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Scott Street: Prologue - The Road to Atlanta (OC x TWD)

Daisy Grimes was only sixteen years old. She shouldn’t have had any more to worry about than — at least in her opinion — what was soon to be her parents' impending divorce. She was supposed to be drinking too much at parties her friends made her sneak out to, or being endlessly annoyed by her endearing yet infuriating little brother who had apparently made it his life’s mission to irritate his big sister to death. She was supposed to be worrying about college, or if she’d be asked to the dances, and whether or not she was going to beg her parents to finally get the family a cat for the sixteenth year in a row. Slowly but surely, Daisy was cracking away at their resolve, and she was sure this time that it finally was her year.

But then Daisy came home to the news that her Dad had been shot. And, as if that wasn’t enough to bring her world to a halt, an outbreak of a rapidly spreading virus took over the world while he was still in the hospital. Along with her family, Daisy was uprooted from her home and forced on the run where she had to fight to survive and keep her family safe every day, while still desperately grasping for some form of normalcy and domesticity.

Even after being reunited with her Dad and meeting new people who might not have been blood but certainly were still family, she realized her world would never be the same. As the days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months, months turned into years….Daisy changed.

And she wasn’t so sure that was a good thing anymore.

—

Walking Scott Street, feeling like a stranger

With an open heart, open container

I've got a stack of mail and a tall can

It's a shower beer, it's a payment plan

There's helicopters over my head

Every night when I go to bed

Spending money and I earned it

When I'm lonely, that's when I'll burn it

Do you feel ashamed

When you hear my name?

Anyway, don't be a stranger

Don't be a stranger

—

Daisy couldn’t make it out the front door fast enough. She made the mistake of snoozing her alarm, which led to her missing the bus, and that led to her having to confront her already pissed off Mom to ask her for a ride to school.

On a normal day, Lori would have been happy to do so. It was rare that her daughter asked her for something, and even rarer that she actually volunteered to spend time with her. Lori could count the days on her fingers in the past few months that Daisy had actually stepped out of her room long enough to spend time with her. But at the end of the day, Lori couldn’t blame her. If she’d had to wake up to her parents bickering every morning, she’d have spent a lot more time hiding in her room listening to music too. She even considered it some mornings when her mind was still reeling from a petty argument with Rick the night before, but then she’d feel guilty and get up to make everyone pancakes before they started their day. She was determined that they were going to be the kind of family that got up to eat pancakes together, and she’d be damned if anything got in the way of that – even if it was her lack of cooking skills.

But today was not a normal day.

There were no pancakes on the table, or a family happily sitting down to eat them. Carl had already left, carpooling with the neighbor’s kid. Rick was running late for work too, fumbling around for his keys while Lori stood in the kitchen, still in her pajamas.

They had argued the night before – it was getting to be a regular occurrence at this point.

And, while they often shielded Carl from it, Daisy more often than not got an unwanted earful. This time, Daisy couldn’t even tell what they were arguing about. She had just woken up to the sound of bickering muffled through the wall. She’d managed to get herself dressed and ready for school in record time, and now she was standing by the front door waiting for the passive aggressive comments to stop so that she could actually make it to class on time. Her parents apparently were determined to make that quite the feat for her. She was debating swiping the keys to her Mom’s car and driving herself when she heard Lori mutter under her breath.

“I wish you would just say it.”

Daisy could hear Rick let out an impatient sigh from down the hall. “Say what, Lori?”

Lori scoffed, and Daisy could practically feel her eyes roll. “Whatever the hell it is you’re not saying. Just say it! Speak!”

“There’s nothing to say–”

“Oh, for the love of God,” Daisy whined for the third time that morning, pausing her parents' bickering. “Can you do this later? I’m gonna be late, and I have a test in first period.”

There was a pause, and she could hear the sound of Rick’s keys as he made his way to the kitchen. He and Lori spoke in a hushed whisper for a while, until that whisper was on the verge of shouting. After she got tired of tapping her foot on the floor for an eternity, Daisy finally marched into the kitchen to see what the argument was about for herself. Her cheeks flushed as she caught the tail end of her parent’s conversation, which came to an abrupt halt as Lori spoke in anger without thinking.

“Sometimes I wonder if you even care about us at all.”

Daisy backed out of the room and headed for the front door before she could even see the shared look of guilt on their faces. Lori sighed as the sound of Rick’s hurried footsteps followed Daisy out into the living room.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured, an awkward silence passing between him and his daughter. “You know she didn’t mean that. She’s just pissed at me, you know how she gets. It was my fault really.”

“It’s fine, Dad,” Daisy replied, her gaze set on the floor.

