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frangipanilove · 7 months ago

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Fighting Fire With Fire Part 2;

"The Duality Of Fire"

(read part one and part three here)

During the early stages of the outbreak, the military used napalm in an attempt to control the spread of the virus. Through flashbacks and through FTWD, we saw how Operation Cobalt completely failed to contain the virus, while simultanously contributing to the total breakdown of societal structures. Metropolitan areas on the North American continent were indiscriminately bombed, making no differentiation between the living residing there, and the undead. We also saw, for instance in Shane's flashback to when Rick was in the hospital, how federal forces went in and killed any remaining survivers.

This is the duality of fire. It can be used for total obliteration, but it can also facilitate new life, as we saw in TOWL 1x1 Days, when Rick told the story of how his father burned down the farm, and how it flourished the next year.

During Rick's echelon briefing, we see the duality of the "fire" symbolism illustrated. Both Rick and Major General Beale talk about how you sometimes "have to burn things down in order to bring things back":

Both recognize the tremendous power of the fire symbolism, but they use the metaphor differently. Where Rick is ultimately interested in a good outcome as in facilitating new life, thriving crops and a sustainable future, Beale is literally talking about burning down cities, along with the people living in them.

In flashbacks seen during Major General Beale's Echelon briefing, we witness how the military used napalm on Atlanta and LA.

Napalm is, simply put, a fire bomb made from petrochemocals.

Let's explore the "fire = fuel" angle for a minute.

The opening minutes of 1x1 was our first introduction to the visuals and the symbolism of the show. We see Rick arrive at a gas station in search of fuel.

He only finds death and destruction, meaning that since the very first seconds of the show, the literal opening scene, we see gas, gas stations and fossil fuel surrounded by death symbolism. And, when we later learn that the military bombed the cities and killed countless civilians using napalm, we realise they used a firebomb made from petrochemicals.

The symbolism around gas stations as temples of doom continues, such as in 4x4 Indifference:

This sign quite literally labels the gas station as "hell". The people residing there had committed suicide. Keep this in mind, I'll return to it shortly!

The term "fighting fire with fire" was originally used to describe a technique of forest management, specifically in regards to how to manage wildfires, in which controlled fires were ignited in the path of a wildfire as a preventative measure:

"Fighting fire with fire" as an expression has also often been used to describe vaccines, due to the way it was discovered that exposure to pathogens in some cases could trigger the immune system to produce antibodies against said pathogens, thus resulting in immunity:

When first we met the character Dr. Edwin Jenner at the CDC in TWD 1x5 Wildfire, his name was a reference to Dr. Edward Jenner, an English physician widely known as the “father of immunology”, due to his role in developing the world's first vaccine, against smallpox, in 1798.

It is not a strecth to say that this foreshadows a potential vaccine in TWDU. The virus is called wildfire. Vaccines are often said to be "fighting fire with fire". We learned about the wildfire virus from a character named after the guy who developed the world's first vaccine.

In TOWL 1x2 Gone, we see Michonne involved in a situation that sheds light on how the "fighting fire with fire" symbolism is utilized by TPTB. We see her trying to get through an enormous walker horde, it's a virtual ocean of death:

She tries to distract the walkers by shooting a small missile into the horde, which then explodes. Fighting fire with fire.

Eventually, Nat shows up and helps by adding more explosive fireballs, and the "ocean of death" parts to reveal a way forward.

Fighting fire with fire:

This also provides an interesting example illustrating how fire bombs can be used responsibly, in contrast to the way napalm was used by the military, who indiscriminately bombed cities, killing innocent civilians in metropolitan areas by incinerating them.

It shows that when the people, who have harnessed the tremendous power of fire, have the right intentions, it can be used for good. It shows the duality of fire, and it illustrates the duality of pharmakon, a poison and a cure.

Fighting fire with fire.

This guy stands out from the crowd, and I believe he tells us something about what the wildfire virus in TWDU in reality is a metaphor for:

He's a callback to Rick, back in TWD 1x1 Days Gone Bye:

He beautifully illustrates the ominous nature of the fire symbolism, here represented by fossil fuels, or simply gasoline. We saw it herald death and dystopian hellscape at the gas station in 1x1, we saw it at the gas station in 4x4 Indifference, which was literally named "Hell", we saw it when napalm made from petrochemicals was used indiscriminately to destroy metropolitan areas on the North American continent and massacre anyone in proximity, infected or not.

And we see it again here.

The gas man is Mr. Wildfire Virus incarnate, a posterboy for death and necrotic life, a metaphor for "the old ways". He represents the disease, the plague, the extinction event...

He represents "the end" of humanity!

I don't think it's a stretch to say that the wildfire virus and the walkers in TWDU are metaphors for carbon emissions, the fossil fuel industry and the rapidly escalating threath of climate change to humanity. That's always been my interpretation, and that's solidified after seeing the gas man.

An interesting detail is how the gas man is shown here with gold teeth, as though he's illustrating the incredible wealth accumulated by the fossil fuel industry at the expense of the equilibrium of the ecology of the planet.

Seeing a gas man as the front figure and team captain of an enormous horde of the undead, an insurmountable obstacle, an ocean of death... it's not subtle.

A gas station innundated in death symbolism was the very first thing we, the audience, saw of TWDU, it was literally in the opening scene of 1x1.

And the gas man were among the last things we saw in what's so far one of the last episodes of the last spin off. But a few episodes later, we did see a glimmer of hope, and a potential way out of the mess...

The gas man functions as the face of the threat to humanity in TWDU, and was, in my opinion, inserted as a counter point to what we saw few episodes later, the ethanol as a representation of a "cure", an "antidote" in the back Richonne's escape car.

An electric/bio-ethanol hybrid car, no less...

Again, not subtle...

Bio-ethanol, a sustainable, renewable source of energy, is portrayed as a foreshadow of a sustainable future, in which humanity recovers and thrives.

A green(e) future?

I wrote about how they in FTWD season 4, and in particular 4x16, explored the "ethanol = cure" theme in a post the other week, read more about it here.

Remember how we in TWD season 9, saw the production of bio-ethanol as an alternative source of fuel. We saw how crucial it was, in that Maggie was even seen trading produce for bio-ethanol.

This is a theme TPTB also explored in TWD World Beyond, where especially Elton was concerned about the sixth extinction event, the Holocene extinction.

The kids in TWDWB called themselves "the Endlings", seeming to have accepted that they were among the last survivers of a humanity that was on a direct path to self destruction. Here's from an article in Comicbook.com:

"'Wind always wins,'" Elton tells Hope, borrowing a phrase from his mother who died at the onset of the apocalypse ten years earlier. "Something my mom said about nature deciding who lives and who dies. Turns out she was right."

He explains humans are "at the conclusion of the Holocene extinction," the sixth extinction event on the planet following the Late Ordovician mass extinction, the Late Devonian extinction, the End-Permian extinction, the Triassic-Jurassic extinction event, and the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event.

"We were already killing ourselves directly and indirectly, but nature made a shortcut," Elton tells Hope. "It took the dinosaurs possibly 60,000 years to die after 240 million of living, so following that ratio, given the human race's 600,000 and factoring in other miscellaneous variables, I say we have about 15 years until we're gone."

Elton was referring to the walkers when he talked about the threath to humanity, however, if the walkers are a metaphor for climate change, Elton's predictions of 15 years until we're extinct are sobering...

In TWOL 1x6, Major General Beale estimated non-necrotic, meaning human, life has 14 years left.

In real life, the doomsday clock is currently at 90 seconds to midnight (x)...

...we're nowhere near reaching the 2 degrees Celcius target...

...and 2023 was the hottest year on record.

We're not doing great.

TPTB seem to be well aware, because...

...here we see how an electric/bio-ethanol hybrid car represent the "antidote", the future, the "escape" from the extinction event.

Richonne's yellow stick shift electric/bio-ethanol hybrid car represents a potential way out of the imminent Holocene extinction. It represents an "escape" from the sixth mass extinction event, much in the same way a shift away from carbon emitting fossil fuels, to sustainable, renewable sources of energy represents the "cure" against climate change in real life.

But back to the narrative of the show. The accumulation of walkers represent a real threath to humanity, as Major General Beale correctly stated. What could the expression "fighting fire with fire", or "pharmakon", tell us about a potential "cure"? What could the "antidote" be, in the canon of the show?

During Rick's echelon briefing, Major General Beale raised a few issues that would be of legitimate concern, even if most of the rest he said were the ramblings of an authoritarian genocidal madman. He mentioned hordes of up to a million walkers, and he referenced studies suggesting non-necrotic life, meaning humans, could have as little as 14 years left before the the dead would outcompete the living. Millions of walking corpses, spreading diseases, polluting the soil, contaminating fresh water sources.

Those are legitimate concerns and would have to be dealth with. Fire could play a literal role.

Glenn told us in season one. "We bury the ones we love and burn the rest". From an infection contagion prevention point of view, it makes sense to use fire to destruct the wildfire virus. Fighting fire with fire. However, there must be some way to contain the virus while still preserving one's own hummanity. "We bury the ones we love and burn the rest". Unlike what happened during the mass murders of Operation Cobalt during the initial stages of the outbreak.

Again, fire, when used responsibly, could play a role in neutralizing the treath of the plague. It's pharmakon, a poison and a cure.

Fighting fire with fire.

And using fire as a contagion preventation measure was already built into the infrastructure at the CDC. We first saw it in 1x5 Wildfire, when Dr. Jenner accidently knocked over a vial containing samples from Test Subject 19, his late wife, upon which the lab went into full decontamination mode and erased any remaining trace of the pathogen in a great ball of fire.

Later, when the doomsday clock at the CDC reached zero, we watched the entire CDC explode, effectively destructing everything inside, including test samples containing wildfire as well as any other pathogen they might have kept in there.

We also saw it on Hershel's farm in season 2, when the barn where he had kept the reanimated corpses of his loved ones while awaiting a cure, caught on fire. Although, that was more of a display of the symbolism involved rather than a depiction of how to scientifically contain a virus:

We've also seen it countless other times. Fire symbolism has been prevalent on the show since the very beinning, and there's a reason for that. It's because it represents pharmakon, a poison and a cure!

My hypothesis is that "fire" could play a literal role in the resolution of the zombie apocalypse. I also believe that it's likely the term "fighting fire with fire", or "pharmakon", could be meant to be interpreted figuratively, as in the develepment of some kind of cure/vaccine/treatment/immunity.

And like I explained in this post from a few days ago, connections to Beth is found everywhere in the symbolism surrounding these themes.

I mentioned her association with ethanol (as in moonshine = alcohol). I discussed the precedence set by Alicia from FTWD in regards to the bite/cure theory.

And finally, I've spent years now, talking about the Sirius symbolism that Beth has been absolutely immersed in. The word "Sirius" comes from Greek Seirios, which means "glowing", "scorching", it refers to Sirius the Dog Star, and it's associated with the scorching hot "dog days of summer".

"Sirius" symbolism IS "fire" symbolism, they're literally the same, and it ultimately means "return/resurrection/rebirth/reunion", as a reference to how Sirius the Dog Star periodically disappears from the night sky, only to return one morning, right before dawn.

I've talked about how Beth is deeply connected to the symbolism we see around Rick, I've talked about how they so often completely mirror each other and the resurrection symbolism around Rick is identical to the resurrection symbolism around Beth.

If "fire" is a part of the "cure" on the show, the fire symbolism includes resurrection symbolism, which we've seen countless exemples of around Rick and Beth.

And remember, the future is green(e)!

#team delusional #bethyl #daryl dixon #beth greene #team defiance #the walking dead #beth x daryl #twd #daryl x beth #twd towl #twd world beyond

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promiscuouspomegranate · 1 year ago

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If you're not busy can I request a yandere shane from stardew I really don't see that much of him😸

Midnight Martini

“A little oneshot with some rambles toward the end.”

Oneshot TWs: Drinking, Existential Thoughts, Shane is Depressed, You got Drugged lol, implied abduction.

