A/N: I had this saved on my computer and decided to throw it up. The story is a little disjointed - the way I wrote it, it's supposed to be more like a collection of loosely related drabbles than anything else. So just consider every paragraph a little story in itself. Tell me what you think, and I'll consider continuing if I ever regain my muse. It's MIA at the moment. Title from an REM song, wrote it after I saw the Resident Evil trilogy. Please notify me if you see any spelling/grammar/plot mistakes.

When they first encounter a zombie, it tries to take a chunk out of Ruby's arm. Dean thinks it's karma, Sam says it's not funny, and Ruby just swears and backhands the SOB so hard she snaps its neck. A few hours later, Ruby's gone and all that's in her place is a shuffling mindless zombie-chick. Apparently, demons and apocalyptic viruses didn't mix well. She had been steadily getting weaker before just doubling over and throwing up the black smoke that was Ruby, then trying to munch on the Winchester brothers. Dean can't help the jolt of vindication that floods his senses as he shoots the former-Ruby zombie clean through the head.

Sam and Dean don't go to Bobby's house for months. They know he's safely tucked away in an isolated (gated) country home with enough weapons to arm a small country and there are other, less well-prepared people scattered through the country that need help. In the first few days, they rescue perhaps a handful. After that, it quickly goes downhill. The Impala leads a run-down convoy of cars with all their tag-alongs towards Bobby's house. They know the hunter won't turn down those that ask for help. They deposit the survivors and reload on weapons and supplies then head back for the open road. Bobby hugs them goodbye; he knows they won't come back if they can help it. There's a country full of dead cannibalistic zombies out there, and they intend to take them down. It's how their daddy taught them, after all.

Dean calls for Castiel every night for a month straight but he never receives an answer. They've all disappeared - angels, demons, spirits, creatures. The supernatural world's just vanished. Sam thinks they're dead; Dean thinks they're just hiding. Sam hypothesizes that the virus has an adverse affect on the supernatural. Ruby was banished from her body after being bitten, he points out. Maybe it worked the same for angels, too. And spirits probably didn't have the strength to appear if their bodies were still up and around. He has an explanation (guess) for everything, a reason for each creature or entity they've faced to up and kick the bucket because of the virus. Dean's just thankful they only have to deal with the zombies for now, and keeps a wary eye out for any signs of return.

It's been a while since the virus outbreak, and nearly everything's died off. What once were fertile fields and forest are now barren. The lakes have dried up, the fish have died, the plants withered. Sam and Dean haven't been to the coastline yet, don't know if the oceans survived, but they're not hopeful. The lands they travel in are now foreign, not quite a desert yet but also nothing near what it used to be. Down south, they imagine, it must be worse.

They've been driving for years through the heartland of America, cleaning out the small towns and isolated roadstops. They don't go near the big cities just yet - it's too crowded, and there are still plenty in the country for them to take down. Sam's taken to driving an oil tanker behind the Impala. It's dead useful when they hit a succession of towns that have already been raided for oil, and they store piles of empty bottles in the passenger seat to use in Molotov Cocktails. Sam tries to convince Dean that he should drive a truck so they'd have more room for supplies and a safer place to sleep. Dean glares and pets his baby, ignoring the dust that covers her and the dents that pepper her body. She's lasted this long, he says. She can last a big longer.

A few weeks later, they go scouting in Chicago. Dean insists it was Sam's idea, hopeful that in a bigger city there would be a bigger chance of survivors. (He still refuses to believe that everybody could be dead. Dean doesn't point out that's what 'apocalypse' means.) They're not even halfway through before the zombies swamp them. Sam's forced to make an impromptu sunroof on the truck to escape the cabin. Dean tosses him a fuse; he dunks one end in the tank and lights the other before leaping onto the roof of the Impala. Dean drives like a bat out of hell, but Sam can feel the explosion in his bones as he clings to the car, thanking every deity he knows that zombies can't bite faster than Dean can drive. Sam listens as Dean hoots and hollers about the explosion for a week, and doesn't ask again about getting a different car.

Dean keeps a stack of state maps in the glove compartment and a red sharpie. Whenever they clean out a place, he carefully unfolds the map and marks it with a big red X. Sam never looks at the maps, because to him they mean just another city where there's no hope of finding a survivor.