Another awkward silence passed as Daisy traced over the pattern on the rug with her eyes. Rick shifted back and forth uncomfortably, before placing a hand on Daisy’s shoulder. She reluctantly met his gaze, shrugging her shoulders.

“It’s fine,” she muttered, speaking under her breath. “Nothing I haven’t heard before.”

Rick’s face fell, and Daisy quickly headed for the kitchen before the guilt could settle into the pit in her stomach. She stuck her head around the corner, stopping in her tracks when she saw her Mom hastily wiping away tears from under her eyes. Lori’s lashes were still wet when Daisy backtracked to the front door where Rick was still waiting.

“I’m just gonna walk today,” she announced.

“Honey, no,” Lori tried to reason, fumbling around in the kitchen for her keys. “I’ll drive you. Just let me grab my purse.”

“It’s only a few blocks, I’ll be fine.”

Rick shook his head, agreeing with Lori. “Daisy, let your Mom take you. You’ll drive her insane if you don’t let her take care of you. It’s her way or the highway.”

Daisy could hear the attempt at humor in his voice. He was trying to make light of the situation, and Daisy could appreciate that. Her parents were trying to be civil and rational. She could see the effort they were putting in every day to try and work on how they spoke to each other, if not for themselves then for their kids. But something in his voice rubbed Daisy the wrong way, and she already had too much on her mind to add her parents fighting like children to the list.

Daisy snapped, spitting out poison. “You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you? You’d think you would have learned by now, Dad. I guess you can always try your luck next time.”

“Days–”

“What?” she spat, unlocking the front door as quickly as she could.

“Look at me.”

Daisy begrudgingly turned around, meeting her Dad’s stern gaze. His jaw was clenched, but he took a deep breath to calm himself down. He always did this – stared at her in silence until he was sure the next words either of them spoke wouldn’t be shouted. He’d used her nickname that only he got the free pass to use, knowing no one else had called her Days since she was little when she decided it sounded too childish. For whatever reason, Daisy could never bring herself to ask her Dad to stop using it. So he saved it for moments like these, when he wanted his little girl to take a breath and listen to him. It was his way of silently saying sorry for whatever it was that was happening between the two of them, and it worked almost every time.

Almost every time. Rick couldn’t even get a hand on her shoulder before Daisy was recoiling, pulling away from him.

“Just stop, Dad!” Daisy shouted, untangling her earbuds as she rambled. “I don’t need this shit today, alright? I’m already late. Please, just save the caring act for Carl. I’m sure he’s the only one in this house that still believes it. God knows I’ve seen it enough times to know that it’s bullshit, so just stop, okay? Go to work and play hero to strangers, Dad. I don’t need you. It's not like you've been much of one to me lately."

She regretted her words as soon as she said them. He was trying to be nice and make the start of her day better, but all she could do was make the situation worse in her anger. She quickly turned around and headed out the door before she could dig herself into an even bigger hole, shoving her earbuds in her ears. She was out the door before he could come up with something to say.

Rick didn’t follow after her this time.

—

Daisy couldn’t focus the whole day. Her parents fighting always put her in a sour mood, and it ruined any potential she had at staying on task. She was almost positive she had bombed her test in first period, or maybe by some miracle she’d managed to scrape by with a C. It was all so hazy in her mind, she couldn’t really tell. Either way, she wasn’t happy. But despite her best efforts, all she could focus on was the conversation she had with her parents that morning.

She didn’t know why she acted the way she did.

When her parents first started fighting, she was always quick to step in and try to diffuse the situation. But she was sixteen now, and the fights that her parents had were beginning to happen more and more often. It had gotten very old, and so she couldn’t help but snap on mornings like this. She’d spend the rest of the day regretting it, and the guilt Lori and Rick also felt from fighting with each other – especially in front of their kid – would postpone their next argument to at least another day out.

At least they all agreed on something – feeling guilty.

Daisy took the bus on the way home. The bus was the place Daisy did her very best thinking. All the ideas about different ways she could apologize or get her parents to apologize to each other filled her head. By the time the bus made it to her stop, she had plenty of methods stocked up. Daisy was about to stand up and grab her backpack when a sudden feeling washed over her. Reluctantly, she let go of her bag. She couldn’t bring herself to get off the bus. Instead, she waited until the doors closed to settle back into her seat, letting the driver continue on down the road.

After a few stops, the bus stopped at the end of Scott Street.

Scott Street was Daisy’s very first home. Her parents married young, barely out of their own parents' houses when they found out Lori was pregnant. They were eighteen and stupid, but Lori was determined to create the little family she had always dreamed of. Naive and in love, Rick did everything he could to give it to her.

