a late update before i go to bed cuz i woRK TOMORROW


oOo

Diana's eyes remained on the amputated hand with a strange morbid fascination. She knew it would be frowned upon to act upon that fascination. She was barely holding on to the restraint that prevented her from literally crouching next to the appendage and poking and prodding it like a science experiment.

She remembered herself and the situation and put her empathy suit back on.

Merle must've been a special kind of desperate to resort to this.

She could imagine it; walkers at the door, squeezing their grasping limbs through the gap, snarling and groaning, with their wild eyes and rotten teeth and all that insatiable hunger.

It was the kind of a would-you-eat-your-own-foot-if-you-were-starving-on-a-deserted-island situation. And Merle had done it, he'd eaten his foot.

Forcing her mind towards some semblance of helpful rationality, Diana tried to analyze the state of matters. The handcuff was still dripping blood, and she was not a forensics expert, but judging by the hand itself it looked like the dismemberment had happened very recently.

Once again, basic observation, that was the most she could do. That in count, depending on his state of mind and how rapid the rate of exsanguination, he couldn't have walked far just as much as he could be out of the city by now. You never knew with Merle.

Daryl was as devastated as he was enraged. Before Diana could blink, he had his crossbow pointed at T-Dog's face, right between his eyes. His chest was heaving and boy, it might be overused, but if looks could kill…

T-Dog remained stiff in place, his brow tense as his gaze never strayed from Daryl. Diana admired his composure in such a situation, and she thought Daryl was overreacting. After all, T-Dog did make up for his mistake. It wasn't his fault Merle hadn't stayed put.

She was paralyzed, mouth agape but nothing coming out of it.

The gun Rick pointed at Daryl's temple made her blood run cold and a chill ran down her spine. That was enough to jar her back into motion.

"I won't hesitate," Rick said, his voice hard, "I don't care if every walker in the city hears it."

Daryl was a perfect statue, but Diana saw the tiny waver in his aim. She didn't like what Daryl was doing and she couldn't defend his actions, but she absolutely hated what Rick was strongly implying. And he knew that she did, his glance her way proved it.

Slowly, so as to not alarm anyone, Diana approached them. Rick's eyes were on her with a calm urgency. She swallowed dryly and said to Daryl, "This isn't gonna solve anything, Daryl." When his gaze flickered to hers, she added, "Merle's alive, let's focus on that."

She could see his chin quiver and the corner of his lips tug down forcefully as he suppressed his grief. Diana laid a comforting and disarming hand on her friend's shoulder. "Let's go find him," she whispered with finality.

Daryl lowered his crossbow little by little and then completely. Diana smiled at him and swiped the back of her hand over his cheek affectionately. "Now let's stop threatening each other and behave like adults for once, everyone down for that?" She gave both Daryl and Rick a pointed look, feeling strangely like a scolding mother.

Rick holstered his pistol and gave her a look she couldn't decipher. "Yeah, I'm 'down for that'," he mimicked with a tilt of his head.

Daryl said nothing. Diana pulled on his wrist to tear his attention away from the souvenir his brother had left. She could see his anger grow by the second the longer he looked at it. She pulled again, his pulse racing on her fingertips, and his gaze met hers. She squeezed his hand lightly and raised a single brow.

He was hard steel, but his temperament at the moment still left a crack for her affections to slip through. He squeezed her fingers back and nodded.

She felt guilty for putting her attention solely on Daryl, but this was about him and his brother. She could understand his state of mind, she could put herself in his place and feel his despair.

And yeah, he had lashed out, but Daryl was rational, he knew killing T-Dog, or Rick, or Glenn, or even her, wouldn't make the clock turn and get them there in time to rescue Merle. Besides, finding a hand was better than a corpse.

With that situation settled, Diana knelt down by the abandoned appendage and swung her backpack forward until she could reach the zipper.

"What're you doing?" Glenn asked just as she took out a sterile gauze pad and put the hand on it by the pointer finger.

