Disclaimer: I do not own anything you recognize. I only lay claim to Adrian and Kale.

AN: So I have decided that I would be nice and post another chapter this week since I am now a few chapters ahead. Who else is excited about Season 4 of TWD airing in 36 days?!

Chapter 23

A few hours later Daryl was quietly moving around the tent getting dressed. They had managed three rounds of hard, rough sex before she had been tired enough to try and sleep. She had never told him what had caused her sudden mood swing, but then again he after he had gotten her naked, he hadn't cared enough to ask.

After he had put all of his clothes back on and had his crossbow slung over his shoulder, Daryl started for the door but the sight of Adrian's sleeping body caught his eye. She was always tense and guarded when she was awake but peaceful when asleep. It made her seem softer, not quite so tough as when she was awake, and he kind of liked it.

She was laying on her left side, partially on his side of the pallet since he had somehow managed to slip out from under her without waking her up.

Her head was on the edge of his pillow, her face half buried in the pillow, her right arm was stretched across the rest of his pillow, her leg was hiked up like it had been when she had it wrapped around his leg, the light blanket covering her was half tangled around her hips, and her loose hair was fanned out behind her. All in all she looked like a beautiful, well satisfied woman.

Daryl then mentally kicked himself for starring at her while she was sleeping like some love sick fool and unzipped the tent and left, zipping it back up behind him.

Adrian was in a wonderful place. She was in a state of where she was asleep but not asleep. She was warm, in a good mood for some reason, and knew she was in a safe place. Adrian internally smiled at herself, happy to be so relaxed for the first time since before the outbreak.

Then she was jerked out of her peaceful place by a high pitched and pain filled scream. Adrian jerked up into a sitting position and looked around wildly, taking in her surroundings. Daryl's tent.

Then she heard the scream again. She threw off the light blanket, quickly threw on her panties, grabbed the first shirt she seen, which surprisingly enough was a black, cotton long sleeved shirt of Daryl's which fell to her midthigh, threw on her boots, not even bothering to properly lace them up and foregoing any pants, grabbed her knife, and ran out of the tent in the direction of the screams. Which seemed to be coming from the field not too far from Daryl's campsite.

Adrian heard Daryl screaming for help and ran in that direction. She reached the spot the same time as everyone else. She felt as if the blood in her veins had turned to ice. Dale lay on the ground, his stomach torn open, and the dead body of a walker a few yards away.

Dale had stopped screaming but had to be in so much pain. Rich screamed for Hershal to help their friend but Hershal said that there was nothing he could do. Andrea was kneeling beside Dale crying. Adrian hadn't even realized she had dropped her knife until she heard the faint sound of metal hitting the ground.

She had only started to get to really know Dale and now he was as good as dead. "He's suffering. Do something!" Andrea cried at no one in general. Rick took out his gun and aimed it at Dale's head but Daryl walked up to him and gently took it from him, willing to take over the duty of putting Dale out of his misery.

He knelt down beside the suffering man, cocked the gun, and aimed it at his forehead. Dale raised his head, putting it against the barrel of the gun, his eyes telling Daryl to please do it. Everyone was quiet except for the sounds of those who were crying.

"Sorry brother." Daryl said just before he pulled the trigger. The loud shot echoed through the still night.

The next morning Daryl woke up to an empty tent. The night before the men had carried Dale's body back to the camp and decided to wait until daylight to bury him. Daryl hadn't stuck around after the decision had been made to wait until morning to bury Dale's body. After it had been decided he took off towards his tent.

To his surprise Adrian was back in his tent still dressed in one of his few, if not his only, long sleeved shirt. At least she was wearing clothes since it was cold outside. Daryl laid down back onto the pallet and took his boots and jacket off.

Daryl just sat there for a minute before Adrian straddled his waist. At first he thought that he just wanted sex again but then felt her hug one arm around his shoulders and the other around his head, as if she was consoling a small child.

