Disclaimer: Sadly, The Walking Dead does not belong to me. This is purely for entertainment purposes.

Warning: This is rated M for language, gore, and suggestive themes.

"But hopes are shy birds flying at a great distance seldom reached by the best of guns."
—John James Audubon

Hope in the Wind

Almost another full hour had passed by the time Shane, Glenn, and Russell returned, sans Rick, Daryl, or Sophia.

Shane spoke to Lori and Carol in calm, soothing tones, working, Jenna could see, to keep them from panicking. Soon after, he made sure they were all busy with scavenging for supplies, and Jenna assumed he was trying to keep them occupied to stave off the encroaching dread that was sure to make itself known eventually.

Soon they were pulling supplies and moving cars out of the road. Dusty, Russell, and Glenn had taken over the task of syphoning more fuel, and Lori and Carol rummaged through the trunk of a car near the guardrail, seeing as Carol wasn't keen on moving from that spot. The sun steadily lowered toward the horizon while they worked. Jenna was glad for the drop in temperature, but she wished it could have dropped a bit faster. She'd wiped her face and neck with her bandana more times than she could count.

She helped Shane push a large SUV off the road, guiding the steering wheel while he used the Peletiers' Jeep Cherokee to shove it along. She stepped back when the SUV reached the divide in the highway and let it roll downward, colliding with another, bringing it to a stop.

"Why aren't we all out there lookin?" Carol asked Dale, approaching him as he worked on the engine of the RV. "Why are we movin cars?"

"Well, we have to clear enough room so I can get the RV turned around as soon as it's running," Dale replied explanatorily. "Now that we have fuel we can double back to a bypass that Glenn flagged on the map."

Shane approached them, having parked the Jeep behind the RV, shotgun in hand. His face and neck were covered in dirt and sweat—evidence of just how rough the day had turned out to be.

"Turnin back's gonna be easier 'n tryna move through this mess," he commented, looking around at the tangle of cars in front of them.

"We're not goin anywhere until my daughter gets back," Carol said adamantly.

Lori gave her a comforting pat on the arm. "That goes without sayin," she murmured in a gentle tone.

"Rick an' Daryl, they're on it," Shane assured her, "okay? Jus' a matter of time," he said, also patting her shoulder.

"Couldn't be soon enough for me," grumbled Andrea as she approached, tossing a bottle of water to Glenn at Jenna's left, who had joined them when he and the others returned with another filled gas can. Carol glanced over at the woman and then walked away with Lori. "I'm still freaked out from that herd that passed us by—or whatever you'd call it," she said, taking a long drink of water from her own bottle.

"Yeah, what was that?" said Glenn, bewildered. "All of them just marching along like that?"

Jenna shrugged. "They do that sometimes," she said.

"You've seen that before?" Glenn asked.

She nodded. "Yeah, a few times," she replied, recalling one particular moment of high-tension back in California. "Never exactly been caught in the middle of one before, though."

"Herd," said Shane with a small chuckle. "That sounds about right…" he said thoughtfully. "Now, we've seen it, the night camp got attacked, just a wonderin pack, only fewer," he reminded them, and Glenn nodded solemnly. Shane sighed and then cleared his throat. "Okay, c'mon people—still got a lot to do. Let's go."

Jenna swallowed a long drink of water and passed the bottle to Dusty before the two of them—with Russell in tow—went off to pull more supplies.

"So, where're you from?" he asked Jenna amiably while they searched. "Dusty said you're from the West Coast."

"Seattle," she answered, and for the sake of being polite, she ventured, "how about you?"

"Hapeville, not far from Atlanta," he answered. "You musical? Dusty here said you play the piano," he added conversationally.

Did she? Jenna wondered wryly. "Yeah, a little bit," she answered, peering into a car they were passing, and not seeing anything of value to be scavenged.

"How long you been playin?" he wondered, and she was really regretting answering his first question now that this tirade had ensued. "Don't mean to brag, but I play a mean guitar, same as Dusty here."

Jenna looked toward Dusty then, ignoring Russell. "I didn't know you played," she said with a slight grin.

