Chapter Text
An (Incomplete) Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse, Ch. 30
May 1st, 1999 – 6:48 am
The drive back to the Lab is filled with laughter and questions and more joy than Tim has heard from his ragtag little crew in the past several months combined.
“It’s a miracle he’s alive,” Wade murmurs, eyebrow raised as he glances in the rearview mirror. Tim follows his gaze to see Angela laughing with her head on Jackson’s shoulder. Her cheeks are flushed red and she looks like she’s nearly glowing with happiness, her face backlit by the morning sunrise.
“We all assumed he was dead. We left supplies behind, just in case, but…”
It seems like an entire lifetime ago that he’d stumbled upon Lucy and the others at the hospital he’d woken up in, but in reality it’s been less than two months.
Two months.
He can barely wrap his head around that minuscule amount of time.
It feels like he’s known Lucy for forever, loved her forever.
“It was the guys that kidnapped us in the woods,” Jackson says, sticking his head in the small opening between the cab and the back of the truck to address Tim. “They caught me. I guess… I guess they were still hanging around in the woods. I got away from the hoard of Zombies after losing track of Celina, and then… well, eventually I managed to convince them I’d be useful to them. I’ve been traveling with them ever since, hoping I’d stumble upon you guys again. I told them about the broadcast from Baltimore, but when we arrived, it was kind of a mess. We didn’t stick around long.”
Tim grins, remembering the chaos they’d left behind for Rosalind.
“That was us,” he says, chuckling darkly.
Sure, they’d lost the RV, but everything had turned out okay in the end — minus the kidnappings, gunshot wounds, broken ribs, and everything they’d endured to get where they are now.
Now they’re at the Lab, relatively safe, and Lucy is working on a cure.
It’s a whole new world.
A world in which there’s hope.
“Literally so much has happened since you … disappeared,” Angela sighs, and Jackson smiles as he leans into her and bumps her shoulder with his playfully.
“Yeah? Tell me all about it.”
Tim half listens as Angela recounts their journey, but his eyes are on Jackson as the younger man nods and hums at all the right places.
He’s healthy, and alive.
But he’s different.
He’s not the wide-eyed innocent he once was, and Tim knows by the darkness in his gaze and the set of his shoulders that he’s seen things.
He’s done things.
Before, he’d never killed a human.
Now?
Tim would bet good money that he has.
“ — and then Lucy threatened Caleb so now he’s working for us.”
Jackson’s eyebrows are raised so high they’re in danger of lifting straight off of his forehead, and Tim can’t blame him.
It’s been a wild few months.
“Did we… have we lost anyone?” he asks, cautious.
Angela shakes her head.
“No, only…”
Only you.
“We gained some friends, too. Wade’s group, including Jan, here. They saved our lives.”
Jackson shakes Jan’s hand and roses a smile at where Wade is watching them in the rearview mirror.
“Well, any friend of Angela’s is a friend of mine.”
Angela chuckles and then wraps her arms around Jackson, laying her head on his shoulder and holding on tightly.
She doesn’t let go of him even once the rest of the way back to the Lab.
____________________
May 1st, 1999 – 5:12 pm
Tim jumps out of the truck before Wade has even parked it, holstering his gun and eagerly searching the faces present for Lucy.
Where is she?
The rest of their little ragtag group of survivors has already started picking through the supplies they’d brought back, the kids exclaiming over the pudding and applesauce cups they’d found while the adults look at the bags of rice and beans with obvious relief on their weary faces.
They’d been mere days from starvation, and what they’d found will last them a good, long time.
Not to mention they can always go back for more if needed.
He’s about to pause Nolan to ask where Lucy is when he hears her voice ring out through the morning air, high and excited as she exits the lab and lays eyes on the newest member of their group.
“Jackson?!”
Nolan whips his head around at the name, and suddenly Lucy’s isn’t the only voice yelling for the man they’d lost so many weeks ago and presumed to be dead. Celina squeals and throws herself at Jackson as he climbs down from the truck, hugging him around the waist while Nolan and Wesley drop the bags they’re carrying to run toward him, too.
Tim watches, his cheeks hurting from the force of his smile as Jackson picks Lucy up and swings her around. He laughs with them from afar, delighted that in all of the chaos and uncertainty, they can still have this moment of pure joy.
