Hi guys, sorry for the cliffhanger in the last chapter, I couldn't resist:-) Hope you'll enjoy this one as well!

This wasn't fair. Her whole freaking life was a laugh. When she'd lost her precious little girl, the only light in her miserable life, she'd wanted to die and the death hadn't come. And now, when the world had gone to hell and she'd found people to care about, the death was coming to take her.

She felt anger bubbling in her veins. She heard the snarl closer to her. Maybe she was about to die here, but she was not going down easily. She clenched her teeth and sank her knife into the skull of the nearest walker with a desperate cry. She did the same with the next one, who was trying to grab her arm, and got out of the creek. For a brief moment she rested on all fours and tried to steady her breathing. She was afraid she might have cracked her ribs in the fall, as her breathing was shallow and her lungs felt on fire.

The walkers were coming, she couldn't see them from her position but she could hear them. Shuffling feet in the soft forest soil, nerve-racking growling.

She got up and once again started running in the opposite direction. The walkers were slow but her remaining strength was leaving her quickly. She stopped in front of a big tree and felt to her knees again. She noticed she'd lost one of her guns; the one Daryl had given her. She pulled out the other one and aimed at the nearest walker. She was no longer bothered she could attract other walkers, she had nothing to lose. She took down one walker with each bullet. Somewhere in the corner of her tortured mind, she thought Daryl would have been proud of her for becoming such a good shot. She emptied her gun but more and more walkers were coming.

She wanted to brace herself for what was coming, she wanted to be brave. She was trying to muffle her sobs with her hand but the horror of what was going to happen was paralyzing her.

She looked up at the sky, desperately searching for any kind of hope. She froze. Her view of the sky was partially blocked by something wrapped around the tree trunk, high above the ground. She blinked, thinking her mind was playing tricks on her. But when she looked up again, it was still there. Some kind of platform encircling the trunk. She got up to her feet and stepped away to find out what she was looking at. Tree house. She was staring in shock at the partly burnt out tree house in the tree crown.

She didn't hesitate a second and ran to the tree.

"Please, please… you can't show me this and leave no way to reach it, please," she found herself whispering hoarsely, when she was walking around thick tree trunk, trying to figure out how to climb up.

She found it. There were notches in the tree trunk and the rope was hanging from one of the branches, about ten feet high. She didn't hesitate and started to climb. She bit her lip when her fingers, injured from the fence, started bleeding again. She knew she couldn't look down and put all her strength into the climbing. She was literally crying in pain when she grabbed the edge of the platform.

She screamed when a greyish rotten hand touched hers. She immediately flinched and lost her balance. She desperately tried to stabilize herself and almost fell back when she gripped the rope. She clutched the rope for a dear life and tried to calm down. She was staring at the walker that used to be a child once. The child that had been playing in the tree house when the world had ended. Child that had been forgotten, abandoned, betrayed. The child that must have suffered of excruciating thirst and hunger, too afraid to climb down. The child who finally set the tree house on fire, only to wake up as one of these monsters. Carol felt sorry for it for a moment. She took out her knife and got closer to the platform again. She buried her knife into the monster's eye and pushed it down. Shortly, she was lying on the platform, her face down, heavily breathing. Her vision started to be blurred and she finally passed out.

Rick was impatiently pacing around the car. Merle was leaning against the passenger's doors, watching him carefully.

"You haven't seen her since you heard me shooting?" Rick's voice was desperate.

Merle sighed: "I already told ya twice man! I didn't even know you left her alone in the house with me. When I heard you yellin', I was tryin' to get out as quickly as I could. Didn't see her anywhere but I heard her shoutin' at ya. When I got out, none of ya were there."

Rick rubbed his eyes. Merle was right in one thing. He'd left Carol alone. If anything happened to her, her blood would be on his hands.

Suddenly the air echoed with the series of gunshots, coming from the nearby wood. Rick started sprinting immediately. Merle tensed, touched the pistol in his pocket and followed Rick.

When they reached the edge of the wood, Merle grabbed Rick's shoulder and wordlessly pointed among the trees. Rick blinked to clear his vision and gulped. The wood was swarming with dozens of walkers.

"Ya're dead if you gonna try it. We can't handle them all ourselves," Merle's voice was serious.

