"Hey, alley cat. Earth to Daryl!" The man jolted awake and scanned the world around him to look for anything at all- an enemy, a friend, a lost life. Anything. Warm air puffed around his neck and he glanced down, the curly hair of Juno shining a soft silver in the dappled moonlight. She still wore that old pilot coat, the soft wool now dingy with caked on dirt and grime from their endless travels in a serpentine path northward.
To D.C. To safety. They hoped.
She was healing up nicely, the hole in her leg had stopped bleeding and was on the mends- though she now had a limp to her step. But that should go away once she's able to put her weight on that leg again. She'll be okay. He'll be okay. They'll be okay.
"Another one?" Jax's voice rumbled through the darkness a few feet away. How he knew every time was beyond him, but he didn't really care to find out either. Daryl simply grunted in response and flicked his gaze towards the trees, the quiet clatter of metal feathers telling him that Lilith was up there somewhere.
The world started to come to life as the sun rose, birds chirping as the nightlife found their shelters from the sunlight. Minute by minute the deep Egyptian blue of the night brightened into a vibrant cerulean that burned with the sun. As soon as everyone was awake they were on the move, stuffing themselves into their two cars as they pushed through the day.
"Shit. The tank's tapped into this one." Daryl growled as the car spluttered with its last few breaths of life. He pressed on the horn so the lead car would stop. Rick stepped out and moved towards them as his group clambered from their dead vehicle.
"Fuel's gone?" Rick asked as the archer slammed his door closed and nodded. How the hell were they supposed to fit in that little four-door was going to be a sight to see. The cop kicked his head back for them to move to the only car left and the others inside were quick to start shuffling around and preparing to get really friendly with whoever they were going to be squashed next to. Thankfully it was a larger SUV so there was room in the back behind the seats for them to fit a few extra more.
"You good to sit with Carl and them in the back?" Daryl rumbled as he looked down to Juno who limply jogged to keep up with his longer legs. She nodded and clicked open the back hatch so she could start figuring out a way to get in. Carl smiled and held out his hands for her to take and use as her help up, the little teen returning his grin as she worked her way in beside him. Lilith was next to hop into the trunk area, slipping her legs between Juno's as she sat across from her and beside Eugene- who looked like he was on the verge of shutting his pants in terror of the scared woman.
Daryl and Jax moved to the front set of seats, Michonne sliding into the middle so Daryl could take the passenger. After another couple of minutes squishing and shuffling around, people started to get comfortable with each other and the car returned to its journey.
"While we're moving let's take inventory in supplies. Especially the water." Rick spoke as the silence grew to a deafening level. Things were passed back and forth as everyone pooled their resources and tallied what they had. Lilith banded Eugene the last bottle of water she had and glanced over at Juno to check and see how she was faring being in such close quarters to everyone she had been trying to distance herself from. A smile quirked her scowling mouth as she saw the curly headed brunette slouched against Carl, both peacefully sleeping.
Kids.
Turning her attention back towards the front, she could see how both Daryl and Rick were trying to casually check on their kids in the back. She caught glances with Rick in the rear view mirror and she held her hand spread over her face before closing all the tips together and tapping in her chin to sign to him that they were sleeping, but his brows furrowed in confusion.
That'll have to be something they work on as a group. Instead she held both her hands together and made the universal image of sleeping, which he instantly got and nodded with a smile and turned to tell the Dixon just in case he missed it.
"We only have a half dozen bottles of water so we'll need to stop for more and for food, there's only enough for a few days." Azolla unformed the leader, Rick nodding as he worked out a plan to think up a way to gather these resources they desperately needed.
"We'll stop soon." He rasped and the car returned to silence. Juno fluttered awake as the car pulled to a stop, her dark eyes sleepily scanning the car as the adults shuffled out. Warmth seeped into her right side and she hummed happily as she moved closer to it.
"Why are we stopping?" Carl's voice sounded blearily above her head, the little teen freezing at the sound. This isn't Daryl. Slowly tilting her head back, she cane face to face with the younger Grimes as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes with the back of his hand. Heat flushed up her throat and she shot backwards with a small squeak of embarrassed surprise.
