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Oh, fuck. It was happening again.
Cass heard a loud bang from the living room. What the hell was that? For a split second, she thought of plucking herself out of her computer chair to go and investigate, but eventually decided against it.
It was probably just her sister, stumbling into their apartment drunk off her ass again. It was Friday night, after all. And if there was one thing that Cass could count on in this world, it was her older sister stumbling through their apartment, knocking everything in her way over. Joanne was definitely good at that.
Cass took a moment to calm her heart beat down. God damnit, when did she become such a chicken shit? Oh, right. It was when she decided to read up on ghost stories and serial killers late at night.
She turned back to her computer screen and opened up a window connecting her to the endless possibilities of the internet. She tapped her finger on the backspace button, contemplating what to type in next. She had just done research on an upcoming novel she had been waiting forever for. Two months, and then it would finally be hers.
About fucking time. I've only been waiting for that shit for over a year.
She rolled her eyes. Sometimes she wondered how she had such patience. She heard her sister's bedroom door slowly creak open, as if moving at an impossibly slow speed, and found herself questioning her patience once more.
It's one thing to come home drunk and causing a ruckus once in a while. Maybe when you just turned legal to drink that would be okay. But now? When she's twenty-six? Time to grow up, Joanne.
Cass lifted up her hand to begin typing on her keyboard when she heard her sister let out a loud scream. Cass froze, her heart nearly leaping out from her chest. Never in her life had she heard someone scream like that. It sounded like she was being murdered.
Without wasting another second, Cass jumped up from her computer chair and bolted out of her bedroom. Joanne's room was cracked open as Cass barged into it, flicking on the light to illuminate the cramped bedroom. That was when she saw it.
Someone was in her sister's bedroom. A man was in her sister's bedroom. And he was…eating her?
Cass awoke in a cold sweat, gasping for air as her eyes darted around the room she had retired to earlier in the night. She hunched over in her bed, burying her head in her hands as she tried to catch her breath. Her heart was pounding so strongly in her chest; she swore she was going to throw up right then and there. A twisting knot grew in her stomach as she shut her eyes, trying to steady herself.
She found she still had nightmares about the outbreak, despite the fact that she tried desperately to lock those memories away in the back of her mind. Some days were definitely more interesting than others. Despite her best efforts, when she lay down and closed her eyes at night, she found every memory, every terrorizing moment flood back to her.
Cass groaned as she tossed the thin bed sheet off her small frame. She had no idea what time it was, or even how long she'd managed to sleep as she pushed herself out of the bed. From past experiences, Cass knew that if she tried to lie down and go back to sleep, her nightmare would only continue. Go figure. When you have awesome dreams and wake up, they never start again when you force yourself to go back to sleep. Only the nightmares do.
The house was quiet. Unusually quiet. It wasn't really something she had become used to, just yet. On any given night, she could hear Merle and Daryl squabbling with each other throughout the night. She would never admit it to them, but sometimes she found herself being lulled to sleep by their voices. Stuck in a world where everything around her was dead, sometimes it felt good to know that she wasn't completely alone.
But tonight, apparently, she was. No one was on guard? That wasn't like the Dixon brothers at all.
Cass crept into the room that was right beside hers and saw Merle's sleeping figure passed out over the bed sheet. She smiled to herself and shook her head as she made her way into the room, intent on grabbing the empty beer bottle on the bed before he hurt himself with it.
Cass walked out of Merle's room without being detected, and closed the door, leaving it open just a crack. He deserved to sleep through the night. Neither brother ever really did, and it drove her insane. Sure, they let her take guard sometimes, but they always tried to keep the duty to themselves to spare her.
And boy, did she ever hate that sometimes.
She hated that sometimes they thought of her as a weakling who always needed rescuing. Sure, she was nowhere near as strong as the two brothers, and she definitely wasn't nearly as brave. They had been brought up in very different households, one that didn't teach her how to hunt and survive on your own for unknown amounts of time. But she still wasn't as useless as she felt they sometimes made her out to be.
Cass opened up the counter under the sink and bent over to place the empty into the beer case. They still had a few cases left, but she knew that would go sooner than she would like. With the world gone to hell, there really wasn't anything better to do than sit around with a gun in one hand and a beer in the other.
"God damnit, girl. I almost just shot you in the ass with an arrow." Daryl warned, lowering his crossbow as he stepped into the kitchen.
The sudden burst of his deep voice interrupting the silence of the kitchen made her jump. Closing the cabinet door, she turned around and watched him make his way towards the fridge. Grabbing a beer, he cracked it open and took a long swig.
