treats put out a pretty amazing piece for  fuzzytoaster and it inspired me to write up a short little something.
I don't feel right making this a submission but fuzzy said it made his day and  Konubadger liked it enough to save it.
So here it is.

The picture the story is based off of: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/19184356/

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I worried.
It's what we all did.
Every time Red went back out there, we knew he was the most capable.
My leg was in constant pain... Jim had long since snapped, unable to do more than shake his head and moan incomprehensibly.

Sometimes it was hours... It'd even been days before.
That week when he'd returned with that abandoned SUV of supplies... And we'd had a car to plow through those... monsters.
The dread suspicion that he might turn and that solemn, but proud look on his face as we sat around that burning barrel with our can of beans.
We hated the beans... but we loved not starving... And there weren't words for how we felt about Red.

He was our hero. He did what we could not.
Of course he would come back...
As our leader, he carried his responsibility like a mantle that cavalierly flared behind him as he leapt over abandoned cars with ease.

When our supplies dwindled... None of us wanted to look at Red.
We knew. He knew... But we couldn't ask him to.
So when he disappeared the next day, we just... knew.

Secretly, we all wondered what he would bring back.
Whether he'd splurge and bring us back some sweets.
What corny pun he would come up with as he opened up his dufflebag, smiling like a proud father as he provided for us..

But days.. turned into a week...
We rationed what we could but we hadn't expected him to take two weeks and when our final can of beans finally emptied..
We waited. We worried.
A week turned into the painful knifestab of another day without Red.

When Tom went silent in the middle of our conversation, his body shaking... I asked him what was wrong.
Tom had always remained calm as our lookout.
His face now looked like shattered glass and I felt a horrible knot grow in my stomach.
As I hobbled to the lookout station and grabbed the second pair of binoculars, Tom's pair dropped to the ground, shaking out of his hand.

Red's pants were in tatters, stained with blood.
His eye glassy as he hobbled purposefully towards our encampment, thick spongy spires jaggedly spiking from his back..
I felt my stomach lurch as I found myself unable to look away from the stark skinless bony maw that would never smile again.

Red had come back.

He always did.