⊱ 02 ~ ❝ the sound and the fury ❞ ⊰
〖 season one, episode one 〗

There was a clear discussion going on last night before Clementine and her father retreated to the confines of their sleeping arrangements.

A plan was in place. Glenn was off to go into the city, scavenging for what he could as per usual. He did it frequently enough for it to not be that worrying when it was brought up. But the feeling of not taking part in the difficult tasks was starting to oppress some of the others.

T-Dog was the first to decide he wanted to go. His suggestion came with another lengthy conversation about safety which only brought on more volunteers. Morales ⎯⎯ a husband and father of two children. Despite her sister's clear irresolute behavior, Andrea offered up herself to go along with them as well.

By the time Clementine had woken up, Jacqui decided to go, and Merle Dixon insisted on him taking part in the trip.

The main goal was to find some much-needed necessities everyone in the camp had been lacking since the last adventure into the city. Glenn was the only one to have breached the safety of their camp on his own and into the city. But he was only one man ⎯⎯ two hands, a backpack, and a couple of pockets could only carry so much for a group of twenty-some people.

Clementine had awoken long before then. She could hardly get six hours of sleep at night since she and her father arrived ⎯⎯ let alone any amount of sleep that was at all restful.

Each night, the thalamus of Clementine's brain created hellacious forms of reality to see in her dreams. Most of the time, so daunting it would shock her awake. The increasingly more explicit versions of the experiences she had already lived not so long ago proved to have a baleful impact on her sleeping cycle. Waking up mid-REM was known to leave you fatigued for the rest of the day, and frequently caused the dreams to be easily remembered ⎯⎯ leaving her sluggish and poignant.

When the group officially left for the city, Clementine was quick to go for the quarry, but she was stopped short.

"Hey, sweetheart."

Clementine didn't turn around immediately, the voice surely wasn't her father so she didn't think for even a second the words would be for her.

Then a hand grabbed her shoulder. "Hey, hey, hey."

She came face to face with Shane Walsh, a deputy who had been doing most of the leadership roles around since she arrived with her father. He grinned, a similar smile she'd seen on his face when he talked to Lori Grimes' son.

Impulsively, she yanked her shoulder away. This man wasn't someone she'd ever spoken to and she did not feel very keen on being grabbed by him. "What?" She wrapped her own arms across the front of her stomach, squeezing the sides of her jacket.

Jim stepped up beside his daughter, resting his hand on her shoulder blade. "What's the problem?"

"Just tellin' her it'd probably be best if she stayed up here. Since a good amount of our manpower is off in the city." Shane explained, waving his hand towards the path to the quarry. "Fewer people are watching out for each other."

"Andrea and Jacqui are women," Clementine added questioningly, only getting a little squeeze from her father in response. Essentially asking her to be quiet.

"Okay, she'll stay." Jim agreed, nodding his head at Shane as he turned away.

It was nothing but incredibly disappointing for her to hear. She was looking forward to finding that rock she dropped. Waking up, despite the nightmares she had being fresh on her mind, her first new thought was going to find the stone.

"But dad-"

"No, you heard bossman." He said, labeling Shane with a condescending tone, and nudging Clementine along away from the quarry.

Down in the quarry was her version of a bathroom stall away from the crowded lunch tables. In the camp, she became uncomfortably aware of having no one to talk to, and nowhere to be.

As her father sauntered off, she looked around. Carol and Lori were hanging laundry, as they usually did around midday, and their children were sitting close by ⎯⎯ Sophia playing with Eliza, Morales' daughter. Amy was gathering sticks, for tonight's fire most likely, and Shane was starting to chop some wood.

Everyone easily fell into a rhythm of getting stuff done where they could ⎯⎯ besides Clementine who had nothing to do. Nobody would want her help anyway.

But Dale sat secluded on the roof of his RV as per usual. He showed her kindness last night that nobody else had, mainly because she didn't get within a ten-foot distance of anyone if she wasn't glued to her father's hip.

Dale was in his foldable chair, beneath an umbrella to give him some shade against the harsh sun, and in his lap ⎯⎯ a book.

Clem loved reading. It was something she used to fill the spaces of her days, but when fleeing from the Holloway home, none of her favorite reads were taken with.

She climbed up the ladder on the back of the RV up to where Dale relaxed, with his beige bucket hat on his head, reading silently with his glasses perched on the tip of his nose. Her legs felt wobbly with the lack of a railing.

