KEZZ 1: Thanks for reading!
Lumina bliss: Oh, the friendship between Maggie and Miri will happen, she's one of my favorites.
AugustRrush: Here is the next one, its super late but here it is!
pyrojack25: Man, life has its rough patches but you gotta pull through :) I finally had time to sit, relax and go over this chapter to let it out.
Rit: Here's more for you!
Acouvion: Update!
Lucy Greenhill: Here's some more to love!
Daryl was leading the group, his annoyance towards the whining and the constant stopping getting on his nerves. When Lori stopped, making everyone else stop, he just about nearly stabbed someone.
Lori looked back to where the loud sound of a gun shot went off, her thoughts driving her nearly crazy.
"You still worrying about it?" Andrea called out to her.
"That was a gunshot." She answered.
"We all heard it." Daryl told her as he looked around for any hidden signs of foot prints or anything that showed if Sophia or Miri came by the same path.
"Why one?" Lori turned around to look at everyone. "Why just one gunshot?"
Daryl shrugged, just wanting everyone to shut up so he could enjoy the silence and focus on finding the missing females. "Maybe they took down a walker."
"Please, don't patronize me." Lori glared at him. "Rick wouldn't risk one bullet to take down a walker. Or Shane. They'd do it quietly."
Carol looked around nervous. "Shouldn't they have caught up with us now?"
Daryl was getting anxious to start moving, but these damn people wouldn't stop talking. "There's nothing we can do anyway. Can't run around these woods chasing after echoes."
"So what do we do?" Lori asked.
Daryl looked around. "We do as we've been. Beat the bush for Sophia and Aussie, work our way back to the highway."
"I'm sure they'll hook up with us back at the RV." Andrea tried to keep everyone's hopes up, though she continued to feel upset.
'All this standing around and talking shit ain't gonna find them.' Daryl thought as they finally started to walk again.
'You're not gonna find them, baby brother.' Merle's voice rang in his head, making him doubt his skills and feel like he did when he was a kid, when Merle would throw it in his face that he was doing everything wrong.
'Shut up, Merle.'
'I'm telling ya, with how pathetic your skills are, you'd never find them.' He laughed darkly.
'Shut up.'
'Just give up-'
'Stop!'
Andrea's voice snapped him out of his thoughts as she tried to comfort Carol. "I'm sorry for what you're going through. I know how you feel."
Carol gave her a sad smile and a nod. "I suppose you do. Thank you. The thought of her, both of them out here by themselves… the not knowing that's killing me. I just keep hoping and praying none of them don't wind up like Amy." Carol froze when she realizes what she said and widens her eyes. "Oh, God! That's the worst thing I ever said."
Andrea just shakes her head, hurt clearly evident on her face. "We're all hoping and praying with you, for what it's worth."
"I'll tell ya what it's worth, not a damn thing." Daryl stepped in between the two of them. "It's a waste of time, all this hoping and praying. We're gonna locate that little girl and Aussie. They're gonna be just fine." He looked at the group. "Am I the only one Zen around here? Good lord." He walk off, shaking his head and they started their trek back to the highway.
Miri was sitting with Rick in the living room while Shane was helping Hershel since Rick was in no condition to help and Rick would not let her go, he couldn't. He needed that anchor to make sure he didn't slip into hysteria.
"Why… why did I let him come with us?" Rick whispered as he rubbed his thumb against Miri's knuckles, his voice wavering as he held back tears. "I should've sent him with Lori."
"It's not your fault for what happened, Rick." She whispered, the sight of her normally strong brother like this was breaking her heart. "You didn't know this would happen, you couldn't have. Carl is a strong boy, he'll get through this just like you did."
Rick turned his head to look at her, eyes bloodshot. "How did you end up here?" She guessed he wanted to get his mind off of Carl. "And why didn't you come back?"
"After I fell from the small cliff, Otis found me and brought me back here. I ended up having a concussion from hitting my head when I landed." Miri licked her lips. "Hershel and his family made sure I was fine before they were going to send me back to you guys, but then you came running in with Carl." She squeezed his hand, the fear of seeing her brother running with Carl in his arms still running through her body.
