My City? (Open)

[Cindy Croft]

The former glamorous politician of Williamsburg was brought to her knees. Her hair was out of place, her clothes ripped and stained and she was now probably out of a job – although no official word had been given – nor could it, the Mayor had been killed in the onslaught of the undead. Cindy had to watch from a cupboard, she had to watch her friend and associate get torn apart limb from limb as he screamed ‘stay hidden, Cindy, stay hidden!’ That in itself was torture.
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Cindy had slept in the office stock cupboard for 2 nights straight without food or water. She had been too frightened to come out in case they were still in the town hall waiting for her. Eventually though, the deputy mayor emerged from the closet and into the Mayor’s office – where her associate lay dead. But for how long? Cindy didn’t know anything about these things, she didn’t know if they stayed dead, or if they came back if they’d been chewed – she had a political mind, she was no scientist.

After mourning for her friend she left the office of the Mayor and the town hall and stepped out onto the street. Chaos awaited her.
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Cindy jaggered down the street mindlessly, her hair a mess and her once $4000 suit tattered and stained. The city where she grew up, loved, it was in ruin. What had they done to deserve this? What had happened? She could only think, what happened to my City?

[Eddie "The Mutt" Sillian]

Eddie muttered under his breath, fighting with the car door, it wasn’t alarmed, he had checked that, he didn’t want to be surprised but his dogs had started growling and sniffing at the car suspiciously. It meant that there was something in there he wanted, something that would get him out of this world for a little while, hopefully something a bit harder. He grasped the handle of the car firmly and yanked it back, grunting with the effort of trying to drag it open, but it had little effect.

After a pause he slung his back pack to the floor, grappled with the horrible modern straps and pulled out a metal canteen of water, nearly full, and threw it at the passenger side window of the car. The window shattered into tiny cubes of glass that sprayed over the seat and inside of the car and the canteen clattered into the door on the other side of the car and rolled under the driver’s seat. He hesitated, scanning the streets behind him for any signs of a lunging corpse. With the street behind him dead, metaphorically, he clambered in to the car, still unable to open the door, he ducked his head in and tried to drag himself in without cutting his hands. The dogs sat at either side watching him struggling with something like a wolfish smile on their faces.

Eddie wasn’t amused, he was stick thin and shouldn’t have had a problem in getting in, but his belt buckle was stuck, and his legs were off the floor, he was dangling in the window, unable to pull himself in or push himself out. He swore koudly, grumbling and grunting as he tried to free himself, finally getting loose and crawling into the car, legs still sticking out of the window.

[Cindy Croft]

The newly appointed Mayor breathed heavily as she tried to walk up the broken sidewalk. The city was in complete ruin, utter destruction had taken place – humanity at its worse. She had just been made Mayor of Williamsburg by default and her first run was disastrous. What the hell could she do? Call in the military? It was an idea, a very good one, but how could she? The phone lines had been cut. The city was dead.

Or was it? Crawling in through a car around the next street was someone very much alive. Cindy would have joked she recognised the ass hanging out, but she recognised the dogs. Cindy quickened her pace; she had left Ed last week when she ran into the other man with the skillet – whom she didn’t like too much. He was out to save his own ass only. “Hey! Hey!” She shouted as she began to run fast up the road. Shit, she mouthed realising that her mindless shouting would attract attention – unwanted attention.

“Ed!” She called loudly but not shouting as she just was. Running in hells wasn’t a good idea. She stumbled. Her heel twisted and the suited woman came tumbling down to the tarmac. Cindy Croft winced in pain. Her clear pantyhose were torn at the knee. “God damn...” She ripped off her left heel – the one she had been using as a makeshift weapon – the same one she used to kill the dead but back alive again secretary at the town hall.

Cindy got back to her feet, but with a little hobble as she moved forward toward the car and the legs flapping out of it. Prada shoe in hand and one still on her foot she leaned against the car bonnet.

