oOo
The annoyance at Glenn's ill-timed interruption quickly faded when her lust-drunk brain finally registered his whispered word. The whole room went oddly silent save for her golden bow's call for war. It was like the world turned into shades of black and white, and the only color shone from the foot of the bed, calling to Diana with urgency, almost begging to be picked up, to be used, to fulfill its purpose; a siren's call.
"How many?" Daryl asked Glenn, standing with a soldier's attention, marching up to him.
Glenn's grimace and beaded forehead spoke volumes. "Too many."
"That ain't a number, Glenn."
"Over a hundred? I don't know, man, it's all hands on deck out there!"
"Shit…" Daryl looked back at Diana, something akin to fear and determination in his eyes. She stared back, daring him to say anything that went against their previous discussion. She knew she won when he sighed and walked back to her. "I'll have your back." His hand cupped the back of her neck, and his lips pressed against hers in a rushed, longing kiss.
Before Diana could chase after his mouth, he was out the door, past a stunned Glenn. She avoided his gaze by clearing her throat and gathering her bow, which responded to her touch with morbid glee. Her fluttering heart was soon stamped upon by the weight of impending slaughter.
She and Glenn walked side by side as he told her of the march of the herd appearing over the horizon, from amidst the forest like a dark mass of skittering fog. The image he painted in her mind was nothing compared to the sight of it. Diana emerged onto the unlit porch, where their quickly gathered troops devised some strategy to ensure their survival.
She heard Rick demand that all their vehicles be readied and their supplies and belongings loaded for a speedy getaway. She heard him plead to Hershel that they join them, that there was no way their disadvantageous number could make a dent on the undead. Hershel firmly refused; his family's farmhouse had stood through the worst in history, he would not abandon his home so quickly.
Diana heard all of that, but their words turned to buzzing in her ears as she watched the black wave cresting over the hill, creeping up on their shore. A vice tightened around her heart. An urgent thought flooded her mind.
Where were Alice and Felix?
She was taken back to the night of their parents' untimely demise. The echo of screechy groans, the stomping feet, the desperate cries of the living, the blasting firearms; she could hear them all.
She needed to find her parents and her siblings. Where were they?
Diana took the steps down the porch, bumping past faceless figures whose shouting voices were placated and indecipherable. Her breathing was ragged, and her heartbeat rang in her ears. Where were they?
Someone grabbed her by the arm as she stalked along the front of the farmhouse, seeing something peeking from beyond the corner. She shook the hand off, hard, and took off running. She knew something was wrong. They were gone, but they couldn't be.
The walkers grew louder in her head, and the ringing of gunshots made her drop the bow to cover her ears, but it wouldn't stop. Nothing made it stop. Her feet took her to the two prone figures, disfigured and mangled, blood seeping steadily from the gashes on their broken bodies, feeding the soil, familiar eyes staring at her, milky and lifeless.
"No," Diana whimpered, her legs giving out from under her like water. Not again. Too late yet again. She shoved the heels of her hands against her eyes until she saw stars and swirls and felt the hot tears silently trail down her cheeks. Someone wrapped an arm around her shoulders, startling her.
In the psychological commotion, the overwhelming sounds cleared, and she could hear someone shushing her. Wiping her eyes and looking up, she confirmed it to be Felix. The relief came mixed with a sharp pain in her heart, and she threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around his broad shoulders. I'm so sorry, she thought.
"I don't know what's happening," Felix whispered into her hair as his hands rubbed up and down her back, making chills rack her torso. "But we need you to get your shit together. Please."
"What's with her?" Alice's voice sounded, and Diana slumped even more into Felix's embrace. They were alright. It wasn't that night. Her parents had been buried. They rested now. "How can someone feel so many emotions? So disgusting…"
Diana sniffled, feeling a stab of embarrassment at her sister's words. She didn't want to look behind her, she didn't want to see that nauseating sight again. But she had to. Felix's eyes studied her face in the dark when she separated from him. Diana avoided his questioning stare by glancing over her shoulder.
Nothing. Of course.
Was she going insane? Hallucinating? PTSD?
Her chest hurt so much. She thought she was coping…
She missed them more than there were stars in the skies, but she wasn't the only one. Felix was right, she had to get her shit together, now more than ever. She was sick and tired of this emotional rollercoaster, she had to be functional. Rational. Focused.
Felix helped her stand and used his thumbs to wipe the tears from her cheeks. "What happened?" Alice approached with the discarded bow in hand, offering it to her in a disguised gesture of sympathy.
Diana considered telling him and Alice of her waking nightmare, but there was literally no time, as the cacophony of voices of both living and dead made very clear, and she didn't want to bring up such a traumatic event to its primary witnesses. It was unnecessary to make them suffer that.
She took the bow, accepting the validation it radiated into her with gratitude and told them, "I'm tired as fuck and there's a sea of walkers at our doors. Frustration levels went a lil overboard. My bad."
They were skeptical. Even in the penetrating inky midnight, Diana could see it in their faces. However, they couldn't afford time to mourn. There were more pressing matters.
Daryl called out to them as soon as they merged with the group by their caravan of vehicles. His free hand cupped the back of Diana's neck as soon as she was at arm's distance, and his eyes roamed her face with worry etched onto his features; a silent question. She nodded as convincingly as she could muster, gave him a short kiss of reassurance and then brushed her thumb over his mouth affectionally. She wished she could indulge in his lips as if they had all the time in the world. She wished she wasn't plagued by guilt her subconscious stubbornly clung onto. She wished she could stop wishing.
