The smell of blood is in the air, thick and sharp, and the old man has fallen silent while Maggie is making small horrified noises, but Rick has things under control and Daryl has his bow aimed squarely at the prisoners. "Why don't you come out slow," he snarls, and they do, though more out of shock at the scene than because they respect him.
That's cool. They will.
Then the pack of them is out of the kitchen or whatever that shit is, and one of the smaller ones from the back is elbowing forwards. Daryl tucks the crossbow's stock even more firmly against his shoulder but freezes, because in its sights is a man as familiar as his own hands. "Daryl?" the man says. "What the fuck?!" And Daryl starts to lower the crossbow.
"Daryl!" Rick snaps, and with a grimace he brings the bow back up.
"Get that stupid look off your face," he says darkly, backing away to cover his people and feeling them behind him as sure as if they were his own blood. "Ain't got time for this."
"Daryl!" Con shouts, like nothing has happened, and the stupid look (hurt and guilt and something fucking mushy) is wiped away by annoyance. "Where the fuck are you going?!"
"Shit, don't open that door!" Another prisoner yelps, and those surrounding Hershel's gurney ignore the warning.
"We got this," Rick says, fierce, and there's no time to think of anything else.
Daryl takes point all down the corridors, and kills another half-dozen geeks with bolts and knife before they get to the cleared cell block and its sealable doors. The others rush in with the old man and Daryl stays behind, aiming at the open doorway that he knows will be filled pretty damn soon.
Sure enough, not a minute later Con comes skidding around the corner at full-throttle, lurching to a halt and falling on his ass as he sees the weapon aimed square at his face. "What the fuck, man?"
"Stay the fuck back."
The other prisoners come up right behind him, the nasty-ass punk with the 6-shooter at the head of the pack. He steps around Con, arrogant as fuck, and nods coolly at the locked door. Like he's the owner of the damn place and not some criminal been hiding in the kitchen for Lord knows how damn long. "C-Block. Cell 4 is mine. This is our territory, gringo."
"The hell it is," T says, his own gun rock-steady. "We took it, it's ours."
Greaser pulls the pea-shooter out of his pants, aiming it like it's gonna do him a damn bit of good, as Rick comes up behind T-Dog and bangs through the gate like a man on a mission. "Put the damn gun down," he says simply. He has a way of giving orders like he's just stating facts; used to drive Daryl nuts, but these days he appreciates it.
Rick and the lead shit-head do their negotiating while Daryl tries to simultaneously cover all the prisoners and not look at Conrad at all. It's hard. Stupid pussy is looking at him like he's water in summer, fire in winter, and an 18-point buck after a week of hunting that brought in fuck-all. Fortunately he does his moon-eyed staring from his position on the floor, all the piss and vineger temporarily gone out of him, so it's not really too needful to look at him. Soon enough the alpha males are done squabbling and Rick comes up behind his shoulder.
"Time to go," he says, and Daryl nods curtly, lowering the bow but keeping his eyes on the prisoners.
He stalks around the small bunch of them, taking point through the door, and Con scrambles to his feet. "Come on, Daryl, you fucker-" Daryl jerks sideways, as far away as the hallway permits.
"Shut. Up."
"You know this guy?" T asks, and Daryl nods curtly.
"Later," Rick commands, and they all move on.
Con has stopped with the staring and the pestering by the time they're gathered around the table giving convicts a crash course in Walker take-downs, and has instead sidled over to stand just close enough to Daryl to be in his personal space.
What pisses him off is how little it bothers him: how quickly his body re-adjusts to having its second axel in place again, angled slightly away and knowing that his back is covered. It's like the way he is with Rick now (and has been for seven months), and standing between the two of them halfway feels like being pulled in opposite directions and halfway like everything is finally right. He doesn't know which is more of a pain in the ass.
He stays a silent presence at Daryl's side all through the corridors, covering his position with no flinching although he practically vibrates with energy. When it all goes to shit with the big guy (what kinda stupid-ass name is Big Tiny, anyway?) and then later with the walkers and the greaser, he sticks to the plan like glue.
His only deviation is after that asshole tries to kill Rick. Daryl is following Rick's lead, ready to shoot whoever makes a move; he doesn't aim at the ringleader because Rick has that piece of shit covered. When Rick ends it with a machete to the head he swings up his bow to cover the others and almost fires when the little guy starts to take off: but Con beats him to it, taking out the convict with a single clean shot to the head.
Probably lifted the revolver off the main shit-head during the fight. Smooth, asshole.
