Author's Note

So I hadn't planned on getting this chapter out so early, but I had this idea in my head and I wanted to get it out to you guys as soon as possible, since the last two chapters were sort of boring (and I apologize profusely for that). Hopefully this one is much better, although I'm not so sure about the writing.

Anyway, please enjoy!


Caterina dug away in the back far corner of the prison field, a few beads of sweat running down her face. It wasn't that hot outside—at least, it wasn't a heat that she wasn't used to from her time in Iraq—but she had been moving fairly quickly, wanting to get these holes dug as soon as possible, and the exertion was getting to her. She had tied Carol's scarf around her bicep, just above elbow, to get it out of the way and to avoid getting any sweat on it.

She refused to think that Carol was dead. Until they found the body or found her as a walker, she would continue to believe that she was alive. When time permitted, she planned to use the scarf to find her. While a blood hound Edgar was not, he had a good nose. He could distinguish between a smell, so she wasn't worried about her own scent covering Carol's.

Normally, she would assume that she was dead. After all, she was sure that there was a horde of walkers in the prison halls. It would be hard for just one person to get away, especially one person who didn't have very many weapons on her. But she was determined to find Carol alive. They had lost enough people already, and Caterina was determined to keep as many of their people alive as she could.

Caterina halted in her digging as she heard the engine of Daryl's bike coming up behind her. She turned and watched as Daryl came to a stop a few feet away from her. He had her crossbow in his hand while his own was strapped to his back along with a dark blue backpack, over some kind of parka.

He cut the engine as he glanced over the hole that Caterina had almost finished.

"Drop the shovel and let's go," he ordered. "We gotta make a run."

"What are we looking for?" she asked, shovel still in hand.

"Formula, for the baby."

Caterina straightened up slightly at that. Ever since it had been made known that Lori and T-Dog were dead, her head had been swimming with thoughts of those two and Carol. She'd completely forgotten about the baby.

"Maggie says there's a shopping center close by that should have some."

"If Maggie knows where it is, why not take her?" she asked. While she didn't mind the thought of going with Daryl on a run, she didn't want anything to distract her from digging the graves. The sooner that she got them done, the sooner she could take Edgar and start looking for Carol.

"She's still shook up 'bout what happened," Daryl replied. "I wanted someone who's still got their head on straight."

Caterina raised an eyebrow. "And naturally you chose me," she observed in a sarcastic tone.

"I never said it was a good choice."

She gave an amused huff at the insult. "Thanks, Daryl."

Daryl just motioned for her over. "C'mon."

Caterina stabbed the shovel into the ground next to the hole and stepped up out of it. She figured that someone would take up for her when they were gone, so she might as well keep it there for it. She dusted her hands off as she approached Daryl, who held her crossbow out for her. She grabbed it and threw the strap over her shoulder before taking Daryl's crossbow and the backpack and getting on the back of the bike. She put it over her other shoulder so she could wrap both arms around Daryl's waist.

Once she was secured on the back, Daryl restarted the engine. "Hang on tight," he called over it.

The corners of Caterina's lips turned up slightly, and she tightened her grip on Daryl's waist. She saw him nod to himself, and then they were off.


The outside of the shopping center was overrun. Walkers were meandering about outside, probably having just been moving through before deciding to stay. So Daryl and Caterina decided to move on. She had spotted what looked like a nursery on their way to the store, so they doubled back to it. They had to cut through the forest in order to keep the shopping center walkers from knowing where they went. Not to mention there was too much debris and too many cars on the main road. It would keep them from going too fast, and they had to outrun the walkers that had spotted them. Not to mention it was better going the back way, in case there were more walkers near the nursery. A motorcycle wasn't exactly quiet.

Daryl pulled to a stop by the backyard and killed the engine. Caterina stepped off quickly, her eyes scanning the smallish building in front of them as she pulled Daryl's crossbow from her shoulder. There was a swing set and monkey bars in the back, along with a red toy race car.

"Company's close," Daryl muttered as he got off the bike. "Stay tight."

Caterina nodded and held his crossbow out to him, and he took it.

