Chapter 1: Their humble beginnings
The landscape looked bleak.
As one lonely peashooter looked through the window and tried to enjoy the scenery, he couldn't help but focus on all the things that were wrong about the scene before him: the leaves on the trees that were starting to fall, the grass not quite green, the busted up cars on the streets...
The giant wall on the other side of the street...
The peashooter sighed to himself and cursed under his breath. 'How could this have happened? When did everything go wrong? Could I have done something to prevent things from ending this way?' He thought to himself. This is what he's been thinking to himself for a while.
In fact, "a while" is a term that doesn't make it justice, since it's hard to even describe that term nowadays.
When peashooter sulked to himself his mind always wandered to the past, when things seemed simple enough... He remembered the first few days of his life, when the "Bloom and Doom" company told him that his purpose was to help combat zombies. At first he was hesitant, since he was told that zombies were human-like creatures that search for brains, but something inside him made him want to do it and do his best at it. Then, he was shipped out of the building he was created in to a house on the outskirts of town; a place with a great view and beautiful scenery.
He remembered meeting the human he was supposed to protect for the first time. The human told the peashooter that he could call him Lewis from here on out, since they were now destined to be buddies. Likewise, the peashooter told him that he didn't have a name yet, since he didn't know a thing about those. The human told him that it was his choice to make, and no one could force him to choose it, so for now the peashooter stood with no name.
At first, he was alone, fighting by himself against the zombies that threatened to enter Lewis' home, and it was quite simple, since he lived in a relatively quiet neighborhood and no more than one or two zombies would come daily. However, more zombies started to come for some reason, and the peashooter was having a bit more trouble fending them off; so Lewis went out to get the peashooter some backup.
When Lewis returned one evening, he came back with quite a few companions: a calm and collected walnut who he became friends with, a coupe of cherries who, despite being hotheaded were very friendly towards everyone, some sort of a potato who was a bit late for everything yet wanted to be friends with him either way, and a big plant with no eyes and very pointy teeth, who, despite having bad breath, made friends with everyone quite quickly.
A couple of hours and greetings later, Lewis made another trip to get even more companions: another peashooter who looked like an ice cube, but was very friendly and kind, and yet another peashooter like him, who had more leaves on his back and some eyebrows that made him look angry. The peashooter was specially curious about him, since they were similar-looking, and this new peashooter explained that they were basically cousins! The new peashooters were called Snow Pea and Repeater, and were his cousins due to them being from the Pea family.
But more surprising to him, Lewis, in his second trip had brought home someone who immediately gained his attention: a Sunflower, a plant which looked very shy at first, but grew to be evryone's favorite; the peashooter quickly became friends with her, and they chatted all night before the next day.
'Ah, those were the times, weren't they?' Thought the peashooter with a nostalgic feeling, almost tearing up from the good memories from the time he described as "the best of his life".
More zombies came to Lewis' house, but with his lead and all his new friends, there was nothing they couldn't accomplish. The peashooters dealt heavy damage to them, the cherries, chomper and potato mine were asked to care of emergencies, wallnut guarded them all and sunflower kept everyone full of energy and determined. It seemed like nothing would be a real threat to them...
But one day, something strange happened...
A zombie with a cone on his head.
Everyone was confused as to why a zombie would put a cone on his head, but the answer surprised even Lewis: the zombie was stronger with that cone in his head. Still, the zombie proved to be no threat but he had given the plants a good scare.
Then a zombie with a bucket on his head showed up.
For some reason, it seemed like the zombies were getting more and more creative with the things they used. The plants and Lewis were starting to get worried that maybe someday a zombie would do or wear something they couldn't deal with.
This fear didn't last very long, as one day their neighbor came to visit them: a man who called himself "Crazy Dave".
Everyone loved Crazy Dave; he was a bit of a madman with certain things, but he was certainly fun to be around, and specially useful when fighting off the zombies because Dave seemed to have a lot of variety of plants and stuff to fight the zombies with, stuff which Lewis bought very quickly.
Now the house started to get crowded, with a new plant joining them almost every day. There were mushrooms, aquatic plants, catapults, more peashooters, more flowers and some plants which didn't even look like plants. Even so, peashooter didn't have any problem befriending every single one of them, as so did sunflower. Curiously enough, the other plants were specially excited to meet HIM of all plants. The peashooter couldn't really figure out why, though...
It was around this time when his decline into a possible depression started.
With so many different plants joining them and so many different types of zombies popping up, he was being left behind. Why would Lewis choose to bring him when there were other plants who could do his job better and more efficiently sun-wise? Heck, there were zombies which he couldn't even help deal with! Like the one with a balloon or the one with the pickaxe.
Of course, no one knew about his thoughts on the matter. The peashooter always hid his feelings on the matter from everyone, including sunflower and Lewis. He knew a zombie apocalypse was far more troublesome than the emotional problems of some plant that couldn't even help on the lawn.
The peashooter slowly began to drift away from everyone else, with him always putting up the excuse of "not having the best day" or "remembered something he had to do", while in reality he was just going upstairs to watch the other plants fight the zombies from the window in Lewis' bedroom.
'I wonder if I shouldn't have done that, but I guess it's too late now'. The peashooter thought to himself while looking up at the sky once again. He also remembered the day the zombies decided to attack the roof. Fighting there was awkward but the plants were still able to come out on top.
Then, one night, he came...
The reason zombies were getting more dangerous and creative each day...
The reason more zombies came to their neighboehood...
The biggest threat they had faced so far...
Dr. Edgar George Zomboss.
The catapult family watched astonished as a giant zombie robot loomed over them in the roof. Ice-shroom and Jalapeño decided to help them fight off the zombot, which proved pivotal for the plant team.
No one is really sure how long that fight lasted for, and peashooter could swear he heard Crazy Dave and Lewis scream in the roof for a moment, but eventually the fight had to end. Either the plants would be victorious or the zombies would destroy them all...
It had been close a number of times, but the plants were victorious.
The plants, Crazy Dave and Lewis celebrated as if they had won a war, and sure enough, in a way they had done it.
Even the peashooter, who had been isolated in Lewis' bedroom went out of the room to celebrate with his friends. Much to everyone's surprise, even some zombies decided to join in the party, with sunflower singing a song in a stage they had quickly built for the occasion.
The peashooter still remembered every moment in that party, how beautiful the sunflower looked in the stage, how kind the zombies turned out to be, how his plant pals cheered all night long, all of it.
The next day, Dave became famous worldwide for providing the plants that took down a zombie robot the size of a house to a human that managed to survive the onslaught. So Dave moved to a mansion where he was sure no remaining zombies would get him, ever.
Now, the peashooter thought that this would be the start of a new and bright future with the zombies as their allies.
"How stupid we were. How stupid I was." Said the peashooter to himself quietly so no one could hear him. He remembered Dr. Zomboss crawling out of the zombot and trying to run off into the distance. What would have happened if someone tried to reach out to Zomboss? Or tried to finish him off? What if he had been there instead of sulking in Lewis' bedroom like usual?
No one knew it, but things were about to take a turn for the worst.