"Randall's missing."
My head snaps up at Glenn's words, my face filled with fear. "Excuse me?" I ask slowly. The rest of the group begin to ask questions as well, each of them just as scared as me. Their questions get lost in the clamoring of voices, and I find myself begging for a moment of silence, my mind reeling. Me and Carl had left the barn a while after Shane had disappeared, planning to help Rick and Daryl load up Randall. Rick coughs loudly, answering his own questions.
"The cuffs are still hooked," he says somberly. "He must've slipped 'em." My brows furrow in confusion, wondering if it's only a coincidence my brother went in there only an hour before.
Carol isn't convinced. "Is that even possible?" she asks bluntly, her usually soft face crumpled with doubt.
Andrea scoffs from beside me "It is if you've got nothing to lose," she mutters quietly, barely loud enough for me to hear.
"The door was secured from the outside," Hershel suddenly tells us, moving away from the building. I narrow my eyes, seeing through Shane's plan.
"Where's Sha-" I begin, my words being cut off by the missing man himself.
"Rick! Hey! Rick!" his voice is loud, echoing of the trees surrounding him. We all spin around, trying to work out where he is. Finally, he steps away from the shadows, and a collective gasp rattles through the group.
Shane's face is covered in blood, and his nose is crooked, clearly broken. He has a single cut on his forehead, and bruises are forming around his eyes. I rush forward, my sympathy for him earlier still lingering. "What happened? Are you okay?" I gasp, trying to reach up and touch his ruined face.
He spares a glance and a smile at me before reaching Rick, pointing wildly at the trees behind him. "He's armed! The little bastard snuck up on me, clocked me in the face and stole my gun," I cover my mouth with a shaky hand, the implications of this escape hitting me.
"Hershel, Lily, get everyone back up to the house, and lock the doors," he orders us sternly. "Glenn, Daryl, you're with us." Fear leaks into every inch of my body, freezing my limbs and my mind. I'm barely able to form my next sentence.
"I thought we were gonna just let him go. You can't go out there, he'll-" Rick cuts me off with a look, as does Daryl. Neither of the men are scared, so I take it upon myself to fear for them.
"Get everyone to the house and lock up! Go," he adds, noticing my hesitation. I finally tear myself away from the group, and grab Carl's shoulders. The rest of them follow slowly behind, me and Carl leading the way.
"Are they gonna be okay?" Carl's small voice asks me, looking fearfully up at me. I smile encouragingly, nodding my head slightly.
"Of course. No one can kill this group 'sides us." The words aren't true, and we both know it. The proof lay behind the deaths of Dale and Sophia.
We reach the house, and run inside, locking the door once the stragglers arrive. Beth is sat on the couch, and looks up in surprise when we run in. Coco is by her feet, though the dog sprints to my side the minute I arrive. I pat her head absentmindedly, my mind reeling with thoughts of doubt and fear. Rick was collected, and he thought things through, as did Glenn. Daryl and my brother were a different story. Both of them led with their emotions, and hardly ever thought about the significance of their actions. I hoped Rick was smart enough to have one of them with him, and I was praying that we wouldn't have any more graves to dig by the end of the night.
"They're out there lookin' for Randall right now, all we have to do is sit tight and wait for them to come back," I announce, trying to calm the room. "T, can you stand guard by the door? And Andrea, can you stand guard upstairs?" Both of them nod eagerly at me, and walk to their places. I smile at everyone left and settle into the armchair next to me. I hear Carl telling Lori he needs to lie down before racing up the stairs. The rest of them grab a gun and settle into a space, everyone's fear causing a silent room. I may as well get some rest, we could be here a while.
Sleep never came, and I found myself wallowing in my thoughts for hours, and when I finally pull myself from the spiralling scenarios, it's well into the night. T-Dog is still by the door, and due to Andrea's lack of presence, I guessed she was still on guard. Hershel and the girls are sat on the couch opposite me, and Lori, Patricia and Carol are all talking in the kitchen. A shot rings out, shattering the silence, and creating a newfound tension. I glance around at my comrades, and see each of them sat straight, their ears listening for anything else. We stay like that for a while, and soon I grow bored of waiting for a shot that will never come. I stand up slowly, shifting the dog from my lap and onto the floor. My legs are asleep, and I try to shake the pins and needles fluttering across them as I walk towards the door. Before I get there, Daryl and Glenn come bursting into the lounge and our group jumps us, leaping towards them.
"We heard a shot," Daryl tells us breathlessly. "Was that y'all?"
