The cold steel lip of the trough dug into his chest before he could really understand what was happening. It was all happening too goddamn fast. One minute they'd been ready to kick some ass and then there was smoke in his eyes, in his mouth, in his lungs. The sun blinding and a belt to the back of the head making everything swim. Then they were being dragged, boots catching on stones and roots, that gippy knee spasming.
And now Daryl's bent over a metal dish and he can't figure out what the fuck is happening. Guys are talking behind him, but their words are beyond him. They sound like idiots. The gag in his mouth – when the hell was that put in? – is biting into the sides of his mouth and that knee's never gonna be the same. And he's still not seeing the big fucking picture because he keeps thinking about that knee and now he's gonna have to live with it and man, he was getting old. All the while hearing yet not hearing the frantic whines of the guy at the end of the line.
Then there's a thunk and a slicing sound, primal, that Daryl wishes he didn't recognise and the sound of gushing. It's the smell, though, really, that wakes him up. He knows that smell, the bright tang of copper, like chewing on a penny, the heavy salty body of air that hangs in your mouth. The smell of antiseptic comes to him then, too. The smell of surgery. Slaughterhouse. Butchers.
Daryl finds himself rearing and bucking in the row, suddenly aware of those on either side, Glenn, his friend. Rick, his brother. They bring no comfort, though. They writhe just like he does, even as the thunk and shhhll is repeated, the sounds and smells getting closer.
This is how it ends, not in quiet bed surrounded by his family, like Beth had hoped for, for her Dad, not even in a blaze of glory. So much for being the last fucking man standing. Even thinking her name gives him a stab of pain so great he almost thinks the idiots needn't bother with him: he's already done in.
Beth. Big, blue-eyed, Bambi of a girl. How the fuck had she had this effect on him? Some forty years he'd lived on this earth and never had anyone pulled him up so short, struck him so dumb. Made him want to live so fucking much. All in the nick of fucking time. Another man slumps over and Glenn's making a keening noise somewhere in the back of his throat, his eyes screwed shut and Daryl just knows he's thinking of Maggie. And he doesn't know just how fucking lucky he really was to have her even if only this long.
Just one time Daryl should have kissed Beth Greene and he knows it's going to be his last thought on this earth. Even if she'd been embarrassed, hadn't felt that way, at least he'd have known, right? And maybe, just maybe, she might have wanted to kiss him some more. And that would have been good enough for Daryl.
Instead, Daryl was going to be strung up and bled out like a goddamn steer and he would never see his blondie again. And she was out there, waiting for him to find her and he would never come. Tears threatened but he couldn't let himself, He mustn't cry. He'd die brave, at least, for her.
Another gurgle and thump and then it was Glenn and it was all over. If Glenn died they'd all die. They'd all go down together and all that shit. Really, they just wouldn't be able to face Maggie. He can hear the idiot squaring up and all and Glenn makes peace with whatever God he believes in – Hershel, maybe, Daryl thinks – and waits.
The door opens and that asshole walks in, ticking things off a list like a goddamn taxman. What the hell was his name?
"Hey guys, what were your shot counts?" He asks, not batting an eye at the scene in front of him, and Daryl wonders if that's how he copes. Doesn't let his own hands get dirty.
"Thirty-eight." Idiot Number One says and the bat starts waggling in the corner of his eye again. Before it can be swung the Taxman interrupts again and Daryl almost screams. For fuck's sakes, just get it over with already. His heart can't take the hoping.
"Hey! Shot count?" He says and there's some embarrassed hemming and hawing going on behind them from Idiot Number Two. The treacly looking blood is under their noses now but he almost can't smell it any more. Daryl's muscles have locked and spasmed as much as they can and everything hurts and yet it's so close to being all over. He should relish the hurt.
"Crap. I'm sorry. It's my first round-up." The dweebish reply comes. The Taxman tuts.
"After you're done here, go back and count your shells. Kaylee won't be collecting them until tomorrow." He moves his pen down the piece of paper and Daryl wishes he could stab him in the eye with it. Has never felt such intense, violent hatred for another human being before. See, Beth, he thinks, the good ones don't make it. Like you. Taxman gets closer, eyeing up the line, marking no difference between the living and the dead.
"Four from A, four from B." He says, more to himself than to the idiots. Bob is trying to talk but it sounds like moans. Finally Taxman takes mercy and takes off the gag, lets Bob ramble about DC before he smiles that bland smile and puts it back on, saying with a sneer:
"Can't go back, Bob."
Daryl almost feels embarrassed on behalf of Bob, for thinking this psycho would listen. But then, at least he's still fighting. A blink and those baby blues are still watching him from the dark, reproachful in that way of hers, yet somehow still without judgement.
Taxman crouches in front of Rick, gets closer than he would if he knew what Rick could do with his teeth these days.
"I saw you go into the woods with a bag and come out without it. What was in it?" Rick just dead-eyes him. But Taxman doesn't take no for an answer and Daryl wishes that Rick could make the lunge across that trough, could get to that scrawny neck.
"You hid it, right, in case things went bad. Smart. Still, we'll find it. But it's too dangerous to go out there now. What was in it? I'm curious and," an almost conservational laugh, "it was a big bag."
It goes on for a while and Daryl feels that weird impatience again. Finally it comes to an end with Rick promising to kill him with the red handled machete. Daryl almost smiles, though he doesn't hope to believe. Taxman starts moving about again, the gag goes back in and the Idiots get back into position.
Best start to praying again. But instead of God or psalms or prayers all that comes to mind is what might have been. A reunion. Getting to be someone's hero. A flash of blonde hair against his chest, spilling over bed sheets. Rosy cheeks, flushed from the sun and happiness and his mouth on hers. His big hands wrapped around her belly, soft and round. Laughter around firesides with friends and brother and sisters. Lives stretching before them in the golden Georgia sunshine.
There's a popping sound instead of the thunk and hiss of the blade over Glenn's skin, his skin. There's a confused silence that lasts just a beat. Then everything goes sideways, again, and the world explodes. Somehow, he thinks, as he comes to, watching the dust and debris fall around him, Rick moving like lightning, somehow free of his bonds, it comes to him that he will get out of this. He must get out of this. And, whatever it takes, he will find her.