#when local fauna are being beaten to death in my area

[mugsywrites]

Fic Update

Friends I’ve been out of town the past week because my uncle died and I had to drive my dad (who’s in terrible health himself) back to our home town for the funeral. I haven’t spoken to my uncle in over 10 years and we were never close but I’m still heartbroken for my dad. Plus I fucking hate being in my hometown (the locals aren’t quirky, they’re racist and the town is so small every time I go out I’m at risk of running into my fucking ex).  So I haven’t gotten around to writing much. But here, have a taste of something I started because I was in a negative frame of mind: (eventual Jaaryl)

The Unquiet Grave

Over thirty years after Daryl Dixon was murdered a small fleet of construction trucks show up on the ridge just above his grave. He isn’t sure of the exact date until one day while drifting through the site he sees an open newspaper—September 21, 2010. Boyd Guthrie and the rest of the Savage Sons had beaten Daryl to death behind Willie’s bar on October 5, 1979.

Daryl keeps waiting for the construction crew to uncover his bones but much to his relief they never do. When he first died he’d been trapped in his body—one minute the world was slowly fading out as Boyd stomped the back of his head again and again the next things snapped into focus. “Oh geez Boyd,” Ashley Morrow was saying as he stared into Daryl’s dead face, “You killed him.”

“Fucking queer deserved it,” Boyd replied.

“Merle ain’t gonna be happy.”

“He’ll get over it,” Boyd said easily.

They wrapped his body in a tarp and threw it in the back of Ash’s pickup truck where Daryl spent several terrifying hours in blackness before hearing Merle’s voice screaming, “I want to see him! I want to fucking see him!” The tarp vanished and Daryl was looking up into his brother’s tear-streaked face. “Oh my sweet Jesus,” Merle whispered. He laid a shaky hand on Daryl’s cheek and Daryl realized he could feel it. Could feel the whiskery kiss that Merle pressed against his forehead. Boyd was jabbering away, saying he was sorry but what did Merle expect him to do when his queer brother tried sucking his dick? What the fuck was any man supposed to do?

Daryl could see Merle’s eyes, could see that Merle didn’t believe the bullshit coming out of Boyd’s mouth and that even though he said, “I understand. Tried beatin’ it out of ‘im myself since he was little,” that Boyd was not forgiven. Merle kissed him again and tenderly replaced the tarp over Daryl’s face.

After that was hours of driving over bumpy back country roads. They stopped and he could hear the scraping of earth, then he was dragged out of the truck and thrown into the ground. Daryl had calmed down a bit but started panicking again at the first feeling of the weight of earth thrown on his remains. The men burying him said nothing but Daryl still knew one of them was Merle.

No Bubba don’t let them, he screamed internally as the weight of earth grew greater, in his panic reverting to his childhood word for his big brother. More weight, the noises from the outside world fading until he could hear nothing. He was imprisoned in darkness and silence and could do nothing but scream helplessly and pray for madness oh god this was hell, worse than any fire or demons or—

The world shifted and Daryl was standing outside in a dark woods at night. Merle was kneeling down at Daryl’s feet, palm flat against the disturbed earth and breathing raggedly.

“Merle?” Boyd’s voice, “We best be on our way.”

“Need a minute,” Merle said in a thick voice, “He was my brother even if he was a queer.”

“Fine,” Boyd muttered, “I’ll be in the truck.”

Daryl was too relieved to be free from the earth to be angry. He could move, he could turn around, and when he looked down he saw he was dressed in the simple black t-shirt and jeans he’d worn to Willie’s that evening.

“Thank you fucking Jesus,” Daryl muttered. He heard the door to the truck slam shut, “If that prick didn’t want to waste his evenin’ up here he shouldn’t’ve bashed my head in.”

Merle let out a choked sob, hand going to his face. Daryl reached down and squeezed his shoulder, surprised that he could do it, surprised that he could feel the leather of Merle’s jacket beneath his hand. It didn’t go both ways; Merle took no notice of his brother’s comforting gesture. Merle’s fists balled up into the earth and he growled out, “Fuckers will pay for this, baby brother. I swear to you on everything.” Then he was getting to his feet and walking back to the truck.

Daryl never saw him again.

