One More Chance (L4D2 fanfic)

When the infection hits Ashcombe, British Columbia, Anna has been in a real classroom for exactly one day. Homeschooled since grade six after being bullied for the one thing she refuses to apologize for, her endless, unshakeable kindness, she's thrown into the apocalypse with a hockey stick, a stranger's stolen car, and a boy who clearly can't stand her.

Evan, cold, stoic, ex-military, has his own reasons for pulling her into his car that first day, reasons he doesn't tell her: he was there when her brother died, and he made her brother a promise. As their group grows to five, an ex-scammer learning to trust, a coward discovering he isn't one, a loose cannon who finds himself softer than he should be, they fight their way across a collapsing country toward a military base in Quebec, the only place rumored to still be standing.

But the real fight isn't just the horde. It's whether Anna's refusal to stop being kind, even when it nearly gets her killed, is a fatal flaw or the only thing keeping any of them human. And it's whether Evan can survive the guilt of the promise he's been keeping in silence long enough to tell her the truth before something else does it for him.
(l4d2 AU, OCs)