"Find anything?"

"Nope."

Lee Everett sighed as he kicked away an empty bottle. He and Carley, a former news reporter, had gone out on a supply hunt in hopes of finding food or something useful.

"Lilly's gonna have a fit," said Lee.

"Doesn't she always?", Carley remarked, making Lee smile a bit.

He hopped over a piece of debris before he helped Carley down. It had been at least five weeks since zombies, that's right, ZOMBIES started roaming around. Lee had several close calls with them on the first day. He had found a young girl named Clementine in her treehouse and had been taking care of her since. He had met Carley when he and Kenny, a man he had made friends with as well as his family, came to Macon, Georgia. She and a man named Glenn had saved them from the zombies and helped them into Lee's parents' pharmacy, where the group she was with was hiding in. One of the members, Larry, had tried to attack Kenny's son when he thought he was bitten, but had a heart attack. Lee helped Lilly, Larry's daughter, get into the pharmacy to get nitroglycerin pills for him. Unfortunately, that caused the alarm to go off and attract the zombies, which they now call walkers. Carley nearly got eaten when she ran out of ammo, but Lee quickly saved her. One of the survivors, Doug, paid the price and was eaten by the walkers. Larry had knocked Lee out, despite him getting the pills. Kenny quickly came and saved him. They all ended up at a motor inn, which has been where they have been staying ever since.

"Wanna try this one?", Lee asked gesturing to a building. Carley shrugged.

"Sure. But remember, we have to be careful," she warned.

Lee nodded before the duo walked up to the building and opened up the door. Lee took a quick look around before they cautiously entered. They could see several items littered around the place. "OK, remember, grab anything you can find," Lee said. Carley nodded and they started looking.

After a few minutes, all they could find were a couple packets of ramen noodles, a box of medicine, and a few packets of Swiss Rolls. Carley sighed. "That's everything," she muttered. "We better get out of here."

They were just about to leave when they heard a banging noise coming from another room. The two froze and reached for their weapons as several walkers staggered into the room. They immediately fired and managed to kill at least five, but more started coming in, cornering them.

"What now?!", asked Carley as they backed away from the walkers.

"Psst!"

The two looked up to see a shadowy figure crouching in a hole in the wall that lead outside.

"Come with me, I can get you out of here!", said the mysterious figure.

"How can we trust you?", asked Lee.

"You wanna live or not?!", the figure retorted. Without hesitation, the two quickly jumped onto a shelf and were helped through the hole by the stranger just as the walkers reached them.

"Sheesh, you guys are a lot heavier than you look," the figure commented.

Lee opened his mouth to say something, but stopped when they saw who their rescuer was. It was a boy at least 14 or 15 with black hair hidden under a dark blue bandana. Some of his bangs stuck out from under it. The boy wore a high collared black jacket with a dark blue T-shirt and jeans. The boy had two bags slung over his shoulder and in his hand was a Glock 17 like Carley's. The boy blinked.

"What? Is there something on my face?", he asked. This earned a snicker from Carley and Lee.

"What? What'd I say?"

Lee chuckled before he smiled and said, "Thanks kid, we really owe ya one."

The teen placed his arms behind his head. "Well, I saw you surrounded by those zombies and I couldn't just leave ya there," he said.

"I'm Lee, and this is Carley," said the man.

"Name's... Max. Max Smith," the boy said hesitating. "You guys in a group?"

"Yeah. They're not to far from here," said Carley. "You want to come back with us?"

"Huh?"

"I mean, it's the least we can do to repay you," said Carley with a smile.

"Thank you so much! You have no idea where I had to sleep since this started!", Max cried. "You do know that Lilly's gonna be angry that we didn't get a lot of stuff, right?", asked Lee. "Lilly? Is that a member of your group?", asked Max. "Yeah, ever since we got to the motor inn, she's been acting like the leader and has been sending us out on supply hunts. Obviously, she gets mad when we barely find anything," Carley explained.

"Well, I have some food," Max said as he set down his bag and pulled out several items of food.

"Holy crap!", Lee exclaimed. Max chuckled. "I'm guessing this is the most food you've seen in a while?", he asked. They nodded. Suddenly, they heard some growling coming from around a corner. "And that's our cue to leave!", Max said. "This way!", Carley exclaimed as the trio ducked around another corner and avoided the walkers.

...

...

Max stopped walking and stared at the motor inn. "This is where you've been staying?", asked the teen. Lee nodded. "You guys did a pretty good job barricading it," Max stated as they walked towards the gate.

"We're back!", Lee called as he pushed the gate open and let Carley and Max in before putting the gate back into place.

"Whoa, hold on, who the h**l is this?!", Lilly demanded as she stomped up to them.

"This is Max. He saved us when we were cornered by walkers," Lee explained.

"And he's got food," added Carley.

Max opened up one of his bags and showed some of the food. Lilly was silent before she looked back up at them. "That's great, but you can't just keep bringing more people here!", she exclaimed. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Chill out lady!", Max said holding his hands up. "Do you all have any idea what it's like out to have to climb up into a tree to avoid walkers and tie yourself down so you won't fall out while you're sleeping and swatting away birds that won't stop pecking at your head?"

"You slept in a tree?", Clementine asked. The frown left Max's face and was replaced by a smile. "Yeah, trust me, it's not as fun as it sounds," he said scratching the back of his head. "I say we let the kid stay with us," Kenny piped up. "And why should we?", Larry asked glaring at the man. Kenny frowned and said, "Cause we can't just leave a kid like him out alone where the walkers can get him!"

"He'll just be another mouth to feed!", Larry growled. Max frowned and stepped forward, but Carley grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled him back. "You better stay out of this one," she told him.

"He's just a kid! If we threw him out, we'd just be heartless monsters tossing him to his death!", said Lee.

"Dad, just let this one go, alright?", Lilly asked trying to calm him down. Larry glared at them before he glared at Max said, "Fine, but if you do anything that puts Lilly or anyone in danger, you're out!"

"DAD!", Lilly exclaimed running after the older man, leaving Kenny, Lee, Carley, and Max glaring at him.

"That guy's a jerk," Max commented. "You got that right, kid," Kenny said.

"It's Max," said the teen.

"Kenny. My wife Katjaa and my boy Duck are over there," he said jabbing his thumb towards Kat and Duck. The two waved. Max smiled and waved back before he looked back at Kenny. "Why's he named Duck?"

"He's never bothered by anything, like water off a duck's back," Kenny explained. Max nodded.

"You're lucky we've got a couple spare rooms left," he said as he walked over to one and opened up the door. "Don't worry, we've cleared this place out," he reassured. "You go ahead and get settled in."

"Alright," Max said as he walked in and closed the door. He set his stuff down on a table and sat down on the bed. A moment later, he reached up and pulled his bandana off, letting his, or rather, HER long black hair fall down her back. She sighed, got up, and looked through the blinds and watched the group.

"Sorry, but... I'm not ready to tell you guys everything about me...", she thought.