"Just do it."

His eyes were teary, and his face was that of a broken man. A man that had lost everything. It was the look of someone who would take the greatest leap of faith in the world, because they had nothing to lose anymore. The look of someone that had everything taken away.

Lincoln offered no resistance as a pair of rough hands grabbed him tightly. The calloused skin of the zombie rubbed against his smoother skin, and the ghoul bent downwards. A maw of sharp teeth opened, and the zombie bit into his flesh, slowly and softly.

Lincoln hissed and grit his teeth as pain filled his arm. He gazed upwards at the ceiling, sighing. He had heard that just before death, a person's life plays right before their very eyes.

I don't need to remember everything… just the last week… when everything went from bad to worse...

One week earlier, at the Loud House, the air was filled with silence as a young man stood on top of the roof, a shotgun clasped in his grip. He stared below at a pale zombie rushing towards his home, though due to the natural limp of the undead, it seemed more like it was jogging slowly. He aimed below, trying to keep his hand steady…

And pulled the trigger.

A zombified Beatrix Yates fell to the ground.

"Excellent shot, older brother."

Lincoln turned his head and smiled lightly at his younger sister Lisa. "Thanks, Lis. It's, uh… well, I won't say it's easier now..."

"I doubt it would be easy, the first time or the last time," Lisa sighed, glancing at the fallen corpse below. "As much as we would like to forget it, these creatures were once our friends… and family."

"Jesus, Lisa. Don't make me think about it."

The two siblings glanced back at the backyard, and swallowed in unison. A single grave was erected in the backyard, and it cast a long shadow in the setting sun. It was Lana's grave, and the memory of her crawling down the street, bleeding and screaming, caused Lincoln to shiver. "At least we got to bury her… she was the only one who made it back..."

When the outbreak started little over a month ago, the entire family, sans Lincoln, Lisa and Lola, had taken a trip to the Royal Woods Mall. Lincoln could still remember all his sisters and his parents filing out the front door. He remembered Lori and Leni and Luna chattering loudly about what they were going to buy, and he could still feel the punch Lynn gave him on his shoulder before she left. "You want anything from the mall?" she had asked. Weeks later, and Lincoln regretted that his answer wasn't "For you to come back."

When the outbreak happened, Lisa was smart enough to take her older brother and sister down to her bunker. For the first few hours, Lincoln and Lola were complaining, thinking that Lisa was acting weird as usual, before they heard the sounds outside; explosions, growling, people screaming for their lives… one scream louder than the others…

Lana was the only one who had made it back. She ran the whole way, but was already dying when they brought her into the bunker. She whispered her goodbyes, and passed away. They buried her the next morning, with Lincoln securing the perimeter with his parents' guns. The white haired boy would never forget the look on Lola's face as the funeral finished…

"Oh right, I should check in with Lola," Lincoln said.

"Go ahead. I shall stay up here for a little while longer and observe the behavior of these zombies..."

"Lisa! Don't call them zombies!" Lincoln gasped playfully. "You never call them zombies in a zombie movie."

"Why not?"

"I don't know. Point is, you're supposed to call them something like 'Infected' or 'Walkers' or 'Zeds…'"

"Zeds? Was that from a British movie?"

"British people in an American movie."

"That makes too much sense," Lisa deadpanned. However, she decided to humor him, and rubbed her chin as she began thinking of alternatives. "How about… Them?"

Them.

It was such a dehumanizing word. But Lisa was counting on that. It would be easier for them to kill the hungry beasts if, at the most psychological level, they could remind themselves that whatever and whoever the creatures used to be did not exist anymore.

That it was an 'Us versus Them' fight.

"We can think of something better later," Lincoln chuckled, patting the young scientist's brown hair. He looked down one last time at his most recent kill, and for a moment felt a twinge of guilt. He hadn't exactly talked to Beatrix, or any of the Yates for that matter, but they seemed like nice people…

You know, now that's dark out, she looks a bit more like a vampire than a zombie.

And that guilt faded as quickly as it appeared as Lincoln jumped into the attic and rushed down the ladder to the second floor. He walked up to the door to Lola's room, but before he knocked he noticed a few scratches on the wood.

Lola and Lana's room

"She must've carved it with a knife yesterday," Lincoln mumbled to himself. He ran his finger over the wood, and found sawdust clinging to it. Yeah, it was recent.

