Episode One

Chapter Eight: Choices We Make

They were back around the campfire. The storm had passed, allowing Johnny to light another fire. He sat beside Alex, holding his hand tight. Alice sat to their left, holding an ice pack to her husband's bruised face. To Johnny's right sat Omid and Christa, with Clementine asleep on their lap. Christa stroked her hair as she snored silently as Omid kept her from rolling out of her place. Clementine often struggled to stay still in her sleep, but as she slept there, the golden flames of the campfire keeping her warm, she didn't move a muscle. Lilly sat opposite Johnny and next to Coach. Johnny had decided it was time to bring the group's muscle back into the loop. He realised he could have used Coach's help when Tom was beating Donald to a pulp. Coach was supposed to have been on watch at that point, but after Tom returned to his tent, Johnny found Coach sleeping in his tent. He wasn't angry with Coach, but with a herd of walkers surrounding the camp, it certainly wasn't safe to leave the front gate unattended.

"Tom should listen to reason now," Johnny went on. They had been discussing what was next for the group after Tom's daughter had passed away. "He and his wife have no reason to stay. If anything, the man's lucky we don't leave him after what he did to Donald." The group's attention once again turned to the battered and bruised Donald, who gave Johnny an unenthusiastic thumbs up for his words.

"But what if it's the exact opposite?" Christa cut in. "What if Tom decides he doesn't care what happens to him and the rest of us? The man clearly isn't mentally stable! With his daughter dead, why should he care what happens to the rest of us?"

Johnny thought about her point, but then remembered something. "Because he has a wife, that's why. He's not going to put Donna in danger."

This made Lilly laugh. "It's not exactly a marriage made in heaven," she said, making the whole group smirk, "but you're right. He wouldn't let Donna get hurt."

Johnny noticed a walker in the corner of his eye, approaching the camp's gate. He whistled to Coach, getting his attention, and nodded at the walker. The walker looked like an older man from what Johnny could make it. It was balding and was wearing a suit and bow tie, as though it had just left a wedding, and gotten hit by a car on its way here. Lilly handed Coach a gun as he got up on his feet to deal with the trespasser.

"So it's settled then," Johnny concluded. "I'll talk with Tom, and we'll get that RV ready to drive out of here before another storm." Everyone nodded in agreement, and Alex gave Johnny's hand a congratulatory squeeze. Johnny watched as Coach slowly approached the walker, whose dead eyes had caught the campfire's flames. But his heart sank when he saw Coach reach into the back of his trousers and draw a firearm.

Coach put one hand in front of his eyes to keep blood out of them as he raised the gun to the height of the walkers head. Coach was close enough to press the barrel of the gun against the walker's head, right between its eyes.

"NOOO!" Johnny screamed at Coach. If the herd of walkers didn't hear the gunshot, they would hear Johnny's cries for Coach to stop. But Johnny was too late. His cries only startled Coach, causing him to pull the trigger a second earlier than he had intended. The sound of the gunshot rang through the air, and Johnny wanted to bury his head in his hands and cry.

His daughter laid as still as a statue, as though she were just asleep. Tom didn't let go of her hand for a second, even though it had turned as cold as ice by now. All life had left the little girl, leaving behind this pale ghost-like shell. Tom thought of all the things he would have given to see Lisa smile again. He looked at his wife, who sat opposite him. She too held her daughter's hand. Every few seconds, she took the girl's hand to her mouth, and kissed the back of it softly. Tom smiled every time she did so, although he couldn't shake the feeling that his daughter was taken from him so unfairly. It should have been her, Tom thought as he stared into his wife's eyes. She took Lisa's hand, and pecked it again.

"What are we going to do, Tom?" Donna asked her husband. But Tom didn't break his silence. He didn't ignore his wife's question, he actually thought about it for a good long minute, but he never gave her an answer, because he had no idea.

Then, Donald was in their tent, his face still bruised and battered from Tom's beating.

"We're leaving," Donald said, although Tom wasn't sure whether this was an invitation or a goodbye. He knew one thing for sure, unless they wanted to walk, they weren't going anywhere without his keys.

Tom turned around, although he wasn't sure what he was going to say. Donald looked terrified. He was obviously expecting Tom to lay into him again. But then Tom realised, his eyes had been caught by something behind him. Tom turned quickly to see his daughter sat upright. For a moment, Tom thought a miracle had occurred in that tent. But he soon realised, this was a curse.

