Feel the fury closing in…

He ran through the trees, hacking at all branches in his way. Most were cut down before scraping at his blackened skin though enough sharp ends reached down and kept his baldhead bleeding. He ran hard down the memorized path, breathing through the pain that still burned his left side. Two packs rocked against the rifle slung over his back. With every jolt, he pushed his boots deeper into the earth to maintain speed. He kept his serrated machete firmly in his hand and glared at the lack of blood. He should have pressed forward. He should've fought for the upper hand. His weapon should be dripping with bright red blood.

Survival of the fittest, the man told himself. Survive at any cost.

It was the only law of his group, the only thing they needed to understand to cohabitate. People need others to survive, but must fend for themselves. The strong survive and the weak provide. Only this time he didn't steal from the weak. He had lost too much in the fire and convinced his partner they needed to return with something, but found something else. Something that was willing to kill and hunt him down for what he stole. He growled with the pain of every step. He should be the predator. He should be the one on the hunt. But the long daggers slicing at his already wounded flesh forced him to run. He would make it to the drop point. He would reload and he would be the one to kill.

At the rock ahead, he pushed himself to jump off with one strong step and landed at the bottom of the slope. Ahead of him was the large tree where he hid some emergency supplies, fatefully the ammo. The man continued on at a sprint, hearing the untiring footsteps of his hunter gaining on him. Nearly reaching the marked trunk, a woman blocked his path and the sight of her caused his feet to immediately stop. It wasn't possible. She couldn't be standing in front of him. There was no way she outran him. Yet she was there, decisively pointing a 9MM at his dark and crusting head.

"Give me the backpacks."

Her honey brown hair was in messy waves and not a strand fell in the dark grey eyes that ceaselessly stared him down. The man narrowed his burned brow and looked closer. Her skin appeared darker than it was due to sweat and dirt, similar to the stains on her flowered lightning bolt tank and dark jeans. There was a single black strap laced across her torso for a double-bladed sword at her back and a knife with a green handle sheathed to her waist. Not to mention the smaller handgun tucked securely in her ankle combat boot. He straightened and gripped his machete tighter. Where was the blood? If this was the same woman, she should be soaked in bright red.

At the sound of footsteps, the man violently turned around and saw her. The same honey brown hair in messed up waves, the same dark grey eyes glaring into him, the same skin dirtied by the wild. Only her dark racerback tank and fading jeans were covered in blood. His partner's blood… Flowing all the way down from her neck to her dark brown boots, still dripping over the high laces. She threateningly twirled her unique, mix-matched blades in her hands as he furiously looked from one to the other. Identical. He was being hunted by interchangeable warriors.

In a rage, the man swung his machete at the woman who held him at gunpoint. He knocked the berretta from her hands, but she evaded his attack by dropping to the ground and kicking his feet out from under him. The woman who killed his partner went to stab him, but he blocked her blades with his own and threw her back with a crazed shout. As she stumbled to regain her footing, he went to end the bitch that made him run. He lifted the machete and got a bullet to the back of his head, brains bursting through burnt flesh and seeping into the roots of his drop point.

"Sage? Are you all right?" she hurriedly stepped over the fresh corpse to check on her sister. "Is any of this your blood?"

"No, no, I'm all right." Sage got to her feet, but her other half refused to believe it as she looked for wounds. "Really, Jade, I promise you I'm all right. His friend pinned me to the ground so I had to gut him on top of me." She looked down at her clothes and finished, "It got messy. That's it. I'm fine."

Jade nodded and sighed as she glanced at the thief. Their backpacks were undamaged and waiting to be reclaimed from his lifeless body. She bent down and grabbed the ash colored pack while Sage went for the blue. He had secured them on his shoulders by tangling the second straps on his empty rifle. It kept the packs closed and safe.

"He didn't know what was in here," Sage said as she held the sky blue backpack to her chest. "Out of everything they saw in the car, out of all the crap they could've taken… They grabbed these. He took these and ran."

Jade clung to her backpack and looked inside, closing her eyes to breathe in the contents. "When I saw him running with them on his back I just – I just dropped everything I collected to cut him off. Any other pack I might've let it go."

