It took everything Gilbert had left of his energy to not groan out loud into the cool night air when he realized he had awoken in the middle of the night with pain beyond anything he could describe. His head was throbbing like nothing he had ever felt before, and he was still deeply disturbed by the day's events. He and Roderich had gotten into a big fight after Elizaveta had woken up. They argued about who would watch her during her recovery and who wouldn't.

Roderich had come out the victor because of Gilbert's head wound.

Speaking of the head wound; Gilbert got out of his bed and walked into the bathroom, lighting a match so as not to use unnecessary energy. The bandage around his head and left eye was drenched again. Gilbert looked around himself for a first aid kit, but sadly for him, there wasn't one in sight. He knew the nurse would have it, but he didn't want to bother him. The man had looked disturbed when he had returned from the roof.

Gilbert sighed, and almost resigned himself to his bloody, sticky fate when he remembered the bespectacled boy with the blonde hair – Matthew, had been his name. So, instead of giving up and sleeping with blood matted hair, Gilbert left his room in search of Matthew.

Matthew never particularly liked being alone, but he also didn't like being around a large group of people. He would be more than pleased to settle for the happy median, maybe just with one or two people, but that was never possible. No one really wanted to be alone with Matthew for so long. Matthew himself could never quite pinpoint what it was that made being friends with him seem so unappealing; he knew that he was boring and too quiet for anyone's tastes, but he wanted to know – really know – what made him so invisible and unappealing to others.

Matthew was just about to pack it in for the night when an answer to his questions – to his annoyance – came barrelling through the door with a blood soaked bandage wrapped around his head. "Oh my God," Matthew started, backing away from the gruesome sight and, in the process, slamming into the cupboard with a loud crash.

"Whoa, relax," the man with the head wound said, raising his hands to show that he meant no harm. "Don't you remember me, you were the one who put these on me?"

"Oh," Matthew said, willing his speeding heart to slow down to an even pace. He was so lost in his thoughts when he had entered the room that he had forgotten the completely unique man he had tended to earlier in the day. He was surprised at himself. Matthew had never seen an actual, true-blue, albino before, and here he was already forgetting he had met one. It was probably due to the fact that he was still very shaken up from the car wreck.

As Matthew thought this over he found himself staring in the man's abnormal pink eyes. The eyes in question were completed with dark red pupils; they looked so otherworldly and foreign. He found himself staring at the man's one revealed eye peeking out from under the bandage, his own eyes wide and mouth gaping as he stared.

Matthew was not exactly the king of inconspicuousness.

Before he could stop himself, the man with the white-blonde hair began laughing raucously, rousing him from his trance. "Creepy, I know," he laughed, "a lot of people have a hard time getting past it."

Matthew looked down, ashamed that he had been caught staring at the man like he was some sort of alien. Even though Matthew himself didn't quite understand the feeling of being stared at, he did understand that being treated like an outcast didn't feel very good. "I'm sorry, it's just very unique. You don't see a man with pink eyes everyday, after all."

Gilbert laughed, turning a chair around and taking a seat in front of Matthew, "it's fine, it's fine, I can't blame people for looking. Seeing someone with pink eyes is a once in a lifetime kind of deal."

Matthew really didn't know what to say to the man, the only thing he could do was nod at him and try not to make eye contact.

"I'm Gilbert," the man stated, hand reaching out from behind the chair, "friendly neighbourhood albino."

Matthew chuckled lightly, taking the man's hand in his own and chancing a look back up at his face, he was smiling brightly. "My name's Matthew."

"Pleased to meet you, Matthew," Gilbert said, "now, if it's not too much trouble, could you re-wrap my bandages?"

"U-uh yeah, of course," Matthew scrambled around the room for the first aid kit he had put away, "sorry, I'm kind of a little scattered right now."

"It's fine," Gilbert said, laying his head down on his crossed arms as he watched Matthew scramble for the first-aid kit, "I have forever to wait now."

After some frantic rummaging, and a few confused head-scratches later, Matthew remembered he had put the first-aid kit on the chair he had been sitting on. He lightly slapped his open palm into his face and lifted the first-aid kit out from his chair before resting it in front of Gilbert.

"Scatterbrain are you?" Gilbert asked from his perch as he toyed with a piece of broken wood protruding from the chair he was sitting on.

Matthew chuckled nervously, "I'm actually normally really organized, but I guess the apocalypse does that to you…"

Gilbert laughed heartily at this, surprising Matthew by clapping a hand on his back, "the apocalypse clearly did that to me too, but slamming my head into hard cement pretty much took the cake." Gilbert brought his hand back and rested it in his lap, "I guess I'm screwed both ways from Sunday."

