"Chick, get up." Daryl shook Briony to wake her up, they'd finally reached the CDC. "Get your bow, it looks like a graveyard."
She yawned, rubbed her eyes and stretched, before opening the car door, stepping out into the crisp air.
She grabbed some rope out of the back of the truck, quickly making a leash for Bandit. She wrapped it around his neck and he jumped out of the car behind her.
"Stay on your guard." Daryl advised. "We don't know what the fuck this place is." She nodded, closing the car door.
She slung her bag of arrows onto her left shoulder, along with her bow. Bandit's leash in her right hand, with Bandit on the other end.
They joined the rest of the group as they all clustered together, slowly walking towards the large building.
Bodies among bodies were piled up with flies feasting on them. The smell was vile, Briony was gagging and coughing. She tried to breathe through her mouth to make it bearable.
"All right, everybody, keep moving." Rick whispered. "Go on. Stay quiet. Let's go."
As they moved closer the smell and the buzzing of the flies intensified, causing a lot more people in the group to react the same as Briony.
"Ohh... Ohh!" Glenn muffled, as they passed what used to be the security building.
"Keep moving. Stay together." Rick ordered, leading the group. "Keep moving. Come on."
"Shh." Someone shushed as a lot of people started to make a fuss about the smell.
"Daryl, it stinks." Briony whispered, she looked up at him, disgust all over her face.
"Suck it up." He replied. Looking at every dead body that they passed.
"Oh, God." Glenn cringed.
"Let's go." Rick pushed and the group began moving quicker to the huge building. "Keep it together. Come on."
"We're trying." Briony whispered back, getting annoyed that he kept repeating himself.
"We're almost there, baby. Almost there." Lori told Carl ahead of Briony.
Rick and Shane reached the shutters, the rest of the group just behind and tried to push them.
"Nothing?" Shane continued to try and push the shutters. Nothing. He started banging on them but also, nothing.
"There's nobody here." T-Dog spoke. Briony rolled her eyes. The lack of hope in this group was unreal, they'd been there 2 seconds.
"Then why are these shutters down?" Rick asked.
"Walkers!" Daryl shouted warning the group from behind Briony.
She turned around swiftly to see how close it was, Daryl then shot an arrow straight into it's skull.
Sophia started to cry, Carol kept her arm around her daughter protecting her.
"You led us into a graveyard!" Daryl shouted.
"He made a call." Shane argued as Daryl stormed towards Rick.
"It was the wrong damn call." Daryl argued.
"You shut up. Shut up!" Shane lightly pushed Daryl causing Bandit to bark at Shane.
Even Bandit didn't like it when people came for Briony's brother. "Shhhh, good boy." Briony praised.
"Rick this is a dead end." Shane shouted. Briony didn't get involved in the conflict, it wasn't worth it.
"Where are we going to go?" Carol asked.
"Do you hear me? No blame." Shane told Rick, pointing a finger at him.
"She's right. We can't be this close to the city after dark." Lori acknowledged. Everyone took a small breather and calmed down, Briony just rolled her eyes.
"Fort Benning. Still an option." Shane commented.
"On what? No food, no fuel. It's 100 miles." Andrea commented.
"Oh fuck me." Briony whispered to herself, while everyone argued.
"Let's get out of here." Someone suggested.
"Let's go." Shane shouted. Everyone started to move back to the cars, Briony sighed and followed along slowly.
This whole trip was a complete and utter mess.
"The camera! It moved!" Rick announced.
"You imagined it." Dale told him.
"It moved!" Rick reassured them, moving towards it and look right into it.
"This is some dumb shit. Let's go." Daryl told Briony, she nodded in response and they started to head back towards the truck.
Everyone started shouting, attracting the walkers, leaving Daryl and Briony to deal with it.
She took out her small hand gun and shot an approaching walker in the head.
"Fuck you!" She shouted, smiling. Since everyone else was shouting, she thought she'd join in to. She giggled to herself.
"You're killing us!" Rick screamed.
"Fucking hell, he's a bit upset." Briony giggled to herself.
Daryl rolled his eyes at his sister and continued to shoot the walkers that were approaching the group. She was being childish. Daryl hated her for being like this in serious situations.
All of a sudden, the shutters opened producing a bright white light. Briony covered her eyes, since it was blinding her. Rick was right, there was a person in there.
↠ ↠ ↠ ↠
"Daryl, you cover the back." Shane ordered, as the group walked in.
"Hello?" Rick asked as he was the first to enter.
Briony walked inside, the place was massive. Nothing like she'd ever seen in her life. "Rah." She spoke to herself in awe.
"Hello." A voice replied, that person cocked their gun and the groups attention was on a blonde haired man. "Anybody infected?"
"One of our group was." Rick informed, staring the man down. "He didn't make it." Briony saddened, remembering not too long ago that Jim was left on the side of the road. She missed him already.
The man started to head down the stairs towards them. "Why are you here? What do you want?" He questioned.
"A chance." Rick answered, his gun still pointing at the stranger.
