Running through a forest is harder than you think.

Seriously. The ground's uneven, and slippery as shit. Its even worse when you're running for your life, not sure if the rustling behind you is a person, a walker, or just an animal.

Josephine, my sister, was having much better luck than me. Small and petite, she was able to dart between trees, and avoid the hanging branches. The forest eventually thinned and we reached a slope, and beyond that, a gas station.

"If we hide over there, we might get away."

"Are they still followin' us?" She had a point, I looked back cautiously, scanning for the metal of a gun, held by a hostile survivor, or the decaying flesh of a fireman we had passed a while back. Nothing.

"We should still go down, maybe we can rig a car, get back to Arkansas."

"Clarksville is nine whole hours in the car." It was a valid argument, I supposed.

"Its safer than walkin', it'll take us a whole week."

"So we wait-" A weak snarl echoed from behind Josie, and we silently agreed that yes, hiding in the gas station was a very good idea.

It was a graveyard in front of the gas station. Abandoned cars were scattered around, and it looked like there had been some kind of campsite set up. It hadn't lasted.

"Uggk!" A walker trapped inside an ugly, canary yellow car had seen us. It banged against the glass uselessly. One good thing about them. Alone, they were weak, it wasn't even scratching the window.

"Ugly piece of shit." I spat, flipping the bird in its direction. We left it behind us as we crept around the abandoned campsite. One trapped walker was nothing. More than a few, however...

BANG! A gunshot. I muffled Josie's frightened scream with my hand, and we knelt down behind a truck. Shit. I moved my hand, and mouthed,

"Gun out. Now." She withdrew the Glock 17 from its holster, and I did the same with my own. We'd been bought the guns by our father some time ago, as a present. I also carried a folding survival knife and a professional bow and arrow, which was a pretty strange thing to some people. My parents had saved up for a whole year to buy me it when I was 16, after I'd won a high-school archery competion. And I had a damn good shot.

The bow was my choice of weapon at this moment. It was quieter. If we were lucky, we'd get out of this without a fight, and we wouldn't need to use a gun. We stood, and silently advanced towards the sound of the gunshot.

"What can ya see?" Josie turned to me, and whispered back,

"It's a cop."

"Why the hell would an officer still be wearin' his uniform." She shrugged. "Why did he shoot?"

"Walker." I peered around her for a better look.

Just as the stranger turned around and saw me.

"Shit." I ducked back, but it was too late. There was no way he didn't spot me. No freaking way.

"Excuse me." Oh, he'd seen us alright. "Excuse me ma'am, I don't wanna hurt you, I need some help."

"You'll be fine. Just go your way, an' I'll go mine."

"I've run outta gas for my car. I'm lookin' for my wife and son, you might've seen them, they're both from here."

"I don' live here. We're on a trip." Damn, I kind felt sorry for him. "We'll come out if you put your gun away."

"It already is." I took Josie's hand, and led her out, keeping her partially behind me. We'd put our weapons away, since the guy had been nice enough to do the same. He looked at Josie, and sadness shone in his eyes. "Sorry for scaring your daughter."

"She ain't my daughter, she's my sister."

"Sorry, I just though-"

"I know, everyone does." He spoke, introducing himself as Rick Grimes.

"Elizabeth Warren. Or Liz. And this is Josie." I felt the tension and worry lift off my shoulders; Rick smiled and spoke,

"Listen, I have a car back there, it's running on fumes, but if you know about any gas stations that still have somethin'-"

"There won't be none. Gas'll have been one of the first things taken. Might be some in one of the farmhouses further up."

"No, I won't steal-"

"Listen, Rick, there ain't nobody to steal from. Thought you said you were from around here, how could you not know?"

"I-I've been in a coma. God knows how long it was. Woke up to find the world's gone to hell and my wife and son are missing."

"Jesus. Sorry." A coma? Really? Josie looked at me, and I knew she was thinking the same thing. Either this guy was really unlucky, or he was lying. Who could still be alive with all those walkers stumbling around? I was willing to bet everything in my bag that hospitals would be crowded with roamers. "Listen, it was nice to meet ya and all, but we should be going."

"Isn't it better if we stick together?"

"We don' even know you!"

