A/N: Hi all!! sorry for not updating for a while i lost a lot of motivation LOL... but i'm gonna kind of rush through the sickness arc bc its lowk hard to write... plz bear with me as i try to stuff it into this chapter
❝ 𝖥𝖮𝖮𝖫 𝖤𝖭𝖮𝖴𝖦𝖧 𝖳𝖮 𝖠𝖫𝖬𝖮𝖲𝖳 𝖡𝖤 𝖨𝖳,
𝖢𝖮𝖮𝖫 𝖤𝖭𝖮𝖴𝖦𝖧 𝖳𝖮 𝖭𝖮𝖳 𝖰𝖴𝖨𝖳𝖤 𝖲𝖤𝖤 𝖨𝖳 . ❞
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A week later, people were getting very sick.
Ross had never seen anything like it, not even before. It was like some awful, magnified strand of the flu. People were bleeding from every oraface possible. by some magical coincidence, he hasn't gotten sick yet, but pretty much everyone else who'd been in the cell has. Carl and Leon were with the rest of the kids somewhere else, Hershel there to watch them. Alfie and Glenn had gotten sick, and it was obvious that Zoe was worrying herself to death over it.
Ross was keeping his distance while trying to be as helpful as possible. He and Zoe had made makeshift masks for everyone who'd been helping those who were infected. The prison's doctor had described the disease as people's blood becoming too hot and "boiling over". That only inspired Ross to stay farther away. Bowie had been more open with him, gravitating more towards him and Zoe than his own cell. They talked everything from music to movies to old high-school lives. Both the boys desperately wanted to keep Zoe's mind off of her dying brother.
Carol disappeared one day with Rick, and he questioned his uncle when he had returned without her.
"She killed Karen. I had to." Rick confesses, distraught by the decision he had to make.
It took Ross by surprise— he hadn't expected Carol to be capable of something like that. But he had to keep moving; if he was meant to see her again, he would. She could definitely survive on her own.
Three days later, Alfie was dead.
Ross held Zoe when Maggie broke the news, and the screams torn from her chest will never be gone from his ears. He couldn't imagine the feeling; what would he do if it was Carl who was dead?
Daryl took a group to grab medicine, and Ross fought tooth and nail to get to go with no success. The older man shot him some bullshit about "holding everyone together". That was nowhere near Ross' pay-grade.
Time began to squish together and skew. People were dying and killing each other in a place he considered home and he didn't know how to deal with it other than putting himself to work and trying his best not to revert to old habits— old habits that, in the old world, only ever brought him hardships and hospitals.
One night, far past when anyone should be awake, Ross sat on the edge of the staircase in a ghost-town cell block. it was almost completely empty, people either infected or dead or out on a run. His head hung in his hands as he listened to Zoe toss and turn and sob, knowing there was absolutely nothing he could do to help. His breaking point was crawling only closer and closer, because God, what else is there to do in Ross' world but break?
Footsteps crept down the stairs behind him, stirring him from his place of solace. A small apology tumbled from his lips as he shoved his own body aside to make room for whoever was coming. To his shock, the person stopped and sat next to him— a familiar blond tuft of hair came into his peripheral. Bowie.
"What's keeping you up at this hour of the night?" The older boy's voice seeps into Ross' ears like honey, or medicine, or something else good enough to make him untense.
He gestured vaguely towards Zoe's cell. "I feel guilty."
Bowie scoffs, and Ross finally turns his head to fully look at him. An amused, bitter half-smile resided on the blond's face. "Well you didn't kill Alfie, did you?"
"Well, no, but—"
"Then you shouldn't feel guilty." Bowie cut him off. Ross knew he was right, but there was this weight in his chest that wanted so badly to prove him otherwise.
Instead of saying that, Ross opts to just shrug. "I fought for them, you know. Zoe and Alfie."
"What do you mean?" Bowie's head tilts in curiosity, and it feels as if the two boys are getting closer with every sentence, like some sort of sick gravitational pull.
"The prison wasn't always... this. It used to just be all the leaders of this place. And Carl, obviously. But Rick was incredibly unwell, as his wife had just died," Ross pauses at the stinging memory of Lori.
"Zoe, Alfie, Tyreese, Sasha, and a handful of others all wandered into the prison through a back exit that we hadn't found. Rick sent them away like it was nothing, and I just... exploded on him. I mean, God, I don't even remember half of what I said. But yeah, he still sent them away. But I fought so hard."
