(Violet's Pov)
The name is Violet, well I like to be called Vincent, I had been born a girl and now I'm a guy, lucky for me science has gone far enough that we only needed to take one pill and bam, we don't need to take multiple shots. I had to have surgery for my chest yes, and down below but hey least I can be who I want to be right? Well not really. My dad wasn't so supportive of me, being who I am, and well he blamed me for my grandmothers death, saying if I had stayed as the precious granddaughter then she would still be here, or he says that because I wanted to be a boy I had screwed them over financially, even though we had been doing bad for years prior too. I don't know all I know is that the world has finally gone to shit, well, a lot shittier than what is was before, it seems the dead have risen from their graves and eat the living. I don't have to worry about my father anymore, unless he's alive but… he wouldn't come here, my mother wouldn't either.
"Vincent come on we got work to do." I heard Marlon say and I got up as I set my book down and I head out to the courtyard and looked at him and Louis.
"What do we have to do?" I asked as we began to walk to the gate.
"Just got to go near the edge of the safe zone to see if there is any food to catch." He said as he grabbed his bow.
"Hmm, true, we have been running low… alright." I said and grabbed my butcher knife and we began to walk out the gate.
"So, what do you think we will catch?" Louis asked.
"Probably some rabbits like always." I said as I shoved him off me a bit.
"What if we get a deer this time?" He asked and I scratched my neck a bit. Need to shave soon.
"That would be great, I could make some jerky like my grandfather made it." I said and he smiled and I nodded.
"We'd need a smoker too." Marlon said and I nodded.
"We could try to go into the town one day?" I asked and he looked at me.
"I'll think on it." He said and we nodded. That's all we could get out of him. We walked a good distance till we heard a crash and I looked to Marlon.
"Adults?" Louis asked.
"I don't know…. We should find out." I said and we all began to run, we even went past the safe zone and got near a train station. I looked around and I saw some smoke.
"A fire?" Marlon asked and I ran to it.
"VINC!" He yelled and I saw a car crashed upside down, down a steep slope, I slide down the steep hill and I hurry to the car and I look inside.
"MARLON, LOUIS THERE ARE KIDS!" I Yelled as I opened the door and looked to the girl as she slowly opened her eyes and closed them again, I looked to her head to see some blood and I look to see Marlon going to the other side and grabbing the boy. I pull the girl out as she said something and I look in to see a bag, Knife, and hat. I quickly grab them and place the items in the bag and put it to my back as I pick the girl up.
"Lets fucking go I'm out of arrows." Marlon says and I nod as we quickly run in the other direction to the school. I looked to the girl as she muttered something as she looked at me a bit.
"Luke?" She asked before she closed her eye's again. When we finally got to the school the night sky was casting over us, I took the girl to my old room where I laid her on the bed. Tenn came over along with Ruby as they checked her over.
"What happened?" Ruby asked.
"We just heard a crash and they were in a car upside down, walkers." I said.
"Did they get bit?" She asked as she looked at me.
"No… not from what we saw, but they would have turned by now if they did get bit." I said and she looked at me.
"Alright, boys need to leave now." She says and I look at her.
"She needs a new shirt; can she borrow one of your old ones?" She asked and I nodded as I went and handed her my shirt.
"Alright, now go, I've got her." Ruby says and I nod as I head out with Tenn as he goes to the old nurse's office.
"You think the girl is ok?" I asked and he looked to me.
"She looks ok but we can't really tell…. There was a boy with you guys?" He asked and I nodded as Marlon came in.
"Ruby is looking at they boy now, she said the girl has a cut on her head but she looks fine but we should uh… tie her hand to the bar." He said and I nod a bit as I look to him.
"You know what you did was stupid Vincent, you didn't even notice the walkers coming at you." He said and I rubbed my neck.
"Look I just… lets talk about this later, not in front of Tenn." I said quietly as Marlon looked at me.
"Fine, whatever." He said and I nod as I grab some tape and Tenn and I went to my room and I looked at the girl.
"You think she will turn?" He asked as I taped her hand to the bar of my bed.
"Probably not, I mean that would be pretty shitty, to live this long but get killed in a car wreak." I said as I looked to her. She was breathing softly and I looked at the bandage on her head.