I shake my head, and Lori steps forward. "Rick and Shane aren't back. Maybe they found Randall." I can hear her voice trembling, and my hands begin to grow restless.
Daryl looks down, shaking his head. "Nah," he grunts. "We found 'im. He was a walker." I can feel some of the tension dissipate, and breathe a sigh of relief.
"What about the walker that got him?" I ask timidly, my anxiety growing every minute Rick and my brother are gone.
Glenn coughs into his hand, and looks at me. "He wasn't bit," he says slowly. "That's the weird thing, his neck was broken." My eyebrows pull down swiftly, forming an almost straight line across my forehead.
"What do you mean he wasn't bit? If his neck was broken, he must have just fought back," Patricia sighs condescendingly.
I roll my eyes and reach forwards, grasping Glenn's shoulder. "Did you find anything else? Shane's gun-?" Both men shake their head, though Daryl's eyes light up.
"Shane and Randall's tracks were right on top of each other's. Shane ain't no tracker," Daryl exhales loudly before continuing. "They were together."
I step away from the group, removing myself from the conversation. Shane and Randall were together. I knew Shane had gone into the barn earlier, though I hadn't thought it was to release the man we'd tried so hard to keep captive. Shane wanted him dead just as much as Daryl, it just didn't make sense for him to let him go. Unless, he took him out there to kill him. My theory works with what I know, as well as the type of person my brother is. I just hoped he hadn't bit off more than he can chew.
"You got it," Daryl rumbles before stepping out the door once more. Did Lori make him go get Rick? I need to stop zoning out.
We had walked onto the porch, everyone gazing across the farm, each eye locked on something I was yet to see. I was expecting a bloody Rick, maybe Shane. What I hadn't expected was the horde of roamer's walking straight towards us, every spare limb raised and reaching for us. There were easily double what was on the highway, and three times bigger than the mall walker's I'd run into. The breath hitches in my throat, and fear grips me for the men still outside the walls protection. Hershel whispers an order, and we all comply immediately, slamming the door behind us.
Lori comes sprinting downstairs, her eyes scanning each face. Her words deliver a second blow, and tears fill my eyes. "Carl's gone."
Glenn curses loudly before turning towards the woman. "Maybe he's hiding?"
Lori narrows her eyes menacingly and I find myself stepping back. "He's supposed to be upstairs. I'm not leaving without my boy," she growls. Carol comes to the rescue and begins the search for him.
An invisible hand grips my throat, halting my oxygen, and slowly choking me. I know what's coming and I try desperately to fight back. I had a job, and that was to keep everyone safe. My anxiety could wait.
"We have guns. We have cars," Hershel tells us, throwing ammo at anyone who needs it. I nod quickly, pulling my gun from its holster on my thigh and checking the rounds.
"We kill as many as we can, and use the cars to lead them out," I declare. "Glenn and Maggie you take the car, T you take the truck with Andrea, Daryl you take your bike, and Jimmy, take the RV. The rest of us, we line up on the porch and we shoot. Don't stop until you run out of ammo." Everyone nods, and hurries to their positions. I glance at Daryl, and he spares me a rare smile, though it doesn't reach his eyes. I smile back, watching as he walks out of the door. I walk onto the porch after him, and load up.
The rest of the group surrounds me, Carol and Hershel on my right, and Beth and Patricia on my left, as well as my dog seated between my outstretched legs. We begin firing, each of us hitting our targets each time. I almost grin, watching as the walker's fall, over and over, a bullet never missing flesh. The caravan of vehicles heads off, Glenn and Maggie leading, with T and Andrea behind them. Daryl revs his bike before following after T and finally, Jimmy brings up the rear, the young boy driving the RV.
I'm not sure how long we had been shooting when the barn went up in flames, but the momentary distraction allows multiple roamer's closer to our home. I curse myself silently and begin firing rounds randomly, not caring whether they hit their target. The cars are beginning to circle back around, trying to get everyone off the quickly overflowing farm.
My heart sinks, realising we'd lost. We'd lost the safe haven we'd been trying so hard to protect. I grab a spare box of bullets from the platform beside me and leap from the porch, calling for Coco as I go. As I had expected, she comes racing after me, matching my long strides easily. I reach T's truck in little time, and I throw myself into the seat Andrea's occupying, securing Coco at my feet. Scanning the area around us, I see Carol being cornered by walker's and begin to get out before Andrea stops me, and leaves herself. Me and T-dog watch helplessly as Andrea saves the woman, falling victim to a stronger walker. I tear my eyes from the scene before us, watching the death of Andrea growing too much to handle. I turn my head to the side, spying a different pair of women on my other side. Beth is crying desperately as Patricia is devoured before her eyes. She finally lets go as Lori comes careening out of the house, pulling Beth towards us. They throw themselves in, their breaths coming in fast sobs. Lori holds the young girl in her arms as T-dog speeds down the dirt road leading out of the farm. Though each of us know this was not the plan, none of us bring ourselves to ask the question.
