CHAPTER 13: THE GUN RUN PREPARATION
POV: Rick Grimes
The camp meeting starts civil enough. Rick spreads his hand-drawn map of Atlanta across the RV's table, tracing the route he took from the hospital to the tank where he lost consciousness.
"There's a bag of weapons," Rick explains to the gathered faces. "Military-grade firearms, ammunition. Enough to properly arm our people."
"You sure it's still there?" Shane asks, arms crossed. His tone carries skepticism wrapped in something sharper.
"The tank's where I left it. Unless someone moved a sixty-ton Sherman, the bag's still there."
Dale adjusts his fishing hat. "Atlanta's gotten worse since you escaped, Rick. More walkers, more danger."
"Which is exactly why we need those guns."
The debate erupts from there. Voices raised, competing fears and needs clashing in the confined space. Rick watches the dynamics play out—Dale arguing for caution, Shane pushing back against the plan with barely concealed hostility, Andrea surprisingly supportive.
Then Scott raises his hand.
POV: Scott
"This is it. The gun run where Merle gets handcuffed to the roof. Where everything changes."
His System pings urgently:
[THE DIXON SITUATION - CRITICAL JUNCTURE APPROACHING]
[TIMELINE CONVERGENCE: 87% PROBABILITY]
Scott's stomach drops as Rick outlines the mission parameters. In the show, this goes catastrophically wrong. Merle's racism and violence nearly get everyone killed, Rick handcuffs him to prevent a massacre, and when they escape, Merle gets left behind.
Daryl never forgives the group for abandoning his brother. The guilt and conflict tear through their unity like shrapnel.
"I'll go," Scott says, surprising himself.
The tent falls silent. Shane's head snaps toward him, eyes narrowing.
"Like hell you will," Shane growls. "We need the EMT here, not risking his neck playing soldier."
POV: Shane Walsh
Shane feels the familiar burn of rage in his chest. Another challenge to his authority, another person Rick automatically considers valuable enough to risk.
"The man's medical training," Shane argues. "You want to throw away our only real medic on a supply run?"
But Rick's already studying Scott with that calculating look Shane knows too well. Measuring, evaluating, deciding without consulting the man who's kept this camp alive for three months.
"You sure about this?" Rick asks Scott.
Scott nods. "You'll need someone with combat medical training if things go sideways. And they will go sideways."
The certainty in Scott's voice makes Shane's skin crawl. How does the EMT always seem to know what's coming next?
POV: Daryl Dixon
Daryl spits tobacco juice and studies the EMT from across the fire. Scott's volunteering for a suicide mission, which means either the man's got balls or he's got reasons nobody else knows about.
"At least someone's got stones," Daryl grunts, earning a sharp look from his brother.
Merle laughs, the sound harsh and mocking. "Pretty boy playing hero? This oughta be good. Hope you don't cry when things get messy, EMT."
"Merle," Rick warns.
"What? I'm just saying, city boy might not have the stomach for real work."
Daryl watches Scott's face during Merle's taunts. No anger, no defensiveness. Just careful attention, like he's studying Merle for weaknesses.
Smart. Merle respects strength, despises weakness, and can smell fear from a mile away. Scott's playing it exactly right.
POV: Andrea
Andrea catches Scott's eye across the crowded tent, concern tightening her chest. She wants to object, to argue against sending him into danger, but the words stick in her throat.
Instead, she mouths, "Be careful."
Scott nods, and something passes between them—acknowledgment, promise, shared understanding of risks that can't be spoken aloud.
She trusts his judgment, even when she doesn't understand it. But that doesn't stop the cold fear from settling in her stomach.
POV: Glenn Rhee
Glenn studies the route on Rick's map, mental calculations running automatically. Traffic patterns, walker congregations, escape routes. The city's gotten worse since his last major supply run.
"Streets are more crowded than they were," Glenn observes. "Herds shifting, consolidating. We'll need to be fast and quiet."
"Cube van," T-Dog suggests. "More cargo space than the motorcycle."
Rick nods. "Who else is volunteering?"
T-Dog raises his hand despite obvious nerves. Glenn's already assumed he's going—it's his city, his expertise they need. That leaves the question of the Dixon brothers.
"We're in," Merle declares before anyone asks. "Ain't letting y'all run off without supervision."
Daryl grunts agreement, and Glenn suppresses a sigh. Merle's going to be a problem. The man's a walking conflict generator, and Atlanta doesn't forgive mistakes.
