He kneeled, taking a look at the gunshot in the things head, pulling a face as the smell grew stronger.

"Your aim was faulty." He said, motioning to the hole, which was slightly to the left of the zombie's head. The man's younger brother scowled, stuffing the handgun into his belt.

"Stop it. We're in the middle of the fucking apocalypse and you're still telling me what I'm doing wrong." Cooper frowns at him and stands up straight.

"Come on Blaine, I-"

"Stop it. Seriously. Next time I'll let the thing kill you. Or turn you. Or whatever. But if you keep judging me, I won't stick around to save your life."

Cooper sighed and didn't get another word in as Blaine stormed off into the blistering heat. He'd be okay for a while. As long as the sun was out. Blaine did this often now. Ever since the outbreak a month ago.

No one had been expecting it. Blaine had just arrived in California to visit Cooper for one weekend, because he wanted to spend the rest of the summer with Kurt before he was to leave to New York. No one's really sure how it started, but it happened fast. And soon enough it was all over the world.

Cooper had broken into a gun shop within the first week, stealing several guns and as many bullets as he could. He's not sure how either of them had survived this long. They had very little food and spent every night barricaded in Cooper's apartment, trying to sleep through the wails of the monsters that trekked the streets.

Blaine had been more emotional than ever, ditching Cooper every chance he got to just walk around the empty city of Los Angeles. He got angrier quicker, and cried a lot. Cooper could hear him crying into his pillow almost every night.

This was killing Blaine without actually killing him.

Cooper knew it had nothing to do with the fact that there was no civilisation anymore. It wasn't because he'd never achieve his lifelong dream. It wasn't because there was a chance they'd die almost every day.

It was because of Kurt. And the fact they had no idea whether he was okay or not.

~X~

"Blaaaaaaaaaaaaaineeee!"

Blaine's head shot up at the sound of Cooper's voice, sand spraying everywhere as he shook it from his curls. He stood from the sand bank, brushing the sand from him, and squinting in the bright sunlight to see his brother grinning at him, standing atop a Mercedes Benz parked wonkily in the street.

"What is it Coop?" he asked tiredly, almost bitter.

Grinning, Cooper jumped off the car and practically skipped over to Blaine, beaming. He looked far too happy for a guy in the middle of an apocalypse.

"We're leaving, Squirt." He said, tossing Blaine a pack of bullets. He caught them, snatching them out of the air with a confused look upon his face, not even thinking about reprimanding Cooper for calling him that.

"We're what?" He asked, bending over to pick up the hand gun and MP5 that had been lying in sand. He nearly dropped them because they had just been sitting there absorbing heat and were sweltering when he touched them. He stuffed the M9 handgun back into his belt, and swung the strap of the MP5 over his back.

"We're leaving. I found this truck loaded with food and the keys are still in the ignition. I say we go back to that gun store that we cleared out of zombies and boarded up in case of an emergency, stock up on ammo and leave tomorrow morning the second the sun rises. We make two stops; one in Albuquerque, and one in Tulsa. We travel through Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Illinois and Indiana. My calculations say we'd be there in three days-"

"Cooper!" Blaine cut him off, confused. "Where? And why are we leaving anyway? What's the point?"

"Lima." Cooper stated, and that was all he needed to say to render Blaine speechless.

Blaine nodded mindlessly as Cooper grabbed him and started wheeling him down the straight road, going on and on like it was a road trip and that everything was okay. Blaine wasn't exactly sure how he felt about this. Sure he wanted to see Kurt again, but he didn't want to go there and find out he's… He can't even think of the word.

He could allow himself to hope, but if he was wrong… he might just turn the gun on himself.

~X~

Blaine shifted the heavy bag to his other arm, sweating from head to foot already. He had to be the one who carried their remaining food to the truck that Cooper had said he'd found. Cooper was walking ahead of him, their ammo supply in his own bag.

Blaine grimaced as he stepped over a rotting body, blood smeared across the sidewalk. He glanced at the face and thought he'd recognized it for a second. He stopped, staring down at it, frowning. After a minute or so, he gave up trying to figure it out and just put it down as some celebrity. He then looked back up, his eyes scanning the street and not seeing Cooper anywhere.

He froze over the body, slowly pulling out his M9 and taking it off safe mode.

"Cooper?" He said, his voice echoing in the empty street. He scanned the houses first, looking for any sign of movement, knowing that 'zombies' were lurking just inside. He stepped carefully forwards, moving onto the road and weaving quietly through the cars, his gun loaded and aimed in his eyesight.

There was a crash to his left, causing Blaine to jump and shoot automatically over in the direction.

Then he got a good look at the situation.

Luckily, the shot had missed Cooper's head by a meter, but he clearly wasn't bothered because he was laughing so hard he was bent over the car holding his stomach.

This just angered Blaine more.

"Are you an idiot? That nearly hit you! Why the fuck did you do that!? I could've killed you!"

It took Cooper a minute to calm down, holding his chest a little. "If that had hit me, it would've been worth it."

Blaine scowls, putting his gun back and folding his arms.

"Oh god… I'm sorry, bro. But you should've seen your face."

Blaine just shakes his head and walks away. Cooper follows, still chuckling a little. Blaine simply rolled his eyes, letting Cooper go ahead to lead him to the truck.