(Vincent's Pov)
I just stared at the blood on my hands as at the rain kept falling. I looked down to Marlon's body laying on the ground and I quickly back away from him. I hear Ruby yelling something about bandages but that wasn't going to help him, he's gone, he's dead, he's not coming back not even as a Walker. I stand up and look around and see AJ scared as he lowered the gun and I look to everyone.
"WHAT THE FUCK!?" Louis yells and I look to him as he glared at AJ then to Clementine who looked at AJ. Was that fear in her eyes?
"A-AJ what did you do?" She asked him as he looked at her. He looked so confused at what was going on.
"He killed Marlon, he's a murderer, what the hell have you been teaching him?" Louis asked pissed as he came up to Clementine and I got between them.
"Don't…. fucking don't." I say as I don't look at anyone. I can't look at anyone.
"She taught him to kill innocent people Violet."
"Who the hell is Violet?" Clementine asked and I glare at Louis.
"Look right now let's not do anything rash." I say as I look at him and he looks back at me.
"RASH?" He yelled, his voice breaking.
"He killed Marlon, she taught him to kill, they both need to go now." He says and I look at him then I see Mitch as he moved to AJ so I quickly go over to them and I hold my knife tightly at him.
"Mitch just back away from the kid ok, we will all talk about this just-."
"JUST WHAT RELAX?" He yelled at me and I watch him.
"We let them in and they do this type of shit, what happens if we do something else that this kid doesn't like, should we expect a bullet to the fucking head." Louis says and I look to AJ who was scared and I turn to face him.
"AJ give me the gun." I say to him gently and he looked to me as I bend down in front of him and he points the gun up a bit.
"Vince." I hear Ruby say scared and I just look at AJ.
"AJ… I won't hurt you…. Just give me the gun, I'll give it back I promise." I say to him gently. I am terrified having a gun on me but right now I can't show that.
"They will." He says quietly. I look to the school kids and then to Clem who looked to AJ then Marlon, then back. Everything is fucked right now, she has to be confused, everything went by so fast.
"I won't let them, just please give me the gun AJ, then you and Clem can go to ya'lls room." I tell him.
"Keep the killer where we sleep how fucking nice." Louis says.
"SHUT UP!" I yell at him and then look back at AJ as he slowly and shakenly places the gun into my hand. I see how small he really is, how scared he is.
"Clementine take AJ to your room while we figure things out." I say as she looks to me and nods just a bit as she goes and takes AJ to their room. I made sure that no one left the area to follow them and I look at the gun and open it to see one bullet left. I take it out and place it in my vest pocket and the gun in my pant pocket. I look to the others as they try to help Marlon but there was no use in it.
"How fucked up are you Vincent?" Louis says pissed as I look to him.
"We don't fucking kill people, we don't hurt kids, you want to talk about fucked up, what about the fact that Marlon admitted to giving away Tenns sisters, to a bunch of fucking raiders." I say.
"We could have talked about it." He said
"TALKED? He was willing to shoot me." I say.
"He didn't." Louis says.
"Happy fucking days, he didn't shoot me, but that still doesn't erase the whole facts that he gave away Sophie and Minerva, shit he killed Brody…. BRODY is dead because of him." I say.
"Clementine could have lied." He says.
"Then where the fuck did the blood on his face come from? Because if he saw Clementine killing her, why the fuck did he not stop her hu? Why didn't he rush out with Brody in his arms and why didn't he call for fucking help?" I say and Louis looked to me as I asked these questions.
"He was scared."
"And you think AJ isn't? you want to beat a little kid be my fucking guest but you'll have to go through me to do so." I tell him and he looked to me. He walked away and headed over to Marlon and I shook my head as the rain started to lighten up and the sun started to raise up to signal It was morning.
"Vincent." I heard as I looked to Tenn as he came up to me.
"We need to bury them." I say and I head inside and go to their rooms and grab their bed sheets I came out and handed Louis one for Marlon and I looked to the basement as I went to get Brody. I go down the stairs and I'm glad no one followed me. They didn't need to see Brody like this, her head was bashed in and there was a lot of blood on the floor surrounding her. I took a few breaths as I slowly wrapped her up in the sheet so no one could see what she looked like. I slowly picked her up and walked up the stairs from the basement to the outside and I didn't see anyone.