He then knocked gently. "Lola, can I come in?"

"Door's open," she called back.

Lincoln opened the door and walked into her room. His eyes wandered to Lana's side of the room, and he frowned lightly when he saw that all of her animals were gone. El Diablo, Hops, Bitey… they must've all escaped through the window when it became clear to them that their owner wasn't going to be back.

"Eyes over here, Linky," Lola muttered, taking a long sip from her misty tea cup.

Somehow, even in the apocalypse, Lola's clothes still maintained a holy degree of cleanliness. Unlike her brother, whose orange shirt was drenched in sweat and grime, and her sister, who's sweater was torn and dripping with oil, her pink dress was the same vibrant color, her gloves showed no sign of damage and her tiara still stood proud on top of her head.

At the moment, she was playing tea party with a few of her stuffed animals, which made Lincoln smile. At least things seemed to be normal again. In her presence, at least.

"Is there room for one more?" he gestured at a small, empty chair. Lola tapped her index finger against the small cup she was drinking from, as if she were debating with herself, but Lincoln knew her well enough what her answer was going to be. Finally, she gestured with a sweeping open hand. "Very well. Be seated and I will get you your tea."

Thank God the food supply Lisa left in her bunker stored a lot of tea. Lincoln suspected that she got the tea bags with the pageant princess in mind.

Lola poured a hot cup of tea for her brother, which he graciously accepted. He put the cup to his lips and set the warm liquid flow down his throat. He didn't really like tea, but he took extra care to swallow it all down. "C-can I have some milk with this?" he asked sheepishly.

"Sorry. Lisa put some chemicals in the milk to make it last longer, and I will not poison my body with preservatives. Nor should you, if I'm being honest."

"I trust Lisa enough that it's safe."

"Really? You trust her? Don't you have a missing kidney because of her?"

"Oh yeah… okay, never mind."

Lola's glossed lips curved into a soft smile, and she gave a nostalgic sigh. "It feels the same way it did a month ago. Just me and you, sitting at my tea table, with no icky monsters outside."

"Yeah, I like it here more too."

"Can I ask you something, Linky? Do you think... do you think the rest of our family is alive?"

Lincoln scratched his head, and he cringed at the awkward question. "I mean... I really hope so. I hope a lot of people are still alive and out there. Like Clyde and Girl Jordan and Ronnie Anne..."

Ronnie Anne.

The mental image of his Latina friend caused Lincoln to shiver, but it was a good kind of shiver. His mind associated her face with warmth and a tingling feeling that was more than friendship, but not really love... really. It wasn't love. She wasn't her girlfriend, he can swear on that. He's serious, guys!1!

Ronnie Anne... I wonder where you are right now...

Lola visibly shook, distracting Lincoln from his thoughts, and clutched herself. "I'm scared of them, Lincoln," she squeaked, "especially after what they did to Lana..."

"Hey, hey," Lincoln whispered softly to her, in the most reassuring tone he could manage. His arm reached out and landed on Lola's shoulder, squeezing it lightly, and the blonde stopped quivering. "I know you're scared of Them. Me and Lisa are too. But… Lola, you're a princess, right?"

She nodded, and Lincoln gave a confident grin. "And every princess has her knight to protect her from monsters and ogres. That would be me. Sir Lincoln Loud, at the service of fair Lola."

The young man struck a pseudo-heroic pose, putting his foot on the table and flexing his unimpressive muscles. Lola giggled, slapping her brother's arm. "Very well, Sir Lincoln. Your first quest is finishing your tea without complaining or making faces."

Fortunately, Lincoln was spared having to suffer more boiling leaf water when his walkie talkie emitted a sharp crackle. "Come in, Lincoln, over."

He picked up the device and held the microphone right next to his mouth. "Come on, Lisa, I said we should use code names like me and Clyde used to."

"Lincoln, we can discuss that buffoonery later. There's something more important at hand right now."

"What is it?"

"You'll have to see this to believe it. I'm staring right now, and my God..."

"I'm on my way. Over and out."

"Is everything alright?" Lola asked, her tone full of worry and fear. Lincoln got up from his small seat, making sure to be slow to show Lola that there was no danger.

"Probably," he replied, scratching his cheek. "If there was a problem, she probably would've yelled at me to get up there as soon as possible."

