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THE WOODS WERE dense with bushes, trees, and the occasional walker sightings. We scrambled to get as far away from the prison as possible before the sun hastened towards its inevitable resting point. This was bullshit, the place that we called home for the last several months was taken from right under our noses. The enemy was able to walk right up to our front door.
Now, where were we going? Was one of the many questions I had floating around in my mind. Like a record on repeat, it replayed the questions over and over again on a never-ending loop. Daryl Dixon, god knows how I ended up with him, but I guess anything was better than being on my own at a time like this.
After the tank came crashing into the base we had no choice but to flee. Walkers had infiltrated our walls and were targeting anything that dared to move. It was complete chaos. Were the others in our group alive? And if so where were they? I wanted to ask my companion in hope that he would have a reassuring answer. And yet he didn't know any more than I.
"We should stay near the base, just in case there are other survivors," I suggested. "And wait around for the enemy to find us? Hell no." He scoffed at my request like it was the worst idea anyone had ever proposed to him. It was annoying, being stuck with a smart ass like him.
We interacted very few times back at the prison, meaning that I knew little to nothing about him. Except for the fact he was able to come up with a snarky comment about practically anything. "Hey asshole, it was just a suggestion," I say. Daryl's voice irritated me, but what made my blood boil was when he didn't say anything at all.
He was stuck up. Just walking away like I hadn't said a damn thing. We both loathed one another, that was obvious, anyone could see from a mile away that we were not meant to work together. If he wasn't the only one around I would have left his sorry redneck ass to the walkers hours ago.
Why I stuck with him was a mystery to even me. Nothing was binding me to him. The thought of trying my luck with the walkers crossed my mind more times than I could count. But then again, he was good with a crossbow. Now that I mentioned it, I had never seen Daryl miss his target.
He always hit a bullseye every time, causing the walkers to drop dead instantly. Most of the time sticking an arrow right through their lifeless eye socket. It would be a lie to say I didn't admire him, but at the same time hated his guts. I respected him as a fellow hunter but didn't like the smug attitude that he wore like a trophy.
Teamwork wasn't my strong suit, however, it was something that began to grow on me as time went on. Relying on people wasn't my ideal method of handling situations, but was something I had to come to terms with in this post-apocalyptic world.
Speaking of teamwork, Daryl didn't seem to be too good at it himself. This whole wandering aimlessly through the forest thing that we've been doing and he has hardly spoken a word to me. I've just been trailing him like a shadow not even stopping to question where he was leading me in the first place.
"Have a place in mind?" I asked, trying to get some insight into where the hell we were going. Maybe he knew of a cabin or a building this deep into the woods and had a plan this whole time. "Nah." My last glimmer of hope vanished with that one spoken word.
We were as good as dead. Doomed to die an agonizing death by getting the flesh ripped off our bones. Just imagining what that would feel like sent a feeling of disguise coursing through me. The more we continued onwards the more walkers I began to see. Was there a town or something like that nearby?
Since the dead tended to crowd around largely populated areas I assumed we were getting closer to something much bigger than our small prison. I was snapped out of my thoughts rather instantly when a branch slapped me in my open eye. "Ouch, mother fucker!" I streaked as my hand instinctively covered my watery eyeball.
"Best watch where you're going." He said. I couldn't help but think that was intentional. I was the one following him after all. "Y'know you can be a real dick sometimes," I informed him. Not even so much as a slight eye glance was given. He just left me behind like I was just dead weight to him.
God, no amount of words could describe my urge to kill him right there and then. My hand stayed on my eye, wiping away any water droplets that fell. Only after a few seconds of trotting across the tree line was I able to catch up with the self-centered prick. "You know, your lucky I haven't abandoned you out here," I say.
"Sunshine, you can do whatever you damn well please, I ain't forcing you to follow me like a lost mutt." He stated. "Don't call me sunshine," I uttered in a low almost inaudible tone. My eyes trailed off to the side, seeing a group consisting of three walkers away in the distance.
Daryl suddenly came to an abrupt stop which made me ram into him. Why did he stop? I peeked over his shoulder expecting something to be wrong. Was it a herd of walkers? Or a tall barbed-wired fence? What I saw surprised me, it was a railroad track running through the middle of nowhere.
