𝐂𝐈𝐓𝐘 𝐑𝐔𝐍
she wasn't just pretty. she was otherworldly and vaguely threatening

RICK LEADS THE group through Atlanta in the truck, trying to avoid any walkers that are lingering on the streets.

Nadia's pulling her hair into a ponytail as sweat keeps dripping down her neck, the other occupants silent as the truck rumbles along.

Then Daryl looks over at T-Dog with a glare. "He'd better be okay," he says to the man who left his brother behind. "It's my only word on the matter."

"I told you, the geeks can't get at him. The only thing that's gonna get through that door is us," T-Dog replies, rolling his eyes.

Glenn looks over at Nadia who's leaning back against the cool wall of the truck. "You said you can pick the lock, right?"

She nods. "Yup."

"What were you before all this?" T-Dog questions the girl. He can't help but wonder about her. "You can easily handle your own."

Nadia simply smirks. "I was nothing before this," she tells them. "I was just a girl in school, about to graduate."

"Then where did you learn all that stuff from?" Glenn asks, his eyes wide as he analyzes her. She's maybe about 5'3, with a petite body and soft features. She looks like she can hardly hurt a fly, let alone do the things he's seen her do, but he has, and it amazes him.

Nadia sighs and tilts her head. "Self-defense classes."

"Where were your parents during all this?" Daryl's the one to ask this. He needs to know who she is and why she looks like his ex-girlfriend.

That's the question that makes Nadia clench her jaw. "I don't know. They gave me up when I was a baby," she says simply, her voice low, showing no emotion at all.

Deep down, the little girl inside Nadia wants to know her parents, but the logical side of her hates them for giving her up and making her go through eighteen years of hell on her own.

Daryl reels back slightly, feeling more protective of the girl than he should. For fuck's sake, he doesn't even know her, but the fact that she looks eerily like his ex-girlfriend is bugging him. Once he gets back to camp, he's going to search for the only picture he has of her to make sure he isn't just seeing things.

"We walk from here," Glenn states as the truck stops, and he gets out of the vehicle along with Rick.

Nadia's the first in the back to stand and pull open the truck's rear door, jumping down without any difficulty. She hardens her features, trying to act like Daryl reminding her she has no one doesn't hurt.

The group quickly make their way down the train tracks and approach a hole in a fence, which they climb through with no problems. It surprises them to see no walkers so far, but it isn't like anyone's going to complain about that.

Suddenly, Rick stops and turns to them, making Nadia straighten. "Merle first or the guns?"

"Merle!" Daryl snaps angrily, and Nadia raises a brow at him. "We ain't even having this conversation."

"We are," Rick spits and then turns to Glenn with raised brows. "You know the geography. It's your call."

"Merle's closest," Glenn answers and Nadia nods, pulling out her trusty knife, grip tightening as she thinks about all the walkers they're going to have to go through. "The guns would mean doubling back."

They start jogging down the street to the department store. Nadia moves her way in first, eyes hardening as she surveys the area, calling on her Slayer instincts.

On the other side of the checkout desk, there's a walker in a pink dress. Nadia smirks before flipping the knife in her hand and flinging it forward.

The knife embeds itself in the back of its skull, and the walker stops moving before falling forward, limp, landing on the floor with a small thud.

Nadia nods to herself as she walks over to the body, pulling out her knife and wiping the blood on her jeans before she starts moving again.

She's the first one into the stairwell and quickly makes her way to the door to the roof, making sure the others are far enough back before she grips the chain and pulls at it so hard that it simply breaks in half.

Once the others reach her, Nadia gives them an innocent look as they stare at the chain with wide eyes. "It was like that when I got here. It's a good thing, I guess," she says with a smirk and opens the door.

Daryl huffs and shoves past her, yelling, "Merle!"

Nadia's eyes widen in horror as she sees the severed hand where they left Merle. She gulps as she realizes she's one of the reasons this happened. It makes her sick to her stomach.

"No! No!" Daryl shouts, tears running down his face as he looks at the others with wide eyes. "No!"

Nadia frowns as she notices a handsaw lying near the hand, and the cuffs are still locked in place, hanging from the metal, covered in Merle's blood. He used the saw to cut off his own hand so he could escape.

He's one tough son of a bitch, the Slayer thinks with a sigh.

And when they step closer to Daryl, he swivells around with his crossbow aimed straight at T-Dog's head.

