Many of the guards on duty pulled Gabe aside the moment he led the group inside without them collecting their weapons for safety purposes.

Despite the hushed tone they used he still managed to hear a few key words that made him chuckle internally.

Immature

Idiotic

Danger

Killed

Still a kid

Bosses kid

Privileged

Too trusting

Honestly the list goes on. No matter, Kenny wouldn't let them take his gun if they tried. He'd shoot the first motherfucker who tires then shoot the next one and so on.

"So good news, you can keep your weapons"  Gabe smiled as he returned with at least six armed guards "But, these guys are dead set on escorting us."

The man in the group rolled his eyes before nudging him with the tip of his gun. "Do that again and I'll sick Clam on you" the man looked at him doubtfully.

"You wouldn't dare" he challenged. Gabe on the other hand shifted his weight to his left leg, his left hand coming to rest in his hip. "Try. Me." He responded full of confidence.

Said man gulped before scowling and walked ahead of them. "Pussy!" Louis taunted with a shit eating grin.

"I wouldn't be so cocky." The another guard added, their hand rubbing the car on their chin.

The kids broke out in low murmurs, each one questioning who exactly was Clam. "Behave" Kenny scolded the teens who all quieted down and one Louis faltering, making him almost eat dirt.

Aj had a death grip on Kenny's arm the entire times they were being led. They passed various people both young and old.

They all seemed genuinely happy, many didn't even look like they carried any weapons.

It didn't take long till they found the leaders. Kenny, although not sure what he was expecting the leaders to look like didn't look like what he thought they would.

The guy who nudged Gabe with his gun called out to the man in an annoyed tone "Javi, Gabe's at it again."

"Am not!" He exclaimed the moment the women by Javi's side began to giggle.

She sent him an apologetic smile then turned it Javi with a smirk "you owe me that chocolate bar" he only signed, like he was regretting his life choices.

"I'll run out to the supply house in a bit" he leaned down to peck her cheek before walking towards their group. "What's the situation now?"

Gabe sent the guard a dirty look, the moment he turned to Javi that look turned to one of what he would call cheeky. "I ran into a grandpa with kids and decided to bring them back with me along with the supply group you sent me to check on, another incident happened. I'll fill you in when Clam gets here."

If the kids dad wasn't standing with him he would have slapped the back of his head. Javi smile faltered at the end of the explanation, incident was probably code for delta attackers.

"I see.." he cleared his throat, his previous smile coming back brighter. "I'm glad Gabe found you when he did. Raising a child in this world is hard let alone 9." His eyes softened when he turned to the women who rubbed her belly, completely missing the way Kenny's eye twitched.

"Their not my kids. I helped bring Aj into this world and promised his mother I'd look after him. Violet and Tenn are the only kids I agreed to adopt as of recently, the rest are stowaways" he motioned to each one the kids.

Said stowaway kids looked offended while his kids beamed, other than Tenn, he looked like he wanted the floor to swallow him whole.

"Well whatever the case is, all of you are welcomed to join our community. I'm Kate by the way, this is Javi my husband, and you already met our son Gabe." She smiled warmly.

Javi nodded and turned to look at each one them, his eyes lingering on Aj. Kenny didn't like that at all.

"I'm sure you all have questions and if you follow me this way we can have a discussion. Aimon, please send for the rest of the captains." The guard from earlier nodded and left.

"Captains?" Marlon asked curiously

Javi nodded "I may be the leader of our community, but I find it less stressful when we have discussions on things as a group, other than me there are four others who's opinion hold a lot of weight I get the finally say though."

Kenny only hummed. The kids were oddly silent when they were led into a large building. When he saw each one of them survey the new area he felt satisfied.

They were learning. Slowly. Very slowly, but they were learning. The building they were in was some kind of church. Further back was a shrine with pictures of people.

The alter was full of melted wax and lit  candles. There was a young teen who was in the process of pinning up a picture. Although he was quite he could still hear faint sniffles.

He must of heard them because he turned around with his hands wiping off the fallen tears. Javi pulled him into a hug not long after which he returned.

They shared a few words before the man left with a small pained smile. "Take a seat, the others should be here shorty" the guards themselves decided to sit near the door.

The kids only shrugged and took a seat. Kenny on the other hand decided to stay standing with Aj sitting right next to him.

"Oh, right, before I forget. Clam is going to be a bit late, overheard a guard saying one of the walls needs repairing and she went to check it out." Gabe supplied with a shrug.

Javi didn't spare him a glance, he probably already knew. Just like Javi said they didn't have to wait long before the captains arrived.

The first two people to walk through the door were wearing white coats, one female and one male. The girl was carrying a red med-kit. "Javi" they both greeted.

"Guys, these are our doctors, Lingard and Eleanor." The two sent them a smile. "Lingard is one of our captains" his eyes shifted to Eleanor who held up the med-kit

"Is anyone injured?" She asked politely.

