Thanks to everyone who reviewed: DanielleBurkex3, Markay81, Zombiepacalypse, Blackhollyyeaah, Guest (anonymous), thegoulashqueen, TheRedBones, IloveDarylDixon, ScornedxRose, and Forevermore-from-Nevermore
Also, I received a PM this week with a certain story-related concern, so let me address this now: The romance that develops between Jack and Daryl will be slow. They are not going to hook up randomly or just suddenly fall in love with each other. Daryl is a complicated character, and I think he needs time to grow close to Jack and start caring about her. So please have patience! That being said, there will be more interaction between the two of them as the story continues on and there will be more deviations from the original plot. This chapter sticks fairly close to the show, though starting in the next chapter the plot will start to deviate a bit.
Chapter Two: Death's Other Kingdom
T-Dog relieved Jack of one of her bags, the heavier one filled with food and water, and they set out for the camp on foot. The happy, almost-carefree mood that had settled over the group after they left the Vatos had disappeared when they discovered the van missing. Now, as they walked there was a cloud of anxiety and frustration in the air between them.
Everyone carried a weapon, even Jack. Rick had insisted she take one of the small handguns even though she had said she didn't know anything about shooting. She didn't even know how to take the safety off. Despite being raised in the South, she had always been a city girl at heart.
"Man, we'll be lucky if we make it back before dark," T-Dog said, hopping over the train tracks as they left the high rises and department stores of Atlanta behind them.
"I think we've exhausted our good luck for one day," Glenn said, staring up at the sky. The sun was making quick progress toward the western horizon. They probably had a few hours of light left, and too many miles left to walk. "I don't think we're gonna make it before nightfall."
"Maybe if we hadn't spent so much time goin' back and forth with those Vatos," T-Dog murmured.
Daryl scoffed. "And maybe if princess here hadn't made a pit stop home first." He gave his head a condescending jerk toward Jack without looking at her.
She cringed but surprised herself by saying, "I didn't think bringing extra supplies would be a bad thing. And Atlanta isn't my home. I'm from Houston."
Daryl rolled his eyes, uninterested in the distinction. "Whatever. Point is, that's thirty minutes we coulda' spent on the road. If Merle did take the van then he's prob'ly on his way to take vengeance right now. Know I would be, in his shoes."
"My suggestion is we pick up the pace, then," Rick said, and began to trot along. His expression was full of concern, worry, and agitation. He set a steady pace and Jack hiked the strap of the duffel up her shoulder before following after.
They were quiet for a while as they jogged along the side of the road, all keeping their eyes turned to the trees and abandoned cars, looking for movement, listening for moans. They only encountered two Walkers on their way back. One had been a child when it died, a little boy with dark brown hair and freckles. Rick had given the kid a long, hesitant look before Daryl took him down with an arrow to the temple.
They didn't slow when darkness fell around them. Jack could feel a stitch forming in her side. She wasn't anywhere near the physical condition she used to be. Back in high school she had been a long distance runner, never one for short sprints. She had a natural endurance, but her body was much frailer than it had been, even after weeks of scavenging and working hard for her meals, she had barely built back any musculature. But she refused to ask the group to slow down. She figured they would probably oblige her, in fact, Glenn and T-Dog might even be happy for the break. But she knew how badly they wanted to reach their camp and how dangerous it was for them to be out in the dark in the middle of nowhere. And she wasn't going to give Daryl an excuse to lay anymore blame on her.
"Can I ask you something, Jack?" Glenn broke the silence, his words huffing out into the darkness.
"Sure," she said quietly, trying to keep her eyes trained on the trees, alert for movement, as she jogged.
"How is it possible? I mean, why don't Walkers attack you?"
She considered this a moment. It's not like there were any scientists or doctors around to explain it, so she only had her own ideas to fall back on. "I don't know for certain."
"But you have a theory," Rick said.
Jack looked at him quickly before shooting her eyes back to the trees. "I had been diagnosed with cancer," she said. "A tumor wrapped around my brain stem. I was in the hospital when hell broke loose and I got bit by one of the nurses-turned-Walker."
"You got bit?" T-Dog asked sharply, and suddenly everyone was staring at her with fear and wariness in their eyes.
Before they could turn their guns on her, Jack hurried to say, "Yes, several weeks ago. But I didn't turn." Everyone seemed to calm the tiniest bit, but the way they held their weapons a little tighter told her that they wouldn't hesitate to put a bullet in her brain if she made a wrong move. "I passed out, still weak and drugged up. I woke up a few days later and my tumor was gone, the bite was scabbed over, and everyone in the hospital was dead or undead."
