The Walking Dead S.o.S.: Chapter Five: S'more the Merrier

                              Chapter Five: S'more the Merrier

  Shane, Rick, Guillermo, and Daryll lead the others to the car. Miguel and Felipe helped Mr. Gilbert walk, the elderly man too weak to keep up on his own. Glenn stayed with Carl and Hershel, laughing about something.
  "So what happened?" Shane asked. "What was with the gun shot?"
  "There was a Walker in the vent," Rick replied. "Carl shot it."
  "That was Carmen Lopez," Guillermo said. "She was bit. She was going to lead the Walkers away from the door before she died. But she was too scared. I don't blame her; none of us wanted her to do it."
  "That would've been a bad way to go," Daryll commented. "Eaten alive by Walkers. No one deserves that."
  "I'm glad she didn't do it." Guillermo looked up at the sky. It was getting dark. "She was only seventeen."
  They walked out of Atlanta, taking the same route they had taken before. They passed a few Walkers, but managed to avoid them. They reached the cars and got in. One of the cars didn't start.
  "What the hell." Shane got out of the car and went to the hood. He opened it. Felipe checked the engine.
  "This isn't gonna work." Felipe inspected the engine. "This engine is a nothing but a paperweight now."
  "Then we'll make two trips," Guillermo said. He pointed at Felipe. "Felipe, you take the old folks and the kid to their place. We'll stay here. Come back when you drop 'em off."
  "I can stay!" Carl argued. He turned to his Dad and Shane. "I can practice my shooting!"
  "He's right Rick," Shane said. "We didn't get a chance to teach him how to deal with Walkers properly."
  "You're right." Rick took out his gun. "Felipe, you, Guillermo, Miguel, and Daryll drive Mr. Gilbert and Hershel to our place. The rest of us will stay here for the night. Meet us here in the morning."
  "I'll stay here too," Guillermo told him. "Glenn can go back. I know a few places we can scavenge supplies from."
  "Alright." Rick turned to Daryll. "Daryll, get them back to the house, keep everyone safe."
  "Got it." Daryll went to the car and hopped in the driver's seat. "I'll come back in the morning to pick you up." He started the car. Felipe and Hershel helped Mr. Gilbert into the back, and Hershel sat next to him. Felipe went to Shane and Rick.
  "I'll stay too," Felipe told them. "We gotta find medicine for Mr. Gilbert."
  "No, you stay with him," Guillermo told him. "He needs you. Tell us what we need to get it."
  "Alright." Felipe handed him some empty pill bottles. "He needs these."
  "Don't worry," Rick said, "we'll get the meds. You just take care of him until then." Felipe nodded, and went back to the car. He held Mr. Gilbert's asthma inhaler in his hand, just in case he went into another attack.
  Shane, Rick, Guillermo, and Carl watched the car leave. When it was out of sight, they turned to walk off. Guillermo lead the way. "There's a pharmacy a few blocks from the nursing home." He looked back at the others. "We were going to make a supply run week ago when everything went to shit."
  "What happened anyway?" Carl asked him.
  "The old folk started dying, one by one," Guillermo told him. "We didn't know that you came back no matter what. We didn't know what to do; half of my gang wanted to kill the old folk, or throw them to the Walkers. I told them we wouldn't do that."
  "And you had a riot," Rick said. He didn't know for sure, but it was the only thing he could think of that would make Guillermo's group fall like that. "Fights broke out? People started trying to kill the old and sick?"
  "Exactly right." Guillermo spit on the ground. "I tried to keep the peace, but a shot was fired. After that, all hell broke loose. They all started shooting each other. Some tried escaping into the city, but they just let the dead inside. The others and me, we just ran. We planned to retake the place, but it was infested in less than a day."
  "How long were you locked up for?" Shane asked.
  "I don't know." Guillermo had a depressed look in his eyes. Shane felt bad for him; everything he had worked so hard to defend fell, all because people were scared. "A few days probably. We went to the armory, armed ourselves. Felipe's grandmother was bit, begged him to end it. He did."
  "It's a shame," Rick said. He put a hand on Guillermo's shoulder. "You had good people Guillermo. Most people would have left those people to die, but you and your men, you kept them safe."
  "Anyone willing to do that is okay in book," Shane told him.
  "How did you find them anyway?" Carl asked Guillermo. "Were you a doctor or something?"
  "No." Guillermo looked at Carl. "I was the custodian." He then pointed at a building. "Over there's a place we can stay. We set up a few a safe houses, just in case we couldn't get back to the nursing home when we scavenging."
  "That's smart idea," Rick complimented. "Really smart."
  They headed for the safe house, Guillermo leading the way.

