the genesis of the end - s. riley x reader
zombie apocalypse au. - simon riley x pregnant!fem reader. inspired loosely by @drmonstersdungeon ! go check out their work :) zombies based on TLOU infection
~ 3k words
tw: blood, gore, death, weapon usage, zombie/body horror, injury, pregnancy, manipulation, stalking, british inaccuracies
The store had certainly been ransacked thoroughly long before you got to it. Coming into town was something you rarely liked to do. The fungus had taken over the cities and towns, crawling between floorboards in houses and weaving between cracks in the asphalt. It's difficult to navigate without triggering the hive of runners you know linger in the streets and decrepit buildings.
It also reeks.
The stench of decaying corpses and pungent fungi permeates the air in a permanent fog. Wet and thick, it sticks in the back of your throat. It used to trigger your nausea much quicker in the first trimester of your pregnancy, but you've learned new tricks in the last several months of apocalyptic living.
The old journalist in you wants to laugh. Apocalyptic Living, sold on shelves next to those catty rags about the royal family or the American HGTV booklets that are strewn haphazardly across the market floor now. It would've been a laugh. A fake doomsday guide that could never be useful, because zombies weren't real. Five months ago, you would've cackled with your boyfriend about it, teased him for purchasing it, had it been real.
It's real, now. As real as the babe in your womb, the fungus veins on the floor, and as real as the memory of Dorian's throat being ripped out by the mangled jaws of a young woman already rotting from the inside out.
Five months ago, you'd been picking out which brand of pickles he wanted, getting pads, and browsing the biscuit selection in this very store. Now it's as desolate and ransacked as the rest of England.
Toeing carefully through the aisles, you manage to find a lone pack of batteries, a couple non-perishables that had somehow missed earlier inspection, and a couple of medications still within date. They weigh your pack down a bit more, but you're used to the weight. Dorian had been a big camper, so the hiking bag on your back has held most of your possessions for months now.
A scarf is wrapped around the lower half of your face, mint leaves from your small stash of herbs shoved into your nostrils to help the stench. Your pack is accompanied by a rifle on your shoulder and a handgun at your thigh. You'd been fortunate that your mother kept your father's things when he died years ago. Your mum had been on holiday in Sicily when the outbreak happened. She hadn't come home, but you'd been able to get to her house out in the country.
One of the things you'd teased Dorian about was how similar he was to your father. Both of the men you'd loved dearly had been doomsday believers. You'd laughed then. You're grateful now. Thanks to them, you weren't left entirely exposed and vulnerable when the world went to shit.
Your father's hunting coat hides most of the bump at your belly. It serves to keep you warm in the December winter. You snag some hand warmers from the shelf and stuff them into your pockets.
An animalistic cry sounds through the shattered windows of the store. It comes from several blocks over, but it's enough to send a terrifying shiver down your spine. It's time to go. You hoist your pack onto your shoulders and make your way out through a hole in the wall. It's difficult to shift around the vehicle that had wrecked into it, your growing bump becoming more of a hindrance each day, but you squeeze out into the frigid street. A quick look both ways gives you a clear view, and you stick close to the wall, boots quiet as you make an efficient path back to your truck.
It's an electric thing Dorian had spent far too much money on, but, saved again by a man who loved you, your father's home had solar panels, and you could get enough charge to the vehicle if you limited your trips to once every two weeks. It was also quieter than the average truck, which made it less of an attraction.
There's a tremor in your limbs from the cold and an unsettling feeling in your stomach. Coming to town was always dangerous. It increased your risk of exposure exponentially, whether to infected or to ravagers. Some trash rustles down the block behind you, and your pace quickens.
The dread increases to a heart-lurching panic when you round the corner to find the truck sitting on the hubcaps. Tires slashed, all four of them. Your feet stop quickly, and you drop behind an old dumpster, pressing your hand to your mouth. Now was not the time to throw up. The truck had been covered up, half tucked behind another wrecked vehicle, and you had even tossed some trash about for good measure. You'd had an odd feeling in your gut this morning before leaving the farmhouse. You'd even considered staying home. You should've.
Focus, you tell yourself, pinching your leg. It has less of an effect with the gloves you're wearing. But you manage to pull it together enough to grab your pistol with shaking fingers. You're no soldier, no hunter. You're just a girl, scared and alone, vulnerable and cold. Slowly, you push yourself into a crouch, gun tucked to your chest like you'd seen in the cop shows. The wind bites. Another shriek sounds, closer now than before. But you know it wasn't the infected who slashed your tires. Their instinct is far more primal and far less sinister.
