From seemingly nowhere emerge two more ragged and tattered boys, one maybe sixteen, the other closer to nineteen. With them they produce wood planks tethered into one and drop the thing across the fast-running water as a pathway from the wooded embankment to the island. Michael crosses first with Daryl following, the limp Peter strung up by his arms between them. A third having joined the who'd produced the bridge, three boys now stand in amazement and worry as two strangers, one a girl, pass into their camp with two of their own, Peter badly beaten. It is not missed on them the man's hand is noticeably bloody.
As soon as Beth's foot touches ground behind Daryl the planks are lifted and moved away from the water then all eyes fall on Daryl, Beth, and Peter. "What happened?" one of them, maybe the oldest, asks in a mix of hard suspicion and panic.
Michael doesn't waste time answering; he lowers his friend to the ground and splashes water on his face, patting his cheeks vigorously, "Pete! Peter?"
"What's going on?" another presses, this one younger, with hair so blond it's almost white.
"Pete?" Michael pushes on, trying to revive his comrade. The tall one, the eldest, pushes him aside and kneels beside the bloodied boy. He puts an ear to his mouth and then to his chest, listening for breath.
The boy Peter's breathing is labored, but it is present, and Beth can see his eyelids fluttering. It looks as though with some time he'll be all right. The one on his knees relaxes some and falls back on his heels, then looks back at his three companions. "Mikey," he asks pointedly, "what happened?"
Michael indicates the newcomers. "There was a mix-up. Pete got the bad end of it." Beth can't decide if this censured retelling is generous on his part for Daryl's sake, or if he's covering up his own part in it all. She looks on as he looks back at his group, who are growing more and more tense, "They're all right." He nods slightly, "This is Beth." Beth's mouth makes the shape of a would-be smile, still unsure of the footing they're standing on. She doesn't know these boys, and they don't know them — all they do know is Daryl nearly killed their friend. "n' Daryl," the eighteen-year-old shrugs.
Daryl eyes them all keenly, waiting to see if they can be trusted, waiting to see if there'll be an ambush or attack. He stays light on his feet, ready to move, ready to cover Beth, should a reckoning come. But no such event seems to lie in wait for them; the boys — the eldest no older than nineteen, the youngest maybe all of fifteen — look at them, the same look of confusion and wary vigilance on each of their faces. The oldest, the nineteen-year-old, who bears similar features with one of the younger ones now rises and steps forward.
"Hey." He waits for a response and in time Daryl gives him a stiff reticent nod, all the while keeping alert, keeping his eyes active, taking in everything in their surroundings. The young man studies him, then gives his name, "James."
Daryl shifts his weight and nods again, and because he doesn't know what else to say, having no clear read on the situation, he grunts and gives his name again. "Daryl."
Beth steps forward some, as no one else seems to be able to make sense of the encounter, "This your camp?" Neither she nor Daryl can get a clear read on any of this. This strip of earth isn't large enough to house too many people, but still, there may be more members in their ranks, lurking unseen.
At this prompting from Beth James surveys the encampment, as though making sure it really is his camp, though his true intent is to assess if they're under attack, questioning if all they have here is under threat. Are these two here, this girl and this man, some kind of Trojan horse? "Yeh." His words are tight and curt. James studies the strangers further, figuring it's unlikely someone would beat up their comrade then show up with no show of aggression if they meant them harm. If the intention is to quell them in preparation for a surprise attack, why beat Peter? Why show up with the evidence of the attack so markedly on one's person? "Yeh," he grunts again. "Well," he stops himself, "ours. I'm not— We don't have leaders." It's the truth, but looking at Daryl and her, he wonders if this is information he should not have betrayed.
Beth nods, and looks around. The plateau goes further back than what it'd first appeared to, tailing back at one end to a thick growth of saplings and brush growing so tightly together nothing but a small child or animal could get through. She sees where the creek wraps back around the land, breaking down a ledge where the water cuts down a back edge of slate, rock and earth into a sort of broken trickle of a waterfall, pooling below more than halfway around the shelf of the once-was island, then resumes as a stream running south-west through the woods. On the ledge of ground claimed as these boys' camp are several dug-out fire pits, several twig and scrap-wood built shelters, somewhat camouflaged by the materials they're constructed from, two jerry-rigged hammocks, and assorted other signs of life and survival. She blinks. "How long have you been here?"
Michael looks at Peter, then at James and at the others; no one knows how long this indefinite armistice with the strangers will last. Eventually James speaks up, a bit gruff in his delivery, perhaps compensating for the disparity of age, bulk, and general all-around ruggedness on display betwixt himself and this Daryl. "More 'n a year."
Neither Beth nor Daryl can conceive of this being true. More than a year? In one place? A place so open and exposed as this? How can that be? "There any more of you?" Daryl grunts, looking around.
Again the eyes of all the boys follow these two intruders — What do they want? Why all these questions? Should they be honest or tell a lie? What will get them what they need? Namely, safety, and leave to continue to exist as they have done? "There're seven of us," James says. "All together." Including the battered Peter there only totals five of that seven accounted for…
Daryl looks at him, "How many you start with?"
