Leave it By the Wayside
Chapter Four: Right Place, Right Time
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, The Walking Dead or The Walking Dead Webisodes.
Harry hated to admit it but Carl had been right. Of course that didn't stop him from smacking the stubborn teen upside the head for being reckless and leaving the room without him.
He'd been asleep for three days, well, more or less. Apparently he'd been conscious enough to swallow water a few times and eat a piece of some nasty diet bar that Carl had found in the nurse's station.
Carl for his part explained that he hadn't gone far, mostly sticking to the upper floors. He'd cleared out oncology and the long-term care ward of bandages, blankets and squirrelled-away food items and then, in a more dangerous move, raided the dispensary a floor down for anything resembling an antibiotic or painkiller.
He'd also come up with a few bags of the same nutritive IV drip that was hanging empty alongside Rick's bed but admitted that he hadn't exactly known how to hang it and hadn't wanted to try in case he messed something up.
All in all it was quite the haul for three days, and Harry had been grateful to have food, some ibuprofen for his aching muscles and a cup to drink out of when he'd finally woke in the wee hours of the third morning.
"I did some scouting," Carl said grunting with effort as he pushed the stubborn rail down and manually lowered Rick's hospital bed to a full vertical. "It looks like someone shut up most of the walkers that were already in the hospital in the cafeteria, they're secure for now but if they got more riled up they could probably get out so I didn't get too close. The ground level is pretty well barricaded with tables and chairs and stuff. They must be what's keeping the people and walkers out, though I did take out a wanderer so there's got to be an unblocked entrance somewhere. Best bet for us is the fire exit, it leads out into the loading docks and the bodies there'll keep the walkers from following our smell back into this place."
Harry nodded in agreement stripping Rick's hospital gown off and cutting through the far edge of his dressing with surgical scissors. "It's early enough that people can still find most of what they need in abandoned stores or houses, no need to take the kind of risk that a hospital might represent."
The bandages were rank with dried blood that had started to rot in the summer heat and discharge from the still-healing mess of a gunshot wound and Carl pulled a face that was half sympathetic and half disgusted as they carefully peeled away the layers of gauze.
"This is so payback for all the years I was in diapers," Carl said with a grimace squirting the area liberally with rubbing alcohol and watching the encrustations start to run, revealing that the actual wound was smaller and better-healed then it looked.
"I hardly think one day makes up for four years," Harry teased as he carefully wiped away the mess leaving the skin clean and a bit pink he looked carefully but there didn't seem to be any signs of a serious infection like sepsis or gangrene, it was inflamed a bit, and irritated but it looked like the relatively sterile environment of the hospital room had done its job.
"Looks okay," said Carl not quite able to mask the hope on his face.
Harry flashed him a smile, "Most definitely," he agreed gently tilting Rick's unresponsive body up into a sitting position so that they could give the exit wound the same attention and have Carl carefully cover it with one of the big sterile bandage pads, "No bedsores either which is lucky for Rick. With some proper care he might wake up earlier or at least be in better shape."
Carl nodded, "I'd forgotten how skinny and pale he was when he found us," he said shaking his head a bit, "And now that I'm thinking about it it's probably kind of amazing that he made it, I mean just look at him."
Harry didn't look at Rick but at Carl who was scowling faintly at the hand he had wrapped around Rick's boney wrist.
"He's going be fine—hey, look at me, yeah?" Harry reached over and closed a hand over Carl's, "He is going to be just fine, there are plenty of things that would've killed a normal bloke twenty time over that Rick Grimes already survived."
"I know," sighed Carl, rubbing at his face, "I do know, I just get worried that one day his luck's gonna run dry."
"We don't have to do this today if you don't want to," Harry said after a long moment of making sure Rick's bandages were secure and tucking a clean blanket in around him and double-checking to make sure the IV was still dripping properly. "We're alright for a bit if you want to stay here with him. Or I could go by myself if—"
"No," Carl interrupted firmly, "No chance you're going on a run alone when you just passed out and slept for three days and don't have any mojo to protect you. Hell no."
"I'm fine," said Harry rolling his eyes.
