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Chapter 24 - Daryl

We'd been on the road all winter. It made us harder. Stronger. Closer. We were family. A seamless unit. Pulling up to a secluded house that looked like a promising shelter - at least for the night - we a filed out of the car silently.

Carl and Sophia stood guard over the cars, protecting Beth, Hershel and Lori as well as our escape route. Amelia stayed behind the wheel of the SUV with the old man, the doe-eyed-girl and the pregnant-as-fuck-lady.

T-dog, Daniel, Maggie and Glenn split into two teams and went around the house to sweep the perimeter.

Rick, Andrea, Carol and myself swept through the house like a S.E.A.L.S. team. No words, no gestures. Absolute confidence. Everyone knew what they had to do. Everyone so attuned to one another we felt what the other would do without having to look.

Carol was my wing as she had been all winter. We rounded corners together, watched each other's backs.

Andrea, our best shot - with a gun at least, was Rick's wing.

Rick was the first through the door, as aways. He blew out the brains of the closest geek with his Glock 17, a bootlegged Maglite silencer making his gun safe from attracting more geeks. He'd been favoring that for most of the winter over his beloved Colt Python - too loud - though he always kept it in his holster.

Carol was next though the door shoving a bolt through the eye of a rotting geek so hard it broke through the back of its skull and shattered the glass door behind it.

I followed behind, with my Horton Scout cocked and drawn.

I feel more than see Andrea sweep in after me following Rick's trajectory.

Carol and I leap frog through the house. She swings around a corner, secures the space, I have her back. I pass her, swing through the next door way, she has my back. Silent. Efficient. Deadly.

We've cleared many a house in this fashion.

I hear something moving behind the next door. Could be Rick or Andrea, not the quietest walkers those two - or breathers, but I keep my bow raised just in case. The door bursts open and my index finger tenses over the trigger. It's just heavy breathing, sweating Rick.

I let out a breathy chuckle and give him a smile at the waisted fear and the fact that we almost killed each other. Haha, isn't that just so funny?

Rick doesn't smile back. There are no smiles from Rick these days. That animal look we all get when we are in survival mode stays permanently planted on his face. He's a desperate man these days. Can't blame him. Being on the road at the end of the world with a 9 months pregnant wife is nothing compared to being on the road with a screaming baby.

Carol and I take the upstairs. It's my turn to lead. I creek open a door and hear a soft hoo-hoo. There sits a an owl all awake and relaxed in a geek house. The last thing I think before loosing my bolt is, damn I hope this thing doesn't have rabies.

I collect my measly prize and straighten back up to see Carol at the window, her crossbow lowered, a frown on her face.

I walk to stand beside her and look over her slender but well muscled shoulder to see two downed geeks in front of Sophia and Carl.

As much as she knew her sister needed to be strong, it'd never stop bothering her, the need for her kid sister to hold a weapon and take out cannibal freaks at the tender age of 13.

I nodded my head towards the door and she followed me out.

By the time we get down to the ground floor everyone's piled into the living room for the night.

I take a seat and start pulling feathers out of my owl. Carol sinks down next to Sophie and the two sisters start whispering to each other, presumably about the dead geeks outside.

I sense Carl enter the room but I don't look up from what I'm doing until I hear a can smash against the wall. It's an open can of dog food and Rick has that crazed look back in his eye, like a cornered animal. Apparently the idea of his son and pregnant wife eating dog food compromised his human dignity in a way not to be born. A cursory glance around the room tells me that the others felt eating dog food meant something, something sad. Me, I thought if was something a survivor would do.

Carl is a child of the zombie apocalypse, survival comes before all else.

Truth is, I've been that hungry and that broke. I've eaten dog food to survive before the apocalypse happened.

I looked up when T-dog whistled and we all filed out the back door in a well practiced maneuver. We were on the road before the first of the geeks ever reached us.

We stopped when we found a quite patch of road and all piled out. Carl running up to his father for instructions before taking point. Carol gave my shoulder a squeeze before dismounting the back of my Bike to check on Sophia.

The girl was always poring over the books we'd scavenged for her about herbal lore.

Carol had told me one night in deep winter that Sophie felt useless. Everyone seemed to have a roll or a skill to offer but her. I got to thinking about my mother's people. Mountain people had healers that used plants and herbs and roots to cure all sorts of things. Figured it couldn't hurt. Especially with a pregnant lady and no access to meds.

