DISCLAIMER: The Walking Dead universe isn't mine. The characters aren't mine. I just invited them over for tea and this is what happened.
Carol hadn't meant for it to come out the way that it did.
It had all been too much. Within the space of several hours they'd lost everything they'd worked so hard to protect. They'd lost the farm. They'd lost more people.
Good people. Andrea had sacrificed her life so that Carol could get away.
And then, Rick had dropped the final bombs on their already shell-shocked state.
He'd killed Shane.
They were all infected.
Her world had only just started to make sense again, and now it was crashing back down around her.
So what came out of her mouth at that first campfire was partly a knee jerk reaction.
She might be a burden, but Daryl was no henchman.
She had wanted to apologize to him the moment the words had left her mouth, but then he'd asked her what she wanted. And instead of telling him that she didn't mean it, she'd answered with the words that had replaced 'henchman' in her thoughts.
"A man of honor."
He hadn't spoken to her since, but for the third morning in a row she had awakened to the familiar weight of his jacket draped over her narrow frame to block the chill of sleeping outside in the open.
He had accepted her softly murmured "thank you" with a slight nod as she had handed the worn leather garment back to him each day.
And when he had mounted his motorcycle and looked at her, she had taken her place behind him without a word passing between the two of them.
That was the way of things between the two of them. Words were awkward and easy to misunderstand. Actions were clear and concise, an understandable language entirely their own.
It still didn't make her regret what she had said any less, and it certainly didn't make it any easier to break the silence between them.
Carol pondered all of these things as the remaining members of the group made their way down yet another deserted stretch of highway, looking for shelter and supplies to replace the meager possessions that they'd had to abandon. The herd of walkers that had driven them from the farm was long behind them, but the stragglers were by no means gone. Every so often, Daryl would lean the bike to the side, giving wide berth to a lurching, snapping corpse shambling down the center of the road, and she would lean with him, hands fisted into the sides of his jacket, eyes trained just over his shoulder, straight ahead.
She'd lost count of how many walkers they'd passed on by in this manner. Nothing else mattered but the next stop, the next meal, the next safe haven for a chance to rest, even if it was just for a few fitful hours before they moved on.
The sound of a car horn from the rear of their group brought her out of her thoughts and back to the here and now. Daryl slowed the bike and turned them around, riding back to where the rest had stopped and were getting out of their vehicles. As soon as he came to a stop, she dismounted, her hand lingering on his shoulder just a moment longer than necessary when her feet touched the pavement.
He didn't shrug her hand away, but stiffened nonetheless at the brief contact.
Carol sighed and walked away from him then, looking for Lori and Maggie as the rest of the group gathered around the hood of the car that Glenn had been driving.
"What's wrong?" she asked quietly, taking a spot next to Maggie as Daryl drifted up behind her.
"Glenn spotted a house back off the road a ways, quarter of a mile back," Maggie informed her. "Might be worth checking out."
"There were a few walkers, but it didn't look like anything we can't handle," Glenn added.
Carol looked to Rick as the leader's eyes found Daryl's. She watched the silent exchange between the two of them, expecting and not disappointed when Daryl's nonchalant shrug was the only answer Rick received.
"Okay then," Rick nodded. "Glenn, you, T-Dog, and Daryl go back and check it out. The rest of us will stay here. Usual drill. Be careful."
The three men headed for T-Dog's truck quickly, Glenn taking the passenger seat and Daryl jumping into the truck bed, crossbow poised and ready for whatever came next. He glanced back at her once, and she nodded to him.
Be careful. Stay safe.
He nodded back as the truck pulled away.
"Well, I suppose we should see if there's anything useful to scavenge," Maggie sighed, looking to the sparse collection of abandoned cars on the opposite side of the road. The group had avoided the interstate as they had fled, keeping to the secondary highways and back roads. It made for easier traveling, but the pickings were also slimmer when it came time to look for supplies.
"It's always worth a look," Carol replied, accepting the crowbar that the young woman offered her, both as a weapon and a way of breaking into locked vehicles. Rick and Hershel were already moving towards a truck further down the road. Beth and Carl were doing the same. The only one not moving was Lori, who hung over a guard rail retching up what little food she'd eaten at breakfast that morning.
Carol shook her head and followed Maggie across the road, wondering if the baby would even survive. They needed more food than the little that they'd found so far. She knew better than to think the pre-natal vitamins the pregnant woman was taking were even staying in her system, when Lori couldn't keep anything else down. Pregnancy was hard enough before the world had ended.
Now… she didn't even want to think about it.
Carol turned her attention to the minivan that Maggie was casing. The young woman had looked in all of the windows and was now trying her luck with the hatch at the rear. Carol joined her just as the latch gave way, rear door flying up and revealing a sizable cache of promising looking grocery bags.
"Jackpot!" Maggie exclaimed, and Carol grinned, pulling bag after bag out of the vehicle while Maggie climbed cautiously over the back seat to see what other treasures the van might contain. She wasn't disappointed. "Blankets and water! And clothes!"
"Any soap?" Carol called hopefully.
"No," Maggie replied. "Too bad, too. I think we all need a bath."
"I know I do," Carol agreed, chuckling for the first time in days. "I'm starting to smell like a walker."
"Join the club," Maggie quipped, sliding open the side door of the van and jumping out.
The pair worked quickly and wordlessly from then on, knowing that their time was limited, scanning their surroundings for any signs of trouble. It seemed like hardly no time at all had passed when those who had stayed behind started loading what they could into Hershel's truck and Glenn's car.
"We'll have to leave the rest for T-Dog's truck," Rick said, looking at the sizeable pile still sitting on the road, and then back in the direction that Glenn, T-Dog, and Daryl had disappeared in.
"Can't be helped," Hershel nodded. "We lucked out."
"We did," Carol agreed. She started to say more, but the familiar sound of T-Dog's truck rumbling down the road stopped her words in her throat. It was only when the truck finally came into view that she let go of the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.
Daryl hopped out of the truck bed and nodded to Rick. "Let's go."
They wasted no time in loading up the rest of the supplies, and when Carol joined him again on the back of the bike, he finally broke the silence between them.
"Ain't no castle, but it's safe," he grumbled, turning his head just enough so that she could see the corner of his lip turning up in a smirk.
She smiled and relaxed.
"I never said you weren't a man of honor, Daryl Dixon," she murmured as he started the bike.
If he heard her, he didn't reply.