"Yeah, okay, whatever, your definition of fine doesn't even resemble our earth definition of fine," said Carl with a snort striding over to where he'd left his gun and holster and belting it around his thigh, scooping up his battered hat and plunking it over his too-long hair. "Ready when you are."
And that was apparently that.
Shaking his head at Carl's expectant look Harry stomped into his boots and belted on his weapons. His wand holster lay empty, his wand sacrificed to the ritual but he still had his father's invisibility cloak folded into one pouch and the glock nine millimetre he favoured was a comforting weight against his hip.
His favourite weapon though was a makeshift Morningstar fashioned out of a heavy metal baseball bat, a few purloined pieces of rebar and magic back in the earliest days of the end of days. And there were more protection spells, anti-theft charms, and spells of unbreakability on the thing then went into the making of the average high-end broomstick.
"Alright, ready," said Harry, making doubly sure he had his knives and that his boots were tightly laced.
Carl looked up from where he was scribbling on yet another one of the get well soon cards, "In case Dad wakes up," he explained setting the note under Rick's slack hand.
"Dad," Harry read, tilting his head to make sense of Carl's abominable handwriting, "Me and Harry made it through. Been here four days. Gone on a run. I'm setting the stopwatch so you'll be able to tell how long we've been gone. Love you. Carl—where in Merlin's name did you find a stopwatch?"
"Nurses station," answered Carl with a shrug, setting the stopwatch with a soft beep and watching the numbers start running before tucking it alongside the note, "They've got all kinds of stuff stashed in there. Let's go."
Carefully they eased the door open a crack, checking that the coast was still clear of walkers and pushing aside the heavy wheeled gurney, and then putting it back into place when they were out. They hadn't had any problems with walkers so far but there was no sense pushing their luck, or Rick's.
The hospital outside of Rick's room was more what they were used to then the little slice of sterile Before they were staying in. Flickering lights draining the emergency generators, suspicious stains, bullet holes and casings peppering the halls like some sort of macabre garnish.
Harry followed Carl as quietly as possible and with a good grip on his weapon. This place felt like you could round the corner right into a milling horde. Too quiet and too filled with obvious signs of futile last-stands.
Carl whistled for him softly and Harry turned and watched him click on an electric torch and nod towards the fire exit stairwell. Harry gave a soft nod of acknowledgement and followed the teen into the yawning dark beyond the door.
It was only one flight of stairs that they had to move down but Harry kept his body between the inside rail and the light in case there were walkers from the first floor who'd wandered in, ears straining for any hint of a wheezing moan or a wet, hungry snarl.
There was none and that almost made the tension thrumming through him worse.
Still, in short order they were outside among the rows and rows of rotting stinking corpses of head-shot former patients making their way out of the loading area and into the military encampment posted up on the hill above them.
There was plenty that they could use there but they'd both agreed to try for a good vehicle before hauling around any of the serious equipment so they just searched it to make sure it was clear and put down a legless woman in a wine colored cardigan that disguised some of the bloodstains slopped down her front.
The sticky humidity of late summer in Georgia was like wading through molasses to Harry, who even after all these years was still more used to the comparably cool weather of the UK and before they'd gone more than a few blocks his t-shirt was damp all over with sweat and his hair was clinging to his neck and jaw uncomfortably.
Carl, the wanker, seemed used to it.
The silence stretched comfortably between them, humming with the natural tension of being out in the open, but the road leading away from the hospital was quiet and any walkers were hidden from view in the wooded area that separated the front of the hospital from the back parking lots and the abandoned encampment.
The houses of the subdivision start up about a block down that road, shut up and abandoned. Given that they're so close to the hospital it's likely that they're locked up and intact and Harry made a mental note of them for the return trip or a potential hideaway for their to-be-acquired vehicle.
Carl stalked forward along the asphalt in that peculiar way he'd learned from watching Daryl in the woods and Rick in the cities and towns, his boots hardly making a sound against the pavement even as he moved forward at a long-legged clip. He'd put the silencer on his gun and he had it held out in front of him now but with the safety on and the nose pointed at an angle towards the ground, the poster boy for gun safety.
It was kind of amazing how Carl had picked up habits and mannerisms from each of their group members and Harry wondered what, if anything, the teen had learned from him as he twirled his weapon keeping his wrist loose.
