Torn Apart (A Daryl Dixon/ The Walking Dead Fanfiction)

Chapter 27

Cat's P.O.V

I awake in my bed to find it is empty, Daryl's presence missing. I get up and change into jeans and a tank top. I pull a sweater over the top and don my boots. I exit the cell to find the cell block is empty and silent. I walk down the stairs and hear a commotion coming from cell block D. I head towards the cell block when I hear an ear piercing scream.

Alarm fills my body as I pull out my knife and bolt towards the noise. As I burst through the door I can see the mayhem before my eyes. Blood is everywhere, the stench of rotting flesh fills the air. People are being feasted upon by walkers, the screams consuming the air. In front of me sits a little boy screaming as a walker approaches him. I run towards him and plunge the knife into the walker's head. I scoop the boy up, his arms wrapping around my neck. I run him outside and place him on the bench in the hall. I run back inside and go to help others, all the while searching for Daryl. I see him upstairs, fighting off three walkers. I plunge my knife into a walker and run to help him.

He is wrestling with one, holding it at arms length, another coming up behind him.

"Look out!" I scream.

He turns and throws a knife into its eye. I run forward and pull the walker away from him and stab it through its skull. A third comes towards us but I kick it down. I straddle it and slam the knife down, the sickening sound filling the air. I stand up and turn to Daryl, he nods and I stand up. I see two small girls cowering in the corner, two walkers approaching them.

Daryl and I run forward and take them down. He grabs the older girl, while I grab the younger. We run down the stairs and hand them to Tyresse and Carol, who rush them outside. I turn back and see that the chaos has stopped, nothing but a mess of blood and gore remaining. My breathing is laboured and I try to catch my breath.

"What happened?" I puff.

"I don't know." Daryl replies.

"Daryl, I think you need to see this." Rick's voice calls.

We walk up the stairs the the cell at the end. Rick is standing there, looking over a body of a walker. As we approached, the body's state disgusts me. There is fresh blood pouring from its dull, yellow eyes, the glasses emphasising their state, which look strangely familiar.

"It's Patrick." Daryl says.

I take a closer look and my heart breaks, I gasp in shock.

"I though so too, I needed to be sure." Rick says glumly.

"What happened to him?" I choke.

"Carol told me he was feeling sick yesterday when he was about to help me on perimeter, so he went to bed. He was coughing and had flu symptoms." Glenn informs us, walking up the stairs, Hershel behind him.

"Back in the old days before modern medicine influenzas caused massive outbreak resulting in death. This seems like one of those things." Hershel explains.

"So what do we do?" Rick asks.

"We need to separate anybody that could be infected. That means all the people from this cell block and anyone that came into contact with Patrick." He says.

"That's nearly everybody." Daryl says.

"We need to separate the most vulnerable."

"Who is that?" Glenn asks.

"The young. The children, Carl, Judith." Hershel explains.

He looks worn out and exhausted, leaning against the wall for support. Concern fills me as I take in the elderly man.