it’s just Ilya unraveling traumatic memories. maybe a little bit of both, Shane hopes.

Macie, a blonde, muscular woman, brings her small child to say hello, a giggly two-year-old who Ilya greets with so much joy, Shane’s heart is so full. From Macie, they learn that no one has seen any trace of the West Virginia gang since they retreated. Leaderless and fractured, Shane likes that he doesn’t feel the need to worry about the group’s enduring survival, that if they wanted, they could find him again. If they did come back, Shane would be ready. He wouldn’t let anyone take all this all away from him.

Then there’s Emmett, who is quiet and tense, but introduces himself directly to Shane, very cordially. Ilya tells him after that Emmett wanted to kick him out when Shane first showed up. Which, given how a pack of ruthless thugs actually tracked him to their community, Shane can’t fault the man for being cautious. Ilya still seems pissed though, which he doesn’t hide from Emmett. Shane tries to compensate for Ilya’s brusqueness with sweetness, though this whiplash only seems to confuse Emmett. Honestly, whatever. Shane has a feeling Ilya will get over it eventually. They have plenty of time, afterall.

And of course, there’s Mike, who visits often, joking and laughing loudly and talking so much in a way that’s effortless and always entertaining. He teaches Ilya how to play Bananagrams (“Is not fair, I am not native English speaker, of course I will not win”) and talks relentlessly about anything (and everything), to the very-happy-to-sit-and-listen-while-they-hold-hands Shane and Ilya.

Shane likes how Ilya kisses him, full and wet and wonderful and wild, but he doesn’t like how Ilya seems afraid to touch him beyond their cuddles in bed, their sweet kisses and more monstrous make-outs, because beyond that, Ilya shys away from anything more, like he’s scared he might break Shane. Shane’s pretty certain at this point that he's totally unbreakable, but he does understand the need for recovery, especially for Ilya’s tender and beaten body, so he doesn’t push it.

Until, after two weeks, he decides enough is enough. They have had ample healing time. Ilya’s black eye has faded away, his cut lip long healed, his ribs slowly getting there. He can walk now without pain, though of course his limp lingers, ever-present and likely never going away. And Shane is putting on weight, and even some muscle, encouraged by unusually large portions the chefs keep giving him at mealtimes.

At the very least, they have to talk about it – whatever it is that they are to each other. They spend all their time together, hardly ever separated, and they touch all the time, just not… sexually. And if Ilya doesn’t want to touch Shane’s dick, fine, it’s not the end of the world. But also Shane really fucking hopes that’s not the case. But if it is, he can deal with it. Either way, he needs to know.

He starts by telling the truth, something he hasn’t said out loud but should be pretty obvious by now.

“I like it here,” Shane tells Ilya when they’re alone, splayed out in bed.

“I like you here,” Ilya coos, reaching out to pull Shane into his arms. That’s encouraging, bodes well for what Shane wants to try next. He lets himself be wrapped up, spooned, and then, Ilya against his back, Shane wiggles his butt.

“Sweetheart…” Ilya starts slowly.

“I’m better,” Shane argues immediately. “You’re fattening me up, you can already see the difference. And your ribs, you said they’re hurting less now. So maybe we can…”

Ilya hasn't responded so he twists around a little, catches the conflicted expressions on Ilya’s face.

“Unless you don’t want to,” Shane says, his stomach dropping, his hips stilling.

“It’s not that,” Ilya says quickly, carding his fingers through Shane’s hair (which has thankfully started to grow out – Shane had hated the stupid buzz that Frankie had forced him to maintain) in a soft, caring way that makes the anxiety dissipate from Shane’s gut. “I… you know we do not have to? If you want to stay here, I do not want you to feel… obligation to do this. Any of it. Is your choice…”

“Ilya,” Shane snaps, a little exasperated, turning over all the way to face him. He sighs, softening. “I already told you. I want this. All of it. You. What do you want?”

Ilya’s mouth gets small, he looks away and then back at Shane, eyes glassy. “The same. I want the same. I want you. All of you.”

“Okay,” Shane huffs, a half-laugh escaping him. “So then can I can please touch your dick? I’m fucking dying over here.”

Ilya’s face breaks out into a grin so wide it could permanently stretch his face. “You are not dying,” he clarifies, and slowly draws a hand down Shane’s body. “You are very alive.”

