I own nothing but my OCs.
Chapter 21: Pretty Much Dead Already
They were all seated around the campfire, eating the breakfast that Brandon was helping Carol cook over the fire. Lori whispered something to Rick and kissed him on the forehead. He whispered something back. Sam was a little concerned by the expression she had seen on Rick's face a few moments before, but decided it was none of her business. Rick had enough to worry about without people poking their nose into his private life. Carol came over and served her and Daryl some of the scrambled eggs she had just finished making.
"Thanks." Sam said, smiling gratefully at her. Despite having done nothing except sit on her ass all day yesterday, she had woken up absolutely starving. Rose whined, licking her chops. "I already let you have my Canadian bacon." Sam reminded her.
"Uh, guys." Glenn said, getting everybody's attention as he stepped up. "So…" There was no easy way to say it, so he might as well just spit it out. "The Barn's full of walkers."
"What?" Sam asked, furrowing her brow, as they all looked up at him.
"Glenn, that is so not funny, man." Brandon said, frowning slightly.
"It's not a joke." Glenn replied grimly. "I've seen them."
…
Sam and Daryl watched with the others while Shane walked up to the bar and peeked inside through small gap in the wood. He counted over ten walkers in there before one of them abruptly appeared right in front of him, staring him in the eye through the gap while it growled. Shane took a step back, slightly startled.
"You cannot tell me you're all right with this." He told Rick as he walked back to the group.
"No I'm not, but we're guests here. This isn't our land." Rick replied, trying to be reasonable and keep everyone calm. Sam was generally of the same opinion as Rick, but she knew they were going to have to deal with the walkers in the barn sooner or later.
"This is our lives, man!" Shane shouted.
"Lower your voice!" Glenn whisper-yelled at him. Was he trying to get the walkers excited?
"We can't just sweep this under the rug." Andrea said.
"It ain't right. Not remotely." T-Dog agreed.
"Okay, we've gotta go in there, we've gotta make things right, or we've just gotta go." Shane said. "Now we have been talking about Fort Benning for a long time."
"We can't go." Rick snapped anxiously.
"Why, Rick?" Shane asked. "Why?"
"Because my daughter's still out there." Carol said.
"Okay." Shane said, covering his mouth as he let out a nervous, incredulous laugh. "Okay, I think it's time that we all start to just consider the other possibility."
"Shane. We're not leaving Sophia behind." Rick insisted.
"We're close to findin' this girl." Daryl added. "I just found her damn doll two days ago."
"You found her doll, Daryl." Shane replied. "That's what you did. You found a doll."
"You don't know what the hell you're talking about." Daryl barked angrily, cutting the air with his hand, as he took several steps towards the other man.
"All right, All right." Rick said calmly as he held an arm out between them, trying to keep things from escalating.
"I'm just saying what needs to be said here." Shane told Daryl, ignoring Rick.
"No, you're just scared." Sam said sternly, from where she was standing over by Carol and Brandon, tightening her grip on her crutches, as she glared at Shane in disapproval."And you're taking it out on Sophia and the rest of us."
"You better keep your mouth shut. You don't know what you're talkin' about." Shane snapped as he violently pointed his finger at her, visibly shaken by her words.
"Don't you talk to her like that!" Daryl snapped back, moving towards him again, only to be stopped by Rick, who was still trying to play peacekeeper.
"You get a good lead, it's the first 48 hours." Shane said, trying to make them understand.
"Shane, stop." Rick said. Carol didn't need to hear this.
"Let me tell you something else, man." Shane said, glancing back at Daryl. "If she was alive out there and saw you coming, all methed out with your buck knife and geek ears around your neck, she would run in the other direction!"
"Shut up!" Daryl growled, lunging at him, while Rick did his best to keep them apart. Everyone started yelling as they moved to intervene and help Rick separate the two hotheads before blood was drawn.
"Back off!" Rick shouted, pushing Shane away.
"Keep your hands off me." Shane told Rick, pointing his finger at him. There was a dangerous look in his eyes.
"Just let me talk to Hershel." Rick said. "Let me figure it out."
"What are you gonna figure out!?" Shane demanded, rounding on him.
