Chapter Text
The blood of the coyote is rich and hot on his tongue, the thick copper tang of its life more than enough to sustain him. He digs his elongated canines deeper into the furry ruff of the creature’s throat, biting down a little more firmly; sucking a little bit harder to get every last drop. He can literally feel the strength it gives him filling his weary limbs, which is good, because he can also hear the raspy hiss of walkers getting louder as they approach.
“Any day now would be just dandy, little brother,” Merle bitches quietly, and he can’t help but narrow his eyes and glare at the older Dixon. His instincts flare, telling him to protect his kill, but he swallows the building growl and ignores them. His big brother has no reason to want to poach the coyote from him. Merle’s not suffering from the same affliction as he is—which is to say that his brother isn’t a fanged monster who needs to drink blood to survive in a world that isn’t really worth living in anymore.
When there isn’t a drop left to drink, Daryl widens his jaws and slides his fangs from the coyote’s throat, panting quietly and trying to ignore the discomfort of his canines retracting as they shorten back to something that is close enough to natural that no one will suspect anything. His mouth and throat are covered in blood, the collar of his shirt soaked and ruined, so he strips out of it and wipes at the mess, cleaning himself up the best he can. Merle watches silently, his eyes dark, and says nothing until Daryl drops the ruined shirt and holds out his hand expectantly.
“Gonna hafta find a cleaner way ta eat, baby brother,” he grouses as he digs a clean shirt out of their pack and tosses it over. Daryl catches it easily and pulls it on, rolling his eyes and mockingly mouthing along with the familiar speech. “Can’t keep goin’ through shirts like this, or we ain’t gonna have nothin’ left. Guess the cold ones won’t so much care if we’re half naked, but I don’t fancy bein’ shirtless in winter.”
It’s the same thing he’s been bitching about for months, ever since the morning Daryl opened his eyes to the sight of their father trying to take a bite out of him. He had reacted instinctively, sinking his knife into the bastard’s skull and grabbing his crossbow before hauling ass through town to the police station. People he’d known all his life had tried to grab at him and bite, their flesh ruined and their clothes bloody; their scents warped by death and something else. He’d recognized that who they were was gone, replaced by ravenous beasts with a hunger for warm, living bodies. Killing them like that had been no real hardship for him—his only concern had been his brother.
Merle had been locked in the drunk tank, mercifully alone, and had been hollering like a damn fool when Daryl had found him. He’d ripped the bars out with barely a thought, and the two of them had grabbed their weapons and hauled ass into the woods. They’d learned at a young age how to keep themselves alive, thankfully, and have rarely come across actual breathing people since the world fell to shit.
“You even listenin’ ta me, Darleena?”
Glancing at Merle, he huffs irritably and shoulders his crossbow before making a vague motion for his brother to lead the way now that he’s done bitching up a storm.
“Wish ya’d agreed ta learn some damn sign language, baby brother. Would make shit so much easier.”
It’s an old complaint—Daryl hasn’t said a single word since the day he woke up in the middle of the woods and started screaming because he was so hungry he was in agony, his stomach cramping and his muscles twitching like he was having a seizure. He doesn’t remember what happened to make him this way; has nothing more to go on than the two faded puncture scars behind his left ear. Merle had found him hours later, crouched over the carcass of a buck; covered in blood and making the most pitiful sounds because he was still so goddamn hungry. As soon as he’d seen the older Dixon, new instincts had roared to life and he’d snarled, putting himself over his kill protectively. It had taken a long time for Merle to calm him down, and when he’d finally opened his mouth to speak, no words had come.
That was nine years ago, and he hasn’t spoken since. He hasn’t even tried to since the first failure. Merle had accepted his willing silence with surprising ease a lot more quickly than he’d expected, but it wasn’t like he’d spoken much before then anyway. His brother’s only grievance is that he refuses to learn sign language. He makes do by communicating in other ways. They’re Dixons, after all, and they’re hunters. They have other ways of expressing themselves that have nothing to do with speaking.
Daryl falls in easily behind Merle, fingering the strap of his bow and watching every miniscule shift and twitch of his brother’s muscles as they creep through the forest. He feels bad that they’re leaving the body of the coyote, but he can already hear the sounds of nature taking its course in the form of scavengers coming to pick at the carcass.