"Have you see Sophia?"
"Sophia?" She frowned. "What do you mean?"
Rick sighed. "Sophia's missing. We hoped you found her and just got lost, but it seems like she's still out there."
Her breath caught, eyes wet with tears from the news added with the worry of Carl. Sophia was still out there, scared and alone with nothing to protect her from anything alive or dead.
The door to the room Carl was in opened and Shane came over to the siblings. "Rick, he needs blood."
They entered the room quickly and saw Carl crying out in pain as Hershel and Patricia hovered over him, working. "You, hold him down." Hershel ordered Shane, who quickly did as he was told.
"Dad!" Carl screamed out to Rick, the fear and pain in his voice made Miri covered her mouth as Hershel tried to reach into Carl's wound for the bullet. Patricia moved her out of the way so she could prep Rick to give blood.
"Stop! You're killing him!" Rick screamed at Hershel.
Miri tried to go over to help Carl but Maggie stopped her and gave her a sorry look.
"Do you want him to live?" Hershel glared over to Rick.
Rick let Patricia prick him with a needle while Maggie let Miri cry on her shoulder, it was the least she could do for her.
Carl suddenly stopped crying out, the sudden quiet scaring Rick, Miri and Shane.
"Is he alive?" Miri asked as she tried to sidestep Maggie.
"He just passed out." Hershel explained. He pulled out a small piece of the bullet from the bullet wound. "One down," He placed the metal into a metal bin next to him as he sighed deeply. "Five to go." He wrapped up the wound and put in the needle to start the blood transfusion. He was checking Carl's blood pressure as Rick sat next to him. Shane was leaning against the wall by the window while Miri sat on the bed, holding Carl's hand. "Pressure is stable." Hershel informed them.
"Lori needs to be here." Rick mumbled. "She doesn't even know what's going on. I got-gotta go get her, bring her back."
"You can't do that." Hershel shot him down.
"That's his mother!" Rick snapped at Hershel. "She needs to know what happened. Her son is lying here, shot."
"He needs blood." Hershel reminded him. "And he's going to need more blood. He can't go more than fifty feet from this bed."
"Why don't I go?" Miri volunteered.
Hershel shook his head. "You still have a concussion and the stress will cause you to become disoriented. You'd never be able to reach them without collapsing again."
"But-" Shane gave her look that made her stop talking.
Patricia helped Rick up from his chair and Shane came over to him. "Hey, come on."
Rick waved him off. "I'm alright. Don't worry, I got it." He stumbled away.
Miri squeezed Carl's hand one more time before getting up and following Rick to the living room, where Maggie and Otis were waiting, looking like they were praying. She helped Rick sit down on the chair as Maggie stood up, seeing Rick was out of the room.
"How is he?" Maggie asked the siblings.
"He's stable for now." Miri felt Rick's hand go into hers as she spoke. "But we're still worried."
"Lori needs to be here, Miri. She has to know." He sounded so defeated.
"Hey," Shane called for their attention. "Don't worry about it, I'll handle it. But you gotta handle your end."
"My-my end?" Rick looked up at Shane confused.
"Your end is being here, for your son. Even if he didn't need your son to survive, there is no way I'd ever let any of you walk out that door." Shane's voice shook. "I'll break your legs if any of you tried that, you know that right?" Rick put his head down, but didn't move his hand from Miri's. "What if something happened to him and none of you were here?" Shane paused. "If he slipped away while you were gone, you would never forgive yourself for that. And neither would Lori."
"Shane." Miri's voice was hard as she spoke to Shane. "Enough." She didn't like the way he was putting guilt into Rick so he could stay. She was defensive.
Rick shook his head. "No, no. Miri, he's right." He sniffled as she rubbed his back.