"Enough!" Lori said, stopping him before he could try to lay into her husband too.
"If we're gonna stay, if we're gonna clear this barn, I have to talk him into it. This is his land." Rick said sternly.
"Hershel sees those things as people—sick people." Dale said, stepping forward. "His wife, his stepson."
"You knew?" Rick asked incredulously. Sam hung her head. Was she the only one who had passed by this barn and failed to figure it out or something?
"Yesterday, I talked to Hershel." Dale replied.
"And you waited the night?" Shane demanded.
"I thought we could survive one more night. We did." Dale retorted. "I was waiting until this morning to say something, but Glenn wanted to be the one."
"The man is crazy, Rick." Shane said. "If Hershel thinks those things are alive—No!" He shouted, interrupting Rick before he could try to calm him down.
RATTLE.
They all whipped their heads around, startled when the walkers in the barn started growling and banging against the barn doors, trying to get out.
"We should give them some distance." Sam suggested quietly. "If there's nothing around to attract their attention, they'll settle down after awhile."
"You don't know that." Shane said.
"I do." Sam retorted seriously. "I spent three days trapped in a cabin after a pack of ten walkers found me. I had used all six of my arrows, and I couldn't retrieve them because of the remaining walkers circling the cabin. I didn't want to use my gun in case the sound attracted more, so I decided to try waiting them out for a few days, and I got lucky. It worked. Just as I was running out of food, they all got bored and left when they realized they couldn't get at me and went off to find an animal or something to munch on instead.
"She's right. I've seen it happen before, too." Rick said. That night he spent with Morgan and his son, even though Morgan's wife had come up to the front door and even managed to turn the knob, she gave up and left once she realized she couldn't get in. "Let's just—Let's all go back to camp. I'll have a talk with Hershel."
…
After hearing that Shane wanted to leave, Daryl didn't waste any time and headed straight for the stable. Leave or stay, he needed to find Sophia as soon as possible. Shane was wrong. That little girl was still out there, waiting for them. He knew it. He grunted in pain as heaved the heavy saddle onto a stand, taking a moment to catch his breath. He might have recovered enough to be walking around on his own, but it hurt to strain himself picking up something that heavy just two days after he'd been seriously injured. He took a moment to catch his breath.
"You can't." Carol said as she entered the stable. While Brandon was helping Sam get back to the camp, she had seen Daryl separate from the group and had decided to go after him.
"I'm fine." He replied tersely.
"Hershel said you need to heal." Carol reminded him as he grabbed a bit and reigns from the wall.
"Yeah, I don't care." Daryl replied. He knew he was pushing it. He hadn't told Sam because he knew she would either try to stop him or try to help him, and he was more worried about that snake bite healing properly than his own wound since Hershel had said there could be muscle damage.
"Well, I do." Carol told him as he walked past her and into the stall with the horse. "Rick's going out later to follow the trail."
"Yeah, well, I ain't gonna sit around and do nothin'." He said as he slipped the bridle onto the horse.
"No, you're gonna go out there and get yourself hurt even worse." She replied. He didn't respond, just kept working on getting the horse ready to ride. "We don't even know if we're gonna find her, Daryl." He finally paused and looked at her. "We don't."
Daryl stared at her. She couldn't be serious.
"I don't." She said softly.
"What?" Daryl asked, stepping back out of the stall.
"Can't lose you, too." She said quietly as tears welled up in her eyes. She blinked and they fell as he walked straight past her. Daryl grabbed the saddle off the stand.
"Urgh!" He grunted angrily, tossing the saddle as far as he could throw it in his current state. He was pissed. What kind chance did that give Sophia if even her own mother was giving up on her now? "Stupid bitch." He grumbled, holding his aching side, as he stomped off.
…
"Ah, there you are." Sam said when Daryl enter the tent in a huff. For awhile she had been worried he might have tried going out after Sophia by himself again. "You okay?" She asked, concerned when she saw the terrible mood he was in.
"Do you think we should give up lookin' for Sophia?" He asked shortly.
"Of course not." Sam replied without having to think. "What's wrong? Is this about the stuff Shane said?"
"No." He replied tartly. "I… I yelled at Carol."