"Vi got shot, I patched her up with what we have" Ruby stood up who was conveniently sitting next to said girl. Eleanor and Lingard both shared a look.

Before she nodded and turned to Kenny "I'll take a look, make sure is healing well." Kenny only nodded back.

The doors opened up again shorty after she kneeled down in front of Violet, this time only a women walked in. Her face had a light jagged scar running down the side of her lip that led down to her chin.

She was rather tall and held some sort of aura that demanded respect. He nodded over to both captains before making her way to sit next to Lingard."This is Wendell our supply chef. Shes our connection to other community's as well as decides where to head out to search for more supplies.

Kenny sent her a nod. "The party has arrived" a man's voice filled the silence making every head turn to him.

"Layton's here" Wendell and Eleanor both rolled their eyes.  Javi had an exasperated look on his face. "This is Layton, he's in charge of growing our food."

"I brought a few things if you don't mind" he smiled and motioned a little boy inside who carried a small basket of clementines.

The boy looked like a carbon copy of him, so maybe his son. The boy followed Layton, only to split off from him when he reached his hellions.

"I'm Rori" the boy held out the basket to Aj with a bright smile on his face.

"Aj" he smiled back and took two Clementines.

In the corner of his eye he saw Kate, Gabe, and Javi sharing a look. He couldn't quite tell what it meant since he felt Aj tugging on his hand.

When he looked down he saw him holding one out for him. Kenny smiled as he took it from him, but not before he ruffled his hair earning an whine in protest.

When he started peeling it, Aj copied him. That's when he realized he never had one before.

"Let's start with introductions on your side, Then we can start."

Lingard frowned "we're missing our little battle doll"

As on cue every leader in the room burst out laughing "she'll kill you when she find out you call her that" Eleanor snickered, rewrapping Violets bandages.

"Am I wrong?" The laughter slowly died off. "I'm not wrong, heck she almost killed me herself before my sobriety"

Javi only shook his head "she's a tough one"

"She's more than tough" Kate added

Wendell gave Eleanor a look when she went to speak "she's skilled I'll give her that" her hand subconsciously ran down the jagged scar.

"Maybe you shouldn't have tried to mug her before you joined us" Gabe earned a dirty look.

"I was starving, she was an easy target....Well I thought she was anyway.
But hey, things worked out in the end." She shrugged and turned to look at them "so are we going to get this started?"

He nodded and motioned for them to introduce themselves. Kenny started and then went down the line of kids until everyone of them said their names.

"Alright, so before we discuss long term you should know we are currently at war with another community called the Delta. You don't have to join the war if you don't want to, we aren't like them who take people and make others fight for them in exchange for living inside their walls."

Marlon bit his lip before he asked "what do have to do to live here in the new-new frontier"

Wendell furrowed her brows. "The what now?" She turned to look at Gabe along with everyone else.

Gabe on the other hand just stared back "what?"

"How many times do have to tell you that we aren't calling ourselves the new new frontier" Kate groaned.

"We're Richmond, anyway to answer your question we have various jobs we need help with. For example Layton needs more hands maintaining our greenhouse. Each one of my captain have a job newcomers can choose to help with"

"If they do end up staying I call dibs on the that red head" Lingard pointed to Ruby "she's a natural healer, with the right teacher she can become a wonderful doctor" Eleanor nodded as well

"She's young, but the work she did on Violets shoulder is pretty good" Ruby smiled at the praise.

"Fine you can have her, I'll take whoever is either strong or good talking to people" Wendell chimed in her eyes surveying the kids as if they were products in a grocery store.

"I'll probably take the little ones, let them be kids for a while longer" Layton smiled

"We don't even know if they'll stay" Kate deadpanned

Gabe snickered "Clam will kick any and everyone of your guys asses if you try and take someone she finds potentially in"

The captains quieted down at the mention of her "if she wants them she can have them, heck I'll even give her everyone of the weapons if she wants"

"Does that mean I can have your double blade dagger?" A new voice echoed throughout the church.

"Clam!" Gabe exclaimed before anyone could turn around.

The footsteps of whoever spoke grew louder as she walked towards them, and by how fast they neared they were basically about to break into a sprint.

The person Kenny saw was small in stature, her hair was long enough to be pulled into short pigtails. Something inside him flickered with familiarity.

Her clothes were stained with blood that looked fresh. The aura around her screamed danger, everyone scooted away from her as she walked straight towards Gabe.

Even Javi seemed to shy away from his own son. The moment the girl got close enough to the poor boy she smacked him across the back of his head "I told you to stop calling me that you dork" he barely registered his hellions say scary.

in the next second she yanked his orange Beanie off his head and had him in a friendly choke hold while her hand messed up his hair, the angry scowl never leaving her face.