Since then Sophie'd been stickin' close to Skeletor and doing a damn fine job of helping the woman.

I got off my bike after Carol and headed to the "war room" that was congregating around the hood of the Hyundia.

"When this group meets up with that group we'll be cut off, we'll never make it south," said Maggie, leaning over an unravelled map.

"Wha'd you say? That was about 150 head?" I asked joining the pow-wow.

"That was last week," said Glenn. "It could be twice that by now."

"This river could have delayed them," said Hershel, pointing to the spot on the map. "If we move fast, we might have a shot to tear right through there."

"Yeah but if this group joins with that one, they could spill out this way," said T-dog.

"So we're blocked," concluded Maggie in a defeated voice.

Carol joined the meeting silently.

"Only thing to do is double back to 27 and swing towards Greenville," said Rick.

I looked over to Carol to see what she thought of that, but she just flicked her eyes to the woods. She wanted to hunt while we were stopped and felt we were wasting time. Rick would decide what we did regardless of what anyone else said, and she was fine with that.

"Yeah we picked though that already," said T-Dog scratching his head. "It's like we spent the winter going in circles."

"Yeah, I know. I know," said Rick. "At Newnan we'll push west. Haven't been though there yet. We can't keep going house to house - need to find someplace to hole up for a few weeks."

With that, everyone dispersed. Rick had his leader voice on and the decision was made.

"All right," said T-Dog. It cool if we get to the creek before we head out? Won't take long. We got to fill up on water. We can boil it later."

"Knock yourself out," said Rick.

I waited until Rick and Hershel had some private discussion, probably about Lori, before calling over to Rick from my bike.

"Hey, while the others wash their panties, I'ma go hunt."

He nodded, "You taking Carol with you?"

"'Course," I said with a grin.

"Greedy taking one of our best shots every time."

I shrugged not caring in the least. "Yeah well, I'm leaving you Andrea."

"Generous," snorted Rick amicably.

I gave him another smile, "Andrea can't hunt for shit."

I headed for the woods and felt my shadow get heavy.

"Is it cool if Sofia comes? She wants to look for some plants and roots she read about in one of her books."

"S'fine. We're not going far and she don't need nearly as much help identifying shit as she did in the beginning."

Suddenly there were three of us and I was impressed by Sofia's stealth. Girl could have been a spy in the old world. Sure glad these ladies were on our side.

We were picking our way through the woods, following some old train tracks when I saw Sofia, maybe 30 feet ahead, freeze and stair at something though the break in the trees where she was standing.

Carol must have seen it as well because she was already jogging passed me with small but quick steps, her crossbow cocked and read to kill.

When she reached Sofia she stopped and stared. I caught up with them a second later.

"That's a shame," I said, not seeing the big deal. It was just a prison overrun with geeks. The whole world was full of 'em now.

I made to keep moving but I could feel Carol's stillness, she wouldn't follow. I stopped and looked back. I could see the wheels spinning behind her clever eyes. I knew not to disturb her when she got like this. She was working something out. When she knew just what that was she would explain. Until then, I just watched her six.

A few minutes later my friend came back to life.

"We need to go find Rick," she said. "Now."

I stared at her for a moment. Carol choosing to abandon a hunt in favor of speaking with one of the others was rare enough to be taken note of. I nodded my head and Carol lead the way back at an aggressive clip. Reaching the road, Carol went straight to Rick, interrupting the conversation he was having with Glenn and Maggie. She'd come a long way, but that was still bold for her. She spoke quickly and quietly and I could see the way Rick snapped to attention at her words, he saw the same thing Carol did in that prison.

…Which is how I found myself breaking into prison on a fine spring day in Georgia.

We'd cut our way between the interior and exterior fences and run around the perimeter to the main gate. As always Rick took the most dangerous job for himself and delegated the rest to everyone else.

"Glenn, Maggie and Beth draw as many as you can over there," said Rick pointing to the far end of the field. "Pop 'em through the fence. Daryl and Carol go back to the other tower.

"Carol, you're become a pretty good shot," said Rick striding toward her.

I snorted under my breath. Besides Andrea and myself she was the best shot in the group.

