She was at school when the war started. No one had expected it to really happen, this was the sort of thing that happened in other countries. It was bombs at first. Power outages. Looting. It was dangerous outside. And then school was cancelled. And food stopped being delivered. The phones went dead.
She didn't know if she was the first person to quit talking and start walking, but she may have been one of the most famous. She had been the most places it seemed. No one knew her name and she wouldn't break her silence to tell them. But when she walked through a town, or part of a city, a hush fell. It wasn't so much what she was, but what she stood for. What was lost.
Town and cities, after the first few, were easy. The walkers were given food and shelter by both sides. It was the roads between that made her think it was a mad plan. Jesse hadn't spoken to her in more than a year, since well before the war. She didn't know if he would come with her or let her stay. She was half starved and filthy. She walked because he was the only person she wanted to be with when world ended.