Disclaimer: I do not own The Walking Dead or any of its characters.
A/N: I have no clue where any of this came from. Yesterday I sat down with the intent to try my hand at a little Daryl, maybe Daryl/Carol one-shot, mostly just to see if I could do it. Anything to get me out of my writing slump, but mostly I'm just looking to get me passed the disappointment I've been feeling since watching the mid-season finale of TWD. I'm having a hard time getting over how they left it. Of course when I sat down and started typing what came out was nothing like what I wanted. I'd say enjoy, but I'm not even sure if I could enjoy it. I apologize in advance.
Warning: Contains violence towards women, rape and child abuse. If you are not old enough to read this sort of thing, please hit the back button on your browser now.
Merle Dixon was a not good man. He was a murderer, though he was never caught. He was a thief, stealing had been a lesson learned while he was still sitting in his own shitty diaper. He had beaten people and robbed little old ladies of their disability checks. He was a good ol' boy, spewing hatred at anything that wasn't white, just like his Daddy taught him. Unlike his Daddy, though, he never once hurt a child and the thought of rape turned his stomach.
When Merle was twenty, he was arrested for stealing tools from a hardware store. He was gonna sell the tools and use the money to buy food and rent a room at a flea-bag motel for a few days. His brother, Daryl, was eleven or twelve at the time. They were both hungry and it was getting too cold to be sleeping out in the woods. Whatever was left of the money would go to buy some more coke, seeing as he only had a hit or two left in his pocket. So he ended up being charged with possession along with the stealing. Leaving his brother out in the world all by his lonesome, not that he was worried about Darylena. His baby-bro could take care of himself. He had for almost six months after their Mama had burned the fuck up a year ago. Daddy had been long gone by then, killed in prison by the brother of the girl that he had raped and beaten during one of his binges.
Mama used to tell Merle, when he was younger, that Daddy hadn't always been the way he was. When they met, he was twenty-two and she was sixteen. He would listen to her go on about how handsome he had been and how nice he treated her. When she came up pregnant with Merle, he had been such a stand-up guy, going straight to her Daddy and swearing he would do right by her. They were married before her seventeenth birthday, while her stomach was still flat, and everything had been perfect. Until she was eight months along and Daddy lost his job at the mine.
Work was scarce in the small town and when he couldn't find a job, he started to drink. She even tried to find work, but no one wanted someone that was ready to pop, so the bills started piling up and he began to drink more. It started with slaps that quickly turned to punches. Merle was born the night that the electric company shut off their power and his Daddy punched her so hard, she flew into the wall. He wasn't a week old before she worked out a deal with a neighbor lady to watch him and she got a job. Daddy stayed at home drinking all day and if she was lucky he would wander out to a bar, before she got home. When she got paid, he would take most of it and disappear for days sometimes, leaving her to buy what little food she could afford and squirrel the rest away for the bills. It stayed like that for years.
She would tell him all this and little Merle would see the faraway look that she would get in her eyes, usually sporting the raccoon look of a woman who had been told more than once, as his Daddy liked to joke. He would watch as she seemed to drift away into the past, a smile forming on lips, heavily scarred from having them split open so many times. Her happiness while talking would slowly turn to sadness, before ending in anger. She would grab him by his arms and shake him, telling him over and over that he wasn't to turn out to be like his Daddy.
"I'll kill you myself," was always the last she would say. She would let him go, setting him down on the floor in front of the television, so she could make supper in case Daddy decided to come home.
Merle learned to be silent, practically invisible when his Daddy was home. When the man would come home after a few days' bender, Merle would lock himself in his room and try to drown out his Mama's screams. When he was about eight, he and Mama were sitting at the kitchen table one night, playing with the army men that she got for him that day. She had saved the money to get them because he had told her that all his friends had them. It had been a good day. Daddy had taken the money and gone out an hour before Merle had gotten home. They could finally breathe and enjoy the next couple days before he turned up again.
