Chapter Text
Daybreak saw everyone who had survived the camp massacre trek down to the road, where several cars awaited. Nearly everyone had a backpack hanging off their shoulders. Shane and Rick stepped up to the front and began to tell everyone what would be happening. "Everybody listen up. Those of you with C.B.s, we're gonna be on channel 40. Let's keep the chatter down, okay? Now you got a problem, don't have a C.B., can't get a signal or anything at all, you're gonna hit your horn one time. That'll stop the caravan. Any questions?" Nobody spoke. "Come on. Let's go. Let's move out."
Deciding where everyone would sit was a disaster. Shane had stalked off to his own truck, and nobody but Rick and his family knew him well enough to ask for a ride. Carol, Lori, Rick and the kids between them piled into Carol's car, and Morales' widow and her kids got in with T-Dog, Jacqui and Andrea.
Josie and I looked around at the RV, where the old man had already offered Glenn a ride. "Josie, we'll get in the old guy's Winnebago-"
"His name is Dale."
"Whatever. So, you get in there now while I grab the other bag." She skipped up the steps as I grabbed the other bags we had left. I'd have to sort everything out to fit into one bag; I couldn't carry two all the time.
"You can ride with me," I heard. Daryl's truck was parked just next to Dale's RV. He looked down at his dirty boots before adding, "nobody in the RV likes you right now." Way to be blunt. Still, he was telling the truth. They had all looked at me like I was going to stab them at any moment.
"You sure?" It surprised me that he was being so friendly. Just a few days ago, we pointed weapons at each other. I had left his brother for dead.
"Uh huh." He threw open the passenger door. Before I could get in, I needed to tell Josie that I would be in a different car. I popped my head around the RV door and shouted through.
"Josie, I'm gonna get in Daryl's truck, okay?"
"Are you sure?" Dale asked me. "I mean, we have enough room." I waved him off and thanked him.
"Naw. I'll put the bags in here and get in with Daryl." Josie dragged the heavy bags into the RV for me as I jumped into Daryl's truck with him. "You ready to go?"
"Sure." He waited until the RV and Carol's car got ahead before pulling onto the main road. I looked at the bike strapped in the back and noted the 'SS' insignia on its side. Merle's bike, I was assuming. Daryl had yet to give me reason to believe he held the same views as Merle. Hadn't given me reason to believe he didn't either.
The Winnebago didn't get far along the road. We made it a few miles from the quarry before it began to splutter and broke down. Group members flooded out of their vehicles to take a look at the RV.
"I told you we'd never get far on that hose. I said I needed the one from the cube van." Dale said.
"Can you jury-rig it?"
"That's all it's been so far. It's more duct tape than hose. And I'm out of duct tape." I stepped out of the truck to go see how bad the situation was.
"Which one."
"Lower radiator hose." Dale answered. An idea came to mind, but since I wasn't an expert, I couldn't be sure.
"What about the flex hose? Could that work if you have a spare?" Dale looked up and banged his hand against the engine.
"You know, it just might!" Suddenly, he frowned. "Flex hose would be pretty tight fitting, could pop out of place or rub against other parts."
"If we duct tape it in place it shouldn't move."
"I don't have any tape."
"I do. Hold on a minute." While Dale rushed into the Winnebago to get his spare flex hose, I jogged to Daryl's truck and unzipped my personal backpack. I carried a lot of things inside and had to root around to find the roll of tape in it.
My hand brushed the corner of something cold and metal inside the backpack, and I pulled it out hesitantly.
It was a family photograph. I sat off to the side, hair much longer and curlier than it was now. Josie was tucked under my arm, grinning.
I didn't hear Andrea come up behind me until she jabbed her finger at the photograph. "Who's that?" She smirked. "your boyfriend?"
She had pointed at the young blond man on my other side. That stupid exclamation mark tattoo beside his left eye stood out like a sore thumb. He never grinned, only gave that idiotic half smile, like he knew something important. "No. Brother." Andrea's smile faded and she sounded much more sincere.
"Sorry. Your twin, right?" So, Josie had been talking to them about our family. Great. The last thing I wanted was for the group to know my entire backstory, just when I was debating whether I would be leaving.
"Yeah."
"Did he die?" I said nothing, I couldn't. Andrea seemed to understand me clearly. She squeezed my shoulder and walked back to Dale.
I turned the photograph over and placed it back in the bag. Memories were a hindrance in this new world. The only solution for survival was to forget.