Sam blinked and took a moment to connect the dots. Carol must have been shaken by what happened and stopped him from going out and searching, even though it was obvious he really wanted to.
"Did she deserve it?" Sam asked, frowning slightly. It was a rhetorical question, really. They both already knew the answer to that.
"Not completely." Daryl admitted, sullenly.
"Then I think you already know what you have to do." She replied calmly. Daryl nodded and quietly left the tent, feeling much calmer.
…
"You see it?" Daryl asked Carol as he led her over to the pond.
"See what?" She asked. Daryl pointed past the wild brambles and mosquito grass to another blooming Cherokee rose bush that he had found. He had decided to show it to her since this one was closer to camp and still in a relatively safe area.
"I'll find her." He said, glancing at her. "Hey, I'm sorry about what happened this morning." He apologized quietly.
"You wanted to look for her." Carol said. "Why? This whole time I've wanted to ask you."
" 'Cause I think she's still out there." He replied. "Truth is, what else I got to do?" Carol was silent for a moment before she reached out and touched one of the roses.
"We'll find her." Carol said softly. "We will. I see it."
…
Sam was chilling on the porch with her foot propped up, watching while Beth and Rose watched Carl and Patricia play checkers. Glenn and Maggie were sitting side by side on the steps. For some reason, he was wearing Dale's hat.
"You look like you should be in line for the early bird special." Maggie teased Glenn, smiling. She removed the fishing hat for him. "Go get your cap. I'll wash it for you, okay?" Glenn smiled back as he stood up, getting ready to go do just that when Andrea and T-Dog walked up.
"Do you know what's going on?" T-Dog asked.
"Where is everyone?" Andrea asked.
"Daryl went off with Carol awhile ago, and Brandon is probably helping Lori out with… whatever, but I'm not sure about the others." Sam replied, furrowing her brow slightly. Was something wrong?
"You haven't seen Rick?" Glenn asked.
"He went off with Hershel." Andrea said. "We were supposed to leave a couple of hours ago."
"Yeah you were." Daryl quipped as he walked up with Carol. "What the hell?"
"Rick told us he was going out." Carol said, referring to herself, Lori, and Brandon. He had stopped by briefly just before Daryl came to get her.
"Damn it. Isn't anybody taking this seriously?" Daryl asked. "We got us a damn trail. Oh, here we go." He said when he spotted Shane, who was also making his way towards the house. Sam frowned when she saw what he had with him. Why was Shane carrying a shotgun and the bag of guns? Did Rick know about this.
"What's all this?" Daryl asked.
"You with me, man?" Shane asked, handing him the shotgun.
"Yeah." Daryl said, cocking it.
"Shane, no." Sam said, grabbing her crutches and getting to her feet.
"Time to grow up." Shane told everyone, ignoring her. "You already got yours?" He asked Andrea.
"Yeah." She replied, glancing around. "Where's Dale?"
"He's on his way." Shane replied somewhat cryptically.
"Thought we couldn't carry." T-Dog said as Shane put a handgun in his hand.
"We can and we have to." Shane told him.
"This has 'bad idea' written all over it." Sam told him. She agreed something had to be done, but not like this. He was going to get everyone thrown off the farm.
"Look, it was one thing sitting around here picking daisies when we thought this place was supposed to be safe, but now we know it ain't." Shane said, glancing at her and Maggie and the others.
"How about you, man?" Shane asked, holding a shotgun out to Glenn. "You gonna protect yours?"
Glenn took the gun.
"That's it." Shane said, grinning at him. "Can you shoot?" He asked Maggie.
"Can you stop?" She retorted. "You do this, you hand out these guns, my dad will make you leave tonight."
"We have to stay Shane." Carl said, stepping down. They still had to find Sophia.
"What is this?" Lori asked as she and Brandon walked over from the around the corner of the porch.
"Why does everyone have guns again?" Brandon asked.
"We ain't going anywhere, okay?" Shane said. "Now look, Hershel, he's just gotta understand. Okay" Well, he—he's gonna have to."
"It doesn't work like that, and you know it." Sam said sternly. Hershel still saw the walkers as people. If they shot them while he felt that way, he wasn't going to see them as anything other than murders.
