What's in the Barn

XX

If every day was going to be like this, Daryl didn't think he'd last very long.

The last rays of sunlight were streaming through the bedroom window as Daryl sat in a rocking chair, still recuperating from his numerous near-death experiences. Herschel had patched him up – although not before chewing him out over taking horses without his permission. Like the man needed the horses for anything else. About all they were good for was searching for Sophia and getting eaten by zombies, or – in some cases, apparently – leading Daryl right into a beehive before flinging him down onto a rattlesnake.

He was in the same bedroom where Carl was laying in bed, and the boy's zombie infection getting worse. As far as Daryl could see, the boy was going to keel over and get back up as a brand new member of the undead any minute now. The way his forehead was glistening with sweat, the way he occasionally let out a faint groan... Daryl was there to keep an eye on him since Lori had gone off for a moment, and while he didn't mind the job, seeing as he needed to rest anyway, he hoped Lori knew he'd put a crossbow through her kid's forehead if Carl so much as looked at him the wrong way.

"What's wrong?" asked Carl, noticing Daryl staring at him.

"Nothin', kid. Just wondering when you're gonna eat the rest of us."

"As soon as you aren't looking."

Daryl's hand edged towards the crossbow propped against the wall beside his rocking chair.

"Just kidding!"

Daryl eyed him for a moment before laughing. At least the kid had a sense of humor about being a dead boy walking. The two of them sat in silence for a while as Daryl listened to the faint sounds of people milling around outside. Soon it would be evening: dinner time. And he got the feeling that with all the tension going on in camp lately, it might get ugly. Not only that, but apparently Dale had gone missing, and nobody could find him. Which meant he'd be out searching for two people just as soon as he started feeling better.

"So you think I'm going to turn into a zombie?" asked Carl.

Daryl looked sadly at the boy. He didn't want to answer.

"Don't worry. I know what's going to happen. I guess it's just hard to think about it, you know? To think about being dead, and then coming back and walking around with nothing on your mind except eating people. It's like I can't believe it's gonna happen, even though I know it will."

The kid seemed smart for his age. Daryl felt bad for him, but then, maybe he was luckier than the rest of them. Maybe there wasn't anything else they could hope for in this world. He caught himself getting melodramatic and rolled his eyes; if he kept up with that kind of attitude, he'd turn into Lori, or Andrea before she had her miraculous change of mind about killing herself right after Otis shot her. But it was too bad he couldn't do anything to save Carl. He had been trying to save Sophia, and even that had gone nowhere.

"I'm just glad my parents are having another kid," said Carl. "Although I wish my mom would hurry up and choose between Shane and dad."

"They're both after her, huh?" Daryl had gotten that impression.

"Yep. Shane's crazier, but dad's stupider. It's a tough call."

Any further conversation was cut off by the sound of a motor gunning and tires screeching outside. Daryl frowned as he listened; nobody had gone out anywhere, at least not that he knew of. Another moment passed and he heard Rick let out a shout of surprise. He grabbed his crossbow and darted up from the chair, but now that he thought about it, Rick's noise had been more of a happy whoop. It sounded like he had recognized someone. "Your mom'll be back in a minute," said Daryl, heading out of the room and onto the front porch. Outside, Rick was yelling at someone who had just gotten out of a truck that Daryl didn't recognize.

"I can't believe it! You know how long I waited for you?"

It was a black man he didn't recognize, but he realized it must have been that guy Rick was always talking about, Morgan. The man's son came out of the passenger side, confirming Daryl's suspicions as he watched them all laughing and hugging. He felt a flash of suspicion at the sight of black people, especially ones he didn't recognize. That was normal, something he had always felt; he and Merle had never been a fan of them.

