She stumbled out of Daryl's room. Leaving him to ponder on what he had just witnessed.

Whisky bottle still in hand, she took another swig. Her eyes scrunched up in pain at the sharp taste.

Her drunken haze led her back to her room, they way she had left it. Empty wine glass still on the floor. She tried to reach down for it, but ended up losing her balance and falling on the couch.

She huffed into the cushion. This isn't my cushion, she thought. She tried her arms to see if they could help her. They ended up not doing that.

She gave up flailing, and turned so she was on her back. She was giving in to the heavy feeling on her eyelids. As she was slowly descending into sleepiness, something decided to wake her for the second time that day.

"Marley!" the voice ordered. She put her hands to her ears. The voice was being way too loud.

The owner of said voice started moving her shoulders. They turned her so she was on her side. Unable to drown in vomit that night.

"Get way me!" she ushered, flailing again at the mystery person.

"It ain' safe to sleep on your back," they said. Marley now knew who that voice belonged to. She recognized it at the "ain'" despite her being slightly helpless.

"Bed, tuck me" she asked innocently, now opening her eyes to look at his face. "Story... now. About one cat." He was incredibly close to her. He didn't have the best of balances either, since he had drunk some too. He had a higher tolerance to boot though.

"What?" he asked confusedly.

"Where did you get that idea... we've never met a cat," she scrunched her eyebrows together. "Your drunk Daryl go to sleep. I'll tuck you in if you want. Story - about cats, with your purchase." She paused for a moment, looking at him expectantly. "Would you like a bag?"

He still struggled to get her to be on her side. "No," he said sternly.

She got out of his grasp, somehow able to now stand up.

"Aww," she cooed. "O'l Daryl always looking after me."

"Stop it."

"What?"

He grabbed her shoulders once more, pushing her down to the seat. She instantly shot back up, nearly toppling over. "You mum?" she cocked an eyebrow at him. "Hah, got you... take you to the burn ward."

Daryl spotted the half-empty whisky bottle on the floor. He swiftly picked it up, and was going to take it away from her.

She reached to grab it. "That's mine!" Jumping up and hitting his shoulders. "Keith David would never do that."

"Who's that?"

"Your mum. Hah got you, double burn!"

He held it above his head. She crossed her arms and huffed in annoyance. She looked like a child.

When she tried to reach for it again, he put it behind her head. She giggled at this little game they were playing.

Two drunk people (one with high tolerance, one with low tolerance) stood in a makeshift bedroom fighting over a whisky bottle.

Daryl then noticed how incredibly close they were. Her chest nearly hitting his. His arm over her shoulder, holding the whisky bottle.

She looked straight into his eyes, unknowingly using the weakness he had for her. Even if he hated her, he would always admit to himself that she had eyes that could draw him from anywhere. They seemed to drag you in.

She was also getting closer to him, her facing drawing closer.

Soon, his breaths hit her face and caused wisps of her hair to sail though the air.

Neither of them knew who closed the gap - but they did. Daryl's eyes grew wide, and his normal self screamed inside of him. Run away! But the other half of him. The part that was intrigued by her, but also seemed to be in partnership with his drunken side - it urged him to keep going, and not let her go.

Marley barely comprehended what was happening. She simply kept up with the pace.

Both of their eyes fluttered closed, as their lips started moving in sync with each other's. Daryl threw the whisky bottle lightly onto the sofa. He then wrapped his now free arm around her shoulders, and grabbed her jaw gently with the other.

She moved her hands to his chest, grasping his shirt tightly in her little hands.

It was like the world was screaming for them to keep going.

But the world had other plans.

Glenn knocked the door and opened it. He just caught a glimpse of what was happening, and hurt spread across his face. He quickly closed the door loudly behind him, and ran down the hallway.

Marley and Daryl jumped apart from each other at the appearance of Glenn. Daryl stayed standing and sucked in a breathe of embarrassment. Marley landed, for the second time that night, on the sofa.

Daryl looked at the door, and wondered where Glenn had gone. But he reverted his gaze to the girl on the sofa.

She was thankfully laid on her side. Clutching the whisky bottle in her arms, cradling it like a baby, giggling. "Whisky the baby," she sniggered. After that comment, she was suckered out and finally gave into sleep.

Daryl couldn't help but smirk, but then scrunch his face up in confusion. He kissed her, he thought. And she kissed me.

He left the room, switching off the lights as he did.

+

Marley's P.O.V:

Opening my eyes was the worst part. It burnt. And I had experience being burnt before. My throat felt like it wanted throw out whatever I had to eat last night. Last night. Last night?

Last night was just a blur to me. A bunch of ripped out pages. The only thing I could remember was grabbing the whisky bottle that I could feel cradles in my arms.

My face was squished into the pillow of the sofa. I sighed a breathe of disappointment. My first hangover in my life, and I'm spending it in the basement of the centre of disease control, which is the last hope of finding a cure to a virus that has taken over our world. And I'm hungry.

Wincing at the slit of light that came from the hallway, I opened my eyes and blinked. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes with the base of my palm. I yawned, still hungry.

