A walker came at him and Daryl had nothing to fight with but his own fists. So he backhanded the rotting thing across it's face and it stumbled into the wall as if dazed. It was odd to Daryl, how the monster seemed to almost act alive. Like it was shocked it got hit and blood was now leaking from the side of it's face.
Daryl took the short reprieve to search for a weapon. Any weapon. A broken bottle, a hunk of wood. His own flashlight, dropped at some point and he can't remember when.
But then the walker is on him again, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him, snarling. Teeth so close. Daryl's hands were up, wrapped around it's neck and pushing back. It won't kill the thing, but it would keep it back until he can find something. Anything...
Pain flared through his side and he couldn't stop the scream that erupted from him. It was loud, too loud. There'd be more walkers coming. He was trapped and weaponless, even if he did survive the walker on him-
"WAKE UP!" the walker screamed in Glenn's voice. "It's just a nightmare, Daryl! Wake up, please, Daryl!"
Daryl gasped, eyes shooting open, and the walker he was strangling was suddenly Glenn clawing at his wrists with one hand and digging his nails in Daryl's side with the other. A desperate attempt to make Daryl come to his senses in the frenzied pit of the Governor's fighting ring. A last attempt if it didn't work.
Daryl's hands weakened their grasp and Glenn could breath again. Just a little. His throat burned, but he could suck in air that without the struggle he'd had just moments before. He took a ragged breath and whispered, "Daryl? You back?"
Even if he was, he got no answer because Daryl was yanked off him by someone else. One of the men that had dragged Daryl into the ring, drugged up and convinced he was going to be thrown to the walkers. The hallucination flickered in his mind and he was back to that room, locked in a life or death fight. But this time, Glenn was with him.
Glenn was on the ground as the walker pulled at his arms and Daryl snarled at it. He didn't fight the motion, but used it to take the monster off guard, run at him and push it backwards into the nearest wall. To slam it's head into the concrete. He took it by the hair and slammed it back again, and again, and again, until it's skull had cracked open and it's brain was smashed to a pulp. One less walker to threaten him and his.
"Daryl..." Glenn's voice broke with fear and horror as he stepped back, the adrenaline starting to drain from his system. The vision of the walker sliding to the ground fuzzed and spun and for a second he saw what had been a perfectly healthy and living man laying with his head caved in. For that second Daryl knew he'd done that. But then the second was over and the room was back.
Glenn was at his elbow and Daryl grabbed him, "Gotta get outta here, Shortround. Don't know how many heard our screamin'."
"Daryl, no!" Glenn held himself firmly in place. He brought his hands up to grab either side of Daryl's face and forced the man to look at him. He took a shaky breath, shook his head when he was sure he had Daryl's drugged attention. "No. Wherever you think we are, we aren't. We're in Woodbury. Do you remember Woodbury?"
Daryl blinked hard and fast. The name was familiar, but he couldn't remember why. He tried to shake his head and it only made him dizzy.
"The Governor," Glenn said, tone firmer, fiercer. "Do you remember the Governor?"
"Which one?" Daryl asked, still confused. He knew this was important. That he needed to pay attention to Glenn. Really pay attention and focus on it. But it was so hard with the moans of the walkers nearby, ringing in his ears.
Glenn took a deep breath and pulled Daryl close, "Okay... You're not getting it. We'll just have to work with whatever they did to you. What do you see, Daryl?"
"I see you," Daryl answered, struggling to find a glimpse of the real under all the wavering fakes that were passing in front of his eyes.
"That's good. Um... okay, so... you keep calling me Shortround, right? That means you've seen Temple of Doom, right?" Glenn asked, trying to find an angle that Daryl could connect with.
Daryl shook his head, "Yeah. You an' your baseball cap..."
"Good," Glenn grinned. And he meant that grin. Daryl couldn't see the rest of the Governor's men outside the circle of walkers that lined the ring. He couldn't see the way they were waiting for a signal to either send someone else in or just shoot them from the sidelines.
"We're in the Temple of Doom," Glenn went on, wrapping his arms around Daryl as if he were getting ready to say goodbye. "I'm Short Round and you're Indy. We just got away from the lava pit and we need to evade the guards and get to the mining tunnel. I'm going to lead you there and you're going to have to fight the cultists. But there are traps you can't see and I know where they are because I was in the mines and I saw them being rigged. You have to go where I say and hit what I say to hit. Can you do that? Can you put yourself there?"
