Chapter 17: Chaotic Brawl
Rip wrapped both arms around the dark figure's waist, throwing all his strength forward.
The figure pressed downward, trying to break free from Rip's bear hug, but his body strength fell far short of Rip's. He could only keep stumbling backward.
Then his foot caught on a stone without warning.
The figure immediately lost balance. Rip used his body weight to execute a takedown slam.
The impact hit the figure hard. Fortunately, dead leaves cushioned the ground beneath him—otherwise that landing might have caused multiple fractures.
The figure lay on the ground, back curled, teeth gritted as he lunged toward his crossbow.
Before he could grab it, Rip kicked the crossbow away and looked down at the figure from above.
Everyone appeared together.
Caesar took one look—sure enough, it was Daryl. He raised his hand in a gesture, and Rip walked back.
Merle hurried forward and helped Daryl up.
"Oh, it's Daryl."
"Daryl, you should report in when you come back."
Seeing it was Daryl, everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Shane explained to Rick who Daryl was.
Merle crouched down with a grin. "Daryl, need your dear big brother to give you a hand?"
Daryl angrily swatted Merle's hand away. Finally grabbing his crossbow, he surged to his feet, his face full of defiance.
"Son of a bitch dared to ambush me."
As he spoke, Daryl raised his crossbow, aiming at Rip, about to fire the next second.
Merle's hands moved quickly, shoving the crossbow upward.
The bolt shot out, embedding itself firmly in a tree trunk.
Daryl shoved Merle aside. "Merle, has your brain gone bad? You won't help me take him down, but you're stopping me? What the hell?"
Furious, Daryl pulled back the bowstring as he spoke, preparing to shoot another bolt.
The people around watched this volatile hothead and instinctively stepped back several paces, afraid of getting involved in whatever this was.
Rip glanced at Caesar and heard him say, "Go ahead. Let the hotheaded fool learn a hard lesson."
Rip nodded, shook out his wrists, and strode toward Daryl.
Daryl had short hair at this point, his face full of youthful rawness. He nocked the string and raised his arms to shoot.
This time, Merle didn't stop him.
But Rip had already grabbed Daryl's raised crossbow. The bolt struck the tree trunk again.
Rip had no intention of holding back. He knocked away the crossbow, grabbed Daryl's shoulder, and delivered a series of heavy punches.
Rip's build was massive—he stood considerably taller than Daryl and had far more strength.
A single heavy punch made Daryl clutch his abdomen in pain. After several consecutive punches, Daryl's consciousness began to blur from the agony.
Rip released his grip on Daryl's shoulder. Daryl went limp and dazed, dropping to his knees on the ground, clutching his stomach as he vomited up some filth.
"Kid, learn how to fight. You're too weak!"
Dropping that line, Rip flexed his hands and turned to leave.
Daryl barely managed to raise his head. His flushed face glared at Rip, then looked resentfully at Merle.
His eyes seemed to say: Why didn't you stop me?
Merle helplessly hoisted Daryl up and carried him back toward camp on his back.
The farce ended. At Caesar's request, the deer carcass was carried back to camp.
"You're saying this is edible?" Dale stood with his hands on his hips, eyes wide, white beard bristling in disbelief.
"Eww—" Amy recoiled at the mental image, her disgust visceral. Like eating a walker.
This triggered waves of revulsion across several women's faces at camp.
Even Rip and Jimmy looked questioningly at Caesar.
Caesar had no choice but to explain. "The virus in walkers can't infect animals—everyone understands that, right?"
People thought about it. True enough, they'd never seen an animal walker.
"That means the virus can't transmit through animals. So us eating animals is fine."
"Besides, when the walker bit the deer, the deer was already dead. Blood and everything wouldn't be circulating. Add high-temperature cooking, and there won't be any problems."
Caesar explained patiently. He didn't want to see such good meat go to waste.
In the future, opportunities to eat deer might become increasingly rare.
Caesar's reasoning convinced some people, though several women still refused.
They cut off the deer's head. The walker had mainly bitten the deer's neck, so for safety's sake, they cut away and discarded an additional portion of meat below that.
After draining the blood, the women began processing the deer carcass.
The camp fell back into bustling activity.
Caesar didn't want to just sit around doing nothing, so he took Rip and Jimmy into the woods to hunt for walkers.
Tate stayed with the cargo truck, guarding the supplies.
After entering the woods, Jimmy started chattering nonstop.
"That walker I saw that day was the ugliest I've ever seen—absolutely ridiculous. No mouth, and its head was caved in on one side."
"No lower body either. The upper body was pretty much rotted through."
Jimmy's face simultaneously showed an expression of disgust, as if his mind kept replaying images of that walker.
"Jimmy, shut up." Caesar raised a single finger, looking seriously at Jimmy.
"Oh, okay."
Jimmy nodded blankly.
"Jimmy, we're not out here to play. We're out here to find walkers. You need to maintain absolute alertness toward your surroundings."
"Can't say for sure—the next second a walker might jump out from somewhere and grab you. You've got to learn conditioned reflex counterattacks."
Caesar explained earnestly to Jimmy.
Jimmy understood his problem. He nodded repeatedly, gripped the machete in his hand properly, and looked toward the surrounding trees.
After they stopped talking, the quiet forest seemed to contain only the three of them, without many of the usual sparse forest sounds.
This made Jimmy exceptionally nervous.
The three walked forward in an inverted triangle formation—Caesar and Rip in front, Jimmy behind.
As Caesar walked past a large tree, he looked at it suspiciously twice.
The next second, a walker burst out from behind the tree, reaching for Caesar.
Caesar had prepared early. He swung his axe violently. The axe split open the walker's skull and, amid flying wood chips, embedded itself in the tree trunk.
Black blood ran down the trunk.
Nearby, Rip gripped a knife and rushed toward several walkers that appeared beside him.
One hand clamped the walker's neck while the other thrust up through the walker's jaw, straight to the brainstem.
Smooth as flowing water, he eliminated the walker.
Meanwhile, Jimmy's situation wasn't optimistic. Jimmy had likewise been latched onto by a walker. The walker grabbed Jimmy's machete, and the two became locked in a test of strength.
Walkers had no muscle strength limitations—they could exert extreme muscular force.
It gradually overpowered Jimmy, pinning him against a tree trunk. Its mouth gaped wide, reeking foulness.
Jimmy watched this scene, his face full of terror and fear.
A sound of cutting air approached—thwack!
The axe split open the walker's head, embedding in the tree trunk and pinning the walker in place.
The walker's entire body went limp, releasing Jimmy.
Jimmy just felt something slimy on top of his head. With the walker no longer moving, he shoved it away violently.
As the axe was pulled free, quite a bit of the walker's brain matter scattered across the ground, like spilled pig brains.
Jimmy frantically pulled off his cowboy hat. It was covered in black blood.
Caesar walked over, retrieved his axe, and patted the calming Jimmy. "Later, after you get used to it, it'll be fine."
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