scars • clementine x louis

Chapter 30: Farewell

"Molly?" Clementine breathed out, obviously in shock. Everyone, including Molly, turned in her direction. Molly furrowed her eyebrows but then widened her eyes when noticing the hat. Molly still looked the same, aside from her hair, which was longer than before.

"Clementine?" Molly tried to get up, but was stopped by Mitch when he aimed his bow at her.

"Mitch, stop. I know her." Clementine said, making Mitch lower the weapon. Clem brushed through the crowd, getting closer to Molly. She stood in front of Molly with her hands on her hips. "Why are you here all of a sudden?" Clem questioned her, earning nothing but a scoff from Molly.

"Hey. I'm talking to you." Clementine reminded her sternly. Molly glanced up at the girl who stood in front of her intimidatingly. "Why. Are. You. Here."

"Because I can. I have legs, don't I?"

"You soon won't if you don't answer me." Clementine threatened. A part of her despised Molly after watching her almost kill Lee. Everyone had perplexed looks on their faces. None of the expected Clementine to be so aggressive with a person.

Molly furrowed her eyebrows and pursed her lips, hesitating to answer. "Fine. I got lost from my group."

"What group?"

"Some have been there for a while... and some are from this other group called the Delta or something," Molly responded. Clementine adverted her eyes over to Javier who had a shocked expression on his face. Clementine glanced back at Molly.

"Who was in the Delta? Tell me the names." Clem demanded. Molly hesitated for a couple of seconds before giving in, knowing that Clementine wouldn't hesitate to kill her. Molly sighed.

"Michael, Anabel, Nia, Kaylie, Sophie, and Oliver. They're all about your age while the rest are older."

Clementine couldn't hear anything Molly said. Just that name. Sophie. She had survived out there, and found another group who was likely devising on killing or capturing the school. Everyone else's face was in shock, it looked like their eyes were about pop out. Clementine suppressed the urge to start panicking and composed herself. "Were you going to attack a group?"

"We were never planning to. That was until I overheard Michael talking to Sophie and Anabel. Michael was talking about how some group destroyed their home and killed everyone there. He said he was gonna get revenge. I'm not sure what he was going to do, but he's definitely planning something."

"That's it." Mitch chimed in, crossing his arms. "It's not safe here anymore, we have to leave."

A few others nodded in approval. That was until Gabe walked in. "Hold up, we can't just leave! What if we run into these assholes on the way? We'll be dead regardless of we do."

"That's why we have legs, dumbass. We just take a different route so we don't run into them!" More people started talking and whispering to one another. Clementine huffed in annoyance as she crossed her arms.

"Enough!" Clementine bellowed, silencing everyone. They looked at her all bug-eyed, both impressed and scared of her. "This is not how we do things! We all agreed we're going to do a vote."

"Clem's right. We can't keep fighting over this." Ruby agreed. Eventually, everyone else agreed to the vote. Clementine looked at Molly.

"Keep her in the cellar. I need to ask her some questions." Clem ordered, walking away. Luke and Javier grasped Molly by her arms, walking her over to the cellar doors that still had the dents in it from the night with Marlon and Brody.

*

The result was finally revealed. They had to leave the school. Clementine deeply exhaled as she sat at one of the picnic tables, silently panicking to herself. They had to leave the school. What if they didn't have any food? What if they got caught by this group? What if AJ or Louis got injured? A stray tear fell from her eyes before she furiously wiped it away. Now was not the time to weep. They had to leave the school.

All of a sudden, Clem felt a hand on her shoulder, suddenly making her enraged. She swatted the hand off her shoulder. Clem turned around before her gaze softened as she saw AJ standing there with a hurt facial expression. "Sorry." He muttered.

"No, it's okay, goofball. I'm sorry, I was just frustrated." Clementine explained, making sure to make it clear to him. AJ paused for a second before talking again.

"About what?" He asked innocently. Clementine quickly adverted her eyes to the ground. She couldn't tell him, not yet.

"Nothing, just... about Molly," Clem answered, mentally punching herself for how obvious she sounded. Even AJ didn't buy it. He raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms, picking up on how Clementine did it. She desperately tried to find something for him to do, just for the intense conversation to end. She glanced at Tenn who was, obviously, drawing a picture. Clementine looked back at AJ and smiled. "AJ, how about you go and play with Tenn? I'm sure he has some new drawing he wants to show you."

A grin grew on AJ's face, making him bounce up and down and run over to Tenn before Clem could say goodbye. Clem chuckled and turned back around. She found it strangely admirable how he always took interest in the littlest things.

"Mind if I join you?" A voice came from beside Clem. She glanced to her right and smiled when she saw Louis standing there, wearing the smile she always loved.

"Sure." Clementine simply answered. Louis sat down next to her before quickly kissing her cheek, which surprisingly didn't affect her.

"So, how'd the voting go? I know you're not telling anyone yet, but maybe you can make an exception for your amazing boyfriend?" Louis proclaimed, practically batting his eyelashes, making Clementine laugh and shake her head.

"Uhm..." A frown crept on on her face as she cleared her throat. Louis stared at her worriedly as he intertwined their fingers together to comfort her. "We... have to leave the school."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I-- I don't know what we're gonna do." Louis' grip on her hand tightened a bit.

"We'll work something out."

An annoyed huff slipped out from Clem's mouth. "Yeah, like that's so simple," Clementine muttered. She saw Louis look in her direction, raising his eyebrow in bewilderment. She rolled her eyes before he could speak again. "Louis, don't look at me like that. You know this isn't going to be easy, and you know that I'm not going to be able to handle a group on the road. It's hard enough to raise a 5-year-old on the road, but it's even harder to handle a bunch of people."

"We could find somewhere else to-"

"What? To stay? It's not that simple, Louis! How many people have died because of me? Kenny, Christa, Lee. I'm not fit to be a leader in here, let alone out there! What if something happens to you? What if-- what if something happens to AJ?" Louis immediately pulled Clementine into him, embracing her tightly. He could hear her muffled sobs from below him, and instantly felt pity for the brunette. The rest of the school was inside, aside from a few people, so it was unlikely that anyone would see them, making both Clementine and Louis relieved.

"GUYS! Get over here!" A voice boomed from the admin building. Mitch's voice. "Somebody broke in!" Louis and Clem looked at each other with wide eyes before running into the admin building.

*

Everyone was crowded around something. Clementine pushed through the crowd until she stopped. Her eyes widened in shock as she gazed at the sight. Never in her life would she think she would see something horrific as this.

"No..." She whispered under her breath. Her hand covered her mouth as a tear fell from her eye and dropped onto the floor.

"Who... did this to you..?"