SURVIVE.
❝ Let the end of the world be
inside you, then you don't
need to fear the end
of the world out there. ❞
THE WALKING DEAD.
DARYL DIXON.
BOOK ONE of the LANCASTER SAGA.
[ SEASONS 1 - 3 ]
******
I do not own The Walking Dead or any of its...
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[ xxxiii. the world we knew is dead ]
november 14th, 2010
➸➸➸
"DALE! DALE, WHERE ARE you?" Astrid's cry carried through the night, a raw, guttural shriek that carried her fear and horror. Her fingers danced over the grip of her gun as, without any hesitation at all, she shot forward in the direction of the desperate and agonized screams.
Andrea's own voice yelled somewhere behind her, yet Astrid's focus was singular—a laser-guided determination locked onto the ground ahead. She leaped over the fence that lined the faraway distant fields and sprinted head-on into the pitch black. The sound of terror grew as others from the camp reawakened at the sound of shouting and joined the fright.
"Wait, Astrid!" Andrea pleaded, struggling to keep pace.
Astrid did not stop. Tall grass whipped against her legs like phantom hands, an obsidian curtain concealing the unknown. Her flashlight carved a path, revealing snippets of her frantic farmland surroundings, but her mind's eye was fixated on one thing—Dale.
"Dale!" She called again.
Then, up ahead, Astrid saw it. An otherworldly and bloody image etched in moonlight. Two figures loomed, one unmistakably Dale and the other a grotesque embodiment of death—a walker, gnashing rotten teeth hungering for the elder man's life. Astrid's soul surged with adrenaline-fueled fury. She hurled herself into the fight.
Astrid slammed into the walker, a collision of desperation and sheer willpower, and toppled it from its perch atop Dale. Yet the victory was short-lived; as they rolled, the walker gained the upper hand above her, jaws now snapping like steel traps only inches from her own face.
Blood dripped down onto her and stained her vision, the tang of iron mingling with the metallic tang of fear. Astrid's fingers scrabbled in the grass for her fallen gun, fingers grazing cool metal that slipped through her grasp like smoke. Panic clawed at her chest as the walker's grip tangled in her hair, searing agony radiating through her scalp.
Then, a shadow swooped in, a guardian angel of brutality. Daryl Dixon materialized, swift and lethal. His knife sang through the air, the crack of skull against metal punctuating the night. The walker crumpled, lifeless and defeated, leaving Astrid breathless as she staggered to her feet.
Daryl's concerned voice reached her ears like a distant echo. "Are you alright?" He demanded. His arms as they held Astrid were a sanctuary that she was too frazzled to appreciate. She could not hear the hunter. Astrid ripped herself out of Daryl's arms. Her gaze locked onto Dale who lay in the grass several feet away, her heart in her throat as she crawled towards him, a woman possessed. Her flashlight's beam fell upon a scene of horror—Dale's stomach laid bare, split open, intestines spilling into the dirt.
