Chapter 24 Training

Waking up early the next morning, John woke up Amy. John then walked out of the tent saying, "You need to train, your strength is severely lacking.", Amy hearing this blushed. She didn't like it when he pointed out her flaws, she had a very competitive spirit.

Taking John's words as a challenge, Amy asked how they were going to train. John said, "You will run around the farm 3 times and then do 50 push-ups, sit-ups, and squats. After hearing her training program, Amy immediately lost her will. John seeing her like this smiled before he grabbed her hand and started to jog. Amy trying hard to keep up.

They were doing this training at the crack of dawn and the only people up were Dale and Hershel. The rest of the group was still resting within their tents.

Amy was able to complete her running in an hour and a half. She wanted to drop to her knees and rest, but John didn't let her. John had her walk for a while, to help keep her muscle warm, and reduce her chances of cramps. After a while Amy had caught her breath, John seeing this, had her get down on the ground together with him.

The two of them started doing the rest of the training. Finishing the push-ups and sit-ups first, so as to give rest to Amy's legs. They finished in an hour, and Amy was soaked with sweat. By now the group had all gotten up and were doing their daily chores.

Finished with her workout, Amy sat on the ground. John got down and started to do his regular training program, Amy who saw this, was shocked. She said, "Aren't we done for the day?", looking over at her.

John said, "Yeah we are done with your training. I am starting to do my own training; I have done it every day since we came to the farm".

Amy was even more shocked when she heard this, she then watched as John did 1,000 push-ups, sit-ups, and squats. When John finished, Amy was already well rested. She then said she was going to bath with a rag in their tent, nodding to show he heard her, John turned around and started to run along the fence doing 20 laps.

With his training done for the day, John ran to his tent. Amy was still inside, washing herself when John walked in and began to help her wash her back. Enjoying their time together, after they had both been washed clean of any grime they accumulated from their run.

They then left the tent and John brought her over to the fence once again to practice shooting. Rick seeing John teaching Amy how to shoot a gun was impressed. He was surprised that under John's tutelage Amy was getting better and better at shooting. Rick then walked up to John and asked him if he could teach people of the group to shoot a gun as well.

John thought for a moment, before agreeing to teach the group. Some of Hershel's family members also came over, asking to be taught to shoot, John seeing this was hesitant to answer. He said, "I will teach you but only after Hershel tells me that I can."

Then John ran over to the house before entering it, he talked to Hershel for quite a while, asking him if he could teach some of his family members to shoot. Hershel reluctantly agreed.

Before John could leave Hershel handed him a golden pocket watch reluctantly. He said, "Take this watch, it has been in my family for many generations. I know you and Maggie have something together. Take this watch as a reminder to keep her safe".

John says, "I won't let anything happen to her".

John then walks out of the house; he could feel the gaze of Hershel on his back for quite a while. Arriving in front of the group he began to teach them all about guns, teaching the group about proper safety, and the functions of the guns. He taught them for quite a while, demonstrating the proper form to use when holding a gun, he then had them imitate him while holding unloaded guns. He then walked around correcting the flaws that they made, also teaching why those flaws would affect their aim.

When he saw that they all had a good stance and had a very little number of flaws, John then had them load their weapons, before he had them aim at the can and try to shoot. They all took one shot, before switching the safety on, they then looked to John. John then looked and saw that some of them had managed to hit the cans, while some were not. He then gave advice to everyone, telling them some of the problems they had when aiming.

John taught them from 11 am to 3 pm, he then had everyone switch the safeties on. He then collected all the guns they used for practice into a bag before storing them in the RV.

2 weeks had gone by with John training Amy, Maggie had also joined in their training sessions. The girls had improved quickly and were getting stronger. He had also continued to teach them about different weapons.

John continued to teach the group to shoot every day, they had improved fast and were quite good at aiming now. John had decided to stop the gun training now as the group was efficient enough. Also, the ammo had been dwindling and John had decided not to waste any more on training.

Over the 2 weeks, John had also brought all the kids together. He would train them and teach them self-defense. Along with the use of several different melee weapons. Teaching them which weapon would be best to use in different situation. They learned that with different weapons, you have to use a different amount of force, they also learned that control was one of the most important parts of training with a weapon.

Even Molly the shy little girl, John had found in the mall, had learned. She had gained confidence in herself.

Along with the training, John would take the kids for a walk each day. Or at least that is what he told the group. What he really did was take them into the woods and have them get practical combat training. He would cripple a walker and then have them kill it, the kids were scared to even go near the walker at first, but over the weeks, they had gained confidence and each managed to kill a small number of walkers. Being able to kill the walkers, the kids began to fear them less and less, knowing that the walkers, were not invincible.

None of the kids had told anyone about this secret training. They had started bonding with John, and they had started to like the somewhat harsh and stoic man.

The group had noticed that the kids were more relaxed after going on walks everyday with John. This made them happy that the kids were starting to get more comfortable on the farm. They were also happy that John, who they were somewhat weary of, was not as cruel as they were thinking.

This caused the group to trust John more. Not holding back when asking for help from him.