Nadia quickly jumps into action, yanking the crossbow from Daryl and tossing it aside. He lunges at her in a fit of rage, and Nadia slams her hand forward, catching him in the chin and shoving him backwards onto the ground.

She leans over the Dixon brother with a hand clenched in his shirt, their eyes meeting. She glares at him for a moment before roughly letting him go.

"Stop being irrational, and think this through," Nadia spits as she places herself in front of T-Dog defensively. She watches with calculating eyes as Daryl moves to stand up while groaning. "Either you cause problems to derail our mission or you can calm the fuck down and allow us to find your dumbass of a brother. Choose wisely."

Daryl grumbles to himself as he studies the girl. She's a lot like his ex-girlfriend who ran off before he could confess his undying love to her. She was just as feisty as the girl in front of him, and not only did they have the same personality, but they looked so similar.

Sighing, Daryl looks to T-Dog. "You got a do-rag or something?"

T-Dog pulls a blue bandana out of his back pocket and hands it to Daryl. The older man takes it and walks over to Merle's hand on the ground.

"I guess the saw blade was too dull for the handcuffs. Ain't that a bitch," Daryl says as he picks up the hand by the pinky before wrapping it up with the bandana.

"You're a ninja," Glenn states as he walks up to Nadia's side. He is smiling, tilting his head slightly, brown eyes sparkling in the sunlight.

Nadia grins at him before walking over to Daryl's crossbow and checking it out. "This is a Horton Scout HD 125, right?" Her eyes twinkle as she holds the weapon out to Daryl.

Daryl frowns at her. "How do you know that?"

The girl shrugs. "I like to study different weapons and the little details the makers put on them. Yours is old, but it almost looks brand new. You must really take care of it." She smiles as he takes it from her, placing it over his back.

Daryl's impressed with her knowledge as he moves over to Glenn with the wrapped-up hand in his hold. The boy grumbles as the Dixon brother stores the hand in a compartment in his backpack.

Nadia raises a brow at that before squatting down. "He must've used a tourniquet—maybe a belt if he had one. If he didn't, there'd be a hell of a lot more blood."

She stands up, glancing at the others who look surprised by her once again. Not only is Nadia a badass, but she also knows her stuff.

They start following Merle's trail, Daryl in front with Nadia behind him.

The five of them end up at a different exit than the one they entered through. Nadia pulls out her knife, stepping in front of Daryl.

She knows these people can handle their own, but it's her duty as a Slayer to save humans from monsters. Walkers are just the latest monsters that aren't going away anytime soon.

Daryl falls into step behind her with his crossbow raised, with Rick, Glenn, and T-Dog in the back with their own weapons also raised.

They make their way down the stairs, and Nadia jumps in surprise when Daryl starts shouting for Merle. She looks back at him with a glare as they enter a room.

A walker makes its way towards them, so Nadia jumps forward and jams her knife into its skull before quickly yanking it free and moving forward once again.

As they walk through a hallway, they pass two dead walkers on the floor, to which Nadia cocks a brow at, impressed.

"Had enough in him to take out these two sumbitches," Daryl states with a proud smirk. "One-handed."

"Who is he, Captain Hook?" Nadia jokes, eyes twinkling.

She remembers the first time she saw the movie when she was about fifteen. It was with Dawn—Buffy's little sister. She decided to have a movie night with all the potential Slayers. They ended up watching Peter Pan, as well as other childish movies. It was the first time in a while that Nadia acted her age. And it was one of the last times, too.

"Toughest asshole I ever met, my brother," Daryl continues, ignoring Nadia's joke as he shoots a crossbow bolt at a walker making its way towards them. He then reloads his crossbow. "Feed him a hammer, he'd crap out nails."

"Any man can pass out from blood loss, no matter how tough he is," Rick pipes in, making Daryl turn and glare at him.

"Come on." Nadia rounds a corner, still following the trail of blood, and stepping into what looks like a kitchen of sorts.

"Merle!" Daryl calls from right behind her.

"We're not alone here," Rick hisses lowly. "Remember?"

"Screw that," Daryl responds as he looks around the room. "He could be bleeding out. You said so yourself."

Nadia approaches a stove and turns the burners off. She notices the plate with burnt skin on it, making her scrunch her nose up. "Damn. He's one tough son of a bitch." She glances over at the four men watching her. "He cauterized the stump."

