Carry On - a Walking Dead Fanfiction

by: MildlyInsane (who is not actually insane at all - not even a little bit.)

Summary: Takes place in season 1 - Daryl, Glenn, Rick, and T-Dog return from Atlanta (and their search for Merle) to find the camp is being over-run with walkers. The group cannot fight them all off and end up fleeing the camp site to save their own lives. Glenn and Daryl are separated from the group and must try to find their companions while also looking out for themselves and each other.

The first two chapters are written in 3rd person Glenn's sort of point of view. The second two chapters are written in 3rd person sort of Daryl's point of view - but they aren't a re-telling of the same chapters two chapters - the story proceeds, just with a different person's perspective upfront. You'll love it. Trust me. I'm your father. I wouldn't lie to you.

xxxxxx

Chapter1

Glenn's lungs burned as he ran after Daryl and Rick back toward their camp. T-Dog trailed behind him. All four of them were on edge, and all four of them were utterly exhausted. Their trip back into the city to locate and retrieve Merle had not gone as planned. Not only were they unable to find Daryl's older brother, but when they had finally made it back to where they'd left their van, it was gone.

It could have been any random person who had stolen the van. After all, there were likely other survivors hiding out all over the place. In their group alone, there were children, an old man, a few women who screamed and cried like they didn't have any clue what to do when a walker approached them, even Glenn himself felt clueless about how to handle walkers half the time... If all these miscellaneous people could manage to survive this long, there had to be others... Anyone out there could have seen their seemingly abandoned van and decided to make use of it. They all knew that. Nevertheless, Glenn couldn't help but assume it had been Merle who hijacked their vehicle. The others seemed to think so as well.

But it didn't really matter who took the van. No matter who it was, the vehicle was still gone. The fact of the matter was that they now had to run back to camp on foot, knowing full well getting back before dark would be impossible. Traveling by any means was dangerous in this new world. Hell, just existing was dangerous. But having to travel on foot at night was one of the stupidest moves to be made in this post-apocalyptic world. Walkers could be around any corner, and since they were running practically blind, if a walker turned up, they probably wouldn't even see it until it was too late.

Gasping as he ran, Glenn tried to keep an eye on both of the men ahead of him as well as the one behind him, while also allowing his eyes to dart to the left or right every few seconds. They were nearly back to camp by now and they hadn't run into any walkers yet. He assumed that meant they were in the clear, but he didn't want to feel too confident, as he knew that in this world, just as soon as you started feeling too comfortable, something was bound to jump out of the darkness and rip your throat out. So he kept his guard up and did his best to be aware of his surroundings as he struggled to keep his legs working.

He felt like he'd been running forever. All he could hear was his own heavy breathing and the sound of his own beating heart pounding in his ears. He couldn't see Daryl or Rick's faces but he assumed they were just as exhausted as he was. They seemed to be doing alright though, as neither of them looked like they were having trouble staying ahead of the other two men.

Having T-Dog running behind him made Glenn nervous though. He hated it when one of his friends kept behind him instead of at his side or in front. He always felt the urge to look back and make sure the person was still there. Even before all this zombie business, he always hated not being able to see that all the people he was traveling with were still there. He always feared leaving someone behind. For this exact reason, he kept looking over his shoulder to make sure T-Dog was still there. Rick and Daryl didn't seem to be looking back much, so Glenn felt like it was his own responsibility to ensure both himself and T-Dog made it back to camp.

T-Dog looked just as tired as Glenn felt. Glenn wished he could propose that they all stop for a minute to catch their breath, but he knew they couldn't afford that. The quicker they moved, the less likely walkers would follow them back to camp, and the sooner they would be in a somewhat safe place. Stopping for breaks just wasn't reasonable.

"We're almost there," he called back to T-Dog. He didn't know if the man heard him. He could barely even hear himself over the sound of his own exhausted breathing. He knew the other man probably already knew they were almost back to camp... Glenn just wanted to say something positive after the hellish day they'd all just been through.

Glenn had expected that getting back to camp would be a relief. He expected to see Lori and Carl run up and hug Rick. Dale or Amy would probably greet him with a smile, hug, or both. Jacqui would probably happily greet T-Dog... Someone might even toss a smile Daryl's way, if they dared. The rest of the camp had probably assumed the four men had been killed in Atlanta since it was well after sundown. Everyone would be so surprised to see them among the living.

