I recently started watching Season 2 of the Walking Dead. I felt so bad for Sophia...Luckily in the world of writing, we can let her live ^^

My first Walking Dead Fic. a Daryl/OC, because he is a brilliant character :)

(I fixed a couple of spelling, grammatical errors in 2019. I posted this story in 2013...A bit of revision was needed.)

Enjoy!

My Salvation

Chapter 1

I could see her running at high speed past the trees. Her wailing indicated she was in a state of fear. It was obvious she was running from something. I turned my head towards the direction she came from. Then I spotted them. One,- two. Two of them were following her.

Shit, shit, shit...

They were not too far behind and at the speed she was running at, she would soon tire out, but they wouldn't. They never did. Despite the fact they did not move as fast as she did, they would not lose her scent any time soon.

I had to do something. I could not stay up here watching while that little girl would soon slow down and they would gain up on her. But the problem wasn't that there were two of them,- I knew there were more back there. Back in the direction I had come from, the direction she was now heading towards.

On my own I wouldn't be able to handle an entire group. I knew my limits when it came to handling them.

Then it happened. I held my breath as I saw the girl trip and hit the ground. If I went after her now, the chances of escaping were slim. A fight between my mind and heart broke out and it annoyed me to admit, my heart won this one.

I made up my mind, there were only two. If I handled this right, I could handle the two and get out before the others were alerted. I turned around, left my backpack between the branches and started to descend from the tree.

My feet touched the ground softly. I had no intention of alarming the two following her just yet. Their focus on her, was my opportunity to get them. But when I turned and looked at the location where the girl had fallen, I saw nothing. She was gone.

A short scream sounded but went silent almost immediately. I spun around and I spotted her once again, only she was no longer alone. A man, I had not noticed earlier, lifted her up in his arms and started to run away.

I quickly scanned for the undead before following the man and the young girl. If he'd run off in the other direction I wouldn't have, but the stranger was running towards the stream. A stupid move, he had no idea what was on the other side of the water.

I suddenly stopped. There was no need for me to continue. The girl was no longer alone, which had been my main reason for leaving my hiding spot in the first place. It wasn't my responsibility to save her anymore. She was with someone now.

I turned back around and headed to the tree where I had left my bag. But what if they got stuck? What if that man was also a stranger to that girl? What if the rest of those walking corpses arrived from the other side of the stream? I hated my conscious. I sighed and hurried after the man and the girl.

It didn't take long for me to reach the stream. But when I got there, there was no sign of the man or the girl. Had I missed them? Then, from my left, I could hear the splashing of water. They were heading down the creek.

"Shit." I muttered as I ran a hand through my hair, there was nothing I could do now. They were heading straight for a death trap. But that's how it went nowadays. Each day was a day of survival and in order to survive you sometimes had to make a choice which would decide your own fate.

Still, I could double check. I ran alongside the bank, watching closely if the two undead were still around. Once I reached the bridge I stopped. There was no sight of them. No man and no girl. Everything was quiet. There was nothing left to do but head back to collect my belongings.

But a soft noise coming from down below stopped me as I was about to go back. Soft sobs, but loud enough to hear over the flow of the water. I peered over the edge of the bridge and saw a head of dark blond hair, the head turned up and widened deep brown eyes stared at me.

It was the girl from earlier. She was still here. I quickly jerked my head up to look around. Where was the guy? Had he left her here all by herself? Why would he,- no, it didn't matter, I had to get her out of here.

I raised my index finger to my lips, signalling for her to keep quiet. She had to keep still, any noise and those undead would surely come back this way. I climbed down and extended my arm out to her and waited for her to grab it. We had to get out of the water. But the girl looked to the left before shaking her head at me. Damn it.

I crouched down this time and once more reached for her with my hand.

"If you don't come with me, more will show up. So either you stay and die, or you can come with me and live." I said trying to sound as nicely as I could.

Her bottom lip started to quiver. Oh no…please don't cry.

"Please." I tried again, even adding a small smile in the process and it worked. She walked forward and grabbed hold of my hand, with one big pull I yanked her out from beneath the branches. She was breathing heavily and started to shake.

"What is your name?" I asked her, I had to figure out a way to prevent her from having some sort of break down. It wasn't winter time, sure the water was chilly, but she couldn't be freezing yet.

"S-S-Sophia,-" The little girl said. "Sophia P-Peletier." In her arms she was holding a small doll, nothing that could protect her.

"Sophia, my name is Madison and I need you to listen to me." I grabbed hold of her hand and looked into her eyes. "We need to get to safety, alright? Do not make a sound until we are safe."

For a moment it looked like she wanted to protest or pull away, but luckily she didn't.

"Good girl, come on." I squeezed her hand tightly and took her back towards the tree I had been in when she caught my attention for the first time.

