Disclaimer: I do not own The Walking Dead.

Lost Hope: The Beginning

Chapter Eight

"Erin, wake up." I felt someone shaking me and slowly opened my eyes to see Carl leaning over me. "Good morning. Mom made eggs for everyone if you're hungry."

"Yum." I said getting up and following Carl out of the R.V. We walked over to where Lori was dishing up eggs for everyone.

"Good morning, Erin." Lori smiled at me. She put some eggs onto a plastic plate for me and handed it to me.

"Thanks." I say smiling back. Lori did the same for Carl and then we sat down on the ground.

"I think it's a good day to start back with some school work." Lori told Carl and me.

"What, why?" Carl asked.

"Because, school is important, and just because the school is closed doesn't mean you can get out of it." Lori told Carl laughing a little.

Carl groaned and I giggled at his reaction.

"You too, Erin." Now it was my turn to groan. "We can start after breakfast. Sophia will being school with us too." Lori told us.

It was a hot day out today, unlike the other days. I could see Andrea and Amy were out fishing in the cove, Dale was keeping look out, and the others were doing their normal chores around the camp. Then I noticed something strange; the man, Jim, was up on a hill just digging. It was really strange and I felt in the pit of my stomach that something wasn't right. Some of the others noticed to and were starting to get a little concerned for him.

"Are you ready to start, Erin?" I snapped my attention away from Jim, to see Lori, Carol, Carl, and Sophia standing behind me carrying some school books.

"I guess so." I moaned a little. I got up and followed them over to a flat rock. They set the books on the rock and we all took a seat on the ground, but before we could start, Andrea and Amy came back carrying a bunch of fish.

"Dang." I said under my breath. Everyone looked at them with awe.

"Ladies, because of you, my children will eat tonight." Morales said happily. "Thank you."

"Thank Dale." Andrea told him. "It's his canoe and gear."

"Erin, look at all the fish." Carl said running over to touch one. I followed him, wanting to touch the fish too.

"Where did you two learn how to catch fish, like that?" Lori asked.

"Our Dad." Amy replied. "He was a fishing fanatic."

"Can you teach me how to do that?" Carl asked.

"Me too?" I asked as well.

"Sure! We will teach you all about nail knots and stuff." Amy said smirking at Andrea. "If that's okay." She asked looking at Lori.

"You won't find me arguing." Lori said laughing.

Then we saw Dale walking over with concern on his face. "I don't want to alarm anyone, but we may have a bit of a problem." He told us pointing up to where Jim was digging.

"Yeah, maybe we should go check on him." Shane said standing up. We followed him up the hill to where Jim was. He had dug quite a few holes, just the right size to fit a body in each. He looked really hot and dehydrated. I notice Carl and Sophia tense up a bit when they saw.

"Hey, Jim?" Shane said to him calmly. Jim continued to dig, paying no attention to him. "Why don't you just hold up for a minute?"

Jim stopped and looked up at him. "What do you want?" he asked.

"Well, we are just a little concerned for you, that's all." Shane replied.

"Dale says you been out here for hours." Morales told him.

"So?"

"So why are you digging?" Shane asked him. "What, are you heading to China?

"Doesn't matter; I'm not hurting anyone." Jim replied.

"You might be hurting yourself." Dale said. "It's one-hundred degrees out. You can't keep this up like this."

"Sure I can! Watch me!" Jim told him beginning to dig again.

"Jim they're not going to say it so I will. You're scaring people. You're scaring my son and Carol's daughter." Lori told him. Carol put an arm around Sophia and Carl.

"They have nothing to be scared about." Jim told her. "Why don't you people just leave me alone."

"I think you should take a break." Shane told him taking a step closer.

"Or what?" he asked.

"There is no "or what". I'm asking you." Shane replied. "Why don't you tell us why you are digging?" I got that weird feeling at the pit of my stomach again and began walking back down the hill.

"Erin?" Carl asked with concern in his voice as I walked past him. He followed me back. "What's wrong?" he asked me.

"Nothing, I'm alright." I lied turning my head towards the ground.

"You can tell me." He told me softly.

I looked up at him and finally gave in. "It's just, something isn't right." I told him.

"Well yeah….Jim has gone a bit off the deep end." Carl replied.

"It's not just that. I have an uneasy feeling in my stomach like something bad is going to happen." I told him looking back down nervously.

Carl stood there beside me not really knowing how to respond at first, but then he pulled me into a hug. "Don't worry. If anything bad happens, you have me and the rest of the group to protect you."

I began to hug him back. "Thanks. I'm sure it's nothing." I pulled away and smiled.

I saw the others coming down the hill with Shane leading Jim who was now in hand cuffs. Shane led him to a big tree and leaned him up against it.

"Now I'm just going to set you here for now; give you a chance to cool down." Shane told him softly.

"Come on kids, let's finish our school work." Carol said leading Sophia back over to the flat rock. Carl and I followed and we began working on our school work. I finished about an hour later and noticed the other two were still working. I saw Shane walk over to Jim carrying a bucket of water. He grabbed a mug and scooped some water out for him to drink.

"Sorry if I scared your boy and your little girl." Jim called over to Lori and Carol.

"You had sun stroke; nobody is blaming you." Lori assured him.

"You're not scared now, are you?" Jim asked Carl and Sophia.

"No sir." Sophia replied and Carl shook his head.

"Why were you digging the holes?" I asked him.

"I had a reason, but I don't remember." He told us. "Something I dreamt last night." He continued. "You and your dad were in it. You were worried about him." He said to Carl. "You were too." He was talking to me now. "You were…."