He sees the tracks before Merle does thanks to his enhanced eyesight and snaps his fingers quickly but quietly. When he’s given a short nod, he settles into hunting mode; gentling his steps until he’s soundless as he walks, every inch of him a predator on the prowl—as liquid and graceful as a cat, but with a wolf’s tenacity and single-minded focus. He is the ultimate predator like this.
A twig snaps up ahead, and he’s already grabbing Merle by the shoulder to haul him back when he hears the frantic, eager hisses of walkers and the labored grunts of the man they’ve been tracking. Daryl can see him easily, even from almost seventy yards away. He’s surrounded but holding his own, his teeth bared and his eyes wild as he stabs any walker that gets too close. His eyes are blue, and as dark and roiling as stormy clouds. They rove over everything as he ducks and twists and stabs. Corpses fall around him like dominoes, and Daryl finds himself awestruck at the display of raw power housed in that lean, wiry body.
When it’s over, he lets Merle go and follows warily as his brother approaches the stranger, his nostrils flaring and his fingers brushing the hilt of his knife. The man smells like sweat and dirt and oil, and the acrid smell of gunpowder is strong enough to make him wrinkle his nose and sneeze. The source of the scent rests heavily at the man’s hip, and he eyes the gun briefly as he waits for Merle to open his mouth. He’s already counting down from ten, wondering what number he’ll get to this time before he has to intervene.
“Hey there, ol’ buddy,” Merle croons, his grin wide and his low, raspy voice cajoling, like he’s trying to coax a reluctant mongrel closer. “Was quite an impressive entrance ya just gave us. Where’d ya learn ta fight like that?”
It takes a moment for the man to respond, which makes Daryl paranoid and suspicious in tandem. In that moment, they’re stared at and sized up in a way that is clearly to gauge the level of danger they may or may not possess. They’re doing the same thing to him, though, because as nice as it is to see an actual living, breathing person, they have no idea who he is or what he’s like.
“The Academy,” the man finally replies, wiping his blade clean on his jeans. Daryl’s mental countdown screeches to a stop at four, and he’s already reaching out to grab Merle because he knows where this is going. Sure enough, the older Dixon doesn’t fail to disappoint.
“You’re a damn cop? Shit, Officer Friendly, should’a let them walkers eatcha then. Would’a saved us a trip.”
Daryl rolls his eyes skyward and sighs heavily, choosing to step away once he’s mostly sure that Merle’s only planning on a little verbal abuse and nothing more. He keeps more to the shade, because while he knows that the sun won’t kill him, it’s still the middle of the summer in Georgia, and it’s easily over one hundred degrees today.
As he wanders away, a set of rabbit prints catches his attention. Merle won’t eat a predator, but he’ll eat anything else, so he pulls his crossbow off his back and hunkers down to start tracking. He’s not going to need to feed himself for at least a day and a half, but Merle needs to eat soon. Behind him, he can hear the banter going on between his brother and the cop, and while it’s not exactly friendly, it’s lacking any edge of danger, so he figures everything’s fine. He does hear something about a wife and son, but most of his attention is locked into his task. Flaring his nostrils, he draws in the multitude of scents around him and picks out the rabbit easily.
“Daryl, right?”
Glancing up, he levels the man with a calculating stare, his eyes narrowed. A quick nod is his answer before he drops his gaze back down. He doesn’t want to stare for too long, even if the guy is more than nice to look at. He looks like he hasn’t shaved in days, but it works for him really well, and his hair is waves of soft-looking curls that cling to the sides of his tanned, pretty throat. Another deep inhale brings in the musky scent of a virile male, and he licks his lips unconsciously before realizing what he’s doing and snapping his eyes back to the ground.
Stop thinking, start tracking.
“Your brother says you two have been out here on your own for a while. Says you’re headed Atlanta way. Would you mind if I tag along?”
Daryl looks up just enough to stare at the man’s chin, his brow furrowed and his lips pressed together tightly.
I don’t even know you. What do you want with me?
As if the man has heard his thoughts, he makes a quiet noise and smiles sheepishly, holding out a hand that he drops the second Daryl’s shoulders twitch reflexively. “Sorry, probably should have started with my name. I’m Rick Grimes. I’d say that it’s a pleasure to meet you, but considering the circumstances…”
A glance at Merle shows his brother watching their interaction, the faint sound of his teeth grinding ringing in Daryl’s ears far too loudly. They share a quick look, eyes dark and eyebrows arching as they communicate the way only they can.
