Choices. To make one, to not make one. To do either is, in effect, making a choice whether you like to believe it or not. Choices were simple once. What to wear in the morning, whether or not to put on makeup, which shoes to wear for that day… if you were going to eat breakfast or not. Choices that helped make your life: choices that probably wouldn't break it if you didn't make the correct decision. Now?

Just one choice can end you or others around you.

.~~.

I made a bad decision earlier today… and someone is dead because of it. I thought the area was safe. It didn't occur to me to check behind locked doors because zombies aren't smart enough to lock doors, right? Wrong apparently. Special infected are very intelligent… and they're growing more so every day.

"You really need to stop beating yourself up over this." Winter sits down next to me, propping her back up against the cold, damp wall. Laying one arm on her knee she looks out the window in the apartment complex we had holed ourselves up in. We knew it wasn't safe to be near an open window, especially with smokers lurking around… but we couldn't deny ourselves the sight of the sun slowly coming up on the horizon. In a world as ugly as now, the smallest things make all the difference.

"You forget that none of us thought to check in the locked room. And how could we have? The door was locked." Winter lays her hand on my shoulder and waits for me to turn to her. I watch the light creep from the sill of the window until it reaches us: the warmth permeating my very soul. Yes… sometimes the smallest things make all the difference.

Winter smiles at me, a warm smile that is the exact opposite of her name. In fact, just who she is is the exact opposite of her name. Well, except the fact that she is as pale as newly fallen snow that is. She could blind the best in sunlight, and we have used it to our advantage before. Just one arm flash sent a witch careening away. Oh, that day.

Her blue eyes look at me quizzically as she pushes a strand of her dark hair out of her face. I had cut my hair after the infection. It seemed pointless to me to have long hair, it would only get in the way. Winter, on the other hand, kept hers. It was falling out of a ponytail as—

"A. Ni. Ta." Quizzically eyes earlier, her blue eyes are now a darker shade. A darker shade of annoyance. "You've been staring at me with blank eyes for ten minutes. Are you going to snap into this world any time soon?"

"Psh… naw," I retort. Ten minutes? Ha! I think not. "Hey, I'm hungry. We got any food?"

Winter chews her bottom lip in thought, "Well, we do have a granola bar left. I've been saving it because it was the last thing I bought with my coupins before the infection hit."

"Coupons, Winter. Coupons."

"Don't lecture me," she says, "I know how to speak."

"Well," I pause, looking out the window at the sun. Not directly into the sun, but close. I'd rather not go blind you know. I watched a bird fly across the sky, turning to the side to pass around a building. Freedom. America used to be the land of the free but that all went to shit once the infection hit. It was only our fault, of course, because we didn't pay attention to the truth. We blinded ourselves to it, only paying attention to what the media was saying and not actually listening what was really happening. America had come into believing that if you just ignored it the bad things would go away. I guess that's how the infection spread so quickly. People just didn't listen…

"Hey. Anita. Damnit girl, am I going to have carry around a fog horn every time I try to speak to you?" Winter looks at me, annoyed again. "Twenty minutes this time. Twenty." She stands up quickly, stretching as she rises. "You know, if I left everything up to you, we'dve starved by now."

Ain't that the truth, then. I can't help but laugh. She's completely right. "Should we do something?"

Winter looks down at me and raises and eyebrow, "Do something? About food? Hell yeah we should. I don't wanna starve because you can't scavenge for shit."

"No," I look out the window again. The bird was just a black dot on the horizon. "About Terrance."

Winter sighs and scoots down next to me. "Oh, about Terrance…" The room becomes silent again as we both lose ourselves in thought. You see, Terrance wasn't just the guy who had given up his life for us. He was the guy who had saved our asses plenty of times before. Who had made sure we remember to eat and kept us warm at night. He was the reason we made it so far. Where did we meet Terrance? In a safe house, of course. Winter and I had made our way down from Murfreesboro to our hometown to check on the status of our families when—

"Anita?" I glance over at my companion, "Do you remember when we first met Terrence?" I can't help but smile and nod. Slowly I look down at the puddle on the floor, watching the reflection of the sky on the surface—wait… a puddle? Why is there a puddle in the middle of the—

"MOVE!" Winter shoves both of us out the door as the ceiling in the previous room collapses. "We've got to get out of here. This complex is already filled with mold and fire damage. It won't hold out much longer if this rain keeps up."

