Chapter Thirty Seven: Outburst
Outburst: a sudden release of strong emotion.
Day 72
"Hold up!" The group's attention was caught by Shane, who had stood from where he had been leaning casually against a nearby tree. Daisy noticed that Lori in particular seemed frightful of his outburst—further supporting her being almost-positive the baby was his. Shane continued, "There's walkers in the barn?" Daisy startled at the reminder, as did the rest of the group who had forgotten that Glenn had confessed that the barn was full of walkers in the wake of the annoyingly exciting baby-drama.
Shane had begun to pace back and forth behind the chairs gathered around the fire pit, shooting wary glares over towards where the barn was sitting innocently in the distance. He stopped and clenched his jaw, eyes flashing, "We gotta do something about that...specially with the—" Shane cut himself off as he gestured vaguely in Lori's direction. He grimaced, likely at the reminder of that whole mess, and suddenly took off towards where the pick-up was parked.
Daisy still held her coffee cup in hand, it was thankfully drained of all the cooling coffee—she had managed to keep down all of it, not able to reconcile herself with wastefulness in this new world—she stared after him with worry, though not enough to make her stir from her chair. Those with significantly more initiative—read: Rick and Lori—followed after Shane, speaking calming platitudes and enquiring as to why he was storming off in the direction of their makeshift armoury. At remembering that the majority of the guns and ammunition were in fact stored in the pick-up, at the behest of Hershel, Daisy felt some trepidation. To say the least, Shane was a bit of a hothead, and live rounds did not make that situation any better.
With a groan, Daisy set her coffee cup down beside her feet and bent down to pull her heavy work-boots closer. She lifted the tongue out of the right shoe and shoved her socked foot in, then began to lace up the shoe in preparation for the confrontation that was likely to happen. Daisy prided herself on her ability to defend herself from more docile assailants—that is, walkers—and decided that she could make herself useful by preparing to help pacify Shane if it came to that.
As Daisy was tying the bow on her second shoe, Shane came barrelling back towards where the group was gathered, shotgun in hand. Many members of the group protested as he passed them by, clearly heading for the barn full of walkers.
"Hey, Shane! You can't do this—it isn't our decision what Hershel does with his barn!" Rick called after his best friend, passing the group by to catch up with him. Daisy followed behind the others as they began to follow the action with wariness clouding their eyes.
"The hell it ain't!" Shane yelled back, snarling back at Rick.
A squeaking groan and a crash caught Daisy's attention, she spared her gaze towards where the sound had erupted to see Hershel himself storming out of his house, closely followed by his daughters and Patricia. Ahead of them, Daisy could see Shane come to a stop in front of the doors to the barn, then aim his shotgun at the heavy chain lock holding them together.
"Shane, don't—!" Rick exclaimed, he was interrupted by the sharp crack of a shotgun blast, Shane had blown the lock off of the doors, "Shane, don't you open those doors!" The group came to a halt a dozen feet away, Daisy glanced warily between Shane and Rick, as the former began tearing the chain from the doors.
"Boy, you better listen to him!" Hershel said firmly, slightly huffing as he came to a stop by the group, glancing fearfully at the doors and not coming any closer to them than he had to.
"Shit...guy's gone crazy," Merle mumbled from where he was meandering near the back of the gathering, a gleeful sneer spread across his face. Beside him, Daryl threw out a punch and hit him soundly on the shoulder, "Hey!"
"No!" Shane roared as he turned back to face the others, the barn doors drifted open behind him under the stress of the groaning walkers inside, "These walkers—they're dead! They are not gonna miraculously take a turn for the fuckin' better! They're a threat to us, to you—!" Shane pointed at Hershel, Maggie, Beth and Patricia with wide, almost crazed eyes. He took a deep breath as he dropped his finger, glancing back to see that the walkers had begun to spill out of the barn. Shane held his shotgun with both hands and aimed at them as he backed away, speaking quietly and certainly, "They need to be put down."
"Get ready, people," Rick called out with a disappointed huff directed in Shane's direction, but he did not seem to care as he directed another gunshot towards the tumble of walkers spilling out of the open doors of the barn.
Daisy sighed and steeled herself as she pulled her knife out of her belt loop—she really had to think of a better solution for the storage of her deadly weapon. She looked around to see the others doing much the same, with a few herding the children away from the danger.
As the walkers began to amble towards their food, shuffling to fan out left to include Hershel and his group in their slothful attack. Daisy moved forward to catch up to the rightmost walker, she threw out her arm and caught it in the back of the head with the tip of her knife. It fell with one last growl, which attracted the attention of two other walkers. Daisy stuttered slightly as her knife caught in the skull of the walker she had killed, she crouched down to push against the neck of the walker with the sole of her boot, using an amount of force that was perhaps too great and sent her flying backwards to fall on her backside.
"Daisy!" She heard Glenn cry, Daisy shuffled away from the reaching walkers and got to her feet hurriedly with a grimace at her incompetence. She swung sharply with her knife and caught the second walker in the eye, the knife slid out without resistance. Backing up a few feet, Daisy took in the rest of the group, most of whom were dispatching walkers as she was. She noticed that Beth was struggling in her sister's arms, crying out for one of the walkers, a brown-haired woman who was walking slowly towards the screaming girl.
