Disclaimer: I own nothing of this brilliant world, only my OC's.
"He's my husband,"
She hesitated for barely a beat of her pulse. Looking down at the disfigured and bruised face of the man who lay dead in the dusty grass at her feet, she contemplated the glaze of his now frozen eyes. Eyes that had watched her every move for too many years. Kept her chained to his side with the weight of their gaze. Eyes that had glared above the cruel leer that had always lurked on his now bloodied lips.
They had always been her weakness. What would make her forget about the flailing of fists and the tearing at her clothes.
His eyes.
She would want to fight, to scream, to kick him away as he would wrench her forward by the waist of her pants… but she could not. Not when he set his eyes on her, that piercing look that she could convince herself was love. That she could imagine gazing at her over the smile of a younger face, standing at an altar while she beamed in a white dress.
But those had been foolish fantasies. Hesitations that had always left her body beaten and bloodied, while she would feel helplessly used and discarded by the man she wanted so desperately to love her. Her own mind setting inescapable traps.
She squeezed the wooden handle of the pickaxe tightly as tears steamed down her face, staring into the eyes of her dead husband and struggling to hold the hefty tool in her sweaty hands. Even in death those eyes seemed to take away her power. Leave her frozen and defenseless. Completely vulnerable.
A sob shook her body. Then another. Not any more.
She swung.
Again and again, sobs quaking her body as blood plumed into the air around the dead man's face. With each strike he became less recognizable. Gone were the staring eyes. Gone was the leering mouth. Gone was the man whom she feared to leave alone with her baby girl.
Until the body on the ground at her feet was nothing to her. Just a mass of blood and flesh that had stood between her and Sophia's safety. No different then the other corpses being burned in the smoldering pile outside of camp.
But still Carol kept swinging.
Flecks of blood and what could possibly be brain matter covered the ground in a wide halo around the late Ed Peletier's head, growing with each new hit. Further soiling a pair of dirty work boots that stood near the sobbing woman as she pounded the axe into bone.
Motionless with shock the hunter watched the scene, a grimace growing on his sweaty face as his brows furrowed deeper with each fall of the axe. He had not expected such aggression from a woman who had always seemed so meek and kind.
But then again, he was no stranger to abuse.
He knew the bruises and the scars. The tricks the mind can play. But most of all he knew the relief in seeing a tormentor fall.
Carol let out a particularly loud sob, and the hunter flinched away. Thoroughly uncomfortable, he averted his eyes to peer across the camp. Looking for the little girl that was hopefully not in sight of this onslaught.
Daryl let out a relieved rush of air when he found the blonde hair of the back of the child's head. Seated in a camp chair, facing perfectly opposite of him near the black Subaru. She was nodding and offering a bloodied knee to a person brandishing a medical kit crouched before the chair.
He saw the sailor stand up from where she had been crouching, watched her mouth moving with a slight smile as she talked to the child. Keeping her distracted from the brutal actions of her mother.
Feeling his gaze, Quinn glanced over to meet his eyes briefly, asking if it was safe for Sophia to go to her mother with the tilt of her head and the raise of an eyebrow.
The hunter shook his head in response, grimacing as he glanced at the scene at his feet. The swings had stopped, but Carol still remained. Tears flowing freely as she stood over the mess.
Crouching back down, the sailor refocused her attention on the girl perched in her camp chair. Flicking her ponytail over her shoulder as she moved, she attempted to come up with some more distracting conversation topics to keep Sophia's mind off her father.
The kid had almost definitely been abused by the man that now lay faceless in the dirt at Daryl's feet, and the sailor had to fight the creeping feeling of relief for the little family that he was now out of their lives. No longer an additional threat to their safety. But sometimes children who are the victims of abuse could have unforeseen reactions to the death of their tormentor, as they may not know any other kind of attention, Quinn thought with her lips pursed as she analyzed the face of the little blonde before her. This was a time to tread carefully.
The sailor settled on pets. All kids like pets, right? So Quinn told the skinny little blonde about her beloved childhood dogs. The whole damned fleet of them and how they had frolicked in the Alaskan blizzards like wild wolves.
The sailor let out a sigh of relief as the child's face lit up with the mention of animals and began readily questioning her about her Alaskan adventures. So Quinn easily spun through stories of sled dogs and swirling snow from her spot in front of the chair. Elbows resting on her muscled thighs as she hovered at the girl's level, keeping her attention opposite of the scene her mother had created. The sailor's freckled face breaking into a smile as Sophia's eyes grew with excitement and wonder that only a child could have at such a time.
"Is that why it says 'BALTO' on that metal tag on your neck?" The little blonde questioned, eyes shining with awe at the sailor's description of a sled dog race she had competed in as a young teenager. Back before she had ever ventured to the lower 48.
