Hey you! I'm sorry that there's so much actual episode dialogue in here but I felt the need to put it in because it needed to be told.
Next couple of chapters will be my own material, though! =)

setting: episode 9 "The Suicide King"

Damnation

Chapter 34 - Parting

The first thing he noticed when they came out of the woods was that Connor wasn't there. He could see the green car and Glenn and the strange woman, but there was no blonde guy with an injured shoulder, no nothing. Daryl tried to convince himself was that everything was alright, that the Irishman was certainly sitting inside the Hyundai to rest for a bit.

"Glenn!" Rick called out and the hunter saw how the Korean and the woman approached them, but there was still no Connor.

The younger Dixon was slowly starting to panic. What made it even worse was the fact that he just knew that shit was about to go down in a minute,
simply because Merle was with them, the very man who had tortured the member of their group less than 24 hours ago.

"Glenn. Now we got a problem here. I need you to back off" Rick tried to reason with him, but it was already too late.

Glenn was already pointing his gun at Daryl's brother, and the strange woman had already drawn her katana as well.

"What the hell is he doing here?!" Glenn spat and pointed his gun at Merle.

The younger Dixon placed himself in front of his brother to protect him. The older Dixon just put his hands in the air with a grin on his face.

"Hey hey hey! Put it down!" Daryl demanded and the whole group started talking and yelling at once.

Rick tried to calm the woman down, who was reacting just as intensely and tried to stab Merle with her katana.

"He tried to kill me!" she yelled and Daryl turned around to look at his brother.

The grin on his face told him everything he needed to know. Jeez. His brother, the troublemaker. How he had missed that. Not.

"Drop the sword!" Rick demanded and Daryl turned around to look at the rest of the group.

Glenn was still furious and had his gun up in the air.

"If it wasn't for him-" he tried to say but the younger Dixon had enough and interrupted him mid sentence.

"He helped us get out of there!"

Rick snorted and looked at Daryl with an angry frown.

"Yeah, right after he beat the shit out of you!"

The hunter narrowed his eyes but decided to let it be.
He didn't want to make the whole yelling and fighting any worse, but his brother was already there to put a spoke in his wheel.

"Hey! We both took our licks, man!" the older Dixon announced and his younger half turned around to give him an angry stare.

"Jackass" he growled and Merle got angry as well.

"Hey, shut up!" he spat and Daryl instinctively backed off, but this time Rick stepped in.

"Enough!" he demanded, but all hell broke loose again.

The woman tried to attack Merle again although Rick told her to put her katana away, and when Glenn wouldn't stop waving the gun around in front of Daryl's face the hunter finally exploded as well.

"Man, get that thing out of my face!" he yelled and everybody finally calmed down a bit.

The younger Dixon tried to calm down, too, but ever since Merle was back he realized that he was just too tense to do anything like that. He was so annoyed by the fact how everyone was freaking out, how Merle couldn't keep his goddamn mouth shut, and how Connor, of all people, wasn't here now. Although the Irishman could be quite a hothead as well he had been rather good at this, the whole staying calm and trying to reason with people first before letting his fists and cursing talk. The uncertainty was driving the hunter insane, and he was still trying to keep telling himself that Connor had returned to the car and was now waiting inside, although he knew that this was very unlikely. Because he was sure the Irishman would have come out by now, attracted by the sheer noise they were making. But the car was just standing there, and it were just the six of them here. Just six.

"Hey, looks like you've gone native, brother" Merle said and snapped his younger half out of it, and Daryl exploded right away.

"No more than you hanging out with that psycho back there!" he spat and tried to shove his brother.

In the end he wouldn't dare doing so, though, because he was still actually afraid of his big brother and respected his strength and dominance too much.

"Oh, yeah, man. He is a charmer, I gotta tell you that" the older Dixon answered and looked at the mysterious woman with a chuckle.

"Been putting the wood to your girlfriend Andrea big time, baby" he went on and started twirling and licking with his tongue.

Daryl rolled his eyes and decided to ignore this bit. He turned his head to look at the car again instead.

Come on, dumbass. Get your ass outta there.

Glenn and the others seemed rather surprised though.

"What? Andrea's in Woodbury?" the Korean asked and Daryl nodded.

"Right next to the Governor" he muttered and remembered her standing there in this insane crowd, looking at him with wide eyes, trying to beg this sicko to stop.

He startled when the woman suddenly darted forward and tried to stab Merle again, and the hunter was left no choice but to back off and dodge the sword attack.