"Yeah, I'm sure you're real upset about the almost part." She rolled her eyes and pushed past him, grabbing her own beer and twisting it open. "Aren't you supposed to be on watch, anyway? What are you doing in here drinking?" She sighed and shook her head at him, a smile spread across her thin lips. "Men just can't do anything right."
Daryl scoffed and patted her on the head, messing up her hair more than it already was. "Ah, shut it, Cass. I'm going to go back to the roof. Are you going to join me, or sit here by yourself and drink yourself into a coma?"
She sneered and spread her arm out in front of her, motioning for him to start walking, and she would follow shortly behind him. He slung his crossbow over his shoulder and turned on his heels, heading towards the roof.
It was actually nice outside. Cass admired the cool summer breeze as it brushed across her tired skin. She took a seat in one of the lawn chairs the guys had set up and set her beer down beside her bare feet. It felt nice, the cool breeze, sitting on a roof in the middle of the night with a good friend and enjoying a nice cold beer. It almost made her forget that they were living in an apocalypse. Almost.
"How long have you been out here?" She asked, glancing at Daryl.
Daryl shrugged and put his beloved crossbow down on the asphalt. "I don't know. I lost track of time." He glanced at the group of empty beet bottles scattered beside him. "However long it took me to drink all those?"
Cass smirked. "So, all of like, five minutes?" She had seen him drink. She knew he could put those babies away like nothing else she had ever seen.
Daryl ignored her joke and took another gulp of beer. "I haven't seen a single walker all night. I think that's a good sign."
Cass groaned so quietly, Daryl almost didn't hear it. She was hoping they could have a nice night without bringing up the walkers. Looks like that wasn't going to happen anymore.
"That definitely is a good sign. After our close call in that pharmacy, I'd say no walkers out here are a very good thing. I have to ask, though." She took another swig, as if for courage. "What are we going to do?"
Daryl gave her a puzzled look, and she continued. "I mean, obviously the police and army have all gone to hell. We know that from the first night I ran into you guys."
Daryl chuckled and reminisced about the night they first ran into Cass, tilting his head up towards the clear sky. "You have to admit, though. That was a pretty amazing night."
Cass didn't say a word. It wasn't that great of a night for her. Not as she watched her sister slowly become one of them.
"And we don't really have the means of looking for help, or other survivors. So what do we do? Sit tight and hope for a miracle?"
"Ah, Cass, we don't need a miracle. We're just fine on our own." He looked over at the younger woman and saw the doubt that lurked in her eyes. "We wouldn't even make it that far if we left. I mean, we barely have enough gas to make it out of the city. We'd have to stop to pump gas from every car we passed, and even then, that's a tricky little bitch. If anything, our incident at the pharmacy should be a perfect example of how screwed we could be if we don't plan things out properly.
He was right. Damnit, she hated when he was right. She rarely let him know it when he was. She didn't want to hear him gloat.
"Speaking of pharmacy, how're your cuts healing?"
She glanced down at her busted hand and made a fist before releasing it. It still hurt like a bitch, but somehow her nightmare had made the pain fade. "They're healing as best they can, I suppose. Thanks for helping me out with them. I'm sure it would've gone a lot differently if you hadn't."
He shot her a coy smile as he toyed with the beer bottle in his hand. "Of course it would've. That's why I was so intent on helping you with them."
Cass rolled her eyes subconsciously and brought her beer to her mouth. She knew that the last couple of weeks would have gone completely differently if she hadn't managed to find the Dixon brothers. There was no doubt in her mind that she wouldn't even be alive.
Someone was definitely watching over her the night they found her.
Daryl watched Cass as she stared down the street, her mind clearly elsewhere. He carefully watched every feature, every movement in her eyes, reading her like a book. He knew she had a nightmare, he had heard her muffled screams from out here. That was why he had gone down in the first place, to check on her and make sure no walkers had found their way into the house. That, and to get another beer.
She never fully told them about what happened before she met them, though he knew she must've gone through hell and back. He could see that much in her demeanor from the very beginning.
"I heard you screaming not too long ago. You have another nightmare?" His voice had gotten low as he spoke to her. He leaned forward, his beer still in his hands as he rested his forearms on his legs.
"Just a bad dream. You know how it is." She shrugged it off as if it was nothing, but he saw past the front.
"About your sister, again?"
That's right. She had almost forgotten she told him about her sister. Late one night, she woke up in a cold sweat, panting for air while warm tears streamed down her face. When she had woken up, she was still screaming.
