AN: Here we are, another chapter here.
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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"Have you heard anything else?" Andrea asked, crawling over the top of the RV's ladder.
"Not for a while now," Dale mused. "What I heard before, I barely heard, to be honest. The signal's too weak. We're too far away. Even up here." The old man patted the lawn chair next to his. "Why don't you sit down, Andrea? Take a break."
"There's so much to be done," Andrea said.
Dale laughed to himself.
"There's never a shortage of things to be done, Andrea," Dale said. "And the truth of it is that things never get done. There's always something else to do. Sit down a minute. Catch your breath. I've been watching you, and half of what you're doing is invented to keep busy. There's no sense in lying to me. I'm old enough to know these things."
Andrea sighed and accepted the seat next to Dale.
Dale was the oldest of their group. He'd been an over-prepared kind of person before the world had tumbled into chaos. He'd been away from home, on a road trip, whenever things had gone crazy, and he'd headed for Atlanta as the closest safe haven. That's how they'd crossed tracks, of course, in the traffic jumble outside of Atlanta. In a lot of ways, though, Andrea felt like she'd known Dale longer than the months they'd been camping at the quarry and wondering what would become of the world—and of all of them. Maybe it was just something about the man that made him feel like someone she just knew. Maybe it was simply the fact that he was pretty accepting of everyone as long as he wasn't witnessing them actively wronging someone else—and he was gentle with his reprimands when he felt the need to dole them out.
He did his share of work around the camp, but they tended to give him some of the less strenuous jobs, given his age. He spent a great deal of his time, on top of his RV, keeping watch for Walkers that might be coming toward the camp. So far, he'd helped them get ahead of quite a few small bunches that might have caused some trouble if they'd gotten too close.
"Drink this," Dale said, offering Andrea a bottle of water—one of the many that they kept and constantly refilled.
"I'm fine," Andrea said.
"I didn't ask if you were fine," Dale said. "I told you to drink it."
Andrea accepted the water, knowing good and well that Dale wasn't going to let it go, and she thanked him.
"I think we're all worried about everybody that's out there right now. Glenn, Jacqui, T-Dog…but I think there's something different about that worry when it's your family. There's so little of that left these days for everyone—family. There was so little of it left for some of us even before all of this. Miranda's worried about Morales. And you're worried about Merle."
Andrea laughed to herself. She didn't feel the laughter, she only felt the need to release something, however she could, that was suffocating her.
"And everybody that's not a Dixon is wondering why," Andrea mused. "You think we're deaf and we don't hear it here or there…just people talking among themselves. Expressing their opinions. Do you think they're any different right now than they are on any normal day? Why would I be worried about Merle? Why would any of us care, right? They'll say Daryl's his brother. He can't help it, maybe. He has to care. And Carol? She stands in solidarity with her husband. She supports him. But what about Andrea? Why the hell would she marry Merle in the first place? Why would she stay married to him?" Andrea glanced at Dale. She stopped watching the comings and goings of people below. "I'm sorry," she said. "You didn't ask me up here to listen to me rant."
Dale laughed to himself.
"I asked you up here for the company," he said. "I made no stipulations about what that company should be like. Still, when Irma was alive, sometimes she'd tell me that I could bother the stripes off a tiger. It doesn't make any sense, but it was her way of saying, nicely, that I had a special way of getting on her nerves, sometimes." He smiled to himself, the way he always did when he talked about his wife—the death of whom had been the catalyst to his RV adventure and without which they might have never met. "I loved Irma dearly—dearly. I don't think I even realized how much I loved her until she was gone. But she had her moments, too."
"We all have our moments," Andrea said, smiling at Dale.
"That's precisely my point," Dale said. "Maybe it isn't for everyone else to understand. But you must know why you married Merle—even if they don't understand."
"My sister would tell you what my parents taught her. It's because I fucked up. Like an idiot, I got pregnant," Andrea said. Dale hummed at her in question. "Barely, I guess," she said in response to a question that hadn't been asked. "If that's how it works. As soon as…I knew about it, I told Merle and…we got married right away. Then it just wasn't there anymore."
"My wife I wanted children," Dale said. "We tried and, once, we thought it might happen. Things just didn't work out, though. Like you said."