“Make me feel it. Make me feel alive.”

Ilya’s hand dips beneath Shane’s waistband, finding the solid hold of his already half-hard cock. He gives it a firm stroke, and Shane shudders out a gasp.

“So good,” Ilya murmurs, and then their lips finally fucking crash together, and Shane is so overtaken by the warmth and wetness of Ilya’s mouth that he thinks he could come just from kissing alone. Ilya must feel as ravenous, because he pulls Shane impossibly closer.

“Fuck, Hollander,” he moans into Shane’s mouth, and then Shane reaches down, searching for Ilya’s dick too.

Shane loves this. All of it.

 

---

 

“I am sorry you had to do it,” Ilya says, after they’ve both shuddered out desperately quiet orgasms into each other mouths (sound travels far with all the windows open, but it would be a furnace inside with them closed). Shane doesn’t immediately know what he’s talking about, but Ilya is clearly struggling with his words, choking over them, so Shane just lays his cheek on Ilya’s chest and listens. “Both times. In West Virginia and here… I wish I had done it.”

Oh, Shane realizes. He's talking about the people Shane had to kill.

“Then maybe you would not have ended up there, in that pit, if I had–”

“Hey, hey, no, no,” Shane whispers, reaching a hand to cup Ilya’s face, the other hand threading through Ilya’s hair. “You had no idea. And you were wounded. You couldn’t–”

“If I had known,” Ilya’s voice breaks, a sorrowful hiccup escaping his lungs. “If I knew, Shane, I would have done everything different.”

“I know,” Shane caresses his thumb across Ilya’s cheek. “But that’s not how it works, yeah? We can’t do it different now. We’ve just got to move forward.”

Ilya, eyes blood-shot, peers into Shane’s soul. And Shane suddenly feels the need to say a lot of things. He takes a shaky breath in attempt to steady himself.

“I know we didn’t know each other even that well before everything ended, but I… I feel drawn to you. Like maybe that’s how I ended up here, how I wandered here, half-dead. Is that crazy?”

A small cry escapes Ilya’s throat, betraying him. “Maybe a little,” he admits, and Shane laughs wetly. They kiss again, less sexy and more so salty from the tears, but no less meaningful than any other kiss. Ilya pulls back, something else to say. “I think I am maybe a little crazy for you too," he adds.

 

---

 

When Shane wakes, it’s dark outside. The cicadas are chirping loudly, a steady white noise coming through the open, screened windows. Beside Shane, Ilya is twitching in his sleep, his face twisted into agony. Russian words burst out of him, surprisingly loud for someone who’s not awake. It must have been what woke Shane.

“Ilya,” Shane says gently, shifting his body around to touch Ilya’s face. He doesn’t stir, instead, he cries in his sleep. So Shane tries again, shaking him roughly this time, desperate to save him from whatever nightmare is plaguing him. “Ilya!”

Ilya gasps awake, pushing himself up, eyes wild and bewildered as he scans his surroundings. He processes Shane in front of him, beside him in bed, and Ilya’s terror washes out of him, his features relaxing. “Sorry,” he murmurs, reaching out to pull Shane into him. “Bad dream.”

“It’s okay,” Shane wiggles into Ilya’s touch, lays an arm over Ilya’s torso. “I get them too.”

Ilya hums, gazing at Shane through half-lidded eyes. “You are real?” he asks, brushing his fingertips over Shane’s lips.

“Yeah, I’m real,” Shane whispers back.

“Mm,” Ilya’s eyes close now, lips smacking sleepily. “Good.”

 

---

 

Shane likes when, a week later, they walk down a little trail to a creek which has been dammed to create a swimming pool of sorts. It’s set up with a decaying wood lifeguard tower, a diving board, and two ladders to get into the water – it must be a remnant from when this was a vacation destination (or whatever – Shane hasn’t really understood if this place was a summer camp, or just a campsite for people who did not want to stay in tents. It doesn’t really matter, he’s just glad someone built it). He likes how Ilya explains that they constructed the wall around this swimming area, just because it was so nice, even though it was a pain in the ass to build the structure wider to accommodate (“Not that I was here to help yet. This was years ago,” Ilya says). Shane likes how they lay out towels in the grass, and then Ilya, giddy like a kid, gets a running start to jump into the water, whooping out a loud cheer before he cannonballs into the water.

