Duct tape pulled tight upon skin.

Blood dripping down a wrecked face.

Growls.

Groans.

Stumbling.

Scraping.

Pizza boy's bricking it.

Who wouldn't be?

Merle can't go soft on him though. There is no scenario where he can go to the Governor without the information he requires. So he gives him one last chance to save his skin, which, as he recalls, is more than any of them gave him on that rooftop in Atlanta.

Glenn doesn't budge.

The hard way it is then.

He sets the walker free and vacates the scene.

He should probably feel bad about this, but as he sees it, the kid made his choice.

Perhaps the walker will scare sense into him. It sure as hell straightened Merle out. Indeed, there's nothing quite like the panic one experiences upon finding death so close as to breathe down your neck.

He'd been powerless. Immobile. Unable to fight back. A waiting meal.

His only option, a hacksaw. A hacksaw with a blade so dull as to be practically useless. Except, that is, when used upon something soft.

Soft as flesh.

In a moment so surreal and nightmarish as to haunt him for the rest of his days, Merle's forced to saw off his own hand to save his own life.

Oh yeah, and fight his way through a building full of walkers with an arm that looked like something out of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, gushing blood like something out of the Texas oil boom.

And last but not least; plug the gusher.

With heat.

Cauterize the wound.

He once saw a film where this was done with an iron and it is every bit as painful as it looks.

There is a moment where he nearly passes out, which would in effect spell game over what with all the biters around, but then he remembers the brothers in that film. Which in turn has him think of his own brother. He has to live. Has to know that his brother lives. Has to see him again.

So, skip to the present, but not forgetting the chain of events that lead and could only lead to this moment, one can comprehend, (if not condone), why Merle might wish to give the man that stands in his way, a dose of that which he has experienced.

Time to grow up. Do whatcha gotta do or die.

If the sounds he hears whilst departing are anything to go by, Glenn knows the deal.


The carousel speeds up and Merle has difficultly staying on his feet.

For a while, he'd had it all under control - even repelled an attack from the lovebirds, who were understandably irate after their separate ordeals and imminent execution, but then the rescue party showed up with smoke-grenades, and barely able to see the hand in front of his face, it all went pear-shaped for Merle and Team Woodbury from there.

Fortunately, the Governor got what he wanted from the girlfriend.

Unfortunately, during the attack someone took his eye.

Merle remembers thinking at the time that he wouldn't want to be that guy because the man is livid.

Not 10 minutes later, however, he's in the arena being informed that (in a roundabout way) he is that guy, and he's expected to prove his loyalty to Woodbury by fighting his brother to the death.

Not exactly the reunion he'd been hoping for.

So, he does what he always does when his back's against the wall: he fights in the hope to fight another day. And this particular fight might be of the pro-wrestling variety (because there's no way he'd ever really hurt Daryl), but these people want a show and ever the showman, Merle gives them what they came for.

By the time walkers are added to the mix, Merle starts to get nervous however, because they are an unpredictable element and as weary as the brothers are, it's easy to make a mistake.

He need not have worried.

The cavalry arrives on cue and all descends into a chaos of darkness, gunfire and smoke.

The crowd hoofs it and Merle wisely finishes off all walkers between them and the exit. At some point, he feels compelled to glance behind him and catches a glimpse of the Governor that gives him the chills. He could swear the bastard gets off on all this - wandering through a gunfight like bullets can have nothing on him. It reminds him of something he'd forgotten...

Someone.

He freezes instantly.

"Merle?"

Ah.

Daryl has noticed.

"I caint."

The agony in his tone has Daryl's eyes wider than Merle has ever seen them. In a life filled with surprise at big brother's unpredictable behaviour that is quite a feat.

"I caint leave her."

Daryl looks at him as if he's insane.

"What the f*ck are you talkin' about?"

"I caint... She's all alone..."

