Chapter Text
(awesome art by darylfever)
For Daryl Dixon the world ended days before it did for almost everyone else, and it was heralded with a prerecorded phone message instead of a bang.
He spent most of that day on the phone calling airline after airline while keeping a nervous eye on the news. At midday he took a break to visit the Walmart, where he maxed out one of their credit cards in order to load up on supplies. Canned goods, large sacks of dried dog food, bottled water, batteries, camping gear, he was barely able to fit all of it into the bed of the truck. He got a few stares from folks but he didn’t give a shit, didn’t give a shit if he was being paranoid or ridiculous. What had been shown on the news was scary as fuck and he wasn’t taking any chances.
When Paul gets home we can head up to the mountains somewhere and wait for this shit to blow over, Daryl thought to himself as he drove his haul back home. His eye kept being drawn to his hands gripping the steering wheel and to the ring finger of his left one where a crude winged skull was tattooed in black ink. Remember that you are going to die. He swallowed hard and forced his eyes back on the road.
When he got home Daryl was greeted by the sound of Lou barking her damn head from the backyard. It made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, Lou hardly ever barked, and when she did it was because she was excited about something. Paul liked to joke that the “Warning: Pit bull” sign on the front gate was a mockery and she would probably show any burglars the valuables in exchange for ear scratches.
He wouldn’t make that joke now, Lou sounded truly savage and when Daryl reached the backyard she looked like she had lost her damn mind. She wasn’t just barking, she was hurling herself against the wooden privacy fence that separated their property from Neighbor Dan’s.
“Lou!” Daryl hollered, “Hell’s gotten into you, girl?”
She paused her maddened attack against the fence when she heard his voice, looking over her shoulder at him with her ears cocked. Then she turned back to the fence, her fawn-colored fur sticking up along her spine.
“C’mon inside!” he said, slapping his hand against his thigh, “C’mon girl!” She didn’t budge other than one ear flicking back toward him. He called her several more times with the same result, even the magic word of “dinner” failed to move her. Daryl uneasily crossed the yard and leaned down to grab her collar. At his touch she looked up at him and whined softly before going back to staring at the fence.
As he started to pull her away without warning Daryl’s pulse slammed in his temples and he felt a surge of adrenaline. There was someone on the other side of the fence, he could sense it before he heard the light scraping of nails against wood.
“Dan? That you?” Daryl called out, scolding himself for his jumpiness. There was no reply, just that whispery noise of fingers against wood. Lou started to growl low in her throat. Daryl took a step back, eyeing the top of the fence. It was about six and a half feet high, he could pull himself up easily and look over, see what had the dog in a state.
Before he could the phone in his front pocket buzzed, knocking away any other thought or consideration. He pulled it out quickly—he didn’t recognize the number but did recognize the Chicago area code. He turned from the fence and flipped his phone open.
“Hello?”
“Thank fuck,” a familiar voice said without even a hello.
“Paul,” Daryl said, sagging with relief, “What the fuck is happening?”
“I got a flight; it’s about to start boarding. Should get to Atlanta around nine thirty. Ticket cost me an arm and a leg, hope you don’t mind putting off getting that bike for another year.”
Daryl let out a low, whistling breath, “I don’t give a fuck if you had to sign the deed to the house over. Just get here, ok? This shit is bad.”
“I’m working on it,” Paul replied. He quickly gave Daryl his flight information then said, “I’m so glad I got ahold of you, cell phone’s are down here. I’m calling from an honest-to-god payphone. One I waited in line three hours to use.”
“Ok,” Daryl said, “I can come to Atlanta to get you-“
“Don’t do that! Stay in the house with Lou, I’ll come to you.”
“Ain’t happenin’,” Daryl said, “How the hell are you supposed to get here? Groome ain’t gonna be running. And forget about renting a fucking car.”
“Daryl,” Paul said sharply, “The last I saw traffic getting into the city was the problem, even if you left right now you probably would just be sitting there stuck long after I landed.”
Daryl was quiet for several heartbeats. He was already starting to get antsy, knowing that Paul had finally gotten a fucking flight and would there in a matter of hours. He wanted to jump in the truck right that second, if he got stuck in traffic he would just walk to the airport. He looked down to where Lou was still pacing back and forth, occasionally looking at the fence and whining.