The walker in front of Daisy swiped with clawed fingers in her direction, she hurriedly ducked out of the way and focused on it again, her knife raised to swing again. Daisy struck the walker on its forehead, a deep gash opened and oozed darkened blood, but the walker remained standing. Its jaw was hanging loose, snapping weakly at her with a resounding moan. Looking around, Daisy saw that most of the walkers had fallen, Daisy's swiped with her knife one last time and a loud crack sounded as it embedded in its skull.
Daisy calmed significantly, and wiped the sweat off her brow with her shirt sleeve. She re-joined the group, inadvisably flicking her knife to rid the blood from it, instead staining the grass below their feet—she took care to hold it tightly and flick away from the people beside her.
"My mom! My—" Daisy finally made out what Beth was crying out, the walker that was apparently once her mother the only walker still standing, restrained only by Rick's hand precariously holding its shoulder.
"Th'fuck? Kill it, why don't you? Already dead, dumb-shit..." Merle muttered beside Daisy, his shirt pulled up fractionally to wipe at his own knife, significantly larger and more blood-stained than Daisy's—she took the time and mental effort to commend Merle on his increasing tact, knowing that he could have easily killed Beth's mother himself with genuine pleasure.
"Her stomach is clean ripped open, Hershel!" Shane said loudly and emphatically, pointing his shotgun at the entrails that were spilling out of Hershel's wife's stomach, "If she is alive...then keepin' her like this is torture—she don't want this."
Beth's cries became louder, and Daisy saw a moment of pure heartbreak in Hershel's eyes, as he looked between his devastated daughter and the woman he had likely loved for as long as Beth had been alive. Seemingly beyond reason, Shane lifted his shotgun once more and cocked it, stopping only to shoot one last dirty look at Hershel. He fired a shot point-blank at the back of the walker's head, splattering rotting brain matter and infected blood everywhere—most of the mess landing on the faces of Beth and Maggie, both flinched at the sound.
An agonised groan wrenched itself from Beth's throat and she ripped her arms from Maggie's stabilising grip, she fell forward and buried her face in her mother's chest, gripping at her shirt with shaking fingers. Daisy balked at the sight and felt incredibly like an intruder; upon glancing at Hershel's stony disposition, she thought that this might have been an accurate descriptor for Daisy and her group at that moment. That safety and happiness that she had felt on the few days they lived at the Greene family farm had evaporated in a matter of minutes, destroyed by the actions of one man—Shane.
The world seemed quiet, the only sounds one could hear was the tired crying of Beth and the muted whimpering of Carl and Sophia in the background, their faces buried in their respective mothers' shirts. Daisy had a sudden yearning for her own mother, but quickly tampered that down when she realised that, as far as she knew, her mother had not been one of those who survived the initial surge of walkers, let alone the following weeks.
"I want all of you off my property, today," Hershel said, his voice weak with emotion. Daisy was not surprised, she had assumed that much would result from Shane's outburst.
"Yeah," Rick sighed, turning his back on Shane and joining his family in their huddle.
"Ugh, this is bullshit," Merle grumbled, he began to trudge away, back to the camp. The crowd began to follow his lead and swiftly dispersed, leaving Daisy and Daryl standing awkwardly beside Hershel and his family.
"You, uh, want help with the..." Daryl spoke up unexpectedly, gesturing towards the body of Hershel's deceased wife, whom Beth was still clutching despite Maggie's continued attempts to pry her fingers from it. Hershel looked up from his daughters over at Daryl with scrutinising eyes, he seemed to decide that Daryl did not contribute to Shane's decision to infiltrate the barn.
"That would be nice, son." Hershel gave a long sigh and walked forward to place a comforting hand on Beth's shoulder.
Daryl shot Daisy an inquiring look, she thought for a moment, "Wanna get the truck? To carry the..." Daisy suggested. Daryl nodded silently and stalked off in the direction of the truck. He continues to be a man of few words, Daisy noted to herself as she stumbled through the dozen or so walkers to determine a plan to get rid of the bodies.
As Hershel and Maggie finally convinced Beth to let go of her mother, Hershel shooting Daisy a thankful—yet unbearably solemn—smile, Daisy decided to do as they had when the walkers had attacked at the quarry. That is, they would burn the bodies of the walkers to eradicate any chance of post-mortem infection, and bury any people that used to belong to Hershel's family. Though Daisy subscribed to the idea that cremation was equally acceptable as burial for loved ones, especially in a world where infected bodies might affect the living, she understood that others might not think along the same lines.
In the distance, Daisy saw that Daryl was driving the truck her way, and prepared herself for a day of dragging, burning and burying dead bodies—she pitied past Daisy, who had thought future Daisy would be snuggled by a camp fire with a second mug of hot coffee by that point in time. Daisy tried to find the good in the situation, but could only note that it was early enough that the sun was not yet smouldering high in the sky. It will be in an hour though, Daisy thought bitterly, lamenting the fact that finding the good in a massacre of walkers was not exactly a possible feat.