Real bullets have run out ages ago. They're using silver, iron, whatever they can get their hands on and melt into bullets. Sometimes they'll even go back to the bodies of the zombies and dig out the metal to melt down and re-cast. Mostly, though, they just use machetes. The calls are closer, risks greater, but at least swords don't risk jamming or running out of ammunition. Sam has tried to make a pike or lance on a few occasions, but they never fit in the car and when he tied them to the top they just fell off.

They have a universal radio in the backseat of the Impala. When it crackles to life with a human voice both brothers jump a foot in the air. Sam's hand shakes as he clicks the button of the walkie-talkie and responds. Out of the corner of his eye, Dean appears to be just as freaked out. The people on the other side nearly cry with joy - they'd also thought that nobody else was alive out there. Incredulity is replaced by hope, then by an overwhelming desire to meet. They quickly exchange locations, decide on a rendezvous. It's a run-down old farm closer to the other people, but Sam and Dean have a car while the others were hiking through the wilderness.

The farm is deserted when they pull up, and Dean quickly kills the purr of the Impala's engine. Sam still wonders how his brother manages to keep his car in such good condition. She's faring better than either brother, and Dean never runs out of spare parts to patch her back together. They quietly slip out of the car through the windows (because in a post-apocalyptic world, it pays to be paranoid and the doors still creak) and scout, guns loaded in one hand while the other twirls a machete. They scour the farm from top to bottom, but there are no signs of life. They sit down on the porch to wait. An hour later, Dean is chomping at the bit and Sam is getting worried. Two hours in, and they head back to the car.

Dean doesn't want anything else to do with the missing survivors, but Sam manages to convince him to at least scout the area where they would have traveled through. They get almost all the way to the next town before stumbling upon an isolated group of zombies. Both brothers are grim as they cut them down and burn the bodies. The survivors had reported five people in their group; they killed twenty-one zombies. "Twenty-one down, 6 billion more to go."

Dean keeps his map of towns; Sam creates a kill-count. They both need something to keep their hopes up, to show that a difference is being made one way or another. Sam reasons that when (if) they meet survivors, they'll want to have a rough estimate of how many zombies are left. The count isn't perfect, of course. Sam can only guess as to the numbers they killed before he started the count, and that guess includes fatalities in their infamous run on Chicago. Despite that, Sam works diligently to record everything he can. When they have time to burn the bodies, he notes down the exact number and location, then takes a rough guess of the date. Dean just shakes his head and sticks with his maps.

When Sam's count reaches a thousand, they take the day off. They overeat on rations and drink some of Dean's carefully hoarded booze. Apparently, the first thing people look to during the apocalypse is alcohol because it's been almost impossible to find any. Neither of them drink enough to warrant a hangover tomorrow, but as a buzzed Sam sings karaoke to an invisible crowd, Dean sits back and thinks maybe the apocalypse just got a bad rep.

("Just do it, Dean.") It was just a routine clean up - just some farming town they were going to stop over and re-supply in before heading out for bigger fish. ("You know I can't, Sammy.") It should have been quick and simple, should have been nothing compared to other places they've already taken down. ("You know what'll happen to me if you don't") Neither brother will admit it, but they both know they got cocky. They split up, searched half-assed, and put their backs to potentially dangerous areas. ("Dammit! I'm not going to shoot my own brother!") As a result, Sam got bit.

Dean won't - can't - shoot his baby brother. Sam understands, but makes him promise to off his body once he's dead. It's not me, Dean. You've seen them. They don't have memories, don't have emotions. They're eating machines. When I'm gone just - just shoot it before it can eat you. Promise me. (Dean hasn't said anything, but the gun digging into his thigh as he drives is loaded with two bullets.) Sam gets worse as Dean drives - just drives, anywhere, everywhere, somewhere else. He keeps up a rambling commentary, tries to get Sam to respond. By hour six, Sam's hallucinating and Dean's fighting to keep himself together. This isn't how he saw them going out.

Hour six crawls into hour seven, then hour eight and nine. Sam's hallucinations have died down and he's fallen into a trance-like state. Dean fears that this might be it. He goes back to a town they've already cleaned out and drags Sam into a motel. They've slept in the car for ages, but he figures they both deserve a rest in a real bed. Dean's so tired - from worrying, from driving, from surviving that he just rolls into the second bed and falls off to sleep. Maybe he'll die, maybe he won't. He can't really find the willpower to care.

Dean wakes up alive, unbitten, and hopeful. Sam's eyes are closed; other then that, there's no change. Dean putters around the hotel room, takes a quick walk outside. He finds a deck of cards and tries to play solitaire, even though the seven of hearts and two of spades are missing. He builds a card house, then draws a target on the wall for knife-throwing practice. He flips through the static on the television, rambling on about all the old shows he used to love even though Sam doesn't respond. He sits and watches Sam breathe, clearing his own mind of thoughts. An entire day wastes away with no change.

