So, I should probably be updating my other one thousand fics but whatever. This one called to me. Thanks to Hayley for editing this for me. So appreciate it. Follow her on castlelions on tumblr!

Lance was rustling through the kitchen cupboards when he first heard the guttural moaning. Frozen, he waited, listening closely. If he could just get an estimate on how close it was, then maybe he'd be okay. Maybe he wouldn't have to fight.

The moan sounded again and chills ran up his spine. That sounded way too close for comfort. Like, the next room close. Was the thing inside the abandoned house? Or was it outside, roaming around? He hoped it was the latter, because he really, really did not want to shoot anything. The sound would only bring more-

Footsteps. Living room.

"Shit," Lance hissed quietly, gathering up what he could and shoving it in his bag. He'd have to sort through it later. "Shit shit shit."

The moment he slung his backpack over his shoulders, he was creeping towards the archway that led to the living room, gun held with hands that didn't shake—after a year of almost constant shooting, it was like he'd been doing it all his life.

He didn't see anything when he peered into the living room. No signs of life or the undead, but that didn't mean that Lance was alone in the house. He had a bad feeling boiling in his gut, and he knew he heard footsteps earlier. Something was here.

The question, though, was why it wasn't coming after him already. Usually Lance would have been charged by now.

The thing was, zombies had taken over the world, infecting people left and right until less than ten percent of the world's population was left. It had been almost a year now, and humans were resilient. Everyone had picked up the pieces and pushed forward. There were safe havens now, camps where people could live, proving every day that humans could adapt.

Zombies, though. Zombies couldn't adapt. They had no intelligence. Enough tests had proven the undead ran off instincts. They were literally brain dead, no higher cognitive processing happening whatsoever—or at least, that's what Lance understood.

As he stood there, gun held high, waiting for something to jump out at him, Lance was kind of starting to wonder if that was correct or not. Because if it wasn't, then Lance was probably screwed.

Too bad. He was really looking forward to winning that bet about not dying with Hunk. Hopefully the guy wouldn't be too upset about Lance not coming back.

"Holy shit," a voice said from behind him, and Lance jumped at least a foot in the air, turning on his heel to face the owner. Dark blue eyes blinked out at him from under a mullet, and Lance couldn't help but stare back. Because this guy was definitely not a zombie. "You're human."

Lance cocked an eyebrow, lowering his gun, but keeping it at the ready. Just because this guy wasn't a zombie, didn't mean that they weren't still out there. But that explained the footsteps. And probably disproved the "zombies are smarter than we think" theory, too. Thank God.

"Yeah," Lance said. "I'm human. Who are you?"

Mullet Man bristled. So he probably could have been a little gentler when phrasing that, but he was still on edge from being outside the relative safety of the camp. He felt too exposed, and his attitude could get downright nasty sometimes.

(Just ask Pidge. She absolutely hated doing raids with him anymore.)

"A human," Mullet Man muttered, crossing his arms in a way that Lance thought was really stupid and reckless—which was kind of weird to think about since Lance was the king of stupid and reckless. "I was looking for food with my brother when we got split up."

Lance's breath hitched. "Got split up how?" he asked. Because if it was how he thought it was then—

"There was this hoard of zombies, and I got turned around. The next thing I know, I'm running for my life—hey!"

But Lance wasn't listening anymore. Grabbing Mullet Man's arm, Lance tugged him towards the kitchen, checking the window for an all clear before he pushed out the door, hopped over the fence, and sprinted into the woods.

No no no no. This could not be happening. Of course he'd be with the one idiot who didn't know that once a zombie found you, there weren't many ways to get it off your trail—and hiding in an abandoned house wasn't one of them. How was this guy even still alive right now?

Mullet Man looked irritated as Lance dragged him deeper into the woods. "Will you please tell me where we're going?"

"Somewhere the shot isn't going to be heard," Lance said tersely, zigzagging around a bristly bush and stopping at the trunk of a particular tall tree. This seemed far enough away. Probably. He turned to Mullet Man, who'd fallen weirdly quiet.

Okay, maybe not weirdly. The guy didn't really seem like the talkative type, now that Lance thought about it. When Lance was quiet for a moment too long, the guy stared straight back at Lance, eyebrows furrowing. "What? What's wrong?"

Lance shook his head. "Come on, let's climb," he said, glad that Mullet Man didn't question him. Once they settled in the tree branch, Lance slid his backpack off his shoulders, shoving his gun into Mullet Man's hands for safekeeping (luckily the guy looked like he knew how to hold the thing).

Mullet Man was looking at him weird, though. "Wait a minute, you're not going to shoot it?"

Lance smirked. "Oh. No, I'm definitely going to shoot it, and I'm going to be amazing at it. You're going to be insanely jealous of my zombie killing skills."

The other guy snorted but didn't say anything else, just watched as Lance pulled out his bayard, activating it while watching Mullet Man's eyes go wide.

And go wide they did, enough that Lance couldn't help but grin, even as tense as he was.

"What is that?" Mullet Man asked. "Is that a gun?"

"You like what you see?" Lance laughed. "A couple geniuses at our camp developed these things called bayards. Basically they're compressible weapons. Easy to store, and gets the job done when needed."

"Woah."

"Shh."

The grin slid off Lance's face. He strained his ears, listening. He thought he heard—yeah. Shuffling. That was definitely shuffling. Luckily, it didn't sound like more than one— thank God. And Lance had scouted out these woods a million times before, since it was relatively near to the camp. He knew this place like the back of his hand. He could do this.

The zombie shuffled into view—slow, creepy, and looking very undead. Zombies were pretty nasty up close, and Lance was more than happy to put them out of their misery. Nobody should have skin that dead looking ever. Even during a zombie apocalypse. Even if you were a zombie.

Lance took a deep breath, forcing his whole body to relax. He waited one, two, three minutes before the zombie finally shuffled to the place Lance had picked ages ago as The Spot.

Lance pulled the trigger.

The thing about guns were that they were loud; Lance had lucked out with his bayard. It wasn't nearly as loud as an actual sniper rifle would be, but it still made a noise that had Mullet Man wincing from where he was sitting next to him on the branch. Lance was glad they'd had time to come out here, otherwise they'd probably be hopelessly surrounded by now.

But now they could (probably) relax. Lance had blown off the zombie's head, and that usually did the job of stopping the things from moving, so he let out his breath in a relieved huff.

"Alright, Mullet Man," Lance laughed, shoulders actually relaxing now that the zombie couldn't get them. He turned to his companion. "Let's go find that brother of yours."

Mullet Man raised an eyebrow. "Mullet Man?" he asked, face scrunching up in incredulity. "Seriously?"

Lance shrugged, an easy grin pulling at his lips. "Hey, I had to call you something."

"Then call me Keith," the guy said. "Not Mullet Man. Who are you?"

"The name's Lance," he said, holding out a hand, one that Keith took. "Zombie Slayer extraordinaire."

I'm not sure how many chapters this will be, and updates will be sporadic due to my awful schedule and some amazing procrastination skills.

I'm lanceaboo on tumblr so if you wanna chat hmu :)