Another story added to my "Harcourt Brace Collection" – stories (mostly Final Fantasy) based on prompts from this workbook that went with my fifth grade literature book. I was looking through that flimsy red writer's journal again, and I found some activity I filled in on a whim back before high school about some story (I think) I read in fifth grade called "Like Jake and Me". I'm trying to mix my fics up a bit so I don't get bored, since I have sever Final Fantasy stories going at this time, and I decided to do this one – featuring Nicholai and a random zombie – and mostly serious. Read up, peeps.

Please note (yet again): All the questions I'm answering in this little series (i.e. anything in bold), is copyright to Harcourt Brace & Company – I'm not making profit from this, so please don't sue me. And you know whom the characters belong to (Capcom)

The titles are my own, and original page titles noted.

Facet Of Your Personality

By Burning Bridges

(Activity's original title: 'A Spider Has Feelings, Too')

For the scenario, all I'm gonna say is… Nicholai is "unavoidably brutal", just kidding when the zombie casually strolls up to him in this scenario. If you had been the zombie, what would you have thought about Nicholai's reaction? What would you have done? Rewrite from the zombie's point of view the story of… Blah, blah, blah… You know, I always wanted to write a story for children called 'If Zombies Were Intelligent' – here's my chance to practice with that concept. It'll start with Nicholai's journal, and then go to the end in the Zombie's thoughts.

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Meandering through the pages of Nicholai's computer journal:

This is crazy! I wish I'd never set eyes upon this God forsaken Raccoon City… It just seems like lately nothing will go right – dogs, explosions, the undead – and now this!

I was scouring the city as usual, when I came across a drove of zombies milling around indiscreetly as they usually do. I shot them all "dead" with my assault rifle, and went to continue on through the door at the end of the pathway. To my dismay, when I turned around, one of those repulsive creatures (whose head leaned to one side, its neck having been partially been chewed through) had gotten back up and was slowly coming at me. I waited until it was a few feet away, and then, producing a magnum, and shot it right in the neck a few times. When it hit the ground, I examined "him" from a safe distance.

He was about 6'4", with what appeared to have once been auburn hair now nearly black from all the blood that it soaked up when he died from a massive jugular wound – and whomever he'd eaten since then. He was nearly decapitated now, his neck being so full of holes that there was barely anything left. His bloodstained shirt (reading "DK" – with a few bullet holes in it now) was shredded in several spots, as if he'd been attacked by something with large claws.

"Eh," I shrugged, "It's dead. It has to be. Might as well leave it to be picked at by crows."

I left the death-filled alley through the door.

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I blinked a couple of times, unsure of what had just occurred. I slowly began to sit up, only for my head to slump to one side and tear completely off. It rolled a couple yards down the alley, and I cursed to myself in my mind. I hadn't been able to do anything more than groan in the first place, but now that my vocal cords were destroyed, well…

"How am I even still alive? Err… Alive in the sense of being undead, that is… Zombies – that is what I am, I suppose – are supposed to drop after getting shot in the head, aren't they? I remember taking a couple out before I died, and they didn't come back… And that guy shot me quite a few times. Ugh… My head hurts… How can I feel it, anyway? It's not attached… And how will I eat?"

I pushed off the ground, awkwardly getting to my feet, and stumbling down the alleyway towards my head. I couldn't see where I was going, since my head wasn't anywhere near my body, and I ended up kicking it further down the alleyway.

"This isn't going to work," I muttered in my mind, dropping back onto the ground and crawling around on the pavement feeling for my head. I finally felt something move when I put my hand forward, and I gently raised my head off the ground with both hands, holding it up before my body.

"Hey! That bastard put bullet holes in the logo of my Dead Kennedys shirt! I've had this for years! … If I'm going to eat anyone, he's first!"

I tucked my head under my left arm carefully, forcing myself back to my feet only to nearly trip over a box as soon as I stood. Catching myself, I turned and glared at the box, only to be gripped by near euphoria when I spotted a combat knife sticking from the rubbish inside.

"Hm… I could use that!" I thought happily, picking it up and sticking it halfway into my pocket. I was starting to thirst for blood again, and I knew I'd need to find someone to sustain my appetite. I had been following the others to do just that.

"Why do zombies need to feed, anyway? We're dead! … There's a lot I don't get about this stuff..."

I shrugged to myself as much as was physically possible, considering how rigid my muscles were. Perhaps there were things in this world we just weren't meant to understand…

"Now if I could only find some tunes, I'd be set!"