You wanna?
Up to you.
You trust him?
Hell no, but we’ll do what needs done if it comes to that.
Merle nods, accepting his decision, and saunters over. Figuring that the conversation is done, he leaves them to their chatter and goes back to hunting. The last thing he pays attention to is his brother’s chuckle, the sound dripping with arrogance and tinged with suspicion, as Merle’s low, rough voice rumbles, “Welcome to the party, officer.”
By the time night has fallen, nothing to light the way but billions of twinkling starts and a sliver of moonlight, Daryl is ready to claw his way up the nearest tree and be done. Merle is such a fucking jackass sometimes, and Rick hasn’t been spared a single sharp-tongued lash from his brother no matter what. Despite his proficiency for killing walkers—the man is good at it, ridiculously so—everything else has been fair game, from the way his clothes hang off him to his riotous curls to the way he just smiles calmly in the face of everything the older Dixon throws at him and chuckles. The words he lobs back are playful and light, but beneath that is pure steel that Daryl picks up on easily even if his brother doesn’t quite manage to. When they finally stop for the night, he’s twitchy and biting too hard at the skin around his left thumbnail, breaking the skin with one sharp canine and licking at the warm bead of blood that wells up. It does nothing to him, doesn’t make the all-consuming hunger pang through his belly thanks to the sacrifice of the coyote.
“You okay?” Rick asks, dropping back and reaching out to grip his shoulder. Just like the last time, Daryl twitches away and shoots him a wary look, and the cop makes a calming sound in the back of his throat. He goes from searching for contact to holding his hand out like he’s trying to coax a wary, shy mutt closer for a sniff. Daryl wrinkles his nose at his own analogy and comparing himself to a shaggy, mangy dog, but he’s not offended the way he thinks he should be. Nonetheless, he gives a quick, jerky nod of his head and turns away somewhat to watch Merle clear a spot for a fire. They can’t make it too high, but they also can’t eat raw rabbit and squirrel. As if sensing his thoughts, the older Dixon looks at him and arches an eyebrow. When Daryl tips his head just slightly, his brother grins and goes back to work.
Georgia is beautiful at night. That’s not to say that the deep forests and endless sky aren’t something to look at during the day, but like this, shrouded in night and the barest flickers of light from above and the tiny flames Merle is coaxing to life, Daryl feels his breath hitch in his lungs slightly. Maybe he notices it more now because of what he is, or maybe he always noticed it and chose to appreciate it more than the others around him. Whatever it is, he lets himself see it all, lets himself breathe in the comforting scents, as he sits on a nearby rock and sets down the bag of game he’s collected throughout the hours of trying to ignore Rick and Merle.
Rick crouches down beside him, and his glance flicks over to the man before he looks away and pulls out a plump, healthy rabbit. He lays the doe across his lap and draws his knife, then thinks better of it and slips off the rock; turning to lay her on it instead. It’ll make gutting her easier, and it will spare him more of Merle’s bitching about how he’s not careful enough with his clothes.
As he gets to work, he tries to ignore the cool, slick blood that smears over his skin. He might not need to feed, but it’s still a tempting thing—his own little curse of gluttony, to want more even when he’s full and sated. Something must show on his face, or maybe it’s the fact that he’s skinning and preparing meat in the dark, but he sees Rick dip his head from the corner of his eye, curls shifting and trailing across smooth skin as the man angles his head to try and catch his eyes.
“Hey,” he murmurs when Daryl chooses to ignore him. As much as he wants to ignore even that, there’s something laced into that word that makes goosebumps shiver down his spine. He glances over, his knife still above the rabbit, and arches an eyebrow that he knows the man will be able to see. “You sure that’s safe to do?” Rick motions toward him like he needs clarification, a quick sweep of long, elegant fingers encompassing the whole scene. Firelight glints off the ring on his left hand, and Daryl bites the inside of his lip because he can’t bite his thumb.
