First Kill

Chapter 1

Daryl Dixon hadn't eaten for a week. So when his father walked in and placed a rabbit in his lap rather than a meal, he was needless to say a tiny bit disgruntled. Looking over at his older brother Merle to gage his reaction to the odd event only showed him an unreadable – if not slightly pained— expression. He raised an eyebrow at Merle, as if to say 'What the hell?' As the tiny brown creature raised its face to his own and twitched its nose at him, Merle shook his head and left the room.

Bizarre.

The Dixon brothers had long ago learned to not ask their father questions when it came to anything. Punishment varied far and wide – you never did know what to expect with Pa— but you could always expect something, even if it wasn't always immediate. Daryl drew his eyebrows together in thought, his brain processing quickly to see if there was some punishment he was still due for. He came up with nothing, at least if he was going by the usual rules of their lives.

The rabbit was squirming now, the shock of the recent turn of events in its life wearing off. He held on to it tightly, confident that if he let a wild rabbit run loose in the house there'd be hell to pay. His father was puttering around in the kitchen now. Daryl was glad he'd cleaned it earlier after Merle got home from wherever he had been last night and had rather messily made himself something resembling dinner. If there was one similarity between seven-year-old Daryl and his father, (other than their appearance – Dixon men were all cut from the same cloth) it was that they both were clean freaks. Everything must be meticulously cared for and cleaned, all in its proper place. Daryl wondered how Merle had been allowed to live this long considering his inability to even find something clean to wear each day. He felt that he spent half of his day just cleaning up what Merle (and his father) had ruined, trying to prevent nastiness for them both. If Pa came home – whenever that would be – and the place was a pig sty…

His attention was brought back from his cleaning tangent when he realized that Merle was snapping his fingers at him. "Daryl!" he growled, pointing towards the kitchen. Daryl's gaze followed Merle's outstretched finger. His father had ceased doing whatever he had been doing and was looking at Daryl, a plastic bag filled with something in his hands.

"Take th't rabbit inta tha garage, Daryl." He told him. Daryl hesitated. "Git!"

Daryl moved quickly, scurrying into the garage, his hold on the creature firm. Merle followed him at a more languid pace, dragging his feet. Once inside the garage he sat down cross-legged on the floor, trapping the rabbit in a cage of his legs, holding it still with one hand, while the other drifted to the vicinity of his mouth, his thumbnail quickly being placed in his mouth as it did when he was stressed. He had picked up that little habit from Merle a few years ago, copying his brother out of a want to deal with things the way the brave older boy did. These days Merle had better things to stick in his mouth other than his thumb though, and more often then not he'd snap when he caught Daryl falling back on childish habits.

Sure enough as he followed Daryl through the door he raised an eyebrow at him dangerously before Pa stepped through behind him. Daryl quickly lowered his hand. Pa placed the plastic bag on the floor, fixing Daryl with a stern look.

"Ya ain't comin' outta this garage until yer done, got it?" he asked. Daryl desperately wanted to say "Yes, sir" and be done, but he really didn't understand, and saying so was the lesser of two evils when it came to doing something wrong in this household. He shook his head at his father. "I don't get it, Pa. What am I doin'?"

"Fixin' dinner." His father told him simply.

Daryl felt his blood drain as the man turned to Merle, telling him in a low voice to 'make sure he did it and doesn't pussy out' before leaving. "Merle?" he asked in a quivering voice.

Merle heaved a heavy sigh, before pushing off the wall he had been leaning against. "Alright Darlina, th's here's tha skinny of it. Ya gotta kill that bunny rabbit there fer dinner. Pa ain't gonna let us eat oth'rwise. Take this here knife," he pulled out his own Bowie knife, thrusting it into Daryl's tiny hand, "and git it 'round the neck."

Daryl made a face, forcing Merle to reconsider. "Or ya kin just snap it. Might be less messy fer ya first one. Just make sure ya do, cuz I'm hungry."

"But Merle—"

"When ya done, put it in that bag wit' tha pan, and bring it outside. I'll teach ya ta skin it."

"Merle!"

"Shuddup kid! Man up and jus' do it! Ya ain't got no choice! Ya wanna eat don'cha?" Daryl gave a tiny nod. He was hungry, just as he knew Merle was. "Rabbit is tha only thin' on tha menu. Make it happen." Merle stomped off up the stairs back to the main house, slamming the door behind him. The small 'click' the lock made as Merle trapped him in was very definite.

Daryl sat there on the ground stunned, his grip on the rabbit loosening. They wanted him to kill this little bunny? To skin it and eat it? Daryl didn't know much about anything, but he thought he knew that the last thing seven year olds were supposed to do was to kill things. As he watched it hop around, finally free from him, he felt a panic rise in him. He couldn't do this.

His friend Sophia had a bunny, he thought worriedly. She called it 'Bruce.' It had the softest fur and the nicest kisses. Its nose twitched as it smelled his hand before taking little nibbles that never hurt. It wasn't so different from this wretched thing sitting in front of him now, its ears all perked up in interest at its surroundings.

They could be brothers.

Why did Sophia's bunny get to live and play, while this one did not?

He was hungry. Merle was hungry.

Bruce had a neat little water bottle with a small ball in the metal straw. It made a funny noise when the bunny sucked at it.

Daryl looked from the locked door he'd seen Merle disappear form to the garage door. The button was too high for him to reach and the only things he could stand on to make him taller were much too heavy for him to move. He was stuck in here until someone let him out.

He was really hungry.

There was no choice.

He stood shakily, the bowie knife clutched in his hand (might as well do this properly) and made his way over to the bunny, launching himself at it and grabbing the scruff of its neck, holding it down and still as he drew the knife across its throat. It struggled and fought and made a noise that he'd never heard come from Bruce. He felt a heat in his eyes and his vision blurred but still he held on.

When the deed was done, he was covered in the tiny thing's blood, shaking like he had never done before. He sat back down, cross-legged again, and cradled it in his arms, sobbing, until finally the door unlocked and Merle lumbered in slowly. Some time later in his life he'd remember the gentle way that Merle had taken the still warm rabbit from his hands and placed it in the bag, before taking him by the small blood soaked hand into the bathroom to clean him up, before going outside to skin the animal.

The smell of rabbit filled the house as Pa and Merle ate. Daryl sat at the table, eyes down. He'd been unable to eat it after all. Later that night, the boys got down on their hands and knees in the garage and scrubbed at the bloodstains. Everything had to be spotless.