𖡼.𖤣𖥧𖡼.𖤣𖥧

Tilly loved summer, the idea of leaving the damned school and coming home was her favourite feeling. Although her home life left much to be desired, it was much better than moping around those dim halls and enduring the worst people on earth. She used to love the soft sounds of birds in the trees and the chirping of cicadas at night. The beaming sun would warm her skin so gently and gift her a constellation of freckles on her face as she lay in her backyard reading whatever Narnia book she could get her hands on.

However now she almost resented the bright season, the sun now meant a harder trek and sweat ridding your body of its much-needed hydration. Now summer meant tiring hikes to shelter and blistering feet on the hot road. What she once bathed in became a sort of challenge to overcome, something in her way as almost everything was these days.

The back of Tilly's neck was soaked with sweat, the lack of hair tie meaning her head soaked up any light shining on it and blanketed her burnt skin. As she walked along following Gabriel at a quickened pace, she wiped her hand over her neck and scrunched her face at how soaked it was. She questioned Gabriel's attire as he babbled on enthusiastically, how could he be wearing an all-black suit in heat like this; just the thought of it made her more exhausted.

She finally lifted her head at the slowing of the group, seeing a clearing right in front of her with a sturdy white building placed in the middle of it. Looking around at her surroundings, she took in the serene picture. She held her weapon tighter as the church sign came into view, 'St. Sarah's Church' it read. The wood of the small building was slowly browning yet in a world like she was in, Tilly was quite surprised at how well it had survived all this time. Despite her reluctance to religion, she found a sort of peace in such an isolated place of spiritual sanctuary.

The group spread out in the small opening of the church, Tyreese passing Judith over to Carl as he and others spread to take cover. Gabriel stood idly at the door as he went to open it.

"Can we take a look around first? We just want to hold onto our squirrels " Rick asked as he scanned the area, keeping any and all sorts of caution he could. He walked up to the priest and held out a hand for the keys as the strong Michone followed him.

Tilly watched as Rick, Michone, Carol and Glenn disappeared into the darkness of the Church, weapons drawn and eyes alert. Tilly tilted her head as she tried to get a better look at the inside.

"You plannin' on using that bus out back?" Abraham spoke up as he rounded the corner, Gabriel looked quite nervous under the stare of the brute redhead. He gulped and smiled with a sigh.

"It doesn't work but you're welcome to it." he clasped his hands together and chuckled once more "where have I got to go?"

"What do you need a bus for?" Tilly spoke up after the awkward silence of Gabriel's attempt at humour. They had shelter, they had somewhere safe to be, why go back on the road?. The group looked around at each other, suddenly aware that Tilly was not with them when all was revealed. Abraham looked to the man with the shaggy mullet and back to the small girl with a smug grin.

"Eugene here is a scientist, he's gonna cure this but only if we get him to Washington." He simply stated as if he was giving a speech to a military commander. Tilly's eyes widened, never since it had all started had she thought for a moment of hope. Sure people thought the government was going to come to save them but Tilly never really believed in being saved from that horrid school.

"What do you mean a cure?..... Like this could all be over?" she stumbled on her words, not truly believing them as the question echoed back to her ears. She couldn't even imagine going back to normal, well as normal as it could get. How could she go to prom with all this blood on her hands? How could she take the SATs with the memory of driving a knife into a skull still lingering on her fingertips? After all that had happened, she couldn't imagine trading her knife for a pencil and throwing all of it away, but if it meant she could live, finally live, she would take it in a heartbeat.

"The dead will die, and all will be better" Abraham smiled at the girl, glimmers of denial and whimsical hope swimming in his eyes.

"You think we can go back after all this after all we've done?" Tilly replied, leaving the conversation to a silence. The words must have hit him, similarly to the rest of the group. She guessed they never really thought about how easily accustomed they had become to cruelty and how hard it would be for peace to return. Not in a world like this.

Rick followed by the others exited the darkened insides of the church, the lack of danger visibly eased him as he handed back the key.

"I spent months here without stepping out the front door. If you found someone inside, well it would have been surprising." he finished with his hands crossed over his body as if he were greeting the locals to his sacred church. As if it were another sunny Sunday in Georgia and the holy souls filled the premises.

"Thanks for this" Carl smiled up at the walls that enclosed the safe surroundings. It had been so long since Tilly had had the pleasure of four walls and a roof around her that the church almost seemed like Disneyland to her.

