Disclaimer: We don't own the X-Men, but if we did they'd be doing a lot more interesting stuff.

This is set in an AU of the RPG Evolution Unbound and involves a world that has been over-run by zombies as the result of an unknown plague. It's written in role-playing format and alternates between Kurt and Rogue's POVs. Rogue's POV was written by Quing and Kurt's by taekwondodo. Boldface indicates a quote being used from the previous character, italics indicate thought and this indicates dialogue in German.

Rogue
—
Zombies. There were motherfucking zombies all over the goddamn place, they'd been there for some time. At first, she'd been reluctant to accept that. Because really. Zombies. Zombies didn't exist. They weren't real, they were made up to scare little kids and sell movies. Or so she'd thought. Now she knew better.

Grabbing a parking meter, she swung it at the head of an approaching zombie, leaning over the body as it hit the wall a few feet away with a satisfying thud, what was left of its head crumpling and sliding to the ground in a gooey mess.

"You'd better fucking stay dead this time, or so help me God I will..." Shit, death threats didn't really work on the undead. And swearing anything to God packed even less of a punch than normal. Earth was Godless. Kicking the sad sack of flesh in the ribs, she turned back to Kurt, who was working on burying the bodies that they'd been too late to save.

It had been a regular patrol; they'd been doing them for a while, trying to find any actual living, breathing people that were still around. Saw a group of zombies attacking some kids, and flown down to help. Unfortunately, the zombies had already killed the kids, leaving the two young mutants to clean up the mess. In the process of destroying the zombies and preparing the burial site for the kids, they'd made a much larger mess out of the area, but at least nobody was standing back up and trying to eat them. And although the kids were all infected, would probably turn, they had to try and honor the fact that they had been people mere moments before. So after making sure that their brains were completely destroyed, a task that had been completely repulsive at first but quickly became just another part of the routine, they'd started to dig.

She'd been digging right alongside him until another few undead goons decided to shamble toward them, intent on having a little snack. There had only been a few of them, though, and killing them was easy enough. Taking to the air to make sure that there weren't any other undead folks making their way toward the burial site, she shouted down to Kurt, "Looks clear."

Of course, they had a tendency to just pop out of fucking nowhere, but at least there weren't any hordes of decaying bodies coming toward them just yet. She turned in the air and swooped back down, landing softly next to him and looking down at the kids, turning her head away as her stomach decided to react violently. She'd puked enough before, and there was no way she was going to let herself do it again. Just needed to keep herself busy, couldn't think too long about what she was doing. Picking up one of the partially folded street signs that they'd been using to dig, she jumped back into the hole and put it to good use. "This is ridiculous. Why do we even bother anymore?"

Tossing a pile of dirt toward the wall where the zombie's body lay crumpled and decaying, she shook her head and turned back to Kurt. "How much longer do you think it'll be before we run out of food, before these fuckers find us and kill us too?"

Kurt

Kurt looked up from his work, not at the sickly-wet sound of once human flesh hitting the wall, but at the sound of Rogue's voice as she raged at the slumped form. It was getting to her more than usual today, it seemed, and he wished they could just call it off and go home. Get away from the filth and the stench and the soul-destroying disappointment of searching and fighting and still being too fucking late.

He didn't even flinch away from the sight of rotting flesh and protruding viscera as he turned back to his task, though his eyes did linger sadly on a nearby swing as it swayed and creaked in what would have qualified as a refreshing breeze if it hadn't carried the choking stench of putrefaction on it. He only stared for a moment, though; only briefly wondered if the children laid out nearby had thought it was safe to sneak out to the park 'for just a minute' in the middle of the afternoon before going back to methodically hacking away at the matted sod at his feet.

It was a routine now. Take out the shambling hordes of the undead at the scene and then one of them would keep an eye out for any further threat while the other scrambled the brains of the latest batch of victims and dug the graves. If they were lucky it was with help from the survivors but the latter seemed to be happening less and less lately. Too many graves and too few survivors, because more often than not they were too late. Sometimes by days and sometimes, like today, only by seconds. Some of the kids had still been screaming when they'd gotten there today, but he blanked that memory from his mind with a shudder. Had too many regrets as it was, he couldn't afford to add to them or he'd crumble under the weight and so he used the steady, mind-numbing labor of digging the grave to keep back memories of having basically pithed the tiny bodies waiting to be lowered into the hole like so many frogs in a biology class.

He turned another pile of earth out of the hole he was now almost shoulder deep in as Rogue took to the air again, checking their perimeter. He was grateful that the sprinkler system in the park still seemed to be running on automatic, though whoever was responsible for it was doubtless long dead...or undead more likely. The ground would have been too verdammt hard to dig, otherwise - well, for him anyway, not for Rogue. As it was he hacked at a tree root in his way with the edge of the stop sign Rogue had folded into a shovel like so much origami paper and tried to decide how much deeper they needed to go.

