Tell me a story (Daryl and the Prison group): companion story to Bayonet

I've been having this spinning in my brain for a good 9 months, as always the wonderful characters of The Walking Dead belong to Kirkman and AMC. The OC and stories they tell are fleshed out by me but many are in the background of some of the episodes. I've always wondered what do you do during the ZA in winter when everyone is trying to keep warm and fed. We tend to skip the winters entirely in TWD. When they aren't busy being badasses, I like to think they sit around, play games, annoy each other and tell tall tales. Obviously I'm a big fan of the Dixon brothers they are just so wonderfully warped that they appeal to me in their growth and character development.

The Decameron (Italian: Decamerone), subtitled Prince Galehaut (Italian: Prencipe Galeotto), is a collection of novellas by the 14th-century Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375). The book is structured as a frame story containing 100 tales told by a group of seven young women and three young men sheltering in a secluded villa just outside Florence to escape the Black Death, which was afflicting the city. ~Wikipedia

OC character list:

Mya: 8 year old daughter of Skya; precocious sweet and sheltered

Liam: 11 year old son of Skya: learning how to prepare game and hunt squirrels, taught by Daryl

Skya: Mother of Mya & Liam, from Ohio, worked in rehab prior to the end of the world, stranded in Georgia while vacationing with family who lived in area near prison. Smart, independent, good at hiding and camouflage. Learned how to use a bow and a hatchet before the end of the world. About 45. Took care of Merle after the governor nearly killed him, now he is teaching her survival skills.

Set midway of the 6 month span between season 3&4 Daryl and Merle are relaxing after dinner with the prison group of my AU story Bayonet. It's been a good day. Daryl and Merle went hunting and got a multitude of wildlife rodent to have in the stew. Skya hung around the prison gardening, practicing her archery, going on a short run with Michonne and Maggie. Rick was in the garden and Carl was bored out of his head. Hershel was concocting a deworming drink for the entire group being that someone came up with intestinal worms recently.

A sweet and mischievous girl wants a story as the group hangs out and digests dinner before doing their own thing.

"Tell me a story" Mya asks. "Somebody's gotta know one. What did all of you do before everything stopped?"

Her innocent question strikes everyone silent as the simplicity of the question implodes with the complexity of the changes this new world has wrought on the survivors.

Mya being 8 looks around the survivors in the prison and wonders who they were before the old world ended and this unpredictable new world began. She looks around and watches the play of expressions.
There is Rick holding Judith leaning against the wall, his head cocked as she burbles in her sleep like a gentle stream. He smirks and his long greasy hair bounces in time with Judith. His thoughts a lifetime away as his expressions slip into sadness and regret of things left unsaid and other things done impulsively.
Carl looks up at his father his so often angry smaller face unreadable as he waits his eyes darting between the adults like a tennis match, his clever fingers fiddling with a string from the frayed end of a pant leg, his mouth a line of schooled emptiness as if a smile or a frown would break open the box of memories in his soul; held captive and bound with chains containing a fountain of emotion as a black hole contains light.

However unlike a black hole cracks are being formed. The world still spins and children still grow in the shade of their adults; even ones with broken hearts and tortured memories. A flash of light remains as Carl remembers his teachers, video games and friends, pool parties in the Georgian summers, the smile of this mother, her eyes glowing with love for her young son.

He hears a snort from the group as Maggie playing Boggle with Glen finds a particularly clever word.

"Screw and Cueue; Beat that college boy".

Maggie's eyes are shining with love and triumph as her competitive nature contemplates winning over her more educated but less assertive lover. She has always been domineering as well as warmhearted. A combination that caused as many problems as it solved, she tucked her head down into her shoulder looking for all the world as a broody hen protecting her winning word combination. Her eyes squinted in the corners as Glen tries unsuccessfully to concentrate as she hums the Jeopardy theme.

She laughs gently as she leans on the table, her tan arms crossed against her generous breasts, her unruly straight brown hair ticking her nose causing her to twitch like the bunny that was the mvp of that night's stew.

"Not so fast; you spell Queue with a "q" not a "c", you're gorgeous but you're still a cheater and you don't spell as well as I do. I was studying journalism when this all started".
That stops her and she considers her lover. She watches as his widow's peak that she finds so lovable falls into his angled eyes. Her pupils dilate as she feels bittersweet with all the lost opportunities that the end of the world caused. She sighs smiling as she is newly impressed with his intelligence as well as his big heart. The end of the world has taken so much away but she has gotten only one thing in return, she would have never met the love of her life any other way.

