spygrrl99 - Oh my, your review made my day. Thank you. I'm glad you think my dialogue is good, I hate writing accents into a story, so I thought maybe the lack of heavily accented dialogue might be a death sentence to this story. Glad it isn't.
Violeta27 - Mah, I like Merle. Don't know why, the man is an unbearable ass, but maybe it's just that I have a secret crush on Michael Rooker...*blush* Did I admit that outloud? Oh my.
Axelrocks - Good heavens, your review was a thing of beauty. I'm so glad you enjoy the Lieutenant (and don't feel bad, I like Merle too and think he can be redeemed, not right away obviously but with time). Don't feel guilty about not reviewing, the point is that you finally did and just voicing the fact that this story isn't crap keeps me going. So thanks ever so for that. You are too kind (and your dad may be my hero). ^_^ As for your love of Carol, I agree, I always appreciate underplayed female characters who have nothing to prove. Gee, speaking of rants...
sammipoop - Ah, so you're the mysterious one, huh? Well, thanks for the support and the kind reviews. Keep on posting those wonderful things over at that place (doesn't want to disclose too much publicly).
MarionArnold - You and me seem to be the only ones who like Merle. I do think he does actually care for his baby brother, but Merle is Merle, he's gruff and uncouth and doesn't put things nicely.
ldyjaydin - Thank you for the kind review. I do try to update as often as possible, school does make it hard, but I stock up on chapters on the weekend, in time to post some throughout the week. ^_^
earthbound68 - Well, thank you kindly. I think you're just aces.
So I went outside...it's not as big a deal as 'normies' make it seem. There was sun and sky and some guy with an overcoat flashing people. Like I haven't seen pictures of the sky before. Pfft.
Chapter Seven: Boo
**The Lieutenant**
Stepping into the main building of the convent after showing the Dixon boys around, the Lieutenant made his way down the long, dim hall, greeted by a wee boo who raced out of a nearby room and launched herself at him.
With the wee boo hanging off his leg like ripe fruit off a peach tree, the Lieutenant slogged his way through the nuns dormitory with the girl still attached to his leg, heading for the Mother Superior's office at the end of the long hall.
"I missed you," the Little Missy chirped, clambering up his side like he was a jungle gym, clinging to his neck like a sloth, hanging down the front of him as he wrapped his arms around her waist to keep her full weight from tearing his head off at the shoulders. "Did you get me a turkey yet?"
"Naw," he replied. "Heard it was his birthday, it's bad luck to kill a bird on his birthday."
Smacking a kiss on his cheek, the wee boo gave him a critical look beyond her years. "You can't catch one, can you?"
"'Course I can, something that ugly can't be smarter than me." He stated, eyeing the little one.
"What about pig's? Aren't they supposed to be smart?"
"Yeah, but I'm smarter than a pig though, right?"
The girl drew her mouth in a straight line and wagged her head side to side. "Um…"
"Possede," he scolded lightly.
"You need a shave," the girl pointed out. "Mother Superior's going to give you a tongue lashing."
"Naw, she likes me."
"You think?"
Tsking at the girl as they reached the Mother Superior's closed office door, the Lieutenant dropped her gently to the ground, kneeling to address her eye to eye. "You'd better let me see her alone, Boo." He said. "Go help Sister Mary Elizabeth in the kitchen, yeah?"
"Okay." The girl reached up to touch his scratchy dark brown beard and grimaced. "I think it's gross."
"We'll see if I have to time to honour your demands, Princess," he replied. "Now go on."
Watching the wee one skip off, the Lieutenant idly wondered if she'd harp on him forever if he didn't shave. She was worse than a wife some days.
Knocking on the Mother Superior's door, he waited nervously. To be honest with himself, the woman scared him a little. She had only ever asked him to her office twice before and both times he wound up feeling like a little boy in deep trouble.
At her bidding, he opened the door and poked his head inside, before moving his body in completely.
She sat in the chair by her fireplace, reading something, her knees drawn to her chest.
"Sister Gertrude said you were looking for me."
Without even looking up from her book, the woman scowled. "Close the door, Lieutenant, this isn't a barn. Just because society is no longer civil, doesn't mean I want the world to hear our conversation. And leave your gun beside it. You know I can't abide them."
Quietly he closed the door, propping his rifle against the wall beside, before moving to stand before her nervously.
She idly flipped a page in her book, before placing the piece of red ribbon in it and setting it in her lap to look up at him.
"What do you make of those boys you've unleashed in my convent, Lafayette? Are they a threat to the Sisters here?"
"At best I think the big one's a threat to himself if he keeps messing with me, but naw, they're alright. Little rough, uncultured, but…you know Georgian so…"
"I'm from Georgia, Lieutenant," the woman replied dryly.