"Can I come with you?" Lola suddenly asked.

"I thought you hated going up on the roof?"

"Okay, maybe I didn't make myself clear; Lincoln, TAKE ME UP TO THE ROOF WITH YOU!"

"So, what is it that you needed to show me?"

Lisa turned with a frantic look on her face as Lincoln and Lola's heads popped out of the opening. Lincoln crawled out first, then offered a hand to his younger sister, who daintily placed her palm on his and allowed him to raise her up. "Greetings, elder sister, I wasn't aware you would be joining us."

"I get bored talking to stuffed unicorns." Lola shrugged her shoulders. "Plus, I wanted to see the stars."

While the sun was still peaking over the horizon, the day had mostly ebbed away into night, and only a purple haze reminded people that the sun was still around. The stars were already revealing themselves, with each shining dot poking through the black sky one at a time. In spite of themselves, the Loud siblings gasped in awe at the beauty of the night's sky.

"With all the lights gone… I can see them much more clearly," Lisa whispered in a mystified hush.

"I hate to interrupt," Lincoln tapped the younger sister's shoulder lightly, "but you brought us up here for something urgent, right?"

"Right. My apologies," she… apologized. Her face suddenly turned more grim, and she pointed to the right. The genius licked her lips before she told her two siblings "Look out there. Do you see what I see?"

Lincoln and Lola squinted, but they could see a large horde of humanoid shapes moving in the distance. Some shuffled and shambled, letting the trio know it was a horde of Them. Lola backed away, hiding behind her older brother, but Lincoln didn't feel her grab his clothes as he stared intensely. They had seen hordes of Them walk by from time to time, but never had they been… so close. If just one shifted its direction, it would drag its hanging entrails all over Franklin Avenue's sidewalk.

And just as that thought ran through his mind, one of Them did turn.

Lola gasped and Lisa swallowed as a single zombie removed itself from the horde and started walking up the street, a bit more balanced in its pace than the rest. Lincoln could barely make it out in the dusk, but he could tell that it was about his size, and he nodded confidently.

He could take it in a fight.

"Lisa, Lola, wait up here. I'll go down there right now..."

"Lincoln, wait," Lisa grabbed his dirty orange polo, and pointed at the singular monster, "If it continues on its trajectory, then it should fall into one of my traps."

"Traps? When did you set those up?"

Her eye nervously glanced over at Lola, before she quietly whispered "A-after Lana's funeral..."

Lola seemed to open her mouth, but whatever the six year old was going to say was drowned out by the sound of devices and machinations below. The three looked back just in time to see four sets of bars fly up around the confused revenant. Lisa cheered silently to herself. "It worked! Now I finally have a subject! I can finally start working on a cure!"

"Let's get the cage when the rest of Them pass," Lincoln said, his face grim. Lola and Lisa weren't about to argue, so they watched in silence as the walking dead passed them by. It took them a while, and in the pale moonlight Lola was able to get a better look at them than she usually did. Their skin colors ranged from normal human tones to more sickly shades of green and yellow. Some sustained cuts, bruises and entire lost limbs, while others seemed completely unharmed by the elements. Some wore clothes, while others had the misfortune of being embarrassingly naked.

But if there was one thing that shocked, and maybe even revolted, Lola the most…

Some looked exactly like normal people.

No shredded clothes, no crawling on torn arms, no ghastly moans of hunger and pain… they looked exactly like she did. Well, obviously not as glamorous, not even the living could be that perfect… but they still managed to resemble the living.

Lola choked slightly. Were her parents and sisters out there, looking like that? Looking exactly how they did when they were alive? Could… could one of them be forced to kill one of their sisters if they still wore the same clothes or had the same smiles…

Well, we don't even know they are zombies. I'm… I'm sure Daddy and Lori will keep everyone safe, Lola tried to reassure herself. And she did her best to ignore the question of why, if they were still alive and bunkered down… why did Lana run back to them…

"They're gone," Lincoln grumbled coolly, snapping Lola out of her terrified state. "I'll drag the one we captured inside. Lisa, where do you want me to put it?"

"I'll figure out a place for it later. Just be careful with my cage. I don't have the resources or time for another one."

"Come to think of it… when did you have time to build the first one?"

