Three Orphan Pilgrimage (The Alternative to TWDG's Final Season) [Walking Dead]

91. Known Unknown

"We don't know what it means," insisted Sarah.

"Sarah, it's clear what it means." Clementine stared up in disbelief at the faded billboard looming over this lonely stretch of highway, the only sign of civilization in either direction for miles.

WILL TRADE FOR
FOOD, AMMO, INFO
GO NORTH ON I-25
PAST CHEYENNE

Clem briefly thought back to when they left Valkaria and how Patty had left a very different message on a billboard outside their city, along with the warning they left on the water tower outside of Port Arthur. Could it be possible she had been here and left this message? It was even in red paint like the others she made, and the handwriting looked familiar, but then so does probably most writing done with an aerosol can.

"It's faded," asserted Sarah as she took her hand off the steering wheel and gestured towards the billboard. "Whoever wrote that is probably dead by now."

"It's not nearly as faded as whatever used to be on the billboard," noted Clem as she felt her chest tightening. "In fact, it looks fresher than anything I saw outside of Denver yesterday."

"It's a trap." Sarah snapped her head around and a chill shot up Clem's spine as she saw the terror bulging in Sarah's eyes. "Why else would anyone put up something like this?"

"Because they need to trade?" answered a reluctant Clem.

"Enough they'd leave directions on how to find them?" challenged Sarah. "We'd never do that."

"We did, back in Tulsa," reminded Clem. "Telling people to stay somewhere we could see them from far away."

"Yeah, and what'd they do? They stole everything!" Sarah's shouting nearly caused Clem to jump out of her seat. She was staring intensely at Clem, almost glaring, then she collapsed into her own hands and started crying.

"Sarah," said Clem as she leaned in close. "It'll—"

"Don't tell me it'll be okay!" dictated Sarah as she looked up suddenly at Clem, her face a tormented mess of anger, fear, sadness, and confusion.

"Oh... okay..." stuttered Clem as she was forced to stare into Sarah's terror struck eyes. "But... this is what we've been looking for. We—"

"No!" Sarah leapt out of the driver's seat.

"Sarah, wait." Clem followed Sarah as she rushed over to the table and started frantically flipping through their road atlas. "What are you doing?"

"Seeing where Cheyenne is," said Sarah as she stopped on one page. "It's... it's north of us, just past the border in Wyoming... right on interstate eighty."

"We should have stayed on eighty instead of going to Denver," realized Clem as she shook her head.

"It was a big city," argued Sarah. "I figured there had to be someone left alive there."

"If there was I didn't see any signs of them," reminded Clem. "Just lots of walkers, old ones, barely able to stand up anymore."

"I figured we'd at least find some food there," mumbled Sarah as she rubbed her head.

"The parts I checked had been cleared out."

"There could have been something left in the center of town. You said you didn't make it that far."

"Because there was no getting to it, even with the coat on," asserted Clem. "If we had the others with us we may have been able to carve a path through the walkers, but on our own..." Clem looked down at the atlas. She spotted a small dot labeled 'Cheyenne', one of only a few on the otherwise blank canvass that was Wyoming. Clem forced herself to march back to the front and sit down in the driver's seat.