He doesn't know what to expect when suddenly the group is gone.

He looks around for Lori, looks for Shane, but they are nowhere to be found.

Nowhere is a severe understatement. Somehow his eyes cannot adjust to his surroundings. He's not engulfed by clouds, that's for sure. There's no castle, no kingdom, no little angels floating about. No Saint Peter, no heavenly rays, no harps playing.

And yet it's familiar, in a way, familiar in the sense that he feels like he's been here before. Maybe not here here, but somewhere that reminds him of this place. He does feel some sense of peace. He doesn't feel crushed by regret, anger, or exhaustion, nor pain. He feels warm and safe, but still troubled by this confusing place.

"It'll become clear in time."

Without turning around he recognizes Dale's voice. The old man is wearing a smile and that damn bucket hat. Rick squints his eyes.

"I'm not exactly sure where it is I should go," he says, confused.

"There's really nowhere you need to be, if that's what you're asking," Dale says . "It's not like the first day of school."

Rick chuckles dryly. "Funny, cause that's exactly how it feels."

Dale smiles.

"Where did everyone go?"

The old man shrugs his shoulders. "They're around. Closer than you think. People have things to do, deal with."

"And you?"

Dale nods. "I felt you might need a hand."

Rick sighs. Each time someone answers a question, he comes up with even more of them. "I don't understand. Where's Lori?"

The old man starts walking. Where? Rick doesn't know. There's nothing in front of them. But he follows anyway.

"Lori's been here a long time, Rick," Dale says. "It gets easier, trust me. But for now you have to figure your way around."

Rick frowns. He can't remember the old man being this cryptic and once again he wonders if he's having a dream. "What... way. There's nothing here."

"There's more than you think," Dale says.

Rick turns to him sharply. He's done with it, done with all this absurdity. "I'm gonna need you to start being honest with me, Dale. I can't deal with all this at once, I need to get it together."

Dale smiles. "You haven't changed."

"Yeah, well, I was alive just a few minutes ago, not a lot of time to change," Rick says sarcastically.

The old man chuckles. "You see what you're ready to see. You saw us, first. So I'm guessing you can see the camp."

"The camp?"

"By the quarry?"

"I don't—" Rick begins, but suddenly there it is. The camp, back in Atlanta. He has to take a moment to stop walking and actually take it in. It's as clear and vivid as the day he first stumbled upon it. He can feel the soil underneath his feet, can feel the breeze, can hear the call of the cicadas.

It doesn't look the way it did when they left it. There's no stench of death, no sign of sadness or distress. A few tents, that's all. It's clean. He can see the RV and he has to take a step back and run his hands through his hair to convince himself that it's real.

"How—"

"It was an important place for us," Dale explains, motioning towards Jim, who sits by a tree with Jaquie next to him, talking. "This is where we first became a group. A lot of people come here."

Rick looks around, looking for others. But it's just Jim and Jacquie. Dale qualms his fears quickly.

"Just because the others aren't here doesn't mean they're not around."

Rick sighs, wishing once again, that someone would just sit down and explain it to him. All of it. But Jim and Jacqui merely wave at him and Dale seems dead set on talking in riddles.

"Where are they?" he asks. He remembers their reunion again and suddenly feels defeated. "Where's Lori ?"

Dale starts walking again. "She could be in any one of her places."

"Her places?" he asks as he follows Dale towards the edge of the cliff.

"Like I said, Lori's been here a long time," the old man explains as they reach the edge and stop. "She's had a lot of time to adjust and learn how to live here. You will, too. Eventually."

Rick sighs as he looks into the distance and then down at the quarry. There's a lone figure down there, sat down upon the pebbles. He squints his eyes, trying to make it out. "Is that Andrea?"

Dale hums. Something troubled passes through the old man but he quickly shakes it away. "She comes here a lot."

He looks up at Dale, then at the spot in front of the RV. "This is where Amy died."

"This is where she found her family," Dale clarifies.

"Then why is she alone?"

Rick looks at the old man and looks down upon her again, but then Dale has a hand on his arm. "Come on."

Indignant that he won't get an answer to all his questions, he follows. "So there's other places," Rick says as they walk. "Can we go to the prison? The farm?" A thought descends upon him and it's so overwhelming he stops walking and feels his eyes moisten. "Can I... Can I go home?"

"You can," Dale says with a shake of his eyebrows. "In time."

Rick sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. "Why not now?"

"It's a lot to deal with, Rick," Dale warns him as they sit around the camp. "It's not easy. I was here a long time before I was able to see the RV. I could see the camp, the quarry. I could go to the farm. But I couldn't see that damn RV, not until I came to terms with some things."

Rick sits with his elbows on his knees, looking down, thinking about it. It doesn't make sense, but of course, nothing is making much sense. He doesn't know if Dale brought him to camp or if Rick himself is magically able to. If he wants to come back to camp, can he?

Or more importantly, can he leave?

A thought occurs to him. "Can Lori come here?"

"She can," Dale says thoughtfully. "She does, sometimes."

Rick turns to him quickly. "Can you find her? Can you tell her to come here?"

Dale smiles. "I don't have that kind of power, Rick. People come here when they want to. I can't summon them; I'm not a wizard."

He sighs, feeling defeated.

"Excuse me," Dale says with a hand on his back and Rick watches as the old man jogs off. He reaches Andrea, who somehow has managed to make it to the top of the cliff in mere seconds. Rick watches as Dale talks to her. Their body language reminds him of those days after the CDC, when there was a great wall between them. Dale seems to try to reach out for her, but before he can, there is no Andrea.

Rick blinks hard, trying to figure out what just happened. But as he's looking down he suddenly realizes something, and it hits him hard on the stomach.

He lifts his left hand to realize quickly he doesn't have his wedding ring.

Frantically, he looks around the ground, checks his pockets, gets up to scan the area. But it's nowhere to be found. He looks at his hand again, and upon realizing he doesn't even have a tan line he stumbles back.

He looks up desperately, trying to locate Dale. Luckily the old man is still standing there, and Rick reaches him quickly.

"What is this?"

Dale looks at Rick's hand and smiles at him.

He finally explodes. "Enough of this, Dale. Enough of this fucking bullshit. If you can't be straight with me then thanks for the hand, but I'd rather figure it out on my own. Where's my ring?"

"Rick, calm down," the old man says as he lays a hand on Rick's arm.

"Don't tell me to calm down!" he shouts, and his voice booms through the camp, and he wants to reach deep inside of him and feel the anger he knows he's supposed to be feeling, but there's no anger there and it frustrates him even more. "Where's my ring?"

"Rick," Dale says and lifts up his left hand.

Rick blinks at it, realizing Dale doesn't have his ring, either.

Dale smiles. "No need for those things here."

But he can't accept it. How could he lose his ring? His wedding ring, the symbol of his marriage, of the vows he took. The symbol of the love that helped create his children, the symbol of the man he is. A family man.

He runs a hand through his face with a sigh and takes one step back. "I need to see Lori."

"I'm sorry, Rick," Dale tells him gently. "I promise you'll see her, you'll see everything. But there's other things you need to see first, in yourself."

Rick nods numbly, accepting it, more out of exhaustion than free will.

"Good," Dale says with a smile. "Let's start with Jim."

to be continued