Their arrival back should have been joyous, but instead it was the complete opposite. When they ran into camp, everyone wasn't laughing and smiling around the camp fire. Instead, it was complete chaos. People were screaming and crying. Apparently a massive hoard of walkers had made it from the city, through the woods, and into camp. These reanimated corpses were in the process of attacking their campsite, taking down and feasting on anyone unlucky enough for them to catch. No one even noticed the four men had made it back, because they all had bigger fish to fry. The four of them immediately grabbed the first weapons they could find and joined in with the rest of the group to fight off the hoard of walkers.

"Glenn!" he heard Rick call his name with much urgency in his voice. When he turned toward the sound, the former cop tossed him a gun from the bag of guns they had retrieved earlier that day.

Glenn didn't have much experience actually killing the walkers. In all his scouting trips into the city, he'd usually just done his best to avoid them or outrun them, and his aim with a gun probably wasn't so great. Nevertheless, he aimed at the first walker he saw and fired. He hit the thing, but not where it mattered. The bullet seemed to have stuck in its shoulder. Glenn's assault on it had gained its attention so that it was now staggering toward him, its rotten mouth hanging open and its dead eyes staring blankly at him.

In the darkness and with its advanced degree of decay, he couldn't even tell if the thing had once been a man or a woman. The fact that these things were once people sickened him. Glenn knew most of his family and friends were just like this grotesque monster. His current friends here in camp would probably become walkers one day. He himself would probably eventually become one. It was inevitable - not a matter of if, but a matter of when...

He aimed again, holding his breath in an attempt to keep his arms steady. When he felt confident that his aim was spot on, he fired the gun a second time. This time, he actually hit it in its head. As it staggered back and fell to the ground, he felt shocked that he'd actually succeeded. But he didn't have the luxury of time to sit around being proud of himself. There were countless more where that one had come from.

So he turned toward the next silhouette, squinting in the darkness to make sure it was actually a walker and not one of his friends. It was indeed a geek, and it was stumbling toward Carol, who was hugging Sophia while backing herself up between a tent and a tree. Both the woman and the girl were screaming and crying. Glenn rushed up and pointed his gun at the back of the walker's head. If he could get close enough, he wouldn't have to take the risk of missing the shot like he had on the first zombie. Killing it in one shot would definitely be best, as it was quicker, and he only had a certain number of bullets. He didn't know how many bullets the gun held or if it was fully loaded when Rick had tossed it to him. He had no clips with which to reload, so each bullet was precious.

With the gun almost touching the geek's exposed skull, Glenn pulled the trigger, watched the body fall to the ground, and then rushed up to Carol and Sophia, "you guys okay?" he breathed out. He was still exhausted from running back to camp.

Carol nodded, but she still looked terrified. Sophia just hid her face against her mother's body and refused to see the ruined world around her.

"You should get into the RV or something," Glenn suggested, trying to speak loudly enough to be heard over the screaming and gunshots. Carol clearly wasn't cut out for killing walkers, and Sophia was just a child. They needed to get themselves someplace safe and out of the way so that they wouldn't fall victim to walking corpses or friendly fire.

He grabbed Carol's hand and started leading her toward the RV, but what he saw next stopped him in his tracks. Lying in front of the RV was Amy, and kneeling over her was Andrea. Amy's neck and shirt were covered in a massive quantity of blood, most definitely her own. A fallen geek lay nearby, and Andrea was sobbing uncontrollably as she frantically pressed her hands up against the deep, bleeding wound on her little sister's neck in some attempt to stop the bleeding and save her life. Amy had been bitten, and if she wasn't dead already, she certainly would be soon.

Glenn wasn't made to deal with stuff like this. What was he supposed to do? If there was a picture that could be used to describe complete fucking chaotic disaster, this would be it. Bodies littered the campsite. Glenn hoped nearly all of them were walkers and that they hadn't lost too many of their own group, but it was impossible to take count of who was left. Even those who were still shooting the zombies could have been bitten, which would mean they were just as good as dead themselves.

