Chapter Status:
[First Draft] January 6th, 2020
[Second Draft, First Edit] April 3rd, 2020
[Final Draft, Second Edit] November 17th, 2020
[Final Edit] January 30th, 2021
[First Polish] March 18th, 2021
[Final Polish] August 28th, 2021
[6,721 words]
Hope you enjoy!
:)
- A Yellow Dress Forgotten -
. . Episode 1: Blood-Stained . .
The day after tragedy struck, by her own hands. Then, the weeks after. Months. Until finally, Clementine fell into oblivion, signing herself away to addiction.
All to numb and forget.
The story of my Clementine, after the events of Season Two…
"And if you gaze long enough into an abyss,
the abyss will gaze back into you..."
~Friedrich Nietzsche
"L-Lee…? Did you have to kill those men?"
The last few strings of a girl in her white-stained dress unraveled with each fleck of the snow, and all there was left to swarm around Clementine was a sharp, glistering white. It chipped away her warmth piece by piece. It chipped away the memory of a better life… She held the bundle of green blankets in her arms, a quiet baby nestled against her shoulder. There were no colors around her other than grey. That glistering white was muted beyond recognition. Her blue jacket and the green blanket were the only sharp contrast. The only color she could process. Yet, even then, dull.
Clementine did not know where she was going, only that it was far, far away. The Glock snuggled at the small of her back was still warm, and the ghost of its scream still rang in her ears. And the roof of her mouth, too, still felt the metal's touch. She wandered down the road, following the remnants of cars and trucks. The girl desperately hoped it wouldn't lead her to a city. Anything but that.
The little girl glanced at her reflection as she passed by the windshields. And in the ones where the snow hadn't fogged the glass, Clementine caught her eyes. The hazel in them. She didn't recognize the color. As if it had…mutated.
"My baby, my doll. You have the sun in your eyes. Who wouldn't want to play with you?" her dad had once said. "You're the light in everyone's day!"
Clementine saw no sun. For quite some time, she hadn't—as if a haze of clouds had covered them. But, on that day, as the snow whipped her face, a crackle of life was born. It wasn't the sun, no. It was an inferno. The same that her parents had warned her so desperately against in their conserved, Christian home. One that she'd burn to ash after crossing the door; the girl would never shake that thought; she'd carry that sentiment to her shallow grave.
Clementine blinked.
Up ahead was a monstrous dark silhouette overlooking a bundle of vehicles. She hesitated before recognizing the comical shape fixed on its roof: a fat roll of pastry. It was only donut shop. She squinted through the light patter of snow; Dunkin', by the looks of the lettering. Clementine ventured forth, her mind buzzing and arms tight around the baby. Her only light of hope: A.J. When the door was pushed open, Clementine half-expected to hear a bell ring; she found it on a table, long since disarmed. Clementine looked around. To her luck, it had been ransacked. Completely hollowed out of resources. Starved and dismal.
"Fucking…" Clementine swore under her breath, and the crackle of life simmered in her glare. The newborn beast within her eyes shivered irritably. In her reflection, from broken mirror shards on the ground, she saw her eyes and tore herself away.
Clementine held A.J closer to her chest in a newfound debate. It was warmer inside, however sour her luck—that she could admit. And empty of people—the last thing she could ever want. Clementine strode into the back, finding some blankets scattered across the floor. It didn't take long for the two to be huddled within those blankets, resting silently.
If only the thoughts Clementine had were as serene. Instead, warfare plagued her consciousness. White noise fogged the beginnings and ends of her thoughts. She felt simply hollow.
A.J coughed and mumbled vowels. Clementine rocked him, and she cooed gently, a mantra, "We'll be okay, A.J, we'll be okay." At least, that's what she hoped. "Just go to sleep for now, okay? We need rest." As she heard the wind pick up outside, she knew that was all they could do.
"W-We'll be okay… We'll be okay."
[. . .]
The wheels of the train rapped along its rails in rhythmic beats, accompanied by the engine's harmonic thrum. Clementine sat at the mouth of the train-car, and her legs dangled off the edge. She watched the ground blitz by as she fiddled with the edge of her white-stained dress. Clementine grimaced. It was yellow, at that point. Her mother would be extremely disappointed in her—
No. Not...anymore. Her mother was dead. Clementine skewed her eyes shut, erasing her face—both healthy and rotted—to save herself from the dismal ache in her chest. And when she blinked them open, all Clementine saw were dead, hollow moons for eyes, and the corroded flesh that rotted her mother's color away.