"Merle and I have tried again a few times, but every time I've ended up putting the brakes on things as soon as he falls off the wagon," Andrea said. "I might have actually said 'I do' to Merle, that time, because the tests came out positive, but I was with Merle before that, if you know what I mean."
"I believe I understand," Dale offered.
"It was a catalyst for the marriage, but…I was with him before that. I would've been with him in spite of that, even if it might have taken him longer to change my name. Merle's an asshole. He always has been. If you get to know him, though—and I mean really get to know him—you realize it's something like a coping mechanism. The addiction changes Merle, when he's on something, but he's an asshole even when he's clean. Still—there's more to him than that."
"We are all greater than the sum of our parts," Dale mused. "I believe it was Aristotle that had something to say about that."
Andrea smiled to herself.
"I couldn't say it better," she said.
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"What if we send another group down there to rescue the group that's already left and they get caught up in whatever it is that's detained the first group?" Shane mused.
The conversation they were having, as a group, was civilized and calm at this point. None of them were sure, though, what was the best way to proceed with things. Daryl had already offered his services to the group in whatever way they could be used—though mostly, Carol knew, he'd meant that he was willing to go down with a group and see if they could find the others. He'd excused himself from the rest of the discussion to go hunting. At the end of it all, Daryl figured that they were going to decide whatever they were going to decide—and mostly that was going to mean whatever Shane was going to decide—and his input would mean very little. Carol knew, too, that Daryl would likely have his own ideas of what he wanted to do, himself, once they'd waited a fair amount of time to see if the other group would return. He likely needed time to think about his plan. Daryl was a man who often required time to simply sit, quietly, and work out whatever problem he was dealing with before he was ready to handle it in what he believed was the best possible way.
Hunting left Daryl relatively close by, but it would give him time to figure things out for himself.
They were expanding their runs into Atlanta and, eventually, the surrounding area for more supplies. They were taking bigger chances for bigger rewards. That had been the idea. The group that left out with the sunrise was the largest group that had ever gone, at once, on a run. Glenn, T-Dog, Merle, Morales, and Jacqui made up the run group. They'd enter the city and hit some high spots that had already been scoped out by Glenn—since he seemed to have a real talent for getting in and out of the city without attracting the attention of the Walkers—and they'd get as much as they could carry. The truck they'd driven would be parked outside of the city. Merle had taught Glenn to hotwire vehicles using his old truck, and Glenn had used the skill to snag a truck that they could use on his last run. That way, if it had to be abandoned, or they had to come back some way that they hadn't gone, it wouldn't be any great loss to anyone.
The group went down to get everything they could—food, clothing, and a variety of other "wish list" items to make their camp and lives better.
They'd radioed in, at one point, to say that there was trouble. The radio connection was terrible. They expected more of their radios than they were really able to provide. Nobody had really understood the whole of the message, but what they did get was cryptic and made nearly everyone sick to think of what might have happened—what might even be happening at this moment.
All they'd heard was that they were surrounded. Trapped.
Atlanta was full of the dead. Walkers wandered in masses in the streets. Carol hadn't seen it for herself, but she'd heard the descriptions. Glenn said they wandered like ants, but aimlessly—until something got their attention. Evidently, if they'd heard the cryptic message correctly, something had gotten the attention of the Walkers.
"We can't just abandon them," Miranda said. "My husband's down there."
"Believe me," Shane said, "I don't want to abandon anybody. There are already too few of us. We need everybody we've got here. And I'm open to any suggestions you've got, but I just don't think we ought to do anything until we've got a plan that isn't going to cost us five more people. Eventually we'll be down to just leaving you three women and your children. And that won't be good for anyone."
"When Daryl comes back," Carol said. "He'll have a plan. He'll know what to do."
Shane laughed to himself and scratched his fingers through his hair nervously.
"I'm glad you're so confident in Daryl, Carol," Shane offered, "but I'd feel a lot better if we had something of a plan right now. We've either got to act quickly or we don't act at all."
"Once the daylight runs out," Jim said, "they might be out of time."
"It's not even noon," Carol said. "And the sun won't set until at least eight. We've got time to get down there and get them out."
