Clementine looked down at the flopping fish she had pinned to the ground with her left hand, trying not to think about the hammer she was holding in her right hand. Looking into the creature's eye, Clem couldn't help but feel it was staring right into her, begging the girl to spare her. Looking to her left, Clem saw Patty studying her carefully. The woman's face said 'do it', but her eyes said 'don't'. Looking straight ahead, Clem saw the lake sprawled out in front of her, shimmering in the midday sun, and she had a sudden urge to toss the fish back into it.

"You know it's suffocating right now." Clementine looked to her right to find Anthony looking down at her, an odd smile on his face. "Every second you just sit there, it's slowly dying and—"

"Would you shut the fuck up?" snapped Patty.

"Hey, you asked for a fishing lesson," said Anthony. "You think killing fish would be easy after killing people all day."

"Walkers aren't people," argued Patty. "Not anymore."

"Fish were never people, but you—"

Clementine brought the hammer down onto the fish's head, then quickly hit it twice more before breathing out. The fish was still now, its head slightly deformed from the blows and its eye now crushed into a gray goo. Clem tossed the hammer aside and took a couple of deep breaths. Looking down at the now lifeless creature, she felt a tinge of sadness stinging at her heart.

"I didn't like doing it either," whispered Patty as she moved in close behind Clem. "But it's done now."

"Yeah…" said Clem in a quiet voice. "Now I… I gotta cut it up right?"

"Yeah, but don't worry, I'll help you," assured Patty.

"You two gut people all the time to smear on raincoats, but get squeamish around cutting open a fish," mused Anthony.

"Why don't you fuck off for a while?" suggested an irritated Patty.

"Whatever." Anthony walked away, moving towards a lawn chair sitting near the lake shore that had a fishing rod leaning against it.

"God that guy pisses me off," grumbled Patty. "He's always looking for any chance he can to talk down to us."

"It is weird though," admitted Clem as she looked at the dead fish. "I've had to do things that were way worse than this, but for some reason this still bothers me."

"Maybe it's because you didn't necessarily have to do this?" suggested Patty. "We have to eat, and we probably should be learning how to do it off the land sooner instead of later, but still, it's our choice to kill a fish to do it; feels different than having to kill something because it might kill you."

"Yeah, I guess that's it," said Clem. "Most of the stuff I've had to kill would have killed me if it didn't. I even had to shoot a dog once."

"You shot a dog?" asked a surprised Patty. "Why?"

"It bit me," explained Clem as she rolled up her left sleeve. "And it just kept growling at me, like it was going to bite me again."

"Jesus…" Clem watched as Patty traced her fingers across the scar on her forearm.

"I didn't like shooting it, but I was scared of what would happen if I didn't," said Clem as she pulled her sleeve down. "But this fish never could have hurt me, even if it wanted to."

"Yeah, unless we don't butcher it right," said Patty as she handed Clem a long knife. "Then we'll all be hurting from food poisoning, or worse."

"And that will mean we killed it for no reason."

With Patty's help, Clem began to remove the fish's scales. It was a simple but repetitive process of dragging the back of her knife across the carcass repeatedly until it managed to lift some scales away from the body. When asked why they weren't using the sharp end, Patty explained it would dull the knife while also likely cutting into the fish. Removing scales wasn't that gross but it was annoying as they seemed to fly everywhere and removing every last one was a long and tedious process.

After that she had to insert the knife into an opening on the underside of the fish and slice its belly from its tail up to its head. Patty warned her not to move the blade too deep inside the fish because she could cut open the stomach and release bacteria. Clem was cautious, only inserting the tip of the knife into the fish and very slowly sawing the blade forward towards the head. Widening the opening by pulling on the flaps of skin, Clem could see the fish's insides now, which meant it was time for the next step.

Removing the organs was by far Clem's least favorite part. Cutting out the gills, pulling on entrails, scooping the kidney or maybe the liver out with a spoon; each step just felt sickening. Even with gloves on, Clem could still sense the disgusting wet texture of the fish's organs just from looking at them, and even though the smell of blood was faint, it still made Clementine feel sick. Also, Clem found it morbid having to slowly cut out everything that allowed the fish to live one piece at a time. It just constantly reminded her of how this was a living thing until just a few minutes ago.

She also kept worrying she may have been missing something that would ruin the meat or make them sick, and it didn't help Patty herself didn't seem entirely confident in what they were doing. Clementine thought about asking for Anthony's help, but she could tell Patty wanted to avoid talking with the young man as much as possible, so the pair carried on alone, meticulously clearing out everything that looked like an organ and dropping it in a bucket.

Eventually, after rinsing out the carcass with water they had boiled earlier, Clem was ready to remove the flesh from the rest of the body. Following Patty's instructions, she cut off the fish's head and tail, then folded open the body as much as should while the spine was still attached, turning the carcass into what looked like a big leaf made out of pink meat.

