Daryl took one last look at the Grady memorial hospital, and spit on the ground in front of him before turning and walking back to the group. He looked down at Beth in his arms; she looked like she could be sleeping. He bit back tears and carried her to the firetruck. Silence echoed around him as he laid her down in the back, and covered her with a blanket. After she was covered, he turned and walked away from her. From Carol, from Rick. He walked away from his family.

"Daryl...?" Rick called after him.

"Just leave me alone man." Daryl yelled back. Everyone stood in awe as the once so strong Daryl crumbled before their eyes. Once he got to the intersection, he turned without looking back.

He continued on for what could have been hours, but only seemed like seconds to Daryl. His head was filled with memories of Beth. How scared and timid she was when he first met her, and how strong she became at the prison. His eyes filled with angry tears as he fought himself, saying there was nothing he could do. He swiped at the tears cascading down his cheeks, and looked around. It was nearly dark, and he was stranded in Atlanta. The group had probably moved on, but he couldn't go back to them just yet. He glanced over his shoulder, and noticed a building that wasn't completely destroyed. He grabbed some of the pieces of laying in the street, and headed inside. As he shut the door, and peered around, he couldn't believe his luck. A bar. He had walked right into a bar. He smiled to himself a little at the Irish flag behind the counter, and immediately got angry again. He began boarding up the door so nothing could surprise him while he drank and slept.

There was a scraping from behind the bar; Daryl grabbed a gin bottle off a nearby table and broke it at the neck. As he inched closer to the counter, he heard the unmistakable growling of a walker, except this one wasn't doing very much walking. Daryl sighed and jammed the broken bottle neck into the walker's cranium. There was a heavy shelf on top of the walker's legs, stopping him from going anywhere. As the walker's head fell to the floor, Daryl looked around behind the bar.

"What the fuck is this shit?" he muttered to himself. "Melon liqueur, Blueberry Vodka...this is bullshit."

And then he found it; the dustiest, most expensive looking bottle of whiskey in the joint. He dusted it off with his thumb, and pulled it out. The label had worn off, but it was still sealed.

"Good enough." he let out an exasperated sigh.

Before he left, he grabbed a disgusting looking bottle of vodka, and a lighter sitting underneath the cash register. He plopped down in front of the fireplace, threw some wood into it, doused the wood in the vodka, and threw the lighter in. Within minutes he had a nice roaring fire. After a few minutes of struggling with shaking hands, he managed to open the bottle. He took a big satisfying swig of the whiskey, and rubbed his forehead. Before too long, but not before the bottle was already almost empty, Daryl started to finally feel relaxed. He leaned up against the wall, and closed his eyes. It had been less than five minutes since he closed his eyes when there was a scraping upstairs. Daryl jolted awake, and grabbed his knife. He carefully and silently moved towards the door going to the apartments upstairs.

Carefully, trying not to put too much weight on any given stair, he made his way to the platform. When he reached it he saw two doors; one of them was covered in dust, and the other looked like it had been used recently. He reached his hand out, turned the knob, and pushed it open.

"Beth?!" he exclaimed.

There was a girl standing in the middle of the room with a chair in her hands. She had shoulder length blonde hair that looked like it had been cut with a knife, and gray eyes that reflected the light of the trashcan fire like mirrors. All of a sudden a dog came bounding out from behind her, and started viciously attacking Daryl with kisses.

"Apollo, come." the girl said, still holding the chair. "Who are you and what do you want?" she asked fervently.

"Daryl, just looking for a place to crash for the night. I'm going back to my group in the mornin." Daryl said, trying to ignore the dog pawing at his leg. "What about you? You all alone?"

"I might be. The name is Matilda, but you can call me Tilly." she lowered the chair, however her arms were positioned to attack if need be.

"Got any food, Tilly?" Daryl finally gave in and patted the dog on the head.

"You like canned chili?" she retorted, glancing over at the closet. Daryl peeked into the room, and saw 50 cans or so of chili stacked neatly in the closet. "The owner of this place loved beans apparently." Apollo gave Daryl one final lick, and returned to his master. "If I live through whatever the fuck this is, I swear I will never eat another bean in my life." she patted him on the head.

"Come on downstairs. I have an actual fire, and there's booze. We can feast on chili." Daryl motioned back towards the stairs. Tilly smiled to herself.

"By the looks of it, you don't need any more booze, but I'll take the rest of that Dalmore." she pointed at the half empty bottle in his hand.

"Sounds good to me. This shit's disgusting. I think I'll stick to my moonshine." he wandered off back down the stairs.

Tilly grabbed a couple cans of chili from the closet, and followed him down; Apollo in tow.