[img=http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs50/i/2009/271/3/8/Dare_you__by_florit.jpg]

[b]Appearance:[/b] 

Shawn is rather tall, standing at 6'1". He has brown eyes and dark hair - usually cut short - and more often than not sports a bit of beard and a mustache. He couldn't really be bothered with shaving all that often, so he doesn't. He's not bulky, but he's not scrawny either, falling somewhere in the middle. He has what you would call 'practical muscle', developed to survive. All in all, he's rather average for the times. 

[b]Name:[/b] Shawn Tuller
[b]Age:[/b] 21

[b]Noteworthy Skills:[/b] 
-	Thief 

[b]Weapons:[/b]
-	Hunting Knife
-	SIG Saur P226

[b]Personality:[/b]

There’s not much to Shawn nowadays. He’s rather cold to those he doesn’t know, distrustful of all but a select few, and honest to a fault. Blunt, is more like it. He doesn’t sugar-coat things really, or lie about anything that’s important. He has his secrets of course, and he doesn’t share those with many people either. All in all, he’s going to do his own thing and he doesn’t so much care what other people are going to do, so long as they don’t get in his way.

He’s drawn to people that remind him of his family. Whether that be a soldier – like his brother – or a girl that looks particularly like his mom or sister. Either way, that’s one of his soft points. He can sympathize with people who have plights close to his own, but can’t stand others who whine about every last thing. He’s almost always in a constant state of alert – ready to fight when need be – and the fact that people are getting [i]comfortable[/i] with how things are irritates him as well.

[b]History:[/b]

Shawn didn’t always live in Billings, Kansas. In fact, he was born and raised in Jacksonville, Florida. He had a mother and father, as well one older brother and one younger sister – sitting perfectly in the middle by two years on each side. Currently, they are no longer with him – victims of The Fall.

He was 19 going on 20 when it happened; home for some time from college at the local community campus. It was some holiday or occasion, so his brother was home as well, on temporary leave from the army. Tommy had enlisted straight out of high school, if Shawn remembered correctly, and he seemed to be loving it thus far. Luckily for the Tullers, Tommy’s never been deployed, but that’s not particularly unusual for where he’s stationed – or so the soldier says. Something about how his company or whatever job he had was not needed? Or maybe it was because they weren’t at war at the time? The actual reason Shawn and his family had received was now lost to the youngest son, outweighed by the memories that followed.

Two days upon returning home, Tommy got a phone call. It was some sort of higher up or somebody in power, but the gist of the message was clear. He had to go back. It was a little unsettling, especially since the older brother had often claimed that it was a very slim chance for time off to be cut short. The main reason behind this was that he still didn’t rank high enough to be of much importance unless there were some sort of crisis. Or they were at war. Either way, Tommy left that night, and that would be the last time Shawn would see him. 

Despite the suspicious event of his older brother’s departure, the next several days of Shawn’s vacation was rather uneventful. It wasn’t until the last day before heading back to campus that things became weird. His younger sister, Lilly, was outside playing with the family dog when it happened. From her recount, she had heard some sort of strange noises coming from behind their fence – the side separating them from their neighbors next-door. The dog seemed upset by it, so she went up to the fence to check it out. Upon peering through a gap between panels, she claimed to see what looked like their neighbor, Mr. Jennings, only he wasn’t himself. He was slack-jawed and deformed, skin peeling and cracking in a uniform decayed manner wherever she could see skin. And he was… feasting on what appeared to be Mrs. Jennings. 

Unable to contain her horror, Lilly screamed, alerting the beast who had been Mr. Jennings. As he scrambled to break through the barrier between them, she ran inside and locked the doors, pulling the curtains shut. Their parents didn’t believe her at first – who would? – but when their ghastly neighbor began scratching at their back door, it was evident she wasn’t lying. Or on some sort of hallucinogen. Their mother attempted to call 9-11 but the line seemed down, so they all did the next best thing. They jumped in the family sedan and drove off, just in time for Mr. Jennings see them out the front door. In the midst of his panic, Shawn couldn’t help but notice how easy it was for everyone to simply abandon their home. 