Merle was on watch that night, sitting by himself up on the roof. Daryl had taken refuge in the room beside her. The poor bastard had heard everything.
Daryl burst through her room like nothing she had ever seen before. Armed with nothing but a small knife, which was the closest thing to him when he had woken up, he scanned the room with narrow eyes, searching for a walker, fearing the worst for the young girl.But she was by herself.
"Cass, what the hells the matter? You alright?" He hurried to her bed, taking a seat in front of her.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." She kept murmuring under her breath. She kept her face buried in her hands as she tried to calm herself down. Her face was flush; embarrassed that she had made enough noise to wake Daryl in the next room.
Setting down the knife on the nightstand beside her, Daryl reached an arm out. He carefully lifted her chin so she could look up at him through blurry eyes.
"Now, this ain't nothing to be sorry about. You let out whatever you need to let out."
Cass lifted her hand and rested it over Daryl's. It felt good, feeling the warmth of another living being against her cold skin. How long had it been since she had felt the comfort another human being can offer?
She looked up at Daryl from loose strands of her dark hair, her thick lashes clumped together from tears. She caught Daryl completely off guard as she lurched forward, wrapping her arms around his neck.
He hesitated for a second, his entire body going rigid as he felt her lean into him, sobbing onto his shoulder. His body relaxed when he realized that all she was looking for was comfort. And between him and his brother, Daryl felt a lot better about him being the one to offer it to her.
Daryl reached around Cass, his hands finding refuge on the small of her back. "Your family?"
Cass nodded solemnly. "My sister. I watched her turn into one of them. She got so sick so fast. I tried to help her, but there was nothing I could do."
Daryl nodded, his stubble gently scraping against her cheek. He couldn't even imagine how she felt. Just the thought of him losing Merle made his blood boil. Sure, he and his brother didn't always get along, but when it came down to it, Merle was his flesh and blood, and there was nothing he wouldn't do for that man.
"There's nothing anyone can do once someone gets bit. Don't beat yourself up over something you had no control over."
Cass nodded and held onto Daryl until she passed out.
Daryl remembered that night very well. After Cass had passed out in his arms, he had laid her down on the bed and carefully tucked her back in, trying not to wake her again. When he picked up his knife and turned to leave the room, he heard her quiet voice fill the room, asking him to stay the night with her.
He knew exactly what she meant by it, but the man inside him couldn't help but flinch at her question. It had been long, too long, since he had been in bed with a woman. Before the walkers took over the streets, finding a woman just wasn't a concern for the younger Dixon brother. Once the walkers took over, Daryl mentally kicking himself in the ass for not taking advantage of the willing women he had come across in the weeks before.
And then there she was, lying in bed. Scared, alone, and asking him to stay the night with her. It was enough to drive any man insane.
But Daryl granted her wish and laid down beside her, on his back, with his hands entangled with one another on his stomach. He remembered she had turned onto her side and watched him, his eyes staring at the ceiling above, as if he were thinking of the meaning of life. In reality, he just kept reminding himself not to reach over and touch her, no matter how badly he wanted to.
He remembered she edged closer to him, resting her head on his chest as she draped an arm over his broad chest. As her breathing slowed and she fell back into a deep sleep, Daryl lifted his arm out from underneath her and let it rest across her waist.
Closing his eyes, he remembered taking in the scent of the younger woman. She was like nothing he could remember. She smelt of innocence in a world that no longer had any.
Cass finished her beer and abruptly got up, unintentionally smashing her injured hand on the armrest of her chair. "Ah, son of a bitch!" She hissed, dropping the beer bottle onto her chair.
"Damnit, Cass. You've got to be careful with that thing." Daryl warned her, putting his beer down beside his chair and walking over to her.
He took a gentle hold of her hand, carefully eying the bandages to see if she had reopened any of the wounds. She stood there, in silence as Daryl held her hand, her big eyes staring up at him as he kept his head down.
Cass didn't say a word as she took a step forward, suddenly feeling the effect of the beer she just practically chugged down on an empty stomach. Daryl's head was still down, examining her hand when she reached up with her other hand and rested her palm on his cheek.
He glanced up at her, a confused look plastered on his face as she closed the rest of the space between them. She tried to calm her shot nerves as she stood up on her toes, reaching up so her lips could finally touch Daryl's.
Every inch of Daryl's body froze when he felt Cass place her lips on his. He didn't let go of her hand. He just stood there, like an idiot, feeling her tongue run along his lips, begging silently for entrance.
