Final Part!
PART 7:
The following morning…Clementine and Omid were walking through the forest to check on the group’s fish traps. Leading them in the front was Pete, who held a rifle in his hands. The rest of the group didn’t trust the two newcomers with any guns yet, so Clementine was restricted to using her hammer, and Omid to use the pocket knife the two of them had found in the campsite when they encountered the dog Sam.
The walk was entirely silent, save for the chirping of birds in the trees. Finally Omid spoke up.
“How much further until the fish traps?” he asked Pete.
“The clearings just up ahead. It’ll only be a few more minutes” he responded. The man then turned to Clementine. “Your friend here ever teach you how to shoot?” he asked her.
“My friend Lee actually taught me. That was before I met Omid. He never taught me how to shoot a rifle though.” the little girl answered.
“Figures, this thing would knock you straight onto your ass if you tried to shoot it.”
There was short silence after that until Pete spoke up once again.
“Nick was about your age the first time I took him hunting.” he told the two, looking at Clem. “Came across this beautiful thirteen-point buck standing on the edge of the river. So he takes the rifle, lines up the shot just like I’ve taught him, and then comes the whining. He turns me and says ‘I can’t do it. I can’t shoot it Uncle Pete’”.
“Aww, that’s sad.” Clementine commented.
Before Pete could continue his story. he was interrupted by a voice calling out from behind them.
“Why didn’t you wait for me back at the cabin?” Nick called out, running up to meet them with a rifle in his hands.
“You want us to wait for you to take a piss boy? You know where the river is.” Pete answered his nephew. “Anyway, like I was saying,” he said, turning to Clementine and Omid to continue his story. ”so I try to take the gun away from him, when the boy nearly gut shots me! And of course the buck gets.
“Man, why do you gotta be telling them that? ” Nick asked Pete, slightly embarassed. “She already forgave me last night!”
“Because you nearly blew the girl’s goddamn face off yesterday! Seems pretty relevant.” His uncle explained.
“Nick’s right, Pete,” Omid said, supporting Nick. “he already apoligized to us yesterday. THis doesn’t have to turn into a shit show.”
“Yeah, all you’ve been doing lately is making an ass out of me!” Nick said to Pete
“Well you seem to doing a pretty damn good job doing that yourself!”
Nick then let out a loud grunt.
“Whatever.” he scoffed, shoving past Pete.
“Running off again are you?” his uncle sarcastically asked him.
“I know where the fuckin’ river is!” Nick responded, irritated.
“That boy sometimes I swear…” Pete told Clementine and Omid. “Sometimes you’ve gotta play a hard role. Even if the ones you love hate you for it.”
“You should probably tell him that.” Clementine suggested. “He’d understand.”
“I’d doubt it, he hardly listens to anything I say these days.”
Their conversation was cut short once again when Nick called out to them.
“Uncle Pete!” he called out.
“Come on, we’d better get going.” Pete said to the other two as they ran over to Nick.
When they had arrived, they had saw Nick staring into the clearing with his eyes wide in shock.
“Dammit what is it? Speak u-”
Pete stopped himself as soon as he had entered the clearing, his eyes wide with shock as well.
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph…” Pete muttered as he saw the horror along the river.
The fish traps were missing from the river. Scattered across the ground were several dead corpses, both humans and walkers alike. Several bullet casings were lying in dirt next to the bodies as well.
“Who do you think did this?” Clementine asked Nick and Pete.
“Not sure, but it ain’t your average gang of thugs.” Pete responded.
“Think about it; you’re Carver, what do you do?” Nick asked his uncle.
“Who’s Carver?” Clementine asked the two.
“It’s not important now,” Pete responded. “Let’s just see if these guys got anything on them. Omid, you go over there with Nick. Clem and I got this side.” he added, ordering Omid.
As Pete went to check one of the walker corpses, Nick and Omid moved over to the east side of the river, searching two human corpses over there. Clementine looked to the right of Pete and saw one dead body slumped on the ground on its side. The body belonged to what looked like a middle aged bald man, wearing jeans and a black leather jacket that had the logo for a band called the “Plastic Toys”.