It's beginning to get light when I turn to T, my eyes wide with fear. "T, where are we going?" I whisper, gripping tightly to Coco's collar.
"We're heading East, to the coast," he grinds out, his eyes never leaving the road ahead of us. "We've got a shot outta here, I'll get us to safety."
Lori cries out loudly, whipping her head towards him. "My son and husband are back there."
I nod furiously, as does Beth. "My brother is with them, as is Hershel and Maggie. We can't abandon our family!"
T-Dog sends me a look. "Lily, you and Shane don't even like each other."
I growl lowly, glaring at the side of his head. "We're still family. We're working on it," I spit, restraining myself from launching at the man.
"Let us out right now," Lori exclaims, her hand resting dangerously on the door handle. T's eyes grow wide, and he screeches to a stop.
"You saw the farm! There were walker's everywhere. How you gonna find them? You can't fight through that by yourself," He yells, gripping the steering wheel tightly.
"The highway. They'll go to the highway," she whispers. "Now turn around, or let us go."
T-Dog punches the dashboard before putting the truck in reverse, performing a U-turn. All of us breathe a sigh of relief, and Beth bursts into a fresh wave of tears, her face tucked snug against Lori's shoulder. I smile, trying to keep my hope alive, hope that Rick and Shane are fine. Hope that Maggie and Hershel can be reunited with Beth. And, strangely, hope that I will see Daryl again.
It doesn't take long for us to reach the highway, and we drive along slowly, keeping our eyes out for anyone, dead or alive. I spy something moving up ahead, and point at it. My eyes grow wide when they land on the bumper of a car. The car that Maggie and Glenn were using.
"Oh my God! It's Maggie and Glenn!" I yelp, grinning madly. We follow them faster, still looking for everyone else. They come to a stop up ahead, and I can see Hershel, his hand clasped tightly to Rick's shoulder. Parked next to Glenn and Maggie, Daryl and Carol are climbing stiffly off his bike.
I leap from the car before it's fully even stopped, Coco close on my heels. I run to Rick, throwing myself into his awaiting arms a few seconds after his wife has left them. He wraps his arms almost painfully around my middle, squeezing the air from my lungs. I laugh loudly, the sound reaching every ear. Once we pull away, I go to each person, reaching Daryl and Glenn last. I don't hug Daryl, knowing how much he hates them, instead, reaching a hand up to cup his cheek, lightly brushing the pad of my thumb across the skin. His brows raise, but he doesn't pull away, staring directly at me. I pull away and turn my attention on Glenn, flinging myself boldly at the young man. He chuckles lightly, the sound bouncing around the small area, and hugs me back, his arms wrapped tightly around my shoulders. Pulling away, I watch happily as Carl buries his face in Coco's neck. Once the reunions are over we turn to the main issue at hand, the decreased number of people in our already small group.
"Where's the rest of us?" Daryl asks, his eyes scanning all of us carefully.
Rick looks down sadly, shaking his head. "We're the only ones who've made it so far."
My eyebrows furrow, an expression of hurt crossing my features. "Shane?" I ask him fearfully. He looks up, pain clouding his usually bright eyes, and shakes his head. I'm taken aback, the meaning of his action not sinking in. Shane can't be dead, he was the only one truly equipped to survive this world. The true injustice of his death was that we'd only just began to reconcile. We were ready to build the relationship we both wanted, the relationship we needed.
Images flash before my eyes, images of the only real times me and Shane had gotten on. Shane cheering me on as I ride my bike for the first time, age 7. Shane taking me out to get ice-cream after my middle school graduation. Shane handing me Daryl's gun, telling me to speak to Carl. Him smiling at me, reassuring me that he is okay.
The shock of his passing is sudden and unforgiving, and I force down a cry of anguish. My emotions are strong, though I find I have no tears to shed for the man. I hear the others talking about Patricia, Jimmy, Andrea. We had lost 4 people in the space of less than 12 hours, 4 lives that didn't deserve to be lost.
"We have to keep moving. There's gonna be walker's everywhere," Rick decides, his eyes refusing to meet mine.
