AN: So here's my next chapter. I hope ya like.
And I'd like to thank all you guess who reviewed, it all made me incredibly happy, I really appreciate it!
Chapter 21
He ends up driving fifteen miles under the speed limit as he drives home, the hammer pounding in his skull making him squint his eyes tight. He doesn't even want to know what he looks like, but he can feel the sticky residue of dried blood across his face pulling on his skin when he contorts his face into a grimace when driving over a particularly rough patch on the road.
He concentrates hard on his surroundings through his throbbing head and the steady downpour of rain, hoping no deer decide to run out in front of him.
He sighs in relief when he pulls into his driveway and into the shed.
Home fuckin' sweet home.
He shuts off his truck, sighing, and slides out of his truck. He suppresses a moan as he walks hurriedly through the rain to the front door and unlocks it; he's aching all the way down to his bones. He rings his hair out onto the floor and turns around to lock the door back. He stands there quietly for a few seconds, listening for any sign of movement. The house is completely silent, but it doesn't help his nerves. He has to check and make sure he's alone before he can even begin to relax.
He walks silently through the dark rooms, suppressing that childish urge to take off running and hide under his covers. He doesn't stop until he's completely satisfied he's the only one in the house. He sighs and walks into his room to get ready for bed. He undresses down to his boxers and slips on a grey t-shirt.
He's incredibly exhausted. His whole world feels like a foggy haze and the only thing he wants and needs is sleep. But he has a hell of a time getting to sleep and when he does sleep it's always shitty. His dreams are getting more graphic, more realistic, disturbing him each night.
Daryl shudders as he thinks about them.
He stiffly walks to the bathroom and examines his face. He's relieved to see it doesn't look as fucked up as it did a couple of weeks ago, but he left eye is swollen again and he has reddish purple marks along the sides of his face. And like he reasoned earlier, he still has splatters of blood dried to his face.
He reaches out with his hand and, with much difficulty, turns the faucet on. He places his cupped hands under the stream of water and splashes it into his face. The water drips off his chin and rolls down his neck onto his chest as he looks intently down at his hands still cupped before him. He takes note of the bad trembling of his hands and grimaces. He turns them over and examines his knuckles where they're already starting to swell. He makes a face at the skinned up meaty sections of his knuckles where the skin looks absent, leaving it looking raw and bloody. He curses Merle for getting him so riled up that he fucked up his knuckles trying to bash his face in.
He bites at his lips, desperately trying to hold back a groan as he awkwardly tries to clean the wounds and then wrap both hands in medical tape to maybe keep himself from jostling his knuckles too much. He leans closer to the mirror and looks at his teeth, pushing at a few that hurt like fuck and finds that Merle knocked a few lose. He curses again and makes a note to himself to be careful chewing certain foods.
He picks up his toothbrush and brushes his teeth the best he can with sore hands, flinching slightly when he brushes over where he was punched.
He rinses his mouth out and stands back, just looking at himself in the mirror and thinking to himself how people will never understands how much he hates the way he looks. Will may have always claimed he wasn't his daddy, but Daryl knew, even then, that he was wrong. Some people may not have noticed it right off, but he can see the resemblance plain as day. He has his mother's eye color, sure, but he can see him residing in the angular shapes of his face. It might be in the way he squints his eyes a certain way or scowls angrily. He can't stand looking at himself. It's like looking into a time portal and seeing his daddy's face all over again. He sees the similarities and he hates himself for it. He knows deep down that he could never be like him, even if he tried, but he still has a lingering fear that he's just like the man he is, destined to follow in his father's footsteps.
Daryl groans loudly, letting all his upsets bleed into his voice.
He walks stiffly out of the bathroom, turning out the light, and immediately heads towards his bed, dragging his feet as he goes.
He moans as he lays himself down and pulls the sheets over his miserable body, snuggling up flat against the mattress, hoping for just this once he can actually have a decent night's sleep.
…
A strong feeling of apprehension fills him as his legs unsteadily carry him through the dark, unknown location. An eerie vibe fills the air as everything stretches and distorts around, everything painted with a dark red hue. It's abnormally quiet except for the sound of booted feet walking at the opposite end of the hallway from him accompanied with a sudden metallic clank that echoes all around him.
A shiver of fear travels down his spine and within seconds, he's bolting in the opposite direction. He's barely pushing himself faster than a walk as the figure gains deadly speed behind him. He runs through the blackened hallway, desperate for any escape and spots a door not far ahead to his right. He makes it to a doorway, just managing to pass the threshold with only the harsh scratch of nails marring his flesh, before slamming the door on them.
He leans against the door, feet scuffing the floor, eyes bulging in horror as the door knob turns and the door begins pounding against Daryl's back and strongly flinging his weight from the door.