Along with my thirst for blood, had come an urge for music. Probably as a by-product from my… "level of sophistication" compared to my undead companions. I could always find that Russian jerk later. It shouldn't be that hard – he smelled pretty strongly of warmth and cologne…

I scrutinized my surroundings, not seeing much of anything that would interest me, or be useful. I staggered down the street a little ways before I spotted one of my favorite places when I was still alive – the pizza parlor! Curious to see what had become of the place since disease hit the city, I wandered up to the door and put my hand on the doorknob. But when I tried to tighten my grasp to turn it, my fingers were too stiff. With a deep sigh (or what sounded like one in my mind), I set my head down on the street and interlaced my fingers. With a loud crack reminiscent of a sternum being split, I retrieved my cranium, and turned the knob clumsily.

"Damn, it's hard to open doors when you're dead."

It was dark inside. The only light came from the windows, which were nearly covered with boards. The floor was littered with garbage, and the air carried a faint smell of decaying roses, and old dough. There was no sign that anyone had been inside for a long time… No blood, no corpses, no sign of people.

I walked maladroitly over to the counter, where there were still pizzas stacked waiting to be delivered. The stereo had been left on a local station, but there was no sound except that of radio silence. I hit some buttons, trying to check other stations and hit CD by accident. I was greeted by the first melody I'd heard since this all began – Bocelli's 'Cante Petiro', a song I could only remember from somewhere long, long ago; a lullaby being sung to a crimson monster…

I sighed in my mind again, and listened to the tune as it drifted, and filled the shadowy haven, intoning to whatever now lay outside. I went into the kitchen, which, to my surprise, was lighted by an unblocked window hidden from the outside by a bright green bush. Boxes and other paraphernalia lay in its usual place around the kitchen. Some flour scattered on the floor was the only thing out of place at all. An oven in the corner was eerily warm as I passed it, suggesting that the wood had burned for a very long time before it went out.

"Warm," I said, and I remembered the feeling of sunlight. "Man, I miss the sun right now."

Bocelli was still singing the Cante, a heavenly voice breaking through the grim residue of what this place had once been. I was beginning to feel down hearted when I spotted another room I hadn't noticed before. I lurched around the corner, and found that it was a coatroom. The employees' belongings still sat on the shelves, not having been touched in a while.

"There must be a CD player here somewhere…"

I rifled through various coats and bags before I finally found one. It was a matte blue, decorated with little pictures relating to a movie release of the time. I carried it in my free hand, and went back out to the counter, where I popped the disk (apparently called "Brenda's Mix") out of the stereo, and into the CD player. Before I could leave, though, I decided to try the radio one more time.

I hit the radio button, and messed around with others until I thankfully heard a voice coming through – a woman's voice.

"This is Lauren T., reporting for 89.3 IMAT. There has been no word from anyone inside of Raccoon City within the past few weeks, and all attempts to find out exactly what's going on have met with dead-ends. Supposedly, the city was being quarantined to prevent a mass outbreak of a disease, which no one outside the city has been able to identify. Some say the government is to blame…"

"Damn right," I said, putting the headphones on my cranium securely, and hitting play.

The street outside was starting to succumb to nightfall, and the clouds that blocked out the setting sun were getting heavy with rain. There was no sign of any other zombies in the vicinity, so I had the whole place to myself.

Slowly, I was becoming more aware of my hunger, and I suddenly understood what made the others stupid with bloodlust… Not that they weren't mentally impaired in their undead state, anyway…

Maybe I didn't have to resort to that just yet. I hadn't been undead for THAT long… I barely even knew anything about being a zombie in my "still intelligent" status. The other zombies survived on instinct alone. Maybe I didn't need to kill anyone yet; I could get by on something else…

I thought it over, and by far, I figured the one thing I'd need after an ordeal like this (if I was still alive) was a cup of coffee. There was a café not far from the pizza parlor, and I decided to give it a whirl. I wasn't sure how… But I'd figure that out when I got there.

The streets were abnormally silent, whereas a short time ago they had always been bustling with people. On any other night like this, you would see any number of cliques mixing on the sidewalks, while in the back streets drug dealers would be hard at work in the shadowy recesses of humanity.

But that had all been erased.

A light drizzle had begun in the time it took me to walk to the café, and the delicate breeze carried the fresh scent of moisture everywhere, blotting out the surprisingly pleasant reek of death. Someone had raised the coffee shop's fire shutter, and I could see that, unlike the pizza parlor, it was well lit inside. I paused the CD in my player, the Cante just about to end, and turned the knob with more ease than the last.