He likes how he can’t stop smiling, that his mouth starts to hurt from the effort, but he can’t seem to stop.

He likes when they lounge in floatie-tubes, holding hands so they don’t drift far from each other. Shane even dozes off, he’s so at peace.

“Ilya,” he picks up his head, squeezing Ilya’s hand lightly to get his attention. Ilya hums sleepily, tugs his hand so their tubes bounce together. “Yes, my love?”

Shane pushes his sunglasses (scavenged by Mike at the Walmart) up into his hair. Ilya does the same, tension starting to wrinkle into his features. “What is it?” Ilya asks, sitting up a little.

“I might… fall in love with you.”

Ilya blinks, his whole face going impossibly soft. “Oh, Shanya, yes, do that.”

“Yeah?” Shane smiles playfully. “It’s okay with you?”

“Yes,” Ilya grins widely. “Is convenient, actually, because I think it might already be too late for me, in this department.”

“Oh, really?” Shane tugs Ilya’s hand, spinning his tube slightly so their heads are closer together. “What department is that?”

“The I-love-Shane department, obviously, Shane. Use your head,” Ilya presses his lips together in a way that shouldn’t be as seductive as it is. His eyes are glued to Shane, flicking between his eyes and his mouth. “So anytime you want to fall in love, be my guest,” Ilya adds with a twinkle in his eye.

“Okay,” Shane nods, smirking. “That’s good to know. I’ll put a rush on it.”

“No rush,” Ilya fits his sunglasses back over his eyes, still smiling. “We have time.”

“Yeah,” Shane agrees, tilting his head. “But I’d rather spend the time in love, y’know?”

“Yes, I know,” Ilya reaches into the water and splashes Shane.

“Hey!”

“Whatever. You love me.”

“I said I might!” Shane defends fruitlessly, scowling in mock upset.

“Mm, I think you already do. Is okay. I can say it first. I lo–”

“I love you!” Shane cuts him off, competitiveness taking over. He rolls his eyes, his face stretched into a smile so wide he thinks it might be sore tomorrow. “Happy?”

“Very,” Ilya beams, and leans over his tube to try to kiss Shane. He shifts his weight too much, though, and splashes into the water. “Ah!” he yells on his way in. “Fucking cold.”

Free from his own tube, he grabs hold of Shane’s, getting cold water all over Shane. “Jesus, Ilya,” Shane complains. Ilya just heaves himself all the way on top of the tube, which surely can’t hold both of them for long.

“I love you, too, Shane,” Ilya announces, straddling Shane on the tube now. “Want to make out?”

Shane grabs Ilya’s hips. “Maybe more than that.”

Ilya cocks an eyebrow. “Shane! Someone might come down to swim,” but his tone is light, because obviously he doesn’t care about that. And Shane doubts anyone in their right mind would bother them at the swimming spot right now. He slips his fingers beneath Ilya’s waistband.

“You want me to stop?”

Ilya bites his lip, desire written all over his expression. “Fuck, no. Keep going. Say it again.” Ilya leans in, hovering his face in front of Shane’s.

“I love you,” Shane whispers, and tries to lean in, reach Ilya’s lips, but Ilya’s pulling back, playing with him.

The tube gives up, popping and tilting them both off one side. Shane is met with freezing cold water all around, darkness. And then Ilya is pulling him up, back above water.

“Fuck!” Shane laughs. Ilya, also laughing, grabs the second tube, hangs one arm over it, and reaches out to Shane. “Come, my prince,” he says, pulling Shane against his wet, cold body. Each with an arm over the second tube, finally, Ilya presses his mouth to Shane’s.

“I maybe have always loved you,” Ilya admits, and then immediately goes back to kissing Shane, so he can barely process it, let alone respond. But the meaning sinks in, settles into his being.

Here he is, with Ilya Rozanov, at the end of the world, happy. Despite the people he’s lost, the grief he holds, the trauma that won’t leave him, the lives he’s taken, in these moments with Ilya, Shane understands that everything is simply what it is. Sometimes it hurts, and the nightmares still plague them both, but other times it’s easy, it’s light. It’s just what life is, even after end of everything. Because the world isn’t over, not for Ilya and Shane. In some ways, it’s only just begun.