CHAPTER TEN ,
as dead as can be

⠀The triumphant stride emulated by Rick and T-Dog was stained when my footsteps followed their own ― whilst they carried their heads high, mine was low as I pursued their tarnished prints that trailed along the stark dissimilarityof concrete. I heard the tired breaths escape their lungs, very well so as the ample amount of dried goods encompassed in their arms was enough to make any of our mouths water.

⠀I had stayed back whilst Rick and the two other men in my company negotitated a deal where it seemed we had won favour. Half their food for service to help clear out a place to live. Despite their possible cruel intentions with us, it seemed the prisoners just wanted somewhere to be. After the failed attempts of triumph over the one we had slept in last night, the strangers settled for just as good.

⠀Despite my endeavors to establish that I didn't want them here, based on the fact that I didn't know them, my mind was just jaded. And a more unrelenting me would have dispute the amount of food we were getting ― but at this point I was only grateful, and frankly distracted.

⠀With T-Dog in our lead, the only thing I carried was my lance. Whilst they had piled boxes and bags into their eager, much stronger arms, taking all the weight towards our group. My own fell limply at my side.

⠀"Food's here!" T-Dog was louder than we had all been in weeks, and the noise rung clearly in my ears as the syllables bounced off the walls like a broken bullet. If I had even tried to emit such a happy sound I was sure my voice would have broken in two.

⠀As the man listed off what we had gathered to the young sir, whom had quickly scurried over to us in an excited race, I stuck attentively to Rick's side. Instead of leading after T-Dog he jutted his chin outwards to the doorway where Hershel still fell unconscious.

⠀I watched as the ones gathered round him turned their eyes wide at the state of me. Glenn, in particular, who had been standing at the doorway reached out towards my shoulder.

⠀"What happened?" His voice went high, and concerned. But before he could try and look over me for bites, I pushed his grapple away from my skin. "Hey, are you okay?"

⠀"Yeah," I didn't even sound convincing to myself. "A walker... but, I'm fine." Once I noticed that all eyes were on me, except for the more introverted Harvey Taylor, my own attention got caught on the slowly discolouring sheets embellished on the recently amputated Hershel. I pointed with my head towards the older farm-hand, wrapping my arms around myself. "What about him?"

⠀Once I had mentioned him, Harvey then looked over to me. "It's―" he caught sight of the blood. "What happened to you?"

⠀A small exhale liberated itself past my lips. "A walker. I'm fine. It's not about me."

⠀It looked as if he wanted to ask more, but the words never left his throat as his mouth opened and closed for a few moments to probably collect his thoughts. "Well, it hasn't changed... much." The once, and always quiet side of my high school friend never let up even in these times. So, it was at these seconds, other people spoke for him. And when it was usually T-Dog these past months, it seemed Lori had taken up that position.

⠀She approached the doorway, towering over me as she gripped cell door ― what with the extra weight she carried. "Bleeding is under control and no fever," she paused for a moment as she looked to her boots. "But his breath is laboured, and his pulse is way down, and he hasn't opened his eyes yet." Her voice carried downwards, slipping into a small piece of grief we were all feeling. Some more than most.

⠀Before any of us could ask any more questions, Rick turned on his feet so that  the back of his belt faced both me and Glenn. "Take my cuffs. Put them on him," he ordered quietly. "I'm not taking any chances."

⠀With a solemn nod, Glenn reached over and unclipped them from the ex-officers wasteband. And after being appraised by Lori with a small gesture, he didn't look ready to cuff the old man.

⠀I turned my head over my shoulder, and eyed the steps Lori took as she approached her husband under the stairwell ― so I turned my gaze away to give them privacy.

⠀"It's not your fault, you know?" Glenn was yet again the speaker of positivity, but there was no telling me it was the truth. "You probably saved his life."

⠀"I do hope so," was the only thing I could whisper back. I didn't feel like speaking about what I had done to Hershel. What danger I put him in, and what I could have done better. Maybe I'd leave my wrongdoings to brew in my nightmares like they always did.