You think of the baby inside you, your only friend or family left. You think of the chickens at home in the shed and your dog, Alfie, waiting for you to come back. You can't fail them. You can't fail yourself.
You won't.
Your hands tremble as you pad forward, using the dumpster for cover. You could go around, go through another building. It would be better than heading out into the open. Avoiding the fungus veins on the ground and keeping a semi-steady eye on your surroundings, you duck into a nearby building. It used to be an accounting firm, you think. It smells like old paper, and the office looks decently expensive as you crouch through it. The muscles in your thighs begin to ache from moving in such a position. You force yourself through it. Better achy thighs than a bullet in your head.
Or worse. The thought comes unbidden.
As if the thought had been a premonition, you look up to make eye contact with one rotting, yellow. It moves before you can scream, the creature mutated with fungal mushroom caps growing out of its head and neck. You throw yourself backwards, raising your gun, but the creature swipes it out of your hands, shoving you to the ground.
Your voice is caught in your throat. Nothing comes out. Your eyes squeeze shut.
I'm sorry, you think to your baby, to your little Bug. Forgive me.
The impact doesn't come. A boot plants by your head, sounds of impact filling your ears. The creature groans and roars, but the sound cuts off with a quick, sickening squelch.
Forcing your eyes open, you scramble, shaking terribly, to grab your handgun from the floor. The same boot steps on your hand and you yelp.
"Don't," says a deep voice. You look up as a gloved hand swoops down to snatch your gun, freezing in terror at the sheer size of the man. He's huge, decked out in military grade gear, with a skeleton balaclava covering everything but his eyes. He cleans his knife on his pant leg, then holds the gun, your gun, at you.
"Please don't-" You start, but he cuts you off with a shushing motion. Your mouth snaps shut. What else can you do at gunpoint with a man standing on your hand?
You watch as the man checks the gun with an efficiency you've never before seen. He looks down at you for a moment before nudging your shoulder with his boot to make you roll over. You grunt, but the action twists your arm, and you wince.
His eyes catch on your belly, and you instinctively curl around it as best as you can. His eyes are cold, dark beneath that mask and his strong brow. You watch as his eyes search the rest of you.
"Did it get you?" He asks, voice low. It's almost low and quiet enough that it slips past your ears. You shake your head quickly. You don't think so, anyway. Everything just hurts from hitting the ground. He grunts before lifting his boot off your hand. "Get up. Ravagers found your truck. We need to move."
Your bones ache as you slowly make your way to your feet. The... infected that had attacked you lies on the ground, throat sliced open enough to see the esophagus and trachea. Some sort of fluid that's no longer sanguine leaks from its cut flesh. The sight of it makes bile rise in your throat, so you clamp your hand over your mouth. You're still shaking, still terrified.
He grabs your chin with rough, gloved fingers, making you focus on him. "You gonna be a good girl if I give this back to you?"
Something tingles under your skin. Fear, maybe a flicker of hope. You nod.
He turns it around and places it in the holster at your thigh. "Gonna shoot your own foot off with how you were holdin' it. Stay behind me. Don't talk."
Your face burns beneath the scarf, and your head tilts in a jerky nod. He wouldn't give you your gun back if he wanted to hurt you, right?He'd saved you from the infected. Surely that meant something. He could've let it kill you, then ransack your pack for supplies.
He gives you one lingering look-over to check you again, then turns on his boot, getting out his own gun. You stick close as he leaves the building, eyes wide and frightened, temporarily blinded by the cold light of the December morning. The veins are mostly what you focus on. You don't want to trip and embarrass yourself further.
He moves with the efficiency of a serpent. Smooth movements, quick, steady, sure. Based on the decisiveness of his mobility, you're sure he was a soldier before the outbreak. The gear, the competence with the firearms, and his execution of the infected. It all adds up. You'd done a few interviews and on-site journalism pieces involving the Met-Police, analysing response teams for your articles and local news pieces. He seems... deadlier. Yet, something about having him with you feels safer, even though he's brutish and off-putting.
The mint and cold air burn in your airways, but it keeps you focused, keeps you here. He leads you through alleys, cuts through buildings, and you follow like a loyal, scared dog. Once or twice, he stops and listens. Your lungs tighten around your held breath.
"What is it?" you whisper.
His cold eyes cut to you, dark and calculating. His gaze could cut in its frigidity if your skin wasn't already so cold. "Bein' watched," he mutters in response.
Your stomach squeezes and you think you lose a bit of color. "Ravagers?"
