The group continued walking trying to push back the memory of what had transpired not long ago
in the direction of the town hoping not to encounter any more people who would mean them harm, Sarah had hardly spoken since the shooting and still looked like she was in shock.
"Joel your gonna have to talk to her about this" Tommy whispered to Joel
"Yeah well I don't want to talk about this" Joel replied
"Joel you're going to have to talk about it sooner or later" Tommy retorted
"Look over there we can cross the river" Joel said deflecting the conversation
As the group approached the river they could several stones laid strewn out across it like stepping stones, Tommy walked across first jumping from stone to stone trying to regain his balance after each small leap he made it across.
"Alright the stones seem sturdy enough come on across" yelled Tommy back to Joel and Sarah
Sarah was up next and if her soccer (Football) skills meant anything it was she had balance and she leapt from stone to stone unhindered unlike Tommy with his balance problems, Sarah made it across receiving a look of slight amazement from Tommy. Joel was last to cross he took it cautiously jumping from one to the next only a couple more remained he leapt and landed on one with a thud momentarily losing his balance.
"Careful Joel" said Tommy
Joel regained his balance and looked up at Tommy with a smirk as if to say how a stone was going to beat him, in that moment the stone fractured shearing off its top face and Joel slid into the river which only stood at about half a foot deep much to Tommy's amusement this even drew a quick laugh from Sarah.
"God dam it" yelled Joel as he got up regaining his composure and waded through the rest of the river and out onto the bank. Looking ahead they faced a steep hill to get back up to the main road, this proved to be no problem as they were all frequent Hikers although Joel was weighed down a bit in water weight.
"Well the towns further away than we thought look at the sign" Tommy stated pointing at the sign
"It says there's a village not far if we can get there today we can make the town by tomorrow" Joel replied
"Shame we can't use any of these cars" said Tommy
"There either crashed or have no keys" replied Joel
The group proceeded on foot towards the village hoping to find safe refuge and something to eat as they no longer had much food and would soon run out. After a couple more hours of walking the group had entered the village, the village looked deserted in the centre stood a sign saying "mandatory evacuation" the people had already moved on leaving a ghost town behind, knowing the place was empty a sound as simple as a wind chime could turn you into the most paranoid of people the group though there was no harm in looking around. Some parts of town were untouched whilst others like food shops had been looted windows smashed and doors held on by a single hinge.
"Okay let's take a look round see what we can scrounge up" Said Tommy
"Yeah you look over there I'll go with Sarah and check over here" replied Joel
Tommy began to search what remained of a few of the local shops whilst Joel sat down with Sarah. Joel took a deep breath and then exhaled.
"Look just so were clear about back there it was either them or us"
"Daddy I shot that man" Sarah whimpered as her composure began to crack
"Hush baby girl I know I know, they got what they deserved they would have done that to us" Joel said reassuringly
"Why what had we done to them" said Sarah
"Nothing baby girl nothing some people are just like that, now I need you to focus can you do that for me" said Joel
"Yeah... yeah" replied Sarah as Joel wiped the single tear off her cheek
Joel continued talking to Sarah convincing her she had managed to do right in a difficult situation a helped her to begin to move past it.
"Hey I found something" Tommy shouted from an adjacent room
"What is it" replied Joel
"I found a bit of food and a couple bottles of water" Tommy replied back as he appeared from behind the door
"I guess that will have to do now let's look for somewhere we can camp tonight" Said Joel
"You feeling better there Sarah" Tommy asked
"Yeah a little bit" Sarah replied
"Just hang in there were here to help" Tommy reassured
The group looked around for a suitable house to spend the night in and chose a house where it would be easiest to see if anyone was approaching and began searching the house to see f the occupant had left anything behind. The house wasn't eye catching but it would be fine for tonight, searching the house didn't turn up anything useful anything that could be considered useful was too big or too heavy to carry around. As the sun began to kiss the horizon the group gathered in the lounge to eat, Sarah had perked up a fair bit more than earlier even smiling at some of Tommy's stories which lightened the mood, Joel however even through his smirk was still worried he nearly lost Sarah to a gunshot wound and today nearly to an emotional break, he tried not to dwell on it and enjoy the time he had right now.
Tommy began telling Sarah about one contractor job he and Joel did where they were fixing a front porch for an old lady who suffered from memory loss and every 5 minutes came out asking who they were and what they were doing to her porch threatening to call the police, this brought a smile to Sarah's face and to Joel's. As the hours went on by more stories were shared and Sarah even began to tell a couple of her own. Soon they started falling asleep Sarah fell asleep her head on Joel's lap, Tommy collapsed into a recliner and Joel stuck in the corner of the sofa no wanting to disturb his daughter simply whispered "Goodnight baby girl" and then tilted his head back and closed his eyes.