The Walking Dead: Return to Paradise Part Two

Chapter Three: Strange Weather

Louis followed Minnie thought the admin building. They traversed the stairs and pushed open the doors to the office, stepping over the burnt patch on the wood floor when the Delta's people had thrown a Molotov into the room.
Asim was sitting on the desk and Ruby was behind him in the office chair. He had a nervous look on his face. Minnie gave Louis a sideways glance and raised an eyebrow.

"Hey guys. Uh.. have a seat." He said.

Louis and Minnie both sat on the table for lack of better seating in the room.

"We were gonna check the hunting shack this morning, see if they're there." Minnie informed them. Louis nodded in agreement.

"Okay, good." Asim paused, seemingly choosing his next words carefully. "I think we should maybe talk about... what we do if you don't find them there."

"How about we look first. Louis and I'll go, you guys figure out what you're gonna say while we're gone. If we don't come back with them, then we can talk about other plans." Minnie said.

"That's... a good idea, actually. Watch yourselves out there, the snowstorm probably buried a lot of walkers."

Minnie got up and gave Asim a nod before heading out of the room with Louis in tow.
As soon as they closed the double doors behind them, they found AJ in the hall with his ear pressed to the wall of the office. Upon seeing them, the boy jumped away from the wall and tried to act innocent.

"I wasn't listening." He blurted.

"Sure you weren't." Louis smirked.

Minnie crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow at AJ with a half smile.

"Ok I was. But only because I wanna help. Can I come with you guys to look for Clem and Violet?" He asked enthusiastically.

"I don't know..." Minnie said uncertainly.

"It's just to the hunting shack and back. It's not gonna be dangerous." Louis said.

"Alright." She shrugged. "But you follow our lead the whole time and stick with us."

"Yes!" AJ celebrated.

***

"Is it... the sky?" AJ asked as they walked.

"Nope." Louis smugly shook his head.

"The snow?"

"Negative."

"Stupid?" Minnie interjected, smirking at Louis.

"Ouch. But wrong again."

"Ugh, I give up. What was it?" AJ groaned.

"Sticks." Louis informed him.

AJ frowned and looked straight ahead.
"This game is dumb." He said.

"Hey, don't badmouth the sacred art of I-spy." Louis defended with the dramatic flair that was typical of him.

"What's say-cred mean?" AJ asked, struggling to match Louis' pronunciation.

"It's like something you can't make fun of, like it's too special." Minnie explained.

AJ gave an intrigued 'huh' before looking around to admire his surroundings.

"It snowed a lot yesterday." AJ noted, shuffling through the fresh piles of powder.

"Yep. The storm is probably why Clem and Vi couldn't come back home last night." Louis said.

He wanted to keep AJ's spirits up, intentionally avoiding the possibility that the girls weren't actually at the shack like they thought.
They came upon the river and followed it down to where the hunting shack was.