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[yogurtgeek]

Life Series Post Apoc AU Pt.1

[First AU on the blr! Welcome to this Etho-centric AU with characters from the life serices/ 3rd life/ last life/ double life/ lim life (and possibly HC). Not sure how much of this I’ll write, but hope you enjoy! :) ] 

Context: life-series characters were all in university/college/recently graduated in Canada when the apocalypse happened. Now they try to survive together.

I wouldn’t say I’m good at ice skating; just better than some people. It’s expected that you will be terrible the first time you get on the ice: you have the instinct to either step or slide, and in reality, skating is something in between. It takes courage to try, to let go of the side, to expect yourself to fall. But once you get it, once you learn how much to bend your knees, how to work with the ice instead of against it, skating is a skill you can never lose.

I remember the time my friends convinced me to take them skating. It was a Saturday, we had exhausted all our good hangout ideas, and they had convinced me to let them do something truly Canadian.

“We are in Canada, anyway,” Scar said with a grin. “I can’t believe it’s taken us this long to go!”

So I took them to a place I used to visit as a kid - a rink that still sported 80s decor and was home to the occasional elementary school match. 

It was an afternoon I remember clearly. I took a moment to lap around the rink, re-adjusting to the feel of the blades on the ice, the wind whistling in my ears. I could already hear Grian’s screech as he fell on his back, accompanied by peals of laughter and excited chatter. Cleo had some experience skating - she took lessons as a kid - so she and I tried our best to teach the others to let go of the wall. We took turns pushing around Scar, who found a special interest in using his wheelchair as a threatening battering ram to inspire the others to skate faster. Scott, a humble natural, eventually volunteered himself to keep Scar out of trouble.

I remember Grian and Mumbo keeping score on how many times they fell over. I remember Joel and Lizzy trying to recreate a routine they had watched on TV to prepare for the event. I remember Bdubs determined to race me in a lap, and me absolutely destroying him. I remember Pearl finally learning the jump Cleo had taught her, her face alight with excitement, her bangs bouncing as she landed.

Pearl’s bangs are longer now - they hide her tired eyes. She stands next to me as we stare out at the frozen lake, the snow swirling around us. 

“Do you think you still remember how to do that jump?” I ask.

I can’t hear her sigh, but I can feel it as she turns away from the lake, back toward our base. “It’s a skill you never lose, Etho. We just need to find some skates.”

#life series #au #life series au #ethoslab #pearlescentmoon #grian #goodtimeswithscar #zombiecleo #scott smajor #dangthatsalongname #mumbo jumbo #smallishbeans #ldshadowlady #bdoubleo #yogurtgeekau

[yogurtgeek]

Pt. 2: Life Series Post Apoc AU

[Etho-centric AU with characters from the life series/ 3rd life/ last life/ double life/ lim life (and possibly HC). I hope you enjoy! :) ]

Context: life-series characters were all in university/college/recently graduated in Canada when the apocalypse happened. Now they try to survive together.

Pt. 1

“Did you find anything good?”

The warm glow of the fire washed over us as we entered the base, Scott securing the door behind us. Jimmy looked at us expectantly from the chair near the fire where he was polishing his sword.

“Well.” Pearl shifted her backpack to the floor and began unwrapping her layers of frozen clothing. “I ‘spose that depends on what you define as good.”

“How far did you go?” Scott asked, helping me untether my crossbow from my harness. “It’s getting dark; I was worried.”

Pearl glanced at her watch. “It’s only 3PM! Stupid Canadian winters with their early sunset and snow.”

“It’s the price you pay for long summer days,” I noted. “We walked about 10 kilometers east-”

“North-east,” Pearl corrected.

“.... okay, north-east. As far as the town over the mountain. Most places have been looted, but we found a few useful things.”

Pearl pulled a yellow sweater out of her bag and tossed it to Jimmy. “Here, Jim; it’s your color.”

“Ah, sweet!”

“Find anything for the Forge?” Tango appeared in the doorway holding a screwdriver.

The Forge was what we called our workshop, the place where us engineers created and maintained the technology that allowed us to survive. Our ongoing project was Scar’s wheelchair, but the most pressing current issue was power. We had relied on a gas-powered generator until recently, when gas had become more difficult to find. Since then, Tango, Impulse, BigB, Mumbo, and I had switched our focus to alternate energy sources.

“No gas for the generator, unfortunately. But we found a few other things on your list.” I handed him a bag of nails. “I know it’s not exactly what we need for the waterwheel -”

Tango sighed. “We’ll work with what we have. We could really use some fresh timber, though; I’d love to have this wheel finished before the ice thaws in the creek.”

