Suffering: Male Reader x TWDG

Prologue Chapter 1: A Promise Made

2 Years after the outbreak

The drowsy rain hit the window of the car as you lay inside on the back seats. Your father is outside trying to build a fire with the others as the sky is already beginning to darken, another day wasted. Your mother should be coming back soon from the small lake nearby.

It's boring with this group. You flick through the pages of the comic you found the day before, there are no kids, it's just you. Well, that wasn't exactly true, there is a married couple who have a baby with them but that's not the same. You can't play with a baby the same way you can play with someone your own age. 

"What I need is a friend" you mumble to yourself half asleep, "Or even someone slightly older than me, someone who could be like an older brother". You slowly climb out of the car and are greeted by a tall man with a thick brown beard and a fat nose.

"Hey Y/N, How are ya!" he asks crouching down to your level and putting a hand on your shoulder.

"Hi Mr Andrew, I'm fine thanks, just bored" you reply still clutching the comic. "Did I show you the comic I found yesterday?"

"Why I don't think you did Y/N. Tell you what, if you would like, I will happily read it with you before bed. Now, you should come round the fire with the rest of us. I'm sure we'll get it lit soon and then we can cook that nice big deer Nathan caught us. Come on".

He leads you to the fire which by the looks of it, has only just been lit. You can hear Nathan telling the story of how he got the deer.

"So there I was against a tree pissing......" he notices you approach "Umm... peeing against a tree. When I saw something moving to my left and well, I went to investigate assuming that it was one of the biters and all of a sudden this huge beast" He gestures to the deer which is currently being prepared. "Well it just jumped out at me. Almost shi.. I mean... uh"

"Shit yourself?" you say grinning at him. "What? I'm twelve, I'm not exactly a baby, you don't need to avoid swearing when I'm around. I already heard plenty just last week when dad stubbed his toe". You look to your father who is smirking at you.

"Hey, enough of that" your mother's voice bellows from behind you. You turn to see her and a few of the other women walking up to camp with buckets of water. "And didn't I tell you to cut the swearing to a minimum" she says looking at your father who is trying to hold back his laughter. They place the water down near the fire as Nathan continues his story. Your father walks over and sits down next to you on a camping chair.

He is a very tall man, from what you guess he is about 6 foot 4, and he has huge muscles. "Don't worry about your mother" he chuckles "She's just a bit stressed lately. You know, with that horde of biters we spotted about 8 miles away". He pulls out a lighter and starts flicking it.

"Will they find us?" you ask as he continues flicking his lighter.

"I doubt it Y/N, they were walking the opposite direction so we should be fine and you know me I am a.... I was a marine. In fact I served with Nathan and Andrew."

"Are you sure we'll be safe?" you whimper shuffling on the tree stump you're sitting on.

"Hey, hey. It's going to be fine. Did I ever tell you the story about the cave?" your father asks patting you on the back. "In fact it doesn't matter if I have, I'll tell you again. So we were behind enemy lines and after a nasty firefight, we were forced into a tactical withdrawal. I think about eight of us were killed with another couple wounded, including Nathan who got shot in the shoulder, that's why he struggles to move his right arm sometimes." He pauses shortly before continuing. "Well anyways, as we were running, this other guy".

He pauses again. "Shawn I think his name was, well he had the genius idea for all of us to hide in this tight cave that was extremely well hidden. In fact now that I think about it, I have absolutely no idea how he spotted it. So we all get in this cave and we hid. Guess how long we hid for before backup arrived and we were rescued".

You look up at him "Three and a half days. You told me this story before."

"Well..." He says, holding your shoulder "The moral of this story is that even the strongest of us have to hide sometimes. If the camp ever gets attacked by a large amount of biters... or people. I want you to run and hide. Can you promise me you'll do this?" He looks at you very seriously almost like he's worried.

"I will" you promise as you look down at your shoes. "But I won't like it"

"Thank you Y/N. I love you more than anything." He whispers as he slowly gets up and shuffles his camping chair back towards the campfire.