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The Quiet Ones

FOUR

They drive. Merle quiet and sweating; Cal's mind reeling and calculating and wondering. She doesn't like being with another person. Too much can go wrong, especially with a man like Merle – angry and sick as he is. The cop had been her one chance; she doubts that Merle would be so kind as to slip the van keys into her hand and walk away.

The burning CDC recedes behind them until all that's left is a great and billowing cloud. A glance at the side-view mirrors suggests there are no walkers following them as they drive slowly through the streets, although the occasional one shambles out of an alley and stares longingly after them. She doesn't watch to see if they begin their creaking lope after the van; she'd rather not think about it.

“We're going to need food,” she says. “My pack is getting low, and you still need antibiotics.”

Merle doesn't say anything. He is staring out the window.

“Edge of the city is probably best,” she's muttering, wondering why she's even trying to include him – wondering why she's even wasting her breath. “Grab what we need, and get out.”

Merle lets out a huff.

“And then we're going to head out of Atlanta.

His head jerks up and he's staring at her, “we leavin' the city?”

She barely nods, “it's not safe here.”

Merle lets out a low, scathing laugh, “ain't no where safe.”



The small strip mall is quiet, idyllic. It's on the edge of town in a nice little suburb. The only indication that the world has gone to hell is the lack of cars in the parking lot, and the sale sign in one of the department store windows that proudly proclaims a weekend sale that was suppose to happen over a month ago.

They both sit in silence, staring across the parking lot to the drug store perched quietly at the end of the strip. It's weird to just sit and watch and wait – like something that they might have done long ago when the parking lot was bustling with life. Instead they're looking out across a desolate slab of concrete, wondering if going into the drug store is more of a death sentence than turning and leaving.

The silence stretches on and on. Cal eventually fishes out the last chocolate bars – both malformed and squishing in their wrappers. They eat in silence, and afterward they suck at the flavour left on their teeth and marvel at the sugar sitting heavily in their guts.

“There should be some food in there – and water,” Merle mutters. The fever in his eyes is dripping away, replaced by an expression of relief. Cal had handed him her newly acquired bottle of Tylenol earlier – “Why the hell is there a sock in here?” He'd asked, wincing when he downed a handful of the pills in one go.

“And medicine for you,” she glances down at his arm. “Sterile bandages. Antibiotic creams.”

“You ain't riskin' your life for me, girl. I know better.”

She nods, “you're right. I'm not.” He sputters, and she ignores him. “If I don't get us some food and water we might as well just take a walk downtown.” She doesn't take the keys from the ignition as she swings the doors open. “If I'm not back in twenty – I'm dead.”

Merle doesn't even have a chance to say anything; she's off and walking across the parking lot, hunting knife in one hand and the backpack slung across her back.

Cal knows it's stupid; hell, coming back into the city was stupid. She was shacked up with a one armed redneck who was a proving to be little more than a chauvinistic pig, and she was risking her own neck to get him something for the arm he had cut off himself. All she can think about was when she'd have a chance to leave him behind, and find somewhere to hide out. She isn't deluded enough to think Merle was permanent partner material – he was loud, obnoxious and was more than likely to kill her than get her killed.

Cal doesn't approach the drug store head on. She swings out further into the parking lot to get a clear view down the building's side. From what she can see there is neither hide nor hair of a walker, or anything else for that matter. She glances over her shoulder at the van, somewhat surprised to see it still sitting there forlornly in the parking lot. Merle waves at her; she turns away.

The store's insides are dark, and the front door is locked. She lets out a sigh of relief at the fact, knowing if there were walkers going to be inside it'd be one or two – not a horde. She's quick to slide her knife against the window, letting the tip of the blade tap against the glass. She holds her breath for a moment, listening and waiting for anything to react.

Nothing.

Cal lets out a long breath, the words of the cop echoing in her mind. Don't be afraid.

She checks over her shoulder before sliding around the side of the building and into the alley. The regret of leaving her exit out of sight and unprotected burns at the back of her throat, and she shoulders the possibility that she might have to rely on Merle to get out of any situation unscathed. The thought lingers in the back of her mind, toxic and unwelcome.

She blinks and moves around to the back door, hesitating when she catches sight of a car parked awkwardly next to the garbage dumpster. The whole scene is eery – a dusted car with a door propped open; the dark interior spilling out a handful of swollen cardboard boxes. Cal stoops low enough to look beneath the car's underbelly – only a few scattered papers stick to the concrete.

She stands up and moves to the door, her eyes glancing back and forth between the pharmacy entrance and the car. She is tucking herself behind the door as she taps the tip of her knife against the handle. Tap-tap-tap. For a long moment after she waits, one hand splayed across the door. She's listening and waiting and feeling.

No moans. No sounds. No scratching hands clawing at the door.


Another long moment draws out, and then she's moving forward. The door is pulled open and she's in, her knife raised and her legs bent; her mind reeling and her muscles screaming; her neck itching and her back sweating. Don't be afraid.

There is nothing. No walkers, no bodies – that she can see –, but she knows they're here because the door was unlocked and the car was abandoned and it just doesn't make sense. She knows they're here because there hadn't been a sign of forced entry. She knows they're here because it's just too damn quiet for them not to be.

