Disclaimer: I don't own The Walking Dead or any of the recognizable characters mentioned or described in this story. All intellectual property belongs to the creators of the comics The Walking Dead, networks AMC and FOX, and pertinent streaming platforms who may also hold rights. This work is public and non-profit.

Read Author's Note at the end.

He was going to die because he was angry at his dad.

Not seeing the third walker coming from behind him was a rookie mistake, but not one he deserved to die for.

He should've acted quicker, aimed better. The first two piled over him, and three poorly-aimed shots at the third one had finally emptied his dad's gun. And now he was going to die in a gruesome pile of walkers, not a mile away from his dad, and all because he had been so angry at him for not thinking he could handle his own.

While the third walked neared its filthy, decaying hands to his body, time seemed to slow down, or maybe his brain was finally processing things as it should, just a bit too late.

At least he'd get to see his mom, he thought for a moment. She went to church often and always believed in the idea of heaven. She'd surely gone there, despite what she did with Shane, and if he was lucky he'd end up there with her, and he'd apologize for pulling the trigger and for not being a better son.

He'll see Shane too, maybe, and he'd wait with them and Judith until his dad died. Which wouldn't take too long now, all because of him.

Carl sighed, pulling the trigger a few more times just in case, but the case was empty.

His last words would've been an apology to his dad, who got him to survive that far into the apocalypse, but didn't get to say them because he gasped in surprised as a long, pointy blade went right through the third walker's skull, ending its growling.

There was a woman at the other end of the stick. Wisps of blonde hair escaped her high ponytail and stuck to the sheen of sweat on her forehead as she panted softly, shoulders rising with every intake of breath. Her jean jacket was relatively clean and she wore a floral skirt that flowed just below her knees, which were firmly separated in a rather stiff pose.

Her hands were shaking as she pulled the sharp end of the stick out of the walker's skull—which, now he realized, wasn't a common stick, but had a very ornate shaft with decor in orange-toned metal. She looked around, turning on her feet a completely 360 degrees before addressing him directly.

"Are you alright?" She said in a very musical voice that reminded him of a teacher's as she extended her hand in his direction. He didn't hesitate to take it, pulling himself back to his feet and dusting off his pants. "Did you hurt yourself?"

"I'm fine." He said proudly, trying to save face. "I had it."

"Of course you did." She said cheekily, giving him a toothy grin that made him look down. "Just making sure, that's all. Are you alone out here?"

No, was his first instinctive response, but he wasn't sure about much these days. For once, he had to think reasonably. After all, he was in charge of his dad's life now. Was this woman alone? Did she have a group like the Governors? Did she want him to tell her where his dad was just so she could take their stuff too? Not like they had much now, but still, his dad would be angry.

He fixed his hat and stared into her eyes, trying to appear as mature as possible. "Are you?"

She chuckled softly just as someone grunted: "For fuck's sake, dude."

Behind them strutted a girl carrying two large backpacks that looked full and quite heavy. Her hair, too, was messy, half tucked away in a cap, but she looked worse for wear and wilder than the blonde, bloodier, and definitely angrier. They both seemed about the same age —maybe around Maggie or Beth's, he couldn't tell.

"I'm sorry about that," the blonde apologized at her companion. "He looked… Well, he had it handled." She turned and gave him a complicit wink that made him blush furiously. Carl turned and rubbed his hot cheeks, hoping they weren't as red as he thought.

The other girl didn't seem amused. "Whatever." She growled as she threw the blonde one of the backpacks. "Done playing Wonder Woman?" She eyed Carl up and down a few times as if assessing him. Her large, tired eyes watching his handgun with caution before she turned around and continued to walk.

"Wait, Poppy…" The blonde jogged to catch up with her. "I think he's alone, we can't…"

They talked in hushed voices that Carl couldn't quite make up, but he understood that the blonde was trying to convince her friend to help him, and the other girl was insisting they just go.

In other circumstances, he would've insisted he was fine, but there was something about the blonde that made Carl want to trust her. And then her skirt lifted with a gush of wind and he saw a fresh, crisp-looking bandage on her leg. It was tight and the gauze was perfectly lined up, just as good as the ones Hershel wrapped up.

"Do you have a doctor?" He anxiously asked the blonde, who seemed a bit startled at the interruption.

Her eyes darted between his and the hem of her skirt. "Are you hurt?"

Carl shook his head. "Not me."

The blonde pursed her lips and looked at her friend with pleading eyes for what seemed like a long minute until the angry girl turned towards Carl, huffing. "How many people are you with?"

"It's just me and my dad now." He said, not feeling like she would take kindly on a lie. "We used to have a big group, but we got separated." He did omit that they got separated just a day back.

"Just you and your dad." She parroted, eyeing him warily. He nodded. She studied his face for a moment until she nodded too. "Fine, lead the way."

"So you have a doctor?"