He started in the police academy, quickly becoming an officer, while Lori took night classes to get a business degree. She never really did end up using it, but at the time she figured it would come in handy one day. It didn’t hurt to get it, and they still could get by on the combined little bit of money their parents gave them to start their own lives. Their first home together was a little apartment by the community college. Slowly, they saved and saved. By the third trimester, they had enough saved to put a down payment on a little house on the edge of the suburbs. It wasn’t much to look at, and it was too cramped for a family of four – they had moved into their current home by the time Carl was around. But their little house on Scott Street was their first home. And, although Daisy hadn’t lived there for quite some time, she still had good memories there. On days like this when her family was fighting, she’d long for her first home.

Before the bus could pull away, Daisy quickly shot out of her seat and stepped off the bus. She gave the driver a friendly wave, taking out her earbuds to roll them up and shove them in her jacket pocket as she stepped out of the street and onto the sidewalk. She watched the bus pull away, leaving her alone on the quiet street.

Daisy slowly walked to the third house down on the left. It had been repurchased since her time there. The new owners had painted over the quaint shade of yellow with a dull gray, and the pretty white trim was now a dirty charcoal color. The red door Daisy had toddled through so many times with her parents hot on her heels was now painted a dusty looking brown. The flower beds Lori could never seem to keep alive had been ripped up and replaced with a layer of mulch. Even the car parked in the driveway was a sad and dreary little thing, reflective of the sad and dreary little people that were living inside of Daisy’s house who had painted over and ruined all of its charm and comforting qualities.

Daisy hadn’t even realized she was crying until the tear rolling down her cheek fell onto her shirt. She quickly wiped under her eyes, clearing her throat as she shoved her earbuds back in. Daisy didn’t know why she was crying.

It was just a house.

It wasn’t her home anymore. It wasn’t the house she saw her little brother grow up in. It wasn’t the house her Mom let her keep the stray cat she found in for all of an afternoon before she discovered it was actually the neighbor's cat, and it was then promptly placed back outside next door. It wasn’t the house where she watched her Dad come home with a tired smile on his face, raving about the promotion he had gotten that day.

And yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was left behind here. A part of herself, or a part of her family – something that was keeping them together, and now that it was missing, they were finally starting to unravel.

Daisy quickly shook her head, taking one last look at the house before turning around and marching back down the street. She wiped under her eyes as she walked, humming along to the music in her ears as she found her way back home. The apology she had spent the entire bus ride working on was now on the tip of her tongue, and she was ready to get home and wait at the dining room table until both her parents were home so she could deliver it to them. But then she turned the corner in her neighborhood to her street.

A squad car was waiting in the driveway, and her Dad’s partner, Shane, was at the front door, frantically pounding on it.

Daisy could feel her stomach drop, a sick and twisted feeling in her gut stopping her in her tracks. She ripped her earbuds out for a final time, this time shoving them into her backpack out of her reach. After a minute, she finally got her feet to move. She slowly made her way down the sidewalk, stopping next to her mailbox. She couldn’t force her feet to take her any further.

She placed a hand on the mailbox, bracing herself as she called out to the man at her front door. “Shane?”

Her voice was quiet and cracked, but it was loud enough that Shane heard it. He whipped around, his eyes landing on her at the end of the driveway. Daisy couldn’t help but instantly notice the dried blood caked on his t-shirt under his uniform. He had clearly tried to scrub it off sometime earlier in the day, but he was too frantic or distracted to notice that he’d missed some. Daisy had to force herself to pry her eyes away from the stain, finally looking up to meet his gaze. Even if there wasn’t any blood, the ghostly white look on Shane’s face would have been enough to tell her that something was seriously wrong.

“Shane?” she asked again.

It was all she could bring herself to say.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he muttered, trying to mask the fear in his voice with calmness.

It was a tactic he had mastered when having to talk to the families of criminals and victims when something in a case went awry. He had gotten used to it by now – he was good at it, even. But at this moment, he couldn’t mask the shakiness in his voice. His eyes were soft on Daisy as he motioned to the squad car.

“Why don’t you come with me, alright?” he asked, opening up the passenger side door. “Your Dad wanted me to come tell you something.”

—

It was like her body was on autopilot.

She knew what was happening the moment she sat down in the car, but it was a shock to her system anyway. Shane told her about the call they responded to. Two armed and dangerous men being chased up and down backroads, firing at the officers any chance they got. They eventually were pinned down and in a shootout with responding officers. In the process, her Dad was shot. Once in the ribs, although the bulletproof vest caught the brunt of it. The worst he would have had from it was a nasty bruise. But the second time, he wasn’t so lucky. An unknown third man crawled out of the car and shot him through the shoulder. He was picked up in an ambulance and rushed to the hospital, passed out by the time surgeons got to him. Before he passed out, he told Shane to go to Lori and his kids. He wanted Shane to tell them that he loved him, and that he’d be okay.

