Thank you to all the lovely readers & followers! I so appreciate hearing from you! If the chapters are feeling a little slow they will pick up, they are all in service of the long story arc, which has been roughly plotted and partially written in snippets since spring. (Crazy to think I originally saw this going no further than 3-4 chapters.) It's the finding time to write and smooth things out that's taking time. Thanks for the patience!
The two boys out in the woods never returned that night. Neither Simon, nor the one who replaced him on watch — John, Daryl thinks this one is called, or Joe — seems too agitated. As they say, it's not common, but on occasion members of the camp'll stay away longer than a day, either because they tracked an animal too far, or got cut off or diverted by walkers, or by some other thing. Their absence is not especially of concern, yet. Daryl and the other stood watch through the night, uninterrupted and disturbed by nothing, other than the aching in Daryl's exhausted body, and the heaviness pulling at the back of his head. All was quiet, and eventually, the vast darkness broke to dawn, and Daryl and Beth had made it to another day.
Beth slept the night alone in one of the camp's three structures, surprisingly cozy, burrowed in and nestled like some kind of nest. Beneath the slanted roofs built from pallets, fence planks and branches, lined on insides with tarps and plastics, are dugout floors extending maybe two, maybe three feet down, giving the little rooms more clearance than expected from without. The benefit of the sunken bottoms being they leave less building to be done and less above ground to be spotted through the woods. Beds are made in the hollowed ground, packed with blankets and sleeping bags, lined first with what plastic they can find, in order to keep moisture in the earth from seeping through. The width and length of the 'beds' extend no further than what's required for two to sleep side by side, three in a pinch, and yet, beneath one of the scrap roofs, to a person road weary and without a home, it seems snugly roomy; an unsought for comfort really. Without each hut is dug a shallow trough designed to keep the dropped interiors from flooding when it rains. In the winters, on the cold nights, there the boys lie, tucked warmly in the earth, below the wind, with dugout tunnels, no wider than an arm, piping in warm air from the dug-down concealed fire pits. In the summers the shade keeps the structures much cooler than the thick Georgian heat, and with the tarp linings down and the flaps left open, night breezes pleasantly find their ways through.
Beth woke in the morning surprised at how soundly she'd slept. She awoke and rose in the early morning light to join the others at the low burning fire. She moves past the two structures other structures, each constructed just as the one she'd occupied, noting again the manner in which they're planted among a network of fire pits and hammocks. The camp is small, but efficiently, and most cleverly contained. The assemblage of it does not appear to have been haphazard.
Her legs stiff, Beth lowers herself, seating herself beside Daryl on a log, and accepts a plate of breakfast one of them hands her. The meal of wild-grown onions and trout is warm and savory, and she accepts it gratefully. "Mornin'," Daryl's gruff, up-all-night voice greets her.
"Morning," she smiles.
Daryl tugs fondly on a scrap of her shorn hair and watches silently as she eats. He drinks from his bottle of water then passes it to her. There is some conversation while the meal is taken, but mostly they're all still waking up, or on their last legs before nodding off. Mostly they eat, and shiver as their bodies adjust to the frigid morning air. Once Beth's finished the meal, and he's climbed down the bank with her and watched after her as she relieved herself some paces down river where the camp has designated the space for such business, and seen her returned, and assured himself she still has on her knife, he brushes her hand, then puts himself to sleep in the bed she's just left empty.
The camp breaks out into quiet activity of minutiae. Michael takes a shovel to a barren stretch of earth sheltered between the third hut and the thicket of close-growing saplings and begins to trace out a square, three by six feet, to dig. John, like Daryl also just off watch, takes an extra serving of fish and reclines himself in a hammock, letting the morning sun warm his night-chilled skin as he drifts to sleep. Simon stokes the fire, keeping it at a low, even burn, and puts a kettle over it to boil water, then sets about putting the camp into order. Expecting to be of use, Beth eyes the dwindling pile of kindling, then puts herself to work gathering more fuel. There isn't a lot available on the island – what coverage they have in the brush and young trees is part of what keeps the settlement protected and undetected; it is counterproductive to hack away at that. What she must do is cross the river, or once more scale down the ledge of the dried riverbank, but she suspects Daryl would find it hard to forgive her if he woke to find her gone, even if she remained in sight. Instead, she collects what she can then takes her knife to a branch and sets herself to the task of shaving it down for tinder. On the road, between herself and Daryl, the division of labor had been innate and happened naturally, as occurs with bonded groups of two. But here, in this actual group, whose inner workings she does not know yet, she can only guess what needs to be done, and how and by whom each task is accomplished. Beth has always pulled herself through by setting her mind to a task, but it occurs to her this is the first time since the turn she's been new to a group, or an outsider at all. Rick and his companions had been the strangers in the established routine on her father's farm. The prison had been her home as much as anyone's since the first night they took it; it's only now she realizes that though they must all have jobs to do, she doesn't know which ones are hers.
