A/N: Hey Bethylers! Here is the chapter you have been waiting for. Sorry this is so late I have been so worried that it would disappoint y'all so this chapter was reallyyyy hard to write. :/ I am super sick so please make me feel better by leaving a review before you go!

Companion song: "Girl is on my mind" by The Black Keys

Disclaimer: I do not own or have any rights to the characters/plot of TWD series. I am just a fan exploring the marvelous, macabre world Robert Kirkman created.

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Chapter 13: The Meeting

"Stay, boy" she whispered to Lucky. He was tensed and poised to run which told her his sensitive ears had picked up on the stranger walking around in the airport even though Beth couldn't hear him.

Lucky was her secret weapon and she didn't want the hunter to shoot her dog on sight.

She came around the corner, the gun she rarely used gripped firmly, to find the man already stepping out of the little souvenir shop. He looked like he was headed back out to the front doors and for a second she thought about hiding back around the corner and just letting him leave, but then she realized that he might be going to signal to companions that had waited in the woods. To her shock, he had somehow sensed her even though he hadn't turned around. She watched as he lifted his crossbow over his shoulder and raised his hands into the universal surrender position, still facing away from her.

"Keep your hands up! Don't even think about reaching for that knife on your hip," she tried to make her voice as low and threatening as possible. She was in control, she had the advantage in this situation and she wanted it to stay that way. From the rippling muscles of his arms and shoulders she knew that this man would be able to overpower her if it came down to a fight. Beth didn't feel any fear, as she knew she wouldn't, but she vividly remembered the two other times men had attacked her…

She wouldn't let that happen again.

She wouldn't mess up this time.

"Turn around, slowly. Tell me what you're doin' here and how many people you have waitin' in the woods for you," her voice echoed through the large space in the airport.

The stranger turned slowly to face her. He kept his hands raised, but she wouldn't be fooled into a false sense of security this time. She had promised Morgan that she would never lower her weapon again.

"My name is Daryl Dix—," the man started to say in a gruff voice.

But then he froze; his voice suddenly cut off as if he choked on the words as they formed in his throat. One of the first things she noticed was that he was clean—it was clear that he had a permanent camp and that it must be near water where he could wash his clothes and himself. This was decidedly not good for her, because if there was a permanent place set up nearby that probably meant there were more people there too.

The stranger's eyes travelled over her. Though not in a way she had ever seen before. It wasn't in the slimy way that Michael's eyes moved over her body or with the menacing look the unnamed man had leered at her over two years ago in the pharmacy.

He looked… awed. It was the best word she could come up with. Complete shock registered on his face.

Why is he looking at me like that? she wondered before trying to come up with a logical explanation. Maybe he just hasn't seen a woman in a long time…

She kept her gun trained on him. It didn't matter why he was looking at her like that. She had made the mistake of lowering her weapon in the woods with Michael and Jerry and her willingness to trust almost cost her and Morgan their lives. Beth had to be more vigilant this time.

But Beth didn't want to hurt this man. He wasn't threatening her and something inside her screamed to trust him.

She felt an unusual pull towards him, like their bodies were magnets. It was those blue eyes… they reminded her of something…

Beth was torn. Her instinct was telling her to lower her weapon and go to him. But the logical side of her told her that she should be afraid of a stranger. In the middle of her internal indecision, the man found his voice again.

"Beth?" it was only a whisper, but her name coming out of this stranger's mouth cut through the air that seemed to have grown thicker between the two of them. His brow was crinkled in confusion.

He knows my name. So he must know me, but I don't remember him. It must have been before I got shot.

The stranger was staring at her so intensely, like he thought she might be a ghost that would turn into vapor at any moment. Then she recognized his eyes. They were the eyes from her dreams: intense, deep, penetrating into her soul, kind but cryptic, mysterious yet comforting. Now she was the one who was confused.

Were those dreams actually memories of this man now standing in front of her?

"Beth!" he repeated her name again, with certainty this time.

That's when he started running towards her.

What the hell is he doing? He's going to attack me!