Daisy had checked out of the conversation by the time Shane got to that part, her ears ringing and muffling his words. She didn’t even realize they had stopped until Shane put the car in park. She looked up to see Carl’s school, her Mom standing in the parking lot with the mother of one of Carl’s friends.

Daisy let out a shaky breath as Shane cleared his throat, wringing his hands together. “Why don’t you wait here, alright? I’ll handle this.”

Shane got out of the car before Daisy could even register what he said. He stepped a few feet from the car, waiting for Lori to approach him. Daisy watched as her Mom’s face fell, but she put on a brave face and walked over anyway. They had a muffled conversation before the sound of a school bell interrupted them.

Daisy perked up when kids began filing out of the school, happy smiles on their faces as they found their parents. She unbuckled and quickly scrambled out of the car once Carl came into view. She was halfway to him when she felt a hand in hers, turning her around.

“What are you doing?” Lori asked gently, bringing her free hand up to hold hers. “Shane said you haven’t spoken since he picked you up. Let me do this, baby girl. Everything is going to be alright, just go wait with Shane.”

Carl had stopped in the street now, a confused look on his face. Daisy glanced at him over her shoulder before quickly turning back to her Mom.

“Let me do it.”

Lori’s face fell as she shook her head. “Honey, no–”

“Mom…please,” she pleaded, squeezing Lori’s hand. “He can’t hear it the way I just heard it. I’ll be gentle, I won’t let him worry. He’ll know it’s bad if you do it.”

Daisy’s voice cracked halfway through her sentence, and she could see her Mom’s eyes fill with tears. It was silent for a moment before Lori nodded, pressing a kiss to the back of her hand. She squeezed it one more time before letting her go.

“I’ll be right here.”

Daisy nodded, turning back to face Carl. She quickly headed across the street, stopping in front of him. She sat down on the curb, patting the spot next to her for him to sit. He obliged, plopping down next to her with a goofy smile on his face.

“What are you doing here?”

“Not happy to see me?” Daisy scoffed, feigning offense. “It was a half day for the high school, remember?”

Carl nodded. Daisy smiled, slinging her arm around his shoulder. In her peripheral vision, she could see her Mom standing by the squad car. Her hands were shaking, and Shane had a comforting hand on her shoulder. Daisy took a deep breath, opening her mouth to speak.

Carl beat her to the punch. “What’s Shane doing here?”

“I need you to listen to me, okay?” Daisy spluttered out, hesitating for a moment. “Don’t make a big deal out of this, everything is fine. I promise. Just…let me say this.”

For once, Carl didn’t fight her on this or do any of the things little brothers do to endlessly annoy their big sisters. He just nodded, letting her take his hand. She gave it a squeeze, giving him a halfhearted smile.

“It’s Dad…there was an accident at work.”

Carl’s eyes widened and filled with fear. “What? Wh…What do you mean? What happened? Is he okay? Is he de–”

“No!” Daisy quickly answered, squeezing his hand. “No. Something happened at work today. He’s been shot, but an ambulance came right away to get him. He’s in the hospital right now. He’s having surgery to fix him. They’re gonna fix him.”

Tears immediately spilled over his cheeks, and Daisy was quick to pull him into a tight hug. Carl hid his face in her shoulder, letting her gently rock them back and forth. She gave him a moment to breathe before gently pulling him back by his shoulders.

“Have I ever lied to you?” Daisy asked, wiping the tears from his cheeks with her thumbs.

Carl shook his head, his voice watery. “No. You said lying was only for kids to use against their parents, and you promised to never lie to me.”

“Exactly,” she chuckled. “I’ve lied to Mom and Dad plenty of times. More times than I care to share, really…but never to you. I’ve always told you the truth, even if I knew it would make you mad at me. I told you when I accidentally backed over your skateboard with Mom’s car, didn’t I?”

“You still haven’t made that up to me, by the way.”

“You little asshole,” Daisy grinned, pulling him in for another hug. “Don’t tell Mom I said that in front of you. Now’s the perfect time for you to practice lying. Or better yet…withholding the truth. That’s a skill a bit harder to master, but I’m sure you’ve got what it takes.”

Carl nodded, a small grin on his face as he slowly calmed down. Daisy stood up, helping him up from the curb. She took his backpack from him, shouldering it herself as she looked down at him. Although he was smiling too, she could still see the fear on his face, so she quickly held him in place and ruffled her fingers all through his hair. It stuck straight up in about eight different places, and Daisy laughed while he fought against her to try and push her back. She finally let him go with a smile, reaching down to smooth his hair down.

