Disclaimer: I do not own The Walking Dead or any of its characters or story lines. I do own my OCs and a computer.

Thanks to everyone who reviewed and favorited and added this story to their alerts so far! You guys are really awesome! I wanted to get this chapter up sooner, but midterms sort of got in the way. But I'm on spring break now and I'm hoping to get at least one other chapter up for you before I go back to school. I hope you all enjoy this one! Reviews are always appreciated!


"Where do we go from here?" Daryl asked late one night. He and Merle had been staying at a camp with other survivors for a few days now. They'd stumbled upon on it while searching for Maddie and decided to stay in case she found it, too.

"A group is goin' out to Atlanta tomorrow," Merle replied. "I volunteered to go with 'em."

"What?" Daryl shot up on his cot, the sudden movement causing all the blood to rush to his head. He caught himself on his elbows and kept his eyes on his brother, who hadn't bothered to look at him until he asked, "What for?"

"Gotta keep 'em trustin' us," Merle replied as if it were obvious.

"What're you talkin' about?" Daryl asked.

"We get 'em to trust us, then take what we can," he reasoned. "Get the hell outta here. We been here fer days and ain't seen no trace of her. If we can get some supplies off a' these people we'll be better off."

Daryl was silent for a while, mulling over his brother's plan. He sighed heavily.

"I guess I'll go huntin' while yer gone, then," he finally replied. Merle's lips twitched up in a smirk.

"Alrigh'," he agreed. "Then, when I get back, we'll wait until they're all sleepin'. Gather up the stuff and get goin'. We'll be long gone 'fore they notice anythin'."

"An' where exactly are we headin'?" Daryl asked. Merle was quiet for a while. Daryl almost thought he'd fallen asleep until his voice, rough and worn and tired, broke the silence.

"Forward," he said simply.


"Hey, Maddie!" Dylan called across the small convenience store. Maddie turned to see him standing by a small DVD display filled with those cheap, straight-to-video releases that no one ever really bought. He was holding up one of the movies with a title in red block lettering and a decaying face on the cover. She walked the few paces to stand beside him and took the DVD from his hands.

"Almost looks like the real thing, don't it?" she said with a laugh.

"Before we knew there was going to be a real thing," Dylan replied.

"Those were the days," Maddie said. She sighed then and shook her head, bringing herself back to reality, where the dead could walk through the streets and not just on TV screens, and placed the movie back on the plastic shelf. "Come on, we're here for supplies," she said then, all business.

"Right," Dylan agreed quickly. The two had been traveling together for all of four days, including this one, covering short distances in the daylight and hunkering down in a truck bed at night. Their first day had been the hardest, as first days often are. They were both wary of each other, always watching and studying one another, each one untrusting. When they'd left the little colonial they'd found each other in they were practically tripping over each other and they argued at every turn.

Five corpses had attacked them that day. They fought awkwardly at first, lunging for the same targets, shouting at each other, until Dylan stopped responding to Maddie's cursing long enough to aim his gun over her shoulder and kill a corpse as it raised its grimy, filthy hands towards her. She'd spun around then, in time to drive the blade of her hunting knife into another corpse's skull, and then she felt Dylan's back pressed against hers as he fought off the last of their opponents.

In the aftermath, as the adrenaline faded and they were left sweating and out of breath and surrounded by bodies that had now died twice, they looked to one another and simply nodded. That night they'd slept side by side in the bed of a rusted pickup truck. Dylan told Maddie about how his father had become one of those things and how he'd watched him tear his mother apart. He told her about how he'd tried to protect his sisters, and how killing his father was the only way to do that.

"It was weird, though," Dylan had whispered that night, staring up at the sky that was so littered with stars. "He wasn't my dad anymore, you know? He was just this…this dead thing that was forced to live again, as if dying once wasn't enough."

He went on to explain that he'd gone to a refugee center with his sisters. He had two, one that was thirteen and another that was only eight. The eight year old did nothing but cry and cling to him, while the older girl cursed him because "you killed him, how could you do that, you killed daddy!" and no matter many times Dylan had tried to explain to her that that thing wasn't daddy she wouldn't stop.

The refugee center had been overrun with corpses two days after that. There was a great scramble, bodies both living and dead working far too hard against each other to get in or to get out and in the chaos Dylan lost track of both of the girls.

He'd been on his own ever since.

There had been a long stretch of silence in which they both just stared at the stars, a sight that felt too beautiful for a world where the dead so greatly outnumbered the living, until Dylan asked Maddie what had happened to her.

