(a/n): Hey there! Welcome to this collection of one-shots of my beloved OTP. These will be uploaded at random, and this 'story' will be sort of like a portfolio, if you will, of all the random one-shots and drabbles I have to write for USUKUS. A lot of these are and will be uploaded onto my tumblr writing blog (nish-s-random-writing for any of you interested folks ;) )

So yeah, here we go with one-shot number one. Hope you enjoy!
~Nish

Before We Jump

"The sky is beautiful today, isn't it, love?"

Alfred sighs, steadily, a calm release of breath as he clutches Arthur's hand; it's the only string of tension in an otherwise relaxing scene.

The wind whips at Alfred's hair, sending his dirtied golden locks skittering all around his head. It's funny to think of it that way. Arthur laughs. He loves the lilt of amusement that sparks in the other's blue eyes when notices his little laugh. He likes it that Alfred is smiling.

"So, here we are," Alfred says. And indeed, there they were, on the ledge of the crumbling concrete of a rooftop. The sun is setting over the horizon sending a watercolor splash of pinks and purples and oranges into the sky. The clouds are moving fast overhead, and Arthur could almost imagine that the burning red glow over the horizon was only part of the sunset, and not an angry fire rapidly closing in.

Alfred closes his eyes and he hums, his thumb rubbing against Arthur's knuckles. He was always a bad singer, but his humming wasn't quite as horrid. In fact, at the moment, it sounded divine to Arthur's ears. It made it possible to ignore the pounding against the metal door behind them. Well, almost.

Despite the warmth of Alfred pressed against him, the fresh mid-summer air, the majestic sunset blessing the city skyline before him—despite everything that Arthur was seeing, breathing, and living, he looked down.

He looked down and saw, twenty stories below, the mass of limping, bloodied things scrambling toward their building. If he closed his eyes, Arthur could simply picture the rotten, melted flesh hanging off of disfigured limbs of what were once people. His friends and his family, potentially. In that crowd that now came banging up the stairs, there might have been someone Arthur once knew.

The postman could have been the armless creature Alfred shot to pieces the other night. His gym teacher could have been the creature that came seconds away from tearing Alfred's skull open. His own mother could have been the mass of flesh and teeth that ripped through Arthur's arm, the creature that sent its infective ooze now racing through him system, melting him away with each passing minute.

It would only take hours for him to turn into one of them, and Arthur didn't want that.

He finds Alfred staring at him, down at his arms, where his open wound bubbled and sizzled in green ooze and crimson blood.

"Are you sure about this, love?" Arthur asks, his heart beating calmer and steadier than it should have. "You can still fight your way out."

Alfred looks down, then back up as though he'd simply made a good-natured joke. "Through that? I'm as good as dead too, you know."

Arthur hums in agreement. So it really has come to this.

"Are you ready?" Arthur asks, lips pressed against his lover's ear.

"Yes," Alfred whispers back. He pulls him close to kiss him, one last time. His movements are sweet and slow and passionate, sending a burning flood of emotion through Arthur's chest. His lips tingle, he feels Alfred's tongue pushing past to explore his mouth.

And then he's gone, breathing hard, looking at Arthur with a satisfied sadness that made him sure, in this very moment, without a beat of sarcasm or doubt, that he really truly loves Alfred F. Jones.

"I love you," he says, with every ounce of sincerity he could muster, to let Alfred know that he spoke true.

His eyes crinkle as he smiles. Tears well up in his sky blue eyes, now somewhat reflecting the fading light of a golden sunset. He looks at Arthur, taking him in, every bit of the man he fell in love with so many years ago—and yet, they were only nineteen. Such a shame that the rose is cut before it can truly bloom.

So he speaks, "I love you," and kisses him again—the last words to be spoken by any man on earth.

And then they jumped.

(a/n): welp. hope you liked that. why not drop a review and tell me what you think? ;)