Bloom and Scatter [Free! Zombie AU]

They Live - Part 2

He wasn't feeling guilty. He wasn't feeling guilty. He wasn't feeling guilty.

Shit. He wasn't feeling guilty.

"Fuck," Rin growled, "God damn it. I'm right. He's just lonely. I don't want him to get me killed. Shit. Stop feeling bad. He understood too. If he didn't, he'd be tagging along right now. Fuck."

He was so wrapped up in trying to justify his feelings over the whole exchange that he barely realised the low, throaty growling. Before he could do anything, a figure lunged at him, clawing for his face. Its flesh was soft and rotting under his hands and he heard bones breaking as he threw it off of him. The creature, despite the twisted pelvis, started crawling towards him. He knew this behaviour.

"Fucking fuck," Rin cursed as he swung his machete down and decapitated the zombie. The noise must have attracted the rest, because he was staring down the beginnings of a small horde surrounding him on all sides.

"For fuck's sake," Rin hissed as he did a 180˚ and ran down a slew of zombies as he sprinted back towards the hospital.

"TACHIBANA," Rin yelled, breaking down the door with a fire axe he had found, pulling it out of the splintered wood and hurling it across the room until it lodged itself in the head of a zombie, "I SWEAR TO FUCKING GOD, IF YOU'RE DEAD, I AM GOING TO MURDER THE SHIT OUT OF YOUR ZOMBIE CORPSE OVER AND OVER AGAIN."

"Kitajima!" The voice was muffled and panicked, but human, and Rin cursed under his breath as he used another zombie for leverage and kicked off the face of another one, jumping over some rubble and landing near the opposite passageway.

"The fuck are you?!"

"In here!"

Rin pulled out his handgun and scored a few headshots before he spiralled into a ward, decapitating another zombie and crashing into Tachibana.

"I hate you so fucking much right now," Rin seethed, "How dare you make me give a shit about you at the resolution of my dilemma. This is shoujo manga-grade bullshit. I want a refund on my feelings."

"Why are there zombies here?" Tachibana whispered back fearfully, holding his sack up in front of him like it would effectively protect him from zombies, "They should have been wiped out weeks ago from the FDMZ! That was the whole point of the FDMZ!"

"Yeah? More importantly, what the fuck were you planning to do, huh? Jump out the window?" Rin glared at the obvious escape route, "And, what, practice flying?"

"I was going to run across the roof," Tachibana's voice was incredibly shaky and, actually, that plan was not half bad, considering the situation they were in.

"Haul ass, right now," Rin grabbed a food tray off the ground and frisbeed it at a zombie in the doorway, using the lull to reload his handgun and fire off two more shots before he backed up against the window and followed Tachibana out.

"Run!"

Rin cursed Tachibana's long legs as he hastily sheathed his machete and flipped the safety back on his gun, all but shoving it in his pants as he leapt off the side of the building and landed painfully on top of Tachibana in a dumpster.

"This way!" Tachibana grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him down the side, where the trash bags overflowed onto the street, and they kept running until they saw a boarded up building. The moment they got in, they slammed as many things as they could against the entrance – desks, chairs, cabinets – and rushed deeper into the building until they were completely out of gas.

Panting, they sank onto the ground, side by side, trying to recover their breaths. After what seemed like an eternity, Rin could finally hear something other than the rapid beating of his own heart, and it seemed as though the zombies hadn't been able to track them all the way... wherever they were.

"You came back," Tachibana said, voice hoarse but undeniably happy.

"I think we need some ground rules," Rin glared at him, "Because I've just chosen to side with you, for god knows what reason, and you are going to make it worth my while."

"Oh," Tachibana said, smile watery, but present, "Okay then."