Guts

Lori

"You two have been gone for ages, how many goddamn mushrooms d'you need?" Lori asked as she watched Amy and Juliet make their way back in to camp. Amy looked pleased with herself, as she carried the majority of them in to camp and Juliet held just a few.

Lori herself was stood with Carl and had been waiting for Amy and Juliet to return for over an hour after Amy having assured her that they would only be ten minutes more. It was the last time she would take her word on anything. It was probably Lori's fault for agreeing to help her prepare dinner before she left them both in the woods because she wanted to check on Carl. And tell Shane to meet her in the forest.

"Don't even ask." Juliet said. She sounded exasperated, probably because Amy had dragged her around the forest for over three hours looking for mushrooms, which Juliet had, while Lori was with them, made it plain she didn't like anyway. "Apparently they're good for you and really filling and her sister likes them which means we have to have a million of them for dinner tonight." Lori laughed and took the mushrooms Juliet was carrying and went to sit beside Amy who was beginning to sort out the millions that they had collected. Juliet sat on the floor in front of the two of them, helping even though she had no obligation to. Lori was glad. Juliet had been rather reluctant to help out with anything around camp, mostly because the men very rarely did, but after a while she had just given in and started helping out where she could, though occasionally she still commented on how little the men did around camp. She clearly disliked confrontation though, and would never say it to any of them.

"How do we tell if they're poison?" Amy asked suddenly. Lori shrugged.

"Uh, there's only one sure way I know of." she replied, and Juliet smirked.

"I'm so glad I don't like mushrooms." she said softly, and Lori laughed. It was always a little touch and go with the food these days; most people could barely stomach it, half of it was probably poisonous and even if it wasn't it was hard to cook it properly. Lori missed her fridge, over, and the luxury of shopping around for food. Had she known she might never go in one again, she would have savoured the last trip to Trader Joes.

"Ask Shane when he gets back?" Amy suggested. Lori nodded. If anyone would know it would probably be Shane.

"Yeah, you've got it." she told her. She felt like now would be the right time to make her exit, and even though it was rude, she didn't excuse herself from the girls, simply turned to her son who was stood nearby and then looked over to Dale. "Dale, I'm heading out. Sweetheart, I want you to stay where Dale can see you, okay?" Carl nodded.

"Yes Mom!" he replied, probably eager to go find his friends and play with them while she couldn't make him do schoolwork. She knew it was futile, but she felt like it was one last attempt to keep things as normal as possible for him.

"You too. Don't wander too far. Stay within shouting distance. And if you see anything, holler. I'll come running." Dale said to her, and she turned to the girls who were both grinning, pressing their lips together to try not to laugh.

"Yes Mom." she said softly, and the two sniggered. She liked them both, but they were barely ten years older than some of the kids here. It was hardly possible to have a grown up discussion with Amy, and no point in trying to talk to Juliet properly unless she was away from the group. She was more like their mother than she was a friend. She hoped Jacqui would get back around the same time she came back from seeing Shane so she could have a normal discussion with someone who wasn't either male or half her age.

Rolling her eyes at nothing in particular, Lori headed silently in to the forest, hoping Shane wasn't too mad at her for being late.

Sophia

As her sister sat with Amy sorting out mushrooms, which Sophia knew for a fact she wouldn't eat, Sophia sat by herself. She hadn't felt like joining in with the others kids today. Her mother had asked if she was feeling okay, and she was, it was just that Juliet had been on edge all morning, and she was always like that when she went shooting with Daryl. Sophia intended on following them again, something she wouldn't be able to do quietly if she had to make up some excuse to tell all the other kids when she left. She knew her mother was busy and her father wouldn't notice, so she just had to hope that Juliet didn't see her. She was sure that she hadn't last time; if she had then she hadn't said anything to her yet.

She wasn't sure why she followed them. It was a combination of curiosity, hope that they might include her in the lesson, and the fact that it was the one interesting thing going on around camp.

Juliet was putting her long blonde hair up in a messy bun, keeping it off her neck when he arrived. All the others were too busy in the heat to notice the look the pair shared before she slipped away, following him down the path that lead out of camp. Sophia barely waited a moment before she too went off, hoping her mother would just assume she was down by the lake with the other children, trying to skip stones, swimming, or whatever it was they were actually doing today.

She couldn't see them well but she could hear Juliet in the distance. She was loud on her own and her voice carried quite far. It wasn't long before they were in her sights.

They walked for miles. She knew enough from science class that the sound of a shot carried less through the woods, but it still carried. Juliet wasn't a particularly careful person, but Daryl was obviously mindful about being caught, although from what she'd seen of him, Sophia wondered if he was worried about the repercussions of teaching her, the thought of someone finding out he was doing something nice for her, or just being caught spending more time than necessary with her. Perhaps it was a little of all three.