Diana looked up at him and said, "Can't just leave it here, right? I mean, I don't really… know the protocol for this but it kinda feels wrong to just… yeah." She shrugged one shoulder.

The breeze on her exposed sweaty back made her shudder. Glenn must've taken it for disgust because he stepped forward and volunteered to take over.

Diana looked up at his blood-drained pale face with a sarcastically questioning raise of a brow. Glenn conceded his defeat.

She wrapped it up and stood, feeling her knees crack with the movement. She gave the 'package' to Daryl, who took it with a grateful nod.

He examined it with a sigh, then said, "Guess the blade was too dull for the handcuffs. Ain't that a bitch."

"He ate his own damn foot, man," Diana added with a half shrug, casually zipping up her backpack. "That is a bitch."

She dismissed the inquisitive looks with a swat of her hand.

Daryl decided to put his brother's hand away in Glenn's backpack. He packed it away with no resistance from Glenn other than an expression that was equal parts disgust and annoyance.

Diana snickered but covered it up by coughing into the back of her hand. Glenn noticed and glared at her, his lip still curled in revulsion.

Then, Daryl followed the trail of blood, saying that Merle must've used his belt as a tourniquet, otherwise there'd be much more blood, and Diana agreed with a nod.

She wished there was more she could do; she'd come with them prepared to lay down some nursing skills, but now she just felt useless and was really regretting disobeying her parents for this. They didn't deserve what she was putting them through; coming here, into the enemy's lair, with no real assurance of whether or not she'd return. It hurt her to be the cause of their pain, as ironic as that may be.

Her heart fell into the pit of her stomach, and she forced herself to deviate from such thoughts.

Rick didn't wait too long to follow Daryl, T-Dog retrieved Dale's toolbox and all its scattered contents, and Diana took the rear with Glenn.

She gave him a sympathetic look and bumped her hip into his. "Want me to carry it if it disgusts you that much?" she asked with a forced smirk. "It's just a hand, dude, it doesn't have the plague."

"Yeah, with Merle you never know," he japed back and shook his head.

oOo

Daryl led them to a staircase on the roof of the adjacent building, it was badly lit and their feet clicked on the metal steps as they descended. Daryl called out to his brother every once in a while, but silence was the only answer.

Once at the bottom, the only door led to an office complex. Diana wondered why they'd overseen this as a possible escape route last time they were there. It made her irrationally mad that she couldn't go back in time to suggest it.

They trod lightly, guarding each other's backs, eyes everywhere and weapons ready.

There were papers scattered all over the carpeted floor, in each office they passed assorted office supplies had been knocked down and books and binders off their shelves. It was a nonsensical sort of mess.

Light filtered through the slanted, half-open blinds, offering poor lighting, but they made do. Specks of dust danced in the light when they disturbed the air and Diana tried to breathe shallowly. It was lucky enough she hadn't had an allergy induced asthma attack at the department store the day before, with all the layers upon layers of dust covering everything, but she wasn't risking it twice.

She raised the collar of her shirt to cover her mouth and nose and tried to focus on the feeling of security the bow was humming into her and not on the eeriness of the ambiance. It was almost too overwhelming to ignore.

The first walker they saw actually made her jump and her shirt shimmied back down; she hadn't been expecting it to just be standing there when they bent the corner.

Daryl shot it as soon as it turned around. Diana twisted her nose down at its mangled features as Daryl retrieved his bolt; its jaw was missing and so the tongue and the flesh of the inside of the mouth lolled out like streamers. Diana clutched at her own jaw and tore her eyes away.

They entered a lunch/break room kind of area. They had to climb over two towering snack machines that had been overturned and pushed against the doors to form some sort of barricade. It had been poorly conceived because the door opened the opposite way. Points for the effort, though. Even if death was the end result.

Unbelievably, Merle's trail of blood still kept going. The state of chaos ruled here as well as everywhere, add to that a couple of dead walkers on the floor. Their skulls had been bashed open, fresh gunk painting them a bloody halo. That had been Merle's doing, for sure.