He watched the truck as it faded off into the distance. The woods were black but Daryl could still see, and he drifted over to his grave. There was a bit of metal flashing in the moonlight, and Daryl bent down to examine it. He saw it was the Zippo lighter Merle’d brought back from ‘Nam; on the side a hand-engraved skull and the words, 15 KILLS IF YOU ARE RECOVERING MY BODY FUCK YOU. He’d laid it on Daryl’s grave as a miniature tombstone, and later Daryl would wonder if that simple act had been what had freed him from the ground.

He supposed he’d never know.

Three decades later he watches the construction crew trample over his grave again and a-fucking-gain he wonders what would happen if his bones were ever discovered and given a “proper burial”. Wonders if he’d pass over into the Great Beyond or start haunting whatever pauper’s grave is his new resting place. Neither option is particularly appealing—he knows where he’s going if it’s the former and it isn’t the place with the harps and angels floating on fluffy clouds. If it’s the latter he’s not interested in hanging around for eternity in the graveyard of Mountain View Baptist next to his Daddy. He doesn’t know if graveyards are full of ghosts or if he’d have to actually talk to Will Dixon and isn’t interested in finding out.

Daryl is perfectly content to stay where he is. He’s not exactly happy, but he’s at peace. The area around his grave is a beautiful spot, and Daryl can think of worst places to spend eternity.Daryl spends his days wandering through the woods cataloging the flora and fauna and marveling at the endless variety of life teaming in this corner of the Southern Appalachians. He finds everything from black bears to blue ghost fireflies; the latter flickering to life for only a few weeks in wet summers.

On the rare occasions he feels lonely he goes to the stretch of the Appalachian Trail that is just inside the boundary of his haunt. It can get fairly lively depending on the time of year, there’s an overnight shelter in Daryl’s range. Solitary hikers stop and sometimes read and Daryl can look over their shoulders. He only gets a chapter or a two at a time this way, random glimpses at a larger story he’s cut off from. Still it’s something. Whenever he gets bored or depressed he just switches off for a bit and when he returns to the world days or years later he’s refreshed.

Daryl would like to switch off for the duration of construction but he can’t, much to his annoyance. There’s too many people for too much of the day. He’s not sure exactly what causes him to come back to the world after switching off—there’s no rhyme or reason to it—but having people around seems to have something to do with it. He’s never had this many people around, never had them this close to his fucking grave. Heavy workmen’s boots tromping everywhere as they tear down his trees and scare off his animals.

Daryl can affect the physical world. It requires a great deal of sustained concentration and effort for not a lot of results but since he can’t fucking switch off he has nothing better to do. Workers lose their keys, are startled by loud bangs, equipment breaks down, wood piles are toppled over. He follows the construction foreman around, placing his hand on the back of the man’s neck. This is the hardest thing to do and he doesn’t always succeed but when he does the foreman stops dead in his tracks and shivers all over.

“Tobin?” says one of the crew, “You alright, boss?”

“Something just walked over my grave is all,” the guy replies, looking spooked.

“Motherfucker you’ve been tromping over my grave all fucking month,” Daryl snarls, “Let’s see how you like it.” He places his hands on the back of Tobin’s neck and pours every ounce of concentration and anger he has into it. He breaks out the big guns, remembering the night he was murdered, every thrown punch and desperate attempt to survive before he was overwhelmed.

“Boss!” the worker says, and lunges forward to catch Tobin before he can collapse. The beefy guy is pale and his eyes are glassy and he looks on the verge of passing out. Daryl feels savagely triumphant, but only for a moment. It’s replaced by guilt so intense he’d give anything to be able to just switch off and not have to deal with his thoughts or the bright lights of the world any longer. Wants these people gone so he doesn’t feel the pull of his grave so strongly and can leave. Wants to just be able to fucking rest. It’s not this fucker’s fault, he’s just doing his job.

“Sorry,” Daryl mutters, even though the guy doesn’t know he’s there and can’t hear him even if he did, “I’m bein’ a dick.” He decides to leave them alone from that point on, wandering among the fringes of the site, following what animals haven’t been scared off. Watches the building come together—it’s a log cabin with enormous picture windows looking out over the valley.

In the end it turns out to be a good thing he can’t switch off. He might have missed when Aaron showed up for the first time if he had been.