"Suzie! It's time for breakfast!"
"Coming, mommy!"
Little Suzie tore her attention away from her coloring book and ran out of her room and down the stairs at the heed of her mother's call. Breakfast was always the best meal of the day and she knew that a big bowl of Fruit Loops awaited her.
She ran into the kitchen, her foot long black hair waving behind her, to greet her mother with a hug, "Morning, mommy!"
"Good morning, sweety. Go sit at the table and I'll get you your cereal."
"Yay!" Suzie said, before pulling out a chair and hopping up onto it. Her mother, a tall woman with the same black hair as her daughter, donning modest beige pants and a red t-shirt, smiled brightly.
Suzie began to munch away at her cereal after it was placed in front of her, taking big bites as to finish faster. Today was a school day, and she didn't want to be late after all. After she finished, her mother told her to go upstairs to dress herself.
She poked through her closet and chose a little blue dress to wear. After getting dressed, she put on her backpack and ran back downstairs to hug her mother again.
"Be safe sweety, just go down the street and wait for the bus, alright? Use your cell phone to call me if something happens."
"I will, mommy!"
After being picked up and kissing her mother on cheek, she waved goodbye one last time and left the apartment. She lived in an apartment at ground level near downtown Philadelphia, two blocks from the school bus stop. She started skipping down the street, humming the tune to 'I Am a Gummy Bear' loud enough for a few passer-bys to hear.
Later in the evening, the school bus dropped her off at the usual spot, and she gave the driver a big wave before making her way back home. On her way back, by an alleyway, she saw a man in a business suit sitting down and clutching his stomach. Few people paid him mind, and she was one of those few people. She walked up to him and saw that he was very pale and sickly looking.
"Are you okay, mister?"
The man erupted in a series of coughs, and she stumbled back when she felt something wet hit her face. She reached up to clean it off, and on her hands, she saw that it was blood.
"Ewwww!" She started to flail her hand around, trying to get the blood off.
She didn't notice when the business man looked up, eyes white and manic, and focused on her. With a bestial snarl, he reached out to try to grab her, but she noticed and stepped back just in time before letting out a shrill scream of fright. Several people turned to see what was going on, and lucky for Suzie, a woman come forward and grabbed the snarling man who was ready to jump at her.
The man's attention was instantly switched to the woman, and he began clawing and biting at her flesh. Suzie screamed again at the sight of this and took off down the alleyway as fast as her little legs would take her. She found a dumpster near the back end of the alleyway and hid behind it. She curled up into a ball as she heard the screams of the people, heard the crashing of cars and twisting metal, and eventually hearing the sounds of gunfire.
After a half an hour of shaking and sobbing, she pulled out her cell phone and selected her mother on the speed dial. She shakily brought the phone to her ear and listened to the ringing. The ringing never stopped.
"Pick up mommy… pick up… please…"
She began to cry, tears running down her face. She rocked, still curled up in a ball, and listened to the ringing. Every time she got the answering machine, she just called again, over and over. Hours passed, her cell phone had long since died, but she kept on pressing the call button anyway, and kept on crying.
"M-mommy! Where are you…?"
Two and a Half Weeks Later
For the past two and a half weeks, she had done almost nothing but cry. Her tears had stopped flowing long ago, and only the sound and racking sobs remained. She cried for her mother, the only thing she still remembered, and she cried for the pain she felt as her body contorted and reformed. Her pain had also caused her to grip and tear at her clothing as a way to try to make the hurt go away. She had barely noticed it through her sorrow and anguish, but her body had thinned considerably. Her black hair turned pure white, with her skin taking a similar shade. The thing that stood out the most, however, were her fingers, which had morphed and elongated into five-inch long, razor sharp claws.
Through her crying, she had noticed the zombies shuffling about, occasionally some walking down her alley. She always just moved out of the way and hid, crying all the time. Around the second week, she noticed some smarter ones, dressed in hoodies, and others grotesquely obese, gurgling about. She kept herself well hidden, and they never bothered her, in fact, some even avoided her.