Daryl's arms rose up to settle around Glenn's waist and he shut his eyes. He leaned in, let his head rest on Glenn's shoulders. He could still see the room, but he could also see the movie running through his head. And that was far more familiar than wherever they actually were.
"Well now," a voice boomed from somewhere Daryl couldn't see. (That's the Governor, the evil priest of this temple.) "It seems we have a pair of lovers in the ring. How sweet. But we aren't here to see a trite reunion, are we boys? We're here to see a traitor watch his brother die before he joins him." (Merle's Willie. Don't tell him I said he's the girl.) "Release the chains."
Glenn pulled away from him, grabbed his hand, and pulled him into a spin, "They're releasing walkers. Run and tackle whoever you come across when I let go."
Daryl didn't have time to respond before Glenn released him. He stumbled forward, legs carrying him into a run. He hit what he thought was a wall but soon became a walker or a cultist or something in between as his vision flickered between scenes. He brought his arms up and tackled whoever was blocking him.
Glenn called out a new order, run to his left. So he shoved himself off and ran. Duck and roll. Run. Hit that guy to your right. Through the door. Merle's voice joined Glenn's and he tried to give orders, but Daryl was only listening to Short Round. He couldn't focus enough to do otherwise. They had to get out and Glenn was the in and out guy.
Merle picked up on it soon enough and though he sounded put out by it, he started shouting at Glenn where to go. What paths to take to get the three of them out. Glenn called those out when he needed to and Daryl was guided to the cliff face that was Woodbury's wall. They were over it and out into the ruins of the town as the drugs started to finally wear off. They left Daryl dizzy, reeling. He could still do little except follow Glenn's orders. But he could also see the obstacles Glenn was leading him around. He could see beyond the room and the walkers and the mine shaft the movie provided as an alternate backdrop.
They didn't stop until they were half-way to the prison. Merle made them. They were leaving too many tracks and Woodbury actually had more than one person who could follow them. At the road, Daryl had them go the opposite direction from where the car and the rest of the group Rick brought would be waiting. Merle had them wander off the road every so often as if they were stumbling from exhaustion. A footprint here and there that would lead their pursuers away. They walked that road for a mile before Daryl led them into the forest on the other side and they took their time hiding their passage. Glenn wasn't as good as the brothers, but he was good enough that even Merle was grudgingly satisfied.
It was only after they circled back to the car and their group that Daryl finally let himself collapse. Too tired and stung out and struggling with blurry vision to keep going on his own. Merle sat himself down next to his brother while Rick and Maggie and Michonne argued with Glenn about Merle coming with them. He elbowed his brother and nodded toward the group, "Thought muffin over there was with the Chinaman."
"She is," Daryl muttered, head leaned back as he let his eyes rest shut while Glenn did his defending.
"Then what was that between you two?" Merle elbowed him again. "Know you were lookin' at that yellow ass back at the quarry. So you can't tell me it weren't something. You two a has-been?"
"We're a never-was," he answered, sighing and wishing Merle would leave it alone. He just didn't have the energy to tell him off right then and there.
"You sure about that?" Merle asked and Daryl could picture the way his brother's eyes squinted as his brow knitted together when he was suspicious.
Daryl half-heartedly slapped his brother's shoulder, "Course I'm sure."
"Then why's he coming over here to give you a kiss?"
Daryl's eyes snapped open and he sat up straight, looking around frantically. His heart hammered in his chest and all he had to thank for the sudden panic was Merle hooting his laughter and slapping his knee. It drew the attention of those fighting and Daryl sagged forward, head dropping between his knees as he waved one hand to let them know things were fine.
Glenn broke away from the argument in the silence that followed and did actually come over to Daryl. He ignored the still-laughing Merle and knelt down in front of his friend. Which was stupid on his part, but there was no way either he or Glenn could have known that Merle would reach over and 'pat' Glenn's back as Glenn lifted Daryl's to get a good look at his eyes. That he'd 'pat' so hard, Glenn was shoved forward and into Daryl's arms which reflexively wrapped around him. They cast matching glares at Merle, but Daryl quietly thanked his brother for giving him an excuse to squeeze Glenn for a moment in a hug he wouldn't have given quite so easily had he done it on his own.
They really were a never-was. Daryl hadn't lied. But if he was honest, he kind of wished they could have be a used-to-be. It just wasn't in the cards though. Glenn would always be the Short Round to Daryl's Indy. Just the kid he watched out for and who watched his back.
Glenn wasn't enough of a damsel in distress to play Willie, anyway.