Author's Note: This is the first and third chronologically of a set of TWD prequels I'm doing. This one follows the Dixon brothers from right around the end of Fear The Walking Dead season 1 up until the time in which Rick is brought back to camp. While I'm trying to stick close to the canon presented in the shows and the comics there will be a bit of an AU element to it. Though I am not following the events laid out in the game Survival Instinct that takes place over this same time frame there will be a few nods in the story to reference some of said events. I haven't really done any first person stories yet so I'm going to experiment in that direction by presenting this from Daryl's perspective. If it turns out to be garbage I can always rewrite it in the 3rd person. Should have the opening chapters for Carl and Michonnes backstory up sometime in the next couple months though I'm starting to lose interest in writing in general so it could be a while for me to get my mojo back. If these prequels turn out fairly good I might follow them up with a full blown TWD AU story running the course of all the seasons up to the current issue of the comics.
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Chapter I
People ask me what I did before the world went to shit, what I was like back then. Turns out it was a lot like it was now. It was just me, wandering around with Merle fucking shit up. Wasn't going anywhere or doing anything with my life. Yeah I was pretty much on a one way street from fucked up to even more fucked up. I was going nowhere then, I'm going nowhere now. All that really changed when the dead started walking is that the stakes got raised. Before you make a mistake and you're on your ass or you spend some time behind bars; now if you slip up you're as good as dead.
We didn't see it here right away out in the sticks. We heard thinks, stuff city folk was seeing, back where there's more people stacked and packed on top of each other; stories of the dead walking, that kind of stuff. There was a report on the news sometime a couple years back of a woman that turned and ate her family while they slept. The police came and put her down and that was that. That was the first I reckon I heard anything like what we're seeing now. Folks just thought she was crazy, we never could've known what really happened, not until it was too late. It started with a few cases here and there, nothing major. The gub'ment did a pretty decent job keeping it contained, well as well as the gub'ment does anything without fucking it up. Then around last fall it started spreading. About five states saw breakouts in the major metropolitan areas and I'm sure other countries had their own shit to deal with. Early in the summertime everything hit a boil and people started dropping in droves from the sickness and turning into these things. There's only about one in ten folks I'd reckon that were immune to the airborne form of whatever the fuck causes folk to geek out. So when they all came back needless to say the whole world was up shit creek without a paddle. Within a couple months the world as we knew it was over, that's when we started to notice it out here in the boondocks. Ran into some of those fucks when we were out hunting. Walkers got my Pa, but me and Merle made sure that son of a bitch paid for what he did.
So me and Merle, we've been out here getting by, fighting the dead to give us some space and shit; it's just like fighting the living only they're slower and stupid as all hell. A few weeks after it all went down I've got fighting the dead down to a science. I'd like to say it gets easier but turns out it was never really hard in the first place. I didn't know any of them poor sons of bitches that got turned into rotters and shit. After a while you stop thinking of them as people. You kind of got to or that shit'll drive you mad in no time at all. In this world it was kill or be killed; ain't no mercy for the weak or faint of heart. That's just the cold hard reality of it. While I did what I had to to survive Merle seemed to enjoy killing a little bit, especially the black ones.
"Wheeew weeee! That's a big ol' coon right there!" Merle exclaimed as he slammed the clawed end of a claw hammer into the side of a dark skinned walker's skull.
Once it popped the brains up inside the thing went down. That's the trick with these guys, you got to nail them in the head. Whatever it is that is in the driver's seat once they turn it's all up in the head. Like the fuckers don't even need the rest of the body any more. Probably why those shits are all falling apart.
"Damn it Merle, stop playing around. I'd like to get this trailer cleared by sundown." I told him.
"Oh just hold your horses little brother. We gots all the time in the world. Ain't no rush." Merle brushed me off.
Merle placed his foot on the walker he had just killed and yanked out the hammer. I saw a walker coming around the back side of the trailer, used to be some junkie it looked like, probably cooked up meth in the kitchen when she was alive. Probably how she got the way she was now. It didn't matter now; she was gonna die again real soon. I shot an arrow from my crossbow straight between that toothless bitches eyes and she fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes. That's how I get it done; it's quick, clean and more elegant than ol' Merle and his bludgeons. Plus it's quiet, you gotta be quiet, noise attracts these things. Pop a gun off to get rid of one of them sons of bitches standing around and pretty soon you go fifty something of 'em coming at you.
