Chapter One:

"How's your arm?"

Rick had gotten into the habit of looking at his cast whenever someone mentioned it, as if he had to see for himself. He shrugged, still squinting away from the sun, "It's alright. Doesn't hurt or anythan'... it's starting to get annoying, though"

Michonne tilted her head to the side as she inspected it, the large bush of hair she had tamed into a high ponytail following her. Her forehead wrinkled in a way that Rick found simply adorable, "When's it coming off?"

"Six weeks?", He didn't mean for his answer to sound like a question, but he wasn't even certain if he knew.

"...Maybe we should get a ladder or something next time…"

His eyes brows sprung up as his eyes widened, "Next time?"

Michonne quickly grew bashful, her gaze falling to the grass beside her hand, "Um… I mean if you want to- we don't have to-"

"I want to", He ejected hurriedly, "I liked it. A lot"

A shy smile tugged on the corners of her lips, "Yeah?"

"Yeah", He confessed in a quiet breath, "It was… great… Did you? Did you like it?"

"Yeah", She nodded, finally looking up at him again, "But I think we should probably… get something next time?"

Rick's confusion was evident on his face, "Huh?"

Michonne hesitated to clarify, her eyes darting around them for a moment, "You know?... protection?"

Rick's mouth opened, then snapped shut, then opened once again, and it was his turn to be embarrassed, "...I thought you haven't gotten a… a thang yet? Don't you need to get a… thang to get pregnant? Isn't that what it means?"

"I think so, but… still?"

Despite taking their young relationship to the next level only a few weeks beforehand, it was a testimony to their immaturity that neither could dare say the word 'Condom' or 'Period'.

Rick could easily see her worry, it was written all over her face, and it wasn't something he bared to witness so he eagerly nodded, hoping to put her mind at ease, "Yeah. Okay"

"Good", She sighed, looking at the empty fields around them once more, and giving him the chance to admire her unknowingly, until she whipped her head back around to look at him, causing him to peer up to the bright sky instead, choosing to burn his retinas rather than get caught leering. She began to speak again, "I got an A on my Spanish test"

He casually locked eyes with her again, his vision blurred, "Oh? That's great... You studied hard for it"

"Thanks", She smiled, her full lips curling up into a smile, leading Rick to give her a goofy grin in return, "I can help you, if you want?"

He huffed, "Sure. I mean, I'll probably still fail anyway but, okay"

"You won't if I'm helping you?"

"Yeah, but you're so pretty… it's hard to concentrate sometimes", The admission left him with such ease that he wished he could stand before a mirror to check he was still Rick Grimes.

Michonne dipped her head as she hid one of her shy smiles, a little whine escaping her, "Rick…"

"It's true", He insisted, leaning towards her and nudging her shoulder with his. Sometimes he found himself feeling unbelievably comfortable around Michonne, able to lavish her with compliments when he saw her reaction, but god forbid she ever looked him in the eye, as he would return to being a stuttering fool in her presence.

"Thank you", She forced herself to meet his blue eyes with her brown ones, "You're great, too"

The goofy grin made an appearance once again, "N-nah, I'm just… I'm just Rick…"

"Yeah… but you're my Rick"

Rick could easily picture every single blood vessel that his gangly body possessed racing to his face, leading him to rub the back of his neck nervously as he tried to remain calm, "Yeah?"

"Yeah", She dropped her head on his shoulder, cosying up to him.

Rick was elated. Giddy enough to jump up and punch the air, but he wouldn't dare move now she was resting on him. Never. The sun was at its highest point without a cloud in the sky to block its view, and the vibrant green grass surrounding them swayed from the gentle breeze that occasionally swept by. It was a picture perfect scene; and he would do whatever he could to make it last.

Once he found a way around her large hair, he kissed the top of her forehead, and that goofy grin of his refused to budge.

..xoxo..

"I really like it here, dad"

Rick already knew what his son would say, so hearing the words leave his mouth just confirmed his suspicions. He slowly nodded, stroking his hand over his ever increasing beard, "So do I, don't think that I don't, it's just these people don't realise how good they've had it. They think the only thang they need to worry about is two walkers by the gate- they haven't seen the thangs we've seen- done the thangs we've done and to top it all off, they're not willing to learn. They're not willing to hear what we have to say and I don't have time to play by their rules. It's that kind of ignorance that gets people killed, and I refuse to put you or your sister in a position where other people's stupidity puts you two in danger. I won't stand for it"

Carl's gaze was low, almost hidden under his father's sheriff's hat, and to anyone else it would appear as if the boy wasn't even paying attention, but Rick knew better. He could see that his son was absorbing his words, taking them into consideration. He finally nodded after several seconds, making eye contact with him once again, "I don't want anything to happen to you guys, either"

Rick was relieved, "I know. And like I said out there, from this point on, it's about survival. It's about making this place safe from every possible threat out there, and most importantly to me, it's making sure my family, all of us, can keep going. We made it this far, we won't give up now"

Carl nodded his head, his dark brows furrowing into a serious expression, "Yeah. You're right"

That was all Rick needed to hear, since his son's opinion was one that he held highly, after all.

The world they once knew had long gone, and with the living outnumbered by the dead, it was vital that he kept his family out of harm's way, and Rick was prepared to do anything to make that happen, even if it meant overrunning a small community they discovered only weeks prior.

It was an easy enough task within itself, as his group scared the original residents with their filthy appearance when they turned up, probably mistaking them for walkers, Rick had thought. It was clear that they were living on opposite ends of the spectrum, and he felt compelled to warn the naive people, to make them understand that they were like sitting ducks before they arrived, but he was met with immediate refusal, which he could only tolerate for so long.

When the opportunity presented itself to them, Rick and his group took their chance to make the new rules known, to let his rules known.

Naturally, this installed even more fear in the people, and so it only made sense that the original residents scurried away when he marched the streets of Alexandria, but the way Rick saw it, they would soon be thanking him when they understood the errors of their ways.

It was after his brief talk with Carl, he made his way to one of the homes in the centre of the community, ready to get started on a certain rule in particular.

"Everyone should know how to use a weapon, and I don't care if they have to think about using it on me to do it, but it needs to happen now, Deanna"

The older woman looked at Rick with nothing but resentment, her once warm, brown eyes had grown hard and tired, "We don't allow just anyone to leave-"

"But if they need to, they should be able to protect themselves and the people around them. I lost one of my people when I let him go out with your inexperienced son", Rick pointed out firmly, "Then another one of yours tried to kill mine for calling them out on their way of doing thangs- I'm not allowing that to happen again"

"We lost our son, too Rick", Her husband added from beside her, looking equally withdrawn, his long slender frame dwarfing his wife's.

Truth be told, Rick hadn't really cared for their son, but as a father himself he tried not to show how little he cared, "Which is exactly why your people need to be trained. You still have another son, and you don't want him to walk out those gates and never come back because these people don't know what they're doing"

Deanna exhaled heavily, rubbing her forehead roughly as she set her elbows on the table, her chestnut hair falling like a curtain to cover her face, "We understand"

Rick was satisfied with that response, "Now I think this would go over better coming from you. I don't think I have too many fans on the other side of that door, and they would probably appreciate seeing a familiar face in front of them. I'll drive home the message to anyone who doesn't comply-"

"Uh, Deanna?", A tall man appeared at the door appearing sceptical, hiding one half of his body behind through door frame, "Aaron's back? He has new people…"

Rick's hand fell on his weapon, purely out of habit, and he started out of the room, "I'll handle this"

The tall man stepped aside nervously, giving him room to stalk out the home to investigate. It was sheer luck that he saw one of his own, Abraham, strolling down the street with a cigar dangling from his lips, leading Rick to whistle to catch the large man's attention, tipping his head as a signal for him to follow.

Rick didn't understand the point of Deanna's interview process when she allowed his group into the community. He thought it was idiotic more than anything else, so he was eager to use his own technique, which he believed to be much more efficient.

Another two from his own group stood at the gate, peering at the new faces that spoke with Aaron, the man who acted as a recruiter for Alexandria. He was the one that brought Rick there in the first place, so he had some appreciation for the man, but he still couldn't fathom how he could be so trusting.

"Any trouble?", Was the first thing Rick asked Daryl when he was near enough, hoping his right hand man would be able to brief him on their scouting mission discreetly.

Daryl shook his head as he adjusted his weapon on his shoulder, his thin lips pursed, "Nah, not much"

Rick slowly nodded as he looked at Aaron and the others. The first two people he noticed appeared to be a couple, older Caucasian man and wife, standing close and peering in past Rick in awe. He looked beyond them and saw a tall dark skinned male, very slender and a little more reserved than the other two, wearing an unreadable expression. Rick took a small step forward, "Aaron?"

