Children. Why did it have to be children. From all the things that could and have happened to Kenny during this apocalypse why did it have to be children.

He had Duck and Clem in the beginning. Then came Ben. He was without any kids for a while however clem came back into his life with Sarah followed by Aj, and it continued to be that way until it was only Aj.

Now it seems he has nine kids, so why the hell did another kid pop out of thin air. Was he cursed? Did he wrong a god that gave outs kids as a punishment!?!?

Children just flock to him, it was getting ridiculous.

"Guns down before you end up shooting yourself" he groaned tiredly, he was too old for this.

Violet only snorted from her place on the floor. Out of everyone there she maybe the safest one other than Aj, but that's because he is short.

The rest sent him offended looks. "Have any of you used a gun before" the teens looked away while Violet raised her hand along with Aj "thought so" he eyed them an all too familiar smug look.

"Now, who the fuck are you" he pointed his newly acquired pistol at Beanie while the kiddos tried and failed to look intimidating.

He chuckled nervously "the names Gabe"

"Who else is with you, Gabe?" He looked like he was pondering his choices.

"Do you mean with me right now? Or what group?" Kenny gave him a deadpanned stare "I'm currently alone, came out to check out how our supply group was doing but It looks like things went to shit. I'm a member of the new, new frontier."

He hummed, he heard about the old new frontier a while back. "Before you ask no we didn't do this, although we killed like three? four? Of the guys in tattered military uniforms when they opened fired on us"

Beanie boys expression turned grim "delta" he muttered, his hand clenching.

He walked off towards the bodies not caring about the gun or eyes trained on him. He walked around a few times Before walking back. "All of theses are delta members. We should move before more come."

Aj furrowed his brows, his lips curling into a frown. "We?"

"No, no, no! I am not taking in another stray kid. I agreed to care for Aj, Violet and Tenn, not all of you" Kenny crossed his arms.

Gabe blinked a few times before he brought his hand up to his mouth in order to stifle a laugh. "Sorry, this is just to good, Clam would die of she saw this"

"Clam?" Louis echoed in obvious confusion.

"It's a nickname. She hates it though, but that only makes it better" he smirked which was returned eagerly by Louis.

Kenny and Violet only rolled his eyes at the same time. "Kids" he murmured to himself. "Look kid we" he gestured to his hellions and himself "are leaving without you, have fun, but I am not adopting"

"We technically aren't your kids" Brody narrowed her eyes at him

"Yet here we are, I'm taking care of you like any parent would even though I wish I could toss you to the walkers" he groaned.

Gabe looked between the too before he started flapping his arms around. Tenn looked wearily at him from behind Aj. "Guys" he spoke up his finger pointed at him.

All eyes turned back to the teen. "Look I have my own parents, so I don't need adopting. On the other hand I think it's best if you come with me, we have a settlement not far from here and we have food, water, houses, and even medicine."

Kenny only scoffed at him. He's heard that same line before. The first time led to cannibals, the second time he was abducted, and the third he heard rumors of the group who branded themselves which turned out to be a group who killed others to survive. This delta promised the same. "We don't want what your selling"

Marlon immediately wanted to protest. The others also started to show signs of denial, they are too sheltered to know what those groups led to.

Settlements were dangerous.

They led to bloodshed

Kenny sent a look to the kids "Don't" he stated firmly. A few backed down while others stayed firm.

"You need my help"

"The hell we do"

Gabe glanced down at the small green pouch Ruby had pulled out earlier. It was all their medicine. "Her shoulder will get infected, you need medication to treat it when it does"

Kenny followed his eye towards the sorry excuse of a med kit. He wasn't wrong. They'll run out soon enough. The tinniest scape could turn harmful, a bullet wound might as well be a death sentence.

"What's the catch?" He crossed his arms. There was always a catch, nothing comes for free.

Gabe placed a hand on his him with a smile "if your thinking we're going to make you fight or something like that we don't. All we ask is that you contribute to our settlement." He paused for a moment, his eyes scanning the crowd.

"We have a long list of jobs you can pick from. We have a doctor who needs help patching up our people, We have people working in gardens, Others go on supply runs, We of course have our defenders, and the list goes on." He shrugged.

Marlon didn't look convince, if he was a good leader Kenny would have shrugged it off however from what he saw back at the school he was not that type of leader. "None of us will have to become weapons for war if we don't want to right?"

Brody flinched behind him, her arm stretching out to jab him in the ribs making him scowl at her. Fishy was the only word that came to mind after that spectacle.

"No, if you what to help defend our settlement once you join that is up to you. We won't force you, and even if you do join our defenders you'll be stuck on watch out or guard duty when people who don't know how to defend themselves venture outside the wall since we are still kids" Gabe rolled his eyes at the word kid

"The only reason why I'm allowed out is because my parents are the people running the new new frontier, they barley give me any leeway. Honestly Clam is the only kid who ever gets to do dangerous stuff, heck she's probably better than some of our adults." He pouted.

Kenny rolled his eyes, he can see why he badly gets any leeway, he's immature. This Clam person sounds really interesting though.

He turned to Marlon who looked a bit more happy after his question was answered "do you think we should go with him?"

Marlon looked startled at the question. The poor boy even jumped before looking around with wide eyes to see who the question was directed towards.

When he found no one he pointed to himself. Kenny was a second away from smacking him and asking who else would I be speaking to, but what left his mouth was completely different. "Kid, you were the leader before me. You may not have been a very good leader, but that is why I'm going to teach you."

The boys look of surprise faded and was replaced with a look of pure star stuck. "I-um, I think we should give it a shot. Violets hurt and we're low on medication."

Kenny nodded approvingly. "We'll go" Gabe smiled excitedly "I have conditions" his smile faltered for a moment.

"Firstly we're going to keep all of our supply with us, that includes weapons. Secondly we will stay for a week then decide if we like to stay, if anything or anyone tries anything funny we are leaving and anyone who tires to stop us will get a bullet to the head."

"That sounds reasonable, unfortunately you'll have to say all of that to my dad. He's in charge and gets the final say in literally everything"

"Alright, you guys ready to move" the kids all nodded with there things in hand "good, let's go. For the love of god don't try out your new guns you'll end up killing yourselves." He sent a pointed look at everyone.

Gabe once failed to stifle a Laugh. "We have gun classes they can attend, they'll be in the same class with the eight year olds though."

Kenny snorted at that and allowed the boy to lead them to the settlement he spoke of. They met up with a group of three others who all lugged large camping backpacks on the way to the settlement.

It was the supply group Gabe was taking about, one was heavily injured while the others had minor wounds. Ruby being the only person with any knowledge of first aid immediately poked and prodded them.

She ended up using up all their medications other than a few pills that were useless in this situation.

They walked for hours with only one break to eat and rest before they were up again. It was honestly entertaining to see the new kid on the block absolutely destroy his hellions at endurance.

The sun was at its peek when they reached large metal walls, armed men and women positioned on top. The moment they got close the guns were pointed at them, Gabe waved them off.

Some of the guards lowered their alertness when they saw the amount of kids, it didn't last long though. They all collectively shivered, each one of them looking as they were reliving some sort of war memory.

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

❤︎ W O R D  C O U N T ❤︎

1722

❤︎ N O T E ❤︎
I'm pretty sure this is the first in a long time that I updated this book 4 days early.

I'm still procrastinating, but I was able to post this ten days after the last update which is on track with my every five days to every other week update schedule.

Hopefully I can continue to stay on track, I Hope you have a wonderful day or night.

❤︎ ꪶꪮꪜꫀ ꪖsꫝ ❤︎
___________________________