Chapter 1: The Hunt

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Ivy Pov:

The sun is beating down hard on my back, the sweat that has built up on my shirt over the past few days is bound to be showing through. That's just what happens when your stuck in Georgia for fucking zombie apocalypse I guess.

"It's hotter than hell out here," I say, quietly almost whispering.

"So turn back, it's not like I need you out here," Daryl replied to me.

Typical guy response, "Yeah because you totally didn't beg me to go with you," I joke with him.

"I just didn't want to leave you in camp with Shane," He said back to me.

I know he meant that, me and Deputy Dipshit have some history and it isn't good. We've only been out for around four hours and the sun is starting to get low. We've been tracking a deer for all of it, which is why we went out in the first place. Daryl's been shooting every squirrel he sees, not realizing that if we get them all this trip there won't be anything next time. I've been going for the bigger rodents, raccoons and possums. I got two of each swinging on my belt. No doubt I have blood dripping all over my old ratty jeans. There's a twig snapping in the distance, instantly we both raise our weapons, him with his crossbow and me with my compound. Daryl raises his hand, a sign for me to stay back while he stalks forward. After a few paces he shoots an arrow and it hits something with a lewd squelch. After the noise of the hit something took off.

"Finally tagged it," Daryl said, he's talking about the deer I assume.

"About fucking time," I say back to him as I walk up to stand at his side.

"Hey it's not my fault the fucker is fast, and you could've helped you know," he said to me as we began to follow the buck.

"I couldn't do shit with your fat ass head in the way, if you don't stop blocking me I'm just gonna shoot you from now on," I say following him in a semi joking tone.

"If you were gonna shoot me you would've done it years ago, I think I'm safe from you princess," Daryl said back to me using his favorite nickname.

"I wouldn't count on that jackass," I muttered under my breath. I don't expect him to reply and he doesn't.

It's a miracle that we are still together through all of this. We were neighbors in the same trailer park. Daryl, Merle, and their deadbeat daddy moved in right next to me when I was nine or ten. Daryl was 13 and Merle was about to turn 18. I didn't meet them until a few months after they moved in. One day I was walking home from school and this guy was following me, he kept saying something but I couldn't make it out. Daryl must have been behind him and when he heard the old guy say something I remember him jogging up to catch up with me. He said something about trying to catch up with me for miles and how we were going to be late for practice if we didn't hurry up. I had no fucking clue what he was talking about. When he glanced behind him is when it clicked, the guy who had been following me turned around and started walking in the other direction. This is where the friendship started.

When the dead started rising around seven years later the first thing he did before getting the hell out of dodge was climb through my bedroom window and pack a bag for me. He found me in the kitchenette shoving cans into a different backpack. We left the park with Merle right after that. Neither of us talked about our families, a mutual understanding of what happened. That was when we got stuck on the highway and met up with the group. I didn't want to join them but Daryl said something about strength in numbers and Merle was obsessed with the idea of just robbing them and leaving when it went sour. That's how I got roped into this group led by one of the worst cops in the state of Georgia.

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