Author's Note: Hey guys, I'm really excited to start writing fanfiction. This is my first series, so take it easy on me. The series greatly improves from the second and third chapter onwards, so I recommend sticking around until then if you're not satisfied with the first. If you're not sure if reading this chapter is worth your time, let the reviews speak for themselves.
UPDATE: I've revamped the opening chapters of the series, most of them kind of sucked, in my opinion. Try and give them some grace, they were the beginning of my writing, so they weren't exactly masterpeices. I apologize for the cringe-worthy first couple parts, it took me a bit to get on my feet with writing.
[Hi, my name is Alice Clutch. I'm 15 years old, and I'm a survivor of the outbreak. This is my story. I've been an orphan all my life, it was little more than a week after I moved into my new foster home that the outbreak hit. My foster parents died. They were nice people. I barely knew them. I was found by a few survivors and taken to a refugee camp, but we were never truly safe. Things began to fall apart. One by one our numbers dwindled until there were only a few of us left. My group was camped at a warehouse, one that I suggested we camp in. We were overrun, and two of us died. They blamed it on me, as if it was somehow my fault they died. Things were never the same after that. Now only two of us, including me, are left. The other is a woman named Iris. She had a husband, Lou. He was killed in the warehouse attack, and she blamed me, just like the others did. She hates me. She always will. Long story short, I'm a survivor, just like everyone else.]
SIX MONTHS AFTER THE OUTBREAK.
Alice put down her large green spiral ringed composition notebook, which she recently decided to use as a journal. Iris sat on a log next to the campfire, staring blankly into the distance, as if some distant object captivated her. She rarely ever talked to Alice nowadays. Iris was a thin, black-haired woman with dark eyes. She had gotten progressively slimmer since the outbreak, as food became more and more scarce. Iris was missing her left arm, after being bit a few weeks prior, forcing Alice to amputate it.
"Iris...there's no easy way to say this, so I'm just going to say it." Said Alice, softly. "We've been on our own ever since Hal died, and we haven't had a real conversation since..since Lou-"
"There's nothing to say." Said Iris coldly, cutting Alice off.
"Please Iris...just talk to me." Said Alice, her voice cracking. "I'm tired of doing this alone."
"...Then don't do it at all."
Iris' voice showed no emotion.
"God dammit Iris, what happened at the warehouse wasn't my fault!" Exclaimed Alice, unable to bear it any longer.
Iris didn't respond.
"I'm going to find some more wood for the fire." Said Iris, finally breaking her dreamy glance into the distance.
Iris walked off, leaving Alice alone. There was nothing but deafening silence, as Alice sat sorrowfully on a rock next to the dwindling fire. Alice finally broke, as tears began to stream down her face. Iris' steps faded away, as she walked out of eyesight.
Something snapped inside Alice. She immediately, almost unconsciously, packed her things and ran off into the forest, away from the campfire. Away from Iris. She kept running, minute after minute, nonstop. Everything became a blur, as she became lost in the sound of her own trotting footsteps.
Eventually she collapsed on the moist forest floor, unable to run any longer. She breathed the brisk autumn air, as leaves fell from the trees onto her. It was oddly peaceful.
She laid there, having finally run out of energy. She thought about her life before the outbreak. The foster homes. The nice people at the orphanage that took care of her. Then she thought about the outbreak. The refugee camp. The warehouse. Lou. All the people that died. Alice became lost in thought.
A raspy moaning noise drew closer and closer. A mutant, as Alice and her group called them. Alice slowly stood up, and pulled the thick baseball bat she used as a weapon out of her hiking backpack.
One swing to the head was all it took. The mutant fell to the ground dead, blood drenching the autumn leaves. Alice gathered her things, and kept running.
[I just couldn't stay there with Iris any longer, I knew I was better off on my own, although I wish it hadn't taken so long to realize. I wasn't the scared little girl who used to rely on others to survive. Not anymore. I never saw Iris again.]
TWO MONTHS LATER.
Alice awoke up inside the large green-sheeted bed that inhabited the house she looted. The bright sunlight shined through the room window, and her eyes took a few seconds to adjust. Her knife sat on the dresser next to her head, with her baseball bat on the floor a few feet away. She didn't have any guns, after all, she didn't even know how to use one.
She sat up, groggily rubbing her eyes. A few minutes later, she finally found the strength to get out of bed. She always slept in her clothes, so there was no need to get dressed. She was hungry, but there was nothing to eat aside from a few oranges she found on a tree nearby.
She walked into the restroom, to see her reflection. She sighed, struggling to remember what she once looked like, imagining her old self in the murky mirror. Her once piercing ghostly blue eyes had darkened since she had last seen herself, now grayish and bleak. Her blonde hair, which was once dyed pink, was now dirty and unkept, all traces of the dye having faded away completely. She liked to keep her hair short, and cut it with her knife every week or so.
"Great, now I look like a boy," Said Alice to herself. "...I really need to stop talking to myself."
Those were the first words she had spoken in days. She had become quite accustomed to being alone, and was almost relieved to be isolated. Most people were dangerous anyways.
She was tempted to use some of her water in one of her water bottles to pat down her hair, but immediately dismissed the notion. She was low on supplies, and water was no exception. After all, there was no one around to notice her hair anyways.
For the first time in a while, she was bored. She'd decided to look for supplies to keep herself busy. She put her knife in her pocket, and picked up her baseball bat. After equipping her backpack, she walked downstairs, into the cluttered living room. Pictures on the wall told a story of a once happy family, one who used to inhabit the home.