She turned to the creaks of the wooden floor panels, and then smiled gingerly as a shadow of great stature stepped to her. His grin was comforting. Within a minute, Lee sat beside the girl, and they remained quiet for a while. Clementine rubbed her ears, and Lee swayed his legs in gentle motions. "You loved this train, didn't you?"
Clementine nodded as the persistent ringing of her ears began to gradually fade away. "Yeah. I never rode on a train before this one."
Lee nodded. He stretched before wrapping his arm around Clementine's shoulder. It was soothing, feeling his arm around her. Clementine's dad was a loving man, but never too physical. Never too emotional either. Both were rare.
She nestled against Lee. The little girl was glad that, in one way or another, she was able to feel a father's embrace after all, even if it was for a short time after Hell itself escaped amongst the living.
"I remember you said that," he noted in a murmur. "Did you ever get tired of it?"
Clementine shook her head. "No. I want to go back here. With you."
"I understand, sweet pea," he murmured. "A lot has happened since I left, hasn't it?" She nodded. Tears welled.
Both of them watched the scenery as it stampeded by. Lee rubbed Clementine's back calmly, humming to himself a tune he didn't quite know. Clementine began to tremble, coughing on the sobs that had developed from the sudden knot in her throat. She clutched her face, her elbows digging into her knees. Lee's coffee-colored eyes looked down in concern. Clementine had grown since her time wearing the white dress; now, she wore dark jeans and a blue jacket with what used to be vibrant colors, soon dulled from its time with the walking dead. His gaze settled on her baseball cap, following the splatter of blood along the side. His splatter of blood.
Lee didn't pause. He continued to soothe her with his gentle hand on her back. "What's wrong, sweet pea?"
Her voice crackled into broken shards: "Le-ee..." Clementine sniffed and looked up at him. "W-Why can't people j-just live...? Li-ike how we used to. I-I don't want people to die. I-I don't want them to fight each other. I-I just want p-people to listen and b-be…h-happy… N-Not die a-and kill each o-other…"
"Oh, Clementine..." Lee felt her collapse further into his side as he fixed his hand on her shoulder. "Death...never was rare. It was just... We were sheltered from it." Clementine sobbed against his shirt. "I'm sorry you have to see so much."
"Ken-ny didn't have to die... He— He c-could still be alive. And Jane... And...and..." Clementine whimpered, unable to add on.
Lee gazed at his side sadly. "I know... I know sweet pea. The world... It isn't right."
"No... No, y-you don't understand w-what I'm saying..." Clementine looked into his eyes. "I— I let him ki— Kill her. I— I was so afraid and... And I let him."
"Sweet pea—"
"I killed him," Clementine sobbed. "I— I saw what he did. I saw what Kenny did. I— I looked into his eyes, and I... I killed him." She cried, clinging to Lee. Her only support. The only other person she wanted by her side. "I didn't even...th-think. I couldn't con— I c-couldn't control myself."
Lee closed his eyes with grief, mourning his friend—mourning a daughter, in a way. Mourning her childhood, and the scrap of innocence she had. Lee felt it, how shattered it was, only one shrapnel of a child's naivety left behind. The only piece that would ferment with age, solely dependent on the number of years she lived. But the rest? Torn away.
"Clementine... I'm so sorry."
"L-Lee...?"
"Yes, sweet pea?"
Clementine didn't speak for a few minutes. Her ears strained, listening to the distant babble of a baby. "Lee...? Do you... Do you still love me? Even though I... I..."
"Of course I do, Clementine. I understand what you're going through," he said. "You're not a monster. You're human. And my father, when I was your age, my pops said to me that being human isn't in the things you do, it's in the things you feel."
"F-Feel...?"
Despite being right underneath her palms, the rattling train grew distant. "Yes. And you feel human, even after doing a terrible, terrible thing." Clementine looked up, and her brows furrowed in confusion. "It's okay. It's okay..."
"Lee?"
"Just live, Clementine. Just live..."
