Disclaimer: L4D 1 & 2 belong to Valve. Andrew and Brian Johnson are mine though.
...
Andrew sat up in a tree flipping through some pages in a folder, when his brother leapt up onto the branch.
"AJ C'mon! Let's see how Danny reacts when he wakes up with his mattress in a lake!" Brian exclaimed excitedly before noticing the papers Andrew was holding. "What're you doing?"
"Oh, well, it's this brand new thing called "reading." You see, there's these tiny little things called letters that-..." Andrew cut himself off and snickered at his brother's facial reaction to his reply. Brian growled before then asking What he was reading. "My file from the lab, turns out our birthday is today." A few days ago the pack had found the old CEDA lab most of them had been in and after finding them, took the folders of each of the pack members. Andrew flipped another page, furrowing his eyebrows as he looked down at it before taking it out and standing up. "C'mon, BJ, We're taking a trip!" He grabbed his brother's arm and pulled him with one hand while holding the paper in the other.
Brian was going to argue but decided against it and just helped Andrew hotwire a car. They drove at top speed just barely swerving to avoid abandoned cars or other infected for a few hours until they got one state over to New York.
Andrew took Brian through different streets until he reached a street full of dilapidated houses. They looked up and down the street before finally stopping at one. The twins went up to it and Andrew tried the door, but the knob fell off, so he used his claws to dig into the side and after a bit of effort managed to get the door to swing open.
Once inside the house, Andrew covered his nose at the smell, "and I thought We smelled like shit..." Looking around he spotted the staircase and made his way up while his brother followed him. At the end of the hall Andrew saw a door with his name on it. After pushing it open he remained in the doorframe, looking hesitant to go inside. Inside the room, from what he could see from the doorway, was that it was relatively clean though it looked like someone left in a hurry, under a desk was a smallish camera and tripod.
After a moment Andrew walked in and looked around before kneeling down to move stuff off of the camera and then picked it up, inspecting it."...was...was this mine?"
Brian walked up behind him and tried to grab the camera from him. "What's that?" Andrew snarled and snapped at him while holding the camera close. "Hey!" Brian exclaimed pulling his hand back fast.
Andrew soon stopped growling and blinked looking confused as to why he suddenly had the urge to protect the camera from his brother. "I-why did I just-..." He looked back at the camera and started pressing buttons on the camera, trying to turn it on. If it was his maybe some of the stuff on it might help him remember Anything about before the infection.
After hitting a few buttons the camera turned on with a little 'ping' but then flashed a battery on the screen and shut off.
"Woooow. Amazing." Brian stated behind him sounding bored.
Andrew turned and opened a drawer on the desk taking out the power cord and plugging it into the camera. He paused after that and blinked. "...How...how the hell did I know that was..." He trailed off and gave a confused groan, he didn't like not being able to fully remember and just have these little flashes.
"Why are you acting so Weird?" Brian was looking at his brother as if he had grown a second head. He'd seen him act weird before but never That weird.
Andrew didn't answer, but instead stuffed the camera and cord into the pocket of his hoodie then grabbed Brian's arm, pulled him out of the room and dragged him to another door but this one had Brian's name on it. "Open it." Andrew told him and stepped back to give him room. Thinking if maybe he looked in his own room he might understand some of the weird memory flashes.
Brian growled at his brother's 'pushiness' and opened the door walking right in rather than pausing to look around first. The room was very messy and after nearly tripping over it first, Brian found and started looking at a pile of naughty magazines both in male and female.
Andrew leaned over to see them, and snickered. "So my past involved a camera and yours involved porno. I should be surprised, but I'm not."
"Mines better than yours! You can't get anything out of a camera!" Brian left the room to go explore the rest of the house. He had a memory flash while in the room, it was small but it reminded him where the kitchen was. He opened the fridge and took a sniff before quickly shutting it and gagged a little on the smell of expired milk and other dairy products that had been there for at least a year.
Andrew went back downstairs as well and looked around stopping to look at a pile of mail that had to have been there for a very long time, the pile was covered in dust and spider webs. Andrew went over and picked the pile, dusting it off.
Brian went over to see what Andrew was looking at. "Bits of paper? There are more interesting things here than that"
"No, no it's..." Andrew tapped his head, trying to think of the right word. "It's right on the tip of my t-mail! Mail! It's mail!"
Brian raised an eyebrow. "That is Not male-"
" ...No, MAIL. M-A-...I..I? Yeah, I. L." Before Brian could ask what the difference was Andrew started looking through the pile and soon found one addressed to himself. He opened that one and looked inside. Inside is what looked like a weekly job paycheck with a news station name on it.
While Andrew was looking at the check Brian tried to snatch it from him to get a look at it too.
Andrew snapped near him and pocketed the check. "DAMMIT, BRIAN, I EARNED THIS AND..."He blinked shaking his head. "Whoa...just had...I'm not sure what that was, but...I...I'm remembering something."
Brian grumbled at having been called by his name rather than his preferred nickname and then asked what he remembered.
"A job, people-me using this thing." He took out the camera and looked into the view before fiddling with the camera for a bit, plugging the cord into it and the wall. There wasn't that much electricity in the house anymore but since things were flickering he thought there might be enough. He then found the on switch and pressed it. Various pictures and what looked like videos appear on the screen and after tapping it, one started to play "...BJ! BJ, look!"
Brian looked over his shoulder at the small screen, it looked like some random old breaking news event where they hadn't had time to get the cameras and just used this small one to capture stuff right away. They watched as the news reporter covered a story where a person had gotten sick, attacked someone, and then the attacked person started showing the same symptoms. It appeared to be the start of the infected.
