am i missing something?

i’m on season 9 ep 7. at the end of ep 6 when eugene and rosita were running from the walkers and eugene fell from the tower and injured his knee, to get away they covered their human scent with mud.. well the herd of walkers that was directly behind them started talking?? saying “where… are… they…” “they…must…be…close” and i have subtitles on so it says “walker 1: blah blah blah” and then so on.

have they always talked??? i’ve never caught this till just now. and the very beginning of ep 7, rosita was running (WITHOUT EUGENE SO WTF)) and they were talking again.

so really, have they always talked? or did that just start?