Georgia Blues ::DarylDixon/TWD::

.:Prologue:.

.:Raelyn | Age 27 *present*:.

Low groans and sounds of confused, shuffling' feet rumbled below me, a consistent reminder that this was real. This was really fuckin' happening. I was really stuck inside a department store somewhere in Atlanta, wedged up in the cramped space between the ceiling tiles and the roof inside the security office.

There really were zombies roaming' around, hundreds of 'em... Almost no living', breathing' people left. It was like something' out of a God damn horror movie.

And worst of all... They were really gone. Daryl and Merle. When all hell broke loose back home, it didn't take but a stop at a 7-11 for God knows what now, for the three of us to be torn apart by the chaos. But that was weeks ago... Maybe months, I honestly couldn't tell the difference. All I did know was that I had been on my own a long, long time... And I missed them somethin' awful... especially Daryl.

Both brothers were very dear friends to me, my closest and only friends... But there was something special about Daryl. The bond we had was very different than the one I shared with Merle, who I looked at as more of an older brother... A perverted, racist drunken older brother. Daryl was older, too, but only by three years... Merle had ten or twelve on me.

So maybe it was because we were closer in age that I had always felt just a little more partial to Daryl... Or it could be that he had always been the one to stand up for me and take my side when everyone else just wanted to push me in the dirt. Our entire friendship, which had blossomed when I was seven and he was ten, there seemed to have been something, some sort of emotion, lingerin' in the shadows, hunting each of us down and waiting to pounce...

And when it finally did after 18 years, leapin' out in the form of an alcohol induced kiss on his livin' room couch two days before the outbreak, I was floored. I knew exactly what it was, and couldn't believe I had been so blind to it.

Finally I realized... I was in love with Daryl Dixon. My best friend. But the kiss seemed to have freaked him out, even though he was the one who made the move. It scared the hell out of me, too. But he shut me out completely, holdin' true to the cold Dixon nature. To this day all these weeks later, we obviously hadn't had the chance to speak about that night.

Hell, I didn't even know if Daryl was still alive. Even if he was, how would I ever find him and ask him all these questions I had about us?

All this time, I'd been working my way up through Georgia, searching for the guys high and low with no signs, the city set as my goal.

They had to be there, I had thought to myself. The city had to be safe, it was quarantined. At least that's what I remembered the radio instructing everyone in the middle of all the panic.

How could I have been so damn stupid? The city wasn't safe at all... It was just like every where else... A barren, death ridden waste land. I guess the never ending sea of rusted, abandoned cars down the long stretch of high way leading into Atlanta should have been my first tip. But I just had too much hope to turn back.

Maybe it had been quarantined at one time in the beginning of this shit storm, I could remember coming across the large stone barriers at the South entry point of the city... But the motionless tanks, blood splatter and endless amounts of debris littering the streets painted a pretty clear picture of exactly just how that had worked out.

Most of the people in the quarantine zone, including the military personnel, were either chewed up and smeared across the pavement, or they had been infected and were stumbling about in search of their next meal, charging anything with a pulse... Which is exactly how I was forced into this little hiding spot of mine.

I sighed as I leaned my head of mangled blonde hair back against the wall and tried not to think about Daryl. My eyes squinted shut as dust particles floated down from the ceiling and coated my face, sticking to the clammy film of sweat that covered my entire body. This was the end of the world, mind you, so of course there was no AC. That shit went out a while ago.

And these summers in Georgia... It was damn near suffocating. If I had counted right, which I really couldn't be too sure of, I had been up here for at least three days, stranded with no food, water, or ammo for my single pistol. I glanced down at a crack through the tiles, glaring at the stupid bastards who chased me up here. My original plan had been to climb up into the ceiling and wait for the freaks to forget about me, and straggle back into the streets... But that never happened. They all just got comfortable right where they were, totally fucking me over.

All of them looked horrible and disgusting, their skin green and slimy, falling right off their bones. The smell they were giving off was hands down the worst thing I could ever possibly think of inhaling... It was a room full of dead bodies, so of course it was going to reek like it.

I tried not to feel hopeless as my mind buzzed for possible solutions to get me out of this mess for about the millionth time.

Option 1) Find a weapon and start killing these fuckers where they stand. Great idea, except there was nothing even remotely deadly anywhere near me.

Option 2) Call for help. Pointless, there was no one around to hear me except more flesh eating geeks. That's a no-go.

Option 3) Just run for it. I'll file that one back there with "Just kill yourself".

No matter which way I looked at it, I was stranded. There was no way I could get out of this... I was going to wither away here, and probably die of dehydration before any walkers around here could lay a creepy hand on me.

I knew if Merle and Daryl were here, they'd slaughter every geek within a fifty foot radius, then tease me about how I let them get the best of me.

"Good lord, Rae, git yerself together. Quit bein' such a pussy." Daryl would say.

"Aw c'mon now, Dare Bear, don't give 'er a hard time," Merle's sarcastic drawl would come back; I could almost see that devilish grin he always had plastered on his scruffy mug, "She's jus' a little girl, after all."

I smiled faintly as their teasing voices bounced back and forth inside my head. Normally, I hated when they called me a little girl, or said that I was weak, or a pussy.

Growin' up around the Dixon boys, that's the last thing you ever wanted to be: weak. And I had spent my entire life proving to them that I could handle myself.

Still, in this moment, I would have given anything just to hear their husky, Southern voices... But instead, I heard my Aunt Laura's.

"Those Dixon boys are nothin' but trouble!"

Trouble they may have been, but they were my everything. And now, sitting here holed up in this damn department store, I knew I'd probably never see 'em again. It had been three months since the world went to shit, and Daryl, Merle and I had been separated...

And two weeks since I'd been bitten.

.:To Be Continued:.