POV: Scott
Hours later, Scott finds himself going over equipment with methodical precision. Crowbar, hunting knife, first aid kit. Items from his System Inventory that he'll claim came from Rick's bag if anyone asks.
His mind races through possibilities, probabilities, consequences. Can he prevent Merle's handcuffing entirely? Should he? The man's genuinely dangerous, a racist and a hothead who nearly gets everyone killed in canon.
But he's also Daryl's brother. And Daryl's trust means everything to Scott's position in the group.
[QUEST ACTIVE: THE DIXON SITUATION]
[PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: SURVIVE ATLANTA - REQUIRED]
[SECONDARY OBJECTIVE: MAINTAIN GROUP COHESION - REQUIRED]
[OPTIONAL OBJECTIVE: PREVENT MERLE'S ABANDONMENT - RISK UNKNOWN]
Footsteps approach through the darkness. Scott looks up to see Daryl emerge from the shadows, crossbow slung over his shoulder.
POV: Daryl Dixon
"You gonna watch my brother's back in there?"
Straight to the point. No small talk, no dancing around the subject. Daryl watches Scott's face in the firelight, reading micro-expressions, body language, the tells that separate honest men from liars.
"I will," Scott says simply.
"Merle's an asshole," Daryl continues. "I know it. Hell, everyone knows it. But he's blood."
The weight of that statement hangs between them. Family loyalty versus group survival. The choice that's torn at Daryl his entire life—protecting a brother who makes self-destruction an art form.
"I understand," Scott says, and something in his tone convinces Daryl the EMT really does.
Daryl grips Scott's shoulder, a gesture of trust and warning combined. "Don't make me regret believing in you."
POV: Carol Peletier
Carol watches the conversation from her tent, recognizing the body language of men making promises about violence. She's seen it before—Ed talking to his drinking buddies, planning some petty revenge or intimidation.
But this feels different. Daryl's not planning to hurt someone. He's asking someone else to protect what matters to him.
The distinction is important. Carol's learning to read the difference between men who use violence to control and men who use it to protect. It's a survival skill she never knew she needed.
POV: Shane Walsh
Shane observes from his watch position, noting the alliance forming between Scott and Daryl. Another relationship that excludes him, another sign that his authority is being eroded piece by piece.
First Rick shows up and immediately assumes leadership. Then Scott arrives and starts implementing tactical improvements Shane should have thought of. Now they're planning a mission to Atlanta without consulting him beyond basic logistics.
"Used to be my decisions that kept these people alive. Now I'm just another voice in the crowd."
The bitterness tastes like metal in his mouth.
POV: Lori Grimes
Lori lies in her tent listening to Carl's quiet breathing, worrying about her husband walking back into the hell he barely escaped the first time. Rick's got that look again—the one he wore before dangerous calls, when he was weighing duty against survival.
She wants to argue against the mission, but knows he won't listen. Rick's always been driven by the need to protect, to provide, to fix problems through action rather than words.
The irony isn't lost on her. She spent three months learning to live without him, and now she's terrified of losing him again.
POV: Dale Horvath
Dale keeps watch from the RV's roof, binoculars scanning the treeline while his mind processes the evening's developments. The dynamics are shifting, alliances forming and fracturing based on loyalty and shared risk.
Scott's volunteering for the Atlanta mission troubles him. Not because Dale doubts the young man's courage, but because he recognizes the look in Scott's eyes. The same expression Dale sees in his own mirror—the weight of knowledge, of seeing patterns others miss.
"What does he know that the rest of us don't?"
POV: Scott
Scott finishes his equipment check and stares into the dying fire, tomorrow's mission weighing on his mind like lead. In a few hours, he'll walk into the city where he died in his original life, where Merle's fate hangs in the balance, where every decision ripples outward in ways his System can't predict.
[COMBAT READINESS: 78%]
[MISSION PARAMETERS: VARIABLE]
[HUMAN FACTORS: UNPREDICTABLE]
The statistics are meaningless against human unpredictability. Shane's hostility, Merle's volatility, the unknown variables that come from changing canon events.
Scott thinks about Daryl's trust, Andrea's concern, the weight of foreknowledge pressing down on his shoulders. Tomorrow he rewrites one of the show's most pivotal moments, and he's not sure if he's hero or villain in this version of the story.
Sleep doesn't come easy.
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