Chapter Thirteen

Daryl's POV

After at least an hour or so later Rick came running back up to the highway without Sophia. I could see the look of panic run across Carol, Lori, and Summer's faces. Where was the little girl? I was assuming the worst. She'd been bit and Rick, with is better judgment, decided not to bring her back. But thankfully, I was wrong. He explained that he left her in a creek in a small alcove while he drew the two walkers away from her and killed them and when he came back to get her she was gone. He asks me, Shane and Glenn to come with him back into the woods to try and find her figuring if she ran off she wouldn't be too far away from where he left her. We grabbed our gear and went off into the woods with Rick. We ran in the same direction Rick ran with Sophia and reached the creek where he left her figuring it would be a good place to start our search for her.

"I told her to go back that way," Rick said pointing toward the direction of the highway, "and keep the sun over her left shoulder."

Shane argues with Rick saying that maybe Sophia misheard him or didn't know her left from her right and went in a different direction. Rick tells Shane she heard him just fine. I was trying to tune them out while I walked around the creek bed looking for tracks or any signs of which direction she went in. Her tracks, and Rick's, were all over the sides of the creek bed. She could have gone in any direction. I needed some more time to really try and figure out which direction she was going. I figured Rick knew my tracking skills from talking to Summer and that is why he asked me to come along.

"Hey short round!" I yelled over to Glenn, "Move over! You're mucking up the trail!"

Everyone looked over at me as if I said the magic words. I had finally figured out which direction her tracks were leading among the massive amount of tracks around the creek bed. I waved for them to follow me and lead them in the direction Sophia's tracks were going. After walking for a while Rick told Shane and Glenn to go back to the highway to tell the group what we found and leave the two of us to continue following the trail. We continued to walk for a while and we discovered she was heading in the direction that Rick told her to go for a good portion of the way and then they split off and went in a completely differently direction. Eventually we came to a stop.

"Tracks stop here," Rick said.

"No, they're faint," I said matter-of-factly, it always pissed me off when people who knew jack shit about tracking thought they knew everything.

"How can you tell, there's just leaves and dirt," Rick said and I immediately regretted getting pissed off at him.

"You want a lesson in tracking? Or do you wanna find that little girl and get the hell off the interstate?" I asked.

Rick nodded knowing I was right and there was no use in me teaching him how to track. We continued on in the general direction of her tracks since they had faded substantially and ended up coming across a walker. Rick and I exchanged looks, hoping that this walker hadn't gotten Sophia, and I shot it through the head with my crossbow. Rick and I made our way over to the walker silently agreeing that if the worst-case scenario was true that he would be the one to tell Carol about it. I yanked my arrow out of its head and Rick and I immediately started checking it for any signs of it coming across Sophia. We found skin in the walker's teeth and Rick looked at me, pulling his knife from his belt.

"I'll do it. How many animals you cut and skinned before?" I asked him and he nodded putting his knife back.

I was preparing myself for the worse. I did not want to find this little girl in this piece of shit's stomach. I cut the walker open and began to gut it. I reached my hand in and started feeling around for the stomach.

"Yeah, had a big meal not long ago. I can feel it in there," I told Rick.

I found the stomach and pulled it out and before cutting it open Rick and I exchanged looks. He nodded and I cut the stomach open.

"This ghost bastard had himself a woodchuck for lunch," I said looking at Rick wiping my hands clean on my pants.

"At least we know," he said.

"At least we know," I agreed and we headed back in the direction of the highway knowing we weren't going to find her tonight because we were losing light pretty fast.

Summer's POV

Not long after they left to go into the woods on the Sophia search Glenn and Shane came back and Lori and I immediately assumed the worst. They explained that Daryl had found her tracks and the two of them would continue tracking her through the woods while we cleared a car path on the highway big enough for the RV and the cars to go through. I let out a sigh of relief and I could feel Lori grip my arm in relief as well. The two of us seemed to constantly be in the same boat of our husbands putting themselves in dangerous situations that could get them killed, but it was always a relief knowing they were still alive.

"We're not going anywhere until my little girl comes back," Carol said coming up next to me.

"That goes without saying," Lori replies.

I grabbed Carol and asked her to come help me go up the highway a bit to gather more supplies from the cars to keep her mind occupied since I couldn't really help with the car moving without risking sending myself into premature labor. Not like it really mattered at this point because I had come to reason that we were going to have this baby on this highway anyway. But still, my main priority was to try and keep Carol as sane as possible or she would probably go into those woods herself and the last thing the group needed was to lose someone else.

We had found a few good things in the cars. Some clothes and more food and water and we were having some idle chit -chat. Keeping the subject off of children and things of that nature. Mostly we talked about our lives before all of this. She wanted to know all about what Daryl was like before the world ended and I had informed her that he was pretty much the same. This caused her to smile and tell me it's good that at least this world didn't change everyone. We started walking back toward the group with our findings and saw everyone convening around a car Shane had managed to start. As we got closer we heard the sound of a security broadcast coming through the radio speakers. You could literally feel the excitement and tension building among us when Shane dismisses it as an old broadcast and shuts off the car and we all looked at each other and went back to doing what we were doing before the small, however futile, glimmer of hope started coming through the car speakers. Carol and I brought the supplies we found over to Dales RV and began to sort them into piles to see which we could actually use and which we should just leave on the highway.

Just before nightfall Daryl and Rick rejoined the group without Sophia and I gripped Carol's hand as they approached us. They told us that the trail went cold and they couldn't find Sophia but they had a feeling she was still out there but they were losing light and should continue the search in the morning. Rick informs the group that Daryl will take point in the search seeing as he has the most experience with tracking through the woods. Suddenly it became apparent that Rick and Daryl were covered in blood.

"Why are you covered in blood?" Carol said holding back sobs.

"Took down a walker," Daryl said.

"There was no sign it was near Sophia," Rick said trying to calm Carol down.

"How can you be so sure?" Carol asked beginning to become hysterical.

"Cut the sommabitch open," Daryl replied and walked over to the RV.

Lori and I went to sit down with Carol and try to calm her nerves as best as possible by continuing sorting through the supplies we found around the highway.