wasteland, baby!

5

The car runs out of gas halfway through the next day. Jungwon's surprised it lasted as long as it did.

He ends up not too far away from a deserted convenience store in the middle of nowhere, though, and he hops out of the car excitedly. He fixes his glasses, slings his backpack over his shoulder, and starts to make his way towards it.

He hasn't slept since he's started driving the minivan and he feels like he's about to collapse from exhaustion at any moment, but he pushes on.

He opens the door slowly when he finally makes it to the building, scanning the room to make sure no one else was inside before making his way in. He makes a beeline directly towards the food, suddenly hyper-aware of how hungry he is and how loudly his stomach is growling.

"Okay, okay," he says to it when it lets out another loud growl and then tears into a bag of chips. He lets out a small moan when he takes a bite— and hey, when was the last time he had eaten?— and keeps stuffing more into his mouth as he starts making his way towards the refrigerated station to grab some water, chugging it down in seconds. He grabs a couple more bottles to stuff into his backpack, then starts to walk around the store like that; stuffing other things he deems necessary inside, not sure when the next time he'll reach another store with food will be.

He doesn't pick up on the sound of footsteps coming towards him until it's too late, and then suddenly the air is filled with the sound of a gun going off. Jungwon dives down to the floor immediately, glasses falling off his face and skittering across the floor a few feet away in front of him. He hears something else hit the floor behind him, but he doesn't turn to look.

"Shit," he swears and shuffles forward to reach for his glasses as quickly as he can when he starts to hear the footsteps get closer. The sound of a gun getting reloaded fills the air and Jungwon freezes for a second.

He shoves his glasses back on his face and turns around to see another guy standing at the end of the aisle, AK-47 pointed directly at him. Jungwon feels the blood drain out of his face and he holds his breath as the guy stares at him, eyes narrowed and calculating, before turning his attention to another sound just behind Jungwon.

The guy moves the gun a few inches to the left and then pulls the trigger. Jungwon follows the guy's line of vision, finally looking behind him and gasps when he sees the motionless body of a zombie on the ground a few feet away from him. A bullet wound going through his stomach and the other one through the head. He breathes out a small omg? and turns back to look at the guy still holding the gun, aim trained back on him.

The other guy, who looks to be around the same age with a much greater height distance, steps closer to him. Jungwon's not sure what to do, can't really do much with a gun trained on him, so he just stares back.

The guy takes a step closer. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

"Hey, I was just hungry," Jungwon responds and holds his hands up to show the backpack filled with chips and water. "Really that's all I was here for. I'll leave, just, okay can you stop pointing that thing at me, it's freaking me out."

"You don't have anything on you?" he asks, looking Jungwon over as if he were hiding his own Ak-fucking-47 behind his back, waiting for an opening to attack.

"No, of course not!" Jungwon insists and shows him the backpack full of food again, shaking it a little. "I just wanted some Funyuns!"

The guy looks him over a couple more times before finally lowering the gun, most likely coming to the conclusion that Jungwon was, indeed, not a threat, and then slinging it over his back. He walks over to Jungwon and bends down a little, holding his hand out for Jungwon to take.

"What're you doing out here alone and unarmed?"

Jungwon looks at the hand offered to him and can't help but notice the guy has nice hands, them being much larger than his- which... is a weird thought so Jungwon shakes his head and takes it, standing up and wobbling a little on his feet.

He steadies himself against the shelves and then shrugs, hand going up to fix his glasses. "Haven't really run into any trouble until now."

The guy eyes him a little unbelievably before asking, "Where you coming from?"

"North Carolina," Jungwon responds. "I go— well, I was going to Duke when this whole thing happened, but now I'm just trying to get back to Canada to see my family."

The guy, who had been eyeing his backpack curiously, looks up and gives him a skeptical look.

"Wait," he starts. "Let me get this straight... You," he points at Jungwon, "were in North Carolina," he points up. Jungwon nods a little slowly, not sure where he was going with this. The guy crosses his arms over his chest and gives him an amused look. "And you've been trying to make your way to Canada." It was a statement, not a question.

"Uh, yeah. That's literally what I just said," Jungwon answers anyway.

"What the fuck are you doing here in Tampa swamp-ass-humidity Florida, then?"

Okay... that takes Jungwon by surprise. He opens and closes his mouth like a fish a couple of times before replying weakly with, "Florida?" Holy shit, had he read that map completely wrong.

The guy's face breaks out into a shit-eating grin before he doubles over laughing, holding onto his sides. "OMG," he lets out a loud laugh, but it's not a mean one. It sounds more like he's laughing with Jungwon than at him, even though Jungwon doesn't really feel like laughing right now. "This dude... didn't even know... he was in... fucking Florida," he gasps out in between laughs and wipes at an eye.

Jungwon feels his face heat up and he crosses and uncrosses his arms over his chest a little self consciously. "Yeah? Well, it's not that easy to read this old of a map, fucking... Mr. Go, Diego, Go! over here..." he mutters lamely.

That makes the guy laugh even harder and Jungwon can't help but smile despite himself at the sound. It was a contagious laugh.

The guy eventually straightens back up, smiling widely as he claps a hand down onto Jungwon's shoulder. "You look tired. Come on, you can crash in the back."

The guy turns around and walks towards the back of the store, not even checking to see if Jungwon's following. Jungwon bites his lip, unsure of what to do, but then shrugs and follows after him. The guy did just save his life after all... and he really was tired.