"Shut up. Just shut up!" Shane snapped at her. "You think you know everything just because you survived out there for over a month on your own, huh? You really expect me to believe that when you can't even save yourself from a snake!?"
"Hey, back off!" Brandon said defensively, moving over to stand by her. Rose growled at Shane.
"I told you not to talk to her like that." Daryl told Shane, glaring at him. He might agree with Shane about the walkers in the barn, but he better not do anything to Sam. Shane took note of the warning in Daryl's eyes and decided to back off before he lost a dependable ally.
"Now, we need to find Sophia. Am I right?" Shane asked, turning his attention to Carl as he knelt down in front of the boy. "Huh? Now I want you to take this." He told him, holding out a small pistol. "You take it, Carl, and you keep your mother safe. You do whatever it takes. You know how. Go on, take the gun and do it."
"Rick said no guns." Lori practically snarled at Shane as she placed herself between him and her son, pushing the boy behind her protectively. She was furious that he would try to drag Carl into this. "This is not your call. This is not your decision to make."
"Oh, shit." T-Dog said, getting their attention. They all turned to see what he was staring at and saw Jimmy clapping, trying to keep the attention of the two walkers that Rick and Hershel were guiding out of the woods and through the fenced in cattle run to the barn using some catch-poles that Hershel must have had on hand for unruly animals in his vet practice.
"Oh my god." Sam breathed, stunned. She knew they had to have gotten the walkers in the barn somehow, but that was just insane.
"What is that?" Shane asked as he took a few steps forward. "What is that?" He asked as he took off running, followed close behind by everyone else except, Sam, who was having trouble keeping up on her crutches, and Brando, who stayed behind to help her and keep and eye on her. She took the precaution of ordering Rose to 'stay' on the porch. "What the hell are you doing?" Shane demanded as he ran up to Rick.
"Shane, just back off." Rick said. He was having enough trouble holding onto the walker at the other end of his pole without him badgering them or running around exciting it.
"Why do your people have guns?" Hershel asked.
"Are you kidding me?" Shane asked incredulously. "You see? You see what they're holding onto?" He asked the others.
"I see who I'm holding onto." Hershel retorted.
"No, man, you don't." Shane told him.
"Shane, just let me do this then we can talk." Rick said, trying to calm him down.
"What you want to talk about, Rick?" Shane demanded. "These things ain't sick. They're not people. They're dead. Ain't gonna feel nothing for them 'cause all they do, the kill! These things right here, they're the things that killed Amy. They killed Otis. They're gonna kill all of us."
"Shane, shut up!" Rick shouted at him as Daryl came up and trained his rifle on the one he was handling, just in case it managed to break free. This was not what they needed right now.
"Hey, Hershel man, let me ask you something." Shane said as he walked around to stand between them and the barn. "Could a living, breathing person," He drew his gun and cocked it, "could they walk away from this?"
BANG! BANG! BANG!
"No!" Rick shouted as Shane raised hi gun and shot the zombie Hershel was handling three times in the torso. "Stop it!"
"That's three rounds in the chest." Shane said, ignoring Rick. "Could some who's alive, could they just take that? Why is it still coming?"
BANG! BANG! BANG!
"That's its heart, its lungs—why is it still coming?" Shane demanded, shooting it two more times.
"Shane, enough!" Rick shouted as Sam and Brandon finally joined them.
"Yeah, you're right, man." Shane said as he start walking towards them. "That is enough." He raised his gun and put another bullet in the walker's forehead, blowing her brains out right in front of Hershel's own eyes. With that, the walker finally fell down dead at his feet as Shane kept walking. Hershel fell to his knees beside the corpse.
"Enough risking our lives for a little girl who's gone!" Shane shouted as he continued to rant. Sam and Brandon went over to Carol when she gasped, horrified that he would even say that in front of her. "Enough living next to a barn full of things that are trying to kill us! Enough. Rick, it ain't like it was before! Now if y'all want to live, if you want to survive, you gotta fight for it! I'm talking about fighting right here, right now!" Shane shouted, heading for the barn doors.
