bullseye ➵ daryl dixon

t w o - run

CHAPTER TWO | r u n
14/5/17

She couldn't open her eyes. Her head was pounding, but she didn't know why. What had happened? Did the monsters get her? Was she dead? A thousand thoughts ran through her mind, too quick to understand.

She couldn't move, either. The only thing she could do was hear. She struggled to hear the words being exchanged over her immobile body, heart racing as she listened to what seemed to be an argument between two unfamiliar men.

"Who is she, Daryl?" a deep Southern voice asked. He sounded almost angry with this Daryl. Adira assumed they were talking about her, seeing as they were speaking above her.

"I don't know, Rick. I told you, I found her with a gun to her head. What was I supposed to do, just let her die? She was sobbing - she didn't exactly seem excited to be... opting out," a voice, who must've been Daryl, replied.

She recognized that voice. It was the redneck, the man who came out of the woods. It suddenly came rushing back to her - the cemetery, the gun to her head, the redneck knocking her arm away from aiming at her head.

This was the man who had stopped her from committing suicide.

But why had he done it? In this world, people had to fend for themselves. There was no time to worry about anyone else. If they did, the monsters would be upon them before they could even blink. She knew that from experience. She'd nearly gotten a chunk of her arm taken out three times before she'd learnt her lesson.

He'd risked that for her.

She heard a sigh. "Well, make sure she doesn't go anywhere. I want to see if it turns out that she was actually worth saving. I know we're supposed to be good people, but we've been out here for months and can barely feed ourselves anymore. And she looks harmless, but we don't know if she's connected to Randall and his group."

She heard footsteps walking away. It was only one person. Her money was on Rick; it sounded as though she was Daryl's responsibility.

She didn't like this. Sure, they seemed like good people, but she couldn't even move. There was no way for her to defend herself, whether she was attacked by the monsters or people.

There was the squeak of a chair, a body sitting down, and then nothing. She hated this. She couldn't tell what was going on around her, and it terrified her.

She didn't hear another sound for what felt like hours. Suddenly, though, she heard a grunt and realized Daryl was leaving. He whispered something to someone a few feet away but it was so quiet, she couldn't tell what he said. Someone else sat in the chair beside her.

For days, she couldn't move. Someone was always watching her, changing out every few hours. Never speaking, always silent.

It continued like this for a long time, until one day, when she could finally open her eyes.

The first thing she saw was a roof. It was old, and nearly collapsed. Clearly, whoever she was with didn't live in a five-star hotel. Next, her eyes glanced towards the window, where there were no signs of life. It was the middle of winter, so not a single flower bloomed.

A young, dark-haired man was sitting next to her. He'd fallen asleep while on watch, or whatever this was, with a gold pocket watch clasped in his fingers. She sat up slowly and quietly, trying not to wake him up. She didn't know these people. Sure, they'd protected her for who knows how long, but that didn't mean that they didn't do it with ill intentions.

She tip-toed to the door. It wasn't completely closed, instead it was cracked open just enough for her to get out without creaking it. She slipped out into the hallway and looked around. She decided to go to the left, as she heard voices to her right.

She walked silently and almost made it to the door when two strong arms snaked around her waist. "Not so fast!"

She stomped behind her onto the man's foot. "Let me go! Let me go!"

She heard a grunt and the man turned her around, pinning her against the wall by holding her shoulders in place. It was the man from the forest. Daryl.

"You'll die out there."

Adira scoffed. "I know. That's why I want to leave. What do you think I was trying to do when you found me?"

Remembering their meeting, she looked down at her arm. It was bandaged up and it didn't hurt too much. Following her gaze, his grip on her shoulders relaxed enough for her to slip out of his grasp. She immediately bolted for the open door.

She ran into the woods and she didn't look back, desperate to escape the one thing she'd thought she'd desired all this time; people.