follow you into the dark - carl grimes

IX

-

ix.

night moves
"if i scream loud enough maybe you'll hear me"

-

The truck runs out of gas a couple miles out of town which is disappointing but still better than expected as we nonetheless progressed faster than we would have had we been on foot this whole time.

It was another cold, sunny day. The sky cloudless and bare but the air still stark with chill. We stomped through the snow, Carl kept a hand on my shoulder, which was progress I guess. Additionally, it made it easier not to lose him.

"No riddles today?" He asked.

I shrugged, which he could easily feel with his hand placement. "I think I'm fresh out. Plus, I thought they annoyed you."

"Well, at the time, I think I was just annoyed in general."

"Are you still annoyed?"

"I'm getting over it."

I want to ask if I'm forgiven, but part of me also just thinks he's a little bitch. I've kept him safe. I've kept him alive. I am going to get him home to his sister. How am I the bad guy here?

The snow was so thick and we had gotten to the plains, stretches of flat land with scatterings of trees and thick brambles of bushes and a hard sense of where the road was and wasn't.

Then, there was something strange. A shift. Not in the air around us, but the earth below us. Something cold, something dangerous.

"Hey, Carl, should we-" I don't get to finish.

Carl's hand slips from my shoulder. He sinks soundlessly, he doesn't even get a chance to cry for help. The crack of the ice below his feet is the briefest warning given.

We are not walking on a snow covered clearing. We are on a snow covered frozen lake.

And Carl just fell through the ice.

I scream his name, knowing it helps nothing but still felt necessary. I drop to my knees beside the hole, seeing nothing but inky black water stark against the frozen white edges.

Honestly, I don't know what to do.

I reach an arm in. My hand finds nothing, just empty water. I realize I have to go after him.

Without a further second of hesitation, I drop beneath the ice.

-

It's deeper and darker than anything. So freezing cold, it feels like it's stabbing my skin all over.

He's struggling when I find him. I can't see him, but I feel him. His backpack is so heavy, it's only making him sink. I shove the straps off his shoulders as he thrashes, I wonder if he understands I'm trying to help.

I grip him tightly and push him forward, towards the small circlet of daylight. He rises from the darkness, his face blooms with color. He makes it to the surface, I'm only a second behind. He rolls over and gasps for air, coughing and sputtering. He might even be crying, or maybe it's just me. I kneel over him, fretting, as he tries to collect himself.

Here's the thing:

We are both soaking wet in freezing weather with absolutely no shelter anywhere close.

"Carl, Carl? Can you hear me?"

He just rolls on his side, heaving, then he vomits into the frost.

"I need to get you off the ice, can you walk?"