With Patty's guidance and a long and flexible knife, Clem inserted the blade in between the ribcage and the flesh. She positioned the tip of the knife along the backbone and started sawing through the body towards the head. Clem found the entire procedure awkward, with her knife bumping into the ribs or poking out of the carcass as she tried to cleave the flesh from the rest of the body.

Patty was patient the entire time though, helping to reposition the knife and then guide it along its course. Although Clem appreciated the woman's help, she found herself bothered by the fact that Patty only seemed to know marginally more about doing this than Clem herself. A lot of the woman's advice was delivered with a series of awkward pauses, as if she was trying to remember what they're supposed to do as they did it.

After slicing off as much flesh as they could from one half of the fish, then repeating the same clumsy procedure for the other half, Clem was now looking at a couple of strips of uncooked fish meat lying before her. They appeared mangled compared to the ones Anthony had given them a few days ago, with small holes and cuts appearing anywhere Clem lost control of the knife, and the edges appeared frayed and torn instead of neatly cut, but it was a couple of cuts of meat just the same.

"You two still fiddling with that bass?" Clem looked up to see Anthony standing over them, still wearing that odd smile he had from earlier.

"Actually, we were just finishing," said Patty as she started storing their knives into a small toolbox.

"How'd I do?" asked Clem as she moved away from the meat so Anthony could see her work better.

"You left a lot of meat on the fish," Anthony noted almost instantly. "And judging from all the scales on your tarp, it looks like you left the skin on. You know you could have skipped descaling it if you just cut the skin off the meat right?"

"No, we didn't know that because you never told us anything about skinning it," retorted Patty as she shut her toolbox.

"Well I was going to until you chased me off," insisted Anthony.

"Oh you were? Any reason you didn't tell me anything about skinning it yesterday during all those lessons you were giving me?"

"It's a bit of advanced technique," said Anthony while wearing a smug smile. "Figured I'd save it for today."

Patty groaned then grabbed her toolbox. "Come on Clem, let's go eat lunch." Clem carefully placed the butchered fish into a cooler, flung all the scales off her tarp, then chased after the woman.

"Lunch sounds good," called Anthony as they walked away. "Any chance I could come over?"

"Go get your own," yelled Patty as she started walking a little faster.

"I already cooked and ate some fish while you two were gutting that one," Clem could barely hear Anthony say as they neared the Brave.

"Then why would you need to come over for lunch then?" Clem asked as loud as she could. Instead of waiting for Anthony answer, she headed into the Brave and Patty locked the door behind them. Briefly heading over the windshield, Clem could see Anthony was still staring in their direction, but then turned away and headed back towards his camper, which was parked in the backyard of an abandoned house built beside the lake.

"Kem-men." Clem turned around to see Omid walking towards her, Sarah right behind him.

"How'd it go?" Clem opened the cooler and set out the two somewhat mangled strips of fish on the counter in front of Sarah. "Wow."

"Mah-bah." Omid tried to reach up towards the counter only for Sarah to take hold of him.

"I messed up a lot," admitted Clem. "And there was something I could do with getting rid of the skin. I'll do better next time."

"You did fine Clem, don't listen to Anthony," assured Patty. "First time ever gutting a fish and you got us two nice strips of meat for lunch; much better than my first attempt where it came back in like a dozen pieces."

"I kind of liked those though," said Sarah. "It was like having little fish pork chops… or fish chops I guess."

"That's only because Clem is such a good cook." Clem found herself nearly blushing at Patty's approval. "Think you can whip us up something like that again today?"

"Sure, I could cut it into smaller pieces, so it's like what we had for dinner last night." Clem quickly headed to the closet to get what she needed. She struggled to locate the spices through the tall stacks of canned and dried foods piled up on every shelf. After just a couple of trips to Hattiesburg, Patty and Anthony had brought back almost enough food to fill the entire closet. They had to even resort to storing some of their food in the RV's exterior compartments, and that was after giving a third of it to Anthony.

After grabbing a few fresh shakers of seasoning salt and oregano, Clem noticed a box filled with little plastic lemons sitting under the bottom shelf. Grabbing one, Clem unscrewed the top of the lemon-shaped bottle and sniffed the contents. She couldn't smell much, so she squirted a tiny bit of liquid onto her hand. It smelled like lemon, and tasting it she found it was tart like a lemon, so she figured it hadn't gone bad yet.

Returning to the kitchen, Clementine eagerly got to work. She sliced the bass into smaller bite-sized pieces before sprinkling them with seasonings and a squirt of lemon juice, then slid them into a pan. Listening to the meat sizzle and watching it turn from pink to a golden brown felt very gratifying to behold for Clem. As she divided the fish up evenly amongst three plates, Clem had to resist the urge to just grab a piece with her bare hands and eat it right then.

