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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[ xliv. she lit a fire ]
july 1st, 2011
➸➸➸
DARYL DIXON'S GAZE BORE down painfully upon the small dirt grave adorned with a single Cherokee Rose, his guarded heart now exposed and heavy with disbelief. It could not be true. Astrid—his Astrid—could not possibly be dead. A full day had passed since the merciless surprise ambush on their home, and Daryl found it impossible to maintain a coherent thought when the Lancaster woman's memory echoed in every corner of his raging mind. The world seemed to crumble around the hunter.
In the span of a day, their group had lost three of their own: Astrid, Lori, and T-Dog.
Among the wreckage of the prison's tombs, Carol Peletier was the lone survivor of her group. She had been with both Astrid and T-Dog. According to her, T-Dog, after being bitten, had made the ultimate sacrifice to save the two women from walkers. But then, Carol, too, had been separated from Astrid only minutes later. Carol had escaped, but before she had, she recounted hearing a blood-curdling scream, an agonized cry that could have meant anything.
In the aftermath, Daryl, driven to find Astrid against all odds, had embarked on an urgent search, scouring every inch of the tombs for any trace of her. But cruelly, he had found nothing—not even her lifeless form (though not once had he expected to find that). In the end, after nearly four hours, all he had to show for his efforts was Carol's abandoned firearm.
He wanted to go back in. Search within crevices he had not peeked into yet. But he had to call off the search early. New priorities had taken over. One of them involved a motherless newborn baby. Motherless—because Lori Grimes was dead.
Unbeknownst to the hunter at the time, she had gone into labor during the initial attack and had died during a rushed and complicated childbirth, delivering—nonetheless—a healthy baby girl into the world. None of those within the group that had survived had figured out a proper name for her yet, so Daryl had taken to calling her Lil' Ass Kicker. Astrid would have loved her.
Will.
Astrid will love her. Daryl could not afford to think otherwise when everything around the hunter kept reminding him of her. It was eating him up inside.
And who was he kidding? They were all being eaten up. The whole group was spiraling out of control over yesterday's mess. In the wake of so much devastation, their leader, Rick, had gone and disappeared, likely drowning in grief over his estranged wife, even though his kids needed him now more than ever. Especially Carl, who had been there, in the flesh, for the birth of his sister and the death of his mother.
And Maggie—she was a wreck, too, because she had been forced to deliver the newborn right out of Lori's lifeless body. Daryl still did not know all the grisly details of what had gone down, and he sure as hell did not want to ask. Some things just needed to stay buried in silence.