Daryl slams into the floor face first and the sound of the door crashing open feels the room. He's frozen in his spot as he hears something being set down and leaned against the wall, too afraid to look.
Rough hands grab his shoulders and roll him over, giving him the perfect view of a silhouette and the glint of teeth as a nasty smile spreads across their face. A rough hand clamps against his mouth, preventing him from screaming. The figure leans closer and the sound of a familiar slurred voice echoes in the room.
"Ya gonna be good this time, boy?"
Daryl rips his eyes open wide with a startled gasp, unable to suck in air. Panic shoots through him when he feels a large hand pressed hard against his nose and mouth smashing his head deep into his pillow. His eyes adjust to the darkness and he sees a large shape looming over him. He bucks his chest out in panicked frenzy and slings his hands out in front of him batting away the shape that's restraining him.
A vice like grip captures his left arm and forces his arm hard against his own chest, the pressure on his face increasing to an incredibly painful degree.
Daryl lets out a muffled scream bucking aimlessly against the weight, bringing up his free fist and swinging it towards what he estimates to be their face, screaming loudly as pain shoots up his entire arm.
The figure grunts and their grip slackens, clearly not expecting the sudden blow. Daryl jerks his arms around and whacks them off, unable to do anything more with his hand, which is now trembling under a painful prickling numbness.
He quickly scrambles for his .45 under his pillow for his with a trembling hand. His blood runs cold when he realizes his fingers are too stiff to even wrap his fingers around the grip and pull the trigger. He panics and in an act of desperation he whips his gun around and smacks the person across the face with the barrel, gritting his teeth at the jarred movements that travel through his hand.
He hears an animalistic growl and the rushing of air before a sickening smack slams against the side of his face. The blow forces him to falls to the side and he lands on the floor in a trembling haze. Hands rip him up from the floor and with an almighty roar he's suddenly traveling through the air.
In a calm illogical part of his brain he feels like he's suspended in mid air until his head rams forcefully against the wall, his spine popping all the way to mid back.
A flurry of thought and emotions flow through him all at once as he lays there in the floor, his heart heavily hammers in his chest as the large shape walks towards him.
"You're makin' this harder on yourself."
He looks up at the shape, body tingling with pain, heart hammering in his chest.
A sudden anger consumes him as he thinks of how easily this bastard is going to just take him. Take him right out of his own damn house while he's sleepin'.
Damn them.
He bursts upwards off the floor and takes off running towards the large figure before ducking and turning sharply to get around them, escaping their grabbing arms. He runs past them and charges through his bedroom doorway, barely concealing the scream bubbling up from his throat. He doesn't even think, he just runs, the heavy pounding of footsteps behind him spurring him on even faster.
He notices the front door is open and darts toward it, yanking his keys from the bowl beside the door as he runs through it.
He scrambles onto the porch with frantic feet, thrusting himself into the air as he clears the steps. He's almost convinced that he has a head start and he's getting away until a heavy weight slams into his back and he plummets to the ground, all the wind knocked from him leaving a hollow ache deep in his gut.
He squirms around kicking his legs at the weight on top of him. He finally gets his first glimpse of his attacker which really only tells him shit because of the black ski mask on their face. He bucks around, kicking and punching anywhere he can reach, doing anything to get free, fucked up hands be damned. He gets a small window of opportunity when they falter as one of his punches lands directly into their throat.
Daryl doesn't stop to think, he just shoves them off with a heavy grunt and stumbles to his feet, running as fast as his wobbly legs will allow towards his truck.
He slams into the door unable to stop himself in time, knocking the sense out of him for a second. He sucks in a breath and pushes off the side of the truck and shoots a glance over his shoulder to see them hauling ass straight for him. He whips forward hurriedly and biting his lip as he almost lets out a scream as his trembling hands wouldn't work fast enough and grip the handle to open the door.
He throws himself into his truck, nearly slamming his ankle in the door as he yanks it closed. He rams his key in the ignition, praying to God that they hadn't decided to fuck with his truck to keep it from working.
He gives a cry of joy when his truck purrs to life and he throws the stick in reverse pealing out of his shed just when his attacker reaches the side of his truck, slamming the window with their hand as he shoots backwards from them.
He throws on his breaks swinging the nose of the truck towards the road and throws it into drive and hauls ass. He peels onto the road and pushes his truck towards eighty, the fastest speed he can possibly go on these back roads without killing himself.
His fingers itch to turn the loud rock music blaring in his ear off, but he doesn't dare, knowing he could swerve and spin out, crashing into the ditch. He hears his truck wine its protests at the speed pushing and Daryl quietly begs it to hold out for him.
