Undead

Lost. (334)

MADISON'S POV.

"Please, we have to go back, our friend is hurt." The man begs.
"Where's my daughter?" I pull back the string on my bow.
"Woah, woah, woah... we swear, we don't know. One minute she was behind us, the next she wasn't. Our friends are missing too. We can help each other find them." One of the two girls defend.
"How do we know this isn't a trap?" Kai argues.

I catch the other girl staring harshly at our lips and I grow uncomfortable until she starts speaking using her hands. Guilt immediately washes over me for judging her so quick. It doesn't mean I trust them, not even in the slightest. Fangs stands alertly beside me and growls at our uninvited guests.

"What did she say?" Carl asks.
"She said, you don't know that you can trust us and we don't know that we can trust you either but together, we're the quickest way to find our people."
"Fine" Kai amends and stretches his arm out, pointing ahead of us. "But you walk first. Let's make this quick."

We move quickly back to where Judith left them last. Fangs runs next to Judith, helping to lead the way. Then Judith stops in front of a run down, over grown field.
"They're gone, they're not here anymore." She murmurs as we stare at the empty field.
She walks out past the tree line and into the deserted field. The field is long past overgrown and the grass reaches Judith's hips. In the center of the field it's been trampled down flat from walkers.

"Then where did she go?" Jenna puzzles, scanning her eyes along the trees.
"She's smart. If she was scared she'd climb the trees." Carl notes.
I nod in agreement.

Judith shakes her head. "I'm not talking about Kara. Walkers... there were walkers everywhere. I mean, there were so many that we couldn't even see the other end of the field. If they were here and we stood here as long as we have been, we'd be dead... they just vanished." She shakes her head in bewilderment.
"Walkers come and go Jude." Carl shrugs.
But still she protests. "Not that quick, not all of them."

"Let's just focus on getting Kara back." I panic.
"And Magna and Yumiko" the man behind us adds.
I stare at him cautiously. "Sure."

"MOM!" I hear her terror-filled screams and my heart almost falls from my chest. Fangs begins to howl loudly as if calling out for her or letting her know we're near by.
So I decide to do the same.
"KARA!" I scream back until my throat aches. I don't know which direction to run.
"DAD!" She screams louder this time and I can hear the panic in her voice.

I begin to run, I don't know if it's in the right direction but I can't just stand here.
"MOMMY! HELP!" She screams again.
Hearing her fear pours gasoline onto the flickering flame of fear resting in the pit of my stomach, making me sick.

As I run I can her her screams echo in my head, bouncing back and forth allowing me to hear nothing else. Sweat drenches my skin and my lungs physically ache as my heart races.

I stop running and take a deep breath. I listen closely for her voice.
"Dad? MOM?!" She yells again, it's louder this time, because I'm closer. But still, fear erodes me from the inside out.
Behind me I can hear Kai and Carl calling my name. Fangs catches up to me, he mustn't have been far behind. Except instead of stopping for me, he scurries past me, adamant on finding her.
"Over here!" I yell back to them before taking off again.

"KARA! I'm coming!"
I push past bushes and branches, ducking and dodging the lower twigs and branches and sometimes running straight into them, too focused on finding her. But I feel the stinging from the backlash and my cheeks become hot where the soft pain is most present.