The Walking Dead: Season Two
Episode Three: Behind Closed Doors
Chapter Two: R.A.F.B.
Previously on The Walking Dead: After leaving Savannah behind them, the group of survivors, now joined by Molly and Todd, head in a new direction suggested by Lilly, who believes she has found the perfect place for them to live in safety from the ever-present threat of the walkers. However, on their way, Johnny struggles to cope with the loss of Alex, and almost allows himself to be bitten by a walker, causing the group to become evermore concerned about his stability. Also, Omid hides a dangerous addiction from Christa. Meanwhile, after leaving Crawford ans assembling a new group of survivors, Jerry leads a group as they forage the wastes for food and supplies, but they soon encounter Jason Quesada and his sinister group of bandits, all of whom are out for blood.
When he swung the RV's door open, Omid was almost blinded by the bright morning sun. He stepped out of the RV, taking each step one at a time, and walked with Lilly and Christa to the front gates of the Air Force Base. As he walked, Omid spotted a sign that was almost buried in the ground. He pulled the metal sign out of the dirt and read the large white text in the middle of the signs' green box. ROBINS AIR FORCE BASE, the sign read. Omid discarded the sign and caught up to Lilly and Christa. The fence stood at least ten feet high, and ran on for perhaps a mile. Together, Omid and Christa swung the gates open, creating a gap in the fence wide enough to fit through five RVs. They stood back as Coach hurriedly drove the RV through the gates, the tires spitting dirt in their faces. That was when Omid noticed Clementine stood beside him, whom he had asked to remain in the RV. "Sorry," she said, shrugging her shoulders, when she noticed Omid's surprise. He wanted to tell her that she should have done as he asked, but he couldn't help but grin at the little girl. He knew he would have done the same in her position. The four of them followed the RV onto the base, swinging the gates closed behind them. They saw Coach park the RV in front of one of the base's two neighbouring hangars, both standing no less than fifty feet tall. Omid also spotted two small cabins close to the hangars. They looked like barracks. A men's and a women's perhaps? They followed the RV's tire treads to where Coach had set it carefully outside the giant hangar. The group were making their way out of the RV one by one. Omid saw Alice exit the vehicle carefully and step aside to let past the next person. Omid watched excitedly but also warily as Donald stepped out of the RV, manoeuvring himself down each step carefully and cautiously with his newfound crutches.
The entire group cheered when Donald stepped off the RV, easing himself to the ground and showing surprising skill with the pair of crutches. Omid even noticed Tom pat Donald on the back and offer words of congratulations. Alice hugged her husband so hard and suddenly he almost dropped his crutches and lost his balance. Omid thought he even saw Johnny smile as he watched from the RV's open door, keeping out of sight of the group. Omid hooted and applauded at Donald's achievement and Clementine did the same. It had been a while since the group had had anything worth cheering over. Omid looked at the excitement buzzing around him, and could hardly believe how happy the group were. Even after everything that had happened to them, they were still capable of showing their support for each other and cheering their friends on. It was like the world had never ended. Lee would have liked this, Omid thought to himself as he and Christa held hands. Seeing the group like this really gave him hope. Hope that, one day, they would no longer have to live in fear of the monsters that lurked outside their walls. Then, Lilly stepped forwards, he rifle in her hands.
"Now I know how excited you all must be by the idea of a bed to yourselves tonight," Lilly explained. She was right. The group had long grown tired of piling into that RV to sleep at night where the privilege of privacy was non-existent. "But before we start deciding where we're going to sleep at night, we need to make this place safe." Omid agreed. Just looking around him he could count at least a dozen walkers wandering aimlessly and non-threateningly, though it didn't look like their sudden arrival had even registered with the base's undead residents. "We need to check out the hangars and the barracks for walkers and clear out the lurkers around the base. So… any volunteers?"
"Me and Christa will check out one of the barracks," Omid decided, raising his arm in the air to grab Lilly's attention and the attention of the rest of the group. Now that his leg was better, it was about time he contributed something to the group.
