Welcome back to the next chapter! i am a bit excited what you think about this one. Have fun reading!

The lighting and thunder scared me. I loved the weather spectacle but was afraid of the sounds. I huddled at the end of the bed, scared in the almost-darkness. I had lit a few candles and wished I could have lit some more. I would have loved an ocean of candles, but we needed them for the next nights.

Where is your new terminator like manner now? Are you afraid?

"I am not …" Yeah I was afraid. Maybe there would be something to distract myself. I took out the matches and lit another candle. I wondered what kind of family would store up so many candles. My eyes wandered over to the bookshelf. I had chosen the teenagers room and now hoped in all sincerity to find comics. I got up and went through the shelves but found nothing. In the end I turned to the bed. Every kid hid his stuff under the bed … I went down on my knees, looked under it and screamed.

Haha. The voice in my head started laughing. That's just a mask.

The kid must have set up a trap. There was a gum mask of Freddy Krüger under the bed. I laughed at myself.

The door was opened and a gun-raised Merle stood in the door. When he saw I was sitting next to the bed he sighed. "What the fuck badass."

I took the mask and put it on my head. "Are you scarred?" I asked in a low voice.

"Fuck this shit…" He put the gun in his jeans and turned around.

"Wait." I asked before he went back to his bed. "I … ehm …" I took off the mask.

He started laughing. "Are ya peein-ya-pants-afraid of the weather?"

"No!"

Are you sure you want that man in your room?

He entered the room and closed the door. "Want some company?" There was good old Merle. He liked his lips with a grin. But all I could do was laugh. And suddenly he started laughing too. There was no mean-Merle behind his eyes, there was Daryl's bigger brother. He sat down at the end of the bed. "Been checkin' for monsters under the bed?"

I smiled. "My brother used to do that for me when I was young." I took another look under the bed and grabbed for a shoebox. "Jackpot." I smiled while opening the box and looked at a good collection of comics.

"Ya really ain't a normal girl."

He is right. You are not normal at all and that is what I love about you. And this is exactly what you are: A sweet crazy girl and not some terminator emotionless shithead. So please cut the crab.

My smile faded. I got up and sat on the bed too spreading all the comics between Merle and me. "I used to read them with my brother. We had a whole collection." I starred at the comics in front of me, took a Batman comic and started reading. The dim light made reading pretty hard so it was more looking at the pics.

Merle took a comic too but looked more bored. "This is for kids."

I looked up to him. "Haven't you been crazy about comics when you were a kid?" I remembered the one moment at the prison were Merle had opened up. When he accidentally had said something about his father's beatings. Daryl's body had told the same story. There were no happy childhood memories.

"The only comic I had ever read was some Lucky Luke shit." He flipped through the pages of a Hulk comic. "To whip my ass." He laughed sarcastically.

"It's never too late to be a child again."

"Ya'll never grow up do ya?" He looked over to me.

"Never planned to." His eyes wondered to my belly. Now I wondered he hadn't asked before. Maybe because you guys were too damn busy to stay alive. "It was not positive." I whispered.

He looked back to the comic in his hand. "So this is yar childhood?"

I went on and on about my favorite characters. My brother was laughing in the back of my head, repeating after me. I had some sketchy lines about my favorite heroes and he knew them all. Eventually we sat next to each other and read silently. The storm slowly diminished until there was just a rumbling in the distance. I finally could relax and shut my eyes.

Merle yawned and I immediately woke up from micro sleep. "Gonna hit the sack." He stood up.

I grabbed for his arm. The whole time in the woods I hadn't been alone. The three of us had stood together, sat at the fire together, slept together … Now I was scared to sleep alone. Who knew who could still enter the house? Even we had searched the house I was still alarmed. "Merle …"

I am here for you. I wouldn't let him sleep in the same room – let alone in the same bed. I felt myself blushing. I'll stay awake for you.

"Please don't leave me alone." I whispered without looking at him.

Merle took my blanket and laid down next to my bed wordlessly. I smiled and threw him the pillow too. Without words he put it under his head. What happened to this man?

He gave his brother a promise.

A promise … I remembered the promise Daryl had made to me. He hadn't kept the promise … he had left me alone again. Forever. I stood up and opened the closet. There weren't much clothes left. Seemed the teenager had took most of his clothes with him. Or someone else had been here before. I took a cardigan which was too big for me, but would do the job. I went back to bed and put the cardigan over me. It wasn't a blanket at all, but it was warming enough.