"We found a short bus out back, it doesn't run but I bet we could fix it in less than a day or two. Father here says he doesn't want it... looks like we found ourselves some transport. " Abraham continued in his determination to saviourship of the human race, his thick southern accent leaking into the air. Rick simply looked at his children, soothing the head of the sweet baby girl that lay in the arms of his young son.

"You understand what's at stake here right" Abraham leant over the shoulder of Rick like a conscious whining in his ear.

"Yes I do," he said as his eyes remained unmoved from his children. That's what Tilly liked about Rick. In the small time, she had known him, she knew he would do anything for his children's safety, and another journey would risk their lives even more. She had longed for that parental love for so long that it had almost seemed like an act when she saw it right in front of her eyes, like a cruel comedy mocking her so terribly.

"Now that we can take a breath-" Michone started, relief ticking in her tone as they finally had safety.

"We take a breath, we slow down. Shit inevitably goes down" Abraham interrupted. Tilly's head shot back and forth from the firey duo as her mind contemplated their sides.

"We need supplies no matter what we do next" Michone shot back, overpowering Abraham's need for a mission.

"That's right. Water, food, ammunition" Rick stated in finality as he walked into the church, his gun lowered this time. Carl and Michone follow in their faithful leader.

"Short bus ain't goin' nowhere, bring you back some baked beans" Daryl finished as he followed suit.

Followed by the approval of everyone who followed into the church, each and every one of them backing rick to the ends of the earth. Tilly wondered where that sort of faith had come from but then remembered she would have done anything Teddy had told her to. He said jump and she would follow, being the only real person she had a connection with within this world. Now without him, she thought it best to stick with the people who gave her a chance, who showed her faith could exist within others.

Abraham shook his head and grunted, looking over to the girl who stood still, her eyes glued on the large cross bared atop the church.

"You with us?" Rosita asked pointing to herself, Abraham and Eugene. Tilly shook her head immediately, her eyes still locked on the cross. Abraham grunted and stomped into the church, followed by a sheepish Eugene and an annoyed Rosita. Yet still, she stayed, until the figure of a boy with a sheriff's hat emerged from the darkness.

"You're not gonna burst into flames if you come in" he chuckled as he leaned on the door, his eyes roaming on the girl whose head fixated on the roof. She tilted her head slightly and shifted her gaze to the boy, letting out a small sigh.

"I might, actually" she stood completely still, connecting her dark brown eyes to his bright blue ones. She honestly wondered if God was real, would he smite her if she stepped in a place so holy. She had spent many hours in the school church atoning for sins she had yet to actually commit. Any small infraction or bad word on her tongue that landed her time in the eerily quiet room would never amount to the ungodly acts she had committed in the after.

"I think God's got bigger issues" a small smile crept on his face. That smile made all her fears disappear. It made her feel like she could really do anything without harm to herself or her heart. She returned the smile as he held out his hand for the girl. She sighed and looked from the cross, back to him, and walked forward so hesitantly she thought she would run away.

From the bottom of the step, she took his hand and he lead her up. Both their hands were covered in dirt and sweat much like the rest of their body, but neither of them could care less and the warmth that surged through them at the simple touch outweighed any embarrassment they felt from a gesture so vulnerable.

The two dropped hands as they walked through the door of the church, the inside holding pews layed out beside red carpeting. Glass-stained windows filtered in the sunlight so the room was cool with shadow but not too dark that no one could see. Tilly felt instant relief as the hot sun no longer bore into her skin. Carl picked up Judith out of his father's hands as the two walked to sit at the pews.

The inside was nothing like the church at school, there was no brightness in that place. The stained windows only sought to block light rather than filter it into glorious colour, and the pews were littered with lude carvings and words of hatred Tilly remembered so clearly that they might as well be carved into her own brain.

She never felt comfortable in any religious setting, not that she hated religion as a whole, just that it never brought her the love that it promised. All those long weekends of priests and reverends spilling words that the bible would fill the loveless hole in her heart never sought a proper resolution. She never got to fill that hole no matter how hard she had tried.

"We can handle a dozen" Rick spoke up, distracting Tilly from her thoughts. She almost giggled at the father's fear of a dozen walkers in one space, remembering the packs and herds that followed her and never stopped. But then she remembered that scared little girl looking at the rotting flesh of the first one she saw, how it invaded her nightmares and never let her sleep peacefully again. Everyone's got their shit she lamented in her own words.

