A/N: We are back on track at this point. I made an upload mistake on 11/19 and skipped a chapter, and instead ended up uploading a certain chapter twice, so if you are seeing this and things didn't flow for you, please go back to Chapter 30 and begin from there. Everything is in order now. Sorry for the muck up
[*]
When they get to the prison cafeteria, there are only a few people still lingering. Glenn, Carl, and Sophia sit at one of the tables, each surrounded by a pile of cash as they play poker. Carol pauses nearby, and Daryl peers at Sophia's hand, which has nothing more than a ten high. "Damn. That's a good one. Raise 'em a Benjamin."
Sophia takes a hundred-dollar bill from her stack and lays it in the center of the table.
Glenn sighs and throws his hand face down. Carl folds with groan, pushing all his cards together. Daryl winks at Sophia, who smiles as she lays her hand face-down and rakes the pot to herself.
When they go to the serving line, a forty-something woman named Jeanette gets them each a tray of food, though it's clear she's already begun to clean up. Carol leads Daryl to the table where Maggie and Lori are chatting over their empty trays. He tries to hide his wincing as he eases down on the bench.
"When do the kids in the library get to eat?" Carol asks.
"They ate already," Maggie replies. "They usually have an early lunch with Beth. Then school, then recess, then chores. It gives all the moms a chance to eat in peace and have a break."
"A break to get work done, mostly," Lori clarifies. "I'll be headed for the gardens soon." She looks Daryl over and smiles. "So…how did you and Carol meet?"
"I shot the asshole who was about to rape her girl."
Lori's smile falters and fades into a frown. "Sometimes I forget the kind of world we're living in. I guess it was unlikely you met reaching for the same book at the bookstore."
"Yeah, 'cause I don't read Harlequins," Daryl says.
Carol flushes while Maggie chuckles.
"Met your boys," Daryl tells Lori. "The little one ain't much of a belcher."
"Well, that's not a goal I've been working toward with him. But he's met a lot of milestones. He can blow raspberries, reach to grab a toy, and he already knows the baby sign language for more, no more, and drink."
"Baby sign language?" Carol asks.
"It wasn't really a thing when Carl and Sophia were born," Lori tells her, "but it became all the rage before the world ended. I had a friend who taught it to her baby."
Lori shows Carol some of the signs while Daryl shovels down his food. He doesn't say it's fucking fantastic, because it's not, but it's clear he's hungry. "Can we go home tomorrow?" he asks Carol after washing down a bite with a swig of water. "I'm fine now."
"You are not fine. You're still hissing in pain every time you stand up and sit down. Bob says you shouldn't be jostled in a truck right now. Besides, Sophia really wants to spend some time with Carl. Give it two more nights, would you?"
"Worried 'bout my traps. Wouldn't want to leave something caught alive in there for thrasher bait. Or leave it sufferin'."
"Garrison said Felipe has been checking the traps for you. One of them had a possum."
"You're a trapper?" Lori asks.
"Hunter. Deer mostly. Some small game. Some trapping."
"How many hunters does Copper Creek have?" Maggie wants to know.
"Jorge's our waterfowl man. Ducks, geese, coots. He's damn good. Felipe's an okay varmint hunter, gets the occasional small game, knows how to work the traps, but he can't track worth shit. And Jorge's training up Zach."
"Maybe you should pick someone to train up," Carol suggests. "Noah's a good shot."
"I hunt alone."
Carol lets the issue slide for now, because Sasha is now striding into the cafeteria and over to their table. She opens a map on the end of the table between Daryl and Lori. "Daryl, right?" she asks. "I'm Sasha. Can you show me where those bandits shot you?"
"Why?" Daryl asks suspiciously.
"So we have an idea where dangerous men hang about."
"We got 'em all. That was the last of 'em."
"Still," Sasha reasons, "it would be good to know."
"Think you want to know 'cause you saw the loot in our truck. You know we ain't finished the job 'cause I got shot." He takes Sasha's silence as a confirmation. "That shit's ours. We're going back for it on the way home."
"That's all right. I can figure it out." Sasha folds up the map. "The prison has an old Yellow Pages phonebook in the warden's office, and the sauce in your truck said Sonny's Barbecue. It doesn't require a five-star detective to crack this case."
Daryl glowers, and Carol hastens to offer a compromise so they won't have all the goods swept out from under them: "What if you and I went together? I can show you exactly where we got the supplies, and we can clear the rest of the shops together, and then our two camps can split the loot. 50-50."