He was having such a good time that when the front door slammed open, hitting the wall behind it, he had barely heard it. It was when his Mama started sweeping the army men off the table and into their box that it clicked. Her eyes grew wide with fear as she grabbed his hand and dragged him over to the cupboard next to the stove. It had been one of his favorite hiding places in the house, probably because it was nice and warm, but he had outgrown it last year. His Mama shoved him in, putting the toy box on his lap and closed the door as much as she could. He held onto the little hook that was screwed into the door, but it still left a gap that he could see through.
"Where the fuck is my supper?" Daddy yelled as he stumbled into the kitchen.
"In the icebox, I'll get it for you," she told him, quickly heading toward the refrigerator. She never made it.
"Fucking stupid bitch," he spat, as he backhanded her. She cried out, holding a hand to her newly split lip, but she still tried to get to the appliance.
"I'll heat it up, it will only take a moment," she pleaded, but like most times, her tears and pleas fell on deaf ears.
"Why can't you remember your place?" he screamed at her, grabbing her arm and pulling her to him, only to slap her away again. "Are you too fucking stupid to do your fucking duties as a wife?"
He still had a hold of her arm, so he flung her towards the table. She landed face down, the edge of the table bending her at the waist. She was crying harder now. Merle watched as his Daddy flipped his Mama's skirt up and ripped her underwear from her body. He pushed into her hard and started pounding away at her. Filth tumbled from his lips, broken only by his grunts and her sobs. Merle was terrified. He wanted so badly to crawl out of the cupboard and beat his Daddy to death for hurting his Mama. He opened the door a little more, preparing himself for what he felt he had to do to protect the woman.
"No!" She cried out suddenly, causing Merle to stop and look at her. She was staring back at him, her eyes huge and full of fear and pain.
"Who the fuck are you telling no to, whore?" His Daddy screamed, knocking his fist into the back of her head. When she made no other sound he screamed at her again. "Answer me, bitch."
Her eyes were closed now, no longer looking at her son huddled in the too small cupboard. Merle knew she had passed out, it was not the first time that Daddy had hit her hard enough to knock her out. He prayed that his Mama stayed knocked out until the bastard finished with her. It seemed that whoever listened to the prayers of scared little boys, who just wanted their Mama to be safe, was too busy to listen to a no good Dixon.
"You think you can go to sleep on me, you fucking no good bitch?" His Daddy raged, spittle flying from his mouth. Merle watched as he fumbled around behind his Mama. He had to bite his tongue when she started screaming, just to keep himself from screaming right along with her. His Daddy was laughing and Merle watched as he stepped back and looked down, whatever he saw made him laugh harder. Mama had stopped screaming, she wasn't passed out again, he could see her eyes open but she was silent. Then the fucker leaned in and bit her butt cheek. The scream was short-lived, followed only by her silence and his grunting. It was over quick after that. Daddy finished with a groan, tucked himself back into his pants and came around to the side of the table she was facing.
"Thanks for the supper, bitch," he told her. He leaned over, kissed her cheek and he chuckled. "It was delicious."
When he looks back on that time, some things he barely remembers and others he wishes he could forget. He's pretty sure that was the night that she got pregnant with Daryl. His fucking Daddy had stayed away, excepting on pay day when he'd blow through just for the money and to call Mama a bitch or a whore. That went on for almost two months, giving the two a little freedom, but always keeping them alert. Merle would seethe every night, as the woman would place a plate of food, piled too high, in the oven. That was food they could have eaten, knowing that the little bit that he ate just barely took away the feeling of an empty stomach, his Mama ate even less.
When he finally started coming home again, it was better, but never good. The filth still spewed from his mouth and he tried to encourage Merle to join in on calling his Mama stupid and bitch. Merle would get a sharp slap upside his head and called a pussy or faggot. He still slapped Mama around but usually only a backhand to the mouth. He went out every night, off with a woman or at the bar, and he would stumble home just as the sun was coming up. Merle had already perfected a silent escape route through his house, not daring to wake the man snoring loudly on the couch. He started skipping breakfast, the smell of stale booze and cheap perfume turned his stomach.