"The tumor was gone?" Glenn asked.
Jack's hand went to the back of her neck instinctively and despite the current situation, a smile spread over her lips. "Yeah. Completely gone."
"So you got bit and somehow survived it. Is that why the Walkers don't come after you?" Rick asked.
"That's what I'm thinking, but I can't really make the connection. I mean, why did I survive? Why didn't I turn? And how did my cancer just disappear?" Jack shrugged and then immediately regretted the action as the strap of her duffel dug into her shoulder. The weight was starting to strain her arm.
"Whatever the reason," Rick said, "I'm glad you did. And I'm glad we found you."
"Actually, I found you," she teased.
Rick smiled and looked like he would say something else, but suddenly the sound of gunshots echoed through the air. They all paused for just a moment, passed around a panicked look, and then shot off toward the sounds. It didn't matter that they were exhausted, burdened with packs and heavy guns. All that mattered was that they reach the camp and protect their people. Jack felt their urgency and fear like it was a living thing wrapping around her body, pulling her forward, pushing her past her physical limits.
They heard the screams before they saw the dying embers of firelight in the distance. It was a terrible noise, the screams. It reminded Jack of the hospital, of the sounds outside the door. Gunshots, screams, and moans. Her heart was in her throat. Her skin rippled with chills. She could smell death in the air, rotting corpses and fresh blood.
When they burst into the camp, it was like walking onto the set of a horror movie. Bodies lay on the ground. Walkers ripped into the flesh of still screaming men and women. People ran for their lives, calling out for their loved ones, crying, too scared to think straight. Daryl, T-Dog, Glenn and Rick started shooting the closest Walkers, yelling for the fleeing people to make for the RV parked on the other side of the clearing.
Jack took in her surroundings, the death, the chaos. She didn't know what to do. Her hand gripped the gun tightly but she didn't raise it, too afraid that if she managed to get the safety off that she might accidently shoot a person instead of a Walker. She let her duffel slip off her shoulder and hit the dirt, but didn't bother picking it back up.
Someone screamed near her, and Jack turned to see a young girl and a woman with very short hair being chased by an unusually fast Walker. Jack didn't think about her actions, didn't try to form a plan of attack, she just lunged forward and jumped onto the Walker's back. It stumbled and fell to its knees, but other than the fact that it had been knocked to the ground, the Walker didn't pay any attention to the person clinging to its back. It started to crawl toward the girl and the woman, undaunted, dragging Jack along. She struggled with it, trying to slow it down, but it kept on relentlessly.
Jack clutched her gun and brought her hand up. She started beating the Walker over the head with the butt of the gun until the skull cracked, caved in and the corpse went still beneath her. She sat up, panting for breath, trembling with adrenaline and disgust. When she looked up the girl and the woman were embracing and shooting her terrified, but appreciative looks.
Jack stood up on shaking legs and looked around her. The Walkers had all been felled. Rick and Daryl and another dark haired man were canvassing the area. Glenn was standing a few yards away, his face ashen and horrified. Near the RV a blond woman was kneeling next to a girl covered in blood, wailing. Bodies were everywhere. Blood and gore was splashed all over the ground. It was worse, somehow, than all she had seen in Atlanta.
This was not the safe haven she had been hoping for. This was a nightmare.
No one in the camp slept that night. Either too frightened or too heartbroken, they worked through the night and into the next day to move the bodies, clean up the destruction, reinforce the meager defenses they had set up around the camp, and get ready to destroy the numerous dead that had accumulated in the night.
Jack fell in with some of the women that were cleaning up. Mostly they were tidying up the things that had been thrown about in the chaos of the previous night, but a few braver souls were also sweeping away the viscera and jellied blood that had clumped in the dirt and grass around camp.
Jack tried not to look at the people who grieved over the dead bodies, or the blond woman who hadn't moved from her spot by the RV and the dead girl beside it. Jack didn't know any of the people who had died, and she felt like an intruder on the pain of the survivors. So she kept busy, picking things up from the ground, cleaning the ashes from the night's fire, and otherwise staying out of anyone's way. Especially when some of the people in the group started discussing the blond woman, Andrea, and her dead sister on the ground.