While the others work, before he leaves to check the traps, James ducks back into a hut to check on Peter. Beth watches, then scrambles to stand, and then to assist as James walks the stiff and aching Peter to the fire, helping to lower him to sit. Simon pours him a cup of warm broth, and they all kind of stand in place watching him drink in slow, halting spurts. His breathing is labored, and he's terribly banged up, and in a lot of evident pain, but he's recovering. What injury was done to his head in blunt force does not appear to have caused lasting damage.
Between sips his battered and bruised eye tries to take Beth in and focus on her as she offers him a meek smile. Peter's head nods at her, or rather, he blinks in the fashion of the head nod he would have made were there not a disorienting throbbing in his head. Her wide doleful eyes take him in. "Beth," she speaks.
"Yeh," he coughs. "I'heard."
James hands over the saved plate of food he's not sure his friend is ready for, then looks him over. "I've cut up an aspirin in quarters. Take one, if it gets too bad." Peter shakes his head limply and affects what might pass for a grin if his face weren't so badly misshapen. "I'm walking the north traps today." Again Peter makes something close to a nod then waves James off with a flick of his finger. He doesn't need to be mothered. In turn James nods, shoulders a game back, packs a pistol in his back waistband, checks his knife in his belt, and takes up a long blade from where some hang in the foliage — cloaked, like everything else in camp, in this case hung and at the ready to grab, but kept out of the sun, safe from any light that might hit them and beam reflections through the leaves, unknowingly announcing their presence. With his gear collected James swings over the border water with a line previously camouflaged in the brush; from the other side he chucks it back across the running stream where Simon catches it, and tucks it once again into the overgrowth of saplings where even Beth, having just watched it, is hard pressed now to see it.
Watching the broken faced boy first blow on, and then grimace as his face makes the necessary contractions to swallow his broth, Beth rises and retrieves her pack from where it lies at Daryl's feet in the hut. She pulls from it, without waking him, a scrap of cloth from among her few meager possessions, then crosses back and wets it in the cool stream. Wringing it out, Beth returns with it to the log, and without word or overture she folds it neatly then holds it gently to his swollen eye. Michael, looking on, shovel still in hand, nods to himself, and continues his digging; he doesn't think he was wrong, bringing in these two. Simon checks the boiling water then picks up another shovel and digs with Michael, slowly scratching off the surface within the outline Michael had marked.
Though he's wincing at her touch, light as it is, Beth examines the markings on Peter's face. The swelling is large and looks painful, but with time it will heel, as will the cut in his split lip, if they can keep it clear from infection. Presenting itself as the most troubling is the deep gash in his brow, just above his right eye. It had been washed and bandaged the day before, but the wrap is now soaked through with blood and the cut shows no signs of closing on its own, as they had thought yesterday it might. Beth's soft brow furrows in consternation.
"That's reassuring," he tells her.
Beth shakes her head. "It'll be all right. Jus'—" she pauses as she examines closer "—gotta get it to close." She dabs at the blood. "Need a sewing kit."
Simon nods. "We have one." He drops his shovel and makes towards the trees. In no time he's producing a different rope, undoing its knots, and letting in slack to lower a plastic canister from where it's hung above head amidst the canopy of leaves formed by the reaching branches of the larger trees across the riverbank. Once the canister is within reach Simon once again tightens the rope, leaving the container hanging chest height in the air, ready for him to unseal the lid and remove, not just any only sewing kit, but a medical grade suture kit. He brings it, and a mason jar of clear liquid, over to the patient and the scruffy-headed girl. He looks at her, "You gonna do it?"
Beth looks from him to the gash. Her father was the doctor. Maggie assisted more than she ever did; Beth did other jobs — fetching things that needed bringing, washing linens and cutting bandages. She hadn't helped when the fevers hit the prison, she babysat, and when her father lost her leg, it was Carol and Lori who'd done that nursing. She waits to see if any of the others present themselves for the job. And though she suspects each would, were there no one else to do it, in the moment, no one steps forward. Beth nods with "I c'n."
"You got steady hands?"
"I can shoot straight," Beth offers.
Peter chokes on a scoff. "C'n believe that."
"Here." Simon passes over the jar. "Only use a little. That's all there is."
Beth takes the jar and with force unscrews the lid. The fumes hit her immediately. She knows this smell, toxic and pungent, mixed with memories of Daryl and rising flames; it smells to her like smoke. Moonshine. She glances at Simon and Michael, then dribbles just a little onto her fingers before she touches anything else. Then she takes the kit being offered her, snaps it open and studies the supplies: gauze, gloves, one straight and one curved needle, forceps, surgical scissors, and suture thread. There are individual antiseptic packets as well, but Beth foregoes the gloves and the wipes as a tactic of rationing, and instead uses the scissors to clip off a small square of gauze, then uses the forceps to dip into the moonshine and hold against the cut. Peter winces and his pallor drops two shades lighter, but he does not buck or pull away. Satisfied the wound's clean, Beth threads the curved needle, ties a knot at the end, and steadies herself.
"Ready?" she asks. Receiving a brusque nod from the patient, Beth makes the first stitch, pulling the thread through slowly to get a feel for the skill, and in hopes of diminishing the pain, accomplishing only the first. Both Simon and Michael stop what they are doing, and in short time seat themselves again around the fire, watching the procedure.