Lee's voice faded away, melting into giggles, and stewing into bellows of thunder. Clementine mumbled incoherent words as she sat up, her eyes gliding around a small shack. She flattened her blue jacket, which was fashioned into a vest—sleeves ripped off—once it grew tight around her shoulders. She unzipped it just enough to release the constriction at the middle of her back. It was getting too small, like her pants and shoes.
A.J, who also outgrew his clothes (or, well, blanket), was wearing a long blue shirt tied in the middle, allowing his small, chunky legs to poke through. He smiled at her, holding his toes as he rocked himself playfully. "Hey A.J, keeping an eye on the storm out there?" she croaked, still groggy. He babbled once again, then crawled to her side. She picked him up and cradled him, brushing off some droplets of rain from his hair. Clementine narrowed her eyes where the rain leaked through; in the shed's roof was a large, though thin crack that splintered across the walls. It was the best shelter she could manage, and even then…
Her eyes dropped down to A.J's as he stared up at her. He patted her cheek with his chubby hand and giggled. Clementine laughed at his smile.
A clap of lightening briefly shook the two, and its light stabbed through the slivers of the shed's wood. A.J gave a worried cry before Clementine rocked him, murmuring, "It's okay. It's just lightening." Still, she kept her eyes on the door, half-expecting something worse.
Clementine waited for another moment. Her skin prickled, and her breath fogged when she exhaled. Fuck. It was going to hail. She chewed the inside of her cheek, and her blazing eyes crept along the shed's wood. That thing wasn't going to last the night. Or it was, but they'd be the last to use it. And—
A.J's laugh was muffled, drawing Clementine's attention. "Hey! Don't chew on that!" She pulled the collar tip of her jacket-vest out of his mouth. She moved around, eyes scanning. "Where's that... Oh, right." She scowled. "It's gone." With the rest of the many things she had gathered for A.J to play with; if only that stupid walker didn't slip and take all the toys down the stream with it. She eyed A.J as he teethed her collar again. With a sigh, Clementine relented, allowing him to continue.
After all, he was the only good thing in this damn world, wasn't he? The only beacon of hope in her life. Regardless of hail. Never mind useless shelters.
Clementine pursed her lips in thought. Was she ever the same for Lee?
"Lee..." she whispered, her eyes landing on the handgun left beside her, leaning against her grey backpack. He was wrong, she had countlessly told herself. She may have been human, but she was still, very much, a monster.
Clementine knew one thing: monsters didn't have to be rotting to be so.
[5 Months Later]
It was like trudging through the first ring of hell getting into the damn ranch house. The barn had nothing. The fields were sodden and wet. All of the earth around the house was just mud, which clung onto her ankles without mercy. Inside the house, three. Fucking. Walkers. In the living room. Upstairs. Each.
But the walkers were particularly moronic, being that they were only her size. A band of kids, she assumed. Unless they were all really tiny adults…
With a promise of resources.
In the last bedroom, Clementine scavenged through another cardboard box as A.J giggled beside her. "Don't worry, I'm trying to find something for you. There's just nothing here." And, boy, he did need it. He had outgrown the small pajama pants she found (which ripped and was lost to another stupid walker only days prior), leaving him in only the blue shirt.
She scowled. There was only junk. "Shit," she hissed, kicking the box. Clementine switched her attention to a small steamer-trunk underneath the bed and tugged at it. With some grunts and pants, Clementine managed to heave the trunk into the center of the bedroom. Once it was open, a smile managed to break free. "Finally!" she said, pulling out a bag of chips. Clementine opened it and took out one chip; as she chewed, Clementine eyed the label curiously. "Vinegar...and sea salt… It tastes fine. …I think."
She scooted towards A.J and held out a chip twice the size of hers. "Here, A.J, you need to eat." A.J's eyes grew wide as he reached for it. Clementine handed it to him, and she chuckled as he sloppily ate it with pleasure. His face squeezed itself after a few seconds. "Do you not like it?" He licked his lips and whined a few syllables, reaching for the bag. "Okay, here you go," she said, and she took a small handle for herself. A.J squealed and indulged, crumbs littering his cheeks.
