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The Bitty Meme

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Time to re-explore that childhood (or get one for the first time). Rules are as simple as usual!

૪ Post up your character -- name and canon.

૪ When replying to someone's post, go and RNG for option one, and see just how conscious you'll be of the trouble you're in.

૪ You can hit it up further for options 1-11 of wat do, and then, let it rip!

૪ Cue crack, hilarity, fluff, angst- a full spectrum of genres.

૪ ????

૪ PROFIT!

You're Just An:

1. Adult mind in the wrong body - looks like you really shouldn't have drank that potion, after all! Better hope nobody sees you like this, and that the effects aren't permanent...

2. Adorable bitty all rounder - Maybe it was an accident, maybe not. But your size is your age, with all the mental attributes that come with it.

Okay, So Wat Do?:

1. Back to school! First day back, middle of term with a small bullying problem? Time for your bitty to get some edumacation. Play with some friends or get the teacher involved! If your adult instincts are still all there, maybe you could play yourself up as a child genius; who knows? Someone might catch you out...

2. It's adventure time!~ Them kids have all the imagination. Quickly! Your damsel in distress needs rescuing from the dragon! It's time to kiss the bride! Play time has no rules, and neither does this prompt- except for curfew. Mother dearest always said to be back before dark.

3. Gots a boo boo! Oh dear, looks like someone's gone and skinned their knee. This requires a serious operation of silly jokes and coddling, before those tears start to fall and never seem to stop.

4. I think I love you! Young love is just so beautiful. Maybe you're pulling pigtails, so to speak. Maybe you have a crush on your teacher, and you just HAVE to get it out there. The clearest sign of love is always a note, however- just make sure to make that 'yes' box really big, so they know exactly where to tick.

5. They went away. We all lose loved ones, sometimes. Maybe the rents have just split, maybe your best friend is moving away. Maybe the only reply that can really be given is that "they're in heaven now, sweetheart". Whatever the reason, they're just not there, and you want to know why.

6. Off to the circus! Or the theme park. Or the aquarium. It's babies day out, with all the crack, fluff, and panic inducing moments implied. Pet a lion! Go on the Ferris wheel! Just try not to lose your adult companion, or things could become dicey.

7. You're in big doo-doo, mister. You missed curfew by ten minutes. Your Sunday best is covered in mud and god knows what else, and you let rip that new swear word you picked up from that friend you're not allowed to play with. You bet your ass you'll be in the naughty corner for weeks.

8. Big ball of FUBAR. You went and got yourself lost, at no fault of your own. The big kids pushed you down the well, and left you there. All you know is you're in a huge amount of trouble, and a little kindness is going to have to go a long way to get you safe.

9. Go the fuck to sleep. Dreamland is good, trust me. No really- don't get out of bed, you're fine right. There. Its time for bed, or to prepare for it! Bath time doesn't mean run down the halls naked, but if you catch a quick break, I'm sure you can achieve great things.

10. Time to shine! This is your big moment, right here. That dance recital you've been working hard on, the Christmas play, and you're the tree. This is a big point in your life, a time where you can show off your skills and make history! This is it. You're making it happen.

11. Choose your own adventure! Re-roll, or get out another idea that appeals to you.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only | Expand All

They were at a Ranger Station along the middle of a back highway. The motorcycle still had half a tank of gas which would hopefully hold them over until they got to another town. Alice made Isaac hide by the bike while she scouted through the station and found it clear. When she came back for him she saw the tears on his face but said nothing about it for now.

The woman and child made their camp in one of the back offices, which Alice barricaded the door of just in case. She felt pretty safe here, but what was safe any more? They had some of their food, jerky and cheese and apple juice for lunch. She noticed Isaac was still teary-eyed and she shifted to sit closer to him and she wrapped her arm around him and rubbed his shoulder. "It's okay to cry. I cry sometimes too, when I'm really scared or exhausted."

They were on the outskirts of town. "We.. came this way, to see my grandma and my grandpa. Before school, in the summer." The world he saw now was not the same he saw then. Everything looked dirtier, garbage was on the highway, buildings were burned, cars were everywhere, and the bodies. The bodies that were not either alive or dead and moving, just plain and simple dead. His thoughts turned to his mother again. "If she's dead.. I want her to be dead.. I wish she were just dead.. not.. not a monster.. I don't want to be like them either, Alice.." He was too upset to eat, and only nibbled on the food they sat down to eat. He held his piece of jerky in one hand and he stared at it. "I don't want to be moving around.. dead."

