Dislcaimer: Left 4 Dead 2 belongs to it's respective creators. The OC, Gina, and this particular plot belong to me. This story was HEAVILY influenced by Separated, by Leapingspirit. I highly recommend you read it; it's an amazing story. If you don't like OC's, good Infected, or SurvivorxInfected, then I highly advise you DON'T read this. Otherwise, enjoy~

"This place is disgusting," Nick groaned, trying to wipe the sludge off of his suit. Ellis snickered, earning a disgruntled glare from the conman. All in all, the atmosphere was light-hearted as they trekked through the murky water, picking off any Infected without much trouble. It was strangely calm that night, even if they hadn't gotten very far from the safe-house they had camped out at – the building behind them was only a couple of hundred yards away. Usually there were at least a few common Infected around.

"I don't even know why you're still trying," Gina spoke up as she scanned the perimeter, "We're in a swamp, Nick. You can clean that suit right up 'til it looks like brand new, but it'll just get ruined again the second we leave the next safe room."

Nick indicated a steep and slippery hill and led the way as they began the perilous climb, "I spent $3,000 on this suit…"

"You ruined it the instant you sliced through a zombie with that machete you picked up back in Georgia…" Gina suddenly squeaked as she slipped, only to be caught by Ellis. She smiled gratefully as he helped her right herself.

Coach held up a hand, silencing the banter between Gina and Nick. The group slowed to a stop.

"Do you hear that?" Coach whispered just loudly enough for the others to hear. Sure enough, when they stopped to listen, they heard the telltale grunts and snorts of the last Infected they wanted to run into, especially on this particular terrain. Gina's grip instinctively tightened on Ellis's shoulders – she absolutely hated running into Tanks, for there were far too many close calls than she wanted when dealing with it. Ellis comfortingly patted her shoulders before releasing her and handing her the assault rifle she had dropped when she fell.

"Great; I didn't think it could get any worse," Nick muttered sarcastically, "Anyone got a Molotov?"

"Where is it, though?" Rochelle was glancing around nervously. Gina's eyes narrowed, and she silently climbed up the slope.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Nick whispered, moving to go after her. She held up a hand, motioning for him to shut up and stay put.

As she crawled up, she noticed the noise growing louder. Cursing under her breath, she glanced down at her friends, pointing to the top of the hill and grimacing.

"So the only way to do this is to skedaddle up this here hill and pray that the feller ain't right there waitin' for us?" Ellis asked once he and the others caught to Gina. She nodded silently in response and he grinned, "Sounds like fun. I'm game."

Gina chuckled at that, averting her gaze to the top of the hill before Ellis could notice the blush creeping up her cheeks. "If we're going to get this to work, we need someone to run up and distract it, and that could allow the rest of us to get up over the hill in a separate spot, a little further away from the Tank," she said, "I think I'm the fastest here, so I can do it…"

"I'll go with you; I'm pretty fast if I do say so myself," Ellis replied, "I learned that it's never a good idea to run into a situation on your own. One time, my friend Keith and I went camping, and he ran off to go fishing without waitin' for me. Well, turns out that we were out in bear country, and Keith…"

"Ellis, sweetie, can this wait?" Rochelle spoke up, cutting his story off before he could get too far into it.

"Okay. But I think I should run up with Gina. We can cover each other's backs that way."

After a moment of thought, Gina nodded slowly, hoping that this wasn't going to turn out badly. She glanced over at Ellis as she crouched slightly, her toes sinking into the mud, "Ready?"

He nodded, and they took off, pushing up and through the muck as fast as their legs could go. Nick, Rochelle, and Coach began running as well, cutting up towards the left to put some distance between the two decoys.

Gina and Ellis were the first to get to the top of the incline. Knowing that the others weren't far behind, Gina grabbed the pipe bomb from Ellis' belt, ignoring his sudden noise of surprise and throwing it as far as she could. They heard a few shrieks as the beeping caught the attention of the common Infected in the area. The explosion made quick work of them. Additionally, it provoked the Tank, who suddenly emerged from a bunch of undergrowth.

Before he could notice her friends, Gina quickly shrieked "Over here, you loping moron!" and opened fire. Ellis was right by her side, using his combat shotgun to pump round after round into the lumbering beast.

Once Nick, Rochelle, and Coach reach the top, they too began to shoot the special Infected, who let out a bellow of rage as he picked up a large rock and hurled it at Ellis and Gina.

Gina leaped to the side, grabbing her friend and bringing him down to the ground with her. The Tank was headed towards the others, so, after scrambling to her feet, she used her Molotov to distract it so they could get to safety.

She whirled over to Ellis, who was standing up and picking up his rifle. "Are you alright?"

"Y-Yea, I'm fine…" Ellis replied, quickly reloading his gun and firing.

