After the guys leave for Atlanta, I head down to the quarry. I sit by the edge and I open my sketchpad to another picture that I started a while back. It was a picture of Rick sitting across from me. We had gone to a diner to have some lunch. I had been staying with him and his family for about a week, and I was still getting used to their daily schedule. It was the day he told me that he wanted me to meet someone.

Soon, Carol and the other women come down with loads of laundry. I flip to an empty page and start sketching out the scene. As soon as I get the placement of all of the women along the edge of the quarry some new faces come into view. Shane leads Carl to a spot across the way. They seem to be trying to find something in the water. I sketch them into the scene as well. I look up to check the size difference between my nephew and Shane and I see that the man has waded into the water and started splashing around. He's yelling about frogs or something. I can't really hear from so far away. I chuckle to myself as I look back down to my work.

I start to change Shane's position in the frame from on land next to Carl, to in the water splashing around. After getting enough detail to remember what everything is supposed to look like, for a later date, I head over to the other women to offer my help with the laundry. They give me a crate to sit on and a bucket to start washing the clothing. It is pretty quiet for a bit before Carol breaks the silence.

"I do miss my Maytag." I smile at her comment.

"I miss my Benz. My sat nav." Andrea adds

"I miss my coffeemaker with that dual-drip filter and built-in grinder, honey." Jacqui adds. Now that is something I miss, too.

"My computer and texting." Amy says.

"I miss my vibrator." I say. They all look at me and laugh a little.

"Oh my god." Amy reacts. Carol looks over her shoulder at her husband, Ed. He has been sitting on his ass and watching us this whole time. Then she looks over at me.

"Me too." We all crack up at her response.

"What's so funny?" Ed says as he walks up to us. We all watch him as he approaches.

"Just swapping war stories, Ed." Andrea speaks up. Then we all go back to washing the clothes. I grab a new article and notice that it is a sleeveless, flannel shirt. I have seen Daryl wear a shirt like this before. I bring the shirt to my nose. The scent is earthy and musky. Yup, definitely Daryl's. As I go to dip it in the water I look over to the other women. Only Carol has seen what I did. She smirks at me before looking down at the shirt that she was currently washing. Ed still has not gone back to where he had been sitting before, so I look up at him wondering what he wants. Andrea speaks what I have been thinking. "Problem, Ed?"

"Nothin' that concerns you." Andrea goes back to scrubbing a shirt with the brush as Ed looks toward Carol. "And you ought to focus on your work. This ain't no comedy club." I cannot believe that he talks to his wife that way, but Carol just sits there and takes it like it's normal. We continue to wash the laundry with Ed, the watchdog, over our shoulder. Finally, I have had enough. I stand up with Daryl's shirt still in my hand.

"Ed, tell you what. You don't like how your laundry is done? You're welcome to pitch in and do it yourself." I say as I walk a little closer to him. I toss Daryl's shirt to Ed. "Here." He throws it back at me and it catches me off guard. "Oh!"

"Ain't my job, missy." He states. I am so pissed that I can't speak.

"Andrea, don't." Amy says as Andrea comes up next to me.

"What is your job, Ed?" She asks him. "Sitting on your ass, smoking cigarettes?"

"Well, it sure as hell ain't listening to some uppity smart-mouthed bitch, I'll tell you what." He answers. He looks over to Carol. "C'mon, lets go." Carol starts to stand up.

"I don't think she needs to go anywhere with you, Ed." I say staring right at him.

"And I say it's none of your business." He looks to Carol over our shoulders. "C'mon now. You heard me." I continue to stare down Ed as Andrea tries to talk to Carol.

"Carol."

"Andrea please." Carol says pushing past Andrea. "It doesn't matter."

"Hey," Ed says to get Andrea's attention. "Don't think I won't knock you on your ass just 'cause you're some college-educated cooz, all right?" What did he just say? Did he really just threaten Andrea? That is some bold shit. I know two men who used to be cops. I could report his behavior to the one at camp, and then we'll see who is top dog here. Ed looks to Carol again. "Now you c'mon now, or you gonna regret it later." I just stare at him with rage building up in my body.

"So she can show up with fresh bruises later, Ed?" Jacqui points out from behind us. "Yeah, we've seen them." Ed just laughs it off.

"Stay outta this." He says. "Now c'mon! You know what? This ain't none of y'all's business. You don't wanna keep prodding the bull here, okay? Now I'm done talking. C'mon." He goes to grab Carol's arm.

"No" All of us keep saying as he starts to drag her away.

"Carol, you don't have-" Amy says from the other side of Carol.

"You don't tell me what!" Ed yells at Carol. "I tell you what!" He then smacks Carol right in the face, right in front of us. I can no longer hold my rage back. I form my hand into a fist and I punch the horrible man right in the face. He stumbles back a bit as blood starts to pour out of his nose. "You're gonna pay for that." Ed says as he points towards me. The other women get Carol out of the way as Ed storms towards me. Before he is able to reach me Shane pulls him away from the group, and he tosses the man to the ground. Shane starts punching Ed viciously. I don't want him to stop, but the other girls start to yell for him to. I can hear Carol crying behind me.

Shane stops the onslaught of punches and says something to him before punching him once more. He stands up and kicks the man in the side before stepping away. Andrea loses her grip on Carol, and the woman rushes to her battered husband in tears. Before walking back to camp ahead of us, Shane looks to me. I nod at him and he returns the gesture. I watch as he quickly walks away rubbing the back of his head.

Daryl POV

I pull down the back door of the box truck, to close it, as I start to get a sinking feeling. Once we are on the road, I sit down in a corner. Across the way is the man who 'dropped the key'. How could he do that? He must have done it on purpose. Him and Merle never got along. As we start to slow down I look over at him.

"He better be okay. That's my only word on the matter" I say.