  When they saw the safe house, they got more than they bargained for. The place was ruined and destroyed, all except for one room. The one room was furnished with a couch, a cooler full of canned goods and drinks, and even some guns and ammunition. They were also surprised to see a bathroom.
  "This place is awesome!!" Carl said. It had been a while since he had seen a place so well made. He saw a bookshelf next to the bathroom door, and saw a book that he had once owned. He ran to the bookshelf and rifled through it. "You have all the 'Harry Potter' books!! I still haven't read the last two!"
  "Yeah," Guillermo said, "we set this place up so you could stay here for days and not have to leave. Seemed like a good idea."
  "We can take the cooler with us when we leave tomorrow," Rick said. He looked at Shane. "Shane, you take Carl and look for some food and gas. I'll go with Guillermo took look for medicine."
  "Got it." Shane headed for the door. "Come on Carl. We should hurry."
  "Coming!" Carl ran for the door.

  Shane and Carl crouched low, walking past Walkers. Shane didn't want to attract any unnecessary attention, though Carl kept asking if he could kill some Walkers. They had searched several cars, but none of them had gas, not one drop. "Looks like Guillermo wasn't kidding about taking every drop of gas."
  "What do we do?" Carl asked. "Do we look for the food?"
  "Yeah. Better than looking for gas that doesn't exist."
  The two of them hurried to an old convenience store that they spotted; they didn't know if there would be any food to be found, but it was better than doing nothing. They entered the store, and saw a few Walkers inside. Carl lifted his gun to shoot one, but Shane stopped him. "Don't be so rash," Shane whispered. "Do that and we'll have ten times more to deal with."
  "Sorry." Carl lowered his gun. "How do we kill them then?"
  "We use this." Shane unsheathed his knife. "You wanna use these as much as possible. It saves ammo and keeps everything nice and quiet."
  "I can't reach with my knife," Carl said. "How am I supposed to kill them?"
  "Umm." Shane didn't think about that. He looked around for something that Carl could use as a weapon. He spotted a dead body with one hand leaning on the wall; it was a bloody bat next to it."We'll get that," he said, pointing to the bat. "Stay here."
  Shane walked to the bat, stabbing a Walker that was next to the body in the back of the head. He retrieved the bat and went back to Carl. He handed the bat to Carl.
  "On three we'll kill them," Shane told Carl. "Remember, be quick. Don't hit them once, hit them several times. Until they're dead. Got it?"
  "Got it." Carl held the bat in his hands. Shane took the Walkers on the left, while Carl took the Walkers on the right. Shane quickly dispatched his Walkers, then looked to Carl. Carl had one Walker on the ground, hitting it repeatedly with his bat. Another Walker came up behind him. Carl turned around and smashed the bat into the second Walker's head. The Walker fell to the ground, dead.
  Shane saw the Walker on the ground reach for Carl. "Carl!" he told him. "It's still alive!"
  "Huh?" Carl looked at the Walker on the ground, then brought his bat down on it's skull again. "There."
  "Good job." Shane surveyed the store. "See if you can find any food and water. Don't leave anything unturned."
  "Got it." The two of the searched the store for food. Shane found canned foods; tuna fish, raviolis, beefaroni, and other food that the group would certainly like.
  Shane saw Carl reaching underneath an oversturned shelf and ran to help. He picked up the shelf, allowing Carl to reach what he was grabbing at. Shane looked down to see Carl holding a backpack with a giant 'L' on it's front; it seemed full. "Nice find."
  "I wonder what's in it." Carl unzipped the bag. Inside he found a variety of sugary sweets. "Whoa! It's full of candy!"
  "Who in there right mind would scavenge nothing but candy?" Shane asked. "Seems kinda stupid."
  "Who cares!" Carl said. "Food is food!"
  Shane took the pack from Carl and set it on the store counter. He put his findings in the pack. They searched the store for a while longer, but found nothing else. They left the store and headed back to the safe house.

