Disclaimer: I don't own AMC's The Walking Dead. Everything belongs to whoever owns them, my wishful thinking aside.

Authors Note #1: After 6x07 "Heads up" I really wanted some Rick/Tobin, so here we are and once again I have no excuse for myself. This scenario is based vaguely off the end of 6x08 where Rick, Carl, Michonne, Jessie, Father Gabriel, Ron, Sam and Judith try to escape Jessie's overrun house with by disguising themselves with walker guts.

Warnings: This is probably a very au take on what happens after 6X08 so keep that in mind. Deals with aspects of PTSD and depression, mild sexual content, big spoon!Tobin and little spoon! Rick, light somnophilia - possible dub-con elements, mutual masturbation sorta, and a weirdly happyish ending.

Proximity (possibility)

Chapter One

Dying is simple. It all just stops. You're dead.

The people around you dying? That's the hard part.

'Cause you keep living knowing that they're gone and you're still here.


It was never their intention to leave the others behind- to abandon Alexandria.

But it ended up happening that way.

Like water swirling down the sink, they hadn't been able jam the plug back in fast enough.

So they'd lost it. Lost people.

People like Jessie, Ron and Sam before they could even make it down the porch steps. People like Maggie, screaming high and hoarse as the walkers brought down the wall platform and sent her falling right into the center of them. People like Mikey, Spencer and Kent getting cut off before they could find a place to ride it out. People like Olivia, calling for help from the pantry, trapped. More people he'd never bothered to know the names of- bleeding, dying, just like he knew they would.

But as for the rest? The others?

Well, they'd gotten separated.

They'd seen some of them as they'd stumbled with the milling crowd. Denise and some man he didn't recognize limping off towards the solar panels. Rosita, Eugene and Tara being snuck in through the cellar of Aaron and Eric's house. Windows barricaded for the long haul as the walkers shambled past without noticing. Those that made it out on foot scattered in a dozen different directions, shearing numbers off the herd so that by the time they'd made it to the edge of the massive crowd they were able to drop the act long enough to jam into one of the cars. Flooring it until the walkers chasing them were specks in the rear-view mirror and the only thing any of them could hear was the tick of the low gas indicator and the muted shrill of Judith's unhappy cries.

Days turned into weeks and eventually the part of him that hoped the others had made it withered and died. The terrible part about it was that emptiness was getting to be a familiar feeling.


They stumbled into Tobin by accident almost two months afterwards.

Finding him alone in the woods, clothing in tatters and smeared head to toe with walker blood. He was half-starved, feral and less than half a second from sinking a hatchet into Gabriel's neck before he realized who they were and dropped it like it'd burned him.

They hadn't even heard him coming.

It seemed impossible considering the man's size, but somehow, he'd spotted them first.

He'd adapted. Survived.

Before the walls had come down Tobin had told him not to give up on them.

Seems as though he'd been right after all.


It took nearly two hours to get Tobin to stop looking at them like they weren't really there. Coaxing and almost high with the knowledge they weren't the only ones as Judith burbled, unperturbed in Michonne's arms and Carl tentatively handed Tobin a granola bar.

Still, it was almost like their roles were reversed when it came time to touch. Finding himself stiffening, wary and alert for something that wasn't there on the man's face. Spine razor sharp and promising violence when Tobin turned the hand he offered into a one armed embrace. Coming back down from it in inches as something broke and Tobin was suddenly swaying in place. Murmuring thank god, thank god over and over. Sinking to the ground like his legs wouldn't hold him anymore as Gabriel and Michonne eased him down. Kicking the axe aside, gleaming, forgotten and stained red with the blood of a recent kill as they leaned him up against a fallen log. Trying to get him to focus.

It took a while to get through to him after that. Shock, Michonne assured him. Barely noticing Carl and Gabriel trying to tend to him. Wetting stripes of cloth and washing him clean of the layers of muck and old blood. Looking him over carefully for any wounds or bites before going through his pack and doing a quick inventory. Finding a couple of handguns and a half dozen boxes of ammunition before they helped him up and took him back to the small, backcountry house they'd cleared and claimed since escaping Alexandria.

But even then, Tobin only had eyes for him.

They all comforted him in their own way. Mostly just being close as Tobin drained three bottles of water like breathing. Clearly forcing himself to go slow as they set out a couple cans of sliced fruit and waited. Tired as he was, it didn't take long for Tobin to start talking. Explaining hoarsely that he'd been with Heath and Francine, trying to get Scott out of the infirmary before it was overrun. That they'd managed to hole up with Bruce and his family in Bob and Natalie Miller's house for a while.

They'd kept quiet.

Trying to wait it out.

Only eventually the food ran out.

Eventually they had to try.

Eventually-


He didn't realize until later how heady that kind of thing was.

To have someone look into your face – despite everything you'd done– and still come out of it liking what they saw.

He'd forgotten what that felt like to be honest.


"It was being alone that was the worst," Tobin told him a couple of days later. When it was his turn on watch and he walked out into the fall chill and found Tobin already there. Cradling a shotgun in his arms as he stood stock-still on the bottom step of the front porch. Able to see the steam of the man's breath – steady in, steady out – in the clear forest air.

"It's deafening you know?" Tobin said quietly, showing him the line of his back as the hairs on the pale of his neck prickled. Feeling the hint of a fellow predator for the first time as they stayed like that – caught in the moment together. "All the voices in your head?"

Distantly he remembered Tobin had a wife. Children.

He didn't ask and Tobin didn't offer.

But for the first time he wasn't really grateful for it.


The silence that followed them around afterwards sang out like a mutual truce to an argument that'd only ever been one sided. Tobin had passed that olive branch a long time ago, but it'd taken until now for him to accept it and understand what it meant.

Because apparently he'd needed all this time apart to take ownership of the fact that out of everyone, Tobin was never going to be the type of person who expected something in return. Who had layers you could peel off and eventually find a lesser man underneath. Most people were like that. They had other faces under their skin. Worse ones. He did. Shane had. But not Tobin.

Funny thing was he had a feeling Tobin wasn't the kind of man to judge him for it.

Even if he had every right to.


Authors Note #2: Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed. – There will be one more chapter, so stay tuned.