A/N Decided to give the vote a little more time since voices were low
Scott slowly shook his head as he looked back at Lilly, "It's not like that Lilly, I don't decide to do the opposite of what you want out of spite. Look at where we are now; we have a working vehicle that is equipped with a gun strong enough to rip apart a small arm of those fuckers. The only reason we got that is because we took a risk and trusted people," Scott explained while motioning to Mark who let out a small smile of relief, feeling that he was gaining some traction on getting the trust he desperately needed in the new group,
"You say that, but you never mention the flip side of the argument, we could have been shot or walkers could have overrun un because we went off course and ignored the mission at hand. You played with Andre's life, and sure it worked this time, but what happens next time? What happens when you trust the wrong person, and you end up paying the price, or worse, someone else ends up paying for it," Lilly fired back, her tone not full of anger but rather full of desperation,
Scott let out a small nod, "Okay, you're right, there is a risk in everything we do which could only be paid in blood if we fuck up. But you gotta look at the benefits of taking risks too, we took the risk to come here for the food, and Andre got shot. I took the risk to trust Mark and now we have a humvee with a gun. It could have gone wrong for me or gone completely right for you, there is just no telling, but we have to take chances," Scott explained as he crossed his arms,
"Right, and so now we're going to take the risk and shoot down all the walkers around the commissary," Lilly spat back, glaring back at Scott,
"No!" Scott finally exclaimed in frustration, "I'm agreeing with you here. The gun is for protection only, we need it for the camp or when there is no other choice left," Lilly's finally seemed to relax and her eyes ever so slightly softened, "We sneak in, sneak out, load up the humvee with everything we can carry,"
"Okay...good," Lilly huffed back with a nod, "Then lets get fucking moving before our luck completely runs out,"
Scott nodded and turned walking with Lilly back towards the humvee, "Alright guys, we're sneaking inside for the food, no discussion. This thing is a gift and we aren't wasting the ammo on shooting up the whole airfield," Scott sharply said causing Mark to grimace and Lee to frown,
"I don't know man, after everything that happened today, Andre shot. The walkers, and now the bandits. Doing this fast and safe would have been the better call in my book," Lee muttered out,
"Well it's not your call Lee, it was ours," Lilly snapped back, taking over the control of the conversation, "Now here's the plan. We are taking the humvee out and driving it over slowly so it doesn't make much noise, we take out any stragglers that notice silently. Once we're at the building, Lee and Andre, you two stay in the humvee, one at the wheel the other on the gun and keep watch. Scott, Mark and I will head inside for the food, we both know the base and can get around pretty easily. Once we get it, we load up as much as we can in our bags, fill the humvee and get the fuck out of here,"
Scott looked to Lilly before letting out a small nod, "She's right, that's the best course we can take to do this smart," He said in full agreement making Lilly let out a brief and missable smile,
"Fine, if that's what you guys want," Mark reluctantly agreed,
"It's a good plan, just needs to be executed right," Andre added on,
"And we'll do it right," Lilly firmly stated, "Come on, Andre you drive it over, and remember, fucking slowly,"
Andre nodded and shut the door of the humvee, putting it in drive and letting the vehicle crawl out of the hangar behind his fellow survivors. They group carefully made their way back across the airfield and thankfully the main bulk of the horde were still far off towards the now forgotten sounds of Mark's earlier gunshots. The few roaming walkers that remained were easily dispatched by Lee and Scott until they finally reached the main barracks of the airfield.
"Okay, Lee get on the gun," Scott said in a hushed tone as he tightened the strap on Andre's shotgun, keeping it on his back freeing his hands for close combat,
"Got it," Lee agreed before tossing Mark his axe, "Incase you run into anything,"
"Thanks man," Mark gratefully replied,
Lilly reached down and yanked out a sharp combat knife from her boot and motioned for the two men to follow her, "Let's go," Lilly moved to the entrance of the building and pulled open the door, crouching down as she entered. Mark and Scott followed close behind, keeping themselves low and ears open for danger.