But all of a sudden Merle's face came back in his mind's eye, standing over him as he lay bleeding in that stream. Merle's laughter, his dismissal of Daryl's efforts at survival. And he remembered T-Dog, or whatever his name was, getting eaten by zombies. Something inside Daryl twisted a little. He made a decision; things were different now. Every day since this zombie apocalypse began, he had come that much closer to realizing he wasn't the same person he used to be. He approached the newcomers and held out a hand. "Daryl Dixon," he said.

The man shook his hand with a friendly smile.

"Nice to meet you. I'm Morgan, and this here's my son, Duane."

"I already told them all about you two," said Rick. "Great to see you again! We've all been hidin' out here at this farm house for a few days now – this guy Herschel owns it, I'll introduce you to him in a minute. I'm sure he'll be fine with a couple of new faces-"

"Who are these people?"

All of them turned to see Herschel on the porch, narrowing his eyes warily at the newcomers.

"Hey, Herschel," said Rick, "these are my friends-"

"We don't need any more people here!" he said angrily. "First you all get Otis killed, then you steal my best horse so he goes runnin' off into the woods, then you eat all the food out of my fridge. And I told you all no guns on the farm!"

"Dale got rid of the guns!" Rick protested.

"Did he? I saw Andrea and Shane engaging in a little target practice this morning, and if I am not mistaken, Andrea nearly shot your friend Daryl just a couple of hours ago. Am I not correct?"

Daryl coughed nervously. "Yeah, that's about right."

Rick looked embarrassed, but he pressed his point. "Well, he got rid of most of the guns. I dunno where he's got them stashed – I haven't seen him in a while."

Herschel stepped off the porch and looked wildly across the field, eyes wide with alarm.

"He didn't go to the barn, did he?"

Rick shrugged.

"You can't even keep track of your people! That's it – everyone has to leave this place by morning!"

Rick tried to protest, but Herschel stormed back inside the farmhouse and slammed the door before anyone could reply. He looked at his newly arrived friends apologetically. Daryl didn't mind the ultimatum at all. The sooner they were all headed out, the better. The only thing holding them back, as far as he could tell, was Sophia.

XX

"You're killing us! You're killing us!"

Rick pounded on the table and shot up from his chair in a frenzy as Herschel sat impassively, waiting for his outburst to be over. He had just announced the news to the rest of the group. Shane didn't mind the ultimatum at all – as far as he was concerned, this place was a deathtrap. Why did Rick want to hang out at a farm run by a guy who thought the best plan of action in a zombie apocalypse was to stow away all your guns and make friends with the corpses trying to tear your flesh off? This wasn't the Rick he remembered from their days on the force. This wasn't the cool, calm, collected deputy he had been friends with. No, something about his friend had changed: maybe it was the pressure of their situation, maybe it was the fact that his kid was gonna be one of the living dead at any moment, but Rick was unhinged.

"That is my decision," said Herschel, "and it's final."

"We can work with you! We already put away most of the weapons except Shane's sidearm, and we can learn to live with the zombies – it'll just take a little while. We're just used to them biting us and eating our flesh, but if you want to eat dinner with them and sit on the porch swing to watch the sun go down with them, well, we're willin' to compromise. You just can't throw us back out there. You don't know what it's like out there."

"But does your group agree with you?" asked Herschel. "I don't think Daryl does. And what about Shane?"

Rick turned to Shane, who looked away uncomfortably as his friend adopted a pleading look.

"Come on, Shane," he said, "what do you think?"

"This whole thing's crazy."

"How can I trust you all if you can't even work together as a group?" asked Herschel.

"You just gotta give us a chance-"

"If Shane gives up his sidearm, that's a start."

Shane's hand slipped down to his side as he shot Herschel a suspicious glance. "Over my dead body."

"You see," said Herschel, "if you all can't accept my rules, you can't live on this farm."

