A/N I'm posting this chapter early as a bit of therapy after last night's heart-crushing episode so we can spend some more time with a beloved character. And can somebody please give Andy Lincoln that friggin Emmy already!
Chapter Seven
Rick walks through the camp strapping his gun belt to his waist and wishing he had his hat to complete the uniform. Hopefully, if all goes well, he'll have it by this afternoon.
He meets Glenn by the open grill of the RV where the Asian guy is getting a lesson in mechanics from Dale as T-Dog keeps watch from the roof. "Good morning," Rick says, coming to stand beside them.
"'Morning, Rick," Dale smiles genially, wiping his hands on a grease stained rag.
"So do you want to go for a ride?" Glenn asks him, squinting into the sun coming up over the Atlanta skyline.
"You think it'll be clear already?" Rick asks skeptically.
"I don't know, but there's another town I want to hit and that CVS isn't too far out of the way. I figure we might as well check it out," Glenn replies.
"Good idea, Chinaman. Let's go," Merle says, carelessly tossing a granola bar wrapper onto the ground at his feet as he steps out of the Winnebago.
"Oh, no. No way!" Glenn tells him adamantly. "Not this time." He looks at Rick while pointing an angry finger toward Merle. "Rick, it was his fault your car got left behind to begin with. He's not coming with us!"
"Fine with me," Rick agrees, more than happy to leave the lazy redneck behind.
"Yeah, but if we didn't take him with us, China doll – he never would'a found his boy!" Merle retorts angrily. "Hey, I did you a favor, man," he says to Rick.
"As I recall, you were ready to leave me and Glenn behind at that store. If he hadn't grabbed onto the car door when he did, you would've been out of that parking lot without us. Not exactly a team player – are you?" Rick accuses, leaning in and tilting his head in distaste.
"Well a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do, ya know."
"Then you do what you gotta do back here. We don't need you on this run," Rick responds shortly as Merle's impervious attitude and insensitive smirk grates on his nerves.
"You can't stop me from going, man."
"You've got your bike. No one is stopping you from going anywhere," Rick counters. "You can hit the highway any time you want." He waves his arm spanning the dirt road leading out of the quarry as he spots Daryl emerging from his tent. The man approaches their group looking like he'd rather be anywhere else.
"C'mon, Merle. Let's go hunt us that deer," he says quietly to his brother. "That one we been tracking can't be too far yet."
"You go on, little brother. Go get that buck while I take a ride with these gentlemen."
"You're not coming, Merle!" Glenn says stubbornly, and then looks at Rick for reinforcement.
"Look, Merle, I know you think you-," Rick starts before Merle cuts him off midsentence.
"You don't know shit about me, cop!" the man spews, angry veins bulging in his neck.
"Oh, trust me. I know you well enough, Dixon." Rick narrows his eyes at the man, scrutinizing his insolent scowl. "I've dealt with a lot of scum just like you. You're a lowlife bottom feeder living off of everyone else's hard work. Why don't you make yourself useful and go hunting with your brother."
"Yeah, come on, Merle. Let's just go," Daryl says to his older brother, trying to diffuse the situation.
Ignoring Daryl, Merle continues to antagonize Rick. "Just 'cause yer wearin' that uniform don't mean shit anymore, sheriff," he protests, spitting into the dirt.
"Well, it must mean something because you're still calling me sheriff," Rick responds sardonically, turning his shoulder in dismissal.
Facing the tents, Rick sees Shane appear from the woods behind Nikki with Kelly and Carl in tow. The man hands Carl a battered pail and points to a table centered between the tents. As the other two head to the table with what Rick assumes is a bucket of berries, Shane approaches their heated gathering, muscles flexed beneath a tight black tee shirt as his combat boots crunch the ground beneath his feet.
Rick throws a nod in his partner's direction as Daryl tries to calm his angry brother while stroking the husky's thick fur.
"What's going on guys?" Shane asks anxiously, dark eyes spoiling for a fight as he feeds off of the tension filling the space between Rick and Merle.
"Nothin'. Me and Merle were just goin' hunting. Right, man?" Daryl says, tapping his brother's arm as a note of apprehension laces his voice.
"Whatever," Merle sneers. "Let's just get the fuck outta here."
Rick gives Daryl a brief nod of thanks as the hunter follows his brother toward the forest. "Asshole," he mutters, looking at the elder Dixon with disdain before turning back toward Shane.
"You're going back for the car?" Shane asks him with a slight accusatory edge to the simple question. Without waiting for a reply, he continues, "You think that's a good idea? I mean you just got back here, man. You really want to leave Carl already?" he finishes with an incredulous tone.
Rick pinches the bridge of his nose as he gears up for another argument. "I'd rather not, no. But I've got a bag of guns in the trunk that I think we could use and I need the walkie to keep in touch with Morgan. I owe that man everything."
"What kind of guns? How many?"
"Six shotguns, two high-powered rifles and over a dozen handguns along with an assortment of seven hundred rounds of ammo."
Shane whistles at the staggering amount of artillery. "Where'd you find all that?" he asks, suddenly interested.
"I cleaned out the cage back at the station. Left a couple of weapons with Morgan along with the other walkie and we agreed to turn them on each morning at dawn to stay in touch," Rick explains. "He was going to meet me at the cabin in a few days."
"You're not still planning on going to Woodland, are you? I don't know if that's such a good idea."
"Well, I don't really need to now since I found you guys here," Rick replies. "Which is why I really need that walkie to tell Morgan to come here instead."
