Chapter Forty Three: Deserted
Deserted: abandoned in a way considered disloyal or treacherous.
Day 83
The world was deceptively calm, outside the rain trickled and the frogs croaked as though the world had not ended at all. Only the distant groaning of the straggling walkers, likely from the herd that had attacked the night before. Daisy was sitting with her forehead pressed against the fogged window, staring out at the mossy green and wet brown gloom that was the forest outside. The window she stared out of was the only one present in the small domicile that they had hunkered down in during the terrifying night before—domicile was perhaps a strong word, it was more accurately a tool shed, maybe a shack at best.
Condensation was cool against her forehead, she sat back in her precariously functioning wooden chair and wiped it away. By her feet, underneath the lip of a heavy bench in the small foot space Sophia lay huddled with a scratchy blanket. It was the kind of blanket that one both loathed for its abrasiveness and loved for its nostalgic resemblance to a similar blanket that seemed to come in hoards to all grandparents. Sophia was asleep despite the sun having slightly risen above the horizon—they had become accustomed to rising with it at the camp—Daisy was not eager to have to wake her. Face stained stickily with salty tears and eyes reddened from copious rubbing, Sophia obviously needed the rest.
Contrastingly, Merle had not slept a wink, as far as Daisy knew—she herself had managed a few hours in the inky darkness that had wrapped around the terror-filled world like a simultaneously suffocating and comforting blanket. He had left their safe haven of a shed before the sun had risen, but after Daisy herself had made herself wake. Gun in tow, Merle likely intended to retreat to his past-time of hunting, both as a comfort and a practicality, the latter because they had salvaged no food in their desperate run from danger. As quiet as the forest around her, Daisy sat back in her chair and wrapped her arms around herself to provide some semblance of warmth and comfort, and waited.
When the sun was high in the sky, above the tallest reaches of the trees that completely encompassed the shed, Merle stumbled back into the shed. Daisy was startled from her nervous stupor, and Sophia stirred slightly where she remained huddled under the work bench, Daisy noted that she was awake and had likely been awake for some time.
"Catch anything?" Daisy asked blearily, her foot curled around the strap of her bag nervously as she supressed a yawn.
Merle scoffed and entered the shed, letting the door fall shut behind him, and sat heavily in the chair across from hers. The shed was so small that his knees almost brushed hers, despite their rickety wooden chairs being pushed against opposite walls.
"Is that a no?" She inferred, a small lick of disappointment making itself known to her. Daisy knew that she had no right to be disappointed at the lack of food—as she had not endeavoured to hunt with Merle or forage on her own—but the pain of hunger in one's stomach often disregarded logic and propriety.
"Yeah, it's a goddamn no," Merle grumbled, huddling down in his chair with his eyes closed, either rightfully tired or dismissive of any conversation with her. If Merle was feeling the latter, Daisy certainly empathised. There was something so exhausting about being separated from one's newfound family that begged solitude. Looking down at the frightened yet curious face of Sophia, Daisy knew that she had become unable to fall prey to such desires. As she had promised Carol in the face of the latter's impending death, Daisy must be strong for Sophia.
"What are we gonna do now?" Daisy asked, trying to be proactive about their dismal situation. Merle's eyes opened a sliver and he looked towards Daisy.
"Guess we should go back to the farm—see if anyone's still there," Merle supposed with a grimace. Daisy nodded agreeably, and pulled her backpack closer to herself with the foot tangled in its strap.
Daisy looked down at Sophia, who was looking right back with her blue eyes wide and afraid. "You ready, Soph?" Daisy asked lightly, trying to infuse a cavalier tone into the situation. She nodded her head dully and scrambled out from under the workbench, Daisy and Merle stood along with her.
Pulling her backpack on, Daisy followed Merle and Sophia outside of the shack, fallen leaves crunched under her feet and a cool morning wind blew callously through her hair. As Daisy looked around, she became relieved to note that there were no walkers lingering around the sparse trees. In that moment, they seemed safe—but Daisy knew not to let her guard down. Beside her, Merle looked up towards the rising sun, then back down at the trees surrounding them, in the direction of a slowly spiralling plume of grey smoke. Without another word, apparently aware of which way the farm was, Merle strode away from the shack and towards the smoke. Daisy did not yet want to ponder why the smoke was coming from the farm.
She followed after him with a nervous huff of a breath, and kept Sophia in her peripherals to ensure that she was following along. It was eerie to walk back along the jagged path that Daisy had walked the previous night, when devastation had hung tangibly in the air and she had felt irreversibly alone. After a few long minutes, Daisy spotted the beginnings of the wreckage, a stray walker lying against the trunk of a tree. A splattering of blackened blood stained the wood around where its forehead had been impaled with a large knife, its face was slack in its final death. The stench of rot and dried blood filled the air as it often did in days of late, Daisy ignored it. She bid Sophia to similarly ignore it with a prompting hand on her shoulder when she paused at the sight of the dead walker.
Such morbid sights became commonplace once more, and after a few miles their ramshackle group finally emerged from the tree line, the Green family farm clear in the distance. There was no movement save the steady licking of flames that were flickering over the ashy remains of the farmhouse. Daisy's heart sank to the bottom of her stomach, and a horrible feeling overtook her. She had not heard an explosion, or seen anyone set fire to the farmhouse. It must have happened after they escaped. Daisy's hand reached out to catch Sophia's, and she held tightly—though she might insist that she had done so to comfort Sophia, it was mostly to comfort herself. Sophia herself seemed to realise this as she looked towards Daisy in confusion, she squeezed Daisy's hand back.