"Merle!?" He's angry now because in the middle of this shitshow this is utterly absurd. Were Merle his usual self, he'd probably find it amusing, but he isn't that man right now - fear has him in a vice-like grip and he's simply unable to do the only sensible thing to be done because that would lay her wide open to whatever the Governor might do to her and he cannot bear that thought, he cannot live with it, he won't.

It seems he will have to however, because seconds later the decision is made for him. They are being fired at. Someone drops nearby; signalling the lunacy of his inaction and any thought of making it through the compound to the cellar suddenly seems ludicrous. They'd cut him off down there. Block any chance of escape. He'd be a sitting duck.

So, he has to suck it up, because he can't help her if he's dead. He's no good to anybody then.

Having seen the light, he lets the last dregs of his adrenaline carry him out the compound, making sure to stick close to his brother all the way.

.*.*.

It doesn't take long for Daryl to lose it.

He goes ballistic as soon as he deems them a safe enough distance from the town.

Wants to know what his hesitation to leave Psychoville was all about.

Rick breaks it up because they're attracting walkers and they've had enough close encounters with the dead for one day, only to have to do it all again once they reach Glenn and this week's special guest star; not dead Michonne.

In the face of such popularity, Merle cannot help but turn up his own particular blend of charm to eleven - sticking in everyone's craw as only an expert in that particular field can. It's hard to tell whose offence he enjoys the most, though Michonne's expression upon being informed of Andrea's extracurricular activities with the Governor, ("he's been puttin' the wood to yer girlfriend big time baby!"), was especially satisfying, he has to admit.

On a roll, he continues to run his mouth - heaping insult upon injury, which eventually has Officer Friendly step in with his signature brand of friendliness, i.e. violence. Considering how little gas he had in the tank, Merle reckons it can't have taken much to knock him out and it's probably better he isn't in on their powwow (where they decide what to do with him), because he'd likely tell them all to go to hell anyway.

A dumb idea if ever there was one. For if there is one thing he has overlooked in all the excitement, it's that he has ended up precisely where he didn't want to be – on the outside. There can be no return to Woodbury. Nor can he expect a place at the prison, no matter how fond they might be of his brother. So, in the space of a day he's pretty much lost everything. It's back to a hunter-gatherer existence from here on out - sleeping with one eye open, trying to keep one step ahead of the dead.

And what about her? What will happen to her now?

He at least has his brother back, but what does she have? Will the Governor take revenge upon him through her? Will Milton protect her? What will she think of him? Will someone even tell her he's gone? Will she be left waiting - ignorant to all that has occurred and left to fear the worst?


A rift has opened up between the brothers.

At first, Merle doesn't see it because he's too busy revelling in the fact that Daryl chose him over Rick and the group to notice.

A big mistake.

Indeed, Merle has taken Daryl's forbearance for granted far too long. Enjoyed the free pass that comes with family.

Now there are storm clouds on the horizon. Storm clouds that come when expectation and reality do not resemble one another. And boy, do they not resemble one another here.

Daryl had expected joy to find Merle again, after all, what were the odds that he lived? Oh, he knew he was tough, only Merle could kill Merle etc. but even a man who can crap out nails is up against it in this world.

He got to experience that joy for all of a second. Then Glenn poured a bucket of cold water all over it. Disappointment doesn't even begin to cover it. Not that he had time for that because he was too busy enjoying Woodbury hospitality in the arena. No, the full impact of that would come later when he left the only decent family he'd ever known standing by the roadside.

The payoff was Merle.

And Merle might be the only kin he had left in this world, (and the unspoken rule was that kin stick together), but jesus christ, he was an ungrateful asshole.

Rick had been in no way obliged to help Merle out of Woodbury. Were it not for Daryl, he'd have doubtless left him there. After all, why would you take in a player from the opposing side? And this wasn't just any player, but one of the most integral players, so integral in fact, that they would resort to torture to find out where your side was based. Hardly a résumé to be proud of, eh?

