More or less inspired by "Decayed" by DoomedToBeACrazyFanGirlForever. Check it out if you haven't. It's still a work in progress, but she updates every Friday. Anyway, have some angst.

It was two years after the world had ended.

Not literally, of course. There were still roads under what was left of the Jeep's tires, and the sky was still reflecting a mocking shade of blue over the sea of ashes and the toppled buildings and skeletons that lay within it. The sun still rose and set on the ruin, indifferent to the misery and chaos existing inside the shadows it cast. Days passed, and months passed, and time itself flew by, although no one was keeping track anymore.

The world still went on, but almost all that had made life worth living had gone away with the spread of the virus, so it was easier to just say that the world had ended.

There was still some stuff to live for. The birds still sang in the morning, and the stars still watched on overhead, seeming more in number now than ever before. The sun's heat felt nice against the wind, and sometimes there would be a bright flower between the ribs in a skeleton. Sometimes they would find a CD that still worked and it sounded just perfect at a whisper through the car stereo when they turned in for the night.

There were still some people to live for, too, or in Dick's case, a person.

Wally sat beside him in the Jeep, as threadbare as their tires and thinning still, and was driving the both of them down what was left of a highway. It was mostly broken rock and pot holes now. Occasionally they would pass a demolished car or a pile of corpses, or even a staggering corpse watching them with a hungry stare, but they were mostly alone on this drive, like they had been for what felt like a lifetime.

Now, they were just outracing the end.

There was nowhere left for them to go. Any camps they had heard of had been long overrun. Their last run in with survivors was three months ago and food was running out. They were running out of options and running on hope, but that hope was stronger in fueling their drive than any amount of gasoline they had ever siphoned out of the abandoned cars they had passed by.

A slightly scratched CD of the Beatles' greatest hits played over the stereo and at All You Need is Love, Wally reached across the console to take Dick's bruised hand in his own. He interlaced their fingers and despite how filthy they both were, blood spattered and in clothes that were several weeks old, it was enough to bring a genuine smile to both of their faces.

Wally squeezed his hand and Dick suddenly remembered squeezing Bruce's hand as he had pressed the syringe into the side of his neck. He remembered sobbing over the dying form of the man he had very nearly called his own father, choking out string after string of, "I love you"s between each apology. Bruce had reached up with his free hand to wipe away his tears and Dick could still hear the whispered, "I love you, too", and the, "Get back. I don't want to infect you," that had been his last words. His grip had relaxed, and the smile he had managed to keep up had faded with him.

Dick's smile had faded, too, and when Bruce blinked out of sight, he realized he had been staring out the window into what could only be described as utter wreckage. He squeezed Wally's hand tighter, and looked across the car, away from the wreckage and into Wally's eyes, into home.

"We're almost there, Dick," Wally said softly, as though he actually knew where they were going.

No one knew where they were going anymore. There was nowhere left to go. Everywhere was destroyed, and what still stood was completely overrun by the infected. The only place left to go was onwards, and they were running out of road. Neither would admit it, but they both knew it.

"Alright," Dick pretended to believe, and Wally pretended, too, and they turned the volume up a little.

They drove until the sun had set, a dangerous time to be out once upon a time but now just as normal as it had been before the disease. The darkness, paired with the radio and the comfort that came with Wally's affection, was enough to coax Dick to sleep. It was light, as all sleep had become during the apocalypse, but it lasted them until the highway was too broken to drive on, forcing Wally to pull off into a field. Once he parked, he leaned over to wake Dick up and grabbed his shoulder, shaking him awake.

As Dick came to, he remembered Kaldur's hand on his shoulder, begging him to just stay conscious long enough to get the others out. When he had blinked his eyes into focus, Kaldur was pressing his other hand against a deep cut in his stomach, and was trying to keep breathing past the blood seeping from his lips.

"You're in charge now," Kaldur had choked out, and tears had welled in both of their eyes.

"I can't be," Dick had tried to say, trying to help, trying to do something, but Kaldur heaved him to his feet and pushed him on.

"Take care of them for me, Dick. Be the better hero."

Only this time when Dick blinked his eyes into focus, it was Wally leaning over him, and he had the faintest of a smile over his lips.

"We tried, didn't we?" Dick found himself asking, and he saw the redhead flinch.

Wally searched his eyes, trying to find where the question had come from, but the source wasn't available in the weathered blues. Biting his lip, the redhead leaned forward and cupped Dick's face in his hands.

"We're still trying," he said after a moment, not sure of what else to say.

"Do you ever think it's time to stop?"

Before Wally could respond, Dick leaned forward and kissed him. It was just once, and then just twice, and before they knew it, they were tangled up in the backseat of the Jeep, and that rusted piece of metal rocked there alone in a field while the Beatles played quietly over the stereo.

The CD stopped long before the Jeep did, and by the time the two climbed out, hair tousled and eyes wide, the stars were eagerly staring down at them.

Wally had a half-cocked grin as he got the blanket out of the trunk and together, he and Dick laid it out over a part of the field they had pulled into. With it, they brought an unopened bottle of wine and two shotgun.

The redhead had just begun to fiddle with the wine bottle when Dick laid back on the blanket, and Wally quickly chose his priority. He abandoned the battle beside the blanket and laid beside his best friend, resting his head in his palms.

In a matter of moments, Dick had moved over and laid his head on Wally's chest. He put his ear over Wally's heart and closed his eyes with a tiny sigh, just listening to the steady pulse, letting his other hand span over the other's ribs. Wally threaded his bloodied fingers through the dark locks and murmured something into them in-between the small kisses he was pressing into the ebony's skull. He slipped his arm around the small of Dick's back and his hand had found its way to the one on his ribs, and the two just laid there, holding each other.

The crickets chirped somewhere and the wind sounded in the distance, and with his eyes shut, Dick could pretend that everyone was still alive. He saw everyone there, saw them all happy and breathing, and for just a second, none of this was real. The virus had never spread and maybe they weren't happy, but it hadn't been this miserable.

But then it faded, and he remembered what Artemis looked like with six infected tearing into her body, and he could hear her choking on her own blood with every scream she gave.

He remembered what M'Gann looked like clutching Conner's corpse and sobbing into his chest, unable to do anything to stop the blood that continued to seep out of the gaping gunshot wound to his forehead, and what she looked like while the hoard of the infected she had failed to notice swallowed her whole. The hoard had swallowed Megan and spit out M'Gann, the white of her Martian skin now tainted red by the pool of blood she lay in.

He could still see Kaldur telling them to go on, trying to hold his blood in with a trembling hand, and could feel every ounce of regret that he had because he had listened.

He still saw Alfred's corpse clean as day in his mind, the apology note he had written before the infection had kicked in on the table beside him, still clutching the shotgun that had done him in.

He had never found Barbara's body, but he remembered the goodbyes she had whispered into her cellphone before hanging up on him, having described the hoard that had just broken the locks on the closet she had locked herself in.

Now, it was just the two of them in that field, more alone than either had ever known. Dick tilted his head to look up at Wally with tear filled eyes, and seeing him there, seeing the smile he was able to force, it was almost all worth it.

"I love you," Dick said, squeezing Wally's hand.

"I love you, too."

They laid together in that field until the stars blinked out, and with the pull of two triggers, they blinked out, too.

-F.J. III