AN: Hey guys, first let me just say a huge thank you to those who faved and followed, and an even bigger thanks to those who reviewed (Katarzyna88gb, BreenaBelle-xoxo, galwidanatitud, Badmoon907, scarletgoldphoenix, Kaikitty165, and MelYu) :D I never expected so many people to actually take in interest in my story! Updates might be a bit irregular but I'll try my best to make some sort of schedule - maybe once every two weeks? I'll make it more frequent if I can, but I can't make any promises.

Did you see 06x09?

SPOILERS- Oh my fricking gosh that episode was AMAZING! I was squealing through almost the whole thing! Everyone showed a badass side that was simply awe-inspiring and the way Daryl dealt with Negan's men was Epic (capital 'E' cause it was that good)! I can't say I didn't expect that to happen to Jessie and Sam; as soon as he started calling out for her in 6x08 I knew they were dead. It sucks because I did like Jessie 'cause she was so sweet, but I prefer Richonne anyway ;) But oh my gosh poor Carl! I thought he was a gonner for sure omg. What did you think about the episode? I'd love to know your thoughts!

-END SPOILERS

Can't wait for 06x10 tonight~!

Anyway, here's the next chapter! It's kinda rushed but whatever. Thank you for your patience!

Goodbye To A World

Chapter 2: Two's company

-Erin Blake-

The pair trekked along in silence.

Erin had always been content to walk or sit quietly with someone, but it felt awkward - wrong, almost - to be doing so with a person she barely knew. Especially since that person was leading her into the unknown, possibly towards danger.

She bit her lip, her gaze wandering over their surroundings as she tried to think of an appropriate conversation topic. She dismissed the idea of asking about Daryl's life prior to the apocalypse; it would've been pointless to reminisce about the past and her questions would only serve to upset or aggravate the man (from what she had seen from him so far, the latter seemed more likely). She couldn't ask about what his life was like after the outbreak either; it would have been downright invasive. She sure as hell didn't want to give her story.

She sighed. Making small talk was really difficult.

Daryl appeared to be struggling with pushing the motorbike (which was to be expected she supposed, as they'd been walking for almost an hour without breaking, and the bike was obviously very heavy) and the sight caused guilt to settle in her stomach. She probably should have offered him assistance much earlier. "Can I help with that-"

"Nawh, s'alright." he brushed her off swiftly without even a glance in her direction, and quickened his pace as if to prove he didn't need her aid, and in extension, her. She sighed again. She wanted Daryl to like her as soon as it was possible, but it was difficult to grow close to a man who was so aloof, and it didn't help that she hadn't had a conversation with someone for months and thus her social skills were out of practice.

They kept walking, passing burnt bodies and charred trees - nothing new, yet it was still scenery Erin was not completely accustomed to. Among the ashes on the ground, she spotted a black, feathered wing, its appearance causing her to slow to a halt. It looked like it had been ripped out from the socket. Morbid, she shuddered. Her superstitious father would have said it was a bad omen. Erin was pretty sure omens and prophecies didn't exist, but regardless she hoped the bird had already been dead when its wing had been torn; somehow the idea of animals in pain had always upset her more than the thought of humans in pain.

Upon noticing Daryl had stopped and raised an eyebrow at her, the redhead trotted after him, the feathered appendage abandoned.

"Do you know what happened here?" she asked once they were walking beside each other again.

"No. Thought you would."

Erin shook her head and ran a hand through her hair. "I've got no clue, I've only been here for a little while." She looked over at him, recalling his earlier words. "You said you have somewhere to be?"

"Yeah." He confirmed, and huffed as he pushed the motorbike over another skeleton. It cracked and snapped like a bundle of twigs under the heavy weight, and Erin cringed at the sound, imagining her bones breaking in a similar manner. "Got separated from two others, gotta find them and get back to Alexandria."

"You've got a group then." she noted, as if it weren't already obvious. He grunted in affirmation. "Is Alexandria a place or a girl?" She'd tried to make her voice teasing, but her genuine curiosity was obvious in her tone. Strangely, part of her hoped Alexandria was a girl; the world needed more love, especially when so many couples were torn apart - literally. Love born of shared experiences was so strong too. True love, the childish part of her mind sang.

