Deep breath.
Using her exhaustion as a gauge, Beth felt like she'd gone a couple of miles. If she kept up this pace, she was going to wear herself down to nothing. She started to slow, but didn't let herself stop moving.
She could only hope that she'd successfully led them away from Tara, Eugene and Judith. If they'd heard the baby crying earlier, they would know that she hadn't been alone, but the whole crowd of them had run after her as one, it was the best she could do—to give Tara, Eugene and Judith the chance to slip away. Now to give herself a chance too, she needed to double back around and make it to their first meeting spot, the one where their pathways naturally intersected.
Turning around the bend of another hill, she collided right into three walkers. With one hand, she covered her mouth to keep from screaming, while the other one dove to unsheathe her knife, she stumbled backwards as the closest walker reached out to her, snarling. She kicked it to the ground, just as the second lurched towards her. Blood spurted from its broken eye-sockets as her dagger automatically found its target. She scrambled backwards as if fell onto her.
Quickly and without a hint of grace she killed the last one frantically, then hurried to take care of the first one that she'd only managed to repel; she'd hardly gotten her bearings back when it was on top of her. She stabbed it in the eye, but it kept throwing its weight against her, even as the dagger dug deeper into its skull, they fell onto the ground together.
Abruptly, the walker's weakened bones gave and the dagger shifted down through it's face with a sickening gush of rotten gore, cutting past what remained of its nose. With her hand still on the hilt, she felt herself slip as well—her hand fell right into its mouth and teeth closed with a sensation like fire. Unable to hold it back, a scream of pain and denial ripped free from her throat. The walker's gray, jaw clamped shut right on top of her bandages, in the exact place where she'd ripped her own flesh with her teeth a few weeks earlier. At first, it seemed like the walker had only caught the bandage, but she felt the tearing and the hot, unstoppable flow of fresh blood as the walker chewed right through the gauze, getting a taste of her blood before the dagger scrambled its brain.
The walker stopped moving, but for a moment Beth lay there underneath it, shaking and unable to keep from letting out a whimper as she tried, to get her hand out of its mouth. The gauze was caught in its teeth.
Finally, she shoved the walker off and ripped the gauze while pulling her hand out of its mouth. The tattered side of the bandage only disguised the damage for a few seconds, then the material drenched red. Frantically, she ripped it off, mind blank, breathing shallow and desperate.
It was bad. It was bad enough. The gnarly teeth- marks where slightly off-set from her own. It almost looked like it was just her old wounds re-opened.
The bleeding had already stopped. The bite throbbed, and the pulse of it seemed to be slowly spread. It would reach her heart. She rewrapped the wound with her torn gauze, her hands shaking badly. She wasn't sure why she bothered to wrap it at all.
She knew what she had to do. "If thy right hand offends thee…" she murmured. At least it was only her left hand. Small favors.
As best she could, she used her T-shirt to clean the walker blood off her dagger. It was all she had to work with. It was her only chance.
The blade of the knife hovered over the pale scars that she'd put there herself two years earlier. This time, it wasn't about dying, it was about living, but all the same her mind carried her back to that desperate, maddening moment right before she'd begun cutting into herself the first time.
Mocking her, the bite pulsated angrily underneath the bandages. The gumption was there, she just had to reach out and take it. Her dagger was sharp. She could do this. She started ripping at the hem of her shirt first, to make a tourniquet, wishing she had a belt. Her dagger still shook in her uninjured right hand.
The snap of a twig scared her back up to her feet.
Franco appeared around the curve of the hill, gun raised and pointed right at her. From the other side of the hill, two more men appeared, out of the corner of her eye, she recognized the brothers who'd also been in the jeep. The others caught up. Two women, and then two familiar faces.
Randall and Father Gabriel took up the rear. To their credit, they looked utterly horrified.
"Put the dagger down." Franco pulled the hammer back.
Beth didn't move.
"Put the dagger down, or eat a bullet."
She was going to die. Either they would kill her now, or they would kill her when they saw she was bitten, or the bite would kill her. There had to be a way out of this, but she couldn't see it. Slowly, she set the dagger down, mind and heart racing. There had to be something she could do—some way she could survive this.
"Put the gun down next to it."
