The luck runs out the next day.
They are so close, 20 or 30 miles, maybe. Almost back. Just the next town over.
They'd taken turns watching the mansion all night. Nothing had moved, except a rabbit near dawn that took off into the woods when he rolled the window down. They ate cold canned chickpeas for breakfast. His knees still ached, and he just wants to get back to the group, so he decides not to waste another day checking the whole place. They'd get back and see what shook out with the others. Figure it out then.
The car is real low on gas, the extra can empty. And he needs cigarettes.
The town's in varying states of decay and destruction. Some dead wander, some are stuck, but they don't cross any big herds. They keep driving, eyes peeled for signs of the living. They pass trailer parks that look like tornadoes hit 'em, two gas stations that were probably scoured for everything long ago, homes that were stripped, boarded, torn up. Whole streets that could've been battle zones. Or trash heaps.
They're heading back out of town, according to the map Beth follows with her finger, when it starts to look abandoned instead of ruined. Like people had fled a long time ago and no one had come to wreck it yet.
He slows on a street of homes, one of the last few neighborhoods, unless they loop around. The houses are lonely-looking, a couple doors stand ajar. The few cars in the driveways and parked on the street are all closed up. They're in decent shape. One mailbox hangs open, but they all still stand in perfect lines down the road. A tattered flag waves lazily.
It's quiet and calm, a ghost town.
He stops in front of the only place with a tall wooden fence. The gate's shut on an overgrown yard, lawn furniture faded but upright. The front door and garage are still closed, too. Before he knocks, he thinks, I wanna go home.
Wherever that was. Home was never a house like this.
The knots in his stomach tighten, the chickpeas sitting like chewed-up stones.
Nothing responds to his pounding. They go through the house together quick and easy. Pictures still hang on the walls with dust, and the fridge is empty and open. A drawer in the kitchen is pulled out, still full of forks and spoons, everything except sharp knives.
He leaves Beth to go through the clothes upstairs, and he finds an older Volkswagen in the garage. He tries to hotwire it but the battery is dead. He'll have to siphon it, but before he gets out, he opens the glovebox– only paperwork– and finds a pack of filtered smokes in the console, only two missing.
For a solid minute, he feels good about the whole trip.
He's halfway up the stairs inside, to find Beth and tell her his plan, when he hears the engine. The low, loud rumble of a diesel truck getting closer. She's frozen in front of a wardrobe, her hand still holding a bathrobe sleeve. Her face is serious, her eyes wide when they meet his.
"What do we do?" She whispers urgently.
It happens too fast. No time to think of something better, smarter. The vehicle comes up on them swiftly, cutting off in front of the house.
He orders, "Hide," the same time the vehicle's doors open and voices mumble too close.
She does as he says, grabbing her unzipped bag and pushing it on the floor of the wardrobe, then stepping in herself. He glances around, the open bathroom door, the empty tub. The dresser's half-filled drawer, some underwear on the floor. The stripped bed. A plain desk. Not many options with the bow. He can't hear what they're saying, but they're talking when the fence gate rattles open.
Daryl gets in the closet, shoving the clothes on hangers as far as he can to the side without a buncha noise. The front door creaks open and a woman's voice clearly says, "I'm tellin' you, that car is new."
The wardrobe door clicks shut, loud as a gunshot to Daryl. He pulls the closet door nearly closed. He can still see the wardrobe from the crack, but it's a tight fit, he can't raise the bow with the door shut this much.
A man's voice replies, "Looks the same to me. No one's ever been here. We just need to check the stuff and grab some clothes for Joan and Kelly."
"Yeah, whatever. Don't be stupid. We should clear it anyway."
"Fine. I got downstairs."
Maybe they shoulda gone out the window in the other room. Too late now.
It's an actual nightmare. The steps up the stairs are cautious, it takes forever. They go through the room across the hall first. The man downstairs is noisy, heavy-footed, opening and shutting things carelessly.
He shouts up the stairs, "All the stuff's still here!"
Daryl hadn't even gotten into the kitchen cupboards yet, neither had Beth. He remembers pickled pigs' feet and peanut butter. He thinks of the cigarettes in the car. That are now in his pocket.