"I'm sorry about Dale." she whispered. They were the only words spoken between the two of them for the rest of the night. They finally fell asleep after an hour of sitting like that. And when Daryl woke up around dawn, Adrian was gone.

He looked around and noticed that her shirt, jeans, boots, and weapons were all gone.

As was his shirt that she had fallen asleep in the night before.

Adrian woke up just before dawn and decided to get away from the farm for a while. It was getting colder by the day and Adrian hadn't felt like going back to her tent for one of her jackets and decided to just keep Daryl's shirt to help keep her warm.

Adrian knew about the service they were going to have for Dale but she decided to attend from afar.

When she had woken up she knew that she needed to get away from it all and had decided to spend as much time in the woods as possible that day. After everyone disbanded after Dale's service she seen a few members of the group pile up into one of the trucks and drive off of the farm.

Adrian knew that she wasn't so good at tracking but it wasn't hard to follow the trail of a walker. When Adrian finally looked up through the trees to get a look at the sun she figured that it had to be somewhere around noon or so.

'A few more hours and then I'll head back.' she thought to herself as she wiped the thick, black coat of walker blood from her knife.

When she had first entered the woods that morning she hadn't had a set destination in her mind, so she just wondered around aimlessly and killed any walker she came across.

Which had racked up into double digits in the past six or seven hours that she had been out.

She knew it wouldn't please more than just one member of the group that she had wondered off again without telling anyone, but she was a grown woman and do what she damn well pleased.

A few hours later Adrian walked back towards the farm house, noticing that Daryl's tent and motorcycle were missing from their usual spot. She walked up to the house and noticed that all of the tents had been taken down and all of the vehicles were close to the house now.

She didn't see her tent anywhere and assumed that either Kale or Daryl had packed it up for her. Her bet was more on Kale than Daryl. Even though she had told Kale to go and do his own thing, he still managed to do things for her when she wasn't around. She was glad that he had been making friends and spending more time with Jimmy, Beth, Glenn, and Maggie.

Adrian knew that she was quite a sight and in desperate need of a shower. She tracked Kale down to find out what was going on. He told her that Hershal wanted everyone to move into the house since it was getting dangerous for everyone to be staying outside. Rick and Daryl were going to take Randall back out and drop him off later as well.

Kale pointed to her stuff on the porch and she grabbed her bag and headed towards the upstairs bathroom for a quick shower. After her shower Adrian dug through her bag and decided to wear a thin pair of black leggings, a light blue spaghetti strap tank top, a thin cotton long sleeve t-shirt over it, a pair of black skinny jeans over her leggings, and her boots.

While she was putting away her dirty clothes she picked up Daryl's shirt and after thinking about it for a minute put it on over thin long sleeve. Never wanting to be caught without her weapons, she also strapped on her hunting knife and her gun, grabbed her bag, and exited the bathroom.

Everyone was busy moving all of their things into the house when Adria came downstairs. She was at a bit of a loss of what to do since all of her clothes and weapons, aside from the ones she was wearing, were all packed into two large duffel bags. Not wanting to be in everyone's way, Adrian decided to go and play guard duty over in the shed with Randall.

She was about halfway there when she seen Shane walk inside. Curious and suspicious of his behavior, Adrian ducked behind a tree and then silently made her was over to the tree line so she could get a better view of the shed and not be spotted.

About ten minutes later Shane opened the door to the shed, looked around, reached inside and then pulled a still blindfolded and gagged Randall out of the shed and quickly into the woods. Adrian was glad of her decision to keep a lookout on the shed up in one of the thicker trees instead of on the ground, since Shane and Randall walked right underneath her and never even knew it.

Adrian knew that Shane was crazy but this was just another example of him making decisions behind Rick's back.

Wanting to know just how far he was going to push the situation, Adrian decided to do one of the things she did best, and shadowed Shane and Randall without them being any the wiser about it.