He looks intently at the road, biting his lip, clamping onto the steering wheel with an iron grip despite the agonizing pain shooting through his hands.
His heart skips a beat when the dashboard is bathed with a sudden faint light and his eyes dart to the rear view mirror, seeing headlights speeding towards him in the distance.
Daryl gasps and presses harder on the gas, ignoring the trucks complaints, all while shouting a panicked mantra of "Shit! Shit! Shit!" as their vehicle gets increasingly closer.
He finally sees Jon's house in the distance and he lets out a strangled laugh.
He rips into their driveway only to slam on his breaks because of Jon's work truck, hidden behind a tree, parked in the driveway. Daryl swerves off to the side barely missing the back bumper. Daryl throws himself from the truck without bother to shut it off and scrambles around Jon's work truck, holding onto it to support his trembling form. A large van skids to a stop a few feet from his truck and he can't stop himself breaking out into a frantic run, cursing Jon for having his house so far back in the woods.
He steps with shaky legs, and pumps as hard as he can gaining as much speed as his screaming muscles will allow. The sounds of his attacker quickly approaching from behind makes his heart pound harder in his head, his breath becomes harder to catch as he sprints harder, the sound of barking dogs barely makes it to his ears as he gasps for air.
He just rounds the corner when hands drag him down and he's crashing face first into the dirt and he feels weight holding him down.
"No!" he screams and flops around to face them. He looks into the cold eyes of his attacker and without thinking reaches for them, jabbing the shit out of them with his fingers.
They let out a scream that raises the hair on the back of his neck and he turns back over to scramble away only to cry out with despair as they grab a hold of a leg, sticking him with something.
He swings his foot around, colliding it into their face and they let go. He rips himself from the ground and takes off running to their door, trembling violently under the adrenaline coursing through his body.
He rams into the storm door, unable to slow himself, before ripping it open and franticly turning the knob of the wooden door letting out an animalistic scream of horror and frustration when he finds it locked.
"JON! PLEASE! OPEN THE DOOR! PLEASE!" he screams in a scratchy voice as he bangs hard on the wooden door. "PLEASE HELP!" The door rattles violently on its hinges as he bangs as hard as his fatigued muscles allow.
He feels his panic soar as he finds increasingly harder to breathe. It becomes increasingly harder to hold himself up. The big burly bark from inside the house and the barks from outside start blending together into one big chaotic atrocity that makes his head ache.
"PLEASE!" He gives another scream as he feels his banging fists begin to lose their vigor and he leans against the door, slowly sliding to the porch floor.
….
Jon's startled awake by all the dogs barking. The faint recollection of screaming in his sleep immediately puts him on guard.
"What the hell?" Diane asks from beside him in a sleepy haze.
Jon ignores her, instead concentrating on their dogs. He already has a feeling something isn't right. Esther's doing her booger bark. She's running up and down the house growling and barking, with her hackles raised, setting Jon more on edge.
Then he sees Esther charge towards the front door viciously as banging and screaming starts.
He jumps out of bed, grabbing his .45 and heads toward the door. He begins to recognize the voice screaming on the other side, and he feels a wave of dread shoot through him. What the hell's going on?!
"Is that Daryl?" he hears Diane ask in an urgent voice behind him.
Jon rushes to the door, heart pounding. He quickly unlocks it and opens the door, only to have a panicked Daryl collide into him to get inside and fall to his knees. Jon only stares in shock at him for a second until the sound of screeching tires pulls his eyes to the road just in time to see a large white van peel off out of sight.
He's vaguely aware of the sound of someone hitting the floor as he stares at the road.
"Daryl?" he hears Diane question to which he hears no audible reply. "Daryl!?"
Her panicked voice puts him even more on edge and he pulls his gaze from the empty road towards Diane leaning over Daryl on the floor with his arms spread out in awkward positions.
He sees Diane put a hand to her mouth and he feels his stomach drop with dread.
"Oh my god. Jon…. He's not breathing!" her shaky voice strangles out.
Jon feels his blood run cold and he rushes to Daryl's form and rolls him over on his back. Daryl's unblinking eyes stare straight out to nothing and Jon feels like he's going to be sick.
He reaches out a shaky hand to Daryl's neck and almost laughs with relief when he feels the thumping of a heartbeat under his fingers. He looks at Diane, his face making hers light up with a slight guarded hope.
"He's alive," he breathes out. "He's alive."
It's almost like the words make something click in her head and she's suddenly pushing him out of the way.
"Call 911," she says before she grabs Daryl's head, tilting it back and clamping his nose closed while she breathes into his mouth, breathing for him– keeping him alive.
Jon watches for a few seconds before he runs to get his phone and calls 911.