[TWD x Resident Evil] — Chapter 467 - A Twist of Fate

Leon leaned against a tree trunk.

He tucked the blue syringe back against his body, close and secure.

Ada had put on an entire performance, bitter, gut-wrenching, just to get that thing into his hands. He wasn't about to let anything happen to it.

He'd spent half an eternity wrestling that giant Leech Abomination, then gone and swum in a freezing river on top of it. His eyelids had stopped cooperating a long time ago.

Rick and the others would search the riverbank. They'd find their way here. These people weren't stupid.

That thought was enough. The last coil of tension in Leon's body finally let go. His head tilted to one side, and he was out.

......

"Tara. Look over there."

A woman in a thick jacket dropped her voice and nudged her companion with her elbow.

The one called Tara raised an old M1 carbine and looked where her companion was pointing.

On the rocky riverbank, a man sat propped against a tree. He hadn't moved.

"Walker?"

Tara brought the sights up and centered them on his head.

"Hold off. Doesn't look like one." Lilly shook her head.

The Chambler sisters. Tara and Lilly. They lived with their father in an apartment building not far from here.

The food was running low. There was a child at home, and an old man who could barely move. They had no choice but to come out and try their luck.

They closed in carefully.

Tara went first, using the barrel of the M1 to prod the man's shoulder.

Leon's body swayed and folded limply to the ground. No reaction whatsoever.

Lilly stepped forward, crouched down, and pressed two fingers to his neck.

"He's alive. There's a pulse."

She looked back at Tara, something between surprise and uncertainty in her voice.

"His body's freezing, though. The river did a number on him."

Tara frowned, studying the man on the ground.

The Tactical Vest was professional-grade. An empty holster hung at his hip.

Not exactly the picture of a harmless civilian.

Right now, though, he looked like a fish that had washed up on shore, barely capable of breathing, let alone anything else.

"What do we do?" Lilly asked.

"We leave him here, he dies."

"We have no idea who he is." Tara kept her voice low and her eyes moving. "What if he's dangerous? We drag him home, he wakes up, and kills us both — then what? And if he turns on the way back and bites us?"

"He could also be a good person." Lilly looked at Leon's pale face. "We can't just leave him here to die."

Tara hesitated.

She looked at her sister. Then down at the half-dead man on the ground.

Finally, she exhaled.

"Fine. You win."

"Let's just hope we haven't gone and rescued an ingrate."

It took everything they had to drag Leon, six feet of dead weight, up into the bed of their beat-up pickup. The engine turned over, and the truck rattled away from the riverbank.

......

Not long after they were gone, footsteps came through the trees.

Daryl, Merle, Rick, and the rest of the group finally crawled out from another exit of the underground facility.

"Christ, that place was a goddamn maze, and then the whole thing blew up on us — good thing we didn't hang around in there any longer."

Merle dropped onto the ground and fished out a cigarette.

"The boss didn't actually get swept away, did he?"

Nobody answered him.

Daryl crouched at the water's edge, eyes working across the ground in sharp, methodical sweeps.

"He came ashore here."

He pointed to a stretch of wet mud on the bank. There was still a vague human-shaped impression pressed into it.

"So where is he?" Shane came up beside him, scanning in every direction. "Walkers drag him off?"

"No." Daryl shook his head.

He stood, walked a few meters to a patch of grass, and used his boot tip to part several bent and flattened stems.

"Tire tracks. Recent."

He moved a few steps further and pinched a small clump of fresh soil off a rock, holding it under his nose.

"Confirmed. Not long ago. The earth smell is still strong."

He straightened and looked back at the group.

"Someone took him."

Dead silence.

"Who the hell would be driving around in this godforsaken place?" Merle threw his cigarette butt down and ground it out hard under his boot.

"Whoever it is." Shane's face had gone tight. His mind went to Ada. "Leon's in their hands right now, and we don't know if he's alive or dead."

Rick glanced at the incubation box cradled in T-Dog's arms.

Stairway of the Sun.

The biggest prize of the entire operation. The thing Leon had nearly gotten himself killed to retrieve.

There could be no mishaps.

"We split up." Rick's voice was steady. "I'll reach out to Citizen Z, have him use the satellite to look for any trace of Leon. Abraham, Shane, you take people and get this back to the prison. Hand it directly to Candace. No one else."

He paused, eyes settling on Daryl.

"Daryl. You track."

Daryl gave a single nod. He pulled his crossbow from his back and checked it over without a word.

"I'll go." Glenn stepped out from the group. "I'm fast. I can help."

Rick looked at Glenn, then at Daryl.

"Alright. Find Leon, you radio in. And remember — you come back in one piece."

Daryl didn't say anything. He just turned toward the direction the tire tracks had disappeared and started walking.

Glenn shouldered his pack and fell in behind him.

"Hey, kid." Merle called out, like he had something else to add.

Glenn turned just long enough to throw an OK sign over his shoulder and kept moving.

Rick watched the two of them disappear into the tree line. The heaviness didn't leave his face.

He just hoped Leon had landed in the right hands.

If Umbrella had him, they were in serious trouble.

➤ Next: Ashley's Breakdown — Heartbreak