I nod at her and we make our way down the steps, slowly but surely. This apartment complex used to be a safe zone before the fire. A family had barricaded the top five floors from the bottom ones and made it a haven for those who needed a place to stay for a few nights or longer. What they didn't realize is that there is a difference between carriers and immunes. They found out the hard way. The original family could not escape so they set their room on fire, to take out as many infected as they could. Someone put out the fire afterword and kept the barricade up so it could be used as a safe spot once again… but it made others weary about being in a group larger than four, with good reason. As we exited the building the top floors began to collapse. We watched in sadness as the building, with so much history behind us, fell apart in front of our eyes.

"Great," says Winter, "Now we're hungry, wet, and homeless."

"Meow," I say as I drag her off towards a makeshift map.

"Great, so you're a homeless kitty. Just don't scratch my face off when we sleep." She says, sarcastic as hell. Yes, hell is very sarcastic, thank you very much.

The map is hard to read in the pouring rain. What's especially frustrating is that the safe houses are marked on the city map in sharpie and, against popular belief, sharpie can be worn off. Across the top of the map read it Music City in big, bold letters. Thought the only music being heard in this city now was the cacophony of hunter screams and random moans and yells from the common infected.

Winter shivers next to me as echoes of the hunter screams reach us. I lay my hand on her shoulder, "It's far away."

"Yeah, but this sounds like a pack to me." She looks at me in fear and we both turn to the map to spot the closest safe zone to our current position. "There's one in Union station, in the lobby."

I look across the street in concern. Normally the infected are not bothered by the rain. The only thing is really does good for us is that they're harder of hearing… but we can't see as well and they'll definitely here us if we use an umbrella.

"Ruuuun…" My eyes widen slightly and I glance towards my friend. "Did you hear that?" I ask, paranoid.

Winter gives me that look, "The only thing I heard was you being retarded." Lightening flashed across the sky and lit up the area around us for a split second. I freeze in fear.

"Ruuuuuuuuun."

"Winter, I think we should run." She turns to me, pale, and nods quickly. We grow still as thunder booms, deafening against the pounding of the rain. Then we hear it. The maniacal sounds of some crazed old man. I fumble against the hilt of my sword, the rain making the handle slick. I hear Winter unlock the safety of her handgun next to me. "How many shots do you have left?"

She looks down and then glances from left to right, trying to see anything in the downpour, "I don't know… six, maybe seven?"

I had run out of ammo some time ago. Winter's better at conserving ammo than I am, but it had been awhile since we had been to a stocked safety room. "Do you think you can make it?"

She sighs audibly next to me, "I'm not sure."

"Well," I smile, turning my voice into the most thickenist southern accent I could acquire, "Don shoot til you can see the white of ther eyes."

"You're an idiot."

"I love you too."

The sounds of the jockey get closer as we banter. We begin to get uneasy. "There's no way to tell which was he's coming from." I gulp and agree in silence.

"Ruuuuun… you fools."

And so, we run.

.~~.

Choices. Everyone makes them. Maybe not always the right decision, but what matters is that you made one, right? Right? I begin to question that logic as I fall. When certain critical events happen, it goes in slow motion. Maybe the moment when you realize that you forgot to wear pants as you open the door to pay the girl scouts, or the moment where you realize that you acted like a total girl to your group of guy friends, or the moment where you decide to run and then trip over a coke-a-cola can. Really? A can? Normally I look where I'm going. But a can trips me up?

Shit.

A moment in slow motion, where time seems to stop. Each rain drop freezes, trapped in time: Winter's look of shock as I fall… and a figure, stilled in movement. A hooded figure.

Choice: my decision to listen to a disembodied voice. Smaaaaart, huh.

Hi! ^^ What do you think? I'd like to know if I'm doing things right or if I'm doing wrong… am I going in the right direction?

I think it's flowing the way I want it to… I guess we'll see in a few chapters. :heart: