Days Gone Bye

"Days Gone Bye" is the first episode of the first season of The Walking Dead. It is the first episode of the series overall.

Plot
Rick searches for his family after emerging from a coma into a world terrorized by the walking dead. Morgan and Duane, whom he meets along the way, help teach Rick the new rules for survival.

Synopsis
A car drives down a desolate road littered with abandoned cars. The car stops, and Rick Grimes steps out, looking around the area. Wearing a full police uniform including a jacket and hat, he walks towards an abandoned gas station. He eventually hears a noise, and looks for the source, a little girl who is standing in front of him. He calls out to her, but soon realizes she is dead. She growls and starts making her way towards him. He backs up a little, shocked, before eventually raising his revolver, and putting her down. He stands for a moment looking at her, before shaking his head, and begins to walk back to the car before leading into the intro.

The next scene opens up with Rick and his partner, Shane in a squad car, eating and talking about their lives at the point. Rick mentions troubles with his wife Lori. He says that Lori accused him that morning of not caring about his family in front of their son, Carl. "The difference between men and women?... I would never say something that cruel to her, especially not in front of Carl," Rick muses. Suddenly, the cruiser's radio cracks to life reporting a high-speed pursuit in progress involving two armed suspects.

Rick and Shane dump their food and rush to the scene. When they arrive, they lay down a spike strip and meet up with their co-workers, Lambert Kendal and Leon Basset. As they all wait for the car, Leon muses about their chances of getting on a police chase reality show. Rick tells him to focus, and worry about having a round in his gun chamber and the safety off. Leon sheepishly checks his gun while Shane suggests that it would be ''"kinda cool gettin' on one of them shows."

At that moment, the car approaches, pursued by two more cruisers. The car, with the suspects inside, speeds over the spike strip, shredding the tires. The driver loses control of the wheel and the vehicle flips off the road, rolling several times before coming to a rough stop upside down in a field. "Holy shit," mutters Shane, cocking his shotgun as the officers descend on the vehicle.

Rick carefully approaches the overturned car. A man emerges from the vehicle and immediately starts shooting at the officers. Rick yells at him to drop his pistol, but the man shoots directly at Rick and hits him in the chest. Shane shoots the gunman, killing him as Rick falls to the ground.

A second man emerges from the vehicle brandishing a shotgun, but is also shot to death. "I'm alright!" Rick shouts, the gunman having shot his Kevlar bulletproof vest. Shane approaches Rick as he pulls himself off the ground. "Shane, you do not tell Lori that happened! Ever!"'' Rick commands Shane as he looks at his vest.

Meanwhile, a third gunman unnoticed by everyone crawls out of the car and through the grass. He gets up, holding a shotgun, and screams “I ain’t goin’ back! I’ll die first!” As he begins to shoot at them. He shoots Shane in the hand first, and then Rick in the side, where his vest does not protect him. He falls to the ground bleeding as Shane shoots at the man, who begins to escape. He begs for Rick to stay with him, barking at Leon to call an ambulance, while Lambert begins to give chase, but Rick remains motionless.

A while later, Shane delivers flowers to Rick in the hospital, but Rick isn't fully conscious while Shane starts talking to him. At an unknown time later, Rick awakens, gasping. He discovers that Shane is no longer there. The flowers have wilted and died, the beeping of the machines have stopped as has the clock; the room is empty. Weak, dehydrated and alone, Rick pulls himself out of bed, flops onto the floor and calls out for a nurse to help, but no one comes.

After getting no response, he stumbles into the bathroom, guzzling water directly from the tap, while noticing a growing beard, before finding his clothes in a drawer. He heads for the door. He opens the door and notices a gurney is blocking the entrance to his room. He pushes it aside and continues walking in the dark and disheveled hallway.

He calls for help as he finally sees a dead woman in the elevator. Terrified, he hurries away, coming across the cafeteria with the words “Don’t Open, Dead Inside” written on it, and the doors attempted to be opened. He hurries away and out of the hospital, walking through the parking lot where body bags litter the area.

