Somehow, you survived.

With all the bullets flying, the influx of walkers treading the once gated grounds, and the cries of the ones you were supposed to protect ringing in your ears despite being miles from the compromised prison, you did it.

You were alive… and the others weren't.

The events leading up to the Governor's attack didn't give you many options for escape. The lead and brass encased bullet that managed to pierce your thigh even hindered your ability to run, but you managed to work past that and get away in one piece. Into the woods, you moved by the adrenaline flowing in your veins, an instinct in you chanting for and motivating your survival.

When it inevitably ran out, you leaned into a tree and panted out in pain, a deep ache that you ignored to keep yourself upright. Your hand pushed off the bark to continue because you had no idea what happened in the aftermath, if there were people looking for you or walkers nearby ready to tear your flesh apart and swallow it down. The greedy fuckers always left enough behind to either turn someone into one of them or have it fertilize the earth winning its planet back below.

However, as much as you wanted and needed to keep moving, you went down to the ground as soon as your boots met the uneven terrain only seven feet away.

"Idiot," you muttered to yourself, your fist pounding the floor with an incredibly dull thud. The solid dirt and leaves did not make for good sound conductors.

Your leg throbbed with a vengeance, an alert to pay attention to it because of all the blood that had been lost up to that point. Considering how far you had been able to move (and the fact that you had been able to walk at all) you were sure it was because of the long distance range. They most likely missed the arteries. Well, you were still alive after what felt like hours and a shot directly to any artery meant death in minutes.

Slipping your bag off your shoulders, you began to rummage through it for supplies that might help. Before the Governor's arrival, you were tending to those who were recovering from the virus that affected the prison. That scare took a lot out of all of you, preparation for what was to come next barely there.

Ironically, you had a bag of medical supplies while others had guns and that's how you ended up in the crossfire, running as things got worse.

Your fight or flight, in your case flight, mode got you safely away from the mayhem. It wasn't heroic or special and some would say that you were lucky by getting away with some supplies when it was possible some got away with nothing or died on the spot.

"Yeah, lucky me," you murmured to yourself, pushing items aside until you uncovered a flask from the bottom of the bag's contents that you had completely forgotten about.

It was Daryl's.

You hadn't seen Daryl drink anything alcoholic (in copious amounts anyway) since the CDC so you asked him why he had it. He informed you that it was necessary in case things went sour. You knew that was just Daryl's way of telling you if everyone just so happened to bite it. It was a realistic stance considering how often people dropped like flies. It didn't make it any less morbid.

It's Plan Z. You never know.

Let's get through Plans B, C, and D first.

You didn't know what happened to him. It hurt to think about it after witnessing Hershel's death at the hands of the Governor. You were shocked, outraged, devastated. You couldn't comprehend how people had gotten so cruel, how much Hershel meant to you as a mentor and a friend.

He demonstrated a skillset you strived for before the fall, teaching you missing pieces that you had yet to acquire. Except, through his voice, you couldn't muster displeasure. There was clear motivation in being a doctor and that was simply a fresh need to survive and ensure others did the same. Your training, where you had a choice, did not have the same stakes as now did.

Beyond that, Hershel had a family. A family you grew to care for. They looked to him and his wisdom regardless of how stubborn he could be. You found yourself seeking his advice, leaning on him since who knew what happened to the parental figures in your life.

Bodies dropped all around you and you couldn't save anyone because of how everyone that needed help was in the line of fire. And you still got hit regardless of your precautions.

For all you knew, you were the only survivor. Your eyes stung with tears to think that way, to mourn the people who you stuck by since the beginning of this mess. These were not new feelings. You still had no clue what happened to your family who had been an entire journey across the country. Their California vacation could not have been more ill-timed.

They most likely died. You couldn't fully accept it having not seen it. Hell, you wouldn't have accepted Hershel or Andrea or Dale if you didn't see it for yourself. The faces of those you lost flashed across your eyes every time you closed them, an irreparable pain you would have to live with, however long you had left.

Daryl kept standing at the forefront, whatever bloomed between the two of you making it feel as if you lost more than you initially thought. You wanted to regret the shared kisses, the way your bodies attentively sought one another out through close proximity. The familiarity of his scent even carried through to your nostrils, a memory you tried to blink away along with the forming tears.