She moved gradually, trying to give herself a few precious seconds to think, but she honestly had no idea how she was going to get out of this.
"Bloody bandage," said one of the women. Her bright red hair was plaited into a long French-braid down her back. She cocked her head at Beth's hand.
Red dripped from the recent trauma as she set the gun down on the ground.
"You bit?" the red-head asked sharply, pointing her own gun at Beth as well.
Franco snorted, "Yeah, but not by a walker—little miss blonde did that to herself when she was cuffed in the hospital. Gnawed through her own hand like some kind of animal to get free."
He couldn't see that it was fresh, or he just thought she'd torn open her own wound. She wasn't sure whether it was a good thing or not that he had dismissed the idea that she'd been bitten.
"Franco, please—don't hurt the girl," begged Father Gabriel, he had his hands raised to show he wasn't armed, as he approached the scene tentatively.
"I believe we were promised a meal," said one of the brothers, glaring darkly, "Randall, control your priest."
"I didn't recognize her until just now… but the last time I saw this little bitch, she was running in the wrong direction—a herd of walkers ready to plow right through her. How the hell did you get yourself out of that mess unscathed?" Franco looked her from the toes up.
The red-head went from looking confused to downright horrified, "This is the girl?! The one who was dragged off to be walker food with the archer, the ones who killed Brady?"
"And crippled our truck, and apparently she survived while the dead were eatin' her boyfriend—and yours," Franco guessed, raising his eyebrows.
"No. The archer made it out too," Randall spoke up for the first time, he was looking around the woods warily, as if expecting Daryl to be hidden somewhere nearby. "You can't eat 'em," he said suddenly, his face sickly pale as he faced Franco, "You can't—she's, she's alright—don't you… she's the one who gave me that tip about the vet's office. If we hadn't known that Juno and Sophie might not've made it, come on," Randall held out his hands towards Franco in supplication.
"We need food—the water-tower was cleaned out, we were counting on that. We can't go back to camp empty-handed, and we need a meal tonight," argued one of the brothers.
"More important," the red-head lowered her gun, she was looking at Beth with wide eyes, "She's strong Franco. She got away from a herd. A survivor. What if we saved her, brought her back to camp… started over."
"No!"said Father Gabriel sharply, immediately the air around her erupted into shouts. She had reignited a debate that they were clearly still in the middle of. "No more of your heathen—"
"I haven't lost my faith!"
"Forget faith, we need food."
"Half the camp will leave if—"
"They won't go anywhere. They don't have anywhere to go."
Infected and overwarm, her bitten hand seemed to grow heavier with every passing moment. Weighing her into the dirt like a lopsided doll. She felt stunned; her mind a blank, her breathing was the only thing she could focus on. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to block out their shouts and angry debate. In her mind she pictured Daryl, during their time alone in the woods. Remember the warm feel of being enfolded into him, his touch, hungry and gentle and firm and thrilling all at once. She had to survive.
Whatever happened, she had to get back. The first step was to cut her hand off.
She lunged for the dagger on the ground, her fingers closed around it.
While the others had been arguing, Franco had been watching her. The second she touched the hilt, he barreled through the distance between them, grabbing a hold of her, right over her bite—crushing the broken skin in his unforgiving grip. She let out a cry.
"Here's my decision," he shouted, "Hilly is right. She's a perfect sacrifice, or a perfect meal. Or why not both? She must be tasty if she was so willing to chew on her own hand," she didn't think it was possible for his hold on her injured hand to get even tighter, but he squeezed hard as he shoved her to the ground head first. He held her arm out straight with one hand, while the other pulled a machete from his belt.
She braced herself, but could never have prepared sufficiently for what happened next. Her elbow burst as the blade connected with it, the bone breaking as blood spurted from her arm. She bit into the ground, screaming as he hacked twice more, finally pulling her severed arm away from the ragged stump. The bloody remnants of her arm flopped into the dirt. For a few angry, red seconds before she blacked out, she was still aware of all of it.
Father Gabriel's cries of protest, Randall's traumatized expression, and Franco tossing her severed arm to the other woman, "Make us some stew or something."
On foot, Daryl led Maggie and Rick, winding through the woods to follow the path. If they spoke, he wasn't hearing it so well. The jeep followed close behind. Everyone was locked and loaded and ready for a fight. His hope was all wrapped up in the image of petite and sweet woman with blue eyes like breaking glass.