I was afraid to close my eyes. I had seen Daryl in my dreams and it hurt every damn time. To see what you love but couldn't reach was breaking me even more. At night it was the worst, when my thoughts and soul rested.

I have given you a promise too.

I just wanted to have a dreamless sleep. The ongoing dreams about my dead love were killing me. I was too tired to keep my eyes open. So I finally closed them.

I will be here as long as you need me.

This time it wasn't Daryl. I could see my brother in front of my inner eye. His eyes and his smile. He still looked young. For the first time I didn't wish for him to be gone again.

There was a scream if joy. "What?!" I looked to the floor but there was no Merle. I stood up and tied the cardigan around my waist. Looking around the candles had all been blown out, they hadn't been burning down. Was that Merle? I took my knife in one hand and the empty gun in the other. No one would know it was not loaded.

Except that you are holding a gun and a knife.

"Shut up." Outside my door I met Jess who looked puzzled. His eyes wandered from the room Merle should have slept in to me.

"Was that Merle?!" He walked to the stairs. Seemed he knew Merle wasn't in his room.

"I hope so." We walked down the stairs together. And there was the sound of a slight whirring. Where did this sound come from? I didn't hear it yesterday.

How could you? You were tired and dumb enough to let that man sleep in the same room.

"How did you sleep?" There was something in his voice. Did he knew Merle and I had slept in the same room?

"Okay." I shrugged shoulders. "It is nice to not sleep at the woods ground anymore." I said without a smile. Smiling had once been my attitude. My way of greeting the world. But somehow everything grew sinister. "What about you?"

"You are right. It is nice to have some comfy privacy again." He smiled.

We reached ground floor. "Merle?" I called loudly. "Where is your bitching ass hiding?"

A funny scream came from my left. Next to the stairs was a door which was slightly open. Jess was the first to open it. He seemed pretty protective, not letting me go first at all.

"Hey Merle." He shouted down the stairs. There was no answer.

Why would he scream in painful joy?

You know that pretty well don't you?

I blushed. Now I was relieved Jess took the lead. When he reached downstairs first I was 6 steps behind. When he looked around the corner his face was as irritating as could be.

"Oh my god ..." He stammered with wide eyes. I wasn't sure if I should get closer. When Jess looked up to me he had a weird smile on his lips. "You won't believe ..." He nodded as if to tell me it was safe to come down.

I stepped closer in a careful-ready-to-jump-away-and-close-my-eyes kind of way. But when I stepped around the corner my eyes went wide too. I couldn't believe it ... the basement was a tattoo studio.

"Merle ..." I went closer. Merle was prepped on a table. His arm outstretched and with the other hand he was drawing a tattoo on his arm.

"Wanted to finish that thing a long time ago!" He didn't look up.

Jess came closer too. "Nice tat man." Merle just snorted. "Have you been a tattooist?" Jess still tried to befriend with Merle. But that really was one-sided.

"When you're finished ..." I interrupted the mololog. "I have a job for you too."

Merle looked up to me. There was something behind his eyes, some stolen thoughts. His brother had the same glance when he had seen the pregnancy test. They had so much in common. When they had been separated Daryl had changed. Now the same thing was happening to Merle. Well at least when he was talking to me.

This is a good thing. A warmth spread in my heart. This will cover bad memories, like the other tattoo.

I propped myself on a lonely old wing chair. The feeling of warmth was new, since I had avoided to let anything get closer. Jess watched my every move as if he expected something big.

"What do you want? Another pair of shoes?" He smiled. The smile on his lips was real this time and it felt like in the old days. For the first time since we were on the road again, he seemed to be the guy I had fallen for. Still my soul didn't know if I was a foul stone-cold brat or a smiling loving-life girl.

If you would ask me I would choose the latter.

"Ya got anythin' in mind?" Merle asked me as if he wanted to sell me a beer.

I didn't need to think hard. It needed to be something big, something to cover it. The memory of the pain I had had diminished but the scar was obvious.

Jess stepped closer and sat down on the armrest close next to me. Merle stopped tattooing and straightened his back. "I think I know …"

"I know what ya need." Merle interrupted Jess and mentioned for me to come over. There was a tension in the air, the same when we had been in the woods. I got the feeling they were fighting over me.

