Lee opened his eyes and got up, brushing his pants.
Where moments ago there had just been some earth and grass, there now was a hard, sleek floor.
It had also become noticeably darker, caused by him suddenly being inside.

Inside a school gym to be correct. Lee swallowed back nostalgia at his own time teaching in the university, where they had had a gym, not much unlike this one.
Every year they organized a science exposition, where Lee helped out with the experiments.

He was brought out of his reminiscing by the sound of a ball shortly bouncing on the floor.
He turned to see Ben standing there, no hole through his stomach, not half devoured after being shot, just Ben, school sweater and all.

The basketball flew through the air again and neatly went through the hoop, bouncing of the opposite wall and landing in the teenager's hands again.
Lee slowly made his way over until he was standing about 10 feet to Ben's right, whom promptly threw the ball at him.

"Quiet a large gym for a high school." Lee stated, catching and taking aim.
Ben shrugged. "You know how it is; they care about the jocks…"
Silence ruled between them for some moments, as Lee caught the ball, which had went sloppily through the hoop, and passed it back.

"Not to say I didn't enjoy it," the teen went on. "I had friends, band practice… my sister was about to start middle school next year."
Lee nodded understandingly. He remembered how he'd had reveled in going to the same school as his brother.
"But now I have nothing."

Lee looked up and into Ben's eyes, just in time to take the ball, which had again gone perfectly through. He could swear he saw moisture in them.

Ben swallowed hard.
"I screwed up, Lee. I was scared and panicked, and I was a coward. I let people die, I stole, I was frightened I would be next." He said it all so quickly, Lee barely understood it.
Still he had an answer at the ready. "You did what you could, Ben."

But the boy just scoffed and turned away, throwing the ball into a dark corner.
"You don't know, Lee. But the truth is, I didn't. I didn't do all I could have done. Because I cared more about getting myself out alive than anything. I was useless, a danger to the group. They said so themselves."

And Lee had no response to this. Because he knew it was true. Kenny, Molly, Chuck, damn, even Lee himself couldn't deny he had thought it at one point or another.
A danger to the group, a danger to Clementine.

Yet, when Ben had been dangling from his hand, just a slip away from a fall that would surely break his leg, would surely have meant his death, being left to be devoured alive and reanimate, Lee hadn't dropped him.

It had passed before his eyes in a split second. What could have happened, what could have been.
And no matter how much Lee wanted it, he knew that there was a tiny dark corner deep in his hearth that had whispered to him. That it would be a good idea. That this was the person who had left Clementine to fend for herself when the bell tolled. That Ben was the reason that the motel hadn't worked out. That he was the cause of all those innocent deaths. Chuck, Katjaa, Duck, Carley.

But Lee hadn't listened. He was angry, but still human. He was pissed, but he could forgive. He had a conscious, he was humane. And that is what kept him going, what dseperate him from the next walker.
That was why he had pulled with all his strength.

No matter what Kenny thought and said about it, because in the end, Lee knew it were those same emotions that had prompted Kenny to shoot Ben.
Mercy was a human thing, and for a brief second, Kenny had been his old self.

These thoughts swirled through Lee's head, and by some weird power, as he had experienced often since coming here, they were transported too Ben.
The latter now turned around, the tears now freely streaming down his cheeks.

"How will I face them, Lee? Katjaa, Duck, My sister… How will I ever be able to look them in the eye again, if all I can see there is disappointment and betrayal?"

"You won't." was Lee's answer. "Because they are human. You will see understanding an forgiveness. That's what separates us, from them."

He looked upon Ben, and could see the scared boy inside, not yet an adult and already expected from
to make all the right decisions.

It was than that Lee knew, he had defiantly made the right choose.

Please review, I need it like I need air, and I'm realy rubbish at holding my breath.
I'll give you a free hug? ^^