My favorite story so far!!!

So yes, it is very long but if should've been longer or at least finished by now lol bc I started this 2 years ago. It is 22 pages long and it does not have any chapters placed yet (I think, I could be wrong) If you guys have any ideas as to what to write, plz help me out with some plot ideas bc I'm about to hit writer's block and when that happens, I won't go back to that book for like a month 😭 anyways but here u go! “Come on, out of the water! We have to keep running!” I yelled at Andrew. “I’ll be right-” Andrew wasn’t coming back. (Chapter One) “Does anyone have spare quarters? I need some for the claw machine.” Liam asked. “Levi? Spare quarters? Anyone?” Andrew walked up to my brother and gave him a quarter. “Here you go Liam!” “Thanks Andrew!” Liam went full game mode. “Ugh! This thing is rigged!” I yelled. Logan looked at the claw machine. “You should know that one is just there to steal your money, I’ve made that mistake so many times on only that one.” “I know but I wanted to win!” I kicked the machine, and a roll went in. I grabbed it. “500 dollars!” I murmured to myself. “What?! We’re rich, Levi!” Liam said. “Come on let’s go tell Mom!” “No.” I said. “I’m getting more.” “What?” Everyone was shocked, especially Logan because I got the dollar rolls and he never got a penny out of the game. I put all my quarters in and played for nearly 1 hour! I had a bunch of quarters, plus Logan and Andrew were giving me theirs. I went into full game mode and won tons of money! We all shared it and were planning to go to Walmart and buy those new VR headset games. “Help me!” A voice from the other side of the gaming center yelled. Everyone stopped playing to look at what was happening! It was the first time I would see them. A type of vine was reaching out to grab a young boy! Everyone stayed silent. Andrew was the first to run out and the rest of us followed. “What was that!” Suddenly one reached out! It scowled at Andrew. Liam looked at me. “Mom? Dad?” He started crying and ran to our house. “Wait! Liam! It’s dangerous!” I started running after him and Logan and Andrew followed. “Wait! Please stop!” Logan pleaded. He stopped and looked shocked and scared, so did Andrew. They ran to their houses to find that no one was there. “Mom? Dad?” Liam said sobbing. I put my hands around him and hugged him. Liam turned around and hugged me back, but we were both crying. I saw a Shadow smiling at me and he put his finger in front of his mouth. I stopped crying. “Liam, run!” I ran and dragged Liam out. We all met in the pool, not expecting to see each other there. “No one is at my house!” Logan cried. “Mom and Dad aren’t there.” Liam said. Everyone stopped what they were doing and stared at Liam, who was a 10-year-old boy, without his parents and in a serious, scary, and sad situation. I hugged Liam. “It’s going to be ok.” My voice shuddered. I remembered what happened at our house and fell in the pool! “Levi!” Liam jumped in. I got out and picked Liam up. “What are you doing! You know you can’t swim!” He looked down and I realized he was trying to help me. “I’m sorry Liam.” I put him on the side of the pool and pulled myself up. “We should find a place to stay, you know like a base?” Andrew suggested. Liam perked up. “We could go to my treehouse!” He was so excited; he nearly fell back into the pool! “Where is your treehouse?” Andrew asked while sitting down next to Liam. “It isn’t a treehouse; it’s a huge house that’s so bright. It’s no good there. You can barely see!” I got up and got a towel. “Wait! Maybe that’s it! In the Game Center, there was a huge shadow, when they scowled at Andrew, they came out of a shadow!” Logan exclaimed. “Yes! That’s the best place for us right now! Liam, show us to the treehouse. Please.” “Ok!” Liam said. Once we got there, we saw there was absolutely nobody there. “Emma! Where are you?” I put my hand on his shoulder. “Emma’s not here.” Liam realized what I meant. “Oh, right.” Liam walked to what looked like a kitchen. “There’s no food? I’m hungry!” Liam pouted. We can go get food, right?” I said. Andrew walked up to me. “I’ll go with you. Logan, keep an eye on Liam.” I walked up to Logan. “If anything happens to him.” I didn’t continue. Logan backed away. “I’ll keep my eye on him.” He stuttered. “You better.” I muttered. We walked outside and searched for food. 2 years passed and we were still here except better in some ways, I guess. We lost Andrew and that hit us all like a brick, but we had to stay strong... for him. We had small pocketknives on us in case the vine-like arms came at one of us again, we had several close calls with them grabbing at our feet and legs. We now had closets full of food, so we didn’t have to worry about that. “L-Levi… it’s so c-cold…” Liam hugged me. “I-I know.” I hugged him back. “Let’s go h-home!” Liam complained weakly. Liam collapsed onto the snow. “Liam! Please get up!” I cried. But he didn’t hear me. (Chapter 2) “Levi! Look!” I turned to look where Logan was pointing and saw a man, standing in the snow far away. He seemed to be walking towards us, I signaled him to follow us so we could take Liam back to base. But something was different about him, something terribly wrong. I was nervous as we led him to base so I went in a different direction and looked back. I gave Liam to Logan