The room is dark when the light floods into it. Bare brick walls of a underground basement, that have been strung up to be somewhere removed, somewhere childish. It is bathed in pink and pale yellows, flowers painted onto the corners. Compared to the outside world, this room - this shut away basement at the back of a cellar, is removed.
The girl sitting in it, with candles for light in the depths, is much the same. Her knees are pulled up to her chest as she sits on the bed - a princesses bed or an impression there of. White with netting, all decorative. She is staring into the light, blinking at the figure that in the sudden flood of pure light behind him, she cannot make out. Blinking at it owlishly, her mouth parted. The dark black hair that covers her face that she peers out from behind it - doesn't serve but to make her look more pale. A stretch out - young, looks like, eyes big and blue and staring vainly as she tries to adjust to the figure that she can't - quite - make it out.
She can't tell, she's not used to sunlight anymore. She unfurls, uneasy, of course she is - she could never tell his moods until he opened his mouth, and she pushes her self forward.
It's then that the chain moves. Big and heavy around her throat, long - some grace to its length, she can move everywhere around the room, attached to above the bed in a heavy bolt - something for a dog, not a girl. The chain loops long, from her, to a pool on the ground. Allows her to reach from the desk to the adjoining door, off to the side, and even to the door that the figure is standing in. Frowning, trying still to make the figure as the chain rattles.
"Dad? Has something happened?"
The expectation. It's him - that it would ever be anyone else, is ridiculous. She's given that up, some time ago.
It starts with a supply run, of course. Lately these days, everything is. Living from hand to mouth, he sure as fuck don't miss it, but that's life. Everything's fallen. Keep going or die.
Some jackass had control of this town once. It's clear as crystal he lost it, he lost more than the town. The graffiti, mostly written in mud and dirt and smudged with time, says something about where Jack can shove it. Daryl assumed, idiot that he is, that this Jack bastard died with whatever killed the town, broke the walls. The place is crawling with corpses. It's clear some bad shit happened here. Would it be too much to ask that this 'Handsome Jack' asshole is dead?
If the bullet wound in his leg and the corpse at his feet is any indication, yes, yes, it is.
But the place is clear for now. He'll set off for the group and lead them in-- the houses are nearly empty, and there's probably still good shit in them. But that's after he loots this jackass' house.
Daryl makes his way through, filling a bag with food and bits of string and wire and knives and anything else good he can find. It's all fine until he hears something moving around in the basement. If this place is gonna be safe for the group, he has to really clear it.
Let's just say, the basement isn't what he's expecting. He shines a flashlight in and finds something he never wanted to fucking see. Drops his bag, lowers his bow. She looks scared.
The second the voice speaks, she cringes, no - not Jack. What had he said before everything went dark? That there were bad men. There were bad men and if they knew she was here, they would hurt her. She pushes back, rapidly scrambling back up the bed. There's a candlestick near her - she thinks she can reach it. Isn't sure she's strong enough to wield it with any force.
Panicked, she curls her knees up into her chest. Breathing rapidly and her voice going desperate. "Don't hurt me."
Okay, yeah, if this is a trap, Daryl would rather die than point a weapon at this kid. He disarms the crossbow and slings it over his shoulder, sheaths his knife, and puts up his hands, the traditional 'mean you no harm' gesture from the world before. The flashlight has confirmed that this kid is chained up.
"Ain't gonna hurt you neither." He takes a slow, gentle step forward. "Hey, you want that chain off?"
She doesn't move, her fingers curling up as tight as they can in the floral patterned sheets. Her toes curling in, and if she could make herself smaller in any way it's clear she would be doing it now.
Take the chain off? But didn't he know - "I could hurt you. That's what - Jack said. It's safer if I wear it."
Kid's fucking terrified. How the hell could she hurt anybody? Daryl takes another slow, cautious step forward. "You can hurt me all you like," he says, not believing for a second he's in danger. "Just lemme get that chain off."
It occurs to him that he needs bolt cutters, and didn't he see some in the hall? But that's not important. He needs to get her to settle down first.
"But what if I bite you?" She knows - he had said that if she was to become like the bad ones, then she would bite. It's why she had to be chained, just in case she hurt him, and she didn't want to hurt him, did she?
It had nothing at all to do with the fact she had learned how to pick locks a week prior.
