AN: So it's been a while since I've written any fanfic. This is my first Walking Dead story (which of course I own no part of. Insert disclaimer here.) and I have it pretty much plotted out, although things may change slightly once the show starts back up. Anyhoo, here we go, taking place in season six, Alexandria.

You know I'm a bastard and we only just met.

Guess I probably shouldn't wear this big old sign round my neck.

I'm not dead but I misplaced the will

Gonna wear this smile like its a hundred dollar bill.

-Modest Mouse, Wicked Campaign

The gates were all wrong. Practically unmanned. Too easy, too vulnerable.

Surveying the walls of Alexandria with his bow at the ready, Daryl Dixon questioned the wisdom of the step they were about to take.

Beside Daryl, Sasha tensed her finger on the trigger of her rifle. Down the line, others stirred restlessly, each adopting similar attitudes of readiness and distrust. Rick held his Colt Python in one hand while supporting baby Judith with the other; Michonne tipped her katana down in an unthreatening pose, but didn't sheath the blade. Tension radiated in such thick waves that it seemed to shimmer with the heat above the sun-baked asphalt. Only Carol held her gun loosely at her side, with a posture that seemed to say she couldn't understand how she had come to be holding such a thing to begin with. Daryl thought this last curious, but trusted Carol had good reason for the pretense.

He returned his attention to the walls. Once glance told him everything he needed to know about the people inside.

They were luckiest damn people alive.

The second thing that Daryl realized - and this was either very concerning or very convenient, depending on how things might pan out - these Alexandrians were the biggest fools alive, as well.

The walls were strong; thick sheets of galvanized tin, twenty feet high or higher, reinforced with steel supports and girders. Adequate for walkers, sure, but walkers weren't the real threat anymore. Didn't these people understand that? Were those gates strong enough to withstand a big-rig or a humvee barreling down that conveniently straight shot of road leading right up to the front gates? Would they stand against a single well-aimed RPG? Daryl didn't think so. He could have sacked the place himself armed with one hand grenade and a single assault rifle, had he been so minded. Good thing for these people he wasn't.

All around were potential hazards. The small neighborhood Aaron had led them through crowded right up against the walls of the commune. Most of the houses were burned out shells, open to the elements and uninhabitable, but a few were structurally sound, including a tall white bell-tower perfectly positioned for a sniper.

But the tower stood unused and empty, and the houses, too close to the walls for Daryl's peace of mind, were the perfect cover for any enemies planning an assault.

Fools, thought Daryl again. They should have razed the unused buildings to the ground, cut the trees back for a clear line of sight, positioned a sentry in the tower. He narrowed his eyes and spat from the side of his mouth, as if the place left a bad taste.

Over Judith's downy head Rick caught his eye. Daryl read the same measure of disbelief and mistrust. Daryl glanced at Judith, balanced jovially on her father's hip.

They needed this. Maybe it was all just a pipe dream, but they needed to take that chance. When a dying man stumbles out of a desert and into an oasis he doesn't turn his nose up and walk away just because locals are a bit dim. Daryl met Rick's eyes with the barest of nods; they had to do this.

The screech of the gate opening snapped Daryl's attention front and center. He quelled the instinct to raise his bow as the gate rolled aside revealing a deserted street lined by spiritless, bland brick and vinyl houses.

Not a soul moved, inside or out.

The gate stopped and a nervous looking man with curling sandy hair emerged. His eyes widened as he took in the rag-tag newcomers and the amount of firepower they held. He shifted anxiously on his feet and fingered his rifle in a twitchy manner, which made Daryl more uncomfortable than if he had raised the weapon with open hostility. Focused hostility was predictable; fear was not. Fear led to stupidity, and stupidity got people killed. And here was the kind of man who got people killed.

Daryl stayed very still. The rabbity man continued to like he might shoot any one of them for the slightest movement.

Aaron stepped forward, between the group and the twitching rifle. "This is Nicholas," he said. "One of our guards and supply runners."

Some guard, thought Daryl, arms tensing around his bow. Nicholas's rabbity demeanor still left him unsettled.

Both sides studied the other without a word. Then Aaron moved toward the gates. Suddenly a loud crash followed by a scurrying movement in the grass outside the wall shattered the tension. A chorus of rifles were cocked and raised. Daryl spun on heel, then deftly released a bolt from his bow in one fluid movement. When the thrashing in the grass stopped he collected his prize from beside a toppled metal garbage can. He raised his hand holding a possum by its tail. The crossbow bolt had struck cleanly through its ribs.