"Where are you going to sleep?" He asked and I looked to him.
"I have look-out tonight, and if she isn't awake by then, than I can crash in… well." I said and looked at him then down at the floor as he nods and leaves. I look at the girl more and I head to the courtyard as I handed Marlon her bag.
"Two more mouths to feed." He mumbled and I looked to him.
"Well at least it's better than letting kids die like that." I said and he looked to me.
"Sorry just…. you're right… you're right, lets just… get them better." He says and I nod as I get ready for my lookout shift. It's been days since we had saved the girl who is called Clementine, and he boy, who says his name is Alvin Junior. Currently Alvin Junior was watching me as I was strumming my guitar a bit.
"What's that?" He asked as I looked to him.
"It's a guitar." I simply said and looked at him as he sat down next to me and I smiled a bit.
"Can you play it?" He asked and I nod as I strum the strings a bit and move my hand in the right position. I began to play a soft tune as I looked to him and he sways a bit and I see Tenn and Ruby, along with Brody come over as I continue to play some more.
"Wow." I heard the boy say and I nod.
"Pretty nice hu?" I asked and he nods as he looked at the guitar as I continued to play it.
"Louis can play the piano too." Tenn says to the boy and he looked to Tenn as I play more.
"Piano?" He asked and I nod.
"We can show it to you in a bit." Brody says as I look to them.
"When do you think Aasim and them will be back?" I asked as I look at the gate.
"They won't be long, if they can't find anything then I'll have to go with them." Brody says and I nod a bit.
"Hey how is Clementine?" Alvin Junior asked and I looked to Ruby as I played a different tune.
"She's doing just fine Sug." Ruby says and I see Marlon come in through the gate with Aasim and Louis as they argued a bit. I stopped playing and got up and went over to them.
"Woah calm down, what is going on?" I asked.
"Nothing." Marlon says.
"Bullshit dude."
"Hey." I said.
"Fucking, the safe zone is getting smaller how the hell can we feed our people?" Aasim asked and I looked to Marlon.
"We will find a way." Marlon says.
"We didn't find shit out there man." Aasim says. And true to his word they didn't catch anything out there.
"Hey how about I go with you Aasim and we can find some type of food." I says as I look to him.
"There is nothing out there Vincent." He says and I rub my neck.
"Look we still have day light to burn, we can go out again, I'll bring my bow and we can see what we can get, let Marlon cool off." I said as I looked to Marlon.
"Fine whatever." Marlon says and I watch him leave.
"Can I come?" I heard and looked to Alvin Junior as he came up to us.
"Uh, it's a bit dangerous kid." I said.
"I can deal with monsters." He said and I looked to Aasim.
"Sure, I don't care but he's not my responsibility." He says and I look to the kid.
"Well, how about this, you stay here and uh, let Louis play the piano for you? Tell him Vincent said he sucked and you wanted to see if it was true." I said and he nods and runs off to Tenn to ask about where to go. I look to Aasim as he looked to me and I grabbed my bow and set my guitar to the side as we begin to leave the school grounds Brody also following us out with her torch.
"Fucking Marlon is going to starve us to death if he keeps pulling back the safe zone more Vincent." Aasim says once we get far enough from the school. I sigh as I look around a bit.
"I know but there's nothing we can do about it right now." I said as I looked to him.
"Bullshit, we can just go out the safe zone just for a bit, get some god damn food and no one would be the wiser." He says and I look at him.
"And if one of us were to get hurt or worse killed?" I asked as we looked at the traps again and I rubbed my neck as I looked to see a rabbit.
"I… it wouldn't happen." He says and I look to him as I grab the rabbit and reset the trap.
"Hypothetical question, if it were to happen and Marlon starts to ask questions, he'd get mad." I said and he looked to me as I looked to Brody.
"Look we'll just make do with what we have now." Brody says.
"Brody, it's fucked ok, we're going to die what are you two not getting?" He says as we stop.
"Hey I know what you're saying man, I really do, yes we should extend the safe Zone so we have more hunting areas but right now we shouldn't be fighting with Marlon." I say to him.