"I should've checked if anyone was alive," you muttered, defeat deep in your tone as you lifted your thigh and poured the alcohol from the flask onto your hands. The minor cuts burned, but it was only slight in comparison to what was to come. This wasn't going to be good and you had no guarantee that you wouldn't pass out, but leaving the bullet where it was called for a strong chance of infection. You were not about to let that be your end after everything else you went through.

Grabbing a rusted knife from your belt, you wiped dried blood on your shirt and then proceeded to douse it in alcohol as you did your hands, but with caution. Wasting it when you had yet to deal with your wound would be foolish.

Jamming the knife between your teeth, you then retrieved the items necessary: tweezers, forceps, bandaging, and gauze. Nothing but dread smacked your face right across the cheek once you realized the next step to be taken after disinfecting your tools.

With a glance to the sky covered by green and dimming sunlight, you looked to your wound and brought the flask over it. The remaining alcohol flowed over the open wound, heat blistering and burning to what felt like your soul. If your leg was on fire before, it was now roasting over the sun's surface.

The knife tucked in your mouth kept you from outwardly screaming, but the grunt of agony must have been heard all the way over in Florida. Your streaming eyes searched back and forth for any walkers that may have been attracted, but there had been nothing in sight. That didn't mean that you were completely safe, but at least there was enough security for you to continue.

A muffled "fuck" was spoken through your gritted teeth as you began to go to work on your leg. Your hands practically vibrated, the effort to remain steady lost despite the willpower attempting to usher you to your best wishes. The bullet sat in your blood, unblocked by many obstacles. It made sense. If it had been any deeper, you probably wouldn't have been alive.

Lucky, lucky.

Grasping it with your tweezers, you shook violently as you brought it to the floor, the ache not letting up by any means. You should have known this would happen, but walking around with a bullet in your leg when there was an extremely low chance of finding shelter, much less a community, would be taking too big of a risk. You were not going to let lead poisoning be your maker.

The bandaging and gauze had been wrapped tightly around your leg, a piece of your shirt even torn off so you could stop the bleeding.

But, as you blinked, you could see that your surroundings were starting to fade. You had no idea if it was the blood loss or if the pain had gotten too intense, but you automatically knew you were surrendering to an overpowering spell instructing you to sleep.

As your world flashed in and out, all you could think about were the faces of the people you failed to save. Daryl's was the last you saw before you finally slipped into the void.

Earth shattering, freezing water filled your nostrils and splashed over your head. You could barely breathe, sleeping one second and then drowning the next. It could have been a dream, but when you blinked through the liquid, you were able to make out several blurry figures standing only a few feet away.

Immediately, you reached to touch the ground to get your knife, but your vision settled enough to see the man at the forefront holding it out and waving it in the air. You slowly moved backwards, your back hitting the tree behind.

"My, my, my… now, where did you come from, hmm?" His drawl held a secret, secrecy of bad intentions coupled with the sadism infiltrating his sickening smile.

Somehow, the men around him looked even worse.

"Listen here, pretty thing, you were lucky enough for me to spot you first before any of these guys behind me did, but I can't guarantee your safety unless you're willing to comply with whatever I say."

This had not been the first situation in which you dealt with men like this since the beginning of the end of the world and even before that. While you wanted to fight and kick and somehow claw your way out, a slight movement of your leg reminded you of the damage that would hinder you from escaping. Running away meant possibly getting trampled by these guys. You wouldn't be fast enough.

You tried to take in where to go, but their formation left little room to get away. You could barely stand without trouble, so it was a no go. Your eyebrows creased inwards in annoyance seeing one of the men holding your bag. The man ahead of you followed your gaze and laughed, a shake of his head taken.

"We're scavengers, doll face, hope you don't mind. He saw that bag first and rules are rules."

His shoulders shrugged, the mention of "rules" making it evidently clear to you that they had a set system of some sort. Now, it couldn't have been stellar considering how it seemed based on taking items that obviously belonged to people nearby, but something disgusted you about the way bag guy had been looking at you.

Almost like a piece of meat.

"Stand up, I'd like to get a better look," he spoke again.

You were in danger and that was blatantly obvious. If he wanted a "better look" then there was probably something else lurking through his mind. At least, if you stood up, you could try and make a break for it since the worst part of that exchange would be over. You seemed to be fucked regardless.

Running away looked like your best option once you moved. Given the slight irritation forming on the man in charge's face, you didn't want to agitate it by thinking too much. Too many thoughts could possibly be your demise.