Tom only got a brief glance at the walker, but when he glanced into those cold, grey, lifeless eyes, he realised, his daughter was gone. The walker dug it's teeth into Donna, its bite spraying blood across the tent, ripping flesh from her neck. The noise Tom let out then was sheepish, but he couldn't bring himself to move.

"FUCK!" Donald cried. He tried to pull Tom out of the tent, but he wasn't going anywhere. Lisa pulled herself off Donna as she chewed a final piece of flesh before setting her sights on Tom. Tom saw his wife fall limp and lifeless onto her back as his daughter began to crawl towards him, drooling as she crawled. He reached into the back of his trousers, and pulled out a gun, but he knew he couldn't do what he had to.

Suddenly, the gun was out of his hands and in Donald's. Tom felt the cold grip of his daughter's dead hands as she pulled herself up his leg. He looked into the undead creature's eyes, those endless pools of nothingness, as Donald reached into his view holding Tom's gun with his right hand.

BLAM. Blood splattered across Tom's face whilst the recoil put Donald on his back. His daughter was now slumped on Tom's lap, limp, lifeless and cold. When the ringing in his ears finally stopped, Tom turned to Donald. He held out his hand, asking for his weapon back. Donald looked unsure, but returned Tom's gun. Tom looked at his wife, disgusted with himself for being willing to do what he had to.

"Leave me," Tom told Donald. He left then tent and went on his way, confident that Tom would follow shortly. The sound of a loud and close gunshot stopped him in his tracks. Donald sighed. He knew that what had just happened in that tent - he would never speak of to anybody, and he never did. His mind still trying to comprehend the tragedy that had just befallen Tom, Donald didn't notice the walker that crawled out of the tall grass behind him. He didn't catch the gaze of the nightmarish figure's face until the undead creature had swiped it's sharp, black claws and seized Donald's leg, causing him to fall into the wet grass where Donald could only listen to himself scream helplessly as the pain that followed made him cry out.

When Donald finally boarded the RV, he was welcomed aboard with a warm hug from Alice. Clementine only counted four people missing then. Tom and his wife and daughter, and Coach. She wondered if the gunshots she had just heard belonged to Coach, but as she searched for him out the RV's rain-covered window, there was no sign of him.

The rain hit harder and harder with every minute that passed, the storm had returned, and the group were getting impatient.

"Where the fuck is Tom!?" Johnny demanded from the driver's seat. For the past five minutes, he had been ready to start the RV and drive away from this nightmare, but one key tool that he required was missing; the RV's keys.

"He's coming," Donald said as reassuringly as he could, but Clementine could tell it wasn't that simple. He hadn't looked a single one of them in the eye since he joined them. "But, his wife and daughter, they didn't make it."

Everyone understood what Donald's words meant, but they still had so many questions. Despite all of their questions, however, everyone remained silent.

A sequence of gunshots rang outside, closer together than the ones Clementine had heard earlier. Outside, she could see Coach fending off a flood of a flood of walkers. They had broken through a weak spot in the fence, but Coach was fighting them off. Everyone was watching out of the windows now, but nobody was acting. Omid, who had strained his injured leg making it to the RV, was laid back on the RV's sofa bed, but he still managed a smile when Clementine looked back at him. Alex was sat in the passenger seat next to Johnny, whilst Lilly and Christa sat with Clementine watching Coach. Finally, Lilly sat up and grabbed her gun. But then, something caught Clementine's eye.

"Look!" she cried. At least three walkers had now made it through the fence. Coach backed up as he continued to open fire one them. But he looked done for when a walker grabbed him as he reloaded his firearm. The walker had dug its claws into Coach's shirt, tearing it across the front. But a bullet took it through it's shoulder, and the walker dropped to the ground. Tom grabbed Coach by the shoulder and shouted something to him.

"Get in the fucking RV!" Tom screamed at Coach at the top of his voice. The walkers had started to break through the fence, so there was no time to ask nicely. Coach saw the open doors of the RV and began to make his way there when something grabbed Tom from behind, pulling him down into the mud.

Tom was on his back now. He wrestled with the walker in the mud. It's teeth chattered as it came closer and closer to biting Tom's face. The stench of the walker was so unbearable, Tom almost wanted to give in and let the creature finish him off. His efforts to push the walker off of him were proving no good so far. He took his hand and grabbed the walker's neck, as if to try and choke it to death. Out of the corner of his eye, Tom could see Coach trying to aim for the walker with his gun from a couple of metres away. Tom cried out, thinking there was more chance of Coach killing him than the walker.