"Place." Daryl answered, and glanced across at her with an eyebrow raised while Erin forced her expression to remain neutral."It's well-defended, surrounded by walls, an' there's electricity and runnin' water." She perked up at his words, her disappointment disappearing like a rabbit in a hat trick. Running water was a rarity and electricity was almost unheard of. A place that had both would've been incredible. She cautioned herself not to get too excited; she didn't want to set herself up for disappointment.

"And the people there? What're they like?" she prodded.

"Most've been there since the start. They're like how people used to be, naive but alright."

"It sounds like a fairytale," she mused before a frown etched into her forehead. "But it also sounds dangerous to be surrounded by people who haven't experienced, well, this." She lifted a hand to gesture vaguely to their surroundings before letting it fall limply back to her side.

"They're alright." Daryl shrugged. "A bit dumb but they ain't gonna cause much harm." Erin's eyes narrowed.

"Exactly, they're harmless. How would they defend themselves if something happened?"

"We're workin' on it."

"I hope so."

They lapsed into silence again and Erin's brow creased in thought. Did she really want to join a group? A group in which a lot of people apparently had no experience or fighting skills? She had been doing rather well on her own. Sure, she was more on the skinny side of the spectrum, and going to sleep was always a bit nerve-wracking because there was no one else there to watch out for walkers or other threats. But she was still alive after months of solitude so that had to count for something.

And if she joined a group she wouldn't be able to fulfil her promise.

However, having a group would make things so much easier. More food, water, people, and sleep... and Alexandria sounded like a secure, well-protected area to live in. With electricity. If it was truly as safe as Daryl implied then some naive occupants wouldn't be too much of a problem, and hypothetically she could sneak out of the camp sometimes to ensure her promise was kept.

Erin realised she was getting ahead of herself; Daryl hadn't even offered to let her join his group. He'd only told her about it. Yet why else would he have let her follow him if not to let her join? She shook her head, thoroughly confused. "How'd you get separated?" she asked. She supposed some more intel could be useful.

"Got attacked."

She bristled. "Wolves?"

"The ones with W's on their heads?" he checked.

"Yeah."

"Don't think so." She was torn between feeling relieved, concerned, and disappointed. His answer meant his group probably wouldn't hunt down the Wolves and slaughter them before she could, but it also meant that she had no one to help her kill them all, so the process would be slower and they would be more suspicious of her for sneaking off at random intervals. On top of that, his answer meant that there was possibly another threat to worry about. Wolves, she could handle. People who weren't Wolves, she wasn't so sure about. Daryl turned to look at her closely. He had squinty eyes, the kind that always looked distrustful and calculating. She fidgeted under his stare, unnerved. "That's twice ya mentioned 'em. " he stated, though she could sense the underlying question in his words.

Erin twitched, one hand reaching up to her scarf while the other rested on the handle of her cleaver. She looked away from him. "I guess you could call me a Wolf hunter," she muttered. Her words were met with more silence. If he had heard her, he'd chosen not to comment.

The terrain dipped into a steep slope which Daryl continued towards without caution, and he paid for that mistake when he stumbled and dropped the motorbike as gravity pulled the vehicle forward. He swore quietly. Erin lengthened her strides to catch up to him.

"Please just let me help," she sighed. Daryl ignored her and instead ditched the bike in favour of pulling out a walkie-talkie from his belt. Erin blinked. Has he had that this whole time? Annoyance at herself for not noticing and at Daryl for not mentioning it boiled in her chest. Before she could scold him, he clicked a button and held the device closer to his mouth.

"Sasha, Abraham, you there?" his inquiry was met with static. Erin tried not to feel too crestfallen and focused on committing the new names to memory.

A dripping noise drew her attention away from her thoughts to a corpse on the ground beside Daryl. Blood was plopping onto its face, slowly yet rhythmically. She lifted her gaze, and stepped forward worriedly when she realised the red liquid had came from Daryl - more specifically, from under his sleeve.