"Sorry! I fell asleep and I must've fallen over and-"
"It's fine, Juno I was sleeping too. Do you need help out of the car?" The little teen bit her bottom lip and nodded sheepishly, the teen Grimes laughing as he moved around her to step out and help her in leaving the back seats.
"Alright, we'll fan out from here. In pairs and threes a couple of miles to see if we find a river or lake." Fingers wrapped around Juno's wrist and she snapped her head over to see who it was, her pinkish face burning crimson when she saw Carl smiling down at her.
"Wanna partner up?" Before she could answer, Lilith popped up out of nowhere and spoke for her.
"That would be a great idea! Juno does need to get some exercise to restrengthen those muscles and this would be perfect! Just look out for each other, okay?" The two teens nodded and moved off into the woods to do as Rick asked. Daryl watched the teen as she vanished into the underbrush and then turned his gaze towards the smirking woman.
"What? I wasn't lying she needs the workout to make sure her leg can support her later. And she needs to get used to these people." Lilith spoke as her and Jax buddies up and moved away, their sharp banter floating off with them. Daryl and Rick were the last ones to find partners so they nodded to each other and picked a direction that nobody else took so they could cover more ground.
Bit by bit the doubles and trips returned to the car, each and every one empty-handed. The last group to rejoin was Sasha, Maggie, and Glenn, the three trudging tiredly up the road.
"They didn't find any either." Maggie muttered as she spotted the deadened group as they waited in the shade of the car.
"How do you know?" Sasha croaked, the sweat beading on her forehead as the sun beat down on her head.
"I know." The Rhee woman's eyes dropped to the concrete. "How much longer we got?"
"60 miles." The brunette shook her head at Sasha's answer.
"I wasn't talking about that." She grumbled and shook her head to tell Rick they didn't find anything either. With exhausted sighs, everyone piled back into the SUV to got a bit further in hopes that they would have better luck further up the road. Every pit stop yielding nothing but low spirits and a lower water count. But they kept at it until the engine clanked and shuddered and came to a stop in the middle of the road- out of gas just like every one before it.
"We're our just like the last one." Abraham growled as he glared out the window at the skies then down at Rosita in his lap.
"So we walk." Rick declares and everyone opened their doors to follow his lead. Daryl stepped out and left the door open for Michonne as he moved to the back to see if Juno needed his help getting out. By the time he weaved his way through the exiting group and rounded the corner of the vehicle, Carl was already holding out his hands for her to use them to get out.
Sliding her good leg out first, Juno slowly moved her injured leg over the locking hook on the bottom of the door jam. Placing her hands on Carl's forearms, she made sure they both had a good grip before pushing to a stand.
"Got a good footing?" The boy asks and she nodded before slowly letting his arms go free. He took a small step back and motioned for her to follow to make sure she could walk on her own. It took her a second to follow, but once she got moving it was easier to ignore the pinching pains. Now that everyone was clear of the empty car, they turned and shuffled further down the road.
"I'm gonna head out, see what I can find." Daryl's voice made Juno turn to look around for him, the man catching her eye as he moved into the underbrush at the side of the road. She tilted her head in a silent question to see if he wanted her to come along, the archer gently shaking his head no as him and Carol vanished into the trunks.
"They'll be okay." Carl broke her mental train of worry. "I promise." He moves up to walk by Maggie, handing her the music box they had found on one of their searches for water. Low growls drew her gaze behind them to see the small herd of walkers that had formed as they walked. Soon there'll be more than they can handle.
"Ain't gotta worry 'bout 'em kiddo." Merle rasped as he noticed she was looking at the group of walkers. "Don't even look at 'em." Juno nodded and turned back to face the road, her tiny limp making her slower than the rest. She gimped forwards and slipped her hand into the older Dixon's, the man lightly jumping at the sudden touch. He looked down at her thin hand curled with his and she thought he was going to shake her off, but instead he looked like he was fighting a smile as he let her hold his hand.
The longer they walked the hotter it got and soon everyone was shedding any outer layers they wore and tucking them into bags or tying them off around their waists. Juno knotted the pilots coat around her hips.