When the floorboards squeak in the room's doorway, he flinches.
The bathroom door clacks against the wall. Two steps. What sounds like a bathroom cupboard opening, then three steps back. He takes a few long breaths, exhaling slow, trying to listen over the pounding blood in his ears before the steps start again.
First thing he sees is the gun.
It takes the air right from him.
Then small hands, feminine. Clean. The arms are loose, but she's got both her hands around a Smith & Wesson M & P. She steps further into the room. Her brown hair is pulled back severely. Her black jacket says ATLANTA PD.
That night in the trunk comes back sudden, like he's there. Beth's eyes like a scared rabbit in the slash of light, visible in each lightning flash. Her body shuddering against his whole side. Solely reliant on him and his quick fuckin' thinking to keep her alive. The groans of the dead. The clap of thunder.
But it's just the wardrobe door smacking the bureau when the woman whips it open, stepping back deftly with the motion.
And Beth isn't in there shaking and scared, a rabbit waiting to be stew, like before. She's got her knife drawn. The sun from the window shines off the blade, angled in the direction of the woman's chin.
There's a beat of silence.
"Alvarado!" The woman shouts.
Daryl almost knocks the closet door open with the bow, ready to pull the trigger. But the woman's now-stiff arms point right at Beth's head. Beth steps slowly out of the wardrobe, putting her feet solid on the ground, but her eyes stay on the woman. And her gun. Her knife stays ready. Beth's voice is quiet, urgent, edgy, "I won't be a problem. We don't need ta' have a problem."
A Hail Mary that Daryl just knows won't work.
The woman yells again, "Alvarado! We got a live one!"
Daryl breaks out in cold sweat. The heavy tread's already coming up the stairs. For a quick moment, Beth's eyes move and look directly at Daryl. Not enough to be noticed, but it stops him. The warning on her face. His grip tightens on the bow, and he waits.
There would be the right moment. They'd get out of this. Somehow.
The woman asks Beth, "So that's your car, huh?"
Beth keeps her back to the window where he can see her, it keeps the woman's back to him. Her knife stays poised, her other hand up, placating. Beth doesn't answer the question, but she asks casually, "This your place?"
The man's weight strains the floor when he comes. Beth's face falls further and freezes. She's real worried now, and that worries him.
"What we got?" The guy asks from the door.
She turns the knife towards the Alvarado guy.
"Told you that car was new," the woman chides him. Beth can't decide who to direct the knife at. Her feet shift and the knife swings to the woman again.
"You should put that down," the man says, drawing her blade back. He steps past his partner, and they are opposites in the same damn outfit. Where the woman is even shorter than Beth, he has to stoop under the ceiling light. His clothes fit in a weird way that reminds Daryl of Lurch. He gets Beth's reaction now. He's gonna be a problem.
Back of his jacket says ATLANTA PD, too. They're wearing police-issued black pants and shoes, and he's got the same gun on his hip. On a police belt. They both have 'em. They've got knives instead of tasers. They even got radios. Their shit is clean as fuck, probably pressed, too. Like they ain't been through the end of the world. Just out on foot patrol.
Beth doesn't speak or move, except to glance between the two, so the woman finally says, "Put it down so we don't have ta' hurt you."
She doesn't want to, obviously, but her fingers unwind from the hilt, stiff and slow. It cracks against the floor when it lands.
"Kick it away," The man instructs, sounding like a cop, his hand on his knife now, too. Her kick isn't great, but it spins towards the bed, away from the pair.
The woman asks, "What're you doin' here?"
Beth licks her lips, and replies, "Just lookin' for clothes and supplies."
"You bit?"
"No."
"You hurt?"
"No."
The woman looks over at the guy, it's a meaningful pause, but Daryl can't see enough of her face to know what it means. Nothin' good. He wonders what Beth sees.
The woman continues her interrogation: "You're here alone half-covered in blood?"
"Yes," Beth answers, but her eyes skitter from the gun to the hulking guy to the cracked closet door, but they jump away quickly. "It's gettin' cold."