Ramble TWs: Alcoholism, Depressive Thoughts, and Yandere Behaviors

(You’re the second person to request something.. so I simply have to entertain the anon. I hope you like it.. I was sleepy writing this 😪)

“Do you ever drink, Y / N or do you constantly keep up the happy farmer charade? I’m genuinely intrigued by your little persona,” Shane smirked and elbowed me, “What happens at this lake stays between us.”

I nervously gripped the martini I ordered earlier and quickly chugged it. It was dry and bitter and overpowered my mouth with gin. I covered it and felt a burn in my throat. Shane, instead of getting a water bottle for me, laughed as if comedy peaked at this very moment.

“You seriously have never drunk before? Fuck, I didn’t know I’d encounter someone like this ever,” He took a swig of his bottled beer and wiped his mouth, “It’s kinda sweet.”

“Shut up,” I nudged him and groaned, “I was always the damn designated driver at work events and high school parties fucking sucked.”

“Oh, you can curse too? It seems my world is coming to an end,” He chuckled and set his bottle down, “I get it, though. I didn’t start until.. well, until some time ago.”

“I don’t get how you enjoy this shit,” I glanced over and realized what I said, “No offense, of course!”

There was a moment of silence between us, and the moonlight rippled through the iridescent lake water. I moved in a little closer and grabbed an unopened bottle of cold beer. I used the dock to pop the cap off and took a sip.

“I don’t even like to drink, honestly,” He sighed, “I only like the feeling of being drunk. It’s the only way I feel happy, y’know? So much shit happened, and life continued. I wasn’t fucking ready to man up, so I drove to the closest gas station in ZuZu city and came him with a six-pack. I woke up the next morning with a throbbing pain in my head and vomit in a bucket, but not a single memory about the shit that happened to me. It’s.. it’s become a ruthless cycle.”

I took another sip and Shane grabbed his bottle. He gazed at my face and rubbed his stubble.

“Do you ever think this is it? All we have in life is a cycle of horrible feelings and emotions until we die? Yoba, I hope it’s not,” His voice sounded raw with emotion as he spoke, “I just wanna get better.”

“For what it’s worth,” I paused and thought about what to say. I set my bottle down and grabbed Shane’s hand, “You’re not alone, Shane. I don’t know what happened, and I would never expect you to tell me. I know what despair feels like, and you can’t help but think it all fucking sucks. That’s because it does. Everything is horrible, but.. but we have these ever so brief moments that make life worth living.”

He was silent and I decided to continue.

“When I first came here, I was depressed. I lost the only family member that genuinely cared about me and had no fucking money, friends, or food,” I laughed and looked at him, “Shane, I remember approaching you, and you told me to fuck off. I went home and started sobbing because I felt like shit. I could’ve wallowed in my misery, but then.. I wouldn’t be here with you.”

Reality seemed to blur with desire and I selfishly leaned in closer. I brushed my hand across his face and his eyes glowed in the darkness of the valley. He felt warm and my mind felt fuzzy.

“I want to be here with you,” I murmured.

“Fuck you,” He whispered back, “Fuck you for being so.. you. Damn it, you’re not supposed to be a flirty drunk. I’m supposed to be making a move on you.”

Our noses touched and I felt my heart racing with intoxication and want. I wanted this kiss to happen and I wanted it to be with Shane. I quickly pressed my lips against his and pulled his head closer to mine. He reciprocated my feelings and wrapped his arms around my body. After a moment, he pulled away.

“That was a long time coming,” I slurred my words and grabbed his face, “I want more Shane. ‘S not fair to kiss me then pull away so quickly.”

“Oh, I know sweetheart,” He calmly replied and kissed my forehead. He stood up and put our bottles back in the cooler, “I’m just concerned about how you feel right now.”

“I’m fine,” I stupidly smiled and bounced up. My head was pounding, and the ground felt like it was swirling, “Just.. just sleepy.”

“That’s good to hear; you’ll be out any second now. It’s past your bedtime, isn’t it,” He pulled me into his arms and muttered, “Just go to sleep. It’ll all be better in the morning. We’ll be together.”

That whole scene would take A LOT of gifts and bonding to happen. I’m sensing a major inferiority complex and, “Oh, if I talk to them, they’re just going to think I’m some stupid drunk who can’t take care of himself.”

I think something terrible happened in his life that spiraled into his alcoholic depression. His parents refused to accept him after discovering that he had nowhere else to go but Marnie’s ranch. He’s stuck in the past and refuses to move on from what happened. He feels horrible and desperately needs to feel something other than self-hate and sorrow.

When you first approach him, he’s too absorbed by his grief to realize that YOU WANT TO BE THERE FOR HIM (like.. you don’t bite.) He tries to close off any form of interaction and conversation. Why would he deserve to talk to someone when he’s terrible? He’s too afraid of his flaws to let anyone close.

Yet, you insist on hanging around like some incurable parasite. Shane feels startled when he finally realizes you want to be with him. Here’s this kind farmer who thinks that HE is worth something. He hasn’t felt proper affection in so long that his feelings spiral immediately. He finally has someone that makes him feel like he has self-worth and that he’s important.

He starts drinking less and talking to you more. As he sobers up more, his feelings are less intense but still linger. He wants you to himself and hates the thought of you falling for another bachelor. So, what better way than to take you late at night? Not like he could just ask you out himself.

Give this man counseling and a hug ⁉️⁉️⁉️

#yandere stardew valley #yandere #yandere shane #yandere writing #dark romance #yandere sdv

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boygiwrites · 1 year ago

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Harley D. Dixon 4

An amazing edit inspired by this story! (Cred to Cora_Line99) Harley D. Dixon's Pinterest Board! Harley D. Dixon's Playlist!

📖Chapter List.

Author's Note. Happy to be posting another chapter! Please enjoy :)

We drive all morning.

The leafy dirt and tilted trees of the quarry crawl past our windows, and they take about an hour to turn into cement roads, gas stations, pharmacies and corner stores with the windows busted out. We're in an empty town, now, trailing the sidewalks like a long line of ants.

At the head of the group is officer Rick's car, leading us left and right 'round the edges of danger and death, 'cause that's what cops do. Behind him is Morales' car. Then, me and my Dad are in the middle, and behind us is the RV. At the back, sandwiching us all together, 'cause he's the only other cop, is officer Shane. His voice crackles up on the walkie every few minutes, goin', everything lookin' good up front, over, which Rick's voice answers, all's good, over, except for that one time, 'cause there was a dead buck blocking the road, and they had to get out and shove it off.

Sometimes we'll get a, Daryl, from one of them, which means, How's Harley, which means, Do we need to pull over and shoot your daughter in the face, and my Dad always answers with a, Keep drivin', and he throws the walkie down like it tried biting him.

Adults like addin' layers onto what they say, 'cause the truth is too offensive to say out loud.

My Dad's watchin' me real close; closer than the road, even. He's chewin' on his thumb.

Things were a little like this when it was just us, in the beginning. All we did for the first three days was drive.

Then, we found these people.

I think about Rick — And how just for one more day, he saved my life.

He split Sophia's Dad in half with a bullet, to keep him from ripping me up. Without him, maybe those teeth in my shoe would'a had one more moment to sink into me, and I'd be dead again, some other way. The only reason I'm able to feel the sun on my skin right now, and listen to the birds as they flutter and chirp on the phone lines is because of Rick, the man who killed my Uncle. I'm half-dyin', and Rick — He's half-good. There might be walker germs inside my body, and they might be squirming their way into my lungs, and my heart, and eventually, my brain, which will turn me into one more dead name the living will have to carry around with 'em, and my Dad will be sad forever, but today, I get to watch the sky pass over us.

That's just enough, I think, for me to only hate officer Rick with half of everything I got.

The walkie chimes.

"Daryl?" It's Rick, again, and I know his police badge is prolly winkin' in the sunlight.

Do we need to shoot your daughter in the face? Did I fail?

Dad snatches up the walkie. He don't like answering the secret question that Rick's askin', not one bit.

"No. Keep drivin'."

He throws it down and goes back to chewin' his thumb, bouncin' his knee, and glancin' at my arm. If he could, he'd blast the music so loud that there wasn't enough space left in his head to think so hard about everything. I go back to watching the clouds pass by, just for today.

We drive all morning, and then after that, we drive all afternoon.

Somebody honks twice, quick. Honk, honk.

That's code for, everybody pull over; something's wrong.

"Stay here, chicken," My Dad mutters, before he hops out. We're in a parking lot for a supermarket.

The adults gather, and the kids are all lookin' at each other through the windows, mouthing what's going on, and frowning. We all shrug.

My Dad comes back a few minutes later.

"Old man says the RV's runnin' on fumes." Dad reports, folding him arms on my window.

"What's that mean?" I ask him.

I can feel nausea spilling in through my stomach; rolling inside my skull, for the third time today.

"Means we're gonna have to stay here for a little bit." He sighs.

The first thing I do when he lets me out the truck is retch my guts up onto the front tyre.

Heads turn, and I know everybody's already makin' excuses in their heads, like I'm just feeling car-sick, but it's just not true. I'm not car-sick. I've been throwing up since yesterday, and everyone knows it, 'cause they watch me like hawks.

My Dad helps me use a spare shirt to wipe my chin clean, and then he sets me up in one of the camping chairs people are pulling out for the long wait. He makes me drink some water, three big sips, and he finds me an apple to nibble on, nagging me to eat as much I can. I hesitate, 'cause it's just gonna end up in another slimy puddle of vomit some hours from now, but I bite into it, anyway.

He tells me to stay put, and then he's leaving with all the other men to search for gas. The women hover around me — Some sitting, some leaning, some standing, but all of 'em starin'. Except for poor, poor Andrea, who's not staring at anything other than her shoes. I feel like Andrea.

More apples and water get passed around.

"Sweetie, I just wanted to tell you I'm so sorry." Lori says to me. "I should have been paying more attention. I shouldn't have let you run off."

I force myself to look at her. "Don't be sorry. It's my fault."

"Oh," She sighs, and she just looks so, so sad. "Please don't say that. It's not your fault."

But, "It is my fault." I tell her. "I ran away."

Carol speaks up. "Honey, what happened was not your fault. It wasn't anybody's fault. It was just... a terrible, terrible accident."

Jacqui nods. "Don't blame yourself."

"Rick feels awful." Lori admits. "After Atlanta, after Merle... Now, this. God. He's just so torn up about it."

I shrink into my chair, 'cause I don't wanna hear a single word 'bout Rick, or his feelings. He saved me, but he's not my friend, and I don't have to care about his feelings; especially not when they're about murdering my family. I don't have to care about any of their feelings. I think they're forgetting that I'm also waiting to see if I die. They keep glancing at my skin, my eyes, and my fingers, which aren't twitching, yet — But, so am I. I don't want to die. I want to listen to the birds every day. I want to see my Dad, too. I want to watch the stars at night, and pick out the shiniest one.

"Okay," Is all I can croak out, 'cause there's something very thin inside of me that's stopping me from crying, and I don't wanna break it.

Then — "God," It's Andrea, and she's laughing. "She's dying! The kid is dying, people!"

I whip my head up. The other women gasp.

"Last thing she wants is you people pestering her all-damn day, so just do her a favor and shut your traps."

Everyone is gobsmacked, as Dale likes to say. Their mouths are hanging open, and their eyes are all shifty, like they're lookin' around to see if everyone just heard what they just heard. But, yep, they heard right. Andrea just said the word dying, which is basically a cuss word, and nobody can do anything to take it back.

You can't swallow words you already said. I know that, 'cause I've tried, like the night I told my Dad he killed my Momma.

"Or Daryl's gonna come back and do it for you."

Andrea don't even care 'bout the stares. She goes back to eating her apple.

"I don't think that's appropriate," Lori tells her.

Jacqui sighs. "Let's just talk about something else, y'all, huh? Like, uh..."

"There's nothing else to talk about, Jacqui. We're all just playing the waiting game, here. Whether we talk about the damn weather or not isn't gonna change the fact that we might have to shoot Harley in the face in a few hours."

Andrea's right, and nobody can change it.

After that, all we do is wait, and wait, and wait, for me to start twitching. Nobody likes this game.

