Papá's Girl

The CDC Part Two

©JRF2016

Papá stopped and turned around before I could close the door. "You know you could stay with me and Darylina?" I smiled at him.

"I know Papá, but I'm a big girl and we are safe here." He kissed me on the forehead.

"We're safe from the creepers. What I'm worried about is that hot shot deputy."  I laughed at him.

"You don't need to worry about him Papá.  I promise."  I hugged him, "Good night.  I'll see you in the morning.'

I changed into an oversized T-shirt to sleep in.  It was an AC/DC shirt I took from my ex-boyfriend the night I had to kill his brain.  The memories rushed in and overtook me as I remembered that night.  He had been so obsessed with meeting Papá for weeks before the world went to shit. After I killed him I lay beside him sobbing like a little baby. I put my arm around him and felt something in his pocket. I reached in and pulled put a little velvet box.  I turned onto my side and stared at the wall squalling now.  I felt a hand land on my shoulder and I jumped out of the bed.  "Gesu Cristo, stronzo! Cosa ti avevo detto riguardo allo spaventare le persone?!" [Jesus Christ, asshole! What did I tell you about sneaking up on people.]

"Your Italian comes out when you're scared or angry, huh?" Shane smiled at me, "What other times does it pop up?"  He had crawled across the bed and now reached over and grabbed my ass as he pulled me into him and kissed me.  I reached down grabbed his nut sack and twisted.  He howled in pain. Papá ran in with Uncle Daryl by his side.  Papá's face turned a bright shade of red as he ran over and grabbed Shane by the neck.  Daryl grabbed Papá trying to pull him back.

"Papá," I said putting a hand on his shoulder, "Penso che abbia ricevuto il messaggio.  Ho avuto la situazione sotto controllo."  {I think he's got the message.  I got the situation under control.}  I smiled at him and kissed his cheek, "Thank you for running in to my rescue, but I've got this now."

"Yeah," Papá said loosening his grip on Shane but his eyes never leaving Shane's, "I guess it was pretty obvious the way he was rollin' on the floor holdin' his dick.  You better watch yer ass.  She'll hurt ya and then I'll kill ya."   Shane started to follow as they walked out the door.  I grabbed his arm to stop him.

"I don't dislike you but if you ever grab my ass like that again I will take your dick off!"  I smiled, "All you have to do is ask nicely and I might let you have a taste."  He smiled and inched closer.  I held a finger up and shook it at him.  He stopped, "Can I?"

"Tutto quelloche dovete fare e chiedere." {All you need to do is ask}  I said before kissing him.  I leaned back and said again, "Just ask."  He smiled devilishly.  "Oh no, that's all your getting from me so calm down."  He stuck out his bottom lip and held up his first finger pleading for one more kiss with his big, gorgeous brown eyes.  "Un altro."  {One more.}  I grabbed his shirt and pulled him to me and kissed him one more time.  This one just a little longer than the last.  I pushed him away and toward the door.  He leaned against the door frame and smiled at me, "Good night sweetheart."  I rolled my eyes and whispered, "Buonanotte."  Then shut the door on him.

*************************

I watched as Isabelle closed the door.  She was driving me crazy in all the right ways.  Every cell in my body was on fire right now.  My heart was pounding in my chest.  I turned to walk back to my room and ran into Lori.  She looked mad.  "What do you think you are doing?  She's a Dixon, she's Merle Dixon's daughter."

"Why do you care what I do Lori.  Didn't you tell me to stay away from you?  I guess that's what I'm doing."  She grabbed my hand.

"I'm worried about you.  You know fooling with her is only going to cause trouble, do you really think she's worth all the trouble that this is going to stir up?"  I jerked my hand away from her and started to walk away when she darted around in front of me again.  "You don't really want to fool with her do you?  To get involved with the Dixons?"

"Maybe I do, Lori," I told her.

