What happened after Clementine was shot?
Kenny sat in the middle of the dark room with AJ in his arms. The only light source was the window and the fire.
The baby started squirming a little and making a bit of noise. Kenny stared at it worriedly.
"Hey there, don't worry. You're gonna be fine. Just get back to sleep," he whispered quietly.
Kenny hadn't had a good night sleep ever since the apocalypse. He couldn't rest knowing that constant vigilance would save lives. In his darkest moments, he knew that every surviver would become a walker in time.
Including Clementine and AJ.
"Kenny! Jane! Help!"
A loud bang startled the man. He heard a yell of pain from a familiar voice.
Clementine.
Thinking fast, he placed the baby back in the makeshift cradle. If something was going on out there, he didn't want AJ getting in the middle of it.
Kenny grabbed his gun and ran outside, kicking the back door open.
"What the hell is going on out here?" he yelled, and froze at what he saw.
Clementine lay on the ground, a pool of blood surrounding her. A few metres away from her stood Arvo, Mike and Bonnie. In Arvo's hands was a large gun, pointed directly at where Clementine had been standing. Mike and Bonnie stared worriedly at the little girl, then turned their gazes to a furious Kenny. At this point, Jane came out of the house and stood next to Kenny with equal shock.
"What did you do?!" Kenny yelled as the three retreated into the woods, without looking back.
Kenny started to run after them, furious. How could they hurt a little girl like Clementine?
"Kenny!" Jane yelled after him, but Kenny ignored it. He made it through the first few ranks of the trees before he tripped over and landed face-first into the snow. He quickly checked over his shoulder. Luckily, Jane wasn't able to see it.
Kenny had lost his quarry. He swore, and climbed to his feet before turning back. Jane was kneeling beside Clementine's body as she took off the little girl's jacket. Kenny looked back into the snow-covered forest, silently promising Arvo, Bonnie and Mike a retribution, before running back to Clementine and Jane.
He knelt down beside Jane, Clementine in her shirt now. Jane placed the bloody jacket on the ground next to her.
"How bad is it?" Kenny asked.
"I don't know, I'm not a doctor!" Jane replied.
"We don't have time for this!" Kenny yelled impatiently as he scooped Clementine up.
"What are you doing?" Jane asked angrily.
"Taking her inside, what do you think? We can't just bandage her up outside in the snow!" he yelled as he turned away, swearing under his breath
.
He opened the door and carried the child inside. For once, he was actually glad he'd been shot back at that dairy farm. He would have a little experience behind him to help her now.
He entered the room with the fireplace and set her down on the couch. Jane came in and stared at her.
"Alright, alright. We need to get that bullet out of her shoulder," Kenny said, glaring at Jane. He looked down at Clementine. She was losing a lot of blood.
"Shouldn't we stop the bleeding first?" Jane said, crossing her arms.
"We'll need to get the bullet out eventually, and doing that would just cause more bleeding!" Kenny replied, raising his voice.
"What if she dies from blood loss?" Jane said as she glared back at Kenny.
"It won't come to that! Now, if you stop yellin' at me and let me get started, we can do this before she wakes up!" Kenny yelled at Jane. AJ started wailing from all the noise.
"What makes you in charge? You delivered one baby, does that make you a qualified doctor now?" Jane said, going over to AJ and picking him up. She began to rock him gently from side to side. Kenny arose to his feet and went to her, taking the baby out of her arms.
"Yeah, it'll be easy to help Clem when you have a baby in your arms, genius," she said.
Kenny grumbled unhappily as he placed AJ back in Jane's arms. She smiled, as if saying 'I told you so.'
"We need bandages, or blankets. Anything like that. Does that Arvo have anything around here?" Kenny asked, calming down a little.
"Uh.. I'll check upstairs." Jane said as she placed the baby into the cradle. She paused with her foot on the first step, looking at Clementine worriedly.
"She'll be fine, just go!"' Kenny said loudly.
Once she had left the room, Kenny took the rest of her shirts off, leaving her in a blood-stained, but otherwise white singlet. Years of dressing and undressing Duck helped.
"You're gonna be fine, Clem. I'll make sure of that," he muttered, carefully placing two fingers on her wrist. He felt a heartbeat, but it could be stronger.