and told him to run as fast as he could to base, he didn’t understand why but he ran to base anyways. I took my knife out and stared at the Shadow. He pointed at me which made me nervous, but I didn’t run away, were my legs… frozen? Suddenly vines came out for me, and I sliced them without a thought or a need to look at them. I was surprised about what just happened. My legs suddenly started working and I ran to base. When I opened the door, Logan held a knife to my throat for a few seconds before realizing that it was me. “Sorry, I got nervous.” Was all he said to me as he slowly lowered his knife from my throat. I sat on the couch and smiled when I saw that Liam was ok. “He woke up when we came in, he passed out because of the cold.” “Yeah, no kidding!” I said, laughing but I quickly stopped. “The man we saw, he was a Shadow. A Human Shadow.” I whispered to Logan. His face said everything, he was clearly in shock. “How do you know?” He said sternly. “Up close, he’s the same as the shadow vines.” I showed him the withering shadow vines. “Give me this!” He clearly had an idea. “We are so lucky the person who lived here before was a scientist!” He grinned and led me to the science lab; this was strictly for looking at the shadows. “It’s… different. They mutated into people.” “Come look at this!” I looked through the microscope and Logan put water on it. The vines melted into the water and in a few seconds, it wasn’t water it was something else, like a liquid shadow! Yeah, that. I stopped looking at them and looked at Logan. “Levi?” Liam said as he rubbed his eye. “Put the liquid shadows in the container.” I whispered to Logan. “The what in the container?” He teased me but I stared at him and with a smile he did what I said. “What’s that? I wanna see.” He stopped rubbing his eye and walked towards Logan, trying to grab the container. “Liam, let’s go to bed.” I picked him up so he wouldn’t run away and dropped him on his bed. “I’m tired. What happened? I was cold then warm then Logan was looking at me and poking my cheek.” He covered himself with his tattered blanket. I laid down next to him and hugged him. I think 5 minutes passed until he went to sleep. “Goodnight.” I whispered as I got up and left the room. The next day we saw someone outside the door. I got out my knife and slowly made my way to open the door, Logan was behind me with his knife ready to attack. I opened the door. “Hello? Anyone?” She walked towards me and hugged me. “Umm…” I struggled to find the right words, so I stopped. “What’s your name?” I asked her as she struggled to walk inside. “I’m…” She paused. “Lily. I’m 15.” She said nervously. She looked at me in a way as if she was trying to get a message across from her brain to mine, it took a few seconds for the message to get across. “I’m Levi. I’m 17.” I said. She looked at Logan. “Logan, 16.” He said flatly. Liam woke up and almost attacked Lily on her first day here. “Liam!” I took a box and threw it in front of Lily so that Liam would hit the box and not Lily. Liam fell and his knife stuck on the box. Lily turned around to look at Liam. “Do you know where Lukas is?” Realization washed over me. Lukas was my friend in elementary school, but we saw him get sucked into the wall back in the arcade. Lily jumped on Liam. “He’s my older brother.” I felt horrible and Lily turned around in confusion. I walked away to my room slowly. “Levi? Do you wanna talk?” I heard a voice filled with tears behind the door. I got up and walked to the door. “Yes.” My voice quivered. Months have passed and we’ve adapted to it. The world is messed up and there’s no fixing it. Shadow monsters evolved and created huge monsters out of the shadow people. We wondered whether there was a shadow realm somewhere. One day we threw a camera to the ground, hoping they would take it, and they did. What we saw was a gruesome thing, but the worst part was watching people get sucked in and either eaten or turned into shadow people. When they get sucked in, the vines wrap around them to make them shadows, but you can hear them screaming, then it stops. If they were eaten, they would get stuffed into their terrifying mouth and never return. The camera got eaten and we saw the inside of the vine’s body. This was kept secret from Liam so he wouldn’t worry though. “Liam? Come back. Where are you going? Come back! Please!” I reached out to Liam. Vines surrounded my body. My heart, thumping as hard as possible in my chest, tears down my cheeks. Liam stared and smiled. “Come to me.” He said, as he sank into the ground. “Liam…” I sank to the ground with Liam. I jumped out of bed, terrified. “Liam?!” I ran to Liam’s room to see him peacefully sleeping. I went to check on Logan. “Logan?! Where are you?” I ran through the house, searching for him, finally finding him in the science lab, experimenting on vines. Logan didn’t look at me, like I didn’t exist anymore. I turned around to go back to bed. “Levi!” Lily said. “You scared me.” I said, smiling. She pushed my hand away with a frown. Logan looked at me, startled. “I didn’t know you were awake.” He returned to his research. “I’m going out.” “I don’t care, just stop bothering me.” Logan groaned, he was probably working all night again. I said goodbye to Lily and left. “Hello Cherry.” I said to a tree I had named when I was little. It seemed