That's what I am trying to tell you all the time. You need to make things clear.

"Free yaself!" He laughed.

Somehow this wasn't as easy as I thought. I had never tried to look at the scars on my back, had just heard what Philip hat created on my back. Jess handed me a bottle of whiskey. "Where …"

"Ey, that's mine." Merle protested.

I sniffed at the bottle and took a sip. The whiskey was disgusting, the aftertaste like shit.

Jess took the bottle from me and smelled at it too. "What the fuck is this?"

"Moonshine!" Merle was wearing a rascal smile. "More for me."

I sat down on the table in front of Merle. "There is more?" I turned my back to him uncomfortably.

Jess turned to the back of the room. The basement looked untouched. Maybe no one knew what to do here in an apocalypse. Not like us. "How can it work without electricity?" Jess began to wonder.

"There is a generator." That's been the whizzing sound from before. Merle wary touched my back. The voice and the touch weren't matching. I would have never thought Merle could be gentle. "For the sake of god, relax." He sighed.

"How did you find it?" Jess really was for details.

"Was looking for booze and found much more."

Jess began to investigate the other side of the room and returned with a bottle of Gin. "I got you something."

Merle went to the cupboard and grabbed a new needle. He really seemed to know what he was doing. When he came back he was smiling to himself, as if he was happy to do it. I felt good about it, as if I could make him simile after all the shit he had been through. He managed to do it all alone even with on hand. Merle sat down behind me again and lifted my shirt so he could work. The moment he did so I froze. I grabbed the shirt out of reflex. Merle hesitated. "Go ahead." I told him.

"You did that before?" Jess asked him but Merle was concentrated on my back or was pretending to be. I didn't care if he knew what he was doing.

Yeah sure. What if he writes 'kiss my ass' or draws a penis or something else disgusting.

Hmm ... maybe I just wanted the scar to be gone. No matter on what cost.

Jess stepped around the table. I wanted him to stop walking, didn't want him to see the scar. But he saw it. "What ... who did this?"

"It happened a long time ago ..." I sighed. "Phillip ..." Before I could go on jess smashed the chair next to him with a fury scream.

Now that I said his name I remembered they both had been at Woodbury. "Hold still!" Merle said behind me and the sound of the needle arouse. The pain when the needle pricked my skin wasn't that bad. It was a welcome pain telling me I could still feel.

Why do you feel pain and sorrow, but can't be happy and smile? Your damn facade is just a shitty way to cut the pain.

My head sank to my knees. I sat like a fetus swallowing the pain of the tattoo. Then why did I feel like I was always standing in the rainy darkness alone?

"I am glad that bastard is dead."

I looked up to Jess. "How do you know?"

"I had to check ..." Jess looked devastated. "That's why I split. He had made the kids suffer. He had killed their families." He made a pause. "I found him dead dead. Someone had shot him." His fist met the wall hard twice and started bleeding. I couldn't stand up, I didn't want to disturb Merle working. The rage he felt now was something my heart had shared too. I had been there too ... kind of still was.

"Jess!" I called for him. He didn't look up but stared at his bleeding hand. "Don't act like an idiot and come over." Now he looked up at the sudden change of my tone.

I mentioned for him to come over. Reluctantly he came closer.

I told you you are no I-don't-care-about-anything bitch.

Where did these words come from? Seemed I wasn't the only one under the influence of Merle's rantings.

Jess sat down next to me and I took his damaged hand. "You need that one for survival." His eyes were somewhere else. There was just the sound of the vibrating needle. I flinched from time to time but no cry escaped my lips. I knew too much facets of pain.

"The scars on your body ... was it all him?" Jess asked lowly his eyes still on his hands.

"No ... there was a time ... I had been ..."

"Having wild animal sex." Merle spat behind me. He pushed my upper body further down to work better.

"Fuck you." I said back growing mad beyond insanity. I wanted to get up, but Merle held me back.

"Thought this is some kind of guessin' game." He apologized in his typical Merle manner.

"Next chance I got, I'm gonna kick your ass."

"Sure." He retorted and kept on working on my back.

Jess suddenly looked at me. "I'm definitely on board for this one." He smiled weakly. I took the rag next to me and wanted to doctor his hand. "No thanks. Like you said, I need that one to survive."