[Eddie "The Mutt" Sillian]

Ed was strabbling about in the car, legs still hanging out of the window. His hands had found the glove compartment and had pulled out a small paper bag, brown and wrinkled but untouched since the incident. His spare hand, the other one being used to prop him up, opened the packet and came out with a small, clear bag containing a fine white powder, far whiter than sugar. With a laugh and a manic grin on his shabby, somewhat dirtily tanned face as he stashed the little packet into an inner coat pocket.

A sudden noise in the street made him jump and the problem with being suspended in a window of a small car, legs hanging in the air was that it was only too easy to lose balance entirely. He shot upward in shock, smashing his head into the roof of the car with a solid clang then fell forward into the car, head down the foot well and into glass fragments. “Fuckfuckfuckfuck!” The stream of curses filtered out of the car and into the street, followed by the thudding as Eddie pulled himself entirely into the car and onto the seat.

Very quickly he snapped his head out of the window, just in time to see Ms. Croft lean onto the bonnet of the car, a pained expression on her face. Ed grinned and leaned out the window, smiling at the woman with friendly recognition. The dogs beside the car were wagging their tails, panting at her but made no move to approach, they had been told to stay still and that’s what they were doing. “’ey, ‘allo Ms. Croft!” Eddie grinned at her wryly, brushing the small fragment of glass stuck to his face from the floor.

[Cindy Croft]

Deputy Mayor Croft or Mayor Croft as it now was since the mayor had been of all things, eaten. The usually well made up suited woman winced even more when she heard the foul mouthed Londoner bang his head. Foul mouthed yes, but he wasn’t a bad person. Although she didn’t approve of the language that he blasted, but she could understand why he had blurted it. She wouldn’t have heard language like that back in her home state of Idaho! And certainly not in the little town where she grew up before she came to Colorado.

“Sorry – did I scare you?” What a stupid question, of course she had scared him! And who wouldn’t be jumpy in the city where the dead get back up and eat the living!

Croft lifted her leg up behind her and slid on her red Prada heel. “I thought I’d be wandering around for days before I found anyone again. There’s only so much running you can do in a pencil skirt!” She told him in her typical humour voice. Croft had a very dry sense of humour indeed. She was known as the Barracuda in political parties because of her humour digs at the opposition. Croft had a talent to mock and slur another candidate and make everyone laugh without them even know that she was actually being rude. Everyone would laugh and think it a very good joke on Croft’s behalf, but of course it was in fact a nasty slur.

Croft watched the dogs. She clicked her tongue at them to make sure they knew she was friendly. She didn’t want to be torn apart. “Why are you snooping around in this car? Is it yours?” Croft glanced at the broken glass. “Ha, as if!”

[Eddie "The Mutt" Sillian]

“Me, scared?” He grinned and gave a chortle, a harsh and barking laugh that was gruff from smoking and too much drink. “Nah, gave me a bleedin’ fright though.” He leaned casually out of the car window for a few more moments, as if he were a driver who had casually pulled up to the curb to talk to her. He realised that it was being silly to sit around inside here and moved around awkwardly in the car, banging his head again on the roof.

“’ang on, ‘m gonna get out.” He crouched on the seat and leaned his head out of the window, putting his arms out in front of him and throwing himself out awkwardly, landing on the floor in a heap before he managed to straighten himself out and stand up, brushing himself down as if it would make any difference on the mucky clothes, bits and pieces of different uniforms thrown together, pants from his army days, his police jacket and his SS cap that really didn’t fit well with anything else, but he wasn’t going for best dressed survivor of the year.

“I thought ya would have found summat a bit more practical by now. There ain’t many of us left about an’ I bet ya can’t run all that fast in it. ‘m surprised you are still runnin’, truth be told Miss.” He grinned and shoved his hand into a pocket, drawing forth a packet of tobacco, scarred, dogbitten hands moving quickly to roll himself a cigarette and fetch it to his mouth. A zippo came forth from another of his many pockets and he lit it on his leg, lighting the cigarette and taking a deep breath, all done in one fluid movement.

When she asked about the car, he shifted uncomfortably and frowned a little, looking at his scuffed, heavy boots before returning his shadowed eyes to her face with a wry grin. “Awrigh’, ya caught me. Ain’t mine.” He didn’t expand on the point though, but he was still smiling even if it was guiltily, his voice said that butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth.