Adrian had been shadowing the pair for at least fifteen or twenty minutes. Shane had stopped Randall, taken off the blindfold and duct tape that gagged him, and gave him some story about tired of being with the group and wanting Randall to take him to his.

Since she started following Shane and Randall, she had never been more than twenty-five or thirty feet away from them. She was hiding behind a tree not far from them when she seen Shane looking around.

Then she heard a scuffle, followed by a scream cut short by the sound of a loud snap.

Shane then looked around and caught sight of a thick tree to his right. He then took a few deep breaths and ran face first into the tree. He then backed away, groaned in pain, and headed back towards the farm.

Adrian moved out from behind her tree when Shane was no longer in sight and walked to the tree he had ran into. There was a bit of blood on the rough bark of the tree and a few feet away was the obviously dead body of Randall.

"Twisted bastard snapped his neck." she muttered to herself before she took off after Shane.

Adrian was about ten feet away from Shane on a thick branch when she noticed the commotion around the shed that once held Randall. Adrian smiled wickedly to herself and looked down at a now slightly paniced Shane.

'Try and talk your way out of this one, you sick bastard.' she thought.

Shane hid his gun under a pile of leaves a few feet away from the tree Adrian was hiding in and then started screaming. "Rick!" Shane then stormed out of the woods, still screaming. "Rick! He's loose! Little bastard knocked me in the face, took my gun, and ran off!" he yelled.

'Damn. Not a bad way to talk himself outta this one.' Adrian thought as she quickly climbed down the tree and dug up Shane's gun and tucked it into her jeans at the small of her back.

No sooner than she had tucked the gun away, she was scrambling back up the tree to stay out of sight of the four man hunting party. Not wanting to give herself away, Adrian decided to continue to shadow Shane and just prayed that Daryl didn't pick up any of her tracks.

Shane led Daryl, Rick, and Glenn in the complete opposite direction in which Randall's body was. Shane was being very persistent about splitting up and looking for Randall. "Kid weighs a buck twenty-five wet, and you're tellin' us he got the jump on you?" Daryl said turning on Shane.

'Smart as ever, Mr. Dixon.' she thought smiling to herself.

"I think that rock made us pretty even." Shane snapped, obviously not liking being questioned. "Alright. We'll split up. Daryl, you and Glenn cover the right, me and Shane will cover the left. I want him found." Rick said, turning and taking off with Shane.

Adrian decided to stop following Shane and head off towards where Randall's body was. Except when she got there, it was gone.

Adrian heard Daryl and Glenn walking up. Tired of hiding in the shadows for one day, she made herself known and just hoped that she didn't get shot for it.

"Daryl!" she whispered loudly. Daryl quickly spun in her direction and pointed a light in her face. Adrian quickly covered her eyes and cursed.

"Damn it, I'm really getting tired of people pointing lights in my fucking face." she growled, still seeing spots behind her eyelids from the flashlight. "Adrian." Glenn sighed.

"Fucking woman. What are you doing out here?" Daryl asked. But before she could answer, the trio heard a twig snap a few yards away. Daryl threw Glenn the light and readied his crossbow, hiding behind a tree. Glenn had his funny looking machete at the ready and Adrian silently unsheathed her knife.

A body came stumbling between the trees and Glenn shined the light in their face to reveal the face of Randall. Randall who was very much dead. And very much a walker. Because Glenn had been the one to shine the light on him, Randall went after Glenn, knocking him to the ground a half second before Daryl loosed an arrow, which flew off into the darkness.

Glenn had dropped his knife and was using everything he had to keep from being bit. Daryl dropped his crossbow and grabbed the back of Randall's clothes to get him off of Glenn. Randall turned to start attacking Daryl but Daryl gave him a hard shove that knocked Randall to the ground.

Randall fell to the ground and not three seconds later Glenn slammed his funny looking knife into Randall's skull, effectively killing him. Again.
Glenn removed his knife and Daryl kneeled down next to the body and began to check him over.

