(A/N: *sigh* much delayed again but I vow to keep on track and write / update as much as possible. After last night's EPIC episode I'm so anxious to get this story progressed to amazing and much better and interesting parts it's not even funny. I've just moved last week and things are a bit slower now that all the stress and relocation is out of the way. That and I'm procrastinating unpacking as much as possible so who knows, I may even have another rewrite done by tomorrow night!)

Chapter Seven: Vatos Pt. Seven

The silence that filled the office space when the others were gone was an odd sort of thing really. The first time Analeigh had found herself so completely depleted of company she hadn't really noticed how hard it was to keep herself entertained or, for lack of a better term, contented to be on her own. There had been too much to do when she was first tasked with the chore of keeping watching her own back and keeping herself alive. Now that she was unofficially part of the group, everything that had to be done, simply stopped. At least at that precise moment in time it did anyways.

What little food and supplies left that she had gathered, Analeigh had already stuffed in one of the packs she had all ready and lined up by the door ready for a hasty departure. Rick had assured her that they had enough to get by on back at camp, and there was no real reason to risk a scavenging trip through the rest of the building for what little else there was to be had. The only think left for a poor girl playing the odd man out to do was to sit back idly on her hands and try and occupy her mind and wait for her new found "friends" to come back and claim her. A task that was far easier said than done.

The mere hour the rest of the group was gone felt like days as far as Analeigh was concerned. She paced the layout of the floor so many times she was quick to lose count. Unpacking and neatly repacking everyone's personal belongings had failed to provide much entertainment after the fourth consecutive time. And even a much needed attempt at getting a little further rest fell just a little too short of being successful. No matter what she did, Analeigh could focus on little else other than counting the minutes that she had been left alone as they slowly ticked by. In strange sort of way it was almost as if being left to her own devices was as much torture to her now as anything else horrifying and terrible she had already been subjected to.

It was funny the difference a day of being in good company after being so long deprived could make. The night before, Analeigh had slept more or less soundly through the night for the first time in what had felt like, and likely had been, forever; something which she never thought would be possible to have happen again so long as she lived. On account, it was most likely it was the security that she most enjoyed and most clung to and wanted around her just about every second of the day. Not having to watch every step she made or be on guard twenty-four hours a day. Having someone to stick up for her if need be, and more over someone that gave a shit about whether she lived or was left to rot or be torn to bits by the hoards that were good and ready for a fresh meal. Added to that was the normality and comfort of conversation company had to offer. No matter how unpleasant she continued to find Daryl to be, it was all something that Analeigh rather enjoyed and wished to have last as long as was humanly possible.

It was only when she heard the muffled echo of voices carrying through the stairwells, that Analeigh's nerves let up a little and only once the men started filtering back into the office did she allow herself to let out her breath and relax.

"Got any more ideas?" T-Dog was the first to stomp back into the room, their captive firmly in his grip as he ushered him back into a seat.

"If by that you mean good ones…then no." Rick shook his head "If it's ideas in general you're after…I'm workin' on that."

"What the hell for?" Daryl sneered. "Ain't gonna do us no good anyhow."

"We have to try."

"Best hope all this tryin' don't turn us into walker grub…I say we cut and run while we still got a chance."

"As far as I can tell nothin's keeping you here Daryl." Rick replied flatly, too deep in his own thought to be bothered much with any thought or opinion the redneck had to offer. "You wanna go on back to camp, you got every right to…but I ain't leavin' the city without Glen. I'll get him back one way or the other and whether you decide to be a part of it or not ain't up to me."

He hauled he sack of guns up onto the desk and set about readying himself to make a stand. The others kept silent around him, all eyes fixed in wordless disapproval at what he meant to do with the make shift armory. The situation, hopeless as it may be, was not something that was just going to resolve itself. Rick didn't like it any bit more than anyone else did and he was hardly one to crack under the pressure of demands being made but sometimes the only way to achieve a favorable end was to sweeten the proverbial pot. If handing over a few guns was the only thing that meant getting their own back then that's what was going to happen whether anyone liked it or not. He wasn't about to forfeit all of the guns however, and if the Vatos meant to up and take them anyway, then they would have a fight on their hands. The best fight that Rick could bring to the table anyhow and be that as it may, for everyone's sake he had all fingers and toes crossed that just this once things would play out in his favor.