"Ya doin' okay?" The oldest brother rumbled and looked down at the little girl beside him. He's rarely ever seen her this far from Daryl's side, but she still looked so sad. Both of them.
"Yeah, I will be. You?" Merle nodded and painted on a bright smile.
"Always has, always will be." Her lips curled into a soft smile as the group approached a small bridge sitting over a deep dried up creek bed.
"We'll do it here. That herd is almost too big. Carl, Juno, anyone who can't do this stand over in the trees out of eyesight. The rest of us, line up in front of the guardrails and split the herd. Knock them down and let them roll into the creek. The tall banks will make sure that they can only go a few ways. Don't stop them, they'll just pile up and it'll merge back together. Understand?" Rick looked at all the people in his family, making sure they looked him in the eye and nodded back to say they understood.
Carl nodded and held out his hand towards Juno in an offering to help her down the hill into the trees. The two teens and Eugene were the only ones who couldn't actually help out- Carl because he was helping Juno and her injuries and Eugene because he was too scared to do anything but stare in horror. Tara, Rosita, and Maggie were asked to go in with them to watch their backs and lessen the numbers lined up at the guardrails. The rest of them split up on both sides and waited for the walkers to shamble close enough to get knocked down.
Juno pushes up on tiptoe trying to see if any walkers would accidentally roll their way. White hot pain shot down her thigh and she squealed in pain before slapping her hand over her mouth and dropping back down to her feet, the impact making her knee give so she crumpled sideways and smacked into Carl's shoulder. The Grimes teen caught her around the waist and held her to his chest so she wouldn't hurt herself further and to help muffle her tiny squeaks of pain that slipped between her fingers.
"I gotcha. Are you okay?" Maggie jumped into doctor mode and whispered for him to let her down so she could take a look at the wound.
"I won't be able to visually inspect it since you'd have to take off your pants for that, but I can check for popped stitches or infections. Okay?" Juno nodded and held her breath as the Rhee woman slowly skimmed her fingers over the area around her wound.
"Nothing feels ripped or infected, so it's probably just a little strained from you putting too much weight on it. Be gentle with it for the next few days okay?" The girl nodded again as Carl helped bring her back to her feet. A few minutes later Rick was calling for them to come back up the hill now that the herd was dealt with. It took them a bit but one by one they all made it back up onto the road now littered with various walker corpses.
"What happened to throwing them down the hill?" Maggie blurted as she looked to her husband, who kicked his head back towards Sasha.
"We couldn't keep them from piling up. Needed a new plan." Lilith rolled her coppery eyes and scoffed at Glenn's generalization of how the woman royally fucked up their plan.
"More like the wrong people were on the bench." She growled, Sasha whipping around with a roiling rage covering her face. Lilith simply quirked an eyebrow and waited for the chance.
"Excuse me?" Growled the dark woman, the two stepping towards each other like two wild animals getting ready to fight to the death.
"Did I stutter? Or do I need to water it down for you? You nearly got some of us killed because you're so far up your own ass to even comprehend the idea of thinking about anyone but yourself. Rick told you to throw them down the hill because we couldn't afford to waste the energy killing them. But no, Sasha is the exception, Sasha is better than the rest, Sasha didn't rub her three brain cells together hard enough to understand that her wants never outweighed the rest of the group's needs." As the smaller woman tore into Sasha, she gripped her gun harder and harder until her knuckles were white with rage.
"You better shut the hell up-"
"Or what? You'll cut me like you did Abraham? You'll stab me in the neck like you did that man in the church? Enlighten me, what will you do about it?" The two stared at each other in a silent fight for alpha, daring the other to make the first move and see who would get knocked to the ground first. After a few minutes Rick finally stepped between them and stopped the fight before it could get started.
"Like I said, the wrong people were benched." Snarled the copper eyed woman before stepping away and holding her hands up to tell Rick she wasn't going to hurt anyone.
"I'd beg to differ." Sasha snapped as she hefted her rifle and stepped away as well. A wicked smirk curled Lilith's lips as she rolled her eyes and turned back towards the road.
