"Are you bleeding?"
Jim and Jacqui made their way towards the same dead walker on the ground, When the latter crouched down, she spotted the concentrated bloodstains on his shirt.
"I just got some on me from the bodies" Jim tried to pass it off, though his voice sounded a little too weak.
Jacqui started to feel a little apprehensive looking at him. "That blood is fresh. Were you bit?"
"No, I got scratched during the attack" Bending down, Jim attempted another excuse in hopes that she would just drop the subject.
Instead, Jacqui slightly raised her voice and slowly stood up away from him. "You got bit."
"I'm fine"
"Then show me!" Jacqui shouted, quickly attracting the attention of everyone around them.
JIm looked up and then around him before whispering. "Don't tell, please"
She obviously didn't care about his pleas and immediately yelled for the others to hear her. "A walker got him. A walker bit Jim!"
"I'm okay.."
The men slowly crowded towards them, and Daryl pointed his finger at him with a pickax over his shoulder. "Show it to us."
Weak and distressed, Jim hurriedly bent down and picked up the shovel from the ground.
"Jim, put it down. Put it down."
Shane and the others tried to calm him down, but their actions otherwise said so. T-Dog snuck from behind him and quickly restrained him.
"I'm okay. I'm okay~"
Daryl hurriedly grabbed Jim's shirt and pulled it up, revealing a freshly bitten wound on the side of his stomach.
Daryl looked shocked and quickly retreated from him while T-Dog looked disgusted and quickly let him go and also retreated.
"I'm okay"
"I'm okay, I'm okay.."
Jim weakly repeated while breathing heavily. He looked lost and helpless. The others looked stressed.
'Crap, I completely forgot about this guy! Ughh, we just lost our main mechanic!' Michael clenched his fist tightly. He was frustrated as he had completely forgotten to keep a close eye on Jim last night.
*****
The group of survivors convened in the center of the camp and Daryl...was just being himself again, looking and sounding a little too aggressive while making a suggestion.
"I say we put a pickaxe in his head and be done with it."
Shane looked up and glared at Daryl. "Is that what you want if it were you?"
"Yeah, I'd even thank you while you did it." Daryl boldly stated, then he turned to Michael. "What do you think man?"
Michael shrugged with a shake of his head. "I don't know. As of now, there's no cure for the virus. Someone can turn in as little as three minutes. The longest I've witnessed was two hours."
"How do you know that?" Glenn questioned.
"Well, this is not the first group I've been with during my escape from Atlanta." Michael stated the obvious.
"You guys heard him. Jim can turn any minute now. Leaving him alone could endanger our safety!" Daryl looked pissed that he's not getting his point across.
On the other hand, Dale looked helpless as he couldn't help but feel that Daryl was maybe right this time. "I hate to say it, I never thought I would, but maybe Daryl is right. We can't keep a timebomb with us, we have kids here."
"Jim is not a monster, Dale, or some rabid dog. He's sick. A sick man who needs us right now. If we start down that road, where do we draw the line?" Rick was starting to feel agitated. He still can't believe that as a police officer, he had to listen to people talk about murdering a person so openly and casually at that.
Daryl gripped his pickaxe tightly and once again proposed doing the pragmatic way. "The line's pretty clear. Zero tolerance for walkers, or them to be."
Rick didn't agree with his plan and instead proposed another. One he thinks that's better than Daryl. "What if we can get him help? I heard the CDC was working on a cure."
"Weren't you listening? Michael just told us that there's no cure!" Rick's attitude is starting to frustrate Daryl that he couldn't help but raise his voice.
"I was listening, but was he with the CDC? No, so Jim's best chance…is the CDC." Rick argued. He's not stepping back on that.
"But what if he turns on the way there?"
Feeling the growing tension between the two, Shane quickly chimed in. "Then we put him down. The cure, I heard about that too. I heard a lot of things before the world went to hell, and here we are."
"What if the CDC is still up and running?" Rick remained positive.
"Man, that is a stretch right there." Shane shook his head.
Michael just looked on and didn't offer any more input. Though he did keep a close eye on every single one of them.
'So, he's TV series Shane. Unlike the comic series Shane who remained positive that there will soon be military intervention.'