As time passed, Merle noticed his Mama wearing clothes that hung off her body. He had no idea what it meant until he heard his Daddy screaming about bringing another faggot kid into his house. This time when he left, Mama had both her nose and arm broken, but he didn't come back. Pay day came and went and there was no sign of him. He heard Mama praying one night, praying that he never came back, praying to a God that Merle had already lost faith in, that her husband was dead. The call came in the middle of the next week. Daddy was in jail. The judge sentenced him to five years for raping and beating a woman in an alley behind some bar in town two states over. He had never seen his Mama so happy.
Daryl was born and Merle thought he was cool for all of ten seconds, before realizing that there was nothing cool about a baby. It wasn't until Daryl was two and tearing through the house that Merle could appreciate having a baby brother. It was fun to watch the destruction that the kid could cause and not be blamed for it. His Mama let them have their fun, like Merle she always had that five year mark in the back of her mind. His brother was about three and a half, when all hell broke loose.
The front door slammed open, hitting the wall behind it hard enough to shake the house. Merle's eyes flew open just as his Daddy yelled. "Honey, I'm home."
Everything happened quickly after that. Daryl started crying in the bed next to his just as he heard his Daddy stomping through the house. Merle knew that he should grab his brother, get him to be quiet, but he could hear his Mama's scream as the door to her bedroom was kicked off its hinges. Merle ran from his bed, ignoring Daryl's shrieking cries and focusing on the one's his Mama was making. When he reached her room, his Daddy was dragging her off the bed by her ankle. She was trying to get away, trying to pull herself back up, but in the end she was torn from the mattress and her body hit the floor with a sickening thud. She was clawing at the carpet, trying to crawl away, until he put a knee in her back. He was reaching for his belt buckle when thirteen year old Merle took his first swing at his Daddy.
Daddy let go of his Mama and stood up, evil smirk on his face. "You wanna fight your Mama's battles for her pussy boy? You wanna take it up the ass in her place?"
Merle tried to swing at the bastard again, but this one was halted by his Daddy's hand smacking him down to the floor. He took a kick to the stomach and one to the ribs, he braced himself for more, but they never came.
"No, bitch, you ain't going nowhere,"
Merle opened his eyes when he heard the cruel tone his Daddy was using. Mama had crawled halfway to the wall on the other side of the room. He could see blood on her hands and her knees from dragging herself across the carpet. He watched as Daddy grabbed her ankle again and dragged her right back to him, when he had her flat down in from of him, he lifted his booted foot and stomped down on the back of her right knee. It made a horrible crunching sound that echoed in Merle's ears. He lunged to help his Mama once more, but he never made it. The last thing he saw was the fucker's fist coming toward his face.
He doesn't know how long he was out cold. When he came to he could hear his Mama's sobbing cries, his Daddy's grunting and laughter every time he made her cry out in pain. He could also hear Daryl's cries, louder than they should have been. He turned quickly, spotting his baby brother in the open doorway, and drawing his Daddy's attention.
"Get that fucking thing out of here, pussy boy, before I stomp it's fucking head in," His Daddy grunted at him. He looked back at the evil son of a bitch and wished he hadn't. He had a clear view of what he was doing to his Mama. Blood was dripping down her backside, down her legs and soaking into the carpet. There was a larger spot under her right leg, probably from her knee. The bastard saw me looking and laughed.
"This here's a good lesson to learn, boys," His Daddy told them, while he continued to rape their Mama. "If you fuck them in the ass, you don't got to worry about little fucking pussy brats like the two of you. Now get, boy. Me and your Mama need to get reacquainted."
Merle got up quickly pushing past the dizziness and feeling like he was gonna puke, he picked up Daryl and he ran. It was summer out so it was warm enough that he didn't have to worry about them freezing to death. He kept running until he was well into the woods behind their house. He found his tent easily, even in the pitch black, and unzipped it. Crawling inside with his brother attached to him proved difficult, but in the end he got the boy to let go of his neck, long enough to wrap the sleeping bag around them. Daryl was sobbing still, but mostly he was calling for Mama.
When he finally exhausted himself and fell asleep, Merle waited another ten minutes or so before he slipped back out of the tent, slowly zipping it up behind him. If Daryl woke up, Merle would be close enough to hear him cry out. He really hoped the boy stayed sleeping. He had been through enough tonight, without adding waking up locked inside a dark tent alone to that.