When they eventually stopped Sophia found a good place to sit to watch them.

"Where do you even get these bullets from? I mean, don't you need them?" she heard her sister ask as he handed her the gun. She held it out, then remembering, brought it back and flicked the safety off it, returning quickly to her previous stance.

"They're mine. I can do what I like with 'em. You only use a few rounds each time, and I gave most to the group anyway. Well, a few. 'F you don't like it you can always stop learning."

"No. A few bullets wasted on training is a sacrifice I'm willing to make. I need to learn to defend myself; I cannot rely on the rest of you to have my back forever."

"Sure?" Juliet nodded. Sophia wondered if he wanted her to say yes so he didn't have to do this anymore, though he didn't strike her as someone who would do something if he didn't want to. "'Kay then." He walked to a tree about twenty feet away and carved out a piece of bark, of similar size to a human head. "Aim towards the top."

He stood away as Juliet pointed. Sophia remembered last week he had told her she took too long getting ready, and if she tried that if she was actually being attacked she'd be dead before she even got to shooting whatever was coming at her. Obviously she'd taken heed of and remembered his words, because she shot immediately. The bullet hit the lower half, but she quickly adjusted her aim and hot again, hitting the top half the second time.

"Admit it." Juliet said, sounding rightly proud of herself. For someone who had never held a gun until whenever she had started learning with him, she'd certainly progressed fast. "I'm getting good."

"You're gettin' better." Daryl corrected her, not smiling, but also not looking as exasperated with her as he usually did. Clearly he was glad that however much time he had spent teaching her had not gone to waste. "Won't know if you're good 'til I see how you are with a walkin' target."

"I… I don't wanna seek one out."

"Wasn't suggestin' we did. We don't have to." She looked confused, but through the trees Sophia noticed as Juliet did the slowly moving shape. Sophia froze. Since all this had started she hadn't seen one up close. Now there was one just a few feet away from her, and all she wanted to do was run back to camp, where it was safe. Juliet looked as scared as she did, and she realised that even with everything, Juliet had about as much up close experience with the walkers as she had.

"The noise will attract more. Just shoot it with your crossbow." The terror in her voice was thinly veiled behind something masquerading as reason.

"You were shootin' three seconds ago and you're worried about doin' it again now? Jus' fire. You know I'll get it before it come near you. Now shoot." He said the last part as the walker caught their scent, finally acknowledging them and picking up its pace now that the promise of food was imminent. Sophia watched her sister hold out the gun, able to see her lips moving softly, mouthing silent words before she shot. She missed the first two times, hit it in the chest a third. It was only on the fourth shot that she hit the forehead, bullet making a perfect round hole through the rotten flesh, and the walker fell back. She watched Juliet drop the gun and walk away, not far, just to a tree. She leant against it quietly with her eyes shut. Daryl made no attempt to follow her, but stood waiting, not impatient in the least. Sophia watched her sister take a deep breath before she opened her eyes and looked at him.

"You okay?" It didn't sound like concern, more just something he was obliged to ask, but Juliet looked grateful nonetheless.

"Yeah. Sorry. It's just… The only thing I ever killed before was a bird, and it was half dead already when I found it, so the only reason I did it was to put it out of its misery. I cried then too." Sophia hadn't realised she was crying. She was too far away to see properly. She had always been quite an emotional person; she cried at the most minor of provocations. Sophia was a lot like her in that respect, although she still had time to grow out of it.

"Well, they're already dead. Savin' your own skin's more important than tryin' to save them. They ain't comin' back from that. Might as well put them outta their misery too." She nodded and pushed one strand of hair which had fallen out of the up-do from her face.

"I know. And if it was me I'd want someone to do it. It's just… Hard. I took one taster Philosophy class once because my friend didn't want to be on her own once. All I learnt was that everyone else might not see the same blue as I see, like they might see the sky as being pink but they call that blue and you'll never know because it's not like you can see what they're seeing."

"Sure." Both Sophia and Juliet knew full well that he didn't understand. Sophia didn't really either.

"Anyway, one taster class is not enough for me to be having to think about these moral dilemmas. If I'd know I'd have to answer the question 'If a person dies but then comes back but also wants to eat you and doesn't remember who they are should you kill them or is it technically murder?' I would have taken that instead of English. Fat lot of good knowing Shakespeare quotations does me now."

"Well you said some Shakespeare crap before you shot it, so it must be doin' you some good."

"That wasn't Shakespeare. It wasn't even in English. It was from Dracula. Not even remotely the same thing. I tend to quote things when I need to take my mind off something. Especially that."