My backpack was still hanging from one of the branches. I told Sophia to wait while I climbed back up to grab the bag. Sophia nodded, still shaking, and looking around her as I grabbed my things. There wasn't much inside the backpack, simple stuff. A first aid-kit, a flash light, four cans which contained food and two matchboxes.

"Do you have a weapon?" Sophia whispered as soft as she could when I reached the ground. I glanced over my shoulder and held up a crowbar for her to see. She nodded.

"Come on. Let's get out of here before it turns dark." I was about to grab hold of her hand but she stepped back.

"Rick told me to go back to the road." She replied. Rick? Was that the man she was with earlier? He told her to go back to the road on her own? The road was a dangerous place to go. Lots of undead walked the highway.

"Sophia," I lowered myself to the ground and looked at her. "You can't go back to the road now. Those things that came after you, they came from the highway. They could still be near, blocking the way back to where you came from."

"B-but my mum,-" Her bottom lip started to tremble again.

Heaven help me, why did I go after her?

I sighed deeply. "Sophia, tomorrow we,-" With one big push I shoved Sophia aside and stood up.

I raised my crowbar and swung it with full force against the head of the walking corpse in front of me. Sophia screamed as the undead man hit the ground right before her feet.

The highway was definitely not an option and it didn't matter to me what Sophia wanted to do. Right now we had to get the hell out of here before more would show up. I quickly grabbed Sophia's arm and pulled her with me. She did not resist this time.

::::::…...::::::

"How come we didn't stop at that tent back there?" Sophia asked me as we walked out of the woods. We passed a small camping site a couple of feet back. I didn't give it a second glance but the little girl wanted to stop and rest. Without saying anything I pulled her with me.

"Because I have been there before and there is nothing to find." I replied shortly. That wasn't a hundred percent true. I had found some things inside the tent, but nothing I would tell that little girl about. The current world was already traumatizing enough as it was.

It seemed like she didn't care that much in the first place for she quickly changed her focus on something else. Something tall and white, she extended her arm into the distance. "Look over there." Sophia pointed. "A church."

The church. We weren't too far away from one of the houses I was planning on hiding in for the night with Sophia, but I needed to check on the church for undead first. It had been a while since there was one in there. Probably a week since I whacked the last one to the ground, but that only meant it would only be a matter of time until a new corpse would decide to show up.

"We have to be extra quiet." I whispered to her. "There may be some of them inside." Sophia nodded.

The first time I'd gone into that church, there had been no one there it was completely deserted. And then the church bells went off and scared the living daylights out of me. Luckily I quickly discovered the source of the bells. It was an automated bell toll hanging outside on the side of the building. After I had managed to shut the damn thing off, I had to fight two undead off my back.

It hadn't taken long for me to figure out that these things were attracted by sounds and the louder those sounds were, the better it worked. The timer on the bells gave me an advantage when I needed to head out to find supplies or scan the neighbourhood, so I changed the time setting on the church bells to my own liking.

Sophia and I stopped at the side of the church. I placed my backpack on the ground and opened up the box containing the timer of the bell toll. I turned one of the knobs then pressed a button, something I was certain I had done before, but then I don't know what went wrong. I must have pressed something because suddenly the audio blasted through the speaker echoing over the entire area.

"Shit!" I cursed, hitting the button again and the bells stopped. Damn it. Now we had to be extra careful, every undead in the area would join the party.

"Won't the noise attract the Walkers?" Sophia said to me.

"What? Walkers? What are Walkers?" I looked at her as I grabbed the backpack.

"That's what we call them. We call them Walkers." She explained.

"Oh. Walkers, huh?" I frowned. Walkers. That sounded less gruesome than undead. I looked at Sophia, clutching that raggedy looking doll close to her chest. She looked so innocent, with her short blond hair, dark brown eyes and her rainbow t-shirt.

"We'd better get going before those,- Walkers show up." I hoisted the backpack onto my back and grabbed Sophia's hand.

"Any moment now these church bells will go off again, luring some of those Walkers towards the church. That will provide us with a clear path to reach one of the abandoned houses in the woods safely."

"What about the road? Aren't we moving too far away from it?" I felt a tug on my arm, Sophia had stopped. She wanted to go back to the road more than anything and even though I fully understood her, I couldn't risk my life giving our current situation. The best thing to do was to wait till morning and then get to the road.

"We're not, I'll make sure we won't go too far. I will get you back to your mother, Sophia." I smiled at her. "I promise."

The bells chimed, we had waited too long. If we wanted to reach the house safe and sound then we'd had to go now.

"Come on, no more dawdling." I told her firmly.

I hope this first chapter caught your interest, and that you will at least stick around long enough to read the whole story :)

Reviews are very much appreciated, and if you like...check out my other stories ^^