Zedler, M.D. // Daryl Dixon

Chapter Sixty-Seven: Welcome to the Family

•sixty-seven•

achtung: this chapter has HELLA fluff :)) kinda ooc for daryl and no real action i am sorry if that's what you were expecting. more action and back to normal in the next chapter I promise <3i just couldn't help myself when the opportunity presented itself. have fun reading

Beatrix

Two days have passed since I was bitten. Two whole days, and I feel like it never even happened. Well, except for how much the damn bite hurts, of course. I've already said my goodbyes to my whole family, but that was two days ago. I wish Shane had made it so that I could talk to him. He could have known what's going on with me.

As for the rest of us, we have no idea. Even without the bite, Lucas and I have never seen somebody come down with an illness and then recover as quickly as I did. The illness hit me like a train, and left just as quick. It was almost gone when I woke up the next day, and pretty much completely gone yesterday. Other people, like Glenn, are just now getting rid of their cough.

"Can you change my bandage?" I ask Beth. I had just walked over to her cell, using my IV pole to help me walk. We decided to keep me on an IV drip of saline to keep fluids in me.

"Of course," she smiles, jumping up off of her bed. She passes Judith off to Baxly before walking with me down to the medical room.

"Beth, do you really think I could survive this?" I jump onto one of my hospital beds, laying down and lifting up my shirt so that she can see the wound easily. "I don't want to like, jinx it or anything, but what do you think?"

"We've been in this for over a year now, Bea, almost two," her voice is calm as she removes the bandage and starts spreading antibiotic ointment on it. "We've seen a lot of people get bit. None of us have ever seen anybody make it past a few hours after, let alone two days. Are you sure you haven't been secretly doing your experiment on yourself?"

"No," I shake my head. "I'll tell you something, though, if you promise not to tell anybody else. The only other person that knows is Bax."

"Promise," she smiles down at me.

"I couldn't even if I wanted to. I'm immunocompromised," I explain. "I have an autoimmune disease dormant inside of me. Any day it could explode, and big changes to my body could trigger it. I always thought if I injected myself I would die."

"Oh, my goodness, Beatrix. That's awful. I'm so sorry," her smile quickly turns to a frown.

"Yeah, so no, I haven't been doing anything to myself," I close my eyes, trying to ignore the pain in my abdomen.

"You must be a miracle, then," her voice is optimistic as she pats down the new bandage. "All done!"

"Thank you," I sit up, looking down at the wound.

I try to ignore the fact that my ribs are showing, now, probably because I haven't eaten in days, and the last time I did eat, I threw up probably thirty times. The bite, though, is healing remarkably well. Beth stitched it up for me, and she did it beautifully. I know I haven't been the best mentor lately, but she has retained everything I've ever taught her, and I know she will be a great doctor one day.

"Have you seen Daryl?" I ask once we're ready to leave the medical room. "I haven't seen him all day, which is weird, because he's barely left my side since the incident."

"Yeah, I know where he is," she bites her lip, obviously trying to hide a smile. "Let's go find him."

"What's going on with you?" I laugh at her. "You're too happy today, even for you. It's suspicious."