Using the tree behind, your hands found stability in pressing into the bark. Gradually, you stood to full height, the weight placed on your hurt leg delivering pain that you could barely withstand. Spite must've helped you, though, because a defiance rested in your gaze as you locked eyes with the man in front of you. His jaw slackened as he took you in, the eye contact broken so he could look down at the length of your body.

His eyebrow raised, however, when he got to your thighs. He then looked back up at your face and gestured towards your leg.

"What happened there?"

You knew what he was referring to, but you looked down anyway. Your bandages and poorly tied sleeve had been stained brick red, but they managed to get the job done. They seemed to have been dried by the cold air through the night and through the morning… you had no idea how long you had been out. It was a miracle walkers didn't find you to pick your flesh apart.

"Gunshot wound, I had to take the bullet out," you murmured through a cracked, dry throat. A sip of alcohol might have sufficed before you used it all up to prevent infection. Considering your current circumstances, infection looked pretty good right about now.

"How'd you do that?" was not the question that you expected to come out of this man's mouth. You thought that he was going to take advantage, kick it or something, unwrap it and stick his finger where it shouldn't go, but his curiosity went elsewhere.

The confusion plastered on the faces of the men behind him did not go beyond you. This wasn't a characteristic of their friend/leader.

"I… I had to disinfect it with alcohol and then use tweezers to fish it out. It stung a mighty fire, but I…"

You almost overshared what was currently resting on your mind. Who could blame you? This was probably going to be your last contact with humans and your fate's luck seemed to dwindle by the passing seconds.

But the expression that crossed the man's face was different than the predatory one he held before. If you could label it, you may have called it impressed.

"But you what? Come on, I don't have all day."

"But I wanted to live," you stated firmly.

There were a lot of things you had to do that you did not care for. Despite living in Georgia, you had no experience living on a farm. You learned through Hershel, Maggie, Beth, Annette, and Shawn through the time you spent with them. You learned how to shoot a gun because Rick and Shane showed you how, so many wasted bullets flying because you had a severe lack of aim.

Daryl had been teaching you how to track before the prison fell, something that you wouldn't have bothered to learn before the world ended. You had to do things because you needed to survive. There may not have been much left to survive for, but you would not let yourself go silently into the dark.

"You've got medical experience."

He said it as a statement and not a question. Suddenly, he was turning over to his men and whispering something that you could barely register. The chirping of the birds signaled you the time of day and you greatly considered just running right then and there since his back was turned, but just as fast as that thought came about, the man turned to look at you all over again.

His men did not look pleased.

"I'll tell you what, if you come with us without any of the screamin' and hollerin', then I promise nothin' bad will happen to you as long as I'm around. My men here are honorin' our code by leavin' you alone, but I advise you not to provoke them."

He paused, but you knew he had more to say. Men like this always had more to say, they loved hearing themselves talk. The pause was just to make sure that you were listening, an interlude where you would nod your head. You did just that.

"Alright, if you agree to be our new medic, then you've got a spot with us. We'll keep you fed, keep you clothed, if you want that is," there was that damn pause again but this time it was to see if you'd laugh. You didn't. He continued, "And you can tag along on our misadventures until the end of time strikes. So… what's it gonna' be?"

With what you assumed ran rampant in their minds, this sounded a lot more appealing than anything else did. Your eyes flickered to each face to try and gain a reading on them. None seemed too open of a book, some even looking like they were barely pamphlets.

"What if I say no?"

The amusement that erupted from the men behind the man at the forefront almost caused your eyes to roll. They boomed in their laughing and their snorting as if walkers weren't prowling around and hunting down every noise that came within their radius. You refrained from further aggravating them by remaining still against your tree.

The man didn't laugh, but his smile remained. He was just as amused as everyone else had been at your hypothetical question.

Taking steps forward, he got closer to you. The leaves crunched under his boots and you tried with everything you had to sink into your tree.

You didn't.

"You wouldn't live to see tomorrow. Does that sound like a decision you want to make, little miss survivor?"

Even in his mockery, there came hesitation in his words. He was so close to you that you probably wouldn't have caught it if he stayed in his former position. From here, you could see the fine lines and the specks of dark hair turning as white as the rest of it.

This agreement was advantageous to both parties. You didn't trust any of them, but you did trust your instincts. If you could heal or wait for a moment where they were distracted, you could find your way out and try to find the others.

