"Special snowflakes?" he joked, knowing for a fact that hadn't been what Leah meant.
Imagination. Brandon smirked at that. "She's already pretty damn creative. Kinda can't wait to see what that sense of imagination develops into." He'd had imaginary friends at her age, too. Even though hers was because of how few kids her age there were to play with around here, no doubt. Besides that, to this day, Brandon wasn't even a third as creative as his niece was. "She's always thinking. And drawing. It's cute." He didn't even entertain the possibility that it was Marchand's influence. Or think that it was weird that he'd called something cute.
"I can introduce her to the bear if you want. I'd feel better if I did it anyway," he told his sister. "Zimmerman may know how to calm it but just in case..." If one of Hel's bees flew by or something, after that incident with all the stings, the bear was probably a little skittish around bees. "Y'know. The bee thing. It'll be easier for me to protect her than for him, and everything."
How can something so big be so damn fast? Brandon had wondered that on a few occasions himself. "I don't fucking know but they're faster and stronger than any person I know and it's fucking annoying," he said seriously. "Makes me wonder what other shit mutations we're in store for if this is some kind of fucking evolution." Scary thought, but one that he'd had a few times, even though he didn't know how that shit worked.
When Brandon had seen his first leaper attack so many years ago, he'd cracked wise about it. Called them rude, even for zombies, because they "played with their food and made a mess of things," when they tore people apart. It had been easy, back then, to make jokes about things, because he hadn't seen half the things he'd seen by now.
It hit Brandon quickly. Literally. Hit him. One second he was climbing off the truck on the driver's side, and the next second he was on his back on the ground.
Had he not been so busy trying to keep the thing from tearing his throat out, he'd probably have been amused by the irony of the situation. As it stood, though, his right hand was the only thing keeping the leaper from biting into his throat. He shielded it with his left arm, writhing as he felt the creature's claws scratching along his chest. "Fuck," he grunted, pushing harder with his right hand to put a little more distance between his throat and the leaper.
But it broke past his grip and started slashing at his arm instead of his throat. Brandon shouted at the top of his lungs at the pain, probably not the smartest thing he could have done, but it was instinct. "Leah!" he called to his sister. "Ah! H-help!"