#crossbowking

Daryl Dixon wasn’t exactly a ray of sunshine either, but there was this strange pull you felt towards him, and you were sure that below all the grumpy exterior, there were layers, lots and lots of them. You couldn’t know for sure, though, ‘cause it was hard to approach the guy, but you had a hunch he was one of the good ones. He had potential - potential to become a valuable and vital part of the group, and you still felt in debt with him, for getting you off that damn walker-surrounded tree you got stuck on the other day. 

That’s why you pushed yourself up to your feet and grabbed the bowl of food that remained untouched, hesitating for a moment, as you noticed a couple of people eyeing you curiously, before you turned towards his tent, simply mumbling – “The guy has to eat,” as if trying to justify yourself for being a decent person.

Daryl’s glare remained stuck to the flickering flames, stubbornly refusing to acknowledge your presence as you approached him, but you lowered yourself to the ground next to him, sticking the bowl under his nose and whispering a silent “Hi." 

Greeting you with nothing more than an icy look and a nod, ignoring the food you brought, he pulled back to his own thoughts, probably expecting you to just leave him be. But two could play this game, and when it came to being mulish, you were hard to beat.

Once you had your mind stuck onto something, you would hardly ever give up on it. Right now, you approached the guy to make him eat, and there was no way in hell you’d leave before he’d eaten. A quite convenient excuse…

"They shouldn’t have done it. I’m sorry,” you started, “I know you’re pissed right now. Worried sick, probably. I get it, I would be too. Your brother’s an asshole, though, you know. Most times you’re an asshole too, but you’re okay, I think.” Your gaze shifted from the bowl to the man, eyes meeting his as you spoke. You might’ve not been the best at complimenting, but you meant good.

“Ya don’ have to do that. Don’t need no babysitter.” He mumbled, finger pointing to the food in your hands.

“You don’t have to be an asshole now, you know?”

“And you don’t have to act like ya care.”

It was worse than we’d thought.

As we drove along the interstate, watching the fields go by in a sepia blur, it became quite obvious that we were going to need more people to get this job done. Daryl rose ahead, a good few metres in front of Michonne, Glenn, and I in our little sedan. At our backs, Tyreese and his sister, Sasha, drove the truck a handful of car lengths behind. As our little convey grew closer to the turn off that lead down to the first farmhouse, we couldn’t help but notice the biters shuffling through the fields. They began to group together the further along we drove, forming denser packs, almost multiplying in numbers with each passing mile.

By the time the turn off came into view, we knew it was going to be next to impossible to make it down that damn dirt road.

Daryl pulled off to the side, rolling to a stop and lifting his hand to indicate we do the same. Michonne brought the car to a stop beside him and I rolled down my window, opening my mouth to speak but finding myself only able to grimace as the truck behind us came to a halt. The squeak of the breaks was loud enough to draw the attention of a few dozen biters within the fields to our right. Thankfully, as they stumbled toward us, the barbed wire fence made short work of stopping them.

“There’s gotta be more than two-hundred of ‘em,” Daryl remarked, gesturing with one hand toward the dirt road just in view over the slight hill before us.

“Well, I got thirty bullets,” I remarked with a soft grin. “So, I’ll just have to take out six or so for every shot. That’ll be a piece of cake, right?”

Daryl snorted but shook his head, anyway, just in case I was being serious. “Ain’t no way we’re cutting a path for the cars.”

I straightened in my seat in order to peer across Daryl, to the dirt road. Even from this distance, I could see the bobbing heads of biters, so numerous they all but shrouded the horizon with their numbers. A frown formed on my face as I turned to look at Michonne.

“Way I see it, we have two choices. Glenn and Sasha drive while the four of us cut down as many as we can,” I said. “Or, we go home.” And I use way too much magic to grow the crops and likely end up putting my moronic ass in a coma or something equally irritatingly stupid.

Michonne pursed her lips in thought, looking across me at Daryl and lifting a questioning brow. Glenn leant forwards, putting his head in the space between the two front seats and looking at us all in turn.