Nervous and hugely embarrassed, the Cajun turned on his charming grin, hoping to smooth things over. The others were from far and wide, he wasn't expecting the lady with the high born Southern accent to actually be from within the state. If he had to guess, he would have said Tennessee or maybe Missouri, but what did he know? All Texian's sounded alike to him. "And you're just the epitome of a proper Southern Belle, cher." He cooed in a thicker accent than normal, hoping to smooth everything over with a little sweet Cajun charm.
There was a long, drawn moment of silence as the Mother Superior studied him with that hard glare of hers.
"She's always on my mind," he added, clearing his throat. "Georgia."
Mother Superior Philomena angled her chin down ever so, still eyeing him coolly.
The Lieutenant dropped his gaze sheepishly and eyed her bare feet for an entire minute before he realized that her feet were bare. He tilted his head and frowned.
Quickly covering her feet with her habit, the Old Missy huffed. "You're responsible for them. I'll not have that big one flirting shamelessly with the Sisters here. The ungodly things he said to Sister Mary Claire will not go over well with me again."
"Of course, I'll keep them in my sights."
"Hn," she opened her book again. "I hear you're planning on leaving us."
"Not for good, ma'am. Only trying to make friends in a godless world."
"Godless?" She inquired, looking up at him sharply. "God is everywhere, don't tell me this world is godless."
Nervously wiping his palms on his thighs, the Lieutenant gave a half quirked grin. "No offense, cher, but I haven't seen much of God's work here lately."
"That's enough of that talk, Lieutenant." She stated firmly. "Not here, not under this roof."
"Missy," the Lieutenant began firmly, suddenly very aware of how he was digging his own grave. "You give me one solid line of evidence that God is still with us." Before she could speak, he interrupted. "You can't. All I see outside these walls is death and lost hope. Do you know what a man without hope looks like? I do. Saw it in every soldier's eyes before they split, left their posts, abandoned their mission. God isn't with us anymore, he's given up on us, we're all lost causes clinging to a ghost."
"And that little girl?" The Old Missy asked. "That small creature who turns such hopeful eyes on you, how did she make it to our gate without the hand of God guiding her? She didn't have a single scratch on her, not one. Tell me that isn't a miracle."
"If that is the work of God, then tell me why he saw fit to make her suffer through whatever hell it is that wakes her in the middle of the night screaming." He demanded. "You and I have both seen her eyes when she wakes and they are wild and they're panicked. It's not something any God I'd believe in would show an angel like her to make her shake in the dark of night." He shifted on his feet, voice softening when he realized she didn't look so angry at him, more wistful. He wasn't supposed to be the sort of man who tore apart people's beliefs; hell, his Mamere would have tanned his hide for speaking to anyone about their beliefs the way he just had. "You believe what you want, cher. But under this roof, I'm going to keep on believing that God has left us for better things."
Clearing his throat, he eyed the window behind her desk and the tiny sparrow that alighted upon the sill.
"I'll come back to you here," he said, turning his eyes back on the Mother Superior.
She was busy clearing tears from her cheeks, looking for all the world like he had just told her she was going to die.
The Lieutenant had stolen her hope from her and it twisted his guts. He wasn't a cruel man by any nature and the words he said to her, his own theory on the state of the spiritual world wasn't asked for, he shouldn't have given it.
He dropped to one knee at her side and placed his hand on that bare foot she had tried to hide from him. "I…I shouldn't have said that to you, honeychild," he apologized softly, brows puckered, eyes wide. "I'm an idiot ninety-eighty percent of the time, so I'm probably wrong."
She forced a hand to her mouth, looking like she was about to throw up.
"If it's true," she sobbed, "and God has forsaken us—"
"Naw, don't…"
"What do I tell the Sisters of this convent?"
There was a flutter of wings against the window as the sparrow took flight. It was the only sound that broke the moment, everything had fallen still.
It was then that the Lieutenant realized that the Old Missy may have had her own doubts about the spiritual nature of the world around them. That maybe she was going through her own internal struggle.
He had always thought she never once questioned the whole rising of the dead, coming of the apocalypse thing, but she was. She had been this whole time. After all, weren't the righteous supposed to ascend? Wasn't she worried that maybe God had forgotten or abandoned them? His daughters of mercy?
Licking his bottom lip, he realized that the hope she had in her God had actually kept hope in him, that it gave him something to fight for. If she had no hope…what did he have?
Maybe he was hoping her God actually did exist and that he was going to show up at any moment and save them from the horrors outside the walls of the convent. Maybe for as much as he scoffed at the idea of God, he was – deep down – comforted by the thought that the being might prove him wrong eventually.
If the Mother Superior had lost faith, then it meant that there was no hope.
Sniffing then, the woman straightened her spine and closed the book with a snap. "God will provide," she assured him.
