Disclaimer: I do not own The Walking Dead, nor do I own any of it's characters portrayed in this story. I do not intend to get paid for my work. This story is simply me inserting my characters into the original storyline of the TV show. This is just a hobby of mine that keeps my mind off of the stressful things in life.

Father Daughter Duo: The New Duo

Chapter 1-The Calm Before The Storm.

"Hold on Bay it's almost here." Doctor Caleb said calmly from behind the sheet that had been draped across my parted knees. Daryl stood on one side of my hospital bed holding one of my hands and Uncle Seth the other. "Okay give me a good push." He said looking up at me and I nodded as I took a deep breath, gritted my teeth and bore down with everything I had. "Keep pushing. Come on you're doing fine." He said and soon I had to relax. I looked up at Daryl trying to breathe through the pain like Doctor S. had taught me. Daryl just smiled at me and gave my hand a squeeze. "One more time, Bay." I started crying as I shook my head no and said that I couldn't. "Yes you can. Come on I know you can." He encouraged so I did as he asked and pushed again.

It felt like I pushed forever before the pressure down below subsided and I heard Merle say "Told ya it'd be a girl." I looked up to see him standing behind the doctor at the foot of my bed. So I mustered up enough energy to attempt to throw something at him before I felt my head slump against the pillow and the white ceiling tiles faded away.

I inhaled a deep breath as my eyes shot open. "What was it this time, a puppy or a kitten?" Daryl asked with a smirk on his face where he laid with his head propped up on his elbow.

I playfully rolled my eyes at him. "I had that dream one time and you won't let me live it down." He just lifted one eyebrow at me in response. "It was a girl." I said under my breath, but I knew he would hear me.

"Uh huh. So you think it will be a girl too." He said as he flung the covers off of himself and got out of bed.

"No, but you and Merle call it a girl so much that I almost can't even imagine how the two of you would react if I had a boy." I said before he turned to me and offered me a hand that I took so that I could sit up on the side of the queen sized mattress. "Thanks." I smiled at him before he kissed my head.

"Ya think of a name yet?" he asked and I shook my head. "Ya've had over seven and a half months to think and ya still don't have a name?" he asked for the millionth time and I rolled my eyes.

"I told you I don't wanna think about names until I see her-it." I corrected myself when he smirked at me.

"I think yer lyin'. I think you have names picked out and ya just don't wanna tell anyone." He slid his hands over my big belly as his lips pulled up into a smile making me laugh. He was right. I had thought about names and I did have some picked out. But I didn't want to tell anyone and have the names be judged and picked apart while we were waiting for the baby to make its grand appearance.

"You know what?" I asked and he hummed at me making me smile bigger. "I think your right." He laughed, something I had fallen in love with over the months the more he did it. "I would tell you if I knew you wouldn't tell Merle and then he would tell the whole world." He just shook his head from side to side before he grabbed his crossbow off of the small table that was sitting in the corner of our small room of the prison. "Are y'all goin' on a run today?" I asked and he turned to me as he threw the bow over his shoulder like I had seen him do a thousand times.

"Yeah. We're gettin' low on food, especially for Little Ass Kicker." I released a stressed breath and slid down off of the mattresses. He placed his hands on the thin fabric that was stretched to the max over my itching belly. "I'mma go get breakfast, ya comin'?" he asked as he rubbed my belly with his thumbs. I don't think he knew how much it soothed the taunt skin.

I nodded before I started waddling behind him. I was feeling really swollen, not just my stomach, but my feet and hands. I felt swollen all over. My morning sickness finally went away. When it disappeared my appetite came back and I found myself craving foods that I had forgotten even existed. Like yogurt, lemons and cheesecake. I never spoke about my carvings to people unless they asked. Uncle Seth asked pretty often then joked about me making him hungry and Daryl almost made it a game to ask me every night what food I had been craving that day. This was a good way for me to figure out that our food tastes were really different when it came to certain things. I loved cream cheese and pineapples where he couldn't stand either. He loved Reese's pieces and Taco Bell's soft tacos and I couldn't stand those.

