The Waking Sleep
He thought he was dying.
It was an odd feeling. Daryl
could feel the coldness in his limbs. His breath caught in lungs. He felt as if
he was clutching on to something but couldn’t determine if it was real or
imaginary. Alive or spiritual. Something inside of him was telling him to hold on
yet part of him wanted to let go, to die. To go beyond this sick world and find
some sort of peace. Something else though was keeping him here.
He didn’t want to open his eyes. The secluded darkness
shielded him from sight of what should have been an abandoned shack. It was littered
with debris, dead animal carcasses, and now, rotting corpses. The stench could
not be avoided but the horrible vision could be kept at bay a while
longer. In the darkness he turned his
head toward the window. He was about a foot away from it and the broken pane
allowed some fresh air to mask the scent of decaying flesh. He was tired, so
damn tired. ‘Just go …I’m done here’
Light, as bright as the sun, fell on him. Trying to see it source, he squinted. Where he
was or what was beyond it? It was a large window…a window with bars. The tombs. Carol called it home. He thought it
strange she would call that place home but now he wished he could go back. Turn back time before the attack, before the
sickness. He failed them. Michonne was right to go after him. He should never
have talked her out of going to Macon. He should have helped her find the
bastard.
He could see their faces. They were happy.
Peaceful. Such moments were rare for them. He felt warm inside now. His heart swell at
the sight of his friends. Rick stood by Hershel in the fields. Carl was talking
Michonne. He could see Glenn and Maggie, Carol with the kids and Beth with lil
ass-kicker.
Beth…
Beth! He saw her. She
saw him. His chest felt tight. She
stood, leaving Judith on the ground to play. He moved toward her but the closer
he tried to get the further away she was, slipping into the dark recesses of
the tombs. Her appearance was changing before his eyes. She grew thinner,
disheveled, and hungry. Her smiling face had become a mix of anger and sadness.
The tightness in his chest felt like vise squeezing the air and blood from him.
He screamed out to the others, searched them for help but they were gone. The
field was now strewn with dead bodies. He turned to Beth. She was so far away
laying on the ground. Agony in her eyes and tears on her soiled face. She was reaching up to him…pleading for his
help.
The light fades. Its
brightness succumbs to the darkness. Cold and empty. Sick and alone…Beth was
gone. They all were gone. He shivered. His shivers turn to a constant shaking.
All his life he had felt alone but then, it was bearable. It was because it
was normal; it was what he was used to. This. This was different. This was a
vast emptiness and emptiness is nothing. How could nothing feel so painful?
He knew why it hurt. Just
like his hair and skin and his body and soul, they were a part of him. They
were gone now and he was here, left to walk amongst the walking dead, the
marauders, the pillagers, the psychos and maniacs, the desperate and the lost.
The Cannibals!
Daryl bolted upright. Bile filled his mouth. He turned to his side
and began to retch, expelling the vileness that was within him. At some point
in the night the clouds had cleared. The room was bathed in dim pale light of
the moon. The dead bodies of the hunters laid where they had fallen. He killed them, killed all of them. He felt no
remorse.
He saw the trunk too.
It was real. All of it. The dead hunters, the rotting flesh of walkers,
the bare bones of animals and walkers, the stench in the air and the vile taste
in his mouth. It was all real. Bones of
walkers? Before he assumed that was what they were. Some may have been but he knew now in that
corner laid the bones of the living.
He had to leave.
He promised her he would. He promised Beth he would leave
this place.
He struggled to stand. He found his bow and walked over to
the dead bodies of the hunters. He extracted the bolts he had left from their
bodies. He found his knife. It laid beside the trunk, where he last used it. In
the moonlight he could see it, but he felt it as if it was plunging deep into his heart. He picked it off and carefully
wiped the blood from it blade. His left hand rested on the trunk. He gently
stroked it the smooth wooden top. Moments later and lost in thoughts of her, he
knelt beside it and blanketed it with his torso, his knife still in his hand.
He stared its steely edge. It would be so easy to end all of this now, but he
made a promise to her.
He stood. He grabbed the side handle of the trunk and
dragged it outside. The land surrounding the shack was littered with debris,
wooden boards and soiled household items.
He search the ground for the broken shovel he saw earlier. In his quest
he turned over soiled items of other people lives. He didn’t find it strange
that he thought about Lori now and the time they spent on the highway. “This
is a graveyard” . The cars and trucks stuffed the valuable things of those who died. Daryl
found what he was looking for and head back to the trunk. He stopped and looked around again. “This is a graveyard”
Not here. Not this place. Not
with them.
The morning sun crested the ridge and it’s ray washed down
on the valley below. The air was still
chilled but the site before him was beautiful. He sat under a canopy of a
massive tree. He legs were propped up
and on them was a board. He took his
knife and chipped more at the piece of wood. Satisfied, he set the board aside
and looked at the view before him.
It was beautiful. It
was a clearing he and Beth rested at several days ago. Days ago that felt like
ages. To him it was an advantage point.
The backside of the hilltop in which he now sat was steep, and thick
with brush, making it difficult for walkers to climb. It also kept the scent of
their living flesh away from the walkers. Before him was a meadow which tapered off into
valley. The open field provide a clear view of any threats. The warmer days hinted spring was
approaching. In Georgia, winters bring about a mild dormant stage, not the full
fledge de-foliage of the north but more of stalled or a momentary stillness of
life. Now, it was it evident, the vibrancy of new life was approaching.
Daryl looked to his left, to the mound of freshly turned
soil. It was a beyond the canopy of branches of a large oak. It was here he
laid Beth to rest. She never said it but he could tell she loved this place.
He saw the practical side of this hilltop. She saw it for its beauty and it
peacefulness.
Daryl stood. He
gathered up the wood he had with him. They were pieces he had found laying out
the shack. He fashioned two pieces into
a, cross using twine he had in his pack. The other board was flat, most likely
from a busted up crate. With the stock end of his crossbow he drove the cross
in to the ground, then he secured the wood board to the cross. He stood and took a step back, surveying the
site.
It was done. She is at peace now.
Beth
Greene
Beloved
Daughter
Sweet
Sister
Dear
Friend
Her passing sadden him. Hell, it was ripping him apart. But this… this
was right. He couldn’t bury her at that shack. It was a place of hell and
carnage. She deserved better. Hershel and Maggie would have wanted this for
her. Yes…this was right.
Daryl wasn’t trying to right a wrong. He knew no amount of rights can
undo the wrongs he has done. He was responsible
for this grave and the graves of the others. He failed them and it is this
world he deserves. He didn’t know if there was a heaven or hell. He did hope
though, for Beth sake. Hoped she had found peace and that peace is beside her
father and amongst the others.
He had to go now. He made a promise to her, a promise to carry on. Other
must have survived. You need to find them, Daryl. She said that. Even as
she laid there bleeding to death, she had hope. He would carry on. He will
continue to walk on this plane. This place where the dead walk amongst the
living and feed off the lives others. This place where the sickest of mankind
resides, feeding off the lives of others.
Defiling what is sacred and pure. Precious and kind. Daryl will walk this plane
between heaven and hell. The real and the unreal. Which is not a dream but a
nightmare.
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