The interior of the commissary was dark, only occasional beams of sunlight lit the path as Lilly led the pair off of muscle memory alone. Scott could hear the sounds of dozens of walkers, snarling and moaning while shuffling around. This was broken when he heard Lill suddenly grunt and a crunch filled his ears as the woman clearly drove her knife into a skull. Lilly eased the body down, laying it on the ground before moving on until finally they reached the kitchen. A soft jingle of keys was heard and everyone held their breath until they realized no walker was coming.
With a click and a small creak Lilly opened the commissary doors and stepped into the room. Scott pulled out a flashlight and turned it on, lighting up the room just enough for the three to start stuffing their duffel bags. "There's got to be months of food in here," Scott whispered in awe,
"More than I expected," Lilly admitted, showing a rare amount of joy as well, "We take this all back, ration it, we'll be okay for at least four maybe five months,"
"This was a good call, Lilly," Scott nodded as he continued to shove his bag full.
"If you'd listen to me more often you'd realize those are the calls I always try to make," Lilly muttered back giving Scott a small side eye reminding him that things between them were still quite dicey,
"Did you guys bring more bags?" Mark whispered over, "I've almost filled the two you handed me but we got tons more here,"
"You grabbed the essential stuff right? MRE's and canned food first?" Scott asked back, causing Mark to nod, "Damn, there's still a ton of it on the shelves. We didn't bring more bags but I know Lee and I brought backpacks that we can fill too,"
"With the humvee we can just dump the shit out and come back to fill them up... it's good for hauling, I'll give you that," Lilly jumped in, "Just make sure you're really filling them each time, and don't forget anything,"
"Trust me, after this last week of crackers and apples, I'm not leaving any good meals behind," Scott joked back. The trio went silent again as they stuffed their packs and finally, once all six duffle bags were filled to the brim, did Scott speak back up, "Okay, time to head back and drop off?"
"Yeah, we got half, one more trip should clean it up," Lilly nodded, "Follow me," Lilly slowly pushed the door back open and snuck her way out with Scott and Mark on her heels. The sound of walkers still filled the rooms but thankfully they sounded just as distant. The group moved down black hallways for minutes until they could just start to make out the sunlight coming in from their entry door. The three reached the door and slipped out of the building with ease, letting out a sigh of relief as they jogged over to the Humvee, "You guys alright?" Andre asked with a wide smile, eyes already glued on the bags of food, "Holy shit…"
"We're good, and better yet, we're only halfway done," Scott chuckled back,
"Halfway?!" Lee exclaimed with a joyous laugh, "God damn!"
"Told you guys this would be worth it," Lilly grinned, a bit of smugness hanging off her words as she tossed a bag into the backseat, "Lee, grab us the backpacks while we dump out the bags, I want to make one more run only. This is going well but their are a lot of fucking walkers in the building,"
"Gotcha," Lee sank down from the gunning seat and reached over for his and Andre's backpacks, "Here you go,"
"Thanks, now lets -" Lilly began to say only for a shot to ring out richoteting off the side of the vehicle, only inches away from her head, "Fuck!" Lilly screamed, diving to the side while Scott and Mark clambered for safety as well,
"Give us the food!" A gruff southern voice yelled out, "You motherfuckers aren't getting out of here until we get what's ours!"
"Shit, it's them!" Mark exclaimed, shakily taking his rifle off his shoulder,
"Hey, back off, we don't want any trouble!" Lee shouted out to the approaching men only for another shot to ring out, narrowly missing Lee as well, "Shit!"
Scott looked at Lilly for a moment, before holding up his hand and standing up, "Listen man, there is plenty of food still inside, you can take it! You and your crew!"