Heading for the dinner table, Clem found Sarah had already opened a couple of cans of mixed fruit. The older girl carefully spooned out the sticky concoction of cherries, bits of pineapple, and sliced peaches onto the plates while Patty poured kool-aid into glasses and Omid's sippy cup. After Omid took a place on Sarah's lap and Patty pulled the stool up to the table, the group started eating.

Clem found herself carefully evaluating the taste of the fish more than anything. The lemon she put on it was a welcome addition, giving the meat a much-needed zest that seasoning salt and oregano alone didn't seem capable of. She found the texture a little odd however, noting that one side felt rougher than the other. She had noticed this for the fish Patty had butchered yesterday and assumed it must be the skin Anthony mentioned.

Other than that, Clem had no complaints, and it seemed like no one else did either. Patty, Sarah and even Omid were all devouring their meals as quickly as they could, joy bubbling over in their eyes, satisfaction on their faces, and the occasional noises of appreciation escaping their lips in the short time they weren't closed for chewing. It wasn't until they had nearly cleared their plates did a conversation start.

"I know I say this like every time," Patty told Clem. "But that was your best meal yet."

"Thanks," spoke a flattered Clem. "I added some lemon juice you guys brought back from Hattiesburg yesterday. I guess it doesn't go bad."

"Is that why is tastes so good?" said Sarah as she tore off a small piece of fish. "I knew something was different, but I couldn't tell what."

"Mah-bah, mah-bah," chanted an excited Omid as Sarah fed him the fish.

"I think Omid noticed too," said Sarah as the boy clumsily chewed his morsel of food. "You did a great job, even better than you usually do, and you usually do great."

"Thanks," Clem said again, finding herself embarrassed by all the praise.

"And you butchered the fish too," noted Patty.

"You did?" asked a surprised Sarah.

"With a lot of help from Patty," said Clem. "Who learned how from Anthony."

"Don't be modest, you're a regular frontierswoman now," said Patty.

"I still don't know how to catch fish," said Clem. "You wanted Anthony to teach us how to cut them up first."

"That's because I figured it wouldn't do us any good to catch fish if we didn't know the safe way to prepare them," said Patty. "We get a couple more lessons from Anthony on the subject, teach Sarah how to butcher a fish, and then we can move onto catching fish ourselves."

"I… I have to learn to… kill fish?" asked Sarah. "And… cut them up?"

"I figured you'd want to," said Patty. "I know it's not pleasant, but—"

"It's important," finished a resigned Sarah.

"Well don't despair, we're not going to rush you into it," assured Patty as she put an arm around the older girl's shoulder.

"No, I should probably learn it as soon as possible," realized Sarah. "In case I ever have to do it while you two are gone or something. I just know I'm going to hate it."

"Yeah, I hated it. I hated killing that fish, and taking out its organs was really gross, but…" Clem looked down at the last scrap of fish she hadn't eaten. "That's where meat comes from," shrugged the girl before cleaning off her plate.

"It is really nice to have fresh meat again," said Sarah as she fed another small piece of fish to an excitable Omid. "I guess we're lucky Anthony knows how to get them and cut them up."

"Speaking of which, I think it's time we told our new 'friend' about our plans to go to New Orleans," said Patty. "We've never actually said where we're going, and if he's coming with us he'll need to know."

"You're sure you still want to go to New Orleans?" asked Clem. "I mean, after what we saw in Mobile?"

"I'm not expecting to find much, if anything…" admitted Patty.

"Then why go?"

"Where should we go?" Patty's question was met with total silence. "We all agreed we need to find something more permanent than just moving around scavenging whatever little food is left before it dwindles away."

"And then there's OJ," said Clem as she looked at the boy sitting in Sarah's lap, drinking from his sippy cup in big gulps. "He's just going to keep getting bigger, and eventually he'll figure out how to open the door and might go outside because he doesn't know any better. He can already get out his crib somehow."

"Actually I think I figured that out," said Sarah. "I think he stuck his rattle's handle past the bars and pushed open the latch that locks the front."

"You saw him do that?"

"No, but I remembered he tried opening the door outside like that, and figured if he tried that for the crib it might work," said Sarah as she guided a cherry into the boy's mouth, much to his approval. "I figure if I don't leave him with his rattle, he probably can't get out."

"Well that's good I guess," said Clem. "But eventually he'll be able to get out without that, and then what?"

"Maybe we could find a place like this and stay there, or just stay here for now?" suggested Sarah as she gestured to the beautiful lake beyond the windshield. "The houses next to it are in good shape, we wouldn't even have to stay in the RV."

"Sarah, you know we can't stay here," said Clem. "We'll run out of food."

"I know, but we got a lot now and we have fish," said Sarah. "Couldn't we just stay here for a little while? It'd be nice to live in something bigger than an RV again, at least until the winter was over."

"We would just have to move back into the Brave afterwards, and start looking for somewhere safe all over again," reminded Clem. "And Omid would be even bigger when that happens."

