AN: Here we go, another chapter here.

I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!

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"The windows are all secured from the outside," Daryl said emerging from one of the two rooms, just off the living room and kitchen space, that their small house boasted.

"Just like the door," Carol responded trying the door knob again and pushing against the door like it might actually open this time. Daryl hummed in response and sat down on the couch with a sigh. "Some freedom," Carol commented, as much to herself as to him.

"What the hell does it matter anyway?" Daryl asked. "Were you going somewhere? There's guards out there anyway." Carol looked at him. She didn't know why it bothered her, exactly, but it did. He looked tired, but he didn't really look bothered by the whole thing. "In here? This is the most damn freedom any of us have known in a long time. I took a piss and there weren't nobody watching me."

In spite of herself, Carol laughed at him. She crossed her arms across her chest and leaned against the doorframe.

One thing that was bothering her was that, perhaps, they actually had too much freedom. She didn't know what to do with herself. Their lives had been structured, since they'd been taken into captivity, down to the second. Even their so-called "free time" was had under supervision and nothing was sacred. What Daryl said was true. Going to the bathroom alone and closing a door? That was something entirely unfamiliar. At Region Thirty Three the showers and toilets had been without doors. For as shy as she remembered once having been, Carol had practically become an exhibitionist. She didn't know how to exist without being watched.

And she was far too paranoid to believe that they weren't being watched now.

They told them that their homes were private. Carol had done a quick sweep of the space, sparsely furnished as it was, and she'd found nothing she could directly identify as a camera or a bugging system. However, that did relatively little to relieve the feeling of being watched that she had in her gut. They all lived their lives, now, with the permanent sensation that someone was just behind them, looking over their shoulders, and that punishment for something was imminent.

"Besides," Daryl said, clearly not as uncomfortable as Carol was in the moment, "they said that these were all privileges we earned. Roamin' around at night's sure as hell gotta be a privilege. We just got here. Ain't earned jack shit yet."

He got up from the couch and walked over to the small table that their new home boasted. It was barely big enough for the both of them to eat at for the same meal and there were only two chairs for it. Clearly they weren't expected to have company. On the table there was a large gift basket that very nearly took over the entire top of the table. There was another, though Carol was sure the contents were different, in the kitchen. Daryl touched the ribbon to the bow that was on the basket and laughed quietly to himself.

"Two of these in the bedroom," he said. "One in the bathroom. Ain't opened 'em."

"One in the kitchen," Carol said, gesturing with her hand toward the kitchen space. Glancing in that direction, Daryl would see the basket from where he stood. He hummed. He'd no doubt noticed it already.

"And we got the whole order thing," he said, pointing out the notepad that they'd been given that, at the moment, rested on the table next to the basket. "Anything your heart desires, right? Just write that shit down and they'll deliver it to the door."

Carol doubted that too. She was suspicious of everything that they'd been given and everything that they'd been promised.

So far they'd been shown to their house—their home—and they were told that everything in the home belonged to them. These were their possessions, beyond what they'd brought with them, to do with as they pleased. The kitchen was "stocked" to provide for any meals that weren't "community" meals, as the officer had called them, and they were given some "treats" which Carol assumed could be found in the basket. Any other needs that they might have would be met if they simply listed them on the form provided for them. Their requests would be reviewed and, as long as everything was within reason, they could expect someone to deliver their goods the following day.

They were also given a list of the rules to read at their leisure. The project would start slowly. They'd be given three days to simply be. This was time for them to adjust to their new home, file rehousing requests, and think about the things that they wanted to make their lives more livable and pleasant.

They were given time to think about their new lives and their hopes for their lives to come.

And then they would all meet with the officers that Carol could only think of as something like parole officers. Each of them would be assigned to someone and they would meet with them to discuss things like their jobs within the community. According to the officer that had debriefed them before locking them in for the night, they would also be meeting with someone else who would simply like to "get to know them" and would be something of a confidant that they could feel free to discuss everything with. Carol was pretty sure this individual—or individuals, whatever the case may be—was nothing less than a psychiatrist that would be trying to figure out if they were actually the wonderful citizens that the people running the project were searching for.

But Daryl didn't seem to be concerned.

He was nosing through the basket on the table already. The ribbon was discarded to the side and he was sorting items out onto the table. More than concerned, he looked like a kid at Christmas.

"Are you finding things to your liking?" Carol asked, somewhat amused by his interest in the basket.