Sage looked up to the carving on the tree. "Do you think there's more of them?"

"I don't know, but we should probably take what supplies he has stashed here and go."

They dug up the hole and pulled out a filthy athletic pack. It wasn't full, but had several boxes of assorted ammo, matches, a tactical combat axe, five bags of beef jerky, and two full canteens of water. "What do you think?" Jade asked as Sage took a moment to examine it. "We can't say no to ammo and we could use the matches."

Sage flipped her seaxes into their sheaths fastened to her thighs and put the blue backpack safely on her shoulders. "I'll carry it." Jade handed her the supplies and put her own safely on her back. "What about the rifle and machete?"

They looked at his corpse and the weapons lying with him. Jade looked to her sister and replied, "Those we don't need."

As the warriors walked away, they looked back one last time and lifted their heads to the sky. "Inga träd växer till himmelen."

Are we sisters wearing thin?

They watched the road. Still nothing. Sage sharpened her tracker knife while Jade tapped at the steering wheel. It had been nine days. They had foraged and scavenged all they needed in supplies, but were getting restless.

"Mile marker," Jade announced as she shifted upright in her seat. "Please tell me we're outside the city."

Sage rummaged in the glove compartment and pulled out the map. She scraped some of the dried blood off with her fingernail and squinted at the colored lines. "Yes, if we stay off the main highways and keep having luck with these clear roads, we should be out of Georgia and in Tallahassee as early as tomorrow."

Jade looked over at her sister and broke a smile. "We might just make it."

"We will."

As Sage folded the map and shoved it back in place, Jade echoed, "We will."

Luck ran out when a throng of gorgers appeared on the road. Jade slammed her foot on the brake, stopping at their shuffling feet. Dozens turned to face the Expedition… Too many milky glazed eyes peered through the windshield. Gorgers began to reach out and claw at the metal. More and more pressed up on the hood and spilled over to both sides of the SUV. Their hands slammed against the glass and their snapping jaws hungrily groaned.

"There's no way through," Sage yelled over the herd.

"Hang on!" Jade thrust the SUV in reverse and put all her weight on the gas. The tires screeched but escaped the rotting bodies trying to hold on. Jade kept her sight focused on the rear window and followed the road back to the last major turn. Sage kept her sights on the gorgers, readying her sharpened knife for an emergency stop.

They came up to the exit and Jade brought them to a harsh stop, pushing them into drive, and fled the following herd. Sage held her knife to the window and Jade gripped the steering wheel. A few gorgers weaved in and out of the abandoned cars spread over the new road, but they never slowed. Not until they saw a large black dog run through the trees, deeper into the woods.

Jade stopped the car and Sage rolled down her window. As swiftly as it came into sight, it was gone.

Nowhere to run from all of this havoc…

It had been almost an hour of walking through the trees. Jade marking their way while Sage collected leaves. Somehow being in the woods, aimlessly searching for a phantom hound, calmed the unrest inside them. It kept their eyes and ears open. Let them be there without being there.

"MOM!" They stopped cold, digging their boots into the earth. "HELP!"

"No, this isn't our problem," Jade forced the words out of her mouth. "This is not our responsibility."

"AH! MOM! HELP!"

It was a young boy. By the sound of his screams, he couldn't be more than 12 years old. They stared at each other and waited. No sound of the mother. No sound of anyone; just their even breaths and the dead moans to echo his pleas.

"We don't have to risk our lives for him," Sage painfully agreed. "He's not our kid."

"AH! AH! SHANE! MOM! HELP!"

They both looked off in the direction of his terrified voice. Jade gave in and shook her head. "He's someone's kid."

Running deeper into the woods, the sisters listened for any sound from the boy. He screamed again. He was close and so were the gorgers. They bolted through the brush and soon collided with a dark haired kid. He was panting and shaking. Those bright blue eyes gripped Jade tighter than his white knuckled fists clinging to her blue shirt.

"Help me," the boy cried.