Lucas never asked. To be completely honest after mine and Daryl's wedding Lucas never asked me anything that didn't have to do with my health. He was cold and dismissive. Every time I tried to be nice to him he would turn his nose up. He was hurt and I understood why, but it was no reason to treat me like I was the very embodiment of the plague. As soon as Doctor S. came along Lucas dropped me as a patient and never spoke to me again. It was easy now days to avoid someone. There were so many people gathered in the prison that they had spread to other cell blocks. Daryl and I had to relocate to a random empty room further inside the prison in order to get any kind of privacy.

Lucas was sitting at one of the picnic tables beside Uncle Seth when we walked outside. As soon as he saw us he got up and headed off to help pick walkers off of the fences. "Must be exhausting." I heard Daryl say to himself. "Avoiding ya like he does, stupid."

"Yeah, but he's a good doctor." Daryl cut his eyes over at me.

"Ya ever gonna say anything bad 'bout him?" he asked and I just shook my head not wanting to continue the conversation.

"Mornin' Daryl." The nice doctor chimed as we walked by. "Mornin' Bailey."

"Sup Doctor S.?" Daryl said as we walked past and I smiled and gave him a nod of my head.

"Morning Daryl." "Mornin' Daryl." "Hey Daryl." People yelled as we walked past and I laughed when Daryl gave me a look. He wasn't coping too well with the appreciation he was getting from the people he had brought in.

"Smells good." Daryl complimented Carol as we walked up to where she was handing out food.

"Just so you know, I liked you first." She said with a smile at him and a wink at me to let me know she was just kidding.

"Stop." He said with an awkward look at me before he looked back at her. "Ya know Rick brought in a lot of 'em too."

"Not recently. Give the strangers sanctuary, keeping people fed, you're gonna have to learn to live with the love." She smiled at us, but he gave me a look that said he wished she would stop talking. I wanted to take his hand, but I knew it would only make him that much more tense. I had learned over the past six months that he didn't do well with being praised a lot. "I need you to see something." Carol turned to a young man that was fairly new to the prison, Patrick, and asked him to take over, which he eagerly did. I liked Patrick, I never saw him without a smile on his face. That's why I thought it was such a good idea for him to be hanging out with Carl, who was still acting more adult than kid. Daryl was about to walk off with Carol before Patrick stopped him.

"Uh…Mr. Dixon," The look on Daryl's face as he turned to Patrick suggested that he had no idea what the kid was going to say to him, but I did. "I just wanted to thank you for bringing that deer back yesterday. I mean, it was a real treat, sir, and I'd be honored to shake your hand."

I snickered behind Daryl's back when he licked his fingers clean of the meat he had just been eating, slapped his hand into Patrick's and shook it. I tried to wipe my face clean of my smile when Daryl gave me a nod before he walked off to see whatever Carol wanted to show him. "Sup baby momma?" I sighed when I heard the raspy voice of Merle behind me.

"How many times have I asked you not to call me that?" I asked as I rolled my eyes and turned to face the rugged man.

"Not enough to keep me from doin' it." He answered as he walked around me and grabbed two bowls of food from Patrick. He handed one to me and we walked over to sit with Uncle Seth. "Still no idea when she's gonna get here?" he asked and I rolled my eyes again. He still insisted that the baby was going to be a girl.

"There's really no way to tell. I've also told you that a million times." I said and Uncle Seth chimed in that it could be any day now. I didn't know if I wanted it to be anytime soon. Yes I wanted to see my baby, but I didn't want her to get here too soon. I didn't want there to be anything wrong with it.

Merle and Uncle Seth had gotten along pretty well, although I'm sure that if my uncle knew what my father and everyone else here knew, what Merle did to me, they wouldn't be sitting next to each other talking like they were best friends.

When I was done eating I found Daryl around the side of the building getting things together for the run. "Ya shouldn't 'a walked all the way out here." He said with a caring tone that I had grown to love.

"I'm fine, I like the exercise. It's not good for me to stay inside all day caring for Judith." He didn't say anything else as he shook a gas can to see how much was in it. Zach, a guy that had been with us for a while walked around the truck and put his gun into the back. I smiled when Zach walked up to Beth and kissed her. It was nice to see couple's forming around here.

"It's like a damn romance novel." Daryl scoffed as Beth walked away from Zach without saying goodbye. Daryl looked over at me when I laughed at him. "What?"

