seeing red
—
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you can't
believe your
eyes at first
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They find her almost dead, eyes closed as though submerged in deep slumber. A thin trail of blood drizzles down her chin, lips agape and breathing weak as she quietly fights to stay in the world of the living. She's peaceful, nothing but serenity on her face as she lays there, her back against the thick mattress of dirt and dry leaves that veils the ground.
"Damn… Girlie's a fine piece of work for a mongrel," Merle snickers, his hungry eyes examining her from head to toe. But his racist remarks are ignored, and he can swear his younger brother is dazzled by the girl's comely appearance. He continues, though, "Gotta admit 'em race traitors did a real good job with this one… Wouldn't mind gettin' all up in that—"
"Knock it off, Merle. She's just a kid," Daryl cuts him off, earning himself a taunting smirk from the other redneck.
Her feminine features are youthful, as if only recently reached adulthood. Her kinky hair is a mess of loose, caramel blonde curls, and her tan skin is festooned with scratches and bruises. There are no bite marks they can see, and they soon realize most of the damp blood staining her grubby, torn clothes is gushing from a deep, vertical cut on the inner side of her left arm.
"A sweet piece of ass, is what she is… and I sure as hell ain't the only one that thinks that," Merle says, and that's when Daryl realizes there's crimson smeared on her tights, too. "Seems someone's been givin' the bone to her…" Merle watches his younger brother kneel next to the girl, eyes wide in shock as realization hits him. "Ya wanna have a go with her, too?" he taunts, his smirk growing wider, "Can't say I blame ya. Nothin' better than young meat—"
"It ain't like that!" Daryl retorts, cutting him off, "…Can't leave her like this, s'all." And it's true, because right now, she's nothing but walker bait. The open wound on her arm speaks to him, telling him that she's the kind of girl who can't cope with this world's cruelness, and probably because of that, he finds himself unable to walk away.
"Well, if ya ain't claimin' her, I will, baby brother," Merle speaks with that usual sneer of his, and Daryl tries his best to ignore him, "It ain't like she don't know how—"
"Just shut up, bro!" Daryl yells, and it feels alien to him, standing up to his brother like this. It seems it's a major shock for Merle, too, as he just stares at him in silence, eyes wide as plates.
Daryl is about to pick the girl up in his arms, when she suddenly stirs at the mere touch of his calloused hands. He flinches, watching her as she slowly flutters her eyelashes open, revealing a pair of glassy, aqua orbs. She stares at him in complete emptiness through half-lidded eyes, almost as if too exhausted to even react at all.
"We ain't gonna hurt ya," Daryl reassures her, his voice low and strangely soft. Her tensed limbs relax, but no words come out from her full, rosy lips. "You alright?" he asks, and an instant later regrets having asked such a dumb, pointless question. Of course she's not alright; he doesn't need to hear it from her to know. "…What's yer name, girl?"
She offers nothing but silence, and a sigh escapes Merle's mouth. "Ain't no point in tryin' to talk to her now."
"…Guess you're right," Daryl mumbles as he slowly picks her up in his arms, careful as though she were made of porcelain. Her skinny body is light and limp, almost like that of a rag doll's, and he fears he might wreck her even more than she already is if he's not cautious enough. "C'mon," he says, "Let's go back to camp."
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but now
you know you've
seen the worst
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—
