Hey, guys. So today's chapter title is a grim, Alice in Wonderland kind of song by Glass Animals called "Mama's Gun". It's a really cool song that I think perfectly sets the tone of this chapter. Anyway, please let me know what you think!
16. Mama's Gun
They ran far and fast, in complete disregard of sore limbs and tears. Branches whipped them till they bled. Cannibal shadows hunted them. The prison faded but they could still see the smoke.
Mason kept moving for as long as she could, but eventually she collapsed. The sickness was gone, but she hadn't been given a chance to recover. Her lungs felt like they were bleeding all over again. Her throat was raw.
Daryl set up camp around her as much as he could with what little he could find. Beth sat next to her, staring mutely into the distance like she was seeing something else. Mason didn't have to ask to know what that something was. It kept replaying in her mind, too.
When she felt rested enough to return to her feet, Mason helped Daryl gather firewood. Something about the simple process of it, having something to do… It didn't make her feel better, but it cleared her mind a little.
They kept the fire low as the sun went down. Most of the walkers in the area had been drawn to the prison, but they didn't want to take the chance either way. The temperature dropped with the night's arrival. Beth and Mason curled up against a tree, watching regretfully as the flames dwindled into embers. Daryl kept watch, sometimes hovering near their tree, sometimes pacing back and forth. In spite of her exhaustion, Mason never slept. She couldn't stand to close her eyes.
Beth woke just before dawn but she didn't move. She lay in Mason's lap, staring up at the steel-blue sky, and Mason didn't dare disturb her until the sun pierced the leaves.
Numbly she kissed the crown of Beth's head and stood up. Her head reeled but her body was restless. She needed something to do. The night had passed too slowly, trapping her with her thoughts, and she needed desperately to move.
Daryl grabbed her arm as she passed him, hard enough to hurt. He eyed her silently.
Quietly, she said, "Hunting." Her voice was a stranger's voice.
When he made to follow, she pressed a hand to his chest and growled, "No."
His eyes narrowed. "You ain't goin' out there alone."
"You're not leaving Beth alone."
He looked about to argue, but obviously thought better of it. Chewing agitatedly on his lip, he strode back to their makeshift camp. She was alone.
She set to work immediately, wasting no time in constructing a trap, one of the ones Daryl taught her nearly a year ago. It kept her busy, and she let her thoughts be consumed by the simple, physical act of it. When she was finished, all too soon, she hunkered down nearby to wait.
She'd forgotten how loud silence could be.
It took less time than she thought it would to snare a rabbit, but it felt to her like several eternities. Eternities in which her mind spun in the same gruesome circle, playing the same images over and over until she felt the looming winter of insanity.
Hershel was gone. The prison was gone. Her family, nearly all the people she loved…
Her breath caught sharply, her lungs and stomach burned, and only then did she become aware of the tears blurring her vision.
She tried to blink them away, but they were urgent, violent, like an entire ocean had built up behind her eyes. Curling in on herself, mouth wide in a silent wail, she let the pain have her.
She didn't make a sound. She couldn't afford to. The agony of keeping silent nearly cracked her in half.
Hershel was gone.
The prison was gone.
Her family…
But Beth is alive. And Daryl. You have to keep them safe. That is all that matters now. That's all that's left.
This thought was the only thing that brought her back to some semblance of sanity. And when she returned to Beth and Daryl with the rabbit, her face was a perfect, emotionless mask.
~m~
They gathered empty cans from a dumpster behind a gas station. The building itself was empty, and looked as though it had been long before the world fell apart. There was nothing else to scavenge aside from some worn twine and a handful of strawberries growing under the window.
By the glow of another low fire, they strung up cans to cordon their campsite. They split strawberries in the twilight and watched the sparks live out there microscopic lives against a stage of black.
They didn't talk about what happened. It was all they saw when they looked at each other, and even that was too much.
~m~
The third day began with mind-numbing sameness. They sat watching each other as the sun came up, oblivious to the chill. No one bothered to stoke the anemic fire. No one complained as a handful of insipid green pecans was passed around for breakfast. Mason traced the edges of her iPod, her headphones, but the usual desire to slip them on was gone from her.
Eventually Daryl stood, hefting his crossbow over his shoulder. Mason and Beth blinked at him.
"Hunting," he growled by way of explanation.
When he had gone, the silence pressed in just a little more. Like water, filling his absence. Mason watched the wind tease the trees, appraising the flicker of every shadow for any sign of unexpected company.
"When Daryl gets back, we should start searchin'."
It took Mason a moment to realize that Beth had spoken, that it wasn't her mind playing tricks.
It took a second longer to process her words, but she asked the question anyway.
"Search for what?"
"The others."
Mason looked at her, and was surprised at the steadiness in her eyes. The conviction.
"Beth…"
"Don't."
It was there in her voice, too. That steel. It was the sharpened point of a sword.
"Don't tell me they're not alive. We don't know that. And I won't believe it."
Mason sighed, exhausted before the words were out of her mouth.
"We don't know that they are. We can't…we can't go running off in search of a maybe."
"How can you say that? My sister is out there. If there's even a chance she's still alive I won't stop lookin'."
Mason's heart throbbed with agony. The air dragged in her lungs. She couldn't think about this, she didn't want to. She couldn't stand maybes.
"Beth, we got out. You, me and Daryl, that is all that matters now. We have to-"
"No!"
In spite of herself, Mason flinched. Beth glared at her with unwavering ferocity.
"That's bullshit and you know it! You're scared? So am I. That's part of carin' about people. You promised me you wouldn't disappear again. That hasn't changed."
"It has."
"It hasn't-"
"It has."
Now Mason was seething, too, her hands shaking, her stomach surging with anger. She took a shuddering breath, blinking as her vision blurred.
"We escaped. You, me and Daryl. And now that is all that matters, and I will do anything I have to to keep you two safe, I will give up every part of me to do that, because I cannot fucking lose you. I won't."
She was burning with rage, burning with agony, but she wasn't too far gone to feel it when Beth wrapped her arms around her. She shuddered into the embrace, submitting to her wrenching sobs. Beth pressed her lips to Mason's ear and whispered, soft and insistent.
"I know you're scared, Mason. But this isn't like before. It isn't. And you won't lose us. I promise I'm not goin' anywhere. But…we can't just sit here like everythin' is over, because it isn't. Until I see otherwise, Maggie is alive. Glenn is alive. Rick, Michonne, Carl, they're all waitin' for us. It isn't like before. It isn't over."
It took a while. They clung to each other, exchanging tears, heavy in their shared grief.
But they weren't alone. There was that.
At some point, when the tears ran dry, Mason offered Beth a smile. It was hollow and tired, but it was there.
"I'm going to find Daryl. Will you be alright here for a minute?"
Beth rolled her eyes. "You taught me how to protect myself. I think I'll be just fine."
"If you run into any trouble, fire your gun. I'll come running."
Tracking Daryl was simple. All those lessons he'd given her paid off when she found him just a few minutes away from the campsite. Ignoring his glare, she leaned up against a tree and, after a moment, he relaxed next to her.
They were silent for a while. Mason watched the trees and twirled her headphone cord.
"Beth wants to start looking for the others," she finally said. "I don't know…if we'll find anyone. But she wants to try, and I'm going to help her."
Daryl looked at her, all of her own doubts clear in his eyes, and once again she felt that terrible kinship between them. That grim understanding.
"You and I both know how it is out here," she continued. "I'm going to stay alive to keep her alive. To keep you alive. But… If anything happens, you keep her safe. No matter what."
Daryl tensed. "We're keepin' each other safe," he growled.
"For as long as we can," Mason agreed. "But it can't be her. If something happens… It can't be her. You promise me that if I'm not around-"
"You will be."
"If I'm not around, you keep her safe. Promise me."
Without responding, Daryl pushed off from the tree and began pacing back and forth, teeth worrying the inside of his lip. Mason watched him patiently, and didn't flinch when he whipped around, eyes blazing, and jabbed his finger in her direction.
"I ain't promisin' shit. We're gonna protect each other together," he spat.
"Daryl."
"Don't. Just don't."
He strode off, everything about his posture screaming angry. Mason followed him slowly, keeping her eyes out for walkers, her ears peeled for the report of a gun. Neither came. They returned to camp with two squirrels and a handful of riper pecans.