" I'm grateful for it, and everything else" Rick spoke again, reminding Tilly that she soul pay more attention to what the group was saying in case she missed anything important. It all came so suddenly that she had not one clue about what happened to these people before they found her, they already knew her loss and her past even in such vague detail but she had not one blink of an idea where these people have been.

"I'll draw you a map," Gabriel said as he moved forward.

"You don't need to, you're coming with us" Rick interrupted his movements with simple words, visibly sending fear through the poor man's body.

"I'm not going to be of any help, you saw me. I'm no good around those things." he let out surprised gasps in his words as he looked around at the people, almost pleading for someone to stop Rick.

"You're coming with us" Rick finalised, walking away from the conversation as Gabriel gulped down his fear. Tilly looked at the face of the man and felt pity for him, she too had feared what was out there for so long until she was forced into it. That feeling still fresh in her stomach sometimes no matter how much she gets used to the danger.

"I'll go" she suggested to Rick against her better judgement. Rick turned around and tilted his head to the girl in question. "Gotta prove myself somehow" she raised her eyebrows, not exactly wanting to go into the belly of the beast yet feeling so desperately to win them over, not have them looking over their shoulders at her in mistrust. Rick placed his hands on his hip and looked from his son to the girl.

"Not until you can use a gun... Carl will teach you" he told her in such a paternal tone it sent a slight ache through the girl whilst he pointed from her to Carl. Rick walked over to his son as she dropped her head to her feet, leaving to topic alone and heading to the corner of the room. Where everyone seemed to have placed their weapons. She threw her machete down, feeling the weight of something so dangerous leave her body and she sat at the front pew quietly, letting the two Grimes' have their conversation.

She heard whispers of 'I don't entirely trust her yet' and 'watch out' as she caught the two glancing over her way every so often. She couldn't blame them, she didn't entirely trust them either yet but figured she had no other choice. She had been on her own before and almost lost every ounce of herself. Betrayal and death were much worse than losing the glimpse of what you once were. These days mistrust was a survival skill, something to hold onto and remember to keep yourself alive. Tilly never forgot that yet wanted so badly to.

...........

Once the five had filtered out of the church in search of sustenance, Carl sat himself next to the girl in the pew as she stared at the dust that collected on the grand piano. She never played, all she could muster up was the faint tunes of what she heard on her mother's record and 'Happy Birthday', even then she wasn't quite sure she could make it past the third line.

"I need to know something about you," she said out of nowhere, she had a habit of doing that, getting caught up in her thoughts and blurting out something that made so much sense to her yet was so out of the ordinary for others. Maybe that's why everyone thought she was so strange in the before.

"What do you mean?" Carl's head shifted to face her, his feature covered by the shadow of the room and his sheriffs hat, she wondered if he could even see in this light.

"I mean I told you guys about where I was before you found me, now I need to know" she stood up as she walked to the middle of the pew, the rest of the group listening in on her as she idly walked through the isles, subconsciously checking for anything hidden.

"A few of us were at a camp in Atlanta in the start" Carl started, everyone's heads switching to him.

"Then a farm, then a prison, then terminus and now..." Carol interrupted the boy, hurt lacing her words as she spoke of all the places. Tilly knew easily that everyone had lost people, places these days only seemed to be associated with the people who never got to leave them. Tilly shared a simple smile with the grey-haired woman, she seemed strong, but only strong from the things that had once broken her. Much like Tilly herself.

"I'm sorry for what you've lost" Tilly squeaked, her voice cracking from the raw emotion she felt remembering all she too, had lost.

"We've all lost something sweetie" she smiled and dropped her head to the floor. Tilly's hand dug into the side of the pew as she chipped away at the decaying wood.

"Sometimes I hope the loss will stop, but I know it won't. Feeling the loss is knowing you once loved" she spoke, repeating the words she had heard come from Teddy's mouth so long ago. Something he had said to her in such dire circumstances when they had nothing but each other to cling to and all the pain to drown them. Her lip quivered ever so slightly as she reached into her abandoned backpack and picked up the gun etched with the initials of all this loss she felt. She looked over to Carl and brushed the fallen hair out of her face.

"You gonna show me how to soot this thing or what?" she sighed to the boy as she twirled the gun in her hand. Carl stood up from the pew with a slight smile curving the side of his mouth. The others prepared their things to scavenge as they prepared to leave after the two.