The blonde girl smiled brightly and patted her friend on the shoulder. "Sort of."

"Oh, this is roadkill." The angry girl winced as her blonde friend elbowed her in the ribs.

"That's his dad." She said between gritted teeth, trying to shoot him a reassuring smile that only ended up looking tense.

"Well, he has eyes." The other girl said as she tossed her backpack to the ground and went to clear the house. He'd done that already, but he respected that she wanted to be sure. He'd do the same if he was in her place. She hit the walls with her first a few times, waiting for growls that never came, and peeped out of every window and inside every room on both floors before going back to the couch where Carl's dad was.

The blonde girl never moved from his side, worried eyes studying his dad's almost dead figure, but not moving a finger.

"So, this doctor…" Carl trailed, clearing his throat.

"Oh, that's her." The blonde girl pointed at her friend, who simply opened one of the backpacks and fished underneath a ton of supplies until she pulled out a clear case of medical equipment.

Her hand went to grab Rick's arm, but Carl grabbed her wrist before she could touch his dad. "You… don't look like a doctor."

She unleashes her hand from his grip and breathes out, looking at the ceiling as if calming herself. "That's because I'm not, kid-"

"-It's Carl."

"Whatever… Carl, I'm not a doctor, if you wanna get technical, but you're just gonna have to trust that I'm your dad's best chance right now, alright?" Carl nods. "Good."

She then grabs Rick's left wrist, her free arm rolling up the sleeve of her shirt so it reveals a mechanical watch on her arm, and presses her index and middle fingers right above a fat vein. The room was silent for a few seconds while she counts to herself, watching the thinner hand of the clock waltz over the twelve little numbers.

"Heart rate's on the low 50's, how long's he been out for?" She pulls out a small lantern and opens Rick's eyelids, flashing it on his pupils.

"Six, maybe eight hours." He says.

"Is he or does he have a history of diabetes, high blood pressure, or other major illness I need to know about?" Carl shakes his head. "Blood family members?"

"No, my-my grandpa was a big guy, some problem with his thyroid I think."

"Do you know his blood type?"

"Same as mine…" He says simply, his own gunshot wound almost burning at the memory of the incident at the farmhouse. The girl's exasperated look is enough to make him blurt out: "A positive."

"Pupils are responsive," she opens the man's mouth wide and flashes the light down his throat. "Airway's not visibly obstructed, but I do see some inflammation." She proceeds to unbutton his shirt unceremoniously, revealing a torso full of fresh bruises and scraps. "Holy shit."

"What happened, Carl?" The blonde girl asks, staring at the angry handprints around his neck.

"Abdomen's not rigid, although with all this bruising I can't rule out internal bleeding just yet." She sniffles a yawn on the back of her hand. Her hands unbuckle his belt and then unzip his pants. Carl clears his throat, drawing her attention. "What?"

Carl looks uncomfortable as he says: "I-uh, it's just…"

"This is strictly medical, kid."

"Carl."

"Right!" The blonde says, grabbing his shoulder kindly like his mother used to do. "Carl, Ophelia here is conducting what they call a full physical exam, so this is strictly…"

"Motherfucker, kid…" Ophelia gasps as she pulls the man's pants down, uncovering a gnarly gunshot wound. "You could've started with this."

She begins to treat the wound while muttering to herself: "G.S.W. to the left thigh, through and through, bleeder's under control, looks like it missed the femoral and didn't hit bone, slight damage to the Vastus Lateralis…" Ophelia pours a clear liquid over the wound that begins to sizzle as soon as it touches blood.

Carl was about to protest, but the blonde spoke before he could. "My, where are our manners, I'm Darcy, this is my charming best friend and end-of-the-world companion Ophelia," she tilts her chin at the other girl. "She's a bit rough around the edges, but she's secretly a softy."

The other girl, Ophelia, simply glares at her under her cap, now dabbing the wound with something else… Alcohol, Carl recognizes from the smell. "Stop talking."

"Why, now I can't talk to people?" Darcy retorts.

"No." Ophelia deadpans as she brings a small, curved needle to the flame of a lighter, holding it there for a few seconds until it turns black, and then wipes it in a square of clean gauze.

Carl watches as she begins to close his father's gunshot wound with the help of tweezers and scissors.

While her friend takes her care of the sick man, Darcy pulls a half-full bag of pretzels and sits on the kitchen table, offering some to Carl as soon as he follows her to the kitchen, still looking back to make sure his dad's alright.

"She'll chew my head off for bringing food near her sterile area." Darcy jokes as she munches on some pretzels. "Lesson number one, leave the room unless she explicitly tells you she needs your help."

"So she's a real doctor?" He asks.