So yeah, Rick didn't go for it. Daryl didn't blame him. And Merle was just Merle. Heaping derision upon the people who basically just saved his ass. Daryl found it surreal.

He kept wondering when an explanation was going to come, but it didn't. Or at least some acknowledgement of the role he'd played in the shit that had gone down, but no, Merle just took potshots at everyone else because god forbid he should acknowledge his own shortcomings. Daryl wouldn't mind, but in all the conversations they had in the hours that followed, not one word was spoken about the girl Merle had been so reluctant to leave behind, and Daryl might have been nursing a broken heart of his own of sorts, but he was observant enough to notice this gaping omission.

It was just as he was about to cut through the crap by asking him about it, that a strange sound caught his attention.

"You hear that?"

"Yeah, wild animals gettin' wild."

"It's a baby."

"Oh come on, why don't you just piss in my ear an' tell me it's rainin?"

Daryl knew the feeling.

Merle had been doing just that since the moment he'd set eyes on him again. Maybe that's why when Merle decides to help himself to some loot from that poor family's car, Daryl puts a stop to it.

He's done with being lead a dance for one day. It's time to do some leading of his own.


You had to have known.

He denies it, but the truth is, he had.

The world is not some place of fairy tales. When you leave a person behind it doesn't mean they don't exist. The tangled landscape of scars upon his brother's back was confirmation of that.

And what had begun as the inevitable blow up between the siblings had taken a very dark turn indeed.

Merle wasn't proud of it. A better man would've tried to get his brother out. Instead, he chose to leave him behind.

"I had to man... I woulda killed him otherwise..."

He practically winces upon saying this because it sounds ridiculous. Any excuse would, but in this world where killing was an inevitable evil, and where Merle had killed people infinitely more deserving of life than their piece of trash father, it seems particularly feeble.

Ridiculous sounding or not, it was the truth. Feeble or not, that's how it was.

Merle might have been many things at the time, but he was not a murderer. And his father might have deserved it, but murder was not a thing back then. And it might have spared Daryl years of misery, but it wasn't to be. Merle chose differently. He chose self-preservation. He wanted out, he got out. He didn't look back. It was selfish and cowardly, but that is a fair description of where he was at at that stage in his life. We like to believe in stories of people overcoming their fears to triumph over their demons, but sometimes that's not how the story goes. Merle was no more able to go toe to toe with Will Dixon than Daryl was years later. Both ended up leaving. Wished countless times that things had turned out differently, but they hadn't.

Sometimes we do not overcome our fears. Sometimes the demons triumph instead. Sometimes the bad people of this world go unpunished. Sometimes the only thing you are able to do is walk away.

It isn't right and it isn't fair, but rightness and fairness are not something we can have just because we want them. The universe does not right our wrongs for us, it just is. A bitter pill to swallow, but it's not as if we have a choice.

If there is a victory to be had, it is in taking consolation in the good things in this world. The good people. The ones who will stand by you in the best and worst of times. Daryl knew people like that. They were in his thoughts now. Their trust in him and appreciation of him had replaced all ideas of unworthiness his father had once instilled in him. In that respect, he was richer and lived a better life than Will Dixon ever did.

Merle was another story. Old demons still had their hooks in him. The drugs had merely amplified this. Had him mixing in ugly circles with uglier people. He'd always figured he'd either end up dead or in prison. Funnily enough, (by a somewhat circuitous route), this is pretty much the choice he's being presented with right now. Not for the first time, he feels as if he's the butt of some cosmic joke.

"I can't go with ya. I tried to kill that black bitch... an' I damn near killed the Chinese kid."

"He's Korean."

"Whatever!" Merle's face screws up in exasperation, "Doesn't matter, I just can't go with ya."

"You know, I may be the one walkin' away, but you're the one that's leavin'. Again."

Merle can only look on in shocked silence as his brother's ragged form disappears into the forest. He takes a moment to curse under his breath before he gets moving.