To keep busy, me and the other kids scribble flowers and stick-men into the tarmac with some chalk that Carol finds in a trunk, and she makes sure to compliment my drawings way more than the others, even though they're kinda wonky. Carl snacks on some jerky. Then Dale wonders on back, and we get to listen to some more of his poetry book, which has teeny-tiny letters that he needs to put his glasses on to read. It makes him look more like everybody's grandpas than he already does. My Grandpappy Dixon, though — He wouldn't read no damn poetry book. He'd chop it up and use it for firewood, just so he could burn some more poetry books.

We're on a poem about a newborn lamb when the men come back.

They're all carrying jerry cans and plastic tubing and heavy, droopy frowns that mean bad news. Glenn flops onto a chair and when he shakes his head, sweat goes flying off, and his arms are covered in black car soot. Morales and T-Dog pinch and shake out their sweaty shirts.

My Dad stands behind my chair, squeezing onto the muscles on either side of my neck.

"You eatcher apple?" He murmurs to me.

"Yeah," I murmur back, and he nods.

Everybody straightens.

"Alright, y'all." Rick hooks his thumbs into his belt. "At the moment, we're only getting gas from 'bout one outta every fifteen cars we check, which'll have us back on the road in about a couple hours. I'm aware that ain't ideal. I'm aware we're on a time limit, here. But we don't have a lotta options."

"There's space in the RV." Comments Dale. "We could ditch one of the cars; pile in the RV."

Shane tries to laugh. "That's a whole lotta pilin', there, Dale."

Glenn looks like he hates to say it, but, "He's right. We've already got me, Jacqui, Carol, Sophia and Andrea crammed in there."

Dale deflates and goes back to stroking his beard.

"Now, this here's a parking lot, people." Shane announces. "There's cars here. There's gas. We're just gonna have to stick it out 'til then."

There's a general wave of disagreement passing over everyone's faces.

I know what they're thinking.

"Is someone going to say it?" Carol huffs, and nope, nobody's going to say it, so she has to. "Harley can't just, 'stick it out'."

We haven't had a real conversation about this. My imminent maybe-death has only been passed around in whispers and mumbles, like a bad stain nobody wants to hold onto for too long. Nobody wants to mention my weak stomach or just how much I've been hurling up my food, because that way, it can't just exist in the background, anymore. It has to take a front seat, where they can see it; where it's scarier.

As soon as the words come out Carol's mouth, eyes start jumping around, as if it's easier to discuss my death if they can't see me.

"I'm sorry, but that's the reality, here." Carol's taking a page out of Andrea's book. "Daryl, how many times has that girl thrown up today?"

His hands grip me harder. "'Bout... 'Bout four-five times."

"Right. So, I think it's time we throw the possibility of those scratches bein' nothing out the window." She says, grim.

Glenn rubs at his forehead. "Oh my God."

"W— H-Hold on, now." Dale's stuttering, shaking his head. "We can't just diagnose her from— from one measly symptom."

"This doesn't change anything." Shane suddenly argues.

My Dad starts, "The Hell it don—"

"We're headed to the CDC for a cure." Shane talks over him. "We're headed there, and that's it. It's all we can do."

Dale's just totally appalled. "I think there's a lot more we can do."

"That supply run from a few weeks ago," Glenn's frowning, "I brought back some good stuff. Maybe that can... Stave it off."

It, meaning the germs reaching my brain, once and for all. I recall the posters in my old science classroom, where a person's head would be sliced in half and you could see all the brains on the inside, and I imagine that it's my brain, and that there are millions of little ants chewing away at the edge, and then one of them breaks through, 'cause all it takes is one, and they eat my brain from the inside-out like an old melon, then that's the end — I die.

My Dad can tell what I'm thinking, 'cause he's magic like that, and he silently takes my place in the chair, and sets me in his lap. His arms wrap around my waist, and Jacqui reaches over to put her hand over mine.

You can't stave off turning into a walker. You can try — Like, with cables, and apologies — but really, it doesn't work like that. We're all just meat and bones and guts and skin, and rules like dying apply to us, even if we don't want 'em to. We're all just animals, even if we read poetry.

Shane scrubs his face with his hand, and he looks like he really wants to call Glenn a cuss word. "Glenn—"

"It doesn't work like that, I know." Glenn snaps. "You think I don't know that? You think I'm an idiot? You think I wanna watch a kid die?"

Rick pipes up. "Nobody's sayin—"

"'Nobody's saying that', I know," Glenn argues, "But you're all thinking it. What? You don't even want to try?"

"No. It's a good idea." Rick disagrees. "In fact, I'm all for it. Daryl?"

My Dad's gone quiet. He gives a nod.

"Well, then I don't think it's anyone else's decision to make." Rick concludes. "What do we have?"

"Kaopectate, Ibuprofen. Nausea stuff." Glenn lists, calmer now.

"Still stuck sitting on our asses, though." Morales sighs, holding Eliza, who's not full of germs. "Wasting time we don't have."

"CDC's not going anywhere." Jim shrugs.

Suddenly, Dad's not quiet anymore. "How 'boutchu go ahead and share whatcher fuckin' problem is with the class?"

Jim claims, "Don't got one."

"Nah, matter fact," Dad scowls, "You know what? You said my daughter's life ain't worth a few drops of gas this mornin', if I 'memmer right, so why don't you go ahead and shoot a fuckin' hole in yer head 'fore I get up 'n do it for you? Right here, right now?"

Jim's jaw drops. "Woah—"

"Hey — Let's just get back on track, here." Rick holds up his hands, always the peacemaker. "There's no need for this."

Jacqui whips her hand in the air, squinting. "Hang on. What?"

"Yeah," Dad's getting heated; his voice higher. "This fuckin' string-bean bastard, you know what he said to me this mornin'? He said, 'Let's just think 'bout how much gas this is gonna cost us', with some lil' fuckin' smirk, when we were talkin' about savin' Harley."

Jim bursts, "Oh, that's compl—"

Conversation breaks out, but my Dad's shouting over all of it. "Yeah, man! S'what you said, right to my face!"

"That's—" Lori's gobsmacked. "I don't even know what to say to that, Jim."

"H— H-hang—" Rick's trying desperately to squash all this arguing down, but the shouting and the bodies — standing, now — are drowning him. Underneath me, my Dad's legs are jerking up and down, up and down, like that day in camp, 'cause he wants to get up and beat Jim until he's just a lumpy, red smear in the road. Suddenly, there's half a dozen people out of their chairs, forming one hostile voice. "H— Hang on, a secon—"

"You know what," Shane's booming, "I thought there was something off 'bout the way you said that, Jim."

"Is that true?" Glenn's asking, eyebrows screwed tight. "That's messed up, man."

Morales frowns, "Would you say that about my daughter?"

"Calm down," Dale echoes Rick. "Calm down."

"What, you gonna hit me, now? That's whatcher gon' do?" My Dad goads, grinnin', now. "Really?"

"Calm down," Jacqui says.

"Calm down," Lori says.

"Calm down!" T-Dog says.

"Calm down!!" Rick bellows, furious, absolutely furious, and there's a cracking gunshot — a bang — aimed into the clouds, and then silence.

Absolute, total, complete silence. It's so solid that people are stuck in it. So solid that I can hear the bird on the hood of Dad's truck jumping back and forth on its little talons, twenty feet away. It watches, oblivious, hopping and shuffling, until people start remembering to breathe again.

Even Rick is disturbed, and he's the one that pulled the trigger. "That's enough," He exhales, lowering his revolver.

"That's gonna pull a lot of geeks this way." Glenn whispers.

"Good thing we can leave right now, then." Rick pants, and he's staring down Jim, now. What does he mean? Leave right now? But we're stuck here. He said that. His cheekbone looks like an old plum, from where my Daddy punched him a couple days ago, and his eyes; they're piercing, like sharp, blue shards of glass melting under a blowtorch, and suddenly, he don't look like much of a peacemaker no more. "'Cause, Jim, your seat just became available."

His seat? What's that mean? Is he—?

"You're leaving me here?" Jim cries.

"Next bullet's goin' in your leg." Rick tosses the words at Jim, tired. "You doin' this willingly, or not?"

Jim cries out again, and that's how he goes down — He goes down crying and kicking and screaming, bastards, bastards, bastards, but the words mean nothing, and Dale's tryna stop them but neither him or Jimmy are strong enough to fend off four other grown men. I find myself in Lori's arms, right beside Carl, watching with my heart in my mouth, as Shane, Rick, Morales, and my Dad pin Jim down like he's an angry cat, and beat his fighting hands into a long coil of rope that they twist — God, you don't have to do this, please, you don — it tight, and then they anchor him to a shopping cart bay, and they leave him there, with nothing but a jar of peanut butter, a steak knife, an unloaded gun, and their bitter regards.

Dale's blubbering, speaking up for everyone who won't; can't. "This isn't right—"

But they brush past us, into the cars. Rick grabs Lori. My Dad grabs me. Shane starts unloading his Jeep, 'cause we're leaving that behind, too.

"We're leaving Jim?" I shriek quietly to my Dad, who's ushering me back into the truck.

He yanks my seat-belt down. "Ain't our fault," Click. "Fella deserves it."

"But—"

The door slams shut.

"Please!" Jim cries. I scramble to peer outside, and I see him kicking the air. "Please! I'll die out here!"

"If yer smart, you'll cut yourself out with the knife, and you'll ration the jar." Daddy calls out as he hops in the driver's seat. "But it's like I said." Slam. "Bag'a bricks."

"No, no, no! Please!"

More doors slamming shut; engines roaring to life. Rick shouts out the radio channel, again, as a reminder.

I can still hear Jim screaming when we peel out onto the highway.

"Everything lookin' good up front? Over."

A pause.

"All's good. Over."

I never wanted this.

Outside the windows, the sunset is melting purples and oranges all over each other like hot wax, and the tips of wheat fields are whipping past.

There's a long list of things that have happened the past few weeks that I never wanted.

I never wanted to leave home. Homes aren't meant to be left. That's why we got a word for house and a word for home, 'cause they're different. House is the walls and the bricks and the paint, but home is the twenty-year-old sofa that's in it, and the people that have been on it, and the old pictures stuck on the fridge. It's where I made memories in the day and dreamt about 'em at night. It's where I took my first steps, and it's where I cried, and laughed, and broke my first bone, and got my height scribbled into the doorframe. It's where I miss — deeply, like a wound I can't put a bandage on — every moment of every day. It's where I won't get to grow up. I never wanted to drive for days and go nowhere. I never wanted my Uncle Merle to turn into a star. I never wanted a dead man to scratch my own death into my skin, and there be nothing I could do to stop it besides stave it off. I never wanted to die; not yet, not now, not before I could live.

And parents aren't supposed to live longer than their kids. It's just one of them rules that everybody's born knowing.

I think that's why my Dad is cryin' again; crying, crying, crying, and he just can't stop. My Daddy never cries. Toughest man in camp, I'd say.

The common assessment, now, is that I really am infected. I'm going to die.

I remember my Dad's wallet, with all the photos tucked into the sleeves. I remember all the other photos we lost, or left, or didn't think to capture. I remember my last birthday, which was my seventh. Such a small number. Not even all my fingers. Some people get two number-candles on their cakes before they die. I only got one, but that's okay, 'cause I got other things. I got a day just for me, and I got I love you's, wrapped up in pink and even pinker birthday paper, and I got it all even though my Daddy didn't have much money. I got to live. I don't know how many days are in a year, but I know it's a lot. There's even more in seven years. I got to be alive for every single one of them. Isn't that lucky?

We left Jim to die, and I never wanted that, neither. Nobody deserves to die. I don't.

"Daddy, are you gonna leave me?" I ask. Maybe I won't get shot; I'll get left. I don't know which one I'd choose. I don't wanna choose at all.

"God," My Dad snuffles, smackin' away his tears. "Don't fuckin' ask me that."

"I— It's gonna happen, though." The germs will reach my brain, and that'll be it. "E-everyone thinks so. I'm sick."

"Shut the fuck up, Harley." My Dad whispers, and I wish he was singing again.

"Dad—"

"Don't."

