Winters in Georgia were always warm. They would get the occasional snowfall here and there, but otherwise, it was always pretty mild. The summers were thick with humidity, and caused soupy, swampy air. It was unbearable. Daryl would've much rather taken blistering cold over suffocating heat. At least it would snow more. Merle was the same. Both brothers ran cold. Their sister; however, did not.
Jamie Dixon most definitely preferred heat. She was the sun. Warm, bright, and forever shining. Jamie lit up the lives of all those she entered, the opposite of her icy brothers. Whereas Daryl and Merle usually spent their time after school groaning in detention, Jamie was home and starting her homework approximately 10 minutes after school had ended. She was, after all, a straight A student.
Jamie always looked up to her brothers. They had always protected her, whether it be kids from school or their very own father. Daryl was her rock, the person she could always talk and spill her feelings to. He understood. Merle, not so much but he still tried his best. Beating up her bullies and taking the brunt of their fathers anger. He tried to protect Daryl too, but Daryl was too stubborn.
As they got older, the siblings began to grow apart. Merle went off to do whatever he did when he was alone. He slowly stopped being there to beat away bullies or put up a wall to ward away their fathers cruel words. Daryl started to hunt and train with his crossbow. He grew distant, colder. Like falling snow. Jamie went to college, her hard work in school paying off. She walked out with a Master's Degree in biochemical science.
With Merle in God knows where and Daryl more distant than ever before, Jamie became colder, the everburning heat cooled a bit. She took up a job as a Biomedical Engineer, acquiring a team of scientists just as smart as her and researching ways to improve and trick the brain into healing faster. As interaction with her brothers began to cease, so did her warmth. Jamie wasn't hesitant to be ruthless, pushing other scientists out of the field by proving them wrong in any which way.
Then, on her 26th birthday, her brothers showed up at her work as a surprise. Daryl was holding a present while Merle begrudgingly carried a small cake. They were probably expecting a surprised smile and an excited hug. Maybe a, "WOW! This is awesome. I haven't seen you forever!" Instead, they got a slammed door after Jamie sourly intoned that she had work to do. Later, Jamie begrudgingly let them in to appease the rest of her co-workers. She soon considered that a mistake as they were forced into a picture that was then hung on a wall in their section of the CDC.
Soon after, Merle went back to being shady but Daryl decided to stay in town. He started to visit Jamie at her work as if sensing something wasn't right. Most days Daryl would sit and silently watch her team work. On one of the few good days, Jamie had come over to him and actually explained what they were doing. "We are in the process of studying a neurological parasite that could possibly activate a specific conduit in the brain; therefore, coinciding with the brains normal functions and causing a rate of healing that is two times faster than a brain without it. This is groundbreaking! If our research pans out, this could monopolize the medicinal industry as we know it!"
Daryl couldn't stay with Jamie forever. Eventually he went back to hunting and whatever he did to pay rent. Back to his own life. Jamie once again fell into her ruthless ways. She worked harder than ever, sometimes even illegally removing vials from the CDC to work on them at home. Jamie had to be the best. The progress she and her team made was outstanding. They were fast approaching the solution to finally perfect the parasite that would speed up the healing rate of all those exposed to it.
The closer to the solution they became, the crazier Jamie seemed to get. She would work day and night, sometimes even suggesting self injection just to test what would happen if it were to enter the bloodstream in its current state. Her eyes were bloodshot from all of the sleepless nights filled with frantic work. A part of her, a part that was very deep inside, knew something was wrong. That part knew that Jamie wasn't Jamie anymore. She was an insane workaholic who didn't seem to care about anything but the parasite she was working on. Daryl was off in Louisiana somewhere, better hunting, he'd said once before. Merle, Jamie suspected, was with Daryl. They usually met after especially hard times with Jamie.
They were too far away. They couldn't do anything to stop her now. She had to finish this project. Had to prove that she was just as good as any other scientist. That she wasn't a redneck girl from a hick family with a drunkard father and two unfeeling brothers. And her team, oh yes, Jamie's team tried to stop her. To calm her down and reassure that everything was alright and she didn't want to do this because they were so close and didn't need illegal tampering and self testing to be recognized. It was never going to work. Jamie was already too far gone.