"Looks clear," Rogue called from overhead, and he tipped his head back to look up at her, pushing sweat-soaked hair back from his eyes and managing a smile, however weak, at the sight of her swooping back towards the earth. It was probably wrong in the middle of this madness that just the sight of her could still make him smile. It didn't last, though, as she looked back at the pile of bodies, her face twisting unmistakably before she picked up her own 'shovel' and set to work next to him.

"This is ridiculous. Why do we even bother anymore?"

He wasn't sure if she meant the graves or the patrols, so he chose to answer the latter, because he wasn't even sure himself about the former any more, other than to know that he couldn't not do it. Couldn't leave the desecrated remains of what had once been human life lying in the open like so much offal...or a breakfast bar for the next group of zombies that came lurching by. Anymore, he knew, than she could herself.

His voice was soft when he answered, almost unrecognizable from the low growl that seemed to be his normal tone of late. "Because sometimes we're not too late, Liebste. Sometimes..." Even if they both knew that they almost always were these days.

Tossing a pile of dirt toward the wall where the zombie's body lay crumpled, she shook her head and turned back to Kurt. "How much longer do you think it'll be before we run out of food, before these fuckers find us and kill us too?"

"I think we can survive for months on what Herr Professor had packed away in the sub-basements," he answered, matter of fact. "Man preached universal peace and love, but it looks like he was preparing for Armageddon. We can hold out as long as it takes." He tossed another shovelful, complete with a clump of tangled roots he'd hacked out, over the lip of the grave as he met her eyes, not saying the rest, what they both knew. That if they couldn't then a clean death at the hands of a friend was the best they could hope for.

He remembered Scott's face when he'd realized what had happened, that he'd been infected. Remembered how calm he'd been when he'd told them what needed to be done. How completely unrecognizable he'd been from the strong, commanding leader they'd all grown accustomed to leaning on before Herr McCoy had finally admitted defeat in his efforts to find a 'cure'...how peaceful he'd looked when they'd lowered him into the first grave on the back lawn. The first, but not the last.

Shaking his head, as though that could clear away the memories, he threw one last shovelful of dirt and roots from the hole before looking up at Rogue. "I think this is deep enough."

He reached up a hand to her, saving the energy that even such a short teleport would cost him. He hadn't eaten since this morning and there was no telling how much energy he'd have to expend before they got back and ate again. "Let's lay them to rest and then finish this patrol."

Rogue
—
It was just plain wrong. Wrong that they were burying kids, wrong that they had to hide out underground again, eating rations that tasted like shit... Wrong that, oh yeah, they'd killed some of their friends. She'd seen Scott start to turn, been there, been part of the decision that it was better to kill him than to let him become one of them. Been part of the process of killing him. It'd been a decision that Scott himself more than supported, but as she held his hand, knocking him unconscious so that the claw to the brain that Logan delivered wouldn't hurt, she'd felt the doubt, the pain, the worry. And there was nothing that she could do about it. There was nothing that any of them could do now except for try to keep on top of the zombies, stay one step ahead of them. For some reason, the fact that the zombies were completely mindless, just creatures of pure habit, made it so much harder. She wasn't even sure why they bothered with any of it anymore.

"Because sometimes we're not too late, Liebste. Sometimes..."

Right. Sometimes. Rarely. She shook her head, appreciative of the attempt but completely aware of the facts. Sometimes wasn't enough. They were screwed. Royally screwed every which way. All they were sure of anymore were each other, and the number of people that that classification encompassed was getting smaller and smaller as the days wore on. And as much as Kurt tried to grab at the tiny strands of hope that he could find, he was wrong. More and more, they'd been getting there too late. Just in time to watch a zombie who looked eerily similar to her Drama teacher from school or the bag boy at the grocery store eat someone else.

"I think we can survive for months on what Herr Professor had packed away in the sub-basements. Man preached universal peace and love, but it looks like he was preparing for Armageddon. We can hold out as long as it takes."

She tilted her head toward him, catching his eyes and frowning. "So long as it only takes months."

Not to mention the fact that the food that'd been packed away in the mansion wasn't exactly the tastiest... better than goddamn brains, though. She frowned as her "shovel" hit the root of a tree, reaching down and pulling the root out of the way, watching almost sadly as the plant life left a crumbling hole in the ground. Everything was dying. Not just the people. Her eyes never left the hole in the wall of the grave as she tilted her head toward Kurt. "I think this is deep enough."

She nodded silently, eyes drifting briefly to the children... God, they were just little kids. Little kids who had wanted nothing more than to enjoy themselves. Than to be kids. Sighing, she lifted herself into the air and landed beside the hole, grabbing Kurt's hand and trying not to let the corners of her mouth twitch into a small smile as bare flesh touched bare flesh. She pulled him out of the hole, looking away before she actually let herself be happy about something. She had no right. No right to be excited, proud even, that she'd gotten some semblance of control. Not when they were burying children, not when said control had been at the expense of a woman's life. Gritting her teeth, she turned from him and stepped toward the bodies, stomach turning ever so slightly again. No thinking about it. Just get it over with.