The rest of captains all tried to blend in with the shadows, afraid they'd be neck."Stooop!" Gabe exclaimed with no real malice.

The blood drained from his face when he saw the girls face. Clem Kenny's mind supplied. Even without her icon hat he could tell it was her.

He wanted to reach out and hug her or even call out to her, but his body was frozen in place.

When Clem had enough of torturing Gabe she released him. Gabe playfully glared at her when he snatched his beanie back and tried to salvage his hair only to give up halfway and put his beanie on to hide it.

Aj must have noticed something was wrong because he squeezed his hand. Kenny squeezed back to ground himself.

Javi shared a few words with Clem, but Kenny couldn't hear what they said, he couldn't hear anything. He was sure Javi was talking about them, about how they may join them because he saw Clem glance in their direction.

The glance lasted a second if not less, she saw something that made her look back for a second time. This time though she looked directly at him, the scowl from earlier completely slipping off her face.

Kenny couldn't figure out how long they stared at each other, but it was long enough for everyone to see that Clem was no longer paying attention.

He saw her lips part only to close again, and her Adam apple bob in throat. That's when he heard it. A choked sob.

Clems hazel eyes turned glassy as they filled with tears. "Clem?" Gabe touched her shoulder in concern.

The other captains grew concerned when they saw tears, they probably never seen her cry before.

She took a few hesitant steps forward, her eyes never leaving him. Afraid that if she did they'd disappear. In a way Kenny was afraid of that too.

When the first few tears rolled down her cheeks she launched forward to warp her arms around middle. The moment he felt her body press against his he let out a breath he didn't know he was holding.

His hand pulled away from Aj to rub circles on her back while the other brought her head closer to her chest in order to lay his head on top of hers. Tears of his own left his single eye.

They stayed like that for a while until Clem managed to stop crying which wasn't that long, she had always hated crying in front of other and tried her best to keep a strong front on which caused her to be able to push down her emotions rather quickly.

"Grandpa Ken..." Aj quietly pulled on the hem of his jacket in pure concern.

Clems breath hitched her throat at the innocent words Aj had just spoken. She pulled away from the hug and looked down to see Aj very much alive.

"Kenny is that...." Her words trialed off when she saw him crouch down in front of him with his hand out stretched to her.

She didn't hesitate this time and allowed him to pull her down. "Aj, remember Clementine?"

Aj's eyes teared up when it dawned on him that this was the mother figure he always asked about. The mother figure Kenny always gushed about with a large smile on his face.

He quickly wiped the tears away with the back of his hand then took off his backpack. He rummaged through it for a few minutes before he pulled out an old blue and white hat that had a capital D on it that needed sowing.

Aj's small fingers traced over it gently, Kenny's heart squeezed in his chest when he saw him holding it out to Clem to take.

The smile that Kenny always longed to see again pulled at Clems lips, her fingers curling around her little boys. "I thought this was lost forever" she paused, taking it from him. "You've been keeping it safe for me all theses years, haven't you goofball?"

She ruffled his hair like she had done to Gabe not to long ago to Aj demise, even so he didn't stop her and instead leaned into her touch.

"Don't mean to break this lovely moment but what the fuck just happened?" Kate questioned

Clementine playfully rolled her eyes. "Guys, officially meet my uncle Kenny and Aj my son"

Javi whistled "damn, so this is the cutie you've been telling us about. I had a feeling he was the one."

"I expect a thank you, Clam. Seeing as I'm the one who found them and brought them here" Gabe smiled cheekily at her.

"How about I take you with me on my next recon mission?"

"Ha, screw the thank you. That's more than enough for me, unless you..." he trailed off when he saw the murderous look both Kenny and Aj shot him. "You know what never mind"

"So, what's the family situation? Didn't know you had a son in this world at that age" Layton eyed Aj trying to spot any shared traits between the two.

Clem only hummed "so remember how I told you guys that when all this shit happened I was left with a babysitter while my parents were in savannah?" They nodded "well a man named Lee found me and took care of me so I consider him my dad."

She then looked at Kenny "we ran into Kenny and his family while resting at a guys farm. Lee decided to go with Kenny and they became basically brothers which makes him my uncle."

Clem placed a hand on Aj's shoulder. "I promised Aj's parents to take care of him after they passed making him my son"

"So he's your son, but not your son" Wendell nodded out of respect.

"Pretty much" she concluded.

"Clem can you vouch for at least those two?" Javi asked.

"I can"

Kate looked over to the teens "Kenny can you vouch for them"

Kenny took a long look at the kids plus Rosie who stared into his soul next to Marlon. "I can vouch for Rosie, Violet, and Tenn. The rest kind stalked me all the way here"

Louis looked highly offended "Rosie's a stowaway too."

"Yeah, but we're talking about Rosie here" Louis shrugged.