Glenn gags at the sight and smell of the skin, turning his face away. "That's gross."

"Sure is," Nadia comments as she recalls cauterizing her friend Xander's wounds that he got once while on a hunt for a huge ass monster.

"Nobody can kill Merle but Merle," Daryl says with a smug look.

"Your brother's not here anymore. He busted out," Nadia tells him, pointing to the broken window that leads to a fire escape.

Glenn furrows his brow as he looks out the window. "Why the hell would he do that?"

"Why wouldn't he?" Daryl asks, looking between them. "He's out there alone, as far as he knows. Doing what he's gotta do—surviving."

"You call that surviving?" T-Dog chimes in, brows furrowed. He shakes his head. "Just wandering out in the streets, maybe passing out? What are his odds out there?"

"No worse than being handcuffed and left to rot by you sorry pricks!" Daryl retorts. "It's your fault that he's even out there alone."

Nadia sighs heavily, biting her lip. "Seeing as we have no clue where he's at or how long he's been out there, we have a better chance of getting the guns." She holds up a hand to stop Daryl from arguing anything further. "Do the math, Dixon. We get those guns, then we can look for your brother."

Daryl clenches his jaw and watches in annoyance as Rick sends him a smirk before following the girl's lead.

GLENN MOVES DOWN the same alleyway where he saved Rick and Nadia, the eighteen-year-old and Daryl right behind him while Rick and T-Dog go down a separate alleyway just in case the plan goes sideways.

"You got some balls for a Chinaman," the younger Dixon says, glancing at Glenn.

The boy gives him a look. "I'm Korean."

"Whatever."

Nadia shakes her head at the older man. "You're literally a grown child."

Glenn chuckles at the girl as he notices Daryl's offended and annoyed expression, then he nods and leaves the alley, making a break for the bag of guns lying in the middle of the road.

As Daryl ducks behind a dumpster, Nadia walks towards the gate, giving Glenn another set of eyes to watch out for danger.

Nadia whips around at footsteps, seeing a boy—no older than seventeen—sneaking towards them. She moves towards him slowly, holding up her dagger threateningly. "Who the hell are you?!"

"Who the hell are you?" The stranger mimics and holds up his hands when Daryl moves towards him, his crossbow raised. "Whoa, don't shoot me!" He looks between them with wide eyes. "What do you want?"

"I'm looking for my brother. He's hurt real bad," Daryl tells him with narrowed eyes. "You seen him?"

"Ayudame!" The kid yells out for help instead.

"Shut up!" Nadia whisper-yells as she quickly glances over her shoulder for any walkers coming towards them.

"Answer me!" Daryl demands, making Nadia glare at him. Now definitely isn't the time to interrogate a kid.

"Ayudame!" The boy shouts again.

Daryl tries to shut him up by slamming his crossbow into the side of his face. The boy falls backwards, Daryl covering his mouth with his free hand.

Suddenly, two guys are running into the alley towards them. The one with a bat runs at Daryl and kicks him away from the kid, while the other one goes for Nadia, who expertly ducks under his swinging fist.

The man then rams into Nadia, grabbing her by the waist and slamming her into the ground. She groans loudly as the air is punched from her lungs but she recovers quickly and kicks at the man.

Her foot pushes at his shoulder hard, the joint popping loudly and making the man cry out in pain. She grins and pushes herself off the ground before doing a front flip over him.

But Nadia isn't expecting him to turn around and punch her in the back. She cries out as she feels the rings he's wearing digging into her skin.

Yet, she grits her teeth and yanks her legs up and around his neck, twisting her body roughly to slam him to the side. She gets up on her hands and knees, panting, but turns her head quickly to glare at the guy.

"You are so going to regret this," Nadia growls before leaping at the man, pushing him back against the brick wall.

She grips his shirt and swings him around until he slams headfirst into the opposite wall. He groans and whimpers, blood gushing out of his nose.

"You're a little bitch," the guy hisses, pushing off the wall and running at her. Nadia sideswipes him, hand pushing against his back and sending him roughly to the ground.

"And you're pathetic," she spits in reply, whipping her body around to kick him in his dislocated shoulder.

He screams, kicking his legs out and hitting her in the shins. Nadia grunts as she falls to her knees, and the next thing she knows, the man is up and kneeing her in the face. She slams backwards, eyes unfocusing briefly from the unexpected kick.