She moves forward slowly, her eyes darting along the shelves of the back room and towards another door on the opposite wall – it sits ajar. There's a sign taped to it, a comical face smiling back – remember to smile when providing excellent customer service.

Cal takes one step forward, and then another, and another. She pulls it shut and snaps the lock into place before she even breathes. She sweeps the backroom quickly, grimacing as every shelf is a separate aisle and the light from the small windows overhead is hardly adequate. She never really considered how her life was similar to a horror movie until this moment.


She starts shuffling through the shelves when the backroom looks clear, digging up a few bottles of antibiotic capsules, and painkillers, and creams and even pulling down a large bag of sterile wraps and pads. Everything is shoved into her backpack, and then she's standing up and eying the locked door to the front of the store. The comical face is still smiling, though the thought that the door had been open when she first arrived leaves a shadow hanging around its joyous expression.

She inches forward, her hand tightening on her knife to stop herself from trembling.

Don't be afraid.

She unlocks the door and eases it open, wincing when it wheezes pitifully. She holds her breath and waits, hoping the sound wasn't enough to attract the attention of whatever might have left that door ajar in the first place.

And then she's through, slinking behind the counter and easing her way out and into the actual store front. Right away she notices the pool of dried blood, brown and flaking and empty.

She nearly curses when she turns the corner and finds the thing slumped against the foot of the pharmacist counter, wheezing pathetically. It's just a torso at this point; its legs are gone from the knees down, and its hands are little more than boney stumps. It would have to try a great deal to even slide a few feet, let alone pursue her through the store. But Cal doesn't wait for it to wake up and recognize her – she plunges the hunting knife into the top of its head and continues on without a backwards glance.

The front windows cast the store in an eery light. Everything is back-lit like some bizarre stage production. The colours of the outside world are muted by the tinted windows, and everything inside is lit with shadowed sunlight. Cal watches carefully, moving through the shelves with wide eyes. Out of the corner of her eye she can see the cube van still parked alone, and the other she can see the walker torso slumped abjectly against the counter.

She's moving through the small food aisle, pushing bags of noodles and boxes of pop tarts into her bag, when it happens – a stray, wayward thought. It stops her in her tracks, one hand on her backpack and the other on a bag of peanuts. She shoulders the bag, hand suddenly going to her thigh and drawing the hunting knife from its sheath. The metal grinds softly in her ears. Her footsteps are silent as she moves down the aisle, her eyes wide and breath long and slow.

She can't hear anything except the rush of her own heart – it's starting to sound like some sad song, whistled into the golden evening.

When she turns the corner she looks down. Down at the torso slumped against the counter. Down. At the torso. Without its legs.

She doesn't say anything, although the foremost thought in her mind is a raging scream along the lines of where the fuck did your legs go? Instead she turns wildly around, eyes searching the store for any movement – anything contrasting sharply against the back lighting of the front windows.

There is a fear there in the pit of her gut. A regret at having not realized earlier. Walkers didn't eat their own damn legs. Walkers didn't just spawn missing a few limbs. At one point that someone laying against the counter had had feet – and at one point something had eaten them off.

At first she doesn't see anything, and she slides along the counter, eying each and every aisle as she goes. It's only as she makes it back to that first aisle – the aisle she had been gathering food in – that she sees it. A shadowed figure standing in the light in the same spot she had stood only moments before.

The walker doesn't move – not at first –, it simply stands and sways. It doesn't groan. It doesn't creak. It simply exists in silence. A shiver races down her spine, the thought of the thing having followed her through the store so soundlessly leaves her breathless.

There isn't time for stealth. The thing turns slowly, and even though she can't see it's face she feels that familiar dread – that familiar wonder if it's someone she knows. And it's funny, she thinks, considering she knew a handful of people in Atlanta before, and they were probably off tearing into some other poor souls at this point.

The pharmacist tag on the walker's coat catches the light. Milky eyes blink and squint and widen as they consider her. For a long moment neither moves.

One, two, three –

Cal's hand tightens on her knife. The walker's teeth click, head lolling back at it regards her – and then it lets loose a low, rattling moan. It takes a lurching step forward, lips peeling back to reveal a row of chipped teeth cloaked in dark pieces of meat.

She walks to meet it, dipping ceremoniously under its arm. Her knife-hand lifts, the blade tucking neatly into the temple. The thing collapses, hitting the ground with a loud crack that makes her grimace. Cal wipes the knife on the pharmacist coat. She doesn't look at the walker's tag, or the picture of the smiling man. She simply turns and walks away.

She's grabbing a few bottles of water from one of the Pepsi fridges when she hears the engine of the van start up. She glances out the window. It isn't Merle taking off and leaving her behind – but rather a dozen walkers ambling awkwardly out from a nearby alley. As the van rolls forward and towards the drug store, the walkers catch notice and begin their stiff lope towards the vehicle.

