9. Back the way we came
"Where—where did they all come from?" Sarah asks as they race out of the bedroom door, and Clementine is so fast that the older girl can hardly keep up as they bound down the hallway and around corners.
"I don't know, I think they might've come from the woods," presumes Clementine with a shaking voice, hauling her backpack on with her pistol still in hand. "I couldn't see very well from where we were."
"Do you think they saw us?" Sarah runs down the stairs after her, making sure not to trip on her own feet. Fearing the answer, her heart is nearly pounding out of her chest.
"Well, they travel in herds. If one of them did, so did the rest of them." She slows to a stop near the bottom of the stairs. Clementine presses her back against the wall and leans to peer through the front window, her gun cautiously raised by her face. "Shit," she mutters upon seeing the crowd of walkers outside already so much closer to the house. "They're coming this way. They must've seen us on the roof."
Frightened by that statement, Sarah rushes next to her to gaze out the window as well. "Wh—maybe we can wait it out. They can't get us from in here, right?" She snaps her head towards the other girl, her eyes desperate for reassurance.
"They know we're in here, Sarah. Once they start banging on that door, they're not gonna stop unless something else distracts them. And there's not much else we can do from inside," Clementine explains as they watch helplessly from the window, dozens of groaning figures stumbling only a few houses down now.
"Should we block the door with something?" suggests Sarah in a panic.
"Yeah," agrees Clementine, who immediately lunges for the couch in the living room. "Here, help me move this."
Sarah rushes to the far end of the sofa next to Clementine. The two of them push with all their strength until it slides in front of the door, the older girl's arms shaking violently.
An aggressive bang from the other side of the door startles Sarah, the sound followed by a muffled snarl. She jumps away with a shriek. More heavy thuds follow, every one of them stronger than the last. The two of them can clearly hear the group of walkers growling and moaning just outside.
"That's not gonna hold for long," Clementine raises her voice over the noise, stepping back away from the door. "Where's your gun?"
As Clementine pulls the magazine out of her pistol, Sarah only becomes more frightened as she watches the other girl check how many bullets she has, terrified of the thought of her having to use it. "It's—I think it's upstairs."
"Go get it, quickly! I'll hold them off." Clicking the loaded magazine back into place and tucking away the weapon for now, Clementine firmly plants herself a few feet away from the door as she pulls out her knife instead. The door rattles constantly from the walkers, and she can see a crowd of them forming on the front porch from the window, getting larger by the second.
Terrified, Sarah sprints back up the stairs as fast as her legs can carry her without further words.
Glass clatters all over the floor as the front window suddenly shatters from the force, but Clementine is quick to stab her knife into the first walker that shoots its head through the opening. It falls to the ground and another decaying figure attempts to climb through. It desperately claws its hands at her, snarling.
Clementine grabs the walker in an instant, plunging her knife into its head and yanking it out after a still moment.
With their chorus of snarls now almost hurting her ears, more and more walkers begin to reach through and she steps away after stabbing another through the skull. Most of them have given up on the door and are instead focusing on getting through the large window. It doesn't take long for the rest of it to shatter out of its frame, and Clementine instinctively pulls out her pistol when she sees how many there are.
She raises her gun and fires, shooting as many as she can. They each climb through the opening one by one, stumbling over each other and growling at her viciously, but there's so many of them that Clementine doesn't even have time to shoot them all.
"I got it!" Sarah announces with pride as she returns from upstairs, her pistol now in hand.
After firing at one last walker, Clementine whips around and rushes up the stairs as soon as Sarah reaches the bottom, grabbing her hand. "Come on!" she shouts, and Sarah is so dazed from the sudden change of direction that she almost falls over in the process.
The older girl glances behind her at the horde of walkers now infesting the house, some of them even crawling on the ground towards them. Clementine pulls the other girl's arm and shoves her in the back so that Sarah is the one in front. She stumbles forward, but her speed never falters as Clementine follows close behind her.