"When was I ever wrong?" Shane grinned playfully. Rick gave him a small smile but Miri didn't. "When you were in that hospital, the one you were never supposed to leave, man. You should've seen Lori. She was like…" Shane rubbed his lips. "The strength of that woman, man… you can't imagine it." He wiped tears from his eyes. "That's what you gotta have now. I mean Carl, he needs that from you. So you hold yourself tight." Rick nodded as he tried to pull himself together. Shane moved over so he was in front of Rick. "You got the hard part, just leave the rest to me." He spoke softly. Rick nodded again.
Hershel opened the door, making everyone stand up quickly. "He's out of danger for the moment, but I need to remove those remaining fragments."
"How?" Rick asked him. "You saw how he was."
"I know, and that was the shallowest one. I need to go deeper to get the others." The news made everyone's heart drop. "There's more."
"Tell us." Miri nodded to Hershel.
"His belly is distended, his pressure is dropping… which means there is internal bleeding. A fragment must've nicked one of the blood vessels. I have to open him up, find the bleeder, and stich it. And he can't move while I'm in there, and I mean at all. If he reacts the same as before, I'll sever an artery and he'll die in minutes." Hershel pressed his lips together as he saw their scared faces. "To even try this, I'll have to put him under. But if I do, he won't be able to breathe on his own. Same bad results."
"What'll it take?" Rick asked him as he squeezed Miri's shaking hand, his own hand shaking as well.
Otis stepped up. "He'll need a respirator." He turned to Hershel. "What else?"
"The tube that goes with it, extra surgical supplies, drapes, sutures." Hershel listed off.
"If you had all that, could you save him?" Miri looked at Hershel as he looked like he was analyzing Carl's survival rate with the supplies.
"If I had all that, I can try, Miri."
"Nearest hospital went up in flames a month ago." Otis commented. Hershel threw him a look. "The high school." Otis whispered, a sudden realization hitting him.
"That's what I was thinking." He looked back to the siblings. "They set up a FEMA shelter there." he explained. "They would have everything we need."
"The place was over run that last time I saw it. You couldn't even get near it." Otis shrugged when he saw everyone's shoulders sag. "Maybe it's better now." He added.
"I said leave the rest to me." Shane sighed. "Is it too late to take that back?" he asked playfully.
"I hate you going alone." Rick's tone wasn't playful like Shane's.
"Doc, why don't you make me a list, draw me a map." Shane told Hershel.
"You won't need a map." Otis told him. "I'll take you there. Ain't but 5 miles."
"Otis," Patricia, his wife, shot him down. "No." she told him firmly. She never liked him being out there—much less at night.
"Honey, we don't have time for fighting. This is my fault, I'm responsible. I ain't gonna sit here while this fella takes it on alone." His tone softened, to calm his wife's worry. "I'll be alright."
"Are you sure about this?" Shane asked him, to make sure he was going to go through with this.
"Do you even know what some of the stuff he's talking about looks like?"
Shane shook his head. "Come to think of it, no."
"I've been a voluntary EMT. I do. Now, we can talk about this till next Sunday, or we could just go do it real quick."
"I'll take right quick." Shane answered him.
Rick nodded his head towards Otis. "I should thank you."
"Wait till that boy of yours is up and around, and then we'll talk." Otis sighed. "I'll gather some things." He walked away to get ready.
Maggie came up to Rick, an idea forming. "Where is she? Your wife?"
Rick ran his free hand through his hair. "She should be near the highway, by that huge traffic snarl. Why?"
"I'll inform her of her son and bring her here." Maggie offered.
Miri moved forward. "I want to go with you."
Rick pulled her back. "Miri, no." She opened her mouth to fight with him but she saw the look in his eyes. He looked scared and he squeezed her hand even harder. "I need you here, to help me be strong. Help me like I helped you."
Miri nodded. "Is Ali with her?" He nodded. "Please bring the little girl with her, she's mine." She told Maggie. Maggie nodded and went to get a horse ready.
Otis came back with a pack and they followed him to the blue pickup.
"Just get what you need and get out of there." Rick told Shane.
"You stay strong, all right?" Miri ordered him.
Patricia went over to Otis and embraced him tight.
Rick, letting go of Miri's hand for the first time, walked over to Otis and handed him his colt.
