Far From Home;; [open] {Site Plot}

Dreams had always made the crumbling, murderous, bloody world around her seem as if it were normal again. They mad her feel normal. This dream, in particular, was some what of a memory. It went back to when she worked at that damn gas station. She hated it with a bloody passion, but she had to thank it for starting a life that she was struggling to continue. A pain in the rear to do, too. The dream brought her back to the time she met her former husband, skipping to the first time when they first made love in his daddy's trailer on her lunch break.

This intimate and dear memory caused her to smile in her sleep, something she didn't do that much anymore. But, when she was just settling in her dream, she was awoken by a bump in the road causing the vehicle to slightly jump. She opened her eyes immediately and gazed out her window to see where they had ventured off. Only God knows. Harper had never gone far from her home town of Blairsville, not even for a family vacation. Too poor, too scared.

Too tired to stay awake much longer, Harper slipped back into her deep sleep, only to be awoken not even an hour later. "Harper! Wake yer ass up! Got us some cars to search through." She felt a hand on her knee, waking her oh so suddenly. Harper moaned and sat up to where she could see out the wind shield. She listened to Charlie's careful, but quick instructions, as she got out of the car. It felt good on her lower half to finally stand up after hours of sitting and laying down. Before closing the door, she quickly, from the floor, retrieved her blade, in which she held tightly at the duck-tape handle.

Keeping quiet, as usual in the cautionary areas, she followed Charlie with another member of the group trailing not far behind her. Harper thought long and hard to remember the poor girl's name. Mary? Maria? But, now wasn't the time to debate over such a non-important subject. Doing as she was told, Harper glanced into a windows, viewing gruesome dead bodies still buckled into their seats.

All of a sudden, when Harper least expected it, her leader had yelled, "Don't shoot!" Harper was alerted by this, but all she could do was keep weapon lowered, following orders, as any goody-two-shoes would do. She looked up to see that there was a totally different group, aiming their guns at their group of four. Scanning all of them, she could tell that there were at least eleven people, including two children. Before she knew it, Charlie, the 'bad ass leader' had an emotional, disbelieving look on her face. What Charlie was seeing had also caught Harper in a trance. A memory. Great, a day full of memories, just what she needed.

There, standing in front of Charlie, was a familiar, face. It was Charlie's cousin, Daryl. Harper didn't really know Daryl, but it was still a relief to see him. To Harper's surprise, Charlie was bawling in Daryl's arms within seconds. What she was witnessing was the most emotional family reunion she had ever seen.

Never, in Harper's life time, had she seen Charlie cry. Never. In the last seconds of the reunion, a man called from Daryl's group, "Walkers!", in which translated in 'biters'. Thinking quickly, Harper jumped into the back seat of the car nearest to her, no matter how messy it had been, she laid down and played to the good Lord that now wasn't her time.

When you spend nearly two months hiding whenever you hear the word 'biter', you get a new sense. When you can't see where damn things are, and you can barely hear them, you kind of start to feel when you come near them.

Since she was so concerned with getting to her own hiding place, she didn't even notice where the others hid. She heard exactly what she expected, the shuffling and moans of the biters. A minute or two passed when Harper heard a female scream. The shuffling got louder and louder. She had a natural urge to poke her head up and see who it was. She fought the urge as hard as she could but it was impossible to overcome.

As silently as she could, Harper poked her head up to see that a girl who was in her group, and was beside her not even five minutes ago, was being ripped to shreds, though her screams were still quite loud. Seconds later, she heard some people yelling the girl's name, Margo, followed by their loud foot steps... then more screams. Harper covered her ears, nearly going deaf from three people screaming all at once, near her. She recognized them as Janina and Estebon, but it was too late. They were gone before anyone knew it. She took a peak once again and nearly puked at the sight. Some biters had lost interest after the three were dead. It had only been mere seconds when another person screamed, this one about twenty feet away. This was the fourth person to die. Goes to show how stupid people could be. When that scream had silenced, more screams followed. Harper was starting to get sick of this. Death. It was everywhere.

A series of minutes that felt like hours passed until somebody called that it was clear. Harper was relieved, but when she stepped out of the car, the sight was so gruesome... so bloody that Harper threw up where she stood. "Oh my gosh."