"I told you to drop that!" Rick commanded and approached the woman to press her katana down.

"You know Andrea?"

She just stared at Daryl's brother with furious eyes and wouldn't answer, no matter how many times Rick asked her. It was kind of ironic how little she would talk, and the hunter couldn't help but remember how Connor had compared her quietness to his own. He didn't talk very much either, but this woman was a whole different story. Because she didn't talk at all. Daryl shook his head with an angry frown. Why the fuck couldn't he stop thinking about this stupid leprechaun? They had bigger problems right now, and the blonde was waiting inside the car. Yep. He was waiting inside the car. No need to worry. He needed to focus on this mess now...

He looked at the woman again and was surprised when she finally nodded.

Merle chuckled behind him and started talking again, and Daryl had to grit his teeth because, goddamn, his brother was so annoying.

"Yep, she does. Her and blondie spent all winter cuddling up in the forest. Mmm mmm mm."

There it was again. Blondie. That fucking Irish weirdo had been blonde. And they had spent all winter together, too. And now that asshole was..
Daryl tried to stop the thoughts right then. Connor was waiting inside the car. End of discussion.

"Yeah. My Nubian queen here had two pet walkers. No arms, cut off the jaws, kept them in chains. Kind of ironic now that I think about it."

Why wouldn't this asshole just shut up?

"Shut up, bro!" Daryl yelled and was surprised how good it actually felt to let go of some of that anger that was building up inside him ever since Merle had come back and Connor..Jesus, why wouldn't he stop thinking about that crap?!

His brother chuckled and pointed at the woman.

"Hey, man, we snagged them out of the woods. Andrea was close to dying."

"Is that why she's with him?" Maggie asked and Merle nodded.

"Yeah. Snug as two little bugs. So what you gonna do now, Sheriff, huh?"

Glenn seemed to be the only one who noticed how Daryl was slowly losing it. He was looking at the hunter with a worried look in his face, saw how the younger Dixon kept searching the surrounding woods and kept looking at the car.

"Surrounded by a bunch of liars, thugs and cowards" Merle went on and seemed to enjoy the fact how he could finally provoke all the others and especially Rick again.

"Shut up!" the policeman muttered and eyed the woman, who still wouldn't tell them much.

"Daryl?"

The hunter startled when he heard his name. Glenn had never stopped staring at him.
The younger Dixon turned his head to look at him with an angry frown.

"Where's Connor?"

The hunter gritted his teeth and was just about to answer, but once again Merle wouldn't stop talking.

"Oh, man, look at this. Pathetic. All these guns and no bullets in them.."

The pain in his chest, the fact that Glenn didn't know where Connor was, that the car was empty and Merle just wouldn't shut up finally drove the hunter over the edge.

"Shut up!" he yelled as loud as he could, and the anger was fully dominating him now.

His brother still wouldn't back off and got furious as well. He approached Daryl and clenched his fist.

"Shut up yourself! Bunch of pussies you roll..."

He couldn't speak on because Rick had knocked him out with a hard blow to the back of his head.

"Asshole."

He just needed a fucking break. Even though Merle was "switched off" now the whole annoying nightmare wouldn't end, because there was no solution to the real problem.
The group didn't want the older Dixon with them.

"It won't work" Rick tried to explain to the younger, but Daryl wouldn't have any of that.

"It's gotta" he retorted, because damn right it had to. Merle was his brother.

"It'll stir things up" the former policeman said to this, but the hunter wouldn't give in.

Of course he knew that it would make the whole thing worse, but Merle was family, why wouldn't they get that?

"Look, the Governor is probably on the way to the prison right now. Merle knows how he thinks and we could use the muscle" he argued against that, but it looked like the rest of the group had set up their minds anyway.

"I'm not having him at the prison" Maggie said.

"Do you really want him sleeping in the same cell block as Carol and Beth?" Glenn asked and Daryl just had to snort.

"He ain't a rapist!" he exclaimed.

Sure, Merle was no butterfly, but did they really think he would put up with a bloody rapist?
After everything he had done to that real rapist kid back on the farm?!

"Well, his buddy is" Glenn countered and Daryl rolled his eyes.

"They ain't buddies no more. Not after last night."

Of course he was mad at Merle for actually staying with someone as sick as the Governor, but it wasn't like it was something new. His big brother had been friends with many shady sickos before, and that was exactly the reason why he needed Daryl with him. Because the younger Dixon was the only one who could keep his brother somewhat on the right tracks.