The woman glances to her partner again. Lurch is close enough to Beth now that he's nearly between them, and Daryl hates he can't just pull his bow up. Aim at the back of his towering head. There's not enough space, Daryl's head is already jammed against the clothes rack. He'd give himself away.
No one talks for a stretch of time and it makes him real nervous. If there wasn't a gun on Beth, he'd be out of the closet already.
"I could just go," Beth offers in the dangerous silence, her hands defensive. But her eyes bounce back to him again, to the slit of darkness. Like she can't help it. Like it just happens. This time, it feels bad.
She focuses on the gun again, but it's too late.
His stomach curdles.
The man turns his head and stares right at the barely-open door. Daryl feels that, too. Like he's caught. Like his dad's about to drag him out the closet, belt in hand.
He looks like Lurch too. Just more tan.
He flips the bow's safety off, not caring if they hear it now.
Maybe to distract them from the closet, Beth stammers, "Are you really cops or you just dress that way?"
Neither respond, and the woman's gun stays steady on Beth. The big fucker turns his back to Daryl, then lunges suddenly for Beth's wrist. He's rough with her, yanking a sound from her, yanking her to him. Beth twists and wrenches, but the guy's too much. She's no match for him.
Daryl toes the door open, jerking the bow up at the asshole–- he bands an arm tight around Beth's chest, restricting her arms. He turns them, using Beth as a partial shield. The woman pivots the gun on Daryl, rigid with unease. The guy draws his own knife, putting the tip to Beth's jaw.
"I think," the man addresses Daryl, "You'll drop that. You shoot me, she'll shoot you and the girl. That knife, too. Toss 'em over."
The dickhead orders him around like a cop would, used to things going his way, one way or another. Daryl doesn't move; Beth struggles, digging her fingers into his forearm.
"Bello," the guy barks, tightening his arm around Beth's chest till her face looks pained. "Shoot him if he doesn't do it in ten."
The woman looks over at him sharply, and it sounds more cautious when she says his name. Lurch ignores her. Beth makes a gasping sound when the sharp blade nicks into her.
The woman's finger moves to the trigger. She wouldn't miss from this close.
It hurts to drop his aim. The expression on Beth's face hurts, too, but that gun wins any argument for now. He carefully slides the bow across the wood floor. He pulls his knife, too, and chucks it near Beth's.
"Now," the cop says. "Keep your hands out, okay, buddy? What're you two doing here?"
"She already told ya. Lookin' for shit."
"You just come into any place and take whatever you want?"
"Door weren't locked."
"Guys like you so happy to forget the rules as fast as possible," The woman says scornfully.
"So you do think you're still cops." Daryl observes dryly. "Gonna arrest everyone that's left?"
"It ain't always gonna be like this–" Daryl snorts derisively, but the woman continues over him, "And lucky for this girl, we are cops, and we got a safe, clean place with other people. Can get her clean clothes. Plenty of food. Don't have to worry about winter."
"No," Beth cuts in.
Daryl, too: "She ain't goin' with ya."
He itches to do something, but he's got no weapons, there's nothing he can grab. The knife is too deep into the soft skin under her jaw. The gun stares into his eyes.
Beth stomps on Lurch's foot with her heel, still trying to wriggle away, but it only slightly irritates him. He grunts and lifts her, her heels and toes scuffling at the floorboards.
"Alvarado!" Bello hisses at the man, but he's unfazed.
He puts his knife back in his belt in a quick, practiced motion, and stoops over so suddenly, Beth doesn't expect it. Daryl nearly tackles him then, except that gun too damned close– Lurch scoops the crossbow up. Straightening, he clumsily adjusts it in his one hand and levels it on Daryl too.
"You'll be fine," Alvarado says to Beth. "Just calm down and you'll be safe."
Daryl growls, "She was safe before y'all showed up."
"Yeah, I bet she was," Bello sneers. "We've come across plenty'a guys like you, before and after. We know what you wanna keep her for."
Daryl thinks of outdoor cats. Joe's memory smiles genially at him over the bitch's shoulder. He grits his teeth.
"Stop it," Beth demands, "You're wrong."