"Then beg." Sasha opened her mouth to make another snappy retort, her words shut down when Rick glared at her to not push her luck any further. Snapping her jaw shut, she loudly snorted and stomped off to follow the group as they moved over the bridge.
The rest of the walk was silent until thunder rumbled the ground and the skies finally let its heavy drops come falling back onto their heads. As everyone scrambled to put out containers to catch the water, a few stood in the downpour and it the water drench them. Maggie, Daryl, and Sasha were ignoring the drops as the others rejoiced in the weather change. Juno shimmied between the group and stood by Daryl before she reached out and slid her hand into his much like she did with Merle. He slid his gaze from the asphalt to the little teen beside him as she gave him a small and sweet smile.
"It's okay." The man smiled back and nodded, both looking up at the massive crack of thunder that nearly deafened them with its roar.
"We need shelter!" Rick shouted over the storm's rumbling and Judith's crying as the noise scared her.
"There's a barn not too far!" Daryl shouted back, the group following his lead as they trudged through the muddy woods and into the clearing around the barn. Throwing the door open, they searched for walkers at the entrance before slipping into the darkness. Everyone checked the area for any hidden dangers before they closed and barred the door to make sure it didn't blow open in the middle of the night.
Juno fell into a bundle of hay with a low sigh, lightly wincing when pain pinched down her leg from walking so much. Daryl knelt down beside her and ran his hands around the wounds to see if there was anything wrong.
"Ya good?" He gruffed as he turned his eyes from his inspection to her face, now lit bronze with the glow of a fire. Juno nodded and he gently tapped on her knees for her to move them so he could sit beside her. Once she got settled, she turned and pressed her spine into his ribcage as she used his arm like a small blanket. In a mere few seconds she was out like a light and slumped against his shoulder.
"... That's the trick of it, I think. We do what we need to do and then we get to live. But no matter what we find in DC, I know we'll be okay. Because this is how we survive. We tell ourselves... that we are the walking dead." Rick's words finally caught Daryl's ear.
"We ain't them." He growled, the group agreeing with him. They weren't dead. Not yet. And as long as they could breathe, they could make it. Even him. The fire was put out and everyone element to sleep, the guard shifts not quite needed since they were locked up in a barn with only one entrance. Clanging wood made Daryl holt back awake, the door gusting open a few inches against the wooden beam holding it closed as the storm clawed at the door like a wild animal.
Gently sliding free of Juno, he pushed to his feet to go chain the door tighter just in case the sound pulled walkers their way. Stepping up to the door, he caught the faint and fuzzed silhouettes of walkers as they shuffled right for them. Slamming the door closed, he tightened the chain and dug his feet into the dirt as he fought to keep it closed against the wind and the arriving corpses.
His struggle woke up the rest of the group and soon everyone was leaning up against the door to help press it closed as walker snarls nearly matched pitch with the howling winds. Carl whirled around looking for a place to put Judith so she'd be safe, Juno holding out her arms since she knew she wouldn't be much help with a crippled leg she couldn't trust to retain its strength.
Dropping to his knees, he gently passed the baby over before whispering a small thank you and pecking her cheek- then pushing back to his feet to rush off and join the others against the door. Holding Judith to her chest and lightly swaying side to side, the little teen started to him and lightly sing a lullaby her mom sang to her before everything fell apart. Their struggle lasted the rest of the night, when the storm finally blew itself out and the walkers had stopped growling at their door.
Daryl sat sentry by the door and lightly smiled at the sight of Juno and Judith both sleeping peacefully in the far corner of the barn. He nodded to Sasha and Maggie as they left and pushed to his feet to trade off watch with Abraham. Bones and joints popped as he stretched out the stiffness in his back, whirling around when the door reopened to let in the same two women he had just watched leave.
"Everyone this is Aaron." Maggie announces as a stranger followed them inside, a smile pulling up his features as he held up his hands. "He says he has a camp nearby. He wants us to audition for membership."
"I wish there was another word. Audition makes it sound like we're some kind of a dance troupe. That's only on Friday nights. Um, and it's not a camp. It's a community. I think you all would make valuable additions. But it's not my call. My job is to convince you all to follow me back home. I know. If I were you, I wouldn't go either. Not until I knew exactly what I was getting into. Sasha, can you hand Rick my pack?" Rick nodded and she took the tan bag to hand it to the cop for him to search.