It seemed to be the only reasonable explanation for why he was frantically running at her. What if he knew her because he was the one who shot her the first time?

He was closing the gap between them, sprinting across the floor towards her like he was running for a life raft on a sinking ship. Her heart clenched, and it called out to him, instinct was screaming at her to drop the gun. But part of her was telling her to pull the trigger—who knows what this man is capable of? He was certainly strong enough to attack her and Morgan like the other men had. She had promised Morgan that she would fight the next time someone came after her, that she wouldn't drop her weapon.

But instinct overtook logic and she didn't pull the trigger. Instead, she found that her hand holding the gun was lowering without conscious thought. How did this stranger have such a strong effect on her?

"Who the hell are you? Morgan! Lucky! Help!" She couldn't make this decision on her own. Her broken brain was surely playing tricks on her.

She was still torn. To trust or not to trust?

Then he reached as if to grab onto her. She couldn't shoot him. But she also couldn't allow another stranger to tackle her to the ground so she wound up and punched him with all the power she could muster. He stumbled backwards and actually sprawled out on the checker-patterned floor just as Morgan and Lucky came crashing around the corner. Lucky positioned himself directly in front of Beth, standing between her and the stranger. Morgan had raised his gun but Beth's was only held loosely at her side.

"What's goin' on Beth? You! Back up! Slide that crossbow across the floor towards us" Morgan shouted, keeping the gun trained on the man in the sleeveless gray shirt. The stranger obeyed, backing up to a safer distance but still openly gaping at Beth. His deep-set eyes had narrowed into slits now, so thin that she could not see any of the familiar color in his irises. Hesitantly, he took the crossbow off his back and slid it across the tile with a deep sigh.

"He knew my name. He recognized me," she kept her voice low so the stranger wouldn't overhear "I… I didn't know what to do"

"Beth, honey, if he knows your name that must mean he knew you before ya got shot. He could be a part of your family!" he looked excited at this prospect.

"Or he could have been the one that shot me," she murmured even lower, glancing over at where the stranger stood awkwardly. His eye, where Beth hit him, was already swelling.

"Maybe… but we shouldn't jump to any conclusions. Let's give 'im a chance to talk," he said skeptically.

"You talk to him, please. I don't think I can…" Those eyes were still staring at her, the blue eyes that she had only ever seen in her dreams—the ones that had comforted her for two years.

His gaze was disorienting, it made her unsure if she was dreaming or awake.

"What's your name?" Morgan asked as he approached the stranger.

"Daryl," the man grunted.

He kept his gaze on Beth and opened his mouth as if to ask a question but he snapped it shut again.

"How do you know her name?" Morgan nodded his head in Beth's direction.

The hunter shuffled around and started biting on his thumb.

"I… We… we knew each other before… before she was…" his words faded off, unable to finish his sentence. But he didn't need to, she knew he meant before she was shot, before she died. Dr. Edwards had told her all about how her blood pressure and pulse would have been so slow that even with if they had a stethoscope they might not have been able to hear it. The doctor has suggested that this was why her family had left her behind in the truck, because to an untrained eye—she was dead.

The dark haired stranger shook his head as if to clear it before starting over again. "Met on her farm after the turn, our group stuck together for 'bout two years."

He sent a pleading look at Morgan, as if begging him to change the subject. Beth could sympathize. If he was telling the truth and he knew her for two years and then believed her dead for two more, it would be pretty shocking to find her in the flesh. Morgan obliged his silent plea and moved on in his interrogation.

"Are you alone?" Morgan continued the interrogation.

"Right now, yes. But I live in a town 'bout 40 miles away… we've got 'bout 100 people there." Daryl kept stealing glances at Beth, like if he spent too long looking away from her she might vanish into thin air.

Morgan whistled, and glanced over at Beth with his eyebrows raised.

"100 people? How's that possible?"

"We've got walls, built by some know-it-all architect" he started shifting around again. "There's pictures in my backpack, y'all can take a look."