Sophia knew it was her favourite book. While she herself was more in to Harry Potter and Percy Jackson, and any other fantasy type thing she could find, she knew Juliet liked to read classic books and that she had read most of them enough that she could quote them without thinking about it. Her favourite term of endearment for Sophia was 'light of all lights' which was from Dracula. She had tried to read it to her once, but it had both unnerved and bored her, and Juliet had sighed and left to go and read it by herself.

"What was it?" Daryl asked her. She looked surprised at his interest.

"It came to mind when it started going faster. When it knew we were here. 'Denn die Todten reiten Schnell'. It means 'For the dead travel fast'." Juliet was so much quieter than usual. Either she wasn't talking at all or she was talking loudly. There was no in between like this. Sophia had never witnessed her so shaken up. "It's stupid but it helped."

"Far as I'm concerned you can say whatever you like before you shoot 'em so long as you do it quickly and hit it without wastin' too many bullets."

"I'll try. I won't need to try as many times next time." she assured him. He nodded.

"Hopefully next time you'll get it in one. Now, d'you wanna keep goin' or would you rather head back to camp?"

"I didn't walk all the way out here for a ten minute lesson. Teach me something else." He thought for a moment before and idea seemed to come to him, and he beckoned her over to him. She complied, the perfect student, and stood waiting.

"Gimme the glasses." he demanded.

"Why? It's not like I ever take them off, and even if I did I'd put them back on before I tried to shoot anything."

"And what if they get broken? You need to learn to shoot without being able to see stuff properly, just in case. You really wanna take the chance." She sighed and shook her head. "Thought not. Give 'em here, I promise not to break 'em." She took them off and pushed the loose strand of hair back from her face again. It was clearly annoying her.

They stayed another hour. He wouldn't let her shoot for a long time, mindful of wasting bullets, worried about being heard by more walkers. It took a while but she managed to hit the target a couple of times, though never where the implied brain was, always a little too low or too high.

Daryl had done his level best not to get annoyed with her. Juliet's eyesight was awful, which he must have realised, and Sophia thought she had done quite well, all things considered. They only stopped because Daryl wanted to start hunting again and go deeper in to the forest. He didn't want her to walk back by herself while it was dark, though they both laughed about that for a reason Sophia didn't understand.

"See you later." Juliet said to him.

"Yeah, see ya. Send my brother out this way if he's back when you get there, okay?"

"I'll be sure to." Sophia knew full well that her sister had no intention of talking to his brother unless she had to, so she probably wouldn't. She watched Juliet walk away and waited until Daryl was gone too before she followed her away. She was feeling quite proud of herself when she lost sight of Juliet. She tried not to worry too much as she kept walking the way that she thought she must have gone, but five minutes later when she still couldn't see her sister, she began to get a little nervous.

Sophia heard something behind her and spun around, looking, seeing nothing. She carried on walking, a little more tentatively. It was only when she felt a little more relaxed that she felt a hand over her mouth, preventing her from screaming.

Sophia felt herself being turned around, hand still clamped over her mouth and she looked up at the grinning girl who had her trapped like that.

"Boo."

Juliet

Juliet let her sister go before she dissolved into a fit of laughter. Sophia just glared at her, which made her laugh even more.

"You scared me!" Sophia exclaimed. Juliet rolled her eyes.

"Well, obviously. That was kinda the point. Serves you right for following me out here. That easily could have been a walker sneaking up on you, or someone who couldn't find any dinner from another camp and was so hungry that they decided the little girl walking through the forest would make a better meal than nothing…"

"Stop it!"

"I'm not even sorry. That's the third time you've followed me out here. Apart from being a blatant invasion of my privacy, you're putting yourself in danger. How am I supposed to explain to Carol if something bad happens to you?" How am I supposed to live with myself if it does? "I don't understand why you do it anyway, it's hardly the most interesting thing to watch, me failing to hit a target." Sophia looked down at the ground guiltily. "Hey, look, I'm not mad. And I won't tell Carol because then she'll know what I've been doing and she'll be upset." Sophia nodded and Juliet put an arm around her, and guided her to start walking back to camp again.

"Why are you learning?" Sophia spoke again after what seemed like a long time.

"Because, I want to be able to protect myself if something bad happens. I want to be able to protect you too, and the best way I can do that is by learning to shoot."

"I should learn too."

"You think Carol and Ed are going to let that happen?" Sophia shook her head. "Look, Daryl's never gonna have the patience to teach you, but I'll probably be okay. Just let me work on getting better and in a couple of weeks I can try and teach you some stuff." Juliet didn't mention that she had no idea where to find a gun, or bullets that anyone would be willing to part with while she taught a twelve year old with hand-eye coordination so bad she could barely catch a basketball being thrown to her from three feet away how to shoot.

