Zombie Apocalypse: Creation-Chapter 808: What’s the Name?

"The scared little piggy stayed in the bed, hiding beneath the blanket. The door's hinges began to creak, crack, creak..."

"And then—bang!"

Xiaoyun slammed his hand onto the coffee table. The sharp crack instantly made all three of them flinch.

"Roar! I'm the big bad bear! I'm hungry!"

"Waaaaaaaaa!"

Yongyi was the first to panic. He scrambled behind his two younger sisters, while they sat frozen, seemingly to be too startled to move.

"Where's the tasty little piggy? I'm going to need more than one piggy to satisfy my hunger…"

Xiaoyun snapped the book shut. Then he began to crawl forward, his eyes fixed on three of them.

"Are you the three little piggy I had been looking for?

With a wide-open, evil grin on his face, all three kids jumped to their feet and bolted away from him.

"Muhahaha!"

"Waaaaaaaa! Mommy!"

"Honey, that's not how the story goes."

Leyan commented with irritation in her voice as all three of the kids desperately held onto her leg as if it would protect them.

"A storybook without real action is too boring. Look how fast they ran away when I made that face."

As the grin disappeared from Xiaoyun's face, Leyan gently helped the three of them up to the sofa.

"It's okay, it's okay. Mommy is here to protect you. No need to be scared... Honey, they can't even understand your sentences earlier."

"Doesn't need words to understand loud noises and unnatural things are scary. Ahem, hey kids."

The moment Xiaoyun tried to walk closer to the sofa, all three of them immediately hid behind her back.

"The big bad bear is gone. Is that right, mommy?"

"Yes, the big bad bear is gone... Come on, don't be scared. Yongyi, be a brave brother and stand forward."

Leyan quickly moved Yongyi onto her lap, forcing him to face Xiaoyun directly while the other two continued to hide behind her.

"Yongyi, it's me. Dada. You didn't get scared by the big bear, right?"

There was no response. Yongyi just sat there. Didn't run away despite Leyan moving her hands out of the way.

"Come. Show you're not scared. Give Dada a hug, and you'll get to play for the rest of the day."

Both Xiaoyun and Leyan could see the hesitation. But he took one step forward, then another.

Next thing they knew, Yongyi was now standing an inch away from Xiaoyun's lap. His hands gently slapped his thigh.

"There you go. Looks like someone isn't scared of the big bad bear anymore. I'm proud of you."

As Xiaoyun lifted Yongyi up to his arms, Leyan shook her head as she turned around and helped the two sisters up to her lap.

"Da-da! I-I'm not scared!" Lianrong said out loud.

"M-Me too!" Qiaolan said next.

"Great. I'm proud of you two as well."

With a warm hug to the two of them, Leyan quickly pulled them out of his arms before putting them back down onto the floor.

"Time for the three of you to play with each other. No more running, okay?"

Xiaoyun watched as the three of them crawled away, leaving the sofa area as they headed over to the other side, filled with toys on the floor.

"You want to talk to me?"

"Honey, go to the backyard. Someone wants to talk to you."

The mysterious answer intrigued him, but he didn't ask any further as he quickly got up and headed towards the backyard.

"Da-da!"

"Sorry, I have to do something first."

Xiaoyun gently stopped their invite, continued walking over towards the backyard, and soon reached the glass door.

Tianci was there in the distance, sitting on a swing all by herself. A cold breeze blew him right as he headed towards the playground.

"Hey Tianci, why are you sitting here alone?"

Seeing her not responding, Xiaoyun sat in the other swing, kicking the ground as it swung him backward.

"Something on your mind? I can try to help if you want."

"There's something that's been bothering me, Xiaoyun. Something that Leyan repeatedly asked in the past and even today."

"You mind sharing it?"

Tianci kicked her foot onto the ground as the swing pushed back a little before it wooshed back to the front.

"Our baby's name... What should it be?"

The first three words made Xiaoyun freeze in place. He opened his lips, but his brain came up blank.