Edited 2013-01-31 13:42 (UTC)

"That's not going to happen, alright?" Alice kept rubbing his shoulder, and leaned over to place her cheek to the top of his soft hair. "I won't let that happen to you, I promise. It won't happen to either of us." Alice reached up with her other hand and tilted his chin up so that he would look at her, and she gave his chin a soft pinch and smiled. Her thumb came up to wipe his tears away.

"We're headed west, to the coast. I heard there's a place there where everyone has boats and live on the water. The undead, even if they come out they just sink to the bottom of the ocean and rot down there. They can't swim. They've made lives for themselves, and there's other kids too. You can make new friends."

Alice wiped his other cheek clear of tears. "And your mom, she probably headed that way too. Maybe she's even waiting for you there."

"I'll be back, I left my cell phone in the car."
"Mom, no.. mom.. don't go.. mom.."
"I'll be right back."

"See, I told you, nothing to worry about."
"Mom, he left.. the man.."
"It's okay, he has people he cares about that he needed to leave for.. but you and I will stay here. This will be our haven."
"What about dad?"
"He's at the office, he's going to stay there too.. until an evacuation plan is figured out."

"Isaac, I'm going to go find Dad.. you stay here."
"Take me with you!"
"I'm sure he's at his office, it's only a block away, this place is the safest place.. I made sure."
"Don't leave.. don't leave!"
"We'll be back for you.. with help. I love you. Stay here, don't leave, don't let anyone in."
"Mom!…Mom!!.. MOM!!"

Isaac went to sleep thinking about the span of days that led up to his mom leaving, and the days after in which he was alone. All alone. His dreams suffered for it, and he dreamed of his mom fighting off a monster, a necromorph and it was too strong and all he could do was watch from the little peek hole from the painted window. They couldn't see him, but he could see them. Then he woke, cold, upset, and looked to where Alice slept. His mom wasn't waiting for him, he had hope when she said it, but his dream changed his mind. He moved over to Alice and settled down next to her beneath her blanket and curled himself around her.

When the warm little body moved close to her she roused just long enough to wrap her arms around him and hold him to her, with a whispered, "I'll watch over you, sweet boy." She slept soundly that night, with dreams of a life before, in the Hive and working for Umbrella, only they weren't making viruses or biological weapons they were making medicine and she was telling Isaac she was going to find him the medicine he needed, that he was going to be healthy again.

The next day after breakfast Alice sat Issac down and showed him the handgun she had taken from the gas station the day before. "I'm going to show you how to take this apart and clean it, and then we're going to go into the woods and do some target practice. I want you to be armed, so you can better protect yourself. Alright? A good weapon is only as good as it is clean, it's very important. That's true for most machines."

Alice showed him how to take the magazine out safely, then began showing him how to take it apart. When it was in pieces she carefully went about showing him where to clean, how much to file, where to put the tiniest drop of special oil. When it was all clean she handed him the pieces. "Let's put it back together now."

Isaac did as he was told, with a few requests to repeat directions. He did it over and over again, wanting to learn and finding some strange peace in this. It was calming, really. It gave him some sort of practiced truth. Like math, all there was was the right answer, no in between. First you do this, then this, and then this. It gave him an order in this chaos and he took to it passionately.

The target practice he hadn't hit a single thing, the force of the gun was something to get use to and he decided he needed upper body strength, especially in his arms. So, after the practice shooting, he started to climb trees. Jog, roll around, and train off of what he thought was training. Training to prevail, he thought. He needed muscles like Alice, like Treeman. He needed to be stronger so that when he used the gun it didn't give him too much kick back.

Every night he wrote in his book as well, he spent time writing about Treeman then about Alice. About how cool both of them were, about what they could do, and what he thought they could do. In the coming days he would feel better, stronger mentally, and even more encouraged to continue to work out physically to become stronger that way as well.

Alice stood on the pier, looking out over the ocean and feeling the salty air in her hair. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath, lowing her chin before she looked up again and out at the vastness, seeing that instead of what was really there to look at. Yes, there were boats and dozens of them.