"Okay!" Sophia said brightly. Her face turned immediately more solemn. "But I don't want to shoot walkers. Not like you did today."

"I didn't want to shoot it." Juliet said quietly, not meeting her eyes. "If you hadn't been there I probably wouldn't have been able to, but you were, and I was so worried that it might walk past us and get to you that I had to. My first lesson, Daryl tried to get me to shoot them and I couldn't. Today was the first time I was even able to pull the trigger while I was aiming at one of them. Guess my moral code went out the window. I mean, I kept telling myself they weren't people but it's still hard to raise a gun to something which looks human. But you have to, Sophia. If I teach you, that'll be why I'm teaching you, so you can defend yourself. One day someone with a gun and experience might not be around and then you have two choices, you protect yourself or you die. That's just how it is."

"Maybe everything will go back to normal before then." Sophia said hopefully. Juliet said nothing to her; hope was powerful and it kept people going. Juliet was a realist. She knew there was likely no hope of things going back any time soon, if they ever did. She wasn't going to tell a twelve year old that though. Sophia needed her hope. Luckily, her sister didn't press Juliet for an opinion, and the pair continued walking in silence for a while before Sophia spoke again. She didn't mind. It was like having Amy with her, except Sophia would probably be of more use in a crisis than Amy would have been.

"Hey, Juliet?"

"Yeah?"

"How did you get him to teach you anyway?"

"What, you mean how did I get him to agree?" Sophia nodded. "I didn't. I was out by myself a few weeks ago and he saw me and asked why I didn't have a gun. I told him it would be useless because I had no idea how to hold one, let alone shoot one and begrudgingly he offered to show me and it ended up becoming a regular occurrence. He doesn't like it, I know it interrupts his hunting or brooding or whatever it is he does out here, but I think if it comes to it he'd rather the group had a few more capable shooters than not do it at all. The only reason it's me and not someone else is because he saw me being useless before any of the others. And I think he's kind of used to me now." Juliet told her with a shrug of her shoulders.

"He kinda scared me at first." Sophia admitted.

"Daryl's not that bad, you know that now, right?" Sophia nodded. "I think he acts a lot worse than he is because he likes the rest of us to leave him alone." She wasn't always sure of that. Most of the time, yes, he would obviously rather be somewhere else, but upon occasion, recently even more so, Daryl actually seemed to silently enjoy her company. He probably just liked the change of scenery from just his brother or being alone.

"Juliet, I'm tired." She smiled at her little sister.

"You're twelve, you should be above whining because you have to walk somewhere."

"Well, I'm not."

"C'mon then, it's only another half a mile back to camp, I'll give you a piggyback." Sophia grinned and hopped up on to a log nearby so Juliet could boost her up on to her back. "Fuck, you used to be a lot lighter than this when you were younger." Sophia laughed.

"Well duh, I was like, half my size then. Don't swear or I'll tell Mom."

"Like Carol's going to tell me off for swearing now. She'll probably just tell you not to repeat it and ask me to stay away from you if I'm going to do bad things like that again. There are worse things than swearing right now. It's therapeutic." Sophia had stopped listening. She rested her head on Juliet's shoulder, and she could tell that her little sister was closing her eyes. "Don't you dare fall asleep, it's hard enough carrying you awake, you can nap back at camp."

"Fine."

It wasn't too long before the pair arrived back at camp. She put Sophia down and let her run off to find Carol. She went to sit with Amy who commented on how long she'd been gone disinterestedly before worrying about how late it was getting and telling her that Andrea wasn't back yet. She'd moved on from preparing the mushrooms now. Juliet saw that Lori was back too, watching Shane and Carl together, and that Jim and Dale were talking about the RV.

"They tried to contact us earlier." Amy said. Juliet assumed she mean the group that was out on the run. "Said they were trapped, but Shane said we couldn't go help."

"It's probably for the best." Juliet attempted to reassure her. "They'll figure their way out of things, the always do. How many times have we had them worrying to us over that same radio about how bad things are?" Practically every time a group was out they radioed the camp, terrified that something bad was imminent, and it never was. The group always made it back. Or at least part of it did. She wasn't going to say that to Amy. No point in getting her any more worried about the way things were going in the city.

"I just… I don't have anyone else. I need her to be okay."

Juliet was about to say something reassuring when an odd noise began to approach the camp. Everyone else seemed to notice it at about the same time she did, and she looked around, confused, meeting a few people's eyes before looking out in to the distance to where the noise seemed to be coming from, frowning before she spoke.

"Anyone else think that sounds a lot like a car alarm?"