When Sarah reaches the top of the stairs, she hears Clementine grunt underneath all the noise of the dead, a thud following soon after. She turns to see her now collapsed onto her stomach, a pair of bony hands clutching onto the younger girl's ankle as the walker crawls towards her.
Without a second thought, Sarah raises her pistol and fires. Before Clementine is even able to react, its head audibly snaps backwards and it instantly releases it's hold on her.
"Thanks," Clementine breathes, feeling a wave of relief as Sarah pulls her up to her feet. Grasping her gun on the floor that had flown out of her hands, she continues down the hall behind Sarah, the sound of the walkers following close behind them.
Rounding the corner, they bound through one of the doorways at the end of the hall. As soon as Clementine races in, Sarah slams the door shut behind her and locks it.
The continuous snarls now muffled, the older girl worriedly glances around the empty spare room for anything they could use to block the door, but her eyes meet nothing of use. "W-we're trapped," she pants as the dead begin to pound on the door. "What do we do now?!"
There's a soft click followed by a sliding noise from somewhere behind her. Sarah snaps her head around to see Clementine already positioned in front of the large window at the back of the room. She watches in confusion as the girl pushes it up all the way, peering down at the ground below.
"We're gonna have to jump," Clementine decides in an oddly calm tone.
"What?! Are you crazy?" exclaims Sarah.
"It's not that high. Just trust me!" she reassures before climbing up onto the windowsill, already sensing the other girl's fear. As she looks down from the two-storey height, a part of her can't help but become nervous upon seeing the hill the house is positioned on, a slope leading down towards the fence of the backyard. There's rows of dead trees at the bottom, the near city visible on the other side.
"C-can't we find another way?" begs Sarah, shouting over the deafening noise.
"There's no time, Sarah. There's too many!" Clementine grips the window frame with one hand, peering over her shoulder at the terrified girl who remains frozen in place. "We have to go, now!"
Sarah nervously glances behind her. Figuring they have no other choice, she scrambles to climb up onto the windowsill next to her without further protest, standing with caution.
"It'll be okay," assures Clementine, the wind blowing her hair back. She grabs Sarah's hand, whose worried eyes are fixed on the ground below. "On three," Clementine looks to her. "One… two…"
The door is knocked off its hinges behind them, the entire thing toppling over with a loud thump as a dozen walkers stumble directly over it and towards the window.
Sarah glances over her shoulder just as they all pool into the room. Then Clementine feels Sarah's hand tightening around her own and the older girl leaps off the edge before she can finish counting, bringing Clementine with her.
The next thing they know, they're soaring through the air and landing with a painful thud. The layer of dead leaves crunch underneath them as they tumble down the dirt hill.
They slow to a stop. With Sarah coughing next to her, Clementine lands on her hands and knees, looking back up towards the house with panting breaths. Walkers are plunging out the window they came, more of them stumbling into view at the sides of the house from the front.
Hardly faltering for a second, Sarah and Clementine jump to their feet again as they dead continue to pursue them. They leap over the short wooden fence and advance even further down the hill. When they reach the bottom, they run straight through the parking lot of the gas station by the road.
More roaming figures meet them around the corner, but Clementine pulls out her gun without hesitance, firing at the few in their path.
With the horde still chasing them from behind, and the multiple lone walkers that roam towards them on the street, the gunshots are probably only luring more of them their way. She figures the majority of them had already started making their way towards the house once the first gunshot was fired, and now Sarah and Clementine are only running directly into them.
Still, they continue to the end of the block, but Clementine freezes in her tracks once they round another corner. She extends a cautious arm out in front of Sarah, who nearly collides into her from behind.
She backs up slowly, watching wide-eyed as another growing swarm of walkers in the distance head directly their way. There's so many of them that they block the entire road. Buildings line either side of the streets, and she knows they won't be able to run past them untouched.