"Take your time," said Rick to Carol. "We don't have a lot of ammo to waste."

I admired Carol for not rolling her eyes. I wasn't as successful. I realized the others never saw her when she was at her best, on the hunt. I was glad of the opportunity for her to show off just how good she really was.

"Hershel," said Rick walking up to the man, "You, Carl, take this tower. T-Dog, Amelia and Daniel draw as many as you can to the other side of the field and pop them through the fence as well," said Rick. "With any luck that will create a clear path to the gate.

"Andrea you stay with Sophia and Lori."

I looked to see what Carol's reaction was to Rick assigning the camps best shot to stay on the ground and guard his pregnant wife, but I could see on her face she was happy that Andrea would be watching over her sister.

"I'll run for the gate," said Rick.

"No, you won't," said Amelia.

Everyone stopped and looked back.

"Listen I appreciate you're wanting to contribute but I can't ask anyone else to do this," said Rick.

"Who's asking?" said Amelia walking to the entrance of the outer gate. "I'm faster than everyone else here by a long shot and quite frankly Rick, I'm a better shot then you, so you lead and make decisions, your good at that, but you leave the running to me."

"Bitch, you die I'll kill you," said Daniel in as serious a tone as I had ever heard him use.

"Ditto," said Carol, to my surprise. She rarely spoke before the whole group.

"Me too," said Andrea giving a sassy smile.

"And me," piped in Maggie.

The four women had formed a strong bond over the winter. Sort of like a strong-women-who-get-shit-done club.

With that it seemed decided and we all moved to our positions.

As always, I was impressed when Amelia took off. She was right, she was much faster than Rick.

Carol and I covered her while she ran incase any geeks got too close, but we needn't have bothered. She blew passed the stumbling fucks before they could even turn around and the rest were too distracted by the commotion the fence teams were kicking up.

Amelia reached the interior gate, shut it, locked it, and was in the tower with out a shot having been fired.

"She made it," said Carol beside me with a smile.

I put my fingers in my mouth and whistled so loud everyone could here me.

"Alright, light it up," I shouted.

And then we rained bullets on them. It was over in 15 seconds.

"Waste of damn ammo if you ask me," I said to Carol as we descended the stairs of the tower. "Once the gate was shut, we could have gone in hand to hand."

"I can appreciate Rick not wanting to risk anyone's life if he didn't have to, and give the team a sorely needed victory," she said.

I couldn't think of something to counter that, so I just grunted.

I heard her gently laughing at my gruffness as she opened the door and stepped into the sunshine.

Outside everyone's excitement and relief was intoxicating.

Carol was glowing. I saw her give Carl and Hershel a big smile before saying, "fantastic!"

Then, she turned around and gave me a smile that sent lightning blots though my body which I felt all the way in my toes.

"Nice shootin'," I said, amazingly, in the same gruff tone as ever.

Sofia touched Lori's arm and asked if she was o.k.

"Haven't felt this good in weeks," said Lori with a smile.

Man, even Skeletor was happy, today must be a good day.

Carol grabbed Sofia's hand and ran into the field.

"Oh!" she said. "We haven't had this much space since we left the farm."

Carl followed closely behind looking surprisingly like a kid the way he held onto his stetson and Beretta.

We all followed Carol's laugher as she strode, Sofia in hand, to the center of the field, spinning every few strides to get a good look at every inch of freedom the prison afforded us.

Night found us around a camp fire grilling the measly critters Carol and I had managed to kill before we lost the light.

At the moment the woman in question was walking toward me, where I stood watch atop a pushed over bus, with a plate of food in her hand.

Rick was making his third lap around the field's perimeter, checking to see if the fence was compromised at any point that or…

"Avoiding his wife," said Carol after I pulled her up on top of the bus with me.

I gave her a look that said I agreed before taking the plate she's brought me.

"It's not much," she said before giving me a dower look. "But if I don't bring you something, you wont eat at all."

"Yeah," I said leaning my head back and dropping the meat into my mouth, "I guess little Shane over there has got quite the appetite."

She gave me a laugh before schooling her features and saying, "don't be mean."

But then her smile slipped back on her face and the weight of her reprimand was lost.

"Rick's gotten us a lot farther then I thought he would," said Carol, her eyes following Rick's progress around the fence. "With him leading us, we've become a family."