The freckled woman laughed gently. A quiet, sad sound. Her callused hand floated to grasp the single dog-tag that hung around her neck, as a scene of snow stained red and orange with the setting sun flashed behind her eyes. Followed by the barking of dogs, and spots of blood contrasting clearly against the pure white of fresh powder. "No, no. That's a story for another time, kiddo." Quinn rasped.
A single gunshot sounded in the camp, drawing the eyes of every survivor.
Andrea had finally been forced to move from where she had sat clutching her sister's body for most of the day. Firing a bullet through Amy's head as the dead girl had reanimated in her arms.
The older blonde now wept openly, cradling her sister while still holding the smoking gun in her hand. Leaning into Dale as the retiree hugged her, his face a mask of pity and sorrow.
The action had roused Carol from her state of blind rage and loss. Drawing her focus back toward reality as she dropped the heavy axe with a thud and a cloud of dust in the dirt, and examined the speckles of blood that spotted her arms. His blood.
The gentle gray-haired woman glanced up at Daryl, who had been witness to all of her violent behavior, and offered him a tight-lipped expression that on a better day could have passed as a smile. Shame and embarrassment threating to flood her mind as she worried what his reaction might be. So used to the fury of men.
But, the gruff man made no response other then to jerk his head across the camp. Gesturing to where her daughter sat facing away from her, safely in the care of the sailor, before striding away toward his tent without a word.
Words were whispered over open, shallow graves the next morning.
An attempt at normalizing the deaths of their friends and family, and to seem civilized in a world that inched more and more away from familiarity.
Despite the early hour the air was hot and hung heavy about the grieving survivors, weighing down their despair so that it clung to them like the sweat forming on their skin. Trapped in the atmosphere of loss.
The sailor tightened her arm around Glenn's shoulders as he tensed at her side. Propping him up while she stood tall, gazing stoically forward, far too accustomed to death.
The young man's eyes shot skyward as they threatened tears, bottom lip caught firmly in his teeth to keep himself from crying. Barely able to contain his grief as they watched the scene before them.
Andrea was struggling to place the body of her sister into her grave, stumbling under the weight of the body.
The shake of sobs and the weakness of exhaustion were fighting against her efforts by tooth and nail, but Andrea was a strong woman. Quinn had seen that in her eyes from the first moment they had met. A woman cut from a similar cloth as she, dangerously proud and independent. To the sailor it came as no surprise that the broken blonde refused help from anyone. Ignored the looks of pity and the extended hands of the men who wished to take her burden. Always the men. Wanting to share one last moment with her sister, sorrowfully alone.
Large feet shifting in the tall grass that surrounded the graves, and the not-so-subtle shooting of a glare, drew the SEAL's attention to the men standing beyond the struggling blonde. Men who had now given up offering unwanted help.
The interactions between the deputy and the sheriff had been terse that morning.
Quinn had overheard the rumbles of masculine voices arguing in the early hours from her watch station in the high branches of her favorite tree. Both had strong opinions about what was best for the dwindling group of survivors, and neither had been keen to back down.
But at some point between that argument and the funeral it seemed that Shane had folded to his partner. The sailor theorized that a certain thin brunette woman might have played a hand in that game. His surrender made obvious by the large man's announcement to the group as a whole that he had decided to side with Rick.
Much to the sailor's relief, as that meant they would head toward the CDC rather than Fort Benning without the need for her input. She didn't want to scare the group unnecessarily with the news of the fall of a safe zone, not when their nerves were already so delicate after this attack.
She didn't know what had happened at the base, but a message such as the one she had received had to be followed without question. Always. A 'Do Not Follow' was one of the most serious commands in the Navy, and the sailor had no doubt that her man on the other side of that radio would not have lead her astray. Not a SEAL. Not ever.
A time would come when she would have to intervene with the two bickering lawmen, but she was grateful that time was not yet.
So she had held her tongue.
She had other things to worry about, the sailor thought, as she gave Glenn's shoulder a little squeeze. Her eyes roaming from the disgruntled deputy to where Carol bent to hug the skinny form of her daughter, Quinn bit her lip with concern, squinting slightly to examine their expressions. The image of Carol swinging mercilessly at the head of her husband still fresh in the sailor's mind.
The soft swishing of tall grass floated through the air as sturdy work boots padded up behind her.
"Quit stressin' the kid, we ain't even left yet," came a familiar growl from over her shoulder.
In a whirl of wavy hair the sailor flicked her head in the hunter's direction. Her movement drawing Glenn's attention so his eyes followed hers to the face of the hunter. The distraction from the grave sites seeming to immediately lessen the weight of the grief that held the young man down.
Quinn could even have sworn she saw a flicker of humor in his eyes at the hunter's word choice.