When I returned with the tape and flex hose, I was met with Dale's bemused, quizzical stare. "What?"
"Where did you learn to fix an R.V. then?" he asked.
"My brother worked as a mechanic at my dad's shop, I used to hang around when he fixed cars and shit," I didn't know why I was confessing all this. There was something in Dale's eyes that invited people to tell their stories. He had a grandfatherly demeanor about him. "He'd talk to me about his work while he did it. I guess I just listened more than I thought I had."
"Well, it's certainly come in handy." He replied cheerfully, patting my arm as he returned to the R.V. and told everyone aboard that we were ready to move again. I leapt back into Daryl's truck, where he was waiting.
I opened my mouth and blurted out the question that had been rattling in my head as he started the car. "Why'd you let me drive with you?"
He shrugged, and for a moment I thought he may not have known the answer himself. Then he replied, "Like I said, you're not makin' yourself popular with everyone else right now."
I wanted to call him a liar. I didn't believe his reasons, not for a second.
With no way of proving it, I turned away and stared out at the roads passing us by.
⊱ ─── {⋆⌘⋆} ─── ⊰
From the outside, the CDC looked like a dead end. There was no guard to be seen.
"So much for military protection." I said to Daryl. He stayed silent, choosing to scowl up at the building. I had no doubt that he would have words to say when he came face-to-face with Rick.
The group piled out of the cars and the RV silently. Shane and Rick led the group in the front, whilst Daryl and I stayed at the back to prevent stragglers from being separated. Any words spoken were hushed whispers. "All right, everybody. Keep moving. Go on. Stay quiet. Let's go. Okay, keep moving. Stay together."
"Keep moving. Come on."
"Shh."
"Carol."
"Keep it together. Come on." We passed maybe dozens of dead bodies lying on the ground. Soldiers had been here. Their bodies were easily recognisable, though their uniforms were torn, and blood splattered.
The doors to the CDC were blocked by shutter. We'd travelled all this way to find a building that we had no chance of getting into.
Shane was of a similar thought track. He looked around wildly and finally settled on Rick. "Nothing?"
"There's nobody here."
"Then why are these shutters down?" Rick snapped. He tried to foolishly lift a shutter, which did not budge. Not even a fraction.
Animalistic growling from behind the group caught everyone's attention. Daryl landed an arrow in the forehead on one walker, I shot another.
People began to panic. We were in the middle of an open area, and more and more walkers were advancing. With only a few of us carrying weapons, we'd be mostly defenseless. It would be the quarry camp all over again.
"You led us into a graveyard!" Daryl roared, charging at Rick. Shane stepped between them and tried to reason with him.
"He made a call." Shane reasoned with him. I noticed the man's hands shaking with anger, and I doubted it was directed at Daryl this time.
"It was the wrong damn call!" Daryl roared. The walkers only continued to stumble towards us. If we didn't move soon, we'd be surrounded.
Shane pulled at Rick's still figure. The man didn't budge.
"Rick, we need to think of something, now. Fort Bennet, anywhere!" insisted Lori.
"We don't have time to think of something!" I spat. "We need a place to stay now."
"Come on, let's go. Let's get out of here. Let's go. Please," Shane attempted to herd everyone back to the RV. "All right, everybody back to the cars. Let's go. Move." A hand pushed against my lower back, trying to direct me towards the cars. Rick remained where he was, staring up at a CCTV camera in the corner of the abandoned building.
"The camera... it moved." He exclaimed. I almost laughed for a minute there. He'd cracked. Finally, the new world had caught up to him and cracked him.
"You imagined it." Dale suggested to him, starting up at the camera dubiously.
"It moved." Rick insisted. "It moved."
"Rick, it is dead, man. It's an automated device. It's gears, okay? They're just winding down. Now come on," No matter how hard Shane pushed him, or tried to convince him, Rick would not leave the front of the building. "Man, just listen to me. Look around this place. It's dead, okay? It's dead. You need to let it go, Rick."
Still, Rick paid no attention. He began to bang on the shutters desperately, shouting to people we couldn't even prove existed. "I know you're in there. I know you can hear me!"
"Everybody get back to the cars now!" T-Dog yelled. The hand on my back became a little more forceful, calloused fingers digging in to try and push me towards the cars.