She shakes her head, her hands moving from the sheets to her legs, sinking into the bare skin. Her breath getting quick and higher as he steps closer. "I never wanted to hurt anyone. But D- Jack said we have to, sometimes. That's how we have to survive."
She sobs in a breath, scared, terrified, of the words that come out - if Jack finds out - if Jack knows, he'll kill him. "If you let me go, Jack will hunt you down."
"Uh," Daryl has a sneaking suspicion he knows how this little tragedy ends, and he doesn't totally care. It can't really be avoided, so there's no use avoiding it. "Jack's dead."
But the air goes out of it. The sky is falling and the world is ending and - she didn't know how she'd really feel when this happened. Maybe she always expected to die first. Maybe she expected it to come with trumpets sounding - she didn't know. She's thought about it. The way that when people invent stories for themselves, they imagine the fairytale ending. The forever after.
She's not sure if that's this - he's bleeding, he looks ragged. He's - not what Jack told her Princes looked like. But fighting dragons wasn't exactly clean work, was it? He'd - had he been the one to kill Jack? Maybe, did that mean she could trust him. She didn't know - she didn't know anything at all about outside, she realises, as she looks at him.
It overwhelms, it chokes, she doesn't know anything and she's chained to a wall, and he's going to do something awful. That's what happens in the real world. That's what she'd been told. Why she has to be kept secret, kept hidden. "Are you going to kill me?" It's hitched, scared, high in her throat. She can be ready for it. It's okay, it's okay, it's okay. "It's okay if ... if you have to. Can I just go outside first?"
During this silence, Daryl walks away, a few steps down the hall, back to that bolt cutter. When he returns, it's with the nearest he gets to a smile. More like a grin. "Ain't gonna kill you," he says, holding the bolt cutters. "Gonna get that fucking thing off you."
He's not interested in any more chitchat with someone chained up when they don't have to be.
Without really knowing what else to do, she waits on the bed. Hanging onto herself, watching him out from under her hair.
When he comes back with the bolt cutters, she shifts on the bed, making room for him. The rattle of heavy metal that moves snake like where it unravels. Nervously eyeing the bolt cutters. Her hand moving up to the chain, the big metal collar. Studded, the padlock that sits at the side. Made sure she was never getting out of it by herself. Made sure, she was always going to need him. She tugs it around to him.
Daryl cuts the chain first, and it takes a significant amount of effort to manage it. This shit was made right, wasn't it? Fucking sicko.
He stares at her collar, trying to figure out to get that off. Her question snaps him from his reprieve. "Uh- yeah? Got him in the head; he ain't turning." He can see a slight resemblance, and with her earlier slip-- "He your dad?"
It's so hard, not to run - not because she's scared of him. But that she can. She can tear up the stairs, she can hang her head the window and scream at the top of lungs. All of it. No one can stop her again and -
She nods. "Y... yes." Most people hated Jack - they should. The world had ended, and he had snapped. But he'd always been like that, she'd wanted to tell someone, anyone. But she was never allowed to, was she? Talk to anyone, see anyone. His perfect little princess. "You should have let him turn. It's what he deserves."
Well, that answers another question, whether or not the girl knows it. So her own dad put her down here. Who wouldn't hate their father after that?
But now the chain is cut, even if the collar isn't gone. He stands, and offers her a hand getting up. She might need it. Who fucking knows what Jack did to her down here. He wouldn't trust him either, all bloody and disgusting.
It's a second between where she takes his hand and the next she's falling forward into him. It could be because her legs are rusty with their disuse, it could be that it's all too much - or the part that makes her breath speed up so sharp and high in her throat is the feel of his hand in hers. He's real, he's real. He's not some fever dream she's made up in her head. He smells of blood and sweat and dirt, he's dark and messy and doesn't fit in her clean brightly colour room. He's nobodies ideal and - he's hers.
One step, to get off the bed, the next where her face presses into his chest. Her arms slow, and the gripping tightly against the leather of his best, the coarse material of his shirt. She's soft, of course she is, her hands are weak and her legs are unsteady. Hanging onto him as she begins to cry, then sob, shaking like a leaf, about to crash and fall to the ground. "You're real. You are. I didn't make you up. I never thought I was ever going to see anyone again." Then it goes, and mercifully she has the sense to presses her face into the material as she begins to take deep, hysterical breaths of relief.
It's too much for Daryl too. He stands there, rigid and confused as a little girl presses her head to his chest and cries. What is he supposed to do with this? He was never built for this kind of use.