"They must be digging the graves." I say to no one in particular. I slowly set Brody down on the ground and I look to the school building and I hear some talking through the broken windows.
"AJ stop it you'll break a toe or something." I hear Clementine say to him. What is the boy doing that could cause him to break a toe?
"Am I a murderer?" I heard and I shook my head a bit. I shouldn't listen to this so I pick up Brody and I take her over to our graveyard. I look to see the others digging the graves and I set Brody down away from Marlon's body and I begin to help them. We all keep quiet as we just dig, using a few bowls and cups to dig. I don't see Louis doing anything but stare at Marlon's body and I sigh as we finish up the holes. Mitch and I get out of the holes and he grabbed Marlon while I got Brody. We set them in their graves and Aasim and Omar cover them up. I see Tenn and Willy place the crosses behind the graves. I cross my arms and sigh as I look to them and Tenn comes over to me.
"Tenn, can you get Clem and AJ?" I asked and I felt eyes on me.
"You're going to let them come the fuck?" Mitch says.
"They knew Brody, didn't they? They aren't coming for Marlon, so drop it, Brody liked them too." I say as I look to her grave. I see Tenn walk away to the school to grab the two.
"Vincent." I heard as I look to Ruby.
"Just everyone keep quiet and don't start anything, this is a funeral and we all will be respectful, that's all I'm asking." I say as I look back to Brody's grave. Willy was crying a bit and I crossed my arms a bit as I looked to Rosie who was sitting next to me. I hear some footsteps as see Tenn walking over to us.
"They'll be here in a bit." He explains and I nod as I look to them.
"Shit… what do we do again?" Ruby asked.
"Place flowers on the grave, sing… I think… talk." I say and she looked to me and I rub my neck.
"Oh god, they're here." I hear Aasim say.
"Drop it." I tell them and he looked to me shocked. I looked to Brody's grave and I sighed.
"Brody… will be missed, she was loved by all, and she…. She." I tried to say but there's nothing to say really. She's gone, she was killed by her friend, someone we thought of as family, someone we've known for years and he killed her just because she was worried for not only our safety but for Clementine and AJ's safety as well.
"She was a wonderful woman… she didn't deserve to die the way she did." I say and I hear some feet shuffling and I shake my head. I look to Marlon's grave and I was about to speak but I had nothing good to say.
"Marlon…. He….. fuck I can't do it someone else can."
"Fucking bitch." Mitch says and I look at him.
"Dude." Louis says.
"He was your god damn friend louis, your best friend, and that kid killed him." Mitch complains and I look to him.
"And Brody was mine but Marlon killed her." I tell him.
"You didn't even like Brody, you were always mean to her." Willy says and I glare at him.
"You don't know shit Willy, you can't say that I was mean to her when you were never around us all the time, you never asked questions, none of us did, and because of that Brody was killed by Marlon, and Marlon was shot in the head, Karma is a major fucking bitch to people, so everyone shut the fuck up." I say and they all look at me, some not to happy with what I said but I don't care at all.
"Sophie and Minerva are gone because of Marlon, Brody found out some way somehow, regardless of the situation Marlon killed Brody for talking about how OUR safety was in danger because Marlon was probably going to trade me off in the morning and say the same damn lie." I tell them.
"I can't deal with this." Louis says and he walks away and I shake my head.
"I don't care about the what ifs at this point, AJ killed Marlon, they have to go." Mitch says.
"The fuck?" I asked.
"We take a Vote, either they stay or go, they can't stay here." Mitch says and I glare at him.
"Fine we'll do the stupid voting bullshit, but if they leave, they get a duffle bag of the food, they fucking got it, they fucking keep it." I say and he glared at me.
"Don't kick us out, I'll atone." AJ says and I look to him sadly.
"AJ." I say.
"You don't get a say in this." Mitch tells him and I clench my hand into a fist and shake my head and I look to Clementine. She kept quiet for a bit before she placed a hand on AJ's shoulder.
"AJ, it's their home, we have no say in this." She explains to him and they head off to their room and I look at Tenn.
"Louis needs to vote; can you get him please?" I asked and he nods as he goes to find the boy. I look to everyone as we all start to think on what we're going to say.
"I vote they leave." Mitch says and I roll my eyes.
"I vote they stay." I heard Aasim say and I look to him.
"The fuck?" Mitch says.