Clementine ate her chips with far more manners as she looted through the trunk. "There's so much stuff here!" she told A.J excitedly. One by one, she took out the loot: a blanket, two bottles of water, a half-filled bag of jerky, boots, a pair of small overalls, a bandanna, and a flask. First, she compared the shoes to her own, which had been feeling tight for the last few months. They were bigger in comparison, so Clementine tried them on; her feet didn't slip or slide in them, though her toes weren't crammed at the point. And they were boots. Only to the ankle, but hell it was probably infinitely better than Converse. Satisfied, she replaced her muddy shoes with the new ones, and set the old pair to the side. Next, she folded the blanket and slipped it into her backpack, followed by the water and jerky.
She held the flask and hesitated. Slowly, Clementine shook it. There was water in it. She twisted the cap open and peered inside. Frowning, she grew unconvinced. "Is that water...?" It certainly didn't smell like it. With nothing much on the line (unless it was poisoned, though she doubted it was), and her curiosity abound, Clementine took a sip. "Ack!" She coughed into her arm. "Ugh... That's not water," she informed A.J, who paused in his meal to stare at her in concern. Clementine licked her lips. It wasn't...terrible. She held her stomach. It made her warm without a blanket. And the taste, it wasn't great, but she could manage.
With care, she closed the flask and dropped it into the bag. And then Clementine swallowed. She wanted another sip. Her hand hovered over the bag, though Clementine paused and shook her head.
"Okay, A.J, let's give you some new clothes." She looked at the overalls. "These might fit you." A.J hiccupped. He raised both hands, grabbing the air for Clementine. She grimaced and cleaned his hands of chip-muck with the bandanna before carrying him. Clementine patted his back and strolled to the bed. He burped in between hiccups. "You stay here, and I'll put these on you," she said, setting him on the bare mattress. A.J replied with noise.
Clementine worked with him for several minutes, tugging the clothing on. He laughed as she fastened the buttons, which prompted a long strand of snot to flow down his nose. "Ew, A.J." Clementine grabbed the bandanna and cleaned his face. Figuring that the bandanna proved itself helpful—several times in the matter of a minute—, she tied it around his neck.
Clementine analyzed his new clothes. The overalls were big on him, but she was sure he'd grow into them soon enough. "You look like a little farmer," she hummed, marching in place playfully. A.J giggled, and his arms swung to mirror her.
A gunshot tore through the moment.
Panicked, Clementine faced the door. It sounded several pastures away from the ranch house, but its echo didn't sit well with her. She darted towards her bag, zipped it, and snatched her handgun from the floor. A.J babbled as he wobbled his way off the bed, landing on his hind with a thud. He grumbled, then staggered on his legs a few paces before toppling to his knees. "A.J! I said stay on the bed!" Clementine gasped, swooping him into her arms.
She whisked herself towards the window, then ducked to the side with A.J crying softly against her shoulder. "It'll be okay, A.J..." Clementine looked out of the window, careful of being seen. There were three dark figures amongst the fields of dead crops and fruitful weeds. They moved too swiftly to be dead—especially in that sludge of dirt and muck. "Shit, shit," she hissed, briskly jogging out of the bedroom door and over the last walker she killed.
Within a minute, Clementine left the house as the men walked in from the other side—right into the couch she'd overturned. She and A.J disappeared into the trees, dangerously close to falling eagle-spread in the mud after a handful of slips. Clementine didn't look back as she hopped over logs and meandered around entangled roots. Not when her panic overtook her curiosity. The latter bloomed, however, to a painful degree.
Once a good distance away, that was when she glanced back at the house. And nothing. They weren't by the windows facing her. Clementine gulped. She didn't know if they had been following her, or if their near misses were coincidences.
Her gut told her otherwise. Startling herself by catching sight of people, multiple times, in a single day was enough to raise alarm alone. But that single day was several ago, and the men were still behind her.
Clementine swallowed and slipped away, frazzled and desperate to get more distance between them. Several roads away.
Once the baby mewled softly, Clementine whispered, "It's okay, A.J, it's okay. We're going to find a new place away from here. It's okay, it's okay..."
[. . .]
After a few hours of walking, Clementine was thankful of the new boots she found. They were warm. They were a strong barricade against wet mulch. They were sturdy. And as A.J slept soundly against the crook of her neck, that was all she could ask of those boots.