"Please, we're desperate. Please help us. We have women, children, no food, hardly any gas left." Rick begged. He rammed the shutters with his whole body. They clattered against the walls of the CDC uselessly.
"Rick. There's nobody here."
"We have nowhere else to go," Rick pleaded. His voice began to rise as he hit the shutters harder and harder each time. "Keep your eyes open. If you don't let us in, you're killing us! Please!"
"Come on, buddy, let's go. Let's go." Shane had had enough. He gripped Rick and tried to drag him literally kicking and screaming towards the cars. Josie rushed back to grip my hand, working with the hand behind me to pull me towards the cars.
"Please help us. You're killing us! YOU'RE KILLING US! YOU'RE KILLING US!" Shane finally managed to turn Rick around to face the other way.
I heard the shutters moving before I saw it. They clanked and clattered open; wide light flooded the nightfall as we stood there.
Rick had been right. I tried to speak, but my throat was too dry.
The group was deservedly paranoid as we crept inside the CDC's main lobby. Nobody was waiting for us, instead, we were greeted with utter silence. The only sounds that could be heard were the groans of walkers mingled in with Lori's whispering in an attempt to comfort Sophia and her son.
"Daryl, you cover the back." Shane ordered, pumping the shotgun and advancing alongside Rick.
I peered into the darkness of the building's corner. The CDC was large and made mainly of glass; it was fairly bright in the main lobby, light beamed down from the ceiling.
Some loaded a shotgun from the dark. The stranger leaned over the countertop and shouted at us from where they were. "Anybody infected?"
"No"
"Why are you here? What do you want?"
"A chance."
"That's asking an awful lot these days." The stranger pointed out.
"I know." Rick admitted. The stranger stayed silent for a moment, holding us in anticipation. Josie's grip on my arm became incredibly tight.
"You all submit to a blood test. That's the price of admission." They finally decided, stepping into the light.
It was a man, older and blond, with some scruff clinging to his chin. He held a shotgun in his hands tentatively, as if he was afraid it would bite him.
"We can do that."
"You got stuff to bring in, you do it now. Once this door closes, it stays closed." The man warned. Shane, T-Dog and Daryl all volunteered to run outside and grab things we may need. I followed Andrea and Dale as we headed further into the building. Every room we passed was shut and locked tight, and I could see no other doctors with the man. "Vi, seal the main entrance. Kill the power up here." The front door shutters closed down moments after Shane and the other two men flocked inside.
The man had us crowded into the elevator, pressed up against each other like a can of sardines.
"Doctors always go around packing heat like that?" Daryl commented; Dr Jenner turned around and tapped his fingers against the gun barrel absentmindedly.
"There were plenty left lying around. I familiarized myself. But you look harmless enough. Except you." He said to Carl jokingly. "I'll have to keep my eye on you."
The doors opened with a pleasantly familiar ding. Everything was concrete and cold, with no life. Jenner stalked down the hallway, his shoes clicking across the hard flooring. The inside of the CDC was so clean and bare, and I'd almost forgotten what it felt like to not be surrounded by blood and dirt and rubble.
"Are we underground?" Carol asked, nervously glancing at the ceiling.
"Are you claustrophobic?"
"A little." Carol admitted.
"Try not to think about it." The man dismissed her concerns. I frowned from behind him and reached out to brush Carol's arms in a weak attempt at support. Although she initially flinched, Carol returned the gesture with a kind smile.
Large metal doors at the end of the corridor opened as the man reached them. "Vi, bring up the lights in the big room."
As if on command, the room lit up, and a calm female voice echoed around the chamber. "Welcome to Zone 5."
Aside from the strange man, I couldn't see anybody else here. The room was cold and empty, just like everywhere else in Atlanta.
"Jenner, is everybody here?" Rick questioned. "The other doctors, the staff?"
"I'm it. It's just me here." Hot bubbles of anger popped inside me. If I could have gotten away with it, I would have turned to Rick and punched him. We'd risked death and used up all of our fuel and food to get to the CDC, only for it to be abandoned by all but one?
"What about the person you were speaking with? Vi?" Jenner looked at Lori's hopeful face and crushed that glimmer of possibility.
"Vi, say hello to our guests. Tell them... Welcome."
"Hello, guests. Welcome." The voiceover echoed back. A computer. All that was left of the CDC was one doctor and a damn computer.