"Like it or not dude but Clementine would be a good thing around here, she got us food, she helped us right after she woke up, you think I didn't see the bandages on her head still? She's a bad ass person, who helped us not even knowing who we were." He says and I nod a bit.
"Fine whatever my vote still stays." Mitch says.
"I vote they leave." Ruby says and I look to her.
"Leave." Omar says. I then hear Louis and Tenn walking over to us.
"I vote they stay." Tenn says and I nod.
"Seriously?" Mitch says again.
"AJ is just a kid still, and Clementine is too, they can help us, they already did, and plus AJ is ok, he just needs to talk things out, like when we all first came here." Tenn says.
"None of us killed anyone though." Ruby says and I hear Mitch scoff.
"One of us didn't even try to stop someone from dying." He says and I look to him.
"Don't if we're going to bring that shit up, you could have killed yourself or others with the shit you pulled." I say and he gets in my face.
"Fuck you." He says and I shove him away from me and he tried to swing at my but I moved away fast enough to dodge and I kicked him. We started to fight a lot, fist being hit against faces, broken skins causing blood to come out, probably a black eye or bruising, before anyone pulled us away from each other.
"FUCK YOU!" I yell to him and he glared at me.
"STOP IT BOTH OF YOU!" Tenn yells and I look to him and shove Omar off of me. I Shake my head and glare at Mitch as they continued to Vote. Tenn had left in the middle of it knowing they won't be able to stay.
"I vote they stay." I say. But it didn't matter, everyone else had voted for them to leave.
"Fine, they leave." Louis says and I shake my head. I walked to the school to tell them they had to go, it wasn't right, it wasn't fair to them after all they did, after all Clementine did.
"Get a duffle bag of food ready for them, like I said, they get a bag." I tell them all and I open the door to the rooming area. I sigh as I head to their door and I look to see Louis following me. I really didn't care at the moment as I go up to the twins' old room and I knock on the door softly and I open the door to see AJ and Clem standing up from the bed. I sigh internally and walk up to them a bit.
"We took the vote…. You have to go." I say quietly.
"Don't we get to Vote? I vote that we stay." AJ says and I can't help but smile just a tiny bit at this boy.
"That's not how it works." Louis says.
"Yea well it's pretty fucked." I say.
"You don't have to like it." He says.
"And I don't." I tell him.
"But a vote is a vote you agreed to it." He says and I shake my head as I look to them.
"You'll get a duffle bag of the food; I'll make sure it's a fair amount seeing as you helped us get it." I tell them.
"This isn't fair." AJ says and I nod.
"I'm sorry little dude." I say and we stay in silent as he tried to calm down. I pull out his gun from my pocket and I grab the bullet as well and I look to him as I hand the items to him.
"The fuck are you doing Vincent?" Louis says pissed.
"They're going to need it; we will walk behind them so grow up." I look to AJ as he stares at the gun.
"But I'm a murderer." He says.
"Well I'm not a huge fan of guns and it's not mine." I tell him.
"How about this, you hold the gun and I'll hold the bullet." I say as I place the bullet back in my chest pocket and hold the gun out to him and he slowly takes it and places it in the back of his pants. I nod as I watch Clementine grab her bag and she looked around the room a bit. I noticed a few new items here and I rub my neck a bit as we all begin to walk out. I go and check through the bag and I nod when satisfied and I help carry it out. I grab my bow and arrow as Louis grabbed his chair leg with nails. We began walking them out into the woods almost out passed the safe zone.
"Will we find another car?" AJ asked.
"No, we got lucky that one time." She says to him.
"So, we're walking." He says.
"My shoes are going to break." He says and I look down as we walk.
"We'll tie them up."
"I'll bleed." He says and I shake my head a bit at knowing this.
"It's not so bad." Louis says and I glare at him.
"I mean, you've done it before." He says again.
"You have no idea what it's like out there, you've lived in walls your whole life." Clem snapped at him and he looked a bit shocked at her reaction. I don't blame her for this though, he shouldn't have said that, no matter how mad you are at someone, you don't bring up things that you don't know about. I sigh a bit as I look to the side and stop in my tracks.
"We uh… just head down this direction, there should be a road a mile or two out." I say and they stop and look at us and AJ was twiddling his thumbs just like Tenn does when he's sad or scared.
