Getting up with the birds has never been a novelty for Beth, not growing up on a farm even before the outbreak. Maybe she didn't have to help out with the cattle, but the chickens were her job from the time she was trusted to unlatch and latch the coop properly. Time in the prison only honed that wakefulness, between Judy's needs and the fact that there was always too much noise to try to sleep past dawn.
That first night, after the prison fell, neither she nor Daryl slept, both too keyed up to bother. He told her to try, but she simply couldn't, but it wasn't the idea she was outside that bothered her. The part she doesn't think she is ever going to get used to is sleeping without her father snoring in the same cell or hearing Judy's quiet baby snuffles as she sleeps. It took either moonshine or complete exhaustion the other times she slept. Last night, it was grief, but at least with Biscuit's snuffling breath against her shoulder, she did manage.
Even if Shane finds the people she's missing, she doesn't think sleep will ever feel as safe as it did in that prison cell with her daddy a few feet away. Blinking back tears, she rubs Biscuit's ears, causing the dog to raise his head and lick her face.
A glance across the treehouse sees Shane startle awake when Biscuit whines just a little. The man blinks, but recognition dawns for him quickly when he sees her. It reminds her of how intense his expressions always seemed.
"Be home before lunch if we get an early start," he says, sitting up and stretching. "Let you get a rest day, if you need. Look at the maps and find your sister for you."
Beth knows she's spared little thought for Maggie since the prison fell, maybe because thinking about her means being afraid she didn't make it out. Her sister was in the thick of the battle, she knows, and there were so many bodies that Daryl tried to shield her from when they fled through smoke and walkers that she could have easily stepped right over Maggie and never known.
"Okay." She pulls her now dry socks on, followed by her boots, eyeing the little camp toilet uncomfortably. While privacy was at a minimum at the prison, she's never had to pee in front of a male yet, although it was close with Daryl, who would turn his back and keep watch. But she barely knows Shane, unlike more than a year spent with the hunter in the same group.
Shane seems to catch on, because he finishes lacing up his boots. "Gonna take Biscuit down to do his business. We can eat while we walk."
Once he's gone with the dog and his pack, she takes care of nature quickly and checks the treehouse to see that everything is back where she remembers it being. Once she's on the ground, they're waiting, and she watches carefully as Shane uses a cord camouflaged against the trunk to raise the treehouse ladder.
When they set off, he leads her through a ramshackle garden, pointing out the tomato plants he gleaned from last night. "Still some good ones there, if you want." He kneels next to an overgrown zucchini plant and removes two, dropping them into the modified messenger bag he wears in addition to the pack. More rustling comes from his direction while she gathers the small bite-sized tomatoes into her shirt, picking more than she'll eat since she saw him eat a few last night.
"Potatoes?" she asks, watching as he dusts his hands off and returns the trowel he was using to a bucket on a fence post.
"Lot of stuff growing wild now. Not the more finicky ones, but the staples like these, yeah." Half a dozen potatoes about the size of Beth's fist join the zucchini, and Shane closes the bag. "Don't really have to do much gardening to get by, with just me."
He accepts a handful of tomatoes and passes her another ration bar as they start back along a seemingly random path that occasionally follows roads, but just as likely zigzags across neighborhoods as they progress.
It's easy to fall into a silent rhythm. Shane answers any questions she asks about their route, but otherwise doesn't seem to speak much at all. It's a contrast with Carl once telling her that Shane could talk for hours on any topic, with Sophia giggling in agreement. Beth guesses that much like herself, he just doesn't have anything to waste words on right now.
When they stop for a break at a trickle that barely qualifies as a creek, she rinses her face while Shane pours water from a canteen into a collapsing bowl for Biscuit.
"He doesn't just drink out of the creek?"
Shane shakes his head. "Could be contaminated. Trained him to wait for water from me. Dogs don't get sick as much from anything like that, but I'm paranoid." He strokes one hand down Biscuit's back.
