Walker? or Zombies? (Walking Dead Game x Strong OC)

Chapter 22: The Salt and the Sorrow

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The sea was a liar.

Sixteen months ago, it had promised freedom, an endless blue horizon that was a sanctuary from the grasping hands of the dead. Now, it was just a bigger cage. The Jolene, once a symbol of hope, had become a floating prison, rusted and weary, adrift in an ocean of suffocating loneliness. Every surface was coated in a fine, corrosive layer of salt, and the constant groan of the hull was a mournful sigh that never ended.

Dawn broke, painting the calm water in soft shades of grey and pink. The beauty was a cruel joke. Kenny stood at the stern, his hands gripping the salt-crusted railing so tightly his knuckles were white. He wasn't looking at the sunrise. He was staring back the way they came, as if he could see the ghost of Savannah on the horizon. He was thinner now, his face a roadmap of grief carved by the sun and the salt spray. The loss of Zack, the boy he'd watched become a monster and then a hero, was a wound that had never closed. It had festered, turning his grief into a hard, brittle anger that was always just beneath the surface.

"He'd have found us a way," he muttered to the empty air, the words swallowed by the vastness. "That kid... he'd have done something. Wouldn't have let us just... float."

"Talking to ghosts again, Kenny?"

Katjaa's voice was soft as she came up behind him, wrapping a thin blanket around his shoulders. She looked tired, the endless rocking of the boat having stolen the light from her eyes, but her strength remained. It was a quiet, stubborn strength, fueled by the one thing she refused to let this world take: her son.

"He ain't a ghost," Kenny grumbled, not turning. "Just... gone."

"Duck is asking for breakfast," she said gently, changing the subject. "I told him we'd have that special peach stuff today."

Kenny finally turned, his eyes meeting hers. They both knew the "special peach stuff" was the last can of peaches they had, saved for a day when morale was at its absolute lowest. Apparently, that day was today. He nodded grimly. "Yeah. Okay."

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Below deck, in the cramped, dimly lit main cabin that carried the acrid scent of diesel mingled with stale air and the weight of too many weary souls, Lee found himself engulfed in a stark realization. Spread out on the tiny, splintered table was their meager stockpile—a pitiful collection of three rusted cans of baked beans, one lonely can of peaches, and six half-filled bottles of murky, questionable water, each a testament to their dwindling hope.

He dragged a shaky hand over his taut, exhausted features, feeling the stubble scratch against his palm. Sixteen long months. Sixteen months of navigating treacherous waters, both literal and metaphorical, keeping the fragile threads of their lives intertwined. He had become an unwilling mediator, calming the raging storms between Kenny, who wore his grief like a heavy cloak, and the pragmatic Carley, who unfurled reason like a lifeline in turbulent seas. But now, the reality was stark and unforgiving—no amount of planning could steer them away from the void of an empty pantry. Time had slipped through their fingers; the clock had finally struck its last hour.

Carley slipped into the cabin, her movements almost ghostly in their quietude. A resigned heaviness enveloped her as she took in the pitiful offerings laid out before them, her shoulders sagging like the sails of a forgotten ship. "That's it, then?"

"That's it," Lee replied, his voice a gravelly whisper, barely rising above the low hum of despair. "We're running on fumes."

"Kenny's getting worse," she murmured, leaning against the weathered doorframe, the wood creaking under her weight. "He spends half the day just staring at the wake, lost in whatever darkness haunts him. At night, I hear him—sometimes he calls out the kid's name."