Awkward, feeling the largeness of his hands and the dirt under his fingernails, he pats the flat space between her shoulders. "Hey, c'mon," he hears himself muttering. "You wanna see outside, right?"
It's clumsy, but it's not like she'd know. Not like Jack had picked her up, looked after her, been a father - for years. Just snapped at her to stop crying, didn't he know how hard he was working for her? For them? This blood - was for her.
This - this right now, is everything. So when he prompts, she pulls up - though not far. Doesn't let go of him. Rather she takes a fistful of the corner of his untucked shirt. Knows better than to take his hands, he might need them - she didn't doubt what Jack had said because she had heard the groans from outside. The screams. The wretching wet noises of what she had assumed was flesh.
He'd have to fight - they all had to fight, that's what Jack said. He'd need both hands, and she'd have to make sure not to get in his way. That'd be alright - she hopes because she doesn't think she could let go of him, not right now. Too scared that he'd disappear. But as she does give him a little space as she nods, the once, wiping at her face. Blotchy and red with the tears. The smudge of blood on her cheek from his clothes.
He looks at this little kid in front of him, and his heart lurches. How fucking dumb do you have to be, to get all caught up in some little girl's tears? Daryl wonders, not for the first time, what Merle would do if he were here. He was always better about this stuff, even if Daryl hated it. He knew how to cut it back, to be rough even when you didn't want to.
Daryl doesn't want to be rough now. But he doesn't want to be soft either, and end up wrapped around this little girl's finger, only to watch her die in a week or a month or a year. He can't take much more of this. He wants to say that. To scream at her or shake her or something, to separate himself from this inevitable repeating circumstance.
He wants to say that. Instead, he says, "c'mon," and stands. Putting his bow up over his shoulder, he reaches for her, holding out a calloused hand.
She catches on tight to his hand the second it's offered. Grips tightly, tucking herself into the side of his body. Her feet bare on the ground, arching up on them that little as if to make herself taller. Her toes pressing into the carpets Jack had laid out to make the basement feel more homely.
It was still a basement though, and that door in front of her, her way out, takes more of herself to fix upon. To gather up courage, she wanted to walk out that door like it was nothing but right now, it was everything. She sucks in a breath, holds fast to him and nods again. "Okay, I'm ready."
She's like a dead leaf in the wind, this girl. He keeps her hand in his, and one of his big, calloused hands goes to sit awkwardly on her little shoulder. Christ, she's small. Small and pale and weak, and he guesses she's got nobody now. Nobody but him.
Christ, what has he done?
The house they wander into is bloody and disgusting. There are clear signs of an ugly struggle, bullet holes and blood smeared on the wall. The long hallway leads to an open living room with a wide window. It's all fancy and modern except for the dead body shoved through the window, bits of bloody glass everywhere.
"Couldn't let him turn," Daryl mutters. "Bashed his damn head in."
She won't believe it, she realises, until she sees that face. She will always think he's going to be there - because he always had been. He always acted like he was invulnerable.
"Sometimes, I think he didn't like to look at me because he knew I didn't believe in him." It's curt, stepping forward but not letting go of his hand. Picking her way around on her bare feet like she was scared to make an imprint on the ground, but mostly minding the broken things, the blood stains - the mess of it all.
She goes for the body, her hand outstretched. Those were Jack's clothes, that was Jack's hair, this was the house he said would be all theirs and she would never need anything else again.
This was her father, under her fingers, pushing the head out of the way - these were the eyes; one blue, one green, that would crinkle up at the corners when she was little and call her his baby girl. Little Princess. This was the hands that promised her freedom from all their worries and locked her up in a dark room with no light but what he provided.
Nothing but him, he'd made sure. Like he was God.
"I knew he was just a person."
She drops it like it was so much rubbish, she would remember his dead face every night, she promises herself. She will hold it in her mind and hold onto this man's hand and she will remember she never has to go back.
"Why'd he lock you up?" Daryl asks. He knows it's none of his business, but it comes out anyway. "Just crazy?"
If she's got no love for her dead father, he's got no time for delicacy. The mangled body is caught in front of the shattered window, and it only takes a moment to kick his torso and launch him out of it. Handsome Jack gets the dull thud of concrete to herald him to the ground.
She shakes her head - because yes, yes he was crazy, but the horror of Jack was that - he wasn't the raving monster that people would like to imagine existed.
