Well, they're getting a little closer to getting where they are going anyway. It kind of feels like things are crawling here but I usually feel that way when I'm posting. Hope you enjoy this chapter and thank you all for reading =)

Chapter Seven

Daryl woke to the sound of birds singing and frowned. He cracked one eye open and was staring out the windshield of the truck. For a few seconds he wasn't sure what the hell he was doing in his truck to begin with but it didn't take long for the terrifying events of yesterday and last night to replay in his mind. He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands and then froze.

He felt a warm pressure on his lap. His eyebrows shot up and he looked down. Carol had shifted in her sleep, curling up on her side, facing the back of the seat and apparently deciding to use his crotch as a pillow. Her face was pressed against his stomach, her deep even breaths warming the skin under his shirt and causing him to swallow hard. His body reacted accordingly, of course. During the chaos of the day before he hadn't put much thought into things like how she looked or where they would end up or that they could eventually be two of the last handful of people on earth. But right now, things were coming into stark focus.

Like the long delicate line of her throat, the way her lips looked invitingly soft, especially in a world that had lost all of it's softness, the way her lashes rested on her cheek bones as her eyes moved swiftly under her lids.

"Son of a bitch," he whispered as the corner of her mouth turned up in her sleep. He didn't need this. He didn't want this. He didn't need to want this woman. Maybe their situation had his head all fucked up. He was under a lot of stress and she was attractive and right now the only person he had to face this with. That was all it was...

He tore his eyes away from her sleeping face, looking out the side window. It was barely dawn but he could see clearly. He almost wished he couldn't see anything past the gates at all. All thoughts of the side of Carol's face pressed against his package flew out the window at what he saw pressing against the fence, causing it to bow inward.

He shook her shoulder hard, heard her gasp at the position she had put herself in and then sat up quickly, an apology dying on her lips as she looked past him and saw the bodies pressing against the fence. He didn't know how many there were but the ones in the back were pressing the ones in the front against the fence so hard that a few of them started bleeding. Their faces dragging across the chain link, leaving skin hanging from the metal.

"Daryl," she breathed as he reached for the keys. The fence looked as though it were close to collapsing.

He threw the truck into reverse and cut the wheel hard, angling the truck so it was facing the mass of bodies. This was the only way out. He had driven them through the gates and then fixed the gate closed with a chain he had found in the back of the truck. The storage units were protected on three sides with an eight foot high block wall. If they were going to get out of here then he had no choice but to drive right through the fence, and through the sea of bodies that were there. "I gotta go through them," he said, glancing at her quickly.

She buckled her seat belt and braced one hand on the dash. She nodded but he didn't give her a chance to say anything. If there were too many of them and the truck stalled, they were dead. They wouldn't have a chance to find their families and he would have failed her completely, just one day after it all started.

When he hit the fence his face would have slammed into the steering wheel if he wasn't holding on to it so tightly. He stomped on the gas, launching the truck forward and plowing over everything in it's way. The truck bounced sickeningly but didn't stall. He hung a sharp right, heading further away from the exit that would take them to the Interstate.

He glanced back and saw that the group was trying to come after the truck. "We need to get our asses to Tennessee. I'm not gonna even bother tryin' the main roads. This is gonna take a while."

"How long?" She asked, her voice almost panicked.

He shook his head. "It's usually a three and a half hour trip. I'd say we can make it in six if we don't run into any traffic. Scenic route."

"Be completely honest with me. What are the chances of us getting there alive?" She asked.

He looked over, meeting her gaze steadily. "I'm getting you to that goddamn cabin alive. Then we're gonna go after your girl."

She nodded and he knew that she had faith that he would do exactly what he said he was going to do. He just hoped to God that he wasn't promising this woman things that he would never be able to deliver. He didn't know why, but it was important to him. He had to do this. Maybe he didn't even have to do this for her. Maybe he had to do it just to prove to himself that what she said was true. He was a good man. He was capable.

And he was scared shitless.

~H~

"This is such bullshit!" Piper yelled, kicking the side of the bus.

Damon ran a hand over his face, fatigue causing him to look much older than he was. It was barely dawn and they were broken down at the bottom of the mountain. They were all tired and they were all on edge.

"What now?" Sophia asked.