Shane was tired of the ridiculous conversation. He stormed out of the kitchen, knocking over a chair as he left. Herschel was nothing but trouble. Here they were, arguing about how they could stay at the farm house, when the man had a whole passel of relatives stowed in his barn, just waiting to break out and eat everyone alive. It was like the whole group had gone crazy! Or at least everyone seemed to follow Rick's lead, no matter how crazy it was, instead of looking to him as a leader. And all just because a couple people suspected him of maybe killing Otis. He had no choice! And if they wanted to talk about monsters, what about Herschel? The man hadn't let him put the ice cream in the freezer, so it had all melted. Shane hadn't seen such a travesty against nature since the dead began to rise.

As he stepped out past the porch and began to walk across the yard, Shane realized he knew what to do. Dale had taken all the guns from the group and hidden them somewhere – Shane had tried to follow him earlier, but the man was surprisingly elusive and turned off into the forest at some point, at which point Shane lost his trail. But he had missed one gun, as Herschel and Rick both knew. Shane still had his sidearm.

And as he saw the barn across the field, draped in the descending blanket of evening darkness, he knew how to solve the problem. If Herschel thought his relatives were still alive, then it wasn't nice to keep them all locked up like that. And if Herschel didn't like them heading for his farm house and his living family, well, the solution was right there in Shane's holster.

He crossed the field, heading towards the barn. He was halfway there when a horse ran by out of nowhere, rearing up on its hind legs and almost braining Shane before it took off in the other direction. He fell over, cursed, and got back up; probably the one Daryl had lost in the forest when he had his little accident. He knew Daryl agreed with him about this stupid farm. Maybe the two of them could join up and convince the group that Rick and Herschel were wrong. He worried about Lori, though – when it came down to it, which of them would she choose? Would she really give up everything to stay with Rick?

The barn door was padlocked, but Shane skirted around the side as he peered through the slats. The sky was darkening, which didn't help his seeing anything, but it looked like there was something in there. He couldn't tell what it was, but he could swear he caught a flash of movement just inside. There was a rustling sound, too. Around the side of the barn he managed to climb up to a loft window, creeping inside and pausing a moment to let his eyes get adjusted to the dark interior. He crouched on a hay loft ledge; below him lay the rest of the barn. As he got used to the darkness, he could make out figures standing all over the place. A shiver went down his spine. Herschel's relatives, all standing still, probably smelling his-

Wait a minute. Shane looked a little closer. Those weren't zombies.

They were plants.

"What are you doing in here?"

Shane caught the voice from across the barn. Dale emerged from the darkness between several of the plants. So this was where the old man had gone. "I could ask you that myself," said Shane.

"I lost track of time," said Dale.

The man had something in his hand. Shane realized what it was: a cigarette. This whole situation was strange. He looked at the plants again, and suddenly realized they were marijuana plants. The whole barn was a marijuana growing facility! Dale reached over and flipped a switch on a wall, turning on growing lights hanging from the barn's roof. Shane blinked at the sudden bright flood of light, looking around as his suspicions were confirmed. He couldn't help laughing. So that was why Herschel didn't want them coming around to the barn. He was worried about his stash!

As Shane clambered down from a ladder and hit the dirt floor, he noticed Dale shifting to the side. Trying to protect something from view. Down on the floor beside him was a big black duffel bag: the weapons. Shane took a step closer, and Dale dropped his doobie before dropping to the ground and grabbing something from among the plants. Shane drew his pistol in a flash as Dale came back up with a shotgun. The man froze, seeing Shane's gun pointed at him; he held the shotgun in one hand, but couldn't fire it from his position yet. Shane had him. The two of them stood tensely, each waiting for the other to make a move.

"Now, let's not get hasty," said Shane. "I think you've been smokin' it up a little too much."

"Don't be ridiculous," said Dale. "Smoking it up was all my wife and I did in the camper before things turned to shit. Besides shooting rabid squirrels, I mean. And I know why you're here – for the weapons. Well, you're not getting them."

"Why are you doing what Herschel wants? You know the man's crazy. Even if he doesn't have any relatives in here, he thinks we shouldn't be shootin' the zombies. You really wanna follow his orders?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Hiding all the guns – that's just gonna get us all killed."