Otis tenderly took it. "That's a fine weapon, Rick. I'll bring it back in good shape." Otis and Shane went into his truck and drove up, with the others watching they drove away. Patricia was the first to leave.
Hershel capped his hand on Rick's shoulder. "Let's check on your boy."
Rick nodded and slipped his hand into Miri's again.
Daryl stopped the group as he looked up to the sky, the sun would be setting soon and it would be too dark to see and too dangerous to be walking around in the open. "We'll lose the light before too long. I think we should call it."
"Let's head back." Lori looked down to Alice, who was looking exhausted but wasn't whining. 'Tough kid', thought Daryl.
"We'll pick it up again tomorrow?" Carol asked.
Lori nodded. "Yeah, we'll find them tomorrow."
Daryl turned to group around and they started making their way back to the highway, still looking around for signs for their missing members.
They must've been walking for a while when Lori spoke up. "How much further?"
Daryl shrugged "Not much. Maybe a hundred yards as the crow flies."
"Too bad we're not crows." Alice mutters, making Lori and Carol chuckle. They continued walking when Andrea's yell caused everyone to run over to her.
"Andrea?" Lori picked up the little girl and ran over with the others.
Andrea's screams of 'No' got louder as they got closer. When she got in sight, they saw the walker standing over her, trying to get a bite out of her but she was kicking him back.
All of a sudden, as if some hero in a story, somebody on a horse came out of the bushes and hit the walker off of her with just a baseball bat. The person came back around and to show it was a young woman with short brown hair, green eyes and olive skin. "Lori? Lori Grimes?" She asked the blonde she just saved, hoping it to be the person she was looking for.
"I'm Lori." Lori stepped forward with Alice still in her arms.
"Rick sent me. You got to come now."
"What?"
"There's been an accident. Carl's been shot. He's still alive but you gotta come now." Daryl looked her over, not trusting her as she continued. "Rick needs you! Just come!"
Daryl noticed Lori taking off her pack and he stopped her. Was this bitch crazy? "Whoa, whoa, whoa. We don't know this girl. You can't get on that horse." The woman helped Lori put Alice in front of her. "Whoa! Why you takin' the little girl?" No one answered him.
"Rick said you had others on the highway, that big traffic snarl?" The woman asked the group.
Glenn just nodded his head, mesmerized by her. "Uh-huh."
The woman made sure Alice was safe in front and helped Lori get on behind her. "Backtrack to Fairburn road. Two miles down is our farm. You'll see the mailbox. Name's Greene." She kicked the horse and the three of them went off into the forest.
What the fuck just happened?
A gargle made Daryl snap his head towards the sound to see it was the walker that the woman hit off Andrea. "Shut up." He muttered angrily as he shot it in the head with his crossbow and made his way to help Andrea up.
When they finally made it to the RV, Glenn yelled out to Dale that Carl had been shot.
"Shot? What do you mean shot?" Dale gasped, taken back from the news.
Glenn hopped over the railing. "I don't know, Dale. I wasn't there. All I know is this chick rode out of nowhere like Zorro on a horse and took Lori and Alice."
Dale turned to Daryl shocked. "You let her?"
"Climb down out of my asshole, man." Daryl glared at him so he could back off. "Rick sent her. She knew Lori's name and Carl's." He walked away from him.
"I heard screams. Was that you?" Dale asked Andrea, but she walked away from him too.
"She got attacked by a walker." Glenn explained. "It was a close call."
"Andrea, are you all right?" Dale called out to her again, hoping for an answer. Andrea only turned around and gave him a look before going into the RV.
Carol shook her head as the group told her the plan about all of them going to the farm. "I won't do it. We can't just leave."
"Carol, the group is split. We're scattered and weak." Dale tried to get through her, get her to see some reason but the mother wasn't having it.
"What if they come back and we're not here?" Carol's voice got higher in pitch as panic started to set in. "It could happen."
Andrea, who was finally out of the RV, spoke. "If they found their way back and we were gone, that would be awful."