There is something so final, to how he does it. Ceremony like story books endings. Like there were heroes and she knows that's not true. She has to tell herself that, that's - that's how things really are. "Because he loved me more than anything. He loved me so much he wouldn't let anyone hurt me."
Jack's body is a broken doll, and she's the smashed porcelain thing. She feels as empty as one, mouths forming around the words like they happened to someone else. "I'm the smartest person you'll probably meet. He said that it made me precious. So I could never be near anyone else, just in case they tried to use me."
She keeps her eyes down as she follows after him. Careful to pick around the wreckage.
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Some jackass had control of this town once. It's clear as crystal he lost it, he lost more than the town. The graffiti, mostly written in mud and dirt and smudged with time, says something about where Jack can shove it. Daryl assumed, idiot that he is, that this Jack bastard died with whatever killed the town, broke the walls. The place is crawling with corpses. It's clear some bad shit happened here. Would it be too much to ask that this 'Handsome Jack' asshole is dead?
If the bullet wound in his leg and the corpse at his feet is any indication, yes, yes, it is.
But the place is clear for now. He'll set off for the group and lead them in-- the houses are nearly empty, and there's probably still good shit in them. But that's after he loots this jackass' house.
Daryl makes his way through, filling a bag with food and bits of string and wire and knives and anything else good he can find. It's all fine until he hears something moving around in the basement. If this place is gonna be safe for the group, he has to really clear it.
Let's just say, the basement isn't what he's expecting. He shines a flashlight in and finds something he never wanted to fucking see. Drops his bag, lowers his bow. She looks scared.
And all he can think to say is, "ain't your dad."
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Panicked, she curls her knees up into her chest. Breathing rapidly and her voice going desperate. "Don't hurt me."
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"Ain't gonna hurt you neither." He takes a slow, gentle step forward. "Hey, you want that chain off?"
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Take the chain off? But didn't he know - "I could hurt you. That's what - Jack said. It's safer if I wear it."
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It occurs to him that he needs bolt cutters, and didn't he see some in the hall? But that's not important. He needs to get her to settle down first.
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It had nothing at all to do with the fact she had learned how to pick locks a week prior.
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She sobs in a breath, scared, terrified, of the words that come out - if Jack finds out - if Jack knows, he'll kill him. "If you let me go, Jack will hunt you down."
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But the air goes out of it. The sky is falling and the world is ending and - she didn't know how she'd really feel when this happened. Maybe she always expected to die first. Maybe she expected it to come with trumpets sounding - she didn't know. She's thought about it. The way that when people invent stories for themselves, they imagine the fairytale ending. The forever after.
She's not sure if that's this - he's bleeding, he looks ragged. He's - not what Jack told her Princes looked like. But fighting dragons wasn't exactly clean work, was it? He'd - had he been the one to kill Jack? Maybe, did that mean she could trust him. She didn't know - she didn't know anything at all about outside, she realises, as she looks at him.
It overwhelms, it chokes, she doesn't know anything and she's chained to a wall, and he's going to do something awful. That's what happens in the real world. That's what she'd been told. Why she has to be kept secret, kept hidden. "Are you going to kill me?" It's hitched, scared, high in her throat. She can be ready for it. It's okay, it's okay, it's okay. "It's okay if ... if you have to. Can I just go outside first?"
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He's not interested in any more chitchat with someone chained up when they don't have to be.
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When he comes back with the bolt cutters, she shifts on the bed, making room for him. The rattle of heavy metal that moves snake like where it unravels. Nervously eyeing the bolt cutters. Her hand moving up to the chain, the big metal collar. Studded, the padlock that sits at the side. Made sure she was never getting out of it by herself. Made sure, she was always going to need him. She tugs it around to him.
"Is his body upstairs?"
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He stares at her collar, trying to figure out to get that off. Her question snaps him from his reprieve. "Uh- yeah? Got him in the head; he ain't turning." He can see a slight resemblance, and with her earlier slip-- "He your dad?"
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She nods. "Y... yes." Most people hated Jack - they should. The world had ended, and he had snapped. But he'd always been like that, she'd wanted to tell someone, anyone. But she was never allowed to, was she? Talk to anyone, see anyone. His perfect little princess. "You should have let him turn. It's what he deserves."