Dusty shrugged shyly. "Yeah, been playin since I was a kid," she informed. "Used to work at Rody's Music store in Savannah."

"This one's full," Russell said, gesturing to the car they had just come upon—a shiny blue Camry—and Dusty began rummaging through the backseat while Jenna searched the trunk with Russell keeping watch.

Jenna stifled the urge to be rude and tell him that he could go and pick through cars elsewhere because they didn't need his protection. But, she held that comment back and let him proceed with his manly duties. Whatever made him feel better. Dusty seemed to like him—and he seemed to like her at least as much—and just because Jenna found him mildly annoying didn't give her the excuse to bite his head off.

"Hey, look," said Dusty. "The little guy might like these." She pulled two graphic novels from the Spiderman backpack that lay on the floor of the car.

She handed them to Jenna, who flipped through them, recognizing them after a moment. They were the first two volumes of the Bone series by Jeff Smith—the boy she used to babysit as a teenager had loved these stories, and he'd only been a few years older than Thao. Well, she had her own books; it was only fair that her boy had some of his own too.

"Thanks, these are great," said Jenna smiling. "Thao'll love these."

"Thao," said Russell, testing out the name. "He your kid, or…?"

Jenna recalled what Shane had said last night, and deliberated. "In a way, he is now," she answered as they returned to the RV to add their findings to the growing stock they'd acquired so far.

She entered the RV, finding Thao sitting at the table with his spherical maze, thoroughly engrossed. Thankfully, most of the blood from Andrea's struggle earlier had been cleaned away.

"Hey, bud," she said, setting the comics on the table in front of him. "Dusty found these for you. Make sure you tell her thanks, okay?"

He nodded, setting down the toy and pulling one of the colorful comics toward him, intrigued. She smirked and ruffled his hair before exiting the RV again, seeing that he would be very well occupied one way or another.

Russell had Dusty very engaged in conversation, and from the looks of things, an extra person would be a bit of an intrusion. Jenna didn't really see the man's appeal, but she supposed that there weren't many options to choose from these days. Slim pickins, a southerner would say—maybe. She really needed to brush up on her southern if she wanted to keep up with Dusty and the others.

Not wanting to interrupt Dusty, Jenna looked around at the area, trying to decide where to look next. She recalled the tool kit Thao had found, and wondered what had become of it.

She scouted up ahead, working her way back to the pickup truck she and Thao had taken refuge under, scanning the area for danger all the while. Sure enough, the small, red metal case was lying on the asphalt beside the car, and she picked it up, opening it to see what tools it contained. It looked similar to the little tool box Danny had used to work on his dad's BMW in the garage of his parents' house back in Seattle on the weekends. She smiled fondly, and started making her way back toward the RV.

On her way, she noticed Shane leaning over the engine of a green Hyundai. It looked like he'd already emptied the contents of the vehicle, and she assumed he was fixing up the car for himself. She couldn't blame him—the RV was extremely crowded. If it wasn't such a drag on fuel, she might've fixed one up for herself as well, as long as the keys were already included in the vehicle. Unless Daryl knew how to hotwire them.

"Need help?" she asked him as she approached after he'd sighed in frustration, straightening back up to look down at the engine.

He looked up at her. "Know anythin about fixin up an engine?" he asked, smirking sardonically.

"Other than replacing sparkplugs, gaskets, alternator belts, and radiator hoses, no," she said honestly as she came to a stop in front of the engine next to him, "but maybe you can do something with these," she offered, holding out the tool kit.

His brows raised in surprise. "Where'd you get that?" he wondered.

"Thao found it in a car," she said. "Just before the herd came through."

"Nice find," he admired, accepting the tool kit from her. "Thank you." She nodded simply, and looked around, scanning for danger. "Sparkplugs, huh?" he inquired somewhat amusedly, fixing a socket to the ratchet. "Your boy Danny teach you that?"

