Disclaimer- I do not own the Walking Dead.

Alwaysand- Yes he did, likes to tell everyone everything as long as it will embarrass her.

Shadowoftheblackdeat- All good ideas and all taken in.

Enjoy.

Danny's POV

We stop on the road, the factory gates are down and the factory itself has had a massive fire. The building is still up but the windows on the higher levels have been blown out and the exterior walls are black from the smoke, We stay sitting in the idling car staring at the building because pulling into the yard and actually getting out of the car requires a lot of trust in these two people, who we do not know. I'm putting my peoples lives in their hands and I'm not comfortable with it.

I stare at the closed factory doors. "Why didn't you go inside?" If they had a herd on them going inside would have been safer even with the possible structure damage. My fingers twitch against my leg, right where my knife sits. Michonne casts me a wary side glance.

"Because there are a lot of Walkers inside, we tried to get in there before the herd appeared." The soldier nods towards the factory. "Those gates were up when the herd appeared".

I let out an involuntary noise in shock, a herd big enough to run through the gates is not a herd I would ever want to see. The ones we've seen so far have been scary enough for me.

"It was huge", the Woman whispers, "I have no idea how we escaped".

"How did you escape?" Michonne asks them.

"The others got through a side gate as the herd came for us, We climbed over the fence at the back" the Soldier says a little defensively. He knows what the questions were getting at, I can tell. "If you have changed your mind about helping us then we can do it ourselves". I don't believe that otherwise they would have already been doing it instead of being lost in the woods.

Michonne and I look at each other and then she puts the car in first gear and finally pulls into the yard.

We climb out and the Soldier takes us to the gate he says the others went through. We stare out of it like the people will just suddenly appear.

"Is now a good time to say that I haven't picked up on any of Daryl or Merles tracking skills".

"Seriously" Fred exclaims rather dramatically, "What can you actually do?" I know he's joking.

"She could beat you in a fight", Oscar defends, "My money would be on her".

"Money doesn't mean shit", Trevor snarks at him.

"Fine, I would bet everything I have right now that she'd beat either one of you". I grin at Oscar and his absolute bogus faith he has in me.

Michonne sighs heavily, she's definitely had enough of us. "I know enough to get us by". She turns to the Soldier. "Do you not know how to track?"

His eyes widen slightly and he doesn't seem to want to keep eye contact with her. Oh he has something he really doesn't want to say.

"I uh, I never… I didn't complete basic training. The end of the world happened before I could get anywhere. Instead they just threw us in, didn't care that half of us had no idea what we were doing". He seems ashamed of the fact but it's not exactly his fault.

"Okay, it'll be fine," I say to try and reassure them and me. "I'm sure we'll figure it out however", I face Trevor, Oscar and Fred. "You three need to stay here".

They are immediately unhappy.

"No!"

"Not happening."

"In your dreams".

They all talk over each other but I'm not wrong. "Yes you are. We need those supplies to make it back home, especially within the twenty hour deadline otherwise Daryl will come looking". That can't happen because he will do it and Riley won't have one of us there.

Oscar tuts, "I don't think that's what he meant when he said you had twenty hours".

"Yeah obviously", my hand hits my thigh with a slap. "But if you can get back and then tell him what we're doing. In fact, once those supplies are home you're more than welcome to come right back with Merle". I raise my eyebrows at him. "But for now can you please stay with the cars and if we're not back in…" I glance at Michonne.

"Four", she tells me quietly.

"In four hours then you need to drive home. All of you". I say the last part as sternly as I can. I don't mind the bantering, the fake arguing but when it comes down to it they have to know I mean it.

Trevor throws his head back and groans rather dramatically. "Fine. We'll do it".

"But", Fred interjects, "If something happens to you", He glares at me, "Then remember you'll be making us homeless".

I grin, "I'm okay with that". He knows that's a lie, I never want them to not have a home with us, ever. I look at the soldier and the Woman. "Can I ask you your names?" I can't keep calling them Soldier and Woman in my head.

"I'm James and this is Hannah".

"Well it's nice to meet you, should we get going 'cause I'm not sure if you got any of that but we're technically on a deadline".

James nods with a very small smile.

The scream makes all of us wince.

"That's Sienna", Hannah cries out.

"Are you sure?" Michonne asks her.

She nods with tears now streaming down her face. "I know her. I know that's her".

"Okay then, new plan". I hurry back to our car to grab my rifle that's sat in the passenger footwell. "We go and get them".

