—  THE NEXT MORNING, MOST OF THE group were prepared to set off in search for Sophia in the woods. Everyone had taken a weapon of their own, Zoe's being a machete she had found in one of the abandoned cars; she had never used one before, but when the time came, she was sure she would know how to, how hard could it be? She couldn't believe that the little girl had to stay in the woods all by herself for the whole night, she couldn't think of anything worse at that age, or even at her own age, she would hate that. She just wished that Sophia was okay and that she would come back completely safe. Who knew, they were probably going to find her today - but due to their luck lately, Zoe didn't know if that was going to happen, but she knew she needed to keep her hope up in order to keep her head high..

It pained Zoe to see Carol in such a state, she didn't understand what it was like to be a mother, but if it was Carl that went missing, she would be in complete bits. "Hey." She heard a familiar voice from behind her, and when she turned around, she saw Nate, catching up to her in a slight jog, "How you holding up?" He asked her, knowing that Carl was friends with Sophia, meaning that this must be taking a toll on the girl as it was her brother.

Zoe hesitated to answer at first, before sighing, "Yeah, I'm just worried that we won't be able to find her, you know?" She spoke, causing Nate to nod, sadly, he didn't know the little girl, having not spoken to her much, but to see Zoe so sad, upset him, just like at the CDC, where he hated hearing her cry, making him incredibly angry. He personally didn't think that they were going to find the little girl - a whole night by herself at nine years old.. He would have been able to survive that at that young age, but that was solely due to the fact that he had experience with living out there, as at times he would often have to go days in the woods to avoid his father..

"I think we're going to find her." Nate announced, as Zoe looked up at him expectantly, knowing that he had more to say just from the tone of his voice. "Just not in the way that everybody hopes." He admitted, causing the girls face to fall.

Zoe nodded, sadly agreeing with his words, but wishing that she didn't; it wasn't something she liked to think about, but it was probably going to be the outcome of this search. "You think she's dead?" She asked him.

"I'm just saying that there's a chance. I want to find her just as much as everyone else... We just have to consider the other possibilities." Nate spoke, the words getting to Zoe. He didn't want to admit that the girl could be dead, but the odds weren't in her favour, and with the strength that some of these walkers had, he didn't think that she would be able to fight one off on her own. Even some of the men in the group have troubles with walkers, so it didn't make him think that Sophia could handle any..

As she was looking up at Nate to see if he was telling the truth in his words, she caught her foot on a tree root, causing her to stumble forwards; but luckily for her, Nate had caught her just in time, grabbing her arm, and pulling her back up to a standing position besides him. "Thanks." She breathed out, keeping her hand gripped onto his jacket. She got lost in his eyes slightly, just as the group stopped just ahead, "Let's go." She mumbled, letting go of him and heading off towards the others, causing him to sigh at the sight of her go, before following after her.

As they stopped with the rest of the group, they spotted a tent up ahead, which looked very creepy in Zoe's opinion, like something out of a horror movie - if this was before the apocalypse and she stumbled upon an empty tent she would have been terrified at the sight of it. But right now, she just wished that Sophia was currently resided in there. "She could be in there." Daryl muttered, "Could be a whole bunch of things in there." He added, knowing that she may not actually be in there.

Rick, Shane and Daryl then began to move forwards once more, while Nate stayed behind with the girls, watching their surroundings in case anything were to jump out at them. Daryl pulled out his knife and crouched next to the tent, before looking back towards Rick with a shrug, not knowing how they could get the girl to come out. "Carol. Call out softly. If she's in there, yours is the first voice she should hear." Rick explained to Carol, earning a nod from the mother.

"Sophia, sweetie, are you in there?" Carol called out, tears beginning to form in her eyes, after no sound is heard. "Sophia, it's mommy. Sophia, we're all here, baby. It's mommy." She spoke out.

The rest of the group watched in anticipation as Daryl entered the tent, Zoe subconsciously grabbed hold of Nate's hand as they watched, gripping onto him. In response, he squeezed back in hopes to make her feel better.
As Daryl exited the tent, everyone awaited his answer. "It ain't her." He spoke, causing the group to sink in defeat. Zoe felt awful for Carol, every single time they felt as if they could have found Sophia, she wasn't there. She slouched in defeat when Daryl left the tent, and leaned some of her weight onto Nate, feeling exhausted at the whole day of searching for Sophia - it had taken a toll on the group physically and mentally.

Zoe lifted her head with a surprised expression, as well as the rest of the group, when the loud sound of church bells began to echo through the air - they all instantly began to sprint towards the sound, Zoe and Nate dropping their hands instantly, until they all stopped once they found out that they couldn't find out the direction that the bells were currently coming from. "Which direction?" Shane wondered out loud, frantically looking around,

Rick pointed in front of the group, "I think that way. I'm pretty sure." He told the group.