Diana had to agree with Daryl, even one-handed, Merle was a tough son of a bitch, for a racist, misogynistic asshole.

Although, he wouldn't be for much longer if he didn't get his stump cauterized and treated, which meant they had to find him quick before he bled out or passed out somewhere.

Diana felt a familiar tickle in her throat and cursed internally. She joined Rick and Daryl by the water dispenser. There was a joke hidden there somewhere.

She glanced at it, about a fifth full, and shrugged before pouring herself a cup. The water gurgled loudly and then she straightened herself while bringing the cup to her lips.

The sound had attracted every attentive eye in the room to her direction. Diana felt her face heat up. "What? My throat's dry." She avoided their eyes and took a sip, only to spit it back out. "Oh what the fridge, this is stale as fuck! Bleh!"

"Thought you were smarter than that, Dee," T-Dog commented with a witty smile as she poured the water into the pot of a desiccated office plant.

"Shut up," she said without looking up.

Daryl extended his flask to her once she was done. Diana took it with a grateful nod and swallowed a mouthful. Thankfully, it seemed like he'd thoroughly rinsed it since last time.

Seeing as Merle's trail of blood didn't end there, they followed it to a room similar to a lab. On a counter, they found a couple of portable stoves turned on to full gas, their blue flames hissing. Next to them a belt, most surely Merle's, which he would've used as a tourniquet, and an iron plate. Upon close inspection, Rick determined that Merle had used it to cauterize his stump, seeing as pieces of his skin and some of his blood had dried on it.

Diana winced, imagining the mind-numbing pain he surely must've gone through to get that done. She didn't pity him, though. She had no sympathy for the man, her presence there was purely for Daryl's sake.

"Losin' a lot of blood didn't stop him from bustin' out of this death trap," Daryl boasted, strutting away and to a broken window, which led to the emergency staircase outside.

Diana hurried after and looked out the window, in hopes of catching a glimpse of the 'fugitive'. She couldn't believe that Merle had actually left the building and was wandering around the city in his state, possibly unarmed, and likely on the verge of passing out from hypovolemic shock.

T-Dog said her thoughts out loud almost word by word, sans medical insight. Daryl took that as an opportunity to take another dig at them, accusing them of leaving Merle handcuffed to that roof to rot in the first place.

He turned to Rick. "You couldn't kill him. Ain't so worried about some dumb dead bastard."

Rick tilted his head and stared him down. "What about a thousand dumb dead bastards? Different story?"

Diana chewed anxiously on the inside of her cheek. Suddenly, Glenn was at her side. He must've noticed her uneasiness and opened up her fist and slipped his hand into hers. She appreciated the gesture, she didn't mind having a hand to hold at any given time, however childish that could be.

Rick and Daryl were toe to toe, one significantly calmer than the other, as was to be expected. Daryl ranted about going after his brother on his own, then lashed out at Rick when he advised him against it, which Diana agreed to wholeheartedly.

Glenn pulled on her hand and gestured with his head at the two men with a furrow of his brow. Diana shook her head minutely.

True that she could have an almost tranquilizing effect on Daryl, but she wasn't his mother nor his babysitter. He was a grown ass man; he wouldn't appreciate her slapping his wrist every time he stepped out of line, and that's not what she was there for.

Besides, if the two men had to butt heads a couple of times to move on to getting on better, then so be it; they could solve their own matters without her interference.

Rick ended the discussion by making a deal with Daryl. They'd help him check a few blocks around the building if he kept a level head.

Daryl agreed adamantly to it, and Diana saw the tenseness in his shoulders, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. She wouldn't be surprised if he considered ditching them and going off by himself to search every little nook and cranny of the city in search of his brother.

Diana guiltily thought of her Godmother and her family, so close yet so unreachable. She mentally shook her head of those stray thoughts; she couldn't, she shouldn't, she wouldn't. Even if it hurt.

T-Dog shook his head and uncrossed his arms with a forlorn shrug. "Only if we get those guns first," he said in response to Rick's proposal, "I'm not strolling the streets of Atlanta with just my good intentions, okay?"

