Hey, just a friendly reminder that I love and appreciate each and every one of you. Those who read, those who review, those who do both, those who do neither, those who make pies and then make little pies so that it looks like a mama duck and her ducklings when you set them out to cool.


Chapter Twelve: Bacon

**Daryl**

"What is this place?" Carol asked as they entered a large, open area beyond the old plantation house still hunting down harvestable vegetation.

Kneeling by a wooden plank that had been worn to a nub by the elements and the years, Daryl drew his lips back over his teeth in curiosity. "Slave cemetery."

"How can you tell?" She asked.

He brushed aside some moss from another unmarked grave. "Behind the house like this, close to those outbuildings? It's a slave cemetery." Noticing her disbelief, Daryl said. "What? You thought all those dilapidated buildings we passed were really old chicken coops lined up in a row? There's a reason those trees were allowed to grow up around them, hiding them out of sight."

"Why wouldn't you tear something like that down?" She asked.

Standing up, Daryl brushed moss and dirt off his hand onto the front of his shirt. "Hell, probably didn't even know they were there. Besides, doesn't matter anymore anyways."

"Ah, must-see historical sites of beautiful Georgia," St. James murmured darkly, kneeling to inspect a grave for himself.

"Yeah?" Daryl snapped. "Let's discuss the Black Hawk War of Utah, smart ass."

"Actually," St. James replied, "my family originally came from Arizona."

"Let's discuss Rhode Island," Milton broke in quickly. "Think it's a safer subject for the moment."

Pulling her rifle off her back, Carol nodded. "I agree."

"I don't know, I enjoy the subject of Utah—" Daryl broke off as the sound of crashing in the woods nearby had them all jumping. It sounded like something coming their way and it sounded heavy.

Immediately everyone drew their guns, aiming them in the direction of the woods.

Daryl moved off towards it, crouching and stalking quietly, while Carol and the others took a covering position behind him, following. He motioned for them to stop at the edge of the woods and entered alone, moving like a ghost through the woods.

The sound of cracking and snapping grew louder as he drew closer to the source and Daryl raised his crossbow, expecting to part the underbrush and find a walker or something human on the other side, snapping or stalking them.

Instead, beyond a wild hazelnut bush, he found a large sow rooting for food in the dirt with her large snout.

From the black spots on her back he made her out to be a domestic sow from somewhere and by the teets under her that were heavy with milk, he figured she had a brood somewhere.

He knew Delgado's people had two or three pigs in a back pen of their barn, they had more before the fire, but many of them had died. He knew, though, that the ones they had were all pink.

And Daryl wasn't sure how this one survived or where it came from, but he wasn't going to waste an opportunity for some more possible food for the convent.

If they could somehow sneak a couple of those piglets, sows especially, they could breed their own for future use.

Wondering if the sow was wild before shit went down or if circumstances made her so, he pondered whether or not to try to approach her. Maybe he could be greedy and try to nab mom and piglets. Or, if there were piglets, there must a boar…figuring he'd have to return at some point to track them, but not wanting to put it off, he pulled back slowly from the scene and moved towards the cemetery.

When he joined the others, he waited for a moment, before speaking. "You see anything to transport pigs around the farmyard?"

Everyone looked amongst themselves.

"Why?" Carol asked.

"Think God crapped us out a miracle."

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"Even if we could drag a bunch of pigs back to the convent it wouldn't end well," St. James argued as Daryl gathered some rope from the plantation. "I mean, we have a hell of a time as it is keeping the chickens and cow out of the garden, could you imagine pigs? They call people who eat a lot pigs for a reason, you know?"

Carol, who had been sitting on an old drag-behind rake, stood up and approached him, her eyes full of ideas. "Why don't we settle some our people here?" She suggested. "It'd be easier getting those pigs into the barn, we'd have more rooms and space for people to sleep comfortably. It's half an hour walk through the woods, ten minutes driving on the road to get back to the convent. We'd have people here to tend to the perennial garden and space for the animals."

Daryl paused, listening to her, the only voice of reason he'd really listen to.

"I mean, there's hardly any walkers left, we could make it work, couldn't we? We'd need a bigger piece of land anyways next year, if we need to feed more mouths."

"We might be able to put up a greenhouse too," Milton added. "That way we can cultivate our own seeds, the ones we salvaged from the DIY store won't last forever, think the lifespan of seeds is about three or four years."

"You have to admit that for now, if you catch those pigs, this is the best place for them," Carol finished.

Tossing a rope at St. James, Daryl murmured, "well, either way, let's rope 'em and ride 'em, Arizona."

"I went to medical school," St. James protested. "I don't know how to rope and ride."

"You were born in Arizona, weren't you?" Daryl demanded, slapping the doctor hard on the back. "Saddle up, smart ass."

"Pull up some of that Air Force courage," Carol suggested, giving him a warm, encouraging squeeze of the forearm.

St. James looked doubtful, but nodded. "Well, I can certainly try."