Considering she just splashed her face, Beth grimaces, which actually provokes a smile out of the man. "Just don't drink it or count on it to wash your hands."
With that as a reminder, Beth drinks the other half of the two water bottles she's carrying in her makeshift bag from the vet clinic. It makes her glad she refilled both of them like he suggested last night when they had the little stove burning to boil water. Thinking about the prison, she wonders now if some of the illness that spread so virulently through the population was from water contamination. She knows people got lazy sometimes with the water, and they certainly didn't boil the water given to the pigs.
She waits until they're back on the road before asking, "How long have you had Biscuit?"
Shane looks to where the pit bull is a few feet ahead, his playful nature tempered a bit as he works as a bit of a forward guard. Beth's seen the dog alert his owner twice this morning, allowing Shane to put down one mobile and one crippled walker.
"It was before I bothered with a watch again, so sometime in the fall after I left the farm. Walkers got his mama and the other pups, but he got wedged far enough into a thicket they couldn't grab him. Think he was probably about half grown then."
"Why do you call him Biscuit?" It's a cute name, but not typical of what men tend to name dogs, especially a big dog like Biscuit.
"Leave one of your biscuits unguarded, and you'll find out. Full name is Damned Biscuit Thief." Beth can't help giggling at how the dog turns and alerts at Shane's words. "Yeah, you, silly mutt."
They fall back into companionable silence, not seeing any more walkers by the time they near Shane's home base. He pulls a pair of leather work gloves from his bag and slips them on outside what seems to be a dense hedge of tangled shrugs and vines. When he reaches into the shrubbery and pulls, a section moves and she realizes it's a gate hidden in the greenery.
"This is creative," she remarks, slipping through after Biscuit and watching as Shane settles the gate back into place.
"Can't take credit for the hidden gate, other than letting things grow up on it. Some kind of fake thing that made it blend into the hedge when it was neat and trim. Muffles sound, too."
With the overgrowth, it's damn near invisible, especially from the outside. She takes a minute before turning. The house is on a large lot, probably easily two or three acres before, and mostly overgrown. If she concentrates, she can see animal trails among the once manicured lawn and flower beds. Although she really hopes the house itself isn't their destination, because there's a very large oak tree that smashed through the roof and took out most of the corner closest to Beth. She can still see the near crater formed by the root ball ripping out of the ground for the once majestic oak.
She doesn't ask, and Shane leads her around the house, although he stops and rehooks lines she realizes are makeshift tripwires. "Anything I should be worried about?"
He looks up from where he's rehooking the invisible line and shakes his head. "Not meant to stop an intruder, just let me know one's been by. Keep them hooked high enough they don't catch the dogs."
"Dogs?" That makes Beth alert. "You have more than Biscuit?"
Shane clears his throat, looking a little bashful. "Thought I said? It's why I went to Atlanta to look for more supplies. Cleared out things closer over time."
He whistles, an odd sound that sounds like some of the bird calls she's heard Daryl use, and it causes a burst of activity to happen from an area nearly hidden from the house by a crepe myrtle gone untrimmed. Three roly poly little masses of energy come pounding their way, yipping until they're shushed quickly by Shane and a nip from Biscuit to the most rambunctious pup. They're followed by a pretty black and white Australian shepherd who eyes Beth warily, circling between her and the puppies.
"C'mere, Muffin. Just another lost pup for you to look after," Shane coaxes. Once the pups are behind the mama, she watches Beth for a minute, crystal blue eyes intent. She ventures forward, sniffing around Beth, and concentrating on the areas Biscuit brushed against on their journey. After a moment, she seems to dismiss Beth entirely, trotting back to wherever she was before the puppies responded to Shane's whistle.
"Muffin's not real friendly right away." As if apologizing for the standoffishness of the female dog, Shane scoops up the smallest pup and hands it to Beth. It blinks at her, a little short haired pup with mama's black and white markings peering up with pretty brown eyes. "That's Jelly. She's the only girl."