"Scott?" Lilly hissed as she watched him walk around the humvee, hands raised,
"Oh really?! You think I'm a fucking idiot?!" The man shouted back,
Scott shook his head, "I'm serious, there is food still inside, you can take what's left and we'll just go," Scott called back before glancing over his shoulder to Andre in the front seat. Andre looked back at Scott and at once let out a nod, "There's no need for any bloodshed, we can all win here today,"
The main bandit went silent, thinking it over for a minute, "Richie, you and Bryan go check it out…" The two bandits ran over to the commissary, bursting inside, "And now you! You give us half your bags and we'll let you go! I'm feeling generous today," The man finished earning a few chuckles from his buddies,
"It's not going down like that man, we're done here," Scott finished backing up and reaching a hand back for the door handle of the humvee, "Me and my friends are leaving,"
"Listen to this motherfucker! You think I'm asking boy?! You probably all think because you ride around in that hunk of shit we're afraid of you! I ain't dumb! The gun is empty, you don't fool me! Now give us the bags, I ain't asking again!" The bandit ordered in a final demanding shout,
"You're wrong," Scott merely replied before swiftly yanking open the door and diving inside. The bandit's eyes widened as Andre pulled himself up into the gunner seat and opened fire at the three bandits. The leader hit the ground while his two lackey's with all but ripped apart by the guns' massive rounds.
"Motherfuckers!" The leader exclaimed as he scrambled to the side of the building, reaching into his pocket and producing a bottle and a lighter, "Burn you motherfuckers!" The man yelled as he lit a rag at the end of the bottle and pulled back to throw but at once Lilly, who had taken the time to level her rifle, took a shot hitting the Molotov in his hand exploding it over his body and the side of the building.
As the lead bandit let out bloody screams, Mark raced forward and slammed all his weight against the doors of the commissary, keeping the final two bandits inside. It was only a mere minute before their desperate bangs stopped and instead turned to a few shots and then horrific screams as the dead inside began to rip them apart, "It's what you deserve…" Mark growled under his breath.
Scott eased himself out of the car, looking around at the carnage before turning to Andre, sharing a short understanding nod with the man, "Everyone okay?"
"Good," Lilly nodded, "That's gonna bring trouble and fast,"
"No shit!" Mark exclaimed as he suddenly felt a slam against the door, "Fuck, guys we gotta go,"
"He's right, we'll come back for the rest of the food," Lee agreed,
"I wouldn't count on that," Scott winced as he saw the side of the building starting to go up in flames, the fire of the molotov starting to catch and overtake the building, "We don't have time to put that out,"
"Fuck!" Lilly groaned, "Fuck...okay, we got what we got, no choice, everyone let's go!"
Lilly pulled herself into the driver's seat while Lee scooted up into the passenger, "Mark, Scott, come on!" Andre ushered.
Scott jumped into the back seat and Mark, once he knew the others were safe, ran away from the door which immediately burst open, letting walkers flood out into the open. The surviving jet mechanic jumped into a final seat and Lilly tore out of the airfield while flames began to overtake the building. Scott rested his head against the seat and let out a small sigh, they failed to get all the food unfortunately but that wasn't to say the mission failed. They probably had just shy of three months worth of food, and now a hell of a defensive boost for the camp. Still, Scott was sure not everyone would take it that way once they learned the story on how everything went down. Thankfully Scott knew he had at least an hour before that conversation.
What Does Scott Do On The Ride Back?
A) Talk To Lilly
B) Check In With Andre
C) Talk To Lee
D) See If Mark Still Wants To Join The Team
E) Tell Mark He Has No Place In Their Group With Less Food Now
Lilly 7/10 - Despite it getting crazy, you backed her play and got everyone out safely. Lilly trusts you a bit more than when you left this morning at least.
Lee 6/10 - Risk after risk this trip has left Lee worried about your judgment.
Andre 10/10 - You two are best friends, you have each other's backs, that's not going to change. Even shot, Andre considers this trip a complete success.
Mark 8/10 - Even though he was scared shitless, he avenged his friends and got out. He's happy with you, but he knows that he needs a definite answer if he's staying.