Alvarado jerks her around, away from Daryl, so he can aim the bow better. Her movements keep the bolt swaying around messily.
"At least you'll survive with us," The woman tries to convince Beth. "You're better off just comin' with us."
"You're wrong, you don't know shit," Beth's panic really starts to rise, but they're not really listening to her anyway.
His own bolt that he'd made pointing in his general direction, the man pisses Daryl off further by offering, "We don't need to make this hard. You can go, find your buddies again. Let us help her."
"No, I ain't goin' with you," Beth interjects again.
"You'll be better off," The woman reiterates, but she's glancing over at Alvarado with more worry.
"No, I won't," Beth disagrees, kicking back at his shin. "Let me go."
"If you don't quit it, she'll shoot him." He informs Beth, but she still strains away from him. He ignores her squirming, and drags her a few steps toward the bed. It's a slight relief when he only boots their knives toward Bello.
"Alvarado, what the fuck are we gonna do–"
"Take those," He tells her, "Shoot him if he tries anything."
"We should–"
"You got cuffs or zips?" He talks over her, shakily holding the bow on Daryl, not used to the weight. Bello picks up their blades and puts 'em in her belt. He thinks about just snatching the bow from him while she's bent down. Just going for it. It's his brother he feels behind him, like a hand on his shoulder, muttering, Not yet, baby brother.
He has no choice but to listen. Her gun never leaves him.
"No," Bello answers, but before she can say more, Alvarado starts heading out the door with Beth.
He instructs, "Keep him here, do what you gotta do, there's still zip ties in the truck."
Daryl's sure the woman, Bello, wants to argue these quick decisions, that she doesn't like it much, but she doesn't try again. She readjusts her grip on the gun, and puts her full attention back on Daryl. Beth doesn't just let it happen. Near the door, she puts her foot up in the corner of the wall, where the doorjamb meets, pushing.
"I won't leave him, I'll fight–" He uses the crossbow to knock her leg down, her hiss of pain interrupting her threats.
"Hey!" Daryl wants to lunge again, but the woman steps forward, the gun in his face drawing him up short.
Just one more time to add to the list.
Daryl promises her, "Ya'll gonna regret that."
"C'mon," the man orders Beth, taking her down the hall, her boots noisy against the walls and floor.
Daryl waits, his whole body furious to go. It's all he can do to just stay there. To wait while the man takes Beth to the stairs. Wait till it's just him and the woman and the gun. Wait for the right moment. Probably wasn't even fifteen minutes since the cops came, but it's elongated and torturous. The worst kind of dream. No moving, no waking up.
Fear makes Beth's pretty voice high, repeating, "No, no, no, I won't go–"
Maybe the man was lulled by her sweet voice. The blonde hair and blue eyes, thinking she wouldn't be that difficult. That she's weak. It's easy to underestimate her. But it's a racket down the hall and stairwell.
Daryl asks Bello, "You really think this's gonna end? It's just temporary?"
His tone makes it clear how absolutely, utterly idiotic he finds that idea.
She frowns at him. Suspicion makes her small eyes even smaller. She doesn't answer. She doesn't like him talking to her, either. Her grip tightens around the gun again. Beth's last No! is harsher. There's an abrupt clatter down the steps.
He sneers at Bello, restless and livid, disdain roughens his voice, "You think someone's comin' to save you? And you'll be in charge again?"
She keeps him pinned with her M & P. And her glare.
He tells her, "Whatever you got goin' now, it'll fall eventually. And you'll be eaten by the dead, maybe even your cop friends. And all this–" His face twists with disgust, "-protectin' and servin', if that's what you call this bullshit, will be for nothin'. We've seen people like you, too."
The look on her face, the moment of doubt, is worth it.
"Real fuckin' pigs are smarter than cops, that still ain't changed."
That pisses her off.
More bangs somewhere downstairs, then Alvarado yells a deep, pained "Fuck!"
Her face whirls to the bedroom doorway.
Merle hollers, Now!
Daryl jumps forward, slamming his left arm into her wrists, knocking the gun aside. His right punches her as hard as possible, his whole weight behind it. All his pent up rage.