Caterina pulled her own crossbow around to her front, and the two walked in to the back yard through the surrounding fence.

As she approached one of the back windows, she motioned it for Daryl to keep an eye out. He nodded in understanding and turned his back on her so he was of facing the back woods. Caterina turned back to the window and cupped her hand around her eyes so that she could peek inside. She couldn't see anything that looked like a body, which was a good sign. Though that didn't mean there weren't any walkers inside. Still, she drew her elbow back and forced it through the glass. It shattered, and she knocked out the rest of the glass, ignoring as a few pieces cut into her elbow.

She climbed through into the room, and she paused for a moment to look around. It looked like a playroom. There were two cribs in there, probably for any infants that were taken to the nursery, along with a whole bunch of toddler toys lying about. And there was a changing station next to the sink.

"How's it look?" Daryl called from the backyard.

"It's clear."

She exchanged her crossbow for the bag and made her way over to the sink. She knelt down and opened the bottom cabinet. There were diapers there, along with a few bottles and some rags. She wasn't sure what all they would need (she had never taken care of a baby before), so she grabbed everything and started stuffing it into the bag.

She heard Daryl step through the window with a grunt.

Once she had everything she thought they needed, she returned the bag to her back and grabbed it her crossbow again. She turned to Daryl and motioned to the door leading out into the hallway.

He nodded and walked over to it. He poked his head through to check the hallway before giving the all clear. Caterina stepped out with him, and she motioned down to the right of the hallway, silently telling Daryl to check that way. Daryl nodded and started down that way, crossbow held at the ready. Caterina watched his back for a moment before turning down the other way.

She passed by a small kitchen. It had one of this two-way doors, with the top and bottom sections separated. She made a mental note to check in there once she had cleared the rest of the rooms before moving on.

She only managed to clear two other rooms before she heard something rattling in the kitchen. She turned quickly, her crossbow held out in front of her readily. She'd been sure that the kitchen was clear.

At the other end of the hall, Daryl turned and hurried down the hall towards her silently. Caterina moved forward to meet him by the kitchen, and they both paused. He stuck the end of the flashlight into his mouth. He nodded for her to stay where she was while he peeked into the room. When he didn't see anything, he reached over the half door to open it. He stepped into the room, with Caterina at his heels, and the rattling was heard again, coming from the cupboards apparently. He nodded for Caterina to open them, and she stepped around to the other side before reaching for the unlatched door. She glanced at Daryl to make sure that he was ready and threw it open. She was surprised when she all saw an opossum inside.

It hissed at the sudden intrusion before it was silenced by one of Daryl's bolts.

"Hello, dinner," he muttered around his flashlight.

"You enjoy that," Caterina muttered in slight disgust. She had tried opossum before, over those months that she had been on her own, and she hadn't enjoyed it. The meat had an odd taste to it, and it was way too greasy.

"What, you don't like opossum?"

"No. And before you ask, yes, I have tried it."

"Never knew you were so damn picky," Daryl muttered.

"I'm not," Caterina argued calmly. She had heard the teasing in his voice, so she knew not to take it personally. Instead, she decided to tease him back. "If I were picky, why would I bother kissing you?"

He flinched dramatically at the retort. "You ain't gotta be so mean."

Caterina shook her head with a grin and turned to the cabinets on the back wall. She tossed her bag and crossbow on to the counter and opened the cabinets, only to be stared in the face with two large cans of liquid baby formula. "Found it," she expressed. She grabbed the cans and turned to show them to Daryl. "But only two."

"It should be fine for now," he grunted. "We can find more later."

Caterina nodded and turned to stuff the cans into her bag.

"So what's goin' on between you and Rick?" Daryl asked out of nowhere.

She didn't even paused in her work. She had been expecting Daryl to ask at some point. But that didn't mean that she was going to answer him truthfully, if at all. "What makes you think there's anything going on?" she replied calmly.

He scoffed. "Please. A blind man could see the tension between you two."

Caterina didn't say anything. She just zipped up the bag and tossed it over her shoulder.

"So what happened?" he pressed. "You have a spat or somethin'?"