"We have two more people at the school, they need to eat too, we don't have enough for all of us." He says.
"I'll give them my portion, shit I already give some to Tenn, and I gave some to the boy too." I say.
"And what good will you bee if you're hungry? Damn it Vincent, you haven't slept either you've taken almost everyone's lookout shifts." He says.
"Sacrifices man, they need to be made at some point, I remember when we would give our food to the younger kids when all this began." I said as we worked more. Brody had grabbed one of the bigger rabbits and I nod to her.
"I understand what Aasim is saying though." She says.
"Thank you." Aasim says and I roll my eyes as I reset the trap.
"But I also understand Vincent as well." She says.
"Ok, yea I get what he's saying too but… fuck, it's just stressing me out." He says.
"It's going to be fine; we've dealt with worse." I said and he nods as we finish up and I light up Brody's torch so we can see. I see some walkers in our path and I sigh as I grab my butcher knife and Aasim starts to shoot some with his bow. It wasn't long till more came and we saw some of our group members come running up to us with the girl Clementine.
"You guy's good?" Marlon asked and I nodded.
"Yea, let's just head back." I said as we began walking and I heard Louis talking.
"I call that an A-plus performance Clementine." Louis says and I roll my eyes.
"And Vincent, you've done better so you get a B-minus." He says and I flip him off.
"Fuck off dude." I tell him and the girl giggles a bit as we get in the gate.
"We never got introduced, I'm Vincent." Louis says as he introduced me.
"What he said." I tell her as she looked to me.
"I'm Clementine." She says and I hold my hand out to her and she looked to my hand.
"It's a handshake." I said.
"I know what it is." She says as she shakes my hand and I chuckle a bit.
"So, now that we have that out of the way, Vincent, you say my piano skills suck but Clem here and AJ loved my version of "Oh my Darling." He says and I roll my eyes.
"The fact that she likes your singing is what scares me." I said as I handed Omar the rabbits.
"Hey, her and AJ have great taste." He said as I looked to him.
"Speaking of the little dude, where is he?" I asked as I looked around.
"Well he's not near Ruby that's for sure." He says and I look to him.
"He may have bit her." He says an I couldn't help but chuckle just a bit.
"He bit her?" I asked.
"Yea, he said she touched him from behind and it freaks him out." He says and I look around and find him with Clementine and Ruby.
"So, did he like the piano?" I asked as we sat near Tenn.
"Oh yea, he did kept him calm while you were gone." He says and I look to him.
"That's good." I said and AJ walked over to us along with Clementine.
"Hey little dude." I said as I held my hand up for a Hi-five which he gave me and I smirked a bit and looked up to Clementine.
"So, You're the Famous Vincent?" She asked and I grabbed the collar of my vest and popped it a bit joking around.
"Sure am, sorry I can't give you an autograph but Louis wasted all the sharpies for his adoring fans." I said and he shaved me and I shoved him back a bit and I heard her giggle.
"So, what has Mr. Dreadlocks told you about me?" I asked.
"Oh, I only heard about you through AJ." She says as she rubbed his head a bit.
"He plays the guitar, it's really cool Clem." He says and I smile.
"I can play some more after dinner." I said and looked to her.
"So, was this like a musical school or something?" She asked.
"Did Marlon not explain?" I asked and she shook her head no.
"Not really, before he could that boy Willy said something and told me to find Louis." She says and I nod.
"Well, this was a school for troubled youth, only Louis and I are the instrumental talents here, Tenn and…. Tenn is the artistic type, Aasim loves to write, Ruby is our doctor and garden expert, Willy is just… Willy, Mitch is our weapons master, aside from Marlon, Omar is the Chef god, and Brody is basically our mother." I said.
"Hey." I heard and looked to Brody.
"Well you know it's true, you and Ruby are basically the mothers the scold us boys." Louis says and I chuckle a bit. I look to Clementine as she looked around a bit.
"Marlon said there aren't any adults around here." She says and I nod.
"Well, unless you count Vincent here, since He's eighteen, he's the oldest one here." Luis says and I lean back a bit.
"Really now?" She says and I nod.
"Yea, but Marlon has been in charge and I don't want to interrupt his mojo at this point." I explain as I watch AJ.
