Chapter 42 "Reunion"
Day 99; Group A&B
Today was a cold, chilly day. The weather was turning colder as it got closer and closer to winter. It appeared to now be the middle of autumn. Most of the trees whose leaves could fall, had. The group awoke later than planned again, but it certainly wasn't too far off from when they needed to get a move on. It was only a few hours past sunrise, and things were looking up.
The group was reloading the RV, preparing to leave the house and begin scavenging. This time, even if it did take longer, they couldn't risk splitting up again. Robert was sitting in the bed in the back resting, as usual, as everyone else prepped their weapons and got the vehicle ready for the day.
"Everybody almost ready?" Shawn asked, cocking his gun and putting it into its holster.
"Almost," Selenis and Greyson said in unison, causing them both to smile slightly to one another.
"Well, hurry up," the farmer sighed as he stepped into the RV to help Seth get the ammo straightened out.
"I'm not sure what it is," Greyson grunted to Selenis as he lugged two heavy bags out of the house, "but I have a good feeling about today."
"Me too," she smiled, loading her gun. "Need some help?"
Before the boy could answer, a walker stepped out of the trees. Selenis rolled her eyes as she lifted her gun and shot it in the head. As it fell limp, she turned back to hear Greyson reply, but his face slowly lit up with fear.
Walkers began pouring out of the treeline, one after another, flooding the yard of the trailer they had slept in rapidly.
"Fuck!" Greyson yelled, and Selenis ran to him, grabbing one of the heavy bags he was struggling with and they sprinted to get into the RV. As Greyson ran forward, Selenis turned and shot two more walkers.
When they were all in, they wasted no time getting out of there as soon as possible. They sped down the road, passing house after house of the town, which was larger than they were expecting.
After they had made it quite a few blocks from their house, Shawn decided to slow slightly, not needing to go ninety miles an hour just to run from trudging walkers.
"Is everyone okay?" he asked.
"Yeah," Selenis sighed. "I think so."
"Did we leave anything behind?" Seth inquired.
"If we did," Greyson stated, "it's gone now."
Then, a loud yelling was heard from the back. It was Robert on the bed. Greyson instantly rose to his feet, horrified of what could be happening, and was followed right by Selenis.
As they made it to the door, Robert burst it open. "Turn around!" he ordered. "Now!"
"Are you insane?!" Shawn asked.
"No," Robert said, still yelling. "Turn the fuck around, now! I saw Beth and Lyrik!"
"You…" Seth started. "Robert, if you saw them back there, that wasn't them. Not anymore…"
"No!" the young man yelled, getting furious. "I'm not playing a fucking game, and they're not walkers! They were outside of a house, just sitting there with a few other people. Now turn around!"
Shawn sighed, strongly disbelieving Robert, but he turned, to humor the poor boy.
They drove back, waiting for Robert to give a signal. Then, getting dangerously close to the walkers, Robert spoke up. "There!" he yelled, pointing to four people standing outside of an elevated trailer that had a sign crossed out, with "NO HOPE" written in red over it.
One of the four people was a man with long, dirty, brown hair. He held a rifle and looked at the RV inquisitively. Beside him was a very large, strong man, who looked at the vehicle just as confusedly. Behind them, running towards the RV in flailing excitement and tears was two teenage girls: a thin blonde and plump, dark one. Robert was right. He began crying in astonishment and bolted out the door, followed quickly by everyone else.
Robert grabbed onto the two girls, hugging them dearly as they all began sobbing onto one another. He clutched their hair and their backs, like a child pinching himself to make sure he was awake. The other four from the RV did the same, creating a massive group hug. Robert and Lyrik couldn't stop hugging, and Beth and Shawn kissed each other.
They were so happy to be back together. This was it; this is what they needed. The light in the darkness to keep them going.
Then, the growls could be heard, and Robert pulled off of them. "Go inside, get your shit, we all gotta go!"
Lyrik and Beth took off instantly, and Taylor followed, but Malcolm puzzledly looked on. "Now wait a minute," he said as Shawn, Greyson, and Selenis also ran inside to help pack, "who are you?"
"We're family," Robert stated. "Now, if you want to make it through another day alive, I suggest you go pack up, now!"
"Why? What's going on?"
"Herd!" Seth and Robert yelled impatiently.
Malcolm hesitated a step back, and then turned and sprinted back to the hardware store.
Within minutes they all rushed out, Beth and Patricia holding hands as they carried their bags over their shoulders, and they were both crying with huge smiles on their face, despite the imminent fear.
Extra bags were carried by Selenis, Greyson, and Shawn. Seth and Robert guarded the RV, taking shots at oncoming walkers and putting them down quickly, trying to buy the group a little extra time.