  When they arrived at the house, they found that Rick and Guillermo hadn't arrived yet. Shane sat on the couch, deciding to get some sleep. He fell asleep to the sight of Carl reading a book.
  Shane woke up to Rick shaking him. "Come on," he said, "wake up."
  "Rick?" Shane slowly opened his eyes. "When did you get back?"
  "Last night," he said. "You've been asleep this whole time."
  "I have?" Shane looked to the boarded up window to find sunlight seeping through the cracks. "Sorry."
  "Forget about it." Shane saw Guillermo putting the backpack they had found on his back. "The others should be here to pick us up soon. We gotta go."
  Shane stood up. "Alright." Shane stretched. "Just let me go to the bathroom." Shane went to the bathroom and closed the door. He did his business then rejoined the others. He looked at the bookshelf. "Let's take some of these." He took some of the books and put them in the cooler.
  "Can we go now?" Guillermo asked. "I'd like to leave this place."
  "Yeah, let's go." The four of them headed for where they left the car.

  The four of them waited for Daryll to pick them up, talking about random things. Shane then wondered if Rick and Guillermo had retrieved the medicine.
  "Did you guys get the medication for the old guy?" Shane asked.
  "His name's Mr. Gilbert," Guillermo told him. "And yes, we did."
  "We also got some antibiotics and pain killers," Rick said. "The place was pretty well stocked."
  They waited in silence until they saw a car pulling up. They noticed it was T-Dog who was driving. He got out of the car. "Hurry up!" He seemed to be in a hurry. "Felipe said that he needs those meds as soon as possible!"
  They piled into the car as quickly as they could.

  The five of them arrived at the house in time to see Felipe and Hershel nursing Mr. Gilbert. Felipe saw them enter, and yelled, "Hurry up and give me the meds! NOW!!"
  Guillermo fished the meds out of the pack and handed them to Felipe. Felipe gave the pills to Mr. Gilbert. They waited for Mr. Gilbert to calm. Hershel monitored his breathing. "He should be fine," Hershel said. "Just let him rest and relax for now."
  Mr. Gilbert soon fell asleep, and the others went to show the group their findings. Felipe stayed next to Mr. Gilbert, unwilling to leave his patient.
  "We found a lot of stuff," Rick told them. "Enough food and water to last us a few weeks. With what we had already, that'll give us about two months supply of food."
  "And the meds'll be useful in case someone gets hurt," Miguel said.
  Carl was placing the food and supplies on the table, showing everyone what they had collected. Most of the food was sweets, but what caught Carl's attention was the graham crackers and chocolate bars. "Hey, look!" he said, picking up the two items. "With the marshmallows we can make s'mores'!"
  "Hey, yeah," Beth grabbed the marshmallows, which were still unopened. "We can make a campfire and make them tonight!"
  "A celebration!" Hershel said. "To celebrate our coming together."
  "Sounds good to me," Daryll said. "I'll get the wood for the fire." Daryll left the house to retrieve firewood.

  The group sat outside, eating delicious, messy s'mores. Everyone was there. They celebrated for two groups coming together, old friends being saved, and for a hopeful future. With four new friends in their group, Shane felt that they could survive anything that came their way. He just feared getting cavities from the multitude of sweets they had retrieved.