The dying sun bled peach across the ruins, painting shattered storefronts in hues that almost made the devastation beautiful. Lee stepped over a shattered windshield, glass crunching under his boots as they picked their way through the graveyard of overturned cars and strewn garbage.
"Stay close, Clem." His whisper carried the weight of every danger they'd faced so far. The girl pressed against his side, her small fingers knotting in the fabric of his shirt.
The pharmacy loomed ahead, its broken sign swinging on one chain. Each step forward made Lee's chest tighten.
Kenny suddenly stiffened, jutting his chin toward a hunched figure rifling through a wrecked sedan. "Look, he—"
Lee's hand shot up, cutting him off. "Careful. Might not be human anymore."
"Shit." Kenny's voice dropped as he scanned the shadows between vehicles. "Didn't even think of that."
"I'll check." Lee slid the kitchen knife from his belt—the same one he'd used to put down Paul, didn't feel like just a day ago. The figure didn't react as he crept closer, too engrossed in its scavenging.
Too engrossed. Too still. Too wrong.
Lee peered around the car's hood.
Rotting hands clawed at a bloody bag. Milky eyes rolled blindly.
Walker.
He moved before it could rise. The knife punched through its temple with a wet thunk, and the thing collapsed like a puppet with cut strings.
The group edged forward, their boots scuffing against asphalt. Kenny nudged the corpse with his toe. "Hell of a way to go out."
"Over there," Kenny muttered, pointing to another figure in a tattered blue pharmacy smock—pinned under a fallen lamppost. Its arms flailed weakly, fingers grasping at air. "Guess he ain't goin' anywhere fast."
Lee's breath hitched.
The name tag was still visible beneath the grime: EVAN.
"...Been a long time." Lee crouched, his voice gravel. The walker's head snapped toward him, jaws working soundlessly. A strand of greasy hair clung to its cheek—the same face Lee had once leaned into, trading a quick dap over the counter when prescriptions got picked up.
His grip tightened on the knife. "I'm sorry. Should've gotten here sooner."
The blade fell.
A quick search of Evan's pockets yielded a single key, cold against Lee's palm. He pocketed it just as Duck's scream tore through the street.
"AHHHH!"
Shadows detached from alleyways. Figures lurched from shattered storefronts. The dead came crawling, groaning, hungry—rising like a tide from the corpse of the city itself.
A sudden movement caught Lee's eye - the pharmacy door creaked open as two figures emerged, weapons raised. The sharp-eyed reporter Carley gripped her pistol with practiced ease, while Glenn's panicked gaze darted between the survivors and the approaching horde.
"Run! Now!" Glenn's voice cracked with urgency.
Lee didn't need telling twice. He scooped Clementine into his arms, her small hands immediately locking around his neck as he sprinted for the doorway. Behind them, the staccato pop of gunfire split the air - Carley taking careful shots at the nearest walkers.
"Damn it," Lee muttered between gasping breaths. Every gunshot was a dinner bell for every walker in the district.
"Dad!" A terrified shriek cut through the chaos. Duck flailed beneath a rotting corpse, its yellowed teeth snapping inches from his face. Kenny roared like a wounded animal, his meaty hands wrestling with the walker's decaying shoulders.
"You ain't taking my boy!" Kenny's face purpled with strain as the walker's jaws inched closer to Duck's throat.
A single gunshot rang out. The walker's skull erupted in a spray of blackened gore, coating Duck in viscous fluid. Kenny didn't hesitate - he hauled his son up by the collar like a ragdoll, sparing only a quick, wordless nod of thanks to Carley before bolting for safety.
The survivors poured through the pharmacy entrance as the metal gate shrieked shut behind them. The padlock clicked home just as the first rotting hands slammed against the bars, skeletal fingers clawing uselessly at the air between them.
The moment Lee stepped into the pharmacy, the scent of antiseptic and dust hit him like a physical blow. Memories of his first playthrough flashed through his mind - every shelf, every shadowed corner was exactly as he remembered. His eyes swept the room, confirming the group was all here: the wary reporter, the nervous tech guy, the hotheaded old man. The whole dysfunctional family.
"Carley, we can't keep taking risks like this." Lilly's voice cut through the stale air like a knife.
Carley crossed her arms as her eyes narrowed. "And we can't let people die."
