The summer sun was high in the sky, too blue for the dark world you found yourself a part didn't have time to wipe the blood from your face as the croats closed in, and it dried into a macabre mask of surviving; if you let even one go after all, your little sister Mary was as good as dead, and that was something you refused to allow.. She was made for the days when women were taken care of; coddled even, but ceartainly not the post apocolyptic world you lived in now. She could sew and cook and read and write, but she had the spacial sense of an infant and about the same stomach for violence. She tried, but it was doomed to fail, which was why, for her good ad yours, you sent her away when clearing areas out. You would send her to a small shop you had already cleared, fire your gun, a small pistol into the air, toss it to her, and take out whatever came at you.

This is what you were doing as sweat poured from your brow. A few awkward contortions had left your body tired and battered, but there was nothing to do but keep fighting, the machete you had been using since this whole mess started swinging around you as quickly and gracefully as your sprained ankle and protesting muscles would allow. Willpower allowed you to ignore most of the pain, but the bloody acrobatics that you often resorted to, in spite of their toll on your energy, were out of the question lest you collapse and end up leaving both you and Mary open for death.
"Get the hell off me!" You shouted, kicking it away and wincing as you further damaged you half-lame ankle. Mary, for her part, stayed put, just as you had told her to. She had been an arts student when this started three years ago, 19, and ready for the world to start. She had tried once, and only once, to help you in battle, and that had resulted in horror for everyone involved.

You were at your Uncle John's hunting cabin, doing fine away from populated cities, the safest place to be when a virus spread mostly by human contact was effectively, when a group of three found their way to you. They must have wandered around looking for some easier prey tha could be found in the crowded cities, where competition left food scarce. By the time you came home from finding your own family's dinner, a deer that you had shot while John prepared the one you'd bagged the day before for smoking and saving to prevent you all starving to death over the winter, they were there, and your mother was dead, your father dying, and Mary wide eyed behind him. You hadn't re-loaded your gun, a stupid move that had cost you so dearly, but Mary tried fighting them off with a kitchen knife to save a man who was already as good as in the ground. Luckily, your uncle had come in by this point to see what was going on, and had his gun ready.

He fired, the one about to bite Mary for the stab to the shoulder she had given him falling to the ground as it's heart stopped. You fumbled with bullets, nerves leaving your hands shaking as they never had before, and never would again.

"Mary, run!" He ordered, clicking the gun into readiness and aiming once more. She heard him, but didn't listen, instead still trying to grab you father, who was bleeding everywhere as though he weren't already done for. Your attention was focused on her, and your fingers dropped the bullet. One of them dug into his shoulder as he shoved her toward the door before firing once more. He had chosen to sacrifice himself so as not to risk the blood getting in her open, screaming mouth, you were you had responded quickly, you would have been able to save him. You could have shot the thing before it got close to Mary, and become a risk. You had seen the thing after all, and if she had listened, he wouldn't have been trying to save her and forgoing his own safety to do so. If you were both better, closer to the people you were now, then you would still have your uncle beside you, and helping you to care of Mary.

When your leg finally gave, sending you t othe pavement, still slashing at the legs of anything you could see, there were still way too many around you, and you were accepting defeat, praying to the God you had given up on that Mary was a better shot than you thought she was, when the sound of machine gun fire rang out, sending panic running anew. They may have saved you, true, but people with big guns were rarely benevolent. You didn't make It this far through your kindess to strangers, and suspicion was the best way to not get dead.