Promp: Anon

Raing: Zombie AU

One.

Minho breathes. Jinki braces himself.

Two.

The last rays of the sun were long gone.

Three.

GO.

We’ve just got to make it down the street. Just down the street. Down the street. Down the–

“Minho! On your right!”

Jinki watches as time slows, as Minho ducks low and sweeps his foot under a walker. The groan that surfaces from the walker’s lips, putrid and stale, as he hits the ground is the last thing Jinki is thinking about. He grabs Minho’s arms, pulls him up and they keep gunning for high walled gate at the end of the dirt road.

A sentry sees them coming from his post and runs to the hit the alarm. As the lights flashed silently across the length of the wall, the sentry runs to the lever and starts to rotate the crank that will open the steel gate. A heavy long groan creeps into the air as the heavy steel lifts from the ground. At a certain distance, it stops and the sentry takes a step away from it the lever. Jinki understands. Minho does too. The steel door was their strongest line of defense. It was impenetrable closed. Open, it was the weakest and easiest point of entry into the prison.  

Jinki reaches behind him and pushes Minho forward. There were three chasers behind them now. Jinki doesn’t know where they came from, but he never knows. And now is not the time for thinking. They’ve are almost there.

We’ve just got to make it under the gate. Just under the gate. Under the gate. Under the–

Jinki inhales. Minho reaches the gate first and slides under it with the ease of a baseball player. Considering Minho’s never played the sport, it’s just a grim reminder of how many times this scenario has played out.

Jinki reaches the gate moments after Minho does and prepares to drop so he can roll under it. He stops when he feels a hand sink for his shoulder and yank him back. Jinki recovers rather quickly, lurching himself forward out of its grasp. He scrambles for the gate and grasps Minho’s outstretched arm.

Somewhere in his head, he’s smiling because Minho was always there, with his hand out, picking him up, pulling him along. Minho pulls him under and into the safety of his arms before signaling for the gate to be closed. Jinki watches the wild convulsing of an arm, its pale green grey flesh visible as the gate slams down on it, severing it from the body. Minho races to the arm, grabs it and flings it back over the high wall to join the rest of it.

But not before Jinki can see the tattoo. Go Ara.

Jinki shakes the feeling off because that’s not the first time he’s seen a friend like that. He turns around to congratulate Minho but Minho is looking at him with so much fire in his eyes that Jinki has to take a step back.

“What’s your problem?”

Minho takes a moment and closes the gap between them. He sweeps over Jinki’s body with his hands, checking all over, muttering to himself. Finally, he peels Jinki’s camouflage jacket back and hisses.

“Goddamn it!” He turns towards the sentry. “Get Jonghyun on the line. Jinki’s been scratched! I need a transport!”

Jinki blinks, bewildered. He takes a look at his shoulder and sure enough he is bleeding. Still, he doesn’t understand Minho’s panic. They’d both been given a high dose anti-viral load before they left the prison compound. A scratch  wasn’t going to–

Before Jinki can voice that very obvious fact, he feels himself being lifted in Minho’s arms. He rolls his eyes.

“Minho. Put me down.”

Minho doesn’t answer him, instead running him across the courtyard to meet Jonghyun and Kyungsoo with the gurney.

“Minho. Do you think all of this is necessary? It’s just a scratch,” Jonghyun asks as he wheels the gurney to a stop. Minho doesn’t say anything and Jonghyun shakes his head and moves out of his way.

Jinki is silent too, as Minho pushes the gurney through the open doors of the prison and wheels him down toward the infirmary, Kyungsoo hot on his heels.

An hour later, Jinki is watching the timer on the decontamination room. His shoulder has been bandaged up, and to satisfy Minho’s silent demands, Kyungsoo gave him another round of anti-viral medication.

Minho is on the other side, standing there with his arms crossed, watching him. He hasn’t said anything, just a firm pressed line where his lips should be. Jinki wants to be as angry as he is, wants to berate and lecture Minho for being emotional. Emotions never got them anywhere, especially in days like this, but he understands. He understands Minho’s fears. He understands the way Minho is overprotective of him, of all of them. He understands how Minho still has nightmares because he watched a zombie tear into his mother as she screamed at him to escape.

If anyone understands Minho, it’s him.

So instead of yelling like he wants to, Jinki presses his forehead against the thick plastic walls of the decontamination room. “I’m sorry.”

He hears footsteps and he looks up to see Minho pacing.

“I didn’t know,” Jinki said quietly.

Minho turns on him and the fire is back in his eyes. “Don’t you ever… in your life… do that again,” he says lowly, his voice deep and impassioned.

Jinki eyes the large backpack full of water bottles and packs of military rations across the room.  It wasn’t much, but every bit helped. The water would last them for days, the rations for weeks.

“I had to. I had to, Minho.”

“No! No you didn’t! We do that in daylight hours. I don’t care if you’re our leader. I don’t care if you think you have to look out for all of us. I need you safe. The rest of them can go to hell.”

Minho’s fuming and Jinki fowns. “You don’t mean that. Don’t ever say anything like that again.”

Minho continues, his jaw clenching. “What would have happened to you if I hadn’t have been in that warehouse with you? Huh? What! You almost walked into a room full of them! If you …if you had…” Minho’s voice cracks as his pacing stops abruptly. He spins away from Jinki.

“I can’t lose you, Jinki. I’ve lost everyone else. I can’t lose you.”

The timer for the lock on the decontamination room buzzes and a loudthunk follows. Slowly, Jinki pushes the door back and takes the few steps across the room to stand behind Minho. Patiently, he wraps his good arm around Minho and pulls him close. He inhales Minho’s scent, leftover rations of a lotion he valued, and held it in, savoring how the calming scent washes over him.

“I’m sorry, Minho. I can’t say I won’t do it again, but I’m sorry.”

Minho doesn’t turn around but a hand comes up and slides across Jinki’s. “I was so scared. I wanted to scream but I couldn’t. And then I saw the scratch…I panicked.”

Jinki remembers his father and his mother in that moment. He tries to remember their faces but can’t. But he feels Minho and he memorizes every line, every fabric, every notion of the man in front of him. It’s his only saving grace; it’s the only grounding factor in his life. Minho is his inspiration, his muse to live, his divine intervention.

He was the love of his life in this piss and world they were forced to survive in.  

“I’ll be here until I’m not anymore, Minho. You have to believe in that. It has to be enough.”

“You have to promise.”

Jinki’s raise a brow.

“You have to promise me you’ll be here until that day comes. You can’t leave before then. I’m going to do everything I can do to make sure it’s when you’re old and grey and we’re not living like this anymore, so please…please…”

Jinki lifts up and kissing the nape of Minho’s neck before burrowing against him again.

“I promise.”