Tattooed Mistakes: Far From Over

Chapter 1

(A new Zephzo-ccentric fic is here! The sequel to Tattooed Mistakes, just in time for Halloween month! This fic was supposed to just be a bonus chapter but it just kept getting longer and longer so I split it up into five chapters instead

If you haven't already, make sure you read the original TM first and if you're completely new to the BG (background) zombies, start with the Limelight one-shot collection! (you only need to read up to chapter 31-ish of that to understand TM)

You can find the theme song playlist, which will be updated on Wednesdays and includes the promo edited by kokinu09, here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbVNF5KuY3tlvplN0G8odeXUQeYJS_kuZ )

Chapter 1 theme songs: Freeze Your Brain from Heathers the Musical and Sominex/Suppertime from Little Shop Of Horrors

______________________________________

~ Forget who you are, unburden your load ~

Alonzo had never particularly liked brain-flavoured food. People, mostly Zane, always seemed to have an opinion on the fact he was a zombie who didn't like brains. But ever since the incident, no-one said anything. No-one questioned it. Not even the ones who had turned against him. They had all heard how sick he had been while in containment, and they all knew he wasn't quite back to full health again just yet – physically or mentally.

There was a lot of progress still to be made, in fact. His relationship with Zephyr was much better, true, but there were occasional moments of tension and fear between them. The integration had been almost completely reversed and things weren't any better now than they had been when Alonzo and Zephyr first started dating. Their curfew was back to its original time. Keira was still avoiding not only Roz and Alonzo himself, but all of the zombies, as were most of the humans. The one good thing was that Zephyr had gone back to counselling and was actually working through his trauma.

Alonzo, however, continued to face his trauma day after day, in ever more distressing and frightening ways, until the day he couldn't hide it anymore.

– FAR FROM OVER –

The night it happened, Alonzo was over at Zach's house. He hadn't intended on staying over but they had lost track of time and it was too late. With curfew only a couple of minutes away, he texted his mom to let her know he wouldn't be home till the morning.

It wasn't often that Al felt so at ease these days; he was always just a little on edge, always felt like he needed to hide or apologise or something. He was gradually getting better but tonight, he let his guard down. He was having an impromptu sleepover with his best friend, no-one else was around and he told himself that maybe, just maybe, he could relax. Zach's parents were asleep down the hall so as long as the boys didn't disturb them, they were free to do what they wanted. They shared a pair of headphones and put on Bowling For Soup and spent a few hours just doing whatever until twelve o'clock had come and gone.

"... Midnight snack?" Al suggested, raising an eyebrow, and Zach grinned.

"Midnight feast!" he shot back and stood up, "Let's go!"

As quietly as possible, the two of them crept downstairs to raid the kitchen. Zach was careful to leave anything brain-flavoured where it was at first but Al nudged his shoulder when he noticed.

"You can eat it if you want, Zach," he shrugged, "Just... don't let it get too close to me or anything, I can't stand the smell of it."

Zach hesitated but looked back at the bag of marshmallow brains in the corner of the cupboard, "You sure?"

"Yeah. It's been forever, I'll be fine." He casually waved a hand and Zach added the candy to their growing stash of junk food, but the anxious breath Al let out didn't go unnoticed.