"Listen- there's meant to be a refugee camp in Atlanta, I think my wife and son might have went there."

"I didn' hear of no refugee camp." Then again, I wasn't even from Georgia. And the only people I'd met hadn't really been bothered about finding an army-led area. They'd preferred a more violent approach.

We followed Rick to his car, a surprisingly well-kept police vehicle. He threw open the back seat and held out his hand towards us. Guess he was being serious about that invitation. "Listen, we barely even know you, and I'm-"

"I'm hungry" Josie's input was most definitely not helpful at a time like this. I opened my mouth to remind her that we still had bags of mixed nuts, and herb crackers, and promptly changed my mind. When was the last time we had real food? An actual meal with meat, cooked and full of flavour. Herb crackers have flavour, but they were dry without any water, which we were quickly running out of. "Can we go? Please?"

No. No, no, no no no nonononono-

"Fine."

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"Hello? Police officer out here. Can I borrow some gas? Hello? Hello? Anybody home?"

"Careful. Whoever's home may not be a as friendly as they used to be. Hell, they probably ain't even alive." He ignored my comment and peered through the window, before gagging and stumbling back against the porch fence. "What? Whadd'ya see?" Yikes. Four bodies of what was obviously a family were decaying on the floor. And in the father's hand, a shotgun. "Took the easy way out. Bunch'a cowards."

Both Rick and Josie jumped when I forced the front door open, knife out and in front of me.

"What are you doing?!" Rick hissed, standing in the doorframe. Poor guy probably hated the thought of entering somebody's home. Personally I didn't see a problem with it, they were busy stinking up the living room. "This is trespassing."

"Nah it ain't. They're dead, murder-suicide by the looks of it. We're just going in and takin' the shit they ain't usin' no more." Upon seeing horror ripple across his face, I continued, "We need it, they don't, pure'n'simple."

Rick was waiting outside with Josie when I exited the house, a new backpack full of goods. Like Rick, Josie hated the idea of stealing, and taking food and supplies from a house with the family rotting inside would've made her feel sick. Still, I stood by my opinion: we needed this shit to survive.

"Don' look at me like that. I got meds, bandages, four cans of food and the dead lady was carrying a full pack of cigarettes."

"You took cigarettes from a dead person?" He replied. I shrugged, lighting one up. Rick turned away and walked around the back of the house, and Josie and I followed.

In the field was a horse, its beautiful torso twisted and turned as it tried its best to stop Rick from coming near it. Rick rested his and on its neck gently, coaxing the animal to calm down. Almost immediately the horse's uneasiness settled and it was relaxed enough to look him in the eyes. It snorted softly and stood silent.

"Easy now, easy. I'm not gonna hurt you. Nothing like that. More like a proposal. Atlanta's just down the road ways. It's safe there. Food, shelter, people, other horses too, I bet. How's that sound?" The horse whinnied lightly, and nudged its head against Rick; I sighed in relief. We weren't getting kicked it the face for now, thank god. "There we go. Good boy. Good boy. Now come with me. Come with me." Upon seeing me repressing laughter, he raised an eyebrow questioningly.

"Look at you. Rick Grimes, horse whisperer." He walked straight past me with the horse in tow and climbed up. "We should stick the kid between me and you. I'll sit on the back."

"You sure?"

"Not a big fan of horses; the further away I am from its mouth, the better." He laughed, and pulled Josie up behind him. Clearly uncomfortable with being so close to our new friend, I had to silently encourage her to hold on to his waist, which she did with disdain. I clambered up after her, and prayed that the horse was well trained.

"Let's go easy, ok? I haven't done this for years." It was a rocky start. I held my breath and dug into Josie's shoulders; the horse continued to veer different directions, stopping suddenly and then moving just as quickly. "Easy. Easy, boy. Easy, easy, easy."

"I thought you knew how to ride a horse."

"I do, I just haven't done it in a while."

Finally, after nearly stumbling into a pole twenty minutes down the road, the stupid horse started to walk steadily. We passed no walkers on the way down, although I thought I spotted someone moving in a field just outside a barn; when I turned back to show Rick, the figure was gone.