“Dad’s going to be alright, Carl. I’m not lying…I’m promising you. I don’t want you to worry, okay? Let’s just save the worrying for Mom. It’s her who’s gonna have to endure Dad’s whining all day at home until he’s well enough to go back to work. Remember the last time he got a cold? You would have thought he had the plague with how much he griped and complained.”

Carl laughed, nodding. Daisy put her hands on his shoulders, pushing him out in front of her in the direction of where Lori and Shane were still standing. Lori had a grateful smile on her face. Shane was still chuckling as he watched Carl continue to smooth his hair down.

“Come on,” Daisy said, leading him to the car. “We’ll ask Mom if we can go to the hospital now.”

—

Rick spent a few hours in surgery. When he was stable, the doctors came out into the waiting room to update everyone on his condition. They explained that, while his condition wasn’t critical, he had lost a lot of blood. He had to be placed into a medically induced coma so his body could recover without overworking itself. In the days following, they’d reduce the medication and let him wake up on his own.

When Daisy asked for a time frame they’d all have to wait, she was given a very vague answer by a clearly overworked and tired nurse. It was obvious this wasn’t her first time dealing with a family like this, and the repetitive questions were wearing her down.

“We can’t give you an exact time or date. It all depends on the rate at which his body heals itself. We’re doing everything we can on our end, all that can be done now is giving him time. Feel free to sit with him now if you want. It’s not entirely proven, but it’s said that patients in comas are actually sometimes cognisant of what’s going on around them. If you talk to him and let him know you’re there, it might encourage him to wake up faster. Understand my use of the word “might,” please.”

“But he will wake up?” Lori asked with an expectant look on her face.

The nurse hesitated, glancing over at Daisy who had Carl asleep on her shoulder. “Like I said, ma’am. Give it time. We’re working at your husband’s pace now.”

“He’s a fighter,’ Shane said impotently, pacing around the waiting room with a cup of coffee in his hand like he’d been doing for the last few hours. “He’ll be up and at it in no time.”

The nurse said nothing more, just nodding as she returned to her work.

—

Daisy spent the following several days in and out of the hospital. Between school and making sure her brother and Mom were doing alright, she felt like she had less and less time to sit in a hospital room. After all, Rick still hadn’t woken up yet. It was possible he had no idea they were there, and it wasn’t making much of a difference sitting and worrying at the hospital instead of sitting and worrying at home.

One evening, Daisy stayed at the hospital late. Carl needed to go to bed, and Lori only had her car to take him home. Daisy wanted to stay, so Shane offered to stay as well and drop her off on his way home.

The two sat alone in the hospital for another hour before Shane stood up, stretching. “I’m gonna go get a cup of coffee. You want anything?” Daisy just shook her head. Shane nodded, leaving her alone in the room. After a few minutes of staring, she shuffled her chair closer until she was sitting right at Rick’s bedside. Carefully, she took his hand in hers. He was cold to the touch. She absentmindedly pulled his blanket up over him higher, trying to ignore the sinking feeling in her stomach that this cold lifeless hand was not the hand of the warm father she always knew. She took a breath, squeezing his hand in hers.

“Dad?” she whispered, getting no response.

Rick lied still in the hospital bed, his hand limp and heavy in hers. Daisy sniffled, trying and failing to fight back tears. She gave his hand a squeeze, her voice low as she spoke.

“I went back to the old house again. Mom drove us by on the way to the hospital. She finally got to see what they did to the paint. She called it a monstrosity. Said she could never picture a family growing up in a house like that. We made bets on what the inside looks like. Carl said he bets their couch still has the cover on it, like the one Grandma put over her furniture last Christmas. He thinks whoever lives there keeps it on year round. Mom said she's thankful you got us all a nice house so that Carl could know a home like the one we had before he was born.”

The words caught in her throat. Daisy looked down at their joined hands, hers beginning to shake.

“Dad,” she tried again, silent tears rolling down her cheeks as she got no response. “I’m so sorry.”

Her last words she said to him came rushing back to her, and she felt like the guilt would swallow her whole. She looked at her Dad’s face, his eyes closed and his skin pale. She could see the outline of his bandages from the surgery under his gown. There was a nagging thought in the back of her mind that maybe he wouldn’t wake up again, and the thought alone was enough to pull a muffled sob from her. She squeezed his hand, her voice raw.

“Why’d you have to be a hero, Dad? Why you? Why’d you let yourself get shot?”

Daisy let out a shaky breath, clutching his hand tighter. “I didn’t mean it. I know you care, we all know you care. I know what I said was cruel, but…I need you. I really need you to be the bigger person right now and wake up. Mom’s worried sick, Carl is following me around like a lost puppy. I had to lie to him and promise you’d be okay, when I don’t know a fucking thing!”

A low sob catching in her chest prevented her from continuing.