"Thanks for taking us this far." Clementine says and I nod a bit as I look to her and AJ.
"I'm sorry." AJ says quietly.
"Nothing you need to say sorry for." I tell him.
"Dude seriously?" Louis says pissed and I look at him.
"Marlon is dead, give him some peace." He says.
"Sorry for having no sympathy to someone who traded our friends like a sack of meat, and killed another one of our friends, just for ratting him out." I say as I glare at Louis.
"You know what Vincent, there are things that you did that were fucked up, but you don't hear me bitching about It."
"Fuck you man, you don't even do shit to help us, you play that dumb piano." I say as he looks at me.
"And you play that stupid fucking guitar."
"Yea when I don't have fucking work to do, I'm guessing the only reason you actually went hunting with Aasim was probably to impress Clementine." I say and he looks at me.
"Guys stop please." Clem says as she gets between us and moves us apart.
"No, this fucker should speak up, you were a sheltered self-absorbed bitch, who let her own grandmother shoot herself and didn't call for fucking help, you are a psychopath that shouldn't have ended up at Ericson." He says and I glare at him.
"Sheltered? How is having an alcoholic father beat the living fuck out of you considered sheltered?" I asked pissed as my hands clenched into fists. I was about to punch him but Clem moved me back before I could.
"Vincent stop." She says and I look to her and I shake my head as I look to him.
"Fuck you Louis, just fucking go back to the school and play that dumb piano." I tell him and he glared at me.
"Fuck you too, I hope you get eaten by walkers out here." He says and I watch him leave. I shake my head as I looked to AJ as he looked to all of us.
"Fucking god damn idiot." I mumble as I move back a bit.
"I'm so sorry Vincent." Clementine says.
"Nothing to be sorry about, Louis just gets mad when things don't go his way, why he even came out here in the first place makes no god damn since…. Anyway, the road is that way, uh you should hit a town, I have no idea if there are supplies but it would be a good place to start." I say and I look to AJ as I come up to him and get on one Knee as I grabbed the bullet from my vest pocket and looked to him as I held it up.
"I can't." He says and I look to him.
"AJ, you and Clem need this, I don't have a gun, and I'm not going to get one any time soon, so it's just useless to me at this point." I tell him and he looks at the bullet.
"But I'm a murderer." He says and I shake my head.
"How about this, you take this bullet, and hold it for me, just in case I get kicked out soon." I say and he looked to me.
"They can't kick you out." He says and I chuckle. He did look at me confused and I place the bullet in his hand.
"Just hold on to it for me?" I ask and he nods gently as he puts it in his pocket and I look to Clementine as I hand her the duffle bag.
"Thanks." She says and I nod.
"I wish I could have said bye to Tenn." AJ says and I look to him.
"For what it's worth, he wanted both of you to stay… he was upset when you guys couldn't." I tell them and he nods sadly and I sigh as they began to walk away. I walked a good few minutes and was close to where Louis was.
"You need to learn that people like that can't stay." He says and I glare at him.
"And according to you, people like me shouldn't stay at the school either." I say as I walk.
"Vincent, I didn't mean." He says.
"You always don't mean anything." I say and I look to him as we stop walking, I look to him and before I could speak again I hear a gun shot ring out and we look to each other and I run in the direction to Clementine and AJ. I heard Louis running next to me as well and I stop as I see the man from the train station.
"Holy fuck he's alive." I say and look to see Clementine on the ground with a boot to her neck and a gun to her head. The weird man had AJ by the arm and looked like he was about to break it. I was pissed but before I could draw my bow Louis stopped me and pointed to one area and I nod as we go to the spot.
"You could join us Clementine, we can help you raise your boy." I heard the woman say as she helped Clementine up.
"All you have to do is convince your friends from the school to come with us." The woman says and I glare at her as I slowly aim my arrow at her.
"I'm not Marlon, and I don't live there, they kicked us out." She says and I watch them.
"Well we could do this, I'll take the boy here, that way you'll cooperate, and I wont mind bashing his head in… ever seen old fruit explode? It'll look just like that." The man says and I see Clementine as she looked at me. No, she couldn't see me, could she?
"RUN!" I hear her yell and I look to see the man aiming his gun at us and shooting. I got hit in the shoulder but Louis and I ran and I didn't want to. I could trust Clementine, right?
