AN: Here we go, another little chapter.
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111
Andrea heard when Michonne slipped back into the house. The woman fumbled around, likely looking for something to drink, and then it wasn't long before she collapsed onto the mattress with the full force of her body, shifting Andrea's side terribly.
Andrea decided that was her wake up call. Even without verbal cues from Michonne, she knew that she was supposed to get up and keep watch.
Whether it was against Walkers or against any other living, breathing human being, Andrea was on watch.
The quiet night, she thought, was proof that the men that they'd encountered weren't coming after them. They were likely survivors, part of a larger group, and weren't interested in them in the slightest. The men wouldn't bother following them because they had nothing to gain from them.
Andrea knew that Michonne thought that she was foolish for considering joining up with the men, but Andrea thought that Michonne was too paranoid for her own good. She didn't believe that everyone they encountered was some kind of saint in dirty clothing, but she also didn't believe that everyone left in the world could be cold and cruel. It wouldn't be reasonable to assume that she and Michonne were the only two decent people left on Earth.
Andrea dressed and stepped out of the house once she was sure that Michonne was asleep. She went about gathering the gear necessary to set some snares close to the house for meat. After she had her arms full, she stopped and listened to the sounds around her.
Animals rustled in the bushes and undergrowth…in the distance she could hear the heavier steps of Walkers that she'd be responsible for putting down when they finally found her using whatever hunting skills they seemed to have…but there was no indication that she wasn't the only living person in the vicinity.
Andrea put the snares out where she could and checked the ones that they already had out. They were all empty and a few had been chewed through by Walkers who had put their efforts and attention into eating the animals out of the snares that had been caught there once.
Old snares cleared and fresh ones set, Andrea turned and walked the long way back to the house, checking her surroundings as best she could as she went to make sure that they were alone in the area. Sure that there were no other people around, she finished the short trip to the house, mounted the steps, and went inside to start a small fire for warming the unsatisfying breakfast of beans and rice that she could put together with minimal effort.
Michonne stirred from her nap about the time the meal was ready. She rolled and groaned, rubbing at her eyes, and then finally paused, staring at Andrea from her position on the mattress.
"Breakfast is ready," Andrea said blankly. "Snares are set. Walkers got to our food before we did in the old snares so I threw those out."
"You went out there alone?" Michonne asked.
"Killed four Walkers," Andrea responded. "Didn't see anyone else, though…just me and the Walkers."
"What if you'd have gotten in trouble?" Michonne asked. "I wouldn't have known anything about it."
"You don't seem to think that you'll get in trouble when you go out alone," Andrea challenged. "I think I'm able bodied enough to take care of myself."
"It's not you I'm worried about so much," Michonne said, getting up from the mattress. She stopped, on her trip across the living room, to look out the windows and check the sunlit yard for any evidence of others.
Andrea snickered to herself.
"We're alone, Mich," Andrea said. "Just like you wanted. The men didn't follow us because they didn't care about us. They stumbled across us by chance, just the same as we stumbled across them."
Michonne didn't say anything. She sat and accepted the food from Andrea that Andrea had dished out for her.
"Maybe we are alone," Michonne responded. "But it's better safe than sorry."
Andrea chuckled to herself again. Michonne was sore, almost, that the men hadn't shown up. Their absence did nothing to verify that her concerns were legitimate. In a way, their safety was a letdown to Michonne because it meant that her gut instinct hadn't been accurate. Andrea might have felt sorry for her under different circumstances, but at the moment she wasn't exactly hating being right.
"I hate to say it, Mich, but…I told you so," Andrea said.
She offered Michonne a smile in exchange for her bored expression before she shoveled some of the food into her mouth.
1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111
Michonne walked a few steps behind Andrea, katana in hand to keep Walkers at bay as they passed along, on their way to clear the snares. She was still insisting that they move on, but she was willing to give Andrea until the next day to finish packing. Everything was ready in their emergency packs, but Andrea had convinced her that they might do well to pack up other things and take the truck as far as they could for a while.
And Michonne wouldn't entirely be against the relief on their feet of riding some distance.