Jane ran into the room, several blankets in her arms. In her right hand was a rolled-up bandage and in her left hand was a bottle.
She knelt beside Clementine, next to Kenny. She dumped everything she was holding onto the floor between them, and looked at him expectantly.
"Well?"
Kenny picked up the bottle and looked at it. Disinfectant.
"This is perfect! Where'd you find this?" he asked as he undid the lid and found a small cloth.
"Upstairs, but that's all I found."
Kenny poured some of the liquid onto the cloth and carefully placed it on Clem's wound, but pulled it away when she unconsciously groaned.
"Don't just stop! It hurts, she can suck it up." Jane said over his shoulder.
Kenny ignored her as he gently placed the cloth back into Clem's shoulder. After he was sure her wound was clean, he placed the cloth and the disinfectant on the floor, making sure to tighten the lid.
"Now we need to get the bullet," Kenny said as he stared at her wound. He couldn't see anything in it so far.
"So.. What, we just go in there and grab it?" Jane asked.
"Go look in the kitchen for tweezers, small ones if you can find any," Kenny said, Jane nodded and ran out of the room.
Just as she did that, Clem's hat fell off her head and landed on the ground. Kenny was surprised that it hadn't come off before, but he didn't care. He picked it up and placed it on the table, next to AJ's cradle.
Kenny placed a hand on Clementine's forehead, checking for fever. When he decided she didn't have one, he gently moved a bit of her dark hair away from her face.
Jane ran back into the room, with a pair of tweezers. A bit large for Clem, but it could have been worse.
Jane gave them to Kenny, who moved the strap of her singlet and pulled her limp arm out. That would give him more space.
Kenny, being extremely careful, placed the tweezers in her wound. Once it was in quite a long way, he squeezed them together, letting him see inside the wound better. Clem let out a small, pained noise.
Kenny looked inside, and he could actually see a tiny bit of the couch. It might of gone straight through.
"Found it yet?" asked Jane, who was currently standing back a little, watching Kenny.
"I think it went clean through," Kenny said as he continued looking, just in case he missed something. After about a minute, the man pulled the tweezers out and placed them onto the table.
He quickly checked her pulse, and finding it was fine, he grabbed the bandages and rolled it out.
"What about stitches?" Jane asked.
"Don't need 'em. If it goes clean through, then you won't need any," Kenny answered before placing the rolled out bandages on the table next to the tweezers. He grabbed the bottle and cloth from the floor and poured some more disinfectant onto the small cloth and carefully put it back on Clementines wound. She didn't groan this time, but Kenny wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not.
Kenny carefully wrapped the bandages around her shoulder after he removed the cloth. A bit of blood already stained the bandage. Jane watched silently behind them, but turned around to look out the window when a shadow caught her eye.
Walkers.
About fifteen walkers shambled towards the house. A few were very close, about five metres from the door. The rest of them strung along behind.
"Shoot, Kenny, walkers." Jane hissed at him as she picked up the baby. Kenny turned around and looked out the window, his eyes going wide. They must have heard the gunshot...
He rushed to finish bandaging up the little girl, having to lift her up to get it properly around her back. He dressed her as quickly as he could. After it was done, he pocketed the disinfectant and picked her up again, turning to make sure Jane had the baby.
They ran through the house and out the back door. Kenny glanced down at the girl, who was still unconscious. He hoped he'd done enough.
He opened the back door to the car and set Clementine down in the back seat, so that she was lying on her back. While Jane got into the passenger seat, he again placed a hand on her forehead to check her temperature, but moved away and shut the door when he decided she was fine.
Kenny climbed into the driver's seat and shut the door. Their small noises had attracted the walkers; he could see them coming from around the side of the house. He turned the key and stepped on the accelerator, dropping the hand-brake. The car moved forward.
After a few moments, they were away from the house and into the wilderness.
"God, I hope she's okay," Jane said as she looked back at Clementine.
"She's gonna be fine, and since when did you ever care about anyone other then yourself?" Kenny growled.
"She's just a kid, and I don't want her to turn-"
"So that's it, you're just worried that she'll turn into a walker?" Kenny snapped.
"At least I'm not a psychopath!"
"Wanna bet?"
Kenny was about to add something else, but AJ started wailing from the yelling. Jane carefully rocked him and quieted him down.
This was going to be a long drive...