It is her choice, and yet there isn't one. She has to tell him yes or find another way there with everybody else in tow, and the more he talks the more uncertain she feels about that. He's right, Owen probably wouldn't listen to him. Mel definitely wouldn't. She thinks he's dangerous, and "using you for something", Abby's had a dozen fights with her about it already, and now she feels a little shocky, like she's standing to the left of herself as she realises: it's gonna be her and him, right to the end of it. The two of them, or not at all.
"Okay," she says. It sounds unsteady, so she repeats it, "Okay. I'll– find a way."
All she has to do is pack, and leave. No need to say goodbye. She doesn't even have to break up with Owen and deal with him being whiny and upset at her for it, she can just... go. That probably shouldn't be so appealing.
His expression thins into a frown. His hand lands on her shoulder, awkward with compassion. He hadn't really had friends, at her age, but he reckons he'd have wanted to hold onto them.
He'll make it up to her. He promises himself he will. She deserves that much-- someone actually looking out for her, not just trying to use her for a weapon. If she has to kill some guy to sleep at night-- fine. She'll manage. She's tough.
"M'sorry, kid," Daryl mumbles. He removes his hand, dirty and stubby. "Can always change your mind."
Until they head out. Then, he won't let her go until he's taught her to live off the land, so she doesn't have to fall in step with operations like WLF.
"Yeah," Abby says, and knows she won't. She can't let this opportunity pass her by, she'll never forgive herself otherwise. Daryl takes his hand back before she can shrug it off her shoulder, and she hitches her bag up a little higher on her back.
Time to go. She has a lot of planning to do; her training block starts in roughly forty-five minutes. For the first time since she joined the WLF, she thinks of skipping it.
She's distracted from giving him any proper goodbye. She forgets to stop and ask if he has anything physical to trade with her, or if he needs anything. She says, "I'll- see you back at your place. Two days." She turns her back on him, to leave.
Two days, which is mostly spent planning. His first urge is to hunt, to start the entire process with ceremony, but that would just be a waste. He's going to do the first hunt with her, and show her how it works. So he packs supplies instead, everything he can carry on his bike. The poor kid is gonna have to ride bitch for a while until he can trade it, which limits the amount of shit he can strap to it. He's been stealing or trading ethanol from WLF for years; he sends out the last of his held-back trinkets for as much fuel as he can get.
And a leather jacket, roughly Abby's size.
Twine, maps, jerky, water skins, all that, he already has. So he plots a course that will get them there by the time deep winter hits. A rough plan forms; if what he's heard of Jackson's Hole is really true, they'll have to infiltrate. They'll have to make nice, and that could lead to retribution down the line. He'll have to figure out how to shield her from that, but right now, he just doesn't know how things will shape up to be. So he plans for everything else, spare crossbow bolts and a real bow and arrows, a silencer, knives. He trades all his books-- manuals he's memorized by now-- except three, a guide to archery, an introduction to what wild plants are edible in North America, and a comprehensive rundown on how to use every part of a deer. Those, he'll give to Abby. Girl's always reading something.
And around mid noon on the second day, he's ready. She's never actually seen the motorcycle before; he's always kept that hidden. She probably never realized the tatty thing he still wore was a motorcycle vest. The bike itself has seen better days, but it's clear he's kept it in fine working condition, even if he's ignored the particular aesthetics. There's a gym bag hanging on each side, carefully balanced.
Abby is, for all intents and purposes, a perfectly loyal soldier. Once, she overheard a little snippet of gossip passed around some of the older survivors: the Salt Lake kids were "a good find". It's not exactly hard to understand why when they're young, fit and capable, and willing to work hard for a spot at the table. There is no plan B. From now on, they're Seattle kids.
All this means is that nobody expects for Abby to up and leave abruptly in two days time. She does show up for training, but only so she can linger behind afterward and palm bullets out of the storerooms, marking the equipment off as she goes in the log book under a different name, and with her wrong hand. They won't look into it if they think it's gone on purpose. It's so easy. Should it be this easy?
