[Closed] It's close to the worst thing to happen.

[justgaveup]

Who| Perry (justgaveup) and R (shambler)
What| Julie is gone.
Where| District 4 suites.
When| Friday afternoon.
Warnings/Notes| Cursing, angst, the usual warnings.

They don't let you know too many things here. Everything had to be a surprise, because doesn't everyone love a good surprise? You would think that the people in the Capitol would understand that the tributes did not like surprises. Surprises are what got you killed in the arena. Surprises are what screw people over.

He'd been here weeks, and Perry was still getting used to this place. And when he went to go see Julie, he was a little nervous. There was history there, so much of it, and then more history that he had no idea about. Meeting your ex was just supposed to happen when you died, and he hadn't been prepared for it. But his nervousness had started to go away, the more he saw her. Talked to her. It couldn't go back to the way it was, and he knew that. But it was a start.

Except she wasn't there today. At all. She wasn't in her room, on her floor. She just... was gone. So Perry went to the only other person who could know, and who would care. Who he'd watched die, except he didn't die then (as he learned, guiltily, much later), except he was dead now.

As soon as he got into the District 4 suites, he went looking around for R. When he finally found him, he wasted no time.

"Have you seen Julie today?"

Comments

[shambler]

R wasn't ready for Perry. The fact was he was never ready for him, even if he would've seen him coming down the hall, waiting to get let in by the Escort, if he'd had any warning at all. He called it the Perry Kelvin Effect.

He sat slumped over on his bed, his shoulders as limp as the hands in his lap and giving the impression of a corpse about to tip over. At Perry's voice, R glanced up, stared like a lost patrol for several seconds too long, his mouth parted slightly behind the muzzle that was caked with old black drool. He had to remember how to speak, realizing as he worked his mouth and tongue that he was getting rusty.

"No," R said, that one syllable so harsh he could feel it cutting across his tongue, the roof of his mouth. "Think...gone. Home."

Maybe. Howard had said she was effectively safe, back with her own kind and he'd assumed Perry would've gone back with her. They could try to start over, work things out and maybe, just maybe, Perry would remember what it was like to care about stuff besides survival and rationing. Seeing Perry outlined by the door shot the idea out of the air. So. Julie's ex and a zombie who frankly wasn't sure if he'd been Julies anything. A friend, maybe.

"Hope...she's...o-kay," R mumbled, unable to face Perry's Dead black eyes again.

[justgaveup]

That nailed it, then. If R said she'd gone home, then she'd gone home. Maybe he could have been lying, Perry wasn't sure if that was something he did. But he didn't think so. Why would you lie about something like this? But now that he knew that her being gone was true, the little light that had been getting started in him just snuffed itself out.

She was gone. Perry leaned back, using the wall against his back to hold him up, because he wasn't sure if he could do it on his own.

"...She'll be okay. She's tough, and smart, and strong." Perry muttered. "She'll be good." His baby girl was gone.

[shambler]

R couldn't help it: he wanted to look away to give Perry at least the privacy of those few seconds to adjust, but he didn't. He had to watch as emotions flitted across the Living boy's face, a sagging of the shoulders that went defensively rigid, the way his eyes went blank as if he'd been punched. His face looked for a moment like it wanted to crumple.

Perry steeled himself as he braced against the wall, looking down as if he was trying to convince himself that in a world where he could kill himself by zombie, Julie would of course be fine, no matter what. He just had to believe hard enough.

It was a failing they both had, apparently.

"Ho-ward said...home. District," R tried to supply more information, determined to be helpful in whatever little way he could. "Maybe...corpse free."

He hoped. It might mean Julie couldn't see Nora or her dad or the people she was crammed shoulder to shoulder with behind the Wall, but R had this idea that any place that was zombie-free had to be a good one. She'd be okay, just like Perry said.