Chapter fifteen: Safer than ever.
It wasn't a long walk between Mount Vernon and the circled area on the map; we made it in less than four days, taking only short breaks for water.
Along a main road, we found a stack of water bottles and a few cans of food with a note blue tacked to them. Sam read it aloud as a note from someone who wanted to help us, there was even a can of baby formula.
"Whoever left this has been followin' us." Phineas spat, throwing the note on the floor as Sam nodded and started to look around at the tree line. "We're bein' spied on, Sam, how the hell do we deal with this?"
"Carefully, we keep a closer watch when we make camp tonight." I replied and he glanced over before nodding and running his hand through his hair. "We'll just have to be twice as cautious to cover our tracks." I continued whilst rubbing my back before the trees behind us rustled. With knives raised, Jonah and Tyreese approached the source of the noise, disappearing before dragging a man in a navy blue raincoat and large backpack from behind a tree; he was carrying some kind of listening device in his hand.
"Hey, hey, I'm not gonna try anything." He said loudly, panicked almost, looking around in confusion at the fact that he was seeing triple. Narrowing my eyes, I stepped around Phineas, handing Judith to him and reaching for my knife.
"Why're you followin' us?" I demanded and the man turned his eyes to me before Sam stepped into his eye-line.
"I wasn't I was just looking for people out here that needed help and happened across your group." He answered and I thought he was being honest, but I could never be sure about that.
"What's your name?" I asked and I could hear him swallowing hard.
"Aaron."
"Are you alone, Aaron?" Phineas sneered, stroking Judy's hair gently.
"No," that got the triplet's backs up again, replacing the slight relaxation they had slipped into. "No, I'm out here with my partner, Eric." I looked around, unable to see another person near us.
"Then where is he? Hiding in the bushes listenin' to us talkin'?" Jonah mocked, Tyreese then left the four of us to watch Aaron and searched the trees surrounding us.
"We're clear; no one else is out here." He replied and I nodded, watching as Sam moved aside and let me get closer to Aaron.
"Where is he?" Aaron swallowed hard again and raised his hands.
"We have a community, he's waiting for us near there," he looked me up and down before trying his luck. "We have walls, plenty of houses where the Walkers would never hear her crying." That struck another nerve.
"Who told you to call them Walkers?" I snapped and he paled. "Who fuckin' told you?"
"That-that-that's what Rick's group call them!" He exclaimed and I froze, the triplets and Tyreese exchanged a confused look before lowering their knives. "We found Rick's group about four months ago, wandering not too far from here, there were more of them then there are of you but even so, we could tell we'd have just as much trouble convincing you to come with us as we did with them."
"What do we do?" Sam asked softly, leaning down to my level.
"Yeah, we had horrible trouble trying to convince Rick that we weren't just trying to lure him in and kill them all; he had loads of back up in his fears. Daryl and Merle did not want to come with us; they were looking for a woman, didn't want to come with us without her." I frowned and turned my back.
"What do you boys think?" Sam shook his head.
"He could be lyin' plenty of people out there called Rick." He reasoned and I nodded.
"Not so many left called Daryl and Merle." Phin pointed out and Jonah shrugged, glancing over his shoulder as Aaron seemed to be catching his breath.
"I say we go and just test the waters, if we don't like it, we can leave." He pointed out and Tyreese nodded, Judith reaching out to pull on Sam's beard before whining.
"Alright, then it's agreed three to one." I muttered, the circle broke and we all turned back to Aaron and nodded in unison. "Fine, we'll come with you, but if you're lyin'," looking over at Sam, I smirked. "Well, if you're lyin' we'll kill you first."
"I guess that's fair enough."
I was glad that we didn't have to walk all the way to this community, Aaron had an RV with him, it was more comfort than we'd had in a long time; I was able to feed Judith proper food, but only a little as I didn't want to risk making her sick. Sam and Jonah were arguing about what to open, flat soda or flat lemonade; Tyreese settled it by opening the lemonade and pouring himself a cup.
"You two should loosen up." He recommended and I rolled my eyes, Phineas in the Driver's seat beside Aaron, who was looking pale as he gave us directions.
"We should pull over here and collect Eric." He recommended, pointing to his right and I looked out of the window and saw a man with strawberry blonde hair waiting on the shoulder of the road.
"Fine," I nodded at Sam and he opened the door, Eric looked surprised but hurried towards the RV, grinning until he took in the pale cast of Aaron's face. "Let's go Phin." I finished, sitting down as Tyreese took Judith and put her down for a nap in the back, staying in there with her. "How much longer will we be driving?"
"About another thirty minutes, it's not too far from here." Eric responded and I nodded, trying to get more comfortable. "There's plenty of room for all of you." He added reassuringly, none of us paid him any heed, Sam sitting beside me as Jonah started to pace.
"How're you feelin'?" He asked, finally perching on the counter as I smoothed my sweater down, shrugging.
"Nauseous, but I can't tell if it's nerves or not." I answered and he sniggered, Sam shaking his head and running a hand through his hair.
"Probably a nasty mix of both, or it could be travel sickness; it's been a long time since any of us were in a car. You might feel better once we're on our feet again." Nodding, I laughed.
"Oh perfect, more walkin'...well, yeehaw bro." I joked and Sam grinned reluctantly, as if he was trying to keep a strong façade going on.
After another thirty minutes, Aaron had Phin pull over; we'd have to walk the rest of the way in as there wasn't really enough room for the RV to get down the road. Tyreese carried Judith part of the way before handing her to me, needing both hands to help push a car out of the way. I wondered if Aaron and Eric were just leading us into a trap but shook the thought out of my head, why would they want to harm a pregnant woman and a baby. They looked like nice enough men and if the rest of our group was already a part of their community…
How bad could it be?