Author's Note: This story isn't perfect. It's sort of quick and not all things work flawlessly, but I liked playing with the idea. The two characters mentioned in the story are entirely original (in case for whatever reason it inspires some kind of confusion). So bear with me and review. ^^ The story hopefully gets better later on.
The sun rose black over the still surface of gray tides, swirling aimlessly over and over like mist over ice against pallid rocks beneath and hidden around a gritting sand. It was all silent and silver to the eyes that threw glances over them, catching a wayward gull or a fishing swallow twirling artfully through a turbulent gust of wind. His name was Tyler Kawazumi, a small man of clear Japanese heritage who was lank, thin, slack shouldered and thin-waisted, his face sporting a tuft of black hair on the edge of his chin that was now spreading up his jawline to add on to his sharp Asian features. Longish, blackish-brown hair that didn't quite touch his shoulders was scruff with streaks of blood and earth, sticking in his eyes when his hand was too tired to push them away. He was in his early twenties, somewhat shy and clever, retained and placid, but regretably fatigued and distant at the moment. He sat with his feet submerged slightly in the water's edge, watching as the current swept over them once, twice, and subsided for a while to take its rest. He was observing the scene anew through silver-tainted eyes, for as he had awakened this morning to an awkward light peering through his irises, he had suddenly found his world in the absence of color, waking to the bleak and dreary with a muted wonder. No longer did his dirt-clashed skin have its bronze, nor his cuts drooling with the red he would have recognized as opposed to this now shimmering mercury... It seemed more important to worry of other matters, however, and so this color blindness was put off like a small discomfort for a time. It was only now that he was beginning to grasp the strangeness of it.
"Hey Tojo!" snapped a voice from behind, and he leapt to his feet like a trained hound to meet the owner of this command. A tall man, likely also early in his years if not a tad over, not particularily imposing but rather lean and hungry looking came striding down the beach with a strained manner. He was grime covered and sickly looking, scraggled hair mussed over a plainly unattractive face holding a scowl. His long, narrow feet hopped one over the other as he approached, and Tyler lowered his head.
"Mr. Dunmoor." He said in an soft, lilting voice, one not quite deep enough to boast anything but his relative youth.
"Hey, enough with the 'last names' shit, okay? I can't even fucking pronounce yours." the tall man said, looming over the littler man with a tremendous shrug skyward. "Just call me Tom. You know? T-O-M. Got it?"
"Got it." He repeated, turning his head away so as not to face him so closely.
"Fag." Tom huffed as he walked to the edge of the water and shuffled a long foot into the pale sand.
There was silence for a while, each one presumedly contemplating. Tom then turned back around and carlessly plucked Tyler in the shoulder with a fist. "This is just like that movie, you know, Night of the Living Dead. You ever seen it? You get those type a'movies in Japan?"
Tyler absently put a hand to the shoulder, eyebrows raising as he processed the question. "No…Well…I mean…" he cleared his throught, letting his eyes drift back to the sand. "I told you before, I'm not from Japan. I was born in Salem. Oregon. America, you know." His eyes came back to meet the hollowed-out face of his companion.
"You don't have a sense of humor, do you, jackass? Lighten up, will you? I heard you the first damn time, it was a joke." Tom snarled back in a rattling voice before chuckling. Tyler doubted, however, that such was really the case. "Whatever. It's a beautiful day," he turned back the the ocean and threw up his arms. "why let a little thing like the end of the world ruin your beautiful day? Huh?!" he then started cackling like a drunken teenager, collapsing onto the sand and kicking a heel into the ground. Tyler shook his head and looked back out onto the waves of the ebony ocean waters.
"What did you find?" he asked, gazing at a smear of what was most likely blood on his palm. Right now he couldn't tell the color through his disabled vision.
"A whole lotta nothin'." Tom answered, seemingly annoyed every time he was forced to talk to his only company. "Everything's desserted. What, you think I found a running strip bar and a Mcdonalds or something?" he snorted.
"I just thought…"
"Yeah, well, if I did find anything, why the hell would I have come back?" Tom hissed meanly as he flopped onto his back in the dry sand.
"Mm." The young man turned away, letting his arms fall at his sides and blinking slowly. Life so devoid of meaning. How could he argue? How to protest? There was never a good enough reason to counter this man with. He had learned that rather quickly once caught up into the swing of the way things were now set to work. He had first come across one Mr. Thomas Jay Dunmoor a week and a half ago, or at least that time seemed an appropriate guess to Tyler. He had camped out on the surface of some rooftop, and had scrambled in such a hurry that now he could not even recall exactly what type of building it had been. Not a tall one, certainly, only perhaps twenty-five feet off the sweltering asphalt. He fancied that he'd taken up a good spot; not a single one of those half-eaten human creatures had seemed to notice him. He'd seen them wandering off a ways of about two hundred feet, dragging mangled forms across the once urban scene and occasionally stumbling along the way, graciously oblivious to his position. He held his breath every time they were in sight, only drawing it out when the creature at last dissappeared and he felt it safe to assume he may live, at least until nightfall, once again. That's when Tom had found him.
