Frankenweenie II

Prologue: Later That Night

The flames of the burning windmill along with the same breed of torches that ignited it illuminated the cloudy night sky in the distance. As she watched with her wide, owl-like eyes, Anne Chambers, most commonly known as the Weird Girl by her classmates, felt her heart beat like it was jumping up and down in her chest.

Toshiaki, Bob and Edgar were steadying Nassor after helping him out of the cabinet he had momentarily been trapped in. The boys approached Anne, who, much like themselves, had their gaze fixed onto the burning windmill towering over the crowd of angry townsfolk around it. To their horror, and audibly the mob's, the windmill came down. The pained and horrified scream of a familiar young male voice was heard.

"NOOOOOOO!!!!!"

Not long after that, the townspeople came down from the hill. The group could make out a saddened Victor carrying Sparky in his arms, his cheeks stained with tears. Most of them internally gasped, riddled with guilt. They felt somewhat responsible for this. The Weird Girl took a step closer, scanning for any sight of her beloved Mr. Whiskers. She did not see him anywhere. Instinctively, her eyes went to the windmill.

"What have we done?" Bob croaked.

As the boys watched and repented, they seemingly didn't notice Anne sneak away. She quietly went through the alleyways and around the back of the houses as to avoid the crowd, who were too busy rigging their cars with cables. When she was sure she was out of sight, she made her way up the hill.

When she reached the entrance, she stopped for a moment to observe the wreckage. Carefully, she walked into what was left of the town's landmark.

After careful digging and traversing, she found him. What was left of her beloved Mr. Whiskers. He was impaled with a long, rather thin wooden stake. The sight made her drop to her knees on the hard dirty ground. For a moment she wondered if he was actually dead. For some strange reason even the sight of his clearly dead body wasn't convincing enough. So, she carefully took him with both hands and pulled him up from the ground. When she finally managed to do so, she pulled his filthy body into a hug, not minding the black dirt he was covered with.

When she couldn't feel any kind of movement, not even a breath or a heartbeat, she finally realised that Mr. Whiskers was really dead.

Her silent facade broke, and she started to cry, still holding him tightly to her chest. In one horrible night, after making one gravely stupid decision, she lost her one- only friend and companion. There were many things she wanted to say to him, but she didn't know if Mr. Whiskers would (or could) listen to her after all she had done.

And then she heard what sounded like... cheering? This seemed to indicate that Victor had his dog back. The harsh reality that Sparky would live, while Mr. Whiskers was dead was hard to stand. She even felt hatred for Victor and Sparky.

However, when she left the windmill and slipped into the crowd around Victor and his dog, the boy's eyes found her, and his facade faded into a much sadder one. She saw remorse in his eyes. She could practically read Victor's mind.

Other people followed his gaze and they finally saw her, with her summer dress covered in ash, wet cheeks, and a tight hold on the dead cat in her arms. The contrast between Victor and the Weird Girl, between Sparky and Mr. Whiskers was so strong that it left the crowd speechless.

Victor got up and slowly, carefully took two steps towards Anne, but her parents quickly appeared and ran to their daughter.

"Sweetie, what were you doing in there?" Worry was all over her mother's face.

"I came for Mr. Whiskers." She said, raising the cat a little higher.

Her father, on the other hand, was very angry. "You went into a crumbling building, where everything could have fallen on you, for a dead cat?! Young lady, that was reckless!"

"Not to mention that this horrible creature almost killed my niece!" Mayor Burgermeister added, getting in-front of the crowd. "You should let it rot there."

"Yeah, get this monster out of here!"

"It's gross! Throw it away!"

Suddenly the rest of the crowd started to agree with him, more or less loudly, and Anne heard the word 'monster' repeated from various directions. She also saw contempt and coldness in the eyes of the townspeople. She felt hostility all around her. Why were they saying such things about Mr. Whiskers? Why were they being so cruel to her? New tears ran down her cheeks and the girl squeezed the cat tighter.

The next thing she remembered, was that she started to run away. She didn't know if she wanted to get home. She just wanted to be as far away from those people as possible. She heard Victor and her parents calling after her to stop, but she didn't listen. She just ran and cried.

She had to find somewhere to hide. She ran through the open gates to the Pet Cemetery and slammed the metal frames shut behind her. She passed the recently disturbed graves of a certain hamster and turtle. Her knees buckled and she collapsed against a gravestone out of the moonlight's watch.

She didn't know how long she had sat in the cemetery, crumpled up into a wet, broken ball. All she could remember was sobbing again. Because of Victor, his stupid dog, and the others that had roped her into their stupid plan, she was left alone in the world, without her cat.

In a twisted fate of irony, curiosity had killed the cat....