The snow muffled everything. The world felt narrowed to the crunch of boots, the sharp smell of pine, and the cold iron weight of the rifle on your back.

You’d told yourself you were here for survival, that the Last Men were the only ones who knew how to keep order. But in the quiet moments, the moments you could still hear Gus’s voice in your head, hesitant but curious the one time he’d answered you; you’d started to wonder if you were on the wrong side. If what Abbot taught you was actually the right thing to believe.

“Monster.” Abbot had called him. “All of them.”

You’d seen otherwise since a little while. You’d heard otherwise.

Then the bowstring snapped.

You saw the arrow hit before the sound registered, slamming into Gus’s back, his body jerking forward. He stumbled in the snow, legs folding. The world lurched with him.

“No!” Big Man’s roar cutted the air as he charged from the trees. Becky was right behind, her voice breaking in panic.

You didn’t even think, you just moved. Instinctively. Because you've had realised thar when the only words Gus told you were "I swear we're not bad...", they rang through your mind, and suddenly they felt completely right.

Abbot has already reached for another arrow, but your hands were on your riffle, shoving the General hard. “What the hell is wrong with you?!” Your voice cracked, too raw, too full of something you couldn’t hide anymore.

He stumbled, snarling at you. “They’re animals!”

“They’re kids!” The words ripped out of you before you could've stopped them.

You were already past him, boots tearing up the snow as you ran for Gus. His breathing was shallow, lips pale against the copper of his freckles. You dropped to your knees, hands hovering because you didn’t even know where to touch without hurting him more.

Gus’s glassy eyes flickered toward you, confused, recognition mixing with something else. Not hate. Not trust. Just… A question.

“It’s okay...” You whispered, the same way you did the day you first spoke through the cage at the Preserve. “I believe you now...” You whispered.

And this time, you completely meant it.

But before you could reach out and tug the arrow out of his back, you felt your shoulder getting grabbed and yanked, getting threw away from Gus by Big Man as you were about to touch Gus. "Don't even approach him!" Big Man told you, eyebrows furrowed as when you threw your riffle off in the snow and tried running back, Becky launched at you.

The two were completely convinced you were trying to hurt Gus more. And it was when Gus's eyes were fluttering, and that he whimpered out something that sounded like him asking Becky to stop fighting with you that everything stopped, and that you shoved Brcky off throwing yourself back of the floor by Gus's side.