"How do you know that?" Lori asked.
Carol swallowed back her laughter.
"Because I can look at the sun," Carol said. "And I know what time the sun sets this time of year."
"We don't even know where they were going," Lori said. "They could be anywhere. We never would have found them in Atlanta before all of this. Now with the Walkers…"
"We do have some idea of the places they were planning to go," Jim said.
"What is that sound?" Carol asked. "I'm sorry—Jim. What is that sound?"
"I don't hear anything," Lori said.
"I do!" Miranda said quickly.
"I hear it, too," Shane said. He broke away from their group and walked in one direction and then another, clearly trying to pinpoint the location of the sound.
"It sounds like it's coming from everywhere," Carol said. "Is that—a siren? An alarm?"
"A siren? Who would have a siren?" Lori asked.
"Do you think it's the government?" Amy asked. Carol reached for the girl to put her hands on her shoulders and ground her before she could get too out of hand. She could hear the panic in her voice. After what had happened in Atlanta, the government didn't exactly bring them all the promise of good things.
"We see something!" Dale shouted from on top of the RV. He had a pair of binoculars. Andrea was standing next to him. The whole of their group rushed toward the RV like they'd somehow be able to see what Dale could see.
"Is it them?" Shane called up.
"Is it the government?" Amy yelled up.
"The government would come in a helicopter, sweetheart," Carol said. "Or a plane. Like in Atlanta."
"It's a car," Dale said. "Headed this way. I just saw it in a turn a few miles from here. Red. Never seen it before, but if I'm right, the sound is a car alarm."
"You think it's them?" Shane asked again.
"Oh yeah—at least—some of them," Dale said. "They're moving fast. They know where they're going. They've been here before. A lot."
"Then it's either Merle or Glenn," Carol said.
She saw Andrea do something of a hop that she was probably not aware that she'd done. Andrea immediately moved toward the ladder to climb down.
"There's a van," Dale said. "I see it, now. It's behind the car—not too far. It's coming. It's gotta be them."
Andrea hit the ground, all smiles, and immediately came to join the rest of them. They all waited, watching the main entrance they'd created to the camp, until the red car came speeding up and practically slid to a stop. Dale was down off the RV and almost at the car by the time it stopped. Shane just beat him there, moving fast enough to find the wires and snatch them loose, disabling the car alarm that had announced the car's approach, as Dale approached.
Glenn climbed out of the red car, wild-eyed and looking very much like the young man he was.
"Are you insane?!" Shane spat. "You probably brought every Walker from Atlanta straight to our front door!"
"I wouldn't worry about it too much," Dale offered quickly, stepping in to save Glenn like he might have done if he'd been his son. "That sound was echoing all around these hills. It would've been impossible to pinpoint, even for the living. We're probably safe."
"All the same," Shane said, "we ought to keep an extra watch out for a while."
Before they could discuss it too much more, the white van that Dale had mentioned came pulling up. Morales opened the driver's side door, and got out. His feet had no sooner hit the ground than Miranda was in his arms and Eliza and Louis were running for him. From the back, the doors of the van opened. One by one, familiar faces spilled out as Jacqui rounded the corner and, a moment later, T-Dog appeared behind her. Everyone greeted them warmly, even though they had no direct family to speak of. The sound of another pair of shoes on the hard dirt made Andrea tense. Carol saw her, out of the corner of her eye, poised to run to Merle when he came around the side of the van—even though he would say it was embarrassing that she was drooling all over him, or something equally ridiculous. When the man came around the side of the van, though, it wasn't Merle. It was a man that none of them had ever seen before. They didn't know him.
At least—most of them didn't know him. Carol saw when he made eye contact with Lori. Suddenly, Carl ran toward the man, yelling out "Dad." Carol was intrigued, but her intrigue was cut short when Andrea, almost walking toward the back of the van like one of the Walkers, reached the back of it.
The sound of Andrea's blood-curdling cry—a sound that was unlike any word from any human language— made Carol rush to her, and she reached her in time to wrap her arms around her and keep her from hitting the ground. Carol didn't even have to look at the empty van for herself to know exactly what Andrea already knew.
They didn't all make it back. Merle hadn't made it back.