Daryl stopped his stride, and nudged the sailor's side with an elbow, one eyebrow cocked as he continued to both of them, "She ain't gonna get bitten er pickaxed when we're standin' like a foot from 'er."
The sailor cocked an eyebrow in return, blue eyes meeting blue. Tapping the brim of Glenn's hat as he snorted, she replied to the hunter, "You say that now."
With a gesture of the SEAL's head, the trio wove through the grass back toward camp, muttering about which car each thought should lead the caravan as they prepared to leave the quarry. Distracting themselves from the horror of the night and day before so that they would not be trapped by the paralysis of grief.
Someone needed to plan. Someone needed to stay alert.
So they carried on, leaving the rest to mourn in silence.
For at least a minute longer.
Yet again the survivors fought to out-race the setting of the sun, although luckily this time safely in vehicles rather than on tired feet.
In the lead of the caravan of cars drove the Subaru, its darkly tinted windows perfectly mirroring the scenery of a fuchsia tinted sky and tall green trees as it sped down the center of the highway.
As it was one of the more heavily armed vehicles and held the two most capable navigators, Quinn had easily quashed any argument that her trusty hatchback should not be out front.
The sailor gazed out her windshield at the endless expanse of asphalt stretching before her, fingers tapping on her steering wheel to some four-count beat that had wormed into her head. Likely due to the constant humming of the young Korean seated at her side, whom had his head bent over the road map of Georgia that stretched across his lap.
Every couple seconds the sailor glanced up to her rearview mirror, checking to see that the line of cars still closely followed. Paranoid of stragglers, as the last time the caravan had stopped the survivors had lost another man.
When the sun had still sat high in the clear Georgia sky, maybe around noon, the RV had broken down.
The old vehicle was reliably unreliable so the hiccup didn't come as a surprise to any of the group. They simply resigned themselves to finding a new radiator hose for it, sending T-dog and Shane off down the highway in search of abandoned cars with abandoned hoses.
But as they had waited, clustered around their parked cars in a little group in the middle of the asphalt strip, the severity of Jim's condition had become evident.
The lanky man had shone with the sweat of high fever, skin sickly green and bite wound seeping, when Rick had helped him out of the RV to get some fresh air.
Jacqui had said that during the drive Jim had been hallucinating severely, calling out the names of his family and weeping. That he had clutched a blanket to his feverish form while the color had slowly drained from his skin. Inching closer and closer to death.
The lanky man had stood amongst the little gathering of survivors for a moment, tired eyes glancing from person to person. A wistful look floating on his face. Before he had asked them to leave him behind.
He was going to die soon, he had murmured, and he wanted to die on his terms.
Some had argued with him, Rick had even begged. Pleading with his honest gaze as he had held the bitten man by the shoulder. They were so near to the CDC and the sheriff had so much hope that he could find Jim a cure. The radiator hose was being fixed, they would be on the road again soon…
But Jim insisted, nodding along as Dale had explained how he believed that the bitten man should have the ultimate say in how his life ended. It was his life, after all.
Insisted as the survivors had argued amongst themselves to decide if he was lucid enough to make that decision. His large eyes, glazed with his rising fever, had rested on a particular face throughout the raising of voices. Had held contact with a pair of soft blue eyes resting in a freckled face. Insisting.
She had nodded.
"Let him make his own damned choice," her raspy voice had commanded, cutting through the stern words of the others as she had held the lanky man's gaze. "He's more sane then most of us."
So they had left him.
Sitting in the shade of a tall tree, muttering the names of his loved ones while they had watched him shrink smaller and smaller in their rearview mirrors.
"Take this exit, Q. We're only a couple miles out now."
Glenn's quiet words drew the sailor's eyes from her mirror. With a nod she flipped her turn signal on and dragged her wheel toward the exit road.
Center for Disease Control 2 miles
"They following?" She asked as she squinted out her windshield to look for the cross street name he had mentioned earlier.
Her co-pilot spun in his chair to glance out the rear window. Counting under his breath before he responded, "Yep, they're all there."
Quinn spotted the cross street and bumped her turn signal on again, an uneasy feeling raising the hairs at the back of her neck as the large modern building came into view.
It looked the same as it always had from a distance.
It was not uncommon for Special Naval Warfare Officers to be briefed on potential outbreaks and security threats at this complex, and the LT Commander had visited several times in her years of service.
Her dark brows furrowed as she noticed the bodies strewn about the parking lot, the abandoned military vehicles, and the torn down barbed-wire fencing. It was not the same. This was a graveyard. Any hope she had held of finding help here dwindled as she pulled her Subaru to park along a curb and leaned forward in her chair to stare at the sealed doors of the CDC.