He pulled his pack off his shoulders and tossed it so it landed at Beth's feet. Lucky sniffed it suspiciously but seemed satisfied that it was not a bomb. Beth smiled at Lucky's attempt to protect her from even something as simple as a backpack while she knelt down and yanked it open. She shuffled through the photos and saw big, beautiful houses and tons of smiling faces. Most of the people in the pictures didn't even wear weapons, just everyday life without the fear of needing to defend themselves. Beth had never known a life like that. These seemed like the pictures she found on the walls of the homes they scavenged, not like anything she had ever actually seen in this world. She passed them to Morgan who shuffled through a few when he sucked in a breath of shock.

"Beth! That's him, that's Rick and his boy!" he gasped, turning the picture towards her.

Daryl's head snapped over to Morgan.

"How da'ya know them?" the dark haired stranger asked skeptically.

This day kept getting weirder and weirder.

Morgan lowered his gun. And it suddenly clicked in Beth's head that this man had the same southern accent as Morgan and herself.

"Met him right at the beginning of all this, taught him 'bout walkers… then I met his boy later on. Rick saved my life. Tracked him all the way to DC because I found this." Morgan reached into his own pack, which he had readied for escape when Beth first woke him, and pulled out the crinkled and ripped map that him and Beth had followed across the country. He handed it to Daryl, who smiled tightly at the inscription at the bottom.

"Abe's got quite a way with words, huh?" he breathed under his breath. "You must be Morgan, met Rick right after his coma?"

Morgan smiled and tucked his gun into the waistband of his pants.

It seems they had another ally.

/

Seeing her, standing in front of him was surreal.

He didn't want to take his eyes off of her, afraid she might disappear again, but he also didn't want to freak her out by staring. Every time he looked up at Beth his breath caught in his chest.

Gonna hyperventilate over a damn girl, brother? Yer weaker than I thought. His brother's voice mocked him in his head, but Daryl didn't care.

It was Beth.

Nothing else mattered except convincing her to come back to Alexandria with him. This would be the best damn recruiting work he ever did. He left her in that truck two years ago, which had clearly been a mistake. He wouldn't leave her behind again. So he was hugely relieved when Morgan agreed to come to Alexandria. Beth seemed reluctant and pulled Morgan aside to talk to him. They were almost out of earshot of Daryl but his sensitive ears from ears of training and hunting which allowed him to hear bits of their conversation.

"— a trap? Can't get lured in again, I almost lost you last time." Beth gripped Morgan's forearm.

"Some risks are worth taking Beth," the black man replied with soft eyes.

"So, this isn't a situation where we should be afraid?"

This seemed like a strange question for Beth to ask.

The older man chuckled at her, "I've got a good feelin' about this one."

She nodded thoughtfully at this, seeming to trust his instinct. "I'm goin' wherever you're goin' old man."

Then Morgan said in a louder voice towards Daryl, "Pick up your stuff and come help us finish grabbin' our bags."

The big dog that Beth had called Lucky, stood with both eyes trained unwaveringly on Daryl. Daryl could tell that it was a mutt, some sort of German Shepard and Husky mix he based on the fur and the size. The dog certainly looked like it would pack a mean bite.

"Come on Luck." Beth called the dog over to her so Daryl could move.

Daryl watched in awe as he saw how much stuff was packed into the back room and hidden in various places throughout the airport, lots of meds and food which didn't even include the stuff they stashed in their emergency packs. He helped them pack things up and offered to carry bags for them.

"Did y'all need anything from the airport? Already got all the meds and most of the useful things out of the luggage, but I figured ya came in here to search the bags for somethin'." Beth glanced nervously across the room at him as she hoisted her own bag over her shoulder and picked up her bow off the ground. Her voice, musical even in regular speech, rolled into his body and he wished she would keep talking. He never thought he'd hear that voice again, but now that he was hearing it, he never wanted it to stop.

"Uh, yeah," he stuttered, trying to form a coherent thought as he stared at the woman who had walked only in his dreams for the last two years. "I was hopin' to get some meds and clothes."