"Take the snare pole." Rick told Jimmy, but the boy was frozen. "Hershel, take the snare pole." He said, turning to the older man. "Hershel, listen to me, man, please. Take it now. Hershel! Take it!"
"Arghh!" Shane roared as he started beating on the chained doors with the pickaxe, trying to force them open.
"No, Shane!" Rick shouted. "Do not do this, brother, wait!"
"Don't do it!" Glenn yelled.
"Cut it out, you dumbass!" Sam shouted. "You can't just let them all out at once!"
"Rick!" Lori yelled.
"Please!" Rick begged his friend. If he did this, they wouldn't be able to stay! Lori would…
"Come on," Shane said when he finally managed to break the chains. "Come on, we're out here." He said, throwing off the wooden bar, the last thing standing between them and the walkers, beating his hand against the door a few times to make sure he had their attention before retreating to a safer distance.
"This is not the way! Please!" Rick yelled.
"Get behind me." Lori told Carl, trying to shield him from what was about to happen.
"Come on." Shane said as he aimed his gun at the barn doors, waiting for the walkers to throw them open and start coming out. When the first two emerged, Andrea and T-Dog ran up to cover Shane, and they all started firing as more began to stream out of the open doors. Daryl maneuvered himself closer to the action, positioning himself between Sam and Carol and the barn when one of the walkers tried to veer off to the side and head their way.
"Maggie." Glenn said, torn between helping his friends protect everyone and keeping out of it for her sake.
"It's okay." Maggie said, nodding, while she cried and held onto her father, who still hadn't moved since Shane put down the walker he had been handling.
"Sam." Brandon said, glancing questioningly at her as he placed a hand on his side. Sam's eyes widened slightly with comprehension, and she nodded.
"Do it." She told him. Now that it was done, the others were going to need all the help they could get. Brandon immediately lifted his shirt and drew his concealed gun from the harness he had been wearing underneath his clothes all along. The first thing he did was take out the walker Rick was still busy trying to hold onto.
BANG!
Rick glanced over at him as the walker fell down dead, stunned. It had been a perfect shot between the eyes. He watched as Brandon turned his attention back to the walkers from the barn and moved up to cover Daryl. Despite having never fired a gun in front of any of them before, Brandon proved to be an even better shot than Andrea.
"My brother taught him." Sam explained calmly when she saw Carol staring, glancing at her. "He doesn't look it, but he's pretty good, for an idiot."
"Stop!" Rick shouted as the gunfire continued. But they didn't stop, not until every last walker was down. Dale walked up just in time to see the terrible aftermath.
And then, when it was completely silent, they realized they could hear a soft growl coming from within the barn. There was still one left. They all froze when it stepped into view. None of them had been prepared for what they saw. The walker was blonde little girl wearing a royal blue shirt with a rainbow on it, cargo capris, and a running shoes. Brandon glanced around, confused when he saw that everyone's guns were lowered and realized no one wanted to shoot. Sam's eyes were wide with shock and horror as she stared a head at it. Carol let out a soft sob beside her. She knew the other woman's heart was breaking more and more with every second.
"Sophia?" Carol cried out as she took of running to her daughter.
"Carol, wait!" Sam shouted, but she was too slow to catch her. Fortunately, Daryl was on the case. He grabbed her as she tried to run past him, holding her back for her own safety.
"Sophia! Sophia!" Carol sobbed as she collapsed to her knees, taking Daryl down with her as he kept a firm grip on the distraught woman. "Sophia…"
"No." Carl cried as his mother held onto him.
"Don't watch." Lori told him a tear fell from her eye. Sam glanced around at the others. Brandon looked confused, like he didn't know whether he should shoot or not anymore, because he was the only one who still had his gun raised. No one else in their group had the guts to shoot Sophia. They couldn't bear it. If Sam was honest with herself, she couldn't say for sure whether she'd be able to go through with or not herself if she had a gun, but it needed to be done. They couldn't just leave her like that. And anyway, it wasn't Sophia anymore, not really. She watched as Rick took a breath, steeled his nerve and began walking towards Sophia. He drew the Python as he stepped past Shane and took aim. He stared at what was left of the scared little girl he had been trying so hard to save.
He pulled the trigger.