Finally, though, everyone was in with the majority of their things. Everyone made it into the vehicle alive.
Sarita, Malcolm, and Taylor were confused and a bit scared, realizing how foolish they were to just hop into an RV full of strangers, leaving the RV Beth's group had brought behind.
Everyone else though was sobbing onto each other, in disbelief that they had found one another again.
They drove for hours, getting as far out from the town as they could, going southwest. Then, they all pulled over on the road to have proper introductions and reunions.
Robert, Seth, Shawn, Greyson, and Selenis were introduced to Sarita, Malcolm, and Taylor.
Mika, Allan, Patricia, Beth, and Lyrik still seemed to be reeling with shock. They were overjoyed, all of them — even Allan.
"So," Patricia asked hesitantly, "you don't know if anyone else made it out, do you?"
"I don't know," Shawn said. "It's just been us...well, and Daniel, but...as you can see…"
Patricia nodded her head solemnly.
"How did you all get out?" Selenis asked.
Allan spoke up, happy to wear his knowledge like a badge. "We were out gardening, trying to take everyone's minds off of the whole, uh," he looked to Mika and held his tongue, unsure of how she would take hearing about Lizzie again, "situation the day before. We were the first to see the herd, and we tried to get everyone out. They just took too long, and we had to leave them behind."
The girls who had been with Allan for the past week frowned angrily at him. They didn't have to leave. There was plenty of time to wait. But this wasn't the time or place to have a large argument, out on the middle of the road after a heart-warming reunion and horrifying herd escape.
"Then we stayed by a creek for a bit, and headed into Winona. That's where we met these three. What about you all?" the disdainful man questioned.
"Well," Shawn thought, "as y'all know, we were out scavenging. We came back, and we couldn't even get to the house. The herd was just, you know, massive. So we went back to the old one — from before we moved in with Ryan's people. We stayed there for like a whole day, waiting on that herd to clear up."
Robert thought back to the day they had went back to the house. He looked to Greyson with a smile. "It all makes sense now," he said, interrupting Shawn, and Greyson nodded, but didn't quite remember what Robert meant. "We went back to the house — you know, Ryan's — and we found that pretty much everybody's bags were gone, other than ours, Mika's, Allan's, and Lyrik's." The boy smiled. "Otis got out. He took your bags," he pointed to the blonde women.
Patricia held back her tears, knowing she had shed too many on her husband already — she didn't want them to start thinking she was just a crying mess. "Is that it?"
"No," Seth said. "We started going south, down the road the walkers went towards, looking for signs of people escaping. All we found was a few fire pits and holes, a trench made for bathroom time," he purposely omitted the dead girl they found in the sewage, conscious of Mika and Beth, "and two of the vans we kept at the little garage that had been abandoned."
"Like, down that road?" Beth asked.
"Yeah. It was a ways before we got to the camp site. They must have broken down and kept walking on foot. From there, we don't know what happened."
"Been out looking for everybody ever since," Selenis said. "Going from town to town, looking to find somebody."
"We were there pretty much whole time," Allan said. "Right after the herd hit, we headed due south, putting as much distance between the herd as we could."
"Wait, due south?" Seth asked. "You don't think that was the same herd, do you?"
A few eyes went wide, realizing it very likely could be. "I didn't even think about that," Allan said. "I think it might have been."
They all nodded, and Lyrik couldn't take it anymore. "You guys don't know if anyone died, do you?"
Robert sighed. "Two people did for sure."
Lyrik frowned, hoping it wasn't someone she liked.
"First, there was Patti," Greyson said, remembering how Daniel had put her down and they had a mini-funeral for her. "And then…"
"And then there was Daniel," Robert said. "He's why my face looks like this."
"Really?" Allan asked, surprised.
"Yeah," Greyson said, irritation thick in his voice. "I couldn't believe it either."
"He just kinda," Seth paused, "went crazy. Blew up, and beat Robert up."
"Then the douche went downstairs and fed himself to a walker," Robert spat. "Left me and Greyson all alone to fend for ourselves, with me aching and in massive pain."
After a few moments of shock and honoring the deaths of their fallen comrades with silence, Selenis smiled to herself, remembering huge news the girls would be delighted to hear.
"We have a couple of lovebirds," she announced.
Greyson and Robert instantly looked to one another, eyes wide and surprised.
"Who?" Beth smiled.
Selenis bit her lip and gestured to the two boys, nervously eyeing each other.
"Awwwwwwwww!" a few of the girls cried in unison, giving Robert and Greyson awkward smiles as they blushed and looked from each other to the ground and the faces of their reunited loved ones.
"Really?" Allan asked, looking slightly disgusted.
