Chapter 58 Rescue! Crush Them!

“Magnus!”

The moment Merle recognized the blood-covered figure below, exhaustion seemed to disappear from his face for a second. He dragged himself toward the edge of the convenience-store roof and leaned over as far as he safely could. “I knew your stubborn ass would come looking for us!” Before Magnus could answer, two more walkers closed in from opposite sides, forcing him to twist away and bring the Quality 5 Stone Sledgehammer around with his left hand.

Whoosh!

THUD!

One walker folded beneath the strike, and the backswing caught another across the head hard enough to send it spinning onto the pavement. More of the remaining dead were already converging on the noise, so Magnus glanced toward the roof while repositioning himself between the pumps and convenience store. “You two still have enough strength to shoot? Then stop sightseeing and help me!”

Merle grinned down at him.

Magnus raised his injured right arm slightly. “In case you missed it, one of my hands is still useless.”

He reached into his system inventory with his free hand, pulled out a heavy black bag, and threw it toward the roof. Daryl leaned over and caught it before it could slide back down, then unzipped the top with Merle crowding beside him. Both brothers immediately went quiet.

Inside were two rifles.

Several loaded magazines sat underneath them.

Merle slowly looked at Daryl.

Daryl looked back.

Whatever exhaustion had been weighing on them seemed to retreat behind something much more familiar.

Merle grinned. “Now we’re talking.”

The Dixon brothers moved almost instinctively once they had weapons in their hands. Merle grabbed one rifle while Daryl took the other, both checking the magazines before positioning themselves along the roof edge. They were badly dehydrated and running on almost nothing, but high ground meant they didn’t need to move much, and the dozens of walkers left behind by the tanker were scattered enough to pick apart without letting them close.

Gunfire cracked across the gas station.

Magnus handled the nearest walkers from ground level while the brothers covered the edges of the lot from above. Daryl prioritized anything approaching Magnus’s blind side, while Merle fired into clusters farther from the fuel pumps and vehicles, both careful not to spray rounds blindly around the station. They had no intention of testing whether damaged fuel lines, spilled gasoline, or some other ignition source could turn the entire place into an inferno.

Magnus didn’t need much support anyway.

The Quality 5 Stone Sledgehammer was a completely different weapon from the crude versions he had used earlier in the apocalypse. Even with only his left hand available, Strength Lv8 and Skull Crusher Lv4 let him drive the hammer through walker skulls with brutal efficiency, while Heavy Weapon Handling Lv1 kept the recovery between swings surprisingly fast. Every time the brothers forced a walker to turn or stumble, Magnus was there to finish it.

Five minutes later, the gas station fell silent.

Walker bodies covered the pavement.

Daryl and Merle both dropped flat onto the roof almost at the same time.

Merle breathed through his mouth for several seconds before calling weakly, “Magnus, if you got food down there, now would be a real good time to remember we’re your favorite people.”

Magnus looked up.

“Favorite?”

“Top five.”

“There aren’t that many of us.”

“Exactly.”

Magnus shook his head and climbed onto the roof with a bag of water and high-calorie food. He dropped it between them, and the reaction was immediate; neither Dixon brother wasted time thanking him before tearing into the supplies. Bottled water went first, followed by anything calorie-dense enough to restore some energy quickly.

Magnus sat nearby and watched them eat.

Only after both men had slowed down enough to breathe normally did he finally speak. “So, how’s my timing?”

Merle nodded repeatedly while chewing. “Perfect. Beautiful. Best thing I’ve seen all week.”

Daryl swallowed a mouthful of water and studied Magnus’s splinted arm. Some color had finally returned to his face, though dehydration still left his features drawn. “How’d you find us?”

“I didn’t.”

Daryl frowned.

Magnus pointed toward the road. “I came here because the motorcycle I stole ran out of gas. Then I saw the herd, spotted your bikes at the pumps, and eventually noticed Merle’s fashion statement flying off the roof.”

Merle looked proud.

Daryl closed his eyes.

“You used your underwear as a flag?”

“It worked.”

“That ain’t the point.”

Magnus laughed once before standing. “Save the family argument for later. We need to fill everything we can and leave before the herd I dragged away decides to wander back.”

That got both brothers moving immediately.

By the time Magnus finished getting fuel into the motorcycle and topping off portable containers, Daryl and Merle were already back beside their bikes with the rifles slung across their backs. The three started their engines and pulled onto the road together, putting distance between themselves and the gas station as quickly as possible. Only after the pumps and convenience store disappeared behind the trees did the tension finally begin to leave Daryl’s shoulders.

Magnus glanced toward Merle. “By the way, nice shorts.”

Merle grinned. “You like ’em?”

“Very eye-catching.”

“For you, I might arrange room service too.”

“Go to hell.”

Daryl groaned from the other motorcycle. “Can both of you shut up for five damn minutes?”

