15 hours and 17 minuets after Carver's Death
Most of the battle was a blur. Somehow she'd fallen down, or maybe she was pushed? She didn't remember.
She looked up, saw Natasha lying on the ground trying to crawl into the trees with a wounded leg. Mike walked into her vision too, he looked wounded. Someone shouted for him, she didn't see who. Then she saw Luke, ducked behind some stone bricks, shooting at something. She followed the bullets and saw one of their attackers, crawling backwards while trying to shoot; how he was still alive, she had no idea. Kenny was taking cover behind a tree, shooting at someone taking cover behind some rocks.
And finally, she saw the baby.
From there, she didn't know why, but she started crawling towards it. Bullets wrung over her, Luke called for her to take cover behind his rock wall.
She told herself to go behind the wall, but her body ignored the command and ran towards the child. Picking it up then sprinting it away to safety.
She took the child behind a rock wall, near Luke's. "Shit, I didn't even see him out there!" he said, "Good work."
"Shut up and make yourself useful," she replied coldly
"Right...right ok," he peeked his head up to fire but swiftly dropped when the guy behind the rock fired on him, "Damn it...we need to do something about this guy!"
"Then do something!"
"Alright...I'll just get over to that side! Cover me, alright! Just...shoot in his general direction, give him something to think about."
"Ok, I'll do that." Probably.
Clem peeked over the wall and took a shot while Luke ran across. Unfortunately, Luke overlooked the shotgun man when forming his perfect plan, who proceeded to put one in his leg. He fell, and would have died then if Clem didn't shoot the burly Russian in the head before he could get a second shot off
"Where'd you learn to run? The baby could have gone faster!" said Clementine
"I know, I need to work out!" he retorted, before looking more closely at his leg, "Alright...hurts a ton but...think it went strait through...I think..." he then started muttering words of self-encouragement and Clem blocked him out to get to the task at hand
Clementine looked up to fire, and saw Kenny run from his cover to grab Natasha, forcing her to her feet and pressing his pistol to her temple. He started shouting at the burly man behind the rock. "Get out here, or I put a bullet in her skull!"
Clementine trained her sights on the rock, ready to shoot the second he came out.
"Leave her alone, Kenny!" Bonnie shouted, "She's just a kid!"
Just a kid who tried to kill all of us
"No! I'm ending this before anyone else gets shot!" he screamed back at her
He and the burly Russian behind the rock (who Clementine had named "Rocky" for easy designation) kept shouting at each other. Natasha looked terrified for a moment, then when she saw Clementine, she made a huge lunge toward her. Knocking herself out of Kenny's hold and leaving him defenseless
Kenny dropped to the ground, making himself as hard a target as possible, while Natasha jumped over the rock wall, tackling Clem. Clementine fired, the bullet going right by Natasha's ear. Natasha's strength weakened, probably due to all the bells that must be wringing in her head after that, and Clem was able to throw her off, hitting her in the head with the butt of the gun.
Finally, Rocky came away from his rock to shoot Kenny, then he immediately fell down. Clem looked past him to see Jane standing behind him, having stabbed him in the back of the neck.
With Rocky finally dead, a strange silence fell over the scene with nobody shooting anymore. Just the baby's cries.
Bonnie walked over and picked the child off the ground from where he landed after Natasha's tackle, while Kenny gave them the all-clear
Clem got out from behind her rock and looked at Jane. A dozen different titles that she could associate with her came to mind. In the end, the loudest title rang through, Sarah's Killer
"Jesus Christ," said Luke, "That was...uh...that was intense."
"Man, I thought that was it..." said Mike
"Yea, well it was for these assholes." said Kenny
Clementine ignored them, and stood in front of Jane. No words. Jane kept staring at Rocky
"I didn't know this man," said Jane, "Never killed someone who hadn't wronged me. That didn't deserve it."
"Except for Sarah."
"What?" Jane looked up at her, "No...please, you can't blame me for that..." she said pleadingly
"Not just you," said Clementine, "A lot of people share some blame, mostly me...but you have some."
"Clementine, I did all I could..."
"You stopped me from doing all I could."
"You would have died!"