"Y'all mute, this li'l girl asked ya for a story and ya sit there lookin at one another like a bunch sheep; bout as brainless too"

Merle chuckles to himself as half the room jumps as his loud rasping voice bounces off the walls. He sits next to Skya and Daryl watches him from the shadows behind them while whittling some new crossbow bolts. Merle stretches and tries the oldest trick in the book, unfortunately backfiring on him due to his missing wrist and hand as he brings his arm across her shoulders to hang over her trying to rest on her curvy form. She startles a little laughing as his plan backfires on him, being that he is concentrating on adjusting his boot sheathe for easier access. His mind playing tricks on him telling him that his hand is still attached as his attention is elsewhere.

"Are you volunteering Merle?"
She the lowers her voice and adds sotto voce "Merle I didn't know we were back in the 1950's and you an awkward teen trying to not so smoothly cop a feel".

She leans hard into his handless arm letting her voluptuous form rest on his right side noting his poorly controlled wince from the pressure on his healing ribs and back. She wonders if he will always feel soreness, but reminds herself that healing takes time.

He is glad for her to not verbalize what she notices. He finches more than his brother does, although he never had done so before his injuries. He always was a confident ballsy sonofabitch with no softness and precious little in the way of inner warmth. He gave up on being loveable decades ago.
The ancient white scars leave a roadmap covering his body; it tells the story, he doesn't need to say a thing. He never needed other people after trust had been beaten out of him when Daryl had been born. He fell in love once in his life at the age of eight; when he looked into the identical blue eyes of his newborn brother for the very first time.

The rest of the world chewed him up and spit him out, educating him that he was unlovable and not worth the time. He put his efforts into making sure that his sweet little brother was worth something even if it was too late for Merle. He perfected hiding under a camouflage of drugs, sarcasm, loveless sex, and brutality that somehow never found its way to the core of his being that still contained his love put away in a box covered in chains.

He realizes that he is becoming what he worked so hard for so many years to prevent a sappy weakling ruled by his feelings. If this just ain't a bundle of shit he thinks. He shakes his head as he fixes the buckles and laces on his boots to allow easy access for a three fingered man. He should have never been saved, or at least he should have died of respiratory failure or infection. He shrugs his shoulders feeling the strain of his newest scars pulling along his chest and his back.

He angles his neck feeling the crunch of his extensive arthritis that no one knows about, gaining a look from Skya as the clicks and soft pops become audible. He thrusts out his jaw but raises an eyebrow in amusement how he knows that she can read him but is equally sure that she will keep yet another secret for him. No one needs to know that the world chewed his bones up too, and that he is starting to notice that they crunch as he stretches and moves.

"Y'all never wanted to lissen to me before but shit I guess I can find some stones and tell ya something about something".

Merle snorts thrumming with amusement ironic really that he actually had a captive audience that weren't trying to tear him a new one. He reminds himself to thank the little girl. He guesses those kids might be good for something other than waking him up too early with their ear bleeding shrill little voices. Funny how he still tolerates the little shits better than the grownup asswipes.

"My grandpa grew up living in the woods and he taught me to hunt, and I taught it all to Daryl. The old man had some stories, boy. Shit the crap he had me believin' when he took me ta the woods before Daryl came along. He taught me forest legends and moonshiner stories they believed in these parts long before my great grandpa was a little shit. I'll let Daryl tell you about the Chupacabra being that he has more firsthand knowledge about it, or was that more knowledge about particular edibles from nature".

"Shut up Merle"

The quiet response comes from the shadows as Daryl squirms under his skin wondering when Merle will ever let him live down the night he took shrooms at 17. He saw a Chupacabra walking through the tiny town, blood dripping from its jaws, a canine grin on its face. He has so many times thought about the memory and knows that he saw what he saw. It couldn't be a dog or a fox or a coyote, nothing was right about the damn thing. He was pulled from his spiraling thoughts by Merle clearing his throat and working up to no doubt a smut filled story.

"Y'all know the story of Moonshiner Jack and Hell's finest daughter? Well it happened right here in these mountains".