"You say that like we're not part of one yourself." I answered as I slid between him and the truck and grabbed his hands. Pink rushed to his cheeks making me smile. I loved that I could still make him blush with the simplest of actions. "Ya know, Carol might have liked you first, but I loved you first." He squeezed my hands and gave me a smile that he tried to hide from the people that weren't far away.

"Love ya too." I couldn't help but smile at how quiet he said it. He used to have no problem showing affection toward me, but all the new faces around here brought out an even more shy side of Daryl.

"Good, because I lied. My feet are killing me. I just wanted to come tell you I love you and to be safe." I said with a smile that he returned with a shake of his head. He was about to climb onto his bike when he turned and started looking around as if he forgot something. "What did you forget?" I asked looking around myself.

"This." As soon as my eyes landed back on him his lips met mine letting me know through that one act how much me truly loved me. All too soon his lips left mine and he straddled his motorcycle. "Ya take care of yerself. Stay off yer feet, stubborn woman." I just shook my head and smiled as he rode off down the dirt road.

I was sitting in the holding room of cell block C watching after Judith when Rick came in. "How's my girl doin'?" he asked as he picked her up and kissed her head. I was glad that he could still be a father to her and Carl after everything that had happened. Rick was living proof that you could come back from horrible things. I just smiled as an answer when he turned to me. "I'm goin' to check the traps. Do you mind looking after her until I get back?" he asked and I shook my head.

"Do I ever?" I asked good heartedly and he smiled at me. "She's such a good little girl. How could anyone not want to spend time with her?" I asked as he handed her over to me.

"Well I won't be long, and I'll take her off your hands when I get back." He answered before he gave his daughter a pat on the back and headed to the door. The holding room was quiet like it usually was during this time of day. Most everyone around here had a job to do. Beth and Karen along with a bunch of other people cleared the fence, Merle and Daryl were almost always out in the woods killing some kind of fresh meat for everyone to eat or going on runs to find supplies that we were getting low on.

I bounced the little girl on my lap where I sat on the stool of the one tables that had been left in the room. She seemed a bit fussy so I began to sing. *If everyone cared and nobody cried, if everyone loved and nobody lied, if everyone shared and swallowed their pride we'd see the day when nobody died. And I'm singin' hey, hey man I..I'm alive.* I sang to the baby as I bounced her on my lap and she giggled at me.

"You know," I jumped at the unexpected voice of Lucas and turned to the door where he was standing "we do need to swallow our pride. The world would be a lot better off if people did that." I pulled myself up and walked over to set Judith in her play pin. This was the first time he had said more than one word to me since Doctor S. came along. "I need to swallow my pride and accept that you're never going to love me."

"I do love you." I interrupted him.

He sighed and put his hand on his hip. "Not the way I want you to. You love Daryl, I get that. I don't like it, but I get it and he loves you too." I crossed my arms over my chest when his eyes landed on my stomach. "I promised you that I would take care of you. That I would make sure that baby got here safe." He wasn't looking at me while he was talking. He was absentmindedly wiping at some dust that had settled on the table and it was making me kinda mad.

"Yeah you did." I stated letting my aggravation at him fill my tone. "And you haven't spoken to me in two months."

"I know, but I thought it was what was best. I thought I needed to just give the two of you space. I didn't think your hubby would like me hanging around you." He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before he looked at me and continued talking. "I haven't been keeping my promise to you. I get it if you want to keep seeing Doctor S. It's not good to keep switching between doctors at this point in your pregnancy. You need one doctor looking over you, consistency. But if something happens, God forbid, then I'll take care of you." He touched my shoulder in his doctor-ly manner for a second before he let his hand drop and gave me a small smile. "I'm sorry for being a class A prick."

"That, you were," I said with a sarcastic, but sincere smile. "but you're forgiven." I sat down now that he was done talking and picked up my knitting as he left the room. I had been sitting there for a while before I saw kids and parents start coming inside and head down the hall to the library. "Come on Ass Kicker," I said as I picked her up from the play pin and settled her on my hip. Merle and Daryl had expressed their concern about me lifting her so often, but both Hershel and Doctor S. said that it was fine as long as I felt comfortable with it.

