2. Already Gone

Merle was loading the pick-up with stuff. The tv news reporters told people to head to Atlanta. Daryl couldn't understand Merle, he seemed wired in a 'bring it on' kinda way. Daryl reckoned they'd be safer staying where they were or heading further up into the mountains. They hadn't even seen a walker up close yet. The tv reporter advised shooting them in the head, claiming it was the only way to stop them.

Daryl waited for Merle to use the bathroom before stealing the hog and riding into town. He wanted to check on Mary. That brought the first bad shock. Mary's shop had been raided and smashed up, the doors hung off their hinges. As Daryl crept upstairs clutching his crossbow, he already knew she wasn't there. His hunch was right, the apartment was unscathed but empty. There were bodies strewn all over Bentnail, and the dead were walking the dusty streets.

Daryl rode through a walker on the way to Mary's mother's house. Old Abraham Brady. Brady's face was half torn off and he grabbed at Daryl just before sliding under the wheel of the hog.

'Jesus shit!' Daryl said under his breath, the smell that floated up from Brady was like a million rotten eggs. He accelerated and bits of flesh and blood flew up from the tires. When he reached the house, he got off the hog and ran up onto the porch.

'Mary!' he banged on the screen door, 'You in there?'

The house was secured. Daryl went around peering through the windows. It looked empty. 'Mary!' he said in a low voice, his mouth up against the door, 'We're leaving, you need a ride?'

He couldn't imagine Mary coming along in the pick-up with Merle but he couldn't leave her behind either. Every woman walker he saw he expected to be her. But none of them were. Plenty of familiar faces but none of them Mary or her mom. He walked speedily around to the backyard and kicked at the basement flap. Locked. He sighed and frowned. There wasn't time to break in and look for her but it felt wrong just walking away. He crept back to the front of the house.

Merle made up his mind for him by screeching in the pick-up, 'What the hell are ya doin'?' he asked as he grabbed the hog, 'Help me load this.'

'Lookin' for someone.' Daryl said quietly as they hoisted the hog into the back of the pick-up.

Merle shot an approaching walker in the head with apparent relish, 'Got ya, ya piece of shit.' he shook his head at Daryl, 'Seems you're too late. Maybe she's already gone.'

'Looks like it.' Daryl replied.

'Never seen this town so active.' Merle observed, getting in the pick up.

Daryl got in the pick-up too. Merle was right. The townsfolk looked they were taking part in an early Halloween parade and they'd all come as extras from Night of the Living Dead. Daryl pinched hard on his wrist. It was like a sick dream. All these people he'd known most of his life. Sam Benson from the hardware store chewing on Ike Crowley's intestines: not even pausing to look up as Merle and Daryl drove by, old Mrs Hunter in her blood splattered nightdress, walking unsteadily, one arm completely gone. It was crazy. Daryl kept looking for Mary walking among them even though he didn't want to see her. But he knew that if he did see her and she had turned into one of them he'd put an arrow through her head. It would be the least he could do for her.

Merle and Daryl sped out of Bentnail, taking out a few walkers on the way.

.

'You should have gone with him.' Mary's mother Clary whispered, as they heard the pick-up screaming away from the front of the house.

They had been hiding in the bathroom when Daryl rolled up on the hog, and Mary had crept to the attic and peeked out of the tiny window. Bless Daryl Dixon, she thought, as she looked down at him, she would never forget he had tried to help her.

Mary smiled at her mother, lying on the bundled quilts on the floor of the bathroom, her face waxy white and beaded with perspiration, 'I'm not leaving you.'

'You know it won't be long.' Clary said, ' You had a chance...'

'No-one has a chance out there.' Mary replied, kneeling down and patting her mom's brow with a cool cloth, 'I need to be here with you.' She slathered more antiseptic cream on the bite on her mom's leg, knowing it was too little too late.

They'd tried to get to the church. Verna Peters had phoned just before the power went off forever and said everyone was gathering there. But Clary couldn't walk very fast and this thing had crawled out of the gutter and grabbed her. Mary recognised the thing as once having been Zack Myers,Bentnail's answer to Kurt Cobain. He had an axe embedded in his head, but it didn't seem to hold him back any, and he sunk his teeth into Clary's leg before Mary managed to finish him off with a gun she'd found on the street. She'd never shot anything before and almost threw up as Zack's head exploded. They'd given up on making it to the church and gone back into the house. Somehow Mary had managed to get Clary up the staircase. She would have liked to carry on up to the attic where she felt they would be safer but her Mom couldn't take any more.