"I'm all that's left. I'm sorry," When Jenner spoke, he seemed genuinely apologetic. The hard lines on his face softened, the coldness in his eyes disappeared. As he remembered our promise, those features returned. "If you'd follow me, I need you to give me those blood samples."
He directed us into a smaller room, filled with desks and chairs. One by one, our blood was taken.
"Why don' you just check for bites?" I suggested. He snickered, like he had expected the question, and knew he could outdo me with an answer.
"I..." he hesitated for a moment, scanning the sea of dirty faces. "a blood test is resolute. Bites are the confirmed way of infection, but what's to say it's not in scratches, or their blood and saliva?"
"I've been soaked in walker blood before, and I ain't got infected." I countered. He dabbed a wet cotton bud on the spot where he had inserted the needle into my arm.
"Well, maybe you're just lucky." He beckoned for Andrea to sit down, where the conversation continued.
"She's not wrong though. What's the point? If we were infected, you would be able to tell." Andrea pointed out. Jenner waved off her attempt to reason with him.
"I've already broken every rule in the book by letting you in here. Let me just at least be thorough." The needle withdrew from Andrea's arm, and Jenner stood up. "all done." Andrea stood, swayed, and would likely have fallen if Jacqui hadn't caught her arm. "Are you okay?"
"She hasn't eaten in days." Jacqui replied. "None of us have."
Jenner leaned against his desk. His eyes flickered to where the children stood, and the corners of his mouth twitched. "Well then, I guess we'll have to fix that."
⊱ ─── {⋆⌘⋆} ─── ⊰
The good doctor was kind enough to fix everyone a meal of spaghetti and sauce while everyone was recovering from their blood tests
The good doctor was kind enough to fix everyone a meal of spaghetti and sauce while everyone was recovering from their blood tests. He was even nice enough to bring alcohol to the table, where I made a beeline for a bottle of scotch to avoid drinking wine.
"You know, in Italy, children have a little bit of wine with dinner. And in France." At the other side of the table, Dale and Rick were attempting to coerce Lori into allowing Carl a taste of wine. So far, they had been unsuccessful.
"Well, when Carl is in Italy or France, he can have some then."
"What's it gonna hurt? Come on." Rick added, taking a long drink from his own glass. Lori looked at Rick with wide eyes. "Come on. What?" Seeing that she had lost the fight, Lori allowed Dale to pour Carl a small glass.
"There you are, young lad." The small boy took one sip and put it down immediately, making a face.
"Eww!" We all burst into laughter as he shook his head "yuck. That tastes nasty!" Lori took his glass and poured the leftover wine into her own. A move I could be proud of.
"Not you, Glenn." Daryl added.
"What?" Glenn, the poor boy, looked as confused as everyone else.
Daryl leaned over and slurred, "Keep drinking, little man. I want to see how red your face can get." As everyone laughed, I noticed Josie try to sneak a little bit of wine from the bottle.
"Miss Josephine Marie Warren, what in the hell do you think your doin'?" Everyone roared with laughter as she froze mid-pour and flashed a sheepish grin.
"I wanna try some too!"
"Oh, go on, let her have a try!" Rick joked, I snorted and poured her a little bit before informing everyone that she already knew what wine tasted like. They just laughed harder.
"It seems to me we haven't thanked our host properly." Rick said, smiling at Dr Jenner. He smiled back tentatively.
"He is more than just our host." Everyone raised their glasses (Daryl and I raised whole bottles) and began to cheer for the doctor.
"Hear hear!"
"Here's to you, doc."
"BOOYAH!" Daryl shouted, swigging from his bottle.
The commotion died down as everyone returned to celebrating our survival with food and drink. Eventually, one voice raised itself higher than the others, and addressed Jenner. "So when are you gonna tell us what the hell happened here, doc? All the... the other doctors that were supposed to be figuring out what happened, where are they?" The merry atmosphere of the dining area died down. Shane, now onto his sixth glass of wine, looked like he'd moved from happy drunk to just plain drunk.
"We're celebrating, Shane." Rick warned him. "Don't need to do this now."
"Whoa, wait a second. This is why we're here, right? This was your move... Supposed to find all the answers. Instead we... We found him. Found one man. Why?" His attempt at laughing was pitiful and bitter. Jenner looked visibly uncomfortable as the attention was turned to him.
He answered quietly, as if the words ashamed him. "Well, when things got bad, a lot of people just left. Went off to be with their families. And when things got worse, when the military cordon got overrun, the rest bolted." I'd seen that happen. I'd watched people run over other people in their panic and desperation to live. I'd done it myself.