Some of the group, including Daryl, the dark haired man who had been introduced to Jack as Shane, and a few others wanted to just put a bullet in Amy's brain, end her before she could come back. Others, like Rick's wife Lori, wanted to let Andrea have her time with Amy before that happened. Jack didn't think it was a smart idea not to take care of Amy now, but she didn't think she had a right to say anything about it. So she turned from the conversation and tried not to regret her decision to come here.
There was a commotion from the other side of the camp. Glenn's upset voice carried through the air. "We don't burn them! We bury our people. Our people go over there. We don't burn them!"
Jack watched as Daryl and another man, Morales, carried a broken body to the other side of the RV where another row of dead were lain out upon the ground. Daryl grumbled something beneath his breath, and Jack figured it must be insulting because Morales shot him a disgusted look and said, "Shut up man!"
Daryl dropped his end of the body onto the ground with a disturbing amount of disregard and yelled, "Screw that! Ya'll left my brother for dead. You had this comin'!" At that he gestured angrily around the entire camp. Jack watched him storm off and cringed.
"I'd like to say that Daryl's normally a nice guy, or that this behavior is out of character for him, but then I'd be deceiving you," Lori said, coming up beside Jack. She gave the younger woman an encouraging but sad smile. "Rick told me how you found them in Atlanta. That you were the one to get the guns. I can't tell you how grateful I am that you helped keep him safe out there, kept him off those streets. We just got him back. I can't lose him again."
Jack rubbed the back of her head, a little uncomfortable. "Rick's a good guy." She felt stupid saying it, but she couldn't think of anything else.
Lori nodded. "Most of the people here are good. I think you'll like it here. I'm just sorry that you came during all of this." She gestured around at the somber group, the piles of bodies.
"Things are like this everywhere, I'd imagine," Jack said. She didn't mean for it to sound as cold as it did, so she followed up with, "When the world ends, I think what matters most is that everyone holds onto their humanity. Bury your dead, honor them, remember them." She thought she had read something like that in a book once.
"Who did you lose?" Lori asked softly.
"Me? No one, at least, no one since all this started. My parents were already dead and I'm an only child."
"I'm sorry. It must have been hard, being alone," Lori said.
"Don't worry about it. My mom died in childbirth and my dad died from a massive heart attack a few years ago. I'd rather they be dead already than have to live through all of this." Once again, Jack thought her words might have come across as cold, or insensitive, but Lori only smiled and nodded her head in understanding.
"A Walker got him," Jacqui suddenly yelled from across camp. She pointed her finger at a tall, slender man that Jack hadn't met yet. "A Walker bit Jim!"
Everyone moved forward at once, even Jack, encircling Jim who had raised a shovel protectively in front himself. "I'm okay," he said, but there was a crazed glean in his eyes that no one missed.
"Show it us, then," Daryl said. He still had the gory pickax he had been using to prevent any of the dead from turning clutched in his hands. "Show it to us!"
Jim swiped the shovel forward to keep everyone at bay, but T-Dog came up behind him and grabbed his arms. Daryl tossed his pickax to the ground and lifted Jim's shirt, exposing a thin abdomen covered in hair, and two crescent shaped marks punched into the skin. A bite so similar to Jack's that she couldn't help but unconsciously run her fingers over her arm.
"I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm okay," Jim kept saying, like a mantra. As if he really would be okay if he just kept repeating it. "I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm okay."
Everyone stepped away from him and exchanged tired, hopeless, heartbroken glances. Another one lost, their expressions seemed to say, another body in a grave. Jack watched Jim as he stood there, repeating those same two words over and over until someone finally took his hand and led him over to the RV, pulling him to sit down and rest. Her fingers slid over her own scar, the still shiny red skin that should have been the end of her but somehow became her salvation. It wouldn't be that way for Jim though, and despite his words, she could see that realization in the defeated slump of his shoulders and the trembling in his hands.
"What do we do?" Jacqui asked quietly. The whole group had assembled and were shooting wary glances at Jim, as if he was going to turn at any second.
"We can put a pickax in his head, an' the dead girl's an' be done with it," Daryl said, fidgeting with the pickax in his hand. He seemed to have an endless supply of energy and no outlet for it.
"That what you would want, if it were you?" Shane asked angrily.
"Yeah, and I'd thank you while you did it," Daryl replied, as if that were the most obvious thing in the world.
"I hate to say it, I never thought I would," Dale, an older gentleman that had introduced himself to Jack the night before, looked around at the others as he spoke. "But maybe Daryl's right."
"Jim's not a monster, Dale. Or some rabid dog," Rick said.