Sasha glances at Maggie. "I'm in," Maggie says. "Three is safer than two, and I'm done with most of my duties for the day. How far is it?"
"Less than thirty minutes," Carol tells her.
"It's that strip mall in Peach Grove, isn't it?" Maggie asks. "Last time we went near there, it was surrounded with walkers. The herd's moved on?"
Carol nods, and the women agree to meet by Maggie's diesel-fueled pick-up truck in an hour. When they finish their lunch, Carol walks Daryl back to the infirmary, gets him settled in bed, and hands him his pain killers, which he tosses in his mouth like popcorn and swallows without water. He's off the IV and heart monitor, at least, but the Vicodin Lilly left by his bedside should knock him out, which is a good thing, because Bob said rest is the number one thing he needs. "I should be back by dinner time," Carol tells him. "Which is about when you'll be waking up, I suspect."
"Can't y'all take Oscar?"
"No. They don't allow more than two council members to leave the camp at the same time, and Maggie says three is all that can fit in the cab of her pick-up. We need the bed free for loot."
"'S just…three women. Lots of rapists assholes in this world."
"Maggie's smart, and she knows her way around a rifle." She pulls the sheet up to his shoulders and tucks it around him. "I don't know Sasha, but she seems formidable. And I'm getting to be a pretty good shot myself, aren't I?"
"You saved my ass out there. Didn't say you can't handle yourself. Just…worried about you is all."
"I know. And it's sweet. But I'll have good backup, and I'll be fine." Carol bends down and presses her lips against his slightly warm brow.
"You like kissing my forehead," he says, almost as though the idea confuses him.
"It's called affection." She says it jokingly, but the truth is, he probably doesn't know much about affection. Carol gets the idea his family rarely showed him any. "You can show me affection, too, anytime you want. A peck, a hug, a little squeeze. I wouldn't mind."
He reaches around her, puts a hand on her left ass cheek, and squeezes it lightly before drawing his hand away.
She chuckles. "Just don't show that kind of affection to strangers." And then she bends and kisses his lips briefly before going to get her pack and Daryl's rifle, which is leaned in the corner of the infirmary, a clear sign he's trusted now. "You don't mind if I take this again, do you?"
"It's yours now," he says. "If you like it."
"Your rifle? Really?"
"I got Merle's rifle still. Don't need two."
"I do like it. Thank you." She smiles, comes over to his side, and kisses his forehead again as he yawns. "Sweet dreams."
[*]
When the three woemn pull into the parking lot of SM 19, one of the transformed Claimers is feasting on the remnants of the bodies of the other two. Carol was too frantic dealing with Daryl to remember to makes sure all were shoot in the head. The walker rises, Daryl's crossbow bolt still protruding through its neck, and growls as Maggie switches off the engine. Sasha throws open the passenger's door, raises her rifle, and shoots the creature in the head as it lurches toward her.
Carol exits the cab from the middle of the bench seat and goes to pull the crossbow bolt out of the fallen walker's neck, her face contorting with disgust as it slurps out covered in blood and a bit of flesh.
"What are you doing?" asks Maggie as she shuts her door.
"Daryl will want his bolt back." Carol cleans it with a handkerchief and then lays it in the bed of the truck.
Meanwhile, Maggie looks over the walker. "Is that Kris Kristofferson?"
"Who's Kris Kristofferson?" Sasha asks.
"You know, the country singer?" Maggie says. "Me and Bobby McGee?"
"I'm more into blues and soul myself."
"Kris Kristofferson, if he's still alive, is in his 70s now," Carol says. "That man's younger. But I noted the resemblance, too."
After doing a full perimeter check, the three woemn make their way to the dentist's office. Carol tells them she's brought Daryl's lockpicking kit, but she doesn't know how to use it. "I should have paid more attention to what Daryl was doing."
"I can use it," Sasha tells her, taking the kit off her hands and then unrolling it on the pavement. "I used to be a fireman. I would never use a lockpicking kit in a time-sensitive scenario, but I have used them from time to time. It came in handy for gate locks if we were checking a fire alarm at night."