Merle moved quickly back to the house. He was just tall enough to be able to see through the windows and as he stepped up to his Mama's room he silently prayed that the bastard was gone. When he looked the prick was holding his Mama's wallet and pulling all the money out of it. Merle watched as he spit at her and said something cruel, before he left. He stood unmoving until he heard the engine turn over, when the car pulled away from the house, Merle jumped into action. He rushed into the house, stopping in the kitchen to call for an ambulance, then headed back to his Mama's room. He tried not to look at the damage that was done, instead grabbing a pillow and the sheet from the bed. He placed the pillow on the floor and gently as he could he rolled her over. She cried out, trying to fight him weakly with her hands, so he started speaking to her. Telling her that it was him. That he loved her and that help was coming. When he had her settled on her back he covered her with the sheet and told her that he had to go get Daryl, but he'd be right back.
Daryl was still sleeping when he made it back to the tent. He hauled him out hoping he didn't wake him, but the boy must have tired himself out with all the crying because they made it back to the house and got him settled in his bed before the sirens could be heard. Merle let them in the door and led them through the house to the back bedroom. He watched from a corner as they ripped the sheet off of her, exposing the damage his Daddy had done for all the world to see. They tried to get her to talk to them, her eyes were open and watching, but she never said a word. They worked quickly, whispering to each other and shooting glances his way. When they had her loaded up on the gurney and where ready to move her out, Merle stepped forward.
"Don't worry, Mama," he told her. She didn't turn her head to look at him, just kept her eyes on the ceiling. "I'll take care of everything here."
One of the men stayed back, watching as his partner rolled Mama out of the room. "The police will probably want to ask you a few questions, after they speak to her."
Merle just nodded his head, keeping his eyes on the now empty doorway. When he couldn't hear the siren anymore, he moved about the room, picking up the bloody sheet and pillow, stuffing them in the laundry basket. He then went to the kitchen to fetch a bucket of water and the scrub brush that Mama used to clean the floor. An hour later, his face was wet with tears and the carpet was as clean as he was going to get it. He dumped the dirty water out into the toilet, watching the pink pour out into the bowl. Merle couldn't hold back any longer and what little supper he had in him, joined the bloody water. He put the bucket and brush away, before going back to his and Daryl's room. The three year old was still sleeping, when Merle grabbed up his hunting knife and sat down on the edge of his bed. He waited the rest of the night, watching over his baby brother, and waiting for his bastard Daddy to come back.
In the morning, he packed up Daryl's things, taking him to the neighbor lady's house, before heading to school. All day he waited, waited for the police to come talk to him, waited for word that his Mama was all right, but he was never pulled out of class. After school he headed back to the neighbor's to pick up Daryl. He brought him home, fed him and sent him to their room to play with what little toys they had, while he waited for the police to come talk to him. Two days past the same as that one. Merle would drop Daryl off, go to school, pick the boy up and wait for someone to come speak to him. They never came.
They ran out of food by the weekend and didn't have any money to get more. Merle had stopped at his Mama's job to get her pay, the day before, but left fuming when he was told that his Daddy had already picked it up. He got home hoping to find the fucker there, but the bastard had taken off again. Saturday was miserable, he fed Daryl the last can of soup and a few crackers that were left and by night fall, Merle's stomach was grumbling something fierce.
Over the years, Merle had been friends with a kid that lived a few streets away. The boy's Daddy was a good man, when compared to what Merle was used to, and he used to take them hunting on the night's that Merle would spend the night. The man had even given him a bow with some arrows for Christmas a few years back. He had hidden the bow out in the tent that he had in the woods, afraid that his Daddy would find it and take it from him.
Sunday morning, Merle got up before the sun and left Daryl sleeping, knowing the boy wouldn't be up for another hour or so, and headed out to try to get some food. His friend's Daddy had called him a natural and Merle, not used to compliments had shrugged it off, but when he stepped out of the woods carrying two squirrels and a rabbit he thought that maybe the man was right. He and Daryl didn't go hungry that day. On Monday, when he brought his brother to the neighbor's house, the lady told him that this would have to be the last time. She couldn't afford to watch his brother for free, but she was real sorry. That was the last day that Merle went to school.