She takes double rations from the kitchen. ... Okay, Manny actually takes double rations from the kitchen, 'cuz he thinks he's helping her out when she asks him to get her a couple extra things, citing her crazy schedule at the gym. Tells him she's a growing girl with her mouth full of five-bean chilli, just to make him laugh and fetch her seconds, and she feels bad about lying to him, but she'll make it up to him. Once Joel is dead she can do whatever she wants. She can come back here and slot herself right back in like nothing happened, and the thought is terrifying, and liberating all at once.
Manny will forgive her. He has a dad too.
When she comes out to the forest the day of she's late to join him by five or ten minutes, and she arrives quiet. Her eyes are red. In the interest of not drawing any attention to herself, she allows her full pack to slip from her back and into the grass so she can come and look at the bike.
Clearing her throat, she says, "No," and skims her hand up the side of it. Skeptically, "Is it safe?" Kinda looks like it could fall apart at any second...
The girl looks like shit, but it ain't his business. Teenagers cry all the time for all sorts of reasons, and Abby has more reasons than most. He pulls Abby's jacket out of one of the gym bags and tosses it to her. He's already wearing a larger version underneath his vest, though the leather is older, cracked and patched over again.
Abby barely slept. Those two nights were spent lying wide awake in bed, splayed out on her back, grinding her teeth. Now her jaw aches and her mouth tastes like blood, so she's just glad he doesn't point out how tired and quiet she is, that he lets her stand there and touch the bike with her hands.
The jacket she catches out of the air, clutching it up in her fists.
"It's okay," she says, turning to show him: she ripped the WLF patches off her clothing already, "But thanks. It's cool."
Daryl shakes his head. He points to his leather jacket, the patches of deer leather along one arm. "You fall off a bike, you put your arms out on instinct. The road'll eat your skin right up. Might as well be somebody else's skin."
He sits on the bike, trying to go about this. He remembers Beth, but Beth was so different from Abby, it was like day and night. Still, she could be riled out of bad moods with distraction, and learning's a good one.
"S'why bikers wear leather. You'll be safer wearing it, 'til we trade the bike out."
Abby wonders if Daryl knows that she grew up around doctors and medical settings, where people were always more careful than not. Then she realises he doesn't really know anything about her. That wasn't them. Daryl wasn't there to trade for stories.
So she takes the jacket and pulls it on over her own windbreaker. It'll probably be cold on the bike once the wind starts whipping up. The jacket is big across the shoulders but aside from that it fits well, only smells a little weird, like the animals it used to be. The straps of her bag slide back on over her arms. There is a holster around her waist for her handgun, resting at the small of her back.
She's nervous. No hiding that she shifts her weight back and forth while they're standing there, she clearly wants to go.
"Depends," he says, "wanna keep it as long as we can. Bike makes better time, but it can only do roads. We'll get as far as we can on it."
Daryl, being an anxious creature at the best of times, can read it well enough in others. He knows the routes out of Seattle, the way to do it without getting too close to WLF or Seraphites. It's a long, circling path, but it'll be worth it.
"You ready?" He thinks she is. He sits on the bike, properly now, and moves his backpack around the front, to give her room behind him.
Abby pulls a breath, and glances back over her shoulder, thumbs pressing underneath the straps of her pack, but you can't see the stadium from here. That's probably why Daryl lives in the forest. Out of sight, out of mind. From the way he's spoken about the WLF here and there it's pretty clear he's got a bone to pick, but Abby's never asked. Well... they've got a long drive ahead of them. Nothing but time.
"... Yeah," she says eventually, on the heels of an exhale. Think so.
No turning back.
She joins him on the end of the bike, shifting her weight until she finds her balance, gripping unsteadily at the back of his leather jacket. "Ready when you are."
Daryl pats his own shoulder, tells her to do the same if she needs him to stop or slow, and they drive for hours on abandoned road, weaving between corroded cars. It's peaceful for Daryl, to feel the wind in his hair, to have open road in front of him. He's got a bandanna up under his eyes, to keep bugs from flying in his nose, and he considers whether he should get one for Abby, too. He'll ask her when they stop.
Which comes sooner than he thought. A clicker wanders on the road, and Daryl pulls a long pike from a holster on the side of his bike, holding it like some goddamn medieval charioteer. With the benefit of speed, metal edge goes right into the monster's skull, and Daryl stops the bike to retrieve the pike.