Dean is used to action, to driving and hunting and talking and just living. Surviving in a post-apocalyptic zombie world only increased his desire to keep moving. This inaction, this waiting for death is not his style. So when he wakes up the second day and Sam is still comatose on the other bed, Dean decides enough is enough. He packs the bags, ransacks the motel, and loads the car before barging back into their motel room. "Sam!" Dean yells as he kicks the mattress with one booted foot. "Rise and shine!" His grin is a mile wide as Sam, groggy but still Sam, blearily raises his head, opens his mouth to retort, and pukes all over the floor.

A week later, the bite wound has faded. It's going to scar, and Dean teases him relentlessly. "You know, the next girl you pick up is going to think you have some really weird fetishes, Sammy-boy." Sam huffs but doesn't say anything, because they're both relieved that Sam's even around to be teased. Later, though, as the night speeds by on the open road, Sam can't help wondering why. Why didn't the virus affect him?

It's been a while since they've seen any animal life. They disappeared early on, hiding from the zombies. Dean says they're smart buggers. Sam wishes they would come back. Neither of them even thought of the possibility of the infection spreading across species until they stumble upon a zombified Chihuahua. Dean thinks it's funny until the rest of the pack comes yipping around the corner. Sam laughs his ass off for a week at how Dean jumped in fright. Dean grumbles good-naturedly because it's just good to have his brother back, even though the bite happened a while ago and has faded into a strange-looking scar.

Dean wants to try their luck at another big city - maybe not as populated as Chicago, but something more substantial than what they've been taking on. He plans for weeks before talking to Sam, choosing a target and raiding a truckstop for a map of the city. It takes a few days to talk Sam around, but eventually he wins out and they drive to an army supply warehouse they'd stumbled upon a few years after the outbreak. They pick up a Hummer and another oil tanker, stockpiling the car with explosives and extra firepower. Sam refuses to pack a flamethrower ("Seriously, Dean, isn't blowing up another tanker enough?") but relents enough to allow the grenade launcher. He'll never admit it, but Sam also thinks grenade launchers are pretty damn cool.

They spend another month planning the attack, arguing over strategy and tactics. They double-check the explosives and quality of the weapons, fill up the tanker past full. Sam scrounges up some waterproof containers tucked away in a corner of the facility that they stuff with dynamite and sink into the tanker. Dean's eyes light up like a five-year-old when he even thinks about the explosion their new and improved tanker-bomb will cause. They cover the Hummer with sturdy metal meshing that will let bullets pass but keep out snapping teeth and weld sharp metal scraps to the front and sides. They practice driving the Hummer and tanker in tandem, and Sam practices jumping onto the roof and climbing inside through the new sunroof. He argued that it was Dean's turn to drive the suicidal truck; Dean insists that he's the better driver, not to mention Sam's impervious to zombie bites. Finally, all the plans are smoothed out and the two-man invasion is ready.

Dean stops the Hummer once they crossed the state line and sinks backwards into the seat. Smoke is still rising behind them, and Dean wouldn't be surprised if Bobby is sitting outside his house looking at the black clouds of smoke and cursing them to hell. He can practically hear Bobby's voice muttering about 'idjits' and headstrong psychotic Winchesters. His heart is still racing, and judging from how twitchy Sam is he's not the only one. "Never again." Sam's voice is strained with nerves and adrenaline. Dean just sighs in exasperated agreement and slumps to the side. They sit there for twenty minutes until they feel back in control, and then Dean starts up the car again and heads for the Impala. "You know, Sammy," he says as the sun begins sinking below the horizon and the road stretches before them in the glare of the headlights, "That was one hell of a fight." Sam's laugh is strangled and he shifts to give Dean a straight-on glare. "Never. Again." Dean chuckles and keeps driving.

When they get back to the army warehouse and the Impala, Sam goes straight to the glove box. He digs out Dean's maps and his own kill-count, and both men lean against the hood of the Impala to write. Dean marks a thick blue X (the red marker ran out a while ago) while Sam tries to come up with a plausible estimate of kills before giving up and just taking the incident out of the count and scribbling something else down. Dean snags the journal before Sam closes it, and laughs. Blew up half the city, shot the rest. I think the grenade launcher was overkill, though. Best guess of numbers: a shitload.