Matthew chuckled at the man's humour despite his precarious situation, he wished he could be so jolly during such a bad time. If he had hit his head in such a way, damaging his vision so severely, he probably would have given himself up to one of the infected. Being disabled during such a dangerous time almost spelled death, considering that a perfectly healthy human being was already at a loss.

Matthew shook his head at the dark thoughts, instead occupying his mind with taking care of dressing Gilbert's wounds. Antonio had shown him how to do it properly, and how to wash the wound without causing too much pain, but he wasn't an expert like Antonio was. He was a law student, not a medical student, after all. Matthew grabbed one end of the bloodied bandage and began unravelling it, slowly revealing the deep gash on the side of Gilbert's head.

To his relief, it looked a little better. The wound was nowhere near healed, but it was already starting to scab over, and it looked pretty clear of infection. He hadn't even heard himself sigh happily until Gilbert piped up from underneath him.

"I'm guessing by that sound you just made that I'm not looking at a bad case of gangrene destroying me in the near future?" Gilbert asked, voice unwavering even as he held his own bloodied bandages in his outstretched hands.

Matthew was surprised, to say the least, by the man's resilience. He had a head wound that was probably incredibly painful, and probably a major headache from the pressure. He was also, most likely, going through a bad case of nausea due to his scrambled vision to boot. Matthew turned away from the man and reached for the saline, picking it up between lithe fingers and holding it close to Gilbert's head. "Tilt your head to the right," Matthew said.

Gilbert complied without a word, leaning over to the right and using the back of the chair he was sitting on as leverage.

Matthew poured the cold saline on the wound and listened to the sound of Gilbert hissing, trying desperately to suppress the shout that wanted to escape. It seemed he was far more affected by the wound than what Matthew had originally thought; the man was just good at hiding it.

Matthew stopped with the saline, re-covering the bottle and returning with a bottle of hydrogen peroxide and cotton balls. And, while he dabbed away at the wound, wiping away the pus that surfaced with the hydrogen peroxide, he began to ask Gilbert how he was feeling. He was not a nurse like Antonio by any means, but he could at least ask how Gilbert was feeling. "Are you feeling pain?" Matthew asked, as if the answer were not already a given.

"A little," Gilbert lied, "mostly in my head and my neck."

"Your neck too?"

"Probably whip lash," Gilbert said with a shrug, "you get thrown from a car head first into the pavement, there are usually a few other problems you'll run into besides a bad concussion."

Matthew didn't say anything at this comment, and continued asking the man questions. "What about your eyesight, is any of it coming back?"

Gilbert nodded, hissing when the motion caused the cotton ball on the side of his head to slip and lift some of the scab. However, he continued speaking despite the obvious pain it caused him. "My right eye is getting much better, my left eye though…" To demonstrate, Gilbert brought a hand up and covered his right eye, "I can barely see out of the left eye, the most I can make out are outlines of things. It's just a blur."

Matthew didn't really need to ask to get the answer to his question, he could clearly see the vision loss in Gilbert's eyes. His right eye was still dilated, but nowhere near as dilated as his left eye. This indicated a severe head injury - and in this case - vision deterioration.

Antonio had made it sound so much lighter – so much less scary – when he had put it to words for the rest of the group. He had made it sound like it wasn't a severe injury. This was most likely to not cause his younger, burlier brother to stir, however, because when he got Matthew alone he had told him to make sure he came to get him if Gilbert started talking about a heavy pressure on the back of his head or if he started saying unintelligible things.

Brain swelling, that was the thing Antonio was worried about. Matthew knew this without asking Antonio for specifics about the kind of pain.

"Are you feeling any pressure," Matthew began, "on the back of your head?"

Gilbert laughed, causing Matthew to look at him quizzically, "my brain's not swelling, no."

"That's n-"

"It's your job to ask that question," Gilbert said, "why are you trying to apologize to me?"

"I'm sorry," Matthew said, head down.

Gilbert laughed again, this time even louder than before, "you really do apologize a lot for someone that's done nothing wrong."

Matthew hesitated, trying to stop himself from saying sorry again, and looked back up at Gilbert, "I guess it's a habit."

"You were about to say sorry again, weren't you?" Gilbert said with a smile, then cringed when the motion caused the tender skin on his head to pull. "Saying sorry isn't a bad habit, but it could be if you said it at the wrong time."

"How could you say sorry at the wrong time?" Matthew asked absently as he pulled a long roll of gauze out from the inside of the first aid kit.

"Well," Gilbert began casually, "you have great sex, and then you apologize? That kind of confidence is not going to go over well."