"Brought dinner," said Daryl casually, holding the possum out to Nicholas for inspection.

The rabbity man swallowed thickly but made no move to accept Daryl's offering.

Daryl narrowed his eyes. Nice place. Houses all tricked out, but that don't mean they got manners.

An all too familiar growling moan came from behind. Shuffling down the sidewalk, eyes burning with hungry intent, was a dead man wearing a gore streaked tee-shirt. Daryl made out the words, "I got wood" written on its front. He thought it a shame to have died wearing a shirt like that.

Nicholas half-heartedly raised his rifle, then seemed to freeze up in indecision. His eyes darted back to Daryl and the possum, as if weighing which threat was of greater concern.

Rick waited, giving Nicholas a chance to fire on the walker. When the man remained frozen, Rick drawled in a bored tone, "Sasha."

Sasha stepped forward, her beautiful dark eyes focused and cold. Easy as breathing, she put a single bullet through the dead man's skull. The walker fell to the sidewalk with a meaty thud.

Nicholas deflated visibly and looked relieved that someone else had taken care of the problem. Meekly, he stepped aside, allowing Daryl and the others file through the gate. Judith cooed happily at the sound of a dog barking, still riding on her daddy's hip.

"Good thing we're here," commented Rick drily as he passed.

An understatement if Daryl had ever heard one.

Sawyer Rydell struggled within a tangle of discordant images that were more dark memory than dream. Birds trilled among the boughs of sun-dappled trees. Near the duck pond, children laughed. Farther in the distance a dog warned a squirrel off with a bark.

But this was not the dream. This was Alexandria, Virginia, walled refuge from the walking dead. Here, tucked safe inside a fortress of tin and steel, Sawyer fitfully slept as the August sun browned her bare skin.

Submerged within a very real dream - a dream which seemed more tangible than the reclining lounge on which she dozed under the spell of singing headphones and the sweet, cathartic breath of a hot Virginia summer - a woman with a face much like Sawyer's own tumbled through the darkness and into a great roiling river.

Jamie.

In the dream, Sawyer dove after her mirror likeness into the watery abyss.

At first she could make out nothing in the frigid black waters. Then Jamie's lovely smile flared to slow life, cutting a sweeping beam bright enough to illuminate the murky spume with an eerie, warm light. Sawyer's breath caught at the sight of Jamie's beloved features. She stretched out her hand, but the current was sweeping them apart. Sawyer kicked angrily, surging forward. Jamie only smiled placidly and waited. We'll make it together, her smile said. No worries.

Something sharp and bony caught the hem of Sawyer's shirt. She spun, kicking up a whirlwind of bubbles, but the bony limb belonged to a submerged branch and not the monster she had been expecting. She shook herself free and turned back.

Now Jamie was farther downstream, barely visible in the gloom. Her smile had vanished and she called out, the first glint of panic in her amber-brown eyes. A precious lungful of air and muted words poured from the round O of her mouth before spiraling up beyond the outer reaches of the light. All around them the river roared with a malignant thrum of heavy water. Frozen and exhausted, Sawyer pummeled against the current, nearly killing herself with exertion. Jamie's hand extended again from the darkness. Sawyer lunged, but was growing weak. The cold bit into her muscles, freezing and burning. She tried again, stretching through needles of cold, but Jamie drifted away, away, until - finally - she was gone.

Thirty two years of vibrant life, extinguished in a blink. Now just another void where once a brilliant light had been.

A sharp keening tore through the watery grave. Sawyer gasped as cold water froze her throat and she realized it was she who was screaming with terror and rage. The river answered her heartbreak with a silvery nebula of bubbles from her own mouth, cold and devoid of life as stars in a liquid night.

Jamie was dead. Only Sawyer was left, bereft and alone.

Sawyer lurched out of the darkness and into the noonday heat, heart skimming like a skipping stone.

There was no hungry maw of darkness. No monsters driving them under. There was only sun and birds and dogs laughing and crystal blue skies. Only one thing carried over from the dream: The empty hole that had formed now that there was no Jamie.

"Shit," Sawyer murmured, straightening the red triangles of her bikini top with shaking hands. She wondered if she had screamed aloud; she knew she often did.