⠀"Hey, no!" Glenn's voice, once again, found its way to my ears. He had, now, taken it upon himself to grip my shoulders between his hands and shake my gaze away from the placid walls of our new home to his eyes. "Okay, we're not letting you get in your head again, okay!" His words were hushed.

⠀"Not like before, you have us."

⠀I wanted to thank him but all I could ponder about was the grip he had on my body. "Please, get off me." My voice was always small in these situations, and so it was as the whistle of my syllables made his fingers pounce off me like I was a blue flame. "And... I know. I know you're here, just― try to understand."

⠀"Okay," a thick, uncomfortable silence swam around our brains. It was then I reached out to the cuffs in my friend's hands. At first, he held them from my will. But, after seeing my pleading eyes, he let them fall into my palms.

⠀I felt their eyes follow me, slowly tiptoeing amongst their huddled presence. All to reach Hershel's dangling arm that brushed the edge of the floor. I took it between my fingers, digging the ends of my own into his wrist. Once I had his hand positioned above his blood speckled forehead, it took me some difficulty in latching the cuff to his wrist, but I eventually got it on.

⠀"Now," the unfamiliar voice of Harvey rose amongst us. "All we can really do is wait."

⠀I turned towards him as he knelt beside the bunk. "How do you know all this?" I was curious. He had never mentioned it before this event, and he seemed to always take blood in his stride. He took trauma like a daily occurrence. When Hershel's body was lured into his company like a fish on the end of a hook, it looked like he had seen worse.

⠀He slowly shook his head, unbending his knees to stand with his back to the man. "I was... a pre-med."

⠀"I never―"

⠀"No," he folded his arms across his chest, a pink tint coming to his cheeks and neck. "I always wanted to be an illustrator." He took a long pause, as if contemplating whether he wanted to reveal his past or not. A look came across his eyes as if to say 'what could it hurt?'.

⠀"Had to make it so my Dad wasn't disappointed in me anymore for... for― uh." He gulped heavily. "For being gay."

⠀I looked him up and down, assessing his body language and the almost pained look in his eyes. "You never told me," I turned my chin downwards, lowering my voice. Suddenly I wasn't in a prison cell next to an unconscious preacher ― I was in a tight space with Harvey Taylor.

⠀It looked as if he wanted to leave, and he started to as his legs carried him towards the exit. "Well, when you and Jimmy left Atlanta..." he turned to face me once more. "You couldn't have."

⠀His presence was replaced with that of Lori, who looked with eager eyes towards my soiled clothes. She balanced her weight so expertly I was jealous. "We should get you cleaned up." Her hand waved me towards her, and even though I knew that gesture was nothing but kind, it still took me a second to follow her out of the cell.

━━━━━━━━━━

⠀The wall I faced turned from a faded grey, to a dark gravel when the shadows once not there were cast upon it. When it did so, I looked from my pooling sleeves to the doorway where Lori was reaching up to place a thin sheet of cloth. It was the best we could do for privacy.

⠀I almost reached out to help her pin it up, but after her content sigh reached my ears, I circled myself back to facing the wall.

⠀"Is this okay?"

⠀Her ask for consent was... not as surprising as anyone would want it to be. I had no problem with her seeing my body, when she had been more a mother to me than anything else. Alongside the fact that I felt there was nothing I had left to hide. My body was the last of those things and there wasn't any point anymore.

⠀"Yeah... I just." I didn't know how to say it. It had never graced my lips before. "I have scars."

⠀"It's okay, Marley." The reassurance in her voice only gave me adrenaline to tear the, once sticky, now sickeningly inflexible, clothing from my form. Along with my, now, stained jeans that were in desperate need of disposing.

⠀I turned on the spot, reaching out to the water bottle she had in her hand. With our steady supply from the stream below the prison, water was now something we didn't clutch onto desperately.

⠀She poured the liquid slowly into my palms. It let the blood flake from my hands. It gathered and I let it fall to my shoulders, bringing the cold substance to my heated skin.