"Why don't you two go look for the clothes he needs and I'll get our bag outside and the C4," Morgan piped up.

Beth nodded and looked seriously at Morgan while she stated, "Three S." Daryl couldn't make any sense out of this but Morgan nodded back at her and turned to go out a back door of the airport.

Then, they were alone.

Instantly Daryl was flooded with the memories of the last time they were alone. It was in the funeral home. Beth obviously didn't remember him, which meant she obviously didn't remember their time at the funeral home. He was smart enough to deduce that the bullet in her brain had affected her brain, which he hadn't even thought about in his initial shock of seeing her. But now his brain was inundated with questions: Was it just him that she had forgotten? Did she remember anything? Would she ever remember? How was she alive? How had he not noticed she was alive when he held her in the fire truck all that time ago?

True to form however, he didn't ask anything out loud. Words had never been his forte. So he settled for the subtle glances he kept stealing over at her. Beth still seemed skeptical of him, walking far away from him and keeping Lucky close to her.

"What're we lookin' for?" she asked curtly as they arrived at the suitcases scattered around the floor.

"Anything a pregnant lady and a newborn would need and some clothes for a 3 year old. Judy's growin' like a weed."

"You've got a pregnant woman in your group?" She smiled, a huge, hopeful smile that crinkled up the sides of her eyes. He lost his breath for a moment and forgot for a second what they were talking about.

Maggie. What the hell was Maggie gonna do when she saw Beth? Did Beth remember her sister?

"Yeah," he said simply. It was definitely not his place to tell Beth that her sister was pregnant.

He couldn't help but notice that she hadn't reacted to the news about Judith and the questions finally reached a boiling point.

"Your memory… do you remember anything?" the words tumbled out of his mouth before he even realized he was saying it. It felt like his damn brain had turned to mush around her.

Her eyes glazed over and she seemed to stare off into space, lost in her own world. When she glanced back at him, he couldn't understand the look in her light blue eyes. Sadness? Irritation? Longing? Amused? Pained?

"Not a thing," she replied simply.

And those three words fractured his heart.

Memories of her flashed through his mind—her rocking Judith to sleep, her taking care of him on the farm, her singing in the prison yard, watching her and Hershel read through the bible on quiet mornings, the way the moon lit up her face on the porch as they drank moonshine and he bared his soul to her. She didn't remember any of that and it was his fault.

Beth seemed to read the guilt in his expression.

"It ain't that bad… Can't miss what ya don't remember." Her voice was sincere and he realized that she meant it. She didn't miss any of their family.

They had been tormented by her absence every day for more than two years but she didn't even know they existed. Daryl felt like he had been rammed through the gut with a rusty kitchen knife. However, simultaneously he was pleased. It meant Beth hadn't suffered, hadn't been heart broken for two years, hadn't been in a state of constant worry about what happened to her family. She didn't know of their losses so she couldn't feel the grief. It was good; Beth didn't deserve to feel that pain. This knowledge seemed to marginally soothe the new stabbing pain.

After several minutes in silence as they searched the bags, Beth looked over at him. The look on her face was still one of uncertainty. Beth had never looked at him like that before, he remembered the time when they were alone after the prison fell and she had always looked at him with complete faith.

"I'm sorry," she said, breaking the heavy silence that had engulfed them. There were several beats of silence that followed this statement, Daryl now uncertain too. "About your eye, I mean," she clarified.

He smiled to himself; it was just like Beth to be concerned about others.

He shrugged and muttered, " 'S all right. Probably deserved it."

Daryl definitely deserved much worse than a punch in the face. He was the reason the Governor had destroyed the prison, the reason she had been kidnapped, the reason she had gotten shot, and he had been the one to leave her behind in Georgia.

Then, he was hit with a realization.

This was his chance to start over, to give Beth a second chance—an opportunity for her to have a better life. He had wedged his way into her life before and look at all the good it did for her. Daryl being in her life got her a bullet in the brain. He had always known that he was bad for her, that she was too good for him. And he had been right. Getting muddled up with a Dixon only dragged her down very nearly to her death.

