Episode One: Choices We Make

Chapter Six: Who We Were Before

Clementine didn't understand why Lilly was crying when she saw her sat outside her tent, tears running from her eyes as she wrapped her arms around her legs. She was nestled in herself, her head in her lap quietening the sound of her tears. But Clementine could still hear, she knew the sound so well now after all. She approached her slowly, taking one step after another, but becoming more and more afraid of the person she was approaching as she did so. Even if Lilly did look like a teenage girl who had been stood up on prom night, it still didn't change the fact that she had murdered someone in front of Clementine. She wondered if that was why Lilly was so upset, but then she remembered the cold empty look Lilly had in her eyes after she pulled the trigger, not even phased by the fact that she had just taken a human life.

She right beside her now. Clementine hoped she hadn't sneaked up on Lilly, as her intentions were not to frighten her; something else had done that. Clementine got down on her knees next to her, she didn't take her eyes off of her. "Why are you crying?" she asked her, unsure of what else to say.

For a while, Clementine wasn't sure whether or not Lilly had heard her. She was about to repeat her question, when Lilly lifted her head out of her lap and began to wipe away her tears. With the back of her hand, she brushed away her tears that had fallen down her face. When she was done, she looked at Clementine, and another tear came streaming down her cheek. She wiped it away, and tried to say something. Her mouth hung open for a few seconds as she tried to think what to say to the little girl, but in the end, she only managed a petty croak. There was a frog in her throat, but it was gone by the time Lilly had cleared her throat. Having thought of nothing better to say, Lilly simply told Clementine: "I miss my Dad."

Clementine had no idea how to respond to that. After what she did, Clementine had picture Lilly as some kind of monster. Not like the walkers, but like the bad people that existed before corpses started walking, like the Bandits, the St. Johns, and the stranger that took her from Lee. In the end, Clementine said: "I miss my Daddy too," it was all she could think to say.

Dinner was served. It had taken the two of them hours to skin, cook and dish out the Stag Lilly had caught out in the woods, but it was finally ready to eat. Separately, Johnny had cooked the rotted piece of meat he and Alex had found on their hunt before Lilly had shown up. He had taken it from a deer a walker had already started feasting on, meaning the meat was very likely to be infected with whatever was turning them into walking corpses. The plan was for Johnny and Alex to feed everyone at camp, whilst feeding Tom this piece of meat that would hopefully kill him. The meat was cooked brown, and gave away no signs of being infected. Like everyone else's juicy pieces of meat, Tom's was served with vegetables and gravy that Alice had made for the group using a mix she had somehow kept handy for so long. The meat, that would ultimately be a death sentence for Tom, couldn't have been told apart from everybody else's, to the point where Johnny had almost mistakenly served it to Clementine. He remembered just after having handed the plate to her. She was just about to dig in to the hot meal when Johnny made an excuse to take it back.

"Uh oh, I see blood," Johnny giggled nervously as he took the plate back from Clementine. "You can't eat that, Alex obviously didn't cook it properly. I'll find you a better-cooked piece and be right back." Clementine could have sworn she hadn't seen any blood, but she didn't bother arguing. She was so hungry now, she would wait another ten minutes before going to dish up a meal herself.

With the infected meal in his hand, Johnny approached Tom's tent. He could hear high-pitched giggling from inside, obviously coming from Lisa, Tom's daughter. Johnny was beginning to have second thoughts when Tom appeared from around the corner.

"Oh, it's you," Tom mumbled as he zipped up his trousers. Then his eyes found the meal in Johnny's hands. "So, is that for me?" Tom was licking his lips.

Johnny was giggling again, the pressure was getting to him. He stopped when Tom looked at him suspiciously. "Sure is," he said with an awkward grin. He handed the plate to Tom carefully as his hands began to tremble.

Tom notice Johnny's hands were shaking, and grabbed the hot plate before he dropped it.

Alex appeared behind Johnny with two more plates of food, intended for Donna and Lisa. The two of them had obviously smelled dinner by now as they both came out of the tent for their food hurriedly. Johnny smiled at them both as Alex handed them their meals. "Be careful, those plates are hot," Alex said with a warm smile. Johnny wondered if that was his idea of some kind of sick joke. Then, his heart sank as he saw Tom take the meat on his plate and piled it on his daughter's plate.

"What are you doing!?" Johnny asked Tom, louder than he had intended. Even Alex looked surprised.

"Feeding my daughter – what does it look like?" Tom replied. "She hasn't eaten in so long, but she's such a good little girl. She deserves it, don't you sweetie?" He mussed Lisa's hair as she cut the infected meat with her knife and fork.

Alex's eyes were on Johnny, he was waiting for him to act. But Johnny was still.

"You should eat some meat, Tom" Johnny finally said. "You're going to need it. Like you said: we're carnivores after all!" Johnny giggled again, but nothing about this situation was funny at all.

Tom had ignored Johnny. He smiled at Lisa as she took the first bite of the meat. Johnny closed his eyes and sighed as Alex returned to the tent with his hand over his mouth.

Johnny returned to his tent to find Alex pacing up and down outside, whispering something to himself. Johnny couldn't hear completely, but at one point, he thought he heard him whisper "it's not my fault". He stopped this when he noticed Johnny had returned. He was on him within seconds.

"What the fuck happened back there?" Alex asked, still struggling to stay still.

"It wasn't my fault. How was I supposed to know he would give up his share?"

"You let that little girl eat infected meat. That stuff will kill her! Why didn't you do something?" Alex was sweating now. He looked flushed, ready to pass out.