"No, Coach!" He cried. "Come closer!" The walker came close and closer to Tom. He felt its drool drip onto his face, and he knew the next thing he would feel would be the cold bite of the undead creature as it sank it's teeth into his neck.

BLAM. The bullet passed straight though the walker's head. Tom even heard the bullet ring as it passed and hit the fence in the distance. The walker stayed atop him for a few seconds, motionless, before it feel into the mud beside him. After he got back on his feet, Tom gave the walker a swift kick in the chest. He looked at Coach, and gave him a courteous nod.

Walkers were flooding into the camp from all corners now. The fence hadn't slowed them down for long. The gate was nothing more than a pile of planks now, and the tents were being ripped apart by the savage trespassers. Clementine watched as one walker stumbled to the RV, attracted by its beaming headlights. It clawed and scratched at the beam of light, trying to catch it in its hand. When the RV's engine roared into life, the walker looked jumped. It stepped back, but Johnny didn't waste any time plowing through the helpless creature with the RV. It slammed into the walker. The creature fell under the vehicle, and Clementine could hear a loud CRUNCH, which was most likely the sound of the walker's skull being crushed by one of the rear tires.

Clementine took a good look around her. She saw Donald and Alice in each other's arms, and she saw Tom looking at them both with envious and hateful eyes. She saw Coach almost fall asleep as he got comfortable on the end of the sofa bed, the rest of which was taken up by Omid, who was asleep. Christa was running her fingers through his hair lovingly. Lilly stood at the back of the RV counting the bullets in her gun. When she noticed Clementine looking at her, she managed a faint smile. Alex never took his hand of Johnny's shoulder, who continued to plow the RV through a seemingly endless army of walkers, until he had finally steered the RV out of the camp.

The RV shook it's passengers as Johnny steered it across the bumpy terrain that was the outskirts of Savannah. It sped up as it drove down the steep hill, and Clementine feared for a second that Johnny wouldn't be able to make it stop. But once they reached the bottom of the hill, back where Omid and Christa had first found Clementine, Johnny slowed the RV down to a comfortable speed, and directed it to the road. Clementine looked back at the camp from the window to her left. As she watched the fences being torn down, the tents being torn apart and the walkers flooding the hilltop, many different feelings filled her head. She couldn't describe them all, but one feeling she did recognise was the same one she got when Lee found her at her house in Atlanta, when they first got on the road. It was the feeling she got when she knew she was leaving to go somewhere better. The feeling that gave her comfort as she sat in the back of that RV was hope.

However, Clementine's feeling of hope was short-lived when she heard the all too familiar sound of Alice's cries. Alice was knelt in front of her husband, Donald, who sat on the second sofa bed opposite Coach and Omid. After hearing her tears, Clementine, Lilly and Christa gathered around her to find out what the problem was. Clementine squeezed in between Lilly and Christa to see Donald laid back, sweating with his right trouser leg rolled up to reveal his hairy thigh. In the middle of his leg, just below his knee, was a large red gash, from which blood bubbled and dripped down his thigh. A large chunk had been taken out of Donald's leg. He had been bitten. Clementine gasped at the horrific sight of the bite and covered her mouth. She looked at Lilly, whose hand was already reaching to the pistol stashed in the back of her trousers.

"What's going on back there?" Johnny asked, the adrenaline making his voice much higher-pitched than usual. "Should I stop the RV?"

No one replied. Nobody knew what to do - except for Lilly, whose grip had tightened around her pistol as she pulled it from its stash.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Well, I hope you all enjoyed Episode One of my Fan Fiction. In this episode my focus was on introducing and establishing the new characters, as well as providing a few new surprises on the way. The purpose of this episode was to set up the rest of the season - things are going to get pretty crazy from now! So I hope you guys decide to stick with this story and enjoy the rest of it. I'm currently in the process of editing Episode Two. The sooner I get some REVIEWS from you guys, the sooner it'll go up. And again, thanks to everyone who has Favorited/Followed/Reviewed this story already, it's because of you guys that I'm writing this story, so a big thank you goes out to you awesome people! Follow me on Twitter Mr_George_B for updates on The Walking Dead Season Two. Just send me a tweet and ask anything you want! :)

-George