It's short, but it's the final part to Chapter 10. Expect Chapter 11 eventually.
Enjoy!
3rd POV
The beginning of the evening sees D, Daryl, Merle, Rick and Shane tracking Chester. Daryl picks up the trail quite quickly with D not too far behind. It's Shane that ends up pointing them in the 'right' direction. Merle ambles behind them all, indifferent to whether they find the man or a horde of walkers.
There's a three way split in the track.
"Daryl, you take D and head that way." Shane points down the left path. "Merle, you take that one." He nods at the less travelled track. "Rick, we'll go right."
With Shane's back turned to his 'friend' he misses Rick's squinted eyes and flat lips. When he does turn around, the Sheriff's face has relaxed. D glances to Daryl, her brows drawn together and biting her lip. Her hunter is staring at Shane, eyes narrowed trying to bore a hole into the man.
With no real evidence of foul play, Daryl grunts and stalks off. D frowns, clutching her crowbar and looking between the two ex-police officers. She trudges slowly after her hunter, looking over her shoulder. Some of her tension seeps away when Merle saunters after Shane and Rick, ignoring the trail he was pointed to.
'Merle will see him safe.' D thinks to herself, picking up speed to catch Daryl.
After some time, D stops and leans against a thick tree. "Daryl."
He stands from his crouch and turns to her. "What?"
"There's nothing here."
"Bastard sent us on a goose chase." He roughly runs a hand through his hair. "Shouldn't have listened to that fu…"
D grabs his arm and the two head back the way they came, to where the first signs of Chester were found. Having wasted precious daylight on the goose chase, the two have less light to work with. It takes a little while longer. But the two do find where the trail ends.
"Must be the fight." Daryl murmurs as he stares at the mess of tracks.
D spies the blood on the tree, her lips pulling down at the ends. "This is a lot further than Shane said he followed him."
Movement and moaning catch their attention. The two turn. It's Chester. Now in walker form. Daryl's quick to take him down. While he goes to inspect the corpse D keeps a look out. Just to make sure that they don't get ambushed.
"He's got a broken neck."
"Where's he bitten?"
"He's not."
D whips around and stares at him. "What?"
"He ain't bit."
The two hold gazes, an ominous feeling weaving around them. Daryl starts the trek back to the others, but D doesn't move. This isn't really news to her, she's always known — at least in the back of her mind — that they're all infected. But for the reality of it to jump out at her like this… Determined not to let this information derail her, she jogs to catch up to her hunter.
There's a gun shot.
With a glance at each other, they race back to the farm just as hordes of walkers emerge from the woods. From her position, D can see T-Dog, Andrea, Jimmy, Maggie and Glenn run to the vehicles.
When they get a little closer, Daryl snags Jimmy, "Get round back with the RV."
Jimmy stares wide eyed at the man. "But…"
"Do it kid." Daryl shoves him towards the RV.
Within seconds there's chaos. People screaming, walkers moaning and gun shots. The dead are upon them and D makes herself useful by slamming her crowbar into the head of zombie after zombie.
Daryl grabs D's arm, tugging her away before she one of the dead can attack her. "I want you in a car. Now." He gazes into her eyes, the fear tugging at him, and drags her closer.
A moan distracts him and whatever may have happened is lost. He propels her towards the cars and stalks off disappear into the horde. But D gets swamped. She kicks and pushes and drives the crowbar into their heads. But there's no break.
Eventually she loses sight of everything and it's only by chance that she spots a gap between to particular gruesome looking walkers. She dives for it. Rolling and skinning her knee on her way to a stand. A flash of beige catches her attention. It's Rick. He's in a vehicle. D does her best to be noticeable, waving and screaming, but it's not use. He's set on something else and there's too much noise to be heard.
She dodges a walker. Then another. With no other choice she races off. As she passes the burning barn, a familiar black bag of weapons lies on the ground. She picks it up on her way off the farm.
A dozen walkers following.