"I don't care about Herschel," laughed Dale. "I'm hiding all the guns from you! You're the one who's going to get us all killed, Shane. I know what kind of man you are. I saw you aiming at Rick out there in the woods, and I know you killed Otis. You're a bad liar."

"Hiding the guns from me?" laughed Shane, waving his pistol.

"Okay, so I forgot one."

The two of them were on either side of the barn, but it wasn't a very big barn. A firefight could get ugly, fast. There were some hay bales and pieces of discarded equipment to his right; Shane could duck behind them if Dale got too itchy with his trigger finger. But as he thought about it, maybe there was no point avoiding it. He could see Dale's red eyes, the shotgun wavering as he clutched it in one hand. He could take the man down right now. Then, after a last ditch plea for Lori to join him, they'd get the hell out of dodge and find that army base. Anything was better than staying here.

Shane smirked, took aim, and fired.

XX

Daryl stepped outside the farm house, wanting to get a little air and escape from all the arguing going on inside. Rick was now following Herschel around from room to room, telling the old man over and over how he didn't know what things were like out there. Not only that but Carl had come into the kitchen like he was in a daze, asking for fresh brains before someone led him back into the bedroom. That had been very concerning to everyone. Outside, sitting on the porch steps, Daryl found Rick's black friend from Atlanta sitting with his son. The father looked back at him and nodded.

"Got tired of all the commotion," explained Daryl.

"Yeah, us too. Have a seat."

Daryl sat down beside them. "Morgan and Dwayne, right?"

The two of them nodded. "Things always like this?" asked Morgan. "Me and my son have been tryin' to get someplace safe for a long time now, but I get the feeling this place ain't much of an improvement."

"You're probably right."

"I heard they got a bunch of zombie relatives in that barn over there?"

Daryl nodded, looking at the barn, a black silhouette against the deep blue evening sky. He sat silently with Morgan and his son, listening to the faint sounds of arguing coming from inside. If the two of them had been searching for Rick, getting away from the city, maybe they had been expecting to find something better than this. Daryl got the feeling there wasn't anything better out there. Not on some secluded farm, and certainly not at an army base. The only place to be in this world was on the move.

Daryl's philosophizing was cut off by the sound of an engine revving in the distance. Shane had disappeared earlier; maybe he had taken the pickup and gone somewhere. But no, there was the pickup truck, right over there. A flash of headlights came through the trees out past the farm house's front yard, but as it drew closer, Daryl could see it was only one headlight. A motorcycle. Had someone taken his bike out for a ride? Morgan and Duane watched along with him as a motorcycle came into view, but it wasn't his. It pulled up to the front of the house and two figures stepped off: a man and a little girl. Daryl stood up abruptly as the figure came in view of the porch lights, holding the little girl in his grasp. He recognized both of them.

It was Merle. And he was with Sophia.

"Well, well, if it isn't my little brother, hangin' out with a couple of darkies!"

Merle shot Morgan a threatening smile as Morgan stood up and moved in front of his son. The sight of his brother was one of the strangest things Daryl had ever experienced. He had been angry and bitter at his brother's loss in Atlanta, hostile towards T-Dog for leaving him up there on that roof, and yet his short time with the group had set something off inside of him. Like a metamorpho – a meta – whatever it was butterflies did. Daryl had been doing that. Maybe it wasn't just them, but this apocalypse – it was putting things in perspective, somehow. Giving him a new perspective on what being human meant. He would have expected joy, relief, happiness on seeing Merle back alive, and yet here his older brother was. And Daryl felt afraid.

"Was I-" he said hesitantly, "-was I hallucinatin' when I saw you in the forest earlier?"

Merle laughed. "'Course not. I bandaged you up, didn't I?"

"Then why'd you leave again?"