“Why do I have to drive?” he asked.

“You want the honest answer to that?” I responded, turning in my seat to look at him with a bemused grin. “Maggie would kill us if anything happened to you. Also, it would disappoint Hershel, which is somehow more terrifying a prospect than Maggie’s rage.”

Glenn snorted.

“Hershel will be disappointed if we push on when we know we shouldn’t,” Michonne said plainly, sinking back into her seat.

Behind us, Tyreese climbed out of the truck bed and made his way over to us, coming to a stop beside Daryl’s bike.

“What’s the game plan?” he asked, leaning down in order to peer through my open window at the rest of us.

I glanced at Michonne and Glenn before turning back to the other two with a shrug. “Fuck knows, mate.”

“We could take the truck through, run ‘em down?” Tyreese suggested.

I shook my head the same time Daryl said, “Nah.”

“It might work for a solid minute or two, but sooner or later, you’ll get bogged in corpses,” I said with a grimace. “Which, believe me, will not be pretty.”

Tyreese’s face scrunched into a cringe as he shook his head. “Yeah, maybe not.”

“We could lead them away?” Glenn suggested, giving me and Michonne a hopeful smile.

“Could work,” I responded. “How’d you go about it?”

Glenn glanced down at the sedan’s console, brows furrowing as he reached out a hand to play with one of the buttons on the dusty radio. “We could turn on the music? Lure them down?”

“If you’re comfortable with two-hundred undead groupies following you and your music along, sure,” I remarked with a chuckle.

Glenn frowned, leaning forward a fraction further to look up at Tyreese. “Does the radio work in the truck?”

“Yes,” I answered before Tyreese even had a chance to think on it. When I received a handful of confused looks, I glanced out the window at Daryl with a bemused chuckle. “Merle and I used to take it out on runs. We’d fight over the music.” My gaze slid back across to Tyreese as I gestured with my hand toward the truck itself. “There should be a couple of good ole tapes in the centre consol. Do not touch the ones that have an “M” written on them, unless you want your ears to bleed.”

Daryl snorted at that, which made me smile.

“Alright, I’ll get Sasha to drive to the opening of the road,” Tyreese began with a serious nod. “Once she’s cleared some of them out, the four of us will head down there and cut down what we can.”

“Four? What about me?” Glenn asked with a frown.

“You drive behind us,” I said, looking up at Tyreese to make sure that was where his head had been, too. “Watch our backs and give us an easy out if things get too much.”

Tyreese nodded, a smile slowly stretching across his face. “Exactly.”

We grinned at one another for a moment and I felt myself beginning to wonder if he was starting to believe I wasn’t quite as unnerving as he’d originally thought. The thought made my chest warm slightly. It was nice to think, even just for a moment, that maybe not everyone on the council agreed with Claire.

Daryl kicked the stand on his bike out and slid off the seat, walking around it to stand by my window as Tyreese strode down to the trunk in order to inform his sister of our plans. His eyes were narrowed slightly in the stream of sunlight that cast a hollow shadow across his face as he peered into the car.

“You sure ‘bout this?” he asked us.

I gave a confident nod, as did Michonne. Glenn seemed a little put out, but he lifted his head in response anyway. Daryl’s boots shuffled against the asphalt as he shifted his weight, taking a deep breath and blowing it out through his nose in a sigh.

“Why, you scared, Little Dixon?” I asked, grinning cheekily up at him.

He cocked a thin brow and scoffed. “Like hell.”  

The sound of a slamming door behind us made him straighten, turning to look back as Tyreese made his way toward the car with a fire axe gripped tightly in both of his meaty hands. Daryl pulled his crossbow from his shoulder and stepped back to allow me space to exit the vehicle.

Michonne got out with me, stepping to the back to collect her blade as Glenn crawled through the centre to find his place in the driver’s seat.

“We set?” Tyreese asked, looking between us all as I unsheathed the two knives on my belt.

