10:25 AM
Dixon's Cabin
Daryl leaned the motorcycle into the turn as he headed up the dirt path to Dixon's cabin, and Carol tightened her grip around his waist. He sped up the roadway that carved an aisle through the Georgia pines, his tires crunching over scattered green needles. The bike shot forward, and then purred to a stop outside the spot where the trip wire used to rest.
Daryl dismounted and investigated the ground. "Wire's down."
"Someone tripped it?" Carol asked as he got back onto the bike.
"Nah. Think the wind knocked it down, during that rainstorm awhile back." He drove the bike forward over the fallen wire which had already been set off some time ago, stopped in front of the cabin, and dismounted again before grabbing his bow from the luggage rack. He swung the bow up and fired. The bolt glided through the air and tore clean through a walker that had lurched out from behind the cabin.
Carol drew her jasmine knife as she dismounted and stabbed another walker. The couple swept around the cabin looking for more of the creatures, but found the area clear. As they rounded the front of the cabin again, Glenn pulled to a stop in the pick-up truck and Maggie leapt out, asking, "Any sign of them?"
Daryl's eyes were sweeping the earth. "Ain't no one been here lately," he said. He climbed the two wooden stairs to the porch and tried the door, only to find it locked. He peered through the windows, a hand against his forehead, pressed to the glass. "Ain't likely no one been here since the kids hid out from the Governor."
"What now then?" asked Glenn, approaching the porch.
"We drive toward that vocational center," Carol said. "They would have been coming from there to the cabin when they got waylaid. If they got waylaid. If that radio call was about them."
"Why did you assume they would be coming to the cabin in the first place?" Maggie asked.
Carol glanced at Daryl.
"Oh." Maggie gritted her teeth and shook her head. "If my sister is hurt or dead because Dixon wanted to get – "
"- Ain't his fault," Daryl growled. "Whatever the hell happened, ain't his fault. My nephew – if he's alive – is probably tearin' himself the hell up right now over whatever happened. He sure as shit don't need you adding to his guilt!"
"She's just worried, man," Glenn told him. "She's worried about her baby sister."
"We're all worried," Carol said in a calming tone. "Let's not take it out on each other."
Glenn opened a map on the hood of the pick-up and trailed his finger over the roadways. "This minor highway is most likely the clearest route toward the vocational center. So we drive it? See what we can find?"
Daryl nodded, cinched his bow to the pack on the luggage rack, and mounted his motorcycle again. Carol slipped on behind him, with her AR-15 strapped across her back, and slipped her arms around him. She pressed a hand against his chest, and could feel his heart thudding with fear for his nephew.
The bike shot off as the doors to the pick-up truck slammed shut.
11:45 AM
Northern Virginia
"You got a man back at the Kingdom?" Gavin asked as he pulled his pick-up onto Route 1 and blew by a walking dead creature before easing around an abandoned van.
"A man?" Dianne asked from the passenger's seat beside him. "Have you seen the pickings?"
"What about Daniel? Your fellow knight?" Gavin was trying to get a feel for the popularity and character of the man that Frankie kept name dropping. He knew Daniel was a decent fighter. He'd seen that much when Jed and Regina attacked the Kingdom.
"I don't care for gingers," Dianne replied. "No offense intended toward your own tastes."
"None taken."
Gavin glanced in the rearview mirror at DJ, who was riding in the bed with some items for trade. "I thought Daniel was more of a strawberry blonde, though."
"Looks like you're the one who's taken an interest," Dianne said drolly.
Gavin changed the subject. "Were you married in the old world?"
"What is this, twenty questions?"
"Just trying to make polite conversation." He dodged another walker in the road and then drove on the shoulder for a few yards to pass some abandoned cars. "I had a wife and two kids. Boys. Liam and Oliver."
"Oliver?" Dianne asked. "Did he always want some more porridge?"
"He always wanted more Pokémon cards. I think spent a small fortune on those things. And to think, I could give him thousands now, if he had lived." Gavin gripped the steering wheel a bit more tightly.
Dianne glanced at his knuckles on the wheel. "I was divorced," she answered.
Gavin glanced at her with a slight smirk. "This is my shocked face."
"Watch the road, councilman."
Gavin chuckled as he returned his attention to the highway.
11:55 AM
About an Hour Outside of Atlanta
Daryl slowed down when Fun Kingdom's military truck came into sight on the shoulder of the highway. His heart caught in his throat. He pulled the bike to a stop and put both feet down as Carol leapt off the back of the motorcycle and swept her rifle free of her shoulder. She began walking around the vehicle, rifle trained for trouble. He'd just grabbed his bow when the pick-up pulled to a stop and the doors opened.
"Daryl!" Carol called.
Daryl jogged to where she stood on the other side of the truck nearest the tree line. A flat tire lay discarded in the ditch at the side of the road, and a spare one lay propped against the vehicle. It appeared Dixon had applied the jack to the truck and pumped it maybe twice before stopping in mid tire-change. Daryl scoured the ground for signs.
"What do you see?" Maggie, who was now beside him, asked anxiously.
"Stand back," he told her.
She stepped away as he examined the scene in silence. Daryl walked up the road a way contemplating a small bit of blood spatter, the tire skids, footprints in the dirt on the shoulder, and the spent shell casings.
He returned to Maggie, who looked at him expectantly. "Think a car hit Beth. She was standin' watch while Dixon changed the tire, and it just came fast and plowed into her. She might of been shootin' at it when it did. Whoever hit her got out quick and took her, before Dixon could grab his rifle. He gave chase on foot, shooting. But the car got away."