"And we'll take a look around the one next-door," Molly said from behind Lilly. Her and Todd nodded at each other as they agreed on their plan.
"Okay. Good," Lilly said from the centre of the crowd. "I'm still gonna need some people to help me search these hangars too." She signalled to the two enormous hangars behind the RV. Omid still gaped at their wondrous size.
"I'll give you a hand," Coach said in a low, booming voice from behind Lilly. Omid saw him sat on the steps of the RV behind her loading a pistol.
"Me too!" Clementine offered enthusiastically as she stepped out of the crowd. Omid was about to stop her, but Christa shook her head. Surprisingly, Christa agreed with Clementine's suggestion. It seemed she'd decided that Clementine would have to learn one to handle herself around the walkers eventually, and if she was it should be from the right person. And that person was Lilly.
"Well alright," Lilly said as Clementine joined her side. "Johnny. Tom. You two can start unpacking our supplies. What we've got left anyway." Lilly looked around at the group of survivors around her. She was proud to call them her friends. "Let's get started."
The door to the men's barracks opened with a long and pitiful creak. Omid stepped inside, pistol in hand, and scanned the room. His eyes were instantly drawn to the room's beds, of which there were a dozen. The beds had been left unmade, the covers lying on the floor along with discarded clothing such as shirts and jeans. Whoever had lived here before had left in a hurry. Omid just hoped they weren't planning on returning anytime soon. Before Christ had even shut the door behind her, Omid had jumped on one the beds to test its softness. He sat lazily on the bed resting his head in his arms as though he was about to drift off to sleep when Christa approached him, her arms crossed impatiently. Omid realised she was angry. "Hey, how about we push a couple of these beds together and get some rest, if you know what I mean," he said with a cringe-worthy wink.
Smooth, Christa thought sarcastically. "Get up, Omid," she said as she rolled her eyes.
"C'mon, Christa," he whined as he jumped off the bed. "I'm just fooling around. I just can't believe our luck. This place is great! Can you believe we found it?" He asked excitedly. Then he noticed Christa beginning to tear up. "What's wrong, honey?" He asked her, concerned.
"You're a liar," she told him as she fought back tears. "That's what's wrong."
"What?" Omid asked her, taken aback by her out-of-the-blue accusation.
"Don't think I can't smell it on your breathe." His heart dropped - he knew exactly what she was talking about now. "Dammit, Omid. This has never been a problem. Why now?"
"Are you fucking serious?" He asked Christa with contempt. His language was enough of a shock to Christa to make her step back slightly. Omid's face had dropped. Christa now saw that long, tried, disheartened look he wore. A look he'd been hiding for a while. "Every person I've met in the last six months has ended up dead. Lee, Ben, Kenny, Chuck, Donna, Lisa, Alex – all dead. I can't shake someone's hand without wondering if they'll even still be alive by the end of the week. Sometimes, I look around and wonder who'll be the next to go. Then I look at you…" Christa could see tears in Omid's eyes now too. He began to choke up as he spoke. "I look at you – and Clementine – and I worry that I can't protect you. After all, I couldn't protect anybody else. I couldn't even protect myself," he remarked as he looked down at his still swollen leg. "If I can't protect you, then I can't protect our child either. I mean, Christ, even if I do get to see our child grow up, it won't even know how things used to be. All it will know is how the world is now, and what it's turned us into. What kind of a future is that? Sometimes I wonder if we're doing the wrong thing by even bringing a child into this world. And, God, Clementine. She's lost everything –everyone she ever knew. And yet, she still finds some way of getting out of bed every morning. And I have to wonder how the hell she does it. I'm sorry, Christa. I just don't think I can do this anymore."
Christa slapped him. "Don't ever say that," she told him. "And don't you dare think you're the only one who's lost something. You think this is easy – for anyone? Well, it's not." She wiped her tears away. "What if you gave up on me? Huh? What if you gave up on us?" She held her belly as Omid rubbed his red, stinging cheek.