Gorgers stumbled through the branches. "We need to move! There could be more!" At her sister's call, Jade turned them around and kept the kid in front of her and the three gorgers at her back. He was too out of breath; at that speed the gorgers would catch up to them. "We need to get him to the car! Now!"

Sage looked over her shoulder at Jade's shout. "There's more to the right!"

"We can take them out! He can't keep running like this!"

The boy began to stumble, but refused to stop. "Hard right!" Sage gripped her knife as she turned and drove it into the skull of a gorger. She quickly yanked it out and jumped over the corpse as it fell. Jade guided the kid forward as she swung her own knife backwards into the temple of a gorger that was getting a little too close. She looked back as it fell to see that after killing two, there were four left.

"We picked one up! Gotta cut them off!"

Sage spun behind a tree and drew her long seaxes. Jade ran ahead and looked down at the breathless boy saying, "Take the keys. Our car is straight ahead. It's a big black SUV parked by some bushes. You can't miss it. Lock yourself inside. Go!"

He obeyed. Once Jade saw him open the door, she turned around and readied her double bladed sword. The gorgers had just reached the tree Sage was waiting behind. She skillfully sliced the first gorger's head in half, putrid blood and brains spurting into the air and onto her purple shirt. The second came up behind her and Jade charged forward to cut off its head. It was still spinning out blood like a sprinkler as she dug the other blade into a gorger's face. Sage took the last one out by kicking it to the ground, then stabbing it between the eyes. They took a moment to catch their breaths and looked the dead over.

"Three turned into six."

Jade wiped off both sides of her sword and said, "They can't really be forming groups…"

"They are drawn to sound and after the road…"

They shook off the thought as Sage finished cleaning off her seaxes, murmuring, "What do we do with him?"

"Hope he's still got a mom to return him to."

Sage nodded as they headed to the car only to find the boy upright and mouth open in the passenger seat. The sisters slowed their pace to glance behind them. All four gorgers, in pieces and plain sight. He definitely saw everything. They shook their heads and walked on. The apocalypse made you forget how a lot of things used to be… impressionable youth now at the top of that list. He had a wide smile on his face as Sage made him scoot to the edge of the seat.

"You killed all of them!"

They stared at his amazement before turning their attentions to the outside. "Yeah. There were four. Two each."

He looked at Sage and said, "No, there were six. Three each."

"We've taken on more than that when we have to," replied Jade with a shake of her head.

"Really? Wow."

"What's your name, Kid?" Sage asked as Jade started the SUV.

"Carl."

"All right, Carl. I'm Sage and this is my sister, Jade."

His eyes kept darting back and forth between them without blinking. "Sage and Jade. Really?" When they nodded, Carl continued, "Jade and Sage. Do you have names that are the color green because you're twins? So they'd match?"

Jade couldn't stifle a laugh. "Nope."

"Oh, well, I like them."

Jade hesitated for a moment, but gave him a small smile. "Thanks. Carl's a good name to have too. Strong."

He beamed up at them and shifted his way onto the center console. Sage kept herself pressed to the door to give him as much space as possible and asked, "You're not alone are you, Kid?"

"No, I have a camp," he looked down at his hands as they picked at the fraying threads of his pocket. "I was playing hide and seek with Sophia and…I got lost."

"Do you know how long you've been wandering around out here?"

"Feels like hours."

Jade frowned. "And no one found you."

"I'm sure they're looking," Carl answered with a shrug.

Automatically, Jade put the car in drive and headed out onto the empty road. "While I bet your mom and dad are tearing up the forest to find you, we're gonna get you back to camp, okay?" She wanted him to smile, to know that they would get him home, but he shook his head. "My dad's dead." They stared at him and he stared back. "And my mom never finds me because I always find my way back. Until now."

Sage rested her head on the seat as her eyes drifted to the back of the car. Jade was already scanning all of the supplies piled on the seats and the floor. As the car slowed to almost a stop, they reached around Carl and dug into the bags shoved closest to the front. Sage pulled out a candy bar and Jade pulled out a soda. He gazed up at them gratefully before gently taking the gifts.

