Just as they painstakingly maneuvered around an on-ramp completely blocked by abandoned vehicles and turned onto a relatively open service road, Bossie's voice came over the radio.
"Hey, Leah. One o'clock. Something on the roadside."
About two hundred meters ahead, a filthy white box truck was parked crookedly by the road.
A faint wisp of white smoke rose from the hood, and the driver's door hung open.
A tall man stood with his back to the highway, leaning against the truck. His body heaved violently, as if he were vomiting—or struggling through intense pain.
He wore a tattered leather vest, his body covered in grime and dark, dried blood.
What stood out most was his right forearm, tightly wrapped with what looked like a torn strip of clothing.
The cloth had long since been soaked through with blood, turning a dark red, and fresh blood still seeped through it, dripping onto the asphalt beneath his feet.
"Careful," Carver said, slowing the vehicle and speaking into the radio. "Could be a trap like yesterday. Or maybe he got bitten. Should we go around?"
But just as the convoy was about to pass him, the man seemed to hear the engines and suddenly turned around.
He spotted the convoy—especially the lead vehicle, a heavily modified military Humvee with welded crash bars.
His eyes lit up instantly, like someone grabbing hold of the last straw.
He struggled to straighten up and instinctively waved toward them.
"Holy shit, look at his arm!" Mike gasped.
As the distance closed, everyone saw clearly—it wasn't just an injury.
His right forearm, wrapped in that crude bandage, had been severed clean at the wrist.
Below the bandage, there was nothing.
Calista immediately turned to look.
The man's face was pale and twisted from blood loss and pain. His stubble was messy, and his short hair clung to his forehead with sweat.
But in his eyes burned an almost crazed will to survive, mixed with the savage ferocity of someone pushed to the edge.
That single glance nearly froze Calista's blood.
Wow. Merle Dixon!
That face—maybe a little younger than in the show—but the rough features and that reckless, defiant attitude were exactly the same.
Why was he here?
According to her memory, when Merle cut off his hand to escape, he had been handcuffed by Rick on a rooftop in Atlanta…
Right.
Rick must have already woken up.
The main storyline had officially begun.
Calista's mind was spinning.
She forced herself to push aside the shock of seeing Merle and tried to recall the plot.
Next, Rick and the others would return to Atlanta to rescue Merle, retrieve the weapons bag, and clash with the nursing home group.
After that, the quarry camp would be attacked by walkers, and the group would decide to head for the CDC.
Which meant…
There were only about three days left before the CDC ran out of power and Dr. Jenner destroyed the facility.
Time was running out.
To be safe, they had to reach the CDC today.
—
Merle's mood today had been one hell of a roller coaster.
First, he'd gone scavenging with a few people from the quarry camp, only to end up trapped inside a building by Atlanta's insane hordes of walkers.
Then, while he was sniping walkers from the rooftop, a bunch of so-called "smart" teammates kept pointing fingers and telling him what to do.
And then a damn cop showed up out of nowhere.
That bastard handcuffed him to a pipe on a rooftop crawling with walkers and strolled out of Atlanta like nothing had happened.
Merle had gone absolutely ballistic, cursing those bastards to hell.
Once he—Merle Dixon—got out of there, that cop and that black guy weren't getting off easy.
As hope slowly faded, Merle even found himself regretting the mess his life had been, desperately begging God to step in.
Goddamn God took the handcuff key—but left him a saw.
In the end, he still had to rely on himself.
Merle really was one tough bastard.
Right before he broke down completely, he sawed off his own hand.
An injury like that, in this world, was practically a death sentence.
Infection. Blood loss. Walkers.
Any one of them could finish him off.
And yet somehow he was still standing—and had even managed to drive out of Atlanta, a city swarming with the dead.
Too bad this was probably as far as he was getting.
Merle's vision was getting blurrier by the second. He could barely stay on his feet.
He pulled the truck over just before losing his grip on the steering wheel and slumped against the vehicle.
All he hoped for now was that his dumb little brother would find him and give him a quick bullet.
He sure as hell didn't want to die and turn into one of those things, wandering the road like an idiot.
And then—
Just as he had accepted his fate, a convoy appeared in front of him.
Merle excitedly waved the stump of his severed right forearm toward the vehicles.
The people in the first car clearly saw him.
Then the driver turned the wheel—
Three vehicles kept their speed, one after another swerving around him and driving straight past.
...
Merle heard something crack inside his chest.
His heart had just shattered.
Guess that's life—one hell of a ride.
—
God… there's hope!
The convoy that had passed him suddenly stopped, as if they'd received some kind of order.
A moment later, the vehicles backed up one by one and stopped about a dozen meters away.
Carver kept the engine running. One hand held the steering wheel while the other rolled down the window.
"Hey! You! Raise your hands so we can see the other one!"
Merle spat out a mouthful of bloody saliva and twisted his face into a mocking grin.
"Easy. Easy there, buddy," he rasped. "If I was in any shape to try something, I wouldn't look this damn pathetic. Fuck."
A wave of pain hit him suddenly.
Merle jerked violently and had to lean against the truck to keep from collapsing. More cold sweat poured down his forehead.
He slowly raised his intact left hand, showing he wasn't holding a weapon.
"What the hell happened to you?" Carver asked, still wary.
"What happened?"
Merle let out a rough laugh, gasping for air.
"Hell of a question. Got cuffed by some self-righteous country cop and his bunch of pansy friends on a rooftop in Atlanta crawling with walkers!"
He cursed between breaths, his words crude and filthy.
"How the hell you think I lost this pretty hand? You think I chewed it off for fun?!"
"So you chopped it off yourself?" Calista opened the car door, looking at him with an amused expression.
Merle's gaze shifted to the back seat where Calista sat.
The madness in his eyes faded slightly, replaced by surprise and scrutiny.
He clearly hadn't expected the one in charge to be a beautiful woman—let alone one this young.
"What else was I supposed to do, sweetheart?" Merle grinned. "Wait for those stinking bastards to crawl up and give me a manicure?"
"Damn thing's my lucky day I found this piece of junk and drove it all the way out here."
He kicked the smoking white truck in frustration.
"What's it like in Atlanta right now? You just came from there, didn't you?" Calista asked.
"Who the hell knows," Merle spat.
Then he suddenly caught himself and stared at her suspiciously.
"You people heading to Atlanta?"
Calista blinked, but didn't answer him directly.
...
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