AN: I won't lie, I've really struggled with this chapter. Originally I'd intended for them to retire for some little snuggle time once the Governor was dead, but then Carol had to go and collapse as they were heading out of there and it's thrown my whole plan out (not that I have plans, it was just a figure of speech!) So, it's also thrown out my numbers. I liked the idea of finishing on chapter ten. My dilemma now is, do I finish with snuggles, or string something new onto the fic? Depending on what you all think and let me know you might like me to do, I will hold off on deciding ;)
Also, fic recs. I am loving a couple of fics at the moment.
Damaged by kaoscraze is so well written and completely deserves more love than it is getting. Give it a shot, people!
The Art of Opportunity by ceeceesings is magical. I love all her work and this one has bite.
And for something a little different, I am totally loving this Merle/Michonne fic. Taking Out The Trash by phantomphan2000 is all sorts of wonderful. It truly deserves a read if you are a Merle fan!
Chapter Ten
"Excuse me…uh…Daryl?"
He thought about ignoring her, the Woodbury woman riding his last nerve for the last four days to the point where he was convinced he was going to shoot her in the head with his crossbow if she didn't leave him the fuck alone. She'd been in his face from the minute he'd got back, Carol lying limp in his arms, her gaze running warily over their new prison mates as Dumb and Stupid stood there, hands cooperatively up in the air with Rick's gun almost in their faces.
"The fuck you want this time?" he huffed angrily, searching the yard for Rick so he could come deal with the bitch. His nerves were on edge, his feet constantly aiming him toward the infirmary where Carol remained in a coma even, though that was the last place he wanted to go. The war between his heart and his head was getting to be an exhausting one.
"I was just wondering if…" she swallowed, hard, and he brightened slightly that she could at least see she was skating on thin ice around him. She took a tentative step back, trying to not make it obvious, but something feral within him picked it up and grinned maliciously. "Has there been a decision about whether Martinez and Schumpert are staying?"
"Why the hell you askin' me? Go talk to Rick about it." He stomped off but she dogged his every step and he nearly growled like a rabid dog when he felt her fingers grasp desperately at his jacket sleeve and haul him to a stop.
"I did," she said almost breathlessly, fearfully. "He told me to ask you." Daryl's eyes narrowed and he could see she was trembling and he was fucking glad. Glad she was scared shitless of him because these days, it was a constant state of survival for him—being scared shitless that Carol wasn't going to wake up. Scared shitless he was going to have to watch those two pricks that ran their car in the first place wandering about free as birds in her home while she rotted away in her own head.
"Sweetheart, if that decision all hinges on me they're as good as dead, now get your fuckin' hands offa me." He swung his arm away from her grasp, swinging his bow off his back in a fluid movement that should have been enough warning to tell her to keep her distance.
"Look, I'm real sorry about Carol but you both should've known better than to be out there anyway," she started and Daryl struggled to keep his fist at his side, his angry eyes flashing at her a caution instead. Stupid bitch chose to ignore it and his temper simmered dangerously. "You can't blame them for going off with Phillip. You saw how bat shit crazy the man was. If it was a choice between being gunned down like the rest of us or going with him and keepin' your life, what the hell would you have done?"
"What would I have done?" he snapped. He revelled in how she flinched back as he got right up in her face, his furious expression leaving no more room for interpretation. "I'da put a bullet in the fucker's head after he tried to pit two brothers against each other to the death. I'da thought long and hard about the blood thirsty crazy as fuck townies he'd turned you all into. An' I wouldn'ta gone attackin' a place with women and children just on the say so of an asshole that put kids in his fuckin' army. That's what I woulda done, now get the fuck out of my face so I can go see Carol."
"Jesus, you actually like being scary, don't you?"
Daryl spun on his heel, staring her down with blind hatred making her image blur. All he could think about was that Carol had been out there with him because he'd said yes to her about getting away from this place, he'd taken her out there to give them some space to feel things out between them and instead it was almost a surety that he'd managed to get her killed. Ending the reign of terror from the Governor was a very small recompense for losing the woman that dragged him through each and every day. That made him want to get up in the mornings, if just to bask briefly in her morning smile.