"Maybe you should— Maybe you shoot me instead."

"This weren't never supposed to fuckin' happen!" He shrieks, suddenly, and punches the horn. "Fuck!"

Then, right on time, the walkie chimes.

"Daryl?"

Do we need to shoot your daughter in the face? Is it over?

With a rage like I ain't never seen before, my Dad steals the walkie off the dash and smashes it into the horn, over and over again, honk, honk, honk, honk, honk, until a piece breaks off, and then another, and another, until the buttons all pop off and the plastic cracks in half, like a broken heart. Then he chucks the whole thing out the window, and it's gone forever, and he sucks in a breath that sounds like a chainsaw tryna start, and he cries.

I feel sick again. My stomach's ballooning up and shrivelling down at the same time, and I'm gonna be sick.

By now, all the cars are pulling over, 'cause my Dad honked the stop, pull over signal ten times over, and then some.

"Daddy, I need to get out—" I'm sayin', gagging.

"Fu— I know. I know." He's sayin' back, and he swerves onto the side of the road, into the wheat.

He leaps out, slams the door shut, and runs around to my side, but by the time he yanks my side open, I've already thrown up all over my feet. I lurch, and then there's more, and my stomach empties again, and there it is — I see the apple, and I see- I see blood, streaked through it, like red-brown poison. I cough more up while my Dad soothes my back and holds my hair out the way.

Then, there's Rick and Dale, standing at either one of my Dad's shoulders.

"Is she okay?" Dale's panting.

"That's it. There you go." Dad beats on my back, and I spit the last of the apple-slime onto the floor. "It's done?"

I murmur a uh-huh, and then I realise what I've done. "I'm sorry."

"Hell you got to be sorry 'bout?" He frowns, still half-crying; still mourning me while I'm still here.

"The— The truck."

"Huh? The tr—?" He huffs, confused, and then shakes his head. "Truck's the last thing I give a damn about."

Rick's tryna put a smile on, but it don't look quite right. "We've got tissues in our car. We can clean it."

I wish they'd all turn away, 'cause it's like I'm naked. My vomit, and the blood, is just sittin' there like a puddle of evidence and dead people germs, for everyone to see. My Dad pulls me out by my wrist, and then we're sitting on the steps of the RV, and he's cradling me, and I'm crying like a baby, and the seven years mean nothin', 'cause I'm zero years old again, like I was in that picture at the hospital, a little pink newborn, so new and alive, and I just need my Momma and my Daddy to kiss it all better again. All I got is my Daddy, now. He's tryin'. But all the kisses in the world won't bring my Momma back. They won't give me another birthday.

"Sh, sh, sh, baby." He's sniffling into my hair, kissing where it meets my skin. "Shhh. I'm sorry, baby. Stop cryin'. Stop cryin'. Please."

But I can't. Not when I'm dying, and I ain't even lived, yet.

Lori and Rick clean the car out for my Dad, and when I climb back in ten minutes later, it's like it was never there, but we all know it was.

We continue driving into the night.

Carl can balance spoons on his nose.

He can also bend his thumb all the way back, twirl a coin like a spin-top, and cross and uncross his left eye. It's pretty cool. Now I know five things about Carl.

"Check this out." He says.

We're sitting at the RV booth, 'cause I get to sleep in here again, tonight. Morales is driving my Dad's truck for us. It's nearly us kids' bed-time, but Carl's trying all this stuff to make me feel better, and his Momma's lettin' him. My stomach's still whirling around, and my eyelids feel bloated, but it's working. I'm not crying anymore, not so much.

"How do you do that?" I giggle, sniffing. He passes me the spoon, and I try copying him.

I wish we had actual toys to play with, but we just gotta make do with what we got.

He shrugs. "I don't know. I just kinda do it."

Lori's chuckling to herself in the passenger seat, next to Dale.

I drop the spoon. This is hard.

"Show me again," Demands little Eliza, who looks far too grumpy for someone so small. "Show me how it works."

Carl's like Glenn — He's a good sport — So, he tilts her head and moves her spoon around until it stays, and she's giggling, too.

"Wanna see what else I can do?" He wiggles his eyebrows.

There's more? Just how cool is Carl?

He takes Sophia's spoon, and he takes my spoon, and then he grips them both so they're cupping each other. He shakes them. Cluh-clink, cluh-clink, cluh-clink. Music!

"I need a piece of wheat to chew on or something." He smiles, pulling an uh-huh, look how awesome I am, face. "Cowboys used to play the spoons, right?"

I grin. "You should have a cowboy hat, like your Dad's. Then you'll be a real cowboy."

"And a horse!" Sophia adds.

"And a gun!" Louis snarls, excited.

Lori gives us a sassily raised eyebrow. "Uh. I don't think so."

It's so silly that we all start laughing together. Carl, the spoon-clinkin' cowboy of the West.

"Oh, and did you know—?" Carl's got another trick. He presents the spoon to me, backwards.

My upside-down reflection stares back at me. For a second, I'm curious, but the feeling quickly fizzles away. Is that really what I look like? The little girl in the spoon got blonde hair that's all spillin' out of a rushed pony-tail in shoulder-length strips, and choppy bangs, and heavy brown eyebrows at the bottom of her face. She got one little black mole dotted onto her cheekbone, a fairy kiss, like Momma called 'em, and another one under her nose. She got purple-ish craters above her lids. She got red cheeks. She got a pair of green eyes, blinking at me from her upside-down prison inside the spoon. She's me, but inverted; wrong. I don't like this trick.

The girl in the spoon is frowning.

"What is it?" Carl asks. He pulls the spoon away and inspects it. "It didn't work?"

"N— No." I quickly tell him. "It worked."

"Then, what's wrong?" He asks, but not in the way adults do. There are no layers to anythin' he says, 'cause he ain't learnt to add 'em, yet.

I think of the spoon-girl, and I compare her to my school photo — The right way up; healthy, a neat ponytail.

"I just look so different," I shrug, 'cause I ain't learnt neither.

Sophia looks like a little dolly when she pouts. "Yeah..."

"What's it feel like?" Eliza asks.

She leans forward, 'cause she wants to hear a secret. Am I allowed to tell her one?

Everyone at this table's seen somebody turn before. Sophia saw her Dad turn. Eliza and Louis saw their Aunt and Uncle turn. Carl was there when Amy... I saw a hitch-hiker turn, once. There's not really an exact moment where someone changes. There's no switch. There's only a slow decline, and then a last breath. Then somebody else wakes up, in your body. This is what I say to the other kids. I think they're picturing each step happening to me as I describe them.

Louis goes, "Woah..."

Then, Eliza asks the un-askable. "Harley, you should show us what's under the bandage."

We all look at her. A proposition. We're all thinking, is she crazy, but then I say the un-sayable, 'cause lookin' won't hurt.

"Alright," I murmur, glancing at Lori and Dale. Their backs are turned. "I'll just lift the corner, okay?"

They all nod and lean even closer.

I pick at the edge of the seal, and it burns, just a little, and nope, the adults are still not looking, so I keep peeling and peeling until there's a little hole. We all contort ourselves to peer inside, and I keep going and going, and it's halfway off, now. It's like I'm opening a little door into a different dimension. I'm expecting melting, pizza-cheese skin, and maybe some gross, alien fungus carpeting a layer of yellow ooze, and blood bubbling up under my muscles, and we can almost see the scratches, now, and I wonder if—

"Hey." I whip my head around — we all do, like meerkats — and it's not Lori, or Dale. It's my Dad, coming in through the bedroom door. He's too tired to be proper angry, so he just sighs. "What the Hell do you think you're doin'?"

"Sorry—"

Wordlessly, he comes up to me and sticks the patch back down.

"What's going on back there?" Lori asks. "You guys behaving?"

"Takin' her bandage off." Dad snitches on me.

He kisses me quickly on the hair to balance out the scolding. He's never done that before. Then he pulls a box of pills off the kitchen shelf.

"Time for yer second one of these."

Lori gets up to pour me a cup of water, and Dad pinches my nose, and I swallow the pill in one gulp.

This is what some people would call a last ditch attempt — Racing to the CDC, filling my stomach with Glenn's medicine, and not being allowed to fiddle with the bandage, to stave it off. Rules are just words, but I'm supposed follow 'em, anyway. That's why I say I'm sorry again, but Dad don't like that, either. He says it's bed-time.

"Say goodnight to everyone," He tells me, 'cause he likes when I have good manners.

He grabs my pyjamas off the back of the driver's seat, where Dale's trying not to fall asleep on his face. I say goodnight to the other kids, and Lori, who gives me a hug. Dale calls out a goodnight, too, and he reaches over to ruffle my hair, like a grandpa. Then my Dad tugs me back into the bedroom we spent the last night in. The kids mumble goodnight to me again as I'm dragged away, but they feel a little too much like goodbye.

I hope Carl knows he made me feel better, even if it was just for a few minutes.

Apparently, we're on the outskirts of Atlanta now. When I peek outside, I see skyscrapers.

"We're gonna make it, right? To the CDC?"

I won't run outta time?

Dad freezes for a second.

"I'll drag you all the way there myself if I gotta." Dad says, and I know he's dead serious. Outta Hell on hot coals.

We're not stopping for the night. We can't. The engine's rumbling below me when I hop onto the bed.

My Dad grabs my hair-brush from our back pack on the floor, and he settles himself behind me on the covers to do my hair. My Daddy's a Dixon, and that doesn't just mean that he looks out for me and hates when people see him cry. It means that instead of saying I love you, he'll show me I love you. This is what he's doin' right now, by carefully running the brush through my messy hair, petting my baby-hairs into place, and threading his fingers through it all from scalp to end. He's done my hair so many times that I couldn't count, even if I used all my fingers and all my toes. He'd brush it while I sat in the bath when I was littler, and when he was gettin' me ready for school. He ain't that good at it, 'cause his hands are made for tools and guns instead of little-girl-hair, but that don't matter. The I love you matters more.

After that, he helps me into my pyjamas even though I don't need any help at all, and I realize that he's got that same intense look on his face that he did on that night in the quarry. It's not so much flaming, anymore. It more of a sinking, heavy look. I study it as he wraps me up in my button-up dinosaur pyjama shirt. Does he think this is the last time he'll put me to bed?

"Can you sing for me tonight, Daddy?" I ask, suddenly. If he gets to brush my hair and do my buttons, then I want to hear him sing.

He was just about to do up the last button. He hesitates.

"Yeah." He says. Then, he pinches my cheek, and he finishes looping the button. "I'll sing, little chicken. Lay down."

I burry myself in the thick covers. My Dad sets down his crossbow on the side-table, and shirks off his red flannel shirt, leaving him in a white tank-top. It's warm enough in here that he can do that, and I wish it was his lamb-skull tank-top, the one with all the crumbs, and I wish I still had my Raggedy Anne doll, which Uncle Merle found on the side of the road but I loved with all my heart, anyway, and I wish we were home. He kicks off his mud-caked boots. That's the last step. This is it.

Dad clicks off the lamp.

The room turns dark, and he rolls onto his side, facing me, but on top of the covers. I reach out and touch his mole, 'cause it matches mine. Lots of him matches me. His blonde-ish hair, his thin mouth. If time let me, I might've looked a little like him when I grew older. Then, I touch my name, permanently marked into his skin. Another I love you, shown and not spoken. I wonder if this will be all that's left of me if I don't wake up. He watches me, and I must be pretty interesting, 'cause he does it for a while. It's like when he was staring at my baby picture. He cups his giant hand over the side of my head, and I can feel his thumb wagging back and forth. Then, he starts whisper-singing, and I close my eyes and I imagine home. Home, where I belong. Home, where everyone I love, plus me, are all still alive.

I dream of a tyre swing and baby lambs.

I hear retching outside.

It's so dark I can't even tell if my eyes are closed or not, and my Daddy's already half-way on his feet, but it's not me, this time. I was sleepin', just a second ago. He notices, and then he's just confused. Who's throwing up? The lamp clicks on, and ugh, that's real bright. I sit up, rubbing my eyes. Dad's pulling his flannel back over his tank-top. He tells me to stay here, baby, and he grabs his crossbow and hurries outside. I crawl to the window.