"I got lost," she said simply. "Or they did- my daddy and my uncle, I mean. One minute we're fine, drivin' along, tryin'a think a' where to go, and the next there's all these corpses everywhere and we're fightin' and yellin' an' they told me to run. They told me they'd find me later."

"And they never did?" Dylan asked after Maddie went quiet too long. The girl swallowed hard past the lump that was forming in her throat and she blinked a few times because Dixons don't cry, Goddammit, they don't, and she nodded her head.

"I waited for 'em," she said. "But I couldn't jus' sit there anymore. I ain't seen any sign of 'em since."

The truck that they slept in had half a tank of gas and a set of keys on the driver's seat, so on the second day they drove it to the tree line and ventured into the woods. Dylan walked as quietly as he could behind Maddie, although it never seemed quiet enough judging by the looks and the occasional "shhh!" thrown his way. By some stroke of luck the only dead things they encountered that day were the three squirrels that Maddie shot down. They returned to the truck and Maddie showed Dylan how to build a fire- what wood to use and how to start it- and he continued with this task while she worked on skinning and gutting her kills.

"You think they're still out there?" Dylan had asked once the fire had sparked. The sun was going down by then, its fading light casting strange shadows across the dirt and grass.

"Who?" Maddie asked absently, not looking up from her work.

"Your family," Dylan explained. He sighed and then added, "My sisters. Do you think they're still alive?"

"Could be," Maddie answered with a shrug. She was arranging the meat on a spit now and once she was done she came to kneel next to Dylan by the fire. They were both silent for a while, watching the flames and the cooking squirrel meat.

"I've never eaten squirrel before," Dylan said if only to break the silence.

"First time for everything," Maddie replied. She reached into her rucksack and fished out a can of peas. Dylan raised his eyebrows as she forced the can open and set it up to cook. "What? You think that jus' 'cause the world's gone to shit ya don't have to eat yer veggies anymore?"

That got a laugh out of a Dylan, a real one that caught on and soon they were talking lightly about how the world used to be over their meager dinner. The conversation died down with the fire and soon enough they were returning to the truck bed for another night.

It rained on the third day. They spent most of their day in the truck, driving along abandoned roads and trying to make out the names of stores and the outlines of neighborhoods through the splashes of water. Dylan saw Maddie's tally that day. He had been driving, and so she thought he wasn't looking when she slipped it and her stub of a pencil out of her pocket to mark it with the eighteenth line.

The thing about the apocalypse, though, was that there were no other drivers around, and so the only real incentive for Dylan to keep his eyes on the road was the rain coming down in sheets. But the rain was starting to let up, the clouds starting to drift and move on, and sure enough Dylan had torn his eyes away from the gray ribbon of the road to find Maddie staring at that little slip of notebook paper.

"What's that?" Dylan had asked.

"Oh," Maddie said, jumping slightly at his voice. "Oh, nothin'. Just, um. It's a tally. I started it when I got split up from my family. Helps me keep track of the days."

Dylan nodded his understanding and he didn't talk for a few minutes. Then he asked, "So you still have hope, then?" Maddie looked at him quizzically. "Hope that you'll find them, I mean."

"Dixons are stubborn. We don't die easy," she said, and then she tore her gaze away from Dylan. "Yeah," she went on without looking at him. "I've got some hope."

They'd found a sporting goods store that day. It had been mostly looted, but Maddie's idea to check the back storage rooms resulted in them finding a small tent and sleeping bags. They had to kill off three corpses to get them, and two more on the floor where they found a package of beef jerky and some extra shirts that they stuffed into their bags.

With their new equipment, Maddie suggested that they try to find more supplies and then head into the woods. She'd said that if they could camp out for at least a few nights it would give her more time to hunt and build up their food supply, and she also offered to teach Dylan a few things that her father and uncle had taught her- which berries were poisonous and that sort of thing. She explained all of this to Dylan that night, and he hopped on board willingly.

This was all true, of course. A few extra kills would do them some good, and Dylan had said he wanted to learn a few more survival skills. "All the things I know are from the Discovery Channel," he'd joked.

But Maddie also knew that if there was one place her family would be, it was the woods. Her daddy always said he felt more comfortable under the cover of the trees. Hell, she'd been half-raised among bushes and berries with twigs snapping and leaves crunching underfoot as she trailed behind her father or, sometimes, her Uncle Daryl, their broad shoulders always blocking out the harsh glare of the sun.

She wasn't lying when she said she had hope, and her hope resided in the wilderness.


In all of his years, Daryl Dixon had never felt so utterly and hopelessly alone.

He'd had moments, of course- stretches of loneliness that left scars on both his body and his heart. But even the worst of those moments couldn't compare with the feeling he had begun welling inside of him, hot and unrelenting in his chest, the moment he realized that his brother wasn't coming back.