He tried to find a job, but no one wanted to hire a boy who wasn't even sixteen yet. He took to going off hunting every morning to feed them. After a week past, he headed down to the payphone, since the phone company had shut theirs off a few days before, and called the hospital. He listened, with one hand tightly clutching the receiver and the other holding Daryl's hand firmly so he wouldn't wander off, as the nurse told him that his Mama was gone. The hospital had let her go days before, but she never came home. That night when the front door opened, Merle had jumped up from the table, where he and Daryl were eating the remains of a rabbit that he had gotten that morning.
"Mama?" Merle called rushing into the parlor. He came up short when he spotted his Daddy there instead. His disappointment must have shown, because Daddy just smirked at him.
"Your Mama's gone boy," Daddy told him cruelly. "She took off and left you and your brother all by your lonesome."
"No, she wouldn't do that," he yelled at his Daddy. The man only laughed, as he backhanded him.
"Let this be a lesson learned," the man told him as he moved into the kitchen. "Bitches like her are only good for one thing. You'd do well to remember that."
Merle watched the bastard grab his plate and finish off the rabbit before taking Daryl's and finishing that one, too. His brother was whimpering in his chair, big fearful eyes watching the man as he ate the rest of their food. When his whimpers turned to cries, Daddy hauled off and smacked him, causing the boy to start screaming. Merle rushed forward when his Daddy stood up, reaching for his belt. He grabbed Daryl from his chair and ran out the door, the bastard's laughter ringing in his ears. He knew he might pay for it later, if the man stuck around, but he wouldn't let his brother be hurt.
From that night on, they had taken to sleeping in the tent, out in the woods. Merle had slowly filled it with Daryl's toys, some blankets and a flashlight. He would hunt in the early morning hours, cooking what he got over a small fire pit that he had dug. What he couldn't hunt for, bread, cans of vegetables and batteries for the flashlight, he had taken to stealing. They would go back to the house, when they knew Daddy was out and he would let Daryl watch the television, while he washed the little bit of clothes they owned. It went on like that for years.
When Merle turned sixteen, he was able to get someone to hire him, only his Daddy found out. Just like with Mama, Daddy would take the money that Merle had worked hard for. He tried to fight the man, at first, but that only got him beaten so bad that he blacked out. When he came to, six year old Daryl was sitting next to him, silent tears streaming down his cheeks. His brother had learned to be silent, invisible, just like he had, when their Daddy was around. Any free time that Merle had was spent teaching his baby-bro, how to hunt and how to fight. His brother turned out to be even better than him with a bow and arrow, and he could track game well enough that he was able to bring down larger animals. Merle tried to teach him how to survive as best he could, but no matter how well either of them did out in the woods, it was even harder to survive inside their house.
Now that Mama wasn't around, Daddy had gotten to taking his anger out on his two sons, leaving both boys bleeding and unconscious, more than once. The older that they got, the worse the beatings got. Learning to be a man, their Daddy would call it. The longer it went on, the more times that they got caught by him, the more both boys would curse their Mama for leaving them with the monster that had fathered them.
At eighteen, Merle was working over forty hours a week. He still got up before the sun to hunt with Daryl, before heading to work and not getting back until well after the sun disappeared for the night. His Daddy still took the money that he worked hard for, leaving him to keep stealing what they couldn't afford. The bastard had taken to leaving him be. Only spewing hatred at him, but Daryl wasn't so lucky. The number of scars on the boy's body grew, as he got older. Daddy had taken to whipping him whenever he could catch him. He never did it when Merle was home, but in those days, he was never home.
When he was home, he was too tired to do much more than eat before falling into bed. It was around that time that a guy he worked with gave him his first taste of the fine white powder that became his best friend. Almost six years had passed since their Mama had left them, and Merle hated her more and more each day for it. He began to steal more, not just food and batteries anymore, now it was bigger things. Things that he could sell for more money, money that he used to buy more drugs. It wasn't long before Merle wound up in jail for the first time. He had been lucky for so long, not to get caught, but like everything else in his life, the luck didn't last. Prison made him harder, angrier than he had ever been.