Michonne secured the strap of her sheath over his shoulders and nodded.

“Keen as a bean,” I remarked, skilfully spinning the two knives in my hands.

Tyreese looked down at them with a small frown before glancing down the road, waving a hand at his sister. Her head was barely visible above the dashboard of the truck as it rumbled to a start.

I looked down at my hands as I spun the knives, pursing my lips in thought. Often, I’d find myself wondering exactly what level of skill I should really be displaying in front of the others. After all, there was no one currently left alive that knew the truth of my previous profession. And I kind of wanted to keep it that way. Which meant, keeping a lid on the extent of my murderous abilities. However, could I truly hold myself back when doing so could potentially put Daryl or Michonne at risk?

These were the kinds of questions that kept me up at night.

As the truck peeled out from its position behind the sedan, Sasha wound down the window and hit play on the radio. Clear as day, loud enough to rattle the windows, the sound of Celine Dion’s voice cut through the silent air like a blade through a biters skull.

Instantly, everyone turned to look at me with a cocked brow. Even Daryl.

I pointed at him. “Don’t you look at me. That’s your brothers.”

His brows rose. “Bullshit.”

“Cross my heart.” My grin widened as Daryl’s look of confusion morphed into an amused smile.

“Bullshit,” he echoed, though more out of surprise than accusation.

“Never would have guessed,” Michonne remarked with an equally amused grin.

“He was a man of many mysteries,” I remarked, chuckling under my breath as I watched Sasha pull the truck over to the opening of the turn off.  

The biters along the road began to shuffle down toward her, kicking up a cloud of dirt as they moved in uncoordinated unison toward the loud sounds coming from the truck. We waited until Sasha had begun to pull away, leading a long line of undead behind her, before we began to move forward.

By the time we got there, Sasha was already almost half a mile down the road, a trail of biters following along to the sounds of Celine Dion’s voice. Glenn rolled to a stop at the opening of the road as Daryl lifted his crossbow and shot an arrow clear through the closest biter’s face. I began to march my way down the dirt path, twirling my knives until I came close enough to strike. Quick as a snake, I thrust my arm out, clearing the two biters on either side of me in one smooth motion. Before they had even hit the ground, I stepped forward, slashing upwards with one hand and slicing a biter’s face near in half before twisting around it to stab another pair through their eye sockets.

Michonne slashed along behind me, followed by Tyreese as he grunted and swung his axe down on biter after biter. Daryl remained a few paces back for the first few before shouldering the crossbow and using both his bowie knife and one of the loose arrows he’d pulled from a biter to clear the way.

Glenn remained at a safe distance, rolling the car along with us as we made slow progress up the dirt road.

The biters out in the fields had begun to shuffle their way over toward the road, too, catching themselves on the barbed wire fence like a group of flies attracted to honey. Though, the more of them that came, the less stable the fence became. I kept half an eye on the wooden posts holding the wire together as I cut my way through biter after biter, noting the way the ground behind the post began to move as the wood was pushed forwards.

We were far enough down the dirt road that the farmhouse was clear in view, barely half a mile away. All we needed to do was reach it before those fences gave way.

#

Luck, as it turned out, was not on our side.

We’d barely made it another ten or so feet down the dirt road before I heard the tell-tale sound of splintering wood. It was slight enough that I knew I was the only one that heard it, barely loud enough to catch my attention over the gargling biters and Tyreese, Michonne, and Daryl’s grunts of effort as they sliced and diced their way down the path.

I stabbed and slashed at the two biters between me and Daryl faster than what was likely humanly possible, reaching out to catch his arm. Before he could even turn to face me, I began yanking him backward, toward the car.

“Ty! Michonne! The car! Now!”

None of them argued. My tone of voice left no room for disagreement.

As we moved toward the car, I waved at Glen to move aside. He put the car in park and slid between the two seats, pushing open the door for Michonne and Ty to climb in beside him. I let go of Daryl only long enough for him to make a move toward the passenger’s side whilst I dove into the driver’s seat and slammed the door shut on a biter’s outstretched hand. The thing fell into my lap but I paid it no mind as I shoved the car back into gear.

