#dawklings

Prior to the outbreak, Nile was pretty much a normal man with a lovely wife and three bubbly kids. Nile's wife was infected first, and in a commotion, she bit Nile but whatever that was causing people to be turned into zombies didn't infect Nile immediately, and it bought him time to run away with his children in tow.

However, in a span of days, the infection affected Nile; in a way that it slowed his capability to think and do essential tasks like eating and sleeping, but he remained rather passive and has no intention to kill or consume the unaffected. 

Nile's kids realized this and decided that their father can be saved somehow. So they embarked on a lonely journey to find a cure, while having Nile on a leash in case their father become violent. And they treated Nile like normal. They would feed him with what food they could find, clean him up at some stranger's garden and cuddle close to him at night to keep him warm.

There would probably be a time when Nile still have his fatherly instincts and would involuntarily protect his kids when there's a zombie or two in their vicinity. He would probably hide them and fight the zombie, then they would run away again.

My ending to this au is that, Nile was, in the end, shot down, when they reached a survivor's camp. And Nile's kids had to part forever with their protective zombie father.

And since her death, he had to manage his time with his kids and work - waking them up in the morning, cook and feed them breakfast, pack everyone's lunch, send them to school, get to work, pick them up from school, do grocery shopping, cook dinner, clean up the house, tuck them to bed - and the routine continues on almost every day.

Despite being exhausted by the boring repetitive days and not having anyone else to help him (maybe except stay-at-home-dad Watson and unemployed Dennis who happened to be Nile's neighbours), Nile was very proud of his kids and always made sure they are brought up well.

Maybe Nile would meet Erwin some time later, starting as strangers then slowly they became friends, and while Erwin sympathized with Nile having to raise kids on his own, Nile never asked for Erwin's help and in some way, he thought that Erwin's presence was a nuisance. But Nile's kids loved it when 'Uncle Erwin' visits them, so Nile had no choice but to allow Erwin in his life.

Eventually, that friendship became love, and while Erwin was ready to live the rest of his life with Nile, Nile wasn't so sure about it. He had his doubts that Erwin would leave him for good one day, just like his late wife did, and he felt it would be too troublesome to start everything over with his kids (after Erwin inevitably screwed up his properly arranged daily schedule with his kids that he had been doing for years).

Of course, after a little push from his work colleagues and neighbours, Nile accepted Erwin. And since then, they lived like a normal functioning family, with Nile working, and Erwin staying at home and do all the chores for him. In the evening, they would have dinner together, spend time with the kids and tucked them to bed, and finally retreating to bedroom they shared for the night.