We're pulled over in an emergency lane. The headlights are beaming a spotlight onto all the commotion.

It's Carl, hunched. He's throwing up over the guard rail, and Lori's crouched next to him.

Why's he throwing up?

My Dad pokes his head back in, hand outstretched, and he says I'm allowed to follow him outside, so I pad alongside him into the night. We reach the small crowd that's gathered around Carl, and I grab onto one of my Dad's belt loops and hide behind him, 'cause I'm scared. There's this terrible moment where I think that Carl is also bitten, or scratched, somehow, but Rick rips Carl's shirt off and rolls up his shorts, and nope, he's totally clean. Lori feels his forehead. It must be hot and wet, 'cause she frowns, but mostly, they're all just really, really confused. Weird, weird, weird.

"What's goin' on?" T-Dog asks, jogging over from one of the cars.

Dale answers, tense. "We're not sure, yet."

Rick searches for me and my Dad amongst the others. "Daryl, bring Harley over here."

We squeeze past some people and into the light. Dad stands me right next to Carl, and now I'm gettin' spun and poked and peered at.

First, me and Carl's skin is the same blotchy white. Weird. Then, our eyes are the same red. Weirder. We've both thrown up. Doesn't make sense.

"They have the same symptoms?" Jacqui asks.

How could we be the same typ'a sick, if he ain't even infected?

"How could this happen?" Glenn's asking for everyone.

"It can't be anything contagious, right?" Dale guesses. "Otherwise, we'd all have it."

Nobody knows what to do or say, 'cause this is the biggest, weirdest mystery in the world. Rick looks back and forth between Carl and me. Lori does, too. My Dad's got a frown on. But then my Daddy's eyes shift off my face and down to my arm, and he gets an idea and it's a weird one, 'cause he pinches the edge of my bandage, and I flinch, and then all in one go — ouch — he rips it off, just like he told me never, ever to do, and it lands on the road, and there's my arm. The cars fill the silence with hums. Am I dreamin'? Am I really still in the RV, sound asleep? My arm— It's not fuzzy or melting or oozing. It's—

"It's healed?" Rick shakes his head, eyes wide, and he grabs my arm like my Dad, to bring it close to his face.

I can't believe it. My arm — It's healthily scabbed over, with not one skin cell outta place.

I gasp, "Daddy, my arm."

"Am I seein' this right?" Dad asks Rick and Lori, suddenly breathin' as if he's been running.

"It— It looks completely healed." Lori breathes.

Several people come forward to take a look at me. Nobody's quite believing it. I'm not—? I'm not dyin'? Is that what this means?

"Have either of you kids eaten the same thing these past few days?" Asks Shane.

It's a weird question, but I have to answer, so I think really hard and so does Carl. The fish fry? The peaches? The—?

"The jerky!" We both shout.

"The—?"

"Who made the jerky?" Dad's lookin' through the crowd; desperate, not breathing, not yet. "Who was it?"

"It was m— I made it." Glenn confesses, but he doesn't know what it is he's confessing to.

"How'd you make it?" Dad asks, and he's pointing, now. So many strange questions, tonight. "Tell me exactly how you made it."

Glenn stammers, and we all listen to him list his jerky recipe like it's the most important thing in the world. "W—Well, I guess I took that meat you bought back — The possum? — And I don't kno— I sliced it, and then I—" Dad barks at him to tell us the exact thickness of the cut. "I guess, like an inch. Then I smoked it, I guess, on a stick over the campfire. I don't know, man. I—"

"You ain't salted it? You ain't cut the fat off?"

Glenn's lost. "No. No, I guess not."

My Daddy, then, drops onto his butt on the tarmac and he does the most confusing thing. He huffs out a big lungful of air, like he's boutta cry, but he doesn't cry. He starts laughing. He starts laughing, hard, like it's all a giant, funny joke that no one has gotten until now. Rick stands and starts laughing too, but his eyes have gone wet, too, and slowly, surely, everyone else starts sighing and laughing and clapping. Even Andrea's smiling! I'm smiling too, because I feel like I'm allowed — Like there ain't some catch. The jerky. Glenn made botched jerky. All those times my stomach was clenching like a sore fist — I weren't dying. All those times I was hurtin', back at the quarry — It weren't nerves. It was the jerky, messin' up my insides, 'cause it weren't made right. Jacqui runs for the food supply and she comes back with a zip-lock bag full of Glenn's jerky, and—

"God!" Everyone cringes all at once.

It's absolutely covered in mold. It's the worst-cured jerky in the entire world.

"Daddy—?"

"It was the fucking jerky?" Glenn's never looked so happy to be an idiot. "It was the jerky?"

"Fuck. Oh, fuck." My Daddy grabs both my cheeks. "You're fine. You got food poisonin', baby."

"I'm not dyin'?" I ask, just so I can hear him say no again, and then I ask it three more times, just to be sure. My Dad kisses my forehead, and then I'm in a big, strong, hug, and I'm alive. I'm alive again! And I can feel my heart-beat in my chest, and I can breathe, and I can do whatever I want, 'cause I'm alive. All that pacing and worrying and breaking of hearts and grave-digging of old memories, just for it to be Glenn's fatty, unsalted jerky. He's coming closer, now, and my Dad pulls away from me just enough to let Glenn give me a little hug.

He almost killed me. I think that makes us friends, now.

"Hoo! Praise Jesus!" T-Dog hoots, and Carol thinks he's bein' silly, 'cause she slaps his shoulder.

"I'm not dyin'." I laugh.

It's like we've won the lottery. All one camp, all happy, together. Rick grabs my Dad's arm and gives him a nod, a nod that says, It's over now, and my Dad nods back. I think to myself, randomly, that this is what family looks like. None of us were born together, and we ain't even know each other before, but we're all cryin' and laughin' together, and we chose each other. We chose to be scared together, and now we get to be happy, together.

"Man, we gotta keep you away from the food for a while!" Shane's teasing Glenn. "I mean, whoo!"

"I love you, Daddy," I'm suddenly admitting to my Dad, under all the happy shouts, while he stares up at me in the light of the truck.

He says somethin' he ain't said in years. "I love you too, Harley."

I get another kiss on the head, and another hug, and maybe, I'm thinking, this could be home. I might get to grow up here, instead.

I'm alive.

"Somebody throw that damn bio-hazard jerky in the trash!"

Author's Note. Hehehe, that last scene. So much fun to write. Stupid Glenn.

There's actually quite a few lines of foreshadowing in all the chapters leading up to this one. We all knew that Harley was probably going to be fine, but I tried using the food poisoning to keep everybody on their toes. Drama. Gotta have it, hehe.

I really hope you enjoyed reading. Thank you for being here! :)

#the walking dead #twd fanfiction #twd #daryl dixon twd #daryl dixon daughter #daryl dixon fanfiction #daddy issues #parent daryl dixon #rick grimes #fanfic #ao3 fanfic #angst #reader

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doghartzy · 7 months ago

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🥰 or 😭 or 😵‍💫 <33333

woe! timbrady be upon ye. this is from a teenage runaway thing i was working on a couple years ago that i'd really love to revisit but unfortunately sort of left my brain in 2022 :/

It’s a nothing night, some random house show with a no-name high school band that was put on by a friend of a friend of a friend who Josh is maybe trying to fuck. Tim agreed to go because he’s seventy percent of Josh’s impulse control, and because if he didn’t, he’d be spending his Friday night fruitlessly dialing Shane for calc answers.

But it’s been an hour and the band’s just started their set, finally, now that everyone’s high enough that the singer’s whispery excuse for vocals sound revelatory instead of shitty. Josh disappeared half an hour ago with the girl, the friend’s friend’s friend, and Tim is standing sort of toward the edge of the crowd, largely uninterested in showing up to practice tomorrow with a bunch of extra bruises from the mosh pit.

He shoves the last of his gas station bag of Ruffles in his mouth, and he pulls out his phone. His messages are barren, Josh having ignored the rosy-cheeked emoji Tim shot him about ten minutes after he vanished. Besides that, the last thing Tim sent anyone was the house’s address, which has likewise gone unanswered. Tim flicks his phone off and slips it back in his pocket, frowning lightly. Pulls it out again unconsciously and feels the crease between his eyebrows deepen when the lock screen still comes up empty.

It’s not like he’d owed a response, obviously, but Tim’s not used to being ignored. For a moment he debates the merits of stepping outside just to leave a voicemail, but he wouldn’t be able to get back inside. Josh got them in the first time, and Tim’s pretty sure plus-ones don’t get priority re-entry.

He’s pulled the thread back up to double-text, because fuck it, honestly, he’s too bored and a little wasted for this, and anyway he has a faint headache coming on, when a voice says, too loud and too close to his ear, “Someone keeping you waiting?”

Tim bites down on a ridiculous grin. “Just this guy. Said he’d meet me here but he’s running late.”

Hands settle on his hips briefly before lifting up and away, rubbing over Tim’s upper arms. “Well that’s rude of him.” Tim can hear his smile. “What an idiot, bailing on a guy like you.”

“Oh yeah? A guy like me, huh?” Tim gives it another second for the incredulous laughter to bubble up, and then he spins around. He is sure his face is ridiculous. He’s smiling incandescently and his cheeks are flushed from the crowd and it’s so good to see Brady that he can barely remember to breathe. “Hey there.”

Brady’s smiling a little dumb and open-mouthed. His eyes are clear. He must have driven here from his parents’ house. “Hey. Sorry about that. Dinner ran late.”

Tim shrugs. His headache’s completely cleared up now and everything. “Just glad you’re here now.”

“Yeah,” Brady says, drawing it out a little and looking around. “This is kinda ass, isn’t it?”

Tim shrugs again. He’s feeling very magnanimous. “You’re just too sober to appreciate it.”

“Don’t actually know if that makes it better.” Brady doesn’t wait for an answer, and Tim doesn’t really want to give one anyway. He’s not sure why he’s defending it. He’s only here for Josh, and it’s not like Josh is around to hear them talking, now. But Brady — and this is why Brady is the best, why Tim texted him to come along instead of Shane or Jacob or, god forbid, Drake — Brady leans in close and breathes hot into Tim’s ear. “You wanna get out of here?” He puts on an affect so it’s a joke.

Tim swallows. His face hurts from smiling. “Where are you gonna take me?”

“Dunno.” Brady’s hands are back on his hips. “I know this real nice place near here, great food, sit-down service.”

“Sounds fancy,” Tim hedges.

“Well,” says Brady. He pulls back so they’re a normal distance apart. A safe distance. “Worth it, for a guy like you.”

#ty britt!!!#ask #alltheprettyplaces #rpf talk #718

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biggerbetterbat · 1 year ago

Text

WITH YOU [10] GOOD LUCK TO US THEN

Daryl Dixon x OC (Charlie Reed)

Summary: The group has to fulfill Jim's last will. Charlie and Daryl get closer to each other on the rode. The CDC is not what they expected.

Warnings: language, death, mostly fluff tho

Song: Snow On The Beach Taylor Swift&Lana Del Rey

A/N Hello! Short chapter today, because episode 18 of season 10 just destroyed me. And absolutely hate this chapter... Next one will be much better and longer, I promise. Feel free to comment and I hope you enjoy this one.

WITH YOU ON WATTPAD

The RV? A mess.

White smoke was coming out of the hood, while Rick and Dale tried to come up with an idea of how to fix it.

"I told you we'd never get far on that hose," said Dale. "I said I needed the one from the cube van."

"Can you jerry-rig it?" Rick asked.

"That's all it's been so far. It's more duct tale than hose." Dale shook his head. "And I'm out of duct tape."

"I see something up ahead. A gas station if we're lucky." Shane said as he put down binoculars.

"Y'all, Jim...It's bad. I don't think he can take anymore." Jacquie gasped as she ran out of the RV.

"Hey, Rick, you want to hold down the fort?" said Shane. "I'll drive ahead, and see what I can bring back."

"Yeah, I'll come along too and I'll back you up." he nodded and headed into the RV to talk with Jim.