Suddenly, the Lieutenant was snapped back into his place by her tone and he dropped his hand from her foot, eyeing her as she collected her senses.
"We will keep surviving until he sees fit to provide us a safe passage into paradise." She stated, touching a hand to the top of his head and running her hand through his hair. "We'll just endure the trials and tribulations to show our faith."
He snapped his gaping maw shut and steeling his jaw, nodded firmly. "'Course we will. Survival is what we do best here, yeah?"
Standing up, he studied the broken woman. If she was any other woman, he would have comforted her physically with a hug or perhaps a kiss to the temple, but he was nervous around nuns, so he awkwardly stuck out a hand and patted the top of her head like a dog. "I'll be back, yeah? You keep to rules about the Little Missy, no going outside for anything and remember to have Sister Joan on night duty."
"Of course."
Spinning on his heel, eager to get away, he was stopped by her voice at the door. Strong as it ever was.
"And shave that beard before you go, Lieutenant," she said. "You look like an unholy fright."
"Top of my to-do list, ma'am."
..-~-..
..-~-..
End of the world and shaving was a priority.
Scoffing at his orders as he strolled out of the garden shed the next morning (where the nuns had stuffed him the first night he arrived). Rubbing a hand over his smooth jaw and scowled at the dim pink world that existed before the sun rose.
Rounding the corner of the church, he found the two Dixon brothers sitting on the front steps and settled beside them.
"It's going to be hot today," he greeted.
They looked up from what they were doing and eyed him long and hard.
Touching a hand to his smooth jaw, the Lieutenant shifted in his spot. "What?"
"No need to clean yourself up on my account," Merle mocked. "I would have taken you to the prom with or without the beard, Doris."
"Embrasse mon tcheue," the Lieutenant replied. "Ready to hit the dusty trail, Texian?" He addressed Daryl.
The younger Dixon brother squinted at the grounds around them. "Maybe you should stay here," he suggested. "We might not be back for a few days."
"We're in the middle of nowhere," the Lieutenant pointed out. "Nothing's happened here yet and I doubt anything would happen while I'm gone."
"Don't worry," Merle said. "I'm going with my baby brother, you can stay here and pretty yourself up some more for me."
"Naw, you're both staying," Daryl said pushing to his feet, swinging his crossbow over his shoulder. "I'm better on my own anyways."
"I'm going," the Lieutenant insisted. "Can't stop me. Besides, you think you can dangle this whole mysterious Carol in front of me and not have my interest piqued?"
The youngest Dixon visibly tensed, his spine straightening, his jaw clenching.
At first the Lieutenant was confused, until he glanced over and saw the gears grinding away in Merle's wooden block of a head.
The older Dixon pushed to his feet carefully, mindful of the side his gunshot was on. "Is there a whole other reason you're so eager to track down this group of yours, baby bro?" Merle inquired, moving to step into Daryl's space.
The Lieutenant didn't like the intimidating way the man seemed to loom over his little brother, but kept out of it, hurrying off to gather his things for the journey.
..-~-..
..-~-..
By the time he returned, the youngest Dixon was waiting at the gate for him, looking as white hot as Satan's microwaved burrito.
Merle stood on the wall besides Sister Joan, gazing out at the world beyond it, his back to them. Father O'Rourke stood a little ways away, eye on the new man, finger on the trigger of his rifle.
"Come on," Daryl grumbled as the Lieutenant arrived.
Quietly, sheepishly, the Cajun followed him out the gate, giving Merle one last worried look.
Father O'Rourke offered to watch over the man, but the Lieutenant still felt bad about leaving. If he wasn't trying to be political in forging allies, he wouldn't be so eager to help Daryl, but as it was it sounded like allies were a necessary thing in the new world.
The two men moved down the dirt road away from the convent in tense silence.
As soon as they were a safe distance, the Lieutenant turned to the pissed off man at his side.
"I'm, uh—"
"Just shut the hell up!" The man snarled, pushing into the Cajun's personal space.
If the Lieutenant hadn't been trained in hand to hand, if he was a lover not a fighter, if his fight or flight had been flight, he would have been afraid. As it was he was concerned. Concerned he may have damaged a bit of the tentative camaraderie that the two of them had built.
"Man, I want you to just shut the fuck up!" Daryl went on, pointing at him with the borrowed Salt. The Lieutenant hadn't asked for it back and the redneck hadn't offered it.
"You don't know shit all about her!" The petit cabri went on. "So don't talk about Carol, don't even think about her anymore or I'll stomp your ass into the dirt! Got it?"
Eyeing the knife warily, the Lieutenant nodded. "Yeah, sorry."
"Fuck you." Daryl grunted, dropping his arm, tucking the blade into the belt of his pants.
The Cajun Dialect
Boo - A form of a pet name, like darling or sweetie.