⠀I felt nervous under her stare, thinking she would ask... but she didn't seem to want to. Not about the scars anyway, and I noticed her eye trail to the thick black line adorned below my left breast. It peeked out ever so often from underneath the firm underwire of my bra.

⠀As more water poured over my body, more markings were shown. Faint white lines across my wrists and sides. Some scattered like sea waves on my chest. No one had ever been close enough to see... but she was. So I decided to ask her instead.

⠀"Do you have scars?"

⠀She looked up from the water pooling at my bare feet, dripping down my pale legs. "Yeah," she drew a small smile. "A c-section from Carl."

⠀"Oh." I didn't get to have my baby

⠀I shook the thought from my brain, going back to scrubbing.

⠀"You're not going to ask?"

⠀"Do you want me to?"

⠀"Nobody ever did"

⠀A sudden dark light in her eyes struck into my own, a concern that always seemed to be there when I was around her. "What's the tattoo for?" She extended her hand over to it, but didn't break the thin barrier between us.

⠀"It was for my boyfriend," I said nonchalantly, furrowing my brows. The water between my fingers was therapeutic. "He made me get it."

⠀"Jimmy... it looks like a tag."

⠀A silence settled between us, and she filled it with the action of gently turning my shoulders. She muttered a small sentence. "Here, let me." Lori's fingers came to my hair, slowly circling her digits over the matted pieces in turn with the water. I shivered.

⠀"You didn't―" I heard her stumble in her throat, as if she couldn't find the right words. "You didn't say much about him. Just that he died." I knew where this inquiry was going, and she reached my quick expectation. "What was he like?"

⠀That sudden, relentless and offstandish attitude rose in my brain. "And why are you interested?" It didn't sound as harsh as it usually would, considering this was uncharted conversational territory.

⠀A small sigh from her lips sent a chilling wave down my neck. "We don't know much about you... none of us do."

⠀I didn't know much of what to say. As I had stated, nobody had ever asked. It had always been blurted in moments of panic or uncomfortable silence. Not now, under the thumb of questions. "He―he was..." My mouth retreated from the truth that she had specified to know. "I met him when I was thirteen."

⠀She homed in on her particular inquiry. "But what was he like?"

⠀My chest was tight, and my cheeks burned. He had that spell on me, and I wanted it gone. I wanted these chains to break, even shatter. It had gotten better and I knew he was gone but the ramifications of his actions were clear as day, painted on me. "Horrid." It came out as an exertion, more than a complete word. And with that flicker in the fire, that flaming hatred, I continued. "A disgusting, horrible little fucking boy who― who... needed gone."

⠀My syllables were harsh, and my shoulders froze for her reaction.

⠀"I'm sorry."

⠀I expected her to question my views, as many people had done before all this. But she believed me, and she seemed to agree even if she had never laid eyes on the man in question. "No," I whispered. "It's fine... I mean, he's dead now."

⠀I was taken back to laying on the ground, his body slumping to the cold, unforgiving floor and atop my body. As if it were his bitter, last attempt to hurt me. "As dead as can be."

⠀And then I was brought into the new ― of Lori gently washing my hair. "But he's still here," as her hands were steady so was her voice. "I can tell."

⠀I firmly closed my eyes. "People like that don't just go away." Instead of crying about it, my voice was defiant. I felt strong against the tide. I stood my ground against the hurricane.

⠀"I don't think I understood you enough until now." It was an odd way for her to phrase it, but it didn't ring anything but true to my ears. Maybe lying about who I was at the beginning of this was a big mistake, but I didn't need another thing to add to the list of things I felt guilty for. I swallowed it like a sizable pill.

⠀Although this was swimming through my brain... I lied in return. "I'm fine."

⠀Suddenly, she maneuvered me again ― except this time it was towards her. I was met with her face once again. With a small hey, she brought her arms around my shoulders, gently pulling my body towards hers.