The sound of cracking wood echoed through the air outside, loud enough now that the others could hear it, even through the closed windows. It started behind us. Biters began to surge forward as the wooden posts gave way beneath their weight, trampling over the fallen barbed wire in their path as they went. A morbidly amusing thought came to mind as I watched the fence give way in the rear-view mirror, post after post. It was like a damn Mexican wave of undead, surging onto the dirt road.

I slammed my foot down on the gas, propelling us forward and into the gathered crowd of biters beyond. Bodies crashed against the bonnet of the car as we sped forwards, smashing into the windscreen, spreading spiderwebs across the glass and decorating them with leaking viscera. It got so bad that I could barely see through the layer of blood and gore, which wasn’t great, considering I was speeding forwards at sixty miles an hour down a short dirt road.

Thankfully, I was the one behind the wheel. My keen eyes and lightning fast reflexes enabled me to react at a rate far superior than the average human.

All it took was a glimpse, slight thought it was, to know where I was and what I needed to do. Without warning, I jerked the wheel to the side. The car slid out, drifting sideways down the last stretch of road, knocking back biter after biter until our speed was reduced to almost nothing.

We skid to a stop merely two feet away from the staircase that lead up to the farmhouse’s entrance. Daryl pushed his door open, lifting his crossbow and taking a blind shot at the biter hovering outside before pushing past it and leaping up the first stair.

Michonne, Glenn, and Ty slid out of the back, following Daryl up the staircase. Biters trailed behind them, too busy on their tail to notice that the door to the car had been left open and I was still inside.

There were too many of them for me to even attempt to get through, so I waited until I heard the front door slam open and then shut before I made my move.

I leant back in my seat and kicked out at the cracks in the windshield, shattering the glass with enough force to pop out the window’s frame. Cautiously, I climbed through and onto the bonnet. The metal was slick with blood. My boots barely had enough grip to counter it, though it thankfully made it a lot more difficult for the biters to climb up alongside me.

They noticed my presence instantly, turning away from the front door of the farmhouse and all but throwing themselves down the staircase toward me. From the road, more and more of them flooded forwards, crashing into the side of the car with enough force to rock it from side to side.

I almost lost my balance as I stepped toward the house, looking up at the overhanging eave that kept the porch shielded from the midday sun.

“Syn! Let me go! She’s still out there! Syn!”

I heard Daryl’s voice screaming from inside the farmhouse and swallowed back against my rising trepidation. The car was rocking violently now, as if I were standing atop a boat in the midst of an ocean storm.

Without thinking about how difficult a jump like this would have been for any regular person, I leapt, reaching my hands out to grip onto the eave’s guttering. Using my body’s momentum, I swung back, simultaneously using my grip to pull myself up and onto the overhanging roof. I scrambled up onto the tiles, cautious not to disrupt them from their placing as I climbed onto my feet.

I could hear rapid footfalls from inside, growing louder and louder until Daryl’s panicked face appeared through the glass of the second story window before me. He reached down and unlatched it, pulling half of the frame up as I made my way up the slight slant of the roof toward him.  

Once I was close enough, he stepped back to give me enough room to slide inside.

Michonne, Glenn and Ty appeared in the doorway of what appeared to be a teenage girl’s bedroom, their expressions of relief matched only by their exhausted laughs.

“Thought you were a goner for a second there,” Glenn remarked, stepping further in the room in order to slap a hand against my shoulder.

I snorted a laugh. “Ye of little faith.”

Tyreese, leaning against the doorframe, cleared his throat. “I don’t mean to ruin the moment, here, but, uh… Now what?”

I pursed my lips as I turned in place to look back out the window I had climbed in through, taking in the ocean of biters that had rolled in from the fields. They had begun to surround the house, almost mindlessly, as if they were propelled by little more than the very basic need for movement.