'When I go you have to make sure I'm gone for good.' Clary told Mary, 'I don't want to become one of them.'

'As soon as your leg gets better we're going to Atlanta.' Mary replied.

But only a few hours later, her mother closed her eyes for the final time. Mary stared down at her in disbelief, knowing what she had to do. She couldn't do it. She picked up the gun and stared at it, not even knowing if there were any bullets left. A whimper escaped from her lips, how could she put a bullet in her own mother's head? Still gripping the gun tightly, she made a tour of the house,shaking her head and breathing erratically. Outside on the street the dead were lumbering owned Bentnail now, there was no-one else left, except maybe the few who had made it to the church. Mary somehow got back up to the bathroom, held the gun to her mother's temple, closed her eyes and squeezed the trigger. There was at least one bullet in the gun. Her mother was truly gone. Mary prayed frantically, 'Forgive me, forgive me.'

She managed to stand on shaky legs and looked out of the window. The dead were curious. They had gathered near the house after hearing the gun. Mary left the bathroom and closed the door. She staggered to the back of the house and looked down into the yard. It was empty. She knew her only hope of reaching the church was through the back yards, if she could get to the end of the street she only had a short distance in the open and she would be there in the church with living breathing people. It was her only chance. She wasn't sure she still wanted to live, but she didn't want to end up like the zombies on the street.

She left the house, checking to make sure all was clear before stepping off the back porch, clutching the gun. The first few yards were easy enough, but there was a fence around the Madson's house, Mary grabbed a trashcan and set it against the fence, and was about to step up on it when something grabbed her leg, she stifled a scream and turned to see Debra Madson, in a pink quilted housecoat. Debra, who had been so weak and sickly in life, seemed to have found strength in death, and she wasted no time in sinking her teeth into Mary's arm. Mary fought her off and Debra fell to the ground. She brought up the gun and squeezed the trigger but nothing happened. Her luck had run out. She dropped the useless gun, grabbed the trashcan lid and smashed it down on Debra over and over until the woman stopped moving. She looked at her bleeding arm and wanted to throw up. Debra had torn a strip of Mary's flesh away.

'Oh no, no,no,no' she wailed.

Somehow she made it back to the house and locked the door. There was no point in going to the church. No-one was going to let her in now she was wounded. She could feel the poison seeping through her veins, her arm felt like it was on fire. she grabbed a bottle of Coke from the refrigerator and scurried upstairs to her childhood bedroom. Already her head was swimming. She took a long swallow of Coke, laid down on the bed and waited to die, as dusk descended outside she lost consciousness.

.

Merle was watching Daryl with a look of unconcealed scorn. Dummy! Look at him acting like he belonged. Talking to that weirdo Dale about squirrel stew. Merle made a point of keeping his distance from the group, he wasn't planning on hanging around long enough to get acquainted,'cept maybe with them blonde sisters, either one or both, he wasn't fussed. He made himself comfortable on his vantage point on the edge of camp, seeing all and hearing much. There was a lot to be said for keeping quiet and gathering information. A muscle in his jaw moved as Shane and Lori stepped out from their tent smiling at her kid, Lori brushing something from the thighs of her jeans, Shane punching his fist lightly on her son's chest and then touching the boy's hair in a fatherly manner. 'Cept he wasn't the kid's father, no sir, he was just banging long tall Lori, keeping her sweet now her husband was dead.

Merle turned his attention to another family ; big man Ed with his mouse of a wife and the scaredy little girl. Merle had no time for Ed, who reminded him of his pa, and even less time for his waste of space wife and child. They added nothing to the group. He followed Carol's gaze and was surprised to see she was staring at Daryl's butt. He grinned nastily. Carol realised Merle was watching her and averted her gaze. Daryl came over to Merle.

'Goin' now.' he said unsurely.

'You feel you have to ask my fuckin' permission to hunt a few damn squirrels?' Merle grunted.