"Front pocket, there's an envelope. There's no way I could convince you to come with me just by talking about our community. That's why I brought those. I apologize in advance for the picture quality. We just found an old camera store last-"
"Nobody gives a sh1t." Daryl growled as he helped Juno to her feet, making sure to keep her behind him so she and Judith were safe in case of attack. Aaron limply smiles and nodded in agreement.
"You're absolutely 100% right. That's the first picture I wanted to show you because nothing I say about our community will matter unless you know you'll be safe. If you join us, you will be. Each panel in that wall is a 15-foot-high, 12-foot-wide slab of solid steel framed by cold-rolled steel beams and square tubing. Nothing alive or dead gets through that without our say-so. Like I said, security is obviously important. In fact, there's only one resource more critical to our community's survival. The people. Together we're strong. You can make us even stronger. The next picture, you'll see inside the gates. Our community was first construc-"
His words were cut off when Rick lunges forward and cracked his fist into his jaw. Aaron collapses to the dirt like a bag of potatoes, Maggie and Sasha quick to check and make sure he was still okay. A few minutes of debate later and he had returned to consciousness with a small laugh.
"That's a hell of a right cross there, Rick. You remind me of a woman I recently met. She's terrifying like you guys." Rick rolled his eyes and sent the group out in doubles and trips to make sure they had multiple sight lines and they weren't all clumped together like sitting ducks. A few of them were sent of to check Aaron's alibi and make sure he wasn't lying to them.
"When the world was still the world I worked for an NGO. Our mission was to deliver food and medicine to the Niger River Delta. Bad people pointed guns in my face every other week. You're not bad people. You're not going to kill us. And we are definitely not going to kill you." Rick scoffed and looked over at Daryl, who stayed with him in the barn since Juno couldn't leave with her injury and she still held Judith.
"Just because we're good people doesn't mean we won't kill you." If the five of them aren't back in an hour, I'll put a knife in the base of your skull." The cop promised. Judith woke up and almost immediately began to wail in a call for food.
"Rick she's hungry." Aaron perked up and turned to the brooding man.
"You did see the jar of applesauce in my bag, right? This isn't a trick. This isn't about trying to make you like me. It's self-preservation. Because if the roamers hear her and come this way, I know I'll be the first to go." Rick dented the ups and down for a second before turning and gently taking the screaming child from the teen. Digging out the applesauce, he popped off the lid and scooped up a small spoonful before kneeling down and holding it out towards the stranger. Aaron made a disgusted face and turned his head away.
"You think I'm trying to poison your baby daughter? I'm tied up and you've already expressed a willingness to stab me in the head. How would cruelly killing your daughter in front of you in any way help the situation?" Juno pushed to her feet and used the wall for a second of support to catch her balance, waving away Daryl as he moved to join her and offer help. If they needed to fight she didn't want him stuck trying to keep her on her feet.
"...I am the only one who can help her because I have applesauce and we all win." Rick held out the spoon again, Aaron giving him the same reaction as the first offer. "I hate applesauce. My mom used to make me eat foods I didn't like to make me more manly. Salmon patties, applesauce, and onions. She was a very confused woman who tried her damnedest. I just bring the jar to show that we have apple trees nearby." Rick wasn't amused.
"Like you said, you'll be the first to go." Aaron shuddered before taking the spoon of applesauce and quickly swallowing it like Rick wanted. Once he knew that it wouldn't hurt Judith, he moved away and started to spoon feed her.
"The community is big enough. We can find a place for you to live where even when she cries, no one, nothing can hear it outside the walls." Juno lifted a brow at the idea that they had a place big enough for that kind of lifestyle.
"You got 43 minutes." Rick growled. Juno hobbled forward and plopped down a few feet away from the tied up man.
"Don't get too close, Juno." Daryl growled, the teen making it an obvious point to slide backwards a few inches like it was going to help. Aaron eyes the girl as she settled in and gently massaged her thigh to try and release some of the pained tension.
"What happened to your leg?"