"Y'all keep your eyes open now. We'll be right back." Shane informed everyone.

There was no saving Jim. The ride was just killing him faster. He felt every bump, the smallest rock was causing him pain. Besides, he was like a bomb, ready to blow and it was just dangerous to have him around. Charlie knew it. Shane knew it. Daryl knew it. And Rick had to face it. There was no way he would make it to the CDC, and he probably didn't even want to.

"It's what he says he wants," said Rick.

"And he's lucid?" asked worried Carl.

"He seems to be." nodded Rick. "I would say yes."

Dale looked around. "Back in the camp when I said Daryl might be right and you shut me down, you misunderstood. I would never go along with callously killing a man. I was just gonna suggest that we ask Jim what he wants." he said. "And I think we have an answer."

"We just leave him here?" Shane asked. "We take off? Man, I'm not sure I could live with that." he shook his head.

Charlie furrowed her eyebrows as she looked at him. He was acting all good and pure, he couldn't live with that...But there was no problem sleeping with his best friend's wife.

"It's not your call, either one of you," said Lori.

Eventually, Rick and Shane helped to carefully walk Jim out of the RV. They placed him under some tree, so he could lean his back on it, and everyone gathered around him- Charlie a little at the back, hiding behind Daryl.

"Hey." Jim breathed with a smile. "Another damn tree."

But nobody laughed or even smiled.

"Hey, Jim." Shane leaned in. "I mean, you know it doesn't need to be this."

"No. It's good." he shook his head. "The breeze feels nice."

"Okay. All right."

Jacquie kneeled beside him and sniffed as she looked at his pale face. "Just close your eyes, sweetie. Don't fight."

After that, she placed a gentle kiss on his cheek and smiled to make him feel better- if a smile could make someone feel better in a situation like that.

"Jim, do you want this?" asked Rick, showing his gun to Jim.

"No," he said. "You'll need it. I'm okay."

Charlie said nothing to Jim. She looked as everyone were trying to come up with something nice, but it was just unnatural because they didn't know him. He was a stranger. He was always keeping his distance from the group and nobody really knew him. His family was dead and he was the only one that made it alive.

And she didn't want to be fake and say things she didn't mean or just to make him feel better. He was dying for God's sake. Probably the most painful death that was killing him slowly.

Her eyes met his. She stopped furrowing her eyebrows immediately and she felt uneasy on the inside. Charlie remembered his words from before and now with how he looked, they were even more scary to her. So she just turned around and sat in the car, waiting for Daryl.

"You didn't like Jim?" Daryl asked as soon as he got inside and started the engine.

"He didn't like me," she answered.

Daryl hummed.

"You are still sad?"

"I wasn't sad." she sighed, not looking at him.

"That's a shame then because I wanted to give you this."

She looked at him and saw the small package in his hands. She gasped. He was shaking small bright red package that screamed to be opened. "No way! Where did you get them?"

He shrugged, giving her sweets.

Once she felt the sweet taste of chocolate, she had to close her eyes. It was the best she felt since a long time. Sugar overflowing her body, she could almost feel how it already gets to her blood. First little square was to just tease her, but soon she just stuffed whole fist of it.

"And you?" she asked with a mouth full of little KitKats.

"What?"

"You didn't like Jim?" Charlie asked.

"I guess he didn't like me, either," Daryl answered.

She smiled and stuck her fisted hand, waiting for a bump. He looked at her hand and then in her eyes, big question marks inside.

"Come on," she said. "Welcome to a club."

"What club?"

"People that are not liked." she encouraged him. "Well, we will come up with a better name." she shrugged.

"You are liked," he said. "Shane seems liking you more than others."

"Please," she rolled her eyes. "Now give it to me. I now you want to." Charlie smiled and moved her brows.

"You are lame," he said.

"I guess we're lame together."

He shook his head in disbelief, but finally, he fist-bumped her and saw even bigger smile on her face.

"You're my brother now!"

"I'm not your brother," he said.

"Best friend."

He looked at her skeptically.

"Friend."

Daryl grimaced.

"Man that saved my life...oh, no. That's Glenn," she said. "Umm...A man that is driving a car."

"Mmm. I liked you more when you were sad and looking out the window."

"Yeah, you gave me sugar. I'm like a child when I eat sugar." Charlie replied and put even more KitKats into her mouth. "And I haven't had it since forever, so..."

That made him think about a question that never entered his mind before. "How old are you?"

"Twenty-four. You?"

"Double your age."

"You're forty-eight?!" she gasped, looking at him with wide eyes.

"Just forty," he said.

"Woah," she said. "You look good for your age...for a Merle brother...for a man who spends most time in the woods...for a person that whole life went to shit. Is it because you never smile?"

Daryl sighed. "What happened to your face?"

Charlie looked in the mirror as if to remember what happened to her. After all the events from the last days, the fight with Ed seemed to be forever ago.

"Cool, right?"

"No," he said. "Somebody just beat the shit out of you."

"Yeah and now I look cool." she smiled. "Laundy can be dangerous. Especially when Ed Peletier is your husband."

"Hitting his wife was too boring for him?" he scoffed and rolled his eyes.

"You knew? Why haven't you done something?"

"'Cause she's not my wife," Daryl answered as if that was the most obvious answer.

Silence fell in the car again, but only for a minute. "Did you have a wife?" she asked.

"No. Why?"

"Nothing. Just curious."

"Curiosity killed the cat," he mumbled.

"Are you a dog person or a cat person?"

"Stop," he said.

"But-"

"But don't." he cut her.

Charlie sighed and looked out the window. But she was in a much better mood than a moment before. She knew he was just acting, he loved her presence...well, maybe he didn't love it just yet, but he enjoyed it more than he thought he would. Daryl on the other hand, was content, too. For a strange reason, he was really happy that he was able to make her feel better. Besides, it was the longest conversation he ever had with any person from the camp.

"Did you have a boyfriend?"

"That's a complicated question," she said.

"You either had or ain't." he shrugged.

She sighed.

But it wasn't that easy. Charlie wasn't a person everyone took her for. She wasn't gentle and sweet like a porcelain doll that needed protection. All she cared about before the turn was money and a comfortable life in luxury, that's all. That's how she was choosing her partners. Charlie didn't expect this big love from romantic comedies with butterflies and sleepless nights when only the touch of your person can calm you. And of course, they could read each other's eyes, what the fuck?

Now, sitting in a stolen car with some stranger man, made her realize how shallow she really was. How heartless for everyone she really was.

"I was seeing someone. And the relationship was more from his side. I was his girlfriend and he was...just a boy to me. Someone I could talk to in the gaps of my schedule." she confessed.

"You weren't in love?" Daryl asked.

"No. In fact, I never was in love." she shrugged. "Feelings are...complicated. They make your life complicated." She looked at him. "Say it. I'm a heartless wrench."

"No, you ain't," he said. "You just haven't met your person yet."

"Like you?" she asked and looked at him. "Haven't met your person?"

"Merle was my person," he answered.

Then she rolled her eyes and made him smile lightly at that. She clearly forgot about whatever was on her mind, which made her feel uneasy.

"Yeah. I haven't met her yet."

"Well, then good luck to us," she said. "Population is getting less and less."

As to confirm her words, they drove into the city and Charlie put back the pack of sweets, sitting up straight on her seat, because nothing could prepare them for what they saw...or smell.

[previous] [masterlist] [next]

#daryl dixon #daryl dixon x reader #daryl dixon fanfiction #daryl x reader #daryl fanfiction #daryl twd #daryl dixon twd #daryl the walking dead #daryl dixon series

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rickgrimesdoingrickthings · 1 year ago

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✰ Character Info Sheet

name: Richard "Rick" D. (Daniel?) Grimes

name meaning: "Fierce brave ruler" Richard: Means "brave ruler", derived from the Old German elements rih "ruler, king" and hart "hard, firm, brave, hardy". Grimes: Originates from the Norse-Viking pre 7th Century personal name of “Grimr” which is both an Old Danish and Old Swedish name as well, appearing in both of these ancient languages as “Grim.” In England, this surname of Grimes was popular due to the influence of Scandinavian settlements. Grimes is a surname that is believed to be of a Scandinavian, English, or Irish descent, that means Masked Person, Fierce.

alias/es: Sheriff, Officer Friendly, Helicopter Boy, Ringleader, Fearless Leader, Consignee Grimes, Mother Goose

ethnicity: North America, United States (British, Irish or Scandinavian descent probably).

one picture you like best of your character: (I'm a rebel, I will put 2).

three h/cs you've never told anyone:

He's actually quite clumsy, specially if he's not paying attention or overload with worry or emotion.

He likes and writes poetry, loves to draw, loves reading novels, but he seems to only do those things in private when he's alone, he's very reserved. He also can play the guitar but that's a secret to most people.

Still has schizophrenia symptoms once in a while (when he's not okay), but doesn't tell anyone.

three things your character likes doing in their free time:

Building or repairing things or organizing things, he will do out of pleasure when he has energy.

Reading

Playing with his kids

eight people your character likes / loves: In canon, everyone he considered his family. (Lori, Shane, Judith, Glenn, Maggie, Beth, Daryl, Carol, Hershel, Jessie, Michonne...) Verse dependent: my Rp partners muses / OCs for sure.

two things your character regrets:

Not listening to his son Carl back at the gas station about recruiting Siddiq and being less moved by hatred and more by compassion (which lead to Carl going back to recruit Siddiq, where Carl got bitten, resulting in his death).

Not solving the emotional conflict with Lori before she died. Rick thought he would have more time to make amends and approach his wife Lori again (she was sleeping with his best friend and got pregnant). He never stopped loving her, despite their arguments, despite being so emotionally distant for a while.

two phobias your character has:

1- Potentially developed a fear of confined spaces (claustrophobia) with large crowds (enochlophobia), due to the tight and dangerous situations he often encountered (Prison reckon, being kidnapped by Jadis, being stuck in a tank). Rick doesn't panic- he can stay calm if he's exposed to the phobia, but he would rather not- at the prison, he would rather sleep outside or in more open indoor areas with windows etc. Isolated crowds in the open or isolated confined spaces are less stressful, I think that what gets Rick is when both are combined.

2- He seems to have a fear of heights (needs to be very high height) specially if it's a place he can potentially fall from. When Michonne climbs a very high tree, he keeps asking her so many times if she's okay, and keeps pacing under the tree as if she were doing something very dangerous- to someone who kills zombies every day, Rick seemed to be overreacting a bit. Rick doesn't seem to have any problem climbing things that aren't too high, like fences, or things he can feel safe while climbing (the top of a building, or something he has firm structures to grab). If he had to face high heights, he would though. Rick normally won't let his phobias stop him from acting.

Tagged by : @sxbaist Tagging: My rp partners (who wants to do)

#character analysis #rick grimes #rick twd #twd #the walking dead #twd rick

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mintytealfox · 1 year ago

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Hellooooo, its me again uwu.

A bring more Nortalice/Alicenort content! This time its AU releated stuff! Hope that is alright

-Modern AU, they are like Shaun and Ryan from Buzzfeed Unsolved with a mix of Nancy Drew and Scooby Doo thrown in. Lots of hijinks and breaking into restricted and or forbidden areas. Sometimes they are actually solving cases, other times they broke into a gas station left to rot from the 1980s because Alice swears she saw something in there and it results with Norton rushing Alice to the doctors because she ate expired Cosmic Brownies. Not like Norton will complain, because him and Alice agreed on 50/50 on the money that comes from the cases and beats working his dead end job.