Michonne grabs my arm before I can exit through the gate. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, we said we'd help so we help".

She pulls out her sword. "Okay, let's go".

Michonne leads the way as we jog in a line across the open field towards the trees. I'm right behind her with Trevor right behind me. Fred is next in line and then James and Hannah with Oscar bringing up the rear.

There's another scream but this one is deeper, definitely a male and it sounded close. We all stop. We can't just go running into what is happening, because we don't even know what is making them scream, people or walkers.

A hand lands heavily on my shoulder and forces me to squat, just in time because a person is moving through the trees just up ahead. As quietly as I can I move onto one knee and use the other to stabilise my arm as I hold up my rifle.

I look through my site. I can only just make out the person as he is blending in pretty well with the shadows, he's filthy like he has been living out here all this time. His clothes are barely holding together and his face is filthy. There's a shout and then he starts heading back to where it came from.

I'm gonna say that this person has nothing to do with James or Hannah, yeah they look a little rough and they're clothes are a little worse for wear but they don't look anything like him. They still look like they wash, this person did not and hasn't for a very long time.

Michonne gestures for us to move forwards. We make sure we keep low and quiet as we follow after the man.

Hannah lets out a muffled gasp and when I throw her a quick glance James has his hand over mouth and he's forcing her to the floor. The scene before us makes my breath catch in my throat, I want to turn around and leave as I don't want any of my family to have to go into that but I also can't let them keep doing what they're doing. It's sick, the most vile thing anyone can do.

He has a woman tied to a tree, her clothes are gone and she's covered in blood. Her head is hanging down but she is moving, barely. Two guys and a woman are on their knees while another man is lying on the floor cradling his arm.

There are eight people standing around them, all looking just like the guy we followed. I can't be a hundred percent certain but I can't see a gun anywhere in sight which means we have an advantage and the element of surprise.

I aim my rifle at the person standing next to the woman tied to the tree. "Get ready" I whisper to whoever can hear me and then I pull the trigger. The person's head snaps back and blood covers the tree behind them. The hostages hit the floor while the other bad guys duck and then they're running, in all directions.

Michonne takes off running after the one closest to us, I drop my rifle, yank out my gun and shoot at another as he stumbles over the uneven ground. When the area is clear Hannah goes running past me and drops to her knees beside the woman cowering on the floor. I'm guessing that's her sister. I stand up and walk towards the poor woman tied to the tree, it's rude but I ignore the others as I walk past them. They're alive so Oscar can help them but this woman is gone. The amount of blood she is covered in has doubled in a very quick amount of time.

I stop just short of her and the image of the woman tied up in that warehouse when we met Sean flashes through my mind. It's almost identical, this woman's throat has been sliced open and she's bled out. If this is the same people then that means they're getting closer to us, closer to my family.

My heart starts racing in my chest and I can feel myself getting hot. I should have tried harder to kill them all.

"You alright?" Oscar asks from behind me but I ignore him. We should have planned it out better, we may have lost a few more of the hostages but we could have made sure none of those bad guys got away. We could have made sure that they couldn't do something like this again. Oscar's hand lands on my shoulder. "Hey!"

"We should have killed them all". My voice is low.

"You got two and saved the rest of James' group, that's a fuckin' win in my book".

I step away and turn to face him. "You see this", I point to the woman tied to the tree. "We've seen this before, god knows how many times these people have done this before, strung innocent people up, tortured them; And we only killed two of them".

"Three", Michonne appears cleaning the blade of her sword which is now covered in blood. "And three is enough for now."

"Guys", Fred calls out. "Have you seen this?" I turn to where he is flipping over one of the guys I shot.

I take a step closer to see a W marked on his forehead, a quick look at the other one and we can see he has one too.

"Did the one you killed have it too". I ask Michonne who is still wiping her blade, she's desperate to get that sick man's blood off of her sword.

"I don't know, I shoved my sword through the back of his skull". She answers nonchalantly.

"Who the fuck are they?" Oscar asks knowing full well no one can actually answer him.

"We need to get this guy back, he's losing a lot of blood", Trevor draws my attention to where he's kneeling on the floor beside one of the guys, he's wrapped his jacket around the man's arm so I can't see what the injury is but the blood is soaking through way too fast.

"What happened here?" Fred asks.

But I shake my head, "That can wait." I'm not sure I'm ready to hear what happened just yet, to hear the vile way they killed this poor woman. "We should go", I cast a glance over my shoulder at the Woman. "After we get her down". She will not be left like this.