"Daryl, you're bleeding." she murmured. He grunted in response and shot her a look, as if to say 'way to point out the obvious'. He pulled off his bloodied glove and slowly peeled off his leather jacket, revealing a sleeveless top, toned arms, and broad shoulders underneath . She swallowed. She had always been appreciative of some muscle but... at that moment she found it hard to appreciate arms that surely had enough strength in them to kill her if she wasn't careful. Plus, there was blood trickling down his arm, and that wasn't exactly what she considered 'hot'.

Her stare latched onto the source of the blood. A wound which, from her angle, looked semi-circle shaped - shit. She had forgotten to ask him if he was bitten. Idiot, idiot, idiot! She couldn't travel with an infected person, there were way too many risks. But she needed him to get to Alexandria; she couldn't just kill him! Then again, he hadn't told her about the walkie-talkie, and he hadn't told her about the bite - could he be trusted at all? Alexandria could have been a carefully constructed lie to make her continue following him. He might have been leading her somewhere completely different for some ulterior motive. The outbreak had brought out the worst in people, spawning rapists, murderers, and thieves... She was brainless to trust him so quickly.

She stepped back, eying him warily as her hand lifted to hover over her gun.

Catching the movement, Daryl glared at her. "I ain't bit," he asserted. She looked at the wound sceptically, and his glare grew firmer. "I ain't." She took a deep breath, attempting to calm herself. Daryl's group was attacked, remember? She reminded herself. A bullet probably grazed him - give him the benefit of the doubt, and if it turns out he was bitten or if he's letting you come with him for all the wrong reasons, you can skewer him. Simple.

Erin slung her backpack around so she could open it, and dug through its contents until she found what she was looking for; a tiny bottle of vodka. She held it out to Daryl. "Here, I was saving it for a special occasion but..." she trailed off with a short, nervous laugh. Though looking somewhat bemused, he took the bottle with a nod of thanks. She was glad to see he didn't always reject help; life with him would be a lot easier that way. He unscrewed the lid and poured its contents on the gash with only a minor wince. There wasn't enough of the liquid to completely wash his arm but at least it would clean the main wound.

She pulled her backpack over her shoulder and (after a few moments of hesitation) she ripped off the bottom of her shirt, revealing a light pink, jagged scar that stretched diagonally across her stomach. Daryl didn't comment on it, which she was more than thankful for, yet she refused to meet his eyes as she wrapped the grey material of her shirt around his wound, tying it off untidily.

"Generosity'll get you killed, Bambi," he grumbled as he turned to pick up his discarded jacket. She frowned at his back- mainly due to the nickname -but smiled brightly when he turned back to face her.

"Well, it hasn't killed me yet so I'm gonna keep doing my thing, Bunny."

Daryl stiffened. His blue gaze narrowed into icy slits. Woops. She might have gone too far, but his reaction was amusing - especially when she imagined him with angrily twitching rabbit ears. "Bunny?" He grit out the word incredulously and the faintest trace of a blush dusted his cheeks. Awh, how cute.

She huffed, blowing a strand of red hair out of her face, and tried (and failed) not to smile. "I forgot the name of the rabbit in Bambi, so 'Bunny' will have to do." She leant back against a tree, its charred bark pressed against her back uncomfortably. Daryl muttered something inaudible. "What was that?" she asked. He seemed to waver before replying gruffly.

"His name's Thumper."

Erin stood up straighter and a chesire-cat grin stretched across her face. There was an edge of matter-of-factness in his tone that simply couldn't be ignored. "Didn't realise you were such a big Disney fan, Bunny," she teased with a quirked eyebrow. Daryl glared at her heatedly.

"I ain't."

"Of course you aren't." she cooed.

He grumbled something unintelligible. Her grin widened.

A twig snapped.

Daryl and Erin froze, their eyes meeting to confirm the other had heard it.

Wolves, was her first instinct. Something akin to a snarl threatened to rumble in her throat. She slid the cleaver from its sheathe, her left hand lingering on the Glock. The Wolves rarely carried weapons with range, and there was something strangely more satisfying about sinking a blade into someone's flesh in comparison to shooting them from a distance. Guns were too neat for what those bastards deserved. Those bastards deserved butchering.