The wind tore at their clothes as they continued north, and after another stretch of road Daryl raised his voice again. “Our radio died. What happened to Rick and everybody else?”

“I don’t know!”

Daryl turned sharply.

Magnus continued before he could ask. “I never made it back after leaving to look for you two. Something happened on my end too, and I was out longer than planned.”

“You think they moved?”

“Almost definitely.”

Daryl nodded after thinking about it.

None of them needed a long discussion to decide what came next. They would return first to the stretch of road where Daryl and Merle had originally separated from the convoy. If Rick’s group was somehow still there, they could reunite immediately; if not, fresh tire marks left in the softened roadside mud after the storm might show which direction the vehicles had gone.

The prison remained the destination either way.

By late afternoon, the three motorcycles finally reached the area where the convoy had once stopped.

Nobody was there.

Magnus slowed and pulled off to the side of the road. “Looks like Rick kept his word.”

Merle climbed off his motorcycle and kicked an empty paper bag across the pavement. “Son of a bitch. They really did leave us.”

Daryl frowned at him. “What did you expect them to do? Sit here until walkers ate everybody?”

Merle opened his mouth.

Then closed it.

Magnus crouched near the shoulder and checked the ground. Multiple deep tire tracks ran through patches of dried mud, enough to confirm the convoy had moved in the expected direction. “They haven’t been gone that long,” he said. “Probably no more than a day or two ahead of us.”

Daryl looked toward the darkening sky. “We shouldn’t chase them tonight.”

Magnus agreed immediately.

Traveling rural Georgia roads after dark on motorcycles offered almost no protection against wrecks, fallen trees, walkers, or people waiting beside the road. The convoy had larger vehicles, headlights, radios, and multiple people watching different directions; the three of them had none of those advantages. Daryl remembered an isolated hunting cabin less than a couple miles away from their earlier scouting route, making it the obvious place to stop.

They returned to the bikes and continued for another short distance before turning onto a narrow dirt path leading into the woods. The cabin appeared between the trees exactly where Daryl remembered it, weathered but intact, with dusty windows and a closed front door. Several walkers wandered through the surrounding forest, but only one had gotten inside.

Magnus dealt with it quickly.

After checking the rooms, they secured the doors and windows and moved upstairs for the night. Daryl immediately began setting up a simple warning measure near the stairs, using a thin line positioned where anyone approaching would disturb it and alert the sleepers. Magnus watched him work with interest while Merle claimed a section of wall without bothering to help.

“What’re you doing?” Magnus asked.

“Early warning,” Daryl replied. “Something comes upstairs, we’ll know before it’s standing over us.”

Magnus nodded.

Daryl checked the position once more before stepping away. “Between that, the rifles, and my crossbow, all three of us can actually sleep instead of taking turns staring at the stairs.”

Magnus clicked his tongue in appreciation. Tracking, hunting, wilderness survival, and noticing signs other people walked straight past were all areas where Daryl remained one of the best people Magnus had encountered. Magnus could overpower most physical threats, but raw Strength didn’t replace experience, and Daryl had spent his life learning the outdoors in ways no system notification could instantly reproduce. If the prison became their permanent home, that skill set would matter far beyond hunting deer.

“Good night, little brother.”

Magnus and Daryl both turned.

Merle was already asleep.

He sat against the wall with his body turned inward, arms folded loosely and head tilted against the wood as though he had simply shut down the moment he felt safe. After days trapped on that roof with almost no food or water, his body apparently had no interest in waiting for the rest of them to finish talking.

Daryl looked at him for several seconds.

Then he spoke quietly.

“He didn’t sleep much at the station.”

Magnus glanced over.

Daryl remained focused on Merle. “He acted like he didn’t care, but he was scared. Kept talking, joking, pissing me off because that’s what he does when things get bad.” His expression shifted slightly. “For a while up there, I thought maybe we weren’t getting off that roof.”

Magnus didn’t interrupt.

Daryl rarely talked about anything personal unless something had forced it out of him, and what had happened at the gas station clearly had.

After a moment, Daryl turned toward Magnus. “So… thanks.”

Magnus raised an eyebrow.

Daryl looked immediately uncomfortable.

“You came for us.”

Magnus smiled faintly. “Yeah.”

“That’s it.”

Daryl slapped Magnus once on the shoulder as if that could erase the awkwardness of the conversation. “You saved our asses. I appreciate it.”

Before Magnus could make the moment any worse for him, Daryl turned and climbed onto the narrow counter beneath the upstairs window. It wasn’t much wider than his body, but he stretched out there anyway with his back facing the room and his front toward the glass. From that position, he could see outside the moment anything moved near the cabin.

Merle slept facing the wall.

Daryl slept facing the danger.

Magnus looked between the brothers and smiled to himself.

Maybe Daryl simply preferred having a view of the woods.

Or maybe after saying something that personal, he needed somewhere to hide his face.

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