At a small intersection, Clementine found herself looking both ways, feet planted right in the center; it wasn't exactly how her mother taught it, but there were rarely any functioning cars anymore. To the left, Clementine saw a gas station. The only building with all four sturdy walls and one whole roof around. Or rather, the only building that was built to last the beginning of the end. She walked towards it, careful of any walkers—and men, for the matter. While there were stragglers of the undead in the distance, she knew they wouldn't be any danger to her for quite a while. That is, if they ignored the station, anyway.
Stepping inside, she looked around. The tables were toppled over for some sort of cover, and bullet holes riddled them from corner to corner. She eyed the few bodies that never turned. With a wince, Clementine decided that she was glad to have avoided the shootout by however many days had passed; even if the apocalypse had tarnished her sense of smell, she tried not to inhale the death too much.
Clementine continued to quietly look around. There were walkers as well, put to rest alongside those bodies. She ducked through the counter's gate, and she let her eyes wander.
Completely looted.
"Great..."
Even so, her skimmed search didn't cease. Clementine poked her head into the back room and found another door. The back room was also completely looted. Though, satisfied with the area cleared, Clementine moved back to the front and set her bag down. A.J stirred, and she wrapped the blanket around him. After she set him down beside her, his head on a torn cushion from one of the chairs (blood, bone, guts and grime dusted off), Clementine rubbed her shoulders.
She shivered. With A.J bundled in the only blanket, Clementine was left frigid. Her arms were kept to her biceps, and her eyes wandered. They landed on her bag. She was drawn back to a lonely brick shed, with bottles and bottles abound. A man tired in the back, tossing the empty ones before they shared her first sip. Then it was her family gathered around a fire underneath a powerline. Passing a bottle around (which skipped her, somehow). The warmth of the air. Their calming grins. A family, and the man...long since dead. And she couldn't bring them back, Clementine knew.
Clementine swallowed and held her forehead. The urge for that second sip of the flask never left her. Clementine didn't even realize she had the urge until she was several roads away from the ranch house. Her mouth watered, and she licked her lips. That first sip warmed her. It reminded her that there was something inside her to warm.
It bled the hollow pain away, the ones that never left her—just like the urge. The snow that continuously sliced her skin. The ghost of gunfire that screamed in her ears. And then…there was the ghost of gunfire that she never shot…
She frowned, then decided.
Hands searched through the bag eagerly. Clementine pulled out the flask and rested against the wall. All within the next minute. She stared long and hard at it. The drink inside was tempting. I can be your friend, it promised. I can make you warm, for the night.
Clementine worked her jaw in thought. She unscrewed the cap carefully, now almost wary of it. Uncertain, Clementine licked the inside of the top. The tip of her tongue prickled, and her mouth watered. She gulped. She sipped just enough to taste it. The urge to cough forced her to gag. But, as Clementine noted, she was warm again. The pain, it was leeched away ounce-by-ounce. Another sip. She managed to control her cough and swallow it with the rest of the booze. More of the pain unraveled itself, and Clementine could feel herself forgetting every ache.
Another sip.
Another sip.
A gulp.
Another gulp.
Another gulp for everything to drain away and leave her at peace.
[. . .]
Clementine groaned as she blinked awake. She frowned, noticing the blanket laid across her hip and thigh. "A.J?" she muttered. "Is that you?" Towards the window, A.J cried out in glee as he stood on the chair he'd climbed onto. Clementine wiped her eyes and stretched; it had been a while since she slept so soundly. She picked up the flask and shook it. Gone. Every last drop. With a sigh, Clementine tucked the flask back into the bag to be filled later. A.J babbled again. She looked up. "What is it, goofball?"
"Ah..." he said, jabbing his finger on the window. "Ah..."
Pulling the blanket off, Clementine crawled towards the window, then poked her head up just enough to see. She narrowed her eyes. "What... No!" She was quick to peel A.J away from the window. "It's them again, A.J! We need to get out of here!" She roughly packed the blanket into the bag and rushed to zip it. She didn't care if the zipper snagged the blanket, so with the damn backpack haphazardly closed, she hauled it over her shoulder. Words snapped, Clementine said, "Come on, we need to move!" With A.J swept into her arms, her urgent words were more for herself than the toddler. She opened the counter's gate swiftly, and, as quietly as she could, Clementine bolted towards the back door in the other room. She jerked the handle, which wouldn't budge. "Come on, come on, come on!" Clementine rushed. "We need to leave!"