"Got cards," he said. "A puzzle. Some—game things? Ain't tried the television to see if it works." He looked at her then and glanced toward the small television that he was referring to before turning his interest back to the basket. "Might as well settle down. Maybe it ain't Buckingham Palace, but it's a helluva lot better'n getting strikes just for breathing heavy."

Carol relaxed a little. She wasn't sure if it had to do with his words or just his overall demeanor. It wasn't easy to maintain her current level of anxiety in the same room as someone who seemed, for just a moment, entirely void of any concern beyond exploring the new space.

"You don't think there's some trick to this?" Carol asked, releasing with her breath even more of the tension that she was causing in herself.

"Oh—I know there is," Daryl said, abandoning the basket on the table on going into the kitchen area to check the refrigerator and then to rummage through that basket. "Or...can't say it's a trick, but there's a catch. And we know it. Play nice with everyone? You get the baskets of shit you haven't seen since the world went to hell and we all went to war against the dead. Play nice with each other? You might get to breathe fresh air on your own damn terms."

"Don't?" Carol prompted when he fell silent, feeling like he was waiting for her to say something.

He shrugged at her offered word.

"Get a bullet in the brain, from what I can tell," Daryl responded. "You want somethin' to eat?"

Carol followed him into the kitchen. Each basket, apparently, was themed. The one in the living room had offered them some entertainment, light as it may be, and the one in the kitchen seemed to have assorted snacks. She assumed the "stocked" kitchen meant they probably had some bare essentials in the refrigerator and cabinet.

"There's a bottle of wine," Carol pointed out.

"You drink that without eating anything all day," Daryl said, "and we might get some kinda strike from you ralphing all over our house the first night."

Carol laughed to herself. There was still a gnawing in her gut, but it was hard to hold onto. Daryl's mood was the lightest she'd seen from anyone in some time and it was contagious.

"What is there even to eat?" She asked.

Daryl shrugged.

"Eggs?" He offered. "Anything you eat's gonna be better'n what you're used to eating."

"I can fix something," Carol said, starting around the small island in their kitchen. Daryl blocked her progress physically. She stopped and couldn't help but smile at him. A move that might have seemed threatening by most people was clearly just something of a lighthearted attempt to mess with her.

Her first night of this so-called freedom and Daryl wanted to "play" with her.

But Carol accepted the move for exactly what it was and tried to step around him, just to the side. He followed her and swayed right into her path once more. The space was too tight and too small to allow for much movement, so it wouldn't be hard for him to block her any way she went. She crossed her arms across her chest and did her best to look annoyed with him. She didn't feel, though, annoyed in the slightest and she was sure that it showed on her face.

"Do you want something to eat or not?" Carol asked, cocking an eyebrow at him.

"Turns out," Daryl said, "that if I ain't forgot it? I make a real mean fried-egg sandwich."

Carol curled her lip.

"With wine?" She asked.

"You sure got your heart set on gettin' me drunk," Daryl teased. "Egg sandwich first. Then—hell—your wine later. But I'm puttin' beer on that list."

Carol laughed at him.

"You're going to make me a sandwich?" She asked. Daryl shrugged in response.

"There something wrong with that?" He asked.

There wasn't anything wrong with it. Not at all. But it still struck Carol.

"I don't think...I can't even remember the last time someone made a sandwich for me because they wanted to," Carol said. "I mean—the cafeteria people, but..."

"Sit down," Daryl said, wagging his hand in the direction of their living room like he was shooing her away in the same manner as he might shoo a fly. "I'll bring the sandwich."

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One glass of wine and Carol's head was swimming like she'd had three or four. She'd underestimated the hit that her tolerance would take from having abstained so long from even tasting anything fermented. She'd never really been much of a drinker in her life, and every time she'd drank she'd had a pretty low tolerance, but she felt almost embarrassed at how much of an effect the liquid was having on her at the moment.

Daryl, too, seemed to be feeling it. He'd gone quiet and seemed to shake his head a little more often than she ever recalled. He rubbed his eyes and stared at the playing cards, which he was simply shuffling through every now and again, to refocus them.

They'd been through the whole house by now. They'd discovered that of their two rooms, one was a furnished bedroom. The other? Well—it was nothing more than an empty room. Apparently if you didn't want to share the bed with your housemate, you'd have to put in an order for them to have a bed. Carol was positive that each of the little houses had a "spare" room to remind the occupants that they would, if everything went according to plan, turn that room into something of a nursery. They weren't being, as far as Carol could tell, at all subtle about things.

