Crossbow Hearts

~Daryl~
“Daryl…just be careful.” Jamie whispered. I could see the concern in her eyes. And it melted some of my hard exterior as I leaned down kissing her softly. I pulled back seeing a look of surprise on her face.
"You just keep everyone in line, especially my brother. He'll run rings round you if you let him." She smiled kissing me again before I walked off my crossbow across my back.
I met Rick, Tyreese and Michonne at the gates, they’d led most of the walkers off round the fence earlier so they could syphon off gas for the generator. So for now the gates were free of walkers. They’d probably have to clear some more off before we got back later. A car pulled up with Glenn inside.
“You guys ready?” He shouted.
“You want me to come?” Tyreese asked Rick.
“No, just tell Lori and the rest what’s going on and keep them safe tonight, you and Jamie. We may have guests tonight.” Rick told before heading into the car.
“Tyreese, leave my brother to Jamie, she’s got him under control.” He nodded his understanding and I got in the back with Michonne, neither of us in riot gear, while Rick and Glenn were fully kitted out in it.
We drove along quietly for a while, Michonne and myself not ones for talking much anyway.
“How’d you get this thing started? The keys weren’t left in it, right?” Rick asked. I thought it was pretty obvious the chink had hotwired the thing.
“You didn’t really think I was just a pizza delivery boy, did you?” The look of shock on Rick’s face was priceless.
“You mean…?” Glenn suddenly looked all guilty as I shook my head, fucking hell stealing cars wasn’t that bad.
“I stole a few cars in my day…yeah. It was never something I enjoyed. Well, that’s a lie. It was kinda fun…But I never wanted to do it. I learned how to do it in high school, for fun…To mess with guys and stuff. I only did it to make rent, on months I was going to come up short. I only did it because I had to. I realise you’re a cop and all. I hope this won’t change your opinion of me…” Rick was quiet for a while I was trying hard not to laugh, Merle, hell and Jamie would have been laughing this up right now it was so comical. Finally Rick spoke.
“Different time. Different world. Hell, I stole a couple of squad cars from my precinct so I could get down to Atlanta to get Lori.” He said almost ashamed of himself. Michonne couldn’t take it anymore.
“I’m shacking up with a bunch of criminals!” She laughed.
“Oh yeah only the hard stuff these two guys were into.” I joked. We all had a little laugh at their hardcore crimes and slowly settled into silence again.
“Do you see where it crashed? DO you know where we’re going?” Rick asked.
“I’m just following that trail of smoke from that tree line…that’s where it went down. Do you see it?” I looked out my window to see where the chink was pointing.
“Where?” Rick said.
“There, now do you see?” I asked as I pointed it out to Rick.
“Do we have enough gas to get us there?” Michonne asked, like me she didn’t fancy traipsing back on foot not with the amount of roamers we could see.
“We’ve got a little under half a tank. That’s more than enough to get us there and back. We should have no problems.” Glenn assured her.
“There’re a lot of roamers out here…it’s almost as if they’re headed right for the prison like they know it’s there.” Rick commented.
“Yeah it’s starting to get real crowded round that outer fence now the weathers picking up.” I replied, we’d have to do something about them.
“I was thinking,” Glenn started.
“Don’t think too hard, your head might explode.” I mocked him. He ignored me with a shake of his head.
“Like I said I was thinking, now we’ve got these suits, a couple of us could just go outside and clean house once a day starting tomorrow. It wouldn’t take too long to get rid of all the ones out there now…and after they’re all gone we could just kill the new arrivals as they build up.” I had to hand it to him it was a good plan.
“Yeah that makes sense. Before it wasn’t a priority and it seemed like a waste of ammo. Ammo we didn’t have. Stabbing them through the fence was thinning them out a little, but nobody was really doing it on a regular basis. It’d be safe to do it with the suits.” Rick added.
“Yeah well when we get back, me and Jamie’ll go out and clear them up.” I said, I’m sure Jamie wouldn’t mind going out there.
“Shit Glenn look!” The road had started to curve away from the field and the woods.
“Dammit I knew I should have grabbed the SUV.” Glenn sighed turning the car into the field. Michonne and I getting jostled about in the back, Michonne banging her head on the roof as I braced myself.
“This is going to be fun.” She grumbled.
