AN: Thanks for all the support, guys! I really appreciate those of you who have taken the time to favorite, follow or review. The feedback you give greatly helps me in the writing process for the next chapter.

Rylynn's foretold knock came with the morning sun. Daryl had already been up for about thirty minutes, eating and getting his gear together for the day's expedition.

He opened the door, crossed the threshold and promptly closed it behind him, practically bowling her over. She stepped backwards and squinted at him.

"Not a morning person?" she quipped. He merely squinted at her in the morning sun and started down the porch stairs. She followed suit, taking two stairs at a time in a bound.

"So the shop we are heading to is about five or six miles out," she called, quickening her pace to keep up with his longer strides.

"Fine," he grumbled, walking even faster.

"You…uh…sure you're up for that?" she said quizzically, spinning in front of him and eyeballing his clothes as they reached the wall gate. He stopped and looked down at his own attire. Torn, dirty jeans, black shirt with the sleeves ripped off, his vest, and a leather jacket over top. His brown, worn boots were laced high on his calves.

"What?" he snapped at her. She gave him an exasperated look. She gestured to her own clothes. Black, sleek running tights and a snug, navy, long-sleeved running thermal set off her orange and black running shoes.

"We're running there…and I need you to keep up," she clarified, rolling her eyes.

"I can keep up just fine. Aint likely to be left behind by some girl," he growled, not liking what she was insinuating.

He realized that he had crossed some invisible line when her head tilted in the already too-familiar side cock, but her eyes were not laughing at him this time. She sucked in a very impatient breath, and then stepped into him, their chests bumping slightly, faces inches apart.

"Look, Daryl," she whispered, but it came out more like a hiss. "You're new, you don't know me too well. So let me make this exceedingly clear to you. I am doing you a favor by letting you come along, not the other way around. This woman has been through just as much as you have, and I will not have some punk-ass boy disrespecting me. Now, you can find me as annoying as you want. You can dislike me all you please. But questioning my abilities at the job entrusted to me is disrespect, and I will not tolerate it."

Daryl heard all of her words, and her message was clear enough to him. But having her in his close, personal space was doing strange things to him. He was trying very hard to listen to her, but occasionally his focus would slip to her eyes, or the strand of hair that had come loose from her pony tail and was hanging down in front of her cheek. Her eyes were fire and intensity, but there was still a sense of softness he felt from the golden flecks.

When she rocked back on her heels to step out of his space, his hands twitched of their own accord, wanting to keep her there.

"Are we clear?" she asked him, and he met her eyes and mumbled a, "yes".

The pace that Rylynn set wasn't brutal, but it wasn't comfortable either. Halfway through the second mile, Daryl began to understand why she had questioned his clothing choices. The leather jacket had been ditched at mile one, but the jeans were rubbing against his skin, the boots were weighing down his feet, and the loose, sleeveless shirt seemed to always be a motion behind him.

Rylynn, on the other hand, was all sleekness and featherweight. Her clothes stuck to her body like a second skin, and her feet lightly scraped the ground as she churned away in her low cut trail shoes. Daryl was acutely aware that he looked absurd on his own accord, but compared to her, he looked downright incompetent.

She turned to look over her shoulder at him, and saw that he was struggling. With a visible sigh, she came to a stop and fell into step behind him. Grateful, Daryl slowed to a walk as well. They fell into place side-by-side.

Rylynn had not resumed her usual banter since she had told him off, almost three miles ago. She wasn't looking at him either, just keeping her eyes fixed on the road and occasionally checking behind them. Daryl, too, was keeping his head on a swivel. He had left his crossbow behind the wall when he realized there was no way he could carry it and run at the same time. He had several knives on him, but still felt exposed without his favorite means of defense.

The lack of proper protection, the uncomfortable clothes, and the cold silence between them was making Daryl all the more fidgety and anxious. He decided to try to alleviate the one discomfort he could.

"So…" he began, and then realized he hadn't thought of a question. He hoped the prompt would be picked up by her, but she still refused to make eye contact with him. He inwardly groaned and tried again.

"So…what do ya usually carry? When…ah,…you're on your own?" he tried. He could see her chewing on the inside of her lip, deciding whether or not to reward his effort. She seemed to go with the middle ground, gesturing to her thigh. Barely visible was a slit in the fabric- a pocket, Daryl realized. She reached into it, barely having to change her posture with her long arms, and produced several small pocket knives. She then dropped them back in, and pulled up the hem of her shirt to reveal a slightly larger pocket knife clipped into her waistband.

"That's it?" Daryl asked, befuddled. "What about a piece?"

"Don't much like guns," she said simply, still not looking at him.

"Why?"

She stopped suddenly, turning to face him. He stopped, too. "Why do you care?"

His eyes opened wider in surprise. "I don't!" he snapped, automatically.

She just shook her head at him and kept walking. Daryl sighed and brought his hand up to scrub at his eyes.

"Ry! C'mon, would ya' just…" he called, breaking into a jog for a few seconds to catch up with her. He grabbed her right arm to stop her.

"Hold up!" he said, frustrated. She looked down at his large, scarred hand and looked up at his face, her eyes screaming anger at his intrusion, and she opened her mouth to presumably scream at him, when suddenly her eyes lost their furious edge, and she dropped her gaze back down to his fingers circling her arm.