"Shane could never have done that," she said, her face hardening as she rolled her neck.

I watched her closely. She hadn't brought up Shane since the farm fell. Maybe it was all this open land bringing back memories?

"What's wrong," I asked. It was breaking one of our cardinal rules, asking questions, not letting each other share what they would in their own time. But fuck it.

"It's that rifle. The kickback," she said, rubbing her shoulder. "I'm just not used to it. My bow does not have kickback."

I gave her an incredulous look. She knew what I meant. Clearly she did not want to talk about it.

Fine. She wants me to ignore the elephant in the room, I'll play ball, for now.

"Hold on," I said putting my plate down. I licked my fingers and waved for her to step closer to me.

I started rubbing her shoulder.

She looked back at me over her shoulder. She was so close. Her lips were so close. And we were touching. Neither of us were real keen on physical contact, but there she was, letting me and there I was, initiating.

I swallowed, hard, suddenly feeling very awkward.

"Better get back," I mumbled, stepping away from her.

She turned and looked at me for a moment and I could see that she was thinking something through.

In a blur of motion she grabbed my shoulders, I felt a breath of air on my cheek and then she was climbing down the side of the bus.

As I watched her walk back to the camp fire I touched my cheek where she had kissed me.

It was awkward and spastic but that didn't stop the shit eating grin that spread over my face.

I decided my watch was over and walked back to the fire.

I could hear singing as I approached.

"So fill to me the parting glass,

Goodnight and joy be with you all-"

Beth sang in a pretty, little girl's voice, but seemed to pause there and look to her sister.

"Oh, all the comrades that

That e'er I had-"

Maggie joined her voice with her sister's and together their sound was more powerful.

It was a sight to see Glenn's head snap to attention when his woman started to sing and I had to struggle not to laugh as I came to stand beside Carol who had stopped about 5 feet from the group.

"Were sorry for

My going away-"

Amelia joined the other women on this verse and I could tell by the way she sang and how much the smile on her face seemed to hurt that the song held some great meaning for her.

"And all the sweethearts

That e're I had-"

Rick came back to the fold now and Carl offered him some food which he promptly offered to his wife. She shook her head no which he would not accept until she gave in and took some and then, he ate for the first time that day.

"Would wish me

One more day to stay-"

Daniel took up the song now, placing his hand on Amelia's shoulder.

It sounds weird to say, but that man had the most beautiful voice I'd ever heard. I wondered if he'd had trainin', in the old world.

"But since it falls

Unto my lot

That I should rise

And you should not

I'll gently rise

And I'll softly call

Good night and joy

Be with you all

Good night and joy

Be with you all."

"Beautiful," said Hershel when they had finished.

I felt Carol turn to look at me but I wasn't so brave and kept my head down.

My momma used to sing that song.

"Better all turn in," said Rick. I'll take watch over there. Got a big day tomorrow."

We all looked at him in an uncomfortable silence.

"What do you mean?" asked Glenn in a quite voice.

"Look, I know we're all exhausted," said Rick.

"This was a great win," he said earnestly, leaning forward on his haunches. "But we gotta push just a little bit more.

"Most of the geeks are dressed as guards and prisoners. Looks like this place fell pretty early. It could mean the supplies may be intact. They'd have an infirmary, commissary."

"An armory?" I asked.

"That would be outside the prison itself, but not too far away," he answered. "Warden's offices would have info on the location.

"Weapons, food, medicine," he repeated with a fever, ticking each one off his fingers. "This place could be a gold mine."

"We're dangerously low on ammo. We'd run out before we make a dent," said Hershel and I rolled my eyes and looked at Carol as if to say see! She looked back at me unimpressed.

"That's why we have to go in there," said Rick. "Hand to hand."

I could see the stress on everyone's face at that prospect. Maggie's jaw had unconsciously dropped open and Glenn's brows were pulled back as they both stared off into the distance.

"After all we've been through, we can handle it, I know it," said Rick, then looking down to meet his son's eyes he said with some affected bravado, "These assholes don't stand a chance."

Then he looked around the fire and met each person's eye to make sure they knew he meant that for each of them. Then he stood and walked off.

Skeletor got up to go after him. Carol and I sat down by the fire to go to bed. Tomorrow was going to be a long day.