Paul spoke, “Please Daryl, I want to know where you are and that I can get in touch with you.”
“Fine, I’ll wait,” Daryl agreed reluctantly. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, “I shoulda come with you. I’m sorry. You were right, I was bein’ a pussy.”
There was a silence on the other end of the line, except for Paul’s breathing. Then in a voice barely above a whisper said, “Don’t. I should have cancelled the trip when you said you couldn’t come. I was just being stubborn.”
“Ain’t we a pair,” Daryl replied.
Paul chuckled weakly, then said, “My flight’s about to board. I’ll be there in a couple of hours if it leaves on time, I’ll call you when I land.”
“Ok. Hey Paul?”
“Yeah?”
Daryl meant to tell him to be careful, but to his surprise what came out was, “I love you.”
That shocked Paul into silence. Four years together and Daryl could use his fingers to count the times they’d said those words to each other. Neither one of them was big on verbal displays of affection, preferring action to demonstrate their feelings.
“I love you too,” Paul answered finally, his voice unsteady, “I’ll see you soon, ok?”
Later Daryl would think that had he known this would be their last conversation— that hours later a prerecorded message would be saying no survivors— he probably wouldn’t have said anything different.
******
Daryl pushed the end call button and returned his phone to his pocket. Lou had calmed down a bit but her fur was still standing on end and she kept staring at the fence. Daryl followed her gaze, listening for a few seconds. It was silent, whoever had been standing on the other side of the fence was gone.
He still had to drag Lou back to the house by her collar, when they got inside he made sure to lock the doggie door so she couldn’t go charging out. Once she realized she was trapped in the house she didn’t calm down, just paced restlessly from room to room. She was quiet though, and that was good enough for Daryl.
He couldn’t just make himself relax, so he turned the TV on to the news and cranked up the volume. While Daryl listened to the updates on the “situation” he packed a bag for him and another for Paul. He loaded them up with a change of clothes, plastic bags, hunting knives, maps, a first aid kit, and as much food as he could. In addition to the canned shit he bought earlier he had pounds of homemade venison jerky in the freezer, Paul hated it but it would keep for a long time.
When he finished with their bags he dug out Lou’s doggie backpack and started filling it up as well. The bright orange monstrosity only came out when they went on a camping trip or an all day hike, and the sight of it was usually enough to make her flip her shit. Running from room to room and jumping like a maniac was her typical response. But this time all Daryl got was a momentary perk of her ears and a brief tail wag, before she went back to her restless pacing. She would hunch by her doggie door and whine, shadow Daryl for a bit as he gathered up supplies or go to the computer room to look for Paul.“He ain’t back yet,” Daryl told her. She cocked her head at the sound of his voice and whimpered, “Yeah girl, I know. Me too,” Daryl said, “Soon.”
Packing didn’t eat up nearly as much time as he would have liked. He watched the news for a bit; a traffic report came on showing a helicopter’s view of 85. Even at this hour the southbound lanes toward the city looked like a parking lot, and the side of the road was littered with abandoned vehicles. The reporter said this had been going on for nearly eight hours. Paul was right, there would be no way in hell Daryl would be able to get into the city. Northbound looked clear, however. If Paul got a ride he could be at the house by midnight. Hell, if he couldn’t find a ride then Daryl would tell him to just steal a damn car out of longterm parking. Paul remembered enough of his juvenile delinquent skills to be able to hotwire a car and Daryl had a feeling police would be too busy for the next however long to come looking for him. He wanted Paul here now, wanted to haul ass up to the mountains far away from all of this shit and lay low until everything blew over.
Soon, he told himself. They could leave early in the morning, before dawn. Paul just needed to get home first. He took out his phone to check the time; a little past eight. He just needed to wait.
******
Daryl would sometimes wonder just how his life would have turned out if Merle hadn’t gotten popped for running meth down into Athens. If Merle had avoided jail and Daryl was still living under his thumb. If he hadn’t gotten into an accident after visiting his brother in prison and nearly died. He totaled his bike and ended up with a concussion, two broken ribs, a collapsed lung, a fractured femur, and a bill from the hospital that approached six figures. But he would never have met Paul otherwise, and up until the world ended he would have said it was a small price to pay for that.
