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Everybody turns into one of them things.
Daryl's seen the proof of it half a dozen times now. People that should be lying on slabs in the morgue still walking around, flesh hanging in chunks from ravaged necks, guts tangling around their legs and dragging in the dirt. And other people, people that just got a little bite on the arm, kind of thing that'd normally mean a trip to the clinic down on 6 and a week's worth of antibiotics. He's seen both kinds, lurching down the road, picking up the pace a little when they hear his old truck barreling down the freeway. They snatch at the panels when he whips by, their teeth snapping together loud enough that he can hear it even over the wind, over the barely-concealed panic in the voice of old Red Barnes on the radio.
Everybody turns. Once you're bit, you're dead. And once you're dead, you get back up again. You become something different. Not a person.
What he did to that deputy is not murder.
* * *
Instead he finds the front door of the small county jailhouse wide open.
He lets the truck idle at the curb out front, bites at his nail as he watches the door swing in the breeze, the wind occasionally gusting strong enough that the door catches and then bangs loudly against the faded red bricks. Nobody comes out of the building to pull it closed and latch it; nothing moves but the flowers swaying in the breeze and Kelly Rowland's old tomcat, slinking low on its belly with its tail between its legs.
A ragged scream from the direction of Poplar reminds him that he ain't exactly alone. His hand hovers for a second over the crossbow on the seat beside him – walking into the county jail with a loaded gun in his pocket is one thing, walking in with a crossbow strapped across his back is another – but in the end he decides that he can't risk leaving the bow behind. Gonna be a lot of people desperate for a good weapon now that shit has well and truly hit the fan, and he wouldn't put it past a lot of the lowlife sons of bitches in this town to break a window and steal it. 'Sides, he's always felt a hell of a lot more comfortable knowing he had it at his back. Daryl has a feeling he's gonna be needing it soon enough.
He edges in through the open door, slow and wary. The room is just as empty as the front courtyard, except it looks like a hurricane went through it. There's an overturned desk where Fat Arnie usually sits laboriously filling out the paperwork for speeding tickets – and where Daryl paid a shitload of them, making mental bets with himself on whether this would be the day that Arnie's shirt buttons finally popped right off from the strain of his gut – and a spill of papers on the floor. One of the frosted glass windows leading to the offices is shattered. The door to the rifle cabinet is empty, the weapons missing.
There's a long red smear of blood on the back wall leading to the cells.
Outside, he hears another scream; this one closer, more ragged and desperate. And closer still, the snarling moans of the undead – the people that used to be his friends, the people that robbed him blind at the corner store, people he shot the shit with on a Friday night, tossing back whiskey like water 'cause there weren't nothing else to do. People that ain't people no more.
If you get bit, you turn. And if you turn, you want to feed.
Daryl pulls his pistol out of his pocket and flicks the safety off before he goes any further.
He tries to step lightly, calling on every trick for tracking prey that he's learned over the years, but his boot still crunches on something hidden beneath a sheaf of paper, something that cracks sharply in the stillness. In the next moment, he's aware of movement in the back corridor; his gun comes up just as McAllister steps from the hallway into the front office.
He can never look at Dave McAllister without seeing the scrawny-ass kid he knew from middle school, nose always stuck in a damn book. The boy filled out in adulthood – even played a little ball in college, before he tore a muscle or somesuch and came back to the 'burg to put on a shiny badge – but now more than ever McAllister reminds him of that bookish kid who was always getting picked on. The man looks haggard and worn, just like he used to in those days. His hand hovers near his holster, eyes twitching as he gazes quickly past Daryl to the rest of the office. Behind them, the open door still bangs raggedly against the building, and Daryl strains to hear past the whisper of the wind and the clunk-rattle of the door for the sound of dragging footsteps.
When McAllister's eyes come back to him Daryl lowers his gun just enough so he don't look like so much of a threat, sees the deputy relax almost imperceptibly.
"Come for my brother," Daryl says.
"Now you know I can't do that, Daryl," McAllister says. "Merle's gotta be transferred down to state for his hearing, and—"
"Ain't you seen what's happening out there? There ain't gonna be no hearing. Nobody's comin' from state to get Merle!"