She was choosing to ignore, for sanity's sake, all of Andrea's somewhat childish looks and eye rolling that went along with her current sensation of singing "I told you so" about the whole encounter with the other group. Michonne may have been wrong, and maybe the men they encountered were nearly knights in shining armor, but she wasn't sorry that she was wrong. She wasn't sorry that they'd managed to come out of the whole thing without being attacked.
When they found the snares, there were clearly rabbits caught in the two of them that they could see immediately. Andrea went for one of the snares, killing the rabbit when she came to it, and Michonne went for the other. Two rabbits weren't a great meal, but they would be better than the nothing that they'd in the way of meat lately.
As Michonne tore down the empty snare that she was leaving, she heard something. She stopped and stood up, signaling to Andrea to be quiet.
The sound was odd, unlike the snarling of a Walker, and Michonne did her best to open her ears and follow the sound, walking as quickly and quietly as she could through the underbrush.
And she stopped when her ears could clearly hear what they were seeking.
Andrea was following close behind her, brow furrowed, and Michonne returned her finger to her lips to signal the need for silence even though Andrea could probably already overhear exactly what Michonne could hear.
It was the men, or at least it was two or three of them.
And they were making much less of an effort to be silent than Michonne and Andrea.
The assholes were talking about a camp. They were talking about a group that they'd encountered. They were laughing about the group. Whatever had happened was humorous to them. Michonne cursed how loud her own breathing was when she tried to make out snatches of the conversation.
They were talking about robbing the group…about how much they got. But it seemed, unless her ears were playing tricks on her, was that the thing the men were most pleased about getting from the group wasn't anything material that they'd taken from them.
Michonne felt her blood run chilled for the moment.
This was the kind of situation in which she hated to be correct. She hated to be right when it came to identifying someone as a despicable human being, and these were most certainly despicable human beings.
Without staying to hear more, Michonne caught Andrea by the arm and pulled her behind her as quietly as she could back in the direction of the house. She didn't know if the men were out there looking for them or not, but she didn't want them to find them by accident or on purpose.
It wasn't until they reached the house that Michonne dared to speak to a wide eyed Andrea at all.
"We're getting out now," Michonne said, keeping her voice low. "We'll take our emergency sacks and anything you can pack in less than five minutes and we're going out the back door."
"What about the truck?" Andrea asked, keeping her voice low. It was written on her face that she now understood exactly how serious this could potentially be.
Michonne shook her head.
"No," she said. "It's too noisy and there's a chance it'll stall. We don't have time for that and we don't want them knowing we're here at all. If they catch on to us then we might not get away."
Michonne stepped into the house and let Andrea in, closing the door as quietly behind her as she could. She found a bag immediately and put the rabbit carcasses in there while Andrea packed up the food that they had left. Those were the most important things. Anything else they'd found there they could find again as long as they were sure to leave the space with their lives.
"We're going out the back," Michonne declared, getting her emergency pack and doing a final sweep of the space for anything they couldn't dare to leave behind.
"We're just going to run from them?" Andrea asked.
"That's all we can do," Michonne said. "We need to move now and we need to move fast. We get as far as we can before the sun goes down."
Andrea wasn't putting up any of her normal arguments at the moment and Michonne was thankful for small things. The blonde took her pack and threw the other bag, packed with food, over her shoulder as well.
Michonne lead the way, then, out the back of the house. She paused as she stepped out the back door, listened for any proof of the men being in their general vicinity, and then, satisfied that they were still pretty much alone, waved Andrea to follow after her.
They darted, as quickly as they could, away from the house. Michonne wanted them to cover as much distance as they could at a solid trot. When they'd reached the end of that line, however far their heaving lungs and burning muscles might take them, they could stop and take it at a slower pace. They could attempt, then, to find somewhere to stay for a night…but they'd only stay for a night.
Michonne loved the idea of camping out long term just as much as the next person, but she wasn't willing to do it when she wasn't sure that their lives weren't at risk from men who really didn't deserve to live.
Andrea, sobered now with the realization that the men that she'd nearly trusted would have subjected her to all the things that Michonne suggested they might, followed along behind her in silence and didn't dare to protest anything about the speed that Michonne set for them to travel.
Maybe it was a hard lesson to learn for someone who wanted to trust people…but at least it was a lesson that was learned with little personal tragedy. They might not have been that lucky.