This is an exert from a slightly longer fic I planned to write with a Zombie AU and shit, but that I know I'll never finish, anyway, this is Arthur and Alistair's reunion scene in it, and I figured I haven't posted a fic on here in ages so I probably should. I need to start writing again, eventually even my back-log of old unfinished fics will run dry (Although that's gonna take a WHILE, damn) It's not my best work, but I figure it's decent enough.

Enjoy! ;)

"Who are you, and what the fuck are you doing here?"

Alfred held the gun, his favourite gun, in his hand to the guy's head, pressing the barrel firmly into the base of his skull. And sure, the gun had no bullets, but he was willing to bet the guy wasn't going to risk it.

The guy held his hands up, his shoulders arching in a clearly submissive gesture. The axe the guy held in his hand dropped to the floor, and Matthew reached down to grab it and take it far out of the guy's reach as Alfred pressed the gun in harder in a sort of 'I'm waiting' gesture.

"My name's Alistair, I came here for food, I didn't know this place was already occupied," The guy, now dubbed Alistair, said, his voice hoarse and rusty, as if he hadn't spoken at length for a great deal of time, "Now, if you'd just give me back my axe, I can be on my way."

Now, Alfred did not want to give this guy back his weapon, he'd only known him for all of thirty seconds, and the last time he was civil to a passer through they'd come back with more guys and damn near driven them out. But luckily for Alistair, he was a good guy at heart.

"Mattie, get Art, I want his opinion on this guy."

Matthew frowned at his brother, "You know exactly what he'll say."

Alfred rolled his eyes, "Yeah, but the last thing I want is him on my case because this one looked to be a valuable asset. He's got some muscle on him, if nothing else he could probably help me with the heavy lifting."

Matthew cast Alistair one last look before disappearing from the room in search of their fearless leader. Alfred was never really sure how exactly that had come to be, it was just something about his being, as broken as he was, that commanded respect, and Alfred (as well as the rest of their rag-tag group, it seemed) couldn't help but trust him completely.

It was several minutes before Matthew returned, the two spending it in tense silence, the gun slowly inching down Alistair's spine as Alfred's arm got tired.

"Okay, who's the fuckhead who-"

Arthur was cut off by the guy turning around, knocking the gun to the ground with a loud clatter as the action caught Alfred by surprise.

"Arthur!" The guy not quite yelled, not quite whispered, but it was a strange mixture of those two things combined with the already harsh rasp of his voice that caught Alfred once again completely off guard.

Before Alfred could regain himself and do something about the guy, Arthur replied in kind with a tone of voice that he hadn't thought possible from the surly Brit. It was soft, disbelieving, almost... loving?

"Alistair!"

And the two simultaneously pushed past their respective twin to catch each other in the middle. Arms wrapped around necks and torsos and waists, and fingers twisted into hair and clothes, while their faces buried themselves deep into each other's necks.

They were both making sounds that sounded either like sobbing or laughter, it was probably a mixture of both, as they leaned the tiniest amount away from each other, but only so they could lean back in and bring their lips crashing together messily and clumsily, without a hint of any finesse in place of desperation. Their kiss was unlike anything Alfred had seen Arthur do before, it was all passion and heat, absolutely nothing like the cold and apathetic man he knew.

It was about thirty seconds until they pulled away from each other, at which point they reached up to touch each other tenderly over necks and jaws with shaking and cautious hands as if unsure of whether the other was really there or not, "You're-" Alistair choked, blinking hard as if to stop tears falling down his face, "Oh god Arthur, I thought you were dead!"

Arthur smiled, and that was weird enough on its own without the strangled laugh that left his lips at the same time. "You too," he gasped, "When you didn't come back-" he struggled through a breath before continuing, "I thought- I mean I thought they'd caught you and- and we went to find you, and you weren't there either, and then I thought- I thought- You'd been killed on your way back by the things and-"

Alistair cut him off with another kiss, "I almost- I got away, but I had to take a detour, and when- When I got back the room was empty," he said, "The entire place was empty, ransacked, I thought someone had- fuck, I thought they'd found you."

At that the taller of the pair really let out a sob, which Arthur responded to by kissing him reverently, tears falling down both of their cheeks now. Arthur shook his head, "I left a note, in case I was wrong," he whispered, "When I- When I got back the place was to shit, I don't know who found it, but they must have taken the note too... and I just thought that you would have been there by then if- you were alive, and you weren't and we couldn't stay and-"

Alistair nodded, pressing their foreheads together, "I'm just so glad you're alive," he whispered, "I missed you so much."

Arthur whispered something in reply, but it was too quiet to hear, Alfred would have been surprised if Alistair himself could hear it.

It was a short moment before Alfred brought himself to speak, "So you two know each other?"

The two of them let out disconcertingly similar snorts of laughter as they loosened their hold on each other enough to look at him. Arthur reached up to his neck, to the chain which always hung there and pulled it out from underneath his shirt. On it was a simple ring of gold, which must have been- "He's my husband," Arthur said as Alistair pulled out a similar ring from around his own neck, looking back up at him with the simple kind of adoration that Alfred had never before seen grace the man's features, "My living husband."

Alistair smiled widely, leaning down and kissing him again, "Oh god, Arthur, I love you."

Arthur replied by kissing him back, dropping the chain for it to rest back into the space just bellow his collar, and twisting his fingers tightly into Alistair's hair.

Alfred took another moment to process this. Arthur had a husband. A husband who he thought was dead, but wasn't and had somehow just… stumbled into their camp. And now they were making out like teenagers. Well, he supposed if he were in Arthur's situation he would do the same thing, so that last part was pretty understandable.

Arthur choked out a strangled noise again, and pulled out of the kiss, "Where have you been, how are you not dead, what are you doing here?"

Alistair kissed Arthur soundly again before answering, "I've just been wandering, surviving on my own for the most part, I came here in search of food. You know, it's pretty easy to get in here, you should work on security."

Arthur shook his head, "That's Dylan's job, I'll be sure to let him know he's shit at it."

Alistair smiled breathily, "Dylan's here?"

Arthur nodded, "And Siobhan and Seamus. None of them had their heart set on breaking my heart."

Alistair brushed a thumb gently over Arthur's cheek at that, "I'm sorry Artie."

Arthur smiled back at him, "It's perfectly alright poppet, you're here now. We're here together."

"And who are these two charming lads?" Alistair twisted around to look at Alfred and Matthew, who just sort of blinked in surprise.

"Stragglers. I've taken in quite a few. We found a group of kids camped out in a local Secondary School, brought them all along with us."

"That's unlike you."

"I'd just lost you. The thought of wasting these kids' lives made me sick. If I couldn't save you, at least I could save something else."

Alistair turned Arthur's head up then and brought their lips together once again. They kissed for a long moment, slow and languid, as if they were just taking the time to drown in each other. "Fuck, I missed you Princess." Alistair whispered into Arthur's mouth, and even though both Alfred and Matthew recoiled, expecting Arthur to blow up at a name like that, Arthur just smiled widely.

"I missed you too Haggis-breath."