A oneshot dedicated to /toomanybooks71 on Tumblr. :)

Ed stayed crouched, his head between his legs. He could hear Jack and Bam fending off the sickos that had ambushed them. He wanted to help, but he wasn't strong enough. He was a coward.

.•.•.•.•

Jack felt his breathing start to falter as the wound squeezed out blood with every swing he made. His vision was already blurry, his ears were ringing a bit, and he felt a massive migraine already kicking in. He was about to hit another zombie with the butt of his pistol when he felt himself start to shut down. His eyes blacked out, his hearing just a ringing noise , and his head already killing him. Before he fell unconscious, Jack thought he had seen Bam rushing towards him.

Bam smashed his way through the sickos. Unfortunately, with every one he took down, another would take its place. He felt himself start to tire out when. He looked over at Ed, mentally sighing. He was still scared of the sickos while a whole ton of other kids got used to them. Bam looked in the opposite direction, where Jack was. He saw him bashing away at sickos with the pistol he had. Bam was about to look away when he saw Jack collapse. Bam did a quick swipe move, pushing away the sickos, and he ran towards Jack. He first checked his pulse and was relieved to find him still breathing. Bam turned around and started to attack the remaining sickos, the stress and worry towards Jack fueling him with energy. In a few minutes, the mothers and fathers were dead.

Bam looked at the macabre scene, the smell of putrid flesh, iron, and smoke fresh in the air. He then looked down at Jack and picked him up, carrying him by his right shoulder. He headed over to Ed, telling him that they should head back and ditch Jack's house. Ed nods his head in agreement.

As they left the street, Ed could feel a stare full of anger and dread aimed right at him. He turned around, but could only see the battle his friends had fought.

"Please, help me!" Yelled the boy wielding a rake as a weapon. Ed looked in horror as he saw the boy being ripped from his grip, taken into that stinking crowd of adults. Ed was wide-eyed, his face as pale as a sheet of paper. Ed didn't know what to do. He looked everywhere for someone to help him too. Aleisha wasn't helping him, as she too was injured from Frederique. Although Jack had released her into the outside world after they had found out she was infected, she had joined the crowd of sickos and attacked Aleisha. Ed had been heading towards the truck when he was grabbed the foot by the boy he had left behind. He had grabbed his hand, but the sickos had taken the boy. Ed still had his face in his mind, the face of utter fear and hopelessness. Now, as he stood in near the foot of Lambeth Bridge, the fire blazing away not too far, he wondered what that boy's name was.

Ed grimly chuckled to himself, wondering if it was something typical like Klaus or Lyle, or maybe a mix of both those two names, making it Kyle.

"No use worrying now Ed. We have to get Aleisha to the truck."

He picked up Aleisha, helping her walk by letting her slouch on his shoulder. As he got to the truck, he called to Brooke. She looked down at the two and told Ed to give Aleisha to her. Ed holstered her up, allowing Brooke to grab her and leave her safely on the roof of the Tesco Truck. Brooke now reached for Ed.

As Ed was about to reach the top, he felt the truck start to pick up speed. He felt Brooke's hands slip, hearing her yells of disbelief and anger towards him and the driver. Ed looked as the truck sped off, leaving him behind. He was truly alone now. Jack had stayed behind at the Museum, along with Bam. Brooke and the others had taken the truck with them, and the only people left were random kids who were leaving him behind too. Just as he felt defeated, he heard distant gunshots. Soon, he saw that Jordan had arrived, many of his kids carrying guns. He saw Jack, a pistol in hand, and a look of dismay on his face. Next to him was Bam, carrying not a gun, but a baseball bat with a ton of nails stuck on it. His face was of determination.

Now, Ed felt a little glimmer of hope light up inside him.

He would make it.

It was a year later now. Matt and his kids were still nowhere to be found. Jack and Bam were doing better than ever. Jack's wound healed and Bam grew more muscle, also getting a bit thinner from the lack of food. The two were like a dynamic duo, always picking off sickos like it was just a day job. Ed wished he could do that too, but his fear would eat at his soul, and he would just run away or crouch and cover himself.

He had heard that Dognut was going to search for Brooke, and he wanted to come along. He was denied by both Jordan and Dognut, whom both stated that he wasn't able to handle a situation like that. Although it had ticked him off, they were right. He was too weak and scared of the outside world. Now, as he looked down at the Thames River, he could see Dognut heading down the river.

If only He had been courageous.

It had been on a rainy day when he had received some sort of news about two kids that were found. The thing that was "special" about them was that they had looked exactly like Matt's poster of The Lamb and The Goat. The two kids had been together and were by themselves. Ed couldn't even believe what he had heard since it was almost impossible for two people to survive the outside world, let alone two ten year olds. He didn't want to believe that these two were somehow special, or were connected to Matt and his religious crap.

Ed shook the thought away, the thought of those two somehow being special.

Jack felt his temper start to rise. He was doing special training with Ed, teaching him to not be afraid of sickos. The two had started off with wood cutouts, then heading to using dead bodies as targets. At the moment, they were starting to use kids as moving targets. Ed was only allowed to use a plastic sword, as to not hurt anybody. Ed was having a hard time trying to hit the kids, let alone even showing any determination in him. Ed was brushing this off as a joke and it was pissing off Jack. He saw this repeat for a good half hour when he couldn't handle it anymore. He grabbed a plastic sword and headed towards Ed.

"Ed, you have to try harder." Jack said, keeping his temper low as to not scare Ed.

"Why do I have to? It's not like you guys even take me on errands!"

"We would if you would learn how to fight better!" Jack spat out. Ed looked as if he was hurt by the useless comment. "Fine then! Let's fight. You. Me. Now!" Ed yelled, his face starting to grow red from anger. Jack rose the toy sword and immediately dashed at Ed, who had been caught off guard. He kept hitting and hitting, releasing the anger towards Ed.

Ed didn't know whether to panic, cry, curl up, or just fight back. He felt his back already hitting the wall, his body hurting from the hard blows Jack was giving, and his anger flowing to the max. Ed closed his eyes and didn't know what to do. He felt like he was about to just quit when he felt something snap. It felt as if everything inside of him just let go. He looked at Jack, but at the same time, he wasn't looking at Jack, at least through his own eyes. It was as if something else had taken over. The fear. The anxiety. The sadness. they had all been thrown out the instant that this thing had taken control. The only thing left in their place was a deep feeling of tranquility as he witnessed himself smacking away at Jack.

Jack was taken aback. He hadn't expected Ed to suddenly attack back with such force and anger. What really had Jack confused was the fact that Ed didn't look scared anymore, but he had a look of something he had never seen before. At first, Ed had attacked him a bit harsh. After a while, Bam had to actually intervene due to Ed already giving Jack major bruises from the plastic swords. Ed had the look for a few more seconds after the match stopped, and when it went away, Ed's face looked calm, collected, as if he hadn't even broken a sweat during the whole thing. Although Jack felt proud that Ed was starting to come around, it was already starting to worry him.

What had he just awakened…?