"Any landmarks you can tell us about your camp?" Jade asked as he took a hungry bite of chocolate. "I'm sure your mom is thinking the worst."

"It's outside of Atlanta, next to a big quarry."

"Big enough to be on a map?"

"I think so."

Sage dug the map out again and tore it open. She was able to find a marked quarry amongst the web of lines and pointed, "Here?"

"Yeah, I think that's it. That's where they are!"

Sage handed it to Jade and said, "I'd say that's about 10 minutes out."

"Which means you've been out here for maybe half an hour and somehow managed to be near a major road. That's really dangerous, Carl."

"Good thing you guys were here."

The twins remained silent as Jade stepped on the gas. After a while, they turned onto something of an access road and Carl was almost done with his soda. As he sucked down the last drops, the boy looked over his shoulder to hopefully find some more cans. Instead, his eyes widened at realizing why he had to sit uncomfortably up front. Jade and Sage glanced at his mesmerized expression and after a moment, decided to let him stare.

The extended backseat was packed with all sorts of supplies. The floor was covered with gym sacks ready to burst with miscellaneous foods and liquids, and duffel bags crammed with clothes, as well as large containers completely full of toiletries, cooking tools, and first aid supplies stacked in the middle. Not to mention the portable generator sitting on the right seat, under and against packs that securely held the few, but coveted electronics and batteries. The left seat had three large duffels strongly and safely strapped down, one on top of the other, each stuffed with their weapons and ammo. Behind these supplies, were more supplies. The third row of seats was put down for more trunk space and was outlined with over a dozen plastic fuel cans. The rest of the trunk held four rows of water bottles stacked by three, four trays of canned goods stacked by two, several boxes of crackers, rice, pasta, and cereal, and all of their camping supplies.

Carl also noticed the ash and blue colored backpacks hanging by the headrests of the driver and passenger seats when he turned back to his saviors. "Is it just you guys? Are you alone?"

Sage nodded. "Just us."

"And you still have all this stuff?"

"We're good at foraging and do our best to save what we can and replace what we use," replied Jade.

Carl stared out the windshield as they turned onto a country road. "Is it hard? Living out of a car? Always moving?"

Jade stubbornly ignored the side glare Sage was giving her and said, "It's better than where we've been. It works for us."

As Sage softly sighed, Carl lifted himself up to be at their eye level. "You could stay with us. You can set up your tent next to mine and park your car next to Shane's jeep. I know my mom will want you to stay after I tell her you saved me."

"Carl –" they said together, but he stopped them. "If you don't like it then you don't have to stay forever, just stay a little while. It'd be better with us. We'd be safer."

Jade couldn't find the words and Sage couldn't even look the boy in the eye. They were too blue and sad. Luckily, they didn't have to come up with an answer. The dirt road led them right into camp. There was an RV, a few cars, and a good amount of tents. Not a bad set up: high ground with a smart formation of supplies. The people, however, looked frantic.

They tilted their heads toward Carl and Sage asked, "See your mom?"

"Yeah, she's yelling at Shane."

"The dark haired guy?" Jade asked.

Carl nodded. "He was my dad's best friend."

She pulled up to their camp and the moment everyone saw the unfamiliar vehicle, they all pulled out what guns they had…which was much less than half of their own firepower. Neither twin was surprised or worried by this reaction. Carl got out of the Expedition and called for his mother.

"Carl? Oh thank god! Carl!" She screamed and ran to him, gathering the young boy in her arms. "Where were you? I told you not to leave Dale's sight! Are you okay?"

The sisters rolled their eyes. Carl was missing for an hour and his mother had not only supposedly stayed at the campsite, but was also blaming him for getting lost? He's a kid. Kids to do stupid things. It's the parent's job to control the stupid.

"You scared us, little man," Shane said as he knelt down to Carl's eye level. "Don't you run off like that again, okay? Could've gotten hurt or worse."

Carl nodded and turned to see the twins leaning against opposite sides of the hood. "I would've gotten eaten if it weren't for Jade and Sage. They found me and saved me."