Her crying was suddenly disturbed by a noise, and instantly her sobs stopped. She turned to see what it was, and she saw one of the hooded ones, wearing dark green this time. This one was unlike the others; it was coming right towards her. She feared for her life, and screamed.
Her scream came out as a horrid screech, but she was too scared to care much. She retreated on the ground until her back hit the dumpster she had taken to liking, and she started waving her clawed hand out.
"Stay back! I'll… I'll... scratch you!"
The hooded man seemed shocked for a moment, even though he had no eyes, she could tell by how his mouth opened, "You… you can talk too?"
She froze at this, and visibly calmed down, "Umm… y-yes?"
Matt smiled, kneeled down, and extended his hand, "You don't know how good it is to hear another person's voice. My name is Matt, apparently. Don't be scared… I'm not like the rest of them."
The girl still looked a little frightened, but was mollified by his kind voice. She looked to him again and stood up, "H-hi… I'm… I'm… I don't remember my name anymore."
"I didn't either… seems we're in the same boat, you and I. How old are you, little girl?"
"S-six… I think…" She looked down and kicked the ground, not noticing her bare feet, old shoes torn to shreds and discarded in a corner.
"Six huh? I thought so… I haven't seen another child since I woke up half an hour ago. I wonder why you're the only zombie kid I've seen...?"
"Zombie?"
"It's what… what a lot of people have become. Violent and mindless. We're… at least I think you are too, we're infected, just like them. But, we're special, you and I. We can still think…Wow this is hard, never had to do anything like this before."
He rubbed his head and raised his head as he heard the girl giggle lightly. He smiled back at her, "Look… no one is left in this city, as far as I know. You and I may be the only two in the city who can still think, and I have no idea if any normal people have survived this. So… want to come with me, instead of staying here to cry? We might be able to find other people if we stick together."
She seemed to think about it for a bit, and then nodded. She took a single step towards Matt and yelped as she stepped on something sharp.
"Ow! Hey, what happened to my shoes?" She whined as she looked to her bare feet.
"Not sure, probably the same thing that happened to mine." He replied, before showing off a bare foot and wiggling his toes.
She giggled at this, "Well… you might'a walked here, but my feet hurt."
"That is a problem… Here." He turned around and kneeled, looking like he wanted her to hop onto his back, "hop on, we'll try to find a clothing store or something, we could both use it."
She smiled and climbed onto his back, but instead of lying on his back with her arms around his neck, she sat atop his shoulder, using only one hand to hold the other side of his neck. He looked to her curiously as he stood, "Why up there?"
"I dunno, I just wanted to be high up."
Matt chuckled at her antics, finding it very comforting to be doing something normal instead of leaping rooftops and finding out that he was a zombie. He began to walk out to the street, the other zombies ignoring him, and started searching for a clothing store.
"You remind me of a parrot, sitting up there and saying stuff." He commented, even though she'd only spoken a sentence.
"A parrot? Why's that?"
"Well, you might be too young, but old time-y pirate captains used to have parrots on their shoulders, for some reason or another. They used to speak to their captains and had a jolly good time."
The little witch on his shoulder smiled, "Squawk squawk!"
Matt laughed at her playfulness, and she too joined with her own giggling. They both seemed to be using each other's presence as a means to forget the chaos around them, even when the hunter occasionally had to dodge a wandering zombie. So distracted were they that they didn't even hear the hollow crying coming from a nearby shop until they'd arrived just outside of it.
"Whoa… what's that sound? Is someone alive?" Said Matt, trying to pick out just what was inside the store.
"I dunno… but she sounds really sad. We should go help her!"
"Maybe… but we should be careful, hold on tight, Parrot."
"Hey! Why're calling me that?" She said as she swatted at him with her palm before laughing a little.
"Hey, I have nothing else to call you, unless you have ID on you or remember your name."
"Hmm… no, I don't. Humph, fine, you can call me Parrot, for now."
