The group headed towards Macon in one of the last remaining trucks of the motel. Lee was the one behind the wheel, with Shane on the right passenger side. Logan and Clementine sat in the back of the truck. Shane looked out of his window into the passing fields as he bite onto his thumbnail. He noticed a lone walker in the fields and thought it was rather strange that it was by its self.
Shane glanced over to Lee and raised one of his eyebrows,
"How long is this drive to Macon, Lee? We gonna have enough fuel to get there?"
Lee took his eyes off the road to look over to Shane. He shook his head before responding,
"Not sure, I remember it taking around an hour or so. Considering that there is no traffic nowadays, we'll probably be there a hell of a lot quicker." Lee turned his head back onto the road as he stared down it. It seemed that the road went on forever and was seemingly rather clear of any abandoned vehicles. Lee looked back in his rearview mirror to see Logan with his head laying on the window, tilted to the side. Lee noticed Clementine gazing out of her window with her head laying on her hand.
Lee continued to drive down the road for what seemed like a rather long time. As he gazed down to check the fuel, he noticed that it was almost empty.
"Shit." Lee muttered to himself.
Shane looked over towards the fuel meter as he chuckled a bit. He looked around the cars surroundings almost mockingly. All that was around them on the road were just trees. There were no sign of civilization anywhere to be seen.
"I just bet we gonna find a gas station out here!"
"Calm down Shane, we'll be alright." Lee said affirmingly to Shane. He looked over to Lee before letting out a long sigh. Shane looked back out of his window as he shook his leg impatiently. Lee continued to drive forward for around ten minutes before he eventually seen abandoned cars start to appear on the road. He would have to make sharp turns in order to avoid them every so often.
Eventually a sign for a rest stop showed up on the right side of the rode. The rest stop also contained a gas station to the side of it. Lee let out a slight smirk at the sight of the gas station. Lee turned into the rest stop and parked into one of the free spaces. A few of the other spaces had vehicles in them, but they had looked long since abandoned.
Lee looked around inside of the truck to see that Shane had fallen asleep, along with Clementine and Logan. Lee opened up the truck door quietly and shut it. Lee began to kick out his legs as he stretched out his arms. Lee did a small twist to the side as he hoped to crack his back for relief.
"Shouldn't be far from Macon now..." Lee muttered to himself.
Lee took out his pistol as he approached the desolated looking rest stop. Some vines had begun to grow over the entrance of the rest stop. Lee approached the rest stop entrance slowly as he readied his gun. Lee hovered his open hand over the window of the door, hoping to catch a glimpse inside. Looking inside, Lee did not see any walkers, but he did see a restaurant area to the right of the entrance area.
"Might just have what we need."
Lee slowly opened the door and as he entered he flung his gun over to the side that he had not checked, luckily it was all clear. Lee saw a bathroom and a few tables and chairs on this side of the rest stop. He turned around to face the other side and began walking into the restaurant area. Multiple tables were flipped over for some odd reason, but other than that the place was in rather good condition.
Lee approached the counter of the restaurant area before noticing that there was a goldmine of canned food just sitting over on the other side. Lee placed his hand on top of the counter and hopped over it. He landed on the other side all the while eyeing down the glorious canned food. Lee looked around in which he could store the food in, finding a couple garbage bag containers in a storage space below the counter. Lee pulled out a garbage bag and flapped it open.
He began to pick up and throw the canned food into the bag. All the while he was letting out a rather large smirk.
"Finally something good comes out of all this." Lee said out loud to himself.
The sound of the rest stop door opening made Lee jump. Lee slowly dropped the garbage bag to the ground, taking a peek over the counter. He relaxed once he noticed that it was just Shane. Lee stood up and waved over to Shane.
"Over here! Just found a bunch of canned food."
Shane jogged slowly over to Lee with a smile on his face. He stopped just behind the counter as he let his hands rest on top of it.
"Well, I'll be damned." Shane chuckled a bit. He then began to walk around the rest of the restaurant area, looking around at some of the tables. Lee continued packing up the canned food into the bag. Lee stood up once he got all of the food into the bag and hopped back over the counter.
"Lee, did you see this?" Shane said, pointing to one of the tables which was obstructed from Lee's view. Lee walked over to Shane, revealing a dead man and woman sitting on one of the table booths. Lee winced at the sight of the assumed couple. Shane noticed the gun that they had used to kill themselves was on the ground, he then picked it up as he examined it.
"Nice gun." Shane muttered out.
"Would be nicer if it had bullets too." Shane said as he threw the gun onto the floor. Lee looked frustrated with Shane, but he didn't say anything.