I was able to appreciate the Georgia landscape for once too. Before shit hit the fan, I'd only left Arkansas once to attend university. The furthest I'd ever gone was Tennessee. Georgia was pretty, with long stretching fields of greenery that went hand-in-hand with the hard tarmac. Looking into its forests caused a resurgence of paranoia; they were dark, and a walker could have easily jumped out before anyone could see a damn thing. I'd already been on the wrong end of that kind of attack.

Rick broke the silence first, "Why exactly did you decide to come to Georgia?"

"My Aunt Ruth. She was ill, broke her pelvis or somethin'. Mom said the stitches had gotten infected, so we were on our way to visit."

"But ya'll never made it."

"We just got into Georgia from Alabama, the bus stopped somewhere around near some creek, began with a 'W'"

"Williams Creek?"

"That's the one. Anyway, the bus driver pulled up, got out, and he comes back in with this chick; she's covered head to toe in mud, and soaking wet. Said her boyfriend went hunting with his friends and got bitten, he said it was from a coyote, she weren't so convinced. They'd gone on some date, he'd wandered off feeling sick, then came back looking like shit. Bit her, then chased her down a stream."

"So she was bitten."

"Oh yeah. Right in the shoulder, no chance of trying to cut that off." The memories flashed back into my head, of that young girl sat on the top step, terrified, not knowing that in the next few hours, she would die and come back as something awful. "She turned just outside of Waco."

He stopped talking. I stopped thinking, and instead turned back to the trees.

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"No. No." Rick was pale and clammy, even his sweat had stopped streaming down the back of his neck. His knuckles tightened on the reins as we looked at what remained of Atlanta. "No."

"So much for a refugee center, this place is dead." Atlanta was a ghost town; the few groans of the dead were further away from my sight. Even so, I nocked an arrow and kept myself steady on the horse. "Rick, we should go, we're not going to find anyone here."

"No." This time, he meant something else. "If there's a center, they'll be hidden away somewhere. We've still gotta find my wife and son, and your Aunt."

"Fun."

A broken down bus housing a few sluggish walkers was up ahead, and they ambled outside lazily to try and get a once in a lifetime chance at a snack. The horse whinnied nervously, staggering around their outstretch hands.

"Steady. It's just a few. Nothing we can't outrun." Rick broke into a trot, moving faster and faster past walkers. The sound of a helicoptor from above caught his attention, and he jerked the reins to get the horse to move faster. We were going too fast, if we ran into anything we'd never have enough time to slow down and get away.

"Rick." He ignored me, urging the horse to speed up. Up ahead, the moans from earlier became louder, and louder. "Rick. Rick, stop, slow down."

We jerked around the corner in time to come face to face with a large herd of walkers; they knashed teeth, blood, foam and saliva dripping from their decaying faces. The horse screeched as they surged forward, claws grabbing at its legs. Rick turned and the horse found itself facing a different herd. "Shit!"

We crashed to the ground, and horse serving as a shield from the majority of the walkers, who scooped flesh from its flank and ate greedily. My stomach churned at the sound of the horses screams as it was torn apart by bony hands. Josie sobbed, and clung to me whilst I drove an arrow into the head of a shambling corpse. More continued to come forward; my saving grace was hearing Rick scream "The tank!" before crawling under.

"Come on!" We knocked two walkers away, and crawled behind Rick. He lay frozen under the tank, gun against his temple. "What the hell are you doing?!"

"Lori, Carl, I'm sorry."

"The hatch, you shithead!" He made an 'oomph' sound as I crawled over him and pushed Josie through the hatch underneath the tank, climbing in myself. Rick barely made it, two rotting hands ripped his undershirt in a bid to pull him back into their clutches.

"The bag. I dropped the damn bag."

"Yeah, well, shit happens." Josie cried out when the soldier I had believed to be dead turned his head to me and snarled. Rick barely lifted his gun before I drove my arrow through his head; it snapped upon contact with the metal of the tank wall. "Just my friggin' luck"

Outside, groans and snarls echoed from all directions. We'd have to sit them out, which could take several days. My bag contained enough for me and Jodie, with Rick here it wouldn't last long.

Radio static from inside the tank startled me; my head collided with the top of the tank; a stream of profanties followed. The radio crackled and buzzed to life; and a voice could just be heard over the static.

