So, I've wanted to start a Daryl fanfiction since The Walking Dead came out, and I was finally hit with some inspiration like three years later! I hope you guys all like this! I will be sticking to the story line for the most part. Please review and let me know what you think and if I should continue!
Disclaimer: I don't own The Walking Dead.
I hear my rapid breathing, it mixes in with the greens, yellows, and brown of the woods, all a blurred concoction swirling around me. I have no idea where I am. My head lulls side to side, feeling like a sack of sand attached to my neck, slowly sloshing and spilling out onto the dirt as I stagger forward. Where was I going again? I can't think of a place, just the colors around me coming in and out of focus of my vision, like little tendrils of smoke wafting around. I reach out to touch one of the dancing hues of green, only to fumble though the empty air. Was there nothing there?
My hand seems foreign in front of me, and I wonder if it's mine. Not realizing I am now still, I raise the alien extremity in front of my face, wiggling the fingers slowly. They are stained with soil, cut and the nails untrimmed. Surely this isn't mine?
I suddenly zone out of the hand, that I can't be sure who's is, I should find the owner and return it, and make my way into the dancing trees again. Their bark wheezes, as if breathing, and the branches creek and ache as they stretch out and curl around me. I laugh, the sound tinkling in my ear. I trace the trees and feel them under my finger tips, I swear I can feel the pump of their blood beneath their trunks. They are living thing's, so they must have blood? I entertain the thought. Yes, it must be true, nothing else can explain the way they live right here around me, calling out and swaying. I feel my lips upturn at the notion. I want to be a tree.
The trees abruptly change, instead of inviting me in, expelling and quivering in anger. Have I upset them? Maybe I shouldn't know their secret. I have to run. I take off, my feet pounding on the ground. Or maybe that's my heartbeat. I just have to escape the ents around me, I feel their fury growing inside of me, reading to explode. They reach for the air, movements quick and uncoordinated, snapping into place like broken bones. I feel them snagging on my t-shirt, trying to rip into my skin. They want to tear my pale flesh clean off, so they can wear it and be a human just like I wanted to be a tree.
There's screaming all around me, high pitched and squealing like a pig, echoing around my brain and making me clutch it in my hands as I sprint. Where is it coming from? The trees? Yelling to each other and at me for intruding into their land? I whimper, clutching at my fiery locks of hair, I can feel the roots straining under me, I just want it to stop. I want the screaming to stop.
A branch comes burrowing out of the dirt, shooting through the land and snarling my foot in it's grasp. I hit the ground running, head colliding into the forest floor. I don't feel the impact, just the ringing in my ears, and the reverberating of my brain making contact with my skull. My lungs have no air, I gape like a fish flapping on land, wind knocked clean out of me. Then oxygen flows in, I gasp, trying to suck in the life. Then there's the screeching again. Everything around me is seeping together, creating a giant picture I can't make out, molding into one. It frightens me, unlike before when it was whimsical and enchanting. This was dark and bloodcurdling.
I bury my hands into the dirt as I try to crawl, the ent's are still after me. Where am I going again? I can still hear the howling, it's all around me, suffocating me. It''s tortured and makes me weep, the tears streaming down my reddened cheeks are hot, blurring my already skewed vision.
My vocal cords feel coarse, and my throat burns. I realize the yelling is mine. Then silence. I lay. My head feels like it's on fire, and a veil of sweat coats my body. It's burning up. Incoherently I wiggle out of my shirt and skinny pants, somehow getting them over the black combat boots attached to my feet, trying to fight off the heat. Humid air clings to me, making it nearly unbearable. Where was I? I touch my skin, squirming and uncomfortable. The sensation of the dirt under me and my own prodding is strange. Like I'm digging into my flesh and scooping piles out while at the same time stitching it back on. It frustrates me. My fears of the trees disappear.
What was I running from? I can't think of the answer, so I roll onto my back in a haze to stare up at the blue of the sky. I feel the pulsating of blood rushing to my brain, creating a headache that makes me groan out loud. My eyes flutter close, hiding the green iris's from the harsh Georgia sun. I just want to not be able to see. The world is swimming and strange, so maybe if I keep my eyes shut, everything will disappear.