Carol also expressed her concern for me when I walked into the library with Judith and sat her in a second play pin in the corner of the room. I told Carol that I was fine and that I would have her carry her back to the holding room if I didn't feel like I could do it. Carol read from a random book until the parents left the room. When the door was shut the little curly haired boy went and took watch. Carol set the book aside and got the knives out of the box that she had been sitting on.

I didn't agree with her teaching the kids how to use weapons behind their parents back, but I also thought that these kids needed to be able to protect themselves if the random occasion ever occurred. I felt a little bad keeping the secret with her, but I didn't feel like it was my responsibility to tell the parents what she was doing. They weren't my kids and I wasn't the one telling them to use knives. Besides, things had been kind of peaceful around here other than the occasional problem that the walkers caused and I didn't want to be responsible for disrupting that. Sometimes we would actually read a book instead of doing the weapon lessons and that was where I came in. I liked teaching the kids something other than how to kill and doing something normal for a change. Every kid has to suffer through schooling of some kind, right?

I picked up the book that Carol had sat down and started reading to myself not paying attention to her or the kids until Patrick spoke up saying that he wasn't feeling well. "Sometimes you're gonna have to fight through it. What if you wind up out there alone, you just gonna give up because you're feeling bad?" I almost laughed when he said that he just didn't want to yack on somebody and the other children moved away. My eyes caught Carl peeking over a shelf at us before Carol's did. "Please don't tell your father." Carol pleaded lightly before Carl gave us a disappointed look and ran from the room.

"Carol," I said getting her attention and she turned to look at me "Maybe we should stop this. It doesn't feel right keeping this from their parents." I said as I bounced Ass Kicker on my knee.

"No." "We like knife lessons." Please don't stop teaching us." The kids each spoke up and Carol gave me a I told you so look. I didn't feel comfortable being in the library anymore so I picked up Judith and sat her on my hip.

"Are you gonna tell Rick?" she asked and I just shook my head. I still didn't feel like it was my place to say something. I had only found out about it by accident to begin with. I was the reason she had Luke, the curly headed little boy, to stand watch now. "You can leave Judy here if you want to." She suggested timidly, but for some reason I didn't feel comfortable leaving the baby with her.

"No, I told Rick I would watch her so I think I should be the one watching her when he gets back." I answered as honestly as I could then I headed to mine and Daryl's room because it was closer than the holding room.

I was still in there when Rick found me and told me that Daryl was back. So I handed the precious baby off to him and went to find Daryl in D block where Rick told me he had last seen him. I hated how eerily dark it got in the prison at this time of night, but that was pushed out of my mind when I walked into the cell block and saw Beth's arms around an uncomfortable looking Daryl. "Me too." His echoed whisper hit my ears as I slipped back around the wall out of sight.

My feet were starting to hurt so I sat down in the holding room and waited for him to come out. I looked up at him when I heard his light footsteps headed my way. I knew something had happened out there as soon as I saw his gloomy expression. "Oh…lord. What happened?" I asked as I stood up and took his hand.

He shook his head making his sweaty hair sway. "Zach." I sighed knowing now why Beth was hugging Daryl.

"How?" I sighed as he sat down next to me at the table.

"There was a helicopter crashed on the roof of the big spot. It made it rot. We didn't know it until walkers started raining down on us." He stopped talking when I sucked in a sharp breath.

"Please tell me everyone else made it out okay." My hands sat idly on my stomach and I didn't look away from them for fear of seeing his sad face.

"Yeah, we're all okay."

"What about Beth?" I asked finally looking up from my hands to see his blank face.

"I don't know. It looked like she took it well, but I'm worried about her. She didn't even cry." I just looked at him. When he had told me about Zach, I assumed Beth had been crying on his shoulder. But if she didn't cry then why exactly was she hugging him? When I didn't say anything back he assumed it was because it was late and I was tired.

He was right, I was tired, but that wasn't why I was being quiet. I couldn't get the image of Beth's arms wrapped around Daryl's waist out of my head. I wasn't jealous, I just didn't understand, because the only other person I had ever seen hug Daryl, and him give them a stiff hug back, was Carol.

From there we walked hand in hand to our room, showered then went to bed.