They didn't think the Tank could get any angrier; setting him on fire was bad enough. With another roar, the Tank charged towards the duo. Behind them was the steep hill they had climbed up – there was no way they'd be able to safely outrun the Tank on that slope. Gina knew that she needed to do something; else the two of them were goners.

At the last possible instant, she used all of her strength to shove Ellis away, screaming "RUN!"

At least Ellis was out of the way. It relieved Gina to a certain degree, but unfortunately that was only half of the problem, and it was already too late. Just as she was turning to jump in the opposite direction, the Tank was upon her. The last thing she saw was his fist hurdling towards her, slamming into her with the force of a speeding car. Limply, her body careened down the steep hill, rolling and tumbling until she slammed into a large rock at the bottom of the slope where she remained unmoving.

"Gina!" Ellis cried out, and the group worked together to bring the Tank down. Nick smacked its fresh corpse with the butt-end of his rifle.

"Bastard…" he muttered.

"Guys, we need to find Gina," Ellis' voice was a bit frantic, the urgency clear, "I seen her go flyin', and it don't take a rocket scientist to figure out she's hurtin' and needs our help."

"We need to hurry up then," Nick replied, noting the sounds of what was most likely an approaching horde.

They quickly retraced their steps to the top of the slope, shining their flashlights down the hill. It was slightly difficult, but they had come across her motionless form at the very bottom of the hill.

"There she is… whoa!" Ellis moved to make his way down to her and check on her, but the incline was so slippery, he nearly plunged down the hill himself. If Coach and Nick hadn't grabbed his arms and hoisted him back up, he most certainly would have as well.

"You need to think before doing shit, you dumbass!" Nick snapped at him irritably before glancing down the hill once more, "Gina! Can you hear me! It's Nick! Move or something if you can hear me!"

No response. Ellis stared at Nick incredulously. "Nick, bro, there's gotta be more we can do. She could be really hurt down there."

"Do you really think she could have survived that?"

Rochelle glared at Nick. "Why are you assuming that she's dead? We can't tell unless we go check!"

"If you can find a safe way down that hill and back up before the horde over-runs us, I'd love to hear it!" Nick shot back, "If we weigh all of our lives against hers, we clearly win. If she really is alive, she'll figure out a way to catch up. She made that sacrifice to protect the rest of us, and it won't mean anything if we all get killed right here by a bunch of zombies!"

The young woman was staring at Nick in incredulous fury before turning to Coach, hoping to get his support in the argument, "Coach!"

The older man had a sorrowful glint in his eye as he slowly shook his head. "I hate to say it Ro," he spoke up, "But Nick is right; we need to get a move on. I'm sure she'll find us again eventually, if she really did live through that."

Coach and Nick started off. Rochelle hesitated for a brief moment before going to catch up, clearly angry with the former two. Ellis stared down the hill, an apologetic glint in his eye.

"I'm sorry, G," he said, "Just hang in there 'til you find us, alright?"

He turned and jogged after the others. And just as they had disappeared into the undergrowth, Gina began to stir.

Her eyelids felt like lead weights as she forced them to open. Her body felt like it had run through a meat tenderizer. There wasn't a sound around her whatsoever. As she came to her senses, she very quickly realized that she was alone.

She dragged herself to her feet before staggering slightly, and she just barely caught herself before she fell. Her left shoulder was screaming in pain – most likely, she had dislocated it – and her ribs were burning. She was sure just taking the hit from that Tank cracked the majority of them. Her head throbbed painfully, and she was overwhelmed by a feeling of vertigo. Vision fading in and out, she caught sight of the safe room that they had stay in the previous night. Nothing really mattered at this point other than to get herself out of the open before she became a convenient snack for an Infected. She had lost her assault rifle and both pistols as she flew down the hill. The only thing she had left was her nearly destroyed medkit.

She fought to stay awake as she wobbled back through the waist-high water, her double-vision worsening. She collapsed against the wall of the safe-house before dragging herself into the room, barely able to push the door shut. She managed to take another step forward before her legs gave out. Luckily, she had passed out before she hit the floor, so she wasn't able to feel the pain of the impact.

When she awoke, the sun had yet to rise; judging from the sounds of birds outside, it wouldn't be long before dawn broke. She had no idea how long she had been sleeping, and at first she didn't know why she had woken up. She pulled herself up into a sitting position, leaning against the wall. The first thing she noticed was a small pile of supplies to her right; a bottle of pain pills, an adrenaline shot, and a couple rolls of bandages. Gina's brows furrowed in confusion. Where had that come from? She remembered that the group, as a whole, cleaned out the safe-house in terms of equipment and medical supplies. A glint of something metal caught her eye, and she glanced over, finding her pistols lying at her feet.