I laughed at him and he responded with a smile. This was the Jess I knew. "Don't bleed out."

I still hate that guy. But if he makes you smile again, makes you Ella again, I don't care.

Before I got the chance to let my thoughts rumble, Jess squeezed my hand. "You have been an incredible emotional loving person once. Now you are a real ass kicking bitch." The words sank into my system. He didn't sound offending.

"I like bad ass much more." Merle laughed behind me.

We sat in silence for minutes or hours – I lost the sense of time when I closed my eyes and felt every pinprick until Jess leaned back and looked at my back. "I'd never thought someone like you could do something beautiful like that."

Merle stopped and leaned back. "Finished ma masterpiece." He sounded epic.

Jess jumped from the table to look at my back too. I straightened my back feeling pain, but I smiled. Suddenly there was a shadow on the small window in the back. "Guys!" I jumped up. The shadow moved too fast to be a walker. Merle and Jess looked at me surprised.

"I think there is someone out there." I checked my weapons. Merle looked to the window too.

Jess took his gun and walked upstairs slowly. We moved as silently as possible after him. There was a sound on first floor. Jess looked up the stairs and nodded. "Are we in the army now?" Merle rumbled and went upstairs loudly. He turned right his knife-stump raised. "Who the fuck are ya?"

I looked over his shoulder into the room. A man with long hair and bandanna in front of his mouth and a cloak stood on my bad trying to reach a small opening in the wall. He looked like a man from a cold country. As if it was winter. "I am just taking the supplies and leave." He smiled and took a backpack.

Something about him looked familiar. But the bandanna made it hard to say. I stepped around Merle. "Wait!" He looked at me surprised.

"Ella?!" The stranger knew my name …

Jess stepped in front of me. "You are not taking anything from here."

"I have been here before. I know all the hidden spots." That man looked pretty happy. "It is not yours."

"Not yours either!" Merle stepped closer.

"I stockpiled some stuff here." The man told us not breaking eye contact with me.

"Then take ya shit and go."

"Not some trusty person, are we?!"

"Who are you?" I asked him again. Stepping closer too. Jess tried to hold me back, but I escaped his grab.

"Funny you don't remember." He smiled. "Well, it has been quite some time." He jumped from the bed, took of the bandana and took a step my direction.

Jess pointed his gun at that guy. The clicking sound made sure he released the safety catch. "Back off."

"Nick will be happy you are still alive and with your group - I presume."

I hadn't thought about him in a while. "Nick …" I recalled that man who had been of my former group.

"Yeah … So when you are here, Alex is …" He looked at me with curious eyes.

"Dead." My voice broke.

"Who the fuck is this guy?" Merle was pissed. And stepped next to me so his blade was close to the stranger.

"Paul Rovia." Paul answered.

I remembered him. He had been at the hotel with Alex and her brother. I had talked to him about supply runs. "Paul." Suddenly I felt guilty. I felt like they had died because of me … "This is Merle and this is Jess."

"No Daryl?" He asked me.

"No … he is …" My eyes fell down to my hands.

"Sorry girl, you had been so eager to find him."

"What the hell is going on?" Jess asked frustrated.

"I know him from before … After I had sneaked out of the camp and lost my first group. I found his group … or better they found me. Doc stitched me up." I looked to Paul again.

"He is alive."

"Are you still at that hotel?"

"No. There were walkers … long story. We are at another place now. It's safe, with walls." I snorted at the walls. "A solid one to protect the inhabitants of Hilltop."

"Ya wanna tell me there is a safe place in the apocalypse?" No one of us was believing in safety anymore.

"People gotta stick together, otherwise the dead will eat us all. You are not safe out here."

"We still have to find our friends." I mumbled more to myself.

"The last time you went out to find your friends didn't seem to be a profit."

"She's with us man." Merle made another step into Paul's direction. "Take your stuff and go."

"Hilltop is a safe place."

"Then what are you doing here?" Jess was slowly losing his temper too.

"I am on a supply run." He turned to me again. "I can take you with me. The place is safe. I think they want to know what happened to the others. To their family."

He was right … My shoulders dropped as if I had been defeated. "They were all killed. A man killed them, but he is dead now."

