Woo I'm back! First off I'd like to apologise for the huuuge delay in this next chapter, let's just say that things are a little stressful at the moment and I lost my muse. NEXT I'd like to thank CriminalMindsWhore, Dannie Tomlinson, Weskette, GageWhitney and endlessvanity for the reviews, they are very much appreciated :D
Alrighty, on with the show
Daryl considered his options as he stood with his face resting lightly against the glass of the door window. He could see that the tracks going into the woods were heading in the opposite direction to the highway. He knew he should make his way back up to the truck, go back to camp and tell them that at the very least Andrea had gotten away from the farm. He shook his head and began pacing a small circle around the room.
The trail would be cold by now, not that that was much of a problem for him; he'd tracked deer that hadn't been in the area for days before the apocalypse and it wouldn't be hard for him to follow the trail of disturbed foliage and broken branches and sticks that the clumsy stumbling horde of walkers would surely have left behind.
He paused his pacing by the door and looked out in the direction of the truck and his motorcycle. He would have to leave them there if he went in to the woods, leaving behind the meagre supplies he had gathered from the highway; there was no way he could risk going back for them, he had his crossbow, it wouldn't be hard for him to find squirrels and rabbits if he needed to hunt.
He ran a hand through his already messy hair and gritted his teeth, his decision made; Rick hadn't wanted to come back to even check if Blondie was alive, he wasn't about to go back to the rest of the group without her or without proof that she couldn't be saved.
"N'body gets left behind my ass," he muttered to himself as he swung the door open and stepped swiftly out onto the porch. The two geeks that had appeared while he was searching the house lurched to a halt and glanced crookedly in his direction, broken teeth bared and dripping. They slowly began to move in his direction, arms outstretched and fingers clawing, guttural moans escaping their throats with every other awkward step they made.
Daryl sneered at them and walked around the side of the house towards the woods, the sounds of the walkers clattering up the wooden steps behind him. He hooked his arm and head through the crossbows strap and secured it to his back as he came to the porch railing. He planted his hands firmly and easily leapt over the wooden railing, barely feeling the sharp splinters that were left behind when he let go, landing with a soft thud on the dirt below.
He absently wiped his hands off on his dirty jeans and crouched low to run the short distance from the farmhouse to the tree line. He slipped in between the bushes and slid down the small slope as quietly as he could, it wouldn't be long before those geeks found a way around the porch railing and followed. He walked a small way further into the trees before veering off to the right in the direction of the tracks. It wasn't hard to find them, the lack of rain and the constant presence of the baking Georgia sun preserving them well enough for him to spot even from a distance.
He quickly distinguished Andrea's footsteps from those of the walkers, they were evenly spaced and clear while those of the dead were sporadic and messy, a testament to their uncoordinated movements.
He began following the trail quickly; automatically employing all the tracking skills he had learnt over the years, picking up small details that would normally be overlooked by anyone who wasn't looking close enough; snapped twigs, disturbed leaves, drops and swipes of old blood left behind by the dead as they tirelessly pursued their quarry.
It didn't take him long to find the first body crumpled facedown in the dirt. He strode cautiously up to it and flipped it over with the toe of his boot. Though he was unsurprised to find a bullet hole almost dead centre in the geek's forehead, he was surprised at the sudden rush of pride that he felt.
He pushed the feeling away and focused on the task at hand. Crouching down beside the dead walker at his feet, he carefully inspected its face and hands and was slightly comforted when he found no traces of fresh blood on the decomposing flesh. He wiped his hands on the back of his jeans as he straightened.
He left the walker behind in the dirt as he continued following the tracks through the woods, occasionally stopping to search more carefully for the footsteps he wanted when he came to sections that had been destroyed and covered by the walkers' own trails. It didn't take him long to pick them up again, his confidence in his direction, and Andrea's continued survival, increasing with every dead walker he came across.
He followed the same procedure with each one as he did with the first, checking each for fresh blood on their hands and around their mouths, the sensation of pride strengthening with every direct kill shot until it became so strong he was unable to suppress it. It was an odd thing for Daryl Dixon to experience; pride in another person. When he was young, his parents had never been proud of any of his accomplishments, or at least, never expressed it to him directly, the case normally being that they were too high or too engrossed in the bottle to notice his achievements. He became uncomfortable when people praised him nowadays, he was so used to being ignored, that having someone notice the little things shocked him.
Daryl threw the string of dead squirrels across one of the logs the group used to sit on and grabbed the large bowl he used when he was dressing his catch. He perched himself on the log beside his kills and pulled out his sharp hunting knife. He lazily wiped it clean on a rag before he took hold of the first squirrel.
He had almost finished skinning the animal when he heard someone walk up behind him. He tensed and dropped the squirrel onto his lap, not caring about the stains the bloody carcass would leave behind. He whipped his head around to see Andrea raise her hands and take a small step away.
"I didn't mean to startle you, I'm sorry," she said cautiously, her green eyes flashing uncertainly between his face and the knife in his still raised hand. He lowered it slowly and turned his attention back to the squirrel. He saw her sit beside him on the log and chose to ignore her, carefully peeling away the rest of the squirrels hide.
He draped the skin over the log, fur down, and pulled out a pocketknife. He dropped the squirrel into the bowl and skilfully cut from the lower abdomen to the chest cavity. When he was done he dropped the knife and removed the animals innards with his hands, leaving them in the bowl when he finished.
He tried not to smile when he heard Andrea take a deep breath beside him. He glanced at her quickly enough to see that her already pale face had lost what little colour it normally held. "Y'okay?" he asked absently as he put the dressed squirrel on top of its fur and reached for another.
"Yeah…fine." She replied softly.
"Well, wha'd'ya want?" he said gruffly, slicing quickly through the second squirrels hide. He dropped his knife and pulled off the skin with less care than he had the first and silently berated himself for his sloppy work.
He saw her twisting her hands together in her lap out of the corner of his eyes before he heard her answer, "I know that people around here don't really thank you for everything that you do around here so I wanted to, thank you I mean." She paused when he turned to look at her, his eyebrows arched in both confusion and a mild interest. "It's just that you do so much for us, and you don't get recognition for it, so I thought that I'd, you know," she blushed furiously and abruptly pulled herself to her feet, "I'm bothering you, I'm sorry." She mumbled quickly before jumping over the log and scampering off towards Dale's RV, most likely in search of her sister.
Daryl blinked rapidly several times; entirely unsure of what the hell had just happened. He shook his head and returned to his work, finishing the job quickly and efficiently.
Daryl glanced at the sky and frowned. By the look of it it was late afternoon, and while it wouldn't be sunset for a good few more hours, darkness would fall much sooner in the thick copse of trees. Attempting to follow Andrea's tracks would be impossible in the dark, not to mention dangerous.
He walked through the woods for a little while longer, following the trails left behind, all the while keeping an eye out for a suitable place to set up camp for the night. He came across a fallen-down tree and was pleasantly surprised to see that it was hollow and plenty large enough for him to crawl into. While probably not the most comfortable place to sleep, it would definitely be safer than sleeping out in the open by himself.
He laid himself down and slid inside the hollow trunk feet first, shuffling in until he was sufficiently hidden from the cold forest outside, then closed his eyes, and waited for sleep.