He nods once. "Stay close."
You do as you're told. He's capable, he's better at this than you are, and you're still fucking scared.
He weaves both of you through town, needle and thread through cloth. The man heads north, toward the countryside, where your home sits about an hour north by dirt road. He brings you to an older cottage on the outskirts of town, one long abandoned. Sure feet head through the door as he clears the small home.
You stay in the living room, transfixed by the sight of what was once the abode of a little family. A mum, dad, and little boy. Baby toys litter the floor, pictures lining the walls. There's a mug of tea on the coffee table, long-dry and slightly molded. You wonder if this would've been your life had the outbreak not happened. Led by seemingly mother’s intuition, your feet lead you. You wonder if you're even allowed to call it that, yet. Being a mother doesn't feel quite real.
The nursery is quaint. Warm browns and gentle greens greet you. It's beautiful, genuinely. An uncomfortable knot forms in the middle of your throat. This could've been yours. It should have been yours. Your gloved hand settles over your rounded belly, and you sink into the rocking chair in the corner, feeling your eyes well and spill. Thick, hot tears roll down your cheeks into your scarf. You bury your face into your gloved hands.
You hadn't known you were pregnant when the outbreak hit. You hadn't known when Dorian died. You didn't even know until two months ago. You'd figured the nausea and difference in your period were due to the stress of the world burning down. It hadn't occurred to you in the slightest that you were with child. You were scared shitless upon finding out. You still are. And if it weren't for the fact that you would need medical assistance now with terminating the pregnancy, you probably would've done it.
Somewhere along the line, the little bug had become a friend instead of a parasitic reminder of everything you lost. The it became your baby, your companion. Bug is who you talk to, who you read, and sing to.
A floorboard creaks, and you look up, startled. It's him, the man who saved you. He stares at you. It's so hard to read him with that mask on, but you're starting to think he might just be expressionless.
"Sorry," you sniffle, pulling your scarf down from your face and taking the mint from your nostrils. His eyes immediately catch on the exposed features.
He doesn't respond to your apologies. His dark eyes move about the nursery, taking it all in in that calculating way that he does. The man goes to the closet and grabs a bag, beginning to stuff some baby clothes, wipes, diaper creams, diapers, and anything else he can grab into it.
"What're you doing?" You ask, sniffling again.
He gives you a look that says What do you think I'm doing? You shrink a little.
"You'll need it," he says shortly. "They don't anymore." It's cold. It's cruel. It's true. This family, whoever they are, is clearly not using this home anymore. Maybe they found somewhere safe, you think. You don't allow yourself to muse over other possibilities.
He straightens, hooking the bag over his shoulder. "Ravagers lost us. Let's get going."
You stand, aching, tired, and upset.
"You got somewhere you're staying?" He asks.
You shouldn't tell him. You don't know him. But you're so tired, and you just want to go home. "It's 32 kilometers north. S'why I used the truck," you say solemnly. It would take anywhere between six to nine hours to walk there, probably closer to nine in your condition.
He seems to calculate the same thing. His eyes narrow, and he sighs. "We'll stay here, then, tonight. Leave at first light when you've got some rest."
You don't fight it like you should. Alfie and the chickens will be fine. They've got automatic feeders. So many things have happened this morning, and you're exhausted despite the hour.
"Stay here. I'll be back by 1300. You got a watch?"
You nod, raising your wrist to show him. He nods, then points at your gun. "Get it out."
Frowning, you do as you're told.
He comes over, towering over you in shadow. You compare him in your mind to the god of death. A spectre, maybe. He fixes your grip. "Two hands, like this. Understood?"
You nod, your throat feeling too raw to speak anymore.
"Hang onto it. I'll announce myself when I get back. Shoot anyone else. Understood?" He repeats, voice low and firm.
You nod once again.
"Good girl," he says before placing the baby bag at your feet and disappearing from the cottage.
He walks with an extra pep in his step on his way back to the truck. There were no ravagers. They were easy to pick off, and he's been keeping this town cleaned up for months. He couldn't have it be unsafe for the little rabbit that comes in to forage. The stalker had been a one-off that he'd missed. He'd barely contained his rage when the infected fucker almost got his prey before he did.
Oh, no, he wouldn't have that.
He goes straight to the stack of new tires he'd stashed earlier today. It was easy to set the snare. The little rabbit always parked her truck in the same spot. He knew she was skittish, knew she needed someone to catch her, pet her, keep her safe.
Slashing the tires had been quick work. Putting the new ones on, just the same.
He caught the rabbit; now it was time to take her home.