"Milton," Daryl held out a coil of rope to the bespectacled man, "you ready to jump in?"

"Uh, I was always a spectator of life, you know? I observe better than I do."

"Well, today you're doing," Daryl stated firmly, shoving the rope hard against the man's chest.

"What about me?" Carol asked.

"You're getting up on that tractor and out of the way," Daryl said.

She smirked. "They're pigs, Daryl, not rampaging bulls."

"You've never seen a full sized boar," he returned.

"Can I at least get the barn door for you?" She inquired. "Or would I trip and fall on the way there and hurt myself too badly?"

"I don't know, you do have those big assed feet," Daryl shot back.

Tsking at him, she made off for the barn, while Daryl and the men headed into the forest, after the pigs.

Daryl directed the men towards the area where he saw the sow, motioning for them to keep their heads down. While St. James moved a little quieter than normal, Milton was tripping up on branches and twigs and anything else that got in his way.

He stopped long enough to give the dorky klutz a hard, warning glare, which earned him a sheepish shrug.

Carefully moving the hazelnut bush, Daryl found the area beyond empty, but he knew she wouldn't have gone far. Slowly he moved out from his hiding place among the hazelnut bush, not even caring that the twig he moved for himself caught St. James right in the face. He was on a hunt and it could be the difference between starvation and eating like kings.

Picking up her hoof prints in the dirt of the forest floor, he followed the disturbed leaves, moving at a snail's pace after the sow.

He caught sight of her at the edge of some stagnant water, drinking her fill, ears twitching to keep the flies off. She wasn't much to look at, but to a man desperate to find food for his people, she was as beautiful as an angel.

Giving the other two a signal to stop, he waited for her to have her drink, hoping to follow her back to wherever she had her piglets.

As he watched her, he mused on the fact that nature was a damned thing. Here he was salivating over the idea of snacking on her or her young in the future and he was covering his own ass from being chomped on by a new species that preyed on humans.

Well, they weren't really a new species, but they were like a different animal. The dead didn't think, they acted out of pure…instinct? Hunger? He didn't know how their damned minds worked, all he knew was that they were a threat, somehow that made them the top of the food chain.

God, he could go for some bacon.

As the sow pulled away from the water's edge, after wading in a bit and rooting for water plants, she headed off again, this time with Daryl and the others keeping a mindful distance, but on her immediate trail.

They must have gone about five minutes through the woods, moving painfully slow, before they came on the sow's ass sticking out of a pile of dead and fallen trees. It was clear by the way the dirt was dug out a little under the heavy trunk, that was where she had her young.

He looked about first for a sign of the boar, carefully, he began to creep in, getting his rope ready.

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**Carol**

She was wandering around the old house, waiting for the men to return with the pigs, keeping one ear tuned for them and another for trouble, when she came across and old steam trunk filled with priceless antiques. Letters from the Civil War, a bayonet, handfuls of costume jewellery and underneath it all another thick, beautiful quilt like the one she had laid on in the room with Daryl.

Settling by a window overlooking the yard, she curled up in a soft chair and opened one of the letters idly for something to do.

My dearest mother, it read in shaky scrawling loops and scratches.

My dearest mother,

There is no way to prepare you for the news I am about to share, but the fact is that for an entire night I lay cold and bleeding on the field outside of Chattanooga and now I believe I am dying.

Sergeant Halloran has come and sat by my bed to ensure I was comfortable, but everywhere around me there are men broken and wasted. They are youth, no older than myself, lying cold in piles of rags that constitute a bed. My chest hurts, so very badly and the blood has finally slowed its flow, but I know that I will soon find the peace that Reverend Milner preaches about.

I don't know why I'm writing to you with such stark frankness, but my dearest mother you are and always have been the one woman in my life who gave me light on the darkest of days and I feel that you need to hear it from my own hand how I tried very hard, how I fought very bravely alongside many men with the same desire to keep our traditions, our ways so very honoured.

Maybe dying is preferable to the cold and suddenly cruel world we are facing here. I cannot tell you how lonesome I am, how I miss the warmth of our hearth.

Know that I will see you again in heaven, mother, that I will be waiting.

Sergeant Halloran has said that they will bury me in the yard yonder, where a gnarled old walnut tree grows. If you wish to mourn over me, mother, that is where he says I'll be.

Your ever loving son, James

Touching a hand to her chest, Carol curled up further on the chair and set the letter aside, feeling ashamed for having read it. As she sat in stunned silence by the macabre poetry of the letter, she heard the crunching of tires on gravel and poked her head around the curtains of the window enough to spy a khaki coloured jeep pulling up close to the house and four men in military garb pile out.

She immediately picked up her rifle, but remained still at the window, watching as a tall, dark haired man looked about, another kneeling by the freshly watered planter, touching the mud.

The soldier said something to the tall man who appeared to be in charge, he nodded, then motioned two men around the west side of the house and the third around the east, taking the front himself and climbing onto the porch.