She smirked and leaned against the side of the engine to watch him work. She could hardly resist the chance to watch an engine getting worked on. "No, that was my dad," she corrected. "I had to help him replace all four sparkplugs in my little Honda Accord in high school. Apparently, they're not supposed to be drenched in oil." He chuckled lightly, proceeding with working on the engine again. "The radiator hose I learned from Danny," she conceded.

He chuckled again. "Can I ask you somethin?"

"Don't you always?" she asked wryly, flicking at a fly that landed on her knee, sending it zigzagging away.

He gave her a sardonic smirk. "Alright, smartass," he shot back with a laugh. "I'm just wonderin if you spent any amount of time around other women growin up."

She snorted lightly. "When my mom was pregnant with me, my dad was really hoping for a boy," she explained. "He got me instead, so he made it work. My brother didn't come along until four years after that, so the groundwork had already been laid out, so to speak."

He laughed outright then, and she had to laugh with him. "That explains a lot," he noted.

"I'll bet," she said with a smirk.

"You know," he began again, beginning to work the accelerator pump back into place, and though he was leaned over the engine again and his face was out of view, she could definitely hear the smirk in his tone, "I may ask a lotta questions, but no one said you had to answer em."

Huh. She hadn't even given any thought to that before now.

"I'll keep that in mind," she said with a laugh, watching him make minor adjustments here and there to the engine. Sitting stranded on the highway for weeks had taken a bit of a toll on the vehicle, but it wasn't irredeemable. "But as far as questions go, Russell sure is giving even you a run for your money," she added wryly.

Shane huffed a breath of laughter. "Maybe he likes ya."

She laughed, relieved to be able to deny that claim. "Oh, no—he's been following Dusty around like she's got a leash around his neck since he got here."

He snorted in amusement. "Yeah, I noticed. But as long as she don't mind, I guess there's nothin to worry about," he conceded.

"Shane!" Carl's voice called out suddenly, and Jenna's head snapped up, wondering if something was wrong.

"Carl?" Lori called frantically, running up to the Hyundai from the left at the same time that Carl approached at the right. "What happened?" she asked, still frantic.

"Shane, Jenna, I found somethin cool," Carl said eagerly, spotting her leaning against the car. "See? Check it out!" He unrolled a large black tool kit on the ground before them, and Jenna's brows raised in honest admiration. "It's an arsenal," he said proudly.

Jenna couldn't deny that she was impressed by the boy's find; the kit had plenty of survival knives, a hatchet included, along with a sinister-looking hooked machete. All of them looked to be brand new, made from dark high-carbon steel. These were no cheap, run-of-the-mill blades. These had been crafted with diligence.

She caught sight of Lori's face as the woman sighed—both relieved and exasperated—and tried her best not to smirk in amusement.

"That's cool, man," she told Carl, who grinned up at her eagerly, "why don't you go give it to Dale?"

"Wait—check this one out," Carl insisted, pulling a hatchet from the kit. "Whoa…it's a hatchet…" he admired in an awed voice.

"Be careful, don't play with those," said Lori.

"It's really sharp," Carl went on, giving the hatchet a slow, careful swing.

"What did I just say?" scolded Lori, reaching out for the weapon. "Where did you even get these?"

Jenna frowned. How did Lori not know that already?

"In a truck, up that way," Carl replied, pointing up the road from the direction he'd come, and looked up at his mother hopefully. "Can I keep it?" he asked eagerly, giving the hatchet another slow swing.

Jenna bit down on her lip to cover up the sympathetic smile that threatened to stretch across her face—she knew the answer to that one already.

"Are you crazy?" said Lori, taking the hatchet from her son.

"What?" demanded Carl in bewilderment. "No way. Shane," Carl tried then, looking to his uncle of sorts for assistance. "Shane, will you tell her to let me keep one?"

Shane chuckled lightly and put his hands up in surrender. "Oh no, bud, I ain't gettin dragged into this one," he said, glancing over at Lori and catching her murderous Mama Bear gaze. "You better do what your mama says," he advised.

"Aw, come on…" Carl protested, recognizing defeat.

Jenna smiled and took pity on the kid, pushing off from the Hyundai and rolling up the kit into which Lori had just stowed away the hatchet. "Come on, man," she said to Carl. "Let's get these to Dale, alright? I'm sure he'd like to see what you found, too."

