Alone. Well mostly.
That was the only way Steve knew to characterize his existence. He'd been mostly alone for the past six months. When this plague had started, the dead suddenly rising up as a ravenous bloodthirsty hoarde, he had barely managed to escaped the city of New York with his surrogate siblings Bucky and Becca Barnes along with his girlfriend Peggy. They managed to get to Connecticut before things got really bad in the city. They traveled across the states to Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland to supposed government safehouses only to find the cities they went to overrun. They stopped trying and just traveled together until after a year they happened upon a group. They were with them for three months but the place was raided by some escaped prisoners and Peggy and Steve got separated from Bucky and Becca. The way things went down they had to assume the others died. Peggy and Steve were together for a while. They did well enough, they watched each other's backs plus they were both soldiers so they knew how to survive the wild and kill zombies without shooting a gun. Then Peggy had gotten pregnant.
The decision to keep the baby was a selfish but mutual one. Once that decision was made they decided they needed to find a group and they had. It was nice, the people friendly and accepting, the place they stayed was secure and fenced off. Peggy had the baby, a blonde beauty with Peggy's eyes who they named Shannon Jamie Rogers after Peggy's niece and Bucky. They had stayed there five months when things went to hell. A sickness started spreading killing off most the group and turning them. Steve had been sick a lot as a kid but instead of his immune system getting weaker from it got super strong. He never got sick again. Shannon must've gained that immune system because she was fine too. Peggy wasn't. Steve knew she'd never want to be that way, a mindless beast, so he did what he had to do. A few quick stabs through the brain and she was gone. At the end of it all only he and Shannon survived.
It was now approximately ten months later give or take two weeks. He wasn't sure but he started counting some days after they left the latest group, he wanted Shannon to know her age. They stuck to the forest and higher ground, avoided zombies where they could and didn't make unnecessary noise. Shannon started sleeping through the night at the last safe house and she had a strict eating schedule she had acclimated to. By some stroke of luck he had found a Gerber food truck that wasn't raided and it was near a stream and so he stayed there. He could care for Shannon and he had some months worth of rations with him. The truck was high enough that the undead didn't see him but there weren't many around that area anyway.
He was currently about to go to the PetSmart that he noticed a ways from the truck to get Shannon diapers before they ran out when he heard the engines. It was the first human interaction he'd have besides his infant daughter in months so he stopped and turned. A car and a motorcycle were approaching. Briefly he wondered how he must look: unshaven, unkempt and dirty with a baby strapped to his back. Then again in a post apocalyptic world appearances didn't really matter. Both vehicles stopped upon reaching him. He could just make out two silhouettes in the car but they didn't get out and were too far away to make out. The man on the motorcycle turned it off and got up before walking a few feet closer to Steve.
"Hello." He greeted in a European accent.
British, Steve thought. Just like Peggy.
"Hi." Steve answered studying him. He was tall, even taller than Steve, with longer and lighter blonde hair and more brawn to boot. If it came to a fight it'd be a struggle.
"My name is Thor, it's a pleasure to meet you." Steve nodded but didn't give his name.
"Are you alone?" He asked. Steve nodded again.
"Just me and my daughter."
"How many walkers have you killed?" Steve raised an eyebrow at the term 'walkers'. People sometimes called them names other than 'zombie'. Peggy called them 'skin eaters' despite the inaccuracy, Bucky simply called them 'the other guys' but Steve answered anyway.
"Enough. I don't really keep count."
"How many people have you killed?"
"Well I was a soldier before so I did what I had to do to survive but since everything changed, three." Steve replied, his mind flashing back to the prisoner's raid. A few of them had attacked Peggy.
"Why?"
"They were trying to rape my girlfriend." Thor studied him for a moment.
"Do you want to come with us?" Steve didn't answer at first. He'd been through this twice. He didn't know if he wanted to do it again. The same thing happened: the people who took him in, the ones he befriends and begins to trust and love end up dead while Steve survives. It's not a particularly happy trend to set in life but there was safety in numbers and he had Shannon to think about. Before he could answer, the passenger door to the car opened and his eyes nearly bulged out of his head at the new entrance to the conversation.
"Steve?" The figure asked questioningly.
"Bucky?" He asked with disbelief. Bucky smiled largely at him before running over pulling a stunned Steve into his arms.
"I thought you were dead." Steve replied almost numbly, wrapping his arms around his long lost friend.
"I thought you were too." Bucky replied.
"I didn't even recognize you at first. Your face is losing the battle, my friend." He said jokingly, pulling back and running his fingers across the beard Steve was sporting. Steve chuckled while Bucky continued grinning at him before kissing Steve's cheek and pulling away from him completely. His attention was grabbed by the infant strapped to Steve's back when she began babbling nonsensical words.
"Whose the kid?" He asked, tickling her cheek a bit prompting a small giggle.
"Her name's Shannon."
"Yours and Peggy's." Bucky assumed rather than questioned. He could pick out features she had gotten from both her parents. Steve nodded in response nonetheless.
"And Peggy? Is she..."
"Gone. She's gone. Becca?"
"Back at camp. She'll be thrilled to see you. I know I am." Steve smiled again. That was more than he smiled in the last month.
"You don't know how happy I am to see you." Steve told him, swallowing the lump in his throat.
"I think I can hazard a guess." He replied, smiling and pulling Steve (and Shannon) into another hug before he pulled away, turned and waved the car driver over. The woman stepped out of the car and walked over to them. Bucky slung his arm around the woman's shoulders casually as if he did it all the time.
"You already met Thor." The man nodded at him again but looked at him with a different glint in his eyes. Steve thought he could spot envy and grief in his eyes. He turned back to the woman who Bucky was going to introduce.
"This is Natasha, my girlfriend." She was a beautiful woman. Average height, a voluptuous but sturdy build with fiery red hair and piercing green eyes which studied Steve like he was a specimen under a microscope that she'd burn alive, forgoing any observation completely. Bucky seemed to noticed the stare down and pressed a sound kiss to the woman's cheek which prompted her to break her glare from Steve and turn it on him.
"Don't mind her. I swear she was a spy or something before. Always so damn suspicious. Deep down she's a softie." Her glare only intensified.
"Way deep down past the cobwebs and dust. There's a heart in there, I know there is." He continued teasingly which caused her to elbow him. He just laughed at the jab.
Bucky said something to her in Russian. Steve didn't know what it was, the only thing he got from the exchange was his name but whatever it was when she looked back at him she wasn't glaring anymore.
"Hmm. James has told me a lot about you, Steve." He was a little surprised at the use of James. Nobody who knew Bucky called him James.
"Wish I could say the same, Miss."
"Natasha will do. We need to get back." She replied curtly, directing the last statement to Bucky and Thor.
"Of course, let's go and welcome to the group Steve." Steve nodded to Thor and followed after Bucky and Natasha to the car while removing Shannon from his back to cradle in his arms during the car ride. Steve went towards the back and opened the door to climb in but Natasha shut it before he could.
"Oh by the way, If you try anything I'll shoot you in the head, both times, without hesitation. Baby or no baby and James won't save you either." She opened the back door for him before climbing back into the driver's seat and slamming her door shut. He looked at Bucky to gauge her seriousness (not that he planned on trying anything) but he was just smiling.
"Way, way deep down." He reiterated before he climbed in. Steve shook his head but climbed in as well. Despite the threat this was one of those rare good days. He got his brother back, soon he'd reunite with his sister and he had Sharon. Peggy was gone but though he missed her he knew she'd conk him on the head for moping about depressed so he pressed on. Having incentive helped and now he had that threefold.