She turned around to look at him, her arms crossed over her chest. "You said before that Rick didn't react well to my supposed death. What did you mean?"

Daryl frowned slightly, knowing that she was stalling, but he decided to play along. "He went crazy. When we found your tags on the corpse, he went on a walker killin' spree." He blinked, seeming to remember something. "Speaking of…" He reached into his shirt for the dog tags that were still hanging around his neck, and he pulled the chain from his neck to hold the necklace out to her. "Here."

"No, that's okay. You keep them. They look better on you anyway."

"You sure?"

"Yeah," she assured him with a slight smile. "Besides, you seem to like wearing them more than I do."

Daryl frowned at her, confused.

"Don't think I haven't noticed that chain around your neck day in and day out," she teased.

An abashed look crossed over Daryl's face before it was replaced with his usual expression, and he scoffed as he pulled the chain back over his head and tucked the tags under his shirt. She just watched him with an amused look on her face.

"You know, normally it's the girl wearing her lover's tags," Caterina pointed out.

Daryl looked up at her with a raised eyebrow. "Lovers?"

Caterina's smile fell as she realized what she'd said. Blood immediately started pooling in her cheeks, and she lowered her gaze to the floor (but not before spotting the amusement on Daryl's face as he stared at her). "Well," she muttered, "when I say lovers, I just mean it's a generic term for two people who are in some kind of relationship."

"What kind of relationship is this then?"

Caterina looked back at him from under her lashes. His expression had turned serious again, but there was still a bit of amusement in his eyes.

She didn't say anything for a moment. She had been wondering the same thing herself. She thought at first that they were maybe dating (at least the only way that two people could date in the apocalypse), but for some reason it didn't seem to fit. The only time they had moments like these was when they were alone, and even then they only mostly flirted with each other. They didn't all really act like that kind of couple.

"I don't know," she admitted after a moment. "What kind of relationship do you think it is?"

Daryl looked thoughtful for a moment. "Well, I'm not gonna go around callin' you my girlfriend."

Caterina frowned, unable to keep herself from feeling hurt, even though she agreed that the word boyfriend didn't fit with him. "Why not?" she demanded.

He shrugged, either ignoring the hurt in her voice or not hearing it. "Just don't feel right." He turned thoughtful again. "But lover sounds about right," he muttered. He then pointed it at her with a slight smirk. "But that means you owe me somethin' when we get through here."

Caterina flushed red. "Daryl!" she hissed at him.

"What?" he asked, as if he didn't think he'd said anything wrong. He paused to take in her red face, and his smirk widened. "You thought I was talkin' 'bout sex? I wasn't even thinkin' along those lines."

Caterina turned even redder, realizing that it had only been her mind that had gone to sex.

Daryl shrugged. "But if that's what you wanna do…"

She turned away from him quickly and grabbed her crossbow. "Okay, that's enough out of your mouth, Mr. Dixon," she said, a little louder than she meant to, but she just wanted to shut him up. "Let's just find whatever else we can for the baby and go."

With that, she waltzed out of the kitchen without waiting for him to follow.

"Yes, ma'am."

He followed Caterina back out into the hallway, and the two stepped into another nursery room, to see if they couldn't find anything else for the baby. They were silent for a moment as they each searched their own corners. While she looked through a small chest of blankets, Caterina thought about what they had been talking about, before it had turned into that embarrassing conversation.

"He knew I was alive," she spoke up after a moment.

She heard Daryl stop whatever he was doing, and she could suddenly feel his gaze on her back.

"Do what?" he asked.

"Rick knew I was alive," Caterina repeated. "I ran out of bolts a few weeks in, so I took to making my own. I don't know why, but I started carving my initials into them. I was probably hoping that one of you would find them and know that I'd been in the area." She shrugged, as if it didn't really matter. "Anyway, Rick found some after you found my tags."

"And he didn't say nothin'?"

"He said you were a wreck when you thought that I was alive, surviving out there on my own, but you started getting better when you believed that I was dead. He said he didn't want you to go back to the way you were. He thought it was for the best."

"He told you that?"

"Yeah…" she muttered.