I walked over, turned the dead bitch over and yanked my arrow out of her skull. I wiped it off with the rag in my pocket and set it back in my bow. Another one dead and dead for good. I swear I must have killed at least a hundred of these rat bastards since the day they got my Pa. No matter how many I kill it seems like they always keep coming though. Another one came out of the woods, I didn't get a good look at it before Merle went up beside it and bashed it's skull in.
"Can't have 'em all to yourself now can ya boy?" Merle teased me.
"Just keep your eyes moving." I stoically replied back to him in a low voice.
I sniped another walker tripping up through the underbrush. There was still noise in those bushes so when I went over to retrieve my arrow I drew my knife just in case one of those dumb bastards thinks it can get the better of me. Of course I needed it when some rotting old man in a flannel coat tries to take a bite out of my arm. Instead it got nothing but cold steel into the back of the head. There was another one back there, coming over from the next trailer down. It was a little girl, say seven or eight years old. This was the part I hated; when they were kids. I mean you know they're dead and all so you're gonna have to get 'em or they're gonna get you but damn man, having to knife a little girl like that is still a little something fucked up. I guess that's just what was left of the old world talking in me. I did what I had to do and got back to Merle who seemed to have finished clearing out the area of walkers.
The place we were in was a small clearing in the woods off a dirt road than ran a few miles down to the county road. It was well off the beaten path, not a whole lot of folks knew it was here. Only about four or five trailers were on these several acres the rest was all woodland. The people that lived here, hillbillies most likely had either turned or jumped ship by the time me and my brother showed up. Surprised these backwoods folk succumbed so easily; figured they would have been made of sterner stuff. Shit, me and Merle weren't much different, poor white trash from the sticks and we were holding our own jus' fine. I guess you can never guess who's gonna make it and who ain't.
"Let's git on in there and make ourselves comfortable." Merle invited me in.
Our home for the night was a single wide trailer home. It had paper thin corrugated steel walls painted a dull white, sullied from years of lackluster neglect. There were spots where the paint had had flaked off or peeled away leaving the underlying metal exposed to the elements. A few of these places had rusted over time and small holes, big enough for a cricket or a wasp to get through had formed in the weakened metal skin. There was a plastic tricycle in the yard and a couple of tires and rusted car parts strewn around the grass. Merle walked up the weathered wood steps leading to the trailer door and opened the outer screen door for me to get on through. I glanced down for a second at the gaping hole through the torn screen mesh and opened the inner door. There wasn't any noise coming from inside, usually a good sign cause walkers ain't bright enough to lie in wait like that. They were noisy sons of bitches, something that seemed to clump the fuckers together on occasion. Feeling sure of my senses I popped in and cleared the corners with my crossbow checking for any walkers that might be lying around inside. The living room/dining room combo was empty. There were dingy soiled couches and chairs and a coffee table cluttered with old pornographic magazines and TV guides. An overflowing ash tray sat on the center of said table with ash and cigarette butts scattered about around it.
I waved Merle in and checked the small bathroom and the second bedroom in the hall. Once again nothing but clutter and junk. Likewise the master bedroom was a mess but not a soul, living or dead stirred inside. We went around the place making sure all the windows were shut and locked then moved one of the couches in front of the front door wedging it shut in case walkers tried to push their way through during the night. With the shitty condition this place was in they were probably more likely to fall through the walls than they would force the door off its hinges.
Once we checked all the rooms and secured all the windows and doors Merle went into the master bedroom and plopped himself down on the bed, dingy dirt and guts covered boots and all. Lazy asshole was just gonna call it a day right then and there. My brother then looked up and over at me standing in the doorway watching him.
"Looks like the place is clear. How bout we get to cooking there buddy?" Merle said after a quick inspection of the dingy trailer. "Why don't you check the ol' pantry up there and rustle us up some grub." Merle told me.