Lisa gave an unsettling grin. "Who said I built it after Armageddon started?"

Lincoln rolled his eyes and hopped back into the attic, grabbing a long knife as he rushed down the stairs. Lisa watched him until he disappeared from her sight, at which point she looked back to her older sister, and saw her shivering. "Is everything alright?"

Lola didn't answer, so all Lisa could do was wrap her arm around her comfortingly.

Back downstairs, Lincoln kicked the front door open with a loud "HIYA!" He paused, then grinned to himself. "I always wanted to do that. It seemed so cool," he chuckled, before rushing out onto the lawn. He briefly missed a slithering snake, and made sure to crouch the rest of the way to the cage. The horde may have passed, but he knew some of his undead neighbors were still lurking. Hell, Mr. Grouse could be anywhere.

Eh, let's be real, he's probably giving the Grouse log to some lady skeleton out there… God bless him, whether he's dead or alive.

The wet grass tickled against his arm, and the sounds of crickets filled the air. For a moment, Lincoln found himself hoping that fireflies would be rising into the air, and he smiled as memories of him and Luan and Lynn catching fireflies flooded into his mind…

Those days are never coming back.

The painful reminder pushed him forward.

Eventually he was walking upright again, still slow and cautious of any external threats. The eleven year old spun around, his eyes scanning the darkness for any sign of motion, before finally reaching the cage. One of Them was inside, though oddly enough it didn't seem to be groaning or grunting like the rest. It moaned, and the sounds it made were more calm than the others.

"Alright, let's get you ins-"

His eyes finally fell on the zombie, and his jaw dropped. He backed away slowly, his chest rising and falling as his breathing became more heavy.

The being in front of him was a female. A young woman, about his age.

"No way..."

She had long, flowing black hair.

"It can't be..."

Her skin was brown, and her face was freckled.

"Not you… not here..."

And she wore a very familiar set of clothes.

"There's no fucking way!" Lincoln screamed. His eyes were beginning to sting, and he prayed to every god he could think of that he was just seeing things. But his eyes weren't fooling him.

Only one girl in Royal Woods ever wore that purple hoodie.

"R-Ronnie Anne..."

She's one of Them.

She's one of Them.

She's one of Them.

The thought repeated itself over and over in his mind as he sat on the couch. He glanced back at the corner of the living room, where he had painstakingly dragged Ronnie Anne's container to. The girl was behaving oddly, not like the rest of them. She was huddled in the back corner, and… she looked eerily like herself from before. Her skin wasn't decaying or changing color, and even the dirt stains on her clothes and messed up hair reminded him of the Ronnie Anne he always knew.

There was one thing different, though.

Her face was neutral and unreadable. She gazed back at him with a calm expression, and her eyes didn't seem to recognize him. That was what reminded Lincoln that she wasn't human… she was one of Them. The expressive, energetic, emotional girl he had known before was… was…

Lincoln coughed. It pained him to think about it.

"I… I never could've foreseen this," Lisa whispered in awe. Her arm was stretching towards the cage as she slowly approached. However, just as she was centimeters away from the metal, Ronnie Anne let out a low pitched growl and snapped her teeth aggressively. Lisa flinched, and even Lola, who was standing comfortably as far away from Ronnie Anne as possible, found herself backing up even further.

"Of course, it was a guarantee that people we were close to would be infected. But… I imagine it's difficult for us to truly picture it. Even now, I imagine we all envision our sisters and parental units alive as we are. And… the idea of close friends of mine turning into Them..."

Lisa shuddered, the image of a zombified Darcy haunting her mind.

Lola shuddered, the image of a zombified Winston haunting her mind.

Lincoln didn't shudder. His worst case scenario was staring him blankly in the eyes.

She was supposed to leave to the city that day.

Lincoln sighed. If she had left, he might've never seen her again. Then again, if she had left, he might've never seen her undead form.

"Lisa," he croaked, "can you cure her?"

"I'm not entirely sure," Lisa confessed. She sighed, lifting her glasses to rub her weary eyes. "Truthfully I have no idea what we're dealing with here. Whether this is a virus or fungus or something human beings have never seen before. If there is something that can be done for Ronnie Anne, it'll likely take..."

Lincoln let out a dispirited sigh, and Lisa's tone softened slightly. "If there is something that can be done for Ronnie Anne, I'll work as fast as I can to do it."