He ain't dead, Daryl kept repeating over and over again in his head, a mantra that would half-calm the raging feeling in his gut that hadn't fully settled since the group had returned from Atlanta without Merle. He ain't dead. He ain't dead. He ain't dead.

There were so many years that Merle wasn't in his life. They were born so far apart, and when Daryl was too young to remember clearly, Merle had taken off. He'd come home now and then, and those were always good days. He'd hear the roar of an engine- it was always a different one until the day Merle bought his bike- and he'd race outside before his father could stop him. He'd spend the whole day with his brother, feeling excited and for a few hours really, truly happy until Merle dropped him back off at the house and he had go to back to reality.

Merle showed up less and less as Daryl got older. He didn't really call at all. He was always either too busy, or too high, or he was incarcerated or one of his many girlfriends had forced him into a rehab center that he'd break out of or get kicked out of two days later. Eventually Daryl's heart stopped skipping at the sound of rumbling engine passing the house because he forced his brain to stop thinking that it could be Merle.

After their old man died, Daryl saw a bit more of his brother. He moved back to their small town. He met a girl at a bar. Daryl stayed living in their childhood home because he couldn't afford to go anywhere else. Merle took to leaving his bike in the driveway because the girl he'd been fucking was too scared to go on it. Daryl wondered why he didn't just cut her loose like he did with so many that had those kinds of complaints. He would eventually get his answer in the form of 5.7 pounds of tiny, flailing limbs about nine months after Merle had switched his bike for the pickup truck.

The mother, her name was Tess, she wanted the baby to have Merle's last name. When mother and child, dubbed Madelyn Grace Dixon, were discharged from the hospital, Merle moved into Tess's one-bedroom apartment with her and for a short while everything was okay.

Then Merle and Tess started fighting. Every day it was something and nine times out of ten it resulted in Merle sleeping on the couch, or passed out drunk in his truck outside the local bar. A few times he'd even wound up at Daryl's. Then came the night that Merle stormed through Daryl's front door with a wailing barely-five month old in his arms. Maddie Grace was crying, and Merle was cursing over her, and that made her cry louder and that made him yell more and more until he finally dumped the child into Daryl's arms and slumped on the couch, all of his energy exhausted.

Daryl had sat down next to Merle, trying to balance the tasks of talking his brother out of his rage and soothing his sobbing, too tiny niece, and from Merle's short responses he'd discovered that Tess had left. She'd gotten fed up and she said some dumb shit and she just up and left. It's not like she just went back to her parents house a town over, or to her friend's apartment like she sometimes did. From what Daryl gathered, the woman had told Merle that she'd already made her decision and she had a plane ticket for California- her sister lived there, and she was going there to stay.

"Fuckin' bitch walked out on 'er Goddamn daughter," Merle had sighed, his tired eyes looking to the infant that was squirming in Daryl's arms.

It was decided then that Merle and Maddie Grace would move in with Daryl, and for seventeen years that was just the way things were.

And now Daryl had lost them both.

They ain't dead, Daryl mentally scolded himself. They were Dixons, and Dixons don't just die.

But sometimes they're reckless, and sometimes they don't think things through. Sometimes they get scared (although not a single one would ever admit to feeling afraid) and they act on their instincts and they cut off their own fucking hands because they think that's the only way to save themselves. Sometimes, they stumble away injured, thinking that they can still pull through if they just keep moving.

The group would be moving on in the morning. He wasn't entirely listening when the two cops were talking about the plan. He tried to, but his mind kept coming up with pictures of Maddie and Merle and he kept wondering where they were. Once or twice the thought of one of them turning up as one of those things, those walkers, as the people here were calling them, would come up and he'd blink fast and shake his head to make it go away.

They ain't dead, he kept telling himself over and over again. They ain't fucking dead.

Merle had laid out a plan that Daryl could still stick to. If he kept close to the group, he could snatch a few things away from them. He could gather it all up slowly and discreetly so that nobody would notice and then one day he could just slip away.

And where exactly are ya headin'? came a voice in his head that sounded like a too distant version of his own. Merle's voice answered, "Forward."


Milton Mamet was a very scientific man.

He was not made for fieldwork at all. He was meant to work in a lab or an office, somewhere that had four walls and a roof over his head. He was meant to sit in a comfortable chair while pouring over notes and writing reports. His mind was geared towards controlled experiments.