When they let him out after three months, he came home to a bruised and battered brother who barely spoke, and an even drunker, more violent Daddy. With no money for food or drugs, Merle took to stealing anything he could get money for. Daryl had only gotten better at hunting, telling Merle that it was easy since be barely left the woods at all. When he was in there, he became invisible, tracking down game that Merle had never been able to land before.
Merle was out of jail maybe a month, when he came home one night high as a kite, to find a couple of half cleaned beavers on the kitchen table. Blood and guts were dripping onto the floor and his brother's screams coming from the back of the house. He flew into a rage, going through the house at full speed, and tackling his Daddy away from his bleeding brother. His Daddy, stunned, didn't have time to react, giving Merle the upper hand. He pummeled his fist into the fucker's face. Over and over, until the bastard was finally able to throw him off. His Daddy had blood all over his face and it looked like his nose was broken. Merle's satisfaction was short-lived, as his Daddy stood and kicked him in the gut before hightailing it out of there. He stayed on the floor until he heard the door slam shut. When he was able to catch his breath, he stood with an arm wrapped around his middle, cursing the bastard the whole time. The cocaine still pumping through his system, fueling his anger, leaving his only outlet his baby brother.
"Stop your fucking crying, Darylena," he yelled at the boy cowering in the corner. He ignored the open wounds on the ten year old's back and sides. "You'd better stop being a pussy and learn to fight your own fucking battles from now on."
Daddy didn't ever come back to the house. Merle heard coupla days later that he had raped and beaten, almost to death, a fifteen year old girl who lived a few streets over. The girl's brother had caught the fucker in the act. By the time the police showed up, the girl was taken to the hospital and his Daddy and the brother were hauled off to jail. The police made the "mistake," as they called it, of not separating the two. Daddy was dead by the morning. The Dixon boys were once again left alone to fend for themselves, not like they ever stopped.
A week or two went by, that time spent hiding his brother from the state that was trying to take him away. Merle was told because he had a record, that he was unfit to raise his brother. It didn't matter how many times he told them that he had been doing it since their Mama had split, or that the only reason that he went to jail was because he was trying to keep them fed. They didn't listen and finally told him that if he didn't hand over Daryl, they would take him back to jail. They didn't get the chance.
Daryl had taken to sleeping in the tent that they still kept out in the woods, just in case the social services people showed up. The last time they had come by, they had told Merle he had two days to give up the boy or they were coming with the police. He and Daryl were planning on running, leaving the house and the small town they lived in their whole lives behind. They had gone hunting that morning, Daryl intent on bringing down something that would hold them over until they found some place else to settle, and Merle was being surly, the effects of the last of his coke stash wearing off long ago. He spent the time in the woods taunting his brother, telling him that he was useless and that he should let the state take him away. The ten year old, just continued on his way, tracking whatever it was that he was after. Merle didn't care that he was being loud and probably scaring the game away with his loudness.
The boys ended up settling for a few squirrels, anything bigger was long gone. Daryl was pissing him off, the more the boy ignored him, the angrier he would get. By the time they reached the house, at around eleven, Merle was ready to snap. He had never laid hands on his brother, but the lack of drugs and all the shit that he had no control over, was getting to him. When they got inside, Daryl put the dead squirrels on the table, grabbing his knife and began going to work cleaning them. Merle was seething, fists clenched. He took a step towards his brother. The only thing that stopped him was a noise at the back of the house. The back bedroom door opened and out stepped their Mama.
"Oh my baby's," she said, rushing forward. Not noticing, or ignoring, their shocked expressions. "There you are. I was so worried."
Merle was boiling over with rage. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. His Mama was hugging Daryl to her body. His brother's face was peeking at him over her arm, his eyes wide with shock. Merle knew that Daryl didn't barely know their Mama. He couldn't even remember what she had looked like. Their Daddy had burned all the pictures in the house after she had taken off, and his brother knew better than to mention her to either of them. He found himself stepping more into the kitchen. A small painful feeling popping up into his chest, as he look at the woman that had birthed him and care for him for years, only to leave him and his baby brother to a man who got off on hurting women and children. The feeling disappeared, leaving nothing but a hatred that had grown for six years. In some ways he hated her more than he hated his Daddy.