He heard the engine of one of the group's cars starting up. Glenn turned toward the sound in time to see the car backing up, rolling over a walker and then speeding off. Someone had decided to leave instead of staying and fighting this out. He couldn't say he blamed them.

Walkers were staggering out of the woods at an alarming rate. The survivors weren't killing them as fast as they were appearing. He aimed at a group of about ten walkers and started firing. He knew he probably wasn't hitting all of them in their heads, but there were so many and he was beginning to panic enough that he couldn't focus on what was the smartest thing to do in this situation. They were all staggering toward him and he knew he couldn't possibly take the time to get a certain head shot on each one.

When he turned around he saw that Carol and Sophia were gone. They must have fled like he'd advised. He hoped they'd made it someplace safe.

"Get in the RV!" he heard Dale scream, "everyone into the RV! Andrea! Leave her! You can't save her! She's gone, Andrea! Get in the RV!"

"Shane!" he heard Lori's voice, "Rick! You can't kill them all! Just get in the car right now! We're not leaving you again!"

So that was it. Everyone was giving up. The camp had been compromised, and there was no gaining it back. The walkers continued stumbling toward him, and he continued to shoot them until his gun was out of bullets. Even after there were no bullets, he kept pulling the trigger, hoping there was by some miracle some extra secret bullet in the gun just for a situation like this. He wasn't sure how many shots he'd fired, but he only managed to take out one of the geeks before the gun was empty. He tossed the the weapon as hard as he could at the swarm of undead and proceeded to run away from them, away from the RV where Dale was frantically trying to convince Andrea to leave her dead or dying little sister behind.

By now almost everyone had filed into a vehicle and many of the vehicles had already sped off. Glenn could see Rick was still out in the open, firing his gun at zombies and helping other people find an empty place in one of the vehicles. Shane was in the driver's seat of a car, with Lori and Carl in the back. Lori was yelling out the window, demanding that Rick get in, while Shane was hanging out the window, shooting the walkers while he waited on his friend to take his place in the passenger side of the car.

There were still many people unaccounted for. Glenn didn't know how many of them were dead and how many were in the cars that had already sped off. It was so hectic and would be impossible for any sort of role call. Besides himself and Rick, he didn't see any more living people walking about the camp.

Glenn's heart was pounding. The car Shane was driving seemed to be the only vehicle left, but it was all the way across the campsite, between himself and a mass of mindless walking corpses. He didn't have a weapon anymore, and this wasn't like the city where there were shops and alleys he could duck into or fire escapes he could climb... Getting passed the zombies wasn't going to be easy.

The walkers were forcing him to back away from Shane's car even further than he already was. The RV that had been in the other direction was gone now, and there were geeks in that direction too. This was going to be where he died. He was finally going to become one of those disgusting monsters he feared... Unless they consumed his corpse enough to make that impossible. If he turned into one of them and his legs had been eaten off, would be feel it? Would be be in pain until someone was kind enough to shoot him and put him out of his misery? Would anyone even bother when he was just a mangled torso and head - absolutely no threat at all... A waste of bullets...

Seemingly out of nowhere he heard the revving of another engine, but this one wasn't a car or the RV. It was much too loud. He turned toward the noise to see it was a motorcycle, and it was being driven by none other than Daryl Dixon. For a moment his heart sunk. Daryl on a motorcycle was almost the same thing as nothing at all. That man wasn't going to help him. If he knew Glenn was still out among the chaos in the camp, he'd probably pretend he didn't know.

Glenn searched around himself for a clear path through the corpses and to the only car left, which Rick was climbing into as he gave one last glance around to make sure he wasn't leaving anyone behind. In the darkness, he must not have seen Glenn, because he got into the car and slammed the door.

"Rick!" Glenn screamed, "wait!" He was frantic by now. That was his last chance of getting out of here alive.

Now that Daryl's motorcycle's engine was blaring, Rick couldn't even hear Glenn call out his name. Shane was pulling the car out of the campsite in no time, leaving Glenn to be yet another casualty in this cruel world.

The sound of the motorcycle drew nearer, so Glenn turned toward it. Daryl would probably deny him passage on his brother's motorcycle, but he could at least make sure the man saw he was there. It would probably not do him any good, but he could at least try...

"Daryl!" Glenn called out, waving his arms frantically as he made his way over toward the sound of the engine.