                                                            *******************************

        Everyone was already around the table eating breakfast when I walked in.  I glanced over at Shane who smiled at me.  I returned the smile before sitting between Papa and Uncle Daryl.  I caught Lori's stare.  She looked mad enough to fight.  Jenner walked in and Shane spoke up, "When are you gonna tell us what happened here Doc?"  He led us into the big room with the giant screen up on the wall.  "Few people ever got to see this, very few."  He started.  He had the computer zoom in on a scan of someone's brain and the screen lit up with what looked like a million little bolts of lightning.  "What are those lights?"  Shane asked as we all stared up at the screen.

"It's a person's life, experiences, memories.  It's everything.  Somewhere in all that organic wiring, all those ripples of light, is you.  The thing that makes you unique and human."  Jenner went on.

"You gonna make sense, ever?"  Uncle Daryl spoke up now.

"They determine everything a person says, does, or thinks from the moment of birth, to the moment of death."  He went on explaining how the virus works while we all looked on.  He told us that this thing got the bodies up and moving but they were just driven by mindless instinct and then he powered everything down.  Andrea asked him, "You have no idea what it is do you?"

"It could be viral, microbial, parasitic, fungal..." Jacqui interrupted him by filling in that last blank.  "Or the wrath of God."

"There could be that," Jenner admitted.  He continued to tell us that the French were the last to hold out and that they were close to figuring it out and the communications, everything had gone down. "I've been in the dark for over a month." 

Uncle Daryl put his hands up to his temples as he walked over to one of the consoles and leaned into it, "Man, I wanna get shit-faced drunk...again."  Dale asked him about the clock that was counting down and Jenner simply replied, "The basement generators run out of fuel."  Then he walked off, just disappeared.

"Vi," Rick said, "What happens when the power runs out?"

'Facility wide decontamination will occur' The computer voice answered.

        Everyone returned to their separate rooms for a while.  Rick, Shane, Glenn, and T-Dog went down to the basement to see what they could find out.  I was in the room with Papa and Daryl when the lights went off.  Uncle Daryl looked out the door when Jenner walked by and grabbed his bottle.  "What's goin' on?  Why's everything turn' off?"

"The system is cutting all non-essential uses of power."  We all followed him back into the big room.  "That starts as we approach the half hour mark, right on time."  The alarm sounded and the door shut.  Jenner had locked us in.  Shane grabbed his gun and pointed it to Jenner's head as Rick pleaded with him to put it down.  Before he did he shot up some of the computer.  Rick pinned him on the floor and asked, "You done?"  Shane replied, "Yeah, I guess we all are."  He told us that the building was going to explode.  I grabbed on to Papá and hugged him tight burying my face into his chest.  Everyone was scared.  Shane and Daryl had grabbed axes and were chopping away at the door.  Shane walked over to Rick out of breath, "We can't make a dent."

"That door is designed to withstand a rocket launcher."  Jenner told him.

"Well yer head ain't," Daryl yelled and ran over to him raising the axe when Shane stopped him.  Rick argued and pleaded with Jenner to let us go, to let us keep trying as long as we can.  He finally opened the door. Everyone ran out and up to the ground floor.  Jacqui and Andrea were going to stay.  Dale stayed behind trying to convince them to leave too.  The guys were chopping away at the glass up top to no avail, nothing was breaking that glass.  Shane fired a round from his gun, still nothing.

"Rick I've got something I think will help," Carol spoke up digging in her purse.

"Carol, I don't think a nail file is gonna do it."  Shane said as she pulled out the grenade she had found in Rick's uniform.  We all took cover as Rick pulled the pin and dropped it at the window.  The glass shattered and we all ran out to the vehicles stabbing and shooting walkers as we ran.  We were all in our separate cars just before the building exploded Dale and Andrea ran out the window, everyone yelling at them to get down.  Papá and Daryl lay over top of me shielding me from the blast.  We stared at the ball of fire that used to be the CDC before we pulled our caravan out onto the street and drove away.