Darcy makes a so-so movement with her head. "Med student, but her daddy was a good one, never lost a patient at least…" She trails off with a soft laugh as if it's an inside joke. Darcy pulls the hem of her shirt to reveal the bandage Carl had peeked at before. "Cut myself open last week with some window, it was bleeding bad, and she came through like I've never seen her. She was all professional, wasn't putting up with any of my emotional babbling. Oh, kid, I was a mess. She would've made a brilliant doctor one day."

Darcy stares at her friend as she diligently works on Carl's dad. "Guess we got lucky." He says, swallowing hard. He didn't like feeling useless. Sure, he could take a few walkers, be a good soldier for his dad, but he couldn't help him like this.

"Yeah, we did," Darcy says. "Anyway, she could use the practice, I think this is the first time she's treated a gunshot. How'd he get that anyway?"

Carl hesitated. He wasn't sure if telling the two people who could help his dad get back on his feet about the massacre at the prison was a good idea. What if they got scared and ran? What if they didn't trust that they were the good guys?

He didn't realize his silence went on for so long until he heard clipping from the living room and saw Ophelia with her head half-turned, squinted eyes locked into him as if daring him to say the wrong words. Carl knew he had to be smart without setting off her alarms. "We had a prison, it was a good place for a while, another guy had a community, he wanted to take everything we had by killing all of us. There was a stand-off…" he starched his arm anxiously. "No one won."

Both girls remained silent for a while after that. Dany took it upon herself to cover a pack of crackers with canned tuna and heat tomato soup for the four of them. She brought three bottles of water and a fourth blue-tinted sports drink. "It's not brunch at August's but it's food." She says as she puts the food on the table just as Ophelia walks into the kitchen area, wiping her hands with a towel that smells strongly of chemicals. "He's a little dehydrated, he'll need…"

Darcy pushes the sports drinks closer to her. "Gatorade?"

Her friend raises an eyebrow, a slightly impressed look on her features. "Yeah, nice thinking, sunshine. Wound's closed, but I want to get him on antibiotics to prevent infection, his temperature's rising and I don't like that he's been unconscious so long."

"We're out of those." Darcy sighs, looking at the unconscious man sprawled on the couch.

"I know."

"We can check the houses." Carl offers. "Looks like people 'round here had money," he says, thinking of the boy's room upstairs. "They probably had the good meds."

"Did you check upstairs already?" Ophelia asks.

"Yeah, they took it all, there's not much of a mess either, so probably at the beginning." He ties his boots securely before strapping on the empty handgun. "We can look around, grab whatever you need."

Daisy had already sat on the ground next to Carl's father, munching on what was left of her improvised cracker sandwiches, and Ophelia looked between her and the man. He could be about 180 pounds, 5'10"… It didn't take her a second to do the math against Darcy's 120 pounds, 5'4" of dainty forest fairy…

"You go." Ophelia decided, pulling a small notepad that had seen better days and scribbling down. "Bring these, I'll be here in case there's an emergency."

Daisy smiled and nodded, taking the note as soon as she ripped it off the pad. "Amoxicillin, Cephalexin, Clindamycin, Dicloxacillin, Doxycycline, Trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole, that's a mouthful."

"You know the drill."

"Active ingredient, don't mind the expiration date, check name matches three times or don't bring it at all."

"Good. Be careful out there, sunshine."

"I'll see you later, Poppy." She smiles warmly and then turns to Carl. "You ready… Cowboy?" She wrinkles her nose at his hat.

Carl blushes in embarrassment and heads out first. Daisy turns back, chuckling conspiratorially at her friend when she finds her pulling her hair out of her cap, letting down her messed-up ponytail. Her hair was dirty and caked in black guts in places, but she could still see the pretty red color beneath the grime, a reminder of the little freckled troublemaker that became her best friend fifteen years ago. The end of the world had painted purple shadows under her eyes, but the rosy tint on her cheeks and the bridge of her nose remained.

She's still Poppy, she would tell herself whenever she thought her gone.

Ophelia looked up and saw Darcy lingering on the threshold with a pensive look on her face. "What?" She asked a bit harshly as she unpacked the tightly-knit cloth bag of dirty garments.

Daisy forced a bright smile to her face. "Nothing, we'll be right back." And she closed the door, following the kid-cowboy down the street, knuckles tightly wrapped around the shaft of her spear, thinking to herself over and over the same phrase.

She's still my best friend.

Author's Note: All feedback is welcome! What do you think of our OC's so far? If you're interested in knowing how I picture them, Ophelia is based on Holland Roden (MTV's Teen Wolf, SyFy's Channel Zero) and Darcy is based on Victoria Pedretti (Netflix's The Haunting of Bly Manor).

Also, please considering buying me a cup of coffee, which is just fancy talk for making a donation so I can continue to pay my bills and have a roof under my head to keep my laptop from getting wet during rainy days, which are particularly nice to write on. The link is in the Author's Note, which is the first 'chapter' on this fic, right behind this one you're reading.

You can also access it through this link: buymeacoffe dot com/nicolescoffee

Thanks for reading!