Chapter Text
Hershel healed the boy's leg after putting him in the stable, while he was still unconscious, Merle came to see Carol and ask her how she was, although the older woman had stopped crying, sadness still invaded her.
“Hey,” Merle greeted slowly as he entered the kitchen. “I wanted to see how you were doing.”
“Good” The woman looked at him and took a deep breath. “Thank you for stopping me, you are not the man you seem to be or that everyone thinks.”
Merle nodded and shrugged as he walked out of the room.
As he left the house again, he found Beth on guard.
“Hey,” Beth greeted him, offering him a warm smile.
"All good?"
“Yeah, I was just thinking,” she paused for a second. “That guy, Randall, knows Maggie.”
"How do you know?"
“I recognize him from when I was looking for Maggie in the city center, I saw him in the cafeteria a couple of times, I never spoke to him”
Maggie was called to the house with the rest of the group, Randall now asleep under sedatives in the barn with t-dog guard.
“Yes, I stopped to talk to him a few times, nothing important, I know he's my age, he doesn't have parents,” Maggie informed.
“We have to see who we're dealing with, if he has people who can look for him,” Daryl sighed with Beth leaning against her chest, her arms wrapped around her from behind.
“How long do we have until he wakes up?” Rick asked.
"A couple of hours"
“Let's go sleep for a while,” Rick warned. “Then Shane and I are going to talk to him.”
“I think Daryl and I should talk to him,” Merle responded.
“Let the cops handle it,” Shane huffed.
Merle sat on the porch smoking a cigarette while he waited for Rick and Shane to give up and let him come in to question the boy. He knew an hour later that they had achieved nothing.
“Nothing,” Rick reported, echoing his thoughts.
“I'm going to call Daryl.” Merle nodded in his direction. Daryl and Beth were dozing together on the living room couch when Merle woke him up.
"I'll be back in a bit," Daryl informed Beth before kissing her on the head and covering her with a blanket.
At dawn, Daryl returned and Merle stayed a few steps behind with Rick and Dale. Beth rose from her spot on the porch and extended her hand to take Daryl's in hers, running her thumb over her fingers, under the cracked knuckles, the skin red and raw. .
"Let's clean this up," Beth said. Taking him away, with the gentlest of touches, she distantly heard Dale ask, “Are you going to kill him?” horrified, following Rick as he left the camp.
They both walked away from them, getting into their own bubble. Daryl did nothing more than hiss under his breath as Beth began the careful process of cleaning her wounds, both of them leaning on the dining room table, her hand flexing in her palm as she held it in place.
"Did he tell you anything useful?" Beth asked, finally broken by the need to know. “Where is her group staying?
"No," Daryl said, his voice rough and raw. “He talked a lot of shit. He would say almost anything if he believed it would set him free.
Beth looked away. "I think we have to kill him." Daryl nodded.
"Merle thinks the same, he's going to talk to Rick about it" Daryl said calmly.
Beth turned into her space, letting go of her hand so she could wrap her arms around him, holding on tight, his hand pressed against her chest. Beth leaned on the balls of her feet and pressed her lips tightly against his, they kissed slowly until the clearing of a man's throat separated them.
Hershel walked into the kitchen and looked at them both, then his gaze went to Daryl's fingers resting on Beth's waist.
"Do you need help cleaning that up?"
"I have a good nurse," Daryl admitted and then let go of Beth with a sigh. "I'm going to go see Merle and Rick."
"Is there any coffee left?" Hershel asked as Daryl left the room.
"Something," Beth nodded and handed a cup of coffee to his hands. With a tense silence Beth headed out of the kitchen.
The day passed without many problems, there were decisions that were made and the humanity of the group was questioned when some thought that it was best to kill Randall.
By nightfall Beth was more exhausted than ever, Daryl told her to get settled in the tent before he went for a final check of the perimeter. Merle was on call again, Beth was worried that her brother-in-law was getting little or no sleep.
A scream echoed through the still night and set Beth in motion, running she headed to a farther part of the field.
What she saw almost made her heart stop: a walker eating a still-screaming Dale. Daryl ran to his side, appearing out of nowhere, stabbed the walker in the head and called for help, although he knew that no matter how many stitches he gave him he couldn't repair the damage the walker had caused. When Rick and the others arrived, Daryl could only stare at Dale's face, his eyes silently pleading to release them from his last moments of pain.