happy today, not how it did the day… “Are you happy today? Do you know why Logan’s mad?” I sat down next to the tree. A leaf fell slowly, and I grabbed it. “Thanks Cherry.” Suddenly wind currents picked up and Cherry’s leaves started to shake rapidly. I noticed something was wrong. Vines reached out, and pain went through me. “Logan! Help!” I cut the vines off, but some stayed and sank into my leg, making it glow for a moment. “What?” I looked back and Logan was at the door staring at me for a minute before slamming it quickly. I walked painfully to the door and opened it. I went to my room to rest for the remainder of the day. I awoke to Logan worrying about whether I’m ok, Liam saying something about Lily and Lily humming a song. “Logan I’m ok, don’t worry.” Logan got startled and fell to the floor. After getting up he asked me how I knew that he was thinking about whether I was ok. “You said that.” “No, I didn’t. What happened out there?” He looked serious but scared. Levi was still talking about Lily and Lily was still humming that song. I walked outside my room to where Liam and Lily were playing and Liam saw me and ran to me, smiling. “Levi! I thought… Don’t do that again..” ‘Are you ok?’ “Yes, I’m ok.” He looked slightly confused. ‘What? Never mind it’s probably just nothing…’ “Why are you talking like you’re thinking to yourself?” Now he looked concerned. Days passed and new things occurred; nothing stayed the same. One day I could hear how they felt. Eventually I got used to my new life… again. “Liam? Why are you staring at me?” I asked. “Oh, I was just coming to wake you... you didn’t wake up yesterday.” I was shocked and felt a sharp pain in my leg. “Liam, can you leave please?” He looked offended but understanding at the same time. “Ok…” Liam left and I checked my leg, it was bleeding, I got band-aids and covered it up. Throughout the day, I would pass out. Logan, Liam, and Lily worried about me and would take turns looking after me. “Did you know every time you pass out, you hit the ground pretty hard?” Logan said. Lily heard this news and lifted the back of my shirt. “Does this hurt?” She slapped my thousands of bruises. I bit my lip to keep from yelling in pain. Logan laughed and pulled Lily away. “Of course it hurts Lily, don’t do that.” Lily snickered and laid down on the couch. Logan tried to contain himself from bursting out in laughter. We heard the door open and someone walked out. “Liam?!” Logan and I yelled. We rushed to see what was happening. Lily stayed behind lying on the couch. She had no interest in knowing what was happening. Outside there was a girl lying on the ground unconscious. Me and Logan looked at each other. We picked her up and took her to the nurse room. This house is not normal. We laid her down on the bed and left. “So what happened?” Lily said annoyingly. “Ugh.” I groaned and walked away as Logan explained to her. A few hours later, we heard Liam. “Levi!” I rushed to the room, hearing the urgency in his voice. But nothing had happened, she just woke up. ‘There’s something weird about her, something strange.’ I thought as I turned to Logan. “I don’t think we should keep her here; there’s something about her.” Logan scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Stop trying to scare us, I’m not going to just blindly follow you.” He pushed me as he walked by to greet her. “Good morning, my name’s Logan, what’s yours?” She looked at him puzzled. “Oh, I don’t have one.” I was stumped. ‘This is a 16-year oldish kid, the apocalypse started around a few years ago, I get it if she was five or four, but she’s around our age. She has to have a name.’ Logan had my same thoughts, he looked at me for a second, thinking, and then looked back at her. “Well, this is Levi,” “Levi? Levi.” She repeated. “And this is Liam. Over there is Lily.” Logan finished the introductions. “Ok.” She said. “You can be…” Logan didn’t know what she looked like. A Katie or a Rachel? “Nemo.” I paused. “You’re wearing a color that reminds me of the name Nemo.” I said. “NEMO’S ORANGE! She’s wearing GREEN!” Logan raged at me playfully. “No, her name’s not-” “Ne- Nemo, that’s a strange word… name.” Logan looked at her from the corner of his eye. The girl… Nemo, could barely walk. “Who’s that?” Lily said half sleeping. I rolled my eyes. “Nemo.” I said and Logan had playful hate in his eyes. Lily looked up immediately. “Nemo…?” She asked with one eyebrow raised and looked up. She saw Nemo and laid back down. “You can’t be serious.” She said, thinking we were teasing her. “Nemo.” Nemo said again, but this time she giggled. “Strange word.” She kept giggling. She was like a baby… with old man vocabulary. The next days, we would wake up to an awake Nemo at our door, just standing there. She never said anything unless you said something to her. Again, I awoke to Nemo staring at me, except this time I noticed something else. ‘I’ve never seen purple eyes.’ Before I could say anything, she just walked away like nothing happened. “Nemo!” Lily ran to her and hugged her. But I think Nemo’s emotionless… because she doesn’t respond. She just stops moving and lets Lily hug her. Then she walks to the table. She doesn’t start a conversation in the morning, but she’s usually very chatty during the day, I guess she’s just not a morning person. The next day, I woke up to a startling scream coming from Logan’s room. I ran to see what happened and saw Shadow Vines in the shape of Logan sleeping. I stood there, eyes wide open, not believing what was right before my eyes. I fell to the ground with tears falling from my eyes to the marble floor, forming small puddles. I blacked out and I don’t remember anything. I don’t think I missed much except for me scaring Nemo. She was shaking me. I sat down in Logan’s chair next to his desk. Nemo left and I fell asleep in it. A few weeks passed and nothing happened to anyone but I kept busy finishing Logan’s work. “Hey Levi! Me and Nemo are going to go on a food run cause someone didn’t go on the last one.” I woke up with papers stuck to my face. “Mmhmm.” Lily laughed and closed the door. They came back a few hours later. “Hey we’re back!” Lily was cheerful. “Levi, can you get off your butt and get over here?” I sighed and walked out the door. Liam and Lily were standing outside and Nemo was next to them, slightly to the side. “What’s up?” I was confused. Lily grabbed Liam’s hand and smiled. “We found a weird serum that might help with an antidote or something!” I wanted to smile and enjoy her wildness, but I couldn’t even bring myself to have happiness in my heart. Liam wouldn’t look at me, he knew what was happening and felt it too. “That’s great! …” I laughed softly, but it wasn’t real. Liam shuddered softly, but suddenly he hugged me. The days passed like leaves in the fall. But one day, we heard crying in the alley. “Levi! Do you hear that?” Lily asked, whispering. I hesitated to go in, but my instincts dragged me in. “It’s a… baby.” Lily put her pocket knife down to inspect the pile of blankets on the ground. “Hurry!” I rushed her, hearing footsteps slowly walking towards us. “We have to help, Levi.” Nemo said firmly. “Well, hurry up, We’re not losing another person.” I shuddered. “Okay, I have the baby, let’s go!” Lily ran out. I looked at Nemo. “Don’t let anything get near her, okay?” I asked. “Okay.” When we got home, we had 5 minutes of peace before there was someone screaming and pounding on the door. “Let me in! Help!” They were muffled behind the door. Liam went for supplies, something to help the person behind the door so I went to open the door. But the second I did; the lights went out. There wasn’t daylight anymore and there wasn’t any protection. Vines reached from the ground and a Human Shadow was standing in the circle of vines with us. The Shadow looked over at us and I noticed something. Glowing purple eyes. Like the color of Nemo’s eyes. But the Shadow wasn’t attacking. Liam screamed. It jumped and sank into the ground. The lights turned back on and the vines that protected us dried up and turned into dust falling to the ground. I ran to where Liam was to find Nemo lying on the ground with wide wounds around her and Liam also on the ground unconscious with cuts around his wrists. ‘I never got to see who was outside…’ I ran to the door and found dead shadow vines on the stairs. Lily started wailing at the sight of Nemo. “Nemo! Nemo wake up!” Lily’s cry was unlike anything I’ve ever heard, just hearing it was making my heart ache. The baby started crying as well. “Lily, the baby.” Lily’s eyes widened and she rushed back to the baby. I nudged Nemo but she didn’t react. Her entire body was filled with cuts, some cutting deep and causing extreme bleeding. I picked her up and took her to the clinic. Liam and Nemo were lying down in the nurse beds. “Levi?” Lily started opening the door. “Lily, no!” I couldn’t get up. Lily came in and saw Nemo hooked up to IVs that were lying around. I was giving Nemo blood. She shuddered loudly and tears rolled down. “Will she be ok?” Lily was quiet and scared. “Yes. Liam will too. Don’t worry.” Lily walked out. Nemo woke up and our eyes crossed each other’s path. “Is everyone okay?” She tried to get up but because of her wound she was in pain. “Stay down, you need to rest.” I put my hand on her . She gasped. “Where is!-” She grimaced in pain. “Where’s Lily?!” She said with pain. “Lay down… your injury isn’t going to heal unless you stay still.” I looked at her again. “Is Liam ok?” Nemo glanced at Liam, still sleeping in his bed. “Yeah, he’s just sleeping. What happened? He can’t seem to stay awake.” She didn’t answer my question. “Turn off the lights, please.” I looked at her worriedly. “So another attack can happen?” I asked. “Trust me.” She said firmly. “Ok.” I turned off the lights nervously. Vines reached up from below Liam and wrapped around him. “Nemo!?” The vines glowed purple and then went back below the surface. I turned the lights back on but she started to burn. She groaned in pain but didn’t react in any way. “Nemo!” I cried and without thinking what to do, I turned off the lights. “Stop it!” I wailed. I stopped screaming and picked up her head, realizing she might’ve been trying to help. “Are you ok?” She didn’t respond. I sprayed water on her face to wake her and it worked. “Nemo!” “Yeah?” Her voice was weak and sad. I sighed deeply. “Are you ok?” Her face was in pain. “Do I look like it?” Liam tried to hold in his laughter but couldn’t control it and burst out laughing. “What happened?” I rolled my eyes. Liam finished laughing and got up. “Liam!” I grabbed Liam’s hand but he seemed fine and his cuts were healed. Lily rushed inside the