Mediocrity

This is my first post in the forums. I've played over 50 hours and my current character is on his 10th day, with at least 20 hours of actual gametime. This is the story of my first killings: At this point I've been surviving in Charn for about a week by myself. I've been up and down the east coast, explored all of Berezino, I've made loot runs on the Intl. airport twice, looted the military camps in Stary Sobor and Bolota, and basically explored everything in between. Needless to say, I was pretty well stocked and have mastered surviving alone. After my second run on the Intl. airport looking for NVG's (unsuccessfully) I decided to head back to Berezino to see if I could find any signs of life. I had a close call with a pack of zombies on the way and got turned around, forcing me to wander the wilderness for about an hour and a half before I made it to Berezino. After checking out the town, which was devoid of sentient life, I made a decision to share my good fortune with others since i'd long forgotten what it was like to go without food, water, meds, and ammo. I knew Electro and Cherno was the best place to find people in need, even if it was a risk. I made my way down the coast, always sticking to the trees for cover. After making it to Solnichniy I started heading west through the woods with the Electro power station as my destination. Through my trek west I would keep hearIng gunshots coming from the south. After a while I thought someone might have been hunting me since the never seemed to get further away even though I was in the boonies. I ended up skipping Electro because there was too much gunfire, so I thought the woods north of Prodgoroki was a safe place to scope out survivors from afar and head to them if they needed assistance. Well, unfortunately this proved to work well, though not in the way I imagined. As I reached my destination I spotted two survivors running west into Prodgorodki, firing intermittently at attacking zombies. They seemed to make a stand in one of those grey warehouses with the catwalk inside. I watched them through my binocs for about 5 minutes and the gunfire never stopped. A steady stream of zombies pored into the building but from my vantage point I couldnt tell how their fight was faring. Eventually one of the survivors sprints out the building and heads west; I did not see the other emerge, so I had to assume the worst. I was excited, this was my chance to render aid to a fellow survivor. I threw caution to the wind and sprinted after him in the open, running down the hill after him. He made it to another warehouse, exactly like the one he ran from, with me trailing after him. I reached the building with no idea of what to say. I stopped outside near a small L-shaped wall and waited since I could still hear gunfire from inside the building. I knew running in might get me killed so as the gunfire winded down I clumsily blurted out, "Hello, I'm friendly! Ummm. I heard gunshots and wanted to check if anyone needed assistance." My introduction was met with silence, and since adrenaline was retarding my ability to think I blurted out, "Ummm. Do you need help? I'm coming in...urp..." I said as I realized that it would be stupid to do that so I just waited my the wall and watched. Shortly after that two people emerged from the building, killed a few more zeds with an AK and a military shotgun, and stopped to look around for me with their guns raised. We spotted each other, me peaking out from my wall and them by a group of bushes. We both hide behind our cover and wait for the other to make their move. It seemed like they were talking, trying to decide what to do, but since I heard nothing I assumed they were using Skype or something. I used the 3rd person cam to keep an eye on them from behind my cover, and as I saw them leave their cover, rounding the bushes in a low crouch with their weapons drawn it dawned on me: They are coming to kill me! Now I'm not proud of myself for getting spooked, but I had no cover for a retreat and I announced myself to two well armed people and was met with silence. What would you have done? I had to think fast! I started to back myself away from my cover while keeping my eye on the wall for them to round the corner. I wasn't going to give up the initiative, so I shouldered my gun, readied a grenade I scavenged from the airport, and let it fly over the wall. It seemed to take forever for the grenade to explode but when it did I was shocked. Even though it exploded about 20-30m away on the other side of a wall it still blurred my vision and deafened me. My assault was met with a bittersweet "Collin was killed". I was too amped to feel guilty...that would come later, so I took a knee and readied my M1A3 CCO and looked down the sight. The other survivor came around the corner and fired about 10 shots, all of which went high but were still close enough to hear the snap of the sonic boom as they passed by. After a few exchanges of bullets, his from his lower position from cover and mine from above in an open field, I decide to lob another grenade to disorient him. It went high and far but the explosion was enough to alert the respawning zombies to his location. Luckily his AK was louder than my M1A3 and they converged on his location. While I was loading a fresh clip I saw my second message in the last couple of minutes,"Jeff was killed." I ended up looting some medical supplies from Jeff but I didn't want to stick around since our battle was quite loud. I left before I could find the exploded Collin. I felt guilty afterward since I didn't know for sure if they were going to attack, but when someone comes to render aid you need to make sure to reply. Too many have died with nothing but their good intentions; saying "friendly" is a declaration of intent, not a statement of fact; a lesson they had to learn the hard way. I've since changed my name to Wasteland Medic and vowed to myself to not fire unless fired upon. If anyone comes across me in their travels please answer my call, I only want to help. Sorry for the long story. I'm still looking for people to help. If you want to request my services add me on steam, my name is Mediocrity4TW, and send me a message. I'll do what I can