CHEROKEE ROSE (D. DIXON)

23.

"Sum this up again." Daryl growls lowly as he steps lightly through the woods. "You saw Randall dragging Sonora into the woods and trailed him."

"Yeah I followed him. Tried to be quiet-like so he don't hurt Sonora and all." Shane grunts, blood coagulating on his nose and mouth. "Then he jumped me, tagged me in the face with a rock."

"Kid weighs a buck twenty-five soaking wet. You trying to tell us he got the jump on you and Sonora ?" Daryl pries, not in the least bit convinced. Sonora? Knocked out by Randall? Not likely.

"I say a rock pretty much evens those odds, wouldn't you?" Shane snaps, eyes darting wildly.

"Alright, knock it off." Rick sighs, gesturing at Daryl. "You and Glenn start heading up the right flank. Me and Shane'll take the left. Remember, Randall's not the only threat out there. Keep an eye out for Sonora. If she's conscious, I've gotta feeling she'd leave something for us."

Daryl nods in agreement, swallowing the worry that creeps up in his throat. She's okay, he tells himself. She has to be.

After a few minutes of fruitless searching, Glenn and Daryl have made no progress, and the worry turns to fear.

"This is pointless." Glenn complains. "We're just stumbling around in the dark."

Daryl ignores him, spotting a disturbance in the foliage. "You got a light? Come on. There's three sets of tracks right here." He pauses, lightly touching the ground. "Shane must have followed them a lot longer than he said." Daryl looks up, touching the bark of a tree. "There's fresh blood on this tree." His stomach drops as he thinks of Sonora, maybe hurt. His gaze falls back to the ground. "More tracks. Looks like they were walking in tandem." 

Glenn jumps at the rustle of foliage, bumping into Daryl. Giving him a glare, Daryl continues on the trail, coming to a disturbance in the leaves and the earth. "Looks like there was a dust up here."

"What do you mean?" Glenn squints at the ground.

"I mean something went down." Daryl utters, looking at the scuffs in the damp soil. Some kind of fight, a struggle. He tries to imagine Sonora and Randall fighting, squabbling in the mud.

"This is getting weird. Glenn mutters nervously, eyes darting around the clearing."

Daryl ignores him, picking up some sort of crude blindfold. Sonora's?

A crashing in the trees behind them spooks both men and they dash behind a tree, holding their breaths as they press their backs against the rough bark. 

Just as Glenn peeks around the trunk, a walker lunges at him, pinning him on the ground. Daryl fires an arrow, but misses in the commotion. The snarling walker stumbles toward Daryl and pins him against the tree, bloodstained drool dripping from his gaping mouth. Daryl looks at its face as its jaws snap inches from his face. Randall? 

He groans in effort as he resists the weight of the dead boy, eyes darting to Glenn in desperation. Glenn fumbles in the foliage, desperately searching for his lost weapon. When his hand comes in contact with the cold weight of the knife, he flings himself at the walker, throwing   it off of Daryl and bringing the blade down into his skull with no hesitation. 

The snarls stop.

"Oh." He utters, recognizing the corpse.

Daryl gives him a pat on the chest. "Nice." Glenn gives Daryl an incredulous look and a quiet scoff, leaning down and tearing the blade from the broken skull with a squelch. 

Daryl kneels by the body, shining a flashlight across it. He tilts Randall's head. "Got his neck broke." He notes. He's not sure Sonora would have been able to do that. He crudely flips the body over, face down. After lifting the shirt and checking the legs, he sits back on his heels, bemused. "He's got no bites."

Glenn shakes his head in disbelief. "Yeah, none you can see."

Daryl probes Randall's neck. "No, I'm telling you, he died from this." He's sure, but he wonders how Randall turned. A single cricket chirps eerily in the night.

Glenn frowns. "How is that possible?"

The two share a brief look of perplexity before Daryl rises, refocusing on Sonora. She's alive. He knows it.

When the two arrive back at Hershel's house, Daryl peers around the hallway. "Rick and Shane ain't back?" He asks the group as they gather around him and Glenn. 

"No." Lori answers, her thin arms crossed over her chest and eyebrows knit together in worry. 

"We heard a shot." Daryl remarks, wondering if Sonora had a gun, or really anything to keep her safe. He hopes maybe it was her gunshot. He hopes Rick finds her.

"Maybe they found Randall." Lori offers.

Daryl shakes his head. "We found him." 

"Is he back in the shed?" Maggie asks, eyes drifting toward Glenn for reassurance. 

"He's a walker." 

"Did you find the walker that bit him?" Hershel presses.

Glenn sighs. "No, the weird thing is, he wasn't bit." 

"His neck was broke." Daryl adds onto the end. He presses his lips together. "The thing is, Shane and Randall's tracks were right on top go eachother," He scoffs. "And Shane ain't no tracker, so he didn't come up behind him. They were together." 

"Would you please get back out there, find Rick and Shane, and Sonora, and find out what on Earth is going on?" Lori's hands are clasped together with anxiety.

Daryl nods. "You got it." He strides out on the porch, shifting the weight of his crossbow, but stops in his tracks when he sees shadows in the field. Groans echo across the pasture.

He swallows. Not shadows. Walkers.