"When I say that door stays shut," Lilly hissed, "it stays fucking shut! We don't know these people! They could be dangerous-" Her glare landed on Lee and Kenny, who instinctively moved to shield the others.
Lee raised his hands slowly. "We're grateful for the help. You have my word we're no danger to you." He gestured to the children. "We've got kids with us."
A derisive snort came from the mountain of a man leaning against the medicine shelves. Larry's arms bulged as he crossed them. "His 'word'. That's worth shit now. And I only see one kid." His beady eyes narrowed at Clementine.
Lee felt a small tug on his sleeve. "Lee?" Clem's voice was barely a whisper. "I gotta pee..."
"Try to hold on just a minute, sweet pea," Lee murmured as she gave a small nod.
Larry and Lilly argued with Carley and Glenn about their decision to let them in when Larry suddenly spotted Katjaa wiping the blackened gore from Duck's face. His eyes widened as his tone grew sharper. "Holy shit. Son of a bitch, one of them is bitten!"
"He's not bitten, it's walker blood." Lee snapped, really not liking this guy.
"Like hell it is!" Larry surged forward like a charging bull. "We have to end this now!"
Kenny moved faster than a man his size should, planting himself between Larry and his family. "Over my dead body."
"We'll dig one hole," Larry returned.
"No!" Katjaa scrubbed frantically at Duck's shirt. "There's no bite! Look for yourself!"
"What the fuck is wrong with you people?" Larry's spittle flew across the room. "We've already seen this happen before - if we let someone bitten stay then we all end up dead!"
Lee's fingers twitched toward his shotgun. For one delicious moment, he imagined bringing the stock down on Larry's thick skull. But violence wouldn't solve this - not yet.
"Lee?" Clem's small voice pulled his attention. She jiggled the bathroom doorknob. "It's locked."
"Coming, Clem." Lee snatched the restroom key from the counter, the argument raging behind him.
The key turned with a click.
The door burst open before he could turn the knob.
Clem's scream tore through the pharmacy as a walker tumbled out, its milky eyes rolling wildly. Lee's boot crushed its throat to the floor before his knife found its temple with a wet crunch. Black ooze pooled on the tiles.
Lee turned slowly, wiping his blade on his jeans. "Listen," he said, stepping nose-to-nose with Larry. "I don't know what the fuck is wrong with your hearing but he's NOT bitten. Plus, it's clear you lot don't know the truth anyway..."
Larry's face twisted. "Oh, this oughta be good-"
"We're all infected." Lee's words landed like a grenade. Horror rippled through the room - except from Kenny's group, who'd learned this truth on the road.
"What are you saying? You mean we're all going to turn?" Lilly asked as she stepped forward, but her father raised his hand in front of her.
"Bullshit! He's just making shit up to protect that kid! Don't listen to him!" Larry roared.
"It's not the bite, damnit!" Lee raised his voice as he looked at each and every one of them. "It's airborne, and when you die you turn into one of them!"
Lilly looked at her father and frowned slightly. "But we've seen people who get bitten turn, how do explain that?" Larry smiled at his daughter's question.
"Because he's a fucking liar people, you can't seriously be falling for this?" He looked at Carley, Doug, and Glenn who looked conflicted.
"The bite simply leads to death, not infection," Lee said, already knowing what response he would get from the predictable Larry.
Larry's laughter was harsh as he walked forward. "Exactly! All this bullshit and it changes nothing! That kid's gonna kill us all! I'll not be convinced otherwise by a fucking murd-"
The big man's words dissolved into a wet gasp. His face went slack. His massive frame crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut, hands clawing at his chest as he hit the floor with a thud that shook the shelves.
"Dad!" Lily slid down to her father who was still clutching his chest with an exhausted and pained expression.
Lee looked down at the gasping man, his sympathy in short supply. "He gonna die? Because in his own words..." He let the implication hang, earning a dark chuckle from Kenny.
"Shut your fucking mouth!" Lily whirled on them, eyes blazing. "It's his heart—he just needs his pills!" Her fingers trembled as she wiped sweat from Larry's brow.
Katjaa looked up from where she'd finished checking Duck. "Nitroglycerin?" The boy clung to her side, wide-eyed but unharmed.
"Yes!" Lily's voice cracked as she pointed a shaking finger at the pharmacy's steel shutter. "We've been trying to get in there for hours. The pills are behind the counter—please!"