"I'm not saying—," Dale began.
"He is a sick, sick man," Rick interrupted. "We go down that road, then where do we draw the line?"
"The line's pretty clear. Zero tolerance for Walkers, or the to-be," Daryl said.
"What if we can get him to help? I heard the CDC is working on a cure," Rick said.
"I heard that too, heard a lot of things before the world went to hell," Shane said.
"What if the CDC is still up and running?" Rick only had eyes for Shane now, and Jack could sense some sort of power struggle between them. One man who had led the group this far, and another man who, with a natural sort of leadership, was trying to lead them in another direction. Both men seemed to have the best intentions, but that wasn't what was going to save this group.
"And that is a stretch right there," Shane said, shaking his head.
"Why?" Rick wasn't willing to give this idea up. "If there's any government left, and structure at all, they'd protect the CDC at all costs. Wouldn't they? I think it's our best shot. Shelter, protection, rescue."
"We all want those things, Rick." Shane's hands were on his hips, and the look he gave Rick was part derisive and part pitying. "I do too, okay? But if they exist, they're at the army base. Fort Benning."
"That's a hundred miles away," Lori said.
"In the opposite direction," Jack said. Shane barely acknowledged her, but Dale gave her a calculated look, interested that she had spoken up at all.
"That's right," Shane went on. "But it's away from the hot zone. Now listen to me, if that place is operational, it would be heavily armed. We would be safe there."
"The military were on the front lines of this. They got overrun, we've all seen that," Rick said. "The CDC's our best bet and Jim's only chance."
Dale shook his head. "There is no miracle cure, Rick. Even if we make it to the CDC before…before it happens, there's no cure! Otherwise we wouldn't be in the mess we are. They would have distributed it long ago."
Now Rick looked directly at Jack. "Maybe they didn't have a cure before. But maybe they can make one now."
Shane and some of the others scoffed at this, even Lori shot her husband a disbelieving look. But then Glenn and T-Dog were both staring expectantly at Jack as well. Even Daryl cast her a sideways glance, though there was no hopeful expectation in his expression. She shifted uncomfortably, not sure what they were wanting her to say. But Rick spared her from having to search for words.
"Jack was bitten by a Walker weeks ago and didn't turn. Her bite healed over and now," he gestured a hand toward her, "now Walker's don't bother with her."
"What do you mean?" Dale demanded.
"That's ridiculous," Shane said. "No one can get bit and not turn. It just doesn't happen."
"I did get bit," Jack said. She lifted her arm and let everyone look at the scar there. Definitely a bite mark, and unlike the sort that resulted from an animal attack. The teeth marks were too blunt.
Shane looked at the scar and said, "Couldn't have been a Walker. Maybe the person that bit you was just manic, or schizophrenic. Or maybe they were just high on bath salts."
Glenn said, "But that wouldn't explain how she can be around them without them trying to eat her. Daryl and I both watched her walk out onto a street full of Walkers, grab the bag of guns, and walk back to us without one Walker trying to attack her."
Everyone looked at her with interest and suspicion until Rick said, "The point is, if we can get to the CDC, and Jack agrees to go with us," at this he gave her a pointed but pleading look, "then maybe they can examine her blood, or DNA or whatever and develop a cure."
"You think that could work?" Lori asked, her expression hopeful as she looked between her husband and Jack.
"That still wouldn't save him," Jack whispered and looked at Jim. "A cure could take weeks, months even. He might have another day, tops."
"There's still hope. Maybe the CDC is close, maybe they've been working on a cure for a while now. We can't know unless we go there. We owe it to Jim to try."
As Rick spoke, Jack watched Daryl. It wasn't a conscious thing, but her attention was drawn to him, to the way he rolled the pickax in his hand and shot Jim a considering look. Despite his earlier words, it wasn't detachment or callousness etched into his face, but rather a fierce desire to protect himself and the camp from the looming threat of allowing an infected person amongst them. He nodded his head slightly and said, "You go find some aspirin, do what you need to do. Time someone had the balls to take care of this problem!"
He had rushed toward Jim, pickax raised, and Jack didn't doubt for a second that if Rick hadn't pulled his gun and aimed it at Daryl's head that he would have gone through with it. But, with the gun only inches from the back of his neck, and Shane coming around to stand between the pickax and Jim, there weren't a lot of options left. Jack didn't realize she had done it, but the moment Daryl ran for Jim she had taken a step back, trying to put distance between herself and the confrontation. A hand came to rest gently on her shoulder and she looked up to see Dale. He didn't say anything, just nodded his head reassuringly. It was enough.
