Alexandria

The small group was near the front gate gearing up when RickyJo showed up. She had her son propped up on her hip and Glen could see by the look on her face that she was not impressed. Eugene was still trying to get out of going with them but he shut right up when he saw her coming. Deanna was standing near them. She saw the woman coming and was interested to see what she wanted. She had assumed when she met her that RickyJo was a weak woman who had latched onto a strong man in order to keep herself alive, and she was starting to figure out that maybe her assumption was wrong.

"This is who is going on the run?," RickyJo asked them, waving her arm at the group. Most of them nodded. "No, no, no," she declared. First she pointed to Noah. "Limpy McGimpy you are not going anywhere," she informed him. Not only did he have a limp, he was a terrible shot and tended to panic and run like a rat.

"I can go," he started to protest, "I want to help."

"Good," she told him, pointing him back towards the house, "You want to help, there is a huge dirt pile down there, Jessie will tell you where she wants it put." Then RickyJo cocked her hand up n her hip and looked at him with her eyebrows raised, like why was he still standing there. Noah sighed and handed his gun to Eugene then headed off down the street grumbling under his breath. Tara was smirking. She had been thinking about the same thing, but had been too nice to say it. RickyJo turned back to the group. That had been easy, but the next one was going to fight her on her decision.

"You," she said, pointing to Aiden's friend Nicholas, "you are not going anywhere either." He looked shocked and Tara had to fight back her laughter a second time. RickyJo waited to see if Deanna was going to challenge her. When the woman didn't say anything she added, "Go home."

"You can't tell me what to do," Nicholas informed her. Most normal people would be relieved not to have to leave the walls. The fact that he wanted to fight her on it confirmed for her that he was as big an idiot as she thought.

"You need combat training before you go out again," she told him firmly. From what she had heard from Tara, what he really needed was to grown a brain and a pair of balls, but she felt saying that was not going to make this go any easier.

"No I don't," he insisted, "I can handle myself just fine." RickyJo shrugged and shoved her baby towards Eugene, who held him like he was a disease. She stepped towards Nicholas, gesturing in the air.

"Come at me then," she said. Nicholas looked around to see if anyone was going to come to his defense. Surely they could see this woman was one brick short of a full house. Aiden had his arms crossed looking at his friend with no small amount of amusement. He was glad he had no been singled out as a weak link. Seeing no other option, Nicholas raised his hands like a amateur boxer. He took a few tentative steps towards the woman, who did not have her hands up and was starting to circle him like a shark. He took an awkward swing at her, which she easily dodged, reaching in to slap him hard across the face and then dancing back out of his reach. Now he was getting pissed off. This woman was making him look stupid in front of everyone. And he wanted to hit her. Hard. Lunging at him with a quick movement and darting back, she made him flinch and almost trip over his own feet.

"Can't be afraid to take a hit," she told him with a smile. Now he was getting serious, clenching his fists and trying to get closer to her. She looked casual, and not afraid of him at all. Moving to get him in the spot she wanted him, RickyJo waited until her took another swing. She blocked it with her forearm and grabbed his wrist with the other hand, twisting it up behind his back and slamming him against the side of the van. She got very close to him, pressing her body agaist his back.

"Out there," she told him, "When someone gets ahold of you like this, they are going to rape you. They are going to kill you. And they are going to eat you." She felt Deanna's hand on her shoulder.

"Enough," the woman told her, "you made your point. Let him go." RickyJo let the man go, backing up and keeping an eye on him in case he decided to have another go at her. Deanna positioned herself between them. "Go home Nicholas," she told him. The man muttered a few curses and stomped off. RickyJo took her baby back from Eugene.

"I know you don't want this to turn into a militant community," RickyJo told the woman, "But if you are going to send people out there, they need to be able to protect themselves." Deanna nodded. She wasn't agreeing to anything yet, but she understood the point. RickyJo turned to Aiden, who was feeling nervous. "Why don't you take your brother with you instead," she suggested. Spencer still needed some seasoning, but at least he wasn't a total moron. Eugene took this opportunity to point out the obvious.

"You know I don't have any combat trainging either," he mentioned.

"Stop being a big wet hen," RickyJo told the man, "You're going." Then she turned to Glen. "Stop by the construction site and take Merle or Abraham with you," she told him. Really Rick should be up here, volunteering to lead the mission, since he was the so-called leader. But who knows where he was. Outside the walls hiding guns in blenders like a squirrel, most likely. Glen didn't bother to argue. He knew what she told him wasn't a request. And though there had been no formal discussion on the matter, everyone pretty much deferred RickyJo when Rick wasn't around, and sometimes even when he was. Whatever she said, Merle and Daryl backed her up, and lately, that meant Abraham and Rosita too. Plus she was close with Tara and Michonne, who usually agreed with her. If there was ever a real split between her and Rick, Glen knew it would tear the group apart. It almost happened when they had been arguing about whether or not to come here with Aaron. If Rick was smart, he would keep her close, like Shane used to do. But politicking had never really been Rick's strong suit.