Opening the door, I was enveloped by the cold air from the outside rushing into the building. The aroma of over-brewed coffee met me, and I staggered inwards, starting to fully contemplate how I was going to go about "drinking" coffee, when my head was no longer attached to the rest of me.

"I don't think I can get my head back on without a medical stapler or something… But maybe I could use a funnel…"

I knew somewhere in the kitchen there had to be a funnel. Everybody has a funnel, don't they?

The kitchen was humid, and all the coffeemakers were still on, suggesting that the last inhabitants had left in a mad rush. In the sink, there were still dishes submerged in murky green water, and above that, the only window in the whole place was steamed up. I reached over, my stiff finger just touching the cool glass, and slowly spelling out the words 'I WAS HERE', in shaky lettering that bled droplets of condensed moisture in little streams down it's surface.

What would someone think if they lived to see it?

Turning away from the window, I spotted drawers in the counter to my left. I opened one, and it was full of cutting utensils. Another was various measuring instruments, and another was towels. After maybe ten drawers, I finally found a small funnel, just small enough that I could maneuver into the remnant of my esophagus without jamming it into my trachea. I found a mug, and poured some of the beyond-brewed coffee into it, deciding to just drink it straight-up black.

Carefully, I felt around what was left of my shredded neck, finally locating the esophageal hole, and ever so fastidiously pushing the end of the funnel in. I didn't technically have a gag reflex anymore, but I got a stomach-turning feeling from it, and decided I better do this fast. I took the mug, and poured the hot liquid down my throat, setting it back down. It wasn't long before my stomach gave a disgruntled lurch, and I knew I wouldn't be able to live off anything other than flesh and blood. I pulled the funnel out, and tossed it into the sink without another thought.

"Guess I'll have to find some animal protein… Perhaps…"

I headed for the door, hitting play on my CD player, and hearing Bocelli sing the last few words, before Pearl Jam's 'Jeremy' commenced as I grabbed some chalk off the chalkboard menu, and exited the café. I figured now would be a good time as any to seek out that Russian dude, and so I headed off towards the place where we first encountered each other, in a quixotically good mood. I didn't know exactly what I'd do when I met up with him, but I knew it wouldn't be easy. And, I'd probably end up eating him…

The alley where my head rolled was no longer filled with the zombies I had followed in there, and my best guess was that they had gotten up and wandered off while I had been exploring. The Russian had closed the door behind him, and I had a little trouble turning the knob, since my hand was slowly stiffening again. I twisted it as much as possible, and slammed into the door with my shoulder, sending it swinging right into the wall, and myself into the ground.

"Ouch…"

There was a startled 'What the Hell?' and I repositioned my head so I could see who it was. Of course, it was the Russian. He raised his assault rifle, and said, in an increasingly distressed tone, "But I killed you… How come you won't die!"

I didn't want to give him the immediate impression that I was going to attack, so I moved slowly to my feet, and stared at him. He didn't seem to know what to do. Thinking quickly, I knelt, pulling a piece of chalk out of my pocket with my free hand, and beginning to write on the pavement to the Russian's near horror. In sloppy lettering reminiscent of a child, I scrawled the words 'I DON'T WANT TO HURT YOU'.

"How… How are you still… 'alive'?" he managed, still unsteadily aiming his rifle.

'DON'T KNOW' I scribbled. 'NEED HELP'.

"Why should I help you?" I could smell his fear from way over here, and it made my nose sting.

'WAS HUMAN. NEED FOOD.'

He thought for a long time, watching me cautiously, ready to shoot if he had to.

"Right," he said quietly, not quite looking directly at me. He pointed to himself, "Nicholai."

'I AM TRAVIS.' I wrote, and somehow a smile spread across the features of my decapitated head.

I hope this was… interesting.

Yeah, the whole 'head-being-able-to-function-after-decapitation' thing is a bit of a mystery borrowed from things such as "Kingdom Hospital" – I actually thought of the headless dude from that while I was writing. That was my favorite episode, where he found his head, and he was carrying it around by the hair! And that bit about the Cante and a 'crimson monster', was a reference to Sesame Street – I think that's the song Bocelli sang to Elmo.

I think I'll add onto this; write a prequel and a sequel, or something.

Either way, if you liked it or not, review and let me know what you think! And… do you think Nicholai was maybe just a tad too nice in the end? This is game-Nicholai we're talking here, the one who reminds me of R. Lee Ermey meets Sean Connery… I keep going to say Dom Deluise…