"Damn, its too hard to tell out here." Shane sighed in frustration.

"Wait." Zoe spoke up, after an idea went through her mind, she earned the attention of the group around her as she spoke up. "If we all heard the bells, then maybe Sophia did to?" She stated, making a good point. She just hoped that Sophia was at the church.

Glenn looked over at Zoe, nodding at her statement, before turning to Carol and Shane. "Someone's ringing those bells, maybe calling others." He suggested, adding onto Zoe's theory.

"Or signalling that they found Sophia." Rick added, lifting slight hope in Carol. "Even so, she could be ringing those bells herself." He spoke.

The group all began to agree with each other and quickly took off after Shane ordered them to - after a while of running through the woods, they came across a church, but the only thing being, that there was no bells in sight, meaning that this couldn't possibly be the right place. Zoe really didn't anything to happen to Sophia, she was too young to be taken from this world. The group narrowed they eyes at the church, wondering where the sound of the bells came from.
"I'm telling you, it's the wrong church." Shane stated, glaring over in Rick's direction, who was gazing around inside of the church with wide eyes. "It's got no steeple, Rick. There's no steeple." He said.

"Well, how many churches can be in one area?" Zoe shot back, not liking the way he was speaking to her father. Don't get her wrong, she loved Shane, but she didn't like how he was treating her father lately - it was as if something in him had switched; he was different to what he used to be. Ever since her dad had come back from everyone thinking he was dead, Shane had changed, and Zoe didn't like it.

Suddenly, the sound of a bell began to ring again and everyone began to pile out of the church, looking around frantically for any sign of Sophia, however, when they left the church, all they found was a small box. Glenn decided to investigate the box, opening it, revealing wires, causing him to pull them apart, which caused the ringing to stop. This meant that they were on a timer, and no one was ringing the bells themselves.

"A timer." Daryl stated, in frustration, "It's on a timer."

Zoe sighed, all she wanted to do was find Sophia and hopefully move on to another area, hopefully very far from Atlanta and never come back - she had enough bad luck near here. Nate noticed her distress and rubbed her back in comfort, causing her to look up at him, "We'll find her, don't worry." He assured her. He would now make it his mission to find the girl, especially if it took away Zoe's distress, he just wanted to take her sadness away.

____

Later on in the day, the group had split up into two. Shane and Rick wanted to carry on looking, whereas the others wanted to go back to the RV before the day ended. Carl obviously wanted to go with the two of them, causing Lori to stress out about him going, so, Zoe, being the great sister she is, volunteered to go with them as an extra person to look out for Carl, making her mom feel a lot better. The chance of finding Sophia was beginning to shrink, fast, after a whole afternoon of not finding anything on the girl's whereabouts, Zoe was beginning to believe they may actually never find the girl. Although, she had to keep up her hope for Carl, as he and Sophia were close friends, so she would never say anything in front of her brother. He was too young for this world.

Zoe walked through the woods with her trusty machete in her hands as she continued to walk past the many trees, her feet crunching on the leaves underneath her feet, making an echo throughout the silent woods. She was secretly hoping that the small girl would just pop out from behind one of the trees, and this whole thing be one big joke, but she knew that wouldn't happen. "Zo, look." Carl whispered to her, pulling on her sleeve, breaking her out of her thoughts.

Zoe looked up to where Carl was pointing, only to see a deer a few feet in front of them, causing a smile to break on her face; it looked so carefree and peaceful, in a broken world that they now lived in. It was beautiful. Suddenly, Shane aimed his shotgun at the animal, causing Zoe to shake her head at him - there was no way that she would let him ruin this moment of Carl being happy, even for one second.

Zoe shortly followed behind him as he made his way towards the deer, slowly, careful not to scare the animal, it was when she noticed the slight fear on Carl's face at the large animal, that she came to his side. As she reached his side, he smiled up at her as she took his hand in her own and moved them both closer to the animal, being as quiet and slow as they could. She raised Carl's hand up, about to place it on the animals back, when the deer looked back at them, finally noticing their presence.

She smiled at Carl's gleaming face, before a gun shot was heard, echoing through the quiet woods around them, Zoe saw the deer drop to the floor, and the next thing she knew, she was following its actions, collapsing, falling unconscious. Carl didn't know what to do as he watched his sister fall to the ground, blood instantly gushing out of her stomach where she had been shot. He looked back at his father with wide eyes, if it wasn't for her standing in front of him, that would have been him on the floor and not his sister, this was his fault.

Rick stared in complete shock as blood began to pour out of Zoe's stomach, her eyes lolling into the back of her head as she finally fell unconscious, scaring her family. "No, no, no!" He shouted, as he and Shane instantly ran towards the unconscious girl, wondering what the hell had just happened.

"No!"