Every pair of eyes stared into them, causing a burning feeling in their skin. The sisters briefly waved to match their awkward smiles. Lori got to her feet and hugged a rigid Sage. "Thank you so much! I don't have words… If you hadn't…" She let go and walked over to Jade, taking a tight hold of her hands. "Thank you. If there's anything I can do –"

"They can stay with us," Carl jumped in. "Right, Mom?"

"Oh, um, yes! Yes, of course. You saved my boy! Please, stay. You're more than welcome here."

Jade stuttered and backed away from the mother's grateful embrace. She looked to Sage, but her sister was suspiciously staring at all the people beginning to circle. They were both thinking the same thing. It was too risky for too many reasons. But then they looked at the damn kid and his pleading, puppy eyes.

"We've been searching the woods for almost an hour and you bring him back safe and sound before dinner," Shane interrogated. "How'd you find him? Better yet, how'd you find us to bring him back?"

"Heard him screaming for help. Calling for his mother and some 'Shane' but no one answered him." Jade glared as she continued; "So we followed his voice, killed the gorgers chasing him, and after Carl pointed out where the camp was on our map we drove him here."

"Any other questions?" Sage snapped.

"Oh, oh, oh!" A broad, sleeveless man with thinning hair and a strong jaw laughed from the back of the group. "Looks like Carl found himself a couple of spicy mommas! Mmhmm. Love me some hotsy totsy pieces o' ass like you in the group, hunnies. I mean, what man hasn't had the twin fantasy? That's one I'd like to live out."

"Shut up, Merle!" Shane shouted as a younger sleeveless man whacked him with an arrow.

The sisters brushed it off and Sage said, "We don't get involved. Today was an exception, with Carl being a kid and all. End of story."

Shane nodded and backed off a bit. "Look, I didn't mean to sound ungrateful. I just don't know you and with the world the way it is now… Gotta be even more distrustful of strangers. I love Carl like he's my own, so thank you for saving his life and bringing him back to his mom."

Jade looked over at Carl talking to a little blonde girl with his mother's arms wrapped around his shoulders. Sage kept her eyes on the tall, rugged man saying, "Filling in the dad role, huh?"

"He told you?" At his whisper, they both nodded. "He was a good man."

"Carl misses him," Jade said as the boy walked in between the sisters and took their hands. "Come on. I'll show you where you can set up your tent."

"And I'll help get your stuff." At Shane's words, Sage instantly looked to Jade who took out the keys and locked the doors. He glanced back at them as the rest of the camp got curious and started looking through the windows. Soon, the twins heard a lot of, 'Holy shit's and 'Oh my god's.

A blonde woman griped, "Are you kidding me? They have all of this and have the nerve to lock the car? If they're gonna stay then they're gonna have to distribute at least half. This could take care of all of us for a month!"

"Easy, Andrea. We all don't know each other yet and we don't know if they're going to stay with us or not," an older man with a tan hat – Dale? – responded.

"Seriously? They have more than enough to spare!"

"Maybe if we asked them, they'd share just some of it?" a younger blonde said.

More and more of the group joined the argument and none looked in their direction, so the sisters prepared for a lot of explaining about why they had no intention of sharing. They looked at the spot Carl picked out for them: trees to protect their back, a place to park the Expedition up and to the left, Carl's tent a little off to the right… and the dirt road leading out of camp straight ahead. Everyone continued to yell and yearn over the supplies while Carl expectantly looked up at his saviors. Jade and Sage locked eyes and with a defeated exhale they told Carl, "One week."

Nowhere to hide from all of this madness, madness, madness…

Jade's boots rhythmically thumped against the cement wall. One heel after the other, marking each beat with the blood splattered on her ankle-high shoes. She curled her fingers over the roof's ledge and stared at her legs dangling in the open air. Too many of the dead were stumbling about below, like ants on a kitchen counter looking for anything to eat. Jade closed her eyes and hung her head back, breathing in the humid air.

"How long are we gonna be stuck here?" Sage groaned. Jade curved her head to look at her sister lying across the ledge. Her arms lazily rested over her stomach while her crossed legs kept tensing. Sage wanted to get up, to run and fight, but there was nowhere to go. Not yet. So she asked again, "How long until we go?"