She crumples.
He grabs her gun before running out the room, straight to Beth. There are holes in the walls, where her boots had gone through drywall. The pictures are knocked askew and broken on the stairs. They're in the living room, the bow is gone, and he's struggling now. Her back's still facing his chest, but he's trying to control her wrists. She kicks backwards with one leg, hitting his shins and thighs till her hard heel finds its mark between his legs.
He doubles over Beth, shouting angry pain. But he keeps ahold of her, and his mitt of a hand grips her hair- and half of her head- pushing her down and away from him viciously. She stumbles into a side table; it skids from the impact and Beth immediately puts a hand to her forehead. She turns from her knees and sits against the wall, a little stunned, but still kicking at the guy's hands.
Daryl's barely down the stairs when he aims and pulls the trigger.
It only clicks. Nothing comes out.
He clears the cartridge and racks it. He pulls the trigger again.
It clicks again.
He thinks, Fuck. What the fuck. but all his focus is on just moving, and it feels molasses slow. The cop is trying to pull Beth away from the wall by her ankle, she's flailing the other at him. He gets a punishing handful of her calf when Daryl hits him with the pistol.
Alvarado lets go of Beth and swings around, connecting with Daryl's ear, making everything sing for a second. He slugs Lurch with the gun one more time, and for another quick moment, he feels pain in his hand and he drops the gun, but then it's a brawl. The guy clocks him again after getting to his feet. He's taller than Merle was, he's got a better angle on Daryl, and his fists hurt.
He's not sure how many blows they exchange before he trips past the coffee table, his legs more and more jelly. Unwilling to keep catching his backward motion. They go to the floor and the man's paws lock around Daryl's throat, leaning into him. His nose is bloodied. He's got angry red welts on his cheek where Beth must've tagged him.
He digs at the man's face, too, his exaggerated features, but Daryl's nails are all chewed up. He pushes his fingertips into his cheeks. Alvarado reels his head back, out of Daryl's reach before he can put his fingers in his eye sockets. The cop's thick thumbs press into Daryl's throat. He's a big motherfucker, with his elbows locked, arms longer than Daryl's. He can't breathe, but he won't leave Beth to whatever fuckin' set-up this is.
He claws for the man's throat, mirroring his hold. Shoving his thumbs as far as he can into the pipes he feels under the skin. He tries to crush them. He gasps for air, the man growls and groans.
He's just too fuckin' large. His palms squash shit together in Daryl's neck that shouldn't be touching. His vision starts to darken and sparkle on the edges when Beth appears, inside the tunnel of his sight. She's standing over the bastard's shoulder.
She's got a little pocket knife open.
He barely sees it before it's stuck in the man's temple. The whole blade.
She twists her wrist when she rips it out, sending blood across the floor and her flannel shirt. He feels when the man's body reacts in shock. His fingers convulse around his neck again. Daryl pries at his arms.
Beth stabs him again, into the side of his neck. When she pulls it out, there's a lot more blood this time. Daryl's throat opens up as Alvarado's hands relax.
He takes a full breath.
Alvarado's face looks a little confused, and he tries to box Daryl's ear one more time, but his arm is limper. There's no real force behind it. Blood spurts out of him like a heartbeat. His heartbeat.
Daryl pushes at him again, nearly bracing him upright as his body loses its tension. Beth shoves her shoulder under his arm, pushing hard so he falls off Daryl onto the floor. Daryl squirms backward, away from the bloody mess.
The oxygen Daryl sucks in is painful and precious.
Alvarado starts making a wet, choking sound on each inhale.
He can't think for several lungfuls. Beth watches the cop for a time, but she kicks out of it all the sudden, glancing at the blade still in her hand. She wipes it off on her own jeans before folding it and slipping it into her boot, next to her right ankle. She comes to where he's laying, her hands clutching frantically at his shirt, his arm. Tugging at him. There's blood on her face.
"Let's go, let's go," she urges. She touches his cheek and begs, "Daryl, you gotta get up, we gotta go."
She's desperate, and she stands again, looking around wildly.