"That's asking an awful lot these days." The man continued to approached them.
"I know." Rick replied. The man's eyes searched around the room. Looking at everyone individually. His eyes made contact with Briony and she smirked at him, not breaking contact until he did.
"You all submit to a blood test. That's the price of admission." The man told the group.
Straight away Briony knew that there was no way in hell she would do that. She had a huge fear of needles.
Daryl looked straight at her and he shook his head, saying she didn't have to do shit that she wasn't comfortable with.
She nodded at him, knowingly. She was now terrified of the man. Anyone who had anything to do with needles, she automatically hated.
She was more scared of a needle than a gun. That was saying something.
"We can do that." Rick agreed.
Yeah, they could do that. He was gonna have to kill her first before she let him put a needle in her.
The man lowered his gun. "You got stuff to bring in, do it now. Once that door closes, it stays closed."
Rick nodded and headed out with a few of the other boys. It took them 5 minutes before they all ran back inside with bags on their back.
Daryl walked up to Briony. "Here's your backpack." He passed it to her and she took it and placed it on her back.
"Thanks." She nodded.
"Vi, seal the main entrance, kill the power up here." The man spoke and the shutters slowly dropped down before they completely shut.
"Rick Grimes." Rick introduced himself.
"Dr Edwin Jenner." The man introduces. Ahh, he was a doctor.
↠ ↠ ↠ ↠
"Are we underground?" Carol asked.
The man had taken the group into an elevator and they were now walking along a corridor.
"You claustrophobic?" Jenner asked.
"A little." She replied.
"Try not to think about it." He advised.
"Great advice man." Briony whispered, rolling her eyes.
"Vi, bring up the lights in the big room." The lights came on and revealed a huge circular room.
"Welcome to Zone Five." The man introduced, the place was really high tech. Briony smirked to herself, she was impressed.
"Where is everybody? The other doctors? The staff?" Rick asked, as they followed behind Jenner.
"I'm it." Jenner replied, standing in the center of the room. "It's just me here."
"What about the person you were speaking with? Vi?" Lori questioned.
"Vi, say hello to our guests. Tell them... Welcome." Jenner ordered.
"Hello, guests. Welcome." A female computer voice filled the room.
"I'm all that's left." Jenner explained. "I'm sorry. Right, let's get your blood tests done."
As soon as those words were spoken Briony suddenly stopped and turned to her brother. Her heart rate started to increase.
"What?" Daryl questioned, looking at her.
"I-i can't b-breathe." Briony whispered in between heavy, rapid breaths. She started to sweat, she knew exactly what was happening.
A panic attack.
Daryl started to panic himself as she dropped to the floor. "Woah." He shouted, catching the attention of some of the group.
Shane suddenly realized she collapsed on the floor and rushed over to her. "She's having a panic attack. Just leave me and Daryl with her. The rest of you go on."
The group left the two boys with her and Shane bent down to her level and started to stroke her hair.
"Hey, hey. What's wrong?" He asked.
"She doesn't like needles, had the biggest fear of them even from a baby." Daryl explained looking down at his sister. He felt useless.
He hated not being able to help his sister, he used to know how to comfort her in every way but now, he didn't have a clue.
It was like he'd forgotten how to be her big brother, she was growing up, fast. He was worried he'd give her the wrong advice or make her feel like shit.
He didn't know how to help. He mentally punished himself for it.
"Deep breaths." Shane told her. Bandit jumped up at her and started to lick her face, this made her smile a little.
"Please." Briony started in between breaths. "Please don't make me. I can't."
Shane looked at her with sympathy, he nodded. He knew what he had to do, if she didn't want it done, he wasn't going to make her.
"Sweetheart." He placed a small strand of hair behind her ear, putting one hand under her chin, making her look at him. "I'm not going to make you do this. I'll speak to Jenner. See what I can do."
He got up and reached out his hand, she grabbed it and he hauled her up. "Come here." He pulled her in for a hug.
Small tears rolled down her face. "I promise you Bri, Daryl and I will never let anything bad happen to you."
She looked up at him, teary eyed, nodding her head. She took a deep breath and smiled at him and then at her brother.
"Thank you." She whispered to both of them. Daryl put his hand around her shoulder and pulled her into him.
Shane stood on the other side of her and the 3 of them headed towards the room where the rest of the group were.
Shane opened the door and Briony trailed in after him, Daryl just behind her. She sat down on a chair, picked up Bandit and put him on her lap.
Andrea was sat opposite Jenner having her blood test done.
"What's the point? If we were infected, we'd all be running a fever." Andrea asked.
"I've already broken every rule in the book letting you in here. So let me just at least be thorough. All done." Andrea stood up, Jacqui behind her, holding her up. "You okay?"
"She hasn't eaten in days." Jacqui told him. "None of us have."
Jenner stopped and looked around the group, the words that Jacqui spoke must've changed his mind because he got up and sighed.
"Let's get you guys a meal then, ey?" He announced.
"I thought-." Lori started.
"It can wait." He smiled.
Briony sighed. Thank fuck for that.