But they were wrecked, some burnt, others sawed into pieces. She turned to face what had been an encampment that the sea dwelling people had used as a base for meeting and for storage. There were fields here and gardens where they had grown food. It was clear to her what had happened here, looking at the evidence of the corpses they found. It wasn't zombies that had done this, it was other people. It was impossible to tell if it had been a group of people passing through that had slaughtered these people for their food, or if it had been a civil war and the town folk had turned on each other. Whatever the case, there was nothing here for them but yet another place to pick clean supplies off bones and death, to dust off anything useful and continue on their way.

She looked over to Isaac, who had grown an amazing amount in the past few years. This wasn't the first "sea town" they had found, but the others had either been overrun with zombies or like this, burnt and ruined. Alice didn't know how to tell Isaac that she didn't know of any more. She didn't know where to go next, and they never had found his mother.

Alice walked slowly down the pier toward him and offered him a small smile as she neared. "I don't see any zombie bodies. We can hold up here for a few days, get our supplies in order." It was all she could say, and she felt terrible saying it. There was nothing she liked less than giving Isaac bad news. It seemed like there was only ever bad news.

Isaac had picked up some literature on fixing boats and made that his focus for the last two years, his serious focus, and he attempted to salvage any boat since then that he thought he could fix. Course it always came down to gas. They needed a lot of fuel. Isaac had been diving in and out of the water, looking at the boats more thoroughly. He was armed with a machete, strapped to his hip. His gun he left out of water on the pier.

When Alice moved toward him, Isaac met her by hopping off the boat and onto the pier. "I was thinking about making an energy efficient boat.. something that charges electricity and recycles back into the propeller, what do you think?" He was pretty happy about his idea. He had grown smarter by the years, stronger, taller, and his hair darkened to a dark brown, almost black, like his father's.

He was almost as tall as her already. Alice had no doubt he would be taller than her in just another year, maybe two. She grinned at him, always impressed by just how handy he had been able to make himself. Alice had taught him everything she knew about fixing cars, hot wiring cars, fixing up batteries to just about anything. That's as far as her knowledge went however and Isaac had went so far beyond that by now, she had no idea how he did half the things he did.

"That's an excellent idea. We could cover so much more ground- er, you know what I mean." Alice laughed softly as she looked at him briefly. He was getting quite the serious set of muscles on him, toned and used often. He was getting just old enough now it was impossible for her not to notice the man he was becoming. "Do you really think you can do that? I saw a lot of tools in the storage shed back by the road."

"Yeah, they do it for a lot of other things, why not boats? They had energy efficient cars, used more battery than gas.. I think it's the same mechanics, just have to find the parts.. problem is we keep moving around, and I can't very well shoulder a boat .. we have to settle somewhere.. then.." He was sure she wouldn't like this. "Then I can go out for the parts I need.. come back with them." He reached for a towel and rubbed his face and tossed the towel back over the railing. "I been thinking.. we can find an island.. live there by ourselves.. live off of it.. grow our food, keep those things out.. what do you think?"

"Isaac..." Alice really didn't like the sound of this idea. She had been on the run, moving and running and moving and escaping for so long, for years before she had ever met him. It was her life, she couldn't imagine anything else or how holding up could be safe. She also didn't like the idea of him going for parts. "I'm not sure about that. It would have to be an island big enough to support soil suitable for crops, small enough not to already be inhabited. It would have to be a very special island. The liklihood of us finding something like that is-"

I don't believe in luck. Alice looked away at his towel then up his arm and to his chest. She gave an uncertain smile and then a slow nod. "Let's camp out here for a few days and see if they have the parts that you need. It's worth a shot. They have seeds and farming supplies here we could take with us. Maybe we'll get lucky?" Alice had said it often enough to Isaac that she knew that he knew she didn't believe in it.

Alice started to walk past him, and her hand came up to pat his stomach on the way by. "I'll go clear out one of the huts for us to live in for now. We'll need to gather up and burn the bodies if we're going to be here longer than a few days."