"Why? If there's still any government left. Any structure at all, they'd protect the CDC at all costs, wouldn't they? I think it's our best shot. Shelter, protection. Everything." Rick was really trying hard to convince them to jump in with his idea, while Daryl looked like he was itching for some action.
"Okay, Rick, you want those things, alright? We do too, okay? Now, if they exist..if they... exist. They're at the army base. Fort Benning." Shane can understand where his friend is coming from. So, he brought up a similar idea alongside Rick's and at least, ignite some hope left to the others. Something to look forward to.
"But that's 100 miles away from the opposite direction." Lori said.
"That is right. But it's away from the hot zone. Now, listen to me, if that place is still operational. It would be heavily armed. We'll be safe there." Shane continued with his idea.
"The military was in the frontline of this thing. They've got overrun, we've seen all that! The CDC is our best choice and Jim's only chance." Rick does not support his idea and still thinks that the CDC is the best choice they got. Then he turned towards Michael for his opinion. "What do you think? You've seen far worse than any of us here. What do you think is our best course of action right now?"
'Why do these people keep asking for my opinion? Couldn't you guys just follow your usual script?!'Michael just wanted to observe, to listen and to follow them, and maybe the occasional intervention from time to time. And them constantly asking for his input is starting to get on his nerves.
But even so, he thought for a moment before giving them an answer that he thinks would satisfy both. "CDC. Fort Benning would attract too much noise, and others would also have the same idea as Shane and would head there. Though, the same goes for CDC too, but it's closer from here. Less risk"
Michael didn't want to choose Fort Benning since it would deviate too much from the story, and he'd become clueless on how the story would unfold if they headed to that place. So, choosing CDC is the safest bet.
Daryl on the other hand, doesn't really care about these options and prefers fixing the current problem at hand.
"You guys go look for Aspirin, do what you need to do. Someone needs to have some balls to take care of this damn problem!" Darly turned around and charged towards Jim! He was about to make another hole on his body when Rick quickly caught up from behind him and pointed his gun at his head.
Click!
"We don't kill the living."Rick spelled out those words in all seriousness.
Daryl paused in his tracks and slowly turned around to face him while lowering his weapon, and Shane stood in between Daryl and Jim.
"That's funny coming from a man who just pointed a gun to my head."
"We may disagree on some things, not on this. You put it down. Go on."
Daryl still doesn't like Rick, but he eventually relented at Shane's insistence and walked away.
"Come with me." Rick quickly went over to Jim and pulled him up.
"Where are you taking me?"
"Somewhere safe."
JIm let himself get pulled around by Rick, who brought him inside the safety of the RV.
With all of that out of the way, Michael and the others had now made their way over to an open area where they had dug graves to bury their dead.
Michael personally offered a short prayer for the departed. The others soon left after that while he decided to stay behind for a moment.
"Hey"
He turned around and saw Amy standing there and had a bout of Deja vu.
"Oh hey, what's up?"
With bashful steps, Amy approached Michael with a smile on her face. He could only watch on as she suddenly kissed him on his cheek, who followed it with a hug.
"Whoa, alright." Michael carefully hugged her back and gave her back some pats.
"Thank you."
"You're welcome kid"
"You sound like an old man."
"Yeah, people have mentioned that before."
The two eventually pulled themselves apart from each other and the two shared a laugh.
"I saw what you and Andrea did back there."
"Yeah, you jealous?" Michael chuckled as he teased her.
Looking at the ground, Amy placed her hands inside her pants back pocket before she raised her head and looked at him. "I guess she beat me to it."
Michael just smiled and kept mum. There was a short silence between them before Amy eventually walked away, not after giving Michael a forced smile.
Michael watched her go and mumbled. "Man, lots of horny these days."
He smelled it, the smell of someone looking for a partner. Not literally smelled it, but Michael was able to perceive how she carried herself, and those emotions behind her eyes. He was familiar with those kinds of eyes. They were the eyes of someone desiring something or someone.
"I wonder what changes will happen after my intervention. The emotional rollercoaster that they should have felt while burying their dead didn't occur since we only lost two and wouldn't produce the desired emotional impact. Now it makes me wonder, will this world try to off me after what I did last night or just let it be? I guess I'll find out in the coming days."