~m~
Sitting around the fire that night, each of them sensed a change in the other. Something had broken- it was a return of feeling for better or worse- so it didn't seem out of place when Mason placed the headphones gently over Beth's ears and pressed play.
The song was a promise as much as it was a comfort, and they smiled as they mouthed the words to each other.
"No grave can hold my body down,
I'll crawl home to her."
Daryl watched them, his expression unreadable. When Mason caught his eye, he got to his feet and disappeared into the dark.
She sighed and looked up through the branches to the stars. He needed time, just like she had. She might not make it, and she was well aware of this, but it would be unacceptable if Beth didn't. She would not let that happen, and Daryl would come to see that. He was her best friend.
A sudden rustling in the woods caught her attention, far off but moving toward them quickly. As it honed in on their campsite, Mason scrambled to her feet, drawing her gun. Startled, Beth yanked the headphones down around her neck.
"What's goin' on?"
Daryl appeared before Mason could answer, leaping over their barrier of clatter cans with his crossbow drawn.
"It's a herd. We gotta go," he hissed.
Mason reached for Beth and pulled her to her feet, just as the snarling horde reached the barrier.
The first wave tangled in the strings but the second trampled them into the ground. Mason, Daryl and Beth escaped by inches, sneaking hurriedly through the dark. They had no hope of making it very far, however, as more walkers surged out of the trees from their chosen direction.
"Back. Back," Daryl said, and now Mason took the lead, cleaving a path through their pursuers, back in the direction of their overrun camp.
Her mind whirled, lost in a panic. Where did they think they could go now, surrounded as they were? How did they ever think they could fight this off? Still, she fought, slashing her fire poker with practiced skill, listening behind her to make sure Beth and Daryl stayed close.
It happened in a confusion of snarling and clustered limbs.
A pocket of walkers surrounded Mason, snapping at her from all sides. In a desperate attempt to free herself, she crouched down and jabbed her iron up through the abdomen of one of them, forcing it back. Drenching her with viscera, it tumbled like a felled tree and she rolled with it. And Beth's hand slipped from hers.
Cursing, she clambered to her feet. She had made it all the way back to the camp. The fire still burned, and walkers still struggled in the mess of clatter cans, the noise of them drawing more and more. A steady stream of them shambled in front of her, discounting her gore-addled scent in favor of fresher meat.
When her eyes fell on Beth and Daryl, a pitiful island shrinking in a surge of dead bodies, the world slowed.
Her pulse narrowed to a steady meter, loud in her ears, engulfing other sounds. Beth called her name, but she heard it only distantly. Looping her poker over one shoulder, she drew two burning branches from the fire and faced the walkers.
"Hey! Over here! Hey!"
One by one, the horde turned, mesmerized by her waving torches. In a matter of seconds, the tides turned and there was no more time. Mason looked over the heads of the walkers and shouted.
"Daryl!"
His eyes met hers then, and there was that terrible understanding, flooded with so much grief Mason felt her own limbs weighed down by it.
She didn't need to say another word. There was no more time.
Daryl grabbed Beth by the arm. Mason caught a last glimpse of her frantic face and then it was time to run.
The walkers followed dutifully like a school of fish. She stayed only far enough ahead that they would not catch her. Her breathing was even and strong. She knew she could run all night if she had to.
When she'd led them a safe distance away, she broke into a sprint, arcing around them back the way they had come. She'd done her job, she'd kept Beth and Daryl safe, and now her heart seized its opportunity to anguish.
The clamor of snared walkers greeted her at the campsite. She dispatched them with vigor, calling for Beth and Daryl as she finished.
No one called back.
Mason hurried to the spot where she had last seen them. It took a little time to pick their footprints out from the mess the horde had left, but eventually she found them. Heart hammering, she followed their tracks through the woods, using her torches to light the way. As she moved, she hissed their names into the dark, hoping for a reply that never came.
She stopped when she came to a place where the undergrowth was trampled, fouled by the unmistakable shambling marks of walkers. Blood soaked the ground. Whatever footprints Beth and Daryl had left had drowned in the churned mud.
Frantically she turned in circles, searching till her eyes burned from the strain.
But the trail was gone.
Gone like it had never been.