"Got impaled on a pole fighting off some walkers. They said that I'll need to relearn how to walk, but I'll heal up fine." Aaron nodded in a quiet answer. "You said you worked for an NGO, right? That you went to the Niger River Delta?"
"Yeah, worked with them for about five years."
"What's it like? Living in a different country? I never left Louisiana before all this so I'm curious." Aaron lightly laughed and nodded before jumping into a story about what it was like out there. What the world was like before everything became a fight for survival. He finished his tale just as the people who were sent to check for the car came back into the barn. There was a long debate that Juno tuned out. She didn't have much opinion on whether or not they should go. As long as she stayed with Daryl like Eevee wanted her to.
"... What do you mean? Why wouldn't we go?" Michonne blurted, catching her attention. "If he were lying or if he wanted to hurt us... but he isn't, and he doesn't. We need this. So we're going, all of us."
"Somebody say something if they feel differently." Rick spoke, his gaze flicking around everyone in the group.
"I don't know, man. This barn smells like horse shit." Daryl grumbled, a wave of quiet laughter passing through the people around them. Rick nodded in agreement with him.
"Yeah. We're going. So where are we going? Where's your camp?" Everyone packed up their things and readied to move to take the walk to the car that Aaron said they could use to get everyone to his community. Pushing to her feet, she followed after Daryl and piled into the R.V. Other split off to get into the car with the tied man, but the archer followed her into the bigger vehicle and she was moved to the back room where the bed was.
And it looked so comfy.
Sliding over the mattress, she curled up in the further corner and passed out in an instant. Daryl pushed his way through the shuffling others to try and find her, a small smile curling his mouth when he saw her sleeping like a little cat on the bed.
"Sure does sleep a lot, don't she?" Merle's voice made him whirl around.
"She's still healin' so I ain't surprised. She'll probably sleep until we get to this Alexandria place." Merle shrugged before ruffling his brother's hair with a wicked smirk, the younger Dixon growling and swatting his hand away.
"An here I though ya didn't like kids." With everyone settled into their spots for the trip, they went on their way. Juno woke up once when weight made the bed squeak, bleary eyes opening to see it was Carl Grimes joining her for a moment of rest before they made it to this community Aaron was talking about. Lids closed over sleepy eyes and didn't open again until warm sunshine turned her eyelids a burnt orange hue.
Sitting up, she rubbed at her eyes with the back of her hands and looked out the window to see why they had stopped. Towering walls filled the pane with slate grey and the teen was quick to hop out of the R.V. and see where they had ended up.
"Looks like someone's finally awake!" Lilith teases as she watched Juno gawk at the walls. "You slept right through a wild night, kiddo!" Juno's brows furrowed and she looked at the group to make a quick head count to ensure that everyone was okay. Loud banging made everyone jump and Daryl shot a bolt at the source, a small scream telling her it was some form of animal- the opossum he hefted by its tail letting her know she was right.
The gate creaked open and everyone jolted around to see who was waiting behind it. Aaron stepped forward to talk with them and calm their nerves about the terrifying group of people at their front door.
"Aaron, you spotted the new girl on your way in? She went out this morning and she isn't back yet." The said man shook his head no, the clatter of metal shoes on concrete road approaching from behind them. Rick's group whipped around and repositioned, eyes wary and ready to attack anything that got too close. A small white and black dot grew on the horizon until a massive horse came to a grinding halt and kicked onto its back legs with a shrill scream. The front line of people scrambled back just in case it's front legs came down hard on their heads, the canines sound of cocking rifles following their movements.
"I would t do that!" Aaron called, Rick looking back at him with furrowed brows. "She's really protective of Bucephalus. She may kill you if you hurt him." Metal shoes slammed down on the asphalt and everyone jumped back to get away, the dying sunlight turning her short brown hair a brilliant copper as she hunched over the horse's neck to calm him down. She ran her fingers throw her hair as she sat up with a low sigh. Catty hazel eyes locked with pastel powder blues and everyone could only stare. Silence hung thick in the air as a palpable shroud that could be cut with a butter knife. Daryl was the first one to speak, his voice thick with tears as his chest tightened.
"Ghost."