He comes across a dead woman next to a bike, and horrifyingly looks at her half body before taking the bike. Rick bikes over to his home to find the front door open and the house deserted. Sobbing on the floor, he calls out for Lori and Carl, questioning if any of this is real or if he's dreaming. He heads back outside the house and sits on the steps. He spots a man stumbling down the road and waves his hand to try and get his attention. As he is doing this, a young boy creeps up from behind and hits him with a shovel. "Carl, I found you", Rick mutters. "Daddy I got this sumbitch! I'm gonna smack him dead!" the boy screams. The boy's father, Morgan Jones, approaches the stumbling man Rick was waving to and shoots him in the head. He then proceeds to walk towards Rick and points a revolver in his face. "What's that bandage for? You tell me, or I will kill you," Morgan asks him, cocking the gun at his face. Before he can answer, Rick passes out.

Later that night, Rick wakes up with his arms and legs tied to a bed. The young boy, Duane, stands guard with a baseball bat. "Did you get bit?" Morgan asks Rick stiffly, having changed his bandages though Rick's gunshot wound that has mostly healed. "Just shot, as far as I know," Rick says. Morgan checks his forehead and says if he had "the fever" it would have killed him by now, so he sets him free of the bedposts with a switchblade, but not before telling him that if he tries anything, he will not hesitate to kill him. He then offers him a seat at their dinner table.

Rick goes downstairs to talk to the man and his son. Rick recognizes the home that they are in as his neighbors' house. Morgan tells Rick not to look out the window because they will see the light. He then begins to explain the story of the outbreak and the following days to a confused and disoriented Rick. "I never should have fired that gun today. The sound draws 'em. Now they're all over the street." Rick accuses Morgan of shooting a man in cold blood. "It was a walker," Morgan corrects. He adds that they get more active after dark sometimes He proceeds to explain to Rick that the man he shot would have tried to eat them. "One thing I do know, don't you get bit. Bites kill. The fever burns you out. But then after a while... You come back." Morgan explains. "Seen it happen," Duane adds solemnly.

After dinner, the trio talk about Rick's son, Carl, and Rick satisfies a lingering curiosity shared by Duane and Morgan as to what line of work would put someone in a position to be shot at. "Sheriff's deputy," Rick remarks. Morgan smiles and says, "Duane thought you were a bank robber." Suddenly, a car alarm starts to go off outside and the trio turns off the lights.

Rick and Morgan peer out to the street through heavy covered windows and boarded up doors. The street is filled with walkers, drawn by the noise of the alarm. When a woman wearing a nightgown appears and walks up to the front door of the house, Duane runs away crying. Morgan comforts his son while Rick stares at the woman through the peephole at the front door. "She died in the other room on that bed. I should have put her down. I just didn't have it in me. She's the mother of my child." Morgan confesses with sorrow.

The next morning, Rick walks outside in a face shield, carrying a baseball bat. "We're sure they're dead? I have to ask," says Rick, approaching a walker sitting near the stoop. "They're dead. Except for something in the brain. That's why it's gotta be the head," Morgan assures him, exiting the house with Duane. Rick approaches the walker and swings the bat repeatedly at his head, beating it down until it stops moving. He quickly becomes fatigued, most likely from his still-healing gunshot wound. Morgan takes the bat, tells him it was "a good start", before finishing off the dead man.

Back at Rick's house, he tells Morgan he thinks his wife and son are still alive. He explains he found empty drawers in the bedrooms and the family pictures and photo albums were gone. "Photo albums. My wife, same thing. There I am packing survival gear; she's grabbing photo albums," Morgan laughs, getting emotional over the memory. Duane suggests to Rick that they could be in Atlanta. Morgan explains that the government was telling people to head to a refugee center there with military protection and food, before the broadcasts stopped. Rick says he’s going to need a car to get to Atlanta, and holds up a set of keys and asks him if he wants to go stocked up.

Rick, Morgan and Duane head to the Cynthiana Police Department, where they luxuriate in hot showers thanks to a separate propane heating system. As they dress, Morgan tells Rick that his family were headed to Atlanta but he and Duane never made it because they got "stuck" after his wife got bit, and after she died they just stayed hunkered down at the Drake's home. Afterward, Rick packs a duffel bag with guns and changes into his sheriff's uniform and hat. He hands Morgan a rifle and some ammunition.