When she turned around to look at him, her scarred lips stretched into a wide smile, which slowly faded away. Merle realized that he was moving closer to her, when a long since forgotten look of fear took over her face. He stopped dead, saw the tears building in her eyes, and saw the matching ones in the eyes of his baby brother, a sick feeling formed in his gut. All his life he had heard people whisper about how much he looked like his Daddy, about how Daryl was lucky to look like Mama. Now, seeing the fear in both their eyes, made him want to puke. He ran out of the house faster than he ever had before, stopping only to dry heave in the gutter, seeing as his stomach was empty.
Daryl was chasing after him, calling his name, but he kept going. When he finally managed to lose the boy, he quickly doubled back, knowing that it wouldn't take long before Daryl picked up his trail again. The boy was too damn good at tracking. He headed into a bar, one of his Daddy's favorites, and ordered a double shot of Jack. He downed it in one and ordered another. Turning on the barstool, he eyed the people drinking their lunches. Spotting a big man sitting in a booth, Merle downed his second shot, hauled his arm back and flung the glass at the man. He doesn't remember much after that, just his own laughter as he smashed his fists into anyone that got in his way.
He was sentenced to two years and mandatory counseling. The first year he would just sit and let the shrink talk at him. He spent his nineteenth birthday in jail. Daryl had visited him once or twice, his Mama too, but he was still too angry to even look at her. His brother seemed happy. Mama was teaching him to read and write and he was going to school for the first time in his life. Merle wanted to be happy for the boy, but a spark of jealousy began to form in him. He loved his brother, but he hated that he was now getting the childhood that Merle hadn't.
Daryl came to visit him on his eleventh birthday, but left stone faced when Merle snapped at him. He told him not to come back and he didn't. He hated himself. After that, he started answering the shrink lady's questions, never volunteering information, but he was truthful. She called him a 'victim of circumstance,' whatever the fuck that meant. He was just starting to let go of his anger towards his baby brother, knowing that it wasn't fair to protect him all those years, only to start hating him because he got to be happy. He had about eight months left when they called him into the shrink's office. He was nervous, knowing he still had days to go before he was supposed to see her again.
"Mr. Dixon, I'm sorry to have to inform you that your mother is dead," the woman told him, pity written all over her face.
"My brother?" he asked.
"It seems that she was drinking wine and smoking in bed," she said, ignoring his question. "They believe that she fell asleep."
What about my fucking brother?" he shouted. The guard in the corner behind him stepped forward, ready to restrain him, but the lady held her hand up.
"I'm sorry, Merle," her voice low and full of pity, as she used his given name for the first time since he had been coming to her. "The police can't find him, they aren't sure if he was in the house or not."
Merle stayed silent as she went on to tell him that they were releasing them early, something about good behavior and getting his family's affairs in order. He got out the next day, used the bus money to get back to his neighborhood. He stood outside what was left of their house, a huge pile of blackness. He walked around it, looking at the scorched ground around it, feeling how the air was just a bit warmer near it. He turned his eyes to the woods and headed out to find his brother.
When he found Daryl, he helped the boy pack up whatever was useful from the tent and they moved on. For years they would settle in one town after another, only staying whenever Merle would get popped for something. More often than not, they would bed down in and abandoned house or building, but they were still most comfortable out in the woods. Both he and his brother had done quite a few years in and out of the joint. When they weren't in jail, they would move around still, getting odd jobs to have a roof over their heads and food besides what they hunted for in their bellies.
In the summer of 2010, Merle had spent his forty-ninth birthday behind bars. He was doing the last few days of a five year stint for drug possession with intent to sell. The day before he was set to get out, he got a visit from Daryl. He knew something was wrong. His baby-bro never visited him, not since his eleventh birthday. The stories he was telling sounded like something from out of a movie, but Merle knew his brother wasn't the fanciful type. If he said the dead were rising, then Merle was gonna believe him. He was out the next morning.