"His neck is broken." Daryl said. Daryl then flipped him over and began to look for a bite or scratch mark. "He ain't got no bites." Daryl said confused. "Yeah, none that you can see." Glenn said in explanation. "No, I mean that he ain't got no bites anywhere. He died of a broken neck." Daryl said standing up.

"Come on. Let's get back to the house. Let everyone know that we found Randall." Adrian said looking at the dead body confused. They left the body where it was and headed back towards the farm house.

"So what the hell you doin' out here anyway? I been seein' your tracks all over the damn place out here." Daryl asked her. "What?!" Glenn exclaimed. "Why didn't you say anything about seeing her track out here?" he asked Daryl.

"We weren't lookin' for her, we were lookin' for Randall. And besides, her tracks weren't close to Randall's like Shane's was. Her's was a little ways away." Daryl said to Glenn. "What the hell was you doin' out here?" Daryl asked her.

"What I do best. Spying." she answered with a smirk.

The trio made it back to the house and everyone stood, anxious to hear something. Daryl looked around. "Rick and Shane ain't back?" Daryl asked no one in particular.

"No. I think they're still out there looking for Randall." someone answered. "We found Randall." Glenn said.

"Is he back in the shed?" Andrea asked. "He's dead. Was a walker." Daryl answered. "Did you find the walker that bit him?" Hershal asked. "That's the thing." Daryl started. "He wasn't bit. We checked. His neck was broken." he finished.

The room was quiet with confusion. Lori then walked up to Daryl. "Will you please go out there and find out what the hell is going on?" she asked him.

"Yeah." Daryl said heading for the door. "I'm going too." Adrian said speaking up for the first time. "I'm coming too." Adrian heard Kale say. She turned at the door to see her young partner.

Adrian had a stern look on her face but her eyes were soft. Kale was close enough for her to touch and she gently placed her hand on his face. "No Kale. I want you here. Safe and protecting the others. All the guns possible are needed here right now. Please." Adrian said, willing him to understand.

Adrian could see Kale searching her face and finally sighed. "Alright." he said stepping back. Daryl and Adrian stepped outside and heard the others on their heels to see them off.

Only what greeted them was not a welcome sight.

If anything it was blood chillingly frightening. It was a full moon that night and the bright light of the full moon was showing them a field full of walkers coming from the woods behind the barn.
"Patrica, the lights." Hershal whispered to her. Maggie went inside and came back out with the groups gun bag.

"Kale. Get my bags. NOW!" she whispered harshly. Kale quickly walked inside and brought out both of her huge duffel bags. "Should we go back inside? Hide like we did from the walkers on the highway?" Glenn asked nervously.

"Unless there's a tunnel in the basement I don't know about, a herd that big will tear this place apart." Daryl said eyeballing the herd of walkers slowly making their way towards the house. Adrian was aware of conversation going on around her but wasn't paying much attention. She dug around in her bags to find any extra loaded clips and put at least two in each pocket.

"This is my farm. I'll die here." she heard Hershal say. The plan was to use the vehicles and take out as many walkers as possible, whether it be by bullet or by the vehicle point system. 'Wonder how the walker point system works exactly...' Adrian thought as she picked up her gun bag.

"Glenn." Adrian said handing him her bags. He looked at it with confusion as he took it. "There are extra shot guns and ammo in those bags. Take them with you." Adrian said turning away and seeking out Kale.

"Kale. Baby I want you to stay here with the women. Protect them any way possible but make sure you don't get bitten and come out alive. I can't loose you too. You remember everything that I taught you. Keep as calm as possible and don't panic. Panicing gets you killed." Adrian said as she framed his face with her hands.

Adrian gave him a soft look before she gave him a soft, chaste kiss on the lips.

"I love you every bit as much as Seth. You are exactly the kind of man I would have wanted him to grow up to be." she whispered as she took off over the railing and towards her bike.