"The guns are worth more than gold." Daryl was the first to speak up on the issue, uncharacteristically injecting a bit of sense into the matter. "Gold won't protect your family or put food on the table. You willing to give that up for that kid."

Analeigh shook her head. It was one thing to up and leave a stranger such as herself, but a whole different matter to abandon someone with whom they had more ties to.

"So that's it then? You really would just walk off and let God knows what happen to him?"

"Sacrifice for the greater good…would if it were up to me."

"Well, thank God it ain't." She spat. "For someone who's lookin' so hard for his damn brother you'll certainly throw off everyone else to the damn wolves as soon as look at 'em…nice way to keep yourself some friends."

"Might wanna know what you're talking 'bout before you open your mouth Sweetheart." Daryl's eyes fixed dead ahead as he fought back stronger reaction.

For someone who was so insistent keeping distance and avoiding his wrath, Analeigh was certainly still more than willing to dig at his buttons.

"It's real funny you think I don't…you go right on ahead and keep assumin'." She shot back. "Not that it matters right now though when the fact remains that you can't just damn well leave him here to whatever may come."

"No one's leavin' anyone alright?" Rick assured her. "That's not even on the table. Plan A didn't work and that's fine…maybe we shouldn't have expected it to. Point is, we regroup and go to plan B…plan B doesn't work and we go to plan C."

"You actually got a plan C?" Analeigh arched a brow.

"Not exactly." Rick slapped a fresh clip in one of the guns. "But I'll let ya'll know when I've got plan B fully worked through. However it goes, this ain't over yet."

"If I knew we'd get Glenn back I might agree." T-Dog brought his stance to the table. "But you think that Vato across the way's just gonna hand him over?"

"I don't plan on givin' him a choice."

"Are you calling G a liar?" The kid asked as though he had the right to take offense at anything said about his friends.

"Are you part of this? You wanna hold on to your teeth?" Daryl stormed towards him and cuffed him upside the head.

"Hit him again Daryl, and I swear to god we'll be leavin' you behind instead." Rick warned.

"Just how much time you plan on spending tryin' to get the Chinaman back?"

"As much as it takes."

"Wouldn't do the same for Mere now would you?" Daryl sneered.

"I came back didn't I? Didn't have to…hell I didn't even want to, but I did."

"Might be a foreign concept to you but some people actually have a little decency." Analeigh couldn't help but adding.

"Decency enough to leave a man handcuffed to a roof in the blindin' heat to be a sittin' duck for anything to come his way. Man saws his off his own damn hand to get away and you wanna tell me I don't know about decency?"

"I told you, your brother would have killed us all one way or another if we hadn't done what we did." Rick countered. "Merle was playin' sniper on the roof top and he was jacked out of his head at the time. I don't know about you but the last thing I want in a man totin' a gun is to be spun out on meth in the process."

Daryl's face fell slightly, humbled by something resembling disappointment in the accusation.

"Found it in his pocket…you can believe it or not but you might wanna take your brother off that pedestal you've got him sittin' up on."

Merle was a bit of a weak spot as far as Daryl was concerned, that much was obvious even to an outsider like Analeigh. The way he carried on about his brother and the desperate need to find him made it about as clear as day his brother was his top priority. Not that she could blame him in the least, Analeigh knew what it was like to deify a sibling just as much as how it was to be the one being held in the highest regard. Knowing someone you more or less worship was only human had a strange way of kicking one in the teeth, and judging from is reaction and the crestfallen look painted across his face it wasn't the first time Daryl had received the blow.

Analeigh would have rather have ignored and dismissed the fact that indeed Daryl apparently did have feelings but it seemed a near impossibility. It was the first spark of something other than aggression in him, something other than the need to project a well-hardened exterior and push the world away. She couldn't help but flash him a sympathetic look and a subdued half smile, even if he didn't want it. Daryl seemed like he would be the last to accept a friendly gesture even if he needed it, especially if came from her. Their eyes caught across the room and for a moment he was genuine and without hostility. No sideways glare, no sneer, no barely restrained anger, absolutely nothing to suggest his usual self. It was an unassuming look, nothing more and nothing less. He was human just the same as she was, and for just a split second, for once it felt like they were on the same level.

"If you don't mind, we need to get back on track." Rick loaded another round of ammunition into a second gun, jarring attention back to himself. "We gotta see to Glenn before we see to anything else."