Matthew felt himself visually redden at how easily the words rolled off of the Albino's tongue, and to hide his embarrassment he found himself wrapping the gauze around Gilbert's head quickly. He didn't know why he found himself so embarrassed, he had heard Alfred – all of his house mates, in fact – say far more obscene things than this man had just said.

It was probably the fact that no one ever put him into the equation before. However, Matthew couldn't pretend that an image hadn't flashed in his mind of the muscled albino leaning over him…

"Ouch," Gilbert protested, reaching up to grab Matthew's hand. Matthew hadn't noticed that he had been winding the bandage so tight around Gilbert's wound. "Are you trying to finish the job that the pavement couldn't?"

"Sor-" Matthew started, but stopped himself in enough time to avoid Gilbert's ridicule. "I just have a lot on my mind right now."

"Really," Gilbert started, "what's on your mind?"

It would be an understatement to say that Matthew was surprised by Gilbert's genuine concern. Matthew's concerns were never taken into consideration by anyone, even Francis - arguably his closest friend - tended to ignore him even in the most serious of situations if the concern in question didn't relate to him. He could be near mental breakdown and he could barely keep anyone's attention for longer than ten minutes, and here he was, with a man he barely knew asking him to talk to him about his problems. He was so surprised that he could only stand there in stunned silence, looking down at Gilbert's half bandaged wound with his mouth gaping open.

"Well?" Gilbert asked, making a twining motion with his fingers to indicate that he wanted Matthew to go on.

"I- I- I guess I'm just really shaken up about everything that happened," Matthew began. "It's hard to wrap my mind around everything, I mean, where do you even start?"

Gilbert didn't cut him off or interrupt him abruptly, so Matthew continued on with his spiel.

"I was a law student, living a comfortable life and doing good in school. I was on my way to success, and I had my whole future planned out right to my death bed. Now, here I am, at the cusp of the apocalypse with no real accomplishments and no real reasons to continue living. I never planned for this." Matthew said this all calmly as he finished wrapping Gilbert's head, saying everything with a sense of finality because he expected Gilbert to leave as soon as his head wound was re-dressed. What Matthew didn't expect was for Gilbert to stay in place, looking up at him almost expectantly. Matthew cocked his head to the side.

"What?" Gilbert asked.

"I just – I guess I just thought that you were going to leave as soon as I finished bandaging you up."

"I wasn't going to, but if you want me to, I can leave," Gilbert stood up, getting ready to leave. However, he was stopped when Matthew's hand shot out and grasped his elbow, stopping him in place.

"No," Matthew started, swallowing hard as he tried to work up the courage to speak, "stay."

Gilbert turned around slowly, large smile plastered on his face, "all right." Gilbert turned back around, full body this time, and sat back down on his chair. He looked up eagerly, waiting for Matthew to start talking again.

Matthew felt completely lost for words. Even though he had so much on his mind – so much to say - he couldn't get anything to come out. He had never had anyone's undivided attention for so long, let alone a complete stranger's attention. Usually they would just roll their eyes and leave, looking for someone more interesting to talk to. Matthew couldn't say he blamed them, but part of him still wished they would grin and bear it, at least give him a little time to open up to them. Benefit of the doubt.

Being an introvert was hard.

"Well?" Gilbert asked, "are you going to talk to me, or not?"

Matthew wrung his hands in front of himself nervously; suddenly hyper aware of his body and the way Gilbert's eyes scanned him expectantly, waiting impatiently for him to start talking. He realized he wouldn't be able to shed his nervous tick, so he decided to sit down in behind the table opposite to Gilbert, hoping to cover some of his fidgeting from the albino man before him. However, even sitting down, he couldn't think of anything to say to Gilbert. "I- I can-"

"Ok, let me get you started," Gilbert said, sitting with his legs stretched out and his head angled onto the back of the chair, "why don't you talk to me about why you're having such a hard time talking to me?" Gilbert laughed, a booming thing that would have been annoying if the voice behind it hadn't been so beautifully unique. "Is it because I'm German? I'm told that we're somewhat intimidating to other people." Gilbert leaned his head forward, "or is it because I'm so damn white everywhere?"

At this, Matthew couldn't help the small chuckle that escaped his throat. He knew that Gilbert hadn't really meant it as a joke, but with his voice and expression combination, Matthew was helpless to the onslaught of laughter bubbling up in his chest. After a good fit that almost escalated into an out-of-breath type of laughter Matthew calmed himself down enough to answer Gilbert properly. "It's not any of those things, really."

Gilbert himself was chuckling, pleased with himself that he had made the shy man laugh, even though he hadn't really meant to, "well, what is it then?"