Her headphones had fallen into the grass. The smoky tones of Eric Burden still howled from the ear buds. Sawyer fished the iPod from under her chair and switched off the player. Her dream had definitely killed the moment.

Next to the 'phones lay a tattered paperback copy of Watership Down, a Browning Russ Kommer buck knife, and a half-smoked joint rolled with an exceptional homegrown strain Sawyer had uncovered in the basement of a derelict row-house the month previous. Being of a pre-apocalypse mint, the buds were dry as hell, but Sawyer was beyond pleased with her find. She hadn't indulged in a few years, but considering the current state of the world it felt like a good time to resume the habit. A bit of weed rendered all her messy memories into one big easy-to-ignore blur and left them running inconspicuously in the background.

Out here we is stoned, immaculate.

Jim Morrison had never been so right.

She lit the joint, lighter jittering minutely in her hand, and took a deep pull of sweet, comforting smoke. Her heart was stuck at its rabbit's pace. To distract herself, she followed the movements her nearest neighbor with wan interest.

In the narrow yard of the large house opposite, Shelly Niedermeyer was forking compost around the roots of a large clump of pampas grass. Compost that could have been put to use on some crop more paramount to survival than ornamental grass, thought Sawyer, exhaling with disdain. The hateful cow's back was turned, so Sawyer was certain that, this time, at least, her screams had remained within the confines of her dream. Otherwise, Shelly would have been dripping her phony concern all over Sawyer while internally gloating gleefully.

Sawyer had just taken a second hit when a sharp squeal of rolling metal echoed up the street. Her head shot up and she froze with the joint pinched between her fingers. Shelly Niedermeyer looked up from her clump of pampas grass with dull bovine curiosity.

There were strangers inside the gates.

"Shit," Sawyer murmured again, eyes going wide. She groped in the grass for the Browning Russ Kommer.

A band of perhaps fifteen rough looking men and women with sharp eyes and loaded guns were staring her way. At the forefront of the group stood a tall man with a grizzled beard. He was lean and haggard and held an infant in one hand and a pistol in the other. Sweeping the empty streets with piercing eyes, he zeroed in on Sawyer and Shelly before seeming to dismiss them as inconsequential.

What the hell was going on?

Sawyer watched anxiously and wished she hadn't taken that second hit.

Leading the newcomers up the street was Aaron, which did much to settle Sawyer's nerves. Out of everyone she had met in Alexandria, Aaron was the only one who Sawyer trusted wholeheartedly. Levelheaded and kind, Aaron had been the one to find her when she had been nearing her breaking point out on her own. He had brought her back with him and offered her safety and a home. If Aaron thought this group was worthy of a chance Sawyer would trust his judgment.

Aaron was in earnest conversation with the tall bearded man. Nicholas trailed behind in his usual apprehensive manner. A third man, broad-shouldered and seeming to consist of leather and hair held together by a thick layer of grime, swung a possum by its tail. He shouldered a crossbow and was squinting with obvious dislike while Nicholas tried to explain what was expected of them if they were to come any farther.

"If you're going to stay," Nicholas began, having apparently found his balls after a moment of tense silence, "You'll have to turn over all of your weapons."

Well good for him, the idiot, Sawyer herself would have demanded that they disarm before being allowed through the gates, but coming from Nicholas even this late-blooming display of common sense was a miracle. Fifteen armed strangers against one armed moron. It was truly a wonder Alexandria was still standing.

Predictably, Nicholas' suggestion was met with less than enthusiasm from the group.

The grizzly-bearded man, obviously their leader, tipped his head almost quizzically. There was no question in his eyes, however; only a coldly calculating glint. Sawyer could just make out his words in the distance.

"If we were going to use them," the cold-eyed man said, speaking of their many guns, "we would have started by now."

Salient point, thought Sawyer, watching the exchange and exhaling the smoke she had been holding for too long. Maybe it was just the weed talking, but she was beginning to feel too exposed. She tucked the end of the extinguished roach into her book as a marker and snatched up her towel from the grass.

The man holding the crossbow turned sharply at her sudden motion. His squinting eyes raked over her half-bare body with a thoroughness that left her feeling more naked than she actually was. She saw what she thought was a fleeting look of disapproval cross his hard features. He set his jaw in a hard L and lowered his head slightly, letting his grimy hair fall across his forehead and into his eyes.