Daryl's eyes met his. The man looked just as angry as always. It was impossible for Glenn to tell what he was thinking. Daryl may have been waiting to watch Glenn get killed. Maybe he hated him that much. Or maybe he would be perfectly willing to let Glenn hitch a ride. Either way, the younger man had to ask.

"Please don't leave me here!" Glenn pleaded, still completely out of breath as he struggled to make his way over to the older man while also avoiding all the hungry hands reaching out toward him.

"Come on then!" Daryl screamed back, "hurry it up!"

Glenn breathed out a sigh of relief as he heard Daryl's words. He began rushing toward the motorcycle, but paused when a walker got much too close for comfort, grabbing his arm and snapping its teeth at him.

Glenn struggled to push the thing off of him. He had no weapon at all. Not even something blunt to hit it with. He was completely defenseless. He had his own hands of course, but they were basically useless. He couldn't beat the walker off him with just his hands... Not easily anyway.

Suddenly, an arrow whizzed through the air and connected with the skull of the decaying corpse trying to make a meal out of him.

"Fetch that arrow and get on the back," Daryl yelled at him, "hurry up! We don't got all night!"

With trembling hands, Glenn grabbed the arrow. He put his shoe on the walker's head and squeezed his eyes shut as he pulled the arrow up and out of its skull. No matter how many of these things he came in contact with, he knew he'd never get used to the idea of dealing with them being a normal every-day annoyance. Pulling an arrow out of someone's head was traumatizing, even if that person was a reanimated corpse... It had still been a person once... He gripped the arrow tightly in his hand and continued making his way over to Daryl as quickly as his tired legs would carry him.

When he finally made it to the man and his bike, Glenn handed him the arrow and then hesitated briefly. Daryl wasn't exactly the kind of person who welcomed the close proximity of other humans. Glenn knew the man probably didn't really want him there, but he also knew he couldn't bother caring. He had to either take the awkward seat Daryl had offered or stay here and die.

He jumped on the back of the motorcycle behind Daryl and then debated silently whether or not grabbing onto the man's waist would result in his death. He was lucky enough that Daryl had allowed him onto the bike in the first place. He didn't want to undo that luck by making the man angry now. But this decision was quickly made for him when he reached out instinctively and grabbed onto the man's flannel shirt as Daryl sped the motorcycle up quickly enough to make the younger man almost fall off the back of it.

Daryl drove the bike as though he had been practicing driving through swarms of zombies all his life. He weaved around the walking corpses, narrowly missing the groping hands and they were out on the road in no time, quickly making their way away from the city.

Glenn gripped the older man's shirt tightly, holding on for dear life. Daryl was driving faster than Glenn would have preferred. Sure, there were no other drivers on the road, but there could be abandoned cars sitting just about anywhere, and a walker could stumble onto the road at any moment. Driving fast was more dangerous now than ever. Before all this, people wouldn't just pace around across highways, and no one abandoned their cars in the middle of the road. Maybe they didn't have to worry about the stupidity of other drivers, but the hazards on the road now were worse than ever in Glenn's eyes.

Even though Daryl's driving scared him, he couldn't help but feel tremendous relief that he was here right now instead of still back at camp fighting off zombies until his last breath. He knew there were many people in their group who would have never left him behind on purpose. If Rick or Dale had known he hadn't made it into someone else's vehicle, they would have been sure to at least try to avoid leaving him behind. In fact, they probably wouldn't have left him there even if he'd been bitten. Glenn wondered if Andrea had ended up taking Amy with them in the RV. Was she already dead? The bite wound on her neck looked pretty bad. He was pretty sure Amy wouldn't have left him behind either, but she was no longer in the position to be making such choices. Andrea probably wouldn't have left him behind either, but having just witnessed her sister being viciously attacked by a decaying human monster, she probably wasn't even thinking about anyone else.

With all those options he had of people who might be looking out for him, Glenn never would have dreamed it would be Daryl who actually made sure he didn't get killed. Anyone else seeing him and leaving him behind anyway would have been devastating to him emotionally. If Daryl had left him there on purpose, he wouldn't have even been surprised.