He shouldn't be doing this. It was stupid and reckless to kiss her back. But he did anyway. The hungry man inside of him wouldn't let him pull away from her.
Finally letting go of her broken hand, Daryl reached up and cupped her face in both hands, pulling her closer to his body as he opened his mouth, desperate to feel her inside of it. She moaned, crushed against his mouth, as a smile spread across her lips.
It had been so long, much longer than he would like to admit, since he felt a woman against him, since he had felt a woman kiss him with such need. It made him twitch the way she kissed him.
She tasted so good in his mouth as his tongue fought with hers. He didn't want to pull away, but he had to for air. He rested his forehead against hers, her hands finding their way to his broad shoulders. He didn't let go of her face as he held it in his hands, staring into her eyes, searching for the doubt that he needed to see to stop.
"Cass, we probably shouldn't-"
She silenced him quickly with another kiss. She wasn't stupid; she knew she shouldn't have kissed him in the first place. Lord knows how old he is, but it's more than obvious he's got plenty of years on her. Plus, she doesn't know where he's been, or even if he had someone before the world went to shit. All she knew was that right now, this felt right. And that was all she needed.
Daryl leaned down to kiss her, his fingers entangling themselves in her hair as his tongue explored her warm mouth. Her body was completely pressed against his now, every curve of her small frame fitting perfectly against him. He felt himself swelling more and more with every moan that slipped out of her mouth and into his.
He broke away from her lips with a growl, pulling himself away from her and taking a step back. His hands dropped to his sides, his eyes dark with desperate hunger and need.
"Daryl, what's wrong?"
He opened his mouth to answer her, God, where should he start, when a loud scream rang out in the streets below them.
Instinctively, Cass jumped back, edging away from the edge of the roof as Daryl bolted forward, bending over to grab his crossbow as he neared the ledge.
Cass covered her mouth, her breathing frantic as she followed Daryl, looking over the second story ledge. She watched as a girl, probably around the same age as her, ran desperately down the street, crying out frantically as she struggled for air.
"Is there a walker? What's going on?" Cass was almost afraid to hear his answer.
There were trees in the way, Daryl noted, as he adjusted his view to try and see what the girl was running from. Oh yeah, there was a walker alright. Scratch that, make that four walkers.
Daryl reached over to Cass and pulled her down onto her knees beside him. There was no way in hell he was going to risk the walkers seeing them.
He loaded his crossbow and took aim at the closest walker to the girl and was about to fire when Cass stopped him.
"Daryl, there's more." She warned him, pointing to where the girl was running.
Daryl pulled the crossbow back and scanned the area. Cass was right. They seemed to be coming out from everywhere, as if they had been sitting patiently, waiting for this girl to come their way to satisfy their hunger.
Daryl counted ten, and they just kept on coming. He glanced down at his crossbow. Five arrows. He didn't have enough to do any damage to the horde of walkers that had emerged.
If he tried to help the girl, he would use all his arrows and would be stranded with none. And getting out of the house to grab her and the arrows seemed much too difficult. There were too many of them to go around pulling the arrows out. And who knew how long the remaining walkers would be hanging around. If their house got swarmed while he was waiting for the numbers to die down outside, he would be signing their death certificates. He didn't even know if she had already been bit. As much as it killed him inside, he had his own to take care of, and she wasn't one of them.
Daryl glanced back at the window he and Cass had climbed out of to get onto the roof. It was closed. It was too heavy to open without drawing their attention to the house. So he did the only thing he could think of.
Reaching out and grabbing Cass, he brought her down to the ground of the roof. He pulled her head into his chest and held her there, close to him as the woman's screams grew louder, more terrified.
Cass clamped a hand over her mouth as warm tears streamed down her face. She heard the woman beg for mercy, crying out to a God all of them knew didn't exist. Her screams were like nothing Cass had ever heard in her life. Cass felt Daryl cover her ears, trying to shield her from the sounds, but it didn't do much.
Shutting her eyes, Cass struggled to breathe as she listened to the woman being torn apart. She was shaking; terrified to open her eyes or even take another breath.
How could he just sit there? Why wasn't he helping her?
The woman's cries and agonizing screams went on for what seemed forever. Cass wanted to pull away from Daryl, shocked that he wasn't going to help her. But her body wouldn't let her move.
All she could do was open her eyes and glance up at Daryl's emotionless face. She stared into his deep blue eyes and found herself staring into the eyes of a monster.
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