A.J screamed, pulling her eyes towards the narrow window in the door. Her heart plummeted. She hissed a breath: "No...!"
A man stood, leering within the narrow glass. His one eye that wasn't covered by a bloody bandage widened, and his grin exposed his gnarly teeth. "THEY'RE IN HERE!" Clementine scampered away, towards the front door. She swerved around the counter.
But to no avail.
A blond man charged through the front door, and his long arms reached for them. He snagged the bag, to which Clementine promptly writhed out of, her hold iron-tight around A.J. She hurled herself away from both men, though smacked into the same wall she had her generous sleep against. A.J wailed as the blond man snatched him.
"No! NO! LET HIM GO!" Clementine screamed. Her boots squeaked and scampered against the floor as she continued to grapple A.J's waist. "FUCKING— LET HIM GO!"
"QUIET!"
The man with one eye backhanded her, and the force alone tore her grasp from A.J. Another man stormed into the room. As Clementine blinked the disorientating blur from her eyes, all she could note was the third man's pale skin; his complexion smeared with his grey eyes and white hair—a ghost.
A.J bawled with tears washed down his puffy cheeks as he snatched the air for her. "Let. Him. Go!" Clementine detested, wrenching herself up from the wall.
The one-eyed man scowled, and he shook his head. His leather shoes booted her stomach, forcing her to cough and curl around herself. A large hand tugged the collar of her shirt. Her feet barely scraped the ground. "You will listen to me now," he seethed quietly, which was far more sinister than his bellowing yell.
"I won't! Give me back A.J!"
The man only snarled. Instead of an answer, the horrible man followed the other two, dragging her out of the gas station without care. She couldn't find her footing. She was left to flounder and gag against the tightened collar of her vest.
With a sneer, Clementine kicked his knee. The man jolted. "You little bitch!" He threw her against a large dumpster, and the clatter of the impact rang in her ears more than any gunfire had. She grasped her head with the man watching—in amusement. Clementine swore she was going to vomit. She swore that the man was the Devil. The little girl stumbled over her own feet, the world a haze, before plummeting back to the asphalt.
Her vision grew unfocused until there was nothing to see.
[. . .]
"GET UP, RIGHT NOW!"
Clementine jerked away with a gasp, inhaling so sharply that it sliced her lungs. She coughed and blinked in rapid succession, screwing her eyes tight, away from whatever blinding light was pointed at her. "I'm awake! I'm awake!" she cried. The flashlight was torn away, allowing Clementine to adjust to the candle-lit room. She looked around, and her heart throbbed against her chest. She was on a worn couch that smelt of all things horrible. Familiar, but nothing less than revolting. A knife on the nightstand beside her, the edge of the metal rusted with blood. Several duffel bags, empty, on the kitchen table down the hall.
But no baby.
"Where's A.J?!" She moved across the couch to look around. "Where's A—"
The man with the blind eye—bandage removed to reveal a sagged crater with a grey orb—whirled around and punched the wall in a fury. "What did I fucking say?! DON'T MOVE!"
"Jesus, Daron," the other man—with the blond hair—said. "Chill out. She literally just woke up. And what is she going to do, step on your toes?"
"I don't want her getting the wrong impression," Daron snapped.
The blond man simpered. "Yeah, like she's actually going to hurt us. She's just a kid! You can chill the fuck out." He turned towards Clementine. "And the boy's fine, if that's what you're asking. He's just in the barn." The two men glared at each other before the blond walked outside, hands tossing and door slamming.
Daron breathed deeply, and he glared out the window. "I swear…" His head jerked towards her, and the vapid motion alone startled Clementine. She thought that even the sagged, blind eye saw right through her. "Just a kid… On her own?!"
Clementine immediately knew what he was getting at. Even so, she forced her brows down and answered, slowly, "…yes."
Daron shook his head. He spat a gruff hum. "Now," he muttered pointedly, barely able to maintain his composure as he settled into the chair facing her, "do you know why you're here?"
"No," Clementine answered bluntly. "You've been following me for days," she added in a hiss.