"Every last one?" Shane asked.
"No, many couldn't face walking out the door." Jenner shifted in his seat. "they... opted out. There was a rash of suicides. That was a bad time."
"You didn't leave." Andrea said. "Why?"
"I just kept working. Hoping to do some good." The good mood was gone. Food suddenly tasted sour.
"Dude, you are such a buzzkill, man." Glenn complained, putting down his wine. Shane rolled his eyes but didn't try to argue.
The majority of the plates were left empty when dinner was finished. Some had been abandoned after Jenner had discussed the absence of his colleagues. He waited for us in the hall and began to run us through the dos, don'ts and bed spaces of the CDC. "Most of the facility is powered down including housing, so you'll have to make do here. The couches are comfortable, but there are cots in storage if you like. There's a rec room down the hall that you kids might enjoy. Just don't plug in the video games, okay? Or anything that draws power," All five children agreed to leave the video games alone, though Louis looked put out. "the same applies... If you shower, go easy on the hot water." His last words were passed around the group like something sacred. A mad dash to the showers followed next, with everyone parting ways without even looking back.
I let Josie into the showers first. It had been decided that, because this room had a larger cot and two couches, that Carol and Sophia would be staying with us. Sophia and Carol had already showered and had headed down to the rec room.
The water was amazing from the first moment it came into contact with my skin. I was immediately thankful I had gone in last; it gave me more time under the blissfully soothing waterfall.
I made sure to scrub away any walker blood or dirt from my body. I was a little less vigorous with scrapes, bruises, and that ugly scab forming on my lip from when I had been punched and hit the gravel hard. The water cascading down my back calmed every nerve in my body. I finally felt okay, like normalcy had been restored, and when I walked into the bedroom, I would be in my house in Arkansas, with my family.
It was painful to step out of the shower, I never wanted it to end, though the warmth of the towel did make it a little better. I moved from the bathroom to the mirror in the main room I'd be sleeping in. Clothing was already set out for me, Carol had left a little note hoping they would fit. It was nice to have someone do something genuinely nice for me.
I dropped the towel. The first thing that stood out was the large scar that ran down from the upper inside of my thigh to just above my knee. I'd almost died from that cut; my mother -a practising nurse before the apocalypse- had told me that it had missed the femoral artery by inches. I'd responded by telling her it was better than being torn apart by the walkers.
I'd just wriggled into a pair of underwear when I heard a gasp from behind me. For a fleeting moment, I thought it may have been Rick or Glenn, and so I rushed to wrap the towel around my chest to hide my bare breasts.
Andrea covered her eyes and apologised, "Jesus, sorry. I should've knocked."
"Ya think?!" I snapped, quickly pulling on my t-shirt and pyjama pants. She continued to look at me. "What?"
"You... have a lot of tattoos."
"Yeah." I retorted. I immediately regretted it.
"How many?"
"Four."
"Oh." She stood in the doorway, examining the carpet as if it was the most interesting thing she could think of. "What are the-"
"Do you actually have a reason you're in here?" I interrupted. I was tired, and with Josie off playing in the rec room, I had time to relax without an energetic ten-year-old buzzing around me.
"How'd you do it?" She asked suddenly. Her eyes were red and puffy. She'd been crying.
"Do what?"
"You lost your brother-"
"I lost a helluva lot more than that." She absorbed that information and shut the door behind us. I wasn't stupid, I knew where this conversation was going.
"How are you doing it?"
"Doin' what-"
"Coping!" She snarled. She started to cry again, a mix of snot and tears on her face. "Since Amy's been gone, I can barely even move without thinking about how I should've saved her."
"Weren't your fault." She shook her head and flicked tears everywhere. Uck. I wasn't sure of how to comfort her. If she left looking like this, people might assume that I'd said something; half of them already hated me enough already. "Hey, you did the right thing in the end. You stopped her from hurting anyone else. It's the best way, they wouldn't ever want to come back and kill people, it's the right thing to do."
"Is that what you did?" She hinted. I spluttered and stumbled over my words, trying to find a decent answer to Andrea's question. "You sound like you know the feeling."
"I'd like you to go now." I said. She stood up, stunned. "I'm tired. I want to sleep."
Andrea left without another word, leaving me to curl up on the couch, the beginning of a headache throbbing in my temples.