“Oh my god, I can’t believe this! You’re … oh my god!”
By the time Tim steps forward to join the celebrating group, Lucy is a mess of tears. She’s sobbing but smiling, her beautiful brown eyes wide and wet as her hands hover over Jackson’s body, unsure if she wants to hug him or hit him or check him over for injuries like a mother hen. Tim pulls her body to his before she can do any of the three, tucking her against his chest and wrapping his arm around her waist as he smiles at the others.
“We should continue this inside,” he murmurs, letting his eyes roam the empty streets. “We’re making a lot of noise.”
Lucy winces at the reminder that they’re never truly alone and nods, reaching for Jackson’s hand to pull him along.
“Yes, right. Yes, we should do that. But oh my god, Jackson! You have to tell us everything!”
Jackson laughs and pulls Lucy to his side and out of Tim’s arms, noisily kissing the side of her head as they walk back to the truck that still needs to be unloaded. Wade’s people, not as affected by Jackson’s return since they didn’t know him, have already started, but there’s a lot to unload and not a lot of sunlight left.
They keep up a constant stream of chatter as they unload bags of dried food, cases of water bottles, and then, very last, their spoils from the pharmacy.
“We found some of those pads you wanted me to look for,” Tim murmurs, his eyes darting to Angela’s as she buries the bag of pregnancy tests under a second bag of tampons. “For Tamara.”
Lucy kisses his cheek, smiling as she takes the boxes of Teen Spirit! Pads from him.
“You’re the best.”
Tim chuckles and squeezes her waist, and then moves over toward Angela under the guise of helping her.
“Can I get a few of those?”
Angela nods and transfers several of the tests to Tim’s bag. He covers them with the diabetes supplies he needs to give to Nolan, and then glances inside the truck cab to make sure they haven’t forgotten anything. It’s empty, and he quickly locks it before pocketing the keys and heading back inside, scanning the rapidly darkening horizon for any unwelcome visitors (alive or not) before locking the front door of the lab, moving a metal bookshelf in front of it, and then following the others inside.
The main room of the lab, what use to be a reception area, he assumes, is now piled high with the goods they’d brought home.
“And there’s plenty more where this came from!” Wade announces, smiling widely as he pats one of the bags of rice. “Virtually untouched.”
“We need to work on a schedule of runs to bring back more supplies,” Tim interrupts, sighing as he leans against the now-empty reception desk. “We were attacked by another group on the way home — if any of them escaped, they now know there’s a huge stockpile of supplies just waiting for them. We need to get everything we can, and we need to do it soon.”
A somber mood takes over the group as Lucy’s eyes snap to his.
“You were attacked?”
Tim nods, but Jackson speaks before he can.
“The men I was with… the ones who attacked us, back on the highway? There’s more of them. We were just a scouting group. They’ll send more men.”
“Then it’s not safe,” Lucy argues, shaking her head. “No more runs. We have what we need.”
“You didn’t see this place, Lucy,” Tim says, pushing off of the desk to walk toward her. “It’s everything we’ve been looking for. Everything we could need. Food, clothes for the kids, medicine, everything. We have to go back. This is just a small portion of what there was. If we want to survive, we have to.”
“It’s not worth you being attacked again,” Lucy argues, her hands crossing over her chest as her eyes very obviously run over his body, likely checking for injuries. “There’s more men? How many more?”
Jackson sighs. “A lot. It was a group of about twenty. Lots of in-fighting, arguing — they’re a volatile group.”
Lucy chews her lip.
“Lucy,” Tim pleads, shaking his head as he reaches a hand out to press to her hip. She glares at him, shaking her head.
“No.”
“Yes. We have to.”
“I agree,” Wade cuts in, his voice soft. “We have children to feed.”
“We have enough food,” Lucy counters, her gaze not leaving Tim’s. “This is enough.”
“For how long?” Tim asks, his voice lower as he tries to reason with his girlfriend. “What happens when we run out? By then, the place will have been raided, and we’ll be out of luck.”
Lucy bites her lip and lets her gaze drop to the floor.
Tim knows he’s getting through to her, though he hates that she’s this upset about something he knows has to be done.