A light smile flickered on Lincoln's lips. "Thanks, Lis."

"Don't thank me yet, brother," Lisa said with a smirk.

The mousy haired girl extended her hand tentatively towards the cage again, only for Ronnie Anne to react similarly. She nodded professionally, and turned her back to head upstairs. "Well, it's late, and I need my REM sleep. Come, Lola, it's not good for us to be up this late."

"Why doesn't Lincoln have to come with us?"

"Lola… let's give him and her some space," she whispered through grit teeth.

The blonde was led away. Lincoln watched his two younger sisters ascend the stairs, and called "Good night!" after them.

He then sat there for a moment, debating what to do next in his mind. On one side, it had been a tiring day, and there was nothing Lincoln would've loved to do more than to toss off his clothes and hop into bed with Bun Bun. On the other side…

Lincoln looked back at Ronnie Anne, and met her eyes. They were a rainy shade of gray now, not the vibrant brown they used to be. Still, whether she was human or Them, she was still Ronnie Anne. The beautiful girl that invaded Lincoln's every thought back in the days when his every thought wasn't surviving to the next day.

He slowly got up from the couch, the furniture groaning loudly. He took a small, careful step forward.

Ronnie Anne didn't seem to get aggressive yet.

He began tiptoeing towards her, checking her reaction with every step. She didn't seem to react negatively at all, and perhaps it was his imagination, but he could've sworn that he saw a glimmer in her eye.

Could she somehow recognize me?

Lincoln stopped with a jolt when he saw Ronnie Anne stand up as well. She clumsily walked towards the bars of the cage, staring at him the whole time. Out of a mix of curiosity and bravery, he got closer.

He was standing pretty close now. All it would take is one more step and he would basically be up against the iron bars. Interestingly, Lisa hadn't gotten this close and Ronnie Anne had snapped her teeth angrily at her. However, for Lincoln, she just stared at him, with a disheveled look that, to him at least, looked sad and forlorn.

She raised her hand, and Lincoln watched as she pressed her palm to the metal bars.

"R-Ronnie..." he breathed, raising his own hand to meet hers...

Suddenly, the zombie girl's head shook wildly, and when she looked back at Lincoln she growled and snapped her teeth at him, and the white haired boy fell back on the ground.

"G- Goddammit!" he yelled, punching the floor with an angry clenched fist. With a look of hatred, anger and even disappointment, he rushed out of the living room and up the stairs, his mind racing with thoughts.

Why are you so disappointed? You know she's one of Them now. There's no way that she could be…

But I saw her. I swear I saw her and she looked human. What if she was trying to… I don't know…

Communicate? Get real, Lincoln, you're being psychotic and delusional.

He bit down on his lip as he reached the top of the stairs, and nodded angrily. That thing wasn't Ronnie Anne. It was something else. He shouldn't let the way she looks trick him.

And yet… that didn't stop his heart from fluttering pleasantly in his chest when he thought about taking her hand and wrapping it with his own.

It was later decided, in a sibling meeting that was much smaller than what the Louds were used to, where the wraith girl would be housed. Ronnie Anne was given a sedative, and as her eyes closed and she fell into a sleep-like state, Lincoln was allowed to open the cage and pull her out. He carried her up the stairs in his arms, handling her with such care and attention that he would've looked like Prince Charming carrying Sleeping Beauty.

He glanced down at her face as she slumbered. Aside from her skin turning a more pasty color, he honestly couldn't say she looked all that different. His cheeks flushed red as the mental image came to him of her waking up, somehow restored to human status, and punching him for holding her in such a romantic way. "The hell are you doing, Lame-O? And why do my clothes smell worse than usual?"

"A boy can dream," he said with a sad smile.

"Thankfully, the bat colony has evacuated Lucy's room," Lisa muttered as she followed Lincoln up the stairs. Lola was walking slowly behind them, scowling deeply at the care Lincoln was holding Ronnie Anne with.

"So is there any real reason you insisted on putting her in Lucy's room?" Lincoln asked.

"Don't ask me. I just didn't want her in my room," Lola muttered.

"I chose our raven haired sister's room for three reasons. One, the coffin Lucy stores in her room will make a good storage place for Ronnie Anne..."

"Don't talk about her like she's furniture," Lincoln growled.

