Wow! I was sooo not expecting a response like that for this story, especially after only one chapter! You guys are truly awesome! Thank you! Things will be a bit slow in the beginning, I admit, but I hope it still is a bit interesting!
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Daryl stumbles back and he hissed as he felt the blade at his throat follow, breaking the skin.
"Damn woman, we gonna make this a habit 'cause I ain't a fan," he grumbles, reaching out and placing his hands on Beth's hips, taking a huge risk he knows, but the crazy look in her eyes was beginning to worry him, or scare him, he wasn't too sure.
"What did you just say?" she whispers, her voice almost threatening and he tightens his grip on her hips, keeping her from coming closer to him.
"Well, 'm pretty sure I got my answer but I asked if ya knew Hershel and Maggie," he repeats, his voice slightly strained as he swallows against the blade.
"How do you know them?" she asks lowly, her voice harder.
"Woman, get that knife away from me an' I'll tell ya," he grunts, glaring at her.
She pulls back slightly but still not enough to make him want to let go of her and give her the chance to tackle him or something because he wasn't sure why but he was sure this tiny thing in front of him was more than capable of bringing him down.
"This place I'm takin' ya," he starts, eyeing her carefully as she stares at him. "They're there."
"They're alive?" she gasps, letting her hand drop completely and Daryl releases her as she steps back, nearly stumbling against a tree.
He nods warily. "Mm hmm." He watches as a range of emotions course over her and for a brief moment he was suddenly terrified that she was going to start crying. She surprises him though by breaking out into a massive grin, her blue eyes sparkling.
"I knew it!" she exclaims and Daryl was beginning to think that with the way this girl changed emotions so fast, that she just might be crazy.
"Well what are ya waitin' for, c'mon let's move!" she said then, still grinning and Daryl watches silently - maybe slightly in shock, he wasn't too sure - as she begins to walk forward, her footsteps still barely making a sound but now full of purpose.
Daryl lets out a low whistle and he resists the urge to smirk when she whips around, giving him a confused look.
"Wrong way, sunshine."
She just gives him a sheepish smile before she turns and follows the direction he is now pointing to. Daryl shook his head, in utter amazement, at the woman in front of him, before he begins to move to catch up to her. He was still trying to determine if the girl was half crazy because here she was all full of smiles and a damn light in her eyes yet not five minutes ago she was holding a knife to his throat.
"So," she says to him, turning to look back as he approaches her side. "How'd ya meet them? Maggie and my Daddy?"
"Carl got shot," he answers gruffly with a simple shrug and continues past her, now back to leading her.
"Oh," she murmurs and nods her head - like it all makes perfect sense - and Daryl smirks again, just waiting. "Wait? What?" she asks then, her voice raising in tone.
"Rick - he's kinda the leader of our group - his son, Carl, got shot and yer daddy fixed 'em up. Been playin' doctor since then." Daryl explains shortly and then he pauses, motioning with his hand for her to stop as he hears something up ahead.
He felt her hesitate for only a moment before they hear the familiar groaning of a walker. Before Daryl can even lift his crossbow the blonde strides forward, and just as the walker stumbles from the bushes she is right in front of it, her knife in it's skull before he can blink and he just looks on in muted shock.
Yeah, the damn woman was crazy.
The walker drops to the ground and she glances back at him, probably wondering why he is just standing there like a damn fool.
"What?" she asks, her eyebrows furrowing.
"Pretty handy with that knife, girl," he grunts, shaking his head as he finally figures out how to move his feet again.
She shrugs. "Had a'lotta practice I guess."
"Ya don't get that good through just practice," he digs, giving her a sideways glance as she walks beside him, eyeing her for a reaction.
"So, when did all this happen? When Carl, got shot?" she asks then, her voice sounding uncertain at the name and Daryl wasn't stupid not to realize that she was changing the subject.
He thought back to her shooting his crossbow with near perfect accuracy and can't help but wonder why she was being so reluctant to share her training experiences. He decides that for now, he would ignore it and he found himself thinking back to the farm, to what he had heard of the "little girl" who had been swarmed by walkers and stolen from her sisters side - as he had overheard Maggie tellin' Glenn when the two had walked past his tent one night, checking the perimeter and believing him to be asleep.
"I'd say by my reckonin', we showed up on yer farm a few weeks after they lost ya," he finally says, nodding his head as he thought.
He risks a glance at her and notices her face looking lost in thought before he sees the hint of a smile forming. "Well it'll be a real surprise when I come walking up with you, I bet. I'm sure they've been goin' crazy lookin' for me, probably be real happy to see me." she says with a wistful glance in his direction and Daryl felt the words pouring out of his mouth before he could stop them.
"More like shocked. Hell, I wouldn't even put it past Maggie ta go an' faint or some shit."
"Why would you say that?" she asks in a confused voice and she stops walking, making him do the same as he looks at her.
"They think yer dead, girl," he blurts out and with the way her face falls, he instantly feels like a dick.
"What?" she asks in a whisper of a breath, her mouth gaping slightly and her eyes disbelieving. "Ya mean they haven't...they haven't been lookin' for me or nothin'?" she asks quietly.
Daryl curses inwardly as he sees the wounded look on her face, like someone had just kicked her damn puppy or something.
He shakes his head slowly. "They, uh, they already had a grave for ya when we got to the farm. Wasn't more than a few days old but I'm sure they looked for ya for a while 'fore that." he explains, scratching his neck as he tries to pull shit out of thin air. He had no clue how long or even if they had looked for her. He never really stuck around long enough to hear that part of the story.