"I'm sorry," he told her, tears running down his red cheeks. "I just couldn't ever bear to lose you, or Clementine," he told her as he wrapped his arms around Christa.
"Don't worry," she told him. "We're not going anywhere."
The door to the women's barracks was already open, Todd could see as he climbed the cabin's wooden steps. He slipped inside with Molly following behind him holding Hilda high above her head, ready to sink the ice tool into the skull of any walker that crept up on them. The blood trail led from the door all the way across the room and through the door to what looked like the bathroom. Todd crept towards the bathroom. The door was ajar, and Todd could just about make out a shadow on the bathroom wall. The shadow was short, like a child or a small house pet. The floorboards creaked beneath Todd's feet as he moved across the room. The next floorboard creaked the loudest, and the sound must have been heard by the bathroom's occupant, as Todd saw the shadow's head turn sharply at sound of the loud creak. "Here it comes," Molly whispered behind him, still holding Hilda up high. Then, Todd saw two hands reach out from the doorway, pulling against the floorboards. The walker's groans echoed across the room as the undead creature showed its face, still pulling itself out of the bathroom. Now, Todd could see that the walker was legless. It had pulled itself out of the bathroom and was making its way slowly towards the two of them, leaving a bloody trail in its wake. "I'll handle this," Molly told him, realising the threat of being bitten was low. She marched towards the walker. It reached out to Molly, clawing at thin air. Then, the ice tool came down hard on the walker's cranium, caving in its skull in a gory explosion of red flesh and white bone. She pulled the ice tool free from the walker's head and returned to Todd's side, now covered in blood. "Well, at least now we're alone."
"Yeah," Todd said, smiling back at Molly. He looked around him. The beds were in a good state, although some we're messing sheets. Some of the beds were even missing their mattresses, leaving only the skeleton of the piece of furniture. But, given the fairly small size of the group, this would do just fine. It was just a shame the beds were all singles.
"It's a shame these are all single beds," Molly joked, as though she'd read his mind. Todd's heart raced, and he turned beat read. Her joke hadn't gone down as well as she'd hoped.
"Yeah," he agreed shyly, oblivious to the fact that he'd just repeated himself foolishly.
Then Todd saw the walker. It must have stumbled in through the open door to the cabin and was now awkwardly moving straight for Molly. It was about to make a swing for her and dig its sharp claws into her arm when Todd pushed her out of the way suddenly and swiftly. The walkers claws missed Todd's face by inches. After it made its swing, Todd tensed his muscles and threw his fist into the walkers jaw. It hurt like hell. The punch knocked a couple of teeth loose and sent the walker crashing to the floor. Todd looked beside him and saw Hilda, the ice tool that Molly must have dropped when she fell. He picked it up and before he knew it he had swung the tool down on the walkers skull and had dug Hilda's blade into the creature's head. The walker became limp and lifeless then, and the groaning stopped. He had lodged Hilda so deep into the walker's skull that, when he released his grip on the tool, it didn't move. Hilda remained buried in the walker's skull. Todd took a step back, wiped the sweat away, and took a moment to appreciate his work. When he turned to his side, Molly stood next to him looking mighty impressed by his actions. They caught each other's gaze, and within seconds their arms were wrapped around each other and their lips were pressed together in a spontaneous kiss. Molly's lips were soft and sweet, whilst Todd's were rough and dry. But Molly didn't pull back. They were stuck to each other, their lips massaging each other, for the longest few seconds of Todd's life. When they pulled away from each other, Todd planted another soft kiss on Molly's cheek. He didn't want the magical moment to ever end. He looked down and saw that they held each other's hands.
"Well, that wasn't bad," Molly said as she looked up at Todd dreamily.
"Yeah," Todd agreed before moving in for another kiss, this one just as sweet as the last.