"Is this what I think it is?..."Andrew started to think that since this seemed to be his camera, that he must have been the one filming. "Is this-did I do this?!"
"YOU caused the infection?"
"Wh-no!" Andrew pointed to the screen. "I'm FILMING the infection there! I was there for it! THAT'S what it means!"
"Oh. Well how do we know that's you? Maybe you stole this camera"
As if on cue after the report, they heard the reporter and cameraman talking about what was happening, the cameraman having Andrew's voice. "Andrew maybe you should quickly get home" They heard the reporter say after a while, "make sure your brother's alright, this crazy infection is getting all over, Fast." They heard him agree to that idea and that's when the clip ended.
Andrew gave Brian a smug smirk. "'Stole', huh? Sure I did." He looked back at the camera and tried to play the next clip wanting to see what was filmed next.
The next clip was more reports on what was going on, though halfway through, an uninfected Brian photo bombed it and almost got bit in the process by a common infected but managed to get out of the way.
"Good thing you dodged that guy, right? Can't imagine what would've happened if you turned."
Brian growled at Andrew's sarcastic comment, then looked back at the camera. "Being a common would have suuuuuuuucked."
Andrew snickered and pressed play on the next video. "I must've been one hell of a...what those people are who film shit to show information."
"Douchebag?"
Andrew slapped Brian upside the head before they watched the next clip. In the next clip was in the house they were currently in, an uninfected Andrew was checking on his brother while also checking around outside where random infected people were running around. In the clip the uninfected Brian asked why he's being one of those 'film everything douchebags'-which earned him a slap upside the head and the explanation about how it was technically still his job to report things that happen.
" Jeez..." Andrew picked up the camera, rewound it, and listened again to the explanation with a serious expression. "I was really into this shit, wasn't I?"
Brian sighed, he never liked with Andrew would get all serious, it normally meant there wasn't going to be anything fun anytime soon. "I'm going to go explore, you can watch that all day if you want." He went back upstairs.
Andrew watched him go before turning back to the camera and playing the next clip. That one had where they were staying in this house. The uninfected Andrew saying it's a lot safer than being out there, and then on camera, with it pointed outside, a guy was jumped by a group of commons and eaten. This Would be horrific for a non-infected person to see this but it was actually making Andrew a little hungry.
The next one had himself stating how it was one week into the infection and that there was basically no one around. The clip is cut short as infected started trying to get into the house and Andrew heard himself telling Brian to help him shut the lights off.
Andrew looked through a few pictures and then played the next clip. This one started with the two of them on a supply run, Andrew using the camera as a means of night vision as some of the places they go into are very dark. In this one there was an infected that they know Now to be another hunter, leaped out and bit Brian on the leg before Andrew was able to chase it off.
Andrew, caught up in the clip he was watching, actually reached forward a little "NO!" Before freezing, finding how he reacted silly and slowly moved back and continued to watch.
From upstairs Brian called down, "Are you Still watching that?" Andrew didn't respond right away though. On screen Brian said to get a close up of the bite, "it's so disgusting yet awesome." After a close up was taken Andrew heard himself panicking, saying how the infection spreads fast. The clip soon ended after Brian was heard telling him to relax.
After the clip, Andrew snapped out of his sort of daze and shouted back up finally. "Yeah, I just got to the part where you got your stupid ass bit!" He clicked on the next video.
"You filmed that?" Brian called back down, "I wanna see!" Brian ran and then leapt downstairs landing next to his brother, some socks stuck to his hoodie. The two of them watched the clip Andrew had started to play. This clip was basically Andrew using the camera to help him keep an eye on Brian to see what happens and at first it was just Brian complaining about how he's Fine and that he would 'beat yo ass to prove just how fine.'
Andrew snickered and looked over at him. "You really thought you could beat my ass? Danny could beat it better than you."
Brian growled then snickered. "So you're saying you could get your ass beat by Danny?" he ducked a swat to his head while he snickered harder.
In the next clip, the two watched as Brian started getting sick as well as acting randomly violent. During that clip, because of the infection, Brian attacked Andrew. Then seemed to snap out of it a little, but not before he gave Andrew the bite he has on his shoulder.
Andrew stared in shock and surprise then reached a hand into his hoodie under his shirt to feel around that shoulder wear he felt the bite. That was definitely something he forgot, that Brian had been the one that infected him.
In the next clip Andrew was also feeling a bit sick, and Brian's eyes had gone yellow. At that time though some guys in hazmat suites with CEDA written on them were clearing out the street and got to their house. On the spot they were going to shoot Brian as he had become already pretty infected. Andrew, having set the camera down but it was still on went over and managed to get them to not shoot his brother and just agree for them to go with them for quarantine. The camera was then picked back up and put back down in the place Andrew found it in, still on, before the battery sign lit up and it went out.
Andrew quietly closed the view screen of the camera as he picked it back up, looking over at Brian as he stuffed it into a pocket. Seemingly out of nowhere he then hugged his brother tight. Even though they were both very used to being infected and it confused him as well as to why, Andrew had found it really hard to watch his twin, and himself, getting infected.
"GAH!" Brian squirmed when he was pulled into a tight hug. "What the hell man! Get off!"
After a few seconds he let go of the hug and let out a sigh. "Sorry, BJ. Just had a sudden urge. had to get it out of my system. ..."he gave an awkward cough, "ok so you find anything upstairs?"
Brian glared at him while he dusted himself off. "Just some photo albums."
"Really? Lead the way." They had been there for a while already they could stay a little longer to look through the photo albums; it was their birthday after all.