The man span around when he heard his name called, immediately smiling, "Oh hey, Rick? Where's-"

"Resting", Rick offered dryly, tilting his head to see the people left behind him, "Who do we have here?"

"Oh, well Um, this is Mr and Mrs Jackson, uh and that's Dominic in the back there…"

From the moment Aaron moved aside Rick's gaze fell on the dark skinned woman who was peering around with narrowed eyes, and he felt his blood run cold, the small hairs on the back of his neck standing to attention.

If someone had told him that the minute he saw Michonne again he would immediately recognise her, he wouldn't have believed them. It had been far too long since he had last seen her that he was sure it would take him some time to realise it was his high school sweetheart, but in spite of what he thought, he knew it was her. Her hair may have been different, but her face had hardly changed, besides the fact that she looked a little more mature than her sixteen year old self. Her own gaze eventually fell on him, and he could tell by the way she continued to scan the people behind him that she didn't recognise him. He couldn't blame her, on the count of the fact that he was hidden beneath a beard and full head of hair.

"Uh, Rick? Rick?"

His eyes darted to the man that kept repeating his name, and he barked out a short, "What?"

Aaron cleared his throat, "I'm just going to take them to-"

"I want to talk to them. One by one", Rick ordered, beginning to stomp away as he raised his arm and pointed at Michonne, "You first, come with me"

She frowned, her eyes following Rick as she didn't move, when a voice piped up from behind her, "Uh, mom? What's going on?"

Rick stopped dead in his tracks, so immersed in her presence that he didn't notice the two young girls hidden in the back. He knew he heard correctly; he heard one of them call her 'Mom', and it stunned him still.

They were obviously twins with near enough identical features, a tad shorter than their mother. One wore their brown hair in ponytail while the other had two long braids that stopped at the middle of her bicep. They had Michonne's almond shaped eyes, and full lips, but the one thing that made that tore them apart, beside their clothes and hairstyles were their eye colour: the one that sported a ponytail had a lovely set of bright blue eyes, while the other had one darker shade of blue and a light shade of brown. Rick could have keeled over as if someone had just shot him in the gut; his eyes moved from one girl to the other, his mind working overtime to trace every square inch of their face into his mind. He stared for so long that they began to frown at him, both knitting their brows together at the exact same time before Michonne and the other tall, dark stranger stepped into view, placing themselves in front of the girls protectively.

"Now!", He managed to choke out, beginning to march again, even though he felt as if he was a breath away from blacking out and hitting the cement floor like a ton of bricks. He didn't dare look back to see if she was following him. He had to make it to the chapel, where he could take a seat in an spacious room and give himself a moment to calm down.

"Oh Rick, I was just-"

"Get out", Rick snapped at Gabriel, the priest the had saved shortly before finding Aaron. He almost knocked him over as he made his way to the front of the church, heading straight for the first pew.

He scraped his fingers threw his scalp so hard that it would have hurt if he wasn't in a state of shock. His hands trembled and his knee bounced, his eyes unable to focus on anything in front of him for more than a second. He couldn't even think about anything for more than a second as he was too busy rehashing everything from his past life; the memories that he had long buried were unearthed easily, as if they were always just hovering beneath the surface. It all came back to him at such a speed that it made him dizzy, and he would have laid down if he didn't hear footsteps slowly approaching him.

Michonne still had her eyes narrowed as she stopped a pew away, a sword hanging on her back and a hunting knife strapped to her waist. Rick stood up and faced her, his chest tight as he nearly spat, "Michonne?"

She raised a single brow at him, as if that was her way of indicating that he was correct.

He blew out a breath, "Michonne Anthony? From Kings County, Georgia?"

Her eyes grew wide, her gaze bouncing all over him as she finally spoke in a deep, rich tone that still managed to carry her words to him, even though she could have been attempting to whisper, "Who are you?"

Rick almost laughed in disbelief as he ignored her question, "...You left town, right? Just upped and left? I heard- I heard it was because you were pregnant, is that true? Is that why I didn't see or hear from you again?"

She took a small step forward as she squinted at him, her lips pursing as if she was about to repeat her question, when the penny finally dropped. Her eyes were wide again as she swallowed, stepping back to her previous spot as she breathed, "...Rick?"

"It was true, wasn't it?", He was sure she could probably see his heart thumping in his chest, his hands trembling a little more violently so he sat them on his sides, "It must have been- I heard them. I heard her call you mom? They look like they could be fourteen? Maybe fifteen? That adds up"

Michonne's eyes glistened before she snapped them shut, her own chest heaving as she took deep breathes, biting her lips together as if she was trying to gain some control of herself.