"Two," Lisa continued, dismissing his interruption, "The room is currently… not in use, so there's no problem leaving her there. And three… well, truthfully, I think the gothic trappings of Lucy's side of the room are a bit appropriate for our paranormal guest."

Lincoln and Lola both rolled their eyes, and Lisa shrugged. "What? We were all thinking it."

When they arrived, Lisa opened the door. It creaked opened, and a wave of powerful smells flooded the hallway, and all three of the siblings began coughing. "The combination of Lynn's unwashed clothes, bat guano and a lack of ventilation should be considered a biological weapon," Lisa said when she finished gagging.

"You're telling me. This smell could cause a whole new apocalypse," Lola waved her hand in the air, dispelling the poisoned air away from her nose.

Despite the mounds of guano, there were no living bats to be found in the room. One or two bats lay dead on the floor, while the rest seemed to have flown away through the open vent that Lucy used to crawl through. "Ew," Lola said when she saw one of the rodents on the ground.

"We probably should've checked in this room at some point," Lincoln realized as he gently set Ronnie Anne down on Lynn's messy bed. His flesh scraped against her's, and Lincoln noticed how cold her skin was.

Of course it's cold. They don't have body warmth.

However, for reasons he couldn't explain, he still found himself grabbing Lynn's crimson blanket and wrapping the young girl in it.

"I blame myself. I knew there were animals in here that needed to be cared for and fed, but..."

"But?" Lola repeated.

"I was hoping Lucy would come home to care for them herself," Lisa whispered, her tiny body shaking. Lincoln shot his blonde sister an angry look, and Lola mouthed 'I just wanted to ask' at him.

The scientist got a hold of herself, however, shaking her head slightly and looking at Ronnie Anne. "Well, as they say, the past is your head and the future is in your hands. And Ronnie Anne is, quite literally, the future of mankind. Lincoln, please roll up her sleeve."

Lincoln did, and he found himself smiling lightly at all the bruises and cuts she maintained from her skater lifestyle.

Lisa approached and pulled a syringe and a wet piece of cotton from her pockets. She rubbed the cotton against Ronnie Anne's skin, in a vain effort to disinfect a being that was riddled with infection. She took a deep breath, calming her nerves, before plunging the needle into the sleeping zombie's arm.

As the shot began to fill with blood, Ronnie Anne shook and moaned lightly, clearly aware of some pain. "H-hey Lisa… can you be a little easier with her?" Lincoln protested uneasily.

"I am, Lincoln. I'm giving her a medicine that will change her neural system, making the pain less apparent to her mind, as well as the potential side effect of making her a bit kinder to huma-"

"I know you're trying that, but still..."

"Lincoln, let the lady do her job," Lola snapped. "I don't see why you care so much..."

"Maybe because she's my friend? Did that ever occur to you, Lola?"

"Was. Was your friend. She's now one of Them," Lola responded coldly.

Lincoln bit his tongue as Lisa finally finished. "Thank you, Lincoln. I'm aware this may be hard on you, but believe me, you're doing the best thing you can for her in this state."

"That's a comfort to know," Lincoln muttered darkly, shoving his hands into his pockets and slouching over.

"Okay, Lincoln, just move Ronnie Anne over to Lucy's coffin. Please strap her down, and Lola and I will be outside, waiting for you to finish. Lola, come with me."

The two girls left him alone with Ronnie Anne, still making pained noises. "Hold on, let me try something before I put you in a coffin."

The young man grabbed her arm and began running his hand along its length, massaging Ronnie Anne's limb. The growling and groaning stopped, instead replaced with a soothed, if still guttural, cooing. Lincoln smiled as Ronnie Anne's expression seem to relax, and he was pleased to see a bit of color return to her arm and, oddly enough, her face.

"Alright, I'll show you where you're sleeping tonight," Lincoln gently whispered as he picked her up again and carried her over to Lucy's coffin. The coffin was standing upright against the shadowy walls on Lucy's side of the room, so Lincoln allowed Ronnie Anne to gently fall back into the soft red cushioning.

He then took a moment to admire what a dark moment had just occurred. He had put one of his best friends in a coffin, and was about to strap her down.

Why did fate/luck/God insist that he put up with strange shit all the time?