Spencer returned, geared up for the trip. In truth, he hated going on runs, and was usually happy to let Aiden and Nicholas handle it. But he was happy that he had been chosen by RickyJo as someone she thought could be trusted and depended on. He liked her and out of the new people he had met, she was one person who's friendship he would like to have. Sammie and Carl came running up at the last minute. They had heard from Noah's angry complaining that he had been kicked off the run team.

"We can go," Sammie offered. RickyJo would have felt fine sending the kids. But she glanced sideways at Deanna, who clearly did not think it was a good idea. Maybe this would be a good opportunity to give in a little. Every battle was not worth fighting.

"Run team is full," RickyJo told the kids. "But I heard some hogs around the outside of the wall this morning if you guys want to go hunting," she added. Deanna still seemed uncertain about this, but at least they weren't going out on the run. Sammie and Carl seemed perfectly happy with the idea of going hunting and ran off to get some guns and bows from the equiptment locker. RickyJo was still thinking about the combat training and how she was going to get Deanna on board with it.

"If you would feel better we could call it self defense training," RickyJo suggested with what she hoped was a helpful smile. Seeing that her suggestion was not going over well, she added with more sincerity, "I just don't want what happened to me to happen to anyone else." Deanna was really finding it hard to resist the other woman's urgings. She had really been wrong about her. This woman was a force to be reckoned with.

"If I was to agree to this," Deanna said, "who would I put in charge of it?" RickyJo smiled a real smile at the woman now. Deanna had noticed the woman's looks before, but she when she smiled she was radiant.

"I would probably put Rick in charge," RickyJo said, "I mean he is a cop. He probably got proper fight training at cop school, right?" Deanna laughed, she wasn't sure what the proper name for the school were policemen went was, but she knew it wasn't 'cop school'. RickyJo thought about it and then decided to give the woman one more peice of advice. "Rick is and ego maniac," she said quietly to Deanna, "when you are dealing with him, its always better if you let him think everything is his own idea."

"Isn't that true for all men?," Deanna asked her. Deanna had been dealing with people for a long time, and she had gotten good at reading them over the years. When RickyJo smiled at her joke, Deanna knew in that moment that she had won the woman's respect. And she also knew respect from this woman was something she needed if she was going to truly going to get these people on board with the kind of community she wanted to build.

Carol smiled after the kids as they ran off to try and join the run team. She guessed they were not going to be allowed to go, which she thought was a mistake. The kids in this town were growing up weak. They were not going to be prepared for the world that they were going to have to live in. She took the bowl of table scraps outside and dumped them into the small compost bin that was in the center of one of the herb gardens. Noah seemed to have gotten over his anger about the run, and was now following Jessie around with the wheelbarrow, talking her ear off.

Rick saw her from where he was sitting on the porch of the other house with Beth and waved her over. Beth could tell they were looking to have a private conversation, so she took Judith over to and set her down in the playpen, pulling it over to a shaded area. Rick would tell her everything later when they were alone anyway. Then she went back to helping with the gardening. Carol set the bowl on the stairs and then sat down on the swing next to Rick.

"You talk to RickyJo about the guns?," she asked. Rick laughed. That could either mean the talk went really well or really bad.

"She and Merle already had guns," Rick told her, "They stole them the same as we did." Carol shook her head. The two of them were really something else. She wondered if they had gotten in through the window like she had.

"They use the window too?," she asked.

"No," Rick told her, "RickyJo said Merle distracted Olivia while she stole the guns." Carol gave him a sideways glance. He was looking pretty amused, so she guessed Merle had not hurt the woman or scared her. "He sucked a little face with her," Rick said.

"RickyJo didn't care?," Carol asked.

"I guess not since she was laughing about it like it was the best thing she's seen all year." Now Carol was laughing. She couldn't help herself, the mental image she was getting was ridiculous.

"Is Daryl on board with this?," she asked.

"RickyJo didn't say," Rick said, "but you know he will usually go along with whatever RickyJo wants to do."

"So what are we doing?," Carol asked.

"Well we are going to try and make these people see reason," Rick said, "get them on board with what we need to do to make this place safe."

"And if they don't get on board?"

"Then we will take this place." Carol nodded. She hated to even think it, but that's really what they should have done the minute they got here, instead of playing these stupid games with Deanna. She knew these people were good people, but they were stupid and like Michonne liked to say, stupid gets you killed.