Beth pets the puppy, who seems to have Biscuit's cuddly disposition. "I'm almost afraid to ask the boys' names if she's Jelly and the other two are Biscuit and Muffin."
When Shane ducks his head, she realizes the man is grinning and hiding it. He points to the little black puppy whose entire chest down to his legs is white. "That's Gravy." He pauses for effect, pointing at the other pup, this one black except for a white chest blaze and toe tips with blue eyes. "And that's Butter."
She can't help laughing. "I'm not sure you should be naming dogs, Shane."
Shane just shrugs, glad the rather odd names he stuck the pups with seems to cheer the girl up. He knows they make no sense, because they don't even have coloring near those items. "Started as a joke, and then kinda stuck. But Muffin really was her name, according to the collar she had when we found her."
Lifting the two boy pups, he motions toward the direction Muffin disappeared. "C'mon. Let's get the packs off our shoulders and get some lunch in."
Leading Beth around the overgrowth, the old boathouse comes into view at last. It's a careworn structure that wasn't kept up in the latter years before the outbreak, but once Shane patched the roof and replaced some broken windows, he got it liveable. The tree collapsed main house just keeps the place looking deserted and not worth looting.
Setting his two pups on the porch, he fishes out the key from the cord around his neck and unlocks the door. "Hot and stuffy in here since I was out," he remarks. He leans his pack against the kitchen counter and goes to open windows.
"It's like a little hidey hole back here," Beth remarks, putting her own bag down on the futon near the door they entered. She lets Jelly down to romp with her brothers, going to look out the windows next to his bed in the studio apartment. "Oh! This is out over the water."
"Yeah. Boat slip is underneath the bed, more or less. Views not what it once was. I didn't trim the trees back to make it less noticable." The shoreline is full of the big weeping willows, allowing just enough of a view to see the pretty private lake that once served a community far bigger than him and his dogs. He wove branches of the stuff to further obscure the glass and rooflines.
"It's still pretty. Been looking at prison fences and trees and rotting walkers for months now. Water is a lot more peaceful." She sounds wistful as she stares out the window.
"I know you don't have extra clothes, but the water tank should be full. Won't be any hot water without running the generator which I try not to do often, but it's usually about room temp at least."
Beth turns at the lure of a bath offered, just as he expected. "That sounds lovely."
Shane rummages in the old dresser and lays out a pair of drawstring shorts and a T-shirt. They'll be too big for her, but it's something clean. "There's a bucket setup in the bathroom to wash clothes and a line outside. Towels in the bathroom."
"Thank you." Her smile matches the gratitude of the words.
"Gonna leave Biscuit and the pups up here with you and take Muffin to the main house. Part I can still access has bedrooms. Might have some ladies' clothes."
Beth nods and he leaves her to it, calling Muffin to him from her hidey hole under the steps. With the pups mostly weaned, she'll jaunt along with him again now around the property. Shane works the back door open with his shoulder, feeling where the wood is swelling from exposure to the elements over time.
The oak fell before he ever ventured here, probably during one of the thunderstorms in the spring. It crushed the front of the house and one back bedroom, but the master and two others are intact. Searching the belongings of long gone residents no longer seems anathema like it did a year ago.
When he finds likely sized items in the first bedroom, he hopes the boy's clothes don't set off some sort of a tantrum. Shane doubts it, though. The girl seems pretty even keeled so far. Dumping the kid's gym bag of thankfully clean baseball gear, he dumps the jeans, shirts, and socks he can find into it.
The next room was a guest room, so no use, and he long since gleaned all the useful toiletries out of the bathrooms here. Checking the sizes of the lady's side of the closet, he decides the boy clothes are the safer bet in size. These are at least four sizes larger than the petite teenager he's temporarily guardian for.
The closet does yield some possibilities for footwear, although Shane forgot to ask her size. He gathers up the expensive running shoes that will be better if they fit. One quick walk through the master bath makes him sigh and clear out the items that weren't useful for him before. That is not something he wants to be finding in an emergency.