Hope still lingered. Your brain kept telling you everyone died, but your chest pounded with protest. It wouldn't hurt to try, would it?

"No. It doesn't. I'll be your new medic."

Triumph took over on the man's face, a glance taken backwards at his men. The killer in you informed you how it was the perfect moment to lurch and strangle him. Your head reminded you of the bloodthirsty audience behind and so all that happened was a twitch of your hand.

"But… no one touches me."

"Isn't that what we just agreed to?"

"No, you said that no one would touch me if you were around. I want that same safety guaranteed if you're not. That isn't too much to ask."

His jaw slackened and his eyes scanned you all over again. Your body hadn't changed within the five minutes of all you standing there. But he wasn't looking for that. He was trying to find where you got the gall.

"Were you a lawyer or somethin'? Fine. Men," he turned his attention back to the others. The back of his head seemingly stared daggers into you despite there being a lack of eyes embedded beneath his hair.

"Do not lay a hand on her, she is one of us now. If I catch wind that you have, it won't be pretty. I'll be forced to let you off the squad and you all know too well what that entails."

An uneasiness fell over their shoulders. None of them looked at you out of fear. Not any fear for you specifically, but for the fear they held for the one running the operations.

He turned back to you, a finger wagged in your face.

"If you lie about any of them, I'll know. Hell, if you lie about anything, I'll know."

The man's tone dropped, the threat now in your court. You stared at his face for anything that could help you, anything that could have you on your own again. But this was a shared game. You both were trying to decipher each other without directly saying any of it.

"Now that that's out of the way," his hand reached out in front of you. Dirt and grime coated it. Your own hands were stained with red and soil so you had no room to be judgmental.

"I'm Joe. What's your name?"

You couldn't sleep the first night you were around all of them. They set up a camp with makeshift tents and twine to alert for the undead.

You chose a spot on the ground near Joe. If anything occurred, he would be within ear's shot to put an end to it. While he was intimidating and just as sleazy as all of the other men, he had a code to adhere to. So far, no one tried anything, either, but a part of you also wanted to test the loyalty Joe held for a complete stranger.

The night brightened into the day. An hour must have passed where you dozed off, your arm shaken to stir you awake. You blinked through the light and immediately sat up with the knife you clutched to your chest during your supposed slumber.

Joe's hands went up in surrender, a laugh barked out.

"This world has scarred you, hasn't it?"

After that incident, you all walked at the same pace. You had trouble keeping up with everyone with your hurt leg, but you also couldn't admit it since you didn't want to stop or take anyone's help.

"I could help you walk," Tony said. "Want me to carry you?"

You sneered and denied his offer. Somehow, it gave you enough strength to walk straighter and pick up your pace.

Joe signaled something with his hand, a point in a direction that everyone seemed to quickly understand. You, on the other hand, were looking back and forth as the men began to surround a spot you didn't look to just yet. You walked ahead, attempting to see what exactly was going on through a gap in their formation.

Before you could stop yourself, your eyes widened at the hunched, panting figure on the floor. Dirt covered wings flashed your eyes, the vest being a sign that everything had not been in vain. A hand came up to your chest in surprise. You attempted to calm your emotions upon recognition. Fortunately, Joe and the others were too focused on seeing the items they could take.

"Well, look it here."

Daryl sprung up as soon as Joe approached him. You flinched seeing Joe crumple to the ground, loaded guns and arrows being raised in Daryl's direction. They hadn't been stupid enough to give you a gun, but after you got over your shock, you stupidly raised your knife up towards Daryl, too.

You were following their leads, unsure of whether to stand by Daryl's side immediately or play it out.

Daryl was not stupid enough to let his guard down or remove his gaze for too long off Joe. It lingered on the others, sizing them up. It also was not the smartest move to take on several men, but you knew Daryl preferred to go down swinging.

His eyes found yours. They paused for a moment. If you didn't know any better, you thought you saw relief cross them. You wondered if he had looked for you. You didn't look for him.

Guilt pooled in your stomach. Your eyes attempted to tell him you were okay, that he could put his crossbow down since Joe was seemingly warm to him already. The both of you could make it out of this.

His eyes left yours and with that, a pitiful feeling filled your stomach. You fought the urge to look at the floor as you gulped down. White noise filled your ears as Joe spoke and in time, Daryl lowered his crossbow.

You both had some explaining to do. On the bright side, at least you weren't alone. At least you had Daryl… and that was all you really needed.