The General's Daughter

Chapter 7

     "Yup. Luckiest man in the world to be seein Sargent Buttercup." He laughed.
     I was stiff at the sound of his voice. But before I could think, his name had passed my lips. "Merle." I went cold. "You're dead."
     "Well I'm standin' right here ain't I?" I didn't want to turn, but slowly I found myself staring the very man in the face, who I'd never thought I'd see again.  "That or you ain't in yer right mind."
Absentmindedly I checked myself for anything that could mean I might be sharing the same fate as him. No horribly bad wounds other than my head. No bites, bullet wounds.. There were no explanations. With a short sigh my eyes went back up to the man next to me.
He seemed to grin from ear to ear. Made me want to punch him.
     I rolled my eye. "Out o my mind?" I spoke as I took hold of my water and walked next to the stream. "I think you got that right." I mutter.
     "Oh c'mon buttercup, you know you love me."
     "You wish." I looked over my shoulder only for a second. "Now start movin' it soldier."
     "Sir yes sir."
I couldn't shake the feeling. There was something wrong about this. Something was just different.. I was starting to get a bad feeling. Merle happened to catch up to me. As we walked I tried to check for his hand. I couldn't see it, yet I couldn't look too much or he'd catch me. For some reason I cared about that. I didn't like people to know when I was suspicious.

At first the silence was horrible through the first thirty minutes, but after hours on end, I was almost out of my mind. That was if I wasn't already. I had heard Merle was killed by the governor. Yet Daryl didn't talk about it much. I didn't get it. If I was seeing a ghost then why Merle? Why not Dan? Or Shawn? Or even Danny?
     "Hey Buttercup!" I snapped out of my deep train of thought. "Ya' even listening?" Merle waved me over to a car he had running. We had a wordless conversation by just looking at each other.
     Walking past him at the front of the van, I gave him a remark. "I drive."
     "Why you don't trust my drivin? Don't think I can stay in control?"
I tensed at the last part of what he said. My fingers instantly found the knife on my belt. Gritting my teeth I forced myself to let it go. With a deep breath it was like nothing happened.
     "No last time someone else drove we got into an accident." I glanced over to find Merle giving me a weird look. Not giving it any mind I got in as he did. With a squeaky start we were off.
...

     "So help me I will kill you if you so much as twitch again." I groaned. Merle being himself, he would not for the love of anything, sit still.
     "Well I kindly apologize that it's taking goddamn forever." He snapped back right as the engine stalled.
     "Damn it!" I slammed my door.
With a sigh I sat down on the hood and drug my hands over my face. When I looked up I saw a sign pointing the direction we had been going. It read that we were thirty-five miles from the capital. Somehow I knew the group wouldn't be there. I felt alone, even with a self-absorbed ass traveling with me, who probably shouldn't be alive. What the hell we needed to do now, my head hurt just thinking about it. We had been driving for about a week and a half by now. I was tired. Physically and mentally. It was a lot of weight. It was a lot of upkeep to not go crazy. I thought the world ending ment I was free. It  wasn't hard to see how painfully wrong I was.

With a deep breath I slid off the hood and got everything out of the car. It was the third or fourth one we had got running, I lost count a while ago. Silently Merle helped me. For once he could keep his mouth shut just long enough for me to calm down. Setting up the small camp we fell into routine. There was hardly any effort put into all, but it was enough. It was set up as far as we could get for the day from the car. Neither of us would get sleep, that much was for sure. It all seemed like mindless instinct now. But there was a small alarm system going off in my head. There was something wrong, but I just couldn't put my finger on it. I didn't want to. Couldn't it wait till morning? My head pounded. Blinking hard I found Merle staring at me.
     "Get some rest Buttercup. I'll keep watch."
     "Wow. Is this even Merle talking?" I laughed under my breath. "Do you actually have feelings Dixon?" I poked.
     "Just shut up and get some sleep." I still chuckled a little as I went into the makeshift tent.
It happened to be the moment I lay down, I fell asleep.

If I had the luxury of saying that sleep was deep and dreamless, I'd be the luckiest person on earth. But when the hell was I ever lucky? My sleep was interrupted when the cans around camp clinked out of control. I had a knife in hand at the groan since I was thinking faster now than any of the days previous. Suddenly the makeshift tent caved in as a walker fell on top of it. Instantly I sprang to action. Rolling out of the cloth I noticed there were a few others. Swiftly I took on of the can string that was already half way around the first and fixed it with another end that was tied to a tree. Just as I finished another latched onto my shoulder. This sent me into defense mode. On a dime I turned, the knife through the dead corpse's skull before I was facing it. Four more came from both directions. Kicking two away I threw my knife at the first before grabbing arrows and throwing them. The last one was right behind me ready to take a chunk from my neck when I pushed us back to a tree and sent the last arrow I held into it's head.

My shoulders heaved as I caught my breath. Now I was aware of the feeling I had yesterday. Taking the arrows from the ones around me I picked up my knife too. The last Walter, still wrapped up in the tent fabric pathetically snarled in a different direction. The moment I stepped forward it looked at me, now knowing my location. Before it could try fighting It collapsed to the ground after I put the damn thing down.

There was no sign of Merle. Not even a bootprint. So it was what I thought, he hadn't been real. I tended when I heard the twig snap. It was hardly even a second before I had myself hidden, waiting for them. Silently I made my way around to where the people should be. Sneaking up on one I covered his mouth. My knife was at his throats after his weak attempt to fight me off. It was a piece of cake overpowering this one, the second didn't look that hard either. He held a gun like they were about to ambush me. That was their mistake, not mine. The redhead turned around in the morning light after I took my hand away from his friends mouth who seemed like a blubbering mess right now. He put his hands in the air and instantly put the gun down.
     "Please don't hurt him. We'll do whatever you need us to do." The first man said.
     "Fine. Answer me one thing." I paused loosening my grip on the second man. "Why are you following me?"

A/N
Sorry for the wait. Anyway, here's a new chapter, I've been a busy and my computer died on me while I was typing this. Anyway I guess I have a few questions...

Why was Nakota seeing Merle?
How come she stopped seeing him?
Who was fallowing her?

Please remember to vote, comment, tell me what you think.
And until the next chapter!