Family
He'd been desperate.
He had to know.
Had to see his father.
For years it had been just him and his father and now his father was all alone in that red town, in that huge house that had felt so empty already.
He snuck out of camp in the middle of the night, rifle strapped to his back, telling Danny he didn't feel well as they he took up his post.
He walked all night in the freezing cold air biting at his skin.
The streets where empty save for soldiers, the dawn silent save for the random bits of spanish and russian drifting across the desolate place.
This used to be his town, this place used to be filled with life and color and warmth.
It had been twisted, stripped down to its bones, it was dying, he was just glad that his mother hadn't lived to see the sad husk of a thing those bastards had turned her town into.
He walked the back allies with silent, practised tread, watching carefully for any sudden movements and trying his best not to look too hard at any one thing. The houses where dull and broken, it was looking more and more like the pictures he'd seen of the ghettos in Germany and Poland. Tried not to notice the burnt out shells of houses he knew had belonged to Jed and Matt and Robert.
He stopped dead at the sight of his house. It was immaculate, light up beautifully, it had no right to look so happy after the hell he'd been through, after the hell the rest of the town had been through.
"What have you done." He whispered, he knew his father was a politician through and through, he gravitated to power rather than create it.
He had to know one way or the other, his father had to know that he was alive.
He climbed the fence not chancing the unoiled gate, and slipped into the kitchen.
Maria stood frozen at the fridge, her eyes wide at the sight of him. She crossed herself and ran to him, trying to push him back out the door.
"Maria have you seen my cufflinks..." His father's voice faded as he entered the kitchen.
"Dad." His vision was blurred and he slipped from Maria's desperate grip and ran to his father.
His fathers arms wrapped around him and a calm fell over him.
Alive.
He finally knew for sure.
"Where have you been?"
"In the forest." He told him breathlessly.
"Maria make some breakfast for Daryl."
Daryl saw the fear in Maria's eyes as she crossed herself again and whispering in spanish began to pull together breakfast.
"I can't stay long." Daryl told his father pushing his fingers desperately into his father's body, feeling the softness in his father's suit. He smelt exactly the same and it washed over him in waves of comfort and familiarity.
"I understand son." He had one arm wrapped tightly around him and the other carefully removing the rifle from his back. His voice was sad but it was the greatest thing he'd heard in a very long time.
The smell of bacon filled the kitchen air and Daryl could almost feel his body call out for it.
His father pulled out of the hug, and rubbed Daryl's arms.
"You sit down and have some bacon I need to find my damn cufflinks and briefcase." And for a moment it was exactly like so many days before this horrible war.
He sits down at the island and watches his father leave the room, going down the hall and turn into his office.
"Check your bottom right desk drawer for the cufflinks!" He yells down the hall. Everytime his father is missing something it always seemed to end up in that drawer.
Maria puts a plate of bacon and sunny eggs in front of him and in hurried scared spanish tries to get him to eat is quickly as possible.
"What's the matter Maria?" He asks, the older woman looks like she's going to cry at any moment. He shoves the food into his mouth. Honest to god bacon. Real eggs. Not canned beans or deer, no poorly cooked rabbit.
"Is your family all right Maria?" He asks and she shakes her head no and grabs at the cross around her neck.
"Please hurry Daryl, you have to leave." She whispers and her face is wet with tears and her eyes dart behind him.
"What's the mat-" he turns in the stool a piece of bacon halfway to his mouth. The fork clatters to the floor and he dives for the corner of the kitchen where his rifle is sitting.
His father steps in front of the rifle and he lands hard on the floor.
Daryl looks up at his father, he doesn't even look sorry as the red's swarm the house.
"Dad..."He almost chokes on the word. They don't even bother picking him up off the floor, they drag him out the front door by his arms.
He's positive he's crying, the cold air is sharp against the wet of his skin.
"I'm glad mom's dead!" He yells back at the house, he can see his father standing in the doorway and for the first time he see's what the others do, a commie bastard.
He hasn't been trying to save as many lives as possible, he's been saving his own skin, getting fat off the people's misery. He spits at the sign on the fence with his last name on it and does his best to try to stand as the soldiers pull him along.
"Wolverines!" He yells out and the street is lined with faces he's known all his life, "Wolverines!" He yells out again only for the butt of someone's rifle to find the back of his head.
When he wakes up he wishes he hadn't. Tied to a chair, the sharp plastic of zipties cutting into his wrists.
His father is standing beside the cuban and the russian.
They're talking quietly and he just feels so broken, so betrayed. His own father. His flesh and blood. This man was supposed to love and protect him. He'd promised mom to take care of him and he was betraying them both now. He'd never been thankful for his mothers death like he was now, he wished he was dead as well.
Wished he had died in one of the raids, died with Col. and Aardvark. Wished he'd never lived to see this, to see what his father had become...what he maybe always was.
He was crying again and when his breath hitched loudly because of it the three men turned to him.
"You're awake...good...we have many things to discuss."
He looked at his father, looked only at him, "how could you..."
He doesn't say a word but he can't look away. He wants his father to see what he's done.
"I want you to tell me were all your little friends are."
"No." He tells them but doesn't look away from his father.
He doesn't even see the kick coming hard in the chest, it knocks the chair over and he lands hard on his hands.
The scream of pain echoes painfully in the room and he can see his father flinch.
One of the men puts a boot down on his chest hard.
"Be careful we don't want anything to show."
"Of course. Perhaps you should leave." The man looks up at his father.
"Right." his father nods but there's a shake in his voice as he leaves the room.
He watches his father shut the door tightly as one of the men in the room unrolls a bag of what he fears are tools.
"Dad!" He screams out as loud as he can.
"DAD!" He screams as the man selects a blunt looking tool, the smile on his face twists his gut and makes him sick and another solider pulls up his shirt.
"DA-" the word dissolves into a primal scream as the cold metal hits skin.
The walk back through the woods is painful.
Not just because of the beating he'd taken.
He moved his hand along his side, he could feel the bandages keeping him from falling apart.
He could see the look on his father's face in every dark corner of the forest.
He dropped to his knees in the snow and heaved.
All that came up was bile and blood and from what may have been a lifetime ago yolk.
Whatever it was they had made him eat, that metal square that cut all the way down just would not come back up.
He wiped away the bile with his damaged hand.
In spite of orders to make him look as undamaged as possible they had had far too much fun twisting his arm until he cried out.
He staggered out of the thick of the woods into a clearing and Toni and Erica were having a private conversation.
"-Psychopath-"
"Don't call him that!" Erica yelled back. He snapped a twig and they both turn on him guns drawn.
"Daryl..." Toni lowers the rifle but Erica's stays on him a little too long. before she lowers hers too.
He wishes that they had just shot him.
He wishes he was dead.
The betrayal of his father rings out across his body an echoing pain he's sure will never die.
Maria had known, everyone had known but him. Well he had learned his lesson now, it had been beaten into him, shoved down his throat.
He wished he was dead.
A/N: A little thing i found in my old phone. I just adore the original Red Dawn. I had a huge Erica/Robert thing in my phone but it apparently didn't survive. This little bit about Daryl did however and I'm glad.