room. “What happened?” She was worried and the baby ceased his crying. Liam rushed to Lily, but upon seeing Liam, she started crying and laughing at the same time, happy he was okay. Liam asked me to leave the room for a moment and his expression changed entirely. “What happened?” I was shocked. “What do you mean?” I asked. “There was a breach in the power! You take care of that! You haven’t gone on runs since Logan died! We almost starved and we would’ve if Nemo didn’t go get food! During a Shadow Storm! You know how dangerous that is! I know you’re still upset about Logan, but that was a long time ago! Get over it.” Liam finished running his mouth. “Well excuse me if I actually cared about Logan!” I yelled back. “You only hung out with us to annoy me.” Liam snarled. “That was a long time ago, get over this kind of stuff, Levi. For us.” I pushed Liam away and left. A long time passed as I was holed up in my room… when Liam came in. “Can’t you think for a moment?! We need to survive, and you’re crying like you lost a toy! Don’t you get it?” Liam yelled. “Liam, stop it!” Lily demanded. “Living with you is like a cruel joke, you know that?” I said grimly. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw his shoulders drop, and then he slowly walked out of the room. Nemo entered after him and sat down next to me on the floor. “You should apologize.” She said gently, putting her hand on mine. She started emitting melatonin into me, making me fall asleep. “He... deserved it.” I managed. “I never had a sibling, I barely had a family, you could stand to appreciate him.” Nemo said in a sad voice. “Family… is the simplest thing. But at the same time, it’s very complicated.” Nemo and I looked at each other for a moment. Then she stood up and left. “Just… think about it, okay?” I nodded gently and fell asleep. The next day, Nemo and Lily went on their food run. I stayed home with Liam and the baby boy. “Isn’t he adorable!” Liam’s eyes were glistening in the light. “Yeah, he is.” We spent the entire day talking about Thomas and honestly, it got to be annoying. When Nemo and Lily came back home, I walked over to Nemo’s door and knocked. “Hey, wanna eat?” I asked her through the door. “No thanks.” Nemo’s muffled voice had a saddened tone to it. “What? I can’t hear you.” I lied. She didn’t respond. “Then go away.” She said after a while of silence. “Okay.” I walked away. A few minutes later I came back with a bowl of soup. “Open the door.” I said gently. “No. I’m not opening the door.” I heard a click. “Did you-!” I jangled the door knob. I leaned on the door and sighed deeply. “I have food. I just want to give it to you.” I closed my eyes because I was so tired. I heard a click again and Nemo opened the door, dropping me onto the floor. “Ow. Warning, next time.” I said as I got up from the floor, rubbing the back of my head. “Don’t lean on my door next time.” Nemo said in an irritated tone. She grabbed the bowl of soup from the floor and shoved me out the room. I knocked on the door again. “Yes?” She said in an irritated voice. “Can you open the door?” I heard her set down the plate and walk towards the door, opening it. She opened the door. “Levi.” She said. “Yeah?” I asked. “Do you like me?” “Yeah.” I replied with a smile. She laughed and slowly closed the door again. The next day, she was standing at my door and there were withering vines on the candles. “Nemo?” I said. Her eyes widened and she looked like she was going to break into pieces, but she just walked away. “How exactly did you get to us?” She turned around in a flash. “I remembered some things that helped get my memory back.” She said, looking guilty of something. When everyone woke up, she told everyone to sit down. “I’m going under the Surface. To try and kill the scientist that created the Shadows.” She declared. “Why?” Nemo paused. “He’s trying to kill you all. Doesn’t that bother you?” She tilted her head slightly to the side. “Yeah, sure, but you always fight him off.” Nemo rolled her eyes. I chuckled as she sank to the ground. After that day, she was disappearing every day to the Shadow world. Until one day, she came back, especially beaten up, her leg was bleeding and her hair looked burnt. “Nemo, are you okay?!” Lily yelped. “Yeah, I’m fine.” She pulled her hood over her head using her vines, and went to her room, as she usually did when she was upset or especially tired. I knocked on the door. “Do you want any Band-Aids?” I asked, laughing. “Yes…” She said, sneaking vines under the door. I put them in the vines; they curled up and went back under the door. “Thanks.” She said. “Is that scientist…” I wanted her to finish the sentence. “Gone? Yes. We’re fine, my- his wife is in control now. I have no doubt her reign will be gracious.” She assured me. “There are rebels. They don’t want the new queen. They will come to kill us though.” She said grimly. “Do you want any tea? I think there’s still some in the boxes.” I asked, trying to help. “It’s fine, I’ll go get it.” She opened the door and limped to the kitchen. “I’ll get it, you should rest, you clearly need it.” I helped her to the couch, Lily, Liam, and the baby boy were out. “Where is everyone?” She asked. “They went to find people.” “With the baby?” She asked. “They also need diapers pronto so they just took him with.” She sighed deeply. “I’ll go get