The accident happened a little more than four years before the end of the world. He left Athens and was heading north on Highway 441 when an eye-searingly yellow Dodge Ram whipped around him doing well over eighty-five and sideswiped his bike. The prick who hit him (Denny St George, a spoiled college brat who had been drinking and was afraid of getting in trouble with his father, Daryl would later find out) didn’t even slow down. Daryl ended up crumpled in a ditch by the side of the road with his leg twisted up underneath him and blood in his mouth. When he tried to move a lightning hot burst of pain shot up his leg and the world went black.
When he came to he was staring up into the most beautiful pair of eyes he’d ever seen. “Am I dead?” he slurred out. He was pretty sure he was. The guy leaning over him looked like he’d walked out of the billboard a mile from his house; the one with Jesus standing with arms outstretched on a fiery battlefield declaring he was still in control.
“I sure fucking hope not,” the Jesus-look-alike said, “Can you feel your legs?”
As soon as he spoke Daryl realized he could in fact feel his legs. This was not as much as a relief as it should have been under the circumstances; one was in agony from his hip down to his ankle and it felt like half the skin had been torn off from the other one. He moaned weakly and tried to push himself up only for Jesus to press his hand against his chest and say, “Hey man, don’t try to move.”
“Fuck you, Jesus,” he muttered, but pain made him comply. His chest hurt, his head hurt, and his leg really fucking hurt. He shivered, he had a battered overcoat thrown over him but it did fuck all to dispel the chill.
“Hey, it’s gonna be ok. What’s your name?”
“Daryl,” he answered, “Daryl Dixon.”
“Ok Daryl,” Jesus said, “I just called 911 on my cell, an ambulance should be here any minute. Plus I got enough of that son of a bitch’s license plate number for the pigs to track him down.”
“You’re alright, Jesus,” Daryl mumbled, “Fuck,” he said, and started coughing. He could taste more blood, his chest felt all broken and wrong. “I think I’m dying.”
“No,” Jesus said, and grabbed Daryl’s hand, “Just keep talking to me. Where do you live?”
“Bought forty miles north a’here,” he answered.
“Wife? Girlfriend? Anyone you need me to call?”
“No. Just Merle,” Daryl coughed out, “M’brother.”
“Do you know his number?”
“He’s in Clarke county jail at the moment,” Daryl said, “Was comin’ back from a visit.”
“I’ll get in touch with him later,” Jesus promised.
“Cops…won’t…need to track that asshole down. Merle will probably punch his way out and get him hisself…” The world was starting to go fuzzy and grey.
Jesus was leaning over him, mouth moving but Daryl couldn’t make out the words. Everything hurt, it was starting to drown the rest of the world out.
Time seemed to skip then, only bits and flashes came after that. Jesus and his pretty eyes were replaced by the faces of paramedics leaning in and asking him the same damn questions Jesus had already asked—“Yes I can feel my fucking leg, it fucking HURTS!”
Another skip, and he was in the back of an ambulance and absolutely nothing hurt. There was a plastic brace around his neck and an oxygen mask over his face and he felt fantastic. He was still pretty sure that he was dying but it didn’t really seem like that big of a deal. Except for having to look at the paramedics, the view was a little lacking. He reached up and tugged the oxygen mask down and asked, “Where did Jesus go?” If he was going to die then he didn’t want to look at the pimply face of this paramedic while he did it.
“Jesus?” Pimple-face asked, “Are you religious?”
“He’s talking about me,” a voice interrupted, and Daryl tried to focus. Jesus was in the ambulance; sat across from him out of the way of the paramedics. He leaned in and took Daryl’s hand again. “The name’s Paul, actually,” he said, “Paul Rovia.”
“Oh,” Daryl said, “You’ve got pretty eyes. What color are they?” He couldn’t really tell; they made him think a little of the sea glass his mother used to keep in a dish on the coffee table.
“Blue or green,” Paul said and a quick smile flashed across his face, “Whichever you prefer.”
Daryl hummed a little, “Green, I think,” he decided.
“They gave you the good drugs, I see,” Jesus-Paul said with another smile.
Daryl wouldn’t be able to admit to himself or anyone else for an entire year that it was a lot more than the drugs.
******
Nine thirty came and went. Daryl checked his phone obsessively—no calls, no texts. Maybe cell service was down in Atlanta as well. He checked the news—traffic was still a tangled snarl, newscasters were discussing whether the president was about to call a state of emergency, send the national guard to certain cities.
