Chapter 4: Tracking Death
POV: Jake
The morning mist clung to the quarry like smoke from an extinguished cigarette, and Jake's death sense was already prickling with unease. Nothing immediate—no walkers in range—but something felt off about the forest beyond the camp's perimeter. It was too quiet, even for a world where most of the animals had fled or died.
He was helping Carol hang laundry when Daryl Dixon materialized from the tree line like a ghost in denim and leather. The man moved with the fluid silence of someone who'd learned to hunt before he could properly walk, and his pale eyes swept the camp with predatory assessment.
"Need someone who knows anatomy," Daryl announced without preamble. "Dale says you're some kind of doctor."
Jake straightened, wiping his hands on a towel. "Medical student. But I know my way around a body. Human or otherwise."
Daryl's mouth quirked in what might have been amusement. "Good enough. Tracking wounded deer, but the blood trail's getting weird. Could use fresh eyes."
The request was obviously a test—Daryl's way of taking Jake's measure. In the three days since arriving at camp, Jake had been careful to downplay his abilities, but he'd also been itching to prove his worth. A hunting trip would let him demonstrate practical skills while testing the limits of his death sense in a controlled environment.
"Give me five minutes to grab my gear."
Jake collected his knife and a small medical kit he'd assembled from camp supplies, ignoring Shane's suspicious stare from across the fire pit. The deputy had been watching him with increasing intensity, clearly convinced that Jake was hiding something. Which, of course, he was—just not what Shane thought.
The forest welcomed them with the green silence of growing things and the distant chittering of insects. Daryl moved like liquid mercury between the trees, his crossbow held ready but not quite raised. Jake followed, trying to match the older man's careful footwork while extending his death sense as far as possible.
"There," Daryl said, pointing to a smear of blood on a fallen log. "That's where I lost the trail yesterday. Blood just... stops."
Jake knelt beside the log, examining the dark stain. His medical training kicked in automatically—arterial blood, given the bright red color, probably from a leg wound based on the splatter pattern. But his death sense was telling him a different story.
"How far is that ridge?" Jake asked, pointing northeast through the trees.
Daryl frowned. "Quarter mile, maybe. Why?"
"The deer made it that far. It's dead now—died sometime yesterday evening." Jake stood, brushing dirt from his knees. "Natural causes, not the wound. Probably infection or blood loss."
"How the hell can you know that?" Daryl's tone was sharp with suspicion.
Jake's heart hammered against his ribs. He'd let his death sense get ahead of his cover story, revealed knowledge he shouldn't possess. Think fast.
"Blood smell," he said, gesturing vaguely at his nose. "Medical school, you spend a lot of time around... biological materials. You start to recognize the scent markers. Fresh blood smells different from old blood, infected blood has a sweet undertone, decomposition has its own signature."
It was complete bullshit, but delivered with enough medical jargon to sound plausible. Daryl studied him for a long moment, those pale eyes reading him like a tracker reading sign.
"Smells wrong. Like death," Jake added, borrowing Daryl's own phrase from the show.
Something shifted in Daryl's expression. Not quite acceptance, but a recognition of shared instinct. "Lead the way, college boy."
They made their way through the forest in companionable silence, Jake using his death sense to navigate while pretending to follow his nose. The deer's corpse lay in a small clearing about three hundred yards from where the blood trail had ended—a decent-sized doe that had clearly died in considerable pain.
"I'll be damned," Daryl muttered, approaching the carcass. "How'd you know she'd drag herself this far?"
"Injured animals seek shelter. That brush pile would have seemed safe to her." Jake knelt beside the deer, noting the infected wound on her hind leg and the way she'd curled up in a defensive position. "Probably spent her last hours hiding here."
Daryl began field-dressing the carcass with practiced efficiency, his hands moving with the unconscious skill of someone who'd been hunting since childhood. "Meat's still good. Infection was localized."
While Daryl worked, Jake wandered the clearing, ostensibly looking for useful plants but actually testing his abilities. A squirrel had died near the base of an oak tree—old age, his death sense told him. Jake glanced back to make sure Daryl was focused on his work, then knelt beside the tiny corpse.
He'd been practicing his necromancy in secret, but only on very small animals and only for brief moments. The squirrel was perfect for experimentation—large enough to provide useful feedback, small enough that controlling it wouldn't drain him completely.
Jake placed his hand on the squirrel's still form and reached out with his power.
Come on. Move.
The squirrel's eyes snapped open, milky white and unseeing. Its body jerked, limbs twitching spasmodically as Jake's will forced animation into dead tissue. For a moment, it almost looked alive—then Jake pushed harder, trying to make it sit up.
The tiny corpse lurched upright with unnatural speed, neck bent at an impossible angle. Jake's vision blurred as his concentration wavered, and blood began trickling from his nose. The squirrel collapsed back to the earth as if its strings had been cut.
"Interesting."
Jake spun around, his heart stopping. Daryl stood ten feet away, crossbow lowered but still in his hands, pale eyes fixed on the dead squirrel with calculating intensity.
"I don't know what you just saw," Jake started, but Daryl held up a hand.
"Saw you kneeling over a dead animal, then saw you get a nosebleed. Saw the squirrel twitch, but hell, bodies do that sometimes. Muscle memory, gas escaping, whatever." Daryl's tone was carefully neutral. "Question is, what do you think I saw?"