"Well what the fuck do you know about this?" Jason Quesada asked his men sadistically as he juggled the old, worn axe in his right hand. His devilish eyes never left Jerry as he laughed with the men around him, all carrying assault rifles or SMGs. Jerry had never seen Jason lay his hands on a weapon other than the cold steel of his signature fire axe, a weapon he got a sick pleasure out of calling his own. He even gave the thing a name. "Nora," he called it. Nobody else ever laid their hands on Nora. Jerry's heart was in his throat as Jason marched towards him and his men. He wondered if any of their bullets had actually hit the bandits back during the shootout. They hadn't meant to hurt anyone – only scare them off. It had been Jerry's fault for taking his men into Jason's territory. Now, it was time to face the consequences. And Jerry knew that they weren't going to get off easy. Tonight, Nora was going to taste some fresh blood.
"Listen, Jason," Jerry heard Tommy begin another academy award-winning performance as he broke into a sincere apology, apparently on behalf of the entire group, to Jason and the bandits. Jerry rubbed his nose with his fingers as he watched Tommy's pitiful performance. One that was bound to only get them in even more trouble. "I am so sorry about what happened back there," Tommy told Jason as he looked up to the bandit leader. "We just panicked is all." Tommy faked a pathetic and slightly feminine laugh in a desperate attempt to level the tension between the two groups. Right now, Jerry felt as though he was trapped between a standoff straight out of a Western, with either group ready to draw their weapons at any moment. "We never meant to hurt-"
"Now why don't we skip past all this bullshit," Jason interrupted Tommy, his face dead with seriousness. The stone cold look on Jason Quesada's white face sent chills even down Jerry's spine. Jerry witnessed all kinds of evils in his time surviving both inside and outside Crawford's walls, but something about this guy was different. Jason had no clear motivations for the things he did, the atrocities he committed – not that Jerry could see. He wasn't trying to protect his family that were already long dead. He wasn't trying to protect his group, a member of which he'd feed to the walkers every now and again. Jerry could only think that maybe the psychotic bastard got some kind of sick pleasure out of the things he did, and that haunted him more than anything. "And let's get the fuck down to business," he spat.
"Look, Jason. What happened back there was an accident," Jerry started, giving Johnny's performance a run for tis money. "We didn't mean to land ourselves in your territory. We just got a little lost. Tommy's right. When your men ambushed us, we panicked. We started shooting and got the hell out of there. But nobody was hurt, I promise you that."
"Nobody was hurt? What about my fucking feelings, Jerry? Did it never cross your mind that you shooting at my fucking men and going against my fucking word might leave me a little more than hurt? I mean, to have the nerve – no – the audacity not just to betray my trust, but to try and kill my own fucking guys? That takes some cojones, my friend," Jason laughed manically at Jerry and his men's impudence. Jerry had never thought of it that way, but he then realised what a fool he'd been. "But fuck, man, that's why I like you," he said a he broke into another crazed laughing fit with his hands on his knees. "Still, I obviously can't let you and your faggot friends get away with this shit, so you and I are gonna have to make a deal," he told Jerry, whom he'd always looked at as the leader of the small group of survivors. "I want six bodies. No more. No less. All gagged and ready at this exact spot two days from now," Jason told him. His look of deadly seriousness had returned as he gave his instructions to Jerry. "I don't care if they're men or women, but no children. They can be your own people or some small group of survivors you kidnapped for all I care – I really don't give a fuck. Just get it done," he patted Jerry on the shoulder motivationally as his list of demands finally came to end. "Also," he added suddenly, "I want them all alive. Show up with any rotten and spoiled corpses and I… Well, I won't be fucking happy, that's for sure."
"Consider it done," Jerry told him dutifully, despite knowing all too well that Jason's demands would be impossible to live up to. But a deal was a deal, and Jerry had just made one with the devil himself.