"So, you play the guitar?" She asked as she sat next to me and I nodded.
"So, let me guess… Country only?" She asked and I laughed.
"If you want country, sorry, not a huge fan, I just play… think of them as lullabies." I said and she nods and I smile.
"Maybe we can both play for you." Louis says and I nod as I look to Omar as he waves to us.
"Dinner is ready." Willy calls out and we all get up and grab our bowls. I sit with Louis, AJ, Clem, Ruby, Brody and Marlon as the others sit at the other table. It wasn't long till Ruby had left due to all of us, except for Brody, for burping and I chuckled as she flipped us off.
"Aww Ruby you wound me." I said as she heads inside and I look at AJ who is looking at his bowl and Clem telling him that we spared as much as we could. I looked to my bowl and I hand it to him.
"Here kid." I said.
"Are you sure?" Clem asked.
"Yea, been sharing with him since he woke up." I said.
"What do you say to Vincent?" She asked him as he looked to me.
"Thank you." He says and I nod as he eats again. It wasn't long till he finishes again and went over to Tenn. Marlon, Louis and I grabbed the bowls as Louis grabbed his cards.
"Time for another game of cards my dear friends." He says and Brody leaves.
"I'm heading out." She says.
"Night." We all say and I look to Clem. I then get up and grab my guitar and head back to my spot as I slowly strum the guitar strings and play a soft tune once again.
"Last time I heard someone play the guitar, way years ago." She says and I look to her.
"Is that so?" Marlon asked as Louis passed out the cards.
"Yea, the mans name was Chuck, or Charles if you're feeling fancy." She says and I smile still strumming away and I look to see AJ swaying a bit as I played.
"Alright so the game for tonight is war." Louis announced.
"How do you play?" Clem asked.
"Easy, highest card wins the others." I said.
"But in this game, we get to ask questions, highest gets to ask Clem here a question." Louis says.
"And if I win?" Clementine asked.
"Then you can ask us a question, only fair." Louis says and I nod in agreement.
"Alright, lets play." Marlon says as we flip our cards and I go back to my guitar.
"Victory Violet." I muttered as I saw I had the highest card. I look up to Clem and think a bit.
"So… AJ…. Is he, you know, really your kid?" I asked.
"Like Blood related?" She asked and I nodded.
"No, he isn't, his parents passed away a long time ago." She says and I nod. We flip our cards again.
"Hey I win." She says happily.
"Indeed, you do, ask away." Louis says.
"Hmmm, grossest thing any of you guy's eaten?" She asked.
"Oh easy, Horse Eyeball." I say.
"Slugs." Marlon tells her.
"Cantaloupe." Louis says.
"Seriously." I said.
"Dude, I fucking hate Cantaloupe." He says and I roll my eyes.
"I almost ate a guys leg once." She says and we all look at her.
"Almost." She says and we nod as we flip our cards again and Louis has the high card.
"Booya I win." He says.
"Ask away." Clem says.
"Do you have a Boyfriend?" He asked.
"Oh my god." I said and he looked at me.
"What? It's a perfectly valid question, it happens, and you know it… and I haven't had a girlfriend if you were wondering." He says.
"Oh, I'm sure she's real surprised at that." I say.
"Hey you two." Marlon says and we keep quiet and we look to Clem as she thinks.
"No, I think love is just a hassle." She says.
"Oh, but the best kind, right?" Louis says.
"Well if getting someone killed because you were to busy screwing around instead of keeping watch, I'd say no, not the best kind." She says and I stop playing my guitar as I look at her.
"I um… I didn't mean." Louis tried to say but couldn't. We just flipped our cards again and Clementine got the highest.
"I win again." She says.
"Oh, what shall we answer." Louis says and she looked to Marlon.
"Got to know what's with the haircut." She says.
"What about it?" He asked.
"She says it looks like a dead cat, probably smells like one too." I joked and he looked at me as I chuckled along with Louis.
"Well I say it looks cool." He says and I laugh again. We flip the cards once more.
"Ok, you couldn't have been all on your own." Marlon asked his question and I looked to Clementine as she looked to him.
"Who raised you? Your parents?" He asked.