I went into the kitchen and opened up the pantry door. Was slim pickins' inside; it wasn't like country folk not to stock up their cupboards. These folks probably took what they had and ran. Unless of course my junkie hypothesis holds in that case they probably never had jack shit to begin with. Traded all their food stamps for meth or somethin'. Found a shit ton of used up lighters in a drawer that seemed to validate that notion. So I took out a can of spam and a couple expired cans of beans. Spam, yep, we always knew that's the shit we'd be eating when the world ended and here we are. It didn't matter that we were stealing people's food. They were probably dead anyways; not like they were gonna eat it. If they were still walking around out there they'd have more of a hankering for man meat than they would a lousy can of spam and some baked beans. I opened the tops of the cans of beans with a rusty old can opener and used the pull tab to open up the spam. I pulled the dinged up trash can out from under the sink and filled it with garbage, paper, magazines, anything that would burn then soaked it in butane after filling up one of the empty lighters. After sparking up a fire i poured the beans and spam into a pan mixed all together and heated them up over the trash fire. This was as close to a home cooked meal as anyone was gonna get tonight. Tomorrow if the weather's good I'll go see about bagging a deer a couple possums and we can have some real meat. Today we just got swamped in dead heads running from our last home away from home and barely got out of there alive. I didn't hear anything outside this evening so I'd have to assume we lost them in the woods somewhere. Probably found some slower prey to go munch on. I'll tell you one thing me and Merle ain't gonna be no easy dinner.
Speaking of dinner I brought Merle back some of the slop I heated up along with a plate for myself. Naturally I took the greater portion for myself; I did make the shit after all. Before heading back I had stomped down the embers of my trash fire and made sure we weren't gonna roast tonight. Merle made a few wise ass remarks about my cooking while we ate. Me I preferred to remain in silence. Ain't no sense in making much noise if you ain't got shit to say.
In the silence between my brother's bellyaching I heard the screen door rattle in the gentle breeze. This place was literally falling apart and this was gonna be our fort for the night it would appear. It wasn't no castle but it's the best we could do for now. Better than being out there in the open if one of those passing freaks gets the midnight munchies. Besides this joint stank to high heaven, I'd hardly guess them walkers would be able to smell anything but shit 'round this place, let alone living flesh. Not like we had much of an option to move even if we wanted to; the sun was going down about now and them things be getting all sorts of ornery after dark. Best to move during the daylight. We'd cover a fair distance tomorrow if we didn't run into another herd like we did today. With any luck we'd get far enough out we wouldn't really have to worry 'bout no damn walkers. Less people around less walkers, makes sense doesn't it. Now in spite of this we heard the gub'ment had a safe place set up somewhere around Atlanta and my brother thought it'd be a nice idea to go and check it out at least before we settled on roaming around the sticks eating roast squirrel and coon the rest of our short lives. I'd be surprised if the place doesn't turn out to be a bust; first time Uncle Sam ever did something that didn't turn out to be all kinds of fucked up. Not counting on a miracle here, but we might as well have a destination if we're gonna be wandering about.
It'd be a while before we found out though. The way I reckoned we were off in southern Georgia somewhere near the Florida/South Carolina state lines and Atlanta is all the way up there in the north part of the state. We weren't exactly going in no straight line either. We went this way and that around the big ol' herds of walkers, sometimes digging in further south and going the wrong way from where we wanted. I guess tomorrow would tell us if we made it any further to where we were headed. The sun went down and the crickets came out filling the night air with their song. I used to thing them damn things were so annoying but hell, nowadays it sounded like sweet music to my ears. Sure as hell beats them walkers hissing and spitting up all over outside. This right here, this was nature's lullaby. Fucking Merle had already knocked out on the bed with me sitting on the floor leaning up against it facing the bedroom door. I'd be sleeping with one eye open tonight, any little sound or movement would jar myself back to alertness. That's how you have to sleep these days, you just can't let yourself go under, you always gotta be watching. Shit, it's light sleep but it's the only sleep a guy's gonna get if you want to avoid going under for the big sleep.