Nico Torres is the protagonist of the story. she's 24, a college dropout and was working retail when the apocalypse began.
nico was born in honduras and moved to arizona with her parents when she was around 3. she's lived in reseco for most of her life since, although spent some time in phoenix during her time at college.
she's always felt sort of directionless in life. nico struggled a lot to figure out what she wanted to do in the future, and never felt particularly exceptional. she felt a sort of pressure to try and be someone "worthwhile", but eventually burnt out and moved back home, working a job she hated and spending most of her spare time at home and online.
since then, nico has felt quite hopeless and depressed, and of course the apocalypse didn't exactly help.
when the infected started to show up in reseco, nico was trapped in the store she worked in. she remained trapped even as people began to evacuate. she was trapped for around a week, being presumed dead by most, and escaped later on to find her parents had already left to find refuge in phoenix. she hasn't heard from them since. nico survived after escaping by scavenging what she could and trying to avoid conflict with other survivors and the infected.
nico's main skills are her speed, agility and fast thinking. while with shiori, she's gained a lot of confidence and has become a lot more capable at dealing with infected head-on, though there's still merit in a sneakier approach. nico has also become less nervous about other survivors. she's a lot more level-headed and reasonable than shiori, so does most of the talking. she aims to suss out how safe the other survivors are, and hopefully be able to have the sort of relationship where they can mutually help each other. nico isn't a pushover, though, and can be ruthless if necessary.
before meeting shiori, nico didn't really have anything to live for. she doesn't know if her parents are okay or if they even made it to phoenix. the supplies she could find were becoming rarer to come across and what she had was always dwindling. shiori has made her life a lot more exciting and given her a reason to wake up every day. nico wants to protect shiori at any cost. she'd do anything for her.
Shiori (Shio, to Nico) Fujihara is the deuteragonist of the story. she's 21 and was working a sort of mechanic internship at a local mechanics in reseco when the apocalypse began.
shiori's family are japanese, but moved to texas a couple years before shiori was born. as a result, shiori's always felt a struggle to fit in, and had a strained relationship with her family. she left at 18, and eventually made it to reseco where for the first time ever she'd found something she's capable of doing.
shiori grew up with adhd and some other learning difficulties that made school life absolute hell for her. her older sister was a lot more reserved and was considered to be the more intelligent, respectable one and shiori was pressured to try keep up. shiori wasn't given a proper chance to show her own strengths or learn in a way that suited her. a lack of care ended up evolving into shiori becoming actively rebellious and doing anything in her power to go against her own parents. the almost over-exaggerated american-ness and more alternative look are part of that for her. her relationship with her parents (and sister, to a lesser extent) was very strained. she lost contact with them entirely a couple of weeks into the apocalypse but is working on trying to get some sort of signal.
shiori did originally have a group of survivors in reseco that sutained itself during the initial outbreak, though over the course of a few weeks/a couple of months that group began to dwindle and infighting began. shiori is, to her knowledge, the only survivor remaining of that group. everybody else was turned or killed, including one by her own hands. since then, she's been extremely wary of other survivors. the entire situation was traumatic for her, and she doesn't want to feel that vulnerable ever again. nico is the only person she feels comfortable with.
the methods shio uses to fight off the infected are... unconventional. she takes a louder approach, actively trying to draw out the infected by generating as much chaos as possible and getting rid of them from afar. she's methodical despite the chaos, clearing one house at a time, and burying each infected she kills. shiori's thicker clothes and ranged weapons make existing a lot easier, but she still struggles a lot with survivors. before nico, she actively drove anybody she came across off. most remaining survivors near the area avoid reseco due to shiori's presence, unpredictable behaviour and capabilities. she's generally quite unstable and not someone people want to mess with.
shiori is a lot less level headed and reasonable than nico when it comes to other survivors, so usually just stands there as menacingly as she can at 5'3", ready with a gun incase things go south. she's very uncomfortable with the idea of talking to other survivors, but ultimately wants to go along with whatever nico is doing. shiori, despite what many people think is very smart and has managed to make reseco very safe for both herself and nico, by getting electricity, water and food sources, as well as a network of traps and other defensive measures.
nico is the only person that feels safe to shiori. she's like the calm in a storm. despite her fears, shiori wants to do anything in her power to keep nico happy, and if finding other survivors is the way to do that she'll go along with it.
(I am aware the border and the text here are clashing a bit, I am trying to fix it)