"Hey, you. Dumb ass. Hey, you guys in the tank. Cozy in there?"

I dropped my knife; the clink of metal against metal distracted Rick from the radio, which had went silent. It had been so long since I'd met more than one stranger on the road. The radio buzzed again, and the voice crackled back into existence, "Hey, are you alive in there?" Rick made a desperate scramble for the radio, ripping it from its post

"Hello?" There was silence from the other side. "Hello?" Finally, the voice came back.

"There you are. You had me wondering."

"Where are you? Outside? Can you see us right now?"

"Yeah, I can see you. You're surrounded by walkers." Because that wasn't obvious. "That's the bad news."

"There's good news?"

"No." Josie's sweaty hand tightened around my wrist; she looked up to me, those big green eyes wide and questioning. Her long hair had fallen out of her ponyail, I'd have to cut it shorter to keep it out of the way of walkers.

"Listen, whoever you are, I don't mind tellin' you, we're a little concerned in here." The man on the radio chuckled.

"Oh man. You should see it from over here. You'd be having a major freak-out."

"Rick, he's not helping right now."

"Got any advice for me?"

"Yeah, I'd say make a run for it."

"That's it? "Make a run for it?"

"Is he an idiot?"

"My way's not as dumb as it sounds. You've got eyes on the outside here. There's one geek still up on the tank but the others have climbed down and joined the feeding frenzy where the horse went down. With me so far?"

"So far."

"Okay, the street on the other side of the tank is less crowded. If you all move now while they're distracted, you stand a chance. Got ammo?"

"In that duffel bag I dropped out there, and guns. Can I get to it?"

"Forget the bag, okay? It's not an option. What do you guys have on you?"

"Hang on." He took out his gun and counted the bullets, I withdrew and knife, and stopped Josie from counting her own bullets.

"Why?"

"Ain't gonna need them. I've got a knife, just stay behind me." Rick repeated back all our weapon information to the man, who 'hmm'ed along and told us what to do.

"Jump off the right side of the tank, keep going in that direction. There's an alley up the street, maybe 50 yards. Be there."

"Hey, what's your name?"

"Have you been listening? You're running out of time."

"Right." Before opening the hatch, Rick grabbed a shovel and showed it to me,

"Yeah, that's good. Try using that before you touch the gun."

One walker stood swaying on top of the tank. He growled and started towards us. A quick swipe of the shovel send his tumbling, his jaw hanging by strings of skin. The walkers that were struggling to reach the horse's body turned and noticed us, a much easier, alive prey. They followed us as we tore through Atlanta's abandoned streets, hacking at spooks that got in our way. After a particularily hard stab, Rick lost the shovel, and pulled his gun to start shooting. "No! You'll draw them to us!" Too late. He fired again, and again, and again.

We rounded and corner and came face to face with a person, at the sight of Rick's gun he threw his hands up and shouted "Whoa! Not dead! Come on!" The man from the radio. Despite my concerns about his 'honest' intentions, we hurried down the alleyway, followed by a horde of hungry spooks. "Come on! Back here! Come on! Come on!"

He clambered up an emergency ladder with Josie right behind him. Rick and I managed to just barely get high enough before the ladders were swarmed with the undead, grabbing at our legs. I made sure that I didn't look down, but felt sick anyway. Heights were one thing, climbing with the possibility of falling to my death was another story.

The man from the radio leaned against the railing, clearly out of breath, and shape. "All three of you are idiots. What, did you think the geeks would just stay out of your way?"

"Not exactly."

"Yeah, whatever. You're all a bunch of dumbasses." Upon further looking, he backpedaled "Except maybe your kid."

Rick and I both corrected him at the same time "She's not my kid." He blinked and shrugged it off.

"Oh no." The walkers were trying to climb up the ladders, and one seemed to be succeeding. "We should get outta here. I'm Glenn, by the way."

"Rick"

"Liz. And this is Josie." We jogged across the rooftops, leaping over small gaps between the buildings, much to my chagrin. And of course, Rick decided to make small talk.

"Are you the one that barricaded the alley?"

"Somebody did... I guess when the city got overrun. Whoever did it was thinking not many geeks would get through."

"You keep using the word geeks, is that what you call'em?"