Carol pays close attention as Sasha works the door open. They split in three directions, left hall, right hall, and forward to the receptionist's desk to clear, but there's no sign of the living or dead. In one of the alcoves, they find a small refrigerator full of vials of lidocaine. Sasha tells them that, according to Bob, it can last for up to four years but often degrades if left above temperatures of 85 for a long time. They can only hope it survived two summers in the insultated refrigerator, which looks like it may have kept running on an emergency generator for the first few warm months after the collapse. "Bob will know if it's good," Sasha says.
They gather all the vials, along with two canisters of nitrous oxide and a bunch of sample packages of ibuprofen, Tylenol, and other pain killers. They snag the fluoride, too, hoping it will reduce the need for pulling teeth. "Bob's already had to pull two," Sasha tells Carol, "and he's not a dentist."
They load up some dental tools as well and then check the breakroom, where they find three dozen K-cups and a Keurig machine, a refrigerator with eleven sodas and four ice tea bottles, and two unopend 5-gallon jugs of water for the watercooler. "Water's ours," Maggie insists. "Y'all have freshwater wells and a stream."
There's a plastic container of moldy, fuzzy green blueberry muffins on the counter next to the microwave. They snag an entire box of fruit snacks and another of granola bars, and then they take the two unopened canisters of Lysol wipes before moving on to the next shop.
The bail bond's office does not disappointed. Once they slay the lone walker inhabitant, they uncover a shotgun from beneath the desk. Carol, wanting to practice, picks the lock on the desk drawer under Sasha's instruction, and finds four boxes of shotgun shells, a Glock handgun, and two boxes of 9 mm ammunition inside. From the mini-fridge, Maggie recovers four more sodas, while holding her shirt over her nose to contend with the curdled smell coming from the cream. There are also two unopened bags of coffee grounds, which may or may not have retained much flavor at this point, and an unopened cannister of sugar.
The FedEx store is next. Daryl and Carol had planned to skip it, but it's unlocked, and it only takes a moment for them to kill the two walkers inside with the bayonets on their rifles. Sasha pulls out two purses from below the counter and begins to search them one by one. She rattles a bottle of pills. "Xanax." Then another. "And valium."
"Must have been a fun job," Maggie murmurs.
That's it for the FedEx. There's no breakroom with snacks, but Sasha does take several rolls of packing tape. "Who knows. It might come in handy."
The shoe repair shop is next, locked up, unpillaged, and walker-free. From there they collect dowels, fasteners, shoe glue, laces, rubber soles, polish and wax, cleaners, clinching and soling nails, threads and needles, and stitching and skiving knives, not to mention an entire hanging stand's worth of dusty but otherwise brand new socks for sale at the checkout.
"Pantyhose, anyone?" Maggie holds up a package from a free-standing stand on the other end of the counter.
"Thank God I never have to wear those again," Sasha mutters. "Not that I did much anyway. Only on dates and for interviews when I was job searching."
"I bet Bob would love it if you showed up in a skirt," Maggie tells her.
"Well Bob can settle for BDUs."
The small liquor store, they find, is locked, and it's been 75% cleared out from the inside, probably by some employee. "How nice of him to lock the door on his way out," Sasha mutters as she picks the lock.
The only alcohol left, besides five lonely bottles of sake, is the flavored liqueurs. They don't bother with anything with cream – they're not risking that after it sat through two Georgia summers – but they take all the Schnaps (mostly peach, but some apple and peppermint), the Frangelico, St. Germain, and Chambord. There's also six bottles of flavored vodkas, two of Southern Comfort, and three of Fireball cinnamon whiskey. They do get some straight-up liquor (vodka, rum, and whiskey) in the little airplane-size bottles in the display basket near the checkout stand.
The thief has left nearly all the mixers, which they box up. Carol is particularly happy about the Bloody Mary Mix, as she's already thinking of tomatoey recipes it would work well with. The margarita mix could be thinned out with water, she thinks, and served to the kids as a juice-like treat. The cocktail syrup could be used in cooking.
The thief was apparently primarily concerned with getting drunk, because he left over half of the snacks still sitting on the one snack shelf in the store. That's the real score –beer nuts, large tubs of Utz Poker Mix, wasabi peanuts, pretzels, sweet and savory bar mix, jars and jars of cherries and martini olives, pickled asparagus, pickled dilly beans, mixed nuts, and "Ooh! Pirate Booty!" Maggie snags the remaining two bags. "Glenn loves this stuff!"
"Glenn loves booty, huh?" Sasha asks. Maggie rolls her eyes at her, but Sasha only chuckles and goes to look behind the checkout counter. "Shotgun!" she yells. "Gotta love Georgia."