the tea.” I left. From the kitchen, I watched her, she lifted her hand and was creating something from the shadows inside of her palm. It moved in an aggressive way. Once I came closer, I saw what is was, and she squashed it as soon as she realized. “Was that a person?” I asked. “A figure. It’s not alive.” She looked down at the tea I’d passed her. “Who was it?” She sighed. “My father. The scientist that ruined the world.” I gasped sharply. “What… your father?!” I exclaimed. “I was put here for a mission. It wasn’t a coincidence that I happened to be outside.” I sat down in the chair across hers. “I was sent… to kil you all.” She looked up at my eyes. Her eyes reflected guilt and sadness. “You were trying to-” I stood up as realization hit me like 2,000 bricks in the face. “You killed Logan.” I said. Nemo drank her tea but wouldn’t dare to look back up at me. “You killed Logan!” I said with anger. “I didn’t- I didn’t understand I was part of your family.” She whimpered. “You aren’t.” I slapped the cup out of her hands. “Levi!” Lily was standing at the front door. “Why are you being so rude to Nemo? Did she do something to you?” I stared at Nemo and walked over to them. “Nemo?” Nemo sunk into the ground. “Levi, what’s wrong with you?!” Lily scoffed and went to her room. Liam followed quickly after her, glaring at me. The next day, Nemo was at my door. But this time she didn’t leave. “Go away.” I groaned. But she just grabbed me with her vines and wrapped them around my head, covering my mouth. “I have someone to show you.” She said as she dragged me down into the ground. I tried to scream and shout, but it was no use. “Look.” She turned me around and pointed a vine at one of the Human Shadows. “Logan.” She said. The Shadow turned around and came closer, bowing to her. “No use for that, get up. Say hello.” She put me closer to the Shadow and uncovered my mouth. She placed a vine on the Shadow and for a second, it’s eyes were normal instead of glowing white as usual. “H-hello.” I felt a tear swelling up in my eye. “Logan?” I tried to walk closer, but then I remembered Nemo was holding me. “H-how’s Liam?” I laughed heartily. “He’s fine!” I smiled as Nemo put me on the ground. “He’ll have trouble speaking, he just gained himself back. I’m going to run an errand.” Nemo said. I turned around to look at her, she had tears running down her face and her voice was shaky and dark. But she glided along as if the world was a rainbow. “How’s L-Lily?” “She’s good too. How have you been?” I asked. Even though his face was only shades of pitch-black, his body language told me he was stumped. “Praising the Royals.” He said blankly. “I don’t want to talk about it.” He tilted his head to the side. “It’s fine.” I said. We talked some more before Nemo said our time was up and picked me back up. Before we left, Nemo placed a vine on Logan’s shoulder and his eyes did the same thing they’d done before. He stopped waving and walked away. When we were back on the Surface, Nemo put me down and walked away. “Hey Nemo, thank-” She closed the door to her room. I looked down, feeling a bit guilty. Liam and Lily were extra chatty that day, talking about the baby. The next day, it seemed they’d already figured out a name for him. “Levi, come over here! You’re always the last one to the discussions!” Lily called from the other room. “Am not!” I argued as I walked in the room. “His name will be… Thomas!” Liam announced. Nemo chuckled, but we all knew it wasn’t real. “I’m tired, I’m gonna go sleep now.” Nemo said as she opened her door. Lily passed Liam the baby- Thomas. “Wait, can I ask you something?” Lily ran to Nemo’s room. “Sure.” I barely heard Nemo reply. They closed the door. I looked at Liam, who shrugged, knowing what I was wondering. "Wanna go on a run?" He asked. I nodded. As we left the building, we saw people in the distance. Liam unshielded his knife, but I put his hand down. “Hello?” I called out to them. One of the 5 or 6 figures seemed to look at us and walk towards us. “Hello?” It called back. “Can you help me?” It asked in a pitiful voice. I took small steps towards it. Liam grabbed my arm and dragged me back; his face was full of sad confidence. Like he knew something he wished was not true. “Look.” I followed his stare. A figure looked like it was being hurt by another figure that seemed to be attacking it. “Get out your knife.” He whispered to me. I grabbed my knife and stood strongly. The figure ran towards us. “Please! Help!” The cry sounded like the cry that happened the day Liam and Nemo almost died. I got ready to slash the figure if it got close enough. Liam put Thomas back in the house and grabbed his second knife. “Good idea.” I said. The figure stopped. “Hello Princess.” The figure cackled. “Wha-” Liam asked as he turned around. Nemo was held up by branches and looked like a goddess of war. “Don’t bother with formalities. Go back down.” Her eyes glowed a violent purple. Her hands were crafting weapons from the darkness of the shadows. “I’ll stay a bit.” The figure said as it ran towards us, we could now see it held two katanas in its hands. In a second, the figure was above us, pointing the katanas at our heads. I grabbed Liam’s hand and tried to drag him out of the way, but Liam’s foot was stuck. “Nemo!” Liam screamed. In a flash of purple, the figure was gone and the