It hurt, worse then when Wichita remarked that his hometown had been burnt to the ground. He hadn't had to dwell on that long. Nobody asking him if he was okay, resting their hands on him, trying to show some form of compassion. This time, Wichita keeps throwing looks at him like he's gonna break and Little Rock will hand over part of her candy bar or bag of chips or even a sno-ball…

Sno-balls…

It hadn't been his fault, the girls kept reminding him. It hadn't been a broken rule or something stupid that happened. It was just one time where there was one zombie too many that they couldn't fight off. One zombie too many that cornered them in.

But they were wrong. He had been protecting Columbus. He had seen the zombie headed straight for him and being a stupid kid, Columbus had his back turned away firing at another in front of him. So he had shoved him out of the way and taken the blow for himself.

Always so stupid. They were all supposed to watch each other's backs…

He had been bitten, had looked at them all in a moment of shock once the last zombie was down. His jacket (armor, that jacket had been like his armor) had been left behind in the truck. Something about the stupid heat, he had shed it and left it inside.

Those biceps…the blood on his arm, skin broken…

He had refused to let the girls get rid of the jacket when they buried him. The necklaces and the hat too. Wichita had drawn the line at removing the boots on his feet and Little Rock said something about him probably wanting to be buried in his boots anyway.

Those eyes look up at them and they all know that the unthinkable has happened…The strongest of them all is about to fall…

He'd curl up with that jacket at night, or when things got too quiet in the truck. Like it could protect him, make him forget what had happened. Like any second, one of those big paws would snatch the jacket off him and tell him to get his ass up.

He presses his gun into Columbus' hands and the boy shakes his head. He can't be the one to do this…Not this. But those blue eyes are staring him down, pleading with him to do it now, do it fast…

He never got to tell him…

"Do it."

A/N: Thought I should clarify for reviewers, it is Tallahassee who gets bit. I know I should have said something, but my sister said she liked it better when it was ambiguious who was attacked.