"And now you think maybe if you hadn't, Alfie would be alive because they wouldn't be in the prison?" Bowie practically read Ross' mind with that one. It left him quiet and full of shame.
"Ross..." Bowie lays a single, gentle hand on his shoulder, and the other can't help the choked breath he inhaled to keep the flood of emotions in. That same hand guided him to Bowie's own shoulder and the floodgates opened up.
Bowie held him that night, close but not too close, and didn't complain once through harsh noises and panicked breaths.
Recovery comes slow.
Daryl returns with medicine and people get better. Glenn gets better and Ross could not be more thankful. He's able to see Carl for the first time in a long time. Nobody took Alfie's passing easy, but Zoe was starting to come outside again.
He was sitting in his and Carl's cell with his friend Leon, teaching them to play war with a crusty set of cards. He was smiling, really smiling for the first time in weeks.
"You're cheating again!" Carl exclaims, pointing at Leon with a joking finger. The latter explodes in laughter while vehemently denying.
"Woah, woah. Okay, shake your sleeve out again Leon," Ross tries to sound stern but the smile on his face proves him otherwise.
A pile of six or seven cards fly out, and Carl just about keels over at the sight, throwing his own deck down in a display of defiance. "I quit!"
"Sounds like loser speak to me," Leon mutters, causing Carl to kick him.
Ross tsks as he reshuffles the deck. "This is the fourth time one of you has quit. No one has won yet."
"Whatever! My brother taught me everything I know. We should play poker," Leon's smile is a little evil for a fourteen year old.
Ross had no idea the younger boy had a brother; he was intrigued. "You have a brother? Tell us more."
Leon's smile becomes bittersweet as he draws into himself, fiddling with his hands in his lap. "Well, it's kind of funny. We look nothing alike. His hair was blond and pin-straight. He was kind of smooth-talking, especially in school. He loved music and collected cassettes, CD's, records, everything." Leon pauses, laughing softly to himself. "God, he had this stupid walkman with these ugly orange headphones. But I miss him so much."
As Leon spoke, gears began to turn in Ross' head. The description was eerily familiar to a certain boy he knew— one who had been searching for his brother who he claimed looks nothing likes him.
"What's your brother's name?" He asks, handing Carl the deck of cards.
"Bowie. My mom was a huge fan of David Bowie. He used to be really embarrassed by it, but—"
"Oh my God, Leon your brother is here," Ross stands up and grabs Leon, dragging him out to where he hoped Bowie was. Carl was not far behind.
"Where's Bowie?" He asks Zoe when the trio get downstairs, just before leaving the cellblock.
Zoe looks up from whatever she was doing, confusion blanketed on her face. "He went out to his impala at the edge of the woods to grab some cassettes, he's finally grabbing the one you wanted. Why?"
"I'll tell you later." Ross darts out of the cellblock, going to find Daryl to open the gate when he's met by a sight that's not unfamiliar, but one that makes his blood run cold. The governor, tanks, Michonne and Hershel. Michonne's katana.
"Fuck, guys get back inside. Stay there and grab a gun." He mumbles, pushing them back towards where they came.
The next few moments played out in flashes. Hershel was dead. There was someone driving through the gate. Gunfire was becoming static as he fired at whoever he didn't recognize. Bodies dropped like flies and Ross didn't have time to think about doing anything but keep fucking firing.
He fired until he made his way back into the cell block, who knows how long later. He began looking for the two boys, hoping to God they listened to him.
Leon was at the top of the stairs, holding a rifle with shaking hands and wide eyes. "Ross?"
"Yeah, it's me." Ross wipes a mix of blood and sweat off his brow. "Where's Carl?"
"I— I don't know. I'm so sorry." He frowns, his mouth wobbling as he drops the rifle. Ross just hushes him, pulling him close.
"Don't worry. We'll get out of here and find him— no one could have gotten far. Come on."
The pair barely makes it out of a back entrance of the prison, narrowly avoiding a fleet of walkers or foot soldiers or God knows what else. As they walk, Ross swears on his life under the Georgia sun that he will find his family, and Leon's again.
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AHHH end of pt1!!
tysm for reading, looking forward to more chapters >:)