[b]Tina - Apartment - Katie/Liam/Scarlett[/b] Happy that her idea was going over well, she quickly grabbed a tarp out of the storage room and laid it down in front of the mural so that they wouldn't get paint on the carpet. She then got out her collection of paint and let the kids go at it. She offered George a brush but he politely refused. Adam was too out of it to participate and Elyse enjoyed watching others paint. Tina began adding to her side of the wall, but she found herself distracted by the kids more often then not. Liam seemed too self-conscious and afraid to paint on the wall much, but Katie took a quick liking to the idea. Tina smiled at their pictures, paying particular interest to Katie's, who was drawing what appeared to be a large family of people. She decided to ask who they were, and Katie responded that it was the people she missed. Elyse made a noise at this, and Tina also felt sadness for the girl. Family, friends... Tina couldn't quite imagine losing all those people at Katie's age. She leaned down and suggested that Katie put their names above the picture, but Katie responded that she needed to go to the bathroom. Tina nodded and put down her brush. "Okay, let's go." She stepped outside the front door with Katie and waited at the top of the stairway to give the girl privacy. "Don't go outside, okay? Call for me if you run into trouble." --- He'd been waiting for her. The girl. Katie. He'd seen her before... fleeting glances. Down. Down in the filth. Her [i]daddy[/i] wouldn't dare let her go near him, but he saw her. He remembered her, just as he remembered every face that crossed his path down there. Down in... He stepped cautiously, his foot brushing against a broken bottle. He'd been squatting under the bar ever since [i]he[/i] left. That man. That bastard. He'd trapped him in the filth, forced him to fight. [i]Join or fight[/i], they said. He always fought. He'd never join such filth. They lived in filth, for they were filth. It was no wonder the filth eventually died out. Their filth crushed and smothered them. He was freed... but no, not truly. He would never be free, not while that man still lived. Tyler. Leader of the filth. He stalked that man for as long as he could, thinking of all the ways he'd remove his filth from the Earth. He'd ended up losing him for some time, but he found him again and again. The leader of the filth was always spreading his filth wherever he went. That little girl, she was filthy too. She'd been with him for so long... how could she not be? So he followed them both, the filthy leader and the filthy girl. He didn't know why he waited so long... perhaps he felt bad for what he had to do. Perhaps waiting made it all the more better. Tyler had found new people to corrupt, and he couldn't wait any longer. He had to do it now. He had to make Tyler cry. Had to make him bleed. When the little filthy girl stepped off the stairs and into the bathroom, he knew this was his chance. He crouched, walking silently on two feet. He crept up behind her, grabbing her before she could do her business. His foul-smelling arms wrapped around her and his dirt-stained hand covered her mouth. He knew he'd gathered quite the look in his travels. He hadn't had time to bathe, not lately. Still, no matter how dirty he was... this girl was simply filthy. He began pulling her roughly and brought her outside the bar. He kept low to avoid the eyes of the tenants upstairs and pulled Katie down the side walk. The filthy man wasn't too far away. Soon, he and his girl would be gone and the Earth would be clean. --- [b]Tina[/b] She waited on the top of the stairs with her arms crossed. She'd worried that Katie wouldn't know what to do with the pails in the bathroom, but the girl's silence indicated that Tina hadn't needed to worry at all. Eventually, though, Katie took longer than Tina would have liked. She moved down the steps and called out Katie's name. "You okay in there?" she asked. She waited for a response, but none came. Sighing, Tina stepped into the bar and slowly moved her head into the bathroom. "If you need help, I--" She wasn't there. Katie was gone. Tina stumbled backward as if struck and felt her heart suddenly leap at her chest. "Katie! I told you not to go outside!" she cried. She spun around and looked over the bar counter, but didn't see her. She stepped out of the building and whipped her head back and forth. [i]Fuck! Fuck! How could she--[/i] She ran around the building and din't find Katie around the greenhouse either. She didn't understand how this was happening. She'd not expected anything to happen! The barbed wire on the windows kept the dead outside. Even then, Katie hadn't made a noise. If she was attacked, there would have been a [i]noise[/i]. The only other explanation was Tremblay, but that didn't make any sense either. "Katie" she cried one last time, turning around and running back into the building. She sprinted up the stairs, not knowing what she would tell the others.