Daryl was waiting for him in a rusted out pickup. Told him he had bought it when the first reports started coming in about a week ago. One thing about his brother was that he was always prepared. Their meager belongings and Merle's motorcycle were in the bed of the truck. In the cab were a coupla shotguns and the crossbow that Daryl had taken to using after Merle had stolen it for him from a Wal-Mart two states away. He listened as his brother told him about the job he had, doing maintenance at some old fogies' home, until the place was shut down a few days ago. Seemed that a bunch of rotted corpses walked in and started snacking on the old people and the staff. It had been his day off, but he had been bunking down in the woods not far from the place and heard the screaming.
They drove until they hit a gas station, the only one that they had seen that wasn't completely full with cars. They filled up the truck and rolled Merle's bike down the wooden plank that Daryl had used to get it up there. Once the bike was filled also, they took off stealing coupla big cases of bottled water on the way out, after Daryl told him that he hadn't touched tap water since this shit had started going down. The news reports were telling people to head towards the bigger cities. Daryl would listen in the truck all day and then fill Merle in when they found a safe place to camp at night. The brothers took turns keeping watch at night, and Merle quickly learned the best way to kill the stinking son of a bitches that crossed their path.
They stayed doing that for a week or two. When they hit Georgia the radio stations began reporting that the military was going around shooting civilians in some of the smaller towns. Those stations were shut down real quick. They stole gas, after the money that Daryl had been saving was gone. Holding up bigger gas stations, the only ones that were still open and had gas left in them. They stocked the truck bed, one side held their possessions, the other held full gas cans. Merle thought that it was kinda sweet that the police were too busy to respond to the hold ups.
Then the whole world went to shit. The power companies shut down, leaving the radio stations broadcasting only emergency instructions. Neither of them wanted to go to Atlanta, the military presence made them both nervous, but when they got there they found nothing but the dead wandering around. Cars were left abandoned on the roads, or with whatever was left of the owners in them. Houses were being looted and people were dying all around them. It was decided that they had to get away from the city, find a place to hunker down, something that they could both easily defend. Daryl knew the woods in the state better than Merle did, so when he told his brother about the quarry, Merle went along with it.
The prospect of fresh water, maybe even some fish, got them excited. They were tearing down the dirt road to the place, Merle laughing as he tried to pass his brother in the truck and Daryl laughing at him every time he would drift left or right to block the motorcycle's path. The laughter stopped as Daryl stomped on the brakes at the end of the road. Merle was lucky that Daryl had pulled far enough ahead and he hadn't upped the throttle, but even then he almost took the bike down. Anger clouded him and he was off the bike and heading to the truck in a moment.
"Have you lost your fucking mind, baby-bro?" Merle yelled at him. "You coulda fucking killed me just then."
His brother wasn't paying him no mind though. Merle turned his attention to whatever had caught his brother's. His hand was shooting for his knife and he was wondering if he could make it too the bike and his shotgun before they were over run. It only took a moment to realize that the people staring at them were alive.
"Muthafucker," he said, more to himself then to his brother.
The door to the truck opened with a shrieking groan, as Daryl got out. Merle noticed that he left his crossbow on the front seat of the cab, but he had slid it along the bench so it was within reach. He kept his eye on the people in front of him, particularly the old man standing on top of the RV with a rifle scoped in on them and the man wearing a hat that said sheriff's dept. on it. He had a 9mm in one hand and the other was holding a small boy behind him. Daryl walked around the open door of the truck slowly, not wanting to get shot for nothing. When he passed him, his brother said something that usually would have been hilarious.
"Nice first impression you made Merle. Now let me do all the talking."
A/N: Two full days of writing one of the longest one-shots, I've ever written. I just wanted to say that I do not condone any of the acts of violence in the story that you just read. It is un-beta'd and only partially re-read, as some of it was very difficult to get through. I still can't believe that I wrote it. Whether Merle or Daryl's home life will ever be touched on, I have no idea, but from what we've seen I don't think they were living the Brady Bunch life. Again I apologize.