So in that moment, as he searched for baby clothes for her sister, he swore to himself that he would stay far away from her this time around.

He would still protect her, would give his own life to keep her from death a second time… but he would do it from afar. He would do it without allowing her to get close to him again. His dad had been right all those years ago, Daryl was no good, and now he would try his damnedest to keep her safe from himself.

Daryl glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. The sun was coming in from the windows and white light surrounded her. Blonde wisps had tugged out of her braid and stood out around her face. The combination of the hair and light made it look like she had a halo around her. Daryl felt his hand floating up automatically to reach out and brush the hair away but he froze. He knew he could never allow himself to touch her. They had only shared a handful of hugs before and it had been enough for Daryl to fall in love with her. If he wanted her to be safe, there could never be any contact between them. So he turned his eyes back to the luggage he was

Morgan reentered the airport with a dirty backpack. It looked like he must've dug it out of the ground. Beth and Daryl stuffed their own bags with the items they'd found, he tried hard not to think of what had happened to the children whose clothes they were taking.

After they had gotten everything useful out of the luggage and Beth and Morgan had gathered all of their own bags, the little group headed out to meet Aaron back at the car. As they all walked in silence he noticed that they were well acquainted with the forest. Morgan gripped his machete tightly in his hand and his footsteps were quiet. Lucky's ears were raised and his nose sniffed the air continuously. Daryl felt confident that the dog was keeping watch for walkers. Beth was the most impressive though. Morgan's footsteps were quiet but Beth's were absolutely silent. He had to glance over his shoulder more than once to be sure she was still behind him. The hunger remembered when the two of them were alone after the prison fell—the way she tromped clumsily through the leaves and couldn't even pull the weight on his crossbow. Now she glided effortlessly like a cat through the trees.

When they got there, Aaron was already waiting for him, empty handed it seemed. But he did seem shocked to see Daryl with full bags, two people and a dog in tow.

He gave a wide smile and said, "Go off for some clothes and you come back with a small gang. Knew there was a reason I picked you for a partner."

The two newcomers introduced themselves to Aaron and his eyebrows rose so high when he heard Beth's name that they nearly disappeared into his hairline.

"Beth? The Beth? From Georgia?" he glanced over at Daryl who merely nodded.

He really didn't want Aaron to make a big deal about this in front of her. Aaron knew bits and pieces about his history with Beth. The two men had spent a lot of time on the road over the last few years and once Daryl had finally warmed up to him, he naturally talked about Beth since she was always on his mind. Somehow, it was easier to talk to Aaron about Beth than to talk to the group from the prison that had actually known her… plus Aaron was the least judgmental person he had ever met. Years of being judged for his sexual orientation meant Aaron was more understanding than most people. Aaron was a smart man, and Daryl guessed a long time ago that he had figured out that Daryl had feelings for Beth, without Daryl ever explicitly telling him. It hadn't bothered Daryl that Aaron knew this, but he hoped that he would keep his mouth shut now that Beth was here.

And Aaron didn't disappoint.

"Wow. Maggie is certainly going to be pleased to see you. We'll have to make sure she's sitting before you walk through the door," Aaron quipped lightly. Daryl shot him a grateful look for not saying anything about him.

Beth shot Aaron a confused look. Of course, she didn't even know who Maggie was.

This is unbelievable. She's here, but without her memory it's like she's not really back.

The other three and Lucky piled into the car with all the backpacks before taking off towards Alexandria. Daryl still couldn't keep his thoughts straight and he sighed with relief when he got on his motorcycle alone. The cold air blasting in his face, the solitude and the roar of his bike would drown out the confusing thoughts that churned in his head. And hopefully steady his resolve to stay away from Beth.

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A/N: Thanks for reading and for your patience! I hope I didn't disappoint you!

Next chapter we finally get to see some of our other TWD characters and some of it partially be from Rick's POV! :)

Please leave me a review about what you thought of the meeting.