𝐂𝐑𝐎𝐒𝐒𝐇𝐀𝐈𝐑𝐒, Daryl Dixon

⁴⁹, PARENTAL AUTHORITY

  "Carol?"

  Daryl's expression tightened, looking back to the forest as his hands slid away from Vex.

  "Come on out."

  The figure that emerged was not Carol, but an unfamiliar boy. He was young and lanky, he looked tired, perhaps injured.

  "This is Noah," Daryl said, his gruff voice stealing Vex's attention away, "He was with Beth in Atlanta."

🗡

  Zeppelin had been glued to Daryl Dixon's side since she woke up that morning to him whispering with her mother. She had little shame for the childish action, and even less care once she heard the conversations transpiring between the group.

  About the hospital. About Beth. About Carol.

  Every new detail made Zeppelin sink further into Daryl's side, protesting the idea of reality once Rick and her mother departed to start talking about a rescue mission.

  "You can't leave again."

  Daryl glanced down at Zeppelin who was curled into a comically small ball under his arm, her own wide eyes staring up at him.

  "Got to," Daryl said. "For Beth and Carol."

  Zeppelin pursed her lips into a tight frown, averting her gaze and resting her head on his collarbone.

  The man himself frowned, unsure of what else to say. The group had already dispersed, picking apart the church to reinforce security outside, so he couldn't give Vex a questioning look to step in.

  It wasn't that Daryl didn't want to talk to Zeppelin, or that the conversation was a daunting one.

  It was the simple fact that Daryl didn't know how to deal with a kid looking up at him like he hung the moon. He'd been around Carl for years now, been around Lizzie and Mika and Sophia-- hell, even Beth was a kid in his eyes.

  But he had never taken on a bigger role, especially following Sophia's fate.

  He kept his distance. He tried to, at least.

  But Zeppelin had crossed that distance a long time ago. She wasn't just some kid that he traveled with and looked out for. She wasn't even a kid that had recently wormed her way into her heart the way Beth Greene had.

  Zeppelin was about as close to family as Daryl Dixon had ever felt.

  Not to say that Rick wasn't his brother, or that he wouldn't call Glenn, Maggie, Carol, Dean, and everyone else in that church his family. Just to say that Zeppelin was different. She would choose to sit with him, always. She would go to him for comfort and advice.

  She would ask him to say, even though it was selfish, just because she liked him.

  And he wasn't sure what to say, because a part of it felt like he was getting too comfortable with that. Too comfortable talking to Zeppelin like she was his kid, instead of a kid. It wasn't his place, he would remind himself, to chastise her for sneaking out of bed at night and watching out of windows. It wasn't his place to teach her to shoot a bow and hunt squirrels in the woods. It wasn't his place to raise her, to shape her views and opinions. It wasn't his place because he wasn't her father, and even if he was, he sure as hell didn't know how to be a good one.

  "I'm comin' back."

  Zeppelin looked up at him again, her wide eyes full of an innocent sparkling hopefulness Daryl had only seen a few times in his life.

  "Never lost."

  Daryl's chest tightened as she waited expectantly for him to speak the words he had only heard her share with Vex.