Nadia blinks, dazed, as he stands above her, about to kick her in the head again when his friend yells out, "That's it! That's the bag, vato!"

Both men rush towards Glenn, who's just made it back to the alley. They quickly take him down and the one previously hitting Daryl with his bat now starts hitting Glenn with it instead.

Nadia growls angrily, jumping to her feet once again, ignoring the aches in her face and stomach. Just as she goes to run forward, Daryl shoots his crossbow, hitting the guy who was punching her right in the ass.

The man starts screaming in pain as the other guy uses Glenn as a shield to protect himself while he moves backwards to the street.

"Get off of me!" Glenn screams as the guy pulls him into the streets where a car pulls up. "Nadia! Daryl!"

Nadia's desperate rush towards Glenn is hindered by a walker in her path. Her face scrunches up in anger as she slams her foot into its stomach before swinging her arm towards its neck. Her anger mixes with her strength, working together to knock the walker's head clean off.

As soon as the walker's head hits the ground, Glenn is pulled into the car and then it speeds off.

"Fuck!" Nadia shouts, whirling around angrily on the kid the men left behind. "Get back here!" She rushes at him as he tries to run and pins him to the wall, her dagger at his neck. She glances over to see Daryl closing the gate, blocking it from the approaching walkers. "Where did they take him?!"

T-Dog skids into the alley with Rick, the latter running over and grabbing Daryl before he can get to where Nadia is holding the kid hostage up against the wall.

"I'm gonna kick your nuts up into your throat!" Daryl yells as Nadia pushes her dagger closer to the boy's neck.

She won't actually kill him, Nadia knows, but the others don't. Slayers are supposed to help humans, not kill them. But that doesn't mean she can't torture him for information.

T-Dog tries to yank her away from the kid, but she's stronger than she looks and stands her ground.

"They took Glenn!" Daryl shouts, angry about Glenn getting taken but also at how he, for some reason, strongly dislikes seeing anyone mishandle Nadia. He continues to struggle in vain to get to her and the kid. "That little bastard and his little bastard homie friends! I'm gonna stomp your ass!"

"Guys! Guys! We're cut off!" T-Dog yells as Nadia resolutely keeps her cold gaze on the boy squirming under her scrutiny.

"Get to the lab! Go!" Rick shouts, grabbing the bag of guns that Glenn dropped.

Nadia grabs her new prisoner roughly by the arm as they all start running in the opposite direction.

ONCE THE GROUP is inside and safe, Nadia licks her bloody lip—she hadn't realized the guy busted it—and glares at the boy. "Those men you were with, we need to know where they went."

"I ain't tellin' you nothin'!" The boy sneers, his eyes narrowed.

"Jesus, man. What the hell happened back there?" T-Dog asks as he looks between Daryl and Nadia.

"I told you, this little turd and his douchebag friends came out of nowhere and jumped us," Daryl says as he paces back and forth behind Rick.

"You're the one who jumped me, puto, screaming about trying to find his brother like it's my damn fault," the teenager spits, flinching as Nadia flings her dagger at him, but it lands right beside his head, and she grins ferally at his horrified look. "You're a psycho!"

"I want Glenn back!" Nadia growls as she marches over to the boy. She yanks her dagger out of the wall and waves it in his face threateningly. "If you don't tell us, I will begin cutting into you. And let me tell you, I know dozens of ways to cut into you that won't kill you right away. So start talking."

"They took Glenn. Could have taken Merle too," Daryl states, seeming to only care about finding his brother rather than him and Glenn.

"Merle? What kind of hick name is that? I wouldn't name my dog Merle," the kid spits sarcastically.

Daryl goes to kick the boy, but Rick grabs him and yanks him back. He then paces a little before shooting a mischievous look towards Glenn's backpack that was left behind. "Want to see what happened to the last guy who pissed me off?" He asks as he pulls Merle's severed hand out of the dark blue bandana.

The kid freaks out when he sees the severed hand, and when Daryl flings it at him, he screams and falls out of the chair.

"Start with the feet this time," Daryl says as he yanks the boy off of the floor and pushes him back onto the chair.

"The men you were with took our friend. All we want to do is talk to them, see if we can work something out," Rick speaks as gently as he can to the kid.

A few minutes later, once the kid finally tells them where his group can be found, Nadia gestures to the door with an innocent grin. "Ready to kick ass?"

Rick chuckles softly at the girl. "Come on."