This is my first Walking Dead fanfiction. I thought I was done with your crowd back in 2009. *shakes an old lady fist* But after seeing the new dynamic between Daryl and Beth, I couldn't stop myself. I know I'm a little bit late on the Bethyl train, but I just recently go Netflix and finally finished the season, hah. This'll get smutty, eventually, in small doses. I've already got the first five chapters penned out and ready for editing, which'll provide me with a nice buffer so ya'll aren't waiting for updates forever.
This is a short one, but I'm trying to separate chapters into distinct scenes.
Enjoy!
Beth felt hands on her shoulders, fisting her shirt and tugging upwards, catching strands of hair and ripping them painfully from her scalp. The violent grab wretched the girl back to the present, bringing with it the pungent smell of new death and an acute ringing in her ears. Her eyes sought out Daryl's, his face stony and eyes hard, as his hand wrapped around her upper arm in a vice like grip to drag her away.
"We gotta go, Beth. We gotta go now," the man bit out, righting Beth to her feet none too gently. Walkers were closing in, snarls and groans from the dead filling the prison yard along with thick clouds of black smoke.
Beth twisted her body around in Daryl's grip, feeling much like Lot's wife turned to chiseled salt as her gaze caught so many familiar faces, joining the horde eager to consume the two living souls still present in the yard, but she couldn't make her feet cooperate as they stumbled over each other and she fell into the warm body near her. "But… Daryl, the others.. Maggie, I gotta.."
Daryl tugged harshly on Beth's arm, not mindful on whether he was guiding or carrying her. "We gotta go!"
With one last visual sweep – taking in the broken fences, smoldering tank, bodies littered on the ground, and finally, Judith's bloody car seat – Beth heaved a sob and turned her back on the gruesome scene to follow obediently.
Daryl's white knuckled grip on Beth was the only thing keeping him grounded, staving away the hush of red that had threatened to cover his vision. Through the woods they ran, walkers making them zigzag around trees, drawn by the sounds of chaos. At some point, Daryl lost his grip on Beth, walkers forcing him to clear the way for himself and his charge as undead emerged from the brush to separate them further, but he didn't abandon the girl.
He had slowed to a stop just in time to hear her gun click empty, a sound that made Daryl's heart jump and his crossbow swing in an arc, barely taking time to aim properly before the bolt exploded from the side of the walker's skull. He grabbed the back of her shirt, urging her on with a push to hip. Daryl couldn't handle losing anyone else that day. The pair ran close, ducking around trees, further into the forest, away from the prison. Daryl ran until his eyes itched and throat burned, though not from the exertion or stench of smoke that blanketed the countryside from their home. Emotions he didn't want to address clawed at his chest and settled in his sternum, the thrumming beat of his heart only wrenching the hurt deeper, so when Beth collapsed in the grassy field, his body landed easily beside hers, his hand coming to cover his eyes, physically pressing away the tears there, real tears, like the ones he shed when fate forced his hand against Merle, tears for Hershel, for Beth. Selfish tears for himself and everyone else in this shit world that lost one of the last good men left in it.
He glanced under his wrist to the Greene girl at his side. Sobbing Beth had given way to a Beth that he was uncomfortably familiar with – stoic, wide eyed and stone faced – so he sat, rolling away and to his feet. When he spoke, his voice was gruff with contained emotion, but he managed to mumble something about finding a safer place to rest, at least for a little while. Daryl pulled a frown at Beth's grimace, but he understood. What place had been safer than their compound, and look how quickly that had been torn away.