The plan was simple – summarizing Rick's words -, the outcome should they stay and stand their ground would be disastrous, suicidal. The walkers had spotted them, having caught their scent. Now it would only be a matter of time until they were upon them. Their insatiable hunger was the best motivator, and they wouldn't stray from their path for any distraction. Not when the living had been caught by surprise like this, with no time or resources to plan any such trap or disruption.
Their only option was to evacuate.
As far as they could tell, that wave of snapping maws came uniquely from a single direction: the woods that covered the expanse between the Greene's land and the highway. They hoped against hope that it remained that way and that no other walkers from the surrounding area made for their current location.
No one admitted it out loud, but Diana knew the shooting practice some days back had been to blame. The countdown to this event had started back then. What a fucking stupid idea that had been. Not to be insensitive, but Shane had taken the gold to his grave with that one.
After the plan had been laid out – and the Greenes and Co. had been convinced to join their band of misfits – every single one of them made haste with rescuing their belongings as well as every salvageable item they came across.
Time was running short. The dingy wooden fence wouldn't hold against the horde. And the walkers were two breaths away from reaching it.
Diana was getting antsy. It felt like everything was moving quickly but not nearly enough, like running while waist-deep in water. The weight in her chest hadn't subsided, but she had chosen to ignore it in favor of single-minded focus on one thing only: survival.
Once everything was packed and everyone was accounted for and inside their respective vehicle, they hightailed it out of the perfect farm life fantasy ruined by a crashing wave of insidiousness.
oOo
They drove for some hours to put as many miles as possible between their caravan and that incessant plague before they turned in. When a safe distance was announced, they slept on the road, bundled up and cramped inside their vehicles with a rotating watch of two people on top of the RV. Some were bone-weary and fell fast asleep, others couldn't so easily let go and slip into helpless unconsciousness.
Diana belonged to the latter group, despite her heavy eyelids and constant yawning. As did Alice, but that wasn't her first time at the rodeo. As for Felix, he was fast asleep between the two, his head lolling off Diana's shoulder every once in a while until she eased him onto her lap, where she let her fingernails pleasantly scrape against his scalp.
She tried to keep her eyes peeled by focusing on the light footfalls overhead. The sound lulled her to sleep, where a horde of walkers continued to chase her, but this time the faces were all familiar.
When she came to, Daryl was coming back from his shift, replaced by Glenn, and took the spot beside her. Diana fell back asleep with her head resting on his bare shoulder and his hand tucking a curl of hair behind her ear. His warmth chased away the terror.
oOo
There was general unrest in the quietude of the dawn. Some had lost a home; most had lost a piece of hope. There were no concrete plans in the future, just a vast blank space.
Their group was also a member short. Andrea had slipped away in the night, leaving only a handwritten note with the words "DON'T FOLLOW ME" scribbled on it. Dale had demanded a search party to bring her back until he was finally dissuaded by Rick and T-Dog, who insisted they respect her wishes.
Diana shortly wondered what had brought Andrea to that decision, but didn't dwell on it. The woman had been of no particular importance to her, especially not after that stunt of shooting at Daryl. If she wanted to go out and fend for herself on some whim, Diana said let her. It may sound selfish, but where had she been when Alice had gotten lost searching for Sophia? She couldn't give half a fuck about the woman.
They rationed their food, ate, divided weapons, and unfolded a map over the hood of a car. According to the faded road signs and mile markers, they were approximately in the middle of nowhere. There were no significant landmarks in their vicinity, and with the Fort Benning plan abandoned, they were lost in an ocean of uncertainty.
Daryl was keen on heading as south as south could get, to keep out of big cities and turn to nature, to seek out national parks with abundant lakes and plenty of game.
Dale suggested the seaside, that they find a boat and sail along the coast. Live off the ocean. That idea didn't resonate well with many of their party members, and Diana had to agree that a pirate's life wasn't the life for her.
T-Dog insisted that as Atlanta had been the epicenter for quarantine stations in Georgia, many other cities may have been almost completely evacuated. He believed their chances lied there.
Meanwhile, Lori wanted to try their luck in the suburbs, maybe to have back a note of familiarity and what many of them had lost.
Hershel put in his two cents by saying that there was plenty of arable land in the countryside, where they could settle and build their foundations.
The discussion went on for a good hour, with pros and cons being weighed on every option until only Daryl and Hershel's remained. They shared the same principle, though, and they all could agree that turning to what the land had to offer would guarantee their prosperity.
They could also all agree that safety was their number one priority, and while farming and hunting were their best bets at survival in the long term, what good would that be if they could be ambushed on the open land at any time?
To thrive, they needed a good defense; land vast enough to farm and maybe keep stock and sturdy fences or walls to surround it, enough to ward off walkers but not trap them in. Then, of course, there were other survivors to take into count. They wanted to create a haven not only for their modest numbers but for any soul in need of a helping hand that they may come across.
That notion pleased Diana very much. It sparked up the flame of hope she thought had long died inside of her. The thought that mom and dad weren't there to share it threw a handful of sand onto the fire but didn't extinguish it entirely. She was doing this for them as well, after all. Survivor's guilt had stung deep into her soul, but she was slowly healing the hurt by reminding herself of her mom and dad's wishes for their children's future.
Diana was nothing if not determined to see them come true.
diana: *aggressively tries to be happy*
please tell me what's on ur minds, dear readers
