𝐫𝐮𝐢𝐧𝐬 | 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐰𝐚𝐥𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐝𝐞𝐚𝐝¹

TWO - x marks the spot

— ASTRID HOPED THAT YESTERDAY WASN'T A DREAM. she hoped that when she opened her eyes, she wouldn't be resting in a tree. thankfully, when she awoke, she was sharing a sleeping bag with her niece, who was still fast asleep. carefully moving out of the sleeping bag, as to not awaken aurora, she noticed another sleeping bag on the right of them. it was empty, so glenn was already awake.

she hadn't changed her clothes the previous night, she was far too tired to do anything but sleep. so, she changed into a black vest top and some green cargo pants. unfortunately, it was far too hot to wear her corduroy jacket, so she left it folded neatly beside her bag. then, slipped her boots on and went to unzip the tent.

astrid cringed at the loud noise the zipper made. she tried to make as little noise as possible, but the loud creaks made rory stir slightly.

the aunt crept out of the two person tent, opting to leave the door open, not wanting to make any unnecessary noise.

the sun scorched down on the camp, as astrid rubbed her tired eyes, trying to get used to the bright light of the sun. "oh there you are! we've been looking all over for you!" the young blonde, amy, exclaimed, as she and her elder sister made their way over to her.

astrid smiled at the two women, before andrea continued to talk, "i promised you a tour, so we're gonna give you one. then, we can help you set up your tent, if that sounds good?"

astrid nodded as the was whisked away by the sisters. "is rory still asleep?" amy asked, walking next to the brunette.

"yeah, didn't wanna wake her. i figured she needs all the sleep she can get." astrid answered, as they walked past dale, who smiled kindly at them, greeting them with a 'good morning'.

"well, when she wakes up, i think lori is teaching the other kids, i'm sure she'll be welcome to join them." amy offered, gesturing over to where lori was sitting with carl, who seemed extremely frustrated with whatever they were doing.

"you still teach them?" astrid questioned, a bit surprised. the world had ended and society had collapsed, why did they still need to do school?

"yeah, they deserve an education." andrea chimed in from ahead of them.

astrid shrugged, "thanks for the offer, i'll talk to rory about it when she wakes up." and with that, they continued the tour around the quarry.

a few minutes had passed, and the trio were traversing over the rocks, heading down to the body of crystal-clear water that shimmered in the morning sunlight.

"where's glenn?" astrid asked, after a moment. she had searched for him on her trip around the camp, and had not yet seen him.

"he's on a run in the city. he should be back later on today." andrea answered, looking at her feet to make sure she didn't slip.

"is he by himself?" she asked. she'd seen most of the residents of her camp already today, so they couldn't be with him.

it was amy who responded to her this time, "he always goes by himself. says it's faster." she shrugged.

"he's come back every time so far." andrea noted, defending her sister.

"until he doesn't." astrid muttered quietly. she liked glenn. in fact, she owed him everything. he'd saved her life. she'd be dead if he hadn't intervened.

"look, this is how we do things around here. he offered to do this for the group, and he's never let us down." andrea scorned. astrid fought the urge to roll her eyes.

"have you seen the city? it's completely overrun." she pointed out. that night she and rory had to flee atlanta was nightmarish. the rotting corpses were everywhere, around every corner, down every alley. she almost died multiple times, but the two them managed to escape by the skin of their teeth.