"Back to camp or back to the road?"

"At this point I'd settle for either," she tilted her head back to look Jade in the eye. "But we did say we'd leave in a week. And now we're in the city with these people for a supply run we didn't need to make."

"You really think he's gonna let us leave?"

"We made that deal well over a week ago," Sage said as she settled back into her relaxed position. "Besides, I'm not against stealing Carl away in the middle of the night."

"That's you're solution? Kidnapping the kid?"

"It's not like they'd be able to find him. They need us for that! Kid runs off more often then he doesn't anyway; maybe he'd want to come. Then it's not kidnapping. It's just getting gone."

Jade stopped bumping her feet against the outer wall and looked out across the buildings. "If we're gone, it's just us. We can't bring Carl."

Sage kept her eyes closed and sighed, "I know."

"We should've left after a week."

"We should've left the next day."

Jade swung her legs over her sister and touched the roof with her toes. She stared at the blood on her boots. No longer dripping, but not completely dry. The gorgers grew louder and began moving faster. Sage rolled her neck to see all the way down to the street. More were gathering by the tank. Something must have gone through.

"Do you hear that?" Jade asked as she jumped down to walk the length of the roof.

"What?"

"Sounded like a helicopter."

Sage sat up and watched the sky with her sister. "I don't see it. Do you still hear it?"

"No." Jade came back and leaned her ribcage over the ledge, burying her face in her hands. "I think this look-out thing is driving me crazy."

"Hold that thought," said Sage at the sound of a neighing horse. They both stared below and saw a man on a strawberry roan get swarmed by gorgers on all sides. Its whinnies turned to screams as they grabbed the poor horse and pulled it down. The man fell off, watching the gorgers plunge their hands and teeth into the helpless animal while fighting off the ones that couldn't get close enough to eat it. He crawled away and left everything behind. In seconds, he was under the tank and gorgers crawled after him. There was no way out. Gunshots fired from underneath. They waited to hear him scream as the gorgers filled their bellies with his flesh. Instead, they heard a shot from inside the tank.

"What's going on? I heard shots!" Glenn yelled as he ran onto the roof.

Jade waved him over and said, "You're not gonna believe this!"

"What?" Glenn situated himself between the girls and his mouth dropped at the gruesome sight below. "What the hell happened?"

"A guy rode in on a horse," Sage pointed to the feeding frenzy and finished, "Then crawled into the tank."

"Wait, he's in the tank?"

Jade couldn't stop herself from laughing. "Yeah! Idiot trapped himself in a damn tank!"

"You can't make this shit up!" Sage laughed with her sister.

Glenn stared at them and couldn't quite bring himself to laugh. However, they all brought their attention back down when the man appeared out of the hatch. He dazedly looked at a bag being walked over in the street until gorgers lamely climbed their way up and he was forced to close the hatch. Sage's gaze widened as more and more gorgers poured in. Whatever opening they might've had to leave the city was gone.

"Glenn? What're you doing?" Jade asked.

He took the walkie out of his backpack and replied, "There's a radio in the tank, right? So we can talk to him."

"Why?" the twins asked simultaneously.

Glenn fiddled with the frequency and said, "To help him get out."

They stared at the young Asian in a baseball cap like he just said he would lift the tank on top of the building with his mind. Still, Glenn was determined and walked back to the ledge with the twins on either side of him. No sign of the man trying to get out and no more gunshots. He was still in there. He was still alive.

"Hey you. Dumbass. Yeah, you in the tank. You cozy in there?"

Madness, Madness, Madness…

song by Ruelle

I think I wrote this chapter at least three times and all were completely different! However, I must say that I am finally pleased with how it turned out and I hope that you agree! I also hope that you continue to read as there is SO much to reveal about my OCs and I am very excited to write their journey (and interactions) with all of our beloved Walking Dead characters. If you enjoyed or are intrigued, please review as I love positive feedback and creative ideas. It is greatly appreciated! Thanks! See you next chapter :)