Chapter twenty-two: Save us almighty Gherkin.
"Be nice until they give you a reason not to be."
"I know it looks bad, we've all been through hell and worse, but at least we found each other." Rick rubbed his eyes in exhaustion, having the whole group up his ass right now probably wasn't doing any good to ease the high running tensions. "I wasn't sure...I really wasn't...but we did. We're together. We keep it that way. We'll find shelter somewhere. There's gotta be a place." Glenn looked around and then scoffed.
"Rick, look around. Okay? There're walkers everywhere, they're migrating or something." He hissed, hands nervously clenching and wringing around the shotgun in his hands as Rick nodded and turned his back on us.
"There's gotta be a place not just where we hole up, but that we fortify, hunker down, pull ourselves together, build a life for each other. I know it's out there. We just have to find it."
"Even if we do find a place and we think it's safe, we can never be sure." Maggie said faithlessly, a shotgun in her hands as well and I could have sworn that Andrea's hand twitched towards her own firearm. "Would you look at what happened on the farm? We fooled ourselves into thinking that that was safe." Hershel shook his head and looked at Maggie sadly.
"We won't make that mistake again." He promised and a collective nod went around the gathered group members.
"We'll make camp tonight over there, get on the road at the break of day." Rick pointed to some ruins on the other side of the road, they looked safe enough.
"Does this feel right to you?" Carol asked softly, looking up at Daryl as though he would argue against stopping and tell everyone that we needed to keep running.
"What if walkers come through or another group like Randall's?" Beth inquired and Daryl shook his head with a small and concerned frown.
"You know I found Randall, right? He had turned, but he wasn't bit." He squinted at Rick as I met his eye and subtly shook my head; now was not the time to be talking about this. "How's that possible?"
"Rick, what the hell happened?" Lori demanded, wrapping her arms around Carl.
"Shane killed Randall, just like he always wanted to." Rick began, and his wife nodded.
"And then the herd got him?" She interrupted.
"We're all infected." I shook my head as the group fell silent in the wake of this revelation; Maggie looked like she wanted to shoot Rick herself.
"What?"
"At the CDC, Jenner told me. Whatever it is, we all carry it."
"And you never said anything?" Glenn observed and I scoffed.
"Would it have made a difference?" I asked and he turned on me with a sharp glare before going back to Rick.
"You knew this whole time?" Rick nodded and shook his head straight after, shaking out his right hand.
"How could I have known for sure?" He retorted and Lori was staring at the floor as she turned Carl's face away from his father. "You saw how crazy that mother-."
"That is not your call." Glenn interrupted before stepping forwards. "Okay, when I found out about the walkers in the barn, I told, for the good of everyone."
"Well, I thought it best that people didn't know." Rick walked away from us all, Lori following hot after leaving Carl with Carol and Sophia.
"How about we go and get that firewood, eh?" I said softly, patting Daryl's arm before heading towards the trees. He was quieter than usual the whole time we were away from the group, deep in thought and he stopped us before we returned. "What's up?" He looked up at me, calculating.
"You knew?" I frowned. "About us all being infected, I heard Rick tellin' you, same day you didn't wanna judge Merle, you said that that knowledge would make people do stupid shit." I nodded and looked down at the floor in shame.
"I knew, yeah." I couldn't bring myself to look Daryl in the eye. "…you gonna tell 'em I knew as well?" He shook his head.
"Nah, it's done." I reached out and grabbed his arm as he went to pass, finally looking into his eyes.
"I meant what I said, all of it."
Camp was uncomfortably quiet as we returned, Daryl and T-Dog built the fire as watches were set up on every open part of the ruin; Rick was pacing back and forth opposite to me, one of us on either side of the fire. The fire crackled as Carol shifted closer to Daryl's side and I could hear her start to try and cast dissent.
"We're not safe with him...keeping something like that from us." As she glanced at Rick over her shoulder, Daryl looked up at me before frowning. "Why do you need him? He's just gonna pull you down."
"No." He shook his head as Lori looked over, listening into their conversation as the rest of us were. "Rick's done all right by me."
"You're his henchman and I'm a burden." Carol accused, sitting back and folding her arms over Sophia as she slept. "You deserve better."
"What do you want?" I asked grudgingly and she turned her dissent towards me.
"I want a man of honour." Snorting, I shook my head and rested my hand on my knife.
"Rick has honour." Daryl argued and Maggie stood from where she, Beth, Hershel and Glenn were sat, she looked around at the group before taking a breath.
"I think we should take our chances."
"Don't be foolish. There's no food, no fuel, no ammo." Hershel said immediately and Maggie glowered down at her father. A twig snapping in the distance had the group on their feet and the children awake; Daryl crossed to where I stood, looking out into the darkness, unable to see anything.
"What was that?" Beth asked, Hershel shielding her from whatever might be about to jump out at us.
"It could have been anything." I replied soothingly, fear rising in my throat as I fought to squish it, reaching behind myself to Daryl for reassurance.
"Could be a raccoon, could be a possum." He agreed indifferently.
"It could have been a Walker." Carol contended and I rolled my eyes, getting just about sick of her attitude already. "We need to leave. I mean what are we waiting for?" Maggie nodded in agreement.
"Which way do we go?"
"It came from over there, back from where we came." Glenn pointed off into the distance, knowing he might have been wrong.
"The last thing we need is for everyone to be running off in the dark." Rick ground out through clenched teeth, holding onto his tether, but barely. "We don't have the vehicles and no one's traveling on foot." Hershel nodded and then patted Maggie's shoulder.
"Don't panic." He advised, sitting back down and pulling Beth with him.
"I'm not...but I'm also not just sitting here and waiting for another herd to blow through. We need to move, now." Rick entered the camp and shook his head.
"No one is going anywhere." Carol stomped over to him, standing about three inches from his face.
"Do something." She demanded and even Lori was nodding, I shook my head and turned back to keeping watch as Rick exploded at the others.
"I am doing something! I'm keeping this group together, alive. I've been doing that all along, no matter what. I didn't ask for this." He raised his voice, but only a little, not wanting to bring unwanted attention down on us. "I killed my best friend for you people, for Christ's sake! You saw what he was like, how he pushed me, how he compromised us, how he threatened us. He staged the whole Randall thing, led me out to put a bullet in my back." Rick shook his head as Lori gaped and Carl began to sob; Maggie was back to glowering as the others stood in silence. "He gave me no choice. He was my friend, but he came after me so my hands are clean. Maybe you people are better off without me. Go ahead. I say there's a place for us, but maybe...maybe it's just another pipe dream. Maybe...maybe I'm fooling myself again. Why don't you...why don't you go and find out yourself? Send me a postcard. Go on, there's the door. You can do better? Let's see how far you get." Not a single person moved a muscle, not even Maggie and Glenn with their big plans of making it on their own. "No takers? Fine, but get one thing straight... if you're staying? This isn't a democracy anymore."