Jesus smiled knowingly. "That's what I had thought all the time. They would have found a way back …"

"Do you want to stay with us?"

"I don't stay in places except Hilltop. It is dangerous, you know – cause of the dead people and other guys." He looked at Merle.

"Pace yourself, it'll only get worse." Merle wanted to attack Paul, but I held him back.

"Stop it." These men were some hard work.

Seems like you got a little boy problem. Too much testosterone in here.

"You can come with me." Paul said looking at everyone. "Hilltop is a safe place. Everyone got a job to do. We stick together to survive."

Jess tucked the gun away in his pants. "Sounds nice."

"Sounds like another Woodbury to me." Merle countered.

"I am sorry Paul, first we need to find our friends."

Paul shrugged shoulders. "Never met anyone who rejected my offer." He laughed out loud.

"When I'll find my friends, I would like to return to your offer." I step closer holding out my hand.

"You are a sweet little girl, you know that?!" Paul took my hand.

That's what I keep on telling you all the time.

"Hilltop is a mansion. You have to look out for the Barrington House. It is located deep in the woods on top of a hill in the Virginia area. We are mostly farmers there." His smile was nice. "Just don't behave too much like a prick." He looked to Merle again.

"He won't." I said and stepped between them. "It is quite a way back … You're sure you don't want to spend the day with us? We have found some booze in the basement."

"Thanks, but we need supplies back at Hilltop." He took his backpack. "I hope to see you alive again."

"I accompany you outside." I joined his walk to the door.

"Better not take our shit." Merle threw after Paul.

Jess looked kind of hesitant, as if he wanted to join Paul. "How many people have you lost at Hilltop?"

"Not many, a few. We have a doctor, we have medications, enough food and cohesion."

Jess nodded and we walked on. "How did you get in here?" I asked him.

"Window. Don't leave it open again!"

"Thanks for the hint." We both cast aside the heavy couch from the door. He went outside and I walked with him. The sun was warm, it was a beautiful day. "Why are you out alone?"

"Trust problems."

"Living in a community should be trusty."

"I don't trust everyone. And maybe they shouldn't have trusted you." His smile dropped – as did my heart.

"I tried to safe them. Believe me, sometimes I think I should have better died with them. After I had lost them the men tortured me almost to death." He walked around the house and I followed him into the garden. "I never wanted Alex to get hurt …"

"We all lose people, but we do not turn our back at friends." He smiled again and punched my shoulder. "By the way, your nose looks different."

"Another story to tell when we'll meet up again." Seemed he was eager to move. "How do you travel?"

"I have a car parked in the woods." We walked on until we met the first row of trees. "So, this is farewell then."

"Yeah. Have a good ride home. Tell doc I am sorry."

"Better tell him yourself."

"One day, I hope so …"

"I'll be looking out for you." He made a funny gesture and bowed. "Yee you Ella. Stay alive!" And he walked quickly into the woods.

I stood still for a few minutes, still looking into the woods. All the memories came flashing back. How I had seen Alex the first time, how John never stopped teasing me, how Doc had treated me, how I met everyone at the hotel. And in the end, how they had been killed. Paul was right, every time when I had been out looking for my friends, something bad happened. I looked back to the house. It looked safe too. But Paul hadn't been lying when he said there was more to fear than the walking dead.

Yeah and you should move your ass into the house. Don't stay out daydreaming. Walkers are everywhere, there is not safe place anymore. You have seen it everywhere. The hotel had been safe, do you remember the high walls? The prison had two rows of fences and went down.

He was right. I wanted to get back to the house when a shadow flew over me, before I could realize what was happening a heavy iron chain was around my neck. With a hard tug I flew back to the ground strangling. Someone pulled me into the woods. "Claim." Another hard tug into the woods and I thought my neck was broken. I tried to break free from the iron chain but that seemed impossible. Someone stepped around me and I couldn't believe my eyes. "I like wide eyes. You look scared little girl."

"Lem …" Grasping for breath I struggled against the chain.

"I kind of hoped to run into you again." He laughed and adjusted the chain more tightly around my neck. "But you will hope to die soon." He laughed and I felt my life fading. "I will make you my dog." He kneeled down and strangled me to unconsciousness.

I am already so excited to write on. I had some thoughts about how to go on, like three options, and I hope you will like how this one goes on. Have a good day xxx R&R