The tobacco shop has not been broken into, and the front door is unlocked, but five walkers emerge from between the red folds of a backroom curtain when the women pound. The creatures slam against the front door and windows and thrash with their hungry faces pressed to the glass. "It's not worth it, is it?" Sasha asks. "Just for smokes."
"But all of that butane," Carol says. "And matches. And, if we're lucky, another gun. I'll see if I can come in from the back. It may be unlocked. Daryl did it at the barbecue joint. You two just keep them drawn to the front."
Maggie insists on joining her, and they leave Sasha to continue her pounding. The backdoor is not only unlocked but propped open by a small wooden wedge. The women turn on the flashlights on their scopes. Maggie jerks open the door, and they both swivel inside, taking opposite directions. There's a small smoking lounge in the back room, with a couch, two armchairs, and a bar at the back end with four stools. Carol, startled to find a walker behind the bar, fires with a gasp, hits the creature's chin, and then fires again to take off the top of its head.
When it falls, Carol swivels 180 degrees to face the front of the store. They've lost the element of surprise, and the other walkers respond to the gunshots by peeling away from the front window and stumbling through the swaying curtain. Remembering Daryl's lesson about knowing what's beyond your target, Carol realizes they can't risk firing in a forward direction. They can't see Sasha's position, and a bullet may travel all the way through the glass front of the store. So she cries, "Bayonets!"
The women stride forward and stab the first two walkers to part the red curtain. They rip their rifles back out and stab again as two more immediately break through, but Sasha has thankfully maintained the attention of the last walker and kept it from piling up on the others. Carol, heart pounding in her throat, breaks through the curtain, runs to the front of the store, and stabs the final monster in the back of the head. It slides slowly down the glass, and Sasha smiles and waves at Carol through the blood-smeared window.
The looting begins. Most of the remaining cigars are falling apart, having been dried out too long, but Carol does collect several unopened cartons of cigarettes containing a dozen factory-sealed packages of cigarettes each.
"You're enabling your boyfriend's bad habits?" Maggie asks.
"He's…I don't know if we're officially a couple yet," she says. As skittish as Daryl can be, she doesn't want him to think she's going around calling him her boyfriend before he calls himself that. "And he smokes outside."
The women gather up all the remaining matches, the bottles of butane, and about a dozen of the nicest lighters. Carol claims a silver one for Daryl, which has the etching of a big-antlered deer on its surface. The bar in back is an extra score. It's a tiny bar, but they still manage to gather up nineteen bottles of hard liquor, most of them at least two-thirds full, seven bottles of wine, two bags of pretzels, three jars of peanuts, and several cans of tonic and seltzer water. They don't bother with the beer - it's surely skunked fifteen months and two summers in. They don't find a shotgun under the counter this time, but they do pull a Sig Sauer handgun from an inside the belt holster on one of the walkers, loaded with a full 12-round magazine plus one in the chamber. "Gotta love Georgia," Sasha says once again.
They must have all died suddenly in here, Carol thinks, and turned around the same time, because that weapon was never drawn, and none of the walkers have been shot or stabbed. She's never been able to make much sense of this disease. Some people, like Jim, die slowly when bit, and some die quickly. Some take hours to turn, and some turn in minutes. They came across scores of dead bodies at steering wheels before they found the farm, even though Dr. Jenner said everyone has the disease within them. Why didn't all those drivers turn? She asked Rick about it, and he said, "Maybe trapped in there, in the Georgia heat, with the windows up, their brains just fried." And yet she's seen walkers walk through fire, too, while others burn up and cease to be. Carol's given up trying to fit it into some kind of consistent narrative. She just knows it's kill or be killed, and killing means piercing the brain.
Last of all, they hit the empty, locked-up barber shop, where they gather straight razors, a few pairs of good scissors, and shaving cream. Maggie holds up a box of auburn hair die to Carol. "Bet you'd look good as a redhead."
"I used to be one. But I think I'll stick with the gray." Daryl doesn't seem to mind it, after all.
"It's more like foxy silver," Sasha tells her.
"The barber didn't have a shotgun," Maggie says with disappointment after examining the back room and the check-in counter.
It's a satisfying expedition, and they drive back to the prison passing back and forth a jar of bourbon-infused cherries. Carol feels a thrill of pride in her clearing skills as she tosses a cherry into her mouth. She can't wait to show Daryl his new lighter.
