Salvation. The Walking Dead: Season Five.

Risks We Take - Part Two.

*

"So you're willing to give up more food reserves because of some dead guy in a store room? Don't be dense Clementine." Lilly argued angrily.

Clementine had tried unsucessfully for the better part of the last ten minutes to adequately explain the groups concerns but Lilly was bullish in her advocacy to return there.

"It's not just some dead guy, Lilly. He'd been mutilated too, they cut off his dick." Clementine defended.

"So they had a grudge. Your point? He was holding a plethora of food in there, Clementine. He probably stole it, and whoever it was came looking for him. He wouldn't give it up so they had a little fun before they wasted him." But that didn't ring true for Clementine.

"I'm pretty sure the threat of losing your dick isn't worth holding onto a few twinkies for."

"Some motherfuckers are tougher than they are smart. Who's to say he didn't have more than himself to think about?"

"Then where are they?"

"The fuck should I know. All I'm saying is we need that food, Clementine. We got a lot today but it's still going to run out at some point. It's a bad move to just let it all go." Lilly said staunchly.

"But what if they come back? What if they're sitting on the place? They have to know its there somewhere." Clementine posed. "We took a risk taking what we did. Do you remember, when we took the food from the back of that car? After leaving the farm?" She asked, testing the memory banks of Lillys mind.

"The station wagon? What does that have to do with anything."

"You won't remember, because we'd been separated by that point -" Lilly scoffed at Clementines choice of phrase but she ignored it. "That food belonged to a man, a family. I'm not going to bore you with the details but he came back and made trouble for us. He kidnapped me." She said, trying to make Lilly see sense. But her point again fell on deaf ears.

"That was a long time ago. You're a big girl now, Clementine. And I'm not going to go round in circles with you. If they - whoever the fuck that is - are sitting on the place then where were they today? Even if they were out, you said the body looked at least a day old. It'd stink the place out. They aren't going to live with him rotting away under their noses. He'd be thrown outside. Ergo, they ain't there no more." Clementine made motion to counter but Lilly shut her down raising her voice to continue.

"-And! If they are there then we'll take them out. We can all go out there and overpower the fuckers" Clementine felt her blood bubble at Lillys ignorance to past events.

"Really!? You want to take some more kids and send them to their deaths for your war!? You remember how that worked out last time right? Have you learned nothing? Are we just collateral to you?"

"We're a group. And we all have to learn to do unpleasant shit, Clementine. Lee protected you and look where that got him. Like I've said before, you're going to end up the same way. It's a different world and a different way now! You know kids used to work a couple hundred years ago? In Mines, up Chimneys. They were made to do everything adults did. That's how we have to be again. Contribute. Show worth. No time to mollycoddle when the world is a death trap, every day." Lilly finished making her case.

"I feel sorry for your childhood, Lilly." Clementine fired somewhat maliciously. There was no way AJ would be taken into danger so readily. Preparing him for survival was one thing, but sending him to his death was a whole other ask. She was sure Lilly could see to the demise of the rest of humanity herself given time.

"Yeah? Well don't. My Dad might have raised me with a firm hand but I'm still here because of it. He made me a soldier, prepared me for this shit show." Clementine didn't doubt she was right, and felt bad for speaking out of turn that way, as ignorant and entitled as Larry was.