"Well, it's just that I'm not used to people willingly listening to me; you kind of caught me off guard."

"Why wouldn't anyone want to listen to you? Those people in the van were your friends, right?" Gilbert brushed a stray hair away from his visible eye, which lit up when he seemed to realize something, "oh, you don't know them, and that's why you can't really talk to them, right?"

Matthew shook his head, "it's not that." Matthew finally got enough confidence to start speaking again; laughing had lightened the mood in the room significantly. "I've known all of them for a very long time; I've actually known Alfred since I was little more than five years old, he's my step-brother."

"Then why can't you talk to him?"

Matthew stuttered for a moment, finding it difficult to come up with a reasonable explanation for Gilbert – one that wasn't confusing. "It's not that I can't talk to him, it's that he doesn't want to listen to me."

Gilbert leaned back on his chair, causing the front legs to lift off of the ground, "he sounds like an asshole."

Matthew shook his head frantically, "no, no, that's not what I'm trying to say."

"Well, that's what it sounds like to me," Gilbert said simply, shrugging his shoulders. "When it comes to family, especially siblings, you should listen to their concerns; you need to listen if you want to keep them in your life. How do you think my brother and I have stayed so close over the years? I listen to him, he listens to me." Gilbert laughed, almost uncomfortably, "if he hadn't listened to me, and hadn't followed me here in the first place, I probably would have never seen him again."

"He's your biological brother, though."

"Family doesn't end in blood," Gilbert said, "I've learned that over the years."

"I guess you're right," Matthew said with a sigh, "but I don't think he cares about me as much as I care about him, and if he does, he doesn't really do a good job of showing it to me."

Gilbert regarded Matthew with an almost pained expression, as if he were sympathizing with him, "everyone's stuck, or has been stuck, in one of those relationships." Gilbert went quiet as he looked off, spacing out as he stared at the cracked and boarded up windows surrounding the room.

"Are you?" Matthew asked, surprised at his own voice escaping. He had willingly engaged in, and invoked, a conversation with someone. Someone he didn't even know, at that.

"Am I what?" Gilbert asked, finally looking back at Matthew.

"Are you stuck in one of those relationships?"

Gilbert regarded Matthew quietly for a long while, not uncomfortably and not with a mean expression, he just looked at him. Whether it was a good thing or a bad thing was to question, but it didn't make Matthew feel nervous, and that was all that really mattered when it came down to it.

Gilbert didn't make Matthew uncomfortable, even when he was scrutinizing him.

"I am," Gilbert said easily, eyes finally moving away from where they were locked on Matthew's. "I've accepted my fate, however."

"Weren't you just lecturing me on not giving up?" Matthew found himself talking, openly arguing, despite his penchant for backing away from things when he felt they were getting too intense for him. He would have been surprised at himself; however, he didn't have the time for that any more. He was engaged in his talk with Gilbert - so enthralled by the strange albino man – that he was barely even aware of himself.

"I guess I kind of was," Gilbert chuckled, "but this is one of those special cases; I know I shouldn't pursue any longer."

"Why not?" Matthew asked. "If it's something you really care about, then shouldn't you pursue it?"

Gilbert finally looked back at Matthew, "why do you care?"

"Why do you care about my story?" Matthew retaliated, surprising both himself, and Gilbert.

Gilbert laughed, pointing his finger accusatorially at Matthew, "you're a lot more fierce than I thought you were, little American."

Matthew immediately discoloured, a cause for concern for Gilbert, "Canadian," Matthew whispered.

"What?"

"I'm Canadian, not American."

Gilbert laughed, another full body chuckle that brought a smile to Matthew's face again, "I'm sorry, I'll keep in mind that you're not a little American, but a little Canadian."

"That's better," Matthew said, straightening out his arms that he had crossed defiantly after being referred to as an American citizen. "But," Matthew started, "don't try to change the subject on me; I still haven't gotten an answer from you."

"You're persistent," Gilbert said.

"I'm a law student," Matthew smirked, "it's my job."

"Fine," Gilbert said, "I'll answer your question because you answered mine." Gilbert leaned the chair back forward, finally standing up from where he was sitting. In the process of moving from sitting to standing, he gave Matthew a good view of lithe muscles working under his black t-shirt. Though he wasn't as large in stature and tone as his younger brother, he clearly wasn't any weaker. Matthew metaphorically shook his head, telling himself that the apocalypse and the stress of everything around him was making him think the way he was. He had heard numerous times that during a dire situation people would start to get weird thoughts, that they would start becoming desperate, especially if they knew that they didn't have very long to live. As if to calm his increasing nerves and his confusion, Gilbert began speaking, "I came here to America for a girl."

