Exhaustion didn't creep up on me the moment I entered those familiar metal gates.

No. It'd been chasing me. Nipping at my heels, at my calves, my thighs, it'd been raining down my back and it sat in my mouth taking any and every last trace of saliva that I was supposed to have. Exhaustion didn't creep up on me. It crushed me. The moment I was through those gates, the moment I was surrounded, I collapsed under the weight of it and stood there.

Instinctively I knew I was safe.

I knew I could kneel, could lie down, I could stop twitching and shifting from foot to foot, I could relax every last muscle that had tensed over the last …god knew how many hours… and relax my guard.

The people that surrounded me, thrust water in my face, tried to get me to sit down, they were familiar enough. Blurred faces, my eyes were watering (or was someone pouring water over my head?), but familiar. Didn't really know the names for all the faces yet. Some of the faces only had names to them. Runner three. Runner fifteen. Runner ten.

Their words were just as blurred as their faces were. All I could hear was my breathing. In, out, in, out, in the stubborn rhythm I'd been trying to keep it at for hours. I was sweating still, my head ached, and my muscles burnt … and yet still I couldn't relax.

'One, two, one, two…' My brain urged, whispered, frantic. 'One, two, one, two…'

It wanted to keep running. It didn't seem to believe me that we were safe. One foot, two foot, one foot, two foot, it'd changed from 'left, right' to something faster. Was it faster? I didn't care. Too exhausted to ponder words.

I'd run all night. All night. Could barely remember why they'd sent me out, why Abal needed Runner Five to go out, and maybe it didn't matter. I stared at the shack. Stared at it long and hard. Ignored faces, ignored the Doc, and knew what I was waiting for.

Maybe I told people to move, maybe I even told them I had to say thanks, the entire scene had become almost dream-like as the crowd parted and let me through. I stumbled forward. It was just fifteen feet, no more, and yet somehow every step towards the communications shack felt like more effort than anything had the entire day.

No one tried to stop me.

I paused, hand on the door, fumbling as the slippery skin found cold metal. Twisted it. Tried again, when it failed, my other hand on the metal wall. The door opened, I stumbled inside, and shoved the door shut again.

Had to say thanks. That was why I was here.

Sam sat there. He looked pale, swivelling around in that damn office chair he'd been so proud of getting, some absurd thing that probably had cost thousands back in the pre-apocalyptic times. Some idiot businessman thinking a ten grand- no, pound, this was Britain- chair was worth it. Sam suited it.

He tugged the headset off his head, as he stood, dropping it on the desk with a shaking hand. Man looked awful, ten years older than his twenty five, pale, and his body trembling, dark shadows under brown eyes.

"Welcome home."

"I-" I tried to talk. This failed spectacularly. The doorhandle started to twist and, without thinking, I reached down to lock it. This pissed off whoever it was. Sam's lips twitched up, just a moment, breaking the strain.

Sam's voice echoed in my head. It, and my mechanical counting of footsteps, had been the only things I'd let remain. Follow the path home. Follow that voice home. Follow him home.

God help me. I didn't come here for this. I didn't come to Abal for feelings.

When it was clear I was beyond taking any more steps, Sam approached, shy and desperate all at once. He grasped my arms, pressing me against the door, a question on his face as he examined my face. Had I come here for this? Was it all right? Could he… eyes darted to my lips, then to me. Was this all right?

I could at least raise my arms, so I did, grasping the back of his head, making it clear. How many times had we flirted around the base, just for a laugh, this easy to and fro between us that made me look forward to every joint meal? Yes. I wanted him to do it.

As our lips met, trembling lips, shy fumbling hands grasping one another's clothing for support, two exhausted beings worn out by more than physical fatigue. He exhaled against me, sheer relief, and I felt my knees sag as the sense of really being home washed over me. The kiss cut short, I sunk down, Sam following.

We knelt there, staring at one another, serenaded by the sound of gunfire outside and the pounding of the door, staring at each other with equal shock. Maybe he was as shocked by this as I was.

Fuck. I hadn't come here for feelings.

"Five…"

I couldn't talk. Even if I wanted to, even if I knew what to say, how to express what his presence had meant to me while running through the dark zombie infested city streets, I couldn't. My mouth was dry and my energy was sapping away into the rough gravel under my knees. Gravel. In his shed. The man needed carpet.

I'd never actually seen Sam so close before. His dark eyelashes, so damn long for a man, framing dark brown eyes, the silky black hair that seemed no less diminished or perfect for the dirt or disbelieved face it belonged to, and the tired lines on his face that belonged to a man ten years older.

His mouth moved, though I heard nothing, and it seemed he was unable to speak as well. He gave up. I felt his hands though, grasping me, pulling me against his shirt, smelt the smell of sweat that was not my own, felt a face course with hair rub against the side of my face and press into my neck.

I wouldn't have made it home without him. An entire night of running through the dark, aware that any corner, any dark shadow could have a zom or a crawler, and god knew I'd outrun more than enough of them… and it had been for Sam.

"Sam-" I croaked. It hurt to talk. It would suck even more to not say it. I was too exhausted to care about pride. "You. Better think you're lucky now."

"I … I do." Sam twisted back, grasping for something on the desk, and pressed a water bottle to my chapped lips.

I drank, shutting my eyes a moment, thinking that was the most damn romantic gift anyone could give me. So what if I hadn't come here for feelings? If we stopped feeling then we'd already died. I wasn't dead yet… so I wasn't going to pretend I didn't feel something now. Water. Yes. When my throat and mouth were wet, when I could talk, I added as I ignored his shush sounds, "Also… friend is the least you can call me after that awful kiss."

That made him laugh. "Then, Five, we'll try again when you've got better breath."

Arms enclosed around me again, squeezing me, drawing me away from the door as it swung open.

For the first time in months, for the first time since I'd lost the ability to feel, to care, I suddenly… I felt feelings. Feelings that went below the surface, thawing a weary heart, pawing at the grief I'd tried to conceal by pretending it no longer mattered. The urge to cry, not just for grief, but also for the sense of relief at this… at the connection I'd found… became overwhelming.

There was a prick in my arm, a sense of warmth running up my skin, and I sunk away into the medicated oblivion where I could hide from my own human self.

A/N This is a nice little quickie after the episode 'A voice in the dark'. :) I quite like how there's clear chemistry between Five and Sam, regardless of Five's gender, and how the human relationships DO play a part in Zombies Run. After all... what do we do when the apocalypse happens? Try to rebuild! I doubt they'd actually make it a thing in the game itself, for obvious reasons, but that doesn't mean we can't 'write between the lines'.

I may continue this as a new story! We'll see. :)