They both looked up at her and then finally Damon shrugged. "We're close. Real close. If we could find another car I know we'd be at the cabin in an hour or less. But walking? That's gonna take us a long time. It was damn stupid to think that this bus would make it all the way up anyway. That road is insane and you can't get up there without a damn truck or an all terrain vehicle. This was just stupid on our part."

She eyed him. He didn't look like he was going to be able to do a whole lot of walking, either to find another car or walking up the mountain to the cabin. She was worried about him. She was worried about all of them, actually. On almost every road they had been on they had to make a detour. They had seen more of those things too. It seemed like at every road they came across that was blocked by vehicles, those things were there. They had turned around every time, not risking getting stuck, which was the only reason they were still in the bus at all. They hadn't wanted to risk taking something else.

The cabin was actually only a three and a half hour drive from Atlanta but it turned into a longer trip because of the roads. She wanted to get to the cabin but she knew that he needed to rest. Then again, they were so close that it seemed reckless to just take a break.

"There's some houses further up the road. Maybe we'll be able to find somethin' to take the rest of the way up there," Damon said, shouldering his bag and turning to head up the incline on foot.

She walked on one side of him and Piper walked on the other. They used the flashlights since the sun wasn't even all the way up yet. The road was mostly uphill and curved around the side of one of the foothills. It wasn't overly steep but none of them had gotten any rest, especially Damon, and it was a rough walk.

"Dude," Piper whispered, grabbing Damon's arm and pointing further uphill.

Sophia squinted. Sure enough, coming around the bend was a group of maybe a dozen people walking towards them. She remembered in vivid detail the look of the man that had forced himself onto the bus yesterday when they had left the school. "Do you think they're friendly?"

Damon shook his head slowly, "Hard to tell from here. I'm not exactly inclined to assume anybody is anymore. Not after what happened yesterday."

They watched as the group up ahead all seemed to pause at once, their heads going up like they were sniffing the air. Sophia gasped when suddenly they weren't walking anymore. They were hurrying towards them.

"Run," Damon growled, turning and grabbing her shirt, hauling her in front of him and giving her a push so she would get the hint.

"What the hell are they doing?" Piper asked. She was surprisingly fast for someone so little.

No one said anything as they ran for the bus. Sophia wasn't sure what was going to happen to them once they were there. It wasn't like the bus could take them anywhere. If they got on the bus then they would be trapped in there. But there wasn't another house for miles in the direction they had come.

Damon was the first one to make it to the bus. He stopped, ushering Sophia and then Piper up before he climbed in behind them. The door folded shut and then he sat down and braced his legs so when those things got there, they wouldn't be able to push it open.

When the first one made it to them Sophia felt like she was going to pass out. It was a woman around her mother's age and part of her face was very attractive. The other side looked as though someone had peeled the skin away, leaving nothing but red glistening muscle and tissue underneath. Her eye was missing from the socket on the damaged side and she snarled, pressing her face against the glass as she clawed at the door.

The other ones joined her, putting more pressure on Damon who grunted as another threw itself against the one in front of it.

Piper was cursing under her breath and then Sophia wedged herself next to Damon, placing her own feet against the door and pushing back against the bodies. This was all for nothing and she knew it. They were exhausted, outnumbered and it wouldn't take long for those things to get inside and, most likely, rip them apart.

"We're gonna have to get the fuck off this bus," Piper hissed.

Damon shook his head. "There's no fuckin' way we can do that."

Sophia's thoughts were running rampant and she closed her eyes and tried to concentrate. Her and Damon couldn't do this forever. They were already too warn out. They also couldn't run forever but she would rather take her chances out there than wait for her and Damon to tire in here. At least out there they had a chance of escape. "Piper, are there any behind the bus?" She asked, gritting her teeth and bracing her feet even harder.

Piper was gone for what seemed like a second before she hurried back. "No, they're all trying to get in this way."

"We should try to get the emergency door open, we can hit the woods and try to lose them. Piper's right. We can't hold them forever."

"And if we can't outrun them?" He snapped, glancing at her.

"At least we'll have a chance."

He cursed under his breath and shook his head. "Piper, get the door. Don't wait for us. Just run for the woods."

Sophia said a silent prayer and then met his eyes. This was it. It was either do or die.