A/N: Okay now I'm getting really hyped over the amount of attention this story's staring to receive, bringing Eddie back was always my plan as he and Wyatt had great banter in the game and hopefully serve as some sort of comic relief in the game left in the void of Omid's death.
This chapter will also introduce one more 400 days character who wasn't the main group. (After this character is introduced I reckon I'll have to stop bringing in new characters as the story will get too clustered with characters and it will harder to develop them all)
Anyway thanks to all of you so far and any suggestions or opinions I'd love to hear!
Wyatt and Eddie thanked Bonnie and Clementine for their help as Bonnie took Clementine back towards the armoury as they walked over the patched floor they ran into none other than Tavia herself who looked very ticked off about something.
"Bonnie!" she snapped upon seeing the redhead woman.
"Howdy Tavia" She replied lightly, but this only caused Tavia's face to diverge further into fury as she gazed with loathing at the freckled woman in front of her.
"Where the hell have you been! I've been looking for you in the armoury" She told her in a fury, thankfully Bonnie was a quick thinker so while Clementine stood gawking like a fish trying to think of an excuse. Bonnie managed to get out causally "Well Clem just wanted a tour around the place, I couldn't refuse, I mean it couldn't do any harm" she said, as Tavia's glare switched to Clementine. The young girl felt uneasy by the chubby's woman's eyes x-raying her back to the bone. Clementine gave her most innocent wide eyed look back, which didn't seem to lighten Tavia's sour face.
"Remember Bonnie these aren't our friends no matter how young they are" she told the redhead flatly, Bonnie felt the sting of the insult but covered her grimace with another question.
"So what y'all looking for me for?" She asked brushing off Tavia's cold and harsh words to her.
"Well more like looking for her, there's been a situation in the greenhouses Bill wants you up there" Tavia commanded her black analytical eyes once again trained on Clementine, who gulped nervously and shared a concerned look with Bonnie, the word "Sarah" telepathically linking to the two of them. "Okay, I'll come" Clementine responded as she followed Tavia back up towards the roof, leaving a blank and worried looking Bonnie behind.
"What's happened?" she asked as they climbed the dark stairwell.
"You'll find out when you get there, God your group is nothing but trouble" she moaned as she slammed open the roof door in frustration, "Head on over there" she snapped coldly at Clementine as she shut the door behind her with a thud. Nervously Clementine approached the greenhouse she could already see a few figures standing around outside and hear (above the gales of the roof) Carver's voice...
"... Now I'm not saying that this shouldn't be allowed, but I honoured a promise..." Carver was saying muffled by the glass of the greenhouse, holding her breath, (knowing what she would find inside would not be good) she slowly creaked open the door.
It wasn't a pretty site.
Plants were crashed all over the place as soil littered the floor, Nick, Jane and Rebecca stood and Clementine noticed they all looked pale and shook by something as she entered all of the heads whipped around to her.
"Ah! Here she is, girl of the moment!" Came Carver's voice, Clementine looked to him and wished she hadn't.
Sarah was crying in her father's arms, more hysterically than Clementine had ever seen her before, as she wailed and cawed into her father's chest as Carlos was bent down, almost as if he was shielding his daughter from Carver himself. Carver had his hands on his hips and wore an easy smile. Rule number one of this camp was that if Carver was happy than something bad had happened.
And so it had, the girl that Clementine had seen yesterday (Becca she remembered it was) lay spread-eagled across the greenhouse floor, a red hole indented in the middle of her head as her black orbs were forever locked upon the celling. Kenny was standing nearby looking appalled at what had occurred, while another messy black haired woman was bent over trying to comfort the short haired woman (Shel) who was sniffing and gazing to the floor, she seemed to be in a cationic state.
"Clementine, I bet you're wondering how this happened?" Carver asked lightly as he caught Clem's eyes widening at the scene.
"What did you do?" she asked horrified gazing at the girl, she may not have liked the girl from her first impression but this... she wasn't expecting this to happen before she even got to talk to her.
"No Clem, you should be asking what we did for the good of the community" Carver smiled at her, his eyes dark as they scanned over her, again Clem felt like she was being x-rayed.
"I didn't mean for any of this to happen!" Clem yelled desperately having no idea what Carver had told them, but knowing it wasn't good and knowing that somehow that she was in some way to blame for this murder.
"Just shut up Clementine" Kenny muttered.
Clementine flinched as Carver began his tale...