⠀Although it was awkward, and my bones stayed stiff; along with her apparent swollen abdomen, this was the most comfortable I felt in a while with anyone besides Daryl.

⠀Her voice broke off. "―oh." I didn't understand what she meant. As she pulled away from the embrace, she not only took the warmth of the contact, but her hand pulled a curled lock of hair between her fingers. It bounced amongst her digits, and it shone in the sun like fire.

⠀"I'm―" I wasn't as shocked as someone would normally be. "Don't worry... it's happened before." My eyes stay trained on the lock of hair now laying against her palm.

⠀Her confused stare rose from the object towards my eyes, yet turned into understanding and pity.

⠀I felt sick. Not the guttural, physical illness. Just the gnawing, dark punch to my abdomen.

━━━━━━━━━━

⠀I had found myself lulled by the hoarse, uneven breaths that echoed amongst where Hershel settled. Some of us had gathered around him, eyeing his currently undisturbed body carefully for any change. But there was none.

⠀With my back pressed unshakably against the concrete wall, I had tucked my knees up to my chest as I sat in the obscurity of the doorway. There was somehow peace surrounding us all, but like most things good these days, it didn't last as long as we ever wanted.

⠀"What's happening?"

⠀I drew in a breath, my eyes burning from being suddenly opened. My hands splayed out beside me to try and ground myself. "Do something!" It was Beth, her desperate shrills replacing the stagnant silence once held among us just a few moments before. "Somebody, help! Somebody!"

⠀Then a louder scream. "Please help!"

⠀I didn't seem to dare spare a glance to Hershel, but from their cries, he must have been stuck in a predicament. With my curiosity and concern, though, I looked over to his now still chest.

⠀"Oh―" I started, only then to be interrupted by the ubiety of Lori. Her hands reinforced against the doorway.

⠀"Harvey!" Her eyes were wide, now accompanied by her son just beside her. Carl popped his head in the cell, his face turning pale.

⠀I heard rushed footsteps as my eyes trailed over to Beth, who clutched her hands to Maggie's shirt with her trembling fingers. I didn't know if I should go over and usher her away; I ended up glued to the spot as we awaited Harvey's presence.

⠀Even though we knew Harvey was coming, Lori braced herself to start CPR. And even if I wanted to be concerned with succoring anyone, I felt that not even I should be looking in the direction I was in that moment.

⠀My stomach contracted as I hovered my hands over the fresh shirt I had recently adorned, the old threads tangling between my fingers. CPR seemed to alert something in my brain.

⠀Just as the person we were waiting for appeared in the doorway, Lori decided to lean over Hershel anyway, turning her hands into fists and steadily pumping his diaphragm ― leading to giving him her two breaths.

⠀I clenched my teeth harder with each compression. With each breath she gave him, I inched closer to the doorway.

⠀It seemed like a century as we watched with curbed heartbeats, Hershel's ribs inflate to only fall again. The artificial way it moved set me on edge.

⠀But, in an instant, the man's arms leaped up towards Lori, just as she leant down towards his face. Everyone audibly either gasped or yelped, the closest rushing to pull her away from the possible walker.

⠀Maggie screamed, and her little sister too. They found their voices as they jumped to everyone else's conclusion. The one where Hershel had turned into something that had no return.

⠀Her hair had been covering their faces, and when I had rushed over to place myself between them, I looked over to find Hershel's eyes just as blue as they were before. No fogged iris, or red pupils. His eyes.

⠀I let out a long sigh, lips twitching upwards at the sight. The heavy feeling of relief made me let up on my grip of Lori, to turn towards everyone who had seen what I seen.

⠀Harvey had his eyes firmly held shut, whilst the young sir behind him shakingly held a gun towards the, now, alive man; and I couldn't help myself.

⠀Without thinking, I held a breath in my lungs as I lurched towards him, grappling the weapon between my own hands and pulling it away from his smaller grip. He had visibly been shaken, stepping backwards under my stare. To which he walked further, and eventually turn tailed from the crowd. Probably to reside in his own cell.