It was silent for a moment as Daryl seemed to soak this in. Then…

"That son of a bitch."

Caterina turned at the angry tone in his voice. She immediately saw how tense his jaw had become and she could see that his grip on his crossbow had tightened. He was staring at the ground with an enraged look in his eye.

She took a cautious step towards him. "Daryl, calm down."

His eyes snapped up to hers, and she couldn't help but flinch at the anger there. "Calm down?" he snapped. "How the hell do you expect me to calm down?" He took an angry step forward, but Caterina didn't step down. "He let us think you were dead!"

"Like I said, he thought it was for the best," she explained in a calm tone.

"Well, he was wrong!" he snarled. "I shoulda left when I first thought of it."

"If you had, we might not have found each other."

"Or I might've found you sooner," he argued.

Caterina didn't say anything against it.

Daryl scoffed angrily and turned away from her, tossing his hands.

"In a way, it's a good thing you didn't," Caterina admitted.

He turned back to her, his glare still in place. "Oh yeah? Why's that?"

"Because then I might not have found my family."

Daryl blinked, seeming to realize what she was saying.

She took a step forward to place her hand on the junction of his shoulder and neck. She could feel how tense he was, and it worried her. She could only guess that, if she didn't calm him down, once they returned the prison, Daryl would immediately attack Rick about what she had just told him. And she didn't want that. While she would appreciate having him on her side, she wanted to keep this between her and Rick.

"Look, I'm just as upset as you, but I don't want you confronting him about it when we get back."

"Why the hell not?" Daryl growled.

"Because this is between me and him. I just…felt like you should know."

Daryl stared at her for a moment, breathing a little heavily from the anger he'd felt just moments before. She watched as the anger finally seemed to seep away, and the tension in his shoulders lessened. Finally, he nodded.

Caterina smiled. "Thank you."

She leaned forward and pecked him on the corner of his lips before dropping her hand and turning away from him.


It was dark by the time that they made it back to the prison. As they got closer, they could hear someone banging on the fences and shouting, apparently to draw any nearby walkers' attention away from the approaching motorcycle. Daryl and Caterina were pretty exposed on it, and either one of them could be torn from the bike if one of the walkers managed to get their hands on them.

When they passed through the trees, she saw that it was Oscar and Axel who were banging and shouting, while Glenn and Maggie were standing up in the tower. The two shot and killed the two walkers that hadn't been drawn in by Oscar and Axel, keeping them from getting to Caterina and Daryl.

While Oscar hurried to the gate and opened it, Axel kept by the fence, still trying to keep walkers distracted.

"You want some of this?" he shouted. "C'mon! C'mon!"

Daryl drove through the entrance and up to the prison, the others following behind them at slower pace. He parked his bike with the rest of the cars in the main courtyard, and he and Caterina both jumped off. They didn't bother waiting for the others and hurried into the cellblock.

"Alison!" Caterina called to her friend as she passed through the door.

Alison hurried forward from where she stood with Caterina's family and followed her over to one of the tables. A lantern had been set up there, which would give them some illumination so that they could get the formula ready. Caterina tossed her bag on to the table and immediately start rifling through it, pulling out everything that they had gotten at the nursery.

While she did that, Daryl went over to Carl, who was holding his little sister.

"How's she doin'?" he asked.

Alison grabbed the bottle and formula, ignoring the rest of what they'd gotten for the moment. Caterina handed her the buck knife, which she used to make a hole in one of the cans. Caterina unscrewed the lid on bottle and held it out for Alison to pour the formula in. Once it had been filled, Caterina returned the lid on to the bottle and turned, expecting to give it to Carl. She paused, however, as she saw that Daryl was the one holding the crying baby, softly cradling her in his arms.

Daryl looked up at her and motioned for her to bring the bottle.

Caterina snapped out of her staring and hurried over, passing the bottle to him.

"Thanks," he muttered. He flipped the bottle in his hand so it was pointing down and pressed the nipple to a baby's lip. "C'mon. C'mon," he encouraged her gently.

The crying immediately stopped as she started sucking out the milk, while Daryl moved side to side in a sort of rocking motion. Caterina watched the two with a soft smile on her lip.

