With Open Arms and Open Eyes

Disclaimer: The Walking Dead belongs to AMC, not me. I just own the story

Pairings: Mentions of Lori/Rick

Warnings: Mention of character death, OOC (Daryl's hard to write D:)

~OoO~

Daryl stirs in his sleep, finally opening his eyes groggily when he hears someone's voice coming from outside of his cell. It takes a minute for him to realize that it's Rick's voice but he's not sure what exactly he's saying. He's not screaming or yelling, so it can't be walkers.

That can only leave one explanation. Despite the fact that he had to be up early the next morning, Daryl didn't want to let the other man suffer in whatever state he was in right now. He had to go see him. He was his right hand man, after all so he knew that he needed to be right next to the man at all times.

With a huff, the redneck gets up from his cot, slipping onto his boots and he heads out, following Rick's voice. He's then lead down to Rick's cell, which was only about 10 steps away from his. He goes inside and sees that Rick is on his bed, the sheets all tousled and wrapped around his body. He kept tossing and turning on his bed and one of his two pillows fall down to the floor. Daryl thinks that he was dreaming.

The older man's muttering something, and Daryl can hear "Lori...Lori...Lori" in his muttering fest. His assumptions were right. Of course it had to do with something about Lori. The woman's been dead for almost a month now and everyone in the group had moved on from her death.

But apparently Rick didn't follow the others' actions. He still clung onto the past, something that the others weren't suppose to do. There was no time to be mourning for a loved one's death for such long periods of time when you're out there risking your life everyday.

Worried, Daryl moves over to Rick's side and places a hand on his shoulder, shaking him.

"Rick. Rick, wake up." He whispers harshly, but does so as quietly as he can so he wouldn't wake little Asskicker up, who was still sleeping away in her pathetic excuse of a crib. It would take forever to get that girl back to sleep again, since a cranky, tired Judith was not an easy one to handle.

"Rick!" Daryl says again, using both hands to shake him awake more forcefully.

The said man finally stops and Daryl could see the leader's sweat glazed over his forehead, along with a few strands of his curly, tousled hair that swept over his forehead.

Rick pants heavily, opening his panicked blue eyes before he looks up at the hunter before him, who wore a concern expression on his face.

"She's not here...is she?" Rick asked and Daryl felt his heart clench when he heard the desperation tracing in his leader's quivering voice.

The hunter shakes his head, muttering a solemn "No" as his response.

Rick lets his head sink back into the pillow, exhaling a heavy sigh from his chapped lips.

"I keep seeing her. No matter where I look, where I turn, she's right there in front of me." Rick says, covering his eyes with his hands.

Daryl bends down to his level, his knees touching the cool concrete floor.

"Rick, ya need to move on. If you keep clinging onto the past, it ain't gonna do much help for ya. You'll end up getting yourself killed and we can't afford that, especially with that psycho Governor out there."

"But...Lori-" The leader starts but is then cut off by the younger man.

"Look, don't worry about her. She's probably in a better place than this shithole and she ain't here anymore and you gotta be more aware of yer surroundings again. We don't want to see our leader losing his sanity and get us all killed. You have a little girl with ya, Rick and Carl, too and I don't anything to happen to either of ya'll."

As Daryl says all of his, Rick just lays there, silent. He's shocked but he doesn't show it. He never seen the redneck being so...open before. Normally, he would keep to himself from others, saying a few snide comments here and there but he would be a bit vocally if Rick asked for his opinion over the decisions he made.

"After...what happened to Merle," Daryl continues, after a bit of hesitation. The mention of his brother still have his heart clench slightly in pain. "You and this group is what I have left now. Me and Merle were blood, yeah, but he did a bunch of shit I didn't like, even before this apocalyptic shit started. But ya'll grew onto me throughout past year and if anythin' were to happen to any of you all...I don't know what I'd do."

"Daryl...I-" Rick speaks up again, but he gets cut off by the hunter once more.

"No, shut up. Rick, I don't want to see you get yourself killed. You're the reason why we're still here, why we're still livin'. Don't pay attention to what happened before and don't blame yerself, either. Focus on what's in front of you, Rick, the real stuff."

Rick doesn't say anything for a second or two, a brief silence falling upon the two men before he sighs heavily, nodding.

"You're right. I'm sorry I got you worried. I just...need some time to get over her, ya know."

Daryl smirks faintly, though the concern look still lingers in his eyes. "It's alright but don't take too long. We have other shit to deal with. We don't want ya losin' yer sanity here." He places a hand on Rick's shoulder, giving it a comforting squeeze before he stands back up to his full height.

"Now, get some sleep, man. I did promised that I would teach a few hunting lessons to ya tomorrow mornin'."

The older man nods, the corners of lips curving into a small smile.

But before Daryl was leaving the room, he heard Rick's voice again.

"Daryl?" He called out and Daryl looked over his shoulder.

"Yeah?"

Rick glanced down at the ground for a moment before he looked at the hunter again. "Thank you."

END

A/N: Just a quick Rickyl fic before I head off to bed. Nothing special. :P

Anyway, hope ya'll liked this.