"Okay. I get it, but I don't like it. Just get the car and get back here, alright?"
"I will." Rick answers with a nod before walking toward his family seated at a small rectangular table.
As Rick approaches the table, Carl stands, wiping purple fingers on his jeans and giving his father a proud smile. "Look at all the berries we found, Dad."
"Great job, bud," Rick says with a hand on the boy's shoulder as he glances at the pail in the center of the worn table. "Listen, Carl," he says, leaning down to get closer to his son's eye level. "I have to take a little ride with Glenn to go get my car," he explains.
"Can I come too?" Carl asks, smiling at the prospect of leaving the camp for once.
"No, buddy. I'm sorry but I need you to stay here to look after Kelly and Erin," Rick answers as he sees the redhead walking toward them from Carol's tent. "Can you do that for me?"
"Sure, Dad." He nods with an air of self-importance, puffing out his thin twelve year old chest. "I'll take care of them while you're gone," he assures his father, taking his newfound responsibility very seriously.
Holding back a hearty chuckle, Rick smiles at his son and replies, "Thank you, Carl. Come here." He pulls the boy into his arms, hugging his thin frame and then straightening again.
"I'll be back as soon as I can," he tells Kelly as she comes around the table to give him a goodbye hug of her own.
Releasing his sister, he looks at Erin as she stands next to Carl. Without thought or reason, he reaches for her instinctively.
He gathers her in his embrace and is nearly overwhelmed at the sudden feeling of protectiveness that tightens his muscles. The last time he'd felt such a surge was at the hospital a few weeks before, when he'd first laid eyes on a pretty nurse in burgundy scrubs.
Of course! No wonder he'd wanted to throw Shane into the quarry yesterday. She really does belong to me!
After recollecting their dream upon waking this morning, he did recall seeing her at the hospital on Easter Sunday. But he did not remember the strong feelings he'd felt that day until she'd stepped into his arms just now. How could I have forgotten?
The quiet strength of her arms lying against his shoulders brings a sense of comfort to him that he'd never experienced before. It's as if she has the same fierce need to protect him coursing through her own veins.
"Be careful, Rick." The hand stroking the nape of his neck feels heavenly.
"No worries. I've got the sweetest guardian angel watching over me," he says against her hair before pressing his lips to her temple. "I'll be back before you know it."
As Glenn and Rick drive away in a plume of dust, Erin catches a curious eyebrow from Kelly. "Well it looks like you two have gotten awfully close."
"You have no idea," Erin answers cryptically, grinning pensively at Rick's sister as Amy and Andrea sit down at the table placing a deck of cards in front of Carl.
As Glenn slows the car to a stop across the street from the CVS in Adamsville, Rick sees his police cruiser sitting patiently beside a handful of walkers shuffling aimlessly about the lot.
"It's not too bad. I think we can take them," Glenn says with a spike of hope as he reaches for the revolver in the center console.
"No guns," Rick says, laying a hand over the barrel of the weapon. "We take them with knives; one stick to the head, quick and quiet so we don't attract others that may be in the area, like that guy up there," he finishes, signaling to a lone straggler lumbering across the street a short distance up the road, his long raincoat billowing in the breeze as various bits of trash drift like tumbleweeds around his feet.
"Fine," Glenn says dejectedly. "Then I'll take the two on the left and you get the three on the right." He places the revolver back in the cup holder and pulls a knife from the long pocket built into the door.
"No, we stick together," Rick says with authority. "We both start with the two on the left and finish with the right."
"Alright, they're starting to head this way. Let's go."
Exiting the car, they swiftly cross the street and easily dispatch the first two walkers before the other three advance on them.
Turning quickly, Glenn stabs a woman with greasy, matted brown hair in a once-white pantsuit as Rick kicks a young man in the chest, sending him stumbling backward and giving himself time to lodge his knife into the left eye of an older man with a blood stained Tampa Bay Buccaneers jersey. Removing the knife as quickly as it had gone in, he turns in time to sink the blade into the forehead of the younger man.
"Glenn!" Rick calls, hunched over the twice dead corpse as he retrieves the knife impacted in its thick skull. "Over there!" he yells, nodding his head toward two walkers that are approaching from behind his patrol car.
Glenn hustles toward the newcomers, pushing the first one against the vehicle and piercing it smoothly through an eye as Rick takes care of the second one – a teenage girl with a tattered cheerleading outfit and severely rotting lips. Breathing heavily, the young Asian turns toward the deputy for a well-deserved, but premature, high five. "Rick! Behind you!"
Rick turns quickly to see the walker with the raincoat advancing steadily toward them. He draws his arm back to deliver the final fatal blow but hesitates as something about this one strikes him as odd. Just before bringing the knife forward, Rick realizes the difference between this walker and the others; he is filthy, bloody, bruised and battered… but not decaying. Though his dark beard could use a good scrubbing, his lips are perfectly intact. In the instant he registers this one small but extremely important detail, he stills the knife as the walker focuses on him with eyes that are haunted, but not hungry. Understanding that the man is not at all dead, Rick is still taken aback to hear a strangled "Please" escape from his throat.
Lowering the knife, Rick puts a hand on the stranger's shoulder to steady himself as much as comfort the dark haired man. "Holy fuck, that was close," Rick exclaims, bending slightly at the waist in an effort to regain his composure. "Are you okay mister?"
Getting no response and realizing that he is definitely not okay, Rick takes a different approach. "Look, I'm Rick, and this is Glenn. We can help you. What's your name?"
"Jim."