"Yeah, a good a word as any."

"And you were willing to risk ya life to save us from them? Why?"

"Call it foolish, naive hope that if I'm ever that far up shit creek, somebody might do the same for me. Guess I'm an even bigger dumbass than you guys." He turned on the radio and spoke into it "I'm back. Got three guests plus four geeks in the alley." In his desperate bid to try and get to the door, Glenn failed to notice the two spooks until he almost crashed into them. "Jesus!"

They crowded us, my back pressed hard against the rail; I barely noticed the door open until the spooks were being bashed into the pavement by two men wearing gear. Glenn pushed me forwards, and I ran through the door.

Something blonde and angry tackled me and shoved me against a table. I squeezed my eyes shut upon impact, and opened them to find myself face to face with the barrel of a gun. "What the f-"

"You son of a bitch. We ought to kill you." Glenn pushed Josie and Rick behind him, leaving me in the hands of the angry, red-faced blonde woman. Behind her, I spotted the two men removing their gear; beside them was a black woman. She moved closer and tried to calm down the woman with the gun.

"Come on, ease up"

"Just chill out, Andrea." One of the men barked, "Back off."

"Ease up? You're kidding me, right? We're dead because of these stupid assholes."

"Hey, watch who you're calling assholes, bitch." She bared her teeth, spittle flying. Maybe I'd pissed her off? Being on the other side of her gun was rather eye-opening; I noticed the safety hadn't been taken off. Who was the stupid asshole now?

"Jesus, Andrea, they've got a kid with them." Andrea glanced behind Glenn, where Josie was holding back tears, her tiny hands reaching into her bag to pull out her gun. I wanted to punch Andrea for making her cry. I really did.

It appeared that Andrea saw the same thing I did; her face softened, and the gun dropped down. I knocked past her, which was admittedly brattish on my part, though her face was worth it when I called back "If you're gonna aim a gun at me again, its best to take the safety off."

Rick and the Hispanic man were stalking ahead. Curiosity took the better of me, and I dragged Josie to hear them. "Look, we came into the city to scavenge supplies. You know what the key to scavenging is? Surviving! You know the key to surviving? Sneaking in and out, tiptoeing. Not shooting up the streets like it's the O.K. Corral." Morales led through the department store, most of the mannequins were knocked over and unclothes, and whilst the store was full of dresses, skirts and shoes, it had seemingly been looted of anything that was wearable for our current situation. I found a pair of cargo pants, and shoved them into my backpack for later. I'd sew them if they didn't fit.

"Every geek for miles around heard you popping off rounds." The other man chimed in.

"You just rang the dinner bell." Jesus. Outside, there was a dozen spooks banging on the glass doors. One of them managed to make its way through the group of corpses with rock in its hands, and managed to crack the first layer of glass.

"Christ, is that thing smart or somethin'?" The survivors had begun to babble to each other, taking turns between berating Rick, and denying that he could have ever seen a helicoptor.

"You were chasing a hallucination, imagining things. It happens."

"I saw it." I voiced my agreement, not that they paid much attention. The walkers banging on the door were slowly attracting more and more walkers, and I don't think any of us knew how long those glass doors would last.

"Hey, T-Dog, try that C.B. Can you contact the others?" The man- T-Dog- lifted his own walkie and tried communicating.

"Others?" Rick perked up, "The refugee center?" The other woman snorted in amusement, turning away to sit on a counter.

"Yeah, the refugee center. They've got biscuits waiting at the oven for us." T-Dog swore as the walkie buzzed lifelessly.

"Got no signal. Maybe the ro-" BANG! BANG!

"Holy shit, were those gunshots!?"

"Oh no. Is that Dixon?"

"What is that maniac doing?" Morales muttered, pushing past Andrea to climb up the stairway to the rooftop.

"Come on, let's go." We followed Glenn up the stairwell. Up on the roof, Morales had just burst out of the door and began shouting at someone. T-Dog grabbed my arm from behind me and said,

"Ya'll gonna wanna watch yourselves. Merle ain't the nicest guy to meet."

On the roof ledge stood an older man -maybe late 30s, early 40s- who brandished a gun. He wore leather, a torn baggy shirt, and jeans. "Hey! Y'all be more polite to a man with a gun! Huh? Ah! Only common sense." The air reeked with his arrogance, and maybe a little too much body odour.

