I take no credit for any Walking Dead themes or characters.
Weee another chapter done! Lots goes on in this one! Let me know what you think please :) Pretty please? Enjoy!
The group of survivors were quiet for some time while staring off into the pile of newly massacred walkers, one of which who was particularly important to them. Hershel Greene sat on the dirty ground in front of the barn, one of his daughters standing behind him vaguely holding his shoulder. His mouth was slightly ajar while the visions of what just occurred spurred through his mind repeatedly. The people who he had kept safe for months were now laying on the ground and bleeding out. Were the people? He was unsure, but all he knew was that almost everyone he loved was dead. He was enraged.
Andrea, T-Dog, Shane and Glenn stood at the front lines of the fight that had just ended, their hands gripping their weapons even thought it was clearly over. No one was sure what to do, so they stood there silently.
Thinking of the poor girl, Andrea's blonde eyebrows lifted up in angst and her bottom lip quivered. Facing her head to the ground, she closed her eyes and dropped her silver handgun to the ground after brainlessly pulling the safety on to have a moment to reflect on what exactly had just happened. She was an extremely strong woman but she had looked after Sophia many a time throughout this whole incident. When she, her now dead sister Amy, and Dale had first started the camp outside of Atlanta, Carol, Sophia and their deadbeat dad/husband had been among the first to arrive. Sophia and Andrea had spent much time together when she was babysitting her, and it was affecting her deeply. Sophia was one of the last reminders she had of Amy, and now she was gone too. Andrea fell silent among her thoughts.
Eve was still standing on one foot, trying to keep the weight off her sprained ankle. The longer she did this the more aware she became of how her injured ankle was falling asleep midair. In order to keep balance, and also for some kind of comfort, her thin fingers lightly held onto Daryl Dixon's waist. Daryl's gun was still held out in front of him. Eve wasn't sure if he had it out in case one of the walkers came back up or if he was too shocked and had just forgotten to move it. In either case, Eve felt protected, but not safe just quite yet.
Across the field, Carol was sobbing in the dirty grass, her hands clenching among the plants and pulling them out in chunks. Her crying was almost hysterical a few moments ago, but it was quieting down with the passage of time. The body that had been her daughter was leaking muddy blood out of its petite skull while lifelessly laying on top of another walker's body. Carol stared at the body of Sophia in anguish, and mourned the death of her beloved daughter. She was distraught.
The old doctor's voice cut the silence. It was pained, but stern, "You have five minutes to get off my property."
Rick immediately looked over to Hershel. "No, no, no. Please, Hershel. This wasn't supposed to happen!" He held his hands together in front of his chest as if praying. In his mind he cursed his supposed best friend. Shane was off the deep end and had just made it worse for all of them than it had to have been. There was no way to dig themselves out of this mess now other than begging. And Rick was prepared to beg in order to assure the safety of his wife and son.
Hershel Greene sighed and shakily stood up while wiping a tear from his cheek. He didn't break eye contact from the pile of his dead family and friends for one second. "I want you off my property. Now! All of you!"
"You can't do that! Lori is pregnant! We have nowhere to go! You can't throw us out!" Rick pled with the man.
The whole group looked up when Rick announced that Lori was pregnant. Andrea's eyes went wide. Shane ran a hand over his freshly buzzed hair, having already heard the news. He picked the gun up from his side and briskly walked over to Hershel. An irritated sigh escaped his lips, and he quickly pointed the gun at Hershel's head. Shane spoke to him in a low, threatening tone, jamming the barrel into his forehead, "Now you listen here. We're not leaving, now are we?"
Hershel looked up at the barrel of the gun now lodged in the skin of his forehead. His eyes shifted nervously to his daughter. In a moment of desperation, Maggie Greene jumped over to Andrea and quickly leaned down and grabbed the gun Andrea had dropped. The woman pointed the gun at Shane. "Don't you dare, you piece of garbage."
Away from the argument, Daryl shifted so that his arms went around his back. He grabbed Eve's waist and pulled her snug to his body, acting as a human shield. They quietly observed from afar.
"Maggie, put the gun down," Glenn's gentle voice cut through the conversation.
Maggie looked over to Glenn, "Going against my Daddy's word is one thing, but threatening his life is altogether different. I won't let this man kill my father."
"Shane, put down the gun. You've done enough damage already!" Rick scolded his out of control friend.
Shane glared at Hershel with death in his eyes. He clenched the gun so hard that it started to shake in his hands. Hershel stood with his eyes closed, waiting for someone to make the next move.
"Are you out of your mind, Shane!" Rick yelled again.