"No…. my parents were long gone, before I found them…. a man named Lee took care of me." She says.
"What did he teach you?" he asked as I looked to her also wanting to know what she was going to answer. She looked deep in thought as her forehead creased a bit and she looked up at Marlon.
"How to let go." She says. We flipped the cards again and it was Louis.
"Have you…. You know what never mind."
"Ask."
"It's not a fun question." He says to her.
"Just ask." She says.
"You ever have to kill someone you loved?" he asked and I glared at him and he looked to me a bit scared and then back to Clem.
"Yea…. I did…. I'm going to head to bed now." She says and I nod.
"Yea." I said as she got up and went to AJ and took him inside.
"You wanted me to ask." Louis says as Marlon looked to him.
"Neither of you should have asked her that." I said.
"Look who's talking." Marlon said and I looked to him confused.
"All I asked is if AJ was actually hers or not." I said.
"Yea but that brought up his parents, what if he heard." Louis said and I rolled my eyes.
"I'm pretty sure she's told him about his parents, it's not like I asked if she shot them or something." I said.
"Alright you two just drop it, and head to bed." Marlon said and I rolled my eyes as I looked to Tenn. I went over to him as he continued to draw.
"Hey time for bed." I say and he looks to me.
"Um sure but uh…. Could you get me Sophie's old coloring box? I just need some colors in there." He said and I nodded as I headed to Minnie and Sophie's old room. I sigh gently as I go and open the door just to see Clementine and AJ in there.
"Oh, sorry didn't know Marlon set you two in here." I said.
"Is that ok?" Clementine asks and I nod.
"Yea, I uh didn't mean to sound rude or anything about it, sorry." I said as I rubbed my neck.
"Sorry." She says and I sigh and look at the closet.
"I just need to grab something." I said and I went to it but didn't see Sophies coloring box, I looked around a bit and saw it on the desk and AJ was drawing.
"Oh uh… that's what I'm looking for." I say as I point to the box and AJ looks at me then to Clem.
"You should let him have it AJ." She tells him and he sighs.
"Ok." He says as he's about to put the pencils up.
"You can finish your drawing first…. I'm not in any rush and I don't think Tenn would mind, I mean it's been sitting in that closet collecting dust for a year now." I explain as I rub my neck a bit and AJ smiles as he continues to color.
"Thanks." Clem says and I nod.
"So… How are you liking the school so far?" I asked.
"It's ok, just a group of kids running this place? I haven't seen that." She says and I smirk.
"Yea, the adults left us here to fend for ourselves once hell broke loose, I mean one adult stayed though, Mrs. Martin." I say as I walk over to one of the bunk beds and I sit down on it.
"That was brave of her." She says and I nod.
"That's how Ruby was able to patch you up as best as she could, Mrs. Martin use to be the school nurse…. And therapist or whatever." I said and she looked at me.
"Not to be rude but how messed up are you guys? I mean you seem to be doing fine but do I have to worry?" She asked and I chuckled.
"No only thing you have to worry about is our foul language near him, and maybe a few of our brawls." I say as I look at the window.
"Oh, don't worry AJ has heard a lot of swearing in his life time, even though I tell him not to swear it slips sometimes and I can't blame him." She says and I nod.
"We tried to keep the swearing to a minimum, since Ruby and Tenn are the supposedly more mature ones out of us, they try to keep us in line with that." I joke and she laughs a bit.
"God, I remember when I was young, I told people not to swear but damn look at me now." She says and we laugh lightly.
"So, you have brawls? Over what?" She asked.
"Oh, you know stupid shi- stuff, like who gets to take down which walker or, who's the strongest in the group, dumb teen stuff." I said and she nods.
"So, was that why you guys are here? To many fights at normal schools?" She asked and I shook my head no.
"No, and it's not my place to tell the others stories, we just hadn't had the best life before the dead began walking." I say as I look to her.
"So uh… who use to live in here?" She asked and I looked down.
"Um…. Tenns, sisters, they were twins." I say.
"Oh…. What happened?" She asked and I stood up from the bed.