"You see Becca here..." he gazed at the body on the floor "She grew frustrated because little Sarah over there wouldn't do her work..." (at this point Sarah howled louder) "... so rather than be patient with her, Becca thought punching some sense into your little friend would work. Now I couldn't have that. Usually I would have finished off your friend Sarah for her incompetence, but seeing as I am a man of my word I decided that the blame lay elsewhere"
Shel sniffed again as Carver continued his tale.
"You see Becca here was a hot headed girl, stupid, cynical, and she broke the promise you set me and seeing as she liked to break my rules more often than any normal member of the community, I feel that she, like Reggie, had to be punished".
"You're insane, you're a murderer!" Clementine accused him, only causing Carver to chuckle lightly.
"Now that's mean Clem, you see I did you and your friends a favour. Becca won't ever mistreat poor Sarah again. It was thanks to you and you're promise that I can finally start acting against unruly members of my community, hell the more they go down the greater you and your friends go up in my book. Maybe I'll even let you out of the pen..."
Clementine felt sick to the stomach, Carver had twisted her promise completely turning those in the pen against her was bad enough, but now (somehow) he knew that she was trying to befriend those in the community and was turning them against her and what spoke louder volumes than a murder. There was no reason to kill Becca, that could have been anyone her death was Carver's way of dividing the community and the pen ever further apart.
And (she realised as she gazed at a sobbing Sarah) traumatize Sarah further, as she knew the girl would now blame herself for Becca's death.
"Stephanie! Get Shel here back to my office, her sister's death as I can see has affected her greatly and it will take time for her to recover" Carver commanded as the messy haired woman simply nodded and helped a distraught Shel to her feet, the pair of them walked out slowly. Surely they would be angry at Carver and not Clementine for this? Wouldn't they?
"You're a liar and a bully, you hurt Luke yesterday!" she snapped.
"That was Troy and he has already been spoken too for acting out of term" Carver responded.
Clementine was sunk she knew that Carver had brought her here to try and make her look the grand master of evil behind Becca's death through the deal. The Pen dwellers would despise her for agreeing to stay and alienating them all from those not in the pen and those in the community would now see her as the hate figure as it was because of her that Becca was dead.
But Carver had pulled the trigger, then again would anyone stand up to Carver? Could she as she was apparently "in league" with him now. She realised as Carver told the group "Alright now that's cleared up everyone get back to work!" as they did (slowly) Carver spoke down to her "Oh no Clem, you'll be working with Stephanie for the rest of the day" he mused smiling.
She wanted to bash his face in. Carver was playing mind games with her and so far he was winning.
Tavia escorted Clementine from the greenhouse so hastily that she didn't even get to check on the others, she caught Nick still gazing at her, while everyone else looked furious and Sarah was still buried in her father's chest for Clementine too look at her.
"Please don't hate me Sarah, I still need to finish you telling you my story" she thought sadly.
Clementine thoughts were on Sarah and the recently dead Becca when Tavia shot back at her smugly "I told you shouldn't have spoken so much" It took Clementine a few seconds to clock on to what Tavia had meant, before she suddenly realised that it was Tavia who had been observing Clementine. No doubt she had been telling Carver about her growing friendship with Bonnie and it was Clementine who was stupidly trying to be friendly with Tavia no doubt with Tavia picked up on that and had told Carver.
Carver knew what she was planning and used it too his advantage to blow back in her face.
"Damn you, you're a horrible person" she told Tavia coldly, the chubby woman only smiled in response as she led Clementine back through the compound before she found herself in front of an alien grey door "Go on inside Clem... I'm sure you and Stephanie will have a blast" she smiled as she walked away seemingly victorious.
An hot headed but innocent girl was dead because of Clementine's deal, was this what she was willing to do to save the group? and now Carver had set her to work with a close friend of Shel's no doubt who would hate her, who would blame Becca's death on her. Clementine could envision Carver holding a giant wooden spoon and stirring the pot. He was a troublemaker and he loved it.
Gritting her teeth, she found the rather attractive woman with her head in her hands muttering something, hearing the door open the woman's (Stephanie as Clementine remembered) head shot upwards as her strong azure eyes scanned over Clementine, she waited for the rant to begin.
Instead Stephanie said (in a neutral tone) "Take a seat" So Clementine did so, the room around her was small and stuffy and filled with strange metallic objects, sitting on a table overfilling with what Clementine could basically describe as "Junk".
After a few seconds Clem looked up at Stephanie, she had to get this woman on her side, Carver had used the murder to his advantage to alienate Clementine but two could play at this game, although it felt degrading to plea to strangers.
"You'll have to depend on the kindness of strangers if you want to get far" A wise man called Hershel Greene once said.