All That's Left (The Walking Dead FanFiction)

Chapter 6

I find an old abandoned house in the woods. I have no more bullets in my gun. I don’t have my backpack. I don’t have water. I don’t have food. All I have is my knife. I extract it from my waistband as I enter the small home. It’s quiet. I know if a walker were in here it would be making noise. There’s dust everywhere. The couches and the tables are covered.

I go upstairs and find one of the bedrooms. Before falling asleep, I move a dresser in front of the door. I’m so exhausted, the darkness hardly gets to me, and only a few moments pass until I fall unconscious.

I wake up to sunlight pouring through one of the windows. The light makes me feel good. Until I remember everything that happened last night. I still feel like I’m in a dream. I’ll wake up any moment on the couch, with Hanna beside me. Then I’ll have breakfast while Natalie talks my ear off and Maggie shoots me dirty looks and Daryl just refuses to look at me in general.

I miss Glenn.

I know that I’m not far enough away from the herd of walkers that attacked us last night. I need to keep moving and I need to find water. I move the dresser away from the door and quickly start down the stairs. When I’m outside, I notice a well out back. I go back inside and manage to find a water bottle and fill it with the water in the well. I set out on my journey, having no idea where I’m going. All I know is that I need to put more distance between me and the farmhouse.

I walk for a long time in the woods. Anytime a twig snaps underneath my feet I have a heart attack. I never stop holding my knife. I walk for hours. But with the protection from the trees, I don’t get dehydrated from the hot Georgia sun. I run into a walker about six miles into my journey.

It lunges at me, it’ teeth going straight for my neck. It’s an old guy, in his late sixties. His left arm is missing. I reach out, holding him back, and drive my knife through his skull. He falls to the ground. My adrenaline kicks in and I start walking faster.

“Macy?” The voice startles me so much I actually let out a scream.

“You’ve gotta be shitting me. Out of anyone who I could of ran into, I run into you,” Daryl snaps.

I turn around to face him. There’s dirt all over his face. I notice he has a backpack and that Sam is in it, asleep. And he’s got his crossbow. He still refuses to look at me, even when he speaks to me.

“God damn it,” he curses under his breath.

I keep staring at him, not believing that he’s really here, in front of me, alive. “What happened last night?” I ask finally.

“I don’t know,” he begins, looking over my shoulder and never at my face. “They must have been migrating or something. A group of them that big just don’t happen for no reason. I think they heard the gun shot and then they started comin’ after us. We all took off. Rick went to get Laurie and Carl. Glenn went to set the barn on fire as some sort of distraction. Shit, I don’t know. And I went to go get my son. Then we got swarmed, and well, you know what happened after that.”

It’s the most he’s ever said to me. The most I’ve ever heard him say. Ever. And it’s all too much. Too much to process, too much to think about. All I know is that I’m so happy he’s here. So happy to know I’m not alone.

“How did you find me?” I question.

“I had to go in the woods to get the hell away from that herd. Didn’t take long before I noticed the tracks. I’ve been tracking you for almost eight miles now. God, you’re fast. Thought you might be Natalie or somethin’.”

He was hoping I was Natalie or Rick or Glenn. Anyone but me. I can see it in his eyes that it’s killing him to be this close to me, spend this much time with me. All he’s thinking about is her. Carrie.