Robert's embarrassed smile dissipated as he turned to Greyson, who was instantly shocked but eased into it as they reached into one another and kissed deeply, happily flaunting their newfound love before the rude man.
Allan rolled his eyes as he looked away, and everyone cheered for the boys.
Malcolm looked over awkwardly to Beth, who was laughing at the sight. She soon noticed Malcolm eyeing her nervously, and her face became serious. She shook her head no, not wanting the long-haired brunet to say a word about what had happened.
The boy panicked, wanting to brag and be proud of his relationship with the girl. "I had sex with Beth!" he blurted, causing many of the laughs to become hysterical. Robert and Greyson broke their kiss, pulling away laughing hard.
Patricia covered her mouth in shock, unaware this had happened, and then realized Mika had heard it. She quickly placed her hands over the young girl's ears, afraid of what else the crazy brunet might say.
Shawn appeared angry, worried that his sister had just hooked up with a potentially dangerous stranger. What if she was pregnant? He felt like punching Malcolm in the face.
Beth's face was bright red, her hands trying desperately to hide her embarrassment. Then, as the icing on the cake, it was clear Patricia was much too late. "What's a segs?" Mika asked innocently.
The laughing became uproarious, unable to contain themselves. No one, not even Beth or Patricia or Shawn, could stop laughing; it was intensified as they began to realize Malcolm was standing there, his face flushed as he feigned laughter with them.
Sadly, it was brought to an end as many walkers approached, attracted to the hysterics.
It brought a quick downfall to the happiness of those nearest the walkers, who did their best to pull out a weapon of some sort hastily. It grounded their enjoyment, and brought a quick reminder that not all was well. However, it didn't kill the joy brought onto them — the laugh they had shared was good, and brought them a much-needed uplift.
Soon, the walkers were taken down, and everyone was once again calm, other than a few leftover giggles.
"So, is that it?" Seth asked.
"Well," Beth hesitantly began, afraid her speaking would bring more laughs, "I adopted Mika."
Everyone clapped or smiled, congratulating the two, and proud of the choice Beth had made. They admired her strength and confidence that she had grown into, despite all of the losses in her life, including her father and two of her fingers. They were impressed the teen had taken such an admirable step in her life.
They remained there, catching up and enjoying one another's companies for hours, along with killing a stray walker every now and then. They were so pleased they were back together again, and that they weren't the only ones left. They knew not everyone was there, and that some of the other peoplehad to still be alive out there, but they were overjoyed to have at least someone back.
As the sun began to set, Shawn realized they still hadn't discussed where they were going to go now.
"So what's the plan?" he asked when a quiet opportunity finally arrived.
Everyone looked amongst themselves or into the distance, unsure of what to do.
"I say we keep moving," Selenis voted.
Patricia and Beth frowned to each other and looked to Mika. "I think we should find a place to stay," Beth said. "A permanent place."
Allan had an internal struggle. He knew they had fled southward, and thus closer to Arkansas. If they kept going further south, they would soon come across the signs for West Little Rock, his old home. As he considered it more and more, the people talking around him, he realized how badly he wanted to go. He wanted to see the people he had left behind, and to be back with people he had known from early on.
"I have a place," he spoke up, interrupting Seth, who was suggesting finding a large institution of some sort.
"Uh," Seth grunted, slightly mad he had been interrupted.
"West Little Rock."
"Wait," Greyson said, "really?"
"What's West Little Rock?" Taylor asked, a brow lifted.
"It's the place Mika and Allan came from," Greyson stated. "Before I met them, they came-"
"Oh yeah," Taylor said, recalling that Patricia had told him.
"I mean," Robert said, "do you think it'd be safe? Or like, that it would even still be there?"
Allan shrugged. "I don't know. But I think it's our best bet — at least we would know."
Mika smiled at the thought of going back to West Little Rock, and seeing all of her friends again. "Can we, please?"
Beth looked worried as she looked to the child. "I'm not sure if-"
"Pleeeeaaaaaaase?" she begged.
Beth sighed and looked to Patricia for guidance. She knew what Beth was afraid of — that the sanctuary had been destroyed, and that Mika would become upset about it. The elder woman could only shrug, unsure of what could happen.
"All for going to West Little Rock?" Allan announced, raising his hand high into the air. Taylor, Malcolm, and Seth soon followed suit, happily and dumbly unaware of what the teen was worried for. Mika's hand shot up as she realized that it was a vote. Beth sighed and raised her hand as well, which signalled everyone else it was fine to vote for such.
The only people opposed were Sarita, who feared large communities because of what had happened to her the last time, and Selenis, who wanted to keep moving, but she understood the need for a permanent home.
"It's settled then," Shawn announced. "We're going to West Little Rock."