“Tango, even if they found timber, It’s not like they could even carry it all the way home,” Jimmy noted astutely. “Lugging huge slabs of wood 10 kilometers through the snow? No thank you.”

Pearl and I exchanged glaces. “Actually, we may have a solution for that.”

“What?” Jimmy set his sword to the side, instantly intrigued.

“It will take some time to set up...”

“What will? What is it?”

“... but, with some patience, we should be able to make it work.”

“Oh come on, guys! What is it? What did you find?”

There was a spark in Pearl’s eye as she paused, building anticipation. “Horses.”

Jimmy, Tango, and Scott stared at her. “Horses? Like, wild horses?”

“They let us get pretty close,” I said. “I think they were domesticated at one point, and they’ve learned to survive on their own. We just need to re-tame them.”

“Did you tell Bdubs about this?” Scott asked. “He’ll be ecstatic!”

“I’ll tell him when he wakes up.” [I knew Bdubs was already asleep - somehow his biological clock corresponded perfectly with the rising and setting of the sun. We could fairly accurately predict what time the sun rose based on when Bdubs was awake.] “I know taming horses is a difficult task, but -”

“When has that stopped us before?” Tango grinned. “If we can create an intruder detection system, we can definitely tame some horses.”

“Yeah!” Jimmy chimed in enthusiastically. “We’ll have a whole posse by the time we’re done! Canadian cowboys!”

Pearl chuckled. “I guess we know what we’re doing tomorrow.” She bent down to unpack the rest of her bag. “I found some rope that could be useful, and we should probably design a stable….” Her face wrinkled in confusion as she pulled a large box out of her bag. “Etho, did you put a book in here?”

“.... yes.”

“That’s why my bag was so heavy!” Pearl shifted the box onto the floor and shot me a reproachful glace. “Why didn’t you carry it?”

“Well, I thought we were sharing. And we had space.”

“What book is it, anyway?” Scott asked, peaking curiously over Pearl’s shoulder as she opened the box. “The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne. That’s the guy who wrote 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.”

“It’s a sequel, sort of,” I explained. “It was one of my favorite books as a kid.”

“You couldn’t have picked a favorite book that was smaller? And paperback?” Pearl complained, but I knew she was as happy as I was to have some sort of entertainment on these cold winter nights.

“At the very least, it’s a decent amount of kindling for the fire,” Jimmy teased.

“I think it might be useful in other ways, actually.”

“How so?”

“It’s a story of a group of soldiers who are marooned on an island,” I explained. “They built a settlement to survive.”

“Published in 1875?” Scott flipped through the first few pages. “Are you sure this will be useful?”

“The technology they had then is pretty similar to what we’re confined to now. They had to create their own forge, smithy, and brickworks, and they even wired a telegraph system.”

“Hmm.” Tango peered at the book through his red-rimmed glasses. “Sounds inspirational.”

“It’s what inspired me to study engineering.”

“Well, I’m sure it will be a great read.” Scott gently placed the book on the mantle. “Let’s get these things put away, fix some supper, and then start the first chapter.”

“Sounds like a plan!”

I glanced at the book, half-illuminated by flickering flames, as I pulled more supplies out of my pack. There was another reason why I kept it. The story wasn’t just about a group of friends fighting for survival - it was about a mysterious island. There was a presence on the island, a hand behind the scenes, a force powerful and unknown to the settlers. A presence all too familiar to our own settlement.

There was anticipation in the air. I noticed it in the way Tilly - Pearl’s dog - growled at the whispering wind at night, the way there happened to be a medieval weapons museum in a nearby town, the way we had found more medical supplies in the past week than in the past year, the way the herd of horses had wandered into our territory. The way we hadn’t seen a single person since we had escaped to my grandfather’s cabin. The way our entire friend group had survived the apocalypse.

Maybe I was being paranoid, my traumatized brain picking out all the patterns it could find. It was a bit ridiculous to think that there might be a higher power manipulating our circumstances, but I had gained the skill of open-mindedness over the past few years, and nothing much could surprise me after what my friends and I had experienced. I didn’t know what lay in our future. I just knew that whatever happened, we needed to be prepared for what was coming.

#yogurtgeekau #life series au #life series #ethoslab #pearlescentmoon #scott smajor #solidarity gaming #tangotek #mumbo jumbo #the mysterious island #finally i get to write about one of my favorite books #au