“My baby brother can skin anything in any kind of light,” Merle boasts, coming closer once he’s sure the fire won’t go out so that he doesn’t have to raise his voice too much. He knows they’re far enough from any walkers thanks to Daryl, but there’s still no reason to throw all caution out the window. They’re playing with fire as it is, he thinks, because Rick’s a cop, and he seems to be really observant about a lot of things. He hasn’t noticed yet that Daryl isn’t anything close to human—at least, he hasn’t mentioned anything. He doesn’t smell like suspicion, or anything else that would send alarm bells blaring, but playing cautious and safe is still the best idea.
“That’s a pretty handy skill to have. Guess your vision’s gotta be pretty good then, huh?”
It’s innocent and friendly, and Daryl is incapable of verbally replying, so he just presses the tip of his hunting knife down into the rabbit’s chest and gets to work with nothing more than a quiet puff of a snort through his nose. Thankfully, he’s not completely mute. He can still whistle and laugh and make other sounds. However, when it comes to words, they’re just not there. It’s like his entire vocabulary was eradicated, or forced behind some mental door that he hasn’t been able to find and open. Truth be told, he hasn’t really looked for them. He doesn’t miss talking—can’t miss what you really didn’t do. It took Merle longer to adjust, probably because the only times Daryl really did speak was when they were yelling at each other. Now he’s more apt to throw a fist than cut with barbed words, and after a few broken ribs and a fractured cheekbone back before he learned to temper his strength, his brother found other ways to deal with his frustrations that didn’t include taking them out on the one who caused them.
It takes him barely twenty minutes to clean and prepare the rabbits and squirrels, and soon enough he’s got them roasting over the small fire, the scent of cooking meat filling his nose. He draws it deep into his lungs and closes his eyes, remembering more nights than can be counted when he and Merle would do this for reasons that had nothing to do with staying away from cities and towns overrun by the walking dead. Back then it was just staying out of their father’s way, or escaping from the oppressive pressure of a society they would never fit into and people who would never accept them.
People like Rick, who is a cop with a wife and son and probably had a nice house and a white-picket fence. People who would usually look down their nose at the Dixon boys and mutter disparaging comments about the state of their clothes and the bruises that clung to their skin like they were painted there, permanent affixtures that never stayed in one place. Merle never cared, and Daryl tried so hard not to—fell into his big brother’s shadow like a good little disciple and did what Merle did; said what Merle told him to say and acted how every other Dixon has always been expected to act: like the white trash no-good rednecks they’ve always been.
Daryl has never been that way, though. Sure, he’s got the temper, and the rough appearance. He wears shitty clothes and hunts and doesn’t care if he’s covered in mud. But he’s got his mom’s heart, or at least he has the heart she used to have before one too many blows knocked it out of her and left something brittle and broken in its place. While Merle thrives on driving people away and running from his own problems because even he can’t stand them, Daryl longs for the kind of acceptance that’s impossible for anyone of his ilk to ever achieve. He wants someone to look at him and see something more than his last name, but humanity is cruel and most people never bother to look past the surface.
The pop of sap knocks him back to the present, and he blinks himself out of the shadowy melancholy he’d fallen into. Rick is looking at him from across the fire, flames dancing in his eyes and turning him into something beautiful and vengeful, black and ember-orange intermingled into something that carves past Daryl’s flesh and sees into the very depths of his soul, where he’d fled to a long time ago behind his fortress of harsh words and unforgiving circumstances. It’s a searching look, and he cannot meet it, so he chooses to look away while Merle pulls their dinner off the spits and checks it.
“Should be pretty well cooked through,” he mutters, which is surprising. Just how long was he lost in his thoughts, then, if even the rabbits are safe to consume? As he watches, his brother takes one of the rabbits and two of the squirrels. He doesn’t offer Daryl any, and he seems to be willfully forgetting about Rick, so Daryl sighs and grabs the second rabbit and the two remaining squirrels, moving close enough to hand them to the cop but minding his distance just in case.
“Aren’t you going to eat those?” Rick looks from them up to him, and he shakes his head to make the fact that he’s avoiding eye contact less noticeable. There is still fire burning in the man’s eyes, even though he’s turned away from the flames slightly, and Daryl isn’t sure why such a look is being directed at someone like him. “When’s the last time you ate, Daryl?”