⠀I didn't want to scare him, but by this point in time, I had become used to everyone's distant attitude. Everyone being fearful.

⠀I turned on my heels, gun between my thumb and forefinger, raising my arms in surrender. And Lori understood, because when I turned, she took the gun from me. Her other arm coming to lower the hand it was in.

⠀"Are you okay?" I asked slowly, as I wiped the back of my hand against my forehead.

⠀"Yeah... he's breathing." She let out a large sigh, circling towards our patient again. It seemed I had been waiting for the harrowing shadow of defeat to cast over us, but with this, all I could see in people's expressions was abatement.

⠀And Harvey's words struck in my brain. All we can really do, is wait.

⠀We all resided towards different parts of the cell block. Some taking their place along the ground, tucked beneath each other ― the rest found purchase leaning against walls.

⠀It seemed the night had gotten quiet, despite a few rays still finding their way in the cellblock. I tried to stay in the shade, under the cover of the concrete wall. My eyes wanted to close, and I desperately wanted to let them, but I felt under watch of too many people... what if I fell asleep and had a nightmare? I couldn't wake up with blood on my palms, and eyes on me.

⠀I felt my mind drifting, somehow peaceful. It was quiet... it was nice.

⠀Maggie and Beth had also sunk to the floor on the opposite side of me, curling their hands over each other in a warm enfold. They let their natural body heat alleviate them, along with the contact. Whilst I shrouded my hands over my forearms, rubbing circles over the skin there.

⠀My new shirt was a heavy material, and it bunched up around my hands and elbows. It stretched over to almost my knees, and the magnitude of space between me and the clothing reminded me of how skinny I had gotten ― I was always slight before, but the lack of food tested my body's limits; and not just me.

⠀My skin pricked with goosebumps under the sleeves, as I blinked slowly for a moment and let the sight of the scorched and stained walls fall under my gaze.

⠀Soft drones were coming from the other end of the cellblock, and I let the sound fill my ears. It was a ameliorative lullabye.

⠀"Hey," Maggie seized my attention, adjusting her neck as her sister lay her head weightily on her shoulder. "You can sleep, you know?"

⠀I nodded, but it wasn't sincere. Not at all.

⠀She obviously didn't sense this, as her own flitted back and forth between my incredibly open eyes, catching onto nothing. Maggie had believed I wasn't too wired to sleep in those moments. It was okay, though. Just as she had said, or maybe implied, that it was okay.

⠀It was okay.

⠀Three words I didn't think to be easy to have faith in, when I'm not okay. Not all the time, anyways.

⠀Bringing my fist to my lips, I pulled tenderly at my lips with my forefinger and thumb, in afterthought. I still tasted the blood under my fingernails, maybe from Hershel, I wasn't sure.

⠀I looked down towards my fingertips, clenching and unclenching them, back and forth.

⠀So instead of retreating like I usually would, to probably save myself from breaking a facade, I simply enfolded my hands farther into my sleeves.

⠀In fact, as the gaze of Maggie fell from my silhouette; and the hopeful, steady signs of respiration from everyone in my company, gave me solidity.

⠀My mind gave in at the thought... maybe it was okay to sleep now.

━━━━━━━━━━

⠀Hershel Greene, without a doubt, could be now described as resilient. Not many of the group had been through such death-defying situations. Much less, sustained a fateful injury, that should have killed him. He was part of the not many people now. Marley was the other.

⠀The former had gained an audience, unknowingly. All of the group had gathered round him, hearing news of his recovering. About how he wasn't a walker, and about how...

⠀"Mom saved him," Carl looked almost in awe, and upwards towards his father.

⠀Rick stepped in moreover towards the old man, being followed by those he had worked with today. All keeping their footfalls small, keeping up with the torpid quietness.

⠀His eyes swiftly scanned the girls upon the ground, spotting the smallest had placed herself in the adumbral corner. He payed her mind for a second, then becoming preoccupied with the sight of his wife.

