I removed Chapter 4 since the remake merged 3 with 4. It didn't make much sense, either, so I redid and merged the two short chapters into one, longer, more understandable chapter!

Here's Chapter 4: Proceed With Caution!

~Katelyn~

Goddamn this headache...

I woke up with the worst headache I've had since that new student back in 3rd Grade, and it took a couple minutes before I could finally get out of bed.

Jason was sleeping peacefully on the edge of the bed, but I could see his mouth watering a bit whenever he would inhale. Either get him some form of meat or my arm, and I prefer keeping that.

As I passed him to the door, I had to hold my nose. He smelled pretty bad. I never noticed this before since I pretty much smelled like him with my hoodie, but now I realize just how bad leapers smell, and an idea popped into my head.

I ran into the kitchen, opened the fridge, and grabbed 3 of the steaks I put in there. All of Bill's food was gone, meaning he probably left already.

I bolted over to the bathroom, and placed the meat down inside the dry tub. After finding some rope, I wrapped it around the faucet, which had water ready to pour within the pipes. I learned (from rather unlucky experience) that ripping out the faucet caused all of the water that was stored to burst out, filling the tub within about 10 seconds.

With that in mind, I placed towels around the outside of the tub. Odds are at least some water would flow over the edge. With everything in place, I turned the light on and set it to dim, so Jason could have difficulty seeing the towels or rope without it hurting him. Then, I left the bathroom door wide open, walked around the corner of the hallway with rope in hand, and waited.

I had infinite patience, so it wasn't hard to wait for Jason to wake up after 5 or 10 minutes and almost immediately scramble into the bathroom.

I snuck in behind him, watching, and once the last piece of raw steak was swallowed, I yanked on the rope, tearing the faucet out. A large stream of water poured out, and Jason yelped as I held him down in the tub. The water filled it up quickly. Then, I submerged him to get him completely soaked.

I took his clothes off and put them in the washing machine, and quickly returned to him so he couldn't get out.

"Close your eyes or this'll hurt like hell," I said, and Jason immediately shut them. I began to untangle his blond hair, which was a nightmare. He continued to whimper in confusion as I opened the bottle of shampoo and began to scrub at anything that was dirty, which was about his entire head. The dried bile would not come out, though, even after emptying half the bottle on his hair. At least it didn't smell now.

Jason had given up struggling, and I began to scrub the grime and blood off his skin. Most of the dirt came out, but his claws were stained with too much blood.

I began washing his right arm when he screeched suddenly, swatting my hand away. He was clutching the top of his arm, and blood was dripping under the soapy bubbles. "What happened?" I asked nervously, even though I knew he couldn't talk. I reached for his arm when he growled at me.

After a few minutes of washing the soap away with water, I was able to see the large, dried gash that ran along the top of his arm, and the bite mark on his shoulder. I'm surprised his shoulder blade wasn't split in half. It took me a while before I remembered what had happened.

It was Jason's 10th birthday, and I wanted to see if I could find him a treat. The grocery store downtown was set up with 2 or 3 generators, so the food that wasn't taken by looters or Infected was still fresh. Almost the instant we left our safe house, several commons attacked us. We easily managed to kill them, but a pounder and leaper ambushed us. The pounder tackled me, knocking me back into the safe house, and instead of uselessly trying to get out of its grasp I grabbed a machete and stabbed the soft, sensitive inside of its huge arm, causing it to drop me instantly. A swift swing at its neck killed it.

Moments later, Jason came in, panting as he stumbled over to me. The shotgun in his hand was completely spent of its ammo. I took it and began to lecture him about how ammo preservation was crucial, especially since we were low at the time.

It took a few seconds for me to realize he was hurt, and I immediately ran to the bathroom to get a first aid kit when I saw the blood seeping out of his arm. I kept reassuring him he'd be fine, and for a few hours, we believed it.

After a couple hours of him complaining it was too bright, he began to throw up. He had a massive fever, and the gash on his arm was starting to get discolored. I sat him down on the couch with 2 blankets, and pulled his hood over his eyes when he said it was hurting too much. I kept telling him it would pass, but I knew it might of been too late. I told him to count down from 100 after he said it was hard to think, and ran around the house, looking for ANYTHING that might help, until I heard him start screaming.

I ran back in the room, to see him doubled over, barely breathing at all. I slowly walked over to him, but he turned sharply towards me when he smelled me. I barely managed to get out of the way when he lunged at me, and ran to the bedroom. I waited for him to lunge again, and right before he hit me I ducked, shutting the door before he could turn around. I ran out of the safe house crying, trying to block my ears as I still heard him in my head.

"Jason, I'm sorry," I whimpered, choking up. It was his birthday. HIS BIRTHDAY! And now he's a victim to this shit virus.

Jason hesitated, but started crawling closer to me, leaning off of his right arm. I was worried he'd swipe his claws at me, but instead he wrapped his arms around me. It was stiff, like he wasn't sure, but it was still a hug.

~Jason~

Why did I do that why did I do that why did I do that why did I do that...

Why did I hug her? She just tortured me with that bath in an attempt to clean me up, and hurt my arm with that stupid soap stuff, and for some reason I forgave her.

We were walking down the street now, and I would keep looking back to make sure Kate was keeping up. Why was I even with her in the first place?! I could just kill her now and have a full stomach for a week, yet instead I'm doing everything I can to keep her safe. What was wrong with me?!

A familiar scent hit my nose, and I made a dead stop. It smelled like the Bill guy that gave us his safe house, and a lot of blood. I motioned for Katelyn to follow me into a building next to us. Inside the dark room, I put my hood up, and saw a large green machine on the other side of the building. There was a blood trail on the ground that led to it from outside, but I couldn't see what was at the end of it. Slowly, I crawled towards it, expecting a giant to jump up from behind the machine. Instead, it was Bill.