[Cindy Croft]

Cindy Croft watched in amazement as Eddie buffaloed out of the car. Her once eye shadowed eyes rolled as a sigh passed through her unpainted lips. “Of for God’s sakes...” She muttered as he finally flopped out of the car in a mangled position.

It wasn’t his car. Typical. Inside her she knew what he was doing was wrong and against the law, but who cared? She didn’t. The city was in ruin. Let him loot all he wanted too, when all this was over she’d make sure the city was brought back from its knees – but until then she didn’t care. Somehow she didn’t see a light through the darkness. “Do you mind?” The official moaned waving her ringed finger at his cigarette. She frowned distastefully. Her hair. What a mess it must have seemed. She could feel it all stringy and loose – the up-do completely ruined.

The Deputy Mayor – as she was before all this destruction – was known for her appearance. She was known for her politics too, but her appearance is what had caught the media’s attention. Her stylish hairdo, her lavish suits – which although followed standard politician smartness, they also had a hint of fashion and style in them – and she always had a nice set of expensive heels on her feet. But since the end of times, or whatever was happening, she was a sight for sore eyes – although still held a certain grace and beauty – even though she looked like she had been dragged through a hedge backwards.

[Eddie "The Mutt" Sillian]

He grinned, and continued smiling until she gestured at his cigarette, at that point his face fell for a few moments and he drew it from his mouth, looking at it hesitantly. It took him a little while before he licked his finger and pinched out the cigarette, stowing it behind his ear with a downcast look. “I guess not...” He muttered, feeling a little flabbergasted all of a sudden, no one had ever made him take his cigarette out without handing him a beating before hand. And she had just asked.

“It ain’t like no one is gonna come back for it, an’ if I didn’ look someone else would.” He didn’t know why but he felt the need to justify himself to her, she made him feel guilty without even trying. He forced his mouth shut and made a whistling noise between his teeth, the dogs trotted over and he crouched down, rubbing their heads and scratching behind their ears.

“Wha ya doin’ out here...? Ain’t ya got a guard or summat...?” He asked, looking a little concerned for the woman, it wasn’t safe for anyone to be alone out here. He didn’t count himself as being alone, he had Jones and Mal with him, he didn’t need anyone else... it was only a shame they couldn’t talk back sometimes. He made a soft growling noise in his throat, not a noise of threat but a comforting noise, at least to a dog. Spending more time with them than other humans had made him a little odd in that way.

[Cindy Croft]

Being the captain of the state champions for the Lacrosse team and track and run, it meant that Cindy Croft was healthy, but not the health freak. Cindy Croft was opposed to cigarettes, opposed to them as she was abortion and a lot of other issues. If she had her way she’d ban them or push them up to a class A drug to limit them. But she knew that would make her a lot of enemies.

The Mayor laughed. “A guard? I think you’re mistaking me for the President. I’m the deputy mayor, not the owner of the White House.” That statement in itself was wrong. The White House was in fact Egg Shell White, not pure white. So the name of the house was all wrong anyway. But that didn’t matter anyway. “I don’t think so, Ed.”

Cindy didn’t particular like calling him Ed, she’d prefer to call him Mr. Something, but Mr. Mutt wouldn’t be very acceptable. In fact it would be rather rude on her part. So for now Ed would be fine. “And I see you have your two guards...” Clearly indicating to the dogs.

[Eddie "The Mutt" Sillian]

“Mebbe, but people dun last long on their own out ‘ere...” He stopped grinning for a few moments, considering the others he had seen die, whether he had played a part in their deaths or not. He wasn’t guilty for that, he didn’t believe he could have done anything else. Why give his life for anyone else. “You oughta get yasel’ a body guard. Save ya beatin’ em wiv whateva ya ‘ave to ‘and.”

He ran his hand through his wild hair, getting too long now but showing no signs of being affected by gravity, still standing on end as if it had hair gel clinging to it. He hadn’t used hair gel before the infection, never mind afterward. He returned his hands to his sides and began to tap his legs, lacking a cigarette to smoke as was his habit, he was having to concentrate not to allow his hands to move up and light one.