Matt laughed a bit at her, "Alright, Parrot it is. Now come on, and keep quiet."
Parrot nodded and tightened her grip on his neck, though wary not to cut him with her claws. Together, they walked into the store, a simple convenience store by the looks of it, ever approaching the hollow wail. Matt could now begin to visualize the one crying from the smells and vibrations in the air, and he gasped lightly.
"The one crying… she's like you, claws and all, but bigger. A full grown woman."
"Really? You can tell that? Oooh! We should go say hi!" She said excitedly, bouncing on his shoulder.
"Alright, but still. Be careful just in case."
Parrot nodded, even though she had a big smile on her face as they approached. They rounded a corner and there she was, a full-grown woman, white hair, claws twice as long as Parrot's, and crying her eyes out on the floor. They approached her slowly, and at about a foot away from her, Matt kneeled down.
"Um… hello? Can you hear me?"
The witch gave no response, and instead just kept on crying. Matt turned to Parrot and shrugged. She shrugged back, and without a second thought, she reached out to touch the crying woman.
"Hel---"
She was cut off by the witch letting out a sudden shriek and turning towards them, a look of deadly rage swimming in her glowing red eyes, something Parrot lacked. The little witch scream in fight and Matt held his hands over his sensitive ears and began to run.
The witch chasing them was fast, and quickly gaining on the two of them, claws bared and ready to strike them down. Matt quickly checked around him, finding nothing but a nearby car fire to be of any use as a weapon, so he knew they needed to run. While he realized he couldn't outrun the raging zombie, he could out jump her, hopefully. He crouched down, and just barely before the offender could rend him asunder, leapt high into the air and caught a nearby drainpipe that was attached to a building on the other side of the street. He glanced down and saw his pursuer heading towards the same pipe, probably with the intent to climb it.
Thinking fast, he too, climbed the pipe, heading towards a nearby windowsill to use as a foothold. When he got close enough, he swung his body and jumped from the pipe to the window, clutching the edge and managing to hang on. Parrot, however, lost her grip and balance and began to fall.
"Matt!" She screamed as she began to fall, holding up her hand towards him.
Matt quickly let go with one of his hands and reached out, barely grabbing onto her hand and cutting himself on her claws, "Argh! I gotcha… don't worry!"
He pulled her up and set her back on his shoulder, at which point she held her arms around his neck for dear life. The witch below had finally reached the pipe and began to climb, shrieking in a high pitched wail as it made its way to kill them both.
Matt felt the assailants approach and crouched once more, "Hold on tight!"
Parrot held on even tighter than before as her hunter friend leapt into the air just barely high enough to grab onto the ledge of the roof. He pulled them both up and the little witch rolled off of his shoulder before lying upon her back, breathing heavily. Matt quickly felt for the pipe and realized that their attacker was already halfway up. He clenched his fist as he thought of what to do next, and hissed as he felt the pain from the cut intensify.
He looked to his hand, then to Parrot, then back to the pipe, then back to the little witch again.
"Parrot! I need you to try and cut this pipe with your claws!"
"W-what? But the lady and… and…" She sat up and looked nervously from left to right, "alright!"
She quickly got up and ran over, shaking a little from fear, and saw that the scary woman was nearing the top. She quickly did as she was told, so as to sooner head back to safety, and sliced at the pipe. Her claws sliced through it effortlessly and under the weight of the climbing witch, it started to fall back, taking the screaming woman with it.
Luckily for the two of them, the witch crashed hard into the burning car below, caught fire, and burned to death.
Both of them finally sat down on the roof, Matt panting heavily and Parrot shaking a little from fright, small sobs escaping her throat. They stayed seated for several minutes before a strange sound interrupted the both of them.
It was a strange coughing sound, as if from someone who had smoked far too much in their lives. They turned their heads, noticed what it really was, and Matt went back on the defensive, standing in front of Parrot to protect her from the new, approaching zombie.
A/N: Well, here's chapter two in record time for me. More to come as time goes on. See you all next time!