He grabbed her wrist, turned with her. "We'll haul dirt over, it doesn't have to be like this the rest of our lives.. I'm sick of being disappointed.. this … this world's.. it's over.. Alice.. we have no where to go." He pulled on her wrist, pulled her closer. "Burning bodies, skipping towns.. finding no one.. we're all that's left.. and we don't got enough bullets to cover staying here.. maybe we'll get lucky and find a sail boat and I we won't have to paddle ourselves into solitude." He looked down her face, to her chin, her thin neck. She never aged. He was fourteen, almost fifteen. Three years ago they had to make their own calendar, the ones they got were expired, out of date. All those days that passed, they found nothing but danger, death, and rot.

Alice looked down to his hand on her and felt the strength in it. This wasn't her little boy any more, and she knew logically he was right. It was just harder to accept in her heart. She reached up and put her other hand on his bare chest, feeling the dampness there from his recent swim.

"I-" She had nothing to say, and she looked away and felt moisture coming to her eyes. She swallowed her emotions down and gave a nod before looking back up at him. "Maybe you're right. It feels like giving up to me, but maybe it's not, maybe it's just appreciating what you have."

She gave him another nod and gently took her wrist from his hold and pet his chest before dropping both hands. "If this is what you want, Isaac. You know I hate disappointing you? Tell me what you need from me."

Isaac's brows drew together and he sighed, his arms folded and he shifted his weight. "No, you're not disappointing me.. it's just the world.. how it seems we're the only ones left." For a while he went through the idea, the thoughts that his parents were the ones that disappointed him the most. They hadn't survived, they didn't come back, they were probably changed too. Isaac sniffed and shook his head. "I don't know.. If we get in gear we can leave this .. place sooner. We should look up North, up the coast, find a good ship, maybe a sail boat.." He felt like he had some how caused her to feel like this was her fault.

Another nod. "Everything here is ruined, we'll move up the coast and try to find an older town." By older town she meant one created before the zombies, before the looting and pillaging roaming bands, before people started turning on each other out of desperation and fear. "Some fishing village that has some boats we can get usable parts from. We'll make your boat and find our island." Alice gave him a reassuring smile, feeling better now that they had a plan. It would also be nice to get away from this town, yet another disappointment for them on their long journey.

"I'll see if there's any gas in the vehicles left." Alice moved to him and hugged him briefly. "Don't go too far, okay?" Her mothering tone in her voice them as she looked over her shoulder at him while walking away.

It took them two days to find the next town, and it was a fishing village more or less. From the shops Alice could guess it used to be a tourist destination too. She spent some time in one of the gifts shops, looking at bumper stickers and snowglobes, feeling nostalgic. If they found this island it would be like starting life in a new world, a world without all these haunting memories. For some reason it was difficult for her to let go but the more she thought about it the more she knew it was for the best. Isaac needed something permanent and Alice wanted to give him that if she could, if this was what he wanted. Maybe she wanted it too but she was too afraid to try. She would be strong for him like she always had.

They scavenged a lot of fuel from the vehicles in this town as they made their way to the docks. When they got there, Alice was astonished at what they found. There were about a dozen boats all moored, and every single one of them looked complete. They were dirty and weather worn yes, but they weren't damaged. She pulled the old motorcycle down the wooden dock and stopped it, then laughed as she looked behind her at Isaac. "Think you can work with these?"

"Yes!" Isaac's face was bright and he set to work on looking through every single boat. It took a week to gather what he needed, find the best salvageable boat, and fix whatever it need fixing. He had backups for his backups and worked whole heartily through the week, early in the morning to late at night. He directed Alice in whatever he needed her to do to help him but worked mostly on his own. They couldn't have asked for a better spot to find, really. There was a shop near the pier where Isaac found plentiful supplies and he began to wonder why no one else made it out here and retrieved their boats. Though, maybe some had? He then thought about his parents, about Alice, it took them over five years to make it out here. To be in this spot. Maybe people were on their way, or at least attempted to come and unfortunately didn't make it.

Isaac made sure the waste tank was functional and their fresh water supply was operational. He had adapters, screws, extra tanks hanging off of the side of the boat, secured by tight rope. Adhesive sealant, towels, the fridge working off batteries, extra power-tech Marine AGM batteries, battery cables, gel-tech marine batteries, extra battery switches. He was spoiled for the whole nine yards and feeling utterly confident.