"Then where's Dixon?" Maggie asked.
"Dunno. Need to follow the shell casings."
Glenn and Maggie got back in the pick-up and Carol and Daryl saddled his motorcycle again. The vehicles crept along the highway, Daryl close to the edge, driving so slowly he could just barely balance it, keeping his eye on every hint of a trail. Eventually, the shell casings disappeared. They'd gone half a mile without seeing one. "He ran out of ammo," Daryl called over the purr of the engine.
Dixon was a good shot, but he wouldn't have wanted to shoot indiscriminately at the windows, not with Beth inside. And hitting the tire of a car moving at sixty or seventy miles an hour or more was next to impossible. But he'd shot until his magazine were spent, and then he'd probably carried on by foot after the car, even when such a chase was pointless. But where was he? He would have returned, changed the tire, and driven after her at some point, wouldn't he?
Because Daryl was so intent on the road, it was Carol who saw the walker first and called to him to stop down. The creature was far enough away they wouldn't have bothered with it except that it seemed to be approaching something in a ditch along the shoulder – a human body.
With no time to unshoulder and aim her rifle, Carol drew her throwing knife, flicked it open, and hurled it through the air and straight into the walker's forehead.
Another walker emerged from the tree line at the edge of the road and came growling forth. Daryl had jerked the motorcycle to a stop. Carol dismounted rapidly, swung her rifle into position, and stared through the scope, one eye closed, to take out the emerging walker. First one, then another and another before they stopped spilling from the trees.
Daryl ran to the body at the side of the road. It was Dixon, all right. He knelt down quickly beside it and lowered his ear to the teenager's mouth. He was still breathing. Frantically, Daryl began running his hands all over the body, lifting up his shirt, and searching for bite marks.
When Carol jogged to him, she asked, "Is he bit?"
"Don't think so."
"Is he alive?"
"Kid's breathing." Daryl slapped Dixon's cheek. "Dixon! Hey, Dixon!"
Dixon blinked and closed his eyes again.
Now Glenn and Maggie were beside them.
"Dixon, where's Beth?" Maggie cried.
Dixon blinked again, swallowed, and murmured something incoherent.
Carol returned to the bike for the pack and pulled out a medical kit. She kneeled beside Dixon and pulled up his eyelids to shine a small flashlight on them. Hershel and Bob had both taught her a thing or two. Daryl stood back as she lifted his head and felt behind it.
"I think he collapsed from exhaustion," she concluded, "when he was giving chase. He hit his head hard on the pavement. He must have been knocked temporarily unconscious."
"He's lucky you got here when you did," Glenn observed, "or he'd have been walker lunch."
"He's got a concussion for sure," Carol said. "I'm not sure when he'll be talking sensibly again. He's probably dehydrated, too. We need to get him back to Fun Kingdom. Have Bob look at him."
The radio on Maggie's hip – which Tom had fixed – crackled. "It's Rick. Come in. Over."
"Maggie here. We found Dixon. He's injured. Incoming. Over."
"I found a list of county codes in the security office. They're Fulton county codes, and they meant more or less what I thought. So possibly Atlanta PD. Over."
"We're bringing Dixon in," Maggie told him. "Tell Bob to be ready. Concussion. Possible dehydration. Deliriousness. Over and out." When she lowered the radio, she exclaimed, "We have to go to Atlanta!"
"We don't know what we're looking for," Glenn told her. "Dixon's not fully conscious yet. We need to talk to him first. We can just run head first into walker-infested Atlanta not knowing what we're looking for! And they might not even be Atlanta cops. Fulton county has other towns."
"Every second we waste," Maggie said, "it will be harder and harder to find Beth."
"Y'all take Dixon back," Daryl said. "Give me the radio. Carol and I'll go on to Atlanta. See what we can see. Be in touch."
Maggie unsnapped the radio and handed it to him. "Be careful what you say on it. They could be listening in." Rick had mentioned the security office, but a security office could be anywhere. He hadn't said park. "And once Dixon is fully conscious, if we find out it was an Atlanta PD cop car? Glenn and I are coming after you."
"Ain't no sense runnin' off half cocked," Daryl insisted. "Wait 'til you hear from us. Might take a couple days to find 'er in that city." If they found her at all, Daryl thought. It would be like searching for a needle in a haystack teaming with the undead. They'd start with the police stations, he supposed. "Need the Georgia map."
As Glenn pulled the map out of his back pocket and handed it to Daryl, Carol said, "We'll assess the situation. Figure out the strength of the camp Beth's been taken into. We might need more than just you and Glenn once we do, to attempt a rescue. Don't mention Beth by name on the radio or any specific locations. Use the code for dates and times."
Maggie nodded. "Let's top off your tank with gas before you go. I suppose you'll park at the edge of the city and then go in to investigate by foot? Because that bike's loud. It'll not only draw the captor's attention, but walkers."
Daryl nodded. "We need to be able to get up high in one of the buildings anyhow, watch the streets for that cop car. It probably goes out from time to time. Might be able to follow it."
"Have you got the binoculars?" Glenn asked.
"Yes," Carol told him. "And my scope. Extra ammo. Two handguns. Six knives between us. Daryl's bow. My rife. A couple of MREs for dinner. Full canteens. We'll scavenge from there as needed."
Maggie went and lowered the tailgate to the pickup, and Glenn and Daryl carefully lay a murmuring, incoherent Dixon in the bed. Maggie tried to give him some water before taking off as Daryl and Carol saddled his motorcycle. Daryl kick started the bike, which roared to life, and then the couple flew off toward the city they hadn't set foot in since the CDC exploded.