Suddenly, she held up her hand to stop him from speaking. "Hold on."

She raised her voice, making it loud enough for her nephew to hear. "Gabe, are you reading like I asked?!"

He heard the scuffle of a chair, so the boy had been listening, "Yeah!"

Her head cocked slightly, "You sure about that, cause when I tell you to read, that means I want your attention on the book, not on what's going on over here."

There was silence for a moment, which seemed to confirm that Gabe was doing as he was told. "Sorry, it's the only way to distract him now."

He nodded, but she interrupted again. "What are these questions for?"

Alice was eyeing him carefully, her body seemed tense now. At this moment, he noticed how on edge she appeared to be, as if ready to spring if he did anything that didn't sit right with her. He was used to making people feel this way, but comforting them, this was foreign; Daryl had never been great at reassuring others, especially when they actually came this close to putting a bullet in him. "They're to figure out if you're ok."

Well, that was ominous. "What do you mean by ok?"

Did she need it spelled out? "Christ, it's to make sure you're not bat shit crazy."

Alice's eyes narrowed again, coppered flecks rearing as if on fire. Daryl watched as her muscles tightened, for a moment he caught the barest trace of flinch when she made an attempt to get up. It was then that he realized how much pain she was in. Taking a deep breath he tried to think of how Rick would go about speaking to a possible addition to the prison. This woman was smart and had managed to survive, all while looking after a kid.

Perhaps pushing the questions wasn't the way to go "How old is he?"

Alice blinked, she seemed surprised. Chuckling, her head dipped a fraction of an inch to where her bangs fell in front of her eyes. "Is that one of your…..Mental health questions?"

Her muscles seemed to relax "No, I was just…just curious."

Glancing out the cell door, Alice sighed "I honestly don't know. Didn't see much of Gabe until everything went to shit…"

Her eyes shadowed for a moment "You put em down…. His parents?"

Slowly, Alice nodded "Yeah, figured they turned the first couple weeks into everything."

She shifted a little, as if trying to get comfortable. "How many have you killed?"

Alice shot him a perplexed look, and then chuckled dryly "Family members?"

"No, no, I meant Walkers?"

She fell back against the wall where her bed sat "Dunno, I kept count for a while, but…."

She rubbed her forehead and then pinched the bridge of her nose "Too many I guess."

Her eyes wandered to the windows that looked down on the cell, Daryl watched her for a second before moving onto the next question "What about people?"

A shadow seemed to shroud her eyes, her hands tightened into fists. As much as Alice wanted to avoid this question, she knew there was no getting out of it. If she and Gabe were to stay here, be it a week or longer, she'd need to answer "I killed 5, possibly 10, hell maybe more than that…"

Daryl had not expected that, maybe 1 or 2 people, but more than 10 "Why?"

She finally looked at him, the brown of her irises seemed to harden, turning them into cold waves of obsidian. Alice blinked and averted her eyes as she forced the truth "There was a group, Gabe and I joined them, lots of men, only a few women…."

Her upper lip twitched, indicating a sneer of disgust "Funny how quickly society reverts to the days when women were valued for what a man can do to them, whether they liked it or not."

At last she looked at Daryl, the obsidian in her eyes rearing "When we ran, I killed their leaders, there were 5. I set the whole camp on fire so that whatever was left would scatter, so that no one would be able to hunt me and Gabe."

Alice stared at the redneck, he didn't seem like the type, then again she thought something similar when she met the leaders of the group that she decimated. It hadn't been until she met the women in the group, that she realized what those monsters were capable of. She found herself smirking, it was then she realized what she had admitted, and to a complete stranger. In some ways, it felt good to unload. In other ways it made her wary.

Daryl started to get up, her hand shot out and shackled his wrist. He stiffened at her touch, but didn't pull away. When he turned to look at her, he could see a strain of fear toiling about in her eyes "Will we be ok to stay here?"

Slowly, Daryl pulled away from her grasp "I'll talk to the Council."

Alice cleared her throat and nodded. So this place had a Council? They were that put together in order to instill a system of government? When she looked up again, she found that Daryl had left the cell.