"Fucking god damn it." Louis says and I hold my shoulder a bit and look to see blood.
"Fucking hell." I say as he turns to look at me.
"Fuck you got shot." He says as he comes up to me and I move away.
"Don't, not now." I tell him as we get to the school and Ruby sees me.
"Good Lord what happened?" She asked as she ran up to us.
"Did those fuckers do this?" Mitch asked pissed.
"No, the fucker from the train station, he's alive, and he has someone else with him they." I tried to say and looked to them.
"Look, I'm fine just need a small patch that's all." I say and Ruby nods as we head to the nurse's office. I sit in the chair as she goes and grabs some medicine as I look to her, she sighs a bit.
"Getting yourself shot just to play hero?" She asked and I looked to her as I shook my head and took my jacket off, then my shirt and I grimaced at the wound. She looked at it a bit and sighed as She got up and grabbed some tweezers.
"You have some shrapnel, god this is a big wound." She says and I nod as she tries to get the shrapnel out of it. It took a bit because she wanted to be thorough with getting the wound as clean as she could.
"God damn it." She says and I hiss in pain as she tried to pull one piece out.
"Sorry." She says and I nod.
"It's fine just… fucking hell." I mumbled as she finally gets the offending piece out. She patches me up a bit and I grab my shirt and jacket and put them on. She goes and cleans her hands and I look down at the ground.
"Vincent?" She asked and I looked to her.
"Those people…. They threatened to kill AJ right in front of Clementine…. They didn't care that he was a kid." I said and she looks at me a bit and sighs.
"They…. People say they will but probably not." She says and I look to her sadly.
"Would you say the same thing if it was Tenn or even Willy?" I asked and she looked to me then away. I go and walk out the medic room and I head out into the court yard as I look to the others.
"So that man is still alive hu?" Aasim says and I nod.
"Yea, he's only got one arm though so, he was bit but." I said as I trailed off.
"Clementine and AJ should be fine." Aasim says.
"And if they aren't? we basically sent them out there to die, we aren't any better than the adults who abandoned us, and even Marlon." I say as I look to the gate.
"what's done is done." He says sadly and I nod. Hours passed and I grabbed my guitar and played some soft tunes. I kept looking at the gate, hoping that they would come back.
"Vincent it's dinner time." I hear but I just continue to play and I looked from the gate down to my guitar.
"Vincent?" I hear and look up to see Tenn.
"Yea?"
"Dinner is ready." He says and I nod.
"You can have my portion…. I'm not hungry." I say and look back to the gate.
"You should eat." He says but I don't answer him. I know I'm being rude but at this time I really don't want to talk to anyone.
"He's upset because we didn't keep them here? They killed Marlon, we voted them out, fair is fair." Mitch says and I shake my head.
"Mitch stop, not now." Ruby says and I play my guitar more.
"Fine whatever." He says and I get up and I set my guitar down. I head over to Marlon's old office and I look to see Rosie looking at me. She whimpered a bit and I go and pet her head gently behind the ear. She looked up to me and I sit on the ground as she looks to me.
"Good girl." I say as I pet her more. I look out the window a bit and I heard some footsteps coming up and I heard the door open. I looked up to see Omar with a bowl of food as he looked to me.
"You should eat." He says.
"I'm just not hungry right now Omar." I say to him as he sits next to me. He pet's Rosie as he sets the bowl down next to me.
"You'll be hungry in a bit, you usually are." He says and I put my knees to my chest and link my arms around my legs.
"How's the shoulder?" He asked.
"It's fine."
"You sure?" He asked as I looked to him. I nodded a bit as I looked to Rosie as she looked at me. Omar had left after a few minutes and I pick up the bowl of rice and meat and I go sit at Marlon's desk. I looked down at the drawers and I opened them up a bit. I found some whiskey in the bottle right drawer and I sighed as I saw it wasn't even opened. It wouldn't hurt would it? No, I closed the drawer and ate a bit of food as I looked out the window. I looked over any maps and papers Marlon had that would be good to go over. It wasn't long till the sun started to raise in the sky and I groaned a bit as I get up and I'm about to head to my bedroom.
"VINCENT, LOUIS THEY'RE BACK!" I hear will yell and I quickly run out the building to see Willy running up to the school and I head to the gate. I see Clementine carrying AJ a bit before she collaped to her knees, I quickly open the gate and run up to her.
