A Day In September - BTS Zombie au

18: Dead to You

The sky was still blue, bright and beautiful.

The smell of rotting corpses was pungent, intolerable to weak stomachs. Their slimy and clotted black blood was everywhere: on the cracked asphalt, on the grey sidewalk, on the nearby wreckage of twisted metal and debris,

And on Jimin's body.

His eyes looked up, seemingly at the sky but devoid of any appreciation towards it. They were almost lifeless if not for the occasional blink. His eyes were bloodshot, dry, and slightly swollen. There were tear stains on his cheeks, accompanied by splatters of blood that wasn't his—a residue of the chaos ensued before his fearful eyes. His lip was bleeding and just under his cheekbone was a bruise, slowly but surely turning purple. His clothes were covered in blood as well, like everything else was. It had dried, the passage of time slowly bringing about the calm after the storm. His view of the sky was slightly obstructed, and his movement was restricted, all by what was splayed unmoving atop him.

Jimin laid motionless under two brutes, one of their heads almost tucked into the crook of his neck while the other's chin sat on his forehead. The shoulder of the latter was just under his eyes, blocking the view of anything around him. Jimin had no other choice but to rely on the sounds around him—the sounds of the dead still stumbling and shuffling around just a couple feet around him. Despite the obvious presence of brutes, the coast was mostly clear. After what happened with the horde, Jimin feared moving a single bone in his body. His head echoed with Mara's screams for him, and his heart stung painfully as he was forced to keep quiet, to refrain from reassuring Mara that no, he had not been eaten alive and yes, he was still here. Her cries for help grew faint; then they halted completely. Jimin could only shed silent tears, stifling his sobs as to remain unnoticed by the horde. He feared the worst, but held hope of her safety, albeit not with him anymore.

Alone.

Alone besides the wind that blew solemn tunes—that cooled his sweating face. He wanted nothing more than to throw the bodies off of him, wishing to scrub until his skin was reddened raw. However, patience was crucial. Too hasty and he could fail at concealing himself and there would be an endless uproar. Jimin was stubborn, and he refused to fail, so despite the rising temperatures under the corpses, he remained still, silent, unwavering. He had a perplexing tenacity even Mara couldn't explain, but it had kept him alive thus far. Being alive meant seeing his brothers again, being alive meant good things.

Did it?

After a long, insipid wait full of thoughts on past unfulfilled endeavors, Jimin slowly began to slide the bodies off of him. He started with the first, gagging at the feeling of the brutes skin unsticking from his—so long in contact had almost fused them together. The sound was revolting to Jimin, but not as much at the guts that sloshed out of the brutes stomach. The squelch of brittle bones and rotting skin was causing bile to rise in disgust. Once its body was off of him, Jimin moved on to the next. This body, more intact than the last one, was heavier. Jimin looked down at the corpse, face once contorted with repugnance slowly growing somber at the sight of what lay on him. Its skin was pale, veins green and protruding. It's eyes were open—an ocean blue turned a dull gray under a layer of milky white. Her hair was blonde, dirtied by mud and blood. Her clothes were dirty, but still somewhat presentable. Her face was delicate, almost left untouched weren't it for the violent gash between her eyebrows. In all the mayhem, Jimin hadn't quite taken the time to study who he was hacking away at. His only concern was keeping up the fight, regardless of whatever came at him. The blood that trailed from her wound was the end of her story.

She was young, and her life had been taken from her.

She had recently turned, and her gentle features were now at rest. No longer was her body used as a vessel for the virus that wreaked havoc—that most likely ripped her from her family.