"...Are they mine?", The question left his mouth with only a little difficulty, but once it was in the air he rephrased it, asking her specifically, "Are they my daughters?"

Her hands came up and covered her face as she exhaled heavily, only able to give him a small nod for an answer. Rick's legs shook so much that he had to sit down as astonishment rendered him speechless.

Thirty minutes beforehand his only agenda was safeguarding the community and enforcing his new way of life. That was the only task he expected to face that day, but he had discovered that he was grossly mistaken. He felt as if the air wasn't filling his lungs despite how hard he was breathing. His eyes continued to focus on nothing as he stared off into the distance, and his knee resumed its bouncing motion.

Michonne walked towards him cautiously, her fists balled at her sides before she took a seat on the very end of the pew. He heard her breath out, "I never thought I would... My mother thought I was pregnant before I did. She knew… I didn't. I knew something wasn't right but I just didn't know what and she made me take the test and… we found out I was pregnant in the morning and by the evening I was on a bus to Atlanta to my Aunts"

Rick listened, though he couldn't find the guts to look at her again right away. Her tone was a tad higher, as if she couldn't believe she was reciting her backstory to him. If that were the case, then he couldn't believe it either. Someone he once loved with every ounce of his being was sat only few feet away from him, but she felt like a stranger to him. He was desperate to see something in her that reminded him of the past, but he was still trying to digest the fact that he would be a father of four and no longer two. Two teens that were also strangers.

"They wanted me to have an abortion, but my Aunt talked them out of it… I wasn't even in Atlanta long, maybe a few weeks? And they came and got me and I thought they were taking me back but we moved to Michigan", She leaned forward and rested her palms against her forehead, making her long black locks fall around her face, "I went back to Kings County looking for you… anyone I spoke to that did know you said you moved and no one could tell me where…"

Rick could only blink painfully slowly while his heart beat softened, no longer pounding against his ribcage and the nausea in his stomach subsiding.

"I didn't even know where to look but I tried… I even tried again four years ago when Elodie was...", She turned her head to look at him, her eyes still appearing to glow from the tears that threatened to fall, "Say something, please?"

His throat was dry, so dry that swallowing did nothing to help. He shut his eyes as he spoke, "... What did you... what are their names?"

"...Colette and Elodie. Colette has the heterochromia Her eye is-"

"Yeah... I saw that", He gently nodded, his eyes opening to see his hands in his lap. He huffed tiredly, though he had bundles of energy before the hour, "You've been out there long with them?"

"Maybe a month or so?...we were held up above a store for a little while-"

"The people you're with, who are they?"

She sat up straight again, "The Jacksons we met a few months ago. Their car broke down and they were almost swarmed-"

"The other guy?", He didn't meant to keep cutting her off, it was purely because she gave him more details than he needed to know for the moment, but when he didn't get a response for his fourth question, he forced himself to look at her. She kept her gaze low, her lips clamped shut as she didn't make any attempt to answer him, so Rick spoke slower, dragging out each word, "Who is he?"

"Dominic's my boyfriend", She explained quietly, snapping out of whatever trance that held her.

Rick blinked in her direction, "Has he been around long?"

She gave him a little nod, "A few years, now"

He rolled his tongue along the bottom row of his teeth as he let that little piece of information sink in. It would have been ridiculous for him to feel some sort of jealousy over the fact that there was man in the their lives, but Rick wasn't impartial to irrational behaviour, "I'll talk to him next"

She gave him another little nod, "Okay"

He peered around the bare chapel for a short time as he gathered his thoughts, putting his leader mask back on. As much as he needed to discuss with her, he wanted to continue their talk freely, without any need to rush because he had a community to whip into shape. Feeling much more stable than before, he stood up abruptly and faced her, "I'll talk to the couple you were with too, but after that we're picking up from here. I won't... I won't talk to them- the girls, yet- but I still have questions and we need to figure out what happens from this point on"

Michonne rose from her seat too, looking at him the way she had done when she first walked in. She didn't respond to his request, but instead walked past him and headed towards the doors, which only earned her another prompt from Rick.

"Hey, I mean it", He called, causing her to come to a halt and turn her head in his direction, though she didn't completely face him. He stared at her back as he issued coolly, pointing at her even though she couldn't see him, "We're not done".