An hour passed, then another. Daryl tried logging on to the airport website to see if the flight had landed on time, but there at the top of the page in giant red letters was an announcement that flight tracking was down.
Fucking hell, Paul, Daryl thought to himself. He cursed himself for letting Paul talk him out of going to the airport, Daryl could have taken his bike instead of the truck and just weaved through traffic. Or gone overland. It was too late for that now, what if Paul was on his way and Daryl missed him?
Daryl couldn’t sit still, he got up and paced through the house, looking for anything to keep his mind occupied. There were a few repairs he’d been meaning to do and hadn’t gotten around to. A leaky faucet, a busted door jamb, a loose floor board. He had the news on the entire evening, volume cranked up so he could hear it anywhere in the house. After a while he stopped really registering what was being said. It was all a distant blur of stunned horror. The buzzing of a fridge. Until after midnight when the words “Multiple plane crashes across the country, one in Los Angeles, another in southern Indiana…” penetrated Daryl’s fog of distraction.
Daryl froze, a cold wall slamming around his heart. He sprinted to the living room, the newscaster was droning on about something else, Daryl let out a frustrated noise and grabbed the remote, flipping through the channels.
A mass riot in Detroit today-
A man in Los Angeles started attacking people—
A strange flu sweeping the nation—
Just hours after True West Airlines Flight 462 went down over Los Angeles, Delta Flight 614 went down just south of Evansville—
Daryl felt himself go numb. The television showed images of burning wreckage, a massive orange fire ball. Daryl watched in horror, feeling his gorge rise. He wanted to tell himself he was misremembering the flight info Paul had given him earlier, but he remembered it exactly. Delta, flight number 614, coming from Midway and arriving at Hartsfield at 9:30.
Everything felt slow and syrupy, like this was a nightmare he would soon wake up from. He hit mute on the remote and stood in front of the television unmoving for some unknown amount of time. Then he shook himself and staggered for the house phone.
**********
Daryl found out Paul was dead via a prerecorded message.
It was nearly two in the morning, he had been calling the airline and both airports trying to get some information on what had happened ever since he saw the news report. The past few hours were a blur of robot voices telling him to hold, that phone lines were down, that all service representatives were currently helping other customers, please call back.
Then the final robot voice calmly telling him that the world had ended: Flight 614 went down tonight at 8:30 pm over southern Indiana. There were no survivors. Call this number for more information.
The recording started rattling out a few numbers but Daryl couldn’t hear them. He had to replay the message again. His fingers shook so bad he could hardly push the numbers into the phone. The second time the message played the shock was wearing off and what the words actually meant started to sink in.
Feeling like his hands belonged to someone else he dialed the number. The phone rang, and a robot’s voice told him to please hold. Music started playing, a jarringly jaunty saxophone number.
It ended, a robot voice thanked him for holding, then after a beat of silence the song started again.
Daryl soon lost count of how many times the song replayed itself. He felt frozen in time, in some weird Purgatory. Lou came in at one point, whined, and put her paw on his foot. He realized he hadn’t fed her that night, she’d been too agitated when he got home, then his mind got occupied with other things.
He put the phone on speaker and walked into the kitchen cradling it against his chest.
Thank you for holding. All our customer service associates are busy. Please wait, and your call will be answered in the order it was received.
The plastic bin they kept Lou’s dried dog food was empty. Of course it was, he had gone out earlier to stock up on dog food and everything else. The bag was still in the truck. He walked mechanically to the cupboard and started rooting around for a can of the wet food. After he found it he searched for a can opener for several moments before realizing that it was a can with one of those pull tabs.
The smell of the wet food hit him and his stomach rolled. He held his breath and spooned out the food into Lu’s bowl. She started tearing into it before Daryl finished, slurping and gulping in a way that made him feel nauseous again.
He tossed the can in the trash bin beneath the sink then sat down at the kitchen table to wait.
Thank you for holding. All our customer service associates are busy. Please wait, and your call will be answered in the order-
The message cut off abruptly, and at first Daryl thought he had been disconnected when an actual human’s voice filled his ears, “Thank you for calling Delta Customer Service. This is Jenny, how may I be of assistance?” If Daryl hadn’t been so keyed up himself he would have noticed just how scared Jenny from Customer Service sounded.