"Right," she whispers, her eyes looking far away, the lightness that had been there only moments before now dimmed away. She swallows thickly and then straightens up, jutting her chin out as she glances toward the direction they had been walking. "How much farther?"
"A few miles or so," Daryl answers cautiously, once again terrified that she might break down right in front of him and he would have to stand there and watch because lord knows he wouldn't have a clue what to do with that.
Daryl Dixon doesn't do emotions.
She doesn't say anything, just squares her shoulders and her hand drops down to rest on the hilt of her knife and this time when she looks up at him, he sees more of the fierce woman who had just saved his ass and less of the girl who was just told her family was alive and only a few miles away. He suddenly feels this strange twisting in his gut and he gets the odd feeling to want and reach out to her. His eyes widen at that last thought and he quickly turns on his heel just as she waves her hand in front of them, signalling him to once again show her the way.
They walk the next few miles in silence, both holding their weapons ready in their hands and she is so damn quiet that more than once he finds himself looking down at her, just making sure that she was indeed still next to him. Daryl relaxes his arms slightly as he recognizes the familiar terrain and deduces there to only be another mile before the gates of the prison start to show. She follows his lead, sheathing her knife at her hip and only a few moments pass before he looks down and sees her now holding a small pocket knife, twisting it around in her hands with an almost deadly precision, the weapon looking much too harsh to be sliding around in her small hands as she twirls it around aimlessly.
"Ya know I went back to the farm," she speaks quietly beside him and he looks down at her in surprise but her gaze is straight ahead, that small knife moving around in her hands in an unconscious movement. "It took me a while to find my way back, I got so turned around when I ran and then I cut my arm up somethin' awful. Had to stitch it up myself and I holed up in an old apartment above a gas station while I healed."
He sees her knife still between her fingers and she glances down at her arm and he watches as her fingers glide over a jaded white scar over the inside of her wrist.
"By the time I made it back though, everything was pretty much gone. The barn was burned down, there were dead all over the yard, along the fences. There were even some in the house. It was awful." she sighs, biting her lip.
Daryl nods and makes a humming noise in the back of his throat. "A'couple a weeks after we showed up, got swarmed by a herd. Had to be more than a hundred. We fought back but in the end, there was no point. Like ya said, it was gone." he explains, his voice soft but still holding that roughness.
She nods, taking in a deep breath. "I never stopped hopin' though. I mean, I saw that the cars were gone and I thought, I knew they got away, that they would have made it. I didn't give up." her voice turns hard toward the end and Daryl has to look away as her knuckles grip the knife in her hand so tight he sees her pale skin turn impossibly whiter.
"You been on your own this whole time?" he questions, not wanting to touch her previous statement with a ten foot pole. That was clearly something she would have to talk with Maggie and Hershel about.
"No," she answers and he expects her to continue, to elaborate but she doesn't say anything more and he gets the feeling that even if he came right out and asked her, she still wouldn't tell him.
Beth Greene clearly had some secrets she didn't feel like sharing and Daryl knew all too well what that was like.
"Why were you out here, all by yourself?" she asks him then, looking up at him.
"Huntin'," he answers and she nods, not seeming to need any more explanation.
"You always go out alone?" she asks with what he deems is probably meant to be innocent curiosity but he can sense something more.
"Pretty much," he answers honestly, his own curiosity getting the best of him. "Ain't no one else knows how to be quiet." he adds in an annoyed tone, thinking of the failed trips he had attempted with anyone else in their group.
She nods and bites her lip. "Ya think maybe, I dunno, maybe I could come along some times? I promise I won't make a peep."
He glances at her but she is once again still staring straight ahead and he wants to answer her, tell her that he already knows she can be quiet because he thought she had snuck away from him a few times already, only to look down and see her walking silently right beside him, but another thought occurs to him first, one that once again has words coming out of his mouth before he can stop them.
"Ain't even got there yet and ya already thinkin' of ways to escape? Haven't even been reunited with yer family, girl." he questions, narrowing his eyes at her, trying to get a read on this strange woman beside him who has done nothing but confuse him since the moment she first shot his crossbow.
"It's not like that," she says quickly, sighing softly. "It's just, I don't know what kinda place ya got here but I just don't like the feeling of bein' caged in too much."
He can't help the snort that escapes him as they step through the last of the trees, the prison now in clear view as they both stop and stare, him down at the woman beside him and her over at the looming prison in front of her.
"Hate ta break it to ya sunshine but, uh," he starts and then trails off, letting her view finish for him.
"Oh." she breathes out, biting that damn lip again.
They start to walk again and as he glances over at her he starts to wonder if maybe he should be worried that even with the knowledge that her family was only a few feet away from her, the light still hasn't returned in those too blue eyes of hers.
...
Okay, next chapter will be Beth's POV...I know a few of you were expecting it this chapter but Daryl's POV is actually a lot easier for me to write at the moment so I just let it play out...
Next, a little info on how updating will be...As is, I am currently working on about four different updates for my current stories plus a Prison AU oneshot that won't leave me alone, not to mention working full time and trying to have an actual life at times outside of TWD and work (I know, crazy right?) So please forgive me if my updating schedule is a little erratic, I try to write whenever I have time and when the muse is cooperating, which unfortunately isn't always at the same time.
All things considered though, thank you so much so reading (I really, like really was shocked by the response I have gotten so far, crazy) and please review! :)