"Let's go" he lead her out of the building, and she followed his footsteps to the back of the church, dragging her fingers along the peeling paint of the wood as she did. Carl stood awkwardly in the small opening around the back and waited for the girl whilst inspecting his gun. He pulled out his gun and motioned for her do to the same.

"Alright, it's pretty simple: magazine release, slide release, thumb safety" he began to explain as he pointed to the different parts of the gun. He looked over to her and nodded to her gun, indicating for her to do the same. Tilly smiled tightly and repeated all the actions with ease. Carl narrowed his eyes slightly as he saw the girl work her way around the gun like she had used it a thousand times before. "Thought you said you didn't know how to use a gun," he asked bitterly.

"I know my way around a gun, just never knew how to shoot it," she told the boy, he was gazing at her like she was the most incomprehensible creature on the planet.

"Why?" he asked plainly. Tilly couldn't possibly fathom why but her heart sank every time she heard that question. Shaking her head and scrunching her nose, she fiddled with the handgun in her palms and squeezed it tightly.

She had seen Teddy and his parents load and clean a gun countless times, it wasn't that hard of a thing to remember, however they never let go of the scared little girl who stumbled across their house. They never wanted that little girl to know the violence, to know how the reverb of a gun travelled through the hand and to the heart.

"Just show me how to shoot the damn thing" she lifted her head to Carl, who raised his eyebrows at her and then proceeded to let it go. He took her arm that held the gun and raised it so it was in her eye line.

"You have to get it up to your eye, every time, no matter how frantic you are. Otherwise, you miss. And you're dead" he spoke as he walked around to the back of her, adjusting his height so he could see if the gun was at eye line.

Tilly was all too aware of how his laboured breathing brushed against her neck, however, chose to ignore it and focused on the tree she decided was her target. He reached around her and gently lifted her other arm to connect to the gun. "Better start out with two hands. Your aim will get better the more you shoot" he finished as he realised his hand was still connected to her arm, he dropped it as he cleared his throat and kicked the dirt under his shoes.

Tilly felt the weight of the firearm in her hand but didn't complain about it, she never did complain about much as she thought it could be far far worse and she was not deserving of making a fuss of anything. She lowered her gun and studied it, its grooves and its indents. Its carvings and its rust and thought about all it had done for her and all it had done against her. It protected her countless times with the cost of humanity and more weight on the chest of those she loved most.

She wanted to use it though, she wanted to protect herself, and the people she owed her life to. It was hard for her to accept that she was no longer the kid that relied on the shield of others and the threat of a dull blade, now she wielded the power to cause so much with the nick of a finger.

She thought that maybe she could have protected Teddy if she knew how to use it. But that didnt matter now, its all past and gone and faded into the stars in the sky.

"Hey Tilly" she was pulled out of her thoughts by Carl, who had wandered to the wall of the church behind her. Her head craned over her shoulder as she placed the useless gun in her waistband. Carl seemed entranced by a particular spot on the cracked wood.

"What" she walked towards hum and planted herself night next to the boy. His arm reached out ad he pointed his calloused finger to a small carving made on the back of the church

Youll burn for this

Tilly and Carl shared a worrisome look as the girl brushed her hand over the rushed carving. She backed away slightly, almost falling over her own feet as she did.

"Fuck's that supposed to mean?" she breathed out, Carl simply shrugged at the girls inquiry as his eyes stayed glued on the writing. Tilly slowly walked around the corner, this time inspecting the wood for any more carvings with ominous messages. As her eyes scanned up and down, she landed on the small divots in the corner of the windowsill, purposeful and sharp strokes that looked to be made from a knife.

"Hey, Carl!" she shouted to the boy who came striding in her direction. She pointed to the knife marks and turned to him with slightly proud look at figuring it out. "Someone tried to get in" she said as she brushed her hand over the rough wood and met the quizical gaze of the grimes boy.

"I think Rick oughta know"

𖡼.𖤣𖥧𖡼.𖤣𖥧

A.N: ayo these chapters r getting a lot longer 😀

i also want to preface that nothing about Tilly's background and beliefs is me hating on religion. It's simply part of her story and not indenting to offend anyone.

idk how long i will make these chapters but i think about the 3,000 range cause personally i like shorter ish chapters to keep my attention span in check 

and yeah i did use the carl teaching her how to use a gun cliche🤨 i like it.

plus i think Tilly using a gun for the first time is super important to her character as she moves on from her past group/family which you will see in the future.

tysm for over 400 reads ❤️❤️❤️

all my love ❤️