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“Yeah,” she replied. “All good.”
She felt Saff’s arm brush lightly against hers as she cleared her throat again. “I brought the shotgun for you, if you want it.”
Maddie tilted her head toward her. “Oh,” she said, a little surprised at the offer. “Yeah, sure. Thanks.”
She held one hand out, and Saff placed the heavy metal in her hand. “The safety is on, but it’s loaded.”
Maddie nodded, taking the familiar weight in both hands, then placed the strap over her shoulder.
“We ready to go, then?” Carter asked with a hint of impatience.
Maddie couldn’t blame him. Now that she knew they were about to go, she didn’t want to delay any longer either. And she’d learned from Saff, the earlier in the day, the better.
“Yeah,” Maddie answered.
She heard the crunch of a few footsteps.
“Dean!” Carter yelled. Maddie flinched at the sudden noise. “Come on! We’re ready!”
“Great,” Saff muttered beside her. “Now every zombie in the area can come with us.”
Maddie frowned. Maybe it really was a good thing that they’d all have Saff traveling with them, given Carter’s limited experience.
A minute later, more footsteps approached, and she heard Dean mutter something under his breath.
“Whatever,” Carter mumbled back to him. “Alright,” he said a bit louder. “Let’s go.”
Maddie shifted the strap of the shotgun on her shoulder and moved the cane out in front of her.
“Here, Maddie,” Carter said, suddenly much closer. “You can hold on to me.”
Maddie paused. “Oh—uh—okay,” she said, her brain freezing up. “Yeah sure.”
It made sense. Carter had guided her countless times before in her life, both before the outbreak and after. Why would it be any different now?
His hand grabbed her wrist, and she flinched at the sudden unexpected contact.
“Sorry,” he muttered. Then he placed her hand on his arm and began moving.
It immediately felt different—wrong. She’d gotten so used to the way Saff’s arm felt. The wayshefelt. The way shemoved.
With Carter, it was all different. Still familiar in a way, but different.
He walked just a little faster than what she was used to, and she had to swing her cane rapidly to keep up and check the path in front of her.
She wondered if Saff would notice.
They walked for a while in silence until they came to what felt like the end of the paved road. The ground then turned uneven, and they seemed to be weaving through the path. She wanted to ask what the terrain had turned into, but for some reason it felt odd breaking the silence that had formed between them all.
Every so often, Carter would slow down, and she would hear an electronic beeping. A GPS most likely. And a quiet voice in her head hoped that Saff was also double checking where they were going.
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Carter. She did. It was just that she’d come to trust Saff a lot more when it came to things like that.
The familiar chime went off, and Carter slowed again, huffing beside her.
“If we keep going straight this way, we’ll have a lot of elevation gain to get over. I think we should redirect to the right and go around.”
“We’ll have to go through a town that way,” Saff replied from behind them. “It’s not like the city, but definitely bigger than the town we were just in. Attracts more people. More zombies.”