"I-is he?" I asked.
"No, he… he got shot, he has a fever." She says scared and I nod as I pick him up from her arms and we go into the school.
"What happened?" I heard Ruby ask and I looked to her.
"Get the medicine, he was shot." I said and she nods.
"In the main building, on the couch, you can lay him there." She says and I nod as I go and take him inside. I go up the stairs as Ruby and Clementine talk a bit, Ruby asked why she said We and I set AJ on the couch and lay him down. I back away as Ruby came up to him and I look to Willy who talked to Louis.
"There was a guy and he was wearing animal skin or something, he looked like a walker." He tells us and I look at him.
"Walker hu?" I asked and he nods and I look to Clementine who was talking to AJ. I go up to her and she looks to me.
"We need to talk." I say and she nods but before she can leave AJ holds her hand.
"Don't go." He says to her scared and I watch her.
"What do we always tell fear?" She asked him.
"T-To fuck off?" He says and I did want to chuckle at this but couldn't.
"That's right… I'll be back I promise." She says and he nods to her as I take her to Marlon's office.
"H-How are you?" I asked a bit scared really. She looked to me a bit and I rubbed my neck.
"I'm ok… what about yourself?" She asked and I look to her.
"Been better." I say and she nods.
"Did… do you have any injuries?" I asked and she shook her head.
"No just AJ… he was shot by Abel."
"Abel?" I asked and she nods.
"That's the man's name." She tells me and I rub my neck.
"And do you know the woman? She knew your name." I state and she looks to me and nods.
"Her name is Lilly, I knew her when I was little, it's been years since I saw her, she… shot a woman in our group and she stole our RV." She says and I nod.
"So, she's not a friend." I say and she nods and I go up to her.
"It's so good to see you." She says and she hugs me and I hug her back. We let go of each other and I look at her more as she looks at my jacket and places her hand on the blood stain.
"Got hit by the fuckers' bullet, don't worry I can still move my arm and everything." I joke as I move my shoulder and arm a bit.
"I'm sorry, I didn't know how close you guys were I didn't know how fast her was." She says.
"Hey, it's cool, I'm alive and so is AJ, Ruby is patching him up." I say and she nods and I look at her.
"Willy said something about a guy with Animal skins with you?" I asked and she rubbed her neck as I looked to her.
"James and it was Walker skin, that's how he gets around." She says.
"You brought him here though…. The others are…. They aren't to happy about a lot of things." I tell her and she looked to me.
"You don't have to worry about James, he isn't a threat, he told me that Able and Lilly will be back with more guns, they want everyone here." She says and I nod.
"I know, I heard that part." I tell her.
"What are we going to do?" I asked.
"You guys need to defend the school, it's already a fortress to begin with, we just need to plan for an attack." She says and I pull out the map and place it on the desk for both of us to see.
"You guy's use the greenhouse anymore?" She asked.
"No walkers got a few people out there so we boarded it up." I tell her and we start making some plans, it wasn't long till I heard Mitch coming in.
"You're fucking kidding me, right? I thought you would go along with what we voted on that you wouldn't let them back in." He says mad and Ruby comes in to hell him to keep quiet.
"Great and now you're giving them our medicine." He complains.
"So what? He had a fever and infection." Ruby says and they argue.
"STOP IT!" I yell at them and they look to me.
"Mitch you and Clem will go to the green house and get the barbed wire, don't argue over it, there are people that are going to come here and try to take us and we aren't going to let that happen." I tell him and he looked to me.
"I'm not-."
"Cut the shit Mitch, either help us, or get kidnapped." I say pissed and he looks to me.
"Fine whatever but I'm not going to risk my ass for her, so if she's in danger don't expect me to help her."
"Oh no, you will help her because if you don't, we can throw your ass out for letting someone die, all is fair Mitch you don't like it oh fucking well, you don't get to be a fucking hypocrite." I tell him and they all look at me.
"I'm tired of this shit, now go get the supplies, I have to make up plans for Marlon's mistakes." I tell him and he glared at me but then walked out. I see Clem look at me and I just shake my head and she leaves as I head to the desk. I sit down and take a few breaths as I listen to Mitch argue with Ruby as they walked away from the door. I sighed as I looked to the papers and try to plan some things out for the future.