She opened the door, to find that very few mutants roamed the streets. It was a bright day, and she held her left hand up to shield her eyes, with her baseball bat in the right. She turned instinctively away from the sun, and began walking in that direction through the abandoned city.
She reached a red, two-story house, with chipped paint, and a large wooden door, with a dusty pane of stained glass in the middle. The door was unlocked, unlike most in the neighborhood. She walked inside, to find that the place was ransacked.
Someone else had been there, probably recently. A dead corpse lay on the ground, with a gunshot wound on it's head. Very recently. The distant moaning noise she had become so accustomed to over the past months was disrupted by the sound of faint chatter in the distance, startling her.
Someone was outside. Alice quickly ducked behind the couch, and listened carefully.
"Yeah, I searched pretty much all the houses here, I'll be heading back up soon." Said a male voice, which was moving towards the house. He was talking to someone.
"Well, we need those supplies, so get up here as soon as you can. Toby's being a bitch about things, as usual." Said a quieter male voice, which sounded oddly robotic.
"Tell him to get his head out of his ass," Said the man, "Or find his own supplies."
He was talking on a walkie-talkie. She faced an inevitable decision. Either reveal herself to the stranger, and risk trouble with him or his group, or stay hidden and hope to be able to leave the area undetected.
The man was just outside the window of the house. Alice took a deep breath, and stood up into the view of the stranger. He immediately saw her through the window, and was startled. He jumped backwards, and drew his handgun.
"Great," Thought Alice. "Just great. He has a gun, and I might as well have a fucking butter knife."
"He-hello? Who are you?" Asked the man.
"I was gonna ask you the same question." Alice stepped out of the house, next to him.
"Um, I'm Dick." The man backed away, keeping his gun trained on her.
"Alice."
Dick was a tall, handsome man with a chiseled face, and jet black hair messily slicked backwards. He was a thick, muscular man, and wore a white tank top, with gray jeans. His light brown eyes glistened in the sunlight, the brightness obviously irritating him. He looked to be at least three years older than Alice.
"I heard you talking on the walkie-talkie, I'm not here to cause any trouble."
"Neither am I." Said Dick. "I say we just both walk away, and forget this happened."
"Agreed."
A mutant, less than thirty feet away from Dick, stumbled towards him and Alice.
"I got it." She said, as Dick noticed the mutant.
Alice calmly walked towards the mutant, and raised her baseball bat. She swung once, hitting the mutant in the neck, knocking it to the ground. After two more rage-filled swings, the mutant was dead(again).
"Nice," Complimented Dick. "Well, um, thanks."
"Nice meeting you."
"You too."
Alice began to walk away, back towards the house she camped in the night before, to gather her supplies and leave. She had second thoughts, but logic put down any idea of joining any group, especially one she wasn't invited to.
"You know- You don't have to leave. My group has a safe place up in the mountains, we're a bit low on supplies, but-" Begins Dick.
"No thanks. I think I'll be alright on my own."
Dick remained silent, as Alice walked further and further away.
Suddenly, a voice came out of his walkie-talkie. "Dick? Are you there? Heloooo?" Asked the voice.
"Uh, yeah. I'm here." Said Dick, as Alice stopped walking away. "I met a woman in the town, asked her if she wanted to join the group."
"Wait, what?"
"A woman. Her name's Alice."
"And you just asked her to join the group?"
"Well, yeah. Pretty much."
"What'd she say?"
"Said no, she's leaving right now."
"Wait a second, can I talk to him?" Asked Alice, beginning to walk back towards Dick.
"Um, sure." He said, handing her the walkie-talkie.
"Hello? Um, who is this?" Asked Alice.
"He can't hear you, you have to push this button first." Said Dick, pointing to a large black button on the walkie-talkie.
A slightly embarrassed Alice repeated her words, this time while pressing the button.
"Um, I'm Riley. I'm guessing you're Alice." Said the voice on the walkie-talkie.
"You guessed right," Replied Alice. "You say you have a camp. How many people are in your group?"
"...Six, including me and Dick," Riley took a few seconds to count. "If Dick says it's alright, then you can stay with us."
It took Alice a moment to think. Either join the group, or leave on her own. If Dick wanted to hurt her, he would've already. And something about Riley's deep, vibrant voice through the walkie-talkie disarmed her. Still, she was uncomfortable being around other survivors. Other people made things complicated, and she enjoyed the simplicity of life nowadays.
[I wasn't quite sure about these people. They seemed harmless, but I'd seen people like them before. They weren't the first "nice" survivors I'd encountered. If there was anything I'd learned in my time alone, it's that trust is overrated. Frankly, I was content being alone. But, I knew I had to take a risk eventually. After all, I lived in a world of risks.]
"Fine." Said Alice at last. "If it's okay with you, I'd like to at least see your camp."
"Fine by me." Said Dick.
"Then I guess it's settled." Said Riley, just before his voice stopped coming through the walkie-talkie. "I'll see you later."
"C'mon, it's about a five to six hour hike to our camp, we live in a set of cabins up on Mt. Hall." Said Dick, as he lead her towards the nearby mountain.
It didn't take long for her and Dick to begin their trek up the mountain, Alice constantly eyeing the gun tucked into a holster on his belt. Alice's mind was racing. Should she trust these people? Would she truly be safe at their camp? Did she stand a better chance alone, as she had been for so long? She dismissed such thoughts, and simply continued walking.
[That day was a start of a journey for me. A long one.]
Author's Note: Hey guys, thanks for reading. I love reviews, so leave one if you can, thanks!