"Yeah, I know all that," said Sarah with a sigh. "I'm just tired of always moving. I hated living at Shaffer's, but they had eggs and fresh fruit and vegetables. If we just had that…"

"Wait, you lived somewhere with stuff like that after things went bad?" Sarah nodded at Patty. "How… how the hell did they get that stuff?"

"One of the people there was a farmer, and she brought her chickens with her, so we had eggs every day," explained Sarah. "And another person was like a scientist, and she knew how to grow food by herself."

"She was also a huge bitch," added Clem.

"You were there too?" Clem nodded at Patty. "Geez, why'd you two ever leave?"

"We told you why," said Clem. "They'd locked us in a cage and would let us starve if we didn't work enough."

"Wait, Shaffer's is that bad place you've told me about before, right?" Clem and Sarah nodded at Patty. "But they had chickens and a farm?"

"A greenhouse, but yeah," said Clem. "But bad people were in charge of who got the food. And even if they're all dead now, we wouldn't want to go back there after what happened."

"Jesus…"

"Even if Dr. Bostwick was mean, I wish she was here," said Sarah. "She could probably grow us stuff to eat, and with the fish Anthony catches we wouldn't have to move around anymore."

"Well whoever that is isn't here, and none of us are farmers," said Patty. "So unless any of you got a better idea…" Clementine tried to think of alternatives, but all she could come up with is what they were already doing; look for food somewhere, then go somewhere else. "All right, let's go tell Anthony about the plan then."

Clem helped Patty with the dishes, then collected their guns and loaded them while Sarah took a drowsy Omid into the bedroom.

"Do you think Anthony wouldn't want to go to New Orleans?" asked Clem as she placed her gun in its holster. "He said he'd stay with us before."

"Yeah, but we didn't mention New Orleans then," said Patty as she loaded her gun. "The whole time we were driving to Hattiesburg, he kept trying to talk me out of it. That was before I gave him the raincoat, but still, it sounds like he knows big cities can mean big trouble."

"Yeah, they've been trouble for us too," said Sarah as she returned to the front. "But then so have small cities, and towns, and—"

"Everywhere really," finished Clem as she loaded another gun.

"Yeah, all the more reason we keep looking for somewhere that's got its shit together," said Patty as she holstered her gun. "And if we're lucky, maybe we'll find some clues to where that is in New Orleans."

"Yeah, I just hope Anthony feels the same way." Clem offered Sarah her gun.

"What's this for?" asked the older girl.

"Aren't you coming with us?" Clem asked Sarah. "I mean, Omid is napping right?"

"Yeah, but I thought I'll just stay here and do the laundry," said Sarah.

"You should come," insisted Clem. "We might need your help to convince Anthony to come with us to New Orleans."

"What could I do?"

"You're smart Sarah, you might think of something we didn't."

"And I don't really get along all that well with Anthony," admitted Patty. "It'd probably help if there were a couple of people who were more… neutral than me, instead of just one."

"Well, I can get the baby monitor and just do the laundry outside I guess," reasoned Sarah as she took the gun and placed it in her holster. "That way I can at least hear what you guys are talking about."

Clem and Patty double checked their weapons while Sarah grabbed a laundry basket and a bucket of water. The trio headed outside together but Sarah quickly broke away from the group to find a place to hang up her clothesline. Heading out of the Brave always caused Clem to instinctively search for threats. She didn't expect to see anything dangerous, but couldn't stop herself from looking anyway.

It was cool and quiet out with a mostly clear sky. If not for some dark clouds off on the horizon, it'd be a picturesque day. When they first arrived, Clem thought this area may have been some kind of resort. There were tropical looking trees she hadn't seen since Mobile planted alongside the lake and a series of buildings made with fine red bricks that matched the path running alongside them, all walled off behind an ornate black iron fence that separated this small section of lakefront property from the road.

Searching the buildings however revealed they were just houses and this was a very small gated neighborhood, likely abandoned long ago. Looking out on the pristine view of the lake, Clem could understand why someone who want to build a house here, but it seemed selfish to fence it off from everyone else. It hardly seemed to matter now as the fence was being put to use by them against walkers or anything else that might come this way. Patty had chained shut the only opened gate they had found, and briefly eyeing it as they walked past, Clem could see the chain was still intact.

"Hey, Anthony? You in there?" Clem turned her head to see Patty knocking on the door to Anthony's camper. He, per Patty's request, had parked behind the house next to the house they had parked the Brave by. Clem wasn't entirely sure why she asked him to do that, but she trusted the woman when she said she didn't want Anthony too close to them. "Seriously, we want to talk to you about something."

"About what?" Clem spun around to find Anthony standing in the backdoor to the house his truck was parked next to.

"What were you doing in there?" asked Patty.

"Enjoying life as a rich prick in a gated community," he said with a smile.

"There's nothing worthwhile in there, you now that," said Patty.

"I disagree," said Anthony. "There's plenty of expensive looking furniture and gold-plated crap sitting on the shelves in here."

