Apocalypse? So what I got a 5 year old to raise!

7

Aww! He's just so cute!

Ahem...

Anyway, I gently patted Danny's head after he had finished speaking with a look of indulgence in my eyes.

"Uh, not quite..." Clair said with a cocked head, scratching her cheek lightly with one finger.
"Don't say that! I thought we were friends," I said with a teasing pout and exaggerated expression.

What slipped my mind is that, regardless of how much I tried to shelter Danny from the new normal in the world, he had picked up on more than one of the changes in people that the outbreak brought about. He may be a child but he is undeniably intelligent. In the original, he survived for years after his mother died even if he was young so undoubtedly he is capable.

As I was zoned out the teens had become flustered before they began to talk with Danny. When I eventually came back into focus Danny had climbed onto me and was poking my cheek lightly which caused me to chuckle.

"What is it, honey?" I asked with my signature smile on my lips, dripping with doting for his childish antics. I much preferred him to be childish and carefree than mature and on edge like in the original.
"Mummy, are you back from talking with the fairies now?" he asked me with his youthful voice that still held a milky quality characteristic of young children.
"Haha, yes baby, did you need anything?" I checked with him once more.
This was when Fin interrupted us as he pointed out with a rushed and hushed voice the approaching zombie hoard, "Lady, look out there are at least 20 to 40 zombies incoming!"
"Oh, don't worry. I'll take care of that now," I assured the frightened children whilst I passed the still-grinning bun to Nathan.

With that, I dusted off the nonexistent dust from my legs and hands with a few light pats and strode towards the ever-approaching walking corpses. I saw confusion mixed with horror and dread on the faces of the three teens as they saw my actions. In sharp contrast, I could see how unfazed Danny was, well it's not like it's an uncommon sight for him. As I was mulling over whether my behaviour would negatively impact his growth I arrived at a common location alongside the undead drifters.

"Good evening," I greeted the (literally) braindead crowd.
"Grrr", "Aghh", and "Uahh" were a few of the responses I got from the 'lovely' guests.
"I see you don't have any manners, you'll be a bad influence on Danny at this rate!" I huffed, every time a new group of these dead tourists find their way to this city I have to re-educate them on their basic manners to ensure they aren't bad influences, even if they are zombies.

I grabbed the leader of the pack, who stood a few centimetres taller than the rest, by the ear. This particular zombie must have been a middle-aged man and was more recently turned. He still had a mostly human appearance suggesting he died in the last few weeks and the cause of death must have been the bullet wound through his chest. It didn't matter to me though, my actions remained unchanged. Yanking the zombie that stood taller than me by a head down to my height, I started to lecture it as an example. It's a simple concept really, one I learnt in my last life from real-life experience. Zombies kind of act in a way like teens in gangs with more violent responses and more animalistic desires. This means if you can get the leader to submit and listen to you, the others will follow along. In a way, I guess it shows humans' true pack animal instincts as even in death we form groups to try to help ourselves and protect others of our kind. Remove human greed which is nurtured by the environment and you get a working system like zombies however zombies lose their intelligence when they lose their lives, usually, so there are pros and cons. By the time I had finished preaching to the leader of this group, the others were also hanging their heads in shame and behaving in a much more mannerly way. Of course, they would only act this way around me due to the fear I naturally brought with my presence.

Without my knowledge, the children had a conversation.

"Awesome..." Clair mumbled as she watched the entire process from start to end.
"How?" Fin muttered in disbelief.
"What did we just see?" Nathan questioned no one in particular.
Danny however answered their questions with the most shocking truth that they had been denying, "Mum can just do that, she's truly spectacular in that way. Because she is so strong she instils fear into them on the most fundamental level which results in them listening to what she tells them like a good doggy. Also, don't tell mum about how I'm acting right now, or else!" Danny explained in a way that was much too mature and contradictory to his previous attitude although his voice and appearance didn't change at all. Much like a well-seasoned actor.

The teens were stunned completely at the reality that Danny had shown them and also the implications of his situation that his warning displayed, namely that the lady didn't know that her son was like this.

This is when I returned I wasn't confused by the shocked faces of the teenagers as I assumed it was because of them seeing how I had dealt with the walking dead as most would react similarly to seeing someone yell at a zombie about its lack of manners and the zombie actually listening to them obediently.

Due to this, I remained ignorant of Danny's true self. However, that's a topic for another time.

I took Danny home soon after and we went about our days as we always had before without a single worry.

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Hope you enjoyed the chapter!