"Let's get out of here." Lee yelled out, walking back towards the entrance of the rest stop. Shane followed behind him. Lee opened up the door of the rest stop and walked back towards the truck. He opened up the door, reached in, and put the canned food on the passenger right side. Shane looked around at the vehicles next to them and raised an eyebrow as he looked back at Lee.
"Y'know man, I bet my ass one of these cars got some gas in it. I got something I can siphon gas with in my bag."
Lee glimpsed back at him, before taking a seat in the truck as he closed the door. The window of the truck remained open, and Lee responded.
"Well, if you can, get us some damn gas." Lee grabbed Shane's bag and tossed it to him. Shane nodded at Lee and began to walk over to some of the other vehicles...
They had been driving for around another fifteen minutes before reaching the inner city of Macon. Lee looked over to Shane, and nodded.
"Glad you had that idea, otherwise we would of been walking through this shithole." Lee drove deeper into the city and eventually they came across a blue truck which was obstructing part of the road. Lee drove over the curb in order to get past it and slowly rode up the street. Suddenly a large sign appeared,
"DRUGS" Lee sighed in a sort of relief. As he slowed the car down to a stop and looked out the window towards the drug store.
"Here it is. My parents drug store. Still standing as if nothing had happened. Let's go guys."
Lee and Shane woke up the others, and they all stepped out of the vehicle together. Clementine ran over to Lee and grabbed onto his hand. Logan yawned as he stepped out of the vehicle.
"That was a damn long ride."
The group walked forward advancing towards the entrance of the drug store. Lee approached the front door and pushed it open. It opened with a reluctant creak as the inside of the drug store came into view. The others walked in behind Lee and shut the door. Lee was greeted by the familiar smell of the drug store as he gazed around. The outside wasn't in a bad condition, however the inside was wrecked.
Many of the shelves were turned over and dried blood was on the floor. Lee saw through the metal protective covering of the pharmacy, noticing that the door to it had been opened. The pharmacy had been raided of any medicine it once held. Lee walked inside of the employee section of the store that was on the right, the same place that his parents had once slept in. He walked in with Clementine not long behind him.
Lee was greeted by the sight of a blood pool sitting under a mattress. Lee slowly walked towards it as his stomach started to turn. Lee closed his eyes for a second before looking down towards the ground. There lied a picture of him and his family, he quickly snatched it off of the ground. He looked at the picture as he held back the tears trying to form in his eyes, he crouched down onto a knee before rubbing his hands across his face.
"God, I'm so sorry, so so sorry." Lee whispered out quietly as he held the photo to his face. Clementine slowly walked behind him with a worried look on her face.
"Lee? Are you okay?"
Lee glanced over his shoulder to Clementine,
"I'm fine sweet pea, it's just... a picture of my family." Lee said.
Clementine looked at Lee with her eyebrows winced slightly, she asked with concern, "Are... are they dead?"
Lee looked towards the ground quickly, being reminded of the sad reality of the situation. Lee brought the photo back in front of him before ripping himself out of the picture. He let the piece of him hit the ground and stuffed the picture of his family into his back pocket.
"They are." Lee said coldly. Clementine looked surprised before lowering her shoulders slightly as she looked towards the ground. She approached Lee slowly with her arms out and they collapsed into each other. Clementine started to sob a bit as she let her head rest on Lee's shoulder.
"I'm so sorry for asking... Lee... do you think my parents are dead too?" Clementine exclaimed.
Lee brought Clementine in front of him and locked eyes with her. Lee's eyed looked sorrowful. Lee glanced towards the side for a second before looking back up at Clementine.
"It's okay, sweet pea. And no, I think your parents are alive. We'll find them now that we are closer to Savannah. But I won't lie Clementine, we are still pretty far."
Clementine nodded as Lee stood up as she wiped some of her tears away. As Lee turned around to exit the employee section, Clementine grabbed the photo of him on the ground and put it into her hoodie pocket. Lee and Clementine walked back into the entrance of the drug store and met up with Shane and Logan. Logan noticed the all too familiar look on Lee's face, the type that he had seen a lot nowadays.
"You alright, Lee?" He asked.
Lee nodded and looked around the drug store. He seemed to ponder his thoughts before looking up at Logan.
"This used to be my parents drug store." Lee exclaimed.
Shane and Logan nodded at Lee. Logan leaned backwards onto the checkout counter. Shane glanced at Lee and raised his eyebrow,
"Well, if your family is gone, what else are we here for? Gotta plan B?"
Lee nodded and rubbed his palm across his face, seemingly a bit stressed out. He glanced towards Clementine and then back up to Shane,
"Gonna look for Clementine's parents. We think they're alive. In Savannah."