"I told you, the geeks can't get at him." I don't believe him. "Only thing that's gonna get through that door is us." He's so confident, but I still don't believe a word he says. The truck stops as the Chinaman confirms that we can only continue on foot. We all get out and start walking into the city. As we get closer the new guy, apparently Vi's twin brother, starts talking strategy.

"Merle first, or guns?"

"Merle." I say right away. "We ain't even havin' this conversation."

"We are." He says sternly. He turns to the Chinaman. "You know the geography. It's your call."

"Merle's closest." He answers. "The guns would mean doubling back. Merle first." Good. Even if they had picked the opposite I would still go after Merle first. We finally get to the building and we enter the bottom floor. There are mannequins and racks of clothing spread throughout the store. Rick spots one of the geeks and I step forward to get rid of it.

"Damn." I say as I aim my crossbow at it. "You are one ugly skank." I pull the trigger and it goes down. I pull the bolt from its head and we continue on our way to recover Merle. We rush up the staircase and get to the door that leads to the roof. The chains are still intact, so we have to use the bolt cutters. As the chains fall away I kick open the door. "Merle!" I call out. I get no response. I look around the roof and I don't see anyone. "Merle!" I call out again. As I near the place where he was said to be chained up I still can't see anyone. Suddenly I see something I didn't want to see. Merle's right hand was sitting on the ground below the cuffs that kept him here. "No!" I can't hold my emotions back. "No!" I still can't believe that he would do this. "No!" Did he think I wouldn't come lookin' for 'im? I look up at 'the man who dropped the key' and he looked back at me with a mixture of guilt and pity. "No!" I wish Vi we here. "No!" I don't know why I want her here right now, but I do. "No!" Maybe it's because she always knows the right things to say. She can make me feel like everything's going to be okay just by saying the simplest thing. I take a few breaths thinking of her voice. What would she say to me in a situation like this? Then I just give up. The memory of her voice is not enough. I bring my crossbow up and I point it at the man who had a bad case of butter fingers. Then, I feel a gun being pointed at my head. We stay that way, in silence, for about a minute before anyone says anything.

"I won't hesitate." Says the lawman. "I don't care if every walker in the city hears it." I suddenly can't see through the water that is pooling in my eye and I bring my crossbow down. Vi's brother lowers his gun and I take a few breaths before asking something.

"You got a doo-rag or somethin'?" I ask the man I was just ready to kill a second ago. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a bandana. I walk over to my brother's severed hand and I pick it up with the bandana. "I guess the saw blade was too dull for the handcuffs." I pick up the hand by its pinky. "Ain't that a bitch." I set it on the bandana, and I wrap it up. The only one with a bag is the Chinaman, so I put the wrapped up hand in his backpack. "He must've used a tourniquet, maybe his belt." I say walking back over to the hanging cuffs. "Be much more blood if he didn't" I notice a trail of blood drips, so I follow them to the other side of the roof. There is another way back into the building. We go in and walk down a set of stairs "Merle!" I yell. I don't care if I am attracting all of the dead to this place. I want to find my brother, now. "You in here?!" We walk around the building, following the blood trail. We enter a big office and there are two walkers laying fully dead on the floor. "Had enough in 'im to take out these two sumbitches. One handed." I pull the tension wire on my crossbow back and lock it into place. "Toughest asshole I ever met, my brother." I load up a bolt as I continue. "Feed 'im a hammer, he'd crap out nails."

"Any man can pass out from blood loss, no matter how tough he is." Vi's brother says. We search some more rooms.

"Merle!" I yell.

"We're not alone here, remember?" The lawman loudly whispers.

"Screw that. He could be bleeding out." I say, looking around the room. "You said so yourself." I enter the room and follow the trail of blood to a stove with an open flame coming from the burners. The lawman picks up something from the stove to look at something burned to it.

"What's that burned stuff?" the Chinaman asks.

"Skin." Answers the former sheriff. "He cauterized the stump."

"Told you he was tough." I say. "Ain't nobody who can kill Merle but Merle."

"Don't take that on faith. He's lost a lot of blood." I can't believe this guy is Vi's brother. He's so negative.

"Yeah?" I look a little farther into the room and notice a window that has been smashed. "Didn't stop 'im from bustin' out of this death trap." I lean on the windowsill and look out the hole as everyone else follows me.

"He left the building?" The Asian kid asks. "Why the hell would he do that?"

"Why wouldn't he? He's out there alone as far as he knows. Doing what he's got to do. Survivin'." I answer.

"You call that survivin'?" Asks my least favorite person in this group. "Just wanderin' out in the streets, maybe passin' out? What are his odds out there?"

"No worse than being handcuffed and left to rot by you sorry pricks." I say as I look to him and the Asian kid. I turn to Vi's brother. "You couldn't kill 'im. Ain't so worried about some dumb dead bastard."

"What about a thousand dumb dead bastards? Different story?" the lawman said back to me.

"Why don't you take a tally? Do what you want. I'm gonna go get 'im." I try to move past him, but he stops me.

"Daryl wait." He says.

"Get your hands off me! You can't stop me."

"I don't blame you." He says. "He's family, I get that. I went through hell to find mine. I know exactly how you feel." Maybe it's genetics, but somehow what he is saying has calmed me down a bit. He hasn't completely calmed me down like Vi would have, but at least I can think straight. "He can't get far with that injury. We could help you check a few blocks around but only if we keep a level head."

"I could do that." I say after taking a few deep breaths. We turn to the others.

"Only if we get those guns first." T-Dog says. "I'm not strolling the streets of Atlanta with just my good intentions, okay?" We all agree as we set up a plan to get those guns.

A/N: I would really like to find out what you guys like and don't like so far. I have to say that I plan on not getting them together until mid to late season 2. Stay tuned.