The sprawling subdivision with its weed choked overgrown lawns became less an idyllic little ghost town and more an urban battleground the further away from the hospital they got. Cars had been left in the middle of the road, suitcases with their contents strewn about sat rotting on the sidewalk and there were walkers in the streets meandering through the obstacle course at a shuffle that spoke volumes to Harry and Carl.
Harry let out a low whistle and nudged Carl's elbow as he took two long strides and drove the spikes of his pike into the back of an unsuspecting walker's head. Stepped over the fallen body and cracked the next one clear across the face before it could do much more that groan at them. That one was more rotten and rotting flesh and thick coagulated blood sprayed liberally over the pavement as it crumpled.
"Gross," Carl whispered pulling an exaggerated grimace as they moved past and Harry tried to shake some of the flesh off his weapon.
"Silent," countered Harry.
A worn out exchange in a long-running and only semi-serious debate about which was the better, Carl's gun or Harry's glorified bat.
It was cut short when Carl gave a whistling hiss and grabbed his wrist, his frame taut with excitement as he pointed.
Harry grinned a bit.
The Subaru was a long-bodied and boxy hatchback parked on a bad angle and written on the inside of the windshield in pink lipstick were the words: 'Got Bit, Dan. I'm sorry—Annick.'
The female walker inside the car had spotted them and was banging on the driver's side window. A lackluster thud that said she'd probably never fed once turned. She was strapped in and trapped by the seatbelt but the driver's side door was unlocked, the keys were in the ignition and it was easy to pike her and leave her lying on the grass.
Harry wondered if the rundown bungalow with the peeling siding belonged to 'Dan', a morbid curiosity that never quite left him no matter how long he continued on in the apocalypse. It would be easy to check, the mailbox was filled with letters all he had to do was jog up to the porch and check—he slipped into the passenger's seat and let Carl drive them away from the temptation. In the end it didn't really matter if Annick had made it to Dan or not, they didn't get a happy ending and knowing that she got so close would…well, it would suck.
"You still okay with going to the house first?" Carl asked drumming his fingers on the steering wheel and chewing his bottom lip to shreds without seeming to realize it.
"'Course," said Harry, "Even if it weren't important to you we still need the keys to get into the sheriff's station and get the guns and ammo there."
"We could always break in," Carl pointed out.
"But why the bloody hell would we when we know where the keys are?" Harry pointed out.
"Right," sighed Carl, "Sorry, I'm just—"
"S'alright," Harry said, "It's your home, but you haven't seen it since before all of this happened. It's bound to be nerve wracking."
"That's just it though, it's not—not home, not really, but it's where I grew up, maybe the last place I was really safe," said Carl, "Thing is…home isn't a place anymore, it's the group. Our people. The group's not there so it can't really be home. I just can't decide whether I'm more worried that it will feel like home or that it won't. It's stupid I know but…"
"It's not stupid," said Harry softly.
Harry understood the feeling better than Carl might have expected. He hadn't really explained about Voldemort because it was all so far it the past but after the final battle Hogwarts and the Burrow they were destroyed and tainted by dark memories. Harry'd never gone back to either of his former homes, not even after they were rebuilt and renewed and he was never quite sure if it was because he was scared that they would hold only bad memories for him or that they wouldn't hold any memories for him.
He'd never know either way now and he thought he might envy Carl the choice to go back and see what his former home held for him now but telling the teen any of that wouldn't be comforting just now so he shoved the feeling aside, glancing out the window in an effort to find something to say.
"What's that?" he blurted narrowing his eyes at a fenced in lot in the distance.
Carl slowed the car.
"Shit, it's a survivor," said teen craning his neck, "She's in trouble."
The survivor, a black woman with broad shoulder's was pelting across the parking lot, pursued by a small herd of about a dozen freshly turned walker, and there was a high chain link fence between her and her vehicle.
"We can help her," said Harry urgently, flinging himself out of the car before it had fully rolled to the stop and reaching for his glock, and running up to the fence letting out a piercing whistle to draw the woman's attention.
She veered towards them without much of a first glance let alone a second thought putting on another burst of speed. She had a gun in one hand and a bulging bag in the other.