Daron gave a chopped laugh, unamused. "Now you better listen here. And do not lie to me again—"
"I'm not lying!"
"You brat, I said listen!" Clementine thought it wise to keep quiet for the meantime. Play along with his little game. From the way his teeth snapped and nose wrinkled, she suspected Daron wasn't above killing children. Or anything that would be an easy target for him… She narrowed her eyes and watched Daron. Clementine knew exactly what kind of man he was: not one at all, but a monster. A filthy, fucking, monster. She heard it in every word he spoke: "You, little shit, stole supplies and let one of our horses escape! What do you have to say to that?!"
"I didn't—do—it," she answered through gritted teeth. "You got the wrong girl."
"Really?" Daron huffed sourly. "Not a lot of little girls running around here. You're from that camp up in Pebble Creek, aren't you?!"
"I don't even know where that is!" Clementine shifted on the couch as he leaned closer with a sneer. "You have the wrong girl, I'm telling you! Now let me go with A.J—!"
She yelped as his open hand plummeted down on her cheek, sending her straight from the couch to the hard, splintering floor. On the way down, Clementine smacked against the nightstand with a clatter, and so brought the oil lamp down with her. The impact was malicious. The flame candle's flame was whiffed out immediately, asphyxiated by Clementine's rattled breath.
She groaned, and the beast in her eyes navigated the shadows in front of her. The knife, hidden within those very shadows, merely inches from her nose. Ever so tempting. Ever so beckoning.
Daron was a monster…but he knew not of the way the fire in her eyes crackled along the blade's edge.
The monster got to his feet and spat on the ground. His voice was low and grueling: "Now pick yourself up, and we'll try that again."
Clementine didn't think. A familiar, violent hurricane of white noise surged within her, awakened by the beast in her eyes. Instead, she catapulted herself within an instant—barely enough time for his one eye to blink.
She grabbed the knife and swerved to her side. Before his malevolence could abuse, the rusted knife sunk deep into the crook of his ankle. He screamed, and, immediately, he grappled her waist to strip her away. Daron's agony only multiplied. Clementine had held onto the knife with her teeth bared, and she worked the blade to completely slit his foot open through the shoe. It cut right into the toe once she was finally yanked away by his monstrous hands. He collapsed, and his claws strangled his ankle with a howl.
Clementine staggered to her feet unevenly.
The monster's snarl came from his gut: "OH NO YOU DON'T, YOU LITTLE BITCH!"
The beast within her, it bellowed its own malevolence once his hand clamped around her foal-like leg, with all the intent to snap it. Instead of fighting against the force, Clementine hurled herself onto Daron, knife at hand. With everything a blur, Clementine was soon on the ground with a sore jaw. Daron's hands went to her neck, his teeth bare and eye rabid. She scratched his wrists, kicking and choking on her own screams. Her arms flailed as she reached under the couch for the knife.
Her vision became dotty. And yet...she remained warm. A buzz drove her. The buzz, it thundered within her blood, directing every bone in her body. And the beast in her eyes rejoiced. It twitched and curdled within itself, growing horns and fangs and wings.
Clementine's fingers slipped on the knife's hilt. Her other hand dug into his wrist. As her festering confusion and writhing anger fueled her, her nails burrowed into his skin. Clementine glared into his eye and watched Daron wince, and a satisfaction plagued her. One that reveled in knowing she could bring down a monster on her own. He squinted down at her, at the beast. Whatever the monstrosity was that surfaced from within the girl.
Her fingers wrapped around the hilt. Clementine spat a broken snarl of her own.
Clementine clumsily whipped the knife out and punctured his seeing eye. The monster howled in pain, and his grip around her neck loosened. Clementine gasped for air, and this time, the sharpness of her breath was welcomed. With nothing to lose, the knife sunk deeper into his skull. Daron gagged. From his mouth, his blood sprayed, pattering Clementine's skin with a dark red. His breath gurgled, and his grey eye rolled.
When he fell on top of her, Clementine grunted on impact. She could feel the point of the knife's hilt as it crushed her sternum.
After a minute of kneeing and punching him off, Clementine snatched the pistol from the small of his back and charged towards the door. With every stride, however, her momentum sagged. Her hand rested on the doorframe as she struggled to retain her breathing.