A hacking cough racked his chest, his scarred, bitten throat heaving as he drew in breath, trying to calm it down. He turned away and raised his hands to his mouth, doubling over trying to control his coughing. It took perhaps 30 seconds before he finally stopped. He pulled a face and spat onto the floor, red saliva staining the street behind him. He turned back to Ms Croft and gave her an apologetic grin. “I wouldn’t be wivout ‘em.”

[Cindy Croft]

The Mayor huffed, “yes, I can imagine...” Her voice was flat as she spoke, the memory of the town hall hitting her like a swift bullet. The mayor, (the former one that is), had been ripped apart by those he had worked with for many, many years. His secretary, his public relations officer and his personal assistant. He had bundled Cindy into the stock cupboard – she had hardly fit! Her legs were cramped and her body crippled. But it had saved her life.

“And don’t take the cigarette smoking personal, I think it’s a filthy habit. My father died of lung cancer, it would be a waste of your young life if you found out you had something similar, wouldn’t it.” It was a load of old crock really. A lot of people died of cancer every day, lung cancer even, and not all of them smoked. It was a lottery. Those unfortunate to play and lose, well, it was just unfortunate.

Mayor Croft winced when he spat onto the street. Her face showing her distaste. “Yes, well. Not all of us are as fortunate as you to own such fine beasts. We have to make do with a Prada heel.” She joked kicking up her leg, but wincing once more from the pain. When she had fallen she had not only tore a hole in her pantyhose, but also a nasty scratch in her knee. “I don’t know what’s worse...” She sighed touching the cut on her knee. “Having this or ripping my only pair of pantyhose.”

Again, although the Mayor was joking, her tone was very dry - that was Cindy's sense of humour. Dry bust fast. Fasting drying some could say - but that would be going too far.

[Eddie "The Mutt" Sillian]

“Heh, well for you Miss, I’ll wait for ma smoke.” He gave her yet another of his cracked grins, followed by another small cough, little more than an aftershock of the previous destruction in his lungs. It barely stung his sore throat. “Sorry ta hear about ya father.” He muttered afterward, not really knowing what to say in such an awkward moment. He didn’t like to consider things like that too much. “But ta be honest Miss, it’s better to die from summat ya like, It’s not like anyone’s gonna live long ‘ere anyway.”

“Ya oughta find yaself a group. I know a few survivor groups. There’s one in the police station, an’ we got one in the Incan.” He rolled his eyes sarcastically and sighed. “A right bunch of weirdos... and comin’ from me that sayin’ summat.” He cackled and glanced down at the tear in her tights. “’m sure ya can pick yasel’ summat up. People ain’t really lookin’ around much for tights these days.” He glanced at his own clothes, a little torn, stained, his trousers bore bloodstains from previous fights, his jacket had more than one hole. The only item that seemed in good repair was the cap, but Eddie reasoned if it had survived a war, a little apocalypse wouldn’t harm it much.

[Cindy Croft]

Cindy Croft flapped her well manicured hand. Surprisingly the manicure had kept fresh looking, it had been a week since she had had it done in that new Chinese place in Portland. “Don’t worry about it.” Cindy hadn’t had a great relationship with her father, in fact, it hadn’t been a pleasant on at all. Push, push, push, push. That was all he ever did. He had pushed for her to go to medical school, but fact was, Cindy wasn’t that intelligent. Of course she had a keen and great political mind, and a mind for fact and figures, but for medical school she wasn’t at all qualified.

“A group?”Croft thought about it for a second. “How many people have survived this ordeal?” She thought of trying to get everyone together, united they could all band together. They could start anew before the undead came back to strike, form an alliance.

Croft unbuttoned her blazer, but as she did her American Flag brooch fell to the floor from her lapel. She gasped in horror thinking it would shatter, but it didn’t, it bounced and landed on the toe of her show. “Thank God!” She said bending down to retrieve it. “You know I’ve had this brooch for 13 years. Nancy Regan gave it to me – funny thing is, it fell off her lapel too!”