Carl scrambled to put the car in park and join him at the fence, he shot a walker without taking the time to really aim but it fell just as easily as if he'd had all the time in the world to line up the shot, and the one behind it after that went down just as fast.
Harry wasn't nearly as good with a gun but he was a fair enough shot and the walkers were close enough that it was like shooting fish in a barrel the bark of his glock loud in the quiet of the street.
The woman tossed the bag over the fence with a grunt and it clattered onto the ground heavily as she hit the fence at a run and pulled herself up, cursing up a blue streak.
"Son of a bitch," she hissed as she took a careless tumble off the top of the fence and skinned her palms.
Once she was clear they stopped shooting even though the walkers were still pouring out into the parking lot and rattling on the fence hissing and clawing at them ineffectually.
There weren't any more in the street just yet so they were safe enough.
"Sheeee—iiiit," panted the woman, smiling up at them with toothpaste commercial teeth, straight and shockingly bright, "Thank you boys, that might've ended badly if you hadn't been around."
"Don't mention it," said Carl neutrally, his hand was hanging loose at his side but Harry knew he hadn't flicked his safety off.
"You're not bit?" said Harry, tucking his own gun away—clip was empty in any case—but keeping a tight grip on the handle of his pike.
"Not this time," said the woman, laughing a bit, "But it was closer than I mighta preferred."
"You got a group? People?" asked Carl.
"Yeah," she said without guile or any particular wariness, "There's my family, husband and son, and then those two strays in the backseat there. Found them just today bundled up inside the concession stand across the way there, eating their way through doritos and snickers."
"Miss Jenny," called a high voice.
It belonged to a young girl, willowy and tan with a raggedy sun-streaked blonde bob, about thirteen or so given how tall she was. She had a gun in one hand and the hand of a boy even younger than she was clutched in the other.
"It's okay Jamie, I'm alright," called the woman.
Carl darted a wary glance around, they were making an awful lot of noise.
"Poor things," sighed Jenny, bending to pick up her bag, a red and pink duffel bag with a gym logo on the side, "Their mama let herself get ripped apart to give them a chance to run, they've been alone, leastaways 'cept for each other, pretty much since the beginning. I'm Captain Jenny Jones by the way."
Harry and Carl shared a quick glance.
"You were in the army?" blurted Carl.
"Florida National Guard," answered Jenny, pulling a face, "Not that that means much of anything with my unit wandering dead around the most godforsaken patch of stinking swamp you can picture. What about you boys? You got names to go with those bright eyes and shiny weapons?"
"I'm Harry, Harry Potter, this is Carl Grimes," Harry answered for them, reaching out to shake hands with the woman.
"Miss Jenny!" repeated the girl more urgently.
A few walkers had staggered out of the surrounding houses and were shambling forward with mindless purpose.
"Damn and damn, but this is a mess," muttered Jenny.
Harry caught sight of something out of the corner of his eye but before he could do much more than whistle a warning Carl had put it down and was scanning the street. "Look boys, I'd really like to thank you, I got a good few cans of soup and beans and the like, I'll give you some if you want to follow me a ways."
She was off before Harry or Carl could respond, and with two kids in the back of her ancient powder blue jeep and walkers closing in they couldn't blame her for her hurry. They climbed back into the Subaru without much fuss and followed her down the street with walkers dragging their fingers along the car ineffectually.
"We should go," said Carl, "This could be a trap."
"It doesn't feel like a trap," countered Harry, "She's got people and supplies. We should offer her a chance to join us, ask her the three questions. It's dangerous, I know, but from what I've seen she's brave, friendly and generous, and that particular mix is hard to find nowadays."
"And how are we meant to explain Dad, or any of the rest of it?" snorted Carl, "Tell her you used to be a wizard and sent us all back in time? I don't want to be shot and robbed when she decides we're crazy, even if it's not a trap."
"You're too cynical," said Harry, "We need good people and she's got kids she's going to need to take care of. They all stand a better chance with us then practically anywhere else."
"You're too trusting," said Carl, shaking his head even as he turned to follow Jenny off the main street into another subdivision, this one even emptier then the last, "It's lucky you haven't been shot or eaten by cannibals."