She hurriedly grabs a few more bottles of water and slings the backpack over her arm – and then she's running for the front door. Merle is yelling – she can hear him through the glass –, and more and more of the walkers are pouring out from alleyways and yards and houses at the sound of his voice. She's cursing him as she unlocks the front doors and bolts for the van; she's hissing that he's an idiot as she throws herself into the passenger seat beside him.

He hollers and laughs, and then peels out of the parking lot with a squeal. When she makes to glance at the side mirror he shakes his head. “I wouldn't if I was you.”

She glares at him and does anyway – and then wishes she didn't.

The walkers loping after the van are like a wave. They're pouring out of every house, every complex, every open building or side street. She remembers the silence; that eery peace before she'd gone in the store.

“Thank you,” she says.

Merle grunts, “fo' what?”

“Not leaving me behind.”

He doesn't say anything – he just glances at her pack.




They're pulled off somewhere on the side of the interstate just outside of Atlanta. A canvas tarp they found in the van's box is draped shoddily across the back of the cab, effectively hiding the light of the single flashlight key chain propped between them from the outside world. Cal taps it every time it flickers and stutters, explaining carefully that she'd found it in a dollar store.

“I could go for a nice, cold beer,” Merle is popping chips into his mouth, chewing and tonguing his teeth. He glances up at her from his bag of Doritos, his lips twitching. “What 'bout you, girly?”

Cal shrugs, licking her fingers clean of any wayward cheese powder. “Didn't you have a beer already today?”

Merle lets out a low, raspy laugh, “warm, skunky beer ain't a beer – it's piss.” Cal glances up at him. Merle scowls and holds out his hand, “pass me my pills.”

She tosses him the bottle, “take too many and they're gonna flush right through you.”

Merle smirks as he downs two more of the tablets, washing them down with a swig of water. “This here ain't my first walk 'round the ballpark with some antibiotics, girly. No need to worry your sweet little self over it.” He doesn't toss the bottle back – she doesn't say anything about it.

For a long while after they sit in silence – it isn't awkward, but neither is it companionable. If she was to call it anything, it would be apathetic.They simply sit and eat and breathe. They don't worry about that achy feeling in their stomachs, or the fact that both of them have had their fair share of near death experiences in the past few days. They're just two people stuck in a cube van with a nightmare walking outside – and for a moment, they don't care.

“You have family?” Merle's voice is shocking in the silence, and she glances up sharply from the crumbs of her chips to stare at him. “You have family, huh? Lil' boy on your hip? Sweet momma bakin' you pies? A boy to worry 'bout?”

Cal stares. She just thinks about what the world once was, and how it is now, and wonders if Merle ever even had a momma to bake him pie. She had already assumed earlier in the day that hell spat him out and told him never to come back. Her lips twitch, barely, as she imagines Merle being fussed over by a woman twice his age.

“How about you?” She turns it back on him. “You got a wife? Kids? A trailer? A sweet momma to bake you pies?”

His grin falls away quickly and is replaced with his crude, jaw jutting scowl. She can practically hear him grinding his teeth. “Ain't none o' your business.”

Her stare hardens, “likewise.”

They go silent. She can feel his eyes on her, but she busies herself by sliding her pack over and digging through the brain. Merle isn't quiet for long. “How'd you get out?” He's asking, and she's wondering if he'll ever stop asking her about her.

She lets out an annoyed breath and glances up at him. “A cop,” she says after a moment. “Older man. Picked me up off the road and put a gun in my hand and told me plainly to shoot anything that looked hungry.”

He had a kindness to his face, she thinks. The kind that you didn't see often – even then.

“Sounds like a smart man.”

She notices hows his eyes shift briefly to her pack – and then he's looking away and sucking the cheese powder off his finger tips. She's had too many run-ins with other survivors to not feel suspicious. The world had twisted people up, and a cursory glance now preluded the truth more often than not. There was a need in the new world; a need so deep in a person that they were willing to kill for it. She hadn't known it then, but it had become obvious over the past week that the cop's words had been encompassing – the world wasn't filled with only one sort of evil.

“Yeah,” she says warily. She clutches the bag until her knuckles ache, and eventually she tells Merle to sleep – that she'll take first watch. He belly aches over the idea of having to watch at all, but eventually nods off.

When he sits up a few hours later and tells her to get some rest she just shakes her head and says she's not tired.




Notes

Comments

Read this story today and am hooked. Love the character Cal and how you've written her. Agree with Phoebe that she reminds me of Michonne when we first meet her. Hope you update soon and let us know what happens next in Cal's story.

Grimesgirl63 Grimesgirl63
10/2/16

I've read this story all the way through another two times since your last update. I'm barely coping with not know what's going to happen next. Legitamet withdrawals.

In case you haven't figured it out - big fan of the story :)

ItsPhoebe ItsPhoebe
6/18/16

It's good, we'll written, I like that you had Randell killed off, by Daryl.

Francesmbezenah Francesmbezenah
5/23/16

Another amazing story!! This is good! Keep writing...you definitely have a knack! And keep the chapters coming! I'm enjoying it greatly!

Taemom Taemom
5/12/16

Your writing is honestly so amazing! I'm excited to see what happens when Cal sees Randall being brought back with Rick. Can't wait for more x

rachelloyd rachelloyd
5/7/16