"There's no way Merle's gonna live there without putting everyone at each other's throats" Rick spoke up and the hunter snorted once more.

He turned around to point at the woman, who was waiting for them by their car.

"So you're gonna cut Merle loose and bring the last samurai home with us?"

Rick shook his head.

"She's not coming back."

Daryl sighed.

"Well, yah took Connor in and took him back to the RV although he looked like some seriously shady bastard, and you also took him back in when he returned with all the immunity and infectiousness crap, and that worked out, didn't it?"

Rick put his hands on his hips.

"Well, Connor wasn't like Merle. And he sure was a better brother to you than Merle ever was."

Daryl was surprised how much freaking past tense could hurt. Because Rick was right. Connor hadn't been like Merle. He had been stupid enough to bring him up.
There was no comparison at all.

"But Merle's blood. He ain't gonna be a threat to us no more. He's family" the hunter tried to bring his last and best argument up.

Because he knew how this group worked, how every single member of this group worked. It was all about family and relationships and nothing else.
So they sure would give him his family, wouldn't they?

"No. Merle's your blood" Glenn said and Daryl looked at him.

"My blood, my family is standing right here and waiting for us back at the prison."

"And you're part of that family. But he's not. He's not. We started something last night. You realize that? We need you with us" Rick joined in and the hunter looked at them all.

He hated them all for actually making him choose. Because they were right. They were his family, maybe not by blood but by bond. He had felt at home with them, and even he had to admit how much he had grown because of them. But Merle was his real family, why wouldn't they get that, why couldn't they understand that? He would never make Rick pick Carl and little asskicker or the group. He would never make Maggie pick her father and sister or Glenn. So why were they doing this to him now? He heard how Merle groaned and woke up behind them and turned around. There he had the answer. They made him choose because they weren't his real family like Merle, they made him choose because they didn't want to understand and because they were selfish.

"Man, y'all don't know!" he growled and got even more angry when he saw all the pleading looks they were giving him.

He remembered what Merle had told him.

Ain't nobody gonna care about you 'cept me little brother ain't nobody ever will.

Even Connor's words were ringing in his head now.

The real problem here is that that stupid group doesn't get ye. And you let 'em treat ye like shit.

Now that he thought about it it just made perfect sense. Damn right. Family, my ass. Real family would never make you choose like that. And why are they begging you now? Because they need you. For what? Not as valued family member and because he was such a good person. They just needed his man power. His crossbow in their stupid war against the Governor. Only two men had ever really cared about him, appreciated him as a friend and as brother, not just as weapon. Not just as Daryl, the watchdog, the one who brought food. He remembered what Connor had told him just a couple of days ago.

Like you? Go Daryl, fetch this fer me Daryl, kill these people fer me Daryl, feed my wife fer me Daryl... And you jump and fetch, no matter what he says.

No.

Only two men had never really used him like that. One of them was gone. The other one was waiting for him.
So he looked at the waiting group again, who was obviously begging him to stay but wouldn't actually speak it out, so he snorted and looked down.

"Fine. We'll fend for ourselves" he muttered and the group got excited all over again.

"That's not what I was saying" Glenn said and Daryl shrugged.

He knew that they hadn't meant it like that, but there was no way he would go anywhere without Merle.

"No him, no me."

Maggie looked at him and shook her head.

"Daryl, you don't have to do that" she said and Daryl raised an eyebrow.

Why would she even talk to him like that? They didn't even really know each other for that long.

"It was always Merle and I before this" he informed her and didn't just mean the apocalypse, but in general.

Merle had pretty much been his only friend before the apocalypse. And they had been through so much shit together, so many years..If it weren't for Connor then he wouldn't even have known any real friends apart from Merle. Although you couldn't even really call his brother a friend. But he had just said so himself. Blood was blood after all.

"Don't" Maggie kept begging, but the hunter ignored her.

"You serious?" Glenn asked, but Daryl just kept looking at Rick.

Truth be told, he was waiting for him to say something. Out of all those people, Rick had been closest to a friend, although their leader was probably just using him as his right hand after Shane's death. He had always been okay with that role, he had always respected that man although his whole decision-making was going downhill ever since Shane's and Lori's death, but still. Rick's opinion had always mattered to him, so why wasn't he speaking up now? Glenn was the one who wouldn't stop talking then.

"You're just gonna leave like that?" he asked and Daryl actually got mad at him.