Suddenly, the door opened once more, and Shane peeked his head in. One look at Daisy’s tear stained face, and he was grabbing his things from the chair. He bent down and placed a kiss on top of her head, then a hand on Rick’s shoulder. His voice was tired, but soft.

“I’ll be in the car. Five minutes, you hear me? I gotta get you home, Days.”

The use of her nickname only made her cry more. She just nodded, and Shane was quick to leave the room. Once she was sure he was gone, Daisy turned back to look at her Dad. She wiped at her cheeks with her free hand, letting out a long sigh.

“I’m gonna take care of them, okay?” she promised, nodding. “Until you come home, I’ll watch out for everyone. I’m gonna make it up to you as soon as you’re awake, I promise. And I’m sorry for swearing…I know you don’t like when I do that. Mom lets me swear, you know — just in front of her anyway, not in front of Carl. You can argue about that with her sooner if you would just wake up.”

Daisy chuckled at her own joke, fresh tears spilling from tired eyes down her cheeks. She shook her head, standing up to gather her things. She reached for his hand one last time, giving it three rapid squeezes.

It meant, I love you.

It was something they did in their family when it needed to be said, but for whatever reason they just couldn’t get the words out. Usually after arguments, or when someone was crying, but during the happy moments too when someone was laughing so hard that they couldn’t get any words out at all. Daisy was longing for one of those moments right about now.

Just as she was about to let go, she felt the faintest of squeezes to her own hand. It was so light, she almost missed it. She nearly convinced herself it was just in her imagination, when she felt another light squeeze. Daisy leaned down and pressed a kiss to the back of Rick’s hand, gently pulling hers away as she headed for the door.

“You can give me that last one when I come back to visit after school tomorrow,” she said excitedly, opening the door. “I’ll be here, Dad. I promise.”

—

Daisy didn’t go back to the hospital the next day – she never got the chance to.

For the first week that Rick was in the hospital, there had been reports of some kind of virus spreading out west and in highly populated cities. While it wasn’t close to Daisy or anyone in her town, the news coverage of it was still making people uneasy. They began locking themselves in their houses, calling out of work and pulling their children out of school.

The night she got home from the hospital, Lori told her she wanted to wait a few days before any of them went back to visit. Apparently, there had been some sort of riot downtown at a grocery store, and a few people were shot and injured. It all seemed dramatic to Daisy, but she could hear the stress in her Mom’s voice when she asked, so she agreed not to go anywhere for a few days until things started to calm down.

As the days progressed, the news coverage of the virus got worse and worse. It was making people violent and deranged. Civilians were being shot dead in the streets by police, people were eating other people, and there were reports that entire villages in other countries had been wiped out by the virus. There was riots and looting and chaos – mass panic was beginning to ensue. Eventually, the virus spread into Daisy’s state, then her county, then her town. The military began sending troops down to manage the situation, and they advised all civilians within a fifty mile radius to evacuate to Atlanta for a while where a quarantine and refugee camp was set up.

Daisy barely had time to wrap her head around it before Shane was showing up to their door, his car packed and ready to go.

“I’m going to the hospital to get Rick,” he whispered to Lori at the front door.

Daisy overheard, making sure Carl wasn’t around before she butted into the conversation. “What? He’s not awake yet, he needs the doctors. You can’t just go get him.”

“Daisy’s right,” Lori tried to reason. “Isn’t a hospital the safest place for him? They know how to handle sickness and contamination, we don’t. They have protocols to follow. They said if it came down to it, they’d medevac patients to Atlanta without notice. Who says they’ll even discharge him?”

Shane lifted the hem of his shirt to show his gun holstered to his side. “They’ll release him.”

Lori’s eyes widened in shock. “Shane…I–”

“Look,” he spoke quickly. “I promised Rick I’d look after y’all while he was gone, and that’s what I’m gonna do. Now, the station has been getting reports from all over the county. The sheriff has been talking to the ones from neighboring counties, and it sounds like this is all gonna get a lot worse before it gets better.”

“Shane,” Daisy tried to interrupt, but he was quick to silence her.

“Damn it, just listen! I promised your Dad I would do this, I promised him I’d look after you and do what’s best for you. And right now, this is what’s best for you. Now I’m gonna do what’s best for him and go to the hospital, I don’t think it’s the safest place for him to be anymore. The news is right, they’re sending damn platoons in every day by the tankload. They’re saying Atlanta is safer, so we have to go. Pack the essentials and be ready to go by the time I get back, alright? Please, Days. We’re all outta here as soon as I get Rick.”

The tone of his voice was something neither Daisy or Lori had ever heard before. There was a sense of such desperation and urgency that Lori listened immediately. She had Daisy going back inside to help Carl pack within seconds, coming up with the next steps of the plan with Shane before he left for the hospital.