"Keep watch," he says to Abby, voice a low whisper. He hasn't taken the bandanna off.
Riding on a motorcycle is a lot louder than Abby thought it would be, more chaotic, but she can shield herself behind the bulk of Daryl's body as he drives them on and on and on. If she cries a little, just at the start, there's no way he would know. Right? She's thinking about Owen finding the note that she left him, folded on his bed. And then she breathes in deep and lets it go, and falls into the rhythm of shifting her body on the bike to help him with the corners. Her arms inch around his waist, and then tighten there once they start to pick up speed.
It's a strange way to travel. She's very aware that she isn't wearing a helmet of any kind, that if they crashed she'd probably die, but the thought doesn't scare her. She's more interested in the journey, soothed by their consistent movement, that she can feel them getting closer and closer to Wyoming.
Hours pass. She's not in her head but not out of it either, she's just- there. Existing. Listening to the wind whistling and feeling the bike rumble, and smelling whatever's on the air, cow shit, sometimes the familiar, fungal smell of infected lingering on everything, the metallic scent of rusting cars that gets in her mouth somehow, sits on her tongue.
When he moves suddenly to pull the pike out she jolts alert. She wasn't sleeping but her mind was definitely wandering, and she grabs him suddenly when he pierces the head of the clicker on the way by. When he trawls the bike back and stops, the silence rings in her head.
Abby sets her feet down. The bike is tall, her feet are just able to be flat on the road. She sits up straight and squints into the middle distance but she barely has to- there's more, coming in from the west. She pats his arm, points them out soundlessly. A little group, moving steadily toward them.
She's heard they migrate.
Where's the pike? Is it stuck? She looks at him, and takes out her gun, attention flickering nervously back to the advancing hoard. Whispers, "I'll keep you safe."
"Goddammit," Daryl says, noticing the oncoming group as Abby does. They must have been attracted by the sound. There are some pretty fucking clear downsides to traveling by bike, and the biggest one is the noise. With a grunt, he gets the pike out of the clicker's skull, and shoves it into the motorcycle's holster.
He sees it up ahead: the reason infected have converged here. Ahead, a bridge is out. Rain always keeps the rivers high in this part of the country. They can move their shit across the river, but it'll take time, and that means this needs to be dealt with.
"Careful," he asks. "Don't panic."
They can't afford to get sloppy, but he's travelling with a kid; that's just how they are. Don't panic, just concentrate was his own personal mantra at her age; he hopes it'll do her some good.
He pulls his crossbow from his pack. His aim is well-practiced, rarely missing, near silent, but slow to reload. He'd like to get all the infected before they get close enough to be dangerous, but he doubts they'll be so lucky.
Does she seem panicked to him? Abby's settled into an eerie calm, her eyes fixed on the approaching group. She knows exactly how many bullets she has to spare, she thinks about that number over and over again in her mind, and watches Daryl collect his pike, and his crossbow, waiting for his say-so.
"I can keep them off if you want to back up," she murmurs, eyeing his weapon. Her heart is beating like it always does whenever she has to contend with the infected, but she knows it's just the start of an adrenaline kick. Once everything gets going she's good... it's the waiting around for everything to go sideways that fucks with her.
She slips from the bike.
There's five of them. No, six- one shorter one, dragging itself along in the middle of the back. If she shoots one now, the rest will come sprinting... Daryl will get a second, and while he reloads, she'll pick off as many as she can. She lifts her gun, looks to him. Waits for him to tell her when.
He looks at her, and he sees a fighter. The WLF did this to her, honed her for soldiering, but he still can't help but feel pride. She's a tough kid. She'll make it through this.
He gets ready to go, loading his bow, and puts his hand on the rusty door of a car.
"Things get bad," he says, "you get in here. Bottleneck 'em. Okay?" And then he aims. "Go."
He wrenches the door open with an ugly creak, timed to match when she fires her gun.
Abby nods, and then she raises her gun, aims, and exhales smoothly as she pulls the trigger. A clean headshot. The body crumples into the street, muffled underneath a cacophony of screams, and the rest of the infected start to zag drunkenly toward them, and she notices, barely, in her peripheral that Daryl's pried that car door open. That he's given her solid plan b.