-Fantasy AU, Norton is the king of the demon realm, and Alice is the queen of Paradis (the one seen in LG and Orpheus's essences). Their kingdoms have tension with each other. Orpheus the Novelist urges war while Nightmare (yes they are two separate people). Alice however is like "Nah, imma talk to the king" and goes to the demon realm, so the two can work on some sort of peace treaty. Nonsense ensues and the two slowly fall in love, it ending with Norton asking for Alice's hang in marriage, which at first she thinks its so their kingdoms dont fight and his response being "...no you dumbass i love you. Thats why im asking to marry me"

Oletus Manor Doesnt Happen AU, aka what if Norton and Alice never went to the manor but still met each other. Can imagine its because Alice is doing a report on Golden Caves, what happened, why it shut down and interviews Norton, the only survivor from the accident. The two just seem to click and neither know why. Norton at the start tries to use this to his own personal gain, since in his state, he knows damn good and well, he will not be able to get a job again, forcing him in poverty so he tries to butter up Alice, get close to her in the hopes maybe he can marry into money. Alice also tries to use this connection to her advantage, hoping Norton's ties to the mining industry can give her access to more secretive information (like how they treat their workers). They do end up falling love properly though, and Alice uses the money from her family to help push Norton out of poverty and help him start a small jewelry business with the only catch being "Before you even dare spend a penny on clothes or luxurious things, I want you to spend the money I give you to go see a doctor in the chance to save yourself. I care too much about you Norton". Which in turn breaks Norton, but like a good break, like a "Holy fuck, she really does love/care about me, this wasn't an act, i wasnt dumb to let her into my life"

HELLO 🫡You're always welcome!! 🤣 AU stuff is ABSOLUTELY ALRIGHT 👏👏👏

LOOOL I saw Shane and Ryan and 80s and my brain went STRANGER THINGS LOL Like it starts as Norton: 'lol ghost hunting, those aren't real at least these people are paying' while Alice: 'ghost hunting, can you imagine the stories ghosts could tell if they could speak easily?? How thrilling!' But it turns into running for their lives LOL followed by eating expired cosmic brownies like nothing happened but they are all covered in dirt and grime and trauma LOL

OH F A N T A S Y A U S are ALWAYS BANGERS IN MY EYES AAAAHHH YEESS! Gives me strong Persephone and Hades vibes and that has me SO HYPE OH MY GOOOSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! AND This reminds me of the theory I saw who knows where by this point lol but it was about the one Alice skin 'Eternity' and FG's skin 'Infernal Sin' and it went something like him being the dragon of the apocalypse to deal out the punishments that Eternity laid out. Something like that, I wish I could remember it cause it was dope as hell LOL

IF THEY MET WITHOUT THE MANOR AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

10000000% using each other until Alice falls first and Norton falls HARDER MUAHHAHAHA Recently my brain keeps going to the quote from 'Our Flag Means Death' and they say "you wear nice things well" and just seeing Alice saying that to Norton when he finally gets to get all dressed up for something and him like 'oh woah' but the magic fading pretty quick at the realization, 'this is not comfy at all' and then waiting until at the gathering to say something out of pocket like "I feel like I have a pickaxe shoved all the way, right up my--" -Alice slams her hand over his mouth- 🤣🤣🤣

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shanehughcs · 6 months ago

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location: xp gas station

status: closed for @samiraxiyer

As he pulled into XP, Shane couldn't help but do a mental tally of all the things he still needed to do tonight once he got home. There was no such thing as a 'end of your work day' when you were a business owner. Parking in front of one of the pumps, Shane slowly got out of his car and made his way around to the other side, lifting the nozzle out of its holder and putting it into his tank, all the while thinking about the emails he needed to return and the orders he needed to place if they were going to arrive in time for next week. He wasn't really paying much attention to what was going on around him until he heard the sound of the bell chiming as the door the convenience shop opened and someone emerged from it.

Shane couldn't help but do a double take.

Samira Iyer was making her way across the parking lot headed straight towards him. The one woman in Shane's life who he truly didn't know if there would ever be a time when he didn't think of her as the one that got away. She was as beautiful as he remembered and as she approached, Shane glanced around, only belatedly realizing she was clearly headed to her car, which was parked on the other side of the pump he was using, and not to him. She hadn't even noticed him. But there would be no avoiding her seeing him soon, so instead of making it even more awkward than it was bound to be, by trying to pretend he hadn't seen her first, Shane stepped forward, towards her car, a ghost of a smile on his face as he met her gaze. "Hey Samira." he greeted quietly.

#( thread - samira )#samira iyer #hope this is ok!

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dontwalkwiththedead · 1 year ago

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( closed starter w/ @rickgrimesdoingrickthings )

ALICE x RICK

One of Alice's worst fears had always been losing her family. She couldn't imagine life without the sweet scent of her daddy's cigars, her mom's colorful flowers filling the vases of their family home, or sneaking six packs of gas station beers into the barn with her three older siblings. She was one of the fortunate few who was sincerely close with her family and one of the unfortunate ones to lose everybody the first night shit hit the fan. The plan had been for everybody to meet in downtown Atlanta for dinner after she got off work at Peachtree Middle School. By the time she fought her way out, Atlanta was burning, and all she had left of her family was a voice-mail of her mom sobbing that everyone was gone before she got cut off by an explosion. The bombs.

It's only when your worst fear gets horrifically realized that you have an opportunity to discover your strength.

Alice found her strength on a highway outside of Atlanta at two am. A former police officer named Shane Walsh needed help getting a couple of families up to the quarry campsite and off the roads. She ended up ignoring her grief in favor of saving those she could. By sunrise her and said police officer were laying out a plan to survive for a bunch of scared people. Within twelve houes over a dozen men, women, and children were relying on the two of them. She was the only one other than Shane who could shoot well. And, admittedly, it was easier to lose yourself in a job you weren't asked to do than acknowledge everyone you've ever loved was gone.

Alice sipped the bitter black coffee from the tin cup as she lingered near Lori and Carl and watched the country road that led up to their camp. It'd been hours since Glenn and his group was supposed to be back with supplies from Atlanta. She was worried. She kept checking her watch. An old piece she found in Dale's junk drawer. If they weren't back in thirty minutes she was gonna take the car and go look for them. She knew it was stupid letting that many people go with.

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skepticbeliever-bookclub · 2 years ago

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Hello friends and shippers!

It is still January, and it’s cold and dark and sort of miserable in the Northern Hemisphere, so the book club was definitely looking for something to warm us up.

Our theme this past week was Shyan+, and we had nominations for all permutations of Shane and Ryan plus an extra! There’s an amazing variety of options in this fandom, which is a wonderful thing, and with a close vote, we selected To The Sun by blacktofade featuring the Shane/Sara/Ryan combination as our read this week.

It’s domestic, it’s comforting, it’s bittersweet in the way that all the best ten years later fics tend to be. It features our usual suspects, in a wildly different era of their lives than the one they were all in in 2019, and it’s done with great care and presence of mind.

Rating: Explicit

Summary:

Life is weird. Ten years after Unsolved ends, Shane’s married with a kid and Ryan accidentally bumps into him at a gas station in Illinois.

Book Club Thoughts:

it's really excellently written. it's beautiful simple prose that never feels overwritten.

I love the balance of it with the tide swaying towards hope.

i really love that their reunion is a chance encounter. it's like fate, which is how i feel about their whole damn relationship.

one of the most excellent establishings of a past without using literal flashback i've seen in fic.

the way [the author] weaves in the memories from past encounters and writes them in the scene so it feels heavy, meaningful, purposeful.

There's this sensation of thinking you have managed to fully get over something and then being faced with it again and discovering that all the feelings you'd managed to forget are still there that gets captured really strongly and accurately through the story.

it's understanding not just who they are, but who that means they will be. incredibly aware writing.

Polyamory and absence and reunion. All were handled so well.

I love in reunion fics when the characters are better together older.

I want to mention "Ghoul Man". that's so cute.

there's nothing quite like the idea of turning all of BuzzFeed Unsolved into children's stories featuring Ghoul Man.

bear is the perfect writing of a lab, they are such good dogs and this writer knows the truth of that fact.

What sticks with me most from this is how much the domesticity of Shane and Sara’s life means to Ryan. It doesn’t put him off, but drags him in. Because it’s them, everything is different but it’s still them.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO JOIN US FOR OUR NEXT DISCUSSION? CHECK OUT THE FAQ, AND SEND US AN ASK! IF YOU’RE LOOKING FOR FIC RECS, PLEASE CHECK OUT OUR READS, NOMINEES AND BOOK CLUB REC LISTS!

#read of the week #shyanara #reunion fic #shyan+ fic #shyanara fic

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rickgrimesrp · 1 year ago

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❝ You promised! You promised you’d stay! ❞

"The guys who attacked our community, they mentioned they crossed paths with a woman of white short hair and a big man with a baby. I know them. They were from my group. Tyreese and Carol; and I believe they have my daughter with them. I thought she had died, devoured by walkers when my group got attack weeks ago, but it seems they got her before that could happen. I need to find them. They should be hiding by a small grocery store past the old gas station, I need to go there." His daughter Judith, he knew she wasn't his, but she was the last trace left in the world of his passed wife Lori and his deceased best friend Shane, he had adopted her and not with a chance of her being alive, he would go to the end of the world after her. "I know I promised I would stay and be part of your community, but Vega, I need to go. It's my daughter. I will come back after I find her."

@sxbaist

#rick grimes #twd #rick grimes rp #the walking dead #sxbaist #come back after he finds her or hunt down everyone who harmed her if shes gone

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somewhat-adorkable · 1 year ago

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My mom has been home for a full five hours, and here are the things she has gotten super pissed at me about:

- I put cinnamon in the baked pecans I specifically made for my brother's birthday (she is allergic to cinnamon. The tin was labeled) She even made a big show of grabbing a handful out of the container, walking to the next room and shoving them into his hand 'since obviously these weren't made for me.'

- I said 'when I went to get up from my nap earlier, Shane's cat was on me'. And she demanded to know why I was in Shane's bed and I reminded her I nap in there with the cats every Sunday after he leaves for work. She found that confusing since i sleep in her bed when she's out of town. So I said 'yes, I did sleep in your bed last night' and she goes 'but you just said you were in Shane's bed!' and I said 'yes. I took a nap in there'. Then she ranted about how I was confusing and can't keep a story straight

- she saw a charge for 13.60$ at a gas station on my credit card bill and got in my face about how I need to turn in my receipts for gas to my boss. I have a company gas card. I don't use my CC to put gas in the truck. The charge was from when I took my roommate out of town for his birthday and we stopped to get drinks and snacks. I explained that to her and she straight up didn't believe me and went "you know what? Whatever." and refused to listen to me anymore. (Note: putting gas in my truck takes between 60 to 85$)

#ill update yall when she snaps at me again #about how snappy and hateful ive been #when in reality I'm not doing anything to her #but any negative things she feels get projected onto me #and are my fault #i also cooked dinner for the whole family #and she was mad the whole time that i wasnt giving her my undivided attention #while she talked about her trip #ma'am im cooking a birthday meal for my brother #and eight other people #i cant stop and look at 100 pictures

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twdmusicboxmystery · 2 years ago

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Re-Watches of The Same Boat

So, last week we re-watched Ghosts, and this week a couple of us re-watched The Same Boat. I know we've been talking about Carol a lot, but the only reason is because we think she'll have a big part in Beth's return. Remember that TSB came not long after Grady, and has a lot of Beth imagery in it, along with a lot of resurrection symbolism. You can check out my past posts about it HERE.

@galadrieljones:

So I just watched The Same Boat. I honestly forgot how brutal it is. In this episode, Carol crosses a line. It’s an interesting culmination of all her tricks. Pretending to be weak (a wolf in sheep’s clothing), manipulation (using Maggie’s pregnancy as a bargaining chip), gaslighting herself into thinking others are “making” her kill them (“I told you to run”). Fire.

One thing I didn’t remember is that Maggie pushes Carol. Carol just wants to leave when they get free but Maggie insists that they kill everyone. When Maggie tells her, “We have to finish it,” Carol just follows like she doesn’t have a choice, like she doesn’t have a say, like she’s just a “tool.”

But it’s not as simple as that. Once the choice is made, and it’s just Paula, Carol insists on dealing with her instead of Maggie, and she kills all the men too with her cigarette. She is shielding Maggie, like a motherly gesture, protecting her. I don’t know if this has anything to do with Beth or just because Maggie is pregnant.