"There was nothing I could do. Besides, we don't know that it'll do anything to her. She could be fine!" Johnny was trying to be reassuring, but his being so calm in a situation like this, where a little girl's life was on the line, only scared Alex more.

"I don't know. I don't know…" Alex put his head in his hands and fell into Johnny. He embraced Alex, holding him in his arms where Alex would have been happy to fall asleep.

"It's okay. I'm here," Johnny told Alex as he held him tight. "I'll always be here…"

Clementine couldn't sleep. So many thoughts were flowing through he mind as she walked across the camp. She was starting to get the hang of the camp's basic layout; the location of her tent, the entrance and where she should go if she needed to pee. But that night she decided to take a walk to the other side of the camp, near Johnny and Alex's tent, just before the edge of the hilltop the camp had been fortified on top of. She approached the edge, although she couldn't see how high up she was (or how far she could fall) due to her small height. The fence before her seemed strong, and she put its strength to the test as she began to climb. The fence was only a couple of meters high, but it stood much taller than her. Clementine climbed a couple of feet off of the ground, high enough to be able to peek over the fence. What she saw from her new perspective made her gasp, and sent a cold and deep shiver down her spine. She swallowed her fear, and tried to count the walkers below, crowding together and slowly surrounding the hilltop. She shuffled across the fence a few metres – they were everywhere. There were too many to count. The darkness would have engulfed many of them too, meaning there will have been more than she could even see; an army hiding in the darkness – waiting. Clementine screamed when something grabbed her shirt. She had been lifted off of her feet, and she began to kick and fidget, trying to break free of the walker's grip.

"Shhh! Be quite!" Johnny said. He released his grip on Clementine and she pushed him away, only just realising that he wasn't one of them.

"I'm sorry. I thought…" Clementine wasn't sure she needed to explain the rest. Johnny was shirtless, wearing only a pair of jogging pants. "Those things… They're everywhere," Clementine said as she turned back to the fence, praying that she wouldn't see a walker climbing over it.

"I know. They've surrounded the entire camp…" Clementine was already shaking, and Johnny didn't want to scare the girl even more, but he had to let her know what had to happen next. "…But we can't tell anybody."

Lilly found Tom and Donna outside their tent. Donna was changing the bandages on Tom's hands. Tom's blood had dried causing the dressing to glue to his hands. He winced as she peeled away layer after layer until she found his wound. Donna threw the bloody bandages into the fire and studied Tom's wounds. His hands had almost fully healed, Lilly saw only a pair of small scars that would fade away over time. Tom rubbed his hands and flexed his fingers – and then he saw Lilly.

"Looks like those cuts have healed nicely," Lilly said whilst almost managing her best effort at a smile. Donna, noticing her effort, gave her a warm smile back. But Tom mumbled something under his breath and turned away, like a shy little boy.

"I wanted you to know I'm sorry. It's my fault you had a heart attack," Lilly admitted, though she couldn't look either of them in the eye. "Maybe you're right. Maybe someone will find us."

"It would be a fucking miracle," Tom finally uttered. His wife gave him a look of daggers. "But thank you, Lilly. I appreciate that." For a second, Tom looked defeated. He looked as though it didn't matter what he thought; that all hope was already lost. And for a second, Lilly agreed.

"Someone will find us," Tom went on. "They just need to find us before it's too late…" He flexed his fingers again, glad to be free of those horrid bandages that were starting to keep him prisoner.

"What do you mean?" Lilly asked, shaken by Tom's words. Although she asked him, she was pretty sure she already knew what Tom meant. He didn't reply to Lilly's question, but she got her answer when she saw Lisa walking from her tent, slowly approaching the three of them.

Donna was still busy looking for her husband's medication when her daughter approached. "Hey honey, are you still up?" she asked Lisa, although she didn't turn to look at her just yet. When Lisa didn't respond, Lilly turned to check on her. What she saw made her gasp, and finally Lisa had both her parent's absolute attention.

Lisa stood there with her thumb in her mouth. The reddest blood Lilly had ever seen was smeared across her clothes and face, and it continued to drip from her mouth. She took her thumb out of her mouth as she tried to say something. "Mommy…" was all she could manage in a voice quitter than a mouse. When she opened her mouth to talk, a stream of blood fell from her mouth, muffling her words.

Donna ran to her daughter in time to catch her as Lisa collapsed into her arms. Lilly could see that the little girl was shaking uncontrollably. She was choking on her own blood. Although she could hear Donna shouting commands at her, none of them processed with her, her mind was completely blank. But when she saw that the life begin to leave the little girl's eyes, she was back in the moment. Without a second thought, Lilly went to grab the first aid kit. She held the rag she found inside to Lisa's mouth, wiping away the blood. Lisa began to cough up blood, until her throat was finally clear. Donna was now covered in blood, but that didn't stop her from holding her daughter tight as she slowly began to recover from whatever kind of an episode she had just gone through.

The three of them were speechless. Donna cried as she held Lisa tight. She was finally breathing normally again, and was no longer shaking. Tom stroked Lisa's fine blonde hair. Lilly looked down at the bloody rag in her hand. She scrunched the rag into a ball and threw it into the fire. Lilly watched the rag slowly burn until it was nothing more than ash. She didn't know what was happening, but she knew that it couldn't possible have a happy ending.

Hope you guys are all enjoying this story so far! Thanks to those who are following my story already. If you're not, and you want to stay up to date with this story, please follow for free! Also, a favourite goes a long way, so does a review if you've got time! If I receive enough feedback, I may even upload the next chapter early! We're reaching the end of Episode One, so get ready for what's to come. In the meantime, ya'll have a good one!

-George