A flush of shame elicited by his glance caught Sawyer by surprise. What must she look like to someone coming from the outside, blithely sunning herself while walkers roamed and people died? The answer was a damned fool, just as the rest of the Alexandrians had seemed to her when she had first arrived at their gates, starving and half feral, only a bare month before.

Tucking her towel around her bare midriff, leaving only her long, tanned legs on display, Sawyer jumped up from the lounge. She couldn't handle this, not now with the throes of her nightmare still rattling around inside her head and the beginnings of a good high cruising along. Clutching the towel and the Browning, she left Shelly Niedermeyer open-mouthed on the street and fled behind the tall stockade privacy fence enclosing the backyard belonging to her very own colonial McMansion.

Was it her imagination or did those slitted, disapproving eyes follow her every step? A stir of anger tinged her shame.

Her backyard was little more than a grass-thatched postage stamp behind the house. It sported all the usual perks of upper middle class living: A stone patio with lounge and grill, a raised deck, and (long stagnant now) a kidney-shaped in-ground pool. Instead of the suburban smell of chlorine, burgers, and fresh cut grass, a strong gaseous odor of rotting vegetation permeated the air around the pool. Sawyer breathed deeply and hid behind the privacy fence with her face pressed to a gap in the slats.

The world was humming along good now that the joint was really kicking in. The marshy fumes didn't bother Sawyer at all. In fact, she found the smell comforting; a slice of dark reality in the midst of this posh oasis, like a gritty reminder not to become too comfortable in what was nothing more than a mirage waiting to be dispelled. Sawyer wasn't fool enough to think those walls would hold forever.

Through the fence she saw Crossbow and Beard (as she had christened them in her mind) still speaking with Aaron. She noted with droll amusement that none of the newcomers had surrendered their weapons. Nicholas sulked on the sidelines, obviously nettled that no one had seen fit to recognize his authority.

"So you saw them, too," said a man's voice suddenly behind her.

Sawyer started, dazed enough from the effect of the joint that she hadn't been aware anyone else was in her yard.

"Pete," she sighed wearily, acknowledging the owner of the voice without turning.

Pete Anderson was the very last person she wanted to see right now. Or ever, really.

Pete was Alexandria's resident surgeon. He lived with his wife, Jessie, and their two sons, Sam and Ron, in the house behind Sawyer's. Their backyards shared a gated fence, which was proving inconvenient. Sawyer would have been happier had they not shared so much as the same zip code.

"I heard the main gate open," he said by way of explanation for his presence. He crossed the knee-high grass to join Sawyer where she eavesdropped at the fence. His sandy blonde hair was impeccably parted, and, despite the August sunshine, he wore a sweater vest and neatly pressed khakis.

Sidling up to her with a familiarity that made Sawyer faintly nauseous, Pete placed his hand possessively on her bare upper arm. Sawyer shied away with a grimace, though she was careful to make it look as though straightening her slipping towel was her only reason for pulling away.

Feeling her dismissal, Pete narrowed his eyes and let his hand fall to his side.

"You should go to meet them," she suggested, hoping to get Pete to leave. "They have children. Some of them might need medical attention."

Pete frowned at the poorly concealed eagerness in her voice. "You don't sound pleased to see me."

Sawyer forced a smile. "Not at all," she said, purposely leaving her reply ambiguous. "But hush if you're going to stay. I want to hear what they're saying."

"You've been avoiding me," Pete continued, ignoring her request for silence.

Sawyer turned, meeting his iced blue eyes. The simmering anger there was so apparent to her now that she wondered how she could have been so stupid to have missed it when they first met. "Not at all," she lied. "You know we've been busy with supply runs. Aiden says we have a new cache of warehouses to clear down on the south end of town. He thinks there's a good supply of panels for the solar grid that we could use."

Sawyer could tell Pete was unconvinced. He was a man who liked things written out in clear black and white. Easier to maintain that tight, rigorous control of a surgeon, even outside of the operating room. Alexandria was lucky to have him, but Sawyer wasn't glad at all to have him in her backyard, especially while she was virtually alone and wearing next to nothing.

Not that he hasn't already seen every naked inch of me, she thought darkly with a frown.

Mistakes, everywhere she turned. Alexandria was slowly becoming a minefield, and Sawyer had only herself to blame for placing the mines. For the past month, Aaron -patient, wonderful Aaron- had tried and failed to help her find her place in their society. But by now, even Aaron had most likely given her up as a lost cause. Sawyer had always possessed the most unbelievable knack for getting in her own way.