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But now the chain is cut, even if the collar isn't gone. He stands, and offers her a hand getting up. She might need it. Who fucking knows what Jack did to her down here. He wouldn't trust him either, all bloody and disgusting.
"C'mon," he says, "you wanna see outside?"
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One step, to get off the bed, the next where her face presses into his chest. Her arms slow, and the gripping tightly against the leather of his best, the coarse material of his shirt. She's soft, of course she is, her hands are weak and her legs are unsteady. Hanging onto him as she begins to cry, then sob, shaking like a leaf, about to crash and fall to the ground. "You're real. You are. I didn't make you up. I never thought I was ever going to see anyone again." Then it goes, and mercifully she has the sense to presses her face into the material as she begins to take deep, hysterical breaths of relief.
It's all too much for her, apparently.
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Awkward, feeling the largeness of his hands and the dirt under his fingernails, he pats the flat space between her shoulders. "Hey, c'mon," he hears himself muttering. "You wanna see outside, right?"
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This - this right now, is everything. So when he prompts, she pulls up - though not far. Doesn't let go of him. Rather she takes a fistful of the corner of his untucked shirt. Knows better than to take his hands, he might need them - she didn't doubt what Jack had said because she had heard the groans from outside. The screams. The wretching wet noises of what she had assumed was flesh.
He'd have to fight - they all had to fight, that's what Jack said. He'd need both hands, and she'd have to make sure not to get in his way. That'd be alright - she hopes because she doesn't think she could let go of him, not right now. Too scared that he'd disappear. But as she does give him a little space as she nods, the once, wiping at her face. Blotchy and red with the tears. The smudge of blood on her cheek from his clothes.
Yes, yes she would like to go outside.
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Daryl doesn't want to be rough now. But he doesn't want to be soft either, and end up wrapped around this little girl's finger, only to watch her die in a week or a month or a year. He can't take much more of this. He wants to say that. To scream at her or shake her or something, to separate himself from this inevitable repeating circumstance.
He wants to say that. Instead, he says, "c'mon," and stands. Putting his bow up over his shoulder, he reaches for her, holding out a calloused hand.
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It was still a basement though, and that door in front of her, her way out, takes more of herself to fix upon. To gather up courage, she wanted to walk out that door like it was nothing but right now, it was everything. She sucks in a breath, holds fast to him and nods again. "Okay, I'm ready."
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Christ, what has he done?
The house they wander into is bloody and disgusting. There are clear signs of an ugly struggle, bullet holes and blood smeared on the wall. The long hallway leads to an open living room with a wide window. It's all fancy and modern except for the dead body shoved through the window, bits of bloody glass everywhere.
"Couldn't let him turn," Daryl mutters. "Bashed his damn head in."
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"Sometimes, I think he didn't like to look at me because he knew I didn't believe in him." It's curt, stepping forward but not letting go of his hand. Picking her way around on her bare feet like she was scared to make an imprint on the ground, but mostly minding the broken things, the blood stains - the mess of it all.
She goes for the body, her hand outstretched. Those were Jack's clothes, that was Jack's hair, this was the house he said would be all theirs and she would never need anything else again.
This was her father, under her fingers, pushing the head out of the way - these were the eyes; one blue, one green, that would crinkle up at the corners when she was little and call her his baby girl. Little Princess. This was the hands that promised her freedom from all their worries and locked her up in a dark room with no light but what he provided.
Nothing but him, he'd made sure. Like he was God.
"I knew he was just a person."
She drops it like it was so much rubbish, she would remember his dead face every night, she promises herself. She will hold it in her mind and hold onto this man's hand and she will remember she never has to go back.
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If she's got no love for her dead father, he's got no time for delicacy. The mangled body is caught in front of the shattered window, and it only takes a moment to kick his torso and launch him out of it. Handsome Jack gets the dull thud of concrete to herald him to the ground.
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There is something so final, to how he does it. Ceremony like story books endings. Like there were heroes and she knows that's not true. She has to tell herself that, that's - that's how things really are. "Because he loved me more than anything. He loved me so much he wouldn't let anyone hurt me."
Jack's body is a broken doll, and she's the smashed porcelain thing. She feels as empty as one, mouths forming around the words like they happened to someone else. "I'm the smartest person you'll probably meet. He said that it made me precious. So I could never be near anyone else, just in case they tried to use me."
She keeps her eyes down as she follows after him. Careful to pick around the wreckage.
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