Rick nodded and shifted his weight while putting a hand on the waist of his pants. "Precisely, I agree. Now we only need a plan."

"Okay, I got an idea," Glenn announced, then scrunched his nose unsurely and corrected himself, "Or the… beginnings of an idea. I need something to draw on."

T-Dog lifted a shoulder and pointed at the door. "Probably something you can use in one of those offices."

As they were leaving the stockroom, Diana hung behind and let Glenn's hand slip from hers. "I'll be right with you, alright?" She grabbed onto Daryl's elbow as he passed her by at the door and pulled him back. "Gotta do something first, gäll?"

Rick and T-Dog didn't look very impressed. Glenn, who knew her best, just raised an annoyed eyebrow and told her to hurry the lecture up.

She pulled Daryl back into the stockroom. The impatience on his face was almost enough to make her curl in on herself, but he didn't act on it.

He looked about to crawl out of his skin with agitation and she knew there was nothing she could do to ease it, other than finding his brother, so she tried to make it quick. "Okay, so first, I want you to promise you're not just gonna abandon us and go off on your own to find Merle. That's not what we came here for, this is not a white-folk let's-split-up-gang kinda thing. We stick together." She grabbed his hand and gripped it tight, her eyes searching his.

"That all? You can lecture me all you want af-"

"Second," she interrupted and grabbed his face by the jaw just as he was about to leave. She turned it to her, his skin warm and slick with sweat, which she didn't mind. She met his blue eyes, hers wide and emphatic. "We're gonna find your brother," she said earnestly and rested her hands on his shoulders, her fingertips digging gently into his flesh, grounding him.

"He might've said some really unsavory things to me over the time that've made me dislike the guts outta him, but I don't wish him dead. I don't, 'cause I know how much that would hurt you and I don't want that. I don't want you to get hurt." After the words had been said, she realized how unhelpful her empty promises were.

But even though she felt like she'd put her foot in her mouth, like she so often did, judging by the look of him, it seemed like she'd actually said something right. That was a first for her today.

Daryl could be a loud and brazen person, there was no doubt of that. But after getting to know him and gaining a bit of his trust, Diana found that he allowed himself to be himself with her. Which, she wasn't going to lie, made her stupidly happy.

He'd have moments of quiet contemplation, where a look conveyed thousand different things and she could only begin to pick up on about a ten of them.

She'd gotten better at reading him, it came with much trial and error, but then he'd spring up something new on her and she'd be left completely clueless.

This was one of those moments, as had been earlier that day when she'd been tending to the marks on his neck after Shane's chokehold. His eyes were glued to her, so patient and serene that it was baffling.

Diana's hands slid down his arms subconsciously, her brow furrowing like she'd just seen a snowfall in July. Okay, maybe a little less extreme than that. She felt her throat work as she swallowed dry. She cleared it and unglued her lips with a quick sweep of her tongue to ask about it, but the words died in her throat.

"Hey uh- guys, sorry," Glenn interrupted, clearing his throat, "but if we wanna hurry, you two better leave your soul sharing for another time and come along." He caught Diana's widened eyes from over Daryl's shoulder and gave her a sly smirk.

Diana snatched her hands back to her sides. "Let's go," she murmured. The bow was trembling at her back with a rhapsodic energy, making her chest vibrate along to the hard thumping going on inside.

They followed Glenn into a room with computer desks and archives on either side, all of which were grey on top from thick layers of settled dust.

Great, she could feel the tickle in her throat resurface. She put the collar of her shirt back over her mouth and nose. At the strange looks, Glenn answered for her, "Allergies, it's the dust."

Rick and T-Dog nodded in understanding and Diana gave him a thumbs up. Daryl startled her by pulling the shirt back down and reaching around her to tie a piece of red fabric loosely over her nose and mouth.

She responded by touching it with a frown.

"Don't worry, that's the clean one," he said.