Of course, he could understand the condition the Korean was in. His stupid big brother had beaten the man up after all, but why wouldn't he just give him a break now? The way he was talking it sounded like he was making Daryl the bad guy now. And how hypocritical he actually was. As if he would do anything else if it were about Maggie.

"You'd do the same thing!" he countered, but Glenn wouldn't let go.

"What do you want us to tell Carol?"

The hunter sighed. Of course they had to bring up the people that mattered to him now. He knew that it was cruel to leave them behind, and he was sure that he would really miss them. But that wouldn't change a thing. The woman wasn't his girlfriend. Little asskicker wasn't his daughter and Carl wasn't his little brother. Those were Rick's children. Merle, on the other hand, was his brother. And that was all that mattered.

"She'll understand" the younger Dixon just said and looked at Rick, waiting for him to say something to that.

But the policeman kept quiet. He was just staring at him. Daryl was disappointed, because this just proved that Merle and Connor were right. They were fighting for Daryl Dixon, the crossbow, the fighter, the right hand. Not for Daryl Dixon, the friend. And he certainly didn't want that anymore. Connor had taught him that he deserved more than that. And the Irishman had also taught him that brothers were more important than anything else. Because without them you might as well hang yourself.

"Say goodbye to your pop for me" the hunter muttered as he passed Maggie.

The others were running after him, but he just kept going.

"Daryl, are you serious? Daryl!" Glenn yelled, and Daryl turned his head when he heard how someone rushed after him.

"Hey. Hey" he heard him say and was actually surprised when he realized that it was Rick.

"There's gotta be another way" the former policeman pleaded, but the hunter kept walking.

"Don't ask me to leave him. I already did that once. I lost my best friend today. Ain't gonna lose my brother, too."

"And what do you want me to tell Connor when he comes back to the prison? If you think we're not worth it, do it for him at least.
Are you seriously choosing Merle over Connor and us? After everything you two.."

"Yeah, well. Connor ain't coming back" the hunter interrupted him with an unreadable expression on his face.

Rick had quite some trouble keeping up with him as they made their way to the car because Daryl seriously just wanted to get out.

"How can you be so sure about this? You saw the laboratory, he got out, he's out there somewhere and..."

"Even if he got out, yah saw the blood. He got bit. You saw what it did t'him last time. Ain't no way he's gonna survive that all on his own.
The leprechaun's lost and I'm leaving. End of discussion."

"You can't just give up so easily, we need you."

Daryl stopped walking and looked at Rick with an angry frown.

"You think this is easy for me?"

The policeman sighed.

"Look, I know how much Connor meant to you, that this really is about him, that's not going to be inside the prison when we get back, but that's no.."

"It ain't about this stupid leprechaun!" Daryl spat and Rick looked at him in surprise. The hunter sighed.

"This is about Merle. It's always been 'bout Merle. So even if that dumbass survived and comes back, I don't care. I've known him for a year. Merle's my brother, I've known him all my life. No him, no me. That's all I can say" Daryl answered and stared Rick down.

He shook his head and was glad that they had finally reached the back of the Hyundai.

"Should he manage to get his stupid ass back to you, tell him that I don't need him no longer. That I got Merle now. That he should stay with you people and that I.."

He had opened the hatchback of the car by now to get his emergency backpack but had to stop talking when he saw that Connor's was still in there as well. For a moment he just stared at it, then he gritted his teeth and pushed it away with an angry growl to get his own.

"Just tell him to watch his ass" he muttered and checked his backpack to make sure that everything was inside.

"And you take care of yourself, too. Take care of lil ass-kicker, Carl."

Daryl put his backpack on and looked at Rick again, hoping to hear one thing that would actually make him stay.
But Rick was just looking at him, all helpless and confused.

"He's one tough kid" Daryl said with a nod and considered this his goodbye.

Rick still wouldn't say anything, so the hunter headed back to get to his brother, who was still standing where he had been knocked out just a couple of minutes ago.
He heard how Maggie and Glenn were calling after him, but he decided to ignore their calls.

"Come on, bro" he muttered and put a hand on his brother's back.

Merle was obviously still a bit dizzy because of the attack with the gun, but that wouldn't stop him from wrapping an arm around his brother's shoulder with a pleased grin. Daryl gave his former group a final and longing stare, hoping to see them come up with something that would make him stay, but Rick and the others were just staring back at him, completely petrified. Daryl felt a big lump in his throat because he knew that this was goodbye, that he would probably regret this decision later, but he still kept going. Soon he and Merle disappeared in the woods.