Carl nodded a bit reluctantly and Jenna handed him the rolled up kit, patting his back encouragingly as she set off to head back to the RV with Carl walking at her side.

"It's got a really cool machete, too, did'ya see it?" Carl asked her eagerly as they set off.

"Sure did," said Jenna, smiling down at the boy. "Might be even cooler than mine."

He checked her belt, where her machete usually resided. "Where is it?" he wondered after having seen that it wasn't on her.

"Gave it to Dusty for the day," she told him as they approached the RV. "Why don't you go and show Dale, and see what he wants to do with them, alright?" she suggested, nodding at the old man who was still tinkering away at the engine of his RV.

Carl nodded and rushed over to go and show Dale his impressive find, and Jenna laughed lightly under her breath before making her way inside the RV to check on Thao. Seeing that he was entertained with his new comics and doing just fine, she helped Carl stow away the "arsenal" into the closet that housed the bag of guns.

Upon exiting the RV again, they were met with a bit of a confrontation. Andrea was having it out with Dale.

"Where's my gun?" she asked aggressively, and Glenn ducked his head, pretending not to have noticed her arrival as he worked on the engine beside Dale. "You had no right to take it," she accused angrily.

Jenna nudged Carl forward, gesturing for him to go and stand beside his mother, who was adding her findings to the slowly growing cluster of supplies on the hood of the Cherokee with Dusty and Russell.

"You don't need that just now, do ya?" Dale asked lightly, pretending to be oblivious.

"My father gave it to me—it's mine," Andrea maintained stubbornly.

Jenna moved over to stand at Dusty's other side, helping her to pull the supplies she'd stuffed into her backpack and add it to the rest, pretending to be ignorant to the dispute just a short distance away, and ignoring Russell when he reached for the bag to offer his assistance instead. Maybe he was nice enough, but Jenna just didn't know him like she knew the other men in the group. Hardwired instinct told her to put up a wall, needless as it may have been.

"I can hold onto it for you," said Dale with a shrug, trying to focus on the engine.

"Or, you could give it back to me," said Andrea pointedly.

Shane approached, standing between them in a relaxed posture, hands casually in his pockets. "Everythin cool?" he asked them in a calm tone, trying to keep things from escalating.

"No," snapped Andrea immediately, "I want my gun back."

Dale cut his eyes over to Shane briefly. "I don't think it's a good idea right now," he said, trying, for Andrea's sake, to be subtle.

Jenna really couldn't blame Dale for taking her gun, truthfully. Andrea, to put it bluntly, was a bit of a loose cannon lately. After her failed suicide attempt, she didn't display much more than bitterness and contempt. Jenna couldn't honestly say the knowledge of Andrea carrying a firearm in her highly emotional state sat very well with her. Firearms and emotional rollercoasters did not make for a safe combination.

"Why not?" Shane asked Dale.

Dale looked hesitant to answer, but ultimately replied with, "I'm not comfortable with it."

Andrea scoffed, shaking her head and crossing her arms stubbornly. She looked up at Shane expectantly.

"Truth is," he began after a moment of deliberation, looking between Dale and Andrea, "the less guns we have floatin around camp the better."

"You turning over your weapon?" she asked snidely.

He let out a short, dry laugh and shook his head. "Naw," he said honestly, "but I'm trained, in its use. That's what the rest of y'all need is proper trainin, but until that time, I think it's best if Dale keeps em all accounted for."

Jenna wondered if she would be asked to turn over her Beretta. Well, she could make due with her machete either way, of course, but it was always reassuring to know that she had that extra safety net to fall back on, just in case. She wasn't too worried about it anyway. Rick and Shane both knew she was capable of handling firearms.

Andrea looked ready to spit venom as she scoffed once more and skulked off into the RV. Jenna and Dusty exchanged a knowing glance. Climbing back into the RV tonight with Andrea was going to be quite a trip.

"You mind tellin me what that's about?" Shane asked Dale when Andrea was out of earshot.