She breathes out, and fires again. And again- damnit, shoulder and chest, useless-
Daryl's aim is better, but he's been doing this for decades. Her shots are good, and he'll tell her later. They help. Every little bit helps.
The bodies drop, and one gets closer. He body checks it with the bulk of his side, watches as it bites deep into his shoulder. The leather saves his life, but there's no way to be sure Abby knows that.
Doesn't matter now. Just don't get ripped apart. He pulls a cruel knife from the holster at his side. "In the car. Now." His voice is a snarl.
The adrenaline is good, helps, but it still makes her hands shake on the grip, no matter how much she steadies up and remembers to breathe and tells herself it's fine- another body drops to the ground. Daryl's, shot through with a thick shafted arrow, and then the second one she sunk two rounds into already.
Three to go.
She's focusing on one trying to break away from the other two cuz it's faster, and one edges up on Daryl, lunges into him.
Abby trusts that he's fine, has to. Then, she catches sight of the open maw, teeth flashing, and her attention wavers by seconds, enough to send a pulse of dread from her head to her toes. She doesn't hear him snarl, it's like she's underwater. She gulps down a breath and swings her attention back around wildly to fire again. She's got four bullets left in her gun.
Fuck. Kid froze up. He wants more than anything to calm her down, but now isn't the time. He's gotta get through this, or it won't matter how she feels.
She's firing too fast, she isn't aiming. "Stop!" He knows he's a quiet man, has been around her. Hopefully the shock of him shouting will cut through whatever shit she's dealing with.
He stands in front of her. Last resort-- he shouldn't have waited so goddamn long, he's stuck in his habits, idiot, idiot-- he pulls out his gun, a colt python that fits oddly in his hand. One shot, one down. The next he rushes toward, getting between it and the girl, the knife going straight into its face.
If she can shoot the final one, they'll be in the clear.
Works perfect. The sudden shout makes Abby's hands clench so tight on the gun and somehow she doesn't fire it. She stops, like he said, blinking hard through the roaring in her ears, swallowing thickly.
The car. She lunges for it, flying across the distance and she scoots in through the door onto the seat as he puts his body firmly between the car and the infected. It gives her enough time to catch her breath and level the gun up through the broken window, waiting for a chance.
She fires. It catches the last flailing runner in the throat and it gargle-screams around the rush of blood, slipping, falling-
She did as good as can be expected, and he wants to tell her that, but there's no time. Too much sound, all at once; every infected in the area will be crawling toward them. "C'mon," he says, his voice a thick hiss, "we gotta go."
They'll circle round, try and find another way over the bridge, or a safer place to cross. It doesn't matter. They just have to get out of here, and in a hurry.
He starts the engine just as the sound of clicking begins to echo through the trees.
"Right behind you." The shock makes her croaky, and she has to wonder if he knows she just saw him get bit. Or maybe he didn't feel it and he'll realise once they hit safety and have time to catch their breath. Either way he's right, they gotta go. He doesn't wear a helmet on the bike. She could press the muzzle of her gun against the back of his neck and be done with it in seconds if she had to, even though the thought makes her fucking sick to her stomach with dread and grief.
He's got time, before he turns. Time to get them out of here.
She leaves the car, running back toward the bike, and jumps onto the back behind him. The engine snarls in the same tone he did. "I'm good, go!"
They speed up the road, and take a pass Daryl knows but had ignored. The forest presses thick around them, and Daryl leans in, hoping Abby will too. Nothing worse than getting whacked with a branch, or some clicker's arm.
They keep going until they reach the high crest of a hill, bald of trees, and it's a good place to keep watch, catch their breath. He recalibrates the plan in his head. If the area's got this many infected in it, they'll have to sell the bike sooner than he thought. It was a good test, and he thinks they proved they can work as a team.
He gets off the bike, pulls some water out of the satchels, takes a drink.
"Did good, kid." He searches for more supplies in the satchels, squat on the ground.
