Finding Abigail (Daryl Dixon)

Prologue

Abigail

The day that dead started walking was a day like I'd never seen before. It was my 29th birthday, after the busiest shift of my life I sat in my apartment watching it all unfold on the news. "This is an emergency broadcast, the state of Georgia is now in crisis. People are becoming sick, turning into monsters and attacking others. Stay in your homes and off the streets. Expect a sudden increase of crime. Lock your doors and keep out of sight. We will update everyone when we can." The news anchors were terrified, they were trying not to cry, as well as half of the United States. It went dark shortly after that, the news stopped broadcasting, the power went out. The world was plunged into darkness from then on. I remember thinking it was some kind of sick prank. 'Zombies? Really?' I had thought to myself.

My dad was like those nutjobs, he seemed like a nice, charming guy, but he was a drunken doomsday prepper. Probably not the most politically correct choice of words, but I didn't care about that, he was a nutjob in my eyes. He would be living underground with his wife and my half sister somewhere, waiting for this to blow over, but it never would. Life would never be the same. My dad taught me a lot, like how to use a gun, how to fight my way out of bad situations and how to escape if I needed to. I learned to throw knives and shoot a crossbow with my uncle. I had to thank my dad for all he taught me, he was a terrible parent, but at least I would survive this longer than most. Maybe I would opt out? Who knows. There was nothing left of the world as we knew it. No police, no hospitals, no anything. People wouldn't get married and start families anymore, we would all die one by one until the world was completely infested with them.

I kicked the trash lying on the sidewalk. The streets of Atlanta were dead, forgive the pun. I had never ventured this far into the city since the world went to shit, there was too many of those things, and they were getting more hungry, more desperate, more deadly. I had no option, my apartment block was overrun at the beginning, one of the floors above me was having a party that night and it attracted 50, maybe 60 of them. I had to get out of there and run for my life, I had no food left and I had to leave or die. I lived house to house since then, picking them clean and then moving on. I had accumulated a decent selection of weapons and ammo, I only had a couple of weeks worth of bullets left, if I was lucky.

Fortunately for me, I had my crossbow, it was the only gift I was proud to have received from my dad, he couldn't use it, but he watched me learn and got me my own for my 16th birthday. I blocked all thought of him out of my head and kept waking. I didn't even know how much time had passed. A few months? A year? Who knew. I guess I would be saying I was 29 until I died. I looked around at my surroundings, a singular freak approached me, its arms outstretched and groaning. "Shut up." I said to it, rolling my eyes. When it was close enough, I stuck my blade through its skull. The ever so familiar feeling of stabbing the brain ran through the knife and up into my hand. Was this really life now? The thwack of the blade penetrating the skull was sickening at first, but now I was used to it,

I was a normal woman before, I worked as a EMT before the world went to shit. I knew how to look after myself, I could stitch myself up if I was injured, hell I could bring myself back from the brink of death if I needed too. I could put out a fire too, having worked both on an ambulance and firetruck. But I doubt that would be a useful thing anymore, there was no people to start fires. I didn't have friends, I grew up isolated in a town in rural Georgia. I never thought I would finish high school, never mind go to college. I didn't have friends, just people I worked with and knew. Spencer was probably the closest thing I had to a friend, she was my ambulance partner and we saved the lives of the people of Atlanta together. But she left this damned city when this all started, she had family she wanted to be with. I stayed alone, I never had to watch out for anyone else, never had to put my life in someone else's hands. I relied on myself, I always had. That was the best lesson my dad ever taught me.