บท 47: Chapter 47

- Xenon -

We went back to camp to find they were all gathered in the middle in front of the RV. I could hear sobbing sounds, which were undoubtedly Carol and Sophia's, morning Ed's death. It made me feel bad they had to go through this, but the fact he was a terrible human made it very difficult to feel bad about his death.

I could spot four new additions, namely those who went to get Merle back, and grab the guns along the way. Rick Grimes was there with them, wearing his silly Sheriff hat and outfit. He looked a lot like his TV Show counterpart, albeit there were some minor differences.

Daryl was standing against a car, a bit further than the others, and we ended up meeting with him first. He gave me a Daryl look, which was basically a fake facade of cold indifference.

"Still not dead, huh?" He looked at me up and down, before saying in a disappointed voice.

"It's gonna take a lot more than the end of the world for me to kick the bucket." I chuckled. "Your worry is always appreciated."

"Don't kid yourself." He snorted. "Heard about your little stunt. Keep it up, and your death wish may just come true." I rolled my eyes, and went on my way.

Lori and Jacqui were doing their best to comfort Carol and her daughter, and Andrea and Amy ran off to their side upon witnessing the scene.

"Good to see you're still in one piece." T-Dog said, as I reached them.

"And good reaction on those walkers. It may have been worse if you hadn't done what you've done." Glenn added.

"Thanks." I nodded. "Did something happen back on Atlanta?"

"Yeah, a little dispute with another group of survivors. It's all taken care of now." Glenn said, and seemed a bit hesitant for some reason. "About what I asked..."

"I got it." I chucked and shook my head at his lack of patience. "We'll check it out later." Rick was now walking towards me with Shane.

"Xenon, right?" I nodded. "I'm Rick Grimes, Lori's husband?"

"I heard about you."

"I want to thank you, for what you've done." He said, a genuine expression of gratitude on his face, as he offered me his hand to shake, which I did.

"Don't mention it."

"Next time, try not to overboard, yeah?" Shane was a lot calmer than before, now that he took a bit of time to think about everything that's happened.

"I'll try." I nodded seriously. "But there won't be no next time'. We can't afford to half ass our survival anymore. Today, it's a horde of forty one, which we somehow survived. We may not be so lucky next time." They fell silent for a while, as they were all probably thinking the same. Especially those that should've been watching out for walkers.

"He's got a point." Jim was the first to break the silence. "I mean, let's face it. We had no warning whatsoever. We were sitting all cozy by the fire, none of us thought of even keeping watch."

"Maybe we should change our location." Rick remarked. "We cannot defend this place if a big swarm come our way. We need to find a better place."

"It's getting late, we're all tired and none of us have any good concrete ideas, so why don't we sleep on it, and talk in the morning?" Dale proposed, something we silently agreed on. I was very tired, regardless of what my stamina would suggest. My muscles were sore, my head hurt like hell, and I wanted nothing more than get some sleep.

"Maybe we agree on who stays on watch this time?" Jim asked, earning a few nods in his direction.

I didn't want to be dragged into that right now, so I left to my tent to get some well needed shut-eye. As if on instinct, my eyes closed themselves and my body shut down as soon as I hit the pillow.

**- Xenon -**

Soreness is all I could feel when I woke up, even a small amount of constant pain. I got up and stretched my body to test it: my movements were limited but not in a crippling way. However, I should avoid any strenuous activity until I have recovered. It's a shame I don't have a health bar... Perhaps I would eventually unlock it?

It was noon by now and no one can blame me for waking up late. It is to be expected, I am technically sick right now. I got out of my tent and went to the truck where we keep all our food. I couldn't see anyone else, except for Andrea and Amy, who were sitting on two chairs, and talking about something.

"Good morning."

"Good morning! Did you sleep well?" Amy said with a smile.

"Very well, thank you." I nodded. "What about you?"

"As well as I could." she shrugged, then she looked at her sister, who did not look so good, now that I can see her better. Her eyes were red, obvious signs of crying clearly visible on her face.

"Is something wrong, Andrea?" I frowned. I know she wasn't crying because of Ed, and that was the only reason she would have to cry about at the moment.

"Nothing..." she shook her head, with a sad expression.

"She had a bad dream yesterday." Amy said worriedly. "She doesn't want to talk about it." I nodded.

"I hope you get better soon." I said genuinely, before continuing my journey to the food truck. I took some cereal, juice, a few snacks, bread, jam, butter... I was terribly hungry. I went back next to the two sisters, took a seat and dug in.

"Where are the others?" I asked between mouthfuls of food.

"They went to bury Ed. Have a small funeral." Amy answered sadly.

"I see."

"By the way, Amy, I found a solution to the walker problem." I said again, and munched on my cereals. Amy was looking at me expecting an answer.

"WELL?!" Amy cried out. "When you say something like that, you're supposed to finish your sentence!" I did technically finish my sentence, but I don't think it's wise to say that right now, I've messed with her enough.

"When I was on Atlanta, I got in a tough spot. Hundreds of walkers surrounded the house I was in, probably attracted to the sound of my car. It was pretty loud, so it's to be expected. An insane idea went through my mind. If walkers are as mindless as they appear to be, how come they can tell the difference between walker and human?" I paused for dramatic effect, and to let her think about it for a while.

"Look at it this way. How do you get a walker's attention? Either by letting him see you, or hear you, right? But both of these aren't enough for him to know for a fact you aren't a walker. But we can at least tell that he uses his basic SENSES, like a human would. But so far, we only took hearing and sight into consideration, so what about smell?

My theory was quite simple. What if they used their smell to make the difference between walker and non walker? So, I smeared walker organs all over my clothes to imitate the smell." She looked a bit uncomfortable at the image.

"Obviously, hearing and sight would be relevant as well, so you'd have to imitate their behavior and growling to fit in.

I tried it that day, and it worked totally fine." I finished my monologue, and I could see she was thinking about everything I just told her.

"Rick and Glenn used the same strategy to get us out of Atlanta City." Andrea said. "But the rain washed off the scent off them, or maybe it doesn't work for extended periods of time. They had to make a run for it." She seemed to have momentarily forgotten what's been plaguing her mind. "And you would have to cover yourself in walker shit each time. It's not a viable option."

"Maybe not, but it can get you out of a tough spot, right?" I countered. "It has got both of us out of tough situation, not to mention, this basically gives us access almost anywhere. We can use it to raid supermarkets for food, an arms dealership for weapons, you name it. Or, we can use it as an escape plan."

"That's brilliant!" Amy jumped from her seat. "If we can get more weapons like that, wouldn't we be way safer than we are? Like, we won't even have to fight them too closely! We can just rain bullets on their asses!" Amy had this overly excited look on her face, and I couldn't stop myself from laughing. She is usually more collected than this. Even Andrea was chuckling, her depressing dream forgotten by now.

"That's right." Amy's cheek were beet red from embarrassment, as she looked at me accusingly in "fake" anger to hide her embarrassment, but that just made her even more cute for some reason.