Dead.

"Oh my god," I heard Katelyn say behind me, but I jumped back as a bullet whisked by her and hit the wall.

"Hunter!" someone yelled, and I jumped into the shadows. Katelyn hid behind a wall, and we waited for something to happen.

Footsteps started coming towards us, and I saw Kate grab two pistols on her belt.

A woman crept into the room, two similar pistols in hand. They looked less customized than Katelyn's, but still dangerous. Once the woman was out of sight of the shooter outside, Katelyn stepped out in front of her, both pistols aimed at the woman's face.
The woman stepped back, surprised, but lowered her pistols. "Sorry! Put your guns down, we thought you were a Hunter," she admitted, and Katelyn slowly lowered her pistols. "Those are the leaping ones, right?" she asked, and the woman nodded, chuckling. "I'm Zoey," she said.

I guess Hunter made sense. Even though I assumed we were known for leaping at people, it makes sense to call them based on the fact that they hunted. I made a silent "Oh," but it accidentally slipped out as a quiet growl.

Zoey immediately turned around with her pistols, aimed directly at my face, and I yelped and looked away from the bright light.

I heard a gunshot, but felt nothing. I slowly turned to see the bullet hole only inches from my head on the wall, and saw Zoey against the wall, Katelyn's elbow at her neck. Not like she's going to kill her, but in a way where Zoey couldn't move without getting injured.

"What the hell are you doing?" Zoey whispered threateningly, but Katelyn didn't even flinch. "I'm stopping you from shooting a human being," she said calmly, "there isn't much to describe about it."

"Wha-he's a Hunter!" Zoey hissed, continuously looking at me. I crawled closer to them incase Katelyn needed help.

"Did he kill you?" Kate asked, and Zoey hesitated.
"N-no-"
"Did he kill me?"
"No, bu-"
"Then shut up, I am well aware of what I'm doing. He's still human inside."

"But..." Zoey's voice trailed off. It was almost funny seeing a girl as young as Katelyn overpowering her. "Can you understand me?" she asked me, and I held in a laugh as I nodded. Why wouldn't I be able to?

Katelyn let Zoey go and walked over to me, sitting me up as she did her usual thing to make me look less infected.

"If your friends ask, he's mute," Kate said, and Zoey carefully nodded. I know she didn't trust me still, but at least she was trying rather than shooting me.

Katelyn pulled her hood off, her tan face being obvious proof she wasn't infected, and walked outside with Zoey. I carefully followed behind them, walking on two feet like they were. It was hard to stand straight up.

"Shit, that wasn't a Hunter?" a man asked above us, and I looked up to see a tall man on a bridge looking down at us. He had tattoos all over his arms, and held a shotgun close to his vest.

"No, she wasn't, Francis," Zoey replied, annoyed, "That's a new low for you, shooting kids."

"B-but I didn't!" Francis stammered, putting his hands up innocently, and Zoey sighed, continuing forward.

Next to the bridge was a small, two floor house, with boxes of ammo on a metal bridge on the second floor. As we went inside, Zoey led us to a ladder next to a barricaded set of stairs, and we went up to the next floor. Outside, there were wooden planks nailed to the house, so that they could get to the large bridge easily.

"Who're these two?" the man Zoey called Francis asked, and I did everything not to whimper. The man looked like he could snap someone's neck with his finger.

"This is Katelyn and..." Zoey stopped, and Francis looked at me expectantly.
"Jason," Katelyn said, and I let out a sigh of relief. "He's mute, sorry."

"What's with your kid toys?" Francis asked, and pointed to Kate's pistols.
"They don't even look like they shoot real bu-"

Katelyn pulled the trigger of the smaller pistol, and it fired 3 bullets at Francis's feet faster than I've seen any other gun shoot. Francis jumped back, breathing heavily, and I could sense his fear like I can smell blood.

Where Francis's feet were was a triangle of three neat bullet holes, the metal wiring around it torn and mangled from the impact. "I wouldn't call them toys, but they are fun to play with," she teased, putting the pistols in their holsters.

A car horn startled all of us, and Zoey directed us to the house as Francis went over to the other end of the bridge to check it out. "Louis, come with me," he said, and a man I didn't notice next to a machine gun nodded as he limped over to Francis. I immediately recognized his injury as his leg, and my mouth had started to water as I wondered what it tasted like...

Luckily, Zoey brought me in the house with Kate, allowing me to forget about Louis. "He can't shoot too, can he?" Zoey asked, and I shook my head. "Well we probably can't have him attack any zombies with claws, otherwise Francis would shoot him, so what should we do?"

I could see Katelyn thinking hard, and watched as her face showed whatever invisible debate was going on in her head. "Whoever's in that car will probably want to get across the bridge, and I guess lowering it will cause a lot of noise, right?" she said, and Zoey nodded. "That means there's going to be quite a few infected that'll hear." Katelyn's eyes shifted over to the hole the ladder was at. "What about the bar downstairs?"

I leaped down the hole, hearing Zoey gasp as I did, and saw a counter with lots of bottles behind it. "That might work..." Zoey said, then she and Kate climbed down to join me.

"Alright," Kate said, looking behind the counter. "Jason, can you hide behind here for a while?" I hopped behind it and nodded. "Good," she said, "hopefully nobody comes in here." Katelyn took one more look around before heading back upstairs with Zoey.

"Remember, no matter what happens, STAY HERE," she told me, and I grunted in approval.

Time to hide.