Double Crossbow (Daryl Dixon) [The Walking Dead]

Chapter 25 ↣ How the hell did this happen?

"It's hard to wake up from a nightmare if you aren't even asleep."

— J.S.

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Kathryn

DARYL AND I stood a little ways from the group the next morning as we were having a ceremony for Dale. The despair that filled the group was sitting on my chest like an anvil. Rick was currently speaking, but everything he said was like white noise.

As the group was dispersing, Daryl nudged me. I soundlessly walked next to him as we approached a truck. Some of us were going out to check the perimeter, and I was grateful that I had something to do besides sitting on my ass all day.

The ride was uncomfortable to say the least. The suspension on the old truck was shot. Add that to sitting in the cab equaled one hell of a bumpy ride. Every single bump set me knocking into either Daryl or T-Dog.

Shane, Andrea, T-Dog, Daryl, and myself walked along the fence line, looking for any weak points. Once we were done there, we searched for any other walkers that might've gotten in the perimeter.

Daryl whistled, catching my attention. He gestured to the walker tracks that littered the forest floor. I gave him a nod, and we led the group along the walker's path.

Shane pulled the truck to a stop just behind us, allowing everyone else to jump out of the back. A few walkers had made another cow their meal. Daryl and I each took out the nearest ones. The group then systematically killed the rest.

The last walker standing had quite the gruesome killing. I retreated back towards the truck as the rest of the group took some of their rage out on the corpse. I kept my rage in, tying it close to my chest with a bow. The time would come when I'd really need it.

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"Gonna be tight," Rick started, looking at Hershel skeptically, "fourteen people in one house."

I internally shuttered, already beginning to feel the claustrophobia setting in.

"Don't worry about that," Hershel replied. "With the swamp hardening, the creek drying up—"

"With fifty head of cattle on the property," Maggie added, "we might as well be ringing the damn dinner bell."

"She's right," Hershel agreed. "We should've moved you in a while ago."

Rick straightened. "All right, let's move the vehicles near each of the doors facing out towards the road. We'll build a lookout in the windmill, another in the barn loft. That should give us sightlines on both sides of the property."

I spaced out for a bit as Rick was assigning different jobs, but my attention was soon caught again.

"Shane will assign shifts for watch, while me and Daryl take Brendan offsite and cut him loose," Rick said, causing tension to flood the air. I could tell Daryl hadn't been expecting that. He was standing so stiffly I thought he was going to pop a vein.

Shane asked, "We're back to that now?"

"It was the right plan the first time," Rick replied. "Poor execution."

"That's a slight understatement," Shane said.

Rick stepped up. "You don't agree, but this is what's happening. Swallow it. Move on."

Shane dropped his voice, but I could still hear him as he said, "You know that Dale's death and the prisoner—that's two separate things, right?" There was a beat, and then he added, "You wanna take Daryl as your wingman? Be my guest."