"Where do we go?" I question timidly, playing with the hem of my shirt nervously.
"East," T-Dog says bluntly, reiterating his point from earlier. I nod, and look around, watching the rest of my group climbing into separate cars.
Lori, Carl, and Rick climb into the red truck Rick had escaped in, and Glenn, Maggie and Beth load into their car. Daryl and Carol are on the bike, leaving me, T, and Hershel. Hershel joins Rick's family, as does T. I stand in the road, staring at the forest until Glenn honks his horn, motioning for me to join him. I hurry over to the door, clambering in next to Beth, allowing Coco onto my lap. We share a small smile, both of us in shock over the loss of our loved ones.
We end up driving around for most of the day, the light very slowly evaporating. I point this out to Glenn, and he nods, telling us that Rick will tell us what to do soon. Glenn is right, as only a few seconds after his statement, Rick leans on his horn, bringing the entire caravan to a stop. We scamper from the cars, meeting around the hood of ours.
"You out of gas?" I ask Rick loudly.
He nods, pointing his gun behind him at the truck. "We've been running on fumes."
Maggie shivers slightly, before glancing around her. "We can't stay here, it's not safe."
I nod, and so does Glenn, before he argues her point. "We can't all fit in one car, there's too many of us."
"We're gonna have to make a run for gas in the morning," Rick rumbles, rubbing his bloodied face.
Carol's brows shoot up, her eyes wider than I'd see before. "Spend the night here?" She asks incredulously. I share her surprise, not buying into the safety of the group.
Carl steps toward Rick, rubbing his hands over his arms. "I'm freezing, Dad."
"We'll have to build a fire," Lori tells him as his father passes him his jacket. I pull my own jacket closer to myself, feeling the chill of the approaching night.
"I'll go an' gather firewood. I've still got a bunch of bullets," I offer, shaking my gun in my hand.
"I'll come with, but you stay close. Only got so many arrows. How you doing on ammo?" he asks Rick, stepping over to me.
Rick sighs. "Not enough," he complains. We were totally and absolutely screwed if we ran out of ammo. We had no food, no shelter, and barely any ammo. Sitting by the side of a highway was rather stupid, and Rick was even stupider if he believed we'd survive doing just that.
Maggie seems to agree. "We can't just sit here with our asses hangin' out, there's walker's everywhere."
"We'll set up a perimeter. In the morning, we'll go out and find gas, hopefully some supplies. We keep pushing on," he orders, pointing around the small area.
"I can make a run now, scrounge up some food and gas," I state, begging to be let off.
"No," he begins angrily. "We stay together. God forbid something happens and people get stranded without a car."
I narrow my eyes, annoyed at the way he's handling the situation. "We're stranded now!" I exclaim.
"I know it looks bad, Lily," he tells me quietly. "We've been through hell and back, but we found each other. I wasn't sure if we would, I really wasn't, but we did. We're together, and we keep it that way. We'll find shelter somewhere. There's gotta be somewhere to go."
I sigh, staring back at him. "Look around. There's walkers everywhere. They're moving, straight towards us."
Hershel shakes his head, glaring at me from his place beside Rick. "There's gotta be a place that we can fortify, pull ourselves together. A place to build a life for each other. I know it's out there."
"Say we do find a place, we think it's safe. For how long? Look at the farm. We fooled ourselves, thinking it was safe," Glenn growls, securing his arm around Maggie's waist.
"We won't make that mistake again. I won't," I mutter. My shock was quickly turning to anger, and I found my emotions building up, threatening to spill.
The rest of the group agree to camp by the road for the night, deciding that we truly have nowhere else to go, at least tonight. I can see Carol stalking over to me and Daryl, her expression dark.
"Does this feel right to you?" She hisses at me.
"I found Randall. He turned, but he weren't bit," Daryl suddenly tells us, looking around quickly.
"What the fuck? How is that even possible," I cry, the events of the day pushing me over the edge.
"Shane killed Randall," Daryl says soberly, not looking at me. "Just like he always said he'd do."
I nod, looking to Rick. "And then the herd got him, right? He was bit afterwards?"
Rick seems to be in a trance, fighting inwardly with himself. "We're all infected," he blurts out, staring at his feet.
"Excuse me?" I whisper. That can't be true, I mean, we were all alive.
"Jenner told me, back at the CDC. Whatever it is, we all have it," he explains, fiddling with his gun.
"And you didn't think to say anythin'?" I yell, pointing at him. "We deserve to know!"