She leans into him, following his direction, and ducks her head so she doesn't have to see. She presses her forehead against the middle of his back and closes her eyes tight, listening to the whistling of the air and the sounds of them passing things so fast, they could be anything, there's no point in looking. She thinks, with a strange, weightless feeling, that she's never been this far east before in her life. She has no idea where they're going.
Eventually, the bike starts to slow, a relief miniscule in comparison to when Daryl dismounts and turns to the satchels, unknowingly showing her the teeth marks imprinted in his leather shoulder. The bite didn't break through the jacket, she's safe. He's fine.
She feels a little weak at the knees suddenly.
She copies him, looks for her own canteen, and gulps some water down.
"Thanks."
What's he looking for? She watches him rifling around for a few seconds before she leaves the bike standing, stepping toward the lookout over the hill- and winces at the drop off, reeling backward. Her hand finds a tree to touch, something sturdy. That helps. "... Where are we?"
Does he know? Or is he pointing his bike in what he thinks is the right direction?
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"Okay," she says. It sounds unsteady, so she repeats it, "Okay. I'll– find a way."
All she has to do is pack, and leave. No need to say goodbye. She doesn't even have to break up with Owen and deal with him being whiny and upset at her for it, she can just... go. That probably shouldn't be so appealing.
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He'll make it up to her. He promises himself he will. She deserves that much-- someone actually looking out for her, not just trying to use her for a weapon. If she has to kill some guy to sleep at night-- fine. She'll manage. She's tough.
"M'sorry, kid," Daryl mumbles. He removes his hand, dirty and stubby. "Can always change your mind."
Until they head out. Then, he won't let her go until he's taught her to live off the land, so she doesn't have to fall in step with operations like WLF.
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Time to go. She has a lot of planning to do; her training block starts in roughly forty-five minutes. For the first time since she joined the WLF, she thinks of skipping it.
She's distracted from giving him any proper goodbye. She forgets to stop and ask if he has anything physical to trade with her, or if he needs anything. She says, "I'll- see you back at your place. Two days." She turns her back on him, to leave.
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And a leather jacket, roughly Abby's size.
Twine, maps, jerky, water skins, all that, he already has. So he plots a course that will get them there by the time deep winter hits. A rough plan forms; if what he's heard of Jackson's Hole is really true, they'll have to infiltrate. They'll have to make nice, and that could lead to retribution down the line. He'll have to figure out how to shield her from that, but right now, he just doesn't know how things will shape up to be. So he plans for everything else, spare crossbow bolts and a real bow and arrows, a silencer, knives. He trades all his books-- manuals he's memorized by now-- except three, a guide to archery, an introduction to what wild plants are edible in North America, and a comprehensive rundown on how to use every part of a deer. Those, he'll give to Abby. Girl's always reading something.
And around mid noon on the second day, he's ready. She's never actually seen the motorcycle before; he's always kept that hidden. She probably never realized the tatty thing he still wore was a motorcycle vest. The bike itself has seen better days, but it's clear he's kept it in fine working condition, even if he's ignored the particular aesthetics. There's a gym bag hanging on each side, carefully balanced.
"You ever been on a bike before?"
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All this means is that nobody expects for Abby to up and leave abruptly in two days time. She does show up for training, but only so she can linger behind afterward and palm bullets out of the storerooms, marking the equipment off as she goes in the log book under a different name, and with her wrong hand. They won't look into it if they think it's gone on purpose. It's so easy. Should it be this easy?
She takes double rations from the kitchen. ... Okay, Manny actually takes double rations from the kitchen, 'cuz he thinks he's helping her out when she asks him to get her a couple extra things, citing her crazy schedule at the gym. Tells him she's a growing girl with her mouth full of five-bean chilli, just to make him laugh and fetch her seconds, and she feels bad about lying to him, but she'll make it up to him. Once Joel is dead she can do whatever she wants. She can come back here and slot herself right back in like nothing happened, and the thought is terrifying, and liberating all at once.
Manny will forgive her. He has a dad too.
When she comes out to the forest the day of she's late to join him by five or ten minutes, and she arrives quiet. Her eyes are red. In the interest of not drawing any attention to herself, she allows her full pack to slip from her back and into the grass so she can come and look at the bike.