"So?"

"So, I like propping my feet up on a couch that probably cost more than I ever made while trying to ring baskets using priceless crap that's worthless now."

"Why?" asked Clem.

"I enjoy it," said Anthony. "Enjoy thinking about how the rich pricks who lived here before are dead and I can do whatever I want to their fancy house now. I find it… comforting."

"That's… weird," said Clem.

"Yeah," said Patty.

"Weirder than going to Disney World during the end of the world?" retorted Anthony. "Besides, my camper is overloaded with food right now. A good problem to have, but it does mean it's even more cramped in there than usual."

"Look, we wanted to talk to you about something," said Patty.

"Well come on in," said Anthony as he gestured to the door.

"You know I like to do our meetings outside," said Patty.

"Right, because I'm going to kill you the second we're alone in the same room together or something," mocked Anthony.

"Humor me." Patty marched with Clem back towards the Brave, Anthony trailing behind them. Clem could see Sarah now, sitting under a clothesline running between a couple of trees. The older girl appeared to be washing a t-shirt in a bucket until she saw them approaching.

"Hi Anthony," called the older girl as she waved at the young man.

"Hey there…" Clem watched as Anthony suddenly moved in close to Patty. "What's her name again?"

"Sarah…" mumbled an irritated Patty.

"Hey Sarah," said Anthony as the group came to a stop near where Sarah was working. "Busy doing the laundry?"

"Yeah, I figured I'd get it done before it rains," said Sarah as she wrung out a shirt. "It's sunny now, but I can see overcast clouds past the lake, and they look closer now than when we woke up. Hopefully everything will be dry before they get here."

"Don't suppose you could do my laundry?" asked Anthony.

"Well, I guess—"

"He's kidding," informed Patty.

"He is?" asked Sarah.

"Well that depends," said Anthony. "It didn't sound like she was going to say no just now."

"I'm already doing laundry, so—"

"She's not doing your laundry, Jesus Anthony," spoke an indignant Patty. "You barely know the girl and the first thing you do is hit her up to clean your filthy clothes? Have some self-respect, you're supposed to be an adult."

"I'm seventeen," informed Anthony.

"You are?" asked a genuinely surprised Clementine.

"Yeah, thanks for finally asking," retorted Anthony.

"But you're so… tall," noted Sarah.

"Thank you," said Anthony with an odd smile. "It's the Italian in me, I sprouted up to full-size when I was thirteen. It was awesome being taller than everyone in the seventh grade, including the teachers."

"Shit, that means I'm still the oldest one here," realized Patty.

"But I bet Sarah's doing your laundry, isn't she?" Patty glared at Anthony in response. "And I thought you had more self-respect than that."

"You sonofa—"

"Wait, if you're only seventeen, does that mean you were sixteen when things changed?" asked Clem.

"Umm… no, I was fifteen when I first started hearing about shit going crazy," recalled Anthony. "That was April I think, and my next birthday was May, and that's when I would have turned sixteen."

"Your birthday is in May?" asked Sarah. "When? Mine's the sixteenth."

"May twenty-third," said Anthony. "How old are you?"

"I'm fourteen right now," said Sarah. "I guess I'll turn fifteen a week before you turn eighteen."

"Okay, that's enough about birthdays," said Patty. "We—"

"What happened to your parents?" asked Clem. "If you were only fifteen then, you must have been living with them."

"Not hardly," retorted Anthony. "I never met dear old dad, and after I got adult sized, my mom sent me off to some bullshit military boarding school, said it would 'straighten me out,' fucking bitch."

"You were in the military?" asked Clem.

"Huh, I wish," scoffed Anthony. "Military school is all the shitty parts of being in the army without any of the fun stuff like using guns or learning how to blow things up. We had to dress up like 'upstanding citizens' and learn worthless shit all day, lot like regular high school, cept you couldn't get away with nothing. I did it for like three months and then bailed."

"You went home?" asked Sarah as she hung a shirt on the clothesline.

"No, I just left," said Anthony. "Bummed a ride to the next town, never looked back."

"Wait, you're a teenage runaway?" asked Patty.

"I prefer drifter that… wait no, that sounds worse than runaway," realized Anthony. "Let's say I walked the Earth, yeah, that sounds good."

"You never went home to your mom?" asked a concerned Sarah.

"Fuck no," said Anthony.

"She had to be worried about you," insisted Sarah.

"I sincerely doubt it," said Anthony. "And she's probably dead now, like almost everyone else."

"What did you do for food?" asked Clem.

"Took odd jobs wherever I could find them," said Anthony. "Hunting season was always good because butchers would always hire extra hands to handle all the deer people wanted made into venison. They always told me I was a natural."

"Is that where you learned how to catch fish and gut them?" asked Clem.

"Yeah, someone whose name I forgot taught me that a while back," said Anthony. "Glad he did, sometimes I'd just go fishing for lunch, save some money."

