Thanks All, for the Alerts and Reviews. Please leave a review if you're gonna alert or favorite, ok? I'd love to hear from ya! And no, this is gonna go pretty slow in the hooking up department folks, at least, slower than normal!

Please remember the disclaimer-don't own or make any claim to TWD characters, etc.

Chapter 3

Aliya found cans of beef stew and warmed it up as the biscuits she'd attempted to make baked in the oven. She dished it into bowls and found a bottle of honey for the biscuits. "Sorry about the biscuits. No butter or eggs, but we have honey and jelly, at least. That might hide the taste." she said, as Daryl sat down at the table.

"Biscuits?" he said as she put the still-steaming basket in front of him.

"Well, yeah. What else you eat with stew?" she looked at him quizzically, sitting down opposite him.

Daryl wolfed down his bowl, and then another, and ate four biscuits without saying a word. Without looking up, really. "Jesus," he said, "I ain't ate that much in a long time."

"I hear ya. I miss beef." Aliya said, wiping her mouth on a paper towel. "You think there 're a lot of walkers out there?"

"A few. Nothin' we can't take care 'a." he said, putting his bowl in the sink. He sat back down. "First thing we gotta' do 's fence this place all tha' way 'round."

"Right. Find a construction or a landscape company. Secure the perimeter. Then, fuel." she said firmly. "We need to find a couple big nurse-tanks from a propane company. There's gotta be a propane dealership around here somewhere. That 'll take care of the hot water situation and the cooking."

"Good thinking'." he agreed.

"We gotta find generators, too, and then we have to look for a gas truck."

"What?"

"You know. A truck full of gasoline. Like what you see filling up the underground tanks at gas stations. You see 'em all over on the road. There had to be some out and about when all this happened. We find one, we can run generators…no more siphoning gas out of abandoned cars."

"You been doin' some thinking' 'bout this."

"Yeah. Fence first, though. We get a safe place to live and then we can start concentrating on stuff like this. It's dumb not to." she shrugged. "We need to start growing our own food, too, and livestock."

Daryl leaned back in his chair with a slight smile on his face, his head cocked sideways, looking at Aliya. "How come ya' know all this stuff?"

Aliya scratched her temple and flipped a strand of hair aside. "What stuff? This is just common sense. Way I figure it, we're all here for a reason. We're either luckier or smarter than everyone else, right?"

"Suppose so." Daryl nodded.

"I'd like to think it's because we're smarter. Now we just gotta' keep on bein' smarter." Aliya looked at Daryl and shrugged. He'd never met a girl like her before. She wasn't prissy. She could handle a gun. She wasn't squeamish, either. She didn't talk about dumb shit and she didn't mince words, either. She seemed real level-headed, rational and yet, when she did speak, there was a glimmer in her eyes. There was a lot more going on with her than she let on.

"Well," he said, clinking his bottle of beer against hers. "Here's ta' bein' fuckin' geniuses."

XXXXX

Daryl Dixon snored. Ok, in all fairness, Daryl Dixon snored after a huge meal and four beers, but he still snored. He was sleeping on the long over-stuffed lounge chair in the master bedroom. Aliya was in the bed. They had decided that it was safer for the both of them if they were in one room. Door locked, dresser in front of it. Weapons within reach. Not that they were needed. It was thankfully an uneventful night. Daryl watched out the window for a while and Aliya read from a book on organic gardening she'd found in the family room downstairs. They both dropped off to sleep pretty quickly.

The next morning, Daryl woke first and coughed loudly, on purpose, to wake her up and get going. There were more houses in the neighborhood to check out, inventory. It was raining now, the ice melting quickly. By the time they were ready to leave, the ice would be gone from the roadways and they'd be ok to drive.

Daryl checked out the garage for tools and equipment while Aliya made breakfast, oatmeal and coffee. Neither of them said much while they ate and got ready to go. Aliya had put her hair up in a tight bun and ditched the skirt for a pair of jeans and a button-down shirt under a denim jacket. That was more of the Aliya that Daryl had come to recognize. He noticed, though, she was still wearing a hint of eye makeup, and chuckled to himself.

They moved through the first two houses on the left with ease. Vehicles still in garages, food in well-stocked pantries. Both houses had generators and one had a large tank out back, the hot water and heating system running on propane. As they were walking through the back yard between the other hoses to the right, a walker came careening out of the woods toward them, arms flapping wildly as it struggled to maintain it's balance with one of it's legs almost severed, clothing in tatters. Aliya raised her rifle automatically to her shoulder and sighted in the center of it's head. "No noise." Daryl said, letting a bolt fly, dropping the walker just yards from them.

"You're takin' all the fun outta this, Dixon."

"Sorry. We getta' decent fence built 'n I'll set you up with a tree stand. Shoot 'em 'til the cows come home." he said, half-joking.

"Promise?" she said, with a gleam in her eye.

"Yeah." he grinned. "Swear."

"Cool." she licked her lips.

Daryl shook his head slowly as he pulled the bolt from the walker and wiped it on the ground. He was really starting to like this chick.

XXXXX

They drove back to the camp with no more walker encounters and little trouble from the road. They arrived just after lunch and had much to tell the others. The layout, the houses, the fence situation, how many walkers and where, what all they found in the houses. Everyone was excited, especially at the prospect of hot water and food. They decided to begin to break camp and plan to be on the move by the next afternoon.