“This one’s shot too.” she said to Pete.
“Through the head?” he asked.
She turned the body over to lay on its back, and noticed a small bullethole in its forehead.
“Yeah.” the eleven year old answered.
“Figures. See if you can find any ammo on these guys, we’re running low.”
Clementine searched the man’s pockets, finding a few handgun bullets inside. She then tucked them away into her back pocket, hoping that she could find a gun to put them into later.
As soon as she stood up, she noticed an odd sight on a small island in the middle of the river. From what she could tell, there were more dead bodies over ther as well.
“There’s some more out there.” she called out to the rest of the group.
Omid, Nick, and Pete all turned to face where Clementine had noticed the bodies, their eyes set on the island as well.
“There’s more out there?” Pete asked. “There’s gotta be more to this; this ain’t just some pissing match between two groups.”
“Well then what is it?” Omid asked him.
“FUBAR” Pete replied, beginning to wade through the river to reach the island.
“So what, you’re just gonna go over there? What if it’s dangerous?” Nick warned his uncle.
“But what if someone’s alive?” Omid asked Nick.
“So?” he responded.
“SO they might just be inclined to tell us what the hell happened here.” Pete answered. “Clem, Omid, you two come help me over here.” he added.
“This is a bad idea…” Nick muttered to himself as Clementine and Omid walked across several stepping stones to reach the island.
“Well I don’t like it either, but sooner or later you’re gonna have to realize a simple truth.” Pete called to Nick across the river.
“What, that you’re an asshole?”
“That no one’s ever gonna give a goddamn whether you like something or not! You gotta grow up son.”
“Whatever” Nick scoffed, walking off to search another corpse.
“Come on you guys,” Pete said to Omid and Clem. “you two wanna be useful? Just scan that treeline while I go search the other side of the lake.”
“We’d be more useful with guns though.” Clementine suggested to Pete. “At some point, you guys have to trust us.”
“Hell I trust you two, but just not everyone’s ready yet.” Pete responded before walking over to the other side of the lake.
“Okay Clem, I’ll watch Pete, you see if you can find anything on these dead guys okay?” Omid asked the little girl.
“Yeah, sure.” she replied.
Clementine walked around the river, looking around at the dead bodies. She saw what looked like a black haired woman and a middle aged man with glasses laying next to each other, each with a bullet hole in their foreheads. She gave a disappointed sigh when there was no useful items in their pockets.
As she looked to her right however, she let out a short gasp as she noticed a purple object leaning on the bank of the island.
“Omid! Over here!” She called to her guardian, who promptly ran over to her.
“What is it Cle-” he was cut off as he noticed the object laying next to one of the corpses. “Is that?”
“My backpack…” Clementine answered as she opened it up. Everything she had left when she was attacked by the bandits was all there; her gun, her lighter, her bottle of water, the drawing of Kenny and his family, Kenny’s hat, and the photo of Lee from the drugstore.
“How the hell did that get here?” Omid asked her.
“Well, well, well…” a voice from behind them said with a heavy cough. “come back to finally finish me?”
“Holy shit…” Omid said in shock upon noticing the wounded man laying behind them.
“Ralph??” Clementine asked with a shocked expression too.
“What? You disappointed Christa didn’t get the chance to finish me off? After you left me to die back at that hospital?” Ralph asked the little girl, still coughing heavily.
“But...but how did you get out? I saw you get bi-”
“What? Didn’t see the large stump when you almost stepped on me?” Ralph asked, pointing to where his left arm would have been.
Omid’s eyes suddenly turned to rage. “You were there that night when we were attacked...You were the one that tried to kill Christa!” He yelled at him.
“Yeah so what? You think I’ll just tell you where she went off to?” Ralph scoffed at him. “Or maybe you’ll kill me before that?”
“Wait, maybe we can fix you up.” Clementine suggested. “Then can you please tell us where Christa is?”
“Ah, don’t get your hopes up kid.” Ralph said to her weakly. “It’s too late for me.”
“What’re you talking abo-”
Clementine cut herself off when she had noticed Ralph’s chest, riddled with what looked like several shots to his torso.
