So, I'm aware this is a short chapter but I am at the end of my rope with this stupid computer. Mine is actually my daddy's, so he gave me this one to use but the keyboard is all different and it keeps writing things in the middle of sentences for no reason. Expect typos. I'm sorry, I choose sanity tonight.
Daryl caved, and at the end of the street before he climbed the rusty fire-escape to the roof for look out, he glanced over his shoulder to see her little shoulders and hips sway away. They could have made this place work. It could've been a real thing. If, of course, there was chance to go get Judith and the others, or it didn't have a creepy feel to it, or they weren't out to kill a close personal friend of theirs. Just little things, you know? But Beth had been proved to be safe here, even in little floral bright dresses and kid's hairstyles. And that was the majority that mattered to him.
He had grown so used to her around within a simple week of being locked in a single room together from 7 'til 7. They wasted the evening away on talks of stuff they missed like peanut butter and Nutella- good solid bread-spread foods. She told him how she would eat it with a tea spoon when she was sad or upset, wasting away hours of contemplation over stupid stuff on the porch watching the horse and wishing she could be free of human constraints like them. And now she was free, mostly. Only had to hide from predators and move to find food. Zombie land makes us all animals, just not the freedom form social control and technological entrapments that we might have hoped it would be.
Times like right now, when he was sat staring at a bleak and empty landscape, he really wished he had a working phone to play angry birds on or Tetris. God, how he loved playing Tetris and that space game when he was younger. His friend Michael had his own game station to share with his brothers, but still that was better than Daryl had it. Being friends then meant free goes on games instead of waiting for a quarter to be dropped so he could run to the arcade and play with the children who got allowances. He missed those times. People had always been arseholes, but now they were arseholes who wanted to eat him.
Paul had started his daily game of eye-spy, which Daryl pointedly would refuse to acknowledge again. After a few minutes he would start chattering away about nothing, eventually just talking to himself. And although he hated it, some people just couldn't put up with be silent and doing nothing for hours on end liked aryl had down to a fine art. The hunter in him exceled at these waiting games, but seven days in a row with no real prize to have gained was grating him last energy. Normally it would be easy for Daryl to start a fight and win to blow off steam, but here was different. They could all fight him back and he had a visible weakness on his shoulder in innocent Beth Greene.
It was about four o clock, the gradual noise of trucks being loaded was slowing down considerably and Daryl realised he and Beth still hadn't come up with a plan. Gary told him he was coming on a mission with them to prove his loyalty and pay back the hospitality, not knowing Daryl knew it was a plan attacking another group. When Beth found out she nodded, saying that she wished she had more information. Surprisingly, Paul had shut up when Daryl asked too many questions about it, growing silently suspicious of his motives and carefully suggesting Daryl tread lightly.
The bell tolled for the first time since he'd been here, simply once to avoid too much noise being made to the local area. Everyone was flooded into the street, shaking hands and saying goodbye. The women all stood together. He found them by following Paul, who pulled his daughter Melissa into a long hug. He had ten minutes to chat and say goodbye so there was no pressure really, but Daryl hadn't yet found Beth.
He looked around the whole square thrice, particularly hanging around the door to their room which had been locked after housekeeping, but she wasn't there. He ended up staring at Paul, his shoulders around the ashen face of the girl whose lips looked sealed so tightly he found it hard to imagine they were related. She looked ill, maybe that's why Paul was so secretive about things. Then from underneath her starched white collar of her green striped dress he saw little purple marks. Daryl edged closer, wondering if some abuse system was happening with the girls and that's why Beth wasn't here. Oh god, what if they had taken her to hurt her. He was still moving closer to Melissa slowly, like he was in a trace. The little bruise were in fact fully formed imprints of human hands, but the fear bubbled up in him again. Those were small hands, woman or child hands, not those belonging to thirty strong muscled men. And by her disappearance Daryl could guess who had caused those marks to appear. Beth.
She coughed loudly when she woke up, a long wheeze from her chest. She felt like she must have the world's worst hang over, it all ached, all over. And what's worse she was cold, and from where her head hung down on her own chest she could see the red stains on her pretty pink dress. Lifting her head was the worst, it made her dizzy and she vomited, only managing to just lunge to the side to miss most of herself. Vomit on her lap was not an option right now.
It was coming back slowly in fragments. She hadn't gained anything at all from her interrogation technique, just when and how it was taking place. Any hope they might hijack a car and get there were days too late to try and perform. Still, she thought, rebellion suited her. Though, she might leave the next time for a small while yet.
The bell tolled behind her, and it split her head like hell. She thought for a moment, and then looked around the dark conditions. It was cold, and she was tied up with pieces of ripped bed sheet, but she was in the same room in which she ambushed frizzy haired girl. Think, Beth think.
The goodbye ceremony was a tradition, she recited, a right to honour the friendships made. Wasn't that what Daryl said. They allotted a time of ten minutes to say anything they had to say in case they didn't make it back. The ceremony was now, and Beth tried not to think about Daryl lost and confused looking for her. Or worse if they hurt him because of her. Of course if that were the case, he'd have joined her hours ago in this room where she was neglected. Beth didn't know how lucky she as she had picked this day of all days to rebel.
Gary walked over with a small smile, putting his hand on Daryl's shoulder who flinched. He asked if everything was alright but the world felt like it was moving around Daryl and districting it all so it didn't quite fit right. He wanted to hold the man down and threaten him.
''Where's Beth?'' He said instead.
''Oh, she was just fetching me my jacket form the washroom, I expect she came back to look for you. Didn't you find her? Well, its ok, you'll see her tomorrow after the mission.''
Daryl recognised the next of the cryptic threats, knowing he had to join in now wholehearted, only because they had Beth somewhere. But it was confirmation enough that she was most probably still alive. But the hand prints bothered him, it they had been hers those she must have been provoked in some way, or in any case she felt it was important enough to throttle a helpless girl like Melissa. He was ordered into the car with a friendly nudge of a gun.
Beth moaned slightly as she shifted, trying to pull her hands apart of slip them through the ties. It wasn't working. Her mind reeled back to her father for an insane second to one of his interesting life lessons she swore she was never going to need. Once in her adolescence, after a serial killer had been kidnapping girls in their local area (which had been the darkest of all things to happen to her until the apocalypse) he told her one thing. If you get handcuffed and taken, dislocate your thumb and run.
She had about three minutes left until Daryl left, which would mean that she had no chance of seeing him again. She was dead meat, and she knew that. Angling herself against the wall Beth braced herself seeing no other alternative. She said a small sorry to her thumb and put her teeth in place to not accidentally bite her tongue. She hoped the scream would be muffled by the revving of impatient engines.
Being outside was increasingly sickening. He didn't want to do this. Too many things were fighting for dominance in his head. He could protect rick, but that might potentially harm Beth. Or help kill Rick on the hope Beth was still alive and he didn't die getting back to her. And neither of them would allow him to not choose the other. Rick was his brother and comrade, had let him into a group and found a niche for him. Sure he was most likely closer to Beth, but her death was either forgone or not as imminent as Rick's was. There was a chance he could save both, but it was unlikely. There was a chance it might not even be Rick, but that was nearing impossible. Letting Rick die didn't mean Beth would survive. But letting rick live was going to kill her.
Beth heard the trucks leave, her hands were free and she was cradling her hand with tears running down her face. That had not been easy. But Daryl was gone, and she needed two hands if she was going to protect herself and get to him.
So next chapter will be the confrontation! I will try and my old laptop back, I mean how important is helping run a charity father? *joking obviously* but it is the reason it took me too long to write this! xxx