Maybe if she could just get to a keypad on the entrance door…
Knuckles rapped on the window by her head, drawing both the sailor's and Glenn's attention. The sheriff gestured from the other side of the glass with his silver pistol, signaling for them to get out of the car as the others of their group pulled in to park along the curb.
Quinn nodded to him before turning to Glenn and tapping the brim of his hat affectionately. "Game time," she rasped with a slight smirk, reaching to pull her snow-camo rifle from the back seat. Knives already strapped to her body.
The kid let out a rush of air and drew his brows together, preparing himself as he took the silenced handgun the sailor offered.
They sprung from the Subaru to join the gathering of survivors, all of who were armed and glancing around the wide parking lot that stretched between them and the entrance. Counting the corpses that shuffled slowly about the concrete, disregarding those on the ground.
Treading as quietly as possible they began to jog across the parking lot, those with the most weapons experience hovering on the outskirts of the pack.
Quinn paced at the rear of the group, head swiveling with carefully trained movements as she crept silently along. Rifle raised and pressed into her shoulder at the ready, her two closest men on either side. Daryl and Glenn strode slightly ahead of her, weapons raised, the trio creating a barrier between the two children lagging behind their mothers and any danger that may approach.
At the front Rick and Shane ran, unpracticed feet making loud steps no matter how hard they tried to be quiet. Leading the little group through the maze of so far oblivious dead up to the heavy metal door of the entrance.
But their luck did not last.
Someone tripped over a destroyed piece of a helicopter, kicking the disfigured metal as they stumbled and sending it clanking across the concrete.
The sound did not go unnoticed. As if the dinner bell had been rung, the once mindlessly wandering dead turned toward the survivors. Forcing the group to break into a run toward the door.
"We should go back!" called Shane from the front of the group as they dashed, "Head for Benning, there's nothing here for us!"
With a harsh pip of air, Quinn dropped a corpse that had wandered far too close to T-dog for her liking. Her brows were drawn in a dark glare as she shifted her sights from the fallen corpse to the others still approaching, they were going to get trapped here if they couldn't get those damned doors open soon.
As they reached the metal barrier and Rick began to pound on the door, yelling for help, the sailor spun on her heels to face the slow charge. Gesturing for the hunter and Glenn to do the same with a nudge to each man's shoulder. They backed in close to the rest of the group, standing shoulder to shoulder so the trio could hopefully effectively guard everyone.
"We have to leave!" came the deep voice of the deputy again as he tried to drag his partner away from the door.
The sailor bit her lip as she scanned the concrete area, they were trapped now. The only escape route would be through the congregating dead, and they would have to use knives to kill quickly enough. The risks were growing with every second.
"Is there a keypad?" She called over her shoulder from her place between Daryl and Glenn, eyes still on the approaching walkers. Repeating louder, "Tell me if there's a fucking keypad!" when there was no immediate response.
"Yes!" Rick replied as his hands found a small keypad on the metal wall of the building.
Thank fucking god. Quinn swung her rifle over her back and turned to cut through the crowd, heading for the door. Rasping: "Close ranks" to the hunter and her co-pilot as she moved. Holding the ice blue gaze of the hunter over her shoulder until he offered her a nod and pulled the younger man closer to him.
Stopping beside Rick, the sailor flipped up the metal cover of the little key pad with one hand, the other bringing her dog tag up to bite between her teeth. An old habit for when she was trying to remember some specific information in a stressful situation, an oddly frequent part of her life.
Quickly tapping through the lengthy chain of digits in her security code, she heard Rick exclaim, "The camera, it moved!"
"Then there must be someone inside, those are manually controlled," The sailor rasped to him, still pounding numbers into the keypad. High-level security clearance meant the world's fucking longest codes, she thought as she swore under her breath.
"Let us in!" The sheriff yelled, waving at the camera, "You're killing us!"
Harsh pips sounded from the back of the group as Glenn took down several corpses.
The dead were closing in around the little group, and Daryl had now joined the delivery boy in the battle. The hunter stabbed those within reach with a bolt from his bow, trying to buy Quinn a little more time.
The keypad beeped twice and flashed green as the final sequence was pressed, causing the sailor to call out with relief, "Oh thank fucking god."
Flicking her long ponytail over her shoulder, Quinn moved her rifle back up to her eye and faced the oncoming storm. Hearing the creaking of the barrier lifting as she tapped her trigger to bring down assailing walkers. Not a second too late.
As gunshots fired the metal doorway slowly lifted, light from the complex pouring out onto the darkening concrete.
Pattering footsteps could be heard running on the tile inside, and a man's voice called out "Quickly, inside!"
More action, arguments, and drunken bonding time to come.
Thanks for reading!
Review if you feel so inclined, those are quite motivating.
Best,
GC