“Managed to stop most of the bleeding, but I’m not getting anywhere in this shape.” Ralph stated with a heavy cough.
Clementine then quickly turned to her backpack, grabbing the bottle of water that was inside.
“At least take this...before you go..” she told the dying man sadly.
“Always had a soft spot for kids…” Ralph told her as he took the bottle, drinking its remains in one sip.”Thanks for that. Your girl, Christa. There were these guys...they were packing….came up in this giant truck loaded with machine guns...they came in shooting us all up...she got away with the kid though…” he explained to the two of them.
“Wait…” Omid said. “You said she was with a kid...was that our baby? Is it okay?”
“Yeah…” Ralph replied with a cough. “I convinced everyone else not to kill it, so we’ve been taking care of it for the past year...he got out with Christa though. Do me a favor and just let me rest for a bit, will you?” he asked the two.
“Yeah, we understand.” Clementine responded.
“Thanks kid. You make sure… *cough* you make sure you find her. Don’t…*cough* don’t keep her waiting…” Ralph told the two.
Afterward, Ralph sighed, took a deep sigh, and closed his eyes, letting death take him.
“Damn…” Omid said. “To think that all this time he’s still been helping us…”
He was cut off as Pete let out a cry of pain. Omid and Clementine looked quickly in Pete’s direction, seeing him back away from a crawling walker before quickly shooting it in the head.
“Pete!” Nick cried out, making sure his uncle was okay.
“I’m fine! I’m...fine.” Pete responded. “Just...just lost my footing.”
However, when Clementine looked down to Pete’s right ankle, her eyes lit up in shock.
Pete had been bitten.
Before she could tell Omid, she was interrupted when Nick fired a shot from behind him.
“Shit! Lurkers!” he cried out, taking aim at the several walkers emerging from the woods.
“Dammit I’m out of ammo!” Pete called out. “You three get your asses over here!”
“No! Get over here! I can cover you!” Nick replied.
“Clem, I’ve got Nick, you go help Pete!” Omid ordered her as he ran through the river to go help Nick.
“Come on, hurry!” Pete called to Clementine, who was running through the river to get to him.
Suddenly, a walker emerged from behind PEte and tackled him to the ground, and causing him to drop his gun. The walker’s jaw was inches away from his neck.
“Clem get this thing off me!” Pete pleaded.
As soon as the walker was about to tear his neck out, it fell to the ground dead, with Clementine slamming her hammer into its head.
Pete then kicked off the walker’s corpse and stood up, running over to help Nick and Omid.
“Nick! Hold on, we’re coming!” He called out as he and Clem began to run around the river.
As they ran. they could see the number of walkers increasing, with almost a small horde surroundign Nick and Omid, who were desperately trying to hold them off.
“Don’t get over here!” Nick called out. “We’ll try to find you later! Omid, let’s go!” Nick said, with him and Omid retreating into the woods away from the walkers.
“Goddammit! NICK!” Pete tried to call out.
“We have to go!” Clem told him, as they had noticed several walkers behind them.
“Dammit...alright, let’s go!” Pete agreed, as the two began their escape from the group of walkers.
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NEXT TIME, ON NOT OUR HOME…Clementine: What are you gonna do?
Pete: Hand me that saw….
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Sarah: Hey Luke’s back!
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: Hello there. I’m out looking for my people. Seven to be exact. Maybe you’ve seen them?
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Clementine: Someone came looking for you. A man.
Rebecca: What? DId he say what his name was?
Alvin: We know damn well who it was.
Clementine: Who is he?
Carlos: One of the guys we were with before.
Sarah: What’s he goona do to us?
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Rebecca: I can’t go on…
Luke: I figure we’ve got about four, or five more days to reach those mountains….
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Alvin: You don’t have to hurt anyone, just put the gun down man.
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Omid: Holy shit….
Clementine: I thought you were dead.
NOT OUR HOME CHAPTER 3: TAINTED BLOODI'll be taking a break before I write Chapter 3. By that time I'll have this and chapter 1 out on Fanfiction.net, with several revisions. Thoughts on this chapter anyone?