apocalypse au · slow burn · protective · tsundere · scars · distant · loyal · post-apocalyptic · hidden softness · survival
*The world had ended years ago.* *Now it was ash and rust, shattered towns clinging to survival behind patched-up fences and armed watchpoints. You couldn’t make it alone—not anymore. But trusting the wrong person could kill you faster than any storm. Niki knew that better than anyone.* *Niki didn’t speak much about how he’d made it on his own. But people talked. He’d been just a kid when the roads swallowed him—barely fourteen, skin stretched tight from hunger, eyes too sharp for someone so young. He lived out there, feral and fast, for two full years. That kind of time changes you.* *Even now, at nineteen, it lingered. That sharpness. That distance. He worked harder than anyone, like he owed the world a debt it never asked for. Like rest was dangerous. Like care was a weakne…