“Before we found ya this mornin’,” Merle answers for him around a mouthful of squirrel meat. He grins while chewing, but finds enough manners somewhere within himself to swallow the rest before speaking again. “My little brother don’t eat much, Officer Friendly, don’t worry about it.”
“Is that really wise though, considering how much running we all have to do? We need to keep up our strength.”
Narrowing his eyes, he glares at the man and snorts. Part of him is baffled that someone he just met cares so much about his well-being, all things considered. The rest of him is just annoyed at the fact that this stranger with eyes like thunderclouds thinks he’s incapable of taking care of himself just because he doesn’t speak.
“Trust me, we’ve run a lot more on a lot less. We can take care of ourselves, don’t ya worry. He’s probably just tryin’ ta be noble, ‘cause you don’t look like you’re real used ta goin’ hungry.”
Fast reaction times and Merle’s distraction means he doesn’t see the stick Daryl hurls at him until it cracks him across the shoulder. The pained grunt that follows makes him smirk, and by the time Merle’s head snaps over so he can fix him with the full force of his glare, he’s already waiting with an unimpressed face of his own.
Can you not insult the guy with the gun?
Oh please, could take him out one-handed. You wouldn’t even need hands. Just your teeth.
Looking away, Daryl grabs his crossbow from where he’d laid it on the ground nearby and stands up. Rick starts to stand too, already opening his mouth, but he gives the man a barely-noticeable shake of his head. It’s not his fault that Merle is an asshole who knows exactly how to hit him where it hurts. He’s just feeling unusually maudlin tonight, and that jibe about his teeth, complete with a pointed look at his mouth, has hit him harder than he probably should be letting it. Someone should be on watch anyway, especially since they have a fire going, so he flicks his fingers at his brother, who grunts in acknowledgement and sits back with a frown already dragging at the corners of his mouth. He knows what he’s done; has always known Daryl’s tells better than anyone. He’s not apologizing for it, though, and the archer isn’t expecting him to. He just waits until Rick’s sitting again and heads out to circle their pitiful little camp.
Being out in the woods, surrounded by the sounds of nature and the quiet murmurs of Rick’s deep, calm voice, is where Daryl finds peace enough to shake away his lingering emotions. It doesn’t even strike him as odd that he’s already using the low cadence of the man’s voice as his way of grounding and calming himself, because he’s using Georgia to do it, too. He feels more alive during the nighttime hours, probably considering his affliction, but tonight he feels even more restless. He can hear the shuffle and hiss of walkers, but they’re probably a good half-mile away, and they’re upwind, so he’s not worried about them catching their scents. It’s still edging into too warm, despite the fact that it’s nearly midnight—summer in Georgia unforgiving even at the coolest points. His shirt is sticking to him because of his sweat, his filthy dirty-blonde hair clinging to his temples in unruly wisps. He runs a hand through the mess of it, huffing in frustration. He misses his darker hair. It’s a stupid thing to miss, but it’s still true. He wasn’t even conscious when Merle decided to prank him by dying it, and he’d been absolutely livid when he’d woken up. His brother still has the scar on the side of his ribs from where Daryl had knocked him into a broken piece of the wall in their house. He has a scar that kind of matches it, though, because when their daddy had gotten home and seen what a mess they’d made of the living room, he’d been pissed enough that he’d grabbed the closest thing and gone at Daryl instead of taking the time to get his belt off.
Stopping to lean his shoulder against the sturdy trunk of a black walnut tree, he watches the progression of nocturnal creatures around him with glittering eyes. If he wanted to, he could rip this tree apart with his bare hands. Becoming what he is has made him stronger and faster than any human could hope to match, but it never mattered when his dad came after him with that look in his eye. He doesn’t know why he didn’t try to run more, or why when he did it was never enough. Maybe it was the memory of the times that he did run, and what happened to him afterwards when he’d had no choice but to finally creep back home.
The scars on his stomach itch when he thinks about it, and he scratches at them unconsciously with his free hand as he sinks further into the serenity of the night. When he’s once again emerged from the past, he pushes off of the tree and keeps walking. He listens to the life of the forest, listens to Rick’s voice. When the man stops talking, he listens to his heartbeat and the soothing sound of his blood pumping; hears the quiet sound of his breathing as it gets slow and deep. Merle’s heartbeat is a little faster, a little louder, and he knows his brother isn’t asleep. He can hear him kicking dirt over the fire before he settles down as well, probably thinking he can outlast Daryl’s stubbornness with his own.