"We don't kill the living," Rick was saying, enunciating each word carefully.
Daryl lowered the pickax and looked at Rick belligerently. "That's funny, coming from a man that jus' put a gun to my head."
"We may disagree on some things," Shane said. "But not on this. You put it down. Go on." He indicated the pickax still gripped in Daryl's hands.
Daryl gave both men disgusted looks, but stabbed the pickax into the ground and walked off. Despite the fact that he had just been thwarted, Daryl exuded an aura of rebellion and independence, and seemed completely uninterested in what any of the people staring at him thought.
Rick gathered up Jim and led him into the RV, and everyone went back to getting the camp cleaned up and the bodies ready for burial. Jack went off with Lori again, and immersed herself in gathering up firewood and the eating utensils that had been knocked over and kicked around in the dirt. They would all need to be washed before use, she thought, which would give her something else to do to occupy her time.
She wasn't at this very long, however, when someone tapped her on the shoulder. Jack looked up to see Glenn standing behind her, looking uncomfortable. She straightened and gave him an inquisitive look. "What's up?"
Glenn shifted on his feet, "I hate to ask you this, but would you be willing to help me wrap them?" He pointed behind them to the pile of bodies waiting to be buried. There were some sheets and picnic blankets lying nearby, but not a lot of volunteers for the job.
Jack didn't want to do it either. There was something intimate about preparing your dead for burial, and since she didn't know any of the deceased, didn't have any sort of bond with them, it felt somehow wrong to be a part of it. But she couldn't say no, not when Glenn was looking so upset, so distraught. She nodded her head and followed him over to the bodies.
They laid out the sheets first and then lifted the bodies onto them. Carefully, gently, they rolled the sheets around the bodies, tucking them around the heads and feet. It was almost like they were just tucking them for the night. They did this with each body. They developed a routine, with Glenn taking the head and Jack the feet. They were almost through when Amy started to move.
Glenn stopped tucking the sheet around the head of a young woman and stared toward Andrea. Jack watched as the blond woman put her ear close to Amy's chest, listening. Amy started to move, her eyes opened, and she reached for a teary Andrea. Jack and Glenn both started forward, as did Shane and Rick, but Andrea raised her gun and shot Amy in the head.
Jack had opted out of the funeral. She had never liked funerals anyway, but she didn't feel like she could be anymore a part of these people's suffering. They needed to grieve, and she needed space from their misery. She also wanted some time with her thoughts. She wasn't sure how she felt about Rick telling everyone about her immunity to Walkers. She hadn't thought to keep it a secret, but she didn't think it was a good idea for him to get their hopes up like that. There was a very real possibility that the CDC would be evacuated, overrun, or just no longer capable of developing a cure. She didn't want to see everyone's hopes dashed against the rocks like that, and she didn't like the position that Rick had put her in. So while everyone else walked up the hill to bury their dead, she walked down into the quarry to wash up and think about her options.
Her clothes and skin were covered in blood, Walker mostly, but also that of the people being placed into the ground. It was starting to dry and itch, so she went through her bags, pulled out some soap and clean clothes, and headed down to the water. She was very careful to fill a bottle with water and scrub the blood off before submerging in the lake. It would be a terrible thing to contaminate such a source of fresh water. Especially since Atlanta didn't have any major rivers or tributaries that ran near it, and they would all need water to survive.
When she was clean enough for a bath, Jack stripped out of her clothes and waded into the cool water. She didn't know how long she'd have, so she hurried and scrubbed off, allowing herself a little extra time to wash her hair. It wasn't very long, just brushing her shoulders, but it was thick and prone to tangles. She had to brush some knots out with her fingers. She considered staying with the group, going with them to the CDC. What if Rick was right? What if they could find a cure using her blood? She couldn't turn a blind eye to a possibility like that.
After she finished she hurried onto land and into some bushes to change. She threw on a pair of jeans, some clean socks and a dark green, V-neck shirt. Her black Chucks were sitting beside the water where she had kicked them off, and besides having a bit of dried blood on them, were still fit to wear.
When she made it back to camp, everyone was assembled around one of the campfire pits, trying to come up with a plan of action since it was obvious that they couldn't remain there any longer. The sun had started to dip in the sky, darkness was approaching from the east. One of the women was starting to assemble dinner, the first meal the group had taken that day.