'No.' Daryl replied, 'If you get to the city will you keep an eye out?'

'For what?' Merle pretended to be dumb.

'Mary.' Daryl mumbled.

'If I find her, little brother, I'll take real good care of her for ya.' Merle laughed, 'You think I'm gonna find her?'

'No.' Daryl said, 'Just if you did, you'd want to bring her back here.'

'You know I can't promise nuthin'' Merle said.'You need to set your mind to other stuff, like survivin' this shit.'

Daryl nodded and turned away.

Merle spat into the dust. If that whore had reached Atlanta and he came across her he was putting a bullet in her head.

.

Mary woke the next morning and knew she had a fever. She chugged back more Coke and managed to crawl to the other bathroom, the one not covered in pieces of her mom, knowing there was more antiseptic cream in the cabinet. Her mother had kept a good supply of such things. As she applied the cream she studied her wound; it had a greenish tinge. Was she beginning to rot away? She found some aspirin and took three, washing them down with water. Screams came from outside but she hadn't the strength to get to the window and look to see what was going on. Her head was swimming. Somehow she made it back to the bedroom and onto the bed. For two days and nights she fought the fever, barely conscious for almost all of the time. Her mom appeared to her in a dream.

'You're a fighter, you'll be ok.' she smoothed Mary's sodden hair.

'There's no point in fighting.' Mary told her, 'I'm waiting to die.'

'You have to fight.' Clary said, 'Promise me you'll fight to live.'

Later she dreamed Daryl appeared and stared down at her silently, 'Why don't you talk to me?' she begged.

'I can talk up a storm...' he whispered.

'Well talk it up then!' she yelled. But he disappeared.

On the third morning she opened her eyes and watched the sunlight making patterns on the wallpaper. Her mind had cleared, she felt surprisingly normal. She moved her arm. The burning had stopped, there was a crust on the wound and the green tinge had gone. She reached out for the Coke bottle and drained it before sitting up carefully. She was hungry. Starving hungry. She stood up and went to the window. There were no walkers on the street, plenty of well chewed corpses, but nothing was moving.

In the kitchen she ate dry Cheerios and drank more Coke. She put a peppermint t-bag in a cup and added bottled water but it didn't seep a whole lot, the flavor was barely there. She needed to heat water but didn't dare light a fire in case it attracted walkers. Still hungry, she went into the pantry and found Saltines and canned tuna.

In her whole life she had never felt so alone. She had to get out of Bentnail and find other survivors, it didn't occur to her that she had been bitten and therefore would be seen as a threat. After cleaning herself up and changing her clothes, she packed a bag with food, the contents of the bathroom cabinet and more clothes. She also grabbed the metal tool her mom used to damp down the wood stove, it was the closest thing to a weapon she could find. She checked the street outside. Her mom's car was in the garage but the doors were powered by electricity and she didn't know if she would be able to open them manually. There was a small Honda out on the street, the driver's door open with the mutilated corpse of the driver half in and half out of it. She knew the Honda was her best chance, there was no point in looking for armored tanks around Bentnail. She took a deep breath and unlocked the front door, checking the street right and left before leaving the porch.

The Honda driver had no legs, just a bloody mass where they would have begun. Mary tried not to chuck up as she pulled at his shoulders, all the time expecting his eyes to fly open and his hands to grab her, but he obligingly fell from the vehicle, the sound of his torso as it hit the road nothing more than a dull plop. The seat was messed up with blood and gore, but Mary had no choice, she had to get in the Honda and pray it would get her out of Bentnail.

She became aware of a scraping sound behind her, and turned to see a walker, she didn't recognise him, but he was a busy determined boy patrolling Bentnail.. Her heart pounded crazily as she jumped into the Honda and pulled the door shut, expecting the walker to pull at it and drag her back out. She turned the key and the engine sprang to life, her eyes darted around to find the safety lock. She was too scared to look out of the driver window. Any minute now he would be trying to get the door open. But nothing happened. the walker walked right on by the Honda. Mary could barely breathe, she sat as still as she could, thinking any slight sound or movement would alert him to her a minute or so she found the courage to lift her head enough to check the rear view mirror. The walker was shuffling off down the street.

Mary exhaled and pushed down on the pedal. She was on her way to Atlanta.