Jake wiped the blood from his nose with the back of his hand, mind racing. How much had Daryl actually observed? How much was he willing to accept? The tracker's expression was unreadable, but there was something in his posture that suggested he was more curious than hostile.
"Sometimes I... feel things. About dead animals. Like I can sense when they died, how they died. It's not exact, but it helps with tracking." Jake let exhaustion creep into his voice. "I know how that sounds."
"Sounds like you've got a gift." Daryl shouldered his crossbow and moved back toward the deer carcass. "Freaky as hell, but useful. Question is, does it work on geeks?"
The casual way Daryl accepted his explanation was almost more unsettling than outright suspicion would have been. Jake followed him back to the deer, trying to process what had just happened.
"I don't know. I try not to get close enough to find out."
"Smart." Daryl finished wrapping the venison in canvas and hefted the bundle onto his shoulder. "But if push comes to shove, might be worth knowing."
They made their way back toward camp through the afternoon heat, Jake's mind churning with implications. Daryl knew something was unusual about him, but seemed willing to let it slide as long as it proved useful. It was a pragmatic response, entirely consistent with what Jake remembered of the character.
But how long before others started noticing? How long before his carefully constructed cover story began to unravel?
POV: Daryl
The college boy was lying.
Not about everything—Daryl could tell when someone had real medical training, and Jake definitely knew his way around anatomy. But that thing with the squirrel, that wasn't normal tracking instinct. That was something else entirely.
Daryl had been hunting since he could hold a rifle, had tracked everything from rabbits to black bears through Georgia's forests. He knew what natural animal behavior looked like, and dead squirrels didn't just sit up on command. Whatever Jake had done, however he'd done it, he'd made that corpse move with his bare hands.
The question was whether it mattered.
Daryl glanced sideways at his companion, noting the way Jake's shoulders hunched with exhaustion and the lingering traces of blood around his nostrils. Whatever the kid's trick was, it cost him. That suggested limits, consequences—not the infinite power of a comic book superhero, but something more human. More manageable.
Everybody's got secrets now, Daryl thought, adjusting his grip on the venison bundle. Long as his helps us live.
The camp had changed in their absence. Merle had emerged from wherever he'd been nursing his latest hangover, and his voice carried across the quarry with its familiar blend of humor and venom. Daryl's jaw tightened at the sound. His brother was many things—loyal, dangerous, occasionally useful—but subtle wasn't one of them.
"Well, look who's back," Merle called out as they entered the camp perimeter. "Baby brother and his new pet college boy. Y'all have a good nature walk?"
Jake stiffened beside him, and Daryl caught the almost imperceptible shift in the younger man's posture. Something predatory flickered behind those dark eyes before being ruthlessly suppressed.
Interesting. Kid's got teeth when he needs them.
"Got dinner," Daryl said shortly, dropping the venison bundle near the fire pit. "Jake's got good instincts."
"I bet he does." Merle's grin was all sharp edges and malice. "Question is, what kind of instincts we talking about?"
T-Dog looked up from the engine he was working on, his expression carefully neutral. The dynamic between Merle and the rest of the group was always tense, barely controlled hostility that everyone pretended not to notice.
"The kind that finds food," Jake said quietly. "Nothing more complicated than that."
Merle circled closer, his movements loose and predatory. "See, that's what I like about you college types. Always got an explanation for everything. Real neat and tidy."
Daryl watched his brother with growing irritation. Merle was testing Jake, probing for weakness like a predator scenting wounded prey. It was behavior Daryl recognized from childhood—Merle pushing boundaries, seeing how far he could go before someone pushed back.
"Leave it alone, Merle," Daryl said, putting just enough warning in his voice to get his brother's attention.
"Just making conversation with our new friend here." Merle's smile widened. "Ain't that right, college boy? We're just talking."
Jake met Merle's stare without flinching, and for a moment Daryl saw something cold and utterly implacable flicker across the younger man's features. Not fear, not anger, but something much more dangerous—the promise of consequences.
Then it was gone, hidden behind Jake's carefully constructed mask of tired civility.
"Just talking," Jake agreed, his voice pleasant and empty.
Merle held his gaze for another few seconds, then laughed and turned away. "Good. Glad we understand each other."
As the camp settled into its evening routine, Daryl found himself watching Jake with new eyes. The kid was hiding something significant—that much was obvious. But he was also useful, genuinely skilled, and apparently willing to share resources with the group.
More importantly, he wasn't trying to take control or assert dominance. Shane was already doing enough of that, his rivalry with Rick creating tension that everyone could feel. Jake seemed content to contribute without demanding recognition or authority.
That was rare in their new world. Most people who'd survived this long had done so by being ruthless, by taking what they needed regardless of the cost to others. Jake felt different—dangerous in his own way, but not predatory. Not yet, anyway.
Daryl made a mental note to keep watching him. In a world where trust was a luxury they couldn't afford, Jake Martinez was an unknown quantity. But he was their unknown quantity now, for better or worse.
And if his weird gift for finding dead things helped keep the group fed and safe, well, Daryl could live with a little mystery.
Long as his helps us live.
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