Tyler at first could not comprehend the figure coming towards him, and in all of the prior instances of these zombies passing him by without a second glance, he ignorantly had been spoiled into thinking that he should not fret if they came a few feet closer than they had previously dared. But this time, the creature was coming nearer and nearer until it was only a scant fifty feet from the building upon which he had perched, and did not look as though he had the intention of moving on soon as he ambled, searched around, and paused every so often. It was only after a tidal wave of cold horror had washed over him before Tyler realized that this man may not have even been a zombie at all. He was haggard with gleaming eyes and a stony snarl of hate implanted onto his face, but it also bore the semblance of tiredness, something you could not sense in the greedy, ever-ravenous eyes of the demons that had so recently walked the streets adjacent. After a few anxiuos moments, this man came away from his vision, and he nervously peered around the edges of the building in wary search.
Shuffling sounds, like tin scraping metal. Coming from one side of the building, and then the other. That creature had scaled the fire escape. Tyler whipped around and threw scouring glances to all edges of his only safe haven, praying that the unthinkable idea of one of those mindless beasts having such initiative was truly as ludacris as it seemed. But such luck wasn't with him. He froze as he heard a grunt, much closer than he had expected it to be. He backed up until the concrete edges of the surrounding miniature wall touched the back of his knees, half fearing in the recesses of his mind that he would have to jump. Surely he could have survived the fall…not in perfect health, however. In the end, he was far too paralyzed to even consider the option. All that was left to do was face whatever came to claim him.
The unshaven mess of a man had landed on the rooftop, sighed, looked around once and cracked his neck before his eyes fell studying onto Tyler. And then he had laughed.
Tyler's head spun and he touched his temple lightly, gazing down at the length of the beach to regain his focus at the vagueness of the memory. Tom had treated him as though he were some incompetent fool ever since that moment, and though they had spent much time together since, rarely ever spoke. Or that is to say, Tyler rarely did so. Tom spoke often, hardly giving his new accquaintance a word in edge wise. Not that it bothered him, entirely. There was little he wished for Tom to know, and even less that Tom wished to know of him. And so sat their mutual relationship of distrust and unwilling dependence for companionship. Wherever one went, the other followed, but always kept his distance.
"It's not so bad, ya know." Tom shouted suddenly, breaking Tyler's thoughts. "It's sort of everything everyone wants, huh? A life on the beach? Hell, I was a construction worker before this, no days lounging on the coast of Cancun for me. Yep. I like this place." He rested his arms behind his head, body spread out over the sand. "Like the hell out of it."
Tyler may have even smiled at the sheer absurdity of his cohort, had his sense of humor not been so badly wounded. Tom put up a grand façade of snide indifference, a feature that was only ironically outdone by his obvious appearance of constant frustration. He breifly thought in the back of his head, I wonder if he was normal before this started. His cynical side predictably answered with a nonchalant Does it matter? Tyler himself barely thought he could recollect who or what he was before the infection, and now it didn't matter. You are defined by those who know you, those who named you, but now all of those people were dead. The things you've accomplished and your goals for the future, but now survival was the only and unanimous goal of anyone still living. The places you go and the hobbies you're interested in, but now there was no familiar place that was safe, and no time or inspiration for any kind of hobby. You no longer existed. You had to completely start over now. In a way, it was like being born again. In a bigger way, it was like being dead.
"I was thinking I could build a summer hom-" Tom began.
"We can't stay here." Tyler said fluidly, cutting him off as he raised his head to stare with dark eyes.
Tom pushed himself up onto his elbows indignantly, looking over a shoulder and seeming extremely put off about being interupted. "Well who the fuck asked you?"
"We don't have anything to help us survive." He bitterly shook away the double meaning to that statement. "We'd have to go back into town or something…I don't know. We'll starve to death out here."
"Hey, if you're goin' back into town, you wanna stop and grab me a burger? No wait—make it something with chicken, I'm on Atkins. You don't mind, do ya?" Tom lay back into the sand and covered his face with his hands tiredly. "Shut the fuck up." He added, ending his chain of superfluous sarcasm.
Once again, another concern thwarted by stubborness. Tyler sighed, rubbing a hand into his dark locks before holding his gaze back onto the edging of a sinking sun.
Author's Note: I know, I know. The first chapter doesn't offer much, but it's a setter.