Jack dropped her soiled clothes with a pile of contaminated things they were going to burn later, and approached the group hesitantly. Lori, Dale and Glenn all nodded at her in welcome, and she fell in behind them, just outside the loose circle.
"I've been thinking about Rick's plan," Shane was saying, addressing the entire group. "Now look, there are no guarantees either way, I'll be the first one to admit that. But I've known this man a long time and I trust his instincts. The most important thing here is we need to stay together. Those of you that agree, we leave first thing in the morning."
Everyone looked around at each other, and a few people shot glances back at Jack. She wished they wouldn't look to her. Eventually everyone got up and went about their business, setting up for the night again.
Jack went to her bag. The duffel filled with food and water had been added to the camp's stash, but her clothes and toiletries had been left alone. She snatched it up from the ground and looked around for a place to crash. She didn't have a tent or a sleeping bag, so she looked for soft place, maybe in the grass but close enough to the fire to keep warm.
"You can sleep in here, if you want," a voice called to her.
Jack turned and saw Dale looking at her. He gestured to the RV and said, "Have some floor space open and extra blankets. Not comfortable, but it's warm."
She smiled and nodded. "That would be great. Thank you." She hadn't counted on anyone being so nice to her.
He took the bag from her and set it inside the RV. "We have to look after one another. Keep each other safe as best we can if we want to make it. And I don't want to put any pressure on you, but if you really can do what Glenn and Rick said you can, then you might be the hope we've all been waiting for."
Jack rubbed the back of her neck, "I don't know about that. What if it's just a fluke? What if we get to the CDC, find people there, and they can't use me to find a cure?" She looked at the people milling around camp. "What is everyone going to think then?"
"You're a part of our group now, and will be for as long as you chose. Whether anyone can find a cure or not," Dale said generously.
Jack looked into his earnest eyes and nodded. She didn't entirely believe him, still figured there would be a fair amount of bitterness in the group if they discovered that Jack's DNA wasn't going to be their salvation, but she couldn't stand the thought of going back to Atlanta alone. Holing up in dark office buildings and scavenging for food while the dead rose all around her. She needed to be around other people, other living people. So she would go with them, to the CDC or Fort Benning, or wherever. She didn't want to be alone anymore.
In the morning they set out. Morales and his family were the only ones to leave the group, deciding to try and find their family in Birmingham. Jack rode with Glenn, Dale, Jacqui and Jim in the RV. She sat at the table by herself, listening as Jacqui cared for Jim, until they had to stop. The RV overheated.
Everyone pulled to the side of the road and Jack couldn't stand to stay inside with Jacqui and Jim any longer. His anguish was too much for her to listen to anymore. She walked outside and breathed in the warm, moist air, as Rick and Shane discussed their options. There was a gas station down the road, there might be parts there.
Jacqui came running out of the RV then, breathless with panic. "It's Jim. It's bad. I don't think he's going to make it much longer."
Rick followed her into the RV, and Jack walked back toward the others to wait. She fidgeted with the hem of her shirt, and tried not to look at anyone until Rick came back out and told them all that Jim wanted them to leave him there. Shane was back from his run down to the gas station now, and shook his head. Most of the others opposed the idea too, but Dale spoke up quickly.
"Back at the camp, when I said I agreed with Daryl and you shot me down, you misunderstood," he said. "I would never go along with callously killing a man. But I was just going to suggest we ask Jim what he wants. And I think we have an answer."
"We just leave him here?" Shane asked. "We take off? Man, I'm not sure I can live with that."
"It's not your call," Lori said, addressing both Rick and Shane. "Either of you."
So Rick and Shane went back into the RV and helped pull Jim out. They carried him, as gently as possible, to the woods just off the road and laid him back against a tree. The others all gathered around him except for Jack. She leaned against the side of the RV and watched as they all said their goodbyes to Jim, farewells and admissions of respect, before heading back to the vehicles.
Jack wasn't sure how she felt about this. It seemed cruel somehow, to leave a man to die alone. But in his place, she imagined that maybe she would want the same thing. Maybe it was better to pass on by yourself, more peaceful when you didn't have to worry about how the people around you would react to your death. She couldn't decide if it was noble or cowardly.
They all climbed back into the cars and soon they were driving off, leaving Jim behind as they raced onward to the CDC.
There you are, chapter 2! Next chapter, the CDC! And expect some one on one interaction between Jack and Daryl, and some of the other characters as well.