—

According to him, Shane barely made it alive out of the hospital.

He came back to the house in a hurry, practically strapping everyone into the car himself and speeding off before he explained what happened. Daisy only heard bits and pieces after Carl started crying and she pulled herself together long enough to comfort him, but the things that she did hear shook her to her core. The hospital was overrun. The military was already there, and they were shooting uninfected doctors and nurses alike. Half the hospital had already been evacuated, and the other half had fallen. Despite doing absolutely everything he could, Shane couldn’t save Rick. He could only save himself and fulfill his promise to Rick by making sure his family made it out safe.

The next few days were a blur.

Eventually, they made it to the highway that led into Atlanta. Cars were at a standstill, stopped for hours at a time. By nightfall, the line had been stalled for so long that everyone had turned off their cars to save gas. Families had gotten out and were talking to the families in the cars next to theirs, sharing food and radios, trying to see if anyone had any clue what was going on. Then, the radios went out. Eventually, Shane decided it was safe enough for everyone to get out of the car and stretch their legs.

That was when Daisy met the Peletier’s – a brutish and seemingly chronically upset father named Ed, a nice but skittish and reserved mother and housewife named Carol, and their quiet little girl called Sophia.

Sophia was right around Carl’s age. Once the two families got to talking, Carol set up a travel size board game of checkers in the trunk of her car for the kids to play with. They were getting bored and antsy, and it was a good way to entertain them. Daisy sat behind Carl on the tailgate silently watching over his shoulder, snickering every time Sophia made a move and took one of his pieces. It was enough to keep everyone calm and distracted for a while, but the helicopters circling overhead eventually uneased everyone enough that they just forgot about the game all together.

After a while, Lori and Shane decided to scout ahead and see if they could figure out what was going on.

“Stay with your brother and Carol, okay?” Lori asked Daisy, reaching up to brush the stray hairs out of her face. “Promise me.”

Daisy nodded, glancing over at Shane. “The broadcasts stopped, didn’t they? The ones telling people about the refugee center in Atlanta. I saw what station it was being broadcasted over on the way here, we must have heard it fifty times over the last few days. I checked in Carol’s car…it’s all static now.”

Shane sighed, knowing he couldn’t lie to her. Daisy was too smart for her own good, and there was no point in trying to hide the truth from her. The highway was a glue trap. It was likely that the refugee center was turning people away, or it had already been overrun. The broadcasts stopped because whoever was broadcasting them decided that there’s no people left and nothing worth broadcasting to. Shane nodded, tilting his head towards Carl.

“Just stay here. We’ll be right back.”

Shane and Lori headed off before Daisy could protest. She just huffed, sitting back down on the tailgate with Carl and Sophia. She reached over Carl’s shoulder to move a checker, giving Sophia a reassuring smile.

“Your dad’s nice,” Sophia commented.

Carl tensed up next to Daisy. “Shane’s not my Dad. My Dad’s dead.”

An awkward silence fell over the group. Daisy could feel a stinging behind her eyes, her chest tightening. She could feel Carol’s pitying eyes on her, making her look up at Sophia. There was nowhere she could look to get away from this feeling though, despite how hard she was trying to. Then Daisy noticed a little doll tucked into Sophia’s lap, clearly a well loved toy.

“I like your doll,” she said, making Sophia’s face light up. “I had one like that when I was your age.”

Sophia smiled, moving another piece. “Where’s yours?”

“I gave her away to the neighbor's daughter. I hadn’t played with her in years, and I figured she’d get better use out of it than I would letting it collect dust on my dresser. I bet it’s buckled into the backseat of that little girl’s car right now. On a roadtrip – sounds cool, right?”

Before Sophia could reply, a distant explosion sounded from somewhere down the highway. The sounds of an argument could be heard, and Daisy craned her neck to see a fight breaking out a few cars ahead of hers. Suddenly, more helicopters circled overhead. This time, they headed into the city. Everyone on the road paused what they were doing to watch, stepping over the guardrail to see past the trees on the hill. The city was dark, only the light from the helicopters illuminating the skyline. The helicopters hovered over the skyline as onlookers watched from the highway. Faint murmurs from people inside the city could be heard alongside the whirring blades of the helicopters.

Sudden flashes of light could be seen in the night sky. Just as Daisy squinted to try and get a better look at their source, multiple fiery mushroom clouds of heat and smoke billowed over the skyline. The city lit up ghastly tones of yellow, orange, and red.

Then it dawned on Daisy – they were dropping napalm in the streets.

“Oh my god,” she muttered, quickly standing up to help Carl and Sophia down from the tailgate. “Don’t watch, okay? Eyes on me.”