Daryl nodded. "Okay. We gotta plan for this." He licked his dry lips before telling them the plan. "I say tomorrow morning is soon enough to pull up stakes. Give us a chance to rig a big sign, leave them some supplies. I'll hold here tonight, stay with the RV."
"If the RV is staying, I am, too." Dale scratched his beard.
Carol had tears in her eyes as she nodded to both of them, touched that they would stay here with her. "Thank you. Thank you, both."
Daryl gave her a nod and looked to Andrea, waiting for an answer.
"I'm in." Andrea piped in.
Glenn looked at everyone. "Well, if you're all staying then I'm…"
Dale cut him off. "Not you, Glenn. You're going. Take Carol's Cherokee."
"Why is it always me?" he whined.
Dale raised his hand to calm him. "You have to find this farm, reconnect with our people and see what's going on. But most important, you have to get T-Dog there. This is not an option." Daryl looked over to T-Dog and saw him at the bumper of the RV, covered in a blanket and sweating like a pig. "That cut has gone from bad to worse. He has a very serious blood infection." He thought about Merle's stash of drugs and walked over to the bike. "Get him to that farm. See if they have any antibiotics. Because if not, T-Dog will die, no joke."
Daryl noticed a white oily rag on the seat of the bike. He grinded his teeth together in annoyance and reached into the bag on the side of the bike, pulling out a big ass Ziploc bag full of drugs. "Keep your oily rags off my brother's motorcycle." He threw the rag at Dale and placed the Ziploc on the hood of the car. "Why'd you wait till now to say anything? Got my brother's stash." He started to rummage through it. "Crystal, X… Don't need that. Got some kickass painkillers." He threw the bottle to Glenn, who caught it. He found the one he was looking for and threw it to Dale. "Doxycycline. Not the generic stuff neither. It's first class. Merle got the clap on occasion."
Rick and Miri were outside, needing fresh air to help their head and to get the smell of blood out of their system.
"This place is beautiful." Rick said as they looked around. This place looked normal, like the world didn't just end.
"Thank you." The siblings turned to see Hershel behind them. "Been in my family for 160 years."
"I can't believe how serene it is." Miri's eyes scanned the front of the place again in awe. "How untouched… You're lucky."
"We weren't completely unscathed. We lost friends, neighbors." Hershel paused. "The epidemic took my wife, my stepson."
"We're sorry to hear that." Rick bowed his head in condolence.
"My daughters were spared. I'm grateful to God for that." He took his eyes off them to look around. "These people here, all we got left is each other. Just hoping we can ride it out in peace till there's a cure."
Rick and Miri shared a look. "We were at the CDC… It's gone now. There is no cure." She told him.
Hershel didn't believe them. "I don't believe it. When AIDS came along, everyone panicked. One boy in town came down with it, and some parents pulled their children from school, so they didn't have to sit in the same room."
"This is a whole other thing." Rick tried to tell him.
"That's what we always say, 'This one's different.'"
"Well, this one is." Miri tried to get him to see but he was having none of it.
He chuckled. "Mankind's been fighting plagues from the start. We get our behinds kicked for a while, then we bounce back. It's nature correcting herself, restoring some balance."
Miri sighed. "I'm going to be inside with Carl." She nodded her head towards Hershel and went into the house, not wanting to hear any more of the ignorance of the old man.
Did he not see what was happening to the world?
How everything they depended on shut itself down and they were forced to fight every day for their lives against the dead and living?
She sighed as she entered Carl's room. How she wish she could have Hershel's ignorance… but if she did, she would've died a long time ago.
She took a seat in the chair Rick was using when he was giving blood and looked over Carl. His skin was sickly pale and he was sweating all over. She grabbed a white rag that was on the night table and lightly dabbed the sweat off his face and chest, being careful of his wound.
"Don't worry little man, soon you'll running around, good and healthy." She bit her lip as she held back a sob. "You need to be okay. Your dad is strong, but you, your mom and I help him stay strong. Kind of like a rock. If you disappear, it'll be chipping away a piece of that rock." She sniffled. "Look at me, rambling to you." She moved his wet bangs from his face. "Ignore me, just keep dreaming."