"I was what?" I asked when he stopped.

"Nothing, it was just a dream. Nothing to be worried about." He said trying to shake it off.

I walked up to him and kneeled down so that I was face to face with him. "I was what?" I asked in a whisper.

He stared at me several moments before answering. "You were covered in blood." He told me quietly. "I don't remember the rest."

I nodded and quietly walked to the R.V. The strange feeling in my stomach was growing. I just wanted it to go away, but it wouldn't. A few minutes later Carl walked in.

"Hey, what did Jim say to you?" Carl asked.

"Nothing, he just told me he couldn't remember the rest of the dream." I told him. I didn't want to tell him the part of me being covered in blood.

"Oh okay. Do you want to come and clean fish with me, Shane, and Sophia?" He asked excitedly.

"Sure." I replied. He led me to where Sophia and Shane were, who had already started cleaning fish.

"This looks like a good bunch of fish." Shane said chuckling. "We will be eating good sea food tonight."

"It doesn't look as appetizing right now." Sophia said holding up a raw fish.

"Don't you worry; we will cook them up real well and tasty, and it shall be the best fish you have ever eaten!" Shane said dramatically. We all laughed and continued cleaning the fish. Shane gutted them and sliced them up while we rinsed them with water.

When we were done we brought them to Morales who was going to be cooking them. He already had a fire going and had seasoning set out.

"I still can't believe that you remembered to bring seasoning out of all things." Shane told him, patting him on the pack and chuckling slightly.

"Hey, when you used to be a part time chef, you remember things like these. It's essential." Morales said placing strips of fish onto a frying pan. He began to cook them over the fire that he had created. When he would finish with one piece he would give it to someone and then start cooking the next one until everyone had gotten a piece of fish.

It smelt really good, but I just couldn't find my appetite. I still couldn't get that bad feeling out. The anxiety continued to build as it got darker outside.

"Erin, is something wrong?" I looked up and saw Dale standing in front of me. I noticed that everyone had already finished eating and some people were already retreating to their tents. "You hardly touched your fish."

"Something isn't right." I said quietly.

"What?" he asked leaning closer so that he could hear me.

"Something isn't right." I said a little louder.

"What are you talking about? Are you feeling alright?" Dale asked me.

I shook my head. "I'm not very hungry. Here, you can have my fish." I handed him my plate and ran over to the R.V. I pulled my gun out of my bag and ran back out and hid behind some trees. I sat on the ground and began fidgeting with the gun by flipping the safety switch on and off. A few minutes later Shane came around the corner.

"Erin, Dale said that he thinks something is wrong, are you…..where did you get that gun?" He asked me.

"It was my uncles." I replied.

"You shouldn't be carrying that around." Shane told me kneeling down in front of me. "You should probably give it to me, to hold on to it for you."

"Something isn't right." I repeated those same words again.

"Here, why don't_" Shane started but he was interrupted by the sound of screaming. I turned pale and stood up. Shane was already running towards the direction of the screaming. I followed him and saw the horror of what was going on.

Walkers had invaded the camp. I could already see them eating some people. I saw another walker coming towards me and I shot it in the head. I saw some others heading towards Sophia and her mother. I ran towards them and shot them down too.

"Mom!" I could hear Carl shouting but I couldn't see where he was. He sounded terrified.

"Carl?" I called out over all the noise.

I turned towards the R.V. and saw that Amy was being eaten by two walkers. I ran over and shot one of them and then I saw Jim come around from behind me and slam the other in the head with a shovel. The screams of terror continued throughout the camp. I looked around the camp and saw that most of the men were beating the walkers with the tools they had found around camp. Shane and Dale were using their own guns to take out walkers. I realized that we were the only three with guns right now. I started to panic; we couldn't take out all these walkers with just three guns.

"What do you think you're doing?" Shane yelled over to me as he continued to shoot walkers. "You can get killed."

"Would you like it if I stopped shooting?" I asked him sarcastically.

"No, keep shooting." He told me.

I continued to fire at walkers and then I heard other guns being fired. I turned my head in the direction that they were coming from and saw that Rick and the others had returned with the guns. I felt a bit more hopeful as I continued to shoot at the walkers. The walkers were dying a lot more quickly since they returned.

"Kid, behind you!" Daryl warned me pointing a shot gun in my direction. I ducked and he shot a walker that was just about to sink its teeth into me. The walker tumbled on top of me causing its blood to spill out on top of me. Daryl ran up beside me and pulled me up.

"Thanks." I told him quickly.

"Come on." He said pulling me forward to where the others were still shooting walkers. It wasn't much longer until they had killed all the walkers that had invaded the camp. I took some time to look around camp to see the damage that had been done. There was a lot more of our people dead than I had thought. I felt my stomach drop. There were people that I had become friends with the last few days now lying dead and torn apart. I all of a sudden felt even sicker. What if they had gotten Carl? I began to run around the camp and look for Carl.

"Carl? Carl!" I called out for him, but there was no reply. I felt tears begin to fall town my face. "Carl?"

Then I saw him with Rick, Shane, Lori, Sophia, and Carol. I felt relief wash over me, but it didn't last long. I remembered Amy. I ran over to where I saw her last. Andrea was leaning over her crying and stroking her face. Amy wasn't dead yet, but I knew she soon will be. I sunk to my knees and began crying.

"I remember my dream now." I hear Jim say.

All of a sudden I find myself standing up and running away. I wasn't running to anything specifically. I was just running; trying to get away from it all. I reached the forest and kept running. I ran through the forest till I couldn't run anymore and collapsed down crying. I just wanted this all to end.