"We should stay on the main road," Glenn offered, "The others probably stopped up ahead at some point so we can all meet back up with each other. I hope no one headed toward the city," He practically had to yell and still wasn't sure if Daryl heard him. The engine mixed with the wind drowned out his voice, and since he was still out of breath, his voice was weaker and softer than he'd have liked.

Daryl either didn't hear him or chose to ignore him.

Even with the roaring engine and swishing sound of the wind, Glenn felt the silence between himself and the driver of the motorcycle to be uncomfortable, "Do you have any idea of who all made it out?" Glenn asked.

"Don't know," Daryl shrugged. Glenn barely heard him, "do you?" he looked over his shoulder slightly and then focused back on the road.

"I'm pretty sure Rick, Shane, Lori, and Carl made it," Glenn practically yelled to be heard, "Carol and Sophia were okay the last I saw them... Everything was happening so fast... I lost track of them. I hope they made it to the RV. Dale was yelling for people to get in. I think Andrea made it, but I'm not sure..." Glenn frowned and felt tears welling up in his eyes. After all the death he'd witnessed in these passed months, he still couldn't get used to his friends being violently killed, "Amy didn't make it..." he managed in a small voice. He didn't say anything more, because he wanted to instead focus on keeping himself from crying. Now was not the time to get emotional.

At first he thought Daryl hadn't heard what he said last, because for a moment the older man remained silent. But after a few seconds, his shoulders slumped, "damn," he muttered.

Glenn wished he could see Daryl's face. It was so hard to tell what the man was thinking. Was that 'damn' a sarcastic remark? Or was he actually disappointed that Amy was dead? Glenn wondered if Daryl had the capacity to care about anyone besides himself and Merle. Surely even if he didn't really like her, he'd be saddened to hear of her death. Even if he didn't know her at all, she was still a person... And she had been a great person.

In fact, Glenn felt closer to her than he had to almost anyone else in the group. She was close to him in age, and she was happy, upbeat, funny, cute... Any time things were getting to be too stressful, they could always count on her to brighten their moods. How were they going to get on without her? Andrea wouldn't ever be the same. Dale wouldn't ever be the same... Each time it seemed like living in this new world might just be manageable, something else happened to rip away all sense of security they'd built up. Maybe making it in the world in its current state just wasn't possible.

With his mind focused on Amy, Glenn didn't even notice what was going on in the road ahead of him until it was already too late. His attention was brought back to reality when he felt Daryl swerving sharply to the left. Just ahead of them were three walkers standing in the road. Daryl's mind must have been wandering too, as he swerved at the last minute. He must not have noticed the geeks either until they were right upon them.

"Watch out!" Glenn screamed. He knew his words were redundant, as Daryl was already aware of the obstruction and was already working to avoid it. The younger man's verbal warning slipped out of his mouth without him even thinking.

Despite the fact that everything was happening so fast, for a moment it felt like he was moving in slow motion. He could feel Daryl losing control over the motorcycle. Glenn held onto the older man's shirt but could feel himself losing his grip. When he wasn't able to hold on any longer, he felt himself thrown off the vehicle and into the grassy ditch next to the highway.

As he landed, he cried out in pain. In an attempt to catch himself and avoid as much injury as possible, he had put out his hands, but in doing so he must have twisted his wrist, or else landed on it wrong, because it was immediately throbbing in pain. He must have also somehow landed on his ankle and shoulder, because those both throbbed as well.

For a moment he just lay in the ditch, afraid to move for so many reasons. He knew there were at least three walkers in the nearby area, and he knew he was still unarmed. He also knew that his wrist was probably broken and his shoulder felt like it had been dislocated. He had landed quite hard and his body was probably in shock. He could very possibly be even more injured than he knew. And then of course he had no idea how Daryl had fared. For all he knew, the other man could have been injured even worse than Glenn. Maybe he was pinned under the motorcycle or something... Glenn had to force himself up off the ground and make sure his companion was alright. If the man was somehow trapped, it would be up to Glenn to make sure he didn't fall victim to the ravenous appetites of the nearby walkers...

xxxxxx

Do you like it so far? Please send me a review telling me what you think. :) There will be three more chapters. They are already written. I just need to proof-read and edit them. I should be posting them somewhat soon... *HINT* reviews make me more excited and therefore more likely to update sooner. ^_^ Thank you.