"Thanks," Diana replied, "I feel like a cowboy." She eyed Rick and nodded at him. "Howdy, pardner."

"Okay, focus up," Glenn snapped his fingers at Diana. "You're like a goldfish, I swear."

"Sorry."

Glenn sighed almost fondly and picked up a permanent marker from the desk Rick was leaning up against. He knelt down by some scribbling on the floor, office supplies scattered next to him.

Now that all of them were present, Rick nodded at Glenn, who returned it. He gestured down at the markings. "Okay, so now we're all here, I can tell you about the plan I cooked up."

Diana interrupted immediately, "This plan include you running around the streets like a fridging kamikaze?" She crossed her arms and raised an accusatory arched eyebrow. She knew Glenn, his plans consisted of such stunts more often than not.

If she was considered reckless by her parents, what would they say about him? Scratch that, she knew exactly what they thought of him, they once called him a 'hazard to himself', Diana's 'crazy suicidal Asian friend'.

Glenn looked at her, annoyed, then he sighed and nodded reluctantly.

Rick looked from Glenn to her and shook his head. "You're not doing this alone."

"Even I think it's a bad idea and I don't even like you much," Daryl added from his seat on the desktop, his thigh pressing lightly against Diana's hip.

Diana swatted his arm with her hand, which he light-heartedly shrugged off, and she put her attention back on her friend on the doodled floor.

"Glenn, for real? You know that I love you and all, but if you're seriously thinking of doing this I'm either gonna beat you up or join you out there. I'm serious." She knew he knew she was bluffing, but she hoped it would make him reconsider, since he had always been more adamant about putting her life in danger than his own. "I mean, there's gotta be something less dangerous, right?"

"This whole place is rigged, ain't no place less dangerous than the last," Daryl added with a glance at her.

Diana shrugged. "Still."

Glenn spoke up, "I know you don't like it, alright? I don't like putting my ass on the line either, but it's a good plan. Okay, if you just hear me out. If we go out there in a group, we're slow, drawing attention. If I'm alone, I can move fast. And I know you don't like being told what to do, Diana, but please, just this once, don't argue with me on this."

She wanted to say something, but she knew he was right. If she went with him just for the sake of going, she would end up endangering them even more. So she sighed dejectedly and nodded her acceptance.

Glenn went back to his scribble, a map, she reckoned, and used a paper binder clip and a scrunched up post-it to symbolize the tank and the famed bag of guns. He used a post-it dispenser down an alley to represent him and Daryl. When Daryl asked why him, he told it was because his crossbow was quieter than Rick's gun and he needed that level of stealth.

Diana almost started to protest; her bow was quiet, too, the hell? But she didn't want to be whiny about it so she let it be and kept on listening.

"While Daryl waits here in the alley, I run up the street and grab the bag," Glenn concluded and awaited the reactions.

"And where are we in this plan?" Diana asked, and Rick nodded at her.

Glenn pointed down the street at another alley. "Rick, T-Dog," he said and smirked at Diana, "and Diana. You'll be in this alley here."

When Rick asked as to why there, he explained that if walkers cut off his path back to Daryl, he would continue that way forward to them, and so he was covered wherever he went.

Diana felt proud of him; despite being risky, that was a very sound strategy with a solid back-up. She smiled knowingly at Glenn, who caught it and furrowed his brow in question.

Daryl shared a silent look with Rick. He asked, "Hey, kid, what'd you do before all this?"

"Delivered pizzas," he answered simply, then frowned, "Why?"

"Without him, who'd deliver our pizzas and strategize our asses to success?" Diana boasted. She pointed a finger gun at Glenn with a wink, her words a throwback to their first conversation.

Glenn grinned with a twinkle in his eyes, seeming to recall it as well, and then looked away with a bashful lift of his shoulder.

They went over the plan one last time, covering all details, and once everyone knew their job and position, the gang did split up after all.


looking back at what i've got until now i realize i got so much work ahead of me till i catch up to the show...
like...
give strength pls...

pls make my day by leaving a nice comment, ly