"Whatcha readin'?" Knees pinned side by side and arms crossed over her chest, Clem moved not a step in any direction.

Over the top of his glasses, Dale peered to meet her eyes with a soft old man smile ⎯⎯ one of which reminded her of her grandfather's. He waved her over gently, closing the book but leaving his thumb in between the pages where he left off. "It's called, The Sound and The Fury. Have you ever heard of it?"

For a few seconds, she took in the cover of the book ⎯⎯ the focal point was a rectangular picture of a mansion in black and white on a yellow rectangle outlined with two thin lines of black and white, and then a thick border of Prussian blue. In red lettering, at the top of the yellow rectangle, read The Sound and The Fury, fully capitalized.

"No... Is it good?" She questioned curiously, inching her feet towards his seat, still dauntingly aware of her ability to fall off.

"Well, I enjoyed it the first time I read it. But this is the... Fifth time I've read the book. So, it has to be somewhat good, right?"

Clementine couldn't ever get behind rereading a book. She actually really hated being assigned a book, going home and reading it, and then having to go to school the next day and listen to the teacher read it aloud.

The whole concept made little sense and reminded her far too much of her brothers and their friends asking each other would you rather know when you die or how you die? Usually, she'd leave the room before having to hear the answer, but either way, she would know the ending of her life and that didn't quite sit right with her. So, perhaps that's why she couldn't bear to reread a book.

If it was a genuine decision, Clementine would rather none of the above ⎯⎯ just be gone without knowing it was coming. Not to see her doom from a mile away and wait for it to near like an ever-encroaching destiny. It was an awfully morbid thing to consider, but Clementine had it all thought out. That is if it were her choice, she didn't want to burn, drown, starve, die of dehydration, or do any of the above ⎯⎯ alone.

Solitude had been a coping mechanism for her since she was just a baby, and for that to be how she died sounded like a sick twist of fate.

Having her father was the sole reason she wasn't completely falling apart. She had no idea what she'd do without him ⎯⎯ even if she felt as though he'd be okay without her.

Dale tapped his fingertip on the center of Clementine's forehead. "What's bouncin' around in there, Clementine?" His gaze was soft, showing he could tell she wasn't thinking of anything pretty.

"Nothin'... I'm just hungry." She paltered, not telling the truth to the question, but still speaking with verity nonetheless.

With the newfound knowledge, Dale stood, not bothering to mark where he last read in the book ⎯⎯ and instead waving her to follow him off the RV. Once back on the ground Clementine felt more stable and could hear Dale talk to one of the many gentlemen in camp, asking him to take his place atop the RV so he could, get the kid somethin' to eat.

He led her over to the campfire, where an older woman sat, and he asked her for a small plate of the food she was watching over in the pot. It was a disappointing mixture of oatmeal, but Clementine wasn't lying when she said she was hungry, and at least it wasn't more mushrooms.

Just as the plate with a spoonful of oatmeal got in her hands, the C.B. released a static purr, and everyone in the main area of the camp could hear a male voice come through. "Hello. Hello. Can anybody hear my voice?" The Georgia accent Clementine had come so used to hearing was laced in the man's words.

Dale sat closest to the C.B. but Amy's urgency had her fumbling to her knees in front of the receiver ⎯⎯ dropping every last collected stick onto the dirt. "Hey. Hello?" She questioned desperately, considering if the man was one of many that left with her sister, she'd surely want to reach out.

Her soft and fully clear voice contrasts against the male's static-y sounding words. "Can you hear my voice?"

"Yes, I can hear you. You're comin' through ⎯⎯ over." Amy rushed out, smiling over her shoulder at Dale, ecstatic when the man's wording gave the inclination of being heard.

It had been so long since they'd spoken to anyone who wasn't in the camp already. Few people had hoped anyone could have survived the bombs that got dropped on Atlanta, and nobody knew for sure if bombs were dropped elsewhere.

The same voice crackled through the built-in speaker. "If anybody reads, please respond." His words sadly verified that he did not hear Amy at all, despite most of the surrounding people thinking he had. Amy turned to Dale, a pleading look on her face ⎯⎯ as if Dale could will the ability to have direct communication with the man into existence. "Broadcasting on emergency channel. Will be approaching Atlanta on Highway eighty-five. If anybody reads please respond."