Rick snarls at me. "It wouldn't have made a difference!" He shouts back.
Glenn steps up, standing to my right. "You knew this entire time?" He asks, his voice dangerously quietly.
"How could I have known? For sure? You saw how crazy he was," Glenn interrupts his rant, voicing the words we all were thinking.
"That's not your call. I told everyone about the walker's in the barn, for the good of the group."
"I thought it was best that people didn't know," he spits, before stalking off, ignoring Lori's calls to come back.
I scoff loudly, walking into the forest, deciding to use the waning light to my advantage. I leave Coco with Carl, understanding the safety of the dog. I hear someone follow me, and I know without turning around that it's Daryl.
"I'm only lookin' for firewood. I can do it myself," I growl behind me.
"You've only got a gun, it's not quiet enough so I came with, like I said I would," he states mildly, still following close behind me.
"I want to be alone," I try again, hoping he'll leave me alone.
"You can't. You've just lost your brother, and the man who you thought of as a brother was lyin' to us all," he counters. "I get it. I know what you're going through."
I spin around at his words, my eyes filling with angry tears. "You know nothin'. You have no idea what I'm goin' through." I seeth. "Me and Shane were finally rebuildin' our relationship. And now he's dead. You and your brother were close! And he might not even be dead!"
I was expecting a big blow up, for Daryl to scream at me, to tell me that I'm a bitch. I'm surprised when he just sighs, throwing his crossbow over his back. "Me and Merle were close, sure. But that don't mean that he wasn't the most irritatin', self centered asshole out there. Everyone could see that you cared about Shane."
I growl menacingly, stepping towards him. "You don't know that. I hated him. I told Rick that he had to kill Shane, for the good of the group. I wanted him dead. And now he is, I want him back."
Daryl releases a long breath, his clear eyes never leaving mine. "You have to care to be able to hate," he tells me softly.
I roll my eyes at him, the tears slowly dissipating. "You're right, but that doesn't make me any better than him. He cared for me, and he got me kicked out. I cared for him, and I basically lined up his execution."
With these parting words, I walk off, still in search for firewood. My mind reels from the conversation, and I feel myself finally opening up my body for my emotions. The tears return, blurring my vision, and heating my face. My breathing grows uneven, coming out in sobs. I gasp for air, begging my lungs to accept the oxygen I'm trying to take in. My hands tingle, and my knife drops from them, a soft thud sounding as it hits the ground. I sink down next to it, my hands grasping the fallen leaves and twigs, needing the grounding of physical objects.
My breakdown doesn't last long, and I pull myself up, still not having any wood to go back with. I spend an extra 20 minutes looking, and when I return to everyone, my arms are full with wood. The light has almost completely disappeared, leaving us in the dark. Daryl quickly lights a small fire in the centre of a clearing, and we use the protection of a few stone walls to shield us from any potential attacks.
I know I should apologize to Rick for shouting at him, and I feel bad for the way I treated him. Though I couldn't do that at the moment, due to the fact that Rick was currently hiding somewhere nearby, and I didn't fancy searching the woods blindly for the man.
A sudden chill ran through the group, accompanied by a loud rustling just outside our camp. I pull Coco closer to me, and inch closer to Glenn. T raises his rifle, as does Maggie, and Rick appears at a gap in the wall.
"What was that?" Beth whispers fearfully, clinging to her father.
"Walker?" I whisper back, not caring if I scare her.
"Which way?" Glenn asks, pushing himself to his feet, bringing his gun with him.
Beth points in the direction of the vehicles. "Back from where we came."
A couple of us begin to get up, prepared to find the source of the noise. "We don't need everyone running off in the dark. We don't have the vehicles and there's no way anyone's traveling on foot," Rick hisses, throwing his arm out to prevent us from escaping.
"I'm not waitin' for another herd to blow through. We need to find shelter," I state, genuinely scared for this group.
Rick shakes his head furiously, glaring daggers at me. "No one is going anywhere!"
I feel myself shaking with anger, and this time I'm unable to push it down. "Then do somethin' for fuck's sake! We're sat here just waiting for the next person to die, for the next attack. We need to move! We've been sayin' it since the farm fell. Nowhere is safe Rick! Even Shane knew that," I spit.
"And look where he is now, Lily!" He screams, disregarding our safety once more. "He led me out to the woods to put a bullet in my back. Randall escaping was him, it was all him. I killed my best friend for y'all!"
I freeze, even my heart stopping in the few seconds that follow his confession.
Rick did what?
A/N I finished s2! please comment what you think :)