Like the Darkness, but not the Darkness (A Gone series fan fiction)

Death (Chapter Nine- Part One)

 "Of course you guys make the injured girl clean the guinea pig cage!"

From upstairs Ivy could hear Alice scream something about poop being gross, and Kim offering to do it once she was done feeding Deon.

Ivy told Kim not to worry about it, that she was joking.

She told Alice she'd plant the poop in her shoes- and she could hear the little girl panicking upstairs as she frantically hid all her little cute and sparkly shoes.

Chuckling to herself Ivy, wrinkled her nose as she took in the mess the guinea pig cage was in. It hadn't been cleaned in at least a week, and even the guinea pig were probably hating the stink.

"Ok, Bon, Nitro- we're going to clean this all up." Ivy spoke to the rodents as she started taking apart the actual cage.

Even the names of their guinea pigs made them seem like a nerdy family, being named after Carbon Dioxide and Nitrogen Dioxide. Alice always called them just Bon or Nitro though- sometimes calling them Mr and Mrs. Dioxide even though they were both girls.

Ivy had the metal caging part off, and was trying to set it nicely on the floor when Alice jumped out from behind the corner and dove into her lap. Before Ivy knew what was happening, the cage jumped out of her hands and crashed noisily on the floor- Ivy swearing as she abandoned any effort towards catching the cage so she could swoop forward and catch Alice- who'd tumbled off her lap when Ivy had instinctively sat forward.

Alice's head was an inch away from the floor when Ivy'd caught her, and her eyes were wide as Ivy carefully set her down on the ground.

The second Ivy let go of her she was on her feet, nervously sputtering out an apology.

Then Kim entered the room, frowning as she took in what happened.

"Ok. Alice, let's go for a walk with Deon so Ivy can get some actual work done?" Kim suggested with a warm voice, making Alice's worried face disappear.

"Ok!  And can we go down to the mineshaft?" Alice whined, bouncing up and down as she did.

"I blame Hunter for this." Kim muttered, reminding Ivy of the time he'd taken her out, and she'd gotten lost inside the mineshaft. Hunter didn't even know she was in there, and when he'd gotten Ivy she'd only discovered it when little Alice came stumbling out of the dangerous mineshaft, covered in dirt with a blank look.

She might as well have been brain dead for the entire day, and then the next she was twittering about wanting to go back in. Saying that her friend wanted her to go back.

Ivy assumed it was some sort of imaginary friend, and Alice was always changing his name. She said she'd heard it, but it was a long and confusing name- she could never get it quite right.

Gay-a-fridge. Or Guy-a-padge. Or Gay-a-fag.

Hunter thought the last one was pretty funny when she'd started screaming it all around the house.

Mother, not so much.

"No, Allie- the mine shaft's dangerous." Kim lectured as she led Alice out the down, the baby in a stroller she was pushing along.

They all shouted goodbye as the door shut behind them, and Ivy shouted back from them to be back within an hour.

Kim stuck a thumbs-up in the air and sighing, Ivy went back to her work.

After a while she managed to get the caging set up on the floor, where she could put the actual guinea pigs in it so she wouldn't have to worry about them escaping.

Then she started shoveling poop.

A half an hour later she had a bag full of old and dirty bedding, and had scrubbed everthing else clean. She just finished replacing the bedding and the little toys they had, feeling relieved when she noticed all she had left to do was put the pigs back and set the caging on.