"They need serious help learning how to survive since they are very fucking sheltered, decent kids though." Kenny caved.

"Don't worry nothing hells week can't fix" everyone in the room except Kenny paled for different reasons.

"Is it too late to go back?" Marlon whispered to Brody.

"This is going to fun" a Cheshire smile formed on Violets face after getting over some war memories. She hated Kenny's lessons in the beginning only to find them thrilling later on.

"Easy for you to say! You live on the edge you psycho!" Aasim huffed

Violet showed him the finger "your just mad we all saw your tiny dick during hells week"

The boys face tuned scarlet. "Okay, moving on. Clem show them around, we'll talk about jobs tomorrow once you settle in." And with that Javi left followed by the captains, only Gabe stayed behind.

"Kids, huh?" Clem nudged his shoulder in a teasing manner.

"Clam, huh?" He teased back.

"Which one's yours?" She changed the topic and looked at the hellions.

"Violet, Tenn" he called out to the two kids. Tenn held onto the back of her jacket while Violet had her arm around his shoulders. 

"You certainly get around don't you?" She asked in a hushed Tone.

"I can say the same about you" he sassed back.

"Clem, do you trust me?" He question all a sudden.

"I'll always trust you" she replied, not missing a beat.

Kenny smiled softly then looked ahead "come here Rosie" he kneeled down as she trotted up to them.

Clem tensed, but stayed next to him. Kenny grabbed her hand in order to bring it up to Rosie's nose.

He could feel her pulse skyrocket the moment her breath touched her skin. Rosie on the other hand looked like she was trying to smile and pushed against her hand to try and coax her into petting her which she managed to do.

He let go of her hand and watched a smile break out onto her face the longer she petted Rosie. When she was done she looked over to the rest of the kids "let's go on that tour now shall we?"

Along the way the kids redid their introduction. Kenny must say he was real impressed with what they saw.

He didn't like how close Gabe was to Clem the entire way, he was so closed their hands or shoulders would brush up against each other. That stupid smile never left his face to make matters worse.

Aj eventually got tired of it too and squeezed in between the two. When they neared the garden They heard a scream.

Clementine immediately pulled out her knife when she spotted a little girl on the floor with a walker towering over her. "Dammit Rue, you had one job!" Clem curse as she threw her knife directly at the walker.

By the time the knife embedded itself into the walkers skull like a bullet. Clem was already on the move. In one swift motion she pulled the knife out splattering blood on her newly recovered hat while kicking the walkers body away to prevent it from falling onto the little girl.

"Gabe!" She shouted before moving on to kill another walker.

Gabe ran over to the girl bring her over to their little group. Kenny was going to go help however when he went to reach for his crowbar he realized that Clem had it handle and this wasn't just some ploy for him to show her off.

She really did have it handle. Her knife was already emended in another walkers head in the blink of an eye. When she spotted another she ran towards it, this time though she kicked it's knee in making it kneel, so its easier for her to stab.

Clem switched out her knife for her pistol when she saw six walkers clumped together after getting inside of the torn wall.

Hands were steady and eyes narrowed, she drew in a small breath before she pulled the trigger.

She moved onto the next walker once the bullet was shot. She in fact did not miss a single shot.

Clem must have decided to show off on her own because once all the walkers were killed she switched on the safely, twirled the gun around her finger twice, then pointed it to the sky just before her lips. What made it even better was that she sent a wink in their direction to no one in particular.

"Is she single?"

❤︎ E N D  O F ❤︎
❤︎ C H A P T E R ❤︎
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❤︎ W O R D  C O U N T ❤︎

4203

❤︎ N O T E ❤︎
Clem is back! Ericson kids are officially charmed. Love rival Gabe. I don't remember if I mentioned/wrote that Clem lost her hat during the car accident and Kenny found it when he went back to see if she made it out.

also for anyone who may be confused on how clementines story works in this story Clem met Ava after she got separated from Kenny and Aj.

Ava convinced her to join the new frontier where she later left because David was a little too aggressive towards her since she reminded him of mariana so he ended up treating Clem like a replacement for his daughter.

Clem didn't like that at all and refused to let David be her dad figure. David got really mad and tried to force her making her runaway. The story goes the same as it does in the game except when Lingard tells Clem to kills him for Aj location.

What happened is that Clem got fed up Lingard constant wanting to die and drug use that she basically bullied the shit out of him.

At the end Javi never cut her hair until he convinced her to stay at Richmond since Kenny and Aj may pass by, and Kate along with Javi cut her hair. Javi made Clem take over David's job of the head of their soldiers since he trusts her and is very skilled.

Many of the guards didn't want to follow her lead since she's a child, but Clem being Clem got her way across and traumatized many of the residents of Richmond including all the soldiers.

I Hope you have a wonderful day or night

❤︎ ꪶꪮꪜꫀ ꪖsꫝ ❤︎
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