The three surviving prisoners, led by Con, drop their weapons and hold their hands up in surrender-good to know they ain't all morons. Rick's gun swings from one to the other, deliberately, and pauses for a moment over Con's shit-eating grin. "You know Daryl?" he says, an unmistakable threat in his voice, and Con just grins some more.
"Yup," he says, and looks square at Daryl. "He's my brother."
That's a show-stopper, all right, and it makes everyone in the room save the two of them hold up. "Merle's your brother," T says, and Daryl rolls his eyes and glares at him.
"Man can have more than one brother, moron."
"Actually, we're twins." Con says. "A twofer."
Rick doesn't answer, just turns and looks at Daryl. Him and Con look more alike than him and Merle, same height and build and body language, and he can see the former deputy taking it in. The hunter feels himself squirm under the look. "Never mentioned him."
"Never came up," Daryl blusters, and shifts the crossbow in his arms. "Come on, what we gonna do with these assholes?"
The blond guy gulps, raising his hands even higher. "Please, mister. We had no idea what they was gonna do. I swear! You saw what Tomas did to Tiny...I was friends with him. The man was a psycho, we're just common crooks."
"It's kinda true," Con offers. "Axel's just a garden-variety shit-head, and I don't even know what Oscar did. B&E or some shit, which is pretty much what y'all did coming in here."
"And what did you do?" Rick asks evenly. Hs eyes are narrowed in his 'cop stare', the one that still made Daryl a little twitchy sometimes, and Con darts a look at his brother before replying.
"Murder."
"That so." Rick looks back at Daryl, brows raised, and Daryl gives a little shrug. Lets his eyes drift to the body on the floor with its skull split by a machete. Looks back at Rick and thinks, ain't we all?
"It's up to Daryl what to do with you," he says finally.
Well, that's awesome, Daryl thinks, and scowls. "You gonna pull some stupid shit?" he says abruptly. "Gonna cause trouble for my people?"
"If they're your people they're my people," Con says, and he's trying to look tough but he's got that stupid look creeping up in his eyes again, and Daryl rolls his eyes and hauls him up by his shirtfront.
"Fine, then, let's go." He shoves his twin. "Jackass." Con shoves him back, and the others tense but Daryl feels himself relax despite himself. Maybe things are finally looking up.
(yeah, right)
The door to the cell-block clangs shut behind them, Carl locking it as sober as a judge, and Rick leads the small group to check on Hershel. He's doing okay-as well as can be expected, anyhow-and those who had stayed in the cell-block look over the bloodied group and their tag-along hesitantly.
"So, what's the deal with the prisoners?" Glenn blurts out.
"Two of 'em tried to screw us over," T-Dog says shortly. "Two of 'em we stuck to the deal and left in their own block. This guy is Daryl's twin brother." They boggle at that little bomb-drop, and Daryl feels his cheeks heat as their wide eyes go from his brother to him and back, again and again.
"You got a problem?" He and Con say the words at the same time and some of the group start to look amused as well as shocked. Daryl scowls even more darkly.
"How come you never said you have a twin, man?" Glenn smiles at them. "That's awesome."
"I didn't have him." Daryl unslings his crossbow just for something to do, setting it against the wall. "He went and got himself in prison."
"I must admit," Rick says in the light voice that isn't really light at all, "I am a mite curious about you being in here for murder."
"The bastard was a kiddie-fiddler," Con says like it's simple, the way he seems to think everything is simple. "Everyone fu...everyone damn well knew it, just weren't nobody did jack-shit about it. I saw him messin' with a little'un and just...stopped him."
"Cut the shit, man," Daryl bursts out, and gets in his face. "You didn't just happen to catch him at somethin', you fucking hunted him down. Weren't nothing accidental about it."
"So what?" Conrad pushes him right back. "You sorry I killed that asshole? Huh? Mad 'cause I did something outside the, uh, the strict moral code of Daryl fuckin' Dixon? Bullshit."
"Ain't pissed you killed him, pissed you went without me!" He shoves at him again, lands a punch on his shoulder for good measure. "What, you think I was gonna be happy 'bout you going off without me? Thirty fuckin' years joined at the fucking hip, I'm gonna wave goodbye with a smile and, what, write you some goddamn letters?"
"Want I shoulda took you to prison with me? Fuck. You." He punctuates the 'fuck you' with double-barreled birds, and Daryl tackles him, spitting mad.
(T went to pull them apart, he learns later, but Rick held him back. "They're brothers," Rick said, and stayed by the knock-down-drag-out while the rest of them tried to find something else to do)