"Where exactly were you staying during all of this?" asked Patty.

"Here, there, friend's houses whenever I made friends," said Anthony. "During the summer I'd usually just camp out somewhere as long as the weather was good."

"You were homeless," realized Patty.

"Again, I walked the Earth, sounds much better," insisted Anthony with a smirk.

"You were all alone and had no home?" asked a disturbed Sarah. "That's horrible."

"Are you kidding? I loved it," professed Anthony. "I spent most of my life having to do what other people told me before I woke up and realized I could be free. No school, no parents, no nothing unless I wanted it. Hell, if not for those damn ghoulies roaming around, there wouldn't be much for me to worry about these days either."

"Except the other people who might be out there," said Patty.

"I had to worry about them before," said Anthony. "But now there's less people, a lot less, so the way I see it, that's just less to worry about."

Clem heard a familiar electronic crackling and thought it was her radio. But then she looked over to see Sarah was holding the baby monitor up to ear as she turned the volume up.

"What is it?" asked Clem as she moved in close beside the older girl. "Is he waking up?"

"I'm not sure," said Sarah as she listened to the baby monitor. "I think I heard him say something, but he might just be talking in his sleep."

"Well let me know if he wakes up," said Clem. "I can finish the laundry for you if you have to go in."

"You guys checking on your secret baby over there?" Clem turned around to see Anthony was staring at her and Sarah. "Still having trouble wrapping my head around that one. It doesn't belong to any of you, but you're raising it anyway?"

Clem found herself glaring at Anthony in response. She wasn't sure why, but the way he said 'it' really irritated her. She left Sarah to work on the laundry and moved back to Patty's side, who also was silently staring at Anthony. "I guess you guys didn't tell me about it because—"

"Him," dictated Clem. "He's not an it."

"All right then, didn't tell me about him because you thought I'd do something?" asked Anthony as he held up his hands. "I can assure you, I'm not in the market for a baby of my own."

"Let's just say, we're really protective of him," informed Patty. "And that's one of the reasons we're looking for somewhere better to live, so he won't have to grow up in a damn RV."

"Okay, I guess this has something to do with what you wanted to talk to me about?" concluded Anthony.

"We want you to come with us to New Orleans."

"New Orleans?" repeated Anthony. "Much as I'd love to go with you to Mardi Gras, I don't think the festivities are happening this year… or ever again."

"I used to live in Miami; it was put under martial law not long after the walkers showed up," explained Patty. "And while I was there, I kept hearing soldiers talk about New Orleans. It came up over and over again, from all different soldiers in all different posts."

"So?"

"So it has to be somewhere important to the military," said Patty.

"The military?" Anthony laughed out loud. "You're still holding out hope that they're gonna take care of all this?"

"Certainly not all of it," retorted Patty. "They pulled out of Miami a few months ago and—"

"Wait, months ago?" asked Anthony.

"Yeah," said Patty.

"You're saying, up until a few months ago, people were still living in Miami while the military took care of things?"

"Their care left a lot to be desired," said Patty. "But yeah, they were there."

"Well hell, I just figured everywhere went to shit at the same time," said Anthony. "I never thought some places held together afterwards. Guess Mississippi wasn't important enough for the military to bother with. Weird thinking about how while most of us were running around trying to stay alive, there were still cities running out there."

"I know how you feel," said Clementine. "When I had to leave home, we stayed in a hotel on the edge of Macon, and for the first couple of nights we heard helicopters and guns and thought the military was going to save us. But after those first few nights we didn't hear them again, and they never came. I figured they all died, but now I'm wondering if they just left us."

"Which is what happened in Miami eventually; one day they just pulled out and left us to fend for ourselves," said Patty. "And it looked like it happened in Mobile as well. Clearly there's somewhere out there they were heading for, somewhere they thought they'd be safer."

"And you think that's New Orleans?"

"Maybe," said Patty. "Or maybe it's just another stop on the way to wherever they were going. Either way, it's the best lead to finding a part of the country that's not a war zone."

"Or New Orleans could be a war zone," retorted Anthony. "When we first met, you acted like we'd stay off the beaten path. Next you wanted me to take you to Hattiesburg and I went along with it because it sounded like you knew how to deal with the dead. But New Orleans? That's a big step up over where we've been."

"It's not that big of a city really," said Sarah as she hung up some socks. "Its population is—um… was, about three-hundred thousand. It's nowhere near as big as somewhere like New York or Chicago."

"It's not even as big as Miami," added Patty.

"How do you people know that?" asked Anthony. "You memorize every city in the country's population or something?"

"No, it's just written in the back of the road atlas we use," said Sarah. "New Orleans is actually kind of small for a big city."

"A 'small' big city is still a big step up over Hattiesburg, or Gulf Port, and I don't need to remind you we want to be avoiding that second one," said Anthony. "And then let's say we get there and the military does have things under control; what makes you think they're just going to let us in? I mean, you didn't sound too happy with how they ran things in Miami."