She looked over as Alison stepped to her side. She grinned at her, as if she knew what she was thinking. Caterina just shook her head and turned back to Daryl.

He looked up at her at the same time and smiled, which only made her smile grow wider.

"You look pretty good with a baby, Daryl," Alison pointed out. "Don't you think so, Cat?

Caterina nodded. "Yeah. I can almost picture you as a dad like this," she teased. Although, that was actually was she was thinking as she stared at him. You wouldn't think that Daryl would make a good father figure, what with his temper and how easily he let it get to him, and how unsocial and crude he was. But, looking at him with the Grimes baby, he looked like he was born to be a father.

"Let's see how good you look with one," Daryl decided.

Caterina immediately shook her head, her smile gone. "No, that's okay."

Daryl was already stepping towards her. Caterina made to step back, but she was stopped by Alison's arm at her back. She glared back at her before turning back around to Daryl.

"C'mon. It ain't like she's gonna bite you," Daryl tried to reassure her. "She don't have teeth."

"I've never held a baby before…" she explained, hoping that he would understand and let the subject drop. But he didn't seem to want to play along this time.

"It's easy," he pressed. "C'mere." He stopped in front of her and held the baby out to her, his gaze expectant. Caterina paused before reluctantly holding out her arms to receive the baby. Daryl immediately placed her in her arms. "You just gotta cradle her."

Caterina curled her arms towards her like Daryl had been doing.

"Just like that."

He grabbed one of Caterina's and pulled it out from under the baby, seeing as she had her secure with her other arm, to place her hand on the bottle. She glanced up at him hesitantly but took their bottle from his grasp. She glanced back down at the baby, who hadn't made a sound as she was being passed from Daryl's grasp into Caterina's. She just continued to suck away on the nipple as if nothing had happened.

Everyone was silent as they watched Caterina with the baby.

Daryl moved around her so that he stood at her back, staring at the baby over Caterina's shoulder. He rested one hand on her waist while the other went up to cradle the baby's head.

He looked over at Carl, who was watching his baby sister in Caterina's arms with a soft smile. "She got a name yet?" he asked.

"Not yet," Carl replied. "I was thinking…maybe Sophia."

Caterina looked up at him at that.

"Then there's Carol too. And… " He sighed. "Andrea, Amy, Jacqui, Patricia, or…Lori." He looked to the ground as that name crossed his lips and kicked his feet. "I don't know."

Caterina felt Daryl shift behind her and watched from the corner of her eye as he moved his face a little closer to the baby's, and in turn Caterina's. "Yeah…" he cooed as the baby continued to down the formula. "You like that? Huh? Little ass-kicker."

Caterina laughed outright at that. Leave it to Daryl Dixon to come up with a name like that.

Daryl grinned up at her before looking around at the others. "Right? That's a good name, right?"

The others laughed and nodded in agreement.

Daryl looked back down at the baby. "Little ass-kicker," he murmured. "You like that, huh?" He moved his hand from the baby's head to gently stroke her nose. "You like that, sweetheart?"

"If ever there were a Kodiak moment in the apocalypse, this would definitely be it," Alison spoke up.

Caterina and Daryl looked up at Alison curiously. She just grinned hugely at them along with Michele. Even Gabriele, who had at some point moved to his fiance's side along with his father, had a small smile on his lips.

"You three look really good together," Alison continued.

Caterina's face turned red for the third time that day, and she quickly lowered her face back to the baby, to keep the others from seeing her blush. "Shut up…" she grumbled, to which the others just laughed again.

She glanced at Daryl from the corner of her eye. He was still staring in Alison's direction, now with a thoughtful look on his face. He didn't look away until he seemed to feel Caterina's gaze on her, and he turned his eyes back to her. She watched as something flashed across his face and, for some reason, her heart skipped beat in her chest.


Author's Note (2)

Please tell me I'm not the only one who thought this was adorable? Because even I had a fangirl moment when I first thought this up, and I don't get those often… Okay, I don't get them when it comes to my own stories.

Anyway, hope you enjoyed!