“Looks like it’s going to be a bumpy ride.” Glenn said a little late.
“Bit fucking late to say that.” I snapped.
“It…ugh…won’t be so bad if you just slow down a little.” Rick said. The car started to slow.
“That’s probably a good idea.”
“No chink! Go fast or we’ll,” But it was too late.
“Oh shit, maybe slowing down wasn’t a good idea. I think we’re stuck.”
“Yeah no fucking shit Sherlock.” Rick raised his hand to silence me and for once I kept my mouth shut.
“Okay…fuck. Now we’re walking. If anyone survived that crash I hope they can walk, cause I really don’t feel like carrying them to the prison.”
“A-fucking-men to that.”
We slowly made it through the woods. Michonne and I taking lead as Rick and Glenn stumbled about tromping through the woods like a pair of fucking elephants. Michonne pulled back slightly as I carried forward scouting for walkers.
“Guy’s look. I can see the smoke again. I think we’re getting close!” Glenn sounding far too excited and taking off. “There it is do you see it?!” He said as suddenly the chopper came into view having landed in a dried up river bed.
“Looks like they landed in this river bed, may have lessened the impact.” I said.
“Do you see anybody?!” Rick shouted catching up to us.
“No…nobody’s here, but that doesn’t make sense. They couldn’t have jumped out could they?” I shook my head.
“Hell no.” I smirked.
“Do you think you can get up in there? We should see if there’s any way of figuring out whose helicopter this is or where they came from.” Glenn moved forward to go, but Michonne grabbed his shoulder as I stuck my arm out blocking him.
“Stop!” She ordered.
“What, what is it?” I shook my head.
“Footprints and lots of them.” Rick peered down at them.
“What does that mean?” Glenn asked a little shocked.
“Means china man that someone is closer to here than we are and they got to them first.”
“You mean like another camp Daryl? Closer to this area than we are? Wouldn’t we have seen them before now?” But we didn’t answer as all three of us set off in the direction the tracks went. “Guys? Guys?! Guys wait up!!”
We followed the tracks breaking through the tree line the road in view again. Glenn complaining the whole way that we’d just took off without him the night sky closing in fast.
“I don’t think I need to remind you guys that we’ve got less than ten minutes of twilight left and then it’s going to be pretty damn dark out here. I’d kinda like to get home. Besides exactly how would we be able to find out where these people went? I think I left my blood hound back at the prison.” I pointed to the ground a set of muddy tyre tracks showing the way.
“Well we at least know the direction they went in.” Michonne told him.
“Great… So what exactly do you guys want to do with this newfound information?” Glenn asked annoyed that none of us where that worried about getting back before dark.
“We should probably discuss that.” Rick said, I wondered what happened to his Ricktatorship. “As much as I hate not getting back to the prison tonight, I think we should follow through with this. If they’re closer to the crash site than we were it may be quicker to walk to them that to get back to the prison. These people could have more cars and gas, they could drive us back to the prison, hell it might have been their helicopter. What do you guys think?”
“Whatever. Either ways fine with me.” I told him unperturbed with the idea of going after these people.
“I’m with you. Let’s do it.” Michonne said moving towards the tracks.
“Oh, right…like I’m going to go back to the prison alone. Let’s go. You’re probably right anyway.” Glenn sighed throwing his hands in the air. I clapped his back hard and started after Michonne.
“Hey check out the sign.” Glenn pointed out a road sign.
Woodbury 1 Mile
Fayetteville 31 Miles
Atlanta 53 Miles
For some reason Woodbury rang a bell, but I couldn’t think were I’d heard it before. Maybe Jamie had mentioned it or Merle had been there with that group of his.
“Hm, my money is on Woodbury. Maybe they’re holed up in a store or something there.”
“Looks like we’re going to find out.” Michonne said as we set off again. I stayed a little ahead scouting, I knew we were being followed by walkers. And I knew Michonne could tell to. They were everywhere at least a dozen of them on our tail. I think Michonne must have told them as Glenn’s foot falls got louder an indicator that he was scared shitless. A sign came into view.
Welcome to
Woodbury
Population 1,102
“Well this is it.” I said. “Don’t look like much.”
“This can’t be it, this place looks dead.” Glenn complained.
“It is dead, there’s nothing here, nothing alive.” Michonne said ever the little ray of fucking sunshine.