He fails.
The sun has had time to brighten the sky when he finally wakes up Merle by kicking at his boot, his head tilted to the side and one eyebrow raised. His brother comes to a little violently, jackknifing into a sitting position with his knife already drawn. When he sees that it’s Daryl smirking down at him, he rolls his eyes and raises his middle finger. The archer replies in kind, giving his brother one last parting kick before he goes to crouch beside Rick and wake him up a lot more gently.
“The fuck’s this, baby brother?” Merle grouses behind him. Daryl ignores him, which is a common enough thing, and instead nudges Rick’s shoulder again. The man wakes up quickly, and a lot less violently, blinking open his dark blue eyes and smiling as soon as he sees Daryl. It’s a soft, just-woken-up smile, and it makes his breath catch in the worst way.
“’S it my turn for watch?” His voice is low and gravelly, and it does horrible things to Daryl’s heart, so he shakes his head roughly and turns away.
“Ain’t no one’s turn, since someone decided he was gonna keep watch the whole damn night, apparently,” Merle scoffs. They glare at each other, but Rick makes a noise that is too close to distressed for him to ignore. When he turns to look, he finds the man on his feet with a hand running through his hair, probably trying to tame the curling ends of it.
“Why didn’t you wake one of us? You need sleep just as badly as we do, Daryl.”
Daryl doesn’t, though, not really. He can go for days without sleep, just so long as he’s fed enough. The hunger is still quiet, although he knows that’s something that’s going to change by the end of the day. He’ll need to kill something before tomorrow morning, so he’ll find something after Rick’s asleep again. Merle is looking at him, and he knows his brother is thinking the same thing. It shouldn’t be too hard to keep this secret, considering that they’ve hidden it just fine for nine years already. Their daddy had never even found out, and he was breathing down their necks damn near every moment he was home.
Rather than answering, Merle tosses the last rabbit at Rick after kicking away most of the coals he’d used to bury it and keep it mostly warm. If the man has a problem with some ash and char in his mouth, he doesn’t say anything about it. He just eats his breakfast, glancing at Daryl. Knowing what he’s asking without even needing it put in words, he points at a few scraps of fur and bone nearby, rolling his eyes. It’s not his kill—he’d found the remains on his way back to wake them up—but it’s a good cover, and Rick seems to accept it. He smiles, relieved, and his scent lightens too.
They don’t linger for much longer, because they’ve got a lot of ground to cover before the end of the day. Merle takes the lead, so he hangs back a little behind Rick, watching the way the man moves. He seems pretty sure of himself, his confidence too far from arrogance to raise Daryl’s proverbial hackles. He’s seen plenty of other people out in the woods before, whether they were hikers or families looking for a day of fun. None of them had known what they were doing, stumbling over rocks and tripping over roots the entire way. Rick walks with confidence, though, not even paying attention to where he’s putting his feet and yet not catching his boots on anything once.
“Thank you for letting me come with you,” he says after they’ve been walking in silence for a good while. Daryl glances over at him, distracted for a moment by the way the sunlight dapples over his cheeks where it’s managing to break through the thick foliage above them. God, this man is gorgeous. It’s almost unfair how much so.
He’s known for a long time that he’s gay. It’s never been something he’s had to worry about, because what man in his right mind would want a Dixon in his bed? He’s never really run into anyone he’s wanted a romp with, either. Sure, he’s met attractive men in his life, but the majority of them were assholes or otherwise unavailable in some way, shape, or form. The fear of what his daddy would do if he ever found out was also a good motivator for Daryl to tamp down on those ‘unnatural’ feelings. He’s always been weird about any kind of romantic attraction, too. Being nice to look at is one thing, but none of those men made him feel the desire to strip naked and offer himself for the taking. What’s the point if your partner is just going to walk away once the deed is done?
Rick looks at him, dipping his head to catch his eyes when Daryl tries to look away. He finds himself ensnared easily and bites the inside of his lip, worrying at the spot with his teeth. The man is attractive, and there’s a calmness about him that is almost deceptive, but not at all manufactured. No, it’s not a fake front he’s got going on—he is genuinely a calm, relaxed person. He’s shown them that. Daryl can’t stop remembering the feral light in his eyes when they’d found him, though, and how he’d been taking down the walkers that had stumbled upon him with ease. The way the firelight had burned in his eyes last night, too, spoke to a deeper darkness inside the man that he’s almost positive few people have ever seen. This isn’t some cop who sits on his ass and eats donuts.