Carol didn't know who they were, but experience told her to hide.

Carefully, she moved to the door and peeking down the hall, scurried across into the bedroom she and Daryl had made use of earlier, knowing there was fireplace that was big enough to fit her and had an overhanging side lip that she could tuck her legs behind. She had admired it as they were dressing, musing on how beautiful it was, but how it didn't even look like it had been used in the last century.

Quickly, she climbed inside the dark brick fireplace, pressing against the wall, hiding behind the lip.

She prayed the men stayed gone, at least until these ones got what they were looking for and left.

After what felt like hours of waiting, she heard boots quietly padding over the thick white carpeting of the hall and into the room.

Carol raised her rifle the best she could in the tight space, prepared to shoot if she had to.

The boots moved about the room quietly, but she couldn't really tell where they were as being in the fireplace made it hard for her to clearly hear and locate the soldier.

Finally, they padded out and away.

She stayed in the fireplace for the longest time, only emerging when she heard angry squealing coming from the farmyard.

And not squealing as in tires on asphalt, but as in angry pig.

Ducking out of her hiding place, she checked her surroundings quickly, before bolting, heading outside to warn Daryl and the others.

She wasn't expecting a pair of iron strong arms to grip her tight around her torso as she flew down the stairs, but as she stepped on the last step, they did and her rifle was wrested away from her.

Carol pulled her knife, but the soldier who had caught her, tossed her rifle away and held up his hands, his own was strapped to his back.

"Whoa, hang on!" He said. "We aren't looking for a fight!"

She kept her knife up, backing against a wall to prevent anyone from creeping up behind her.

The tall, dark haired man smiled warmly at her. "My name is Sergeant Rhoades, I'm with the US Marine Corps," he explained. "We're looking for a Marine here in Georgia. Think he might be from around these parts, tracked him pretty good, I thought."

Carol remained silent, hoping to God Daryl and the others didn't start anything outside.

"Lafayette Vancoughnett? Do you know him?"

Her brow furrowed before she could control it and she knew he saw it, so she had to lie creatively. She didn't know if this man was good or bad news, but she didn't care. She had enough of outsiders to last her a century and being that she had militants from Tennessee on her mind, she didn't trust anyone in a uniform outside of the Lieutenant, Delgado or Kowalski. "What does it matter to you?" She asked in her best Daryl imitation. It was the only way she could be convincingly mean, at least in her mind.

"We're old friends," the man explained.

Carol shifted on her feet, knife still held between them in the defensive way Daryl showed her. "He left our group three months ago," she said. "And we haven't see or heard from him since." Something in her heart told her the lie was a good one, that she did right, because the man seemed to look more annoyed than worried at the news.

"Okay, that's all we wanted to know." He said, adding after a thoughtful moment. "Your people somewhere around here?"

She remained silent.

"Sorry," he said. "Look, we're leaving, okay? No shots fired and everyone walks, fair enough?"

She motioned with a sharp flick of her head to the door, giving him permission to just go.

He moved to the door, not turning his back on her and stepped out it.

By the time Carol retrieved her rifle and moved to the door, the men were gone, Milton and St. James were left standing in the dust, St. James trying to control a pissed off mother pig and Milton struggling with two tiny piglets.

"What, ah, what's up?" St. James asked as the sow stubbornly jerked him in one direction, before he dug his heels in to stop her.

"I don't know," she said. "But we have to get back to the convent now. Where's Daryl?"

"He's bringing more piglets," Milton said.

Carol nodded. "Let's get the sow in the pen."

"Who were those men?" St. James demanded.

"I don't know, but I don't think they're good for the neighbourhood," she explained. "They're looking for the Lieutenant."

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itsi3 - You're the sweetest person ever, I'm going to make sure Merle's Right Hand sees that review. You see this MRH, go read their review, it was lovely and for you!

DarylDixon'sLover - Thanks!

DandelionFunky - You guessed it right. Poor kid. Also, I'm glad you spotted that split top butter roll tit thing. I was kind of proud of it.

Brazen Hussy - Merle is gonna, I swear! Or maybe she'll give it to him, Merle needs to be startled for once.

Yazzy x - You never know with Carl. He sometimes bounces from awesome to little shit.

HGRHfan35 - You know it's about to get bad. This is - after all - the last story. People must meet their ends. Right?

Merle's Right Hand - He is, isn't he? I think he'd make a damned fine papa Dixon.

featherpluckns - I'm glad you mentioned how he acts differently around Carol, I was hoping people would get that their relationship is much more sacred and private. I think some people dislike the fact that I don't have him openly declaring his love and adoration for her in public.

vickih - I have to admit, I enjoyed writing the reverence of the baby bump. Only Daryl could fully appreciate the natural wonder of pregnancy.

Surplus Imagination - That's kind of a neat idea, taking the quilt, I'm using it...at some point. Hopefully. If that's okay with you.