Jason nodded to one of his men who then led a group of four, all large white males clad in black leather jackets and wearing red or blue bandannas across their shaven heads. The group of four approached Jerry and his men, who raised their guns. Jerry signalled for his men to lower their weapons and didn't change his mind even when the group of four grabbed Tommy and threw him against the hood of the jeep. Tommy cried out as his head hit the jeep's metal hood with a loud CLANG that rang out for a few long seconds as the four men wrestled with Tommy and forced him to spread his hands out across the jeep's hood.
"You didn't really think I was just going to let you off with a fucking warning did you?" He asked Jerry and his group, smiling as he approached the jeep and Tommy. "Fuck! You really are stupider than you look, as if that were even possible," he said to Jerry, mocking the Sheriff's uniform he wore, including the cowboy hat on his head. The uniform had belonged to Tommy, but he was no leader. Jerry was in charge outside Crawford's walls or at least, he thought he had been. Out here, watching as Jason, axe in hand, approached Tommy who was now kicking and squealing in the bandits' clutches, Jerry felt very powerless indeed.
"I did tell you not to fuck me," Jason told Jerry and his men, though Jerry felt that his was directed much more at him, "or my men." He juggled the axe in his hand again as he stood before Johnny, still wrestled against the hood of the jeep. "Here," he said as he lifted the axe high above him, "this should help you remember." He swung the axe down and, in one swift swipe, buried the axe in Tommy's forearm as the blade cut through his flesh and bone. Tommy screamed hysterically as Jason pulled the axe from his arm and his hand slid from his arm as blood spewed from the gaping wound. Tommy's hand fell to the ground as his arm leaked red liquid and Tommy continued to cry out at the excruciating, unimaginable pain. Jerry winced when Tommy held his bloody arm before him, staring at the space where his hand should have been where red liquid now bubbled and spat until Tommy finally fainted.
Jerry helped his men lift Tommy to the back of the jeep and set him down carefully in the back seat, where Phillips, in his white lab coat and doctor's scrubs, was already prepared with some medical supplies to treat Tommy with. He got to work immediately, dabbing cotton with alcohol and tearing bandages to dress Tommy with as the rest of Jerry's men piled into the two jeeps, waiting for Jason's roadblock to clear. That was, unless Jason had more to say. Jason strolled past Jerry looking mighty pleased with himself, still juggling the dripping, bloody axe in his hand. "Okay, Sheriff," he shouted. "Two days," he reminded him as he lifted up two fingers to ensure his message had sunk in. He heard Jason laugh hysterically as he piled into one of the black trucks. One by one, the black trucks that formed the roadblock began to clear out of there, and their path was finally clear. Jerry sat in the passenger seat beside the driver in the first jeep. The driver put the pedal to the metal as they got back on the road at long last. Jerry took a quick glance behind his seat, where Phillips was already wrapping Tommy's wound as he slept.
"Let's get on home," Jerry told the driver. It was about time they returned. The world outside the walls of their new home had grown even more dangerous by the rise of the sun, and Jerry wasn't necessarily thinking just about the walkers.
"Alright," the driver agreed positively. "Robins Air Force Base, here we come." Jerry sat back. Just hearing the name of somewhere they knew was safe was music to his ears. He rubbed his forehead. He was getting another headache.
Next time on The Walking Dead: As the group explore the Air Force Base, the survivors learn a lot about each other as some surprising secrets are revealed and some shocking revelations are made. Lilly makes a disturbing discovers, causing the group to wonder whether or not they are actually alone. Whilst Tom and Johnny are left together to work out their differences before they tear the group, as well as each other apart. Meanwhile, Jerry and his men make their way home, unaware of the strangers lurking beyond their walls.
Chapter Three is ready to be uploaded. Would love to hear some feedback on this chapter and this story overall from you guys so please leave some REVIEWS as I haven't heard from you guys in a while! Once I hear back from some of you guys, I'll upload Chapter Three for you to hopefully enjoy!
As always, thanks for reading!
-George