The Rewind Part 1

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God.

Things felt so hazy to you.

Five days, cramped up into a safe room. You barely slept in your own anxiousness.

It started when you had just reached safety. You had been worming your way through countless hordes' prying hands tearing small lines of blood in the both of your skins. It hadn't effected you.

Not in the slightest.

But, your companion?

You couldn't comment with the way he suddenly lost his strength.

The first few hours were torture, tending over your injured companion.

All the minuscule scratches he had endured through masses of infected people, clearly caught up to him, trembling legs unable to properly support himself.

Hauling him in through the door, placing him down with the backpack as his pillow, he laid feverishly on the ground, propped up only by your lowly beaten up backpack.

It had only just started.

The turning process.

You were calm.

You had to be.

But as the first hour ticked past and his labored breathing persisted, you began to crack.

His pants came out quick and fast, with shuddering and pain littered through them.

His groans were quiet, always considerate even now when death seemed to beckon to him.

You had known what was happening, yet you couldn't keep yourself from trying to stop this.

'It was a cold.'

You had repeated in your mind. Persistently you retold yourself these words.

"You have a cold.", you had said to him, "You'll get better." A quiet whisper, sniffling throughout it as though speaking would help.

Even though he couldn't focus on what you were saying, and his thoughts were drifting from conscious to unconscious, you had repeated this to him, wiping sweat off his brow with a rag and leaning over him with a desperate look in your eye.

As you spoke, another dam in your mind broke down, and yet another fresh onslaught of tears bubbled to your eyes.

"You're not-" You choked on your own voice, a shattered sob leaping forth from your throat, "You-" you sobbed again, pressing your head onto his chest and clutching the rag in your hand with a deathly hold.

A few more weeping seconds and you finally gritted out the end to your words, "You're not going to leave me."

That was the first hour.

The second passed in a very similar fashion, your blubbering bawls filling the room as you tried anything you could to tend to him. Cleaning scratches, wiping sweat, whispering words he couldn't quite hear under his own breathing.

The third was the same, albeit you had finally begun to settle, running fingers through his hair and whispering to him in the most soothing voice you could manage. The panting never seemed to end.

When he had finally passed out, either from pain, or sheer exhaustion, it was the fourth hour into this mess.

And with a heavy heart, you pulled him onto your lap, hand still stroking his hair, only if to calm yourself.

Tears fell in a dribbled mess onto his face as you sat hunched over him, engraving a face into your mind that you felt you might never see again.

By the fifth hour, you still couldn't will yourself to sleep. Arms holding tightly to him and hand aching with the constant petting. He looked dead on your lap, and you couldn't bear to stare any longer, instead choosing to look blankly at the ceiling.

The rest of that day passed by in sleep. A sleep so restless and heavy in your heart that you woke every time you closed your eyes, and strained to see him each time you inevitably were jolted awake.

When the sun had just began to rise and the birds chirped and the condensation hung heavy in the air, you were awake. Eyes half lidded and sore from the crying. Your voice felt raw. Your wrist felt almost sprained with the incessant stroking. And anything you tried to tell yourself didn't seem to work.

The only thing you could do was focus on his breathing. He was alive.

Alive and kicking.

An hour after the sun had risen, and you finally shifted him off of you, a feeling of dread sinking into you as you searched for things to aid him with.

Water.

For when he woke up.

Not if.

Even mentioning 'if' made you shake was the urge to re-dampen your still red cheeks with tears.

Promptly after placing the water in a good place, you had pulled him back onto your lap, sucking in a sharp and woeful breath of air.

Water.

For when he wakes up.

Focus on the breathing.

Two more hours of wrist breaking petting, and he finally stirred, rolling his body as if trying to find comfort.

You gladly extended your arms to him, pulling him into a hug, despite his still unconscious state.

Water.

Breathing.

He's fine.

The scratches were nothing.

Another two hours, and he had rolled several more times. But had begun to show increasing discomfort. Tightening his lips in a sour frown, eyebrows furrowing, and eyes squeezing further closed. He placed a whimpering hand onto the arm that neglected to caress his hair, simply holding it in a loose grip.

Then, the more dreadful stage began.

Another hour in and his discomfort skyrocketed.

With a start, he sprung up off of your lap, desperately shaking and rapidly glancing around the room. Try as you might, you couldn't grab his attention, and he let out a panicked yelp of a cry.

By the time you forced him to look at you, a mere few seconds of grabbing his shoulders and spinning him in your direction, he lifted his hands to claw at his face in an intense and self destructive way.

No matter of pleading and begging stopped him, so you took it in stride and began to pry his hands away from his face to spare his beautiful and bright green eyes.

He writhed against your grip, wishing to tear at himself, before something seemed to click in his head.

His eyes were becoming murkier. Not quickly, but since the last time you saw them they already seemed to be covered in a film.

"Are you...." you started, tightening your grip on his wrists for a moment and keeping the low whisper in your mind of something worse at bay, "Okay now?"

His eyes darted everywhere, hot breath fanning your face as he tried to catch lost air.

He took a moment, shaking his head, fluttering his eyes, before finally narrowing in on you.

"Y-" A pause, knees buckling at a sudden loss of strength, "Ye..ah...."

Shifting a supportive hand around his back, you lowered him to the ground, kneeling next to him as he became more aware of things.

"I just...." A shiver ran down his spine and his hand pressed against his head, "I don't know what came over me."

You gave him a sour look, "You tried to claw your eyes out- I'd like more details." Raising a hand, you wiped at the blood running down the trails his raking finger nails left behind.

"Hell, you almost did claw them out- if I hadn't of stopped you." You shuddered to yourself, "I don't want to think about it."

You expected a sarcastic quip back. Something to boldly flare his spitfire personality around.

But he didn't reply, merely pulling his knees closer to his chest and letting blood continue to drip out of the gouged marks.

Those could get infected.

You'd best clean them.

"Come here." One would think patting a hand beside yourself would be an obvious social que to scoot closer, yet he still kept quiet, muttering to himself and tapping his fingers on his shin with a quick flurry of off beat drums.

In a situation like this, you were obviously concerned, and voiced those concerns by placing an arm on his shoulder.

The expected outcome was him coming to and saying something like, 'oh shoot, yeah.' Or, 'sorry, spaced out a little.'

But when he twisted his body in your direction with a loud ass snarl that sounded like the belt of a motorcycle, flat teeth bared as though they were that of a predators, and eyes so flared with anger, you were obviously frightened, jolting back almost entirely.

"What the hell!" Was the first thing you said, the recoiled hand near your chest tightening.

He snapped into focus again, blinking and scattering his focus around the room before looking to you.

"Shit- I didn't." He frowned, "I don't-" he frowned just a little harder, "I'm....."

"....Infected...." you finished for him, voice uttering out a quiet and mournful tone you wished would have never had to have been used.


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