"I don't know man," T-Dog rubbed at the back of his neck nervously. "What's to say anything we plan is gonna go way we want it to? It hasn't yet, and I think the question is do you trust that man's word?

"The question is what you're willing to be on it." Daryl corrected him. "Could be more than them guns, could be your life. Glenn worth that to you?"

"I repay my debts." Rick shoved his gun in his hip holster. "What life I have I owe to him. I was nobody to Glenn, just some idiot in a tank. He could have walked away but he didn't and neither will I."

"So you're gonna hand the guns over."

"I didn't say that." He assured Daryl. "Like I told you, there's nothing keeping you two here. You should get out, make a sweep for Merle, take Analeigh out of here and head back to camp."

"But if we leave how are you gonna get back?" Analeigh asked, eyebrows knitting together in worry. "You can't just make some grand speech about not leavin' no one behind and then expect anyone's gonna be alright with you walkin' on home in the thick of things."

"I won't walk…I can jump a car just as good as the next man and bring it back to camp. We could use the gas and the parts anyways…can't ever have too much."

"We leave and we tell your family what exactly?" T-Dog sighed, knowing full well there wouldn't be any explaining to be had if they just showed up at the quarry sans Rick.

Daryl mulled things over a moment more yanked one of the guns off of the desk. It was a silent show of solidarity, and however bent out of shape he might have been about the whole plan of searching for Merle going the tubes, Rick did have a point. If they were going to talk all grand about not leaving any one behind, they should at least be willing to go all in and make as good a go of it as they could.

No one wanted to see anything go down or anyone to go out in a blaze of glory, not even the kid, who let loose his own protest only to have it fall on deaf ears. It was a risk and a half to go back without the intention of buckling and conceding with the opposing side's demand for the guns, but it was apparently a stand they were all willing to make. This time, even Analeigh wasn't about to be left behind, or let them make it on their own.

"Which one's mine?" She asked Rick, nodding her head in the direction of what was left of the guns.

"We'll sort that out when we get back, don't worry." He popped another round in one of the shotguns. "Not that you need to worry none about that anymore if you're coming back to camp. You won't need your own gun there, I promise we've got things under control."

"That ain't what I meant."

He paused and gave her a disbelieving, and somewhat disapproving look. "Don't think you're coming with us."

"Don't think I'm not."

"No." He shook his head with finality. "It's too dangerous."

"I can handle my own."

"I said no."

"And who says I gotta take that?"

"You know he's right." T-Dog backed Rick up. "Now's not the time to be given him hell. It's for your own good."

"Bullshit it's for my own good." She scoffed. "And bullshit it's too damn dangerous. I appreciate the thought but ya'll just don't get to waltz in and sort out what for my own damn good."

"Analeigh…" Rick attempted to interrupt and talk some sense into her.

"I have been here for two weeks…two weeks in the middle of hell itself." She bushed him off. "I ain't dead yet, am I?"

"I won't have you gettin' hurt resting on my conscience, not when I promised to keep you safe." He lowered his voice slightly. "I don't even like these two going along with me when it's my score to settle."

"Well I guess that's too bad ain't it." Analeigh dodged around him and grabbed one of the shotguns from the pile.

Rick folded his arms across his chest as if doing so would aid his final stance and if by some magic she would realize the error of her ways and replace the gun.

"You say you owe Glenn your life, well guess what I owe you mine and I ain't gonna let you cheat me out of my chance to repay." She stood her ground. "Now, either you give me the rounds for this bad boy or I go get my damn bat…but either way I am goin' with you this time. I don't care if I have to stay a hundred paces behind you so's you don't know I'm following you…I'm goin'."

With another pointedly disappointed look, Rick relented. She wasn't wrong in the slightest. Much like he wanted to do whatever it was that he could to help those who brought him back to camp, Analeigh had every right to do the same even if it was against his better judgment to go along with it.

"I still don't like this." He grumbled and cracked open the shotgun and loaded it for her, unable to keep an amused smirk from spreading over his face.

"Maybe if you say it a few hundred more times it might make a difference. Now if you'll wait just a minute I will go and get my shoes." She took the gun in her grip and slung it over her shoulder with a crooked smirk that lightened the mood.

"You got guts…I'll give you that." Daryl's eyes tracked her as she made for the door. "Just don't let it get you killed."

"Don't you worry about me."

He grabbed her around the arm again, and held her long enough just for a few last words. "Who said I am?"