The world, however, had morphed into one in which the scientific, desk job types would have to adapt to survive. This was why Milton found himself out on the streets of biter-infested Atlanta, Georgia, a clipboard clutched to his chest and a knife in one hand ("Just in case," the Governor had said when he presented Milton with the weapon). Martinez and three other well-bodied Woodbury men were with him. The Governor had gotten the group together shortly after Milton proposed a trip into the city. He needed subjects to study, he'd explained, and the Governor had understood.

They took two vehicles into Atlanta, one stolen police van and one Jeep. They avoided highly populated areas and focused more on side streets and alleyways where they would find one or two biters at a time, occasionally three but never more than four. The rowdier, hungrier ones, those that put up too much of a fight, were put down right away by Martinez's men. The rest were wrestled into the back of the van. Milton oversaw the whole thing. He pointed out where the biters were and kept track of how many they'd gathered.

They were getting ready to head back to Woodbury when Milton first spotted him. He slowed the Jeep down to get a better look at the slumped-over figure. Had they missed him on their first go? Had they just skipped over this alley?

Martinez, who was sitting in the passenger seat with his gun resting on his lap, raised an eyebrow in question.

"There's one more," Milton said. Martinez followed his gaze and nodded. He slipped out of the Jeep, motioning towards the police van to catch his team's attention. Milton's curiosity got the best of him. He'd been hanging back most of the time, but this time there was only one biter there and it hadn't moved since he spotted it.

Martinez and the others were already halfway down the alley by the time Milton slid out of the car. He jogged towards them in time to see the figure raise its head slightly towards the oncoming group. Martinez held out a hand to slow down the three other armed men. Milton came to a halt behind them, straining over their heads to catch a glimpse of the figure.

It was male. His skin was devoid of color and his left arm cradled his right, keeping it close to his chest which was rising and falling with great effort. Sweat and dirt and grime mingled together all over his skin and clothes. His eyes were dull and tired as he watched the group warily. His breath was strained, causing him to wheeze and gasp and grunt and every now and then those tired eyes would flit back and forth like he was looking for an escape.

Milton, overcome with curiosity, pushed his way slowly to the front of the group. The man made a sound at the back of his throat that made Milton hesitate. Martinez hefted up his gun, reminding Milton that his back was covered. Milton swallowed thickly and took another step forward. He paused, and then moved forward again. The man flinched slightly and he pushed himself up just a bit, leaning on the gray brick wall beside him. His mouth was moving but there were no real words coming out of it, just low, rasping sounds punctuated with pain.

Milton held up his hands. The man pushed himself up a bit further, wincing at the effort, but he never broke eye contact. Those pale eyes kept staring at him, boring into him, daring him to get closer.

Milton kept on going. The man tried to back away, making more slurred sounds that weren't quite words. The awkward half-kneeling position he'd been in didn't allow him to get very far before he stumbled and fell back, his knee slamming against the pavement.

"Fuck!" the man cursed and a little red flag sprung up in Milton's mind. He'd never heard a biter talk before. He took another step and the man's eyes found him again. The man huffed out a breath and it sounded like he was cursing more but he was back to slurring and grunting and Milton couldn't make sense of a single thing coming out of his mouth.

He looked down the man's arms, how one was held so close to him like he were a bird with a broken wing. He saw blood staining the skin, bright and fresh, only slightly dulled by the mingling grime and sweat it was mixing with. Biters don't bleed, either.

"I-It's not a biter," Milton stammered. He turned back to the group. Four guns were pointed at him. No, not at him, Milton reminded himself, they were meant for the man on the ground who was still trying his damndest to curse them all. "He's not a biter."

Milton got close enough to crouch down beside the man who was making every effort he could to scramble away but couldn't get too far.

"It's okay, hey, stop, I can help you, it's okay," Milton said over and again, all of his words rushed and panicked and desperate as he tried to get the man to stop. "I could use some help!" Milton called over the ailing man's protests. Milton stood and stepped back and let two of Martinez's team haul up the man, who fought against them with all of his might, going so far as to pull his injured hand away from his body to bat at them and that's when Milton noticed that there was no injured hand, just oozing blood that spilled everywhere and soaked the man's clothes.

"Get him in the Jeep," Milton said.

"You sure?" Martinez asked.

"We c-can't just leave him here," Milton replied. "Put him in the Jeep, in the backseat. We're taking him back. He needs a doctor."

By the time the men had wrestled the man back to the cars and forced him into the back of the Jeep, the man had passed out cold. Milton asked Martinez to drive back, tossing him the keys and tugging the small first aid kit they'd brought with them out from underneath the passenger's seat before settling himself in the back with the nameless, one-handed man.

The only indication that the man hadn't died yet was the occasional groan and a few mumbled, slurred words that Milton assumed were supposed to start with 'F'.