They head outside and start loading the weapons into the trunk of his cruiser. Rick prepares to set off for Atlanta, while Morgan says he'll follow in a few days, once Duane has learned to shoot. Rick hands Morgan a walkie-talkie and he tells him to turn it on every day at dawn to make contact. Before leaving, Morgan gives Rick a warning: "They may not seem like much one at a time. But in a group, all riled up and hungry? Man, you watch your ass." However, the farewell is interrupted when Rick spots a reanimated Leon who claws at the chain link fence separating them. Rick admits he didn't think much of the young officer, but he won't leave him like this. He shoots him in the forehead with his revolver, putting him down. Then, he and Morgan drive away from the sheriff's department in opposite directions.

Back at the Drake's house, Morgan is nailing the doors shut while Duane covers the windows before dark. Morgan then heads up to the attic carrying the rifle Rick left him. He looks at old photo albums and pictures of his wife. Tearfully, he positions the rifle facing the street and begins shooting walkers. He commands Duane to stay downstairs when his son gets startled by the gunshots. "Come on, baby," he says, hoping the noise will draw his wife into view. When she appears, Morgan lines her up but breaks down, still unable to shoot her.

Rick returns to the park where he found the legless walker. He follows a blood trail for quite a distance to find her again, crawling helplessly. She reaches for him futilely. "I'm sorry this happened to you," Rick says, shooting her in the head with his revolver and putting her out of her misery.

Short scenes are shown of him arriving to Georgia, stopping at a gas station, and finding horrific displays of the dead. He makes a transmission the radio, before his car eventually runs out of gas, and taking the bag of guns, begins to walk. He finds a house and goes inside, finding a horrific scene where a family committed suicide together. "GOD FORGIVE US" is written in blood on the wall. He rushes out and a barn. He goes inside and takes the horse, before picking up a hatchet and leaving. Rick talks to the horse about his life as he arrives to Atlanta, telling it about Carl's birth, getting emotional before he has to stop.

He walks through the abandoned city, as the dead begin to notice him. He quickly realizes the city is nothing like Morgan said it should be. He stops short when he sees a crowd of dead gathered around a tank. He tries to turn around, but is now trapped between two walls of the dead. They tackle the horse, who bucks Rick off. He drops his hat and bag of guns, before killing a few of the dead with his hatchet. He begins to shoot at several with his revolver before crawling under the tank, with no other way out. He shoots at more before holding the revolver to his head, saying sorry to Lori and Carl, sure of his death. He stops and climbs up into a tank, sealing the hatch before backing up next to a dead man. The man comes to life and Rick shoots him, making his ears ring. As it settles down, he looks around the tank, and sighs, placing the his revolver’s barrel against his forehead as he sighs. The camera pans out, showing the dead surrounding the tank as "The Man Comes Around" by Johnny Cash plays, before cutting to black.

Credits

 * Rick Grimes
 * Shane Walsh
 * Morgan Jones
 * Duane Jones
 * Reggie
 * Lambert Kendal
 * Leon Basset
 * Rick Grimes' Horse
 * Unnamed Criminal 1
 * Unnamed Criminal 2
 * Jenny Jones (Zombified)
 * Bicycle Girl (Zombified)
 * Lori Grimes (Photograph and mentioned)
 * Carl Grimes (Photograph and mentioned)
 * Dr. Stephens (Mentioned only)

Deaths

 * Unnamed Criminal 1
 * Unnamed Criminal 2
 * Bicycle Girl (Zombified)
 * Rick Grimes' Horse

First Appearances

 * First appearance of Rick Grimes.
 * First appearance of Shane Walsh.
 * First appearance of Morgan Jones.
 * First appearance of Duane Jones.
 * First appearance of Reggie.
 * First appearance of Rick Grimes' Horse. (Alive)
 * First (and last) appearance of Leon Basset. (Alive)
 * First (and last) appearance of Lambert Kendal. (Alive)
 * First (and last) appearance of Unnamed Criminal 1.
 * First (and last) appearance of Unnamed Criminal 2.
 * First appearance of Lori Grimes. (Photograph)
 * First appearance of Carl Grimes. (Photograph)
 * First (and last) appearance of Bicycle Girl. (Zombified)
 * First (and last) appearance of Jenny Jones. (Zombified)
 * First mention of Dr. Stephens.

Other Trivia

 * First episode to be 90 minutes long.
 * The title of the episode, "Days Gone Bye", refers to the fact that many days have passed since Rick has been in a coma and that the old days before the outbreak are gone forever.