"Did you find her, or…" Matthew felt horrible about the way he was thinking as soon as he heard the words leave Gilbert's mouth. He had come here for a girl, and she had probably ended up dying when the outbreak happened.

"I found her," Gilbert said simply, "in fact, she's with us."

Matthew knew right away who Gilbert was talking about as she was the only girl with the group. She was the girl that had gone into shock during the outbreak and had woken up after some help, compliments of the nurse. She was a beautiful woman, golden blonde hair and pearly white teeth, not to mention kind spirited and calm. He could understand why Gilbert was so attracted, and he also knew why Gilbert was giving up on his climb for her.

She was clearly in love with another man, Roderich, had been his name.

Gilbert huffed an annoyed breath of air through his nose and laughed humourlessly at his own words, head resting on his collar bone all the while. Clearly he knew that the woman would never return his feelings. Though Matthew felt bad for this, and understood Gilbert's feelings on some level, he couldn't help the small feeling of hope welling up at the back of his throat.

However, he quashed most of these feelings as soon as they started. He argued with the feelings that arose in him, telling himself that these feelings were starting to develop – not because he was falling in love with this stranger, but because this stranger was one of the only people who offered to listen to him, and the fact that he actually sat through their whole conversation without once sighing and leaving. If anything, it was just admiration that he was feeling for the man.

Gilbert was really surprised by the little Canadian man's willingness to sit down and listen to him, and even more surprised by the man's willingness to open up about himself to him. He was even surprised with himself; it normally took years of friendship before he was willing to talk about his feelings with someone, and even then, he vied away from saying too much to anyone he didn't know well enough. And here he was, talking with a man he had known all of a few minutes, relaying to him his whole life story. He didn't feel uncomfortable about it, though, he felt good about it. He told Ludwig almost everything about himself, but one thing he couldn't tell him about was his love life. If it was anything relating to Gilbert having feelings for someone, Ludwig wanted nothing to do with it. Which was understandable, considering how prudish his little brother was.

"I don't know," Gilbert said, leaning back on the chair once more. "But for some reason, even though I've had feelings for her for so long, I feel like I can get over it easily enough."

"Why, though?"

"Under most normal circumstances I wouldn't, but because of Roderich, I'm not upset at all," Gilbert sighed. "I know that he'll protect her, and as long as I know she's safe and happy, I'm not upset."

"That's very noble of you, Gilbert," Matthew said, yet again making Gilbert feel uncomfortably flustered, yet at the same time, flattered.

"It's not noble," Gilbert said, "it's perfectly natural to want the people you care about to be safe."

Matthew didn't say anything, but his lopsided smile said everything he was thinking. It pissed Gilbert off, but at the same time, it made him feel that uncomfortable sense of self-satisfaction that he was trying so hard to ignore.

Gilbert was about to ask Matthew more about himself, but he was distracted from his thoughts when light began to filter through the planks in the board room. Morning was coming, and neither of the two men had gotten an adequate amount of sleep. And, as much as Gilbert wanted to keep talking with the gentle-voiced blonde man in front of him, he also wanted to get a little sleep before their mandatory meeting in the afternoon.

"We should both get some sleep," Matthew piped up, as if reading Gilbert's mind. "We have a meeting tomorrow, and I don't think it would be good for us to be running on less than three hours of sleep."

Gilbert nodded his head in agreement, "you're right, we'll need some sleep if we want to function properly." Gilbert laughed, "as boring as it's going to be, we should at least try to be coherent enough to understand what's going on."

"Right," Matthew said, a small smile stretching his lips as he got up from behind the table. "Good night then, Gilbert."

"Good night, Matthew."

A/N: There's the PruCan you guys requested! I know it's not much and I know they're not really "loving" on each other like crazy, but I'm a big fan of 'slow-burn' relationships so you can't expect them to start banging right away. Heh.

Anyway, it's Easter weekend so I'm hoping that I'll be able to pump out another chapter by Monday night. I don't have any homework to do, and I don't have anything important that needs to be worked on, so we'll see! Next chapter is the very last chapter before the new arc starts, so it's not going to be that~ long. The next chapter is mostly going to be about all of them having a meeting and discussing living arrangements, and the remaining parts in the chapter will be for character development.

As always, thanks for reading! Also, don't forget that I take most suggestions, so don't be afraid to hit me up in the comments or on my tumblr (link can be found on my profile)!

I love you guys – I really do – your comments and your love keep me working like a maniac! 3

(To the fanfiction . net people, I'm sorry I don't reply to you, but I have NO idea how to work the reply system. I'm not ignoring you guys, I'm just confused!)