James looks at the others, he looks at Peter on the ground, slowly starting to wheeze, he looks back at Daryl, straight in the eye. "We started out with hundreds. We started out with thousands. We started out with seven billion. We lost all but seven." This kid is smart, and though he's on edge he's personable, and his meaning isn't lost on Beth and Daryl, and all this counts for something in the running ledger they're keeping in their heads. "Why?" he looks at Daryl stiffly, "How many did'you lose?"
"Too many," he answers, with a hard distant edge.
James now directs his attention to Michael, "Why'd you bring them here?" His eyes glance again at Beth and Daryl, "They staying?" He looks at Daryl with narrowed eyes, projecting a fierceness he's still too young and not built enough to really fully pull off, "You planning on staying?"
Daryl doesn't falter; he does not hesitate in his reply. "We don't know what this—" meaning the camp itself, its situation and its people "—is."
"'This—'" the younger boy who looks like James interjects, "s the best naturally protected spot in these woods. 'This' is the best you're ever gonna find."
"Jo Jo!" the other one of them reproaches. Even before the change it was never especially smart to boast of what you have to strangers who do not. So that again is one small tilt in the scale toward trusting this group. It's clear from their confusion they're not used to meeting people; they may not have encountered another group for months, maybe more. By all accounts it does not seem like it has ever happened on the grounds of their actual camp before.
Michael looks in consideration from his companions to the two people he'd brought with him to camp. "Peter was bringing her back; he was going to let her in."
"Then what happened to his face?" the smaller facsimile of James interrogates. "Why isn't he standing up, saying all this to us himself?"
"Like I said," Michael maintains, "there was a miscommunication." He looks at Daryl, "You did this 'cuzza her? Right?" Daryl looks at him, at the other faces, and at Beth; he nods mutely. "All right then," he says satisfied, "he thought we were taking her, we weren't; Peter was going to take her in, now instead of one we got two."
"Now instead of one small girl—" the supposed younger brother chimes in "—we got her and this Frank Miller character who beat the shit out of one of us. Good call."
"How else was I gonna get Pete back?" Michael challenges. "The kooks were swarming in, we almost didn't make it. I needed them."
"Yeah? Well, now we got 'em." The boy looks at Daryl. "What do you want?"
"What do'ya think?"
"We don't know, Mr. Blonde, that's why we're asking." He looks at him, "You gonna try n' take this place?" He glances at Beth, "You an' her, an' the rest of your crew gonna come in here at night and slit our throats?"
"There aren't any others," Daryl says, and his voice is so grave as he says it, so empty and flat, the four boys know enough to take it as the truth. "We're not looking to take nothin' off' nobody. That's not who we are."
"Who are you?" This came from the fair-haired one, who looks to be the youngest — maybe fifteen or fourteen — though maybe it's just that he's smaller.
"Daryl," he grunts. "Dixon. This is Beth Greene; we're on the road."
"Just the two of you?" The boys are amazed.
"Mm-hm." Daryl's hooded eyes aren't meeting theirs. Some stories don't want to be told.
"What are you looking for?" It's James again who's asking the questions.
"Safety," Beth answers.
"This place is safe."
"Nothing is safe," Daryl corrects them.
"That mean you're moving on?"
Daryl looks at Beth. He looks at the borders. He looks at the resources surrounding them, and scans the faces of these kids who don't seem to pose any threat or threaten any danger — he'd almost given up those sorts of faces still exist. He looks back to Beth, who looks like she wants to stay, at least for a while. They can't walk forever.
Daryl looks at them, with meaning, "How many walkers you kill?"
"'Walkers'? You mean the dead ones?" Daryl nods. "A lot. I don't know. We avoid 'em more than anything, but we've killed a lot. Why?"
Daryl doesn't answer, he asks his next question. "How many people you kill?"
The boys look at him. They look at each other. The answer comes solemnly, "Six, I think. Maybe seven."
"Why?"
"… Different reasons. Some of 'em, our families, they were hurt, had the fever."
"Or they got swarmed. Weren't going to make it."
"And the others?" Beth asks. All eyes fall on her.
"They were bad." It's the blond one, the youngest, who answered.
Daryl looks at him, intently, his narrowed eyes studying him so closely as to make out his entire character just by observation, "How do you know who is 'bad'?"
"You just do. Badness makes itself known, sooner than later."
These words strike deep; Daryl eye's drift towards Beth, he's thinking of the Governor, and all the missed chances they'd had at stopping him. "Not soon e'nough," he mutters. He looks back at the boys. "How do'you know we ain't bad?"
"If you were bad, really truly bad, you'd look fairer; or much fouler." James' allusion is lost on Daryl but the reasoning seems sound enough.
"So you're staying?" Michael puts it to them.
Daryl looks to Beth, and Beth Greene nods. When she looks at the boys, their newly, as events played out, adopted group, her eyes are bright, full with sweet disbelief as she takes in these faces and this, their new camp. It is not home; it is not the prison, or the farm, there are no walls, no infrastructure of comfort; her family is not here, but yet, it is something — a good something — after so much bad, after so much nothing. The world is no safer, they are not out of woods, but this is a relief, a reprieve, she had not thought they would find. "Thank you."
If you're not familiar, the "Mr. Blonde" is a Reservoir Dogs reference. The Fellowship of the Ring also appears in a moment of reference.