"Oh, I enjoy it about as much as I enjoy watching my friend slip slowly into death when I can't do a damn thing about it." His eyes narrowed at her, then he glared at the cement at his feet, wishing more than anything he could just climb onto his bike and ride right out of the place. Ride until he ran out of fuel or road to follow or memories to haunt him.
"She's in a coma, Daryl. She's not dead yet."
He couldn't summon up the words to tell her to just go and get lost, not with the lump of tears choking his throat. He aimed one last, very precise glare of disgust at her and walked away. Carol wasn't dead yet, and if that woman knew what was good for her, she'd stop asking about the two asshats whose lives hung on that fact.
"You best pray she don't die," he called once he was far enough away that she couldn't touch him again. "She does and your buddies are toast." He ignored her gasp, feeling the threat weigh heavily on his soul, and made his way to Carol.
His step slowed once he reached the infirmary. He stood immobile just outside the door, quietly watching the Woodbury doctor as she circled around her only patient inside and tried to get a hold of himself. He trembled, the sight of Carol lying deathly still and pale in that bed obscuring just about every horrible experience he'd ever known before. It had been four days of the same shit, him sitting by her side, begging her to open her wide, blue eyes and see that he'd brought her to safety once again, that he was saving her the best way he knew how. Nothing ever happened, though, her status never changed and instead he acknowledged that if she ever did open her eyes she'd likely see him behaving like the soft-hearted pussy he'd always vowed to Merle he'd never be, with tears in his eyes and all.
Dr. Stevens glanced up from her clipboard and the notes she was taking as he entered, and she smiled at him. Her gaze swept across the room toward the open window that looked out over the yard and then back to him, her eyebrow raised in question. He sighed and dropped heavily into the chair beside Carol's bed, and with his own head feeling like it'd been stuffed with cotton wool, he took Carol's hand carefully around the IV tube and tried to stop the shaking of his own hands.
"Karen harassing you again?"
He liked Dr. Stevens. The woman was straight up, took no shit, including his, and she was working her ass off to give Carol a fighting chance. He'd been blown away to see the medical system they'd set up in the days he and Carol had been missing, Rick suddenly seeing the wisdom of cleaning out Woodbury of all their medical equipment and making sure they had a workable mini-hospital. Fuck, if Daryl had known they were bringing a doctor with them from Woodbury he might have been even more encouraging to have them at the prison. It was only because of her and Hershel that he had any hope at all of Carol recovering.
"That woman is like a boil on my ass."
Dr. Stevens straight out laughed at him and Daryl was surprised when his face cracked briefly around a smile.
"I have to say, I am surprised she's so determined to save their lives. Caesar can be brutal when he wants to be—he doesn't always think of the consequences of what he's doing." She moved to Carol's head, turned her face gently so that he was staring at her lax features, wan eyelids, those crazy freckles smattered across her nose that he loved so much.
"They're good muscle. If we can trust 'em, they're an asset. If we can't, they ain't," he replied, distracted, his fingers itching to do more than hold her hand. He felt so bone weary and guilty; he hadn't slept much in nearly a week and it was starting to take its toll. "How is she today, Doc?"
"Actually," Dr. Stevens started, her voice infused with hope, "things are looking pretty good so far. Her vital signs have stabilised, there's no more fluid being drained and everything looks as good as we could expect without an MRI or CAT Scans. All we can really do now is wait…and pray."
Prayin', and wishin' and hopin'.
JC had abandoned him as a kid and it just about set his brain alight to silently acknowledge that he'd prayed like he never had before for Carol to recover. Not that it seemed to be doing any good, because as much as the doc sounded optimistic, Carol hadn't moved a damned muscle since he'd brought her in.
"An' if she does wake up? What then?" He just stared at Carol, hating himself that believing the worst case scenario was more likely to be their future was his natural default.
"I can't predict that," she admitted softly, pulling up a chair to sit beside him and taking an example from him and watching Carol carefully. "She could have brain damage and all this might have been the worst thing to do for her, or, she could be completely fine. Then there's the ocean of possibilities in between."
Daryl's head jerked up at her, fear shadowing his face. "Like what?"