For a second Daryl couldn’t think of how to be begin. Everything felt fuzzy and like a bad dream. He cleared his throat and said, “My…my partner,“ Daryl almost said boyfriend, he hated that word but he hated “partner” even more. People seemed to take it more seriously, however, “He…he was on that flight. Flight 614,” Daryl was shaking, “There was a recording, said to call this number.”
“I…I’m sorry, there was a recording?” Daryl finally took notice of the fear in her voice.
“Yeah, been callin’ for hours and you’re the first person I’ve spoken to,” he said. He could hear the fear in his own voice, “Said to call this number. He was on that plane, I need…” The words no survivors flashed through his mind, “Did anyone make it?”
There was a silence on the other end of the line, then, “Sir, we are not giving that information out, the families of the passengers need to be contacted-“
Something in Daryl snapped free. The numb unreality of the past few hours vanished and a was replaced by a thundering rage, “I’m his goddamned family!” he shouted, “He ain’t got no one else! You mean to say with all this SHIT going down you can’t tell me if he’s…” Daryl couldn’t finish. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that Lou was cringing away from him, tail between her legs and ears flat.
Jenny the customer service associate was quiet for so long after his outburst that for a moment Daryl thought she’d hung up. “Sir, do you mind holding?”
“Just…fucking…tell me,” Daryl’s voice broke.
“Sir, I have no way of looking that information up. I’m going to speak to my supervisor and see what I can do. If you can give me your number I can call you back—“
“I can hold,” Daryl said, “Just don’t put that fucking music on again.”
“It’s automatic, I can’t control it,” Jenny the customer service associate told him, “I’ll be as fast as I can.”
As fast as she could turned out to be nearly twenty minutes. Daryl was only vaguely aware of time passing. Part of him wanted to hang up, Paul couldn’t be dead if no one ever told him.
There was a click on the other end of the line, “Sir? I’m going to transfer you,” she said.
Daryl didn’t have long to wait before another voice spoke. It was an older man this time, his voice was grave and terrified. He listened when Daryl told him who he was and why he was calling.
“Sir, normally…” He cleared his throat, “Normally you would have been contacted by someone before now. I have no idea why there was a recording, things are…the current situation…is…” he trailed off, then, “I’m going to tell you this because right now…I can’t guarantee that we’ll be able to send anyone for the foreseeable future,” Daryl realized that unlike Jenny this guy wasn’t scared, he’d gone beyond that, there was a bald terror in his voice, “Sir, all passengers on flight 614 died on impact,” he said, “Your partner, Mr Rovia, was on the passenger manifest list,” he paused, then in a very quiet voice said, “I’m so very sorry.”
He had more to say. Details on who to contact, see about identifying any remains. He repeated that the “current situation” was affecting the normal procedures of the airline. Daryl barely heard him, nothing else really mattered after that final, horrible confirmation. He didn’t bother writing any of the numbers down, and after a bit just hung up the phone. He let it fall to the table, where it landed with a clunk.
So that was it then, Daryl thought, he’s dead. Paul was dead. His mind couldn’t accept it, no matter how often he mentally repeated the words. The idea was laughable, he’d just talked to him on the phone a few hours ago.
The world had gone muted, colors and sounds coming in through a cotton filter. Lou whined on the floor, sensing his distress. He reached down and patted her absently, staring around at the kitchen. There were plates in the sink he hadn’t gotten around to washing. He’d meant to, Paul hated coming home to a dirty kitchen. He usually did most of the cooking, Daryl’s job was cleaning up after.
It hit him then, the full force of it. Paul was dead. He wasn’t coming back. He’d never bitch about dirty dishes in the kitchen sink again. Never do anything again; never smile at him, never shove his icy cold feet against Daryl’s legs in the middle of the night, never sit with him in the backyard sipping beers on a summer evening.
It was like a physical blow. Daryl got clumsily to his feet, not sure where he wanted to go or why. He took a few aimless steps away from the table before his legs gave out. He slumped over, clutching at his hair and whimpering. Lou came over and whined, licking at his face. He shoved her away. She curled in on herself, head hung low. The sight of her caused something in him to break, she didn’t know. He couldn’t tell her that Paul was never coming back.
“Fuck,” Daryl said. He buried his face in his hands while sobs of grief escaped him.