Shane scoffed and looked at Lee with frustration,
"Oh come the hell on man, now me and yo-"
His sentence was interrupted by the sound of an approaching vehicle outside of the drug store. Everyone crouched down and Lee walked towards the window of the drug store, peeking through the opening of the boarded up window. Shane grabbed his shotgun and got on the opposite window of Lee, peeking through it. He held up two fingers,
"Got two cars coming up, they slowing down now. Think I can make out two people in the first car." Lee slowly took out his pistol as he glanced back towards Clementine. Logan took out his handgun and took the side that Shane was on.
"Clem, get behind the counter. Don't know how this is gonna play out. You hear gunfire, lay down." Clementine nodded. Lee peeked through the window again and noticed three men and a woman. They looked around at the nearby buildings but didn't seem pleased by what they had saw. Unfortunately, the sight of the drug store seemed to be the bright moment of their day.
The woman of the group began to jog up to the door of the drug store and she started to open up the doors. Lee slowly walked over to the corner of the wall, preparing for her to walk in. The female was rather short and had black hair, she looked to be a young Hispanic woman. Lee took the girl from behind by the neck and stumbled himself back deeper into the store with his gun pointed towards her head.
"DON'T KILL ME, PLEASE! WE AREN'T LOOKING FOR TROUBLE!" The other members of this group had ran into the drug store. They didn't seem to be armed, but Shane and Logan circled around them with their guns pointed at them. Lee glared at the men with distain in his face.
"If you got any weapons, take them out and put them on the floor." Lee yelled out.
The men looked at each other with fear in their eyes as they all raised their hands up. The men looked rather young, each of them to be in their twenties. The tallest one out of them stepped forward with his hands still raised, he looked at Lee specifically.
"I promise you bro, we don't mean no trouble. Came here looking for some antibiotics or anything useful." Lee looked at him with a look of distrust, slightly raising his eyebrows. Lee released the girl from his grip and pushed her forward.
"Logan, search them, and Shane, you keep your weapon on them."
Shane nodded. Logan stepped forward towards the men and began to search them for weapons. He patted their pants and anywhere else they could store any kind of weapon. Lee stepped forward around three feet away from the men. The woman had stepped to the side of one of the men, and put her arms up.
"Lee, they telling the truth. They don't got nothing." Logan muttered out. Lee nodded and looked at the three men. The tallest one had blonde hair and was rather scrawny, he wore a school jacket, the other two men both had dark hair and sported basic T-shirts and coats, along with some jeans.
Lee looked toward the blonde headed man and asked, "What's your name?"
"Ben. My names Ben." The kid responded frantically.
He looked towards the others and yapped out, "Those two are Mason and Elijah. The girl's name is Amy."
Lee nodded his head and gestured for Shane to lower his gun. He crossed his arms and curiously asked,
"You all must be part of a bigger group? Are you? And sorry for the hostility, can't be too sure these days."
Ben nodded his head, "We are. We secured one of the neighborhoods here in Macon and we even got a wall around it now. It's really secure. You could, come with us? If you want..."
The other group members looked at Ben with visual annoyance on their faces, with slight fear. Lee nodded his head and walked slowly out of the drug store, glancing back towards the group.
"Take us there then."
Lee followed the car of the new group that they had encountered, and surely enough seen the sight of a large wall in the distance. They passed through tons of houses on the way there, and it seemed that they had walled off a small portion of the neighborhood. The area was rather secure and Lee only spot a couple walkers on the drive there. They approached the gate of the community and began to slow down. Lee noticed the driver of the car one car down had reached their hand out of the window, gesturing to a guard tower above.
Slowly the gate of the community opened, revealing more houses inside. They began to drive inside of the community before stopping shortly after the gate. Lee took the keys out of the ignition. Lee stepped out of the vehicle and circled around it. The others exited the truck after him and Clementine circled around to where Lee was. An old man came out from the inside of one of the houses and gestured to Lee.
He approached Lee, and offered Lee a handshake. Lee shook his hand firmly.
"My names Vernon, I heard your Lee. Ben radio'd in that he picked up a few survivors, guessing you been on the road a while, huh?"
Lee nodded in response, "Sure have."
"Well, with winter approaching soon, I'm sure you will be glad to be somewhere like here." He exclaimed.
Lee had a bad feeling about this place as he looked around the neighborhood. Something didn't feel right. But most places didn't nowadays to be fair.
"Well, I leave you to it for now, I'll get a place where you and your friends can stay in a few minutes." Vernon said to Lee.
Lee walked towards the car and to Shane and Logan.
"Stay on your guard, we don't know what exactly these people might got planned..." Lee whispered.