The Dixon Brothers: The Beginning of the End

The Dixon Brothers: The Beginning of the End (Part 5)

The Dixon Brothers: The Beginning of the End (Part 5)

A Walking Dead Fan Fiction

Georgia

Highway 20 East

"I'm gonna give that mutt one more chance." – Daryl Dixon, The Walking Dead, Season 4 Episode 13

Daryl snorted in disgust. "We drove thirteen miles for this? Really?"

The dilapidated double-wide trailers had been made into a makeshift service office and two living areas. The windows on the trailers were grimy; the roof caved in on one of the outlying storage sheds. A junkyard completed the redneck look and Daryl could make out several car models including a rusted 1940's truck on concrete blocks. A wire fence surrounded the property and the faded sign over the entry way had "Cutters Junkyard: Cars and Parts" in faded blue lettering over a red background.

Merle Dixon, never in the best of moods anyway, cuffed his younger brother on the shoulder. "Shut up! When have I ever let you down?"

The younger Dixon was about to comment harshly. Merle never liked to be questioned and Daryl usually kept quiet about whatever was going down. Usually. Instead, he answered with his own question, "You sure the tip on the weapons is legit?"

"'Course I am. We can use the guns and money that Cutter stored here."

It had been five weeks since everything had gone to hell in the damn hand basket. Five weeks since people started to get sick and go crazy. Five damn weeks and Merle was still thinkin' about money!

With tempers that would rival a drunk, irate Irishman knocking back energy drinks, the brothers never really talked so much as barked at one another. And Daryl lost his own temper at that moment.

"Jesus Christ Merle! You really think money is gonna do us any good right now? Guns and ammo are what we need so quit thinkin' 'bout the goddamn money!"

....and these so called conversations usually ended in a fist fight, undead apocalypse notwithstanding...

The elder Dixon swung at Daryl, who easily ducked and danced out of reach of the second jab; he'd learned a long time ago and the hard way that he couldn't beat Merle in a one on one fight.

"You little sonofabitch! C'mere!"

"You get your ass over here, Old Man!"

Merle dove at Daryl, who sidestepped and bodily pushed Merle away. Then the hunting knives came out.

The brothers were expert backwoods knife fighters and no one wanted to take them on in a one on one fight, even to score quick cash betting on the monthly underground matches held at the Lucas Farm; the saying went that if you got in a pig sticking match with a Dixon then you got cut. Merle had even used the knife fights to distract their father when he started to beating on Merle and in later years on Daryl. It wasn't so much the nastiness of instigating a knife fight with a then seven year old Daryl as learning how to survive with their alcoholic father.

Sometimes the knife fights worked on their father and sometimes they didn't.

Daryl took a swing at Merle, the knife biting air as the other man used a quick footed step. Merle moved to take a chunk out of Daryl and then gasped and pushed the younger man out of the way. Not expecting the move at all, Daryl stumbled sideways. He turned in time to see Merle slam his knife into the eye socket of one of the creepers as it emerged from the underbrush. The body fell with a dull thump onto the clay soil.