“You okay?”
Nodding, Daryl stops chewing on the inside of his lip and licks across the bottom one instead. Merle glances back at him, eyebrows raised. He huffs at his brother and rolls his eyes, ignoring the answering snort. Rick looks between them curiously but doesn’t ask for elaboration.
They continue on, keeping to the forest rather than traveling by the main roads. As they draw closer to the outskirts of Atlanta, Daryl’s grip on his crossbow gets tighter and tighter. He can hear walkers more frequently now—frequently enough that Merle drops back and lets him take the lead instead, because he can hear them better and he knows where to go to keep them far enough away. Rick doesn’t comment on that, either, which he is silently grateful for. He knows Merle would be able to explain it away easily, but sometimes suspicion is a tricky thing. Once it’s taken root, it can fester in the back of one’s subconscious mind until it’s impossible to ignore and the damage is already done. If at all possible, he would like to avoid that from anyone they may run into.
If they’re lucky, they’ll reach Atlanta by morning. However, luck is apparently not on their side, because Daryl hears the sound of too many hungry, focused walkers a split second before all three of them hear screaming.
Rick is the first one to start running, drawing his colt mid-stride. Daryl follows right on his heels, gritting his teeth and holding his crossbow ready. Merle doesn’t even protest, just brings his knife up and keeps close. The forest slopes up a little, something that’s too small to be a mountain and too high to be a hill. The screams are coming from the other side of it, so Daryl ranges out to cover Rick’s right while Merle does the same for his left, the two of them offering cover as they crest the top of the rise.
The high sides of the quarry and a sparkling lake are the first things Daryl sees. The beauty of it is ruined by the walkers that have overrun the group that has used this place as shelter. He fires without thought, the bolt slamming home through the skull of a walker that’s pinning a shrieking girl to the ground. She can’t be older than twelve or thirteen, and the way her look of terror morphs to one of shock would almost be comical if it wasn’t because she’d almost just died. He kicks the corpse away before her trembling arms give out, hauling her up onto his hip and running before she realizes what’s happening. He lets her cling to him, her arms around his neck, and kicks a few walkers out of his way as he makes for the Winnebago he can see parked nearby. There’s an old man standing in front of the door, a bucket hat on his head and a rifle braced against his shoulder.
“Sophia!” He drops his weapon and reaches out to take the girl, who tightens her arms around Daryl’s throat to the point of discomfort before he makes a calming noise and manages to hand her over. As soon as his arm’s free, he drops his crossbow and reloads it quickly, giving the man no chance to say anything before he’s running back toward where he saw Rick go. He passes Merle, who’s holding his own with no problem, his eyes fierce and his cheeks flecked with blood as he stabs any of the undead that get too close to him or anyone else who is living.
The people here are woefully unprepared for what has happened. Aside from Rick’s gun and the old man’s, he only hears one or two others. Most of the survivors here are using whatever they can to take down the rabid herd. For some, it’s not enough, and they fall beneath the press of bodies. Others are holding their own, though, determined to keep breathing.
When he gets to Rick, the man has reholstered his gun and drawn his knife instead, the darkness Daryl had sensed before coming to life in his rage-black eyes. He puts his back to the man’s, shouldering his crossbow in favor of his own blade. He can see the huddled bodies of a few people in the tent Rick has put himself in front of, but doesn’t stop long enough to see any details. There are only a few walkers left, and night is encroaching faster now. They have to take care of this before anyone else dies.
Daryl feels the thrill of the fight burning through him, his blood singing and his instincts roaring. He bares his teeth, his canines aching, and growls as he puts his blade into the last walker’s skull so hard he feels too much of it give way, a bit of his tempered strength slipping free as it crumples and he follows it down. Yanking the steel free, he stands and wipes the weapon clean on his shirt; his nostrils flaring as he looks around to make sure they’re all truly gone. Merle is standing beneath a tall, healthy tree nearby, bodies littering the ground around him and his head tipped back to peer up into the branches. Curious, he follows his brother’s gaze and sees pale flesh and darker cloth.