The doctor took a deep breath before she faced him and he could see the worry that etched a line across her forehead. "There are too many possibilities, Daryl. Changes in her personality, behaviour, memory. The brain itself is a very complicated thing. There's really very little point trying to guess until she wakes up and we can observe for ourselves."
"If she wakes up," he grumbled, and then felt like a prick because he was already expecting her to check out and leave them all behind.
"Hey, have some faith in her," Dr. Stevens chided, flicking at his arm with the back of her hand, showing how comfortable she'd become with his daily presence. "I have a funny feeling she's going to surprise you."
He snorted, though his heart felt heavy and bruised. "She always does," he admitted with an affectionate grin.
"You might want to watch out for Karen, too. She's an attractive woman, and quite vocal. I think you might intrigue her a little." Dr. Stevens got back to her feet, letting her hand rest on his shoulder as an offer of comfort before departing with a reassuring squeeze.
"What's she gonna do?" He crinkled his brow in confusion and wondered what in the hell being attractive had to do with anything. She reminded him of Lori and he had a feeling Rick wasn't taking that resemblance too well by the way he kept fobbing the bitch off onto him.
Dr. Stevens returned to her patient with a new bag of saline and went about replacing the nearly empty one. She didn't answer Daryl directly, just stroked Carol's cheek and spoke to her instead.
"Your man has an admirer. You need to wake up and stake your claim, honey."
Daryl huffed in irritation. "Ain't no way in hell," he denied hotly, but even still he couldn't stop the flush that spread across his face. He wasn't completely stupid. Did his ego a boost to think that there was someone out there interested in him, saw some worth, but if she didn't have Carol's eyes, that soft expression whenever she looked his way, he wasn't interested.
"I'll leave you two kids alone then, shall I? Try to keep it clean," she said with a suggestive wink, chuckling as she slinked out of the door. Daryl watched her go, his expression one infused with fear. He'd spent hours alone with Carol while she'd lain like a corpse on this bed, and every time he expected it to be the last. He'd always been a coward, had never fought for what he wanted—it never occurred to him that anything he'd ever wanted in his past life had never been something he could control. Still couldn't. He didn't know how to fight something like this.
"So, it's just you and me, babe. Finally," Daryl said dramatically with a roll of his eyes. Trust for them to finally get time alone and one of them had to be comatose. The doc had told him numerous times that he should talk to Carol, tell her things to try and coax her back to them, but he'd never been much of a talker, so the brief was harder for him than most. He mostly sat and watched her, replayed the last week over in his head for the moments when he'd actually felt free enough to reveal himself to her, and she'd accepted him. She'd accepted him, and suddenly coaxing her back to him was the most important role he had in the world.
"You need to wake your ass up, Carol. Ass-kicker's been cryin' for you, and Beth don't know shit about raisin' a baby. Rick's still chasin' his goddam tail with all these new folks and tryin' to set the place up right, so he's no help with her. An' Carl's runnin' around bein' scary and shit." He paused, taking a deep breath to hold back the emotion threatening to spill out in ways he wasn't prepared for others to see. "You an' me had an understandin'. This lyin' around scaring the fuck out of me wasn't part of the deal. You don't get to do this now. Not now."
His voice broke and he flopped forward onto the bed, his wet face landing against her blanketed thigh. His fingers curled up within hers, and it wasn't lost on him that hers never moved, that there was no tensing of the digits to give any indication of life at all. Monitors tracking her heartbeat continued to beep around him but he was lost to it all, finding no comfort in the reminder that she was here, but not. He snuggled up to her, trying to steal as much of her lingering life as he could without his heart tearing out of his chest. His heart throbbed painfully as he tried to shut out the alternatives—her not waking up ever, turning and him having to be the one that made sure she couldn't hurt anyone. Except him. She was hurting him with everything she was not doing right this minute. Everything about it was wrong and he couldn't prevent it when his body succumbed to a bone rattling shudder as he sniffled pathetically against her blanket.
"Not now," he mumbled again, his face covered, his body aching with the need to hold her.
Above him, dazed and confused, cornflower blue eyes opened softly onto the world.