I couldn't count on my fingers the amount of lives I'd taken. Death was nothing more to me than anything else relative in this world, and it wasn't worse or lesser than anything else I'd seen. In a world filled with the dead, it was easy to dismiss shooting people over and over again when it was a daily occurrence. Whether or not they were people wasn't something that I wanted to think about; elaborating on the lives that people had before the outbreak that the world expected but wasn't ready for made a man weak inside. Even men's hearts of steel were easily worn thin at the thought of inflicting pain on an entire family.

However, these couldn't be described as people. They were creatures, and it was life or death; survival of the fittest. Me and Bear were the strong, and we had more than just the will to survive. We had the power, we had the supplies, and most importantly we had teamwork. He was a large German Shepard; a pair of powerful legs supporting his body and allowing him to run or sneak as I commanded. His chocolate eyes were pools of emotion that he didn't bother hiding when he turned to me. His paws were large, and they reached out to me when I sat down, stress taking over my mind as one hand when to a sweaty, scarred forehead and the other rested over a knee where it contemplated a drink. His paw would reach out, touch my arm, let me know that stopping to get drunk was futile, and I wasn't that kind of man anymore. His head would cock to either side when I spoke to him, and he emitted a high pitched whine to let me know that he didn't understand yet, but he would. His left ear was always flopped down, his right ear standing straight up, and his tongue lolling out to let me know that he felt my stress, and he reciprocated it.

Right ear up; left ear down.

With civilizations tearing themselves apart, trust and betrayal easily seen in a group of more than one, I had done my best to avoid those places. Cities and any houses or buildings were avoided unless I was in need of supplies of some sort. I had enough weapons to last me for some time, bullets out the ass and guns that I kept in a bag on my back, one slung over my shoulder at my side. I chose a gun as a last resort, and kept to the silence and the security that a knife brought me when in the dark or alone. If I was really desperate, Bear would get involved and tear these creatures apart. Because he was the only companion I had left, I tried to keep him out of the turmoil as best as I could. However, his listening skills were not always so great when I was in trouble or fearful of an enemy.

Right ear up; left ear down.

Yet, and yet, I found myself walking the path of a highway and into a large, dilapidating city with nearly no signs of life. There were clear signs of the dead, but they moved around in a slow limbering fashion without intent or purpose, and were easy enough to sneak past. With food running low, and Bear shooting me looks sad enough to make me give up my food to keep him going, I knew that I needed to find something else until I could locate or create a stable food source. The city I found was more empty of the dead than I imagined, and more filled with the living. Upon entering, I was greeted with people holding weapons of mass caliber, and an aim that I wasn't interested in testing. That was until they bore down their sights and their scopes to set their eyes on Bear, and suddenly their bullets had a different path that directed straight through his skull. My own weapons were suddenly in hand, and I stood in front of their aim, jaw set and my eyes stone cold to remind them that I was not afraid to shoot nor would I hesitate. Bear's curiosity remained guarded, and his expression angry but absent.

Right ear up; left ear down.

The man in charge of the small reservoir of people was a short, busty, and angry man. His face was constantly red with the blood rushing to his skull, and his eyes were narrowed in thoughts of the next day, the next move to protect his people while maintaining order. Whether his intentions were good or bad, his voice was loud and stern enough to make anyone else in the vicinity bite back with rage. His tongue was sharpened with authority, but his words were covered in venom and poor intentions. With a gnarled, fat, pointed finger, he demanded to know of my identity and what the creature beside me was doing with me. In fear, I turned to expect the undead with me but found only the pulled back snarl of Bear, whose teeth glistened in the fading light against the angry man and the team of men who held guns behind him.

Right ear up; left ear down.

I reminded the man that he was a pet, and the once upon a time such creatures were kept with love and compassion, a caring animal whose love knew bounds beyond its own being. The man wouldn't hear of my story, wouldn't listen to my words, and refused my entrance into the city for food with my dog at my side. I knew that we wouldn't make it much farther without food, but I would throw myself to the dead before I left my dog to die with them. I took a menacing step towards the man, the man whose eyes spoke untold stories about animals who had gone rabid and attacked his people, who had tricked him into treating them with kindness only to find their betrayal and more people dead and infected under their wrath. His own lips pulled back into a snarl, blue eyes dilating with anger and aggression beyond measurements that I would soon of which meet. His gnarled finger let out a sound that I had long since heard before, a sound that was a wordless order, a silent command, a direct communication with others who knew its meaning and a confusing noise to those who did not. A shot rang out mere seconds after its sound, and before I could move I knew what had happened behind me.

Right ear up; left ear down; legs on the concrete.

I whipped around at speeds that caused my head to spin. Bear's whimper was loud enough to hear for miles it seemed, and it echoed between the now empty space between my ears; what could I do? He'd been shot in the chest, straight through the heart and out behind one shoulder, and he lay on the concrete whimpering. There wasn't anything I could do; he was soon to be a rabid flesh eating creature like the rest. I heard the man behind me walking away, and I wanted to turn to empty lead into his back; to pierce his lungs and watch him hit the cracked and destroyed asphalt below him, to watch him bleed out and fight for breath as the black waves of death took him over, simply so that I could kill him a second time; but a paw reached out to me instead.

Right ear up; left ear down.

Bear's eyes were in pain, and they held fear. For a creature whose love poured only out of his soul and into my own, he understood human emotion too well. I felt fear and hurt course through my veins, and I shook as I rested a hand on his paw. He scooted himself forward, whining with every inch he moved across the ground, and his nose, wet and cold, pressed against my fingertips and then the edge of my gun. He knew what would get rid of his pain, once and for all. For a split second, my brain screamed at me and told me no. This was my best friend, my only companion as the world ended and began under a reign of terror and fear, and there was no way that I could bring myself to hurt him anymore than the memories he would pass with and the pain of bleeding out. Then, altogether, my heart reminded me in a gentle yet harsh way that letting him die this way would be the worse of any pain he'd felt. Bear whimpered again to get my attention, and I looked up at him and his now wavering silhouette through the tears that pooled in my eyes. I stood, and I pulled up the weapon that he had touched. His head cocked to one side, and I swore that I saw him flinch once I loaded a bullet into the chamber. He didn't want to tear me apart if he changed, and I sure as fuck didn't want to have to kill him a second time. I turned away from him, and he whimpered one more time before I let my fingers flinch with a sob and pull the trigger, sending a wave of recoil up to my shoulder from a one handed shot.

For the first time in his life, both ears lay at rest.

~~~

Unedited, my apologies for the errors :/