At first, Gina was relived – she had guns with which she could defend herself – and happy. The supplies meant that there was someone who knew she was here, and had gotten her thing she desperately needed. As she begun to think about, however, her emotion quickly turned towards suspicion and anxiety.

Looking around, it was clear that Nick and the others were long gone, so who was it exactly that left the items for her? They weren't there when she was sleeping, which meant that whoever it was had snuck in while she was out cold and left the items for her to grab when she woke up. So who was it? And why hadn't they stayed with her until she woke up?

Well, if it meant that she was being stalked, it was best to make sure she could fix herself up as much as she could. Grabbing a pipe that ran along the wall, Gina carefully rotated her dislocated shoulder, biting her free hand to fight back a shriek of pain as it eventually popped back into place. After wrapping that shoulder for added protection, she popped a few pain pills, packed the extra items and grabbed her pistols, hoisting herself to her feet.

She decided in the end to just continue to way she was originally going with her friends. The climb up the hill was excruciating and certainly tiring, but she thanked her lucky stars that the area had already been cleared out. Still, she couldn't help but feel a pair of eyes on her back as she made her way through the swamp.

The light in the sky was beginning to fade when she finally came across a safe-house, shutting the door and making herself comfortable against the near wall after placing her guns on the nearby table. She hadn't experienced much in the way of common Infected, which led her to believe that she wasn't all that far behind the others. This gave her a bit more optimism as she considered her situation.

She was making progress keeping up. Unfortunately, she was also injured; her shoulder wasn't too much of a hindrance, but her ribs and her concussion were certain going to get in the way of covering some serious ground. She only hoped that she'd catch up to them by the time she reached New Orleans.

Her name on the wall caught her eye, and Gina walked over, reading the message:

Gina, it said, I hope you're reading this message and are okay. I wanted to get you, but we couldn't reach you safely. Nick was pushing us to get outta there, and he and Coach agreed that you probably weren't alive after taking that hit from the Tank. But I know that you are. There was a horde coming. Keep going the way we've been going, and you'll be fine. I pray every night that you'll catch up to us. – Ellis

Gina's eyes welled with tears. They had assumed the worst of her condition? Did they even try to check?

Her chest burned as she began to sob, but the emotions overwhelmed her and she sank to her knees, burying her face in her hands and bursting into tears. She thought the five of them shared a closer connection than that – that they would look out for each other and take care of each other. She thought she had meant more to them than that.

A sudden noise caught her attention, and she froze, eyes wide in horror as she recognized the low growl. It was a Hunter.

How? How did he get in? Then she remembered – she had closed the door, but failed to barricade it shut with the metal pipe.

She clamped her hands over her mouth, trying to quell her hiccupping as she scooted over to a pile of sleeping bags that was conveniently huddled next to a shelf. She pressed herself against the sleeping bags, curling into a ball and fighting back a whimper of pain as her ribs screamed in protest.

She saw the Hunter round a shelf, crouched on all fours and quietly growling. It was clear he was looking for her; he was sniffing the air every now and then. Of all the times she could be separated from her weapons, this was the worst possible time!

The Hunter looked her way, and she knew that at this point, there was no hope. She was going to be ripped to shreds and eaten by a Hunter right here and she'd never see her friends again… if they could even be called that.

As the Hunter crept towards her, she tried backing away, tried to melt into the sleeping bags, shaking her head and whispering "Please…"

She inhaled sharply when the Hunter stopped, just inches from her face. He leaned forward, sniffing the length of her body, his clawed hands resting on either side of her thighs. She couldn't stop shaking. The Hunter seemed to notice this too; he pulled away, sitting back on his haunches and studying her intently. He growled lowly, backing up further, and reached into his pocket, pulling out another bottle of pills and some bandages and placing them by her feet. Gina could only stare in shock as the Hunter turned and crawled back towards the door, closing it behind him before leaping off into the night with a screech.

At first, the only thing she could do was listen to her rapid, shallow breathing, and feeling the burning in her chest before she scrambled to her feet, quickly barricading the door shut with the metal pipe. She dashed over to the table, grabbing her pistols before hurrying back over to her little hiding spot in the sleeping bags, and huddled there, desperately trying to calm her racing heart down. It would be several hours before she settled down enough to fall into a fitful sleep.

A/N: This plot would NOT leave me alone, especially after reading Separated. This story is influenced by it, but I'm working hard to make this at least somewhat original. Hopefully I'll be able to steer it off in the direction I want it to go in. I don't know what that direction is quite yet, but I plan on steering it that way. Don't judge me for having a sick obsession with the Hunter. And don't ask where it came from. I'm a very twisted individual.

One more thing; this particular story won't be the actual storyline of my OC (me, my sister and a couple of friends are writing storylines with created OC's in the L4D2 verse). I'll eventually write out the actual storyline. Just not right now. Hope you liked this!