Clementine pinched her arm nervously, leaving crescent moon-shaped indents like two parentheses facing each other. "He can't hear us." She spoke matter-of-fact and earned a couple of sideways glances ⎯⎯ disliking a child to be the bearer of bad news.

"We're just outside the city..." Amy sputtered, getting long strings of static in response, signaling the man was no longer physically able to reach them even if he could've heard them to begin with. "Damn it... Hello? Hello?" She shook her head, looking to Dale again for assistance.

"Try to raise him again," Dale advised, turning to Shane Walsh who was approaching himself ⎯⎯ axe in hand ⎯⎯ to find out what the commotion was about. "Come on son, you know best how to work this thing."

A swift swing brought the axe embedded into a wooden stump, dropping down to one knee beside the table and swiping up the handheld receiver. "Hello, hello. Is the person who called still on the air?" The authoritative tone of his voice, truly showed his police force background, most likely having done something like that thousands of times. "This is Officer Shane Walsh, broadcasting to person unknown. Please respond."

"They can't hear you," Clementine told him, shaking her head. She looked around, waiting for anyone else to agree with her ⎯⎯ have the common sense to say the same thing. The poor bastard was long gone, and that was something Clem was sure of. No way in hell could he make it out of Atlanta on his own. Only one person as far as Clementine knew of had that much luck, and that title was being firmly held by Glenn Rhee.

Defeated, Shane set down the receiver. "He's gone."

Clementine couldn't help but roll her eyes, it was almost as if everyone in this camp purposely pretended to ignore her just to say exactly what she had. It was beginning to drive her mad.

"There are others. It's not just us." Lori spoke hopefully, trying to suggest something without verbally saying exactly what was on her mind.

"We knew there would be, right? That's why we left the C.B. on." He clarified, squinting at Lori from the sun blaring down on them.

The mother shook her head, hand on her hip. "A lot of good it's been doing." Clearly, the conversation had been discussed before judging by the exasperated look on Shane's face, saying he had already fought the battle. "And I've been saying for a week, we oughta put signs up on eighty-five to warn people away from the city."

Amy, still sat in the dirt by the receiver, sadly looked up at Lori in agreement ⎯⎯ the two women sharing the same sentiment of caring for the unknown people's safety. "Folks got no idea what they're getting into..."

"Well, we haven't had time." Shane tried to reason, frustratedly running his fingers through the short length of his dark brown hair.

Clementine took a step forward, this time she wouldn't be ignored. If she had something to say ⎯⎯ people best at least hear her actually say it. "There's no point in arguin' about it. The guy's long gone already, it's not like we can beat him to Atlanta and set up the signs before he gets there. Anyone going into Atlanta is ⎯⎯" Her father grabbed her wrist, cutting her words short and pulling her away from the middle of the camp.

Once out of sight and earshot, he spun back around to face her, crouched down to her level, and grabbed both of her wrists to ensure she was fully facing him and listening. Even a good distance away, Clementine could hear Shane and Lori continue their pointless argument.

"What did I tell you about staying out of grown-up's business?" He asked, not much of a fatherly tone in his voice. Clem looked down at her shoes, digging the toe of her sneaker into the dirt. "What did I say, Clementine?"

She huffed out a sigh annoyed. "Don't meddle," Clem grumbled, looking at the wrinkles on his forehead instead of his eyes, but Jim waited for his daughter to continue, but she didn't. Instead, she decided to plead her case. "All they do is fuss, and bicker like Nana and Pops used to." A silence fell between them, the mentioning of long-gone family members lighting the air in between them on fire. "You know what momma used to always say... They squabble just like what they are, an old married couple." If the mentioning of Clementine's Nana and Pops hit Jim hard, his wife being spoken of hit harder ⎯⎯ paling his face within seconds, leaving a sorrowful look. "I'm sorry, Daddy ⎯⎯ I didn't think⎯⎯"

Jim just shook his head, lightly squeezing his daughter's wrist comfortingly, an aloof expression never leaving his face as he tried to recover from the sudden subject. "No, you're right. She would say that if she saw those two." He said, avoiding her name ⎯⎯ or any other descriptive word other than she.

Just her name alone managed to keep him awake at night ⎯⎯ somehow calling her Momma like his daughter just had sounded much harder to cope with.

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〈〈 𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑𝐒 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄 〉〉

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Hope you liked it <3

Ricky Dicky Doo Da Grimes ftw.

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