To her side, Carol let out a gasp and then a short sob, looking to Ed for answers. He just watched with a far away look in his eye, glancing around to see how everyone else was reacting. Daisy could feel Carl clinging to her waist, and she looked down to see a wild look in his eye as he watched the skyline light up.

“Get in the car, now!” Ed ordered, hastily yanking on Carol’s arm to get her in the passenger seat.

“We can’t just leave Carl and Daisy!” Sophia cried, tears running down her cheeks in fear.

Daisy was quick to reassure her, pulling Carl closer. “Go with your Mom, okay? We’ll be fine, we’ll catch up.”

Sophia was pushed into the car by Ed before she could get another word out. He quickly got back in his car, cranking it and stepping on the gas. He rammed into the car in front of him, smashing the bumper into pieces. Daisy gasped as he gunned it until he pushed the car out of the way, tearing up the shoulder of the road. The car scraped against the guard rail making an awful sound till Ed finally drove right through it, turning in the opposite direction the cars were parked to head back the way they came. The tires burned patches into the grass below, leaving tracks in their wake.

Daisy felt like she was going to puke. She looked around frantically for Lori and Shane, but they were nowhere in sight. People were screaming and crying, mass panic blanketing the highway. The smell of the burning city began wafting up the hill, the smoke stinging her eyes. She clutched Carl tighter to her.

“Hold my hand and don’t let go,” she ordered, gripping Carl tight. “We have to find Mom.”

Daisy took off in the direction her Mom had left earlier, turning around to make sure she remembered where their car was left. She pulled Carl over the guard rail, keeping him out of the way of people running and trying to drive on the shoulder of the road. She led him into the patch of trees at the top of the hill, scanning the area as best she could. By some miracle, she spotted Lori and Shane in the midst of the chaos a few yards away. Lori was clinging to Shane from behind as he led her through the sea of people, one hand wrapped around her wrist, the other on his gun. His eyes were wide and calculated, like an animal that had been cornered on a hunt.

“Shane!” Daisy screamed, running to him with Carl in tow. “Mom!”

“Daisy!” Lori cried, immediately breaking from Shane to pull her kids into a hug. “I told you to stay put, what were you thinking?”

“I had to move! We nearly got mowed over just standing there, and Ed already pulled Carol and Sophia into the car, they’re leaving. It’s getting bad, people are fighting and panicking–”

Shane interrupted her, quickly pulling everyone into a tighter huddle. “What do you mean they’re leaving? The grid is locked, there’s nowhere to go!”

Daisy frantically pointed up the hill. “Ed busted through the guard rail. Practically knocked a tire off turning to drive back the way we came. He left tracks as far as I could see.”

Shane looked up the hill for a second before finally nodding. “Come on, we’re following.”

“Shane,” Carl finally managed to spit out, still clinging to Daisy. “I’m scared!”

Lori took ahold of Carl in one hand, Daisy in the other. “Listen to me. I know you’re scared, but we’re going to be fine. We’re going to be brave, and we’re going to get out of this. I want you two to listen to everything Shane says, and you don’t let go. No matter what happens, you listen and never let go.”

Daisy could feel her Mom’s hand shaking in hers, but she was putting on a voice so brave that her words almost convinced Daisy that they’d be okay. They’d get off this highway and make it to somewhere safe, and this living nightmare they were stuck in would all go away. It’s what Daisy kept telling herself as Shane cleared a path for them to get back to the car. Everyone piled in as quickly as possible, and Shane didn’t waste a second before gunning it past the downed guard rail, following Carol’s tire tracks.

As the skyline faded from view, Daisy watched out the back window. Before they rounded a corner, she watched in horror as a group of the undead suddenly emerged from the trees. They descended onto the highway, grabbing and attacking stragglers who were too panicked to run or fight back. Gunfire rang throughout the streets from stray hunting rifles stashed in the backs of cars, but the dead weren’t dropping. They took shot after shot, only finally going down when someone managed to get a headshot in.

Daisy promptly turned back around to face forward and look away just as she watched brain matter splatter across the pavement, the sound of gunfire, groans, and desperate screams fading into the background.

—

A/N - Hi! Finally caved and started a TWD fic! I’ve had this fic idea in my head for a while now, and with The Ones Who Live coming out, I figured now would be a good time to start it while I’m getting back into TWD. This is a lot different than the past fics I’ve written, because unlike my other fics, I’m not disclosing any planned relationships between my OC and any of the other characters until I write up until certain parts of the show. This is gonna be a long fic, so bear with me while I plan, write, and update it. This is a new kind of writing for me, so please be patient! I’m still not entirely sure where I’m going with it, but I wanted to go ahead and get some of it out. I hope you like it, thank you to anyone who reads and supports my work! Any questions, feedback, comments, suggestions, and critiques are all welcome :)

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