Craig of the Dead

8. Bluff?

"Don't kick the baby."

"Guys, back up! The kid is obviously scared, can't you see?" I shoved my way through the crowd of girls until I reached the middle of the circle. There were two boys, one about my age, one much younger, being held with their hands behind their backs.

"Be careful, the blondie's bit." Heidi warned. She was right, on the boy's shoulder there was an irritated, infected bite mark. Better keep an eye on him.

"Don't kick the baby." The younger one repeated. The two girls who were on guard duty restrained them, and although it seemed sort of pointless, I was glad that they had remembered their training.

"They're not going to kick you, Ike. Chill out." The older one laughed.

"No, of course we aren't going to hurt you." I said, squatting down so I could be on the same level as the small boy. "It's Ike, right? You're Kyle's little brother, aren't you?"

"Kyle! Where is Kyle?" He trembled, his wide eyes searching the group for a friendly face. I looked up at Annie, nodding.

"You can let go of him, I don't think he's going to be a problem." She let go, but Ike still remained as still as a statue. "As for you..." I said, standing up and staring at the older boy. "How come I don't recognize you?" I inquired.

"This is retarded. Can I just leave the kid with you and go? Cuz I know you, Wendy. You'll take good care of him. Better care than I could give him."

"What's your name?" I studied him, trying to figure out where I'd seen him before. I knew I had, it was on the top of my tongue. He had ratty, messy hair, kind of a dirty blonde color, with nice blue eyes. His face was dirty, with a tiny splash of freckles across his nose. When he gave me a stupid grin I could see he had just lost a tooth.

"Oh, come on! We've been going to school together for ages!" He was wearing torn white t-shirt with holes in it, but it was his eyes that I kept coming back to. I just know I had seen them somewhere. I began to make a mental list of all the boys in my grad— "Put your hand over my mouth." He said.

"What for?" I asked.

"You'll see."

"Gross, no! Boys have cooties, and you've got zombie cooties!"

"Don't do it, Wendy, he's probably going to bite you!"

"I didn't ask any of you wusses did I?" He shot. "Come on, trust me."

"You sure are mysterious." I said as I walked up to him and, reluctantly, placed my hand over his mouth.

"Yeah, that's why they call me Mysterion." He said, his speech extremely muffled because of my hand. Suddenly, all the pieces clicked into place. How could I have been so stupid? There was a collective gasp all around me as the girls put the voice to the face.

"Better?"

"Yeah." I said, removing my hand. Now that I looked at him again, it was crazy how I couldn't see it was him in the first place.

"That's so weird!" Nicole exclaimed. "Kenny, what happened to your parka? We could hardly recognize you without it."

"I was...trying out something. Testing an experiment you might say."

"What kind of experiment?" I asked, picking up Ike. He had wandered over to my legs while I was standing there and had been hugging them for a while. I scooped him up and held him on my hip. He grabbed my hat off my head and played with it while we spoke.

"It doesn't matter." He said, sneaking a quick look at his infected arm. "It didn't work that much. Only delayed the inevitable." He huffed, shaking his head. "I am so fucking done with this crap." He added under his breath.

"Kenn—y!" Ike squealed, delighted at the change of atmosphere.

"Heidi, you can release Kenny." I ordered. "Hey, Kenny, I'm really sorry but, you know you can't stay here, right?"

"Yeah, no duh." He grinned, inspecting his arm a little bit, not looking concerned at all. "No, I just wanted to drop the kid off. He's all yours. I'm on my way to find my own kid."

"Who?"

"Karen." He said firmly, his eyes taking on a new, fierce look. "Well, and Kevin too, I guess. But mainly Karen. All I wanted to do was help her, but then I... got lost. Even though I told them both to stay put, they left. Without me. And now I'm trying to find out where they went. You haven't seen them, have you?"

"No, I'm sorry." I said.

"Kenny, you do realize that you're going to be a walker soon, right?" Annie pointed out. Now that she had brought it up, I could see that his complexion was paler than usual, more of a sickly green, and there were dark bags under his eyes. He did a good job of hiding it, though. I could respect that.

"No, I don't think so."

"What do you mean?" I asked, curious on how he thought he could prevent that from happening.

"Nah, I got a plan. You wouldn't believe me."

"Try me." I said. Ike had gotten tired of my hat and had flung it on the ground, using my hair as his newest plaything. The fact that I had just cut it short didn't help his tugging and pulling. He had gathered a chunk of my dark hair in his chubby hand and gave it a hard yank.

"Well, tonight, I'm going to blow my brains out with this gun I have hidden somewhere around here. I'm going to shoot myself in the head. Problem solved."

"Haha, very funny."

"I'm not laughing." He said with a straight face.

"Kenny, even if you wanted to do that, it wouldn't help. The virus would still continue, you would just come back a few days later as a full blown walker."

"It'll work for me. Trust me, this isn't my first rodeo." He said, a crazy light gleaming in his eyes.

I was now faced with a choice. Believe him, and let him inside, keeping watch over him so that he wouldn't commit suicide. However, this would also pose a risk to my girls. Or, I could call his bluff and let him go about his business, not letting myself be tricked by any stupid boys. Especially not a stupid boy like Kenny McCormick.

"Then be about your way." I said decisively. "We can provide you some food and supplies but nothing more. And of course, we will look after Ike."

"Thanks, but no thanks. Normally I would jump at the chance for free food, but I won't need it." I raised an eyebrow at him questionably. "Hey, if it's really that big of a deal, you can leave it at my house. I'll be there soon enough." I rolled my eyes at him.

"Nevermind. Come on, girls. Nice work handling the situation." I said, handing off Ike to Annie. She ran off with him, the rest of the girls following her and giggling at how cute he was. Soon the entire group had dispersed until it was just Kenny and I left.

"You weren't being serious, right? About... killing yourself." I asked nervously. I picked my pink hat off the ground and wiped the dirt off, putting it back on my head.

"Is it really bothering you that much?"

"Yes, it really is. I don't know why you seem so nonchalant about the fact that you are infected. How you can just throw around phrases like 'I'll blow out my brains'! It worries me." My hands instinctively went to fiddle with my hair, a nervous tick of mine, but they came up empty. I was going to have to get used to having short hair.

"Then no." He said. "I won't hurt myself in any way. Happy?" He tousled his own messy hair, running his hands through the mop and making some dirt and sand that was stuck in his hair fall to the ground.

"Don't lie to me."

"I'm not! Don't worry, I'm not going to die." He said, giving another grin. "You're alright, Testaburger."

"Shut up!" I said, smiling. "Now go, Karen's waiting for you."

"Thanks." And with that, he moseyed down the street until I couldn't see him anymore.

That night I had guard duty.

That night I heard a lone gunshot echo throughout the town.

That night I found Kenny McCormick, lying in a pool of his own blood, his face blown to bits and scattered about the pavement, a gun at his side.