A/N: So I have caught up on season four – Thank You Netflix! There were so many places I wanted to stop watching and start writing but couldn't stop myself from gorging on the entire season in less than a week. I had a lot of mixed feelings about this season but after seeing the previews for Sunday's show…..hot damn! I am excited and it looks like we will get some Caryl! Anyway, that's enough from me. I don't know how long this story will be or how often I will get to update – I'm posting as I write so this is as far as I've gotten lol. Hope you like it and as always – Happy Reading!

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Banished

It had been a test. That's all. Rick had wanted to test her before he "officially" decided what to do with her. Carol shook her head in sorrow. She had known what he was doing, of course. Rick was about as subtle as a flying brick. She supposed she could have tempered her responses; told him what he wanted to hear but she really didn't see the point. Carol could tell by looking at him that he had already made up his mind. She hadn't been entirely sure what he would do but he was obviously trying to make himself believe he was making the right decision.

Carol nearly laughed aloud at the irony. They were so alike it was ludicrous. She hadn't wanted to kill Karen and David. But she truly believed she was going to prevent more people from dying so she had done something she had never thought she was capable of. She killed two people, two good people that were a part of their community. To save others she had done something terribly wrong, believing she was making the right decision.

Her desperate attempt to stem the flow of illness was for nothing. Nearly everyone from Woodbury was sick and now Glen was too. She hadn't stopped anything, had only become a murderer. Rick thought she was remorseless; a cold-blooded killer and she had done nothing to dispel that assumption. She could have cried – lord knew, she wanted to often enough. She could have begged to go back with him, begged for forgiveness. Maybe she had wanted to be punished but when he told her he couldn't trust her around Carl and Judith she felt her gorge rise.

Carol had killed to try and save them but Rick couldn't – or wouldn't – see that. So here she was driving slowly down a road, passing abandoned cars occasionally. She had no destination in mind and probably shouldn't be wasting gas until she knew where she was going but Carol couldn't summon the will to care just then. So she drove and let her mind wander back to the day after the slaughter.

…

Patrick had gotten sick and less than twenty-four hours later he had died, turned, and killed so many others. When they learned Karen and David were sick too – and the only two showing symptoms – all she could think about was protecting the rest of the survivors.

She had stood there in the hallway after the council meeting as Sasha led Tyreese and Karen away, lost in thought. She had barely registered Daryl lingering until he spoke.

"Hey. You ok?"

"Just worried about Lizzie and Mika. They were around Patrick."

"We all were." She met his gaze, remembering Patrick had wanted to shake his hand the morning before. He had called Daryl "Mr. Dixon" and had been positively bursting with pride at getting to talk with his hero. In so many ways Patrick had still been a child. Young at heart. She forced her thoughts away and looked closer at Daryl.

When Rick had decided to play farmer, the bulk of responsibility had fallen to Daryl. He led the runs and was continuously taking people in. He also hunted daily to make sure they had enough meat for everyone. Then of course he never missed his turn to take watch. She longed to reach out and smooth the tension from his forehead.

"What about you? Are you ok?" Carol knew he had taken it hard when Zach had been killed on the run the day before. Daryl had become such a large part of everyone's lives and knew most everyone at the prison now. Losing the people they had through the night had to be weighing heavily on him. He took every loss as a personal failure.

"Yeah," the way he bit his lip and ducked his head told her he wasn't alright at all. "Gotta be." He nodded at her and turned to leave. He had to start digging graves. Carol watched him walk away with pain in her heart. Daryl would do what needed to be done. He would be strong and help others through this crisis as he had so many times before but he wouldn't let himself take comfort from her or anyone else. And she wouldn't – couldn't – overstep the boundaries he had set around himself.

She had seen Beth hug him after he told her about Zach and felt a rush of jealousy as she stood watching them from the shadows. Beth, young as she was, had no concept of personal boundaries. She had wanted to hug Daryl so she did, with no thought of being rejected. No emotional baggage collected over a lifetime to make her hesitant.

Carol wished it could be that simple for her. For all of their flirting, Carol was certain he didn't view her in a romantic sense and a simple hug would mean far more to her than it would to him. That painful knowledge allowed her to keep her distance. Carol had endured so much in her life, both before and after the turn, but she couldn't bear the thought of being rejected by Daryl.

She couldn't comfort him the way Beth could. She couldn't ease the strain he was under from taking care of so many people. But maybe she could keep anyone else from dying from that illness. Carol knew what she would have to do to make that happen and she felt sick just thinking about it. So many had died the night before and with Karen and David sick there was a risk of the flu spreading and killing even more. The council wanted to keep the sick quarantined but it would still spread, she had seen many epidemics come and go. More would die. The children and the elderly were the most vulnerable. Judith. Carl. Lizzie and Mika. Luke. So many children. She had to do something. She had to try.

…

Coming back to the present, Carol stopped the car and looked around her. She had been so lost in thought she had been heading back toward the prison without realizing it. She turned off the engine and sat for a moment. That's when she heard it. An engine – a loud one. Carol scrambled to grab her bag and some supplies in case she had to abandon the car completely, and jumped out of the station wagon. She looked around and ran for a group of trees and bushes clumped together about twenty yards from the road.

When she was safely hidden behind the thick foliage, she cleared a small area so she could see the road. And then she waited.

TBC…