"They uh…. They died…. A year ago, Sophie was really artistic, loved to draw, and paint….. and Minerva… Minnie…. She uh… she use to sing, all bluesy you know." I ramble a bit and looked to her as she looked back at me and I look to the wall.
"Um…. Walkers got them, they uh… they went out with Marlon and they didn't come back." I tell her.
"Muertos do suck." She says and I chuckle.
"Muertos? Is that Spanish?" I ask and she nods.
"I'm not Mexican or Spanish, I just heard someone say it and it stuck with me." She says and I nod a bit as I look to her.
"So, what does it mean?" I asked.
"Monsters, which is what AJ calls them." She says as AJ sets his pencil down and smiles as he lifts his drawing up.
"Look I'm an artist." He said as he showed Clementine the drawing and then Showed the drawing to me.
"That's really good Kid, you'll be one hell of an artist one day." I said and he smiles.
"Can we put it up?" He asked and I look and find a tack and he hands, me the drawing and I pin it to the wall for him.
"There you go, so you and anyone that comes in here sees it." I said and I look to see Clementine smiling and I rub my neck as he puts the colored pencils away in the box and I grab it gently.
"Um… nice chatting with you, and uh, keep up with the art." I tell AJ and he nods and I walk out the room with the box in hand. I head back outside to Tenn to see him still drawing and I set the box down at the table and he looks up to me.
"Um, AJ was coloring, hope you didn't mind the wait." I say.
"No, it's fine, it's cool." He says and I nod as I watch him draw.
"Do you still miss them?" Tenn asked and I look at him.
"Yea…. You?" I asked.
"Always, but they're in a better place now, you know, they don't have to deal with all this stuff…. I bet they would have loved to have met AJ and Clementine, especially Sophie." Tenn says and I nod.
"Oh yea, she would have love to drawn with AJ, he's pretty good." I said remembering his drawing of Him and Clem on some ranch.
"They seem like good people, I mean, AJ needs to work with being around people, I heard he bit Ruby." He says and I look to him.
"Damn." I mutter and he nods.
"And Clementine, she could have hurt me but she didn't, I mean, she was scared when she woke up, so I don't blame her for what she did." He said and I looked to him concerned.
"Don't worry she apologized." He said and I nodded and I heard some walkers as I look to the gate as Aasim got some with his arrows and Mitch had his knife.
"I'm glade." I said.
"You know, it's a good thing you saved them, I mean, we haven't met any new people in so long, it's good you know, now we get to hear new stories, and talk about new things." He says and I nod.
"Yea you are right on that, it's pretty nice to think we have something new to do here." I said.
"Marlon is thinking about making the safe zone smaller." Tenn says and I sigh.
"I… I know he has his intentions but damn it." I mumbled.
"Vi." He says and I look to him as he used my old nickname.
"Sorry." He says.
"It's fine, only you can call me that really." I said as I rubbed my arm.
"Want to talk?" He asked and I rub my face.
"Need to find a new razor soon." I joked as I touched my beard a bit, it wasn't to long to be a bushy beard just kind of there you know.
"Yea me too." He said as he touched his smooth jaw as he joked and I laughed a bit.
"Don't worry, I can teach ya how to shave without shaving cream, but it's going to be a pain." I said as I looked to Mitch and them.
"So, you plan on playing your guitar a lot now?" He asked as he drew some more.
"If it keeps AJ out of trouble sure." I say as I watch him draw a house.
"Yea, don't need him to be scared anymore." He says and I nod.
"Well, I should head to bed, got a long day ahead of us tomorrow." I say as I get up.
"Night Vinc." He says and gives me a hug and I hug him back then head off to my room. I take my shirt off and stretch a bit as I look at the window, Least I wasn't dumb enough to break my windows, so if people ever need to stay warm they can come in here, it does get really hot in the summer though but at least I can open the window to let the cool air in. I go and lay on my bed and place my hands together on my stomach as I look to the celling and see the fake stars that Minnie, Sophie and I had placed on there when I first came to this school. Sophie had arranged them to where there was the big dipper, little dipper, and even her name if you really look at them. I sigh a bit as I look at them more and I close my eyes a bit, listening to whatever was making noise this night, which was mostly walkers growling, or bugs making sounds, to the wind blowing against the window.