Clearing her throat, she says, "No," and skims her hand up the side of it. Skeptically, "Is it safe?" Kinda looks like it could fall apart at any second...
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"Safe as it can be," he says. "Safer with this."
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The jacket she catches out of the air, clutching it up in her fists.
"It's okay," she says, turning to show him: she ripped the WLF patches off her clothing already, "But thanks. It's cool."
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He sits on the bike, trying to go about this. He remembers Beth, but Beth was so different from Abby, it was like day and night. Still, she could be riled out of bad moods with distraction, and learning's a good one.
"S'why bikers wear leather. You'll be safer wearing it, 'til we trade the bike out."
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So she takes the jacket and pulls it on over her own windbreaker. It'll probably be cold on the bike once the wind starts whipping up. The jacket is big across the shoulders but aside from that it fits well, only smells a little weird, like the animals it used to be. The straps of her bag slide back on over her arms. There is a holster around her waist for her handgun, resting at the small of her back.
She's nervous. No hiding that she shifts her weight back and forth while they're standing there, she clearly wants to go.
"What are we trading it out for?"
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Daryl, being an anxious creature at the best of times, can read it well enough in others. He knows the routes out of Seattle, the way to do it without getting too close to WLF or Seraphites. It's a long, circling path, but it'll be worth it.
"You ready?" He thinks she is. He sits on the bike, properly now, and moves his backpack around the front, to give her room behind him.
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"... Yeah," she says eventually, on the heels of an exhale. Think so.
No turning back.
She joins him on the end of the bike, shifting her weight until she finds her balance, gripping unsteadily at the back of his leather jacket. "Ready when you are."
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Which comes sooner than he thought. A clicker wanders on the road, and Daryl pulls a long pike from a holster on the side of his bike, holding it like some goddamn medieval charioteer. With the benefit of speed, metal edge goes right into the monster's skull, and Daryl stops the bike to retrieve the pike.
"Keep watch," he says to Abby, voice a low whisper. He hasn't taken the bandanna off.
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It's a strange way to travel. She's very aware that she isn't wearing a helmet of any kind, that if they crashed she'd probably die, but the thought doesn't scare her. She's more interested in the journey, soothed by their consistent movement, that she can feel them getting closer and closer to Wyoming.
Hours pass. She's not in her head but not out of it either, she's just- there. Existing. Listening to the wind whistling and feeling the bike rumble, and smelling whatever's on the air, cow shit, sometimes the familiar, fungal smell of infected lingering on everything, the metallic scent of rusting cars that gets in her mouth somehow, sits on her tongue.
When he moves suddenly to pull the pike out she jolts alert. She wasn't sleeping but her mind was definitely wandering, and she grabs him suddenly when he pierces the head of the clicker on the way by. When he trawls the bike back and stops, the silence rings in her head.
Abby sets her feet down. The bike is tall, her feet are just able to be flat on the road. She sits up straight and squints into the middle distance but she barely has to- there's more, coming in from the west. She pats his arm, points them out soundlessly. A little group, moving steadily toward them.
She's heard they migrate.
Where's the pike? Is it stuck? She looks at him, and takes out her gun, attention flickering nervously back to the advancing hoard. Whispers, "I'll keep you safe."
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He sees it up ahead: the reason infected have converged here. Ahead, a bridge is out. Rain always keeps the rivers high in this part of the country. They can move their shit across the river, but it'll take time, and that means this needs to be dealt with.
"Careful," he asks. "Don't panic."
They can't afford to get sloppy, but he's travelling with a kid; that's just how they are. Don't panic, just concentrate was his own personal mantra at her age; he hopes it'll do her some good.
He pulls his crossbow from his pack. His aim is well-practiced, rarely missing, near silent, but slow to reload. He'd like to get all the infected before they get close enough to be dangerous, but he doubts they'll be so lucky.
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"I can keep them off if you want to back up," she murmurs, eyeing his weapon. Her heart is beating like it always does whenever she has to contend with the infected, but she knows it's just the start of an adrenaline kick. Once everything gets going she's good... it's the waiting around for everything to go sideways that fucks with her.
She slips from the bike.