He rolls over to his knees and crawls back to Alvarado; he takes the gun from his holster and passes it to Beth. He takes his knife. In his pants pocket, there's keys, and he fuckin' takes those, too. Just cause.
"Start the car," he rasps at Beth, then, "Go!" as loud as he can, fighting to stand. He's still light-headed, his legs unsteady, still gulping air. It hurts so good. Feels like life.
He falls up the stairs, and the woman is still on the floor where he left her. Thank fuck. He takes all the blades, shoving 'em in his belt. He takes her radio as well.
He leaves her there, out cold on the bedroom floor.
Time to fuckin' go.
His legs wobble down the stairs, tripping the last quarter of the way. When he hits the floor, he pulls himself straight by the banister, and finds Beth still standing in the open front door. The gun is shoved in the front of her waistband, the crossbow ready in her arms.
"Come on!" She stage-whispers.
"Go!" He calls out again, waving her out. He stops long enough to grab the gun he dropped, then runs to catch up with her. Alvarado isn't choking anymore.
Some walkers slap against the wooden fence, drawn by all the noise, but they aren't near the front street. Not yet. He leaves the gate open behind them.
Beth starts the car before he even gets the driver's door open.
The tires squeal when he stomps the gas. He swerves crazily around the cop's truck. He speeds around the corner. He wishes there was time to take some gas. Maybe they shoulda taken the truck, but all their shit is in the car.
It would take time for that woman to get back to her group, if she could make it without weapons. They should be okay, driving away in the coupe. They should have plenty of gas to buy them some time and space. But his heart is still in his fuckin' wrecked windpipe, blocking the air flow. His stomach is still in his ass, and he's starting to shake. It takes a lot of road to catch his breath enough, to loosen his white-knuckle grip on the steering wheel. To take a moment to glance at Beth.
She's got the gun in her lap, loose in her hand. Her other hand's on her head, near the hairline. A blood trail is drying down her cheek and neck. Her shirt is covered.
"You alrigh'?" He asks, the word's vibration aching, they feel too big; chunky, rough rocks in his esophagus and larynx
She looks over at him blankly for a minute with wide owl eyes. A long minute. Shock, or concussion, or both maybe. Her pupils are big, but the same size. He skims a curb, not really paying attention like he should. It jolts her out of the trance, and she blurts out, "Yeah. I'm fine."
"You shoulda gone to the car," he chastises, not even sure why. Except fear.
She turns away, staring out the windshield. Her face is very pale in the sunlight, the dark circles under her eyes like bruises. It's real quiet in the car, except their heavy breathing. Everything is strange. Flashes of bright, sharp sun glares from house windows and cars; the leaves on the trees were flipping in the wind, the wrong-side pale as Beth. Everything else is too still.
"Couldn't do it again. The woman. Like before." She starts and stops, like the thoughts aren't fully formed, and end there. It barely makes sense, it wasn't really like before, but he gets it.
He really gets it.
He tries focusing on the road, his breaths still coarse. Feels so surreal, how fine everything is now. Reality is shifty and untethered. He feels elsewhere.
He isn't sure how many times he got hit in the head, either.
She's still not looking at him, holding her head.
He puts a hand on her leg. Both her legs are trembling, her whole body is. He grips near her knee, doing his best not to throttle it as hard as the steering wheel. It's nothing like he imagined the other day, when everything had also felt so uncannily normal. Now it feels like the only thing keeping the world from slipping sideways.
Beth's face turns, but he keeps his eyes on the road this time, trying to get them somewhere safer than the streets in a car drawing attention.
She asks, "Are you alright?"
He doesn't know how fucked up he looks. He doesn't wanna know. Doesn't wanna see it on her face either, not right now.
"Yeah," he grunts, trying not to squeeze his fingers any deeper into her muscle.
She lets go of the gun. Her palm covers his, holding it to her leg.
There's bright red, living blood sticky on her hand.
He coughs when he speaks again, more gravel. "You keep that gun. 'S yours now. We'll find ammo."
She nods jerkily, but keeps her hand where it is. She winds her fingers between his. Her head gently falls back against the headrest.