XXXXX

When they all arrived, the first thing they did was to sit down together and figure out who was going to room with whom. Six bedrooms suddenly didn't feel like enough all of a sudden. Lori, Rick and Carl got the master bedroom since they had the largest family. Carol and Andrea took another room, Dale and Stuart, Glenn and T-Dog, Bridgette and Aliya, which left Shane and Daryl together in the last remaining bedroom. That discussion quickly morphed into a vote in favor of Daryl taking over the den in the basement. Not a soul dissented.

They set about moving their belongings in and then fixing a hot meal. Afterwards, a schedule was made of chores, guard duty, showering, and household duties. Then the men sat together and talked about obtaining enough chain link fencing to initially secure the grounds. The walker problem stemmed not from the front gate and the fencing that spread out from there on the front of the subdivision, but from the back. The thick woods that the homeowners surely cherished had left them wide open for anyone and anything. Deer and the occasional wild boar were one thing. Walkers and intruders were a whole 'nother.

Daryl was sitting on the porch, smoking a stale cigarette after the meeting broke up and people were getting settled in. Aliya came out and sat down on the step and put her head in her hands, not noticing him.

"You two roomies get all cozy?"

"Not funny. I'm about to waste a bullet."

"Aww, what's 'a matter?" he grinned. "I'll bet it's just like a slumber party. Call me when ya' have a pillow fight in yer' jammies, 'k?" he teased.

"The girl is talking about nail polish. Daryl, nail polish. Please, just kill me now, ok?"

Daryl tried to keep from laughing but it was too hard. He shook his head and started to snicker.

"This isn't funny." Aliya rolled her eyes. "Maybe Shane would take me in."

"Don't even joke about that." Daryl said, turning serious. "Don't say that again." he said, pointing a finger at her.

Aliya looked at him and blinked, frowning. "Why not?"

"Stay tha' hell 'way from him. I'm not kiddin'." He was scowling now.

"Fine then. You wake up some night and I'm sleeping on your floor, don't you say a damn thing then."

"Not a problem." he said, flicking the cigarette butt off the porch and walking back into the house. "Slept with ya' last night, 'member."

XXXXX

Aliya swung the baseball bat hard and shattered the walker's jaw into a million pieces. She spun around with the momentum of the bat and brought it around in a full circle and hit it in the side of the head, knocking it down. She brought the bat down hard on it's skull repeatedly and caved it in more with a sickening series of cracks and splooshes as bone shattered and brain disintegrated. Her pants were speckled with blood and matter. She turned around in time to see a second walker advancing on Rick from behind and she pulled the .9 mm from the back of her belt and fired off a shot before it got too close and there was any risk of missing it and hitting him. She was frustrated at having to make noise and waste the bullets.

Rick turned around after taking the head off the walker in front of him with an axe and looked at the one on the ground behind him. He looked towards Aliya and nodded in appreciation. She raised a hand to waive and T-Dog came running from behind the brick building which housed the construction supply company. "We gotta go. Truck's loaded." The three sprinted around back to the gate and towards the vehicles. Shane was driving a large flat-bed truck he'd hotwired. It was loaded with fencing and uprights. Aliya's idea to find fencing had worked. She hopped in Rick's SUV and Daryl climbed in behind her, shutting the door quickly. He reached around the seat as Rick started the vehicle and grabbed her gently by the shoulder. "Any problems?"

"Nothing we couldn't handle." she said, turning to look at him. "You?"

"A few. No more than we expected, given tha' noise we was making loading that fencin'." he shook his head. "Put on yer' seatbelt." he said, winking.

XXXXX

Aliya locked the slide into place and gave the barrel one last loving wipe with the cleaning rag, removing any trace of fingerprints. She kissed it softly and jumped with a start when Daryl cleared his throat behind her.

"Jesus." she croaked, turning quickly to see him grinning at her. "Oh, what, you tell me you never kissed that Horton of yours before? I've seen you. You fondle that thing like you're in the back seat at a drive in." she laughed. "I'm surprised you ain't got a promise ring dangling from the end of it."

"Shut up. That Scout's what keeps us safe…'n fed."

"Didn't say it didn't. I love that crossbow of yours. I just know you do too." she smiled. "A lot."

"I weren't tha' one making out wi' a Glock a second ago."

"Hey, we go way back. I love my baby." she stroked the grip lovingly.

"I don't wanna' hear 'bout yer' sex life, thanks." he said winking.

"Ha!" she said, throwing the cleaning rag at him, "he's getting more action that you and I put together, lately."

Daryl sat down at the small wooden picnic table and looked at Aliya. The girl had taken out probably a dozen walkers in a parking lot this morning without even blinking and was sitting here in dirty clothes, dried blood and mud spattered on her face, and a clean weapon and it wasn't even four o'clock. Priorities, he thought to himself. "Notice anything' lately?" he asked.

"Yeah. We're running into a lot more walkers than normal, aren't we."

"Yup." Daryl nodded.

"Why?"

"Dunno. Runnin' out a' food maybe."

"Maybe. Got any ideas?" Aliya squinted as she looked at him.

"Nope. But if a horde smells us, it won't be good."

"We gotta' be proactive then, huh?" she said. It was more of a statement than a question.

"'s what I'm thinking'." he nodded.

Aliya looked away and rubbed her jaw slowly, lost in thought.