only remainder was a puddle of black liquid on the brick floor. “There’s someone out there.” Nemo said as half of the dark branches holding her moved forward, then the other half, walking away. “Go inside.” I heard her booming voice say. “Let’s go.” Liam said. Nemo came back a few minutes later with a young girl that seemed confused. “This is Cindy, she was let go by my- the Queen.” Nemo said, looking at me. “Say hello.” The girl stepped forward. “Who are you all?” She looked at the baby and smiled. “What’s his name?” She asked. “Thomas, but you can call him Tommy.” Lily said with a pleased smile on her face. Liam seemed highly territorial and defensive. He scanned her every move when she was next to the baby and insisted on holding him when she was in the room. One day, I took him aside. “What’s wrong with you?” I asked him. “I don’t have a good feeling about her.” He eyed the little girl. Her blonde, curly hair bounced as she jumped up and down, wanting to catch a glimpse of Thomas. Suddenly, she turned to look at us. And I felt what he felt for once. When I looked back at Liam, he was feeling the handle of his pocketknife. “No.” I reminded him and walked away. Little by little, Cindy started acting more and more peculiarly. I walked over to Nemo with some clean water and an apple from the garden in our backyard. “Nemo, wake up.” I said as I knocked on the door. “I’m awake.” She said, her hair seeming to have been a bird’s nest. “Come in.” She said as she yawned. “Good morning, Nemo.” I leaned my head on hers as a little ‘good morning’ hug. She grabbed the apple and saw Cindy through the crack of the door. “What’s she doing?” Cindy was floating and examining everything. From the little dust bunnies to the equipment in the lab. I started tiding the bed. “I’ll go check after I’m done tending to the bed. You have some rest.” After I was done, I walked over to Cindy. “What’re you doing?” I asked her. Her eyes were glowing bright purple like Nemo’s, but she had a childish smile. She was just having fun, but something seemed off. “I’m just looking around my new home!” She laughed and floated off in another direction. She looked back at me. I looked back at her. Her smile turned into a threatening scowl and she immediately became defensive. “You know. Don’t you?” She shot a branch towards me, but I dodged it. “Why are you here?” I investigated her. She frowned and finally caught me. “You seem to think that you run the show.” She wrapped the vines around me and kept tightening them. “Well, you don’t.” I felt blood dripping from my mouth as I wriggled to get out. “You’re strong.” She whimpered as one branch slowly crept up from the rest and shot for my neck. Everything started getting blurry and the room started to spin. I faintly heard Nemo scream out Cindy’s name and I felt myself fall from the height I was at. The impact knocked me out completely. When I came to, Lily was making something to eat and Liam was playing with the baby. “Lily.” I said hoarsely. “He’s awake!” Lily heard me and called out. “Thank goodness. I had to send Liam away for a second because he kept freaking out!” She chuckled and helped me sit up. “Where’s Nemo?” I groaned. “It’s almost dinner. You can go eat with her. I bet she wants to see you right now.” She nodded at Liam and he helped me to Nemo’s room. “Hey, Nemo. Thanks.” She was holding my hand but wouldn’t look at me. “Where’s Cindy?” She started crying. I was confused until she showed me her hand, stained red with blood. “She attacked me. I had to. I didn’t want to, Levi.” Her head was down and her shoulders dropped. I scooched towards her. “It’s okay. Go wash that off and let’s eat.” I rubbed her hand gently. “I killed her.” She murmured. “I would’ve died a thousand times instead of killing her once.” She looked at her hands. I felt horrible. “It’s my fault, Nemo. I shouldn’t have gone to check what she was doing.” She started crying and ran to the bathroom. So, I waited in our room. “Levi, are you gonna come eat with us?” I shook my head. “Okay, I’ll bring the food.” Lily said and walked away. She came back after Nemo had washed her hands thoroughly and was sobbing on her pillow. I passed her the plate as Lily left. “I’m not hungry!” She wailed. I sighed and stood up from the bed, but as I did, Nemo looked up at me. “Where’re you going?” She whimpered, her eyes looked red from the crying and her hair was all over her face. It was the first time I’d ever seen her cry like that. “I’m hungry. I’m gonna go eat with them so I can use the ketchup and cheese.” She wiped her eyes and picked up her spoon and plate. “I’ll eat.” She said before she stuffed her face with some chicken. I sat back down. “It’s not your fault, Nemo.” I said with a firm voice. Nemo started scooching towards me, trying to lean her head on my shoulder. She cried as she ate, so I put my arm around her and moved back and forth to try and calm her. After a day or two, she seemed to have forgotten about it. Thomas was crawling now. Lily seemed to be acting more like his mom every day and Liam seemed to be acting more like his dad. I always teased them about it. “Where’s Lily?” Nemo said, laughing that Thomas’ diaper was full of poo. “I’ll go check in the playroom.” As I was about to walk into the room, I saw Liam and Lily kissing each other on the floor. Nothing too bad, they