"I don't know," Xiaoyun murmured after a whole minute of silence.

"You don't know either?" Tianci questioned, her face remained calm as she didn't look mad over it at all.

"I mean, I can try. But whatever you come up with, I have full trust it will be better than whatever I come up with."

"You sure? What if I come up with a bad name?"

"Someone with the name of Tianci, that in itself is already a great start. There's a non-zero chance of a bad name."

"I didn't come up with my own name. My parents are the ones who named me..." Tianci quietly murmured.

"You ever heard of the saying? Like mother, like daughter. You took a part of her that you might not even know about."

"Thanks... But is Tianci really that good a name?"

"It absolutely is. Think about it, Tian as in sky, and Ci as in bestow. A gift from heaven is what your parents had in mind."

The praises made Tianci blush a little, but the cold breeze quickly shook it away as the problem still remained.

"Do you have anything in particular? Anybody memorable you want to name after? Or something that you like?"

"Something memorable? Something I like?"

Xiaoyun waited in silence, letting her think as he himself started brainstorming. But after what felt like forever, Tianci finally spoke up again.

"I can't think of anything."

"Hm. How about... What does the other Tianci think? Has she given her input on the baby's name yet?"

"She hasn't woken up since last night."

The answer surprised Xiaoyun a little. He could vividly remember talking to the other Tianci on the bed last night.

"Why don't you try waking her up?"

"I tried. But she hasn't responded to me yet."

"Really? That's weird. It can't be because she doesn't have energy... You want me to wake her up for you?"

Tianci's face immediately flushed red as she quickly shook her head, getting up from the swing before walking away.

"I-I'm good."

"Are you sure? You both are the baby's mother, you know... It would be rude for the two of us to leave her out on this."

As Xiaoyun walked closer and closer, Tianci kept taking a step back until she bumped into the playground's staircase.

"Whoa, be careful."

"W-Wait, don't touch me."

"Hm?"

Xiaoyun stopped, standing only a foot away from her as she sat down on the staircase, with Tianci's face redder than an apple.

"I-I don't feel comfortable doing... t-that kind of stuff right now."

"Doing that kind of stuff...?"

The answer made him scratch his head in confusion until he finally connected the dots between his words and her flustered face.

"Oh, you misunderstood me. I'm not going to wake her up that way. Relax, did you already forget how I woke her up in the past?"

Tianci watched as Xiaoyun grabbed onto her arms with his eyes closed. Only a few seconds later, her pupil began to change.

"Hey, asshole, I'm having a food coma. Did you really have to wake me up for this?"

As the alternate Tianci spoke out with an extremely tired face, Xiaoyun finally opened his eyes with a sigh of relief.

"Don't be so rude. I just thought you should be allowed to give your own input for our baby's name."

"If I have an idea, do you think I wouldn't have woken up myself? Do you really think I wouldn't have already told her?"

"I... Okay, maybe I haven't thought of that in hindsight. But hey, three brains can think better than two brains together."

The alternate Tianci rolled her eyes before both of her pupils changed back to normal, giving the normal Tianci full control of the body again.

"I told you that was a bad idea..." Tianci quietly murmured as she felt a little bad waking the other Tianci up.

"Hey, it's not a bad idea... She's the mother of this baby, too, don't make it sound like she doesn't have any responsibility."

"Wrong, not my baby." A dampened voice came out of Tianci's lips as her pupil switched color once again.

"How could you say that? You always say you're the main Tianci, then wouldn't that make you the more responsible one as the mother?"

Rather than answering back, the alternate Tianci fled from the conversation as her pupil changed back to normal.

"Xiaoyun... Don't make her mad. M-My body doesn't really feel comfortable when you two argue." 𝕗𝕣𝐞𝐞𝘄𝐞𝚋𝚗𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹.𝚌𝕠𝚖

"Fine... Ahem, you know what, let's go find a dictionary. I know Nami has one of those naming books in her room."