It doesn't take long for one of them to catch sight of her, another following soon after, followed by another. They quicken their pace, their snarls growing louder as they all eye their new targets.
"Go," Clementine warns Sarah without turning to face her, still backing up. "Go, go, go!" She whips around momentarily, continuously shoving a shaken-up Sarah until she runs in the opposite direction.
Sarah disappears around the corner they came from, but Clementine remains stationary, confidentally shooting down as many of the dead as she can while they still limp towards her in the distance. Firing one last shot for satisfaction, another decaying body collapses to the ground with an audible blood splatter, and she finally turns to follow Sarah.
The older girl is pacing down the sidewalk underneath every awning, yanking on the handles of all the doors with the hope that one will be unlocked. Clementine glances behind her down the opposite road, the horde quickly catching up to them. They're running out of time.
Finding no other option, she joins Sarah in pulling on the doors of every building, desperate for one to open.
Finally, when Sarah moves down to the next door, it swings open in an instant, and she pulls on it with so much force that she almost falls back. "In here!" she calls over to Clementine, who gladly races through the doorway after her.
Just as it heavily swings shut behind them, a pair of decaying hands slam against the other side, sliding down the glass and leaving a dark blood trail.
Sarah and Clementine step away warily, watching as the walker growls viciously at them. The noises of the dead are hardly audible now as they all crowd around the other side of the double doors, angrily trying to reach the stunned girls on the other side.
"That should hold, right?" Sarah pants, her lungs burning for air.
"Yeah," Clementine exhales audibly, her chest rising and falling. "These doors look pretty solid. Shouldn't be able to break through here." Fearlessly, she steps closer in examination, then grimaces at the pathetic group of clawing figures. "Either that or they give up sooner or later."
"Which… probably won't be for a while, I'm guessing." Sarah sighs, finally observing their surroundings. With the individual mailboxes bolted to the walls and the intercom by the door, they appear to be in the foyer of a small apartment building. "Well, it looks like we're trapped. Again."
"Hey, at least it was kinda fun," smirks Clementine after a moment.
Unamused, Sarah faces her with a dead expression. Then she lightly smacks her hand across the girl's arm who dramatically jumps in surprise.
"Ow!" Clementine laughs at her reaction while holding a hand to her arm, playfully offended. "What? I said 'kinda', didn't I?"
"Yeah, I don't see how running for our lives could possibly be fun, but… you're pretty weird, so…"
She scoffs, chuckling softly. "Yeah, I think I've heard that from you before. More than once." Clementine briefly tugs on Sarah's arm once she notices her still staring at the door they came from. "Come on. I don't think we're getting back out that way."
Retrieving the flashlight from her backpack, Clementine shines it down the dark corridor with her pistol held in the other hand. Noticing that Sarah doesn't have her own pack with her, she beckons for the older girl to follow. "Stay close. There might be more of them in here."
"Yeah," Sarah nods, fearful of what lies ahead. Their steps are cautious as they begin down the hallway. "Right behind you."
Deciding to wait out the walkers, Sarah and Clementine climb numerous flights of stairs after finding two other exits on the ground floor that had been heavily barricaded on the other side. They figured it was best for them anyway, and that it wouldn't be wise to go back outside yet. So, they hope to get a view of the walkers from up above and plan their next move.
With no other stairs to climb, they arrive at the fifth and final floor without running into a single unwanted presence in the process. What their eyes are met with is what appears to be remnants of one of the apartments, or even the start of one.
The entire residence had clearly been under construction, the walls and ceiling consisting of nothing but wooden and metal framework, leaving the rooms completely exposed to each other as well as the outside air. There are multiple wires hanging from the ceiling, and so much sawdust covering the ground that Sarah and Clementine leave clear footprints as they walk.
"Whoa…" gasps Sarah as they stroll through the uncomplete apartment, gazing at the visible sky above. "That's kinda cool. You can still see everything outside, even though we're still technically inside." Their footsteps echo loudly, the wind barely whistling nearby. "This is weird… Why do you think everything is only half-built up here, and not everywhere else?"