Lee studied Lily's desperate face. However much he despised Larry, he recognized that wild, protective fear—the same gnawing instinct that had him checking Clementine's whereabouts every thirty seconds. His gaze found Clem perched on a display case, kicking her legs absently. Yeah. He understood. Not Larry's cruelty, but the desperation. That much, he got.
"Alright," Lee sighed. "I'll get the pills. There's another way in—through the back office."
Carley stepped forward, arms crossed. "How do you know that?"
Lee didn't blink. "Just do." He was already moving, the office door creaking ominously as he pushed inside, a small figure appeared behind and followed him.
Lee stepped into the office and froze.
A stained mattress dominated the center of the room, its fabric crusted dark with old blood. A shattered picture frame lay atop it like some macabre bedtime story—the glass spiderwebbed but still holding the photo intact. Someone had slept here clutching this memory until the very end.
"..." Lee's throat tightened as he carefully lifted the frame. The glass cracked further under his fingers as he freed the photograph.
"Who is it?" Clementine's small voice came from behind him, her breath warm against his shoulder as she peered over.
Lee didn't shield her from the truth. "The family who owned this place." He watched her eyes trace the smiling faces—a man in a pharmacist's coat, a woman with kind eyes, and two men that looked strikingly similar. Her small intake of breath told him she'd connected the dots.
"Oh..." Clem's gaze flickered between the blood-soaked mattress and Lee's stony expression. The unspoken question hung between them: What happened here?
Lee forced his fingers to unclench from the photo. "It's alright," he murmured, patting her cap. The lie tasted bitter—nothing about this was alright. He needed to change the subject before the weight in his chest crushed him. "What do you think of everyone out there?"
"They seem nice." She paused, then amended with childlike honesty, "Well, maybe not the sick guy."
"Yeah." Lee's jaw clenched at the memory of Larry's meaty hands reaching for Duck. "Guy's got all the charm of a rabid dog."
Clem shuffled her feet, then looked up with sudden intensity. "That thing in the bathroom... you stopped it real fast. Can you... keep doing that?" There it was—that flicker of trust in her wide eyes, the unspoken plea beneath the question.
Lee knelt until they were eye-level. "Listen close, sweet pea. Any of those things ever come near you?" He tapped the knife at his belt. "They'll wish they hadn't. I promise."
"Good." She nodded solemnly, but her eyes drifted back to the photograph still clutched in his hand.
"Can you do me a favor?" Lee kept his voice steady. "Let's keep this between us. About my family being here."
"Why?"
The innocent question cut deeper than any walker's bite. Lee studied the dust motes swirling in the dim light, choosing his words like a man defusing a bomb. "Some stories... they're like medicine. You only share 'em when someone really needs them." He met her gaze. "Right now, what folks need is supplies, safe walls, and those pills. Not stories."
Clem studied his face for a long moment before nodding solemnly. "Okay, Lee." The way she said it - like she was keeping his secret in some sacred vault - made his chest ache in the best possible way.
"Good." Lee turned toward the barricaded door, rolling his shoulders. His leg still throbbed, but Hershel's treatment held firm as he began wrenching boards free. Each pull came easier than the last, the treated wound granting him back precious mobility.
As the final plank clattered to the floor, revealing just a desk left blocking their path, something unexpected slipped from the debris - an old wooden cane hitting the linoleum with a sharp crack.
Clem's head snapped up at the sound. "What's that?"
Lee froze, fingers hovering over the familiar polished oak. He hadn't seen this in years. "My dad's cane," he said softly, turning it over in his hands. The varnish had worn at the grip from decades of use. "He'd zip around the store with this thing like he was twenty years younger."
"Was he sick?" Clem asked, peering at the implement with clinical curiosity.
Lee huffed a quiet laugh. "Nah, he was fine. Saw him whack a shoplifter's ankles with this once - guy went down like a sack of potatoes." He demonstrated with a gentle swing, the cane cutting through the air with a satisfying whoosh. "Best security system this place ever had. And he made it look..." Lee's eyes flicked to Clem's cap. "Well, about as cool as you do in that hat."
Clem's small fingers automatically went to her cap's brim, a smile tugging at her lips. "My dad gave it to me."
"See?" Lee grinned, tapping the cane against his palm. "Dads just know these things."