He was confused by her sudden change of emotion, but was grateful that she hadn't started yelling at him, too, so he watched in curiosity as she reached across with her opposite hand and gently grasped his fingers in hers, breaking his grip. She brought his hand down from her arm, and rotated his so that his thumb was facing upwards.

It was in that second that Daryl realized what she had seen, and jerkily tried to yank his arm away. But she had reacted just as fast, tightening her grip on him. Her eyes flashed up to his, and she quietly muttered, "Don't."

The circular scar he had given himself with the cigarette a few weeks ago shone in the early sun, white, wrinkled, tough flesh slightly raised above the rest of his skin. She examined it with concern and curiosity, trying to piece together the story behind it. Daryl yanked his hand away again, and this time she let up on her grip. He looked into her eyes, and this time it was his turn to mutter, "Don't."

But she would not let up. She held eye contact, her eyes now exuding softness and concern again. "Daryl… I'm sorry."

"Sorry for what?" he mumbled. She paused, trying to think of how to phrase what she wanted to say.

"I…I'm sorry. For whatever happened, to make you do that."

"Do what?" he said, feigning ignorance.

She was clearly growing increasingly annoyed by his attempts block her, so she continued pushing, with both intensity and sensitivity.

"Daryl…I know you've been through a lot. I know that scar is about three or four weeks old. I know you are the only one who smokes in your group. And I know that you are right handed."

He simply swallowed thickly, watching her. She stepped towards him, and her hands began to float towards his, but she stopped herself and simply said, "If you don't want to tell anyone, I won't force you. But I'm not an idiot and you're not invisible."

He wanted her hands to be around his again. He hadn't been able to look at his own hand without feeling shame and weakness since he had branded himself. But with her hands framing the mark, it had seemed less cowardly.

"I…" he began, then cleared his throat. "I…my brother, Merle…he wasn't a good guy…he tried to do the right…he…someone forced him to turn." He continued, staring at the concrete.

She raised her fingers to under his chin. He flinched away at the contact, but lifted his eyes to meet hers and kept talking, the words flooding out of him in incoherent phrases. "I had to put him out…my brother…we left him there…he didn't fit…and Beth…Maggie's sister…" he could feel his breath catching in his throat, dry sobs breaking up the phrases, "they…took…her…that bitch…shot her…we…too late…tried…harder..."

Rylynn began to worry about his erratic, ragged breathing, the way his eyes were squeezing shut.

"Daryl? Daryl, listen. Listen to me. I need you to open your eyes."

He shook his head sloppily, trapped in the images of Beth dying, Merle as a walker, Hershel being executed, the car with the cross, the man holding down Carl as Rick watched…

"Daryl!" Rylynn was beginning to panic. Several members of the community had experienced flashbacks and elements of post-traumatic stress disorder, and she had been able to help them through those, but they had been behind the walls of the town, in their homes and surrounded by support, not out alone on an abandoned highway.

Then the first moan came from in front of them, travelling down the stretch of the highway. The second one quickly followed. Rylynn looked up from the man next to her and saw at least six or seven of the walking dead shambling down the broken asphalt.

"Shit, Daryl!" she shouted. That seemed to snap Daryl out of it enough, at least to the point where he looked up, confused and dazed.

Focus, remember some of the training! She chided herself. But that had been almost four years ago! Sensory, sensory focus is key. If he isn't responding to auditory input…

She carefully, so as not to startle him, wrapped her arms around him, one across the back of his shoulders, another around his waist. "Come on, we have to go!

They both stumbled backwards onto the soft forest floor, and Rylynn immediately began looking around for a safe hiding place. There were plenty of trees in the area, but they were tall and thin, with few branches to hold onto. Rylynn knew that Daryl's focus would be shoddy for a while after his body and mind recovered from the flashbacks- she couldn't risk him falling out of a tree.

"Daryl!" she whispered, crawling back to him and forcing his face up so he could see her. "Daryl. Are you ok?"

He was still clearly distraught, but his focus and awareness was coming back.

"Daryl, you had a flashback. You probably don't remember the last few minutes. It's ok," she reminded him, knowing the news could be a bit jarring. "It's ok," she repeated, grabbing his hand with his. "But there are walkers coming down the highway, we need to hide. The trees won't hold us."

Daryl shook his head, trying to clear the fog from it. What was she saying? Hiding place. Walkers were coming. Trees are out. Focus.

His survival instincts began to kick in. he began furiously digging into the soft, wet soil beneath them. She caught on quickly, and began digging the shallow ditch as well. Within a matter of seconds, they had one deep enough to lie down in where they could pile leaves over themselves and remain relatively invisible.

The cold, wet leaves were soaking through Rylynn's thin layers, and she shivered against Daryl's side. He looked down at her, not knowing what to do. She had saved his life, that much he was sure of, and he was grateful. But he also didn't like owing her. She was confident and social and open…all the things he wasn't, would never be, could never be. And he resented her for it.

But at the same time, he admired her for it, and he felt himself drawn to her liveliness and her compassion and her stubbornness. But he didn't want to be.

Just like Merle, just like Beth…if you let people in too close, they disappeared. In this world, they disappeared violently. He wasn't sure he could handle it happening again, and he certainly had no control over stopping death, so he just stopped caring.

But looking at the strong woman, with fear and fire and determination in her eyes, laying under the mulch and the leaves next to him…he wasn't sure if he could stop the caring from happening, either.