"I've been watchin' you. I've been watchin' you with this group of fools you're hangin' out with, little brother, and I think you've gone soft. I dunno if I trust you anymore. Not after you let 'em do this to me," he said, holding up his stump of a hand. "You know how hard it is to ride a damn motorcycle with one hand, little brother?"

"Didn't even know it was possible," said Daryl.

Sophia had been smiling when she approached the porch with Merle, but now she began to cry. "What's going on?" she asked. "I thought you were going to bring me back to my mom."

"Maybe," said Merle. "Or maybe not. Depends on if I get what I want."

He grabbed Sophia with his one good hand, holding her by her hair as she let out a squeal. "Where's that black boy that lost me my hand?" he yelled. "You bring him out here, Daryl. After I take care of him, you and me are gettin' the hell out of here. You don't belong with these people."

"They're not all bad," said Daryl. "Yeah, some of them are idiots, but-"

"I said bring that black boy out here! Where are you?" he shouted at the farm house. By this time, people began to come out of the front door and stand on the porch to see what all the commotion was. Carol came out and let out a cry when she saw her daughter. Sophia tried to run forward, but Merle jerked her back by the hair. "I want that boy out here to pay for what he did, or else I'm shootin' this little girl!"

Something snapped in Daryl. Brother or no brother, he had been searching for that little girl day and night. He had gotten bitten by rattlesnakes, stung by bees, and stabbed with his own crossbow bolts for that girl. And his brother was acting crazier than Rick and Shane; even with a missing hand, by now he should have had some time to calm down. Maybe he was tripping on some of that blue stuff they got from Heisenberg. He unslung the crossbow from his back – where he always kept it, even when he was eating dinner – and aimed it at his brother.

"What the hell is this?" snapped Merle.

"Let her go."

"You try anything and I shoot her."

"How are you gonna shoot her? You're holding on to her with your one good hand."

Merle snarled angrily, but then looked at Sophia and down to a gun stuffed into his belt. Apparently, he hadn't considered Daryl's point. Before he could figure out how to threaten anyone with just one hand, however, a strange sound began to float through the air. Everyone in front of the farm house fell silent, listening in the warm evening darkness as a droning noise reached them from the nearby woods.

Daryl rolled his eyes. Was it another vehicle? He was getting tired of all the new arrivals tonight, as if things weren't complicated enough with the people they already had around. But as he listened, he realized it was not a mechanical sound. It was almost like the bees that had stung him earlier. Not just one thing, but many things, and coming closer. Before they could find out what it was, another distraction caught his eye. The barn, out past the field, had just lit up with a yellow glow, pouring out through its slats and highlighting it against the night.

"What the hell is that?"

Everyone turned to Herschel, who coughed nervously.

"One of your relatives turn on the lights in there?" asked Rick. Daryl was amazed to notice that there wasn't any irony in his question, either.

"My dad's been lying to you all," said Maggie. They turned to her in surprise. "We don't have any dead relatives in there. That's not why he didn't want you all going into the barn."

"Then why?"

A gunshot rang out, from the direction of the barn. After a brief pause, several more gunshots came like whip cracks. Merle pulled out his pistol, spooked by all the sudden developments, and accidentally let go of Sophia in doing so. The girl ran up the porch to her mother, and Merle was about to aim at her when Daryl shouldered his crossbow again with a bolt ready to go. "Don't you move!"

"I'm your big brother, Daryl. Why'd you-"

The droning sound grew louder, and now Daryl noticed several dark figures coming across the field towards them. The gunfire from the barn had died down, but now that the sound was closer, he knew what it was. It was the hungry moaning of the undead. Beyond them, the darkness under the trees began to shift and coil, resolving itself into creeping forms that stumbled closer with outstretched hands.

The group looked around in panic. They were surrounded by zombies. And lots of them, too.

XX

Notes - One more chapter to go. So, anybody still reading this? I enjoyed the last episode of the show. Seems like they're ratcheting up the zombie action, which is good.