"You want the heads or feet?" She could easily have laid the kids in the graves herself- even dead, they weren't that heavy to her, but Kurt constantly insisted that they be careful, respectful. As if it was the dead kids that needed the help. They were dead. Didn't have to worry anymore about being turned into something that ate other people. Dead was almost better. Almost. Wasn't the kids who needed their compassion at that point. But it made Kurt feel better, and that was something. Some days, it was everything. They went about their business, laying each of the children gently into the grave, and there was nothing that she could think of to do or say that would make the situation any less disturbing. Well, maybe one thing. "Think we can call it quits after this. Head back."

Even that wasn't nearly as comforting as it should have been.

Kurt
—
It was a feeble effort at reassurance, he knew it as well as she did and believed it as little, but it was all he had to offer.

"So long as it only takes months."

"It's going to have to, isn't it?" he replied, tossing out a couple more mounds of dirt before bracing his shovel against the earth at his feet and asking her for a hand up.

He'd told her once, a lifetime ago it seemed, that sometimes you just had to accept what you could have and make it enough. The context had been different of course, and his lips quirked in a faint, brief smile at the memory but it was just as applicable now as it had been then. The only thing they could control in this world gone mad was how they responded and the only thing they could do short of turning their faces to the wall was to fight and keep fighting until there was no way to go on...and maybe, somehow, that would be enough. It didn't really matter if it was or wasn't, though, since it was the only option left.

There were no options left to them, he thought sadly, following her gaze to the small still bodies nearby. Then she was floating lightly from the hole and reaching down to pull him up behind her. It was strange, he thought sadly, that he could more easily remember a time when she'd been earthbound, when touching her skin had been an impossible fantasy and he'd been the stronger of them, than he could a time when the wind hadn't smelled of carrion and the sight of a child's mangled remains would have sent him running for the bushes to empty his stomach.

"You want the heads or feet?" she asked, as he bent once more to straighten broken limbs, settle small hands across still breasts. He appreciated the courtesy. Knew she could have tossed them all into the grave they'd dug like so many broken toys but that she didn't for him.

It was only a matter of minutes to lay their tiny charges in the bosom of the earth and he paused, crouched at the edge of the grave, eyes once more fixed on the empty swing as he fingered the small gold cross on its chain at his neck.

Eternal rest, grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May the souls of the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace. Amen, he murmured quietly, almost under his breath, as he let a handful of dirt sift onto the upturned faces below.

Eternal rest...there were days when that seemed a mercy he'd pay any price for. Some days, but not today. With a sigh, he surged to his feet, lifting his 'shovel' and joining Rogue in the filling of the small, sad grave. Hopefully they'd still see a mound of earth next time they patrolled this section of town, not a gaping hole and tumbled bones. They'd learned early to bury the victims deep, though it never seemed to be deep enough.

"Think we can call it quits after this. Head back," she offered, and he looked up gratefully as he patted a last 'spadeful' of earth into place. They really should continue their patrol - there might be others - but he was tired and heartsick and she was as well. He could see it in her eyes.

He nodded acquiescence as he tossed his impromptu shovel away. She'd make them more if they needed them again, and they would. For now...he pushed a filthy hand through not quite as filthy hair before stepping to her side, reaching out to brush his palm - his palm, not the fur-covered back of his hand - against her cheek.

Turning his back on the freshly dug grave he leaned in to brush his lips where his hand had passed. He'd say a proper prayer for them, later, but for now they'd done what they could. He wondered if, in the end, there would be anyone left to do the same for them.

"Let's go, Liebste," he finally answered. Another quick kiss and then she was wrapping impossibly strong arms around him and they were lifting into the air.

Rogue
—
She tried not to act bored as Kurt bowed to pray over the bodies, tried not to outright yawn. It was futile, just like burying the bodies neatly. Wouldn't stop the zombies from coming back for them, wouldn't help them. They'd dug the hole deep. As far as those kids were concerned, they had done all that anyone, God included, could do. If there was a God. Which, clearly, there wasn't. And fuck, if God did exist, he sure as hell sucked at figuring out when a little divine intervention was needed. Surely the dead coming to life and eating the living was reason enough to do something. If there was ever a time for some big old man in white to descend from the heavens and rescue "his people," that was it. Unless he'd taken a good look around and decided that everyone was too fucked over for even his help. Didn't matter. None of it did, really. All that mattered was the fact that they were still alive, even though friends- family- had perished at the hands of the creatures. Once Kurt finished, she started to fill the hole back in, giving him a somewhat weak smile. At least they could go home.

She watched as he finished up with the grave, tossing his sign away and running his hand through his short, curly hair. He looked exhausted. Not that she could blame him, she was pretty damn tired herself, but it wasn't easy seeing him like that. The contrast between the Kurt she'd known for so long and the Kurt she knew now was almost too stark to think about. He reached to touch her face, and her hand followed his, holding it as he slowly dropped it and replaced it with his lips. It seemed like as soon as she'd gotten what she had always wanted, the world decided to pack up for a nice little trip to hell.

"Let's go, Liebste." As he kissed her again, she wrapped her arms around him, nodding. One last look toward the grave and she took off, heading straight for Saint Pete's.