White noise—the same that she didn't realize ever consumed her—began to seep away. Layer-by-layer. She was left to her thoughts as they all abruptly swarmed to the brinks of her skull. The past few minutes were heavy on her shoulders, urging her to look behind. Clementine did. She found a dead monster lying beside the couch in a pool of his own blood, mouth gaping and face obliterated.
Clementine choked on a broken whimper, tearing herself away from the sight. Away from the atrocity she committed.
Five months. She counted with each and every night, regardless of sleep. It had been only five months since the muted snow that whipped and stung her flesh. Five months where she couldn't retain herself from claiming another life.
It was too easy. Those five months felt like a millennia…
Clementine gasped, fighting herself to manage her tremors. It was so. Very. Easy. She hissed and dug her palm into her burning eyes. "F-Fuck…" she whimpered, her watery stare back to the couch.
It shouldn't have been…but it was.
Her stare hardened, and the scales of her heart reinforced itself with a seething hatred. Clementine tightened her jaw. The monster deserved it, she decided. He fucking deserved it.
Swallowing the last of her tears, Clementine glared out the door. Through its narrow window, she saw the barn, and the shadows of a man and a baby. The lines of her face warped themselves into the convulsing vat of writhing animosity.
For the first time in five months, she signed her name to a contract. A contract of thirst, to numb the mass of thoughts in her head. A contract of a beast, one that sought to grow and prosper. A contract of an inferno in her eyes, which her parents had desperately tried to drill in her head to avoid. A contract of sin, as it were.
It should have scared Clementine how composed she was, and how the buzz coaxed her ease; how quickly she accepted it, the beast and its malevolent thirst. Even so, she pushed through the door, and her eyes were set on the barn. The buzz throbbed along her body. Its hum continued to course through her thoughts. She was hungry for the flask, wherever it was, and the drink that would soon refill it, something to wash away the tension that would return once the buzz left her.
The grip around the pistol solidified, and her knuckles around the knife's hilt tightened. She steadily marched towards the wide doors where the light of a lantern flickered. As she drew closer, Clementine heard the wails of A.J and the gritty hisses of foul language from the third man. The ghost.
She stalked behind him and aimed the gun. Pure hatred itched her chest as she sneered a controlled breath. "Let us go," Clementine commanded, her voice rasped by the beast's intentions.
The man froze, then sat up from the footstool he was on. "What the fuck is Daron doing letting her—?" As he turned around, his eyes widened. The ghost man found a little girl, pistol in one hand and a knife in the other, with fresh blood painted on her face. Her eyes were unnaturally steady on him.
"Let. Us. Go." Clementine became gradually restless. Her hand began to tremble on the gun—not to drop it, but to jerk her trigger finger.
The ghost man was stunned by the hellfire in her eyes. She was no child. She couldn't have been. Those golden eyes were blaring, blinding him of the pistol raised at his head. There was a long moment of a dreadful silence. There was no need to ask what happened to Daron.
Those eyes of hellfire said everything.
How much of a miscalculation it was to catch the girl.
How much of a mistake it was to have the one-eyed monster interrogate her.
Her face was pulled into a violent sneer, jaw clenched and eyes livid. Obedient to her monstrous contract, Clementine decided his fate. The crack of the bullet and his skull was the last thing he heard, and Clementine darting away towards the hysterical baby was the last thing he ever saw.
The ghost man was dead before he hit the ground.
And so here's the first episode of this fic! As you can probably tell already, this story is based off of my in-game choices as Clementine, and essentially what I envision the aftermath of Season Two. For a little run-down of the rest of this tale, Episodes 2 & 3 are based off of A New Frontier, leaving Episodes 4-7 based off of The Final Season; there is an extra chapter—Episode 1.5, if you will—that takes place between Episode 1 and Episode 2 of this fic. It is considered to be an interlude, separating the episodes based off of the third and fourth seasons. So, in total, there will be eight chapters, but seven episodes, yes?
Anyway, I will say, for those who are planning on binging this…it's a long one. Don't let this chapter fool you. xD It's the only one under 15k words, so you'll be sitting here for a while. It's a project of passion, and I go all in.
So, with that said, grab a snack, get comfy, or take some breaks! I hope you enjoy!
:)