As I stood up, my stomach protested at the sudden movement. I wrapped my hand around my mouth and ran to the toilet. I spewed up the contents from my stomach.

Could today get any worse?

+

At breakfast, I was surprised to be one of the first people up. I'm normally one of the last. Glenn was there, also with a hangover, worse than mine. There was also Lori, Carl, Dale, T-Dog, and Andrea.

I sat next to Lori, who put an arm around my shoulders and rubbed her hand up my arm comfortingly. She could obviously see the obvious pain I was in. Dale passed me a plate of what looked like some form of bacon and powdered eggs.

I ate quietly, getting better by the minute.

As Lori sat next to me, despite her just comforting me, I couldn't help but feel like she didn't want me to sit next to her. I didn't know why.

Rick walked in after a while, whilst I was drinking tea. The second he got near the table, Carl asked, "Are you hungover? Mom said you'd be."

A smile crossed Rick's features as he sat next to me, unable to sit next to his wife because I was occupying the seat. "Mom is right."

"Mom has that annoying habit," Lori then said.

Glenn groaned in pain as Jacqui came and rubbed his shoulders. "Don't ever, let me drink... again," he whined.

"Let's try and keep each other from drinking," I said sincerely. He looked at me, head in his hands, and it was like he didn't want me to say that. The playful smirk I had on my face dropped. What was it

with people this morning?

Shane walked in with scratches up his neck, and I decided to give up on this morning being full of people that were acting normal.

Then Daryl walked in, and he was looking at me like he probably did when faced with a mountain lion, or a bear. Watching me out of the corner of his eye. He obviously wasn't as observant as he thought, because I could see everything he was doing. It was like he was seeing what I was going to do next.

Lastly, Jenner walked in.

"Hey doc," Shane called.

"Doctor, I don't mean to slam you with questions first thing-" Dale started.

"But you will anyway," Jenner finished.

Andrea walked over at him. "We didn't come here for the eggs."

Well apparently I came here for the booze as per last night.

+

Jenner led us all back to the big office room, with all the computers that displayed blank screens. He walked to the big screen on the wall. "Give me playback of TS-19."

"Playback of TS-19," Vi repeated in her usual robotic voice.

Pleased, Jenner turned back to us. "Few people ever got a chance to see this," he took an ominous pause, "Very few."

A large blue tinted imagine appeared on the screen. What looked to be a silhouette of a human, and showing it's inner workings. An MRI of a human brain.

Carl asked, "Is that a brain?"

"An extrordinary one. Not that it matters in the end," he further explained. He made another command, "Take us in for EIV."

"Enhanced internal view," Vi droned. The screen panned inwards to the brain, now showing dancing lights. Like the cars on a highway, speeding sparatically.

"What are those lights?" Shan asked.

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

Despite dropping out of school at fifteen, I did know what he was talking about. I could read anything ever, and it pleased me entirely. I ended up reading about one hundred pages on biology one day... the next day I was reading Harry Potter.

"You don't make sense ever?" Daryl interrupted my thoughts. He walked closer to the screen, and therefore farther away from me.

"Those are synapses," he explained further, "electric impulses in the brain that carry all the messages. They determine everything a person says, does or thinks from the moment of birth... to the moment of death."

Rick took a few steps towards the screen. Everyone seemed to be walking closer to it, whilst I stayed put behind a desk. "Death? That's what this is, a vigil?"

"Yes," Jenner responded, "Or rather the playback of the vigil."

"This person died?" Andrea said in awe. It was actually quite obvious to me that this person was probably dead. A lot of people have died. "Who?"

"Test Subject Nineteen. Someone who was bitten and infected... and volunteered to have us record the process."

The playback fast forwarded probably to when the virus started festering.

"What is that?" Glenn asked.

"It invades the brain like meningitis. The adrenal glands hemorrhage, the brain goes into shutdown, then the major organs." What he had said coincided with the brain turning dead on the screen. It scared me slightly that your mind gives in before your body does. "Then death. Everything you ever were or ever will be... gone."

It was strange to see death so close up. Not to see the life leave their eyes, them simply passing. It was an inward look on all the christmas lights that make us, us. We go out, literally like a light.

"Is that what happened to Jim?" Sophia asked, looking up to her mother.

"Yes," Carol answered strongly.

Andrea looked to be losing her footing, grasping the desk beside her. Jenner gave her questioning look. "She lost someone two days ago," Lori confided. "Her sister."

Jenner carefully approached her. "I lost somebody too. I know how devastating it is." He then instantly switched back to his authoritive voice, "Scan to the second event." The playback once again forwarded. "The resurrection times vary wildly. We have reports of it happening in as little as three minutes. The longest we had was eight hours. In the case of this patient, it was two hours, one minute... seven seconds."

Suddenly a red bee-like swarm started appearing on the image of a brain.

"It restarts the brain?" Lori asked.

"No," Jenner corrected, "just the brainstem. Basically, it gets them up and moving. The frontal lobe, the neocortex, the human part... that doesn't come back. The you part. It's just a shell driven by mindless instinct."

For the first time in a long time. I felt like I had found something in common with the dead roaming this earth.

I was driven by mindless instinct. Vulnerable. Not worth it. Ever.