There's five of them. No, six- one shorter one, dragging itself along in the middle of the back. If she shoots one now, the rest will come sprinting... Daryl will get a second, and while he reloads, she'll pick off as many as she can. She lifts her gun, looks to him. Waits for him to tell her when.
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He gets ready to go, loading his bow, and puts his hand on the rusty door of a car.
"Things get bad," he says, "you get in here. Bottleneck 'em. Okay?" And then he aims. "Go."
He wrenches the door open with an ugly creak, timed to match when she fires her gun.
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She breathes out, and fires again. And again- damnit, shoulder and chest, useless-
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The bodies drop, and one gets closer. He body checks it with the bulk of his side, watches as it bites deep into his shoulder. The leather saves his life, but there's no way to be sure Abby knows that.
Doesn't matter now. Just don't get ripped apart. He pulls a cruel knife from the holster at his side. "In the car. Now." His voice is a snarl.
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Three to go.
She's focusing on one trying to break away from the other two cuz it's faster, and one edges up on Daryl, lunges into him.
Abby trusts that he's fine, has to. Then, she catches sight of the open maw, teeth flashing, and her attention wavers by seconds, enough to send a pulse of dread from her head to her toes. She doesn't hear him snarl, it's like she's underwater. She gulps down a breath and swings her attention back around wildly to fire again. She's got four bullets left in her gun.
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She's firing too fast, she isn't aiming. "Stop!" He knows he's a quiet man, has been around her. Hopefully the shock of him shouting will cut through whatever shit she's dealing with.
He stands in front of her. Last resort-- he shouldn't have waited so goddamn long, he's stuck in his habits, idiot, idiot-- he pulls out his gun, a colt python that fits oddly in his hand. One shot, one down. The next he rushes toward, getting between it and the girl, the knife going straight into its face.
If she can shoot the final one, they'll be in the clear.
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The car. She lunges for it, flying across the distance and she scoots in through the door onto the seat as he puts his body firmly between the car and the infected. It gives her enough time to catch her breath and level the gun up through the broken window, waiting for a chance.
She fires. It catches the last flailing runner in the throat and it gargle-screams around the rush of blood, slipping, falling-
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They'll circle round, try and find another way over the bridge, or a safer place to cross. It doesn't matter. They just have to get out of here, and in a hurry.
He starts the engine just as the sound of clicking begins to echo through the trees.
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"Right behind you." The shock makes her croaky, and she has to wonder if he knows she just saw him get bit. Or maybe he didn't feel it and he'll realise once they hit safety and have time to catch their breath. Either way he's right, they gotta go. He doesn't wear a helmet on the bike. She could press the muzzle of her gun against the back of his neck and be done with it in seconds if she had to, even though the thought makes her fucking sick to her stomach with dread and grief.
He's got time, before he turns. Time to get them out of here.
She leaves the car, running back toward the bike, and jumps onto the back behind him. The engine snarls in the same tone he did. "I'm good, go!"
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They keep going until they reach the high crest of a hill, bald of trees, and it's a good place to keep watch, catch their breath. He recalibrates the plan in his head. If the area's got this many infected in it, they'll have to sell the bike sooner than he thought. It was a good test, and he thinks they proved they can work as a team.
He gets off the bike, pulls some water out of the satchels, takes a drink.
"Did good, kid." He searches for more supplies in the satchels, squat on the ground.
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Eventually, the bike starts to slow, a relief miniscule in comparison to when Daryl dismounts and turns to the satchels, unknowingly showing her the teeth marks imprinted in his leather shoulder. The bite didn't break through the jacket, she's safe. He's fine.
She feels a little weak at the knees suddenly.
She copies him, looks for her own canteen, and gulps some water down.
"Thanks."
What's he looking for? She watches him rifling around for a few seconds before she leaves the bike standing, stepping toward the lookout over the hill- and winces at the drop off, reeling backward. Her hand finds a tree to touch, something sturdy. That helps. "... Where are we?"
Does he know? Or is he pointing his bike in what he thinks is the right direction?
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furiously mangles timelines.
you're so brave for this
thanks i feel valid now
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returns from the grave sorry i was dealing with the agonies.
i understand completely
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