Bayonet

Merle vs. governor but plans goes awry and so does a certain bullet. 1st person crazy headspace with filthy language, racial slurs and disrespecting women. In other words, the Merle we love and love to hate. Merle and all other characters from TWD are not owned by me. The OC is owned by me (much good it will do me). Much of this will be a character study and it all will be 1st person study from multiple characters point of view. I will try to keep it somewhat canon but much of it will be behind the scenes that we know best. Slight alterations will occur due to ramifications of that certain bullet going astray and our favorite antihero having some luck for once. Merle is a southerner but I most certainly am not. That being said I tried to make his speaking voice be close to Southern speech.

Short one but lots of Merle/Daryl brotherly love. I love how they are both complex incredibly undervalued people; smart yet uneducated & way more than what they appear. Self taught; I really respect that .

This is a rewrite folks; thanks to my amazing Beta, Sinvisigoth the grammar and the flow of the story should hopefully improve (other than this note). My thanks for her thoughts and support. It's great to have the constructive criticism that I've needed for a long time.

~Lefty~.

Breathe

Merle POV

In the midst of the chaos that I created, the governor's people didn't care about one crappy old car moving slowly. The Nubian Queen was driving me 'home' to the prison while Daryl stubbornly tried to stop my bleeding and keep me breathing. Guess he learned something from hunting and our abusive home life (you guessed it; he has patched me up many times). You sometimes get a deer that's shot through the chest, runs off and suffers, bleeding out, dying from shock as the lungs collapse and air builds up around the lung. This results in too much pressure in the other lung and on the heart. The animal bleeds out or suffocates, but it takes a while. If the lungs don't collapse the animal (or human) could live long enough to bleed to death in fear and pain. I taught Daryl to never let that happen because it seemed so likely that it would be agonizing.

Now I know that it is agonizing. It's so much harder to live in pain and struggle against devastating wounds. Dying would have been the easy part; guess I'm too damn stubborn or stupid to die. Would have literally been the first time I did something the easy way. It felt as though I was torn apart from the inside. I was getting cold from blood loss. Daryl was screaming at me and calling me soft. But somehow he sealed the sucking wounds and I was still breathing and swearing a stream of inventive cussing only an angry, redneck biker would have been able to come up with.

I'd told him a story from when I was in the marines and one of my fellow soldiers was shot through in the field. The medic applied airtight dressings on his back and semi airtight on the front leaving one side free. It stabilized the lungs until we got him into a hospital and he did survive. All they'd had to do was control his bleeding and lung pressure and hope he didn't die of an infection. Damn him, Daryl knew exactly what to do. That boy could have been so smart if he had finished school but he only has a tenth grade education, just like me. That's what you get when you grow up in the Dixon clan. He saved me and I didn't really want to be saved. It's hard work healing from nasty injuries like these, and there is always the possibility that I will always be gimpy. When I get moving again I'm gonna kick your ass into tomorrow baby brother.

I'm most worried about now having two fingers gone from my remaining hand. How the hell am I supposed to be able to do all the shit I've always done when I'm missing most of my fingers? I'm going to be clumsy as shit. Others will see me as a cripple and the weak link. I'd see someone that way who was missing most of their fingers. FUCK. This is gonna be damn near impossible. Then again, I ain't ever been soft. There is some benefit to being underestimated. Like how most people think me a dumb hick; so obviously wrong if someone takes time to know me. I prefer not to give them the chance to see how smart I really am because I can outthink most people. So many equate education with intelligence, when most college educated snooty bastards can't outthink me. That was why I hated the military.

I don't feel angry anymore; I feel sleepy and calm. I listen as Daryl screams at me and feel his tears dripping on me as he desperately tries to prevent me from bleeding out or suffocating. I feel the warmth of his hands on my skin (so cold from blood loss). I smell his odor, mixed with the coppery smell of my own blood. All my senses sharpen, and then mix together as reality fades. I dream. Daryl is a toddler, I'm almost eleven, just starting to grow into my size. I'm showing him the fish in the stream and he is laughing his baby laugh, trying to catch the fish in his hands he almost falls in but I catch him, already fearless and loving being outside.

"Don't worry, brother, I've got ya. Ain't never gonna let you go. You're the only one I've got." Then it hits me…HE hits me…this is now and he won't let me be, won't let me go, won't let me rest. I'm so tired; damn you, can't you just let me fucking rest? My chest hurts. My back, my hand, my ribs hurt, my arm hurts; it's hard to breathe. Each breath feels like my lungs are chewing up glass. But surprisingly enough I'm still breathing, my heart is still beating, and the bleeding is slowing down.

"Hold on, got some walkers up ahead." She guns it and smooch goes the fuckers in the way. Again I dream. It's raining, pounding against the cheap, tin roof, the holes in my shoes smooshing mud up through my toes. (Incidentally I HATE being barefoot; I've always equated being on top of the food chain with wearing boots). I'm hearing my old man crashing around in a drunken state yelling at my mom. I'm fifteen or so and Darylina is seven, being a pain in the ass. He just got his umpteenth concussion from the old man and a bloody nose, to boot. Stupid kid, why'd he have to pour the beer out? When is he gonna learn some brains? I'm not going to be around forever. I care about him, but I gotta get outta here or I'm gonna kill the bastard. My back is still healing from last week and I still have bruises around my throat from being choked. Why do I have to raise him? I'm only eight years older; I don't know nothing about kids. I want to join the military and learn how to put some hurting on someone who deserves it and never, never be on this end of the pain again. What do I do about the kid? He deserves it less than I do…

I fade in and out of reality as the car barrels down the road with walkers bouncing off the heavy, beat-to-shit, metal car (best to hotwire), like a damn pinball machine. I mumble "Daryl, ya dumbass why the hell waste yer time with me? Should have just left me; I'm gonna die anyway. I'm more worthless than a pussy full of splinters."

I grunt and groan with each walker collision, each bump sending shockwaves of pain through my already abused body. "Damn, Nubian Queen, didya get yer license out of a gum machine? Ya ain't driving worth a shit. Ya got an injured man back here." I start laughing and coughing up ropes of blood stained snot. Fuck. They careen into the prison, bursting through the gates as Bo Peep and Chinatown dive out of the way. I enjoy the view as I begin to laugh and pass out again. Listening to my brother swear, the voices fade and the darkness urges me on, pulling me into its peace as I begin to fade again.