The drove as far away as they could get, running into traffic here and there but never anything too bad. It was only the beginning of the Fall, so there weren’t too many infected at the time, but that would slowly change. Over the course of a month, Shawn and his family went from one relative’s or family friend’s house to the next. They didn’t stay very long at any location – after finding a zombified grandmother at the first stop – but at the same time, they didn’t know where they were going. Eventually, they had to abandon the car as well and continue on foot. They managed to find other groups to travel with and so found a goal to reach: Kansas.

Unfortunately, as is the way of The Fall, people die; Shawn’s mother was the first to go. It didn’t happen the way he expected it to. There were no warning signs or big swarm of the undead. There was just one. The Tullers were making their way through southern Mississippi at the time, passing through an uninhibited town. They had just parted with the last group they were traveling with, so their numbers didn’t include anyone else. It was foolish to do so, looking back at it, but they hadn’t seen a monster in weeks, so they were feeling confident. He came barreling out of an old convenience store, foaming at the mouth and possibly ‘underfed’. There was not enough time to react – the thing tackled his mother to the ground and bit at her before his father could chop the sorry bastard’s head off. Unfortunately, it was too late. The image of his mother, neck opened and gargling on her own blood, would forever be imprinted in his mind. 

Without hesitation, his father reached back and brought the blade down on his wife, separating her head from her body completely. He didn’t say a word about it, and he never would, but as they left, tears streamed freely down the man’s face. 

After that, things were different. Their father adopted an attitude where he cared for none but his family. They no longer traveled in groups, but instead followed ones they’d cross paths with, just out of sight. In the nights that followed, the three of them would sneak into camp and take the group’s supplies while the watch person was relieving themselves or otherwise occupied. It was a hazardous and dishonorable way to live, but it was the best way to survive. They never went hungry and they kept cleaner and better weapons. They were doing well.

But then, things started to go bad. They came across a rather small group one day – a family, it seemed, consisting of one older woman, two adult men, and a young girl. The plan was as it always was; keep your distance, follow their trail, and steal their things that night. As mentioned, the group was rather small, so only Shawn would go in. He was innocent enough to feign being lost, but old enough to handle himself if things went sour. The only problem was, the watch person did not falter. They came across groups with similar situations, and under normal circumstances, would let it go and move on. Unfortunately, they could not afford to so as they were running low on supplies.

So Shawn killed the man keeping watch. It was the beginning of a downhill ride. Once the line had been crossed, the value of life seemed to drop. Soon, instead of following groups, they would travel and set up camp outside of ‘safe’ cities – ambushing groups that went in and out. Shawn, Lilly, and their father had quickly learned to kill without hesitation and, little did they know, it would become their downfall. Despite America turning rather lawless, word still travelled and killers were still prosecuted in a sense. Other people would take the law into their own hands and attempt to hunt them down. For the most part, it was easy to avoid, but eventually death caught up with them.

The second to die was his father. The man departed from life without much struggle – his neck was slashed in the middle of one night. It was a mystery to Shawn why his killer had decided to leave him and Lilly alive, but they did. They tried to give their father a proper burial to make up for their mother’s lack of one, but quickly moved on after. Just because their father’s assassin let them live did not mean they wouldn’t change their mind and come back. It was a strange experience, entirely unlike their mother’s death. Then, there was emotion – grief, anger, guilt – but now all Shawn felt was numb. He didn’t like it.

He and Lilly fought frequently after that. She didn’t agree with how they were living and he kept telling her it was the only way. One month following their father’s death, she disappeared and almost a full year after he had left his parents’ home, Shawn was alone. Whether Lilly had died or was kidnapped or went her own way, he was not sure. Given the circumstances and how tense they had been, he assumed the last. Still, he looked for her when he could and more or less wandered aimlessly, feeling empty. With Lilly’s absence, he felt a hole in his chest that had been growing without him knowing from the day his mother had died. He didn’t know what to do, so he just did what they were originally planning on doing. As a family.

He went to Kansas.