“Come on down, now, kid. Ain’t none of ‘em left ta hurtcha. We took care of them bastards.”
He can hear Rick following behind him, and when the man trips over his own feet it’s startling enough that he turns to make sure he’s okay, his brow furrowed. One look at his face and he understands, though, because the tragic hope mingled with the lingering fear leaves him in no doubt of who could be up in that tree. He turns again to stare up through the leaves, coming close enough to get a better look at the kid. The first thing he sees are the boy’s eyes, which are blue and wide and looking past Daryl as they fill with tears. There’s no mistaking that dark hair, either, even if it lacks any kind of curls.
“Dad?”
Rick chokes on his next breath, stepping past Daryl and looking like he’s ready to climb the tree himself, but his son is already scrambling to get down and get to his father as fast as he can, another cry of, “Dad!” ripping from his young throat. When he’s down far enough, he just jumps the rest of the way, throwing himself into Rick’s arms and clinging tightly as the man takes them both to the ground.
“Carl,” Rick breathes. He curls over him, protecting the child with his bigger body, his arms tight and his eyes wide open and fixed on Daryl even as he whispers to his son that everything’s going to be okay.
Thank you, his eyes say, so dark and fierce and full of the kind of love that the younger Dixon has never been able to understand. He knows, objectively, that plenty of fathers out there love their sons and will do anything for them—has known Rick was one of those men ever since he told Merle he was looking for his family. To actually see it, though, to see Rick cradling his boy to his chest in front of a group of strangers, makes his breath freeze in his lungs and his fist clench around the hilt of his knife.
Thank you, Rick is telling him, and Daryl doesn’t know what else to do but swallow thickly and give a small nod in return. People are starting to gather, checking each other over and coming to see who the newcomers are. He watches them, which is why he sees the woman when she steps out of the tent, her hand trembling when she puts it against her own mouth.
“Rick?” she whispers. A man steps up behind her, his hair a mess of curls and his eyes wide. He puts a hand on the woman’s shoulder, then steps past her.
“Rick,” he chokes out, and Rick’s head snaps up. Daryl watches the comprehension dawn on his face as he sees who it is, and he gets to his feet with Carl in his arms, tears filling his eyes as he reaches out with his free hand.
“Shane.” He looks past her. “Lori.”
It looks like he's found his family, then. Daryl steps back to give them room, taking his place at Merle’s side and ignoring the looks they’re already getting when the little girl he’d saved pushes her way through the throng of people and throws her arms around his waist. He grunts in surprise and drops his knife before she hurts herself, reaching down to steady her in case she misjudges the distance and falls.
“Are you the one who saved her?” A woman with buzzed hair and a pixie-like face comes forward, tears in her eyes and the fading reminder of a bruise peeking out from the collar of her shirt. He looks at her and nods, then looks down at the little girl and sees the dark smudge of fingerprints on her upper arm.
“Thank you, mister,” the girl—Sophia, isn’t that what the old man had called her?—whispers into the front of his shirt. “Thank you for saving us.”
Unsure of what else to do, he nods and pats the little girl’s back, trying to coax her into letting go without being too forceful. She must understand, because she steps back and wipes at her eyes before giving him a smile that leaves him feeling warm and dumbfounded simultaneously. All he gets is a second to breathe, because then her mother is hugging him too, and he can’t stop the way he flinches this time. She lets go immediately when she feels it, giving him his space and pinning him in place with the most heartfelt smile anyone has ever bestowed upon him.
“I’d say you’ve earned your place,” she murmurs, and the first tendrils of hope that stir in his chest remind him of brand new buds blooming in spring. It’s a feeling he’s unfamiliar with, but it leaves him feeling the closest to content he’s ever come. When he looks over at Rick again, the man is looking at him over his wife’s head, smiling and smelling like the wilds of Georgia and something that reminds him of cinnamon. No one has ever looked at Daryl like that, like they’re grateful he’s alive. It makes the tiny blossom burst into full bloom; turns it from a fragile buttercup to a reaching fern. One of those fronds is reaching for Rick, and he knows that it’s a bad idea. Right here, right now, surrounded by strangers and being looked at the way he is, he can’t find it in himself to do anything about it though.