"I'm not denying it looks bad—"
"Bad?" Daryl repeats incredulously.
"We just got to stay calm. Whatever's happening out there, we can deal with it."
Daryl told himself time and again on the long ride out to the jailhouse that he wasn't going to let his temper get the better of him. But he's not much good at reasoning with people at the best of times, never mind with so much at stake. And McAllister's lackadaisical attitude is starting to piss him off.
"Are you listenin' to yourself?" Daryl says. "You got half the town rippin' the guts out of the other half and eatin' 'em like it's a potluck supper. Get our head out of your damn ass, Dave. It's fuckin' Armageddon!"
McAllister holds up a hand conciliatorily. "We already got a call out for the National Guard. I don't know what the hell's happened… maybe some kind of chemical spill…"
Daryl knows that the deputy continues talking. He can see his lips moving, going on about hazmat teams and special units and fortifying their position, but it's mostly white noise to Daryl's ears. All he can focus on is the blood staining the underside of McAllister's arm, the hastily applied gauze bandage showing through the ripped fabric and soaked with blood.
Daryl's throat suddenly feels dry and tight. "You bit?"
The deputy's voice trails off and he glances down at his arm, seemingly remembering the injury for the first time. "It's just a scratch," he answers. "I'll get it looked at when the Guard gets here."
Daryl forces himself to look away from the wound. He's not sure if he's imagining it or not, but now that he knows it's there he almost seems to be able to smell it, the stench of infection permeating the still air of the jailhouse.
The grip of the gun feels slick in his hand.
When you get bit, you die. There's no other option.
"You bit?" he repeats.
"Some of them sons of bitches are…" McAllister swallows, and when he looks up again Daryl can see the veneer of calm crack and peel away, can see the fear in his eyes. "They're quicker than you think. One of 'em made a grab for me when I was leaving the house today. Just came barreling out of nowhere, grabbed me before I even had time to pull my gun. Got his teeth in me when I tried to push him back—"
Daryl's heard all he needs to. He straightens, squares his shoulders. "Gimme the keys," he says. "I'm gettin' my brother."
McAllister blinks, his gaze flicking to the gun that Daryl still holds loosely in his hand. He grimaces, and his own hand twitches at the holster strapped to his side.
"Daryl."
Daryl remembers when Dave McAllister wasn't nothing more than a wimp with glasses and a mop of unruly red hair, remembers the kid getting shoved into lockers and picked last in gym class. Remembers saving his ass a time or two as well, out on the playground when things got out of hand.
He doesn't want to hurt him.
Daryl grits his teeth, squeezes hard on the grip of the gun. "Gimme the damn keys!"
"Daryl," McAllister says again. "I can't."
The deputy's gun slides smoothly out of the holster.
McAllister might have had a lot of firearms training when he joined the sheriff's department, but Daryl's always been fast.
* * *
He takes the corner too sharply, skids and slides, a white-knuckled grip on the wheel before he gets the truck back under control. Then he is burning down the interstate, passing cars flying by just as frantically in the other direction.
"Take the turnoff past the Third Line bridge," Merle instructs when he finally hauls his ass inside the vehicle.
Daryl grunts, nods distractedly, because he has no better ideas. He hadn't thought this far ahead. When it became apparent that the walkers weren't just an "isolated incident" like the news reports kept saying, his only thought was to get to Merle. Break him out of that damn cell before things got any worse, 'cause he knew they were going to get a hell of a lot worse before they got better.
He swipes a hand over his eyes, but he can still see the look of shocked surprise on Dave McAllister's face. Can still see the bloodstain spreading on the front of Dave's tan uniform shirt as his knees buckled and the animation left his eyes.
McAllister had a chunk taken out of him already. And when you get bit, you die.
It wasn't murder.
He grips the wheel tight, ignores Merle's constant, upbeat chatter from the passenger seat and turns the radio up to drown him out. But his vision is blurred, the road wavering in front of him, for the next half a dozen miles.