It doesn't. Instead, I see a thousand lights flickering and flashing in the darkness, like little fireflies made out of rainbows. They remind me of when I was young and always wanted to go find a swarm of them. I never could. So, I would watch the flashing of car lights speeding by as a replacement. I guess this is what I always wanted. To see my fireflies. I don't know what triggers the old forgotten memory, but it seems to bring me out of my stupor into a moment of clarity.
Im in the wood's. I'm lost. I'm sick.
Then, I'm back to my feverish antics, looking at the small patch of moss growing in my peripheral. It glistens, and I picture my skin probably looking the same with sweat. I want to touch it, but my arm seems to be be numb. Maybe I lost it.
All there is is me, and the wood's. We are one. My body sinks into the ground, and little feathers of grass sprout out of my naked skin. I hope I look like an earth nymph. Maybe someday, someone will stumble upon me here, one with the forest, my tomb the nature embracing me.
There's a rustle to my left, and it takes all my will to turn my head to the side. Has someone already found me? Has it already been a hundred years that passed in a blink of an eye?
Amidst all the colors of the woods, there's a blotch of darkness winding towards me. Straining my eye's, I can make out the gimp of a man. Or perhaps another nymph or ent? I can't be for certain what mythical creature has ventured close by. The sky rumbles, hissing out. If I have upset the heavens like I did the Earths, I fear I can't run anymore.
The mysterious figure moves in at a lethargic pace, I can pick out more and more about it as it draws closer. Torn white button up. Its fluttering around him. I think it might actually be large wings, which are soaked in grime and blood. A fallen angel who had their wings clipped and sent to fall to the Earth. My vision crosses and I can no longer make anything out, just shapes and blurs.
I wonder if the sky groaning is actually this fallen angel, calling out in despair. Now, I'm almost certain it is. My subconscious shivers, I know this thing is dangerous. Why can't I move? My sight finally focuses again, right onto the torn apart lips on his face. A piece of lip dangles onto his chin, and it's decaying mouth is oozing dark goo as feral guttural noises escape him.
He was no fallen angel, he was a demon sent straight from the depths of hell itself.
Bracing my weight on my paralyzed arms, I push myself up, feet unsteady on the ground for only a second before I go limp and slam into the floor once again, face meeting the dirt in reacquaintence. I feel it all this time, it's unsurpassed. My hearing fuzzes out. Dread sweeps over me like a blanket. I'm confused. A ringing starts in my left ear, buzzing like an agitated bee. Maybe there was one flying around me.
Forcing my eyes open, I can see the demon only feet from me, reaching out and speeding up. It's only a few seconds til he reaches me. I cant look away even though its all I want. I don't want to see him get to me. So why can't I tear my gaze?
Something whizzes through the air, and just like that he drop's like a sack.
Suddenly, a ruff hand grabs my shoulder, and it feels like it's melting into my back. Was somebody here? Another demon? Reality blurs as I'm flipped over, the ringing picking up. Where am I? Who am I? Why does my head feel like it's going to explode?
I can barely make out the silhouette of a man kneeling over me, rays of sun cascading behind his head. He lean's forward, and I can make out the movement of his lips. He's talking, but all I see is his mouth move. They fascinate me, and I try to understand and read his lips. Was this what it's like to be deaf? There's freckles of dirt around them, and I can make out a dusting of facial hair.
Repositioning on his knee, he's right in my face.
"You...listening...are...bit?" The word's all fuse and sound drawn out and slow, as if I could reach out and pluck them out of thin air. I don't care about that though, I care about the eye's I can now see since he leaned in. They pierce right into mine, baby blues shifting with frustration. He blinks, and long eyelashes sit upon his cheeks for a fleeting moment, kissing his tan skin. I want to touch them, but I can't move, and I have a feeling he would slap my fingers away.
He looks like a real angel.
Then all there is, is black.