As they approached, they saw that the camp itself was also destroyed, with tents trampled and belongings strewn over the grass. There were dozens of bodies, most were long decayed and clearly walkers, some were less decayed and thankfully unfamiliar to her. In the distance, Daisy spotted the blonde and red-stained head of Patricia near the stairs to the burning house, she looked away guiltily.
"They're gone," Merle rasped loudly, after poking his head into a nearby tent. "Don't see none of 'em dead 'round here."
"Where would they be?" Daisy asked. "The highway?" She suggested, it being the only reasonably safe place she could think of. Merle caught her gaze for a long moment, he seemed thoughtful.
"Might as well try there," Merle said, nodding vaguely. He seemed to realise something and he looked around. With a cursorily excited grin, he noted, "Cars're gone." Daisy searched where he had and found him to be telling the truth, a burst of excitement fluttered in her heart. An instinctual smile broke across her face to match Merle's, and Sophia's followed not too long after.
"They wouldn't leave us," Sophia spoke up determinedly. "So, they must be on the highway." Her words caused Daisy some pause, but she decided to observe some newfound optimism.
"Soph's right…" Daisy informed Merle with a smile. "How're we gonna get there, though?" She addressed their lack of vehicle, which had seemed solely fortunate a moment before.
"Walk," Merle said obviously, Daisy forgave him for his insolent tone when she saw him restrain an eye roll—she conceded that it had been the most obvious solution. "We should get going, nothing to salvage here." Merle glared at the wreckage that surrounded them. Daisy pulled the straps of her backpack forward with a sigh, stepped over the top half of a dismembered walker, then began to follow Merle towards the highway.
It had taken an hour, but Daisy, Merle, and Sophia had eventually reached the illustrious highway. Though their accomplishments were many, their fruits were withered and dismal; the highway was empty save the crushed remains of a car by the side of the road. Times might not have seemed so tough if the abandoned car had been usable for their continued search for the remainder of the group, but the car was not usable. Thus, times not only seemed tough, but were tough.
The sun was high in the sky, Daisy supposed it to be midday, and its harsh beams of light assaulted the back of her neck. She could feel her skin burning, and longed for cloud cover. They had stopped to pity themselves for only a moment upon reaching the highway and finding it empty of their loved ones, then had continued their trek down the highway in the direction of Senoia. Though Senoia had been the town that held the original clash of their group with those who had attacked the farm, it had also been the town that they had rested in before meeting Hershel, Maggie, and Beth—they had stayed the night in a pizza place that Glenn had noted upheld their promised grade 'A' sanitation, even in the wake of an apocalypse as messy and gore-filled as theirs.
It took a few hours, but Daisy, Merle, and Sophia finally arrived in Senoia, just in time for exactly nothing to happen. The town was entirely empty, with only the usual wreckage and straggling walkers occupying the streets. Daisy tried not to fall into pessimism, but it seemed as though the rest of their group had left them—she assumed due to a belief that they had perished in the attack, and not some secretly harboured hatred of them.
"Fuckers left us," Merle expressed her thoughts with his signature callousness.
"Maybe—" Daisy started to reason, she was interrupted by a dirty glare shot towards her courtesy of Merle.
"Maybe…them fuckers left us," he grumbled with a certainty that began to scratch at her insecurities—maybe they were irrevocably gone. One might think that it was easy to find loved ones in a mostly unpopulated wasteland, it was decidedly not as such in reality. It had taken Rick under two days to find his family, but he was undoubtedly an outlier. Way back when the dead first started to rise, her mother had told her to stay put, and that they would come to find her and keep her safe. Daisy had not seen or heard from any members of her family since then, and she doubted that she ever would.
"What are we gonna do, then?" Sophia asked with uncertainty clouding her words.
"We're gonna survive," Merle replied unfalteringly, he shared a reassuring glance with Sophia. "Might cross paths with them…sooner or later." Daisy silently wagered that it would be later, if at all, then cursed her lingering pessimism as it refused to remove its grasp over her.
As she gazed around at the disparagingly deserted town, Daisy was startled to realise that there was one thing out of place—a faded, powder blue truck. Daisy immediately assured herself that it was empty, and supposed that the others had left a truck in the case that they were alive and had found themselves in Senoia.
"Merle, Soph," Daisy said quietly to catch their attention, they looked towards her and she simply nodded her head towards the truck, bright smile burgeoning on her face.
"Oh, shit…" Merle said lightly. Sophia shot them both an ecstatic grin, either at the presence of the truck or at Merle's casual cursing. "Well, that's one good thing, at least." Daisy agreed wholeheartedly with him, and was quietly pleased that life was not as dismal as it had been a minute before. Sophia led the three of them towards the truck, she tugged the heavy door open and looked down at the seat.
"There's a note," Sophia said softly as she lifted it from the seat. "'Going South,'" she read. Daisy shared a thoughtful glance with Merle as they idled by the side of the truck.
"Guess we're headin' south," Merle said unequivocally, Daisy felt an intense relief as she had thought for a moment that perhaps Merle would rather they remain on their own. Sophia scrambled into the truck, note still clenched tightly in hand and a beaming, hopeful smile on her face. As she rounded the truck, Daisy supposed that was a foolish thought—Merle would never leave his baby brother behind if he could help it.