"I didn't like how the Army ran things, at least not the ones I met, but they weren't the only ones trying to keep control of major cities," said Patty. "I heard soldiers gripe all the time about how the Navy or the Marines were given 'better' posts, and how they wish they were there instead of Miami."

"And you think New Orleans was one of them," said Anthony. "You seem to be putting a lot of faith in stuff you heard other people talking about. How do you know they weren't full of shit, or that the Army would be any different than the Navy and the Marines?"

"Because the Army attacked the Navy in Mobile," informed Clementine. "Or at least some of them did."

"What?" spoke a shocked Anthony. "You saw that?"

"We saw what was left," said Clem. "A busted tank and bodies in Army uniforms on one side, and a bunch graves with tags that said Navy on the other."

"It looked like the Navy won the fight before they left," said Patty. "And it also looked like they were trying to protect people from the Army, so maybe they moved onto New Orleans and are still there."

"Or maybe not," said Anthony. "I'll admit, all this talk about the military roaming around at odds with each other does peak my curiosity, but it still sounds like going to New Orleans is a shot in the dark."

"That's why we want you to come with us," said Patty. "We don't know what to expect, and we could use all the help we can get."

"So, you need me in other words." Clem watched as Patty groaned and Anthony's grin grew wider.

"In other words… yes," said Patty through clenched teeth. "So, please, we're asking for your help."

"Well I don't know," said Anthony. "Really I'm pretty happy with our current arrangement of laying low while grabbing food from Hattiesburg a truckload at a time."

"You know the food is going to run out," said Patty. "Just yesterday we only found a handful of what we found on our first day."

"That handful was still a pretty nice chunk," said Anthony. "It'd take a lot to convince me to just bail on all that."

"A lot… what the hell do you want?" asked Patty.

"I don't know, what's my help worth to you?" Anthony flashed Patty a sly grin and the woman spun around in a hurry.

"Patty," said Clem as she grabbed hold of the woman's hand as she hurried towards the Brave. "Wait."

"Are you okay?" asked Sarah as she approached the woman.

"I can't do this," grumbled Patty. "He just keeps… God…"

"Let us talk to him," suggested Clem.

"Us?" said Sarah.

"Come on, just for a minute, to give Patty a break." Clem looked at Patty, who just shrugged. Clem then looked at Sarah, who looked unsure of herself, but still willing to help anyway.

"You three done huddling yet?" asked Anthony.

"Do you not want to find somewhere safer than here?" asked Clem as she stepped forward.

"I wouldn't mind, but I just don't see why I should be risking my neck on some long shot you yourselves don't sound all that sure of," said Anthony. "You're asking a lot from me and don't seem to have much to give back."

"What could we give you?" asked Sarah. "You already have plenty of food, and we already told you what we know about getting past the lurkers."

"I wouldn't mind having my gun back," said Anthony.

"Come with us to New Orleans and maybe we'll give it back then," proposed Patty.

"Yeah, but you also said you'd give it back if I ever left," said Anthony. "So unless that's changed, maybe I'd be better just taking my gun and leaving you three to go wherever you want."

"You can't be serious," said Patty. "You haven't even finished teaching us how to fish."

"Then I'll stick around long enough to do that before I go, it won't take long," said Anthony.

"You're really going to leave us?" asked Sarah. "Just like that?"

"From where I'm standing, you're planning on leaving me," informed Anthony. "I don't just see the reason to rush off to take such a big risk."

"Because we're gonna have to take a big risk eventually," said Clem. "The military has already cleaned out cities like Mobile, which are bigger than Hattiesburg, and even if they're not still out there, there's gotta be other groups of people looking for food. We're not just going to keep finding food forever, but we will eventually find other people, it's just a matter of time."

"I guess, but I don't see the need to rush out to meet them," said Anthony.

"If there are any people left in New Orleans, they might help us like we've been helping each other. Teach us something we didn't know, or tell us where we should go or shouldn't go. I mean, haven't things been better for you since you met us?" Anthony didn't answer Clementine's question, instead he just stood there quietly rubbing his chin. "If we just wait, there might not be anyone left by the time we get there, and we'll just be stuck guessing where to go next all over again."

"And think about what if it is safe, and it's just waiting there, and we didn't go because we're afraid?" said Sarah. "If it is safe, then we wouldn't have to worry about lurkers, or people attacking us, and we'd have food, and could just… be happy, and do things we used to do. Aren't there things you did before that you wish you could do again?"

"You can't just want to live in rich people's houses," added Clem.

"Yeah, the fun of that did wear thin pretty quick," admitted Anthony. "If there are people still alive in New Orleans, maybe I could finally find me a date again. I'm starting to doubt my chances here, unless…"

"No," answered Patty. "But even if New Orleans is trashed, we might luck up and it'll have plenty left to eat, like Hattiesburg," suggested Patty. "You and I have gotten probably most of what's worth getting there, but New Orleans is a much bigger town. If there's even one grocery store that hasn't been picked clean, we could just go on break until we eat everything we can't pack into our vehicles."