Beth heard Daryl mutter a soft "Sorry, bro" before pulling the trigger.
After what happened and with the danger of walkers invading while they slept, Hershel allowed everyone to sleep inside the house. Beth grabbed her backpack and sleeping bags before heading inside, Daryl and Merle following her awkwardly in a tense silence.
They settled in a corner of the house eating some cans.
Beth looked at the youngest of the group, Carl was leaning on his mother who had an arm around him. Rick was leaning against a wall watching them both. Beth wondered what kind of life awaited them now for such a small child who had not yet been born.
She was grateful for everyone around her, for better or worse, she considered that everyone had found each other at the right time. Merle turned to have a conversation with Carol who was next to her, in the heaviness of the night with the loss of someone dear to her back, Daryl wrapped her in her arms "sing something honey."
Beth thought for a few moments before softly singing a Coldplay song.
Reaching the end of the song, Glenn entered the house with a worried face and interrupted the night.
"Randall escaped" with her heart pounding in her chest, the three of them stood up but Daryl stopped her before he could move forward.
"I need you to stay inside." One look told Beth more than she could say in words. He was afraid of losing her like they had lost Dale. Beth nodded, she leaned in to kiss him and let him go.
When Daryl went searching in the woods with Glenn and Merle, Beth stayed on the front porch of the farm house. Maggie emerged after a while with a cup of steaming tea in her hands and held it out to her.
"They will be back soon"
Beth felt like hours, but it could have been brief moments until Daryl and Glenn returned, the moment he put her feet on the wood of the entryway, they shared a long look and her hands clasped.
Glenn explained that they had found Randall, but that he had already died and turned around. Randall had not been bitten or scratched, but rather the boy had died from a broken neck.
"Where's Merle?" Beth asked.
"He went looking for Rick and Shane"
From behind someone commented that it had been a long time since they had seen any of the men. They both took a step towards the patio, looking into the darkness of the night, when some movements in the distance caught their attention.
"It's a pack," someone shouted, although Beth couldn't tell who it was because of the thunderous noise of her pulse ringing in her ears.
Others ran in, grabbing whatever weapons they could find. Daryl just shook his head. “We are not going to be able to stop them. “A herd that size would go through the entire house.”
"So what do we do?" —Andrea asked.
“We have to keep them away. Turn off the lights in the house, use the cars to extend them and make them point towards the road,” Daryl ordered and Beth started looking for her things and the car keys, the rest automatically followed her instructions.
Merle emerged from behind the house saying that he had not been able to find the men, that they should leave.
"I'm going with you," Beth declared.
"It's safer for you to go in the truck and me on the motorcycle, I have to guide the rest" Daryl sighed and took her in his arms "Take care of the women and we'll see each other when this is over, don't do anything stupid" Beth let go of him with reluctance. and with a worried look I let him go.
Merle was already shouting for him from another car.
Beth tried to organize the women left behind when she noticed Maggie arguing with her father.
"He doesn't want to leave Beth, help me"
Beth watched as more and more walkers approached the house and her urgency made her make a decision, with the voices of her father and her sister arguing in the background, she called.
"Glenn help me" The younger boy looked at her with intrigue in his eyes and fear.
"I'm sorry, Dad." Beth took her place behind the larger man and with the butt of her gun she gave him a sharp blow, sending the larger man to the ground. Maggie looked at her with wonder in her eyes. "Let's put him in the truck." With the help of the other two and while she was shooting at the nearest walkers, they put him in the truck. Beth was about to get in when Lori screamed.
"I can't find Carl."
"Take the truck and follow the rest, tell Daryl I'm coming after you, and don't let him come back for me for anything in the world," Beth instructed.
"But Bethy," Maggie tried to argue.
"Go away Maggie, go away"
Beth tried to focus only on Lori and the missing little boy, while she watched in the distance as the barn went up in flames and thought that the cars were working to get the herd away from the house only to realize that they were all driving away, abandoning the farm. .
Beth cursed under her breath as she noticed Lori get into a car with Carl and leave her behind, she had only taken a minute of her eyes from her woman, and the woman had abandoned her.
Before she could scream, a walker cornered her and the time it took her to get him off her, Lori was gone.
She was alone, without a car and surrounded by walkers.
Daryl was going to be so angry.