"I swear, there's something about the weather," Lincoln grumbled as he reached over to Lucy's bed to grab the straps Lisa left for him. There were only two of them, so Lincoln quickly looked over the coffin to decide where to strap down.

"I guess legs and, uh, chest work," Lincoln's cheeks went red as he stared at Ronnie Anne's torso.

The lean boy crouched down as he began roping Ronnie Anne's legs together. He still wasn't exactly sure how strong she was in this form (the strength of each of Them seemed to vary, as Lincoln observed) but he was sure that Lisa's straps would hold.

Once he finished down there, he stood back up, the other strap in hand. He swallowed deeply and his face lit up brighter as his hand shakingly approached Ronnie Anne's chest. His hand touched one of her budding breasts, and Lincoln fell back with a cry of "I'm sorry!"

The girl was unresponsive.

Come on, Lincoln… pull it together. You're acting like she's the same human girl she was before. She's not! She's… she's not…

He approached the corpse once again, his hand nervous. And just as he was about to try again…

Her eyes shot wide open.

"Oh… fuck..." Lincoln exhaled.

For a few terrifying moments, Lincoln and Ronnie Anne simply stared at each other. Her sharp, glowing eyes penetrated his softer, blueish gaze. A drop of sweat rolled down his face as he realized that all she had to do to get to him was simply reach out…

But she didn't.

Despite how close he was, she didn't seem to want to grab or attack him. She simply gaze at him with an odd expression. It was curious, as she cocked her head to the side, her eyes scanning him up and down. She extended her head a little and sniffed him, in a puppy-like way.

In the weirdest sense of the word… she was actually kind of cute.

"Okay, this is… strange," Lincoln thought out loud. He extended his hand towards her, his eyes alert for the threat of a bite. But she didn't seem to want to anything more than sniff and stare at him, like an immensely curious child.

Lincoln found it surprisingly easy to tie her upper half against the coffin. His hand lightly brushed against her breast again, and the pale boy blushed again. "S-sorry," he stammered an embarrassed apology. He felt less like the monster hunters of his comics and movies, and more like the awkward lead in one of his sisters' comics or movies. The romantic kind, of course. Barf.

When he finished, he backed away, but he never broke sight with his guest. "So, um, I know this is weird and all, and you're not really 'you' anymore but… I'm glad to see you again Ronnie Anne. In any form."

The undead Latina only let out a low pitched groan as a response.

"Don't worry about anything, Lisa will make you way better. Trust me." Lincoln promised with an enthusiastic smile, before his cheeks started blushing again. "Until then… can I try something?"

He reached over and grabbed Ronnie Anne's arms, ignoring the wolfish growl that she was making, and locked his fingers with her's. Their palms pressed flat together, and Lincoln noted how strange her hand felt. It wasn't exactly rough, but not smooth either. Definitely better than what one of Them should've had, though.

"And definitely the only thing I really want to be touching right now."

"And don't repeat any of this to our fraternal unit, understood?"

"Got it."

"Good."

Lisa sighed. "Very well, you are dismissed."

"Don't talk to me like you're the one in charge," Lola sneered, crossing her arms, "I still have something I want to ask you."

"Very well. One question before I go back to counting how much fresh fruit we have remaining."

Lola scowled at first, but then her expression softened and she clutched her arm fearfully. "I already lost Lana to Them. Will I lose Linky as well?"

"Hopefully not. Not if we remain vigilant, dear sister," Lisa placed her hand on Lola's shoulder and gave a comforting squeeze, and Lola responded with a toothy smile.

As Lola began strolling away, Lisa took a moment to look out the window. It was still a bit dim outside, but Lisa could make out the silhouette of a crawling corpse, dragging itself towards their home. Its nails dug painful into the pavement, and the more it dragged itself the bloodier the trail it left behind. Lisa watched as a large dog came rushing towards the zombie, and with a loud fit of barking, bit deeply into the monster's neck. It bloodily tore out its throat, and began clawing its back and face. The ghoul flung its arms around uselessly before shaking violently and dying, leaving the canine to feast on its gored kill.

Lisa took off her glasses, rubbing them against her green sweater. "I suppose even in these times, the circle of life continues, and no one, us or Them, can escape it," she waxed poetically. She put her glasses back on, and sighed again.

"I'm going to get a glass of juice now. I'm tired of thinking."