Eve's POV
My body is heavier than plutonium right now but I feel light as feather being back with my group. My partner.
I have to be one of the luckiest people to ever exist. Even though just breathing feels like being in labor right now.
I don't know how long passed, time is kind of going in and out in bubbles of awareness but I know I drank at least half another water bottle that was put to my lips and as soon as Daryl (I assume) laid me down in the car, I was out like sand in the tide.
A deep breath inflated my aching lungs, pushing on my sore ribs as the glue seeming to hold my eyelids shut, began to crack.
I don't wanna get up. It's cold.
But that's exactly why I'm awake.
The more I wake up, the colder it gets. Or rather, the more aware of it I become.
I tried to pull my jacket around myself tighter but the intense dull aching in every atom of my being, is making my entire body pulse; all the way down to my bones.
The only part of my body that doesn't hurt is the half I know I slept on, and it's tingling like a wasp's nest.
Peeling my eyes open to the world around me, I blinked harshly; trying to rid myself of the haze of sleep but no matter how hard I try, it's holding on tighter than a scared toddler.
However, not even that can keep the realization that I'm alone, at bay.
Panic struck through me as I looked around, not recognizing the interior of the car.
I pressed my hand into the backseat my face is squished against and pushed myself to sit up, wheezing as I grappled with the seat and my own pain receptors to get up.
My hand smacked the door handle, pulling on it to get myself the rest of the way up and I barely remembered to look around before all but kicking it open.
My boot hit the ground and I nearly collapsed, saved only by my hands grabbing the top of the car door out of pure instinct.
"Whoa whoa whoa, ey" an arm wrapped my back and I jumped, almost clobbering Daryl around the head (if my arms were up for cooperating at the moment, he'd have a bloody nose already).
"The Hell do ya think yer doin'? You shouldn't even be awake yet, Sunshine." Daryl scolded me as Glenn came around the car from the circle the group seems to be standing in, in the middle of the road.
"Put that grown child back to bed."
I deadpanned at T-Dog.
"Don' give me that look." he pointed at me. "You're lucky you ain't sleepin' with the fishes after what you pulled."
"I don't go for merfolk." I mumbled, and immediately regret it. My throat feels like the sahara and sounds like I've been smoking for 1000 years.
Glenn choked and Randall next to him snorted so hard I felt it from here.
I flinched as Daryl squeezed my side a little too hard. "If you got the energy to make stupid jokes, you should be layin' down."
"I don't wanna lay down." I mumbled like a dejected little kid, voice much softer .
"She gets weird when she's tired." Beth almost smiled but looks like she's too stressed.
Everyone looks stressed.
"It's like when she got drunk and started talking about pancakes." Carl muttered to her, shaking in his dad's big tan jacket.
"Alright alright. We need to focus on the problem at hand." Rick brought everyone back.
I looked at Daryl for explanation and he just brought my arm over his shoulders, helping me walk to the circle.
I feel like I'm about to be sacrificed.
He sat me down on his bike, "Stay. If I see ya so much as bouncing yer leg, yer goin' back in the truck."
What am I, a misbehaving pet?
"No. Yer worse."
Oops, did I say that outloud?
"What do you think?"
I bit my lips. 'Apparently filter is broken. Check back later when tank is full.'
Where the Hell are we? I'm so hungry I think my intestines just got a foot shorter. Is there any water?
This looks like a long two way road through some backwater woods. A scenic long distance traveller's road. With nothing but forest for miles. Then again, this is Georgia.
"Glenn and I could make a run, try to scrounge up some gas." Maggie suggested, whispering the last part and glancing around with the shotgun in her arms held tight; Ready to just swing and shoot at a moment's notice.
Jesus, I can taste the tension. What the Hell happened while I was asleep?
I only remember laying on the ground, thinking this was my final stop. Then Daryl, and water, and the loveliest nap of my life.
"No, we stay together." Rick nipped that idea in the bud. "God forbid something happens and people get stranded without a car."
"Rick we're stranded now." Glenn reminded, glancing through the woods around us.
"I know it looks bad. We've all been through Hell and worse, but at least we found each other." Rick stressed. And I can't agree more.
It doesn't matter where we are, or what happens around us so long as we stick together, we'll be ok.
"I wasn't sure, I—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." Rick turned, looking around like you can actually see more than ten feet into the forest.
If there is a place like that around… I don't think it'll be unoccupied. I don't think it's somewhere we can find.
"Rick look around. There's walkers everywhere, they're—they're migrating or something." Glenn reasoned, almost pleading.
"There's gotta be a place not— not just where we hole up. But where we fortify." Rick's not just answering now, he's thinking out loud. "Hunker down. Pull ourselves together, build a life for each other." Whoa getting a little aggressive there, Officer.
"I know it it's out there we just have to find it."
We can't count on finding a place like the CDC or Hershel's farm again. Both of those places fell to the walkers within days or weeks of when we found them.
We'll have better luck building the place ourselves—...
Actually. That's not such a bad idea.
Assuming we can find somewhere with a good enough foundation.
Even that'll be tough to find outside of the cities (which crawl with walkers). And we're not the only people out there with an idea like that. G's group is enough proof of that; even if they're not there anymore.
I really hope my predictions about their place were wrong, but I'm not holding my breath.
"Even if we do find such a place." Maggie started. "And we think it's safe, we can never be sure. For how long."
She has a point. Unless we design it very carefully. Specifically so that it will last.
"Look what happened with the farm. We fooled ourselves into thinking that was safe." Maggie persisted.
"We won't make that mistake again." Hershel interjected.
To do that, we need to figure out what went wrong. Why wasn't it safe? Why haven't any of the places we've been to, or seen, withstood the test of time?
The pitfall of all the places out there right now is they're either: not designed to withstand the world today, they're not self-sufficient enough to sustain themselves, or they're poorly constructed; often in a hurry to just have a place defensible enough to sleep at night.
The farm in the countryside, G's place in the city, and the CDC are all great examples of each flaw. Hell, even the quarry camp is a good example to draw from.
The problem with the farm: not built to withstand walkers.
The CDC: not built to sustain itself.
G's place: constructed in a hurry and to be a temporary hideout until they could get out of the city (he said so himself).
The problem with the quarry: no sight lines, no defenses, not even early warning systems.
We were sitting ducks on that hilltop, but that was before we had any idea of what we're dealing with on a day to day basis.
Hell, some were still hoping for rescue or a way out back then.
It feels like so long ago. In reality it's only been a few months since then.
I know Rick wants this place more than anything right now. But… I'm not sure it's even obtainable anymore. Something like that isn't just dropped into your lap. If it were, there'd be much larger factions of the population surviving.
Maybe that'll change down the line someday, but for now, the best we can hope for is a base camp.
Things will never be like they were before. We won't ever be able to let our guard down not just against walkers, but against people who want what we have and nothing to stop them from simply killing us and taking it.
There's gotta be a way. There always is.