No Rest For the Wicked ~ A Walking Dead Fan Fiction

Chapter 27: Losing My Religion

Chapter 27

Losing My Religion

Third Person~

"Hey kiddo. Howdy Sheriff." Kate ruffled Elsie's hair and dropped Carl a nod as she jogged up the porch steps that the kid's were sitting on.

"Watch out!" Elsie pointed at a game of hangman traced in the dirt, one that T-dog had just stepped on. He peered around the big plastic bucket he was carrying.

"Oh, my bad, sorry 'bout that." He passed them and followed Kate into the house.

"What happened to Shane and your dad?" Elsie asked as the screen door banged shut behind them, working on retracing the parts of the game that fell under T-dog's shoe.

"Walkers attacked while they were trying to let Randal go, that's why he's back now." Carl explained before taking another guess. "R?"

Elsie frowned as she traced the first leg onto the hangman. She didn't understand how walker trouble would cause cuts and bruises on their faces. "Was Randal tied up the whole time?" It looked more like a fist fight to her, but Rick and Shane wouldn't attack each other, would they?

"I dunno." Carl shrugged, not seeing why that was relevant. "T?"

"You lose." She drew the final leg, not mentioning her suspicions to Carl.

"Ah, what was it?"

"Swallow."

He raised his eyebrows. "You couldn't have just picked 'bird'?" He muttered.

"Too easy." She shrugged as she scuffed the word game out and handed the stick to Carl. "I'm glad they didn't leave him there with all the walkers."

"Well Daryl said his groups bad, that they'd kill all the men if they found us." He pointed out, tracing six blanks in the dirt.

"Yeah but... We he can't just kill him." She mused before they noticed Shane breezing by, headed for the shed Randal was in. "Come on," she nodded as she stood up. "Let's go find out what's going on." Carl jumped up, game forgotten and headed after Shane with her.

"Hey, Shane!" He called as the pair jogged to catch up.

"Hey, what's up little man?" Shane asked as the kids fell in step beside him.

"What are you gonna do with Randal?"

"We're workin' on it." Shane muttered, picking up the speed.

"How old is he?" Elsie asked. If she knew his age she could gauge his height and find out if he might have been the one throwing the punches.

"He ain't a kid." Shane shook his head. "Just... That's a figure of speech."

"Can we see him?" Carl asked.

"No. Look, man, this is..." Shane stopped walking. "This is grown-up stuff, all right? You just- you just let us handle this." He patted Carl's shoulder before continuing on toward the shed by himself.

Elsie pressed her lips together. Like they weren't capable of handling grown up stuff after all they'd been through.

Carl turned to her, scuffing his toe in the dirt as he did. "No one tells us anything." He muttered. "We should go talk to him ourselves." He decided suddenly, pale blue eyes turning back up to her dark ones. "I bet we could climb through there." He pointed at the slits between the rafters. A nearby tree made getting up there possible.