Furthermore, they had supplies and resources to use for when the food in the fridge ran out. Fishing poles, lines, nets even. Extra chains, an underwater storage chest that set beside the lifeboat. He had even rigged, built, and installed an Air-X Marine Wind Turbine that produced 400 watts of power at 28 mph winds. He was feeling pretty good, and the complete preparation for all of this took less than a month. Nearly three and a half weeks and he was jonesing to get out to sea.

"It's done."

Alice spent those weeks playing Mom, mostly. She cooked for her growing, working boy and kept their adopted but temporary home clean and comfortable. Whenever Isaac needed something not in the nearby parts store she would go out and find it somewhere in the town, occasionally finding other odds and ends of use. The most original idea she had for helping them prepare for their voyage was to get them both some new clothes but especially some mens clothing... for Isaac to grow into. She actually spent a very long time shopping around the town for his wardrobe, feeling quite a few emotions over it. Her little baby boy, he was growing up so quickly. She spent some time sitting in a child's bedroom of a random house in the fishing village, wondering about Isaac and what kind of man he would be. He didn't have the luxury of this kind of childhood. She wondered where his real mother was.

When the day came he announced the boat was done, she was only happy for it: no more tears and no more doubts. She had him give her a tour of everything he had done and she was so impressed she just said over and over again, "It's incredible!" She was now more sure than ever that Isaac was some kind of engineering genius, and without any schooling even. She had taught him what she could of math and literature and such but she was no teacher, she gave Isaac all the credit for his intellect and ability.

It seemed like in no time at all they were out there, just as Isaac had wanted, in the middle of the ocean. The boat had enough power to run a GPS device and she somehow found it comforting that the satellites were still up there above earth orbiting around, and she wondered how many years before they stopped working?

Two weeks it took them to find the first island. It was far too tiny and had nothing to offer them, including no wildlife and hardly any trees. They moored only a day, long enough to feel solid ground again and clean out the boat. It only took three days to find the next island and it looked highly promising. While Isaac moored the boat Alice had the binoculars out, scanning what she could. There was a large forest on the island and they could hear birds there, which mean there was probably other wildlife too.

"Isaac." Alice called down to him. "I think I see buildings. I wonder if someone used to live here. Maybe I'm imagining things?" She leaned over the edge of the boat and tossed the binoculars to him.

Isaac was feeling really proud of himself and his boat that he had named Treeman. It was the final touch before they set off onto the sea, with a dozen of maps, atlases, and GPS machines, all fed from the batteries he collected and charged with the wind turbine. Yep, Isaac was feeling real proud. He even made sure to complete the role with a captain's hat and a pair of big round sunglasses. The first Island was a dud, but he marked a few trees with spray paint, using the date, his age, Alice's age, and the coordinates of the island.

The second island they found he was hesitant to leave the boat. He anchored it off shore a few miles, and they took the life boat to the island. Both of them armed and ready. They dragged the lifeboat up the shore and with a reluctant pout Isaac looked to the Treeman with a sense of longing. Longing to be back on the boat and not on this island. He'd worked real hard on that boat.

They headed out toward the building they saw on the Treeman, and they were quiet about it. Listening for anything, any steps, branches snapping, moaning, screaming, or - dare they hope - actual talking.

Alice patted him on the back when noticing his look back toward the boat, and she grinned to herself. "Zombies can't drive boats any more than they can swim, it'll be fine. Come on." Forty-five minutes later they were coming up on two rows of cabins, it was obviously a tourist spot where (rich) people could come and rough it for holidays. The whole world was rough now, she mused silently, it was funny people used to pay for it. It looked in disrepair but that didn't necessarily mean real people weren't still here.

"Maybe we'll find you a girlfriend," she teased him as they came up to the first cabin. Her pistols were both drawn as she eased up with her back to the wall and moved toward the door. She took in a breath and moved quickly, kicking it open as she moved inside with her guns pointed forward. It was empty, there was trash on the floor, the curtains were torn. It was like a thousand other houses they had entered. "Clear," she said, backing up and out the door again to turn to Isaac.

