Love's dark side – comfort

Sophia Pelitier, the walker with the human mind sighed in that 'I really can't be bothered anymore' tone. For the past two hours, she and the rest of the group had been searching the entire prison (the parts they had claimed) for two members of the group who had run off, Rick Grimes and his son Carl. Via the walkie-talkies they had obtained, Sophia had been told only five minutes ago by Hershel that the rest of the group had found Rick and he was in pretty bad shape so they informed her not to expect any different from her boyfriend if she found him before someone else did but Sophia had to agree, Carl DID have a good reason to run off.

Whilst searching the prison for more supplies, the Dixon brothers had come across another prison survivor and after persuading Merle not to kill the man, had brought him back to their cell block in order to discuss with the group what to do with him. After a quite heated discussion, the group decided that they would not accept the man into the group. Knowing that he was going to have no chance of staying with them, the prisoner decided to taunt them before being kicked out on his backside. Most of the taunts had been fruitless but there was ONE taunt that the prisoner had been able to use due to the knowledge he gained from his old cellmate Andrew which had affected everybody, even if only a little.

He had mentioned 'Lori'.

At that moment, almost everyone's faces had frowns on them as they remembered the horrible fate Rick's wife had met in order to give birth to her daughter Judith. However, no one even suspected that the prisoner would be leaving in a body bag by the hands... of Carl. In a burst of anger, the young teenager had taken the knife that belonged to his girlfriend's mother (just because she happened to be closest to him) and began stabbing the prisoner. In fact, you could say that the group became SCARED of how Carl attacked the prisoner, even after death by multiple thrusts of Carol's knife.

After another whole minute of thrusting the knife into the prisoner's body, Carl left the cell block covered in the man's blood with the scared and shocked faces of his friends, father and girlfriend following him. Rick had said he would go talk to his son to try and calm him down but even half an hour later after the prisoner's body had been disposed off, Rick and Carl hadn't returned which led to the current search.

As she looked across the grassy prison courtyard, Sophia was happy to see a familiar cowboy hat in the horizon but as she got closer, she felt a mass amount of heat well up to her cheeks as she saw her beloved boyfriend Carl, shirtless with a mop of wet hair. Despite the awkward situation, Sophia continued and walked closer towards her boyfriend, who was sitting up with his legs straight out in front of him.

Upon reaching Carl, Sophia let a small smile take over her facial features and despite the white blush that was STILL on her cheeks, put a hand on his shoulder in a comforting manner. "Need a friend?" she asked. Carl looked away from the walkers outside the prison fence and up to the only zombie he cared about. "No, but I'd like my girlfriend please" he replied with an almost cheeky smile. After a roll of her eyes at his childish tone, the Pelitier girl sat down but as a silence overtook them, she began to shuffle about.

"I'm sorry if I scared you."

The awkwardness of the situation disappeared as those words entered the atmosphere. "It's ok" she began. "I understand, you had your reasons." Carl looked at her for a second before putting his white hand on her walker grey one and he interlocked their fingers whilst she shyly smiled. "I don't think I could do that" Sophia said as she looked at the ground in what appeared to be shame. "I might be able to shoot but not continuously stab them." Carl looked at her frowning face and felt himself get angry again but this time, it was at himself for making her sad.

Suddenly, Carl took his girlfriend into a killer bear hug and literally squeezed the life out of her; begging for comfort in his own manner. "C...Carl... let g-go" Sophia pleaded, losing air quickly. In response, Carl loosened up on his grip but made no effort to let go of her completely. "I didn't want to do it" Carl said on the verge of tears and Sophia realised he was talking about Lori. "I h-had to though, she would have come back if I didn't." Sophia's eyes widened in shock.

Eyes now full of sympathy for him, Sophia pulled her arms out of Carl's comfort hug only to put them around his shirtless body in a hug of her own. "Oh Carl" she began as tears began to slowly creep out of the boy's eyes. "I didn't know that you had to do THAT; I'm so sorry." For a while, there was silence between the two 13 year olds but then Sophia said the words that would give her a wet shoulder.

"It's okay to cry, Carl. Let it out."

Words did not meet the zombie-hybrid's ears but a wave of weeps and cries to which she just increased the strength of her hug on their source whilst giving him an occasional peck on the cheek. After a minute, Sophia heard only a small sniffle as Carl pulled away from her to wipe his eyes. When he looked back at her, his eyes widened as he saw the spot on her shoulder that he had literally DRENCHED with his tears.

"Wow, didn't know I had that much stored up." Sophia laughed a small girly laugh at her boyfriend's shock. "Are you alright now?" she asked. Carl looked down at the ground at the question as if thinking it over before he looked back at her whilst smiling a small smile and said "Yeah, I think so." Satisfied, Sophia stood up and held her hand out for Carl to take. "C'mon, everyone's waiting for you."

Later that night, Damien had been doing his night-time cell rounds to make sure everyone was sleeping when he came across what was to him, the CUTEST sight he had seen in a long time - Sophia and Carl were together in the same bed, snuggling together in their sleep with the sweetest smiles Damien had ever seen plastered onto their faces. However, even though it WAS the cutest sight he had ever seen, Damien couldn't help but frown at the sleeping teens. Why? This would've been perfect blackmail...

If Sophia hadn't broken his camera last time.