But she knew, of course she knew. Her team was watching and waiting for a tiny slip up. Then they could report her and Jamie would get thrown off the team. They were against her. Everyone was against her. So Jamie planned. She acted normal. A cheesy hello here, a few excited words of gossip there. Maybe some lunches with the team sprinkled in. And it was gone, the suspicion. The team probably just suspected a mental break or a few too many late nights. If her brothers were here, they'd be able to tell something wasn't right. Daryl would be able to tell that she wasn't the same cheery girl. Merle could tell that she still wasn't all the way right.
But the thing is, her brothers weren't there and they hadn't been for a while. So Jamie acted like she was ok and nobody noticed the insanity that lurked just below the surface. And everybody knows where the story goes from there. That coil of anger and madness is pulled tighter and tighter until one day, it just snaps and everything that it supported collapses. That's what happened. Jamie looked fine. Then she wasn't.
It was… a disappointment to say the least. There wasn't any manic screaming. There weren't any flames or blood spattered windows. A few poor decisions and a lack of vigilance was all it took for the world to come to an end. Before, it had been loud. Jamie laughing and everyone joking around as she led them into the labs, leaving the strong steel door open as they were only going to be in there for a few minutes. The last sound in the before was shattering glass. A sealed vial holding the contents of their research. It slipped from Jamie's hand, an unsuspecting smile plastered on her face, the last expression of a normal world. Was it an accident? Nobody will ever know. Although if you were to ask her team, in their final moments, some may say they could see a spark of madness hiding in her eyes.
The before was loud. The after was different. The first few minutes were muted. Red flashed and lights flickered. Shards of glass lay scattered on the blinding white laboratory floor. All was quiet. Then, it was chaos. Shrill alarms pierced the air. The after had descended into chaos and it would remain chaotic until the end. The CDC was in panic. The news spread that Jamie Dixon and her team were dead from the noxious contents of their laboratory. No, wait, they were alive. They're attacking other scientists. The CDC was to be evacuated. They would never make it.
And so you have it. From the moment that Jamie Dixon began to pursue her studies in Biochemical Engineering, she was doomed to failure and the world was damned to be showered in ash and covered with the blood of mankind. The sins of man were recognized and the dead began to walk the earth. And it was all due to a young, glistening eyed girl who was now dead as she wandered aimlessly through the streets of Atlanta, eyes no longer glistening.
Coming to the CDC was a bad idea from the start. Daryl knew something would happen. Plus, he really didn't want to be back in the place his sister used to work. He hoped she was somewhere safe, far away from Atlanta. Daryl knew the jig was up when Rick somehow got them hopelessly lost in their frantic escape in the seconds before the CDC blew. Unless he wanted them to die, Daryl would have to lead them out. And so he did. He knew and paved the way through the halls his had sister had joyously shown him what seemed like lifetimes ago.
Daryl winced as he sprinted through the once sterile halls. This used to be Jamie's life, her happy place. She always dreamt of being recognized for her work. Now everything was gone. He saw Rick, ever observant, glance back and then do a double take as they passed the framed photo of Daryl, Merle, and Jamie on the wall as they ran past her old workspace. Daryl cringed. Rick would question him later. But later didn't currently matter at the moment. Daryl led the group out and the CDC exploded. Flames licked the sky as their last hope for a cure was destroyed. He sighed as Rick led the group away. Hopefully they'd find shelter before nightfall. It was dangerous to be outside at night.
The stars gleamed, shining like nothing ever happened. Like Earth hadn't turned to Hell. Daryl hated it. The stars were mocking in their shining. Leaves crunched and Daryl sighed as Rick lowered himself down, skin warm from the campfire. Now was as good as ever to tell how his sister had fallen. Like a star that had finally burned out.
"Wait. You knew her?" Rick questioned.
"I knew all of them," Daryl murmured. "At least, I thought I did. Once. A long time ago."
"What were they like?"
Some crumpled copy of a smile crossed his face. "They were going to change the world."
And around them, the world burned.