This only paused for so long because I lost the paper tablet that I was writing my first drafts in. I found it! Apparently I had put it somewhere safe... you know how that goes.
Well, I hope you like the next chunk of this story. I have at least 3 more chapters already written so its just a matter of typing them up and editing. I hope you enjoy Gareth like I do.
Comments are always welcome. =)
He knew that look; the determined look of regret that needed to be dealt with, promptly. She was going to ditch him. His best hope was that she would at least get him to shelter before she ditched him. The pain in his chest was crippling. He had been right, walking was a bitch. Holding the gun had almost been too much effort. If she left him now, he would be dead before sundown.
Now, trudging along, half supported by someone who obviously wanted nothing to do with him, he realized that he was once again reliant on people. Just not as a food source. He didn't like needing her, but it felt right or at least not dirty like eating them had felt.
"What's your name?" She asked suddenly, after a good mile of walking in silence. She hadn't pushed, but he could feel her desire to put distance between them and where the buffalo had been. He was sure that the only reason she was carrying his nearly barren bag was because he hadn't wanted to leave it, and so taking it got them moving faster. She had not been willing to let him carry it, probably because it would have slowed him down.
So she had stashed it on top of her own bag, but under the bow that she carried around with her. He wondered if she could use it. He wondered if she was some weird hybrid of Michonne and Daryl.
"Allen." Well, it was his middle name. He wasn't sure if she would be able to pin his first name to the 'cannibal clan,' or not. Better to play it safe as long as he could. Fending off the dead would be difficult enough in his current state. Fending her off could be impossible.
"Well Allen, my name is Raine."
Raine. Raine? What kind of name was that? How often was she asked that? To save some face, he chose not to ask. A name was a name and little more.
Rained took him through the woods sometimes, other times they went down the road. Any time he felt the hunters instinct start noticing possible people, prey, she shut it down by switching their course. Apparently she wanted to avoid people as much as he needed to. Why had she taken him? Her tactics screamed Loner, yet here he was, slowing her down.
"There." She said, nearly an hour after swapping names.
He pulled his head up, the last few miles, it had been easier to watch the ground. His head had gotten progressively heavier, as had the rest of him. Gareth could feel the lure of sleep, like he felt the curl of hunger in his stomach. He ached to appease both.
What lay before them was a bar, maybe. There was a sign that read, "Ribbits," with a frog sitting on the end of the word. The place was well off any main road. It had a dirt parking lot and only a couple of vehicles sitting in it. Those vehicles had probably been considered a busy night at one point. It was certainly not a mainstream place to go for a beer with friends.
The two walkers that had been lingering near the cars did nothing to breathe life back into the area. It had been dying out far longer that the world had, by the look of the dingy windows, half broken "open" sign over the door and the missing shingles. It all spoke of a lengthy decay that no one had tried to stop.