were probably sitting down, reacted in the heat of the moment, and ended up kissing. I was going to walk away when I accidentally slipped and the floorboards creaked loudly. They jumped and moved away from each other. “Sorry.” Lily put her hands on her lips. Liam turned his head towards the floor and looked behind him. “I’m sorry.” He started to stand up when Lily grabbed his hand and whispered something in his ear. His face turned red and then he grabbed Lily’s hand back and went for the door. I gasped and signaled for Nemo to hide. I hid behind the door. “Wait, what if Nemo and Levi are out there?” She said, giggling. “It’s fine.” He led her to his room. Nemo looked at me and almost started laughing out loud. “Should I go make sure they’re just grabbing a diaper for Tommy?” She giggled. “Sure, but I want to see too.” I snickered and Nemo passed me Thomas, somehow temporarily turned me into a Shadow, and then led us through the wall. They were just kissing again. I decided Thomas’ stink was too fatal to get stuck with it that long though. So, I knocked on the door. “Lily?” I almost started crying. “Yes?!” Lily’s voice got super high-pitched. “Do you have a diaper for Thomas?” I asked while Nemo died in the background. “Oh! I’ll go change his diaper.” I heard Liam tell her not to so she could stay with him, but Lily said no. “Give me a minute!” I agreed and we both sat down on the couch. When Lily came out, she was red and fixing her shirt. “I’ll change him.” She murmured. Liam came out shortly after when he thought we weren’t looking. “What were you doing in Lily’s room?” I asked him with a smirk. “Uh… I was grabbing some butt cream for the baby!” He laughed awkwardly and so did Lily, who was now feeding Tommy some chicken. I sighed. “We know what you were doing.” I laughed and sat back in my seat as Lily shrieked. “NO! NO! It’s not what you think! We were just talking! I swear!” Nemo decided to step in. “You were kissing. It’s not very nice to swear, now is it Tommy?” Lily realized they’d been caught, Liam continued denying until he couldn’t anymore. “Fine. I have feelings for Lily. Fine, she has feelings for me. We like each other. As if you guys don’t.” He smirked, thinking we were going to hide it. Nemo decided to prank them though. “Actually… there’s something we’ve been meaning to tell you guys, but there’s just never time…” I didn’t know what she was up to but I still went along with it. Lily raised her eyebrows. “I’m… we’re… having a baby.” Nemo rubbed her stomach to sell the idea. “What?!” Lily nearly fainted but Liam just stared at Nemo’s stomach. I wrapped my arm around her. “It’s true. I hope we’re having a girl, but Nemo’s hoping we’re gonna have a boy.” Nemo kissed my cheek. Liam kept staring at Nemo’s belly and Thomas started crying because Lily had stopped feeding him. “So… you…” Lily murmured. “We’re… gonna have another… baby?...” She pointed the spoon at Thomas. And Nemo nodded. Nemo.” I scolded her since it was going a bit too far. “Fine!” She busted out in laughter. "I'm not actually pregnant, you guys are so naive..." Nemo paused and grabbed my hand. "But... we were thinking about getting married." **Lily looked stunned. “But- we don’t even have a priest or anything! And you just turned 18, Nemo!” Lily finally continued feeding Thomas, who was screeching his lungs out. “It’s fine, and we’re planning on doing it soon. I’m close and Nemo’s already 18 so we were thinking about getting things ready.” I explained. Nemo looked happy but Lily and Liam were completely lost. “You want to get married? During an apocalypse?!” Liam asked again. I nodded while Lily suddenly worked out her mathematical equation and agreed. “It’ll be cute!” Lily remarked. The next day, we got things ready and everyone was dressed in their best clothes. Nemo looked stunning since Lily actually went out and grabbed a nice wedding dress. Since none of us knew the little speech that the priests always say before marrying them, Nemo and I just promised to always love each other and that was it. It was sad getting married in an apocalypse. No honeymoon, no cake, no clean tuxedos. Just a cute little kiss and then back to normal life for us. Suddenly, when Nemo left to use the bathroom, Lily walked towards me. “You should be more lovey towards her. She is your wife now after all!” Lily laughed and then walked back to little Thomas who was playing with some boxes we found lying around. Liam was getting our meal ready, and Nemo came back. “No honeymoon, huh?” She laughed and I put my arm around her, pulling her closer. “We could have our honeymoon after dinner.” I smirked. Nemo laughed and we started helping Liam finish dinner faster. Baked beans and some not-so-frozen pizza. It was sort of hard and really cold even though it went through the oven like 50 times. Nemo seemed grossed out by the pizza, so I offered to eat it for her. She quickly agreed.** Edit: To those who have already read this, I just made some minor corrections to better grasp this most recent plot in the story so instead of the mains being 14-16 years old, they're now 16-18 years old and I have added more to the last words of it since I've been working on it, if you want to read it, it's in bold but only for a while then it'll go back to normal :D Edit 2: Anytime I edit it, it'll just be in bold (for the future :3)