It was finally over.

Lying there, blood drooling onto the dirty wooden porch, Daryl fought his every instinct to break down and cry. His eyes blurred and fingers shook as emotion threatened to overtake.

'No!' He thought angrily, painfully crushing his knuckles into the ground. "I will not cry."

He desperately thought back to the day, six years ago, when his brother first told him how to deal with their father when he was drunk.

Merle, as his name was, had found Daryl huddled under the kitchen table, ashen white with a brilliant purple bruise flowering just under his eye. Scooping him up, dumping him on the dusty kitchen counter and hastily shoving a bag of frozen peas onto his face, Merle told him how he survived each day with what he like to call 'The Beast'.

"First things first," He'd said gruffly. "You stay out of his way." Daryl nodded slowly, this was easy, he'd seen the things his father was capable of and knew better than to go and annoy him after he'd had a few.

"If that don' work," Merle paused, as if to think. "then no cryin', he gon' think he raised a pussy for a son, ain't no father want no goddamn whiny bitch bawlin' at him every time he gets mad." Another pause. "Ain't no fightin' back either, he's way too strong for your scrawny ass." He said, cruelly jabbing his finger into Daryl's chest. "It'd be best if you just stayed on his good side, and if you can't…Well you better fuckin' make sure you don't get him any angrier."

Stepping back, as if to let the message sink in, Merle surveyed him.

"You'd better scram, don' want him catchin' you lookin' like some beat-ass pansy."

Daryl remembered the rest of that day well, sitting alone in his dead mothers' closet, forcing himself to bury all his emotions.

Now, closing his eyes, he slowly pushed himself off the ground.

"I ain't no fuckin' bitch." He muttered angrily, ignoring the throbbing pain in his temple.

Wiping away the stream of blood from his nose, he staggered down through his ramshackle garden, plonking himself dejectedly down on a tall tree stump. Weeds tangled their way through the nooks and crannies of the stump, careening down and into the tall jungle of dry grass. A few lonely trees swayed gently in the cool afternoon breeze, insects buzzing lazily through the branches in the hot sunshine.

Turning away from this somewhat beautiful spectacle, Daryl stared at his calloused dirty feet, he hadn't cut his toenails in months and after endless days of careering through the woods with Merle, they'd practically turned into brown speckled stubs.

A small, uncontrollable rush of worry coursed through him at the thought of his older brother. The last he'd heard from him was three months ago, when a letter from the district court came in through the mail. His father, who was as per usual, completely wasted, tore the letter up without even reading it, declaring in a woozy voice that 'the boy was no son of his', and sloped off into the kitchen and collapsing headfirst into the badly stocked fridge.

Daryl had waited patiently in the old beaten up couch that stood in the far corner of their living room, watching the events unfold with a wary glimmer of hope. Slowly, making sure that his father was out of it, he picked up the shredded pieces of the letter. Stealing away into his room, he delicately pieced back what he could of the letter.

Dear Mr. Dixon

Following the recent arrest of your son, Mr. Merle Dixon, for possession and trade of illicit substances (including, but not limited to: Marijuana, Cocaine and Heroin), we request you attendance at Mr. Dixons' Court Hearing on Wednesday the 18th of November.

The next few lines were to shredded to read, but Daryl ploughed through regardless.

Refusal or – will be followe-

Mr. Dixon is facing a full sentence including 4 months of – and a possibility of fine.

Please contact Willow Davis a – to confirm attendance of Hearing at 395 Haast Road –

The rest of the letter was gone.

In the days leading up to that Wednesday, Daryl had valiantly tried to find 395 Haast Road.

Living hundreds of miles away from the small farming community of Sailbridge, which was too small to host any kind of Court or Prison, Daryl had eventually given up his search for his missing brother. And when that Wednesday had finally rolled around, he had already swept the torn letter away and given up hope of seeing his brother again.

Tearing himself away from the dark depths of his mind, Daryl rose slowly, his knees nearly giving way with the sudden crush of hideous pain. Running his hands slowly down his body he felt nothing apart from a few steadily swelling bruises. Seemingly relived at this, he turned back towards the house, beginning his sluggish, painful walk back to the porch.

Broken bones had never fared well with Daryl. Being stuck in a grotty bedroom with the sole company of the few mice who dared enter his room, but even that felt like nothing when Merle was away. With no-one to bring home the night's dinner, his father would be absolutely livid. For the first few nights, Daryl would have nothing to listen to but the sound of an enraged man smashing plates, punching walls, frenzied by drink and hunger.

Shivering, despite the boiling heat of the day, he forced himself to push past the long cold memories.

He cursed, for the past few weeks he'd found himself lost within his own mind. Kneeling down, he pummelled his head. "You goin' fuckin' crazy now?" He muttered angrily to himself, tearing at the dying grass. "This it? THIS ALL YOU CAN TAKE?!"

His voice became a frenzied roar, built up emotion poured out of him, making the world spin and duck hazily. Blindly he began to tear at his eyes, scratching and clawing, unearthly cries drowning him in a sea of pain and anguish. Unaware of what he was even doing, he mindlessly began to slam his forehead into the dirt.

Again and again and again. "Let me go, let me go, let me GO!" He roared to no-one.

And, as it should, the world went black.