Muffin is waiting from a shady spot by the back door when he returns, looking serene. They cross the scraggly backyard to the boathouse. From the trio 'guarding' the bathroom door, Shane surmises that Beth is still inside, so he sets the gym bag on the futon and goes through the supplies they brought back.
If they're going to the prison tomorrow or the next day to look for clues to start the search, he needs to get organized. They were lucky during the hike here that the weather held fairly warm. It isn't something they can count on, so keeping warm at night in an area he's less familiar with is going to take preparation.
With the supplies tidied away, he spreads a map out just as Beth comes out of the bathroom. Her blonde hair is still wet enough to dampen the back of the shirt he loaned her, but she doesn't seem bothered as she pads over barefoot to peer at the circle he made on the map of the prison.
"We can probably ignore Woodbury," she suggests, pointing southwest of the prison. "That's been destroyed, and I can't see anyone wanting to return. Daryl and I were following train tracks a bit."
Shane finds the nearest train tracks to where the prison is and pencils a question mark on them. "Any other landmarks you remember?"
"A country club. That's where we explored, but we didn't stay. Later it was a funeral home where we got separated by walkers and I got taken."
"We'll have to rummage around some businesses near the prison to find a phone book. Both of those are good landmarks, because there's usually not an overabundance of country clubs or funeral homes to an area. Good memory on you."
Beth smiles at the bland compliment. "Guess it could have been random houses, yeah. We did sorta burn a small building down between the two."
"Why?" Shane can only think of a rare few reasons to set an entire building on fire.
"Moonshine was involved."
Despite the danger it imposed on the girl, he can't help but chuckle. "Moonshine is a harbinger of many a bad decision. Although adding arson to your trail certainly makes it distinctive."
Folding the map for now, he points out the gym bag. "Might see what's useful. No ladies your size, but the boy's clothes might work until we can find something better. I'll start us up a late lunch."
It's a little warmer than he likes for the wood stove itself, but he keeps a camp stove on what passes as a deck but is really a landing to the stairs to the boat slip. Once he's got water boiling and pasta and sauce started, he steps back inside to find that Beth's out the other door hanging up her wet laundry. She's still in the borrowed shirt and shorts and barefoot, so he hopes the rest fits.
"Make a list of anything we need to scavenge for you," he calls out, pulling the bread out of the bread box and slicing what remains of the loaf he made before going to Atlanta.
Lunch doesn't take long to get on the table, although it's close to two in the afternoon by that point. Beth eats with good appetite, reminding him it's probably been days since she had a solid meal. He's glad of the big lunch, because she looks so tired he thinks she might fall into her empty plate.
"Go, sleep. You can have the bed, since you'll want the breeze to sleep this early."
"It's your bed," she tries to argue, but gives in after he points out the perfectly serviceable futon. Sprawled on the bed in the afternoon sunlight, she looks so impossibly young that it's hard to imagine her being on her own. There must be something to guardian angels to have them converge on the same veterinary clinic at the same time.
Feeling a pang of homesickness in a way he hasn't in a while, he busies himself with preparing to set out tomorrow. Beth still hasn't woken by dusk, so he slides the windows closed as the temperature begins to drop and make the night feel like October really should. With the wood stove lit, he settles to sleep himself.
It's easier tonight, when his mind is growing used to the idea of another person in his space. For the first time since he returned north in the spring, Shane truly considers whether he might be welcomed back among people he once walked away from and feels like there might be hope.
A/N: Timeline wise, they're falling asleep as the other groups are trickling into Terminus. Next chapter will have an update on the other group included.
Bethylguest:. I'll add a Bethyl + Judith + Dog request to my list, so long as you don't mind her aged up a little. Otherwise the age difference is in creeperville for me. And please bear with Rick-bashing occasionally... Beth is not an unbiased narrator amd she saw her father beheaded by a man those in power around her provoked... she'll probably grow beyond it faster than Sophia in the Hell series. 😉