“Christ. You may be right.” Rick sounded deflated.
“Yeah well we can at least whole up in a store for the night.”
“Daryl’s right. We can’t turn around now. We’ve got to many roamers on our tail. Some are as close as twenty steps behind us.”
“Maybe we could,” Glenn started, but lights shone us blinding us as somebody shouted,
“DOWN ON YOUR STOMACHS NOW!!! WE DON’T WANT TO SHOOT YOU BY ACCIDENT!” We all dropped to the floor as a hail of bullets went past taking down the walkers. “Now walk toward the left, quickly, before any more biters catch up to you! Now!”
“Who the hell are you? What are you doing here?” Rick demanded, but I didn’t think we were in any position to be asking questions.
“We’re living mother fucker. Now get in before we the only ones.” He yanked Rick forward and we followed so we didn’t have the light glaring into our faces.
“Get their weapons Wes, guns, knives, all of them. Make sure they’re clean before they take another step inside.” One man shouted.
“Right boss.” Michonne and I weren’t so willing to give up our weapons though.
“Let’em, Michonne, Daryl, doesn’t look like we have much of a choice.” I grunted once then let them take my crossbow, handing over my hunting knife and gun. “Why are you taking our weapons? We just want to know what happened to the people in the helicopter. You saved them right?” The boss man stepped forward.
“We don’t want to hurt you. Taking the weapons is for our protection. We get a lot of crazies in here. Names Martinez. Welcome to Woodbury, the last little town on earth.” This Martinez turned to one of his guys. “I’m taking them to the big man. I hear about a biter getting so much as twenty feet close to the wall you’re going to hear about it. Clean House. You guys follow me.” We went to follow him when a long haired guy with two goons with guns walked towards us.
“I can take it from here, Martinez. I’d like to escort our guest myself. I need you at the wall cleaning off all the biters they no doubt drug with them.” Something was telling me we were in a bucket load of shit and things were only going to get worse. “Follow me folks I’ll give you the nickel tour. I’m the Governor. I saw my chance to make something here and took it and then dubbed myself the Governor, it’s a bit of joke now, but enough what’s your story?”
“No story, we’ve been traveling since the turn. Saw the helicopter and was close enough to investigate, just not closer than you, right?” Michonne supplied.
“Believe I was talking to the man here ma’am, I hope you understand.”
“That’s our story, shit hit the fan and we been walking ever since, but this place is amazing you’re pretty lucky here. Where is it you’re taking us? We’re walking toward the light. What is that? Baseball game?” Rick recovered quickly.
“Well stranger. It looks like we’re not the only ones lucky around here. You showed up on a perfect night. There’s a fight tonight.” I looked to Rick, not liking the sound of it one bit. We walked through an alleyway and then up on to the bleachers the ground below completely illuminated. Walkers were chained to posts and I liked our situation less and less. “Curious about all the electricity? Fucking red necks. They loved their dirt track racing so much they had a big ass generator installed. That way their night races wouldn’t be interrupted by a power failure. Fights are usually for the day. We only save the generator for special occasions. C’mon, I’ve got a private room at the top best seat in the house.”
“So what you make the zombies fight each-other?” Rick needed to not judge these people.
“Zombies? No, a biter fight ain’t no kind of entertainment. We got real live people going into the circle to enter, they beat the hell out of each other, put on a good show, the biters are just extra motivation.” He smiled.
“You serious?” This was fucked up.
“I’m sensing a bit of disapproval stranger. In case you ain’t noticed the cables out. Ain’t a whole lot in the way of entertainment to be had. People get restless without entertainment.” Rick was shaking his head.
“You fence off this area, make it safe and then cart in a pile of roamers for entertainment, not very safe, Governor.” He turned round to face us as we walked into a room that said private outside.
“At first yeah, we had a few accidents. Once we started feeding them though…they got pretty docile. Not much of a threat now. Bruce close that door please.” Oh fuck, this shit got real, real fast. We had to get out if we didn’t no doubt Jamie and Merle would send out a search party and I didn’t want either of them here, especially Jamie.
“Wait you’re feeding them? What the hell are you feeding them?” Rick demanded. But I think it was pretty obvious.
“Well Stranger. We’re feeding them Strangers.”