"It wasn't your call!"
"Hey!" Bonnie shouted at them, "A little...a little respect for the dead..."
Clementine noticed her and all the rest gathered around Rebecca's body, she looked at Jane "Leave or stay, I don't care. Just don't talk to me." Then she joined the other mourners, and after a moment's hesitation, Jane followed
The group looked down on Rebecca's lifeless body, hunched over with her arms positioned just right for holding a child, like it was still there
"How...did this happen?" said Mike
"She died, and came back," said Clementine, "I had to shoot her."
"You were sure?" said Bonnie, "You were sure she was dead?"
"Yes, Bonnie," said Luke, "I saw it. She was dead, no doubt about it. Clem saved the boy's life."
Bonnie sighed, "I suppose she did."
"This ain't your fault," Luke said to Clem, anticipating her next words, "This ain't nobody's fault, she just lost too much blood..."
The worst part is, I don't give a damn
"She's with Alvin now," she said the hollow words
"Yea..." said Luke
"No...we all know who's fault this was," said Kenny, clenching his fist. He turned towards Natasha, machine gun in hand he walked up to her and pressed the barrel against her temple
"Hey, hey!" Bonnie shouted after him
Natasha looked up at him defiantly, "Girl, give me one good reason not to blow your brains out," said Kenny, matching her glare
"Kenny, put it down!" Mike and Luke ran to Natasha's defense, pushing Kenny away and standing inbetween them
"She's not a threat to us!" said Luke
"How can you say that? After what her crew just did to Rebecca, you should be doing this! Not me!"
Clementine looked around at Natasha's dead friends, 3 people. Originally four. These two looked pretty well fed...
"Don't Kenny," she said, "Not yet."
"And why the hell not, Clem?" said Kenny, angrily
"They have a house, or a base of some sort, not far from here." she said, looking up, "In this weather, you don't want to travel far from home. There, judging by how much meat her friends have on them, we'll find enough food to make us the rest of the trip." She looked at Natasha, "So, what do you say, dead girl? Buy yourself some time?"
Natasha stared at her for a long time, "Ya...I'll take you."
"Why should we trust you?" said Kenny
"Trust or don't trust her, it's worth the risk," said Jane, "We need the food or we won't last a week out here,"
"You stay out of this!" Kenny shouted at her, "You're the reason these fuckers attacked us in the first place!"
"No, it's because I killed her brother," said Clementine
"Think about the baby, Kenny!" said Bonnie, "We need to take a chance on this, or he won't make it."
Kenny's gaze dropped, and he holstered his gun, "We got something to tie her up?"
"Yea, I got something." Said Bonnie
Bonnie handed the baby off to Mike while she set about tying Natasha's hands
"Just follow me." said Natasha
"Just give me a reason," said Kenny, pushing her forward
They hadn't been walking for more than 10 seconds before Jane matched her pace to Clem's, "Hey."
Clem turned her head away
"It's alright, you don't have to reply, I just want you to know...I'm sorry I couldn't save her. You were counting on me to do it and...I couldn't, but I will do everything I can to make that up to you, and I promise, I will never abandon you people again."
"So what, you want a cookie? You want a cookie for doing the right thing?" said Clementine, mockingly
"I...I'm just not leaving this time," said Jane, "If that gets me a cookie then...awesome, but either way I'm going to pay you back for-"
"You don't have to be pointing the gun at her the whole time?" said Mike shouted at Kenny
"Are you kidding, after what she just put us through?" said Kenny
"She's not going anywhere, Kenny," said Bonnie
"Don't be stupid, Bonnie, of course she's going to try to escape. That's the only reason she said yes, so she could get a chance to escape and kill us all in the attempt." said Clementine
"Wait...what does that mean?" said Luke
"I mean that's the risk," said Clementine, "She gets a chance to have revenge, and we get a chance to have food. Only one of us can get what we want, so either we get food or she gets revenge. Isn't that right, Natasha?"
"Screw that!" said Kenny, "I ain't given her the chance!"
"You don't have a choice, Kenny. Without the food we might get, we'll die for sure. If we want to keep our lives, we have to risk them."
