Disclaimer: I don't own The Walking Dead or any of its characters. I don't even own Annie, she belongs to Sophie, who you can find on YouTube under xSoppySofax. Read on, darlings, and enjoy!

Safe & Sound

Prologue

Annie stood frozen in the middle of the street, uncertain and scared. To her immediate left, on the corner where the bus always picked up and dropped off kids for school, there was a walking corpse feasting on someone. She couldn't remember her name, but Annie did remember that she was the one who always brought the terrible casserole that nobody ate to book club. Annie hadn't really even liked book club. Sitting in some sweltering house in the middle of summer, listening to someone pontificate about the symbolism of the color of some man's tie, or the significance of a woman wearing pearls at the beach. She had better things to do on her Saturdays off. Like laundry. But no, she'd been roped into book club. Joe had told her that she had to make nice with her neighbors. Her only friends couldn't be a bunch of grease monkeys and thugs. She'd argued but he'd been firm. Joe was always the type to be firm, insistent. And he was very insistent that she have friends that were…well, boring, was how she described them, but Joe had said "good". But Joe was good in Annie's book. All the guys at the shop were.

Regardless, Annie had never particularly liked anyone in her neighborhood. And the woman with the terrible casserole from book club, her intestines were currently spilled out on the sidewalk. Car horns were honking, alarms were blaring, and people were screaming all around her. One of the people shouting was Hannah. Annie didn't know the woman very well, just enough from book club gossip she overheard that Hannah was a divorced mother of two. Annie recalled seeing the two kids, riding their bikes up and down the sidewalk every afternoon. They weren't bad or good kids in her opinion. Just kids. Jaime would come around and ask her about cars from time to time, and she never minded teaching him a thing or two. Wasn't like she had anyone else to pass the knowledge onto. Apparently, those two kids were missing. Hannah was running up the street screaming for them. Jaime. Billy. Jaime! BILLY! JAIME! Annie turned around, looking up the street and sighed. She didn't know what the hell was going on. All she knew was that she needed to call Joe, make a plan, and pack. Quickly.