"Oh, God," breathed Glenn, his voice heavy with relief, "they're back…"

Jenna turned around to follow his gaze, and sure enough, Rick and Daryl were climbing their way back up over the guardrail. When she noticed that Sophia was still nowhere in sight, she sighed heavily and hung her head, a pang of dread assaulting her heart once more. They hadn't found her.

"You didn't…you didn't find her…" Carol whimpered, looking close to breaking down again.

"Her trail went cold," Rick told her regretfully. "We'll pick it up again at first light."

"You can't leave my daughter out there on her own," she plead helplessly, "to spend the night alone in the woods."

"Huntin in the dark's no good," said Daryl in a subdued tone, crossbow slung over his shoulder. Both he and Rick looked thoroughly spent. "We'd just be trippin over ourselves, more people'd get lost."

"But she's ten, she can't be out there on her own, you didn't find anything?" Carol begged.

Rick looked torn down as he tried to calm the grieving mother. "I know it's hard, but I'm askin you not to panic," he urged, fruitlessly, Jenna knew, "we know she was out there."

"An' we tracked her for a while," input Daryl in a soft voice, looking back at Carol with sympathetic reassurance.

"We have to make this an organized effort," Rick informed all of them adamantly. "Daryl knows the woods better than anybody—I've asked him to oversee this."

Carol's eyes zeroed in on Daryl with intense scrutiny. "Is that blood?" she asked, nodding at the nasty-looking stain on the knee of his pants.

He looked down at the dark stain, obviously reluctant to have to give an answer.

"We took down a walker," Rick said to her after a moment.

She looked like she was ready to faint. "A walker…" she breathed.

"There was no sign that it was ever anywhere near Sophia," Rick assured her intently, trying to calm her.

Jenna was highly skeptical about that claim—it would have been just about impossible to tell whether or not the walker had gotten a hold of that little girl.

"How can you know that?" Andrea asked, looking as doubtful as Jenna felt.

Jenna pinned her with an exasperated glare, tossing her hand out and shaking her head in the universal "what the fuck?" gesture. It was one thing to have doubts, but entirely another to voice them to a grieving, panicking mother.

Daryl's eyes cut across to Andrea, looking a bit annoyed himself, and then looked back to Carol once more, his expression softening. "We cut the som'bitch open—made sure," he told her sincerely.

Carol looked mildly relieved, but let out a long, shaky breath as she settled herself down on the guardrail. Lori moved to take a seat beside her, putting an arm around the other woman's shoulders. Unable to stand there and witness Carol's agonized dismay like a statue, Jenna moved to take a seat at her other side, taking her hand in both of her own gently.

Carol took a moment to catch her breath, and then gazed up at Rick, accusation in her blue eyes. "How could you just leave her out there to begin with?" she asked scornfully. "How could you just leave her?"

"Those two walkers were on us, I had to draw em off, it was her best chance," Rick insisted in a slightly pleading voice as he leaned down to be at level with her.

"Sounds like he didn't have a choice, Carol," Shane defended in a gentle tone.

Carol shook her head, tears pouring from her face, and looked back up at Rick. "How was she supposed to find her way back on her own—she's just a child," she wept. "She's just a child…"

Rick ran a hand through his filthy hair and knelt down to peer up at her, begging her with his eyes to understand. "It was my only option," he insisted desperately, "the only choice I could make."

Carol shook her head again. "My little girl got left in the woods," she whimpered in a trembling voice.

She hung her head and proceeded to weep once more, and Jenna and Lori rubbed her back and shoulders gently, trying in vain to provide some semblance of comfort. Jenna glanced up at Rick, and if she wasn't busy soothing Carol, she might have attempted to soothe him; she couldn't tell which of them looked like they needed it more in that moment.

Rick stood up again and walked off, seeming to have taken the situation as a personal failure on his part.

For what seemed to be the tenth time that day, Jenna found herself wondering how things had gone so horribly wrong so blindingly fast, and it killed her that there was nothing any of them could do for Sophia and Carol until morning. All they could do was hope—and where a missing child was concerned, how could hope be nearly enough?