"Man, you wasting bullets we ain't even got!" Merle Dixon took the damn to jump down as T-Dog continued to rant. "And you're bringing even more of them down on our ass! Man, just chill."

"Hey! Bad enough I've got this taco-bender on my ass all day. Now I'm gonna take orders from you? I don't think so, bro. That'll be the day." My heart flew up to my mouth. We'd managed to land ourselves in the middle of a group of angry people, one of whom seemed to have racist opinions. To be safe, I withdrew my knife; Rick looked at me and shook his head. I couldn't take that risk.

"'That'll be the day?' You got something you want to tell me?"

"Hey, T-Dog man, just leave it." Morales pleaded,

"No."

"All right? It ain't worth it. Now Merle, just relax, okay? We've got enough trouble." Merle snorted and continued to taunt T-Dog,

"You want to know the day?"

"Yeah."

"I'll tell you the day, Mr. 'Yo.' It's the day I take orders from a nigger." Shit. T-Dog paled, before launching himself at Merle, with no luck. Merle hit back quickly and hard, a sharp crack to the nose from Merle's gun send T-Dog flying. He never got a hit in. Merle was sat on his chest before anyone could move to stop him, holding a smaller handgun, the large rifle dropped.

Rick started to edge around the rooftop, slowly wrapping his hand around the gun whilst everyone else begged and pleaded with Merle. "Hey, come on, Merle. That's enough."

"Come on. Dixon!"

"Whoa, cut it out, man!"

"Stop it! Dixon, get off him! Dixon, you're gonna hurt him." If it had been appropriate, I would have commented on how he'd already hurt him. T-Dog was beaten to a pulp, blood trickling from his mouth and nose. "Merle, cut it out" Merle aimed the pistol; the atmostphere changed immediatly. "No no no, please. Please." And then they were all quiet. Rick was still moving carefully to the group, where Merle stood triumphant, waving the gun around and yelling,

"Yeah! All right! We're gonna have ourselves a little powwow, huh? Talk about who's in charge. I vote me. Anybody else? Huh? Democracy time, y'all. Show of hands, huh? All in favor? Huh? Come on. Let's see 'em." One by one, everyone raised their hands between caring for the injured T-Dog. Merle rocked back on his heels and laughed, "Oh, come on. All in favor? Yeah. That's good. Now that means I'm the boss, right? Yeah. Anybody else? Hmm? Anybody?"

"Yeah." Smack. Merle fell back against the pipes; Rick took the opening and attached a set of handcuffs to one of Merle's wrists. The other circled a small metal screw.

"Who the hell are you, man?!"

"Officer friendly. Look here, Merle. Things are different now. There are no niggers anymore. No dumb-as-shit, inbred white-trash fools either." Mildly offensive, but okay Rick, okay. "Only dark meat and white meat. There's us and the dead. We survive this by pulling together, not apart."

"Screw you, man."

"I can see you make a habit of missing the point."

"Yeah? Well, screw you twice." Rick put the pistol to Merle's head

"Ought to be polite to a man with a gun. Only common sense."

"You wouldn't." Merle sneered, "You're a cop."

"All I am anymore is a man looking for his wife and son. Anybody that gets in the way of that is gonna lose. I'll give you a moment to think about that. Got some on your nose there." Ah, damn. I'd thought he was an alcoholic. Drugs were hard to get in an apocalypse; my brother had learnt that the hard way.

"What are you gonna do? Arrest me?" Instead, I was able to watch Rick throw Merle Dixon's bag over the roof. "Hey! What are you doing? Man, that was my stuff! Hey! If I get loose, you'd better pray... Yeah, you hear me, you pig?! You hear me?!"

"Yeah, your voice carries."

"Do you hear me, you filthy pig?!" Rick walked to join me and Josie alongside the roof edge. Morales moved to join us.

"You're not Atlanta P.D. Where you from?"

"I'm from up the road a ways. These two, I'm not quite sure." Morales looked to me for an answer,

"Clarksville, Arkansas."

"Well, Officer Friendly from 'Up The Road A Ways', welcome to the big city."