Isaac stared at the back of her head for a long time, wondering what she meant. Wasn't she his girlfriend? He worked this thought out for a long while as she cleared the house and when she returned he asked her. "You're my girlfriend, aren't you?" He looked over her face, she was a girl, they were friends. What a weird thing to say. Isaac may have heard the term when he was young but he had nothing to associate with it and while growing up on the run there really was no media exposure to that side of life. Romance, girlfriends, husbands and wives. He didn't understand what she meant, in those terms.

When Isaac asked his question, Alice was already moving toward the next cabin. She looked over her shoulder and winked at him and then continued to walk, but a few more steps and she stopped and looked at him again, then slowly turned to face him. "No... I'm your- well, adopted Mom, I guess. We're friends, and I love you." She had said it to him before, especially when he was younger and they had been together month after month. Alice had quickly come to love the smart, sweet little boy she had rescued.

She took a few steps closer to the teenager. They had lived together long enough that Alice could tell he wasn't joking around, but genuinely asking her. It was such a strange thing to realize that this young man had no point of reference for that sort of relationship, and Alice felt guilty for never having any kind of talk with him about it before. It just wasn't something that came up, when you were the only two living people that each other had seen for years. "A girlfriend is a woman that you're romantically interested in."

Romantically interested in. Isaac lowered his eyes and searched his memory for this concept, once again he was drawing blanks. But then he thought about his mom and dad. "Like a wife? Is that what you mean?" He hadn't thought about it, honestly he hasn't. It was starting to make him feel worried, did he need a wife? Why did he need a wife? Besides there was no one left, no one. He frowned and shook his head then huffed. "You're joking." He decided with a soft smile and gave her an expression, almost trying to convince her as much as he was trying to convince himself that there was nobody left in the world. He didn't want to start hoping again. Besides, he'd not hope for a wife, he'd hope for his parents.

He moved toward the next cabin with his gun out and smiling at the building. He would help clear this one. Later he'd look through the cabins more thoroughly. Scavenging anything worth taking.

Yes, she had been joking but now it seemed an exceptionally cruel joke and she felt bad for making it. Often Alice had lamented her own lack of companionship, often she would sneak away from Isaac at night to ease her own aching and wishing she had Carlos or Luther there to ease it for her. Isaac might never have that, would never go out to a dinner and movie with a girl his own age, never sneak out of a bedroom window to go meet her under the school bleachers.

Alice felt uneasy as they cleared the second cabin, and then the third, but her uneasiness had nothing to do with zombies. She suddenly hoped more than ever that they would find some living people, she hoped there would be a girl Isaac's age among them. She was quiet as they walked across the pathway to the opposing row of cabins and she let Isaac go in first again. She smelled it before she saw it, a zombie idling in the far corner, and it turned with a low moan as Isaac walked inside.

Isaac saw the zombie, though he didn't react right away, instead he watched it. Curious about it. It was weak, barely able to groan and the fingers on the zombie's hand moved with a twitch, then settled, it was to the point of wasting away. It was strange, thinking of a zombie dying out of hunger, but how long did it take? Years? Months? The skin was thin, gray, and there was only a few strands of long black hair. Isaac learned that hair grew even after someone died, and nails, though he didn't know how long. But that was a normal person's death, zombies, their hair and nails kept growing. He saw a zombie once with nails curled into its palms.

It smelled bad in here and he looked around to see the remains of soiled clothes and bones. He looked back to the zombie, it had clouded eyes and likely only knew they were here because of the fresh smell of flesh, breath, life. The zombie was slouched back against the corner, its shoulder looked dislocated and his arm was unnaturally turned around over his chest and the fingers kept twitching.

"Do you think they understand that they're in pain? Or do you think they don't feel at all?"

"They are beyond pain." She was convinced of this. "The purpose of pain is to alert the brain that the body is suffering damage, so that it can react appropriately to avoid that. It's a defensive mechanism. No undead I have ever seen reacts as if it wishes to protect its body from damage. All it knows is hunger, insatiable hunger."

Alice stepped forward and put her hand on Isaac's shoulder, and aimed her gun and shot the zombie in the middle of the forehead, ending it. She too had notice how emaciated it was. Her hopes of finding anyone alive on this island just went from close to zero, to absolute zero. She closed her eyes a moment and then turned and wrapped her arm around the young man and gave his shoulder a squeeze. "Let's clear the rest, we can stay in the boat each night until we finish exploring the island. How does that sound?"