A simple supply hunt for a source of water in the middle of Atlanta turns sour quickly for Erin as she come fist to face with a fuming, handless Merle Dixon.
Alone in the middle of the apocalypse with only a racist guy who doesn't know the differen...
"Family is my strength and my weakness." - Aishwarya Rai Bachchan
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The two continued to follow the brigade of vehicles in front of them for a good few miles, neither of them finding any words suitable to even start processing what the heck had just happened. They remained at the same pace, passing the same forests and farms they'd seen on their way there only ten hours previous, but suddenly turning off down a side road just before they reached where they'd left 'Jim'.
Erin kept her sight fixed on the rear of the truck in front which happened to be the one carrying the bike as it seemed to keep its distance from the rest of the group, remaining the same distance from the RV ahead of it as she was from its tailgate. It seemed to be lengthening the distance with every second that passed.
The driver knew they were following.
She'd seen him glance in the rear view mirror more than once already, watching them but seemingly not making any moves to stop them or confront them. "Who's in the truck up ahead?" she asked Merle, who was focusing more on the motorcycle than the truck carrying it.
He squinted slightly. The only thing they could see in the cab was the back of the man's head, but Merle smirked slightly after a few seconds, "Daryl, my brother. Why?"
"Because he's seen us." Almost a second after she'd said it, the truck in question swerved to a stop in front of them, blocking the road and leaving the rest of the convoy oblivious to his actions as they continued to wherever they were headed. Erin was forced to slam on the brakes so as not to collide with it, skidding to a halt behind it and making Merle hit his head on the headrest of the passenger seat.
"Son of a-" His last word was cut off by the sound of a door slamming in front of them and they both looked up simultaneously to see the man she'd previously thought looked like a biker standing in front of the truck, a weighty crossbow hitched up in his arms, the bolt aimed at Erin's head. The windows were tinted so he couldn't properly see who was inside, but he'd guessed someone had to be in the driver's seat.
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"Out!" Daryl ordered, keeping the bow trained on the window. With the right force and tension, he could more than likely send the bolt straight through the window and into the guy's head with only one shot and minimal noise. Maybe it wouldn't come to that, but whoever this dude was he wasn't gonna show mercy without good reason to.
The truck he'd been driving was out of gas and that was the main reason he'd stopped. He'd been planning to wait a while to make sure this guy was definitely following them, but now was a good a time as any and he physically couldn't drive any further without fuel.
He waited a few seconds, beginning to think this guy was really damn stupid, before the driver's side door was pushed open and a pair of booted feet dropped to the ground followed by a much more slender and feminine body than he was expecting. It belonged to an Asian-looking woman whose dark brown hair was tucked into the collar of an army jacket, which hung on her shoulders over a khaki vest and blue jeans that were torn and stained in multiple places.
She looked up at him briefly before closing the door behind her and turning back to face him, her hands held slightly up in some sort of surrender, "Don't shoot me."
Daryl thought that was a rich thing to say considering the position she was in, "Why shouldn't I? The hell was ya followin' us for?"
"That can be explained," she replied calmly, brushing a loose hair back behind her ear and taking a step forward. Daryl immediately lifted the crossbow back to its original position, pointing it back at her head, "Wow... I guess it runs in the family..."
"Whaddya' mean? Ya don't know shit about my family..." His grip loosened slightly on the bow as he raised an eyebrow at her.
She lowered her hands slightly, not realising that Daryl's eyes were watching her every move as she pulled a small blade from her jacket and flung it through the air, aiming to hit his hand and make him drop the bow. Unfortunately for her, Daryl's reaction times were much quicker as he snatched it from the air, barely even moving his hands from the crossbow before dropping it to the ground with a light clatter.
"Now ya just makin' me mad," he took a step forwards, mirroring her earlier actions and stopping in his tracks as he saw another glint of silver in her hand, "How many fuckin' knives d'ya have?"
"Enough. Lower the crossbow and I'll lower the knives," she offered, her heated gaze boring into his.
"Ya stupid if ya think ya can throw that quicker than I can shoot ya..."
Daryl narrowed his eyes at her, fully prepared to land a bolt in her brain by the way she was pissing him off, but a sudden bang of a door closing pulled his attention away from her and back to the truck. He rounded the crossbow on the newcomer instead until he heard the person's voice. "Ya really gonna shoot a girl, Daryl? Thought I taught ya better than that..."
Daryl's expression dropped as he looked over the bow at the man. His brother, Merle.
"Merle? The hell?!"
"Hey, baby brother," Merle strolled around the front of the truck, seemingly unfazed by the crossbow that had been aimed at his face, "I see ya met my... driver. Emily."
'Emily' shot him an angry glare, but Daryl wasn't fully certain what had provoked it. He could only guess that his brother had been an asshole, as usual. "I told you to stay in the truck..." she hissed, lowering her knife but not putting it away.
"Oh, cause you was handlin' all this so well by ya self," Merle countered, crossing the gap between himself and Daryl, his arms open for a hug. Daryl tensed up at the contact, but made his best effort to hug his brother back, knowing that Merle would only tease him if he showed his apprehension. All Merle ever seemed to do was tease him.
The embrace was interrupted by a cough and they both turned, Daryl more thankful than angry, to see 'Emily' stood with her arms crossed, looking at them unimpressed, "It's lovely to see a family reunion, but can we do this later? Y'know, 'cause this is the apocalypse and we're attracting strays by the dozen by standing here in the open?"
From a simple glance around them, he saw she was right. Blowing out a breath of annoyance, Merle let go of him, allowing Daryl to relax slightly before looking back to the two of them, "Rick won't welcome ya back with open arms, y'know..."
Merle growled at the mention of the Sheriff, an angry glint appearing in his eyes, "I'd like to have a word with the nice Sheriff... concernin' why the hell he left me cuff'd to a roof! And why the hell ya let him live when he came back!"
Daryl gritted his teeth, knowing full well that question would arise as soon as he'd figured out his older brother wasn't dead. The bandage wrapped around his forearm explained the hand he'd found, "I forced 'em to go back..."
His brother's expression changed, taken aback by the fact he wasn't expecting, "Ya what-?"
"We came back for ya... but ya weren't there, Merle." Out of the corner of his eye, he could see 'Emily' tapping her foot impatiently, glaring at them both as she kept her knife raised. "C'mon," he looked back to Merle who was taking a moment to process what he'd just been told, "We should go..."
He hitched his crossbow back over his shoulder and headed back to the bed of his truck to pull down the motorcycle, hearing the two newcomers do the same. Setting the bike down to the ground, he stepped one leg over it and started the engine, beckoning for the truck to follow as he set off in the direction the rest of the group had gone.
How he was gonna explain this one to the group, he had no idea...