Eve was watching the argument in front of them with caution. Even though they were standing only twenty feet from the men, she had to squint slightly to make out what was happening. Her grip on Daryl grew tighter, and he returned the motion by pulling her delicate body in closer to him. Daryl's eyes didn't stray from the scene for one moment. He was ready to act if any kind of danger arose.
Carol's cries had turned into sloppy sniffles as she watched the quarrel in horror. T-Dog held his gun up and pointed it at Maggie, unsure of what to do. Maggie Greene held her ground, but occasionally glanced over to Glenn.
"No, I 'aint out of my mind! It's this fuck who's out of his god damned mind! He's going to throw us back out there! Lori is fucking pregnant! Hell if we're stepping foot out in that shit hole!" Shane pushed the gun further into Hershel's forehead. He started to sweat. Shane was feeling a swarm of emotions; confused, infuriated, protective of Lori, desperate and willing to do anything to keep them safe. He wasn't about to give up without a fight.
Rick walked up next to Shane and forcefully pulled the gun away from Hershel's head. "My wife is none of your concern, Shane!"
Enraged, Shane pointed the gun towards Rick, "Hell if she's none of my concern! You're a fucking idiot if you believe that."
Eve's ears perked up. Something was amiss.
Turning her head back towards the edges of the property, Eve closed her eyes and concentrated. In the distance, something was approaching. Quick, but sloppy footsteps were heading towards them. She could hear it. She could hear their far-away groans and hisses. Twigs were snapping underneath their feet and echoing in the emptiness of the forest. Walkers were on their way to the farmhouse. Lots of them.
Eve turned back to Daryl quickly and hurriedly whispered in his right ear, "Do you hear them?"
Daryl turned back to her with a confused look. Gesturing towards the men arguing, he replied, "Yeah..?"
"No. Them." Eve pointed towards the pile of dead walkers Shane and the others had just massacred, and then circled her finger around the camp, indicating what she could hear. Her pale blue eyes were brimming with worry.
Daryl was quiet for a moment, but then opened his eyes wide when he understood, "Fuck me." Turning around and picking up Eve, he hoisted her over his shoulder much like the time when he had first found her. Loudly, he spoke over to the screaming men, "We've gotta' get the fuck outta' here."
Infuriated, Shane turned to Daryl, the gun following suit.
Daryl glared. "Don't you point that shit at me, you fuck." Daryl lifted his gun in suit, and turned slightly so Eve was further away from the barrel of the gun Shane was pointing at them.
"We're not leaving here for anything, you stupid redneck piece of garbage." Shane glared right back.
Daryl growled, but then turned his attention to Rick, "We've got about five minutes before a fuck-ton of walkers come through here."
Rick took a moment to understand. The slaughter of the walkers from the barn used about a hundred bullets. That's a hundred gunshots that walkers around for miles could hear. The steady stream of time it took to kill them all probably led them all right to the farmhouse. It was like ringing the dinner bell for a bunch of starving men. Hershel's farm was no longer safe.
Rick picked up his son and grabbed his wife's upper arm. "Grab everything you can! Throw it into one of the cars and get in. We're leaving! Now!" Rick addressed the camp.
Before Eve could even observe what the others did, Daryl adjusted her body on his shoulder and held her by the back of the thighs. He took off running towards his pickup truck.
In the distance a limping walker broke through the trees. It immediately spotted T-Dog and ran as fast as it could towards him even with a lame leg. Its jaw was ripped off completely so the only thing it had for a mouth was the top layer of teeth and a huge gaping hole of where its throat began. Ligaments hung freely from its cheek and wagged in the breeze it created with every step it took.
As soon as the others heard Rick, they quickly parted. Andrea leapt over to Carol and helped the depressed woman to her feet, then dragged her to the campsite where they both started grabbing important items and threw them in Dale's camper. Dale emerged from the trees panting, a bloody shovel by his side, "We've got a problem."
"We know. Get the camper ready, Rick says we're leaving," Andrea gasped while collecting some of the cooking utensils and chucking them into the door of the Winnebago.
With worried and tired eyes, Dale pointed towards the far side of the field. Andrea looked up and spotted the ill walker headed towards T-Dog. T-Dog quickly shot it and yelled over, "I'll shoot the motherfuckers! You guys get our shit ready!"
Rick, Lori and Carl quickly made their way to their tent and packed it up sloppily. Carl was crying and looking all around him, trying to catch any walkers ambling in. The Grimes family threw their tent in the trunk of the van and started packing up camp with Andrea and Carol.