"Yeah, or we could just go on break now with what left's in Hattiesburg," suggested Anthony. "Seriously, we've could have it pretty good here for a while."

"Unless something goes wrong," said Clementine. "We have food and we're okay now, but if one of us gets sick, or hurt, or all of us, it'll make it harder for us to do anything about it, and that's probably when we'll need to do something the most."

"I made that mistake more times than I'd like to admit in Miami," added Patty. "Waited until I was nearly starving and barely had the energy to go out looking for food; lucky I didn't die along the way. New Orleans might be dangerous, but we'd have a better chance of surviving if we went there when we're all healthy and well-fed.

"And if something does go wrong there and one of us gets hurt, we've got enough supplies right now to hide out for a while. Knowing our luck, New Orleans probably won't be the answer to all our problems and we'll have to go somewhere else afterwards. Every day we spend here eating through our supplies is one less day we'll have later when we really need the rest."

"You make some good points," admitted Anthony. "But, I'm still not hearing much in it for me right now."

"Jesus…" mumbled Patty. "Would you just—"

"If you come with us, I'll give you some freeze-dried ice cream."

Anthony's eyes lit up as soon as he heard those words. "Wait, she said—"

"That was all the freeze-dried ice cream Patty had left," explained Clem. "I saved a little of mine."

"You did?"

"It's in the RV," said Clem as she gestured behind her. "Just say you'll come with us to New Orleans and I'll go get it."

"Damn… you drive a hard bargain," said Anthony as he scratched his head. "Well, seeing as you clearly want me, and thinking about all the points you just made, if you gave me some of that ice cream to literally sweeten the deal, I could see coming along with you to the Big Easy."

"The what?"

"That's a nickname for New Orleans," explained Patty.

"Oh, right. I'll be right back then." Clem hopped into the RV, rushed right to the closet, and located their ice cream. She first grabbed an unopened pack, but then she realized the open one would fit her story better. Then she realized it'd probably be more convincing if there wasn't so much ice cream left inside and quickly ate a piece herself, savoring its flavor before zipping up the bag.

"Here you go," said Clem as she rushed out of the Brave. "Freeze-dried—"

Anthony snatched the bag and immediately ate a piece of chocolate ice-cream. Clem watched his face become overcome with pleasure as his chewing slowed and let the flavor sink in. "Where did you find these things?" asked Anthony, sounding like he was almost ready to cry.

"The Cape Kennedy Space Center," said Sarah.

"So, we got a deal?" Anthony merely nodded at Patty while grabbing another piece of ice-cream. "Great, we can leave in a few days."

"Why wait?" asked Anthony. "You seemed ready to leave a minute ago."

"I still want to top off our supplies with one last trip to Hattiesburg, and you still owe us a few fishing lessons, and I also need to tune up your truck," listed Patty. "Plus, I want to wait for a clear day to go to New Orleans. The last thing we want to do is get caught out in the rain."

"Yeah, and it's definitely going to rain later," said Sarah as she looked out over the lake.

"Don't tell me you three are afraid of the rain?" asked Anthony.

"Rain would wash the blood off our raincoats," said Patty.

"And then the walkers will smell you again," said Clem. "Trust me, you don't want to be near them when that happens."

"All right then," said Anthony before popping another piece of ice cream in his mouth. "Well I'll just be in the house next door, let me—whoa, I bet I know who that belongs to." Clem followed Anthony's line of sight and saw he was watching Sarah, who was currently hanging a pair of black panties on the clothesline. "Didn't think a girl like you would be into lacy things."

Clem watched as Patty's face turned bright red as she raced over to the clothesline and snatched the underwear off of them. "Oh come on, you don't wear something like that unless you're hoping someone sees it."

"Fuck you Anthony!" barked Patty as she marched over to the man. "Why don't you fuck off right back to that damn fancy house you like so much."

"You know, you keep telling me to fuck off, and I might take it personally someday." Anthony popped another piece of ice cream into his mouth and then calmly walked away. Clem watched as a still blushing Patty crammed the underwear into her pocket, her face cringing with anger as she did so.

"I'm sorry," spoke a penitent Sarah. "I didn't mean to embarrass you."

"It's okay Sarah, you're… I'm not mad at you," assured Patty.

"It's not like he saw you in your underwear," consoled Clem. "I mean, they were just hanging there."

"Yeah, I know, but I'm getting so sick of him…" Patty groaned. "Forget it, let's just get inside." As they trio headed back to the Brave, a distant clap of thunder sounded in the distance. Looking out over the lake, Clem saw the storm clouds off in the distance. They were still far away, but she knew they were getting closer with every passing minute.