"I know what evil and crazy both look like," said Harry, "And she's not either of those. There's no harm in offering. Besides, isn't it you who's always telling Rick that we're strong enough that we don't have to be afraid of helping people?"
Carl just rolled his eyes, "Fine, whatever, but don't say I didn't warn you."
"Should they turn out to be marauding cannibals you can say I told you so until you are blue in the face," Harry agreed.
Jenny Jones led them around another corner, plowing down a lone walker without concern and parked in front of a brown brick two-story with a wide porch and a big blue ball sitting in the front yard. Carl pulled up alongside her and rather than getting out of the car he just rolled down his window and waited for the ex-national guardsman to do the same.
"You even old enough to have a license?" she asked.
"Just barely," shrugged Carl, "I'm sixteen but I've been driving for a while now, my Dad taught me."
"Your Daddy the sheriff?" said Jenny, arching a brow.
"Sheriff's deputy," frowned Carl suspiciously, "How'd you—"
"That hat," said Jenny, "It may be beat to hell and back but it's still pretty distinctive, star or no."
"Sorry," offered the teen with a grimace, "I didn't mean to…y'know."
"It's alright," said Jenny, "I'm glad you're showing some wariness, not everyone out there is as willing to let people be or give them the benefit of the doubt as me. The world got real dangerous real quick but it seems to me like you boys got a good handle on things."
"We do," said Harry with a small smile of his own, "That's why we were wondering if you'd like to join up with us?"
"You together with other survivors?"
"Just my Dad for now," answered Carl, "He was hurt before all this but he's getting better now, we're gonna move out and join the rest of our group outside Atlanta as soon as he's able though. It's a pretty big group. Good people."
"Sounds like a good deal," said Jenny cautiously.
"It is," said Harry simply.
"What's the catch then?"
"We're a tight knit group, we take care of each other. But we don't want…" Harry trailed off with an ambiguous hand wave not quite knowing how to say, 'evil dictators, rapists, cannibals or otherwise seriously fucked up people' with any sort of tact.
"We've got rules," Carl interrupted, "To keep us safe. You seem like a good person, so if you and yours answer the three questions we'll let you come with us if you like."
"What kind of questions?" the young boy butted in, climbing up into the front seat.
"Billy!" hissed the girl.
"It's alright," said Jenny.
"How many walkers have you killed?" asked Carl by rote.
"Two," said Billy somewhat solemnly, "Jamie got more though on account of she has mama's gun."
Harry shot Jenny a questioning look, "I've put down a lot of them, more than I could count," she answered frankly, "It's been a long road."
"How many people have you killed?"
"Enough," said Jenny coolly, "Last question?"
"Why?" asked Harry.
Jenny glanced between them and seemed to understand something because some of the ice faded from her gaze, and after a moment she began to speak with a kind of aloof uncompromising dignity, "When I was with the guard I killed a number of men under orders, out here I've killed three men so far but I did it to protect my family, or others who couldn't protect themselves. As much as I don't like to admit it people are just animals when you get right down to it, and this whole situation has just brought out the worst in us far as I can tell. I did what I had to do to survive, to keep my family alive."
Harry and Carl shared a glance. Harry knew that Carl already knew what he thought but if he really didn't think that this was a good idea Harry would let it be. But Carl just sighed and gave a barely perceptible little nod, so Harry offered Jenny a grim sort of smile.
"Alright then," he said, "Welcome to the family."
AN: And here we are with another chapter and this one is nice and long for you guys too so hopefully that's a bit of a bonus! Next update should come very fast as I started writing that chapter before I did this one so please look forward to that as well.
As always thank you to everybody who took the time to review, alert and fave, I always love hearing from you guys and I'm super-glad to see you're enjoying the story thus far :) Special mention goes out to blackspiderlily for your lovely detailed, and well-thought out opinions.
Now a bit of a vote time, I wasn't inclined to keep Merle in the story for very long but a good number of people seem to want him to stay with the group and clean up his act, I can work it into the story either way so I thought I'd leave the decision up to you guys-let me know, Merle? or No Merle?
til next time
-Donna