Swiftly, Daryl dropped his jacket, unclipped a bag from his bike and slung it over his shoulder, then picked up his crossbow. He grabbed some dead foliage and dragged it over the bike, concealing it from view. Erin frowned. "We're leaving it here?" she whispered, and noticed how he eyed the bloodstained cleaver in her hand. His expression didn't reveal how he felt about it. He nodded curtly.

He gestured for Erin to stay behind him, his crossbow raised expertly as he crept forward. It was almost eerie how quietly he moved, as graceful and predatory as a panther stalking its prey. If the situation wasn't so tense she would have stopped to admire him. She generally considered herself to be light-footed, yet compared to him she felt like a stomping elephant. He must have been military - or a hunter, she deduced as they eased forward.

Another twig snapped.

The pair turned sharply towards the sound.

Two women shot up from their crouching position, one blonde and one brunette, their hands flung up in surrender. Both were quite skinny (which was unsurprising) but the blonde seemed to be better fed than the brunette, suggesting that most of the food they gathered was given to her - why? Her hair was cropped short, and her face was rounded and youthful. She seemed to be in her early twenties. The brunette's hair was thrown up in a messy ponytail, and she had a more defined face than her companion and deep brown eyes. Erin guessed she was in her late twenties or early thirties. Both women may have been pretty if not for their dirty and dishevelled appearances. Erin supposed she couldn't judge too much; she was probably in a similar state.

Neither woman had a 'W' shaped scar.

Not Wolves and not important, Erin concluded. If she hadn't met Daryl then she might have thought differently. But she had met Daryl and with him was the hope of a group and safety. He was a ticket to a better life and until she met the rest of his group, he was the only survivor who was of importance to her.

"You found us, okay? Here we are." The brunette's voice was shaky and both girls were trembling with fear. Erin and Daryl exchanged a quick glance. The woman's words had been confusing - and worrying, too, as they had implied someone was looking for the two girls. Maybe the Wolves are chasing them, Erin thought hopefully, already plotting to use the women as bait to draw out the rabid bandits. The brunette stepped forward then, slightly in front of the blonde in a protective manner. Her voice - previously fearful - sharpened accusingly along with her expression. "We earned what we took." The woman's stare flickered to the side of Daryl, alerting him and Erin to someone sneaking up on them.

Erin spun on her heel to face the new threat just in time to see Daryl get smacked in the face with a log.

Her flight instinct kicked in.

Erin bolted back the way she and Daryl came without looking backwards, her feet pounding against the forest floor as she darted through the burnt trees. She heard a shout behind her but ignored it, and focused on the ground ahead so she could avoid anything that could have tripped her. She was fast- fast enough to outrun any walker without too much difficulty, and fast enough to outrun a few Wolves if enough effort was acquired. She could escape.

A gunshot rang through the air. A game-changing factor. The bullet collided with the tree next to her in a shower of splinters and instinctively she flinched away from it, ducking her head and shifting her direction. Keep running, keep running, keep running, the words were repeated in her head like a mantra. Erin yelped as another shot was fired at her, the bullet hitting the ground near her feet. A curse rumbled from the man chasing her, the unexpected proximity of the voice causing her heart to leap. Impulsively she glanced back to see how close her pursuer was.

It was a grave mistake. One moment of diverted attention was all it took for Erin to trip over a branch and crash to the ground.

Desperately she crawled forward, a muffled cry escaping her mouth as the man grasped her ankle and dragged her backwards. She jerked her leg, intending to kick him off. It worked to a degree, but moments later the hand gripped onto the back of her shirt instead and pulled her upright. She tugged away and stumbled forward. Her heart was dancing in her chest, her legs ached to bolt again. The click of a gun made her freeze. He was too close and she had no doubt his aim was steady since he wasn't running anymore; he wouldn't miss if he chose to shoot at her again.

Erin turned slowly, her hands held up in the universal sign of surrender.

AN: And here we see the less likeable side of Erin. The self-preservation side. The side that runs away and leaves her hot hunter pal/future bae when he gets hit in the face with part of a tree. Tut-tut.

On another note, Daryl is a hard character to write geez

...I hope this is passable?