A few more walkers strode into the field. The smell immediately overtook Eve. It was a mix of disgusting rotting flesh and wriggling maggots. She wanted to throw up. Daryl threw the door open to his pickup and dropped her into the passenger seat. He buckled her seatbelt and put the gun he had gotten from Shane into her hands. "Anythin' come close to you, anything at all. Shoot the basterd in the head. Ya' hear me, woman?"
Eve clumsily gripped the gun with both hands and looked at Daryl with wide eyes. She slowly nodded.
Daryl put a hand on her thigh in comfort, "Alright. You stay here." He looked down at her with an intense stare and reminded her, "Anything, Eve. Shoot it."
Shakily, she responded, "Okay."
Daryl squeezed her thigh and shut the passenger door before jumping over to one of the tents and disassembling it with record speed.
By the barn, Shane, Hershel and Maggie stood, waiting for one to make the first move. A few walkers were peaking through the trees, just about to make their way over to the trio. Hershel's attention was no longer on Shane, and Shane's attention was no longer on Hershel. Hershel stared around them at the walking dead, in horrified awe. Shane stared towards the camp with longing and a feeling of regret where Lori was packing away the few canned goods they had left into one of the cars. The woman was unaware of the silent watcher; she was much more worried about the impending danger.
"Maggie, we have to leave!" Glenn pled while standing off to the side. A female walker crawled towards Glenn and he nervously shot it in the skull, blood and brains raining out from it like a roman candle.
Maggie aimed her gun around the farmhouse property nervously, "...Glenn!"
The young Asian man grabbed her shoulder and pulled her towards the cars, leaving her father behind.
In the pickup, Eve sat in the passenger seat shaking. She had never shot a gun and she wasn't ever planning on having to. It was at this point where she desperately missed her cozy job back in the hospital where there was nothing to worry about. Lost in her thoughts, she didn't notice the moseying walker stride up to the door of the car before sticking its gnarled, rotting hand in through the open window.
What was left of its fingernails were covered in dirt and grime. Some had been ripped out completely or were torn up from various attacks. The skin of its hand and arm was grey. Some areas were deeply bruised with purple flesh. There were a few bloody lacerations dripping with pus and mud. Its boney fingers yanked on Eve's long, auburn hair and tried to pull her out of the window. Eve screamed, "Daryl!" The gun in her hand was forgotten as she struggled to open its fingers to free her hair while keeping her limbs away from its teeth.
Daryl dropped the bag he had collected and ran over to his truck. As soon as he was there he took out a knife from his side and artfully sliced through its wrist. The walker howled as its hand was chopped off and turned to Daryl, ready to attack. As soon as the stinking hand of the monster dropped into Eve's lap she screamed again. Quickly fumbling with the gun, she pulled the trigger and shot the thing through its eye before it got a hold of Daryl.
The body dropped to the ground.
Giving a half smile, Daryl spoke, "Good girl." He kicked it out of the way, grabbed his dropped bag, and jumped into the driver's seat of the car.
T-Dog shot the approaching walkers down quickly. Their numbers were growing and they were approaching at all angles. He eyed the man who was standing near him without making any attempts to leave. In between shots he turned to Shane, "Shane! Get in the Jeep!"
The sudden voice broke Shane out of his thoughts. He turned to T-Dog just in time to see a stray walker jump onto the man and bite into his forearm with its diseased lips. T-Dog screamed out in pain as its teeth tore into his flesh and ripped it away from the bone, a river of blood flowing out and dribbling onto the ground. The two men stared into each other's eyes as they knew what was going to happen.
Without a second glance, Shane picked up his firearm and shot the walker in the brain. In another second's time, his changed targets and shot T-Dog in the head as well. Their bodies fell into the grass of the field, becoming one with the pile of dead zombies from the barn.
Shane gave Hershel one last empty look before quietly stalking off towards his Jeep. Hershel stared off at him in disgusted awe. The old doctor glanced back with a dropped jaw at the newly dead. How someone could shoot one of their friends, point blank, without a care in the world was beyond him. Hershel hurried off into his home to gather his own remaining family and decide what to do.
Eve heard gunshots across the field but couldn't make out what happened. She watched as Shane walked towards the camp and grabbed the bag of guns from before. He tossed them into his Jeep which was parked next to Daryl's pickup truck.
Andrea, Carol and Dale jumped into the camper, Glenn and Maggie following behind. Rick Grimes packed his family into their old van and turned to the rest of the group. "Everyone get in your cars! We're headed to Fort Benning!"
Shane grabbed the last of his things and hopped into his Jeep, unperturbed. All four vehicles started their engines and sped out of the driveway, back onto the dangerous roads of Georgia.