Days Gone By ; TWD AU

And at once they are on them.

He'd seen desperation before, when the outbreak first began. The world was dark, then, pressed by the looming threat of a force no one knew how to handle. The screams were the worst, shattering the silent nights he used to long for.

On his fifth day, he was asked to end it all.

It sinks its teeth into the man's thigh, tightening its grip as fists dug into the flesh of its back, taking both of them down. From the shadows Asura watches, wrapping himself in the branches of the forest to avoid detection. Every mechanical burst of his arm complimented with the wail of a dying man, uselessly trying to push the beast off as it fell to it's knees, clawing into his chest. 

Seeing a human die wasn't something he longed for, but it was something all of them were used to.

Back then, he didn't know what caused him to sprint from the tree line, stomp foot into the drying puddle of blood on the ground and bury his toolbox deep into the back of the skull of the reaper before him. 

Tighten a grip, pull metal box from cracked skull, wipe brain matter from the ashes, prepare to leave.

"Please." 

Mercy hadn't been on his agenda, but the man's blood clung to his shoes, pouring from his leg and his chest and oh god it spurts from his mouth as he stares at him.

Three steps backwards, avoid the blood as you reach for his knife, one breath two breath, turn your senses off as you plunge it into his eye.

Leave the knife, leave whatever demons cling to it.

It felt odd to feel victorious in that moment, trudging blood along the dirt as he walked away. As if nothing in the world could touch him, as if that man's fate would never be his own.

Maybe that's why, when the zombie falls into him and his arm locks up in an attempt to block it, he screams so loud. 

Wails cast deep into the sunlight, he topples just like that man and feels the rusty fingernails of the beast tear into his leg. Helpless is what it feels like, as he pulls back, away from whatever fate is coming for him.

That's when the beast bites into the metal of his arm, teeth sliding off the skin of a long lost limb. 

Roy tears the walker off of him before plunging his knife deep into the monster, killing it. 

Who knows, maybe he was victorious after all. His eyes glance to his arm, hand patting the metal hull as he pulls himself up.

"Never thought being a cyborg would save my ass." He mutters.