TWDG\\II-South State

TWENTY-SIX

Third person
The five kids stood outside in the snow, the freezing storm settling to a plain sunlight. The subdivided forest had ended its long road, and went onto an even longer, struggling highway, which had out of control vegetation which accompanied more buildings and trees; the buildings of which looked like deserted walker traps. It was already unspokenly decided that entering and investigating these urban figures would be dangerous. The road itself held more traps then the suburbs; used barricades and dead walkers scattered the highway for miles; Gabe groaned as he saw the sight. It looked like he was going to tangle mangled corpses off the front of the truck.
The truck was stopped on the side, the kids loitering outside with opened food candy in thief ands, as they ate hungrily to satisfy their ravenous cravings.
AJ ate his second cane of flavourless tomato soup when he frowned at his food, the bandaid that stretched over his knife wound distorting when he did.
Clementine, who was balanced on the seats, unable to stand due to her amputated leg, caught sight of AJ's action.
"What's wrong, AJ?" Clementine asked, breaking the decided silence between the group. AJ only met Clem's eyes for a second before retracting back to his hands.
"Nothing." AJ croaked. "I just—"
AJ looked over at Violet, who had been mostly quiet for the car ride. Violet's eyes met AJ's.
"I'm sorry, Violet." AJ apologised. "I...I know it wasn't your fault that Ethan died...it's just.."
"It's okay, AJ." Violet said. "I'm..not mad at you for that."
Violet had another spoonful of her food before, sighing.
"You know...sooner or later we have to figure out where we're gonna go." Violet said.
And that was the biggest issue; an issue that nobody had bothered to attend. Everyone was all so caught up with escaping that hell riddened town.
"We could stay in these buildings." AJ suggested. "I know it might be dangerous...but it's better then being out in the open."
"I...I don't think so, AJ." Clementine spoke, addressing AJ's idea as carefully as she could. "There's no food source nearby; we would die within a month of two."
"Richmond." Gabe spoke.
"Richmond?" Clementine repeated. "You've got to kidding. The last time I caught sight of that place, it made me happy that I was leaving soon after."
"Look, I know it's probably emptied out by now; I mean, the last time I was there was about a year ago. I doubt anybody really goes out that way anymore." Gabe reasoned. "And...I might know where it is."
"That's fucking ridiculous." Violet spoke. "That's probably walker city by now. We need to go somewhere else."
As Violet was speaking, she walked around to the side of the truck, and chucked her empty can in the back, before slamming the trunk shut. A loud echo passed through the highway.
"Believe me, I know—" Gabe began to argue back, but Violet interrupted.
"Listen, this entire plan was shit in the first place!" Violet said, and then eyed Clementine. "What did I say? I said Ivan couldn't be trusted. And whoopty-Doo, turns out Violet was right. Again."
"Stop." Louis intervened, clearly feeling uncomfortable with the slowly escalating conversation.
Clementine looked at the ground, forbidding herself to see anyone else. It was obvious she felt guilty; but she knew Violet wasn't wrong. It then occurred to Clem that she had led all of her friends to death—Aasim, Omar, Ruby, Javi...the list went way back. All starting with Lee—
"Shut up!" AJ hissed, and his worried gaze focused on the centre of the highway, where the trees caved in to a twindling spiral of hell. It took Gabe, Louis, Violet and Clementine half a second to see that a single person walked alone in the distance; a long weapon of some sort in their hand. The stance was too normal to be considered a walker threat; the person's figures wiped due to lack of vision upon the individual.
A sense of fear rocked AJ; he was always hard to trust others, especially now coming from a place where he faked his trust with certainties. But Clementine was brave, a direction of knowingness of how to interact with strangers.
"What do we do, Clem?" Gabe asked, his voice cracking at the end. The car door was slowly opened in his hand, like he was ready to jump in his seat, and drive off within seconds.
"I know this sounds stupid, but we need to approach them nicely. There's nothing to lose; they might know a place where we can go." Clementine spoke, not moving her eyes off the person.
"I doubt it." Violet spoke, but the others didn't listen. Louis nodded in advancement.
"Gabe and Violet will speak to him; Louis and I can look  after AJ." Clementine demanded, and Violet panicked.
"What am I supposed to say?!" Violet exclaimed.
"Just.. be civil." Clementine thought about this for a split second. "On second thoughts, Gabe, you do the talking."
Gabe looked down, before meeting Clem's eyes. "Okay. Come on, Violet."
Violet sighed, and nodded back at Clementine. She needed to be strong now. Like she always has been. She turned, and began to follow Gabe away.
"Wait!" AJ called. "Clem, let me come, please!"
Clementine put a hand on AJ's shoulder, and twisted him around.
"AJ." Clementine spoke. "You need to be brave. For me. Stay here, and shoot from the distance if you need to." And with that, she dropped the heavy weighted hand gun onto his open palm.
As much as AJ knew he had to follow Violet and Gabe  and confront the stranger, he sighed, and nodded, and his grasp on the gun tightened.
"Okay, Clem." AJ spoke. "I'll stay with you guys."
"Good boy." Clementine spoke, Louis looking off the distance of where Violet and Gabe began walking off.
Gabe slightly shook as he concealed the machete into his jacket pocket, easily being able to grab hold of it if he needed to. He want used to newcomers; he generally disliked them. He found this entire situation of making themselves vulnerable to a stranger stupid, but like Clem said, they might be able to know a place.
As they walked closer, an unfamiliar woman came into coarse view.
"What do we do?" Gabe whispered to Violet through clenched teeth. So much for leaving the taking up to Gabe.
"Follow my lead." Violet spoke back.