“Look, I know it’s dangerous. We know now, and we’ll be more prepared next time. We’ll send more men, more weapons. We’ll travel more quickly since we know the way. It’ll be a two day trip, maximum. It’ll be safer.”
“But you could get hurt,” she whispers, and Tim sighs as he glances up to see that most everyone has moved to the side, carrying on quiet side conversations as they pick through their spoils. It’s become clear to them that this conversation has turned personal, and Tim is thankful for the illusion of privacy that they’ve been given.
“I’ll be careful, okay? I swear, Lucy, I will come back to you. But we have to do this. We have to feed our people, right? The kids?”
Lucy glances away from him and toward where little Aaron is holding up a pudding cup, his fingers already covered in the sticky chocolate. Tamara and Celina are laughing with him, trying to get a bite of the sugary goodness.
The first real treat that they’ve had in months.
Celina’s jeans are several inches too short and Aaron isn’t wearing shoes.
The Costco they’d found has those things, and she knows as well as he does that they have to do this.
“Okay,” she whispers, sighing as she slumps against Tim. “But… Tim, it was awful waiting for you to come home. I missed you.”
Tim pulls her close to his chest and Lucy presses her ear over his heart, taking comfort in the steady beating as they watch the excitement and happiness on the faces of their group. Jackson has hoisted Aaron onto his shoulders and is running around the room, the girls begging for their turn as Aaron shrieks in happiness.
“I missed you, too,” he murmurs. “But we’re here, and no one is leaving for a little while. Plus, it won’t always be me going out. We’ll alternate making runs and guarding Caleb.”
Lucy makes a noise at the mention of Caleb.
“He’s insufferable,” she groans. “Taunting me the whole time about how you’d die, how you weren’t coming back. I almost shot him.”
Tim growls, pressing a kiss to Lucy’s hair as he frowns in the direction of the lab they have Caleb locked up in.
“I’ll shoot him for you,” he offers, but Lucy just shakes her head with a quiet laugh.
“No, but thank you. Unfortunately we can’t. We’re getting close.”
Tim pulls back, raising an eyebrow as Lucy steps out of his embrace, knowing that they can’t stay here all day. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” she confirms, nodding. “I’m really close, Tim.”
Tim smiles, pride for Lucy rushing through his veins.
“You’re going to save the word, baby.”
Lucy flushes but Tim is having absolutely none of it.
“No, listen, Lucy. If you pull this off… you will literally be saving the world, and I am so proud of you.”
Lucy scoffs and waves a hang between them, trying to dispel the heavy air suddenly surrounding them. “Let’s just take it one day at a time, okay? We’re not there just yet. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”
Tim wants to argue but he also knows that there are other important things to attend to — putting away their supplies, for starters, though the pregnancy tests in the bag he’s holding are also beginning to weigh heavily on him.
He needs to know.
They need to know.
“Let’s help get this stuff put away,” he murmurs, knowing that the sooner they’re finished, the sooner he can haul her back to their quarters.
______________________
Once they’re back in their room, Tim takes the tests out of his back pocket and lays them on the bed in front of Lucy.
It takes a second for her to process what’s in front of her, but Tim clocks the exact moment she realizes what the boxes are and, more importantly, what they mean.
She gasps, pressing a hand over her mouth as her eyes flicker between the tests and Tim’s face.
“Angela brought up a good point while we were out,” he murmurs, reaching for her hand and pulling her to sit next to him on the bed, the tests sitting innocently beside them. “We haven’t had condemns in… a while. And we have exactly abstained.”
Lucy whimpers, and Tim wishes he could make this better but he can’t.
“Shit,” she whispers. “We should have thought… god, how stupid are we?”
Tim shakes his head, tightening his grip on her hand.
“We’re barely even adults, Lucy, and we’re trying to save the entire fucking world. We were stressed and didn’t think about the consequences. That hardly makes us stupid.”
“I should have thought about it, though,” Lucy argues, but Tim shakes his head.
“What’s done is done. But… you should probably take a test.”
Lucy bites her lip but nods slowly.
“What about… Angela? The others?”