He'd be lying if he tried to pretend like he didn't want to kill someone today.
It wasn't exactly a righteous desire, but he couldn't hold it back, all the same. Daryl didn't usually think of himself as a blood-thirsty man, but he'd had his moments. Strangely enough, he seemed to experience less of them after the world ended and he'd been let off his leash. But he gave into those moments now, whereas before, he'd kept it together.
Why the hell did she love him anyway? He felt more beast than man. She even seemed to like that about him. The least he could do was make sure that the beast served her. She needed that monster right now. She needed someone to kill for her.
He tried not to think about it. Tried not to dwell on where she might be or what they might be doing to her. He was going to get stupid if he didn't bridle that shit.
He couldn't help but see the signs now, however. The land was screaming the story at him from all sides. If he focused too hard, he'd drive himself mad with the fear and the anger.
She's counting on you. No time to go axe-crazy. Think about that, think about her.
He pictured her as she should be, happy, playful, foolish and wise, somehow full of perfect sorrow, but still radiating with light. She was always so many things, all at once. He remembered chasing her through the woods, just days earlier, finally catching her by the waist, feeling her tremble as she whirled around in his arms, smiling up at him like he might actually be what made her smile. He thought about the feel of yellow hair in his hands and her laughter in his head. He thought about how she tasted like summer and how it felt to hear her whispering in his ear.
He had an easy trail to follow. The Termites thought they were hunters and so they hadn't bothered to do anything to disguise their path. It was beaten into the ground. They might as well have left big neon signs for him to follow.
For speed, the three of them would hop back into the jeep wherever the trail was most obvious.
Greene had led these dead bastards on a hell of a chase, weaving through underbrush and around swells. She must have been moving fast—they'd already gone a full mile and the pursuit was still painted on the ground. For a moment, a flood of fear was all he could experience, he imagined being her in this moment, heart racing, feet and lungs beat all to hell as she tried desperately to just be away. His own heart started to race and he growled out loud, pinching the bridge of his nose, trying to bury the feeling and cling to it at the same time. "Stop," he beat the side of the jeep with his fist, and was crawling out even before Tyreese got the message and put on the breaks.
Maggie and Rick were right behind him.
Finally, the path hit a snag. Daryl had been searching for this, and he'd been terrified to see it. A snag couldn't be good. They rounded the hill and came upon three dead walkers and an obvious dust-up.
In the middle of it, were scraps and fresh blood.
"W-what is that?" Maggie's voice trembled as she came up behind Daryl.
Without taking note of his own actions, Daryl had crouched down in the mess and picked up the cleaned bones, still sticky. Discarded skin was jumbled with torn and bloodied gauze, along with a jumble of leather cords and bracelets.
With fingers that were usually so steady and graceful, Maggie clumsily took the jumble of bracelets from Daryl's hand. "Oh, oh…" Maggie's voice collapsed into a kind of sickened gurgle, she gasped in a breath, eyes shimmering.
"Maggie, maybe you should go be in the jeep with Glenn," Rick started to suggest in as mild a voice as he was capable of. He tried to help her to her feet, but she didn't need his arm.
Once she was on her feet she had a hold of him by the lapel, driving him backwards, "We gotta find these guys and kill—Rick, you hear me?"
Agreeing with her, whole-heartedly, Daryl stood up and resumed the trail, though he only made it a few drunken steps before he had to stop and catch himself against a tree.
"Daryl—Daryl…" Rick was at his side in an instant, hand on his shoulder. He opened and closed his mouth, at a loss.
"Come on. They went this way," Daryl barely heard himself speak. It might have only come out as a growl to Maggie and Rick.
Before, there had been eight sets of footprints. Now there were only seven.
Someone could be carrying her. She might be alive. She had to be alive.
Rage and fear twisted inside him, threatening to blind him; eat him whole. He could barely register anything besides the trail. He didn't know if Maggie and Rick had jumped back in the jeep or if they were right next to him. He didn't know whether he was walking or running or being pushed or held up by some unseen force. It was another half-hour before he realized that he was still clutching her bones.
Everyone okay?
I Will Come – Alpha Rev