Carol believes that Beth saved her life, so she may feel she owes this to Beth. In the end, she keeps the rosary beads and this feels like a callback to Beth and Coda as Beth = the Christ figure, and maybe it is also a reference to Mary, Christ’s mother. Beth saves Carol and then Carol ends up in this hostage situation, and she gets to go free but Beth doesn’t. Then it’s The Same Boat, and Carol is again in a hostage situation with Rick on the radio and a trade, and this time she’s with Maggie instead of Beth.

I feel like she sacrifices whatever she has left of her humanity to save Maggie and to prevent Maggie from having to lose herself so that Maggie can stay strong for her baby. Over the course of the episode, the whole thing is Maggie’s plan but she only kills Molls. Carol kills everybody else, including Donnie. That one just took a long time.

There’s plenty of talk about making choices and choosing sides in the episode, too, per the theme of “indifference.”

The whole deal with Gregory for the Satellite Station was Maggie’s deal, and she’s really on some sort of tear. Maggie’s arc is fairly secondary in seasons 5-6, like it’s easy to forget. But after Beth she slowly changes. She becomes ruthless, and I think it’s actually really well done because it creates this karmic pressure that builds toward Glenn’s death over time. Glenn pays the price for Maggie’s mistakes. To be honest I’m still not sure whether Maggie has owned up to this.

It also occurred to me that this episode feels like the Grady arc mainly in that it takes place in a completely other world, separate from Team family. There’s a whole new cast of characters at the forefront, and we are looking at Rick et al from the outside. Carol infiltrates yet again to another timeline, but this one is for the Saviors. Ofc she wants to just leave but she ends up burning it to bits so there’s nothing left, and only then does Rick arrive. The Red “X” gas cans are an interesting touch in this respect.

I don’t have much else for now. Going to think on it some more. A very unique episode, to be sure.

Actually, looking forward, I like the idea of Carol feeling like she owes Beth. I think she feels too like she owes Daryl. Carol is selfish so she wants to impress Daryl and win his affection and respect, but she also wants to repay those who help her. She is loyal to the people who save her life or show her compassion.

I think this is why she defends Shane to Rick ever so briefly in Indifference. If Carol could find Beth and return her to Daryl that would be, in Carol’s eyes, the crown jewel. It would absolve her of all her sins and she could then just live out her days knowing she reunited the two people in this world who have saved and defended her even when she knows she didn’t deserve it. I think looking at Carol as a maternal figure to Beth is interesting, not something I’ve thought about much before.

@twdmusicboxmystery:

I re-watched The Same Boat as well and will now give you my notes about it.

So, I’m positive some of this has been discussed before, so some of it will seem familiar. But it’s what I wrote down as I watched. My over-arching theory here is basically not any different from any of our others recently. I think this whole sequence both parallels Grady and foreshadows the CRM. The Saviors and AOW were always a foreshadow of the coming CRM war, but we knew little of the CRM when this episode first aired. I also had some of the same impressions you had, Tarah. But I’ll get to those.

The first is Primo. He’s the guy Rick and Daryl capture, and who Rick shoots at the end because he tells Rick he’s Negan. It’s been discussed before that “primo” is the upper part of a musical duet. So there’s a musical reference going on here. But what I didn’t remember or maybe just never registered is that Primo is also a medical guy of some kind.

Donnie, the guy Carol shoots in the arm at the beginning, who ends up bleeding out and dying, keeps saying they need to get Primo back because he can patch Donnie up. He can fix Donnie’s injury. We aren’t told if Primo is a doctor or surgeon or medic like Bob. But Donnie is telling us very obviously that he’s a medical guy who heals people. It’s yet another parallel to Beth and Grady, and the fact that he’s shot in the head at the end also parallels him to Denise.

After being captured, it shows Carol’s POV. She has a good over her head but is looking down at her feet. It’s very similar to how it showed Beth’s feet walking in Inmates, Rick’s in 9x05 just before Jadis takes him, and more recently, Madison’s when she was revealed to be alive. Hence, connections to the CRM and them taking people captive, as Carol was a captive here.

I could talk about other things like their “omega” talk and the coffee analogy, but I think we’ve talked through those pretty thoroughly.

This place they go is missing guns and food. They talk about how only a month ago it was stalked, but now the guns and food are gone and it’s full of walkers. This is actually very similar to TF believing Alpha sent the walkers in Ghosts.

Here, Paula’s people come to the conclusion that Rick and TF are the ones that took everything. But Rick and TF have never been to this place before. It wasn’t them. So, someone else took the Saviors’ supplies from this place, and we’re never told who. Even back then, with these little background conversations about the supplies, the writers were hinting at the CRM.

I think I mentioned the Saw movie reference before, so I won’t go through it again, unless someone needs a refresher. Let me know.

So, one thing that really struck me watching it this time, was how much talk there is of pregnant women and making babies. Of course it’s all about Maggie being pregnant, and Carol reveals that in the hopes that they’ll show Maggie mercy because of her delicate condition. But if this foreshadows the CRM, while Paula and her gang aren’t actively taking pregnant women, we still have Maggie, who happens to be pregnant, become their prisoner.

We also find out ‘Chelle lost a baby, through miscarriage, at some point. Even though the CRM is doing something totally different than Paula, I still feel like there’s a parallel there in the flippant attitude toward something that ought to be protected.

Paula is disrespectful and makes fun of the idea of creating families in the apocalypse, calling them “bite sized snacks for the dead.” While the CRM, or Padre at least, is ripping families apart by kidnapping the children, and sometimes the pregnant women. It’s different logistically, but the same in terms of the dystopian attitude and concept.

I had the same thought as you, Tarah, in that I got the sense Carol was being so protective of Maggie and determined to free her because of what happened to Beth. Since she couldn’t save Beth and bring her out, she would save Maggie.

I wrote down that the guy who got shot, Donnie, reminded me of Dawn, but I can’t remember why or what I was thinking there. Unless it was just the similarity of name: Dawn, Don.

Maggie wears the red shoelaces all through this episode. I’m pretty sure she wears them all through S6, and maybe even beyond.

Oh, the other thing about Donnie is that he bleeds out from a wound in his arm, right. The wound comes from a gun shot (a la Carol) which is like Beth, but of course it’s in his arm instead of his head. But remember that in 9x05, in Rick’s vision, we don’t see the gunshot wound in Beth’s head. We see blood on her arm. I wonder if this and that are part of the same symbolism. We just aren’t sure what it points to, yet.

Even back when this episode aired, people talked about how ‘Chelle and Maggie are foils to one another. Both were pregnant at some point. Both had very closed relationships with their fathers, and lost them. They differ in that, obviously, Maggie lives and ‘Chelle dies. Maggie gets to have her baby, while ‘Chelle lost hers.

But it struck me that the parallels run much deeper than that. The guy ‘Chelle was with was a jerk. Total douchebag by her own admission. She only looked for him on principal because he was her boyfriend. Maggie, on the other hand, married Glenn. Even more, though, are ties to Daryl, even if ‘Chelle never knew who he was or really met him. Daryl killed her boyfriend by blowing him up on the road. Daryl also, though unwittingly, had hand in Glenn’s death.

I think a lot of this also feeds into what you’ve said above, Tarah. TF losing their humanity during this period. Maggie and Carol abandoned their humanity in order to survival. (Survive first, live later.) But by the end, it wiped them both out. Neither of them were “okay.” And then Rick shooting Primo obviously traumatized them more.

Let’s talk about some interesting things about Carol. Where ‘Chelle was a foil to Maggie, Paula was an obvious foil to Carol. I thought it was interesting when Paula said, “I see exactly who you are, Carol.” Except she didn’t. Carol had put on a mask. Paula thought she saw everything, but she was willfully blind. Paula talked about how she was in DC when the turn happened. She said she killed her boss, and she stopped counting how many she’d killed when she got to double digits. That’s also when she stopped feeling badly about it.

Herein, I think, lies Carol’s redemption. We’ve talked a lot about how she very often does morally questionable things, and sometimes we’d just like to smack her upside the head for it. But the thing is, she always feels badly about it.

(Lol. It just reminded me of a line from a song in the Sound of Music, when the nuns sing about Maria. One says, “she’s always late for chapel” and the second one says, “but her penitence is real.” That line always made me laugh. It’s like, she does all these bad things, but she feels REALLY bad afterward, lol. That’s kind of Carol in nutshell, though her story is much darker than The Sound of Music ever was.)

The point is, Carol never becomes hardened to the humanity of it the way Paula has. Carol thinks she has to be hard in order to survive, and maybe sometimes she does, but she always feels it afterward. With the people she’s killed, with the kids, with Connie. Also remember that later in S7, just before leaving Tobin, she is writing down and counting the people she’s killed. I really loved the observation that that’s when we saw her smoking cigarettes a lot. It’s a visual way the writers show psychological illness. It’s like, even though she does kill and will, she’s truly worried about her soul.

I always loved J.K. Rowling’s analogy that murder rips the soul into pieces. It’s like Carol’s soul is ripped apart, and she doesn’t know how to fix it. This is why, when she killed the Saviors on the road after leaving Alexandria, she was crying to hard. It’s funny, because that REALLY confused most of Carol’s fans, who follow her so closely and like to see her as a badass. Most of them had this really confused reaction like, “why is she CRYING.” Lol. Most of them chocked it up to it being a trick to put them at ease so she could kill them. And that was part of it.

But it’s deeper than that. She genuinely doesn’t want to kill anyone else. She totally will, and in that case they truly would have killed her if she hadn’t. But those tears, as well as the ones she showed Paula in this episode, were based in something real. She ran away to the cabin in S7 because she was trying to avoid tearing it any further. But when the war broke out, she was right back in it again, defending the people she loves.

I love the line when Carol tells Paula that she’s the one who’s really afraid to die. This isn’t really anything to do with TWD, but I just think there’s truth in it. Anyone who is mean or nasty or violent to others, it’s always based in fear. Those who are calm and kind are more concerned with their own souls and being decent to people. And if they die, they die, but at least they do it with a clear conscience. So Carol is right that it’s really Paula’s people who are terrified to die. Carol is terrified of not being able to save Maggie, but I don’t think she’s afraid to die herself.

When Carol goes ham on Paula’s group at the end, Paula says, “you’re good, nervous little bird. You were her, but not now.” Just more of Carol being a chameleon, as you discussed earlier in detail. Then Paula says, “what were you so afraid of?”

And it’s interesting, because you would think Paul would just assume it was an act, but it’s like she intuitively knows Carol was not faking that. Just backs up what I said above. Carol’s tears and the trauma she show are real, but she mostly hides them, and when they don’t serve her anymore, she buries them again. The answer is that she’s afraid of losing her Maggie, and of losing her soul. She’s also afraid of exactly what happened in this episode: being responsible for the deaths of more people.

I’ve always thought it was downright creepy when Carol did Paula’s voice on the radio. She just does it so perfectly. Morphs into Paula for a second. But I think it shows a) her chameleonness (totally a word ;D) and b) that Paula is her foil or dark side. They’re the light and shadow elements of the same character. (Remember in S11, Zeke calls Carol a light.)

The only other things I wrote down is that at parts of this episode, there’s a high-pitched squealing noise in the background. It almost sounds like a tea kettle whistling. But it’s not part of the show. It’s just a sound effect, much like background music, that is put in. And it’s always around Carol. I think it’s meant to make us think of coffee brewing, or of Carol being a boiling kettle that’s about to explode.

Finally, they put down Paula on their way out. So, they don’t leave her as a walker. Probably representative of Carol trying to kill her shadow self, though it doesn’t entirely work here. So yeah.

I know not much of this is about Beth, but it just backs up everything else we’ve said about Carol’s role in finding Beth and bringing her back to Daryl. She saved Maggie here, but later lost Sam. She saved Henry as a boy, which called back to not saving Sophia, but then she lost him to Alpha. She lost Tobin, both emotionally and physically, but gained Zeke. Carol is such a fascinating character because she is always wrestling with her own demons, and often loses. I don’t think many of Carol’s biggest fans understand her at all.

Anyway, that’s what I have from The Same Boat. It was fun to re-watch.

#beth greene #beth greene lives #beth is alive #beth is coming #td theory #td theories #team delusional #team defiance #beth is almost here #bethyl

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