Hiraeth (The Walking Dead)

Chapter 1

Rick and Shane had found themselves in trouble.

As in, knee-deep-in-shit trouble.

The two former cops lifted their guns and knives at the surrounding walkers, slashing and shooting at them. The flow of the undead couldn't seem to stop as the men fought for their lives once again in the forest. Walkers herded in on them, trying to simply get a bite of the fresh meat that Rick and Shane held on their bodies.

Rick was pushed to the ground. He twisted onto his back to see the surprise walker, and he pushed on its face. He tried to reach for a weapon that had fallen far from his arms, but to no succeed. Shane didn't want to make himself vulnerable by stabbing the walker, so he aimed his gun at its head.

Click!

Shane held down the trigger twice more.

Click!

Click!

Empty. He was out of bullets. Rick still lied on the ground, struggling to push off the walker on him.

Splat!

An arrow sliced through the walker's head. The corpse fell on top of Rick's chest and splattered blood on his button-down shirt. The smell burned Rick's nostrils. The two men looked to their right as more arrows sliced through walker's brains to clear a path through the trees. They expected to see Daryl, but someone with a pale face hidden by a tied-back black bandanna ran about to retrieve arrows.

The short person had dark brown undercut-styled hair with fringe that reached just past their eyes. They swung a black curvy bow too long for their body as they retrieved their arrows, leaving muddy footprints with their combat boots. Their ripped camouflage pants hung low on their waist as they ran, beginning to disappear into the dense trees.

"Who the hell is that?" Shane yelled with a deep voice. He lifted his gun again as he perceived the threat, clicking the trigger helplessly as their helper began to run off. "Goddammit," he snarled, reaching for Rick's gun on the ground. He pushed past dead corpses until he could pick up the gun with a slightly trembling hand.

Bang!

Bang!

The masked person began running in zig-zags as Shane shot bullets at them. "Stop!" Rick shouted. The ex-sheriff reached to pull down Shane's arm quickly, but his partner pulled it back up to let another gunshot echo.

The person stumbled. They fell on the ground a far distance from their shooter, frantically trying to stand. "Shane, I said stop!" Rick shouted again.

"And I'm just gonna let someone run around the forest where we live? Where Lori and Carl live?" Shane began trying to guilt-trip Rick into letting him kill their momentary saviour. He didn't want anymore threats to his home, and he would do anything it took to get rid of them.

Shane looked back at where the person had been, but they were beginning to stumble up and out again, nearly out of eyesight. He lifted the silver handgun again, pounding out two more loud bullets.

Bang!

Bam!

The two cops couldn't see if the person had been hit. They were too far away, and the masked helper had disappeared into the trees, wounded at least once.

Rick hit Shane's arm forcefully. "The hell was that? That looked like a fucking kid, and you were gonna kill him?"

Shane turned his body to the other. "I'm not letting any more threats to my home or anyone else's. You want someone who can kill you around Lori, around Carl?"

"We don't know if he's a threat," Rick argued in a growl-like voice. "If he was a threat, he wouldn't have just saved our asses."

Shane made a wide so what gesture with his arms. "We don't know that."

Rick bit down on his back teeth. "Let's get back to the farm. We'll talk over this with Hershel."

Rick and Shane followed the path they had taken back to the farm, finding Daryl before going immediately through the house to get to Hershel. They stood around with the white-haired farmer and brunet redneck in the living room to describe the person they had been saved by.

"And you shot at him?" Hershel asked in horrified amazement, once he had listened, "The idea didn't come to you that you could have killed a living person?"

"He could have been a threat," Shane justified angrily. "He could have a group, come find us and kill us, raid the farm. You want that?"

"We don't know that he'll do that," Hershel retorted, trying to stay calm.

"What we need to do right now," Rick intervened loudly with his thick Southern accent, "Is find the kid. He's been shot at least once, and if he isn't dead already, he will be soon after bleeding out. We'll figure out if he has a group or not after, and we'll figure out his plans."

"What makes ya think it's a guy," Daryl interrupted, "Said their face was covered, could be a chick."

Rick inhaled and put his hands on his hips in a kind of I'm in charge and I know it way. "I don't think so," he replied with a small shrug to Daryl. "Girls like that, they can't always do that kind of thing. When's the last time you saw a girl bowman?"

Hershel almost intervened to argue with Rick about stereotyping people. He believed gender roles were okay, but women could still be decent archers and fighters. However, he knew the task at hand was more important.

"So why d'ya call me down here," Daryl asked in a sort of mumble as he fixed the strap on the crossbow hanging around his torso. "I don' know the kid."

"Can you track 'im?"

Daryl nodded his head. Rick crossed his arms and nodded back at the hunter.

"All right. Let's head out in an hour, then."