Case in point, Pete.

"When can I see you again?" Pete demanded, breaking in on her thoughts. He was closer now. His mouth hovered near her ear. She fought a shudder of revulsion as his breath mingled with her sweat-damp hair.

"Don't," she cautioned, stepping back.

He stepped toward her, and this time his hand on her arm was not gentle.

"I asked you a question. You see, I don't think you're being straight with me. What's got you rattled? Is it Jessie?"

"Of course it's Jessie!" she hissed. "You didn't tell me you had a wife, so don't you dare accuse me of not playing straight! You know damn well I- "

Pete's fist smashing into her mouth cut her words short. Her head snapped back with a gasp.

Then, just as quickly as his fist had appeared, his arms wrapped around her, comforting her as though he were rocking a child. "I didn't want to do that. Shh, I'm sorry, there. But you'll learn, you'll learn..."

For a moment, Sawyer was too shocked to do more than allow him to hold her. Then her hand tightened around the Browning under her towel and brought her to her senses. Her lower lip pulsed angrily against her teeth and she felt a trickle of blood run down her chin.

"You get the fuck away from me," she breathed ominously, tasting her blood. Between them, beneath the towel, she raised the knife. Pete froze as he felt the point of the Browning press inconspicuously against his chest. "Right now."

Pete released Sawyer and raised his hands in surrender, but she could feel the mockery in his gesture. He wasn't sorry, and he wasn't scared.

What he was was angry. Very, very angry.

"Stay back." She brought the knife into plain view, holding her arm extended. Slowly she backed toward the open front gate. Carefully she smeared the blood on her chin over her lips, hoping it would pass for lipstick from a distance.

Pete stared after her with glittering malice in his eyes, but stayed back. For now.

Sawyer thrust the knife back under the towel and turned just in time to catch herself from stumbling over the lounge chair. Shelly Niedermeyer was watching, no doubt filing away new details to use to support her inflammatory gossip concerning Sawyer's many oddities. Thankfully, it would have been impossible for Shelly to have seen Pete from that angle; then she would really have had some ammunition capable of making Sawyer's life a living hell. As it was, stories of Sawyer stumbling around stoned all over the place were sure to circulate.

Sawyer's head was spinning and her heart hammered. Out of habit she pulled the remaining roach from her book and lit it, suddenly desperate for an annihilating high. Fucking Shelly, she thought, shaking still. Fucking Pete.

The affair with Pete was her own goddamn fault. She had made the mistake of sleeping with him once, nearly a month ago when she first arrived in Alexandria. Deanna's goddamn welcoming party for Sawyer and several other new 'recruits,' as they called the newcomers. Liquor had flowed unfettered, and Sawyer, fresh from the outside, hadn't touched a drop in close to a year. The scotch had gone straight to her head and Pete had closed in. There hadn't been a ring for her to see until it materialized the next morning. Lesson learned, but the harm had already been done.

Sawyer had been growing worried; the way Pete hounded her after she found out he was married showed he had already become obsessed. She had seen his need for control and gratification to his ego. But he had never shown any signs of his taste for violence before now. This was a whole new problem.

What a mess. What a huge goddamn mess.

She a prickle ran along the back of her neck as she sensed a second pair of eyes watching her. She glanced down the street.

Crossbow was staring at her again with disconcerting intensity. Sawyer glared back.

With wanton exaggeration, she raised the now-stubby joint to her blood-slicked lips and watched as the man's face darkened. She felt an unexpected rush of heated anger swarm into her cheeks. Who did this possum-toting asshole think he was to judge her?

Her burst of anger was accompanied by the urge to flip him off, but she still gripped the Browning in the hand hidden beneath the towel. Without breaking eye contact she let smoke build inside her mouth, pooling around her tongue. When she judged the cloud thick enough, she opened her mouth, centered her tongue, and exhaled a single perfect smoke ring. She blew the ring pointedly in Crossbow's direction, letting her eyes say the rest.

Then, without waiting for his reaction, Sawyer turned and sauntered coolly up the porch steps, whipping off her towel and giving her ass an extra bit of sass as she did.

What with her fat lip and bruised ego, it was as good a telling-off as she could muster just this moment.

"Welcome to Alexandria," she called boldly over her bronzed shoulder before the door slammed.

Once inside, she sunk shaking against the wall, head buried in her arms.

Today could just go to hell.