Rick knew he was right, but it was Carol out there and he'd promised Daryl, he'd look after her. He wanted to shout her name but knew it would only attract the walkers.

Merle seemed to be reading his mind.

"If she's there, she'd dead. No one can fight so many walkers without getting bit or scratched. We can come back here tomorrow and check if she didn't hide in any of the houses. But it is getting dark quickly, we need to head back to the prison."

Rick knew Merle was right but he didn't seem to be able to leave.

"I can't leave her here…"

"Maybe it's not 'her' anymore," Merle whispered, "and the same shit will happen to us if we don't get our asses movin' soon!"

Rick still didn't move and Merle started to be impatient as couple of walkers noticed their presence.

"Look man, I'm outta here. You comin'? Jeez, think of your kids man!"

Rick looked at him sharply and then, with the last look into the wood, started walking back to the car.

Merle turned towards the wood: "Sweet dreams, sugartits."

Maggie opened the gate and the car drove in. It was already dark; they came back about three hours later than usual so the whole group gathered even before they managed to get out of the car.

Heavy silence fell on the group when only two of them got out.

Rick automatically turned to Daryl, who was coming back from his watch. He noticed Daryl slowed down at the sight of them and Rick held out his hand in calming gesture to brace himself against what he knew was coming.

Daryl didn't say the word at first. He scanned Rick, his brother and then the car before turning to Rick.

"What the hell?" It was rather a growl than a question.

Rick thought he'd rather faced furious Daryl they had been all used to, than this quiet dangerous guy.

"We lost her Daryl…I don't know what to say, we just…," Rick had no idea where to start. He was surprised when Merle rushed to help him and explained in short what had happened.

Daryl was listening, the muscle in his right cheek twitching and didn't take his eyes of Rick.

"You said you'd take care of her," Daryl still didn't raise his voice and Rick must have admitted he hated this new 'quiet' part of Daryl's personality. For a brief moment he felt like a deer cornered by a mountain lion, who was about to attack.

"How fuckin' difficult it must be to make a woman not to leave your side during the run?"

"Bro, look, we did…"

"Stay out of it Merle," Daryl snapped.

Merle stepped back surprised. He'd never seen his brother acting this way and it made him nervous. He'd truly underestimated the influence that woman had over him and was glad he'd found such an easy solution today.

Rick watched Daryl pacing around him, not sure what to expect. He had a feeling Daryl himself didn't know what to do. His face was red, his jaw hardened and he was clenching fingers around his crossbow.

"Where?" was the only word he spitted out.

"Probably in the wood behind one of the houses, near the first shop. We heard the gunshots and….."

Daryl stopped in his tracks.

"Ya heard the gunshots, knew she was there fightin' for her life and left?" he yelled.

Rick put his hand on Daryl's shoulder and Daryl violently shook it off.

"Daryl, if there was anything I could do…there were so many walkers we would get killed!"

"There was something ya could do! Ya shouldn't have left her out of your fuckin''sight!" he shouted into Rick's face. Old Daryl was back.

They heard Lil'Asskicker started crying in her crib and Beth ran off to calm the baby down.

Daryl felt he would explode. The strength of his own fury scared him.

"Have ya seen her?"

He was shouting again and was afraid he would punch Rick straight in the face if he didn't get out pretty soon.

"Have ya fuckin' seen her dead or turned ?"

Rick shook his head. Daryl put his crossbow over his shoulder and turned on his heel, heading to the door.

"Where the hell ya think ya goin' bro'?" Merle's voice was clearly annoyed.

"None of your damn business," Daryl brushed him off.

In the next second Merle had Daryl pinned against the wall.

"Are ya out of your mind boy?"

Daryl tried to break free from Merle's grip but he held him tight.

"Let me go Merle!"

"Forget goin' on that suicide mission you idiot! It's already dark and that were more walkers than trees in that fuckin' wood!"

"And still you left her behind! Since when you're afraid of couple of walkers?"

"Daryl, we will set out at dawn. You, me, Merle and Glenn. If she's still out there, we'll find her. Merle's right – by going there alone now you will only get yourself killed," Rick's arguments were reasonable but didn't help Daryl to feel better.

He finally wrenched himself from Merle's grasp. He needed to get out, he needed a fresh air.