⠀"Still, no fever," Lori murmured, still with her knees ready to stand up from her seat in case of emergency. But, with the new company, her shoulders slumped.

⠀Maggie and Beth moved upwards, steadying their arms against the upper bunk. All eyes on their father.

⠀Daryl, as he braced his arm up against the doorway, didn't pretend that the slow awakening Hershel was the first thing he looked to. It never was, and never was going to be.

⠀His eyes attended downwards, almost on instinct, to the sleeping form of Marley Van Allen. Daryl's pupils washed over her like he was walking on mountain tops. Each edge framed by jagged lines.

⠀It's not entirely his fault, he thinks. She's just so... pretty. And she's here.

⠀He was much more interested in how she became alerted. In how her eyelashes kissed the tops of her cheeks, as her irises lit up under the small amount of light. She was like a cat in an alley backway, receding up into the wall, as she realised her surrounding.

⠀And he heard the giggles and laughs of Hershel's daughters, but all he saw was her own lips quirk lightly as she listened to the same thing. He knew she had no need to look, she was smart enough to know all was well.

⠀And so neither of them saw as Rick handed off his own grip to the youngest Greene. As Marley stared off into any space around her, Daryl liked the look of peace she had etched on her face. He liked the way she seemed at ease, even with the mass amount of people around her. It gave him the sign that maybe she was okay again.

⠀Daryl noticed; that's all he seemed to do around her. Sometimes too much. But he did, in this case, just enough. He knew she was still recovering because he knew how that felt. He knew that her uttering a language he had no clue she even possessed was a weird occurrence, paired with her breaking to some degree, was a sign of her not being okay. But in this moment, he knew she was ― even if it was for this moment.

⠀After the mentally strenuous things that happened that day, he watched, in spite of that, as Marley straightened her legs and let out a sigh of appeasement.

⠀Her eyes caught his, and she's slightly taken aback for a second, before she welcomes his company. Only leaning more towards him, and it seems she is exiting.

⠀But before she does, Marley gives him this look like... like she's sorry. It's a guilty juncture between their knowing converse and her fleeting pass. He can't help but not welcome it ― because, in his eyes, she has nothing to be sorry for. She didn't do anything wrong.

⠀But it still paints itself across her expression. It still actually hurts him more than something she would have been sorry for. He doesn't know why she feels the need to look at him that way.

⠀Sorry for yelling?

⠀Sorry for letting herself crack, for even a second?

⠀He wants to reassure her just that, she has nothing to be apologising for ― even if she wasn't conveying it in words.

⠀But he doesn't, when she doesn't give him a chance to as she ducks out beside him.

⠀He wants to go after her and ask if she's okay.

⠀He wants to stay with her.

⠀... He doesn't.

━━━━━━━━━━

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ note.

me, writing: *writes the line "he doesn't"*
also me: fUck

and yes... not to be a party pooper here, daryl, but you are actually overreacting... marley really only was *saying* sorry for yelling at you earlier in her mother tongue.

i love my complicated babies so much

marley: "i'm so peaceful rn"
me to marley: babe, your hair is falling out tho u need to get that checked

i am very excited to write the next episode as we know some major stuff happens. people are lost, people are given purpose, and relationships are tested.

applause to harvey for coming out to team family even though he was bullied for it in school which is why he's so quiet.

and yes i know this took me like 29372927668999 years to write but it's over 5000 words long so that's my apologies to you.

also if any of you haven't yet, check out my other twd fanfic called "whiplash" ( previously titled "hanging tree" )( for some reason I feel like promoting it rn ). it stars dylan o'brien as the inhibited isiah greene, an asthmatic twenty-five year old who wakes up in grady memorial hospital. isiah really took people's hearts for some reason.

also like, what are your guys predictions as to how marley will react to judith? (and lori dying?)  i already have it mapped out but i'd love to know your opinions. i mean, marley's way of thinking just around lori's pregnancy is interesting to me.

ily all 

❨ edited ✓ ❩