Carol and Daryl had gone through their new possessions as well. They'd gone through every article of clothing they'd been given and all the baskets. Daryl had dragged his basket, like Linus with his blanket, from the bedroom into the living room so that he could keep rooting through it and marveling over the fact that, after so long with relatively nothing to call their own, they were now swimming in what were practically luxury items.

"You want more?" Daryl asked, noticing that Carol drained the last bit of wine out of her glass. Carol looked at her glass and shook her head. "Plenty," Daryl pointed out. Carol shook her head again and the action made her feel a little like her brain was swimming.

"I've had enough," she admitted. "Maybe even too much."

"Me too," Daryl said. "Too sweet anyway. Don't know what time they'll wake us up. Said something about community breakfast."

Carol had heard that too. Community meals or something of the like. She had no doubt that one of the larger buildings, set away from the houses, would be something like a cafeteria. It would be a way to socialize them—and a way to monitor them—while limiting how much the project spent on food. No matter what their lavish welcome gifts may look like, after all, there was surely a budget—and nothing they were given wasn't likely to have been donated by someone for the cause.

"We should sleep," Carol agreed. "Tomorrow? We'll find out a little bit more about this—place."

"You take the bed," Daryl said. "I'll take the couch."

"The bed is big enough for two," Carol pointed out.

"Then you'll be real damn comfortable," Daryl confirmed. He stared at Carol and she simply stared back at him. He dropped his eyes, then, to the playing cards and shuffled them once more. "I know what they're doin' here," he said. "So do you. It ain't real hard to figure out they give us a couple bottles of wine, a bed we gotta share, and some fancy ass pajamas—but they ain't put no condoms in them baskets."

Carol laughed to herself. Nothing he said was actually funny, but it still struck a chord with her because she'd noticed everything that he'd noticed.

"Like a honeymoon suite," she said. Daryl hummed his agreement.

Carol sighed and started to drink from her glass again, habit brought on by having had too much already, before she lowered it to rest against her leg once more.

"It's not the closet, but..." She offered. Daryl looked at her and shook his head at her before he dropped his attention back to the playing cards.

"You slept with me then because that's what the hell you wanted," Daryl said. "What we both wanted. I don't want—not because it's what they want. Not just—because it's like a job."

Carol swallowed.

She didn't know if they'd have sex together or not. She could have been easily convinced and she was aware of it. However, she could see that it was something that Daryl was struggling with at the moment. It seemed to be, thus far, the only thing that he was struggling with in regard to this new situation. And she knew, at this point, that no matter what she said to him, he wasn't going to believe her. Not tonight. Tonight he would only believe that anything that happened between them was simply a matter of obligation or expectation.

And he didn't want that. Neither did Carol.

She moved her hand and, for the first time since they'd played in the kitchen, touched Daryl. She rested her hand on his arm and stilled his toying with the cards.

"I won't go to bed with you out of obligation," Carol said. He glanced at her and she shook her head gently. "Never. They can make me do a lot of things. But they won't make me do that. But—tonight? I'm just asking you to share the bed with me. That's all. Just sleep with me. Will you do that?"

He looked, for a second, like he might refuse and Carol smiled softly at him. She raised her eyebrows at him.

"You know you're wondering what a bed will feel like after all that time on a prison cot," Carol said. "It'd be worth even sleeping with me."

Daryl looked somewhat amused then and, as something of a show, he put the cards down on the couch beside him and stood up. He reached and, at first, Carol thought he was going to take her hand. Instead, he took her wine glass first and gathered it into a strange bouquet with his. Then, shifting both to one hand, he reached again for her hand and pulled her up.

"Go," he said. "Brush your teeth. I'ma just—be there in a minute."

Carol swallowed, her stomach churning a little. She wasn't sure, either, that the sensation had anything to do with the wine as much as it had to do with the words that she was working over in her mind.

"You're coming to bed?" She asked. The words sounded as strange to her ears as she'd thought they might.

Daryl nodded his head, already leaving her to start toward the kitchen area.

"Yeah," he called back. "I'm coming to bed."

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AN: Just a reminder that this story, much like most of my others, has and will have other character involvement. This reminder is pertinent for the upcoming chapters.