Tim reaches for one of the tests, pulling it out of its box and quickly scanning the directions and expiration date. It’s still good for a few more months, he notes, and wonders what they’ll do when there are no more pregnancy tests.
“Angela is taking one, too. I don’t know if any of the other women need them, but she said she’ll ask Wade. For our group, it’s just the two of you.”
Lucy blows out a breath and takes the test that Tim hands her.
“Come with me?”
Tim smiles and takes her hand as she stands. “Of course, Luce.”
She entwines their fingers and then leads him through the hallway of the dormitory section of the Lab. They’re at the end of the hallway, so they have to pass everyone else’s rooms to reach the bathroom. Thankfully no one stops them or even pays them any attention, and before he even has time to prepare for how his life might be about to change, Tim is leaning up against the stall door while Lucy sits and pees on the test before quickly cleaning up.
“Three minutes,” she murmurs, placing it face down on the counter as she washes her hands.
Tim quickly wraps the little plastic stick in paper towels and then takes Lucy’s hand again, guiding her through the hallway and back into the privacy of their room where she collapses on the bed, her eyes red and wet as he lays the test face down on the bedside table.
“What are we going to do?” Lucy asks, sighing as she drops her head against Tim’s back. He’s perched on the edge of the bed, his hands clasped between his knees, his knees bouncing up and down anxiously as they wait.
“Have a baby, I guess,” he says, and though he’s not trying to be funny, Lucy laughs a little bit.
“I guess there aren’t that many options, huh?”
Tim shakes his head slowly.
“I more meant… god, how do you raise a baby while being chased by zombies? This is… this is something out of a nightmare.”
“It could be negative,” Tim points out, but Lucy just shakes her head.
“Not for long, though. There are no more condoms that we can find. No birth control. So, unless we just… give up sex altogether, eventually… eventually it will be positive.”
Tim swallows thickly as he imagines a hazy future in which Lucy is pregnant and he’s teaching a young child how to cut down trees and hunt deer (or people).
Their lives are fucked up, that’s for sure.
Everything is so different than he’d ever imagined his life would be.
The test beeps, pulling Tim from his thoughts, and he sucks in a desperate breath as he reaches for it.
Lucy whimpers against his back, and because he knows it’ll be easier for him to look than for her to do it, he flips it over.
“Oh, thank fuck,” he whispers, holding up the test so that Lucy can see where she’s basically hiding behind him. “Negative.”
Lucy sighs, dropping her forehead to his shoulder.
“For now,” she murmurs, pressing her cheek to his. They breathe heavily in the silence for several long moments, letting the relief wash over them as they stare at the clear Negative on the screen of the test.
“We should… we should probably be more careful,” Tim murmurs, staring at the test for a long moment before dropping it in the small trash can beside the bed. “We can… time your cycles, or something.”
Lucy chuckles softly as Tim lays back on the narrow, twin bed, taking her with him. She throws a leg over his and tucks her head into the crook of his neck, sighing in contentment as Tim runs his fingers through her hair slowly.
“I can start trying to track it, but it’s… it’s so random. The stress, the malnutrition… everything’s out of whack. I doubt it’d be much help.”
“I can pull out,” Tim murmurs, his eyes fluttering closed as Lucy’s heart beats in time with his own. “Or we can… we can just stop having sex.”
Lucy makes a noise and Tim laughs.
“We don’t have to stop everything,” he says, sliding his hand down her back to pat her ass. “Just penetration.”
“So romantic,” Lucy grumbles, and Tim rolls his eyes as he pulls the blanket over them.
“And not very realistic, long term.”
“I’m close,” Lucy murmurs, exhaustion tinging her voice. Tim wonders if she’d slept much, or at all, while he was gone. “Once we have a cure…”
“Yeah,” Tim whispers, nodding. “Once we have a cure the world needs repopulating, anyway, right?”
Lucy doesn’t respond, but Tim doesn't blame her. He knows the idea of pregnancy and birth scare her, especially in a world without medical care.
“Let’s not worry about it for now,” he murmurs, pressing a kiss to her hair. “For now, let’s rest. Tomorrow we can worry about everything else.”
“Tomorrow,” Lucy agrees sleepily, and while she falls asleep quickly, Tim lays away for a long time wondering what the future will bring.