"We haven't had to do this yet," Michael needlessly observes. They watch, as Beth makes six more stitches. A person trained in it might have made fewer, but she did the best as she was able, trying to summon in her mind the times she'd watched her father's unfailing hands perform the task with skilled assurance and honed certainty. Her father— Still it's difficult for her to think of. She grits her teeth, breathes, and focuses on the task at hand. It feels good to have a task, to be of use, to see something done.
As she works the two boys Simon and Michael watch her, meanwhile John dozes without concern in the nearest hammock and Daryl sleeps stiffly in a hut. Michael studies her face – all intent and drawn up in purpose, and he thinks back to try to recall what she'd looked like yester morning, when he and Peter first stumbled across her in the woods. She seemed to have appeared so much younger then, shaded by the flickering leaves as she was, gazing up into the sky and the breeze. After, as they'd dragged Peter back to camp, he'd felt compelled by Daryl's suspicions to say what needed saying to earn his trust, and to withhold the rest. In his accusation Daryl'd called Beth 'a young pretty girl', and Michael had fervently denied any nefarious intention; what Michael had not answered was: 'Yes, she is young, but looked younger when they first caught sight of her in the shifting shadows of the trees', and 'Yes, she's unequivocally pretty, the dirt and the hollowness of her cheeks and the pitiful showing of her hair not withstanding', and 'They had thought she was scared and alone, and in need of help — but upon closer acquaintance she's not exactly what he would consider helpless, or even vulnerable.' Once he'd had a better view of her, and watching her now, this Beth, she makes a rather formidable image. Her thin body looks to him to be all muscles, her person is bloody and gritty, and the expression she wears, while not steely or cold, and certainly not menacing, is fixed, and watchful, and penetrating. In the short time he's known her there have been flashes of moments in which he's spied what might be her true self — something softer, something brighter — but these two newcomers carry with them a battle-tried intimidating air — both of them — and looking at her now as she purports herself, he can't think of how he'd seen her as small, and in need of his protection. In truth, she looks like she's walked through hell — they both do — and 's still standing with grit. Michael said none of this, only pleaded his case, he had been, after all, trying to get them to trust him.
Beth ties off the last knot, trims the loose ends, dabs once more with the alcohol swab, then moves back some to study her work.
"D'you survive?" she asks him.
Too spent to muster much for words, Peter nods.
"You done that b'fore?" Michael asks while Simon collects the supplies and returns them to the container he once more hoists into the branches.
Beth's head shakes 'no' as her eyes follow the canister. "Do you hang everything?"
"'s a precaution," Peter breathes huskily.
"Keeps it safe from the corpses if we ever have to clear camp in a hurry. Don't want 'em shuffling it all into the water, or breaking things. Keeps the animals out of the food supply too."
It isn't missed on Beth there was no mention of people. Possibly the worst threat out there, and no mention. Why? Is this place so sheltered they really don't know what they're up against when it comes to the living? Are they hoping to ward off an encounter by not speaking the words? Is there some other reason, they do not fear the living?
The question lingers in her mind but there is little opportunity to dwell on it, the boys seem intent on commanding her attention.
"Tell us your story."
"How long 've you been on the road?"
"Where 're you comin' from?"
"Were you with a larger group?"
Beth breathes in; she's never had to tell her story. Not from start to finish. It isn't something she especially wants to tell, or relive. Alone with Daryl, he never asked questions. Most answers he knew already – he'd lived them with her, the others he let her keep. No one works to let the past lie like Daryl Dixon. Her eyes falter, and though Peter can hardly see, he does not miss her reticence toward this subject.
"You like our camp?"
The unexpectedness of the save takes Beth by surprise, and the appreciation of it shows as evident in the faintest appearance of her dimples. She nods stolidly, "I do."
"Havf'ta show you around," Simon inserts.
"There's a lot to it," offers Michael.
"You an'…" Peter struggles.
"Daryl," Beth completes for him.
"Right. Mr. Paranoid."
Beth looks at him sternly. "You had it coming." She's sorry he's hurting, but it's his and Michael's fault things happened as they did. She will not apologize. They should know better than to grab people.
"M'ybe." Then there's a glint that flashes in the depths of his swollen eyes. "He your father?" Two more sets of youthful eyes turn to her.
"No." She answers softly, delving no further into who Daryl is, and who he most definitely is not. It falls to them, to construe what they will of her silence that follows.
Beth looks around the camp, with one gone and two never yet returned, it's difficult to keep track of just how many of them there are. She recalls being told several had been lost. "Was there, did you have a fever come through? A terrible one?"
"No." Simon ducks his head toward her, "That what happened to you all? A fever?"
Because it's easier and less painful to tell, Beth nods. "Partly."
No more is said of it as all heads lift and turn at the sound of a whistle calling through the trees at some near distance. The boys stand, and so does she, and in no time two brash looking boys burst through the foliage and make for the river. Something, as they bound closer, catches Beth's attention with singular interest. It is not their persons, nor the game they carry, but the shape of the thing hanging over one of their shoulders. A weapon. She sees it now, a crossbow.