"Maybe there was a fire or something. But it was only on the top floor, so they had to do reconstruction up here," presumes Clementine who walks even further inwards. "That's what it looks like, at least."
"I… guess that makes sense," decides Sarah. She follows Clementine to the edge of the building, who's now standing stationary and observing the roof across from them.
The sky is gray, the moans of the dead sounding faint from down below. The other building is shorter than the one they're currently in. The roof lines up exactly with the floor they're on, and a narrow wooden plank acts as a bridge between the two. They can't tell if it had already been placed there as part of the construction sight, or by another survivor.
"Don't tell me we have to cross that," mumbles Sarah. The cool afternoon wind sends a shiver trailing up her spine.
Clementine presses her lips together, examining the scene before them. "I don't see any other way around," she says with disappointment. "There's a ladder on the other side. We could use that to get down," she nods her head towards the roof in front of them.
Uninterested in the ladder, Sarah steps closer to the edge. She wouldn't say she's afraid of heights, and they're only five storeys up, but it isn't exactly comforting looking down at the ground from the edge of a building either, especially knowing there are probably nearby walkers down there. She steps away again, then looks to the thin wooden plank that reaches the other side. The sight of it does nothing to calm her nerves.
"It looks kinda… rickety," grimaces Sarah. She wonders how long it's actually been there. If other people have crossed it in the past, they could have weakened the board even more.
Clementine inhales. "You're right. I'll go first." Confidentally, she begins to stride towards the makeshift bridge, but Sarah pulls her arm back.
"No. No, I'll—I'll go…" Sarah protests, walking past the other girl with hesitance.
"Are you sure?" Clementine presses her brows together, concerned.
"Yeah," she answers, and she isn't even sure whether she's trying to convince herself anymore. "Yeah, I can do this."
Clementine eyes her for a moment, skeptical of the unusual offer. "Okay then," she agrees, her voice slow. "I'll be right behind you. Just… take it really slow and whatever you do, don't stop moving. And don't look down."
Sarah nods, then takes a deep and audible breath. "Okay." She turns to face the plank again.
"Be careful," Clementine advises from behind her.
Slowly, Sarah places a foot onto the board, taking the time to test her weight before stepping onto it completely. Her body sways briefly, but upon remembering Clementine's words, she brings the other leg from behind her and begins to walk.
The wood creaks from underneath as she continuously places a foot in front of the other, and her heart beats even quicker than before. Clementine hears it too, but the younger girl doesn't say anything in hopes of encouraging Sarah to concentrate.
When she makes it half way, she suddenly stops in her tracks. It isn't until Clementine begins to hear Sarah whimpering that her own heart nearly jumps out of her throat.
Sarah is panicking.
Her arms begin to shake and her breath is quivering now. Her weight is only continuing to weaken the board as she stands stationary on the least supported section of the bridge. If she doesn't move, the entire thing will break underneath her.
"Sarah! You have to keep moving!" Clementine shouts to her across the way, now beginning to panic. "Listen to me. You're almost there, just put one foot in front of the other."
Desperate to get her to move, Sarah doesn't respond. She only continues to stand there, staring in horror at the ground below her, too afraid for her own life to even move a muscle.
"Sarah, you have to listen to me! It'll be okay, I promise. Just don't stop moving!"
Clementine can hear it clearly now - the creaking of the board, groaning so much that it may even be louder than her own heartbeat. Then there's a deafening snap and Clementine is racing towards her in an instant.
The next thing Sarah knows, she's shoved in the back so forcefully and she's collapsed onto her stomach. The surface of the roof is mere inches from her face now, and it all happens so fast that she isn't even sure where she is anymore.
When she whips her head back around towards the bridge, the last thing she sees is Clementine falling out of view before Sarah starts to scream.
