Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Daryl sat, fidgeting next to Carol, expectantly. They were taking watch, and even though Daryl swore the group was being watched, they couldn’t find anything, or anyone. He’d been telling her how he’d gotten to Terminus, or at least, a brief, watered down version. He was waiting for her to share how she’d gotten to them all, but she wasn’t talking.

“I just need to forget it.” She finally says, in answer to Daryl’s deliberate silence.

He debates on how to respond to her.

“Alright.” He says, nodding his head slightly. Even if he thought it would be better for her to say whatever was clearly on her mind, what had happened out there when they were separated. Having his own moment of sharing deep secrets and trauma recently, he’d understood how good it felt for once in his life. Even though the thought still filled him with guilt, since Beth was gone now.

Carol doesn’t say anything else.

Still, if there was one thing that Daryl understood, it was keeping yourself hidden from the rest of the world, regardless of how damaging it was or wasn’t.

Daryl was still shocked that she was back with them. He’d thought that he’d never see the woman again after the prison, and then at Terminus, when everyone was explaining how they got there, no one had mentioned seeing Carol, and he’d assumed that that had to be the end of it.

He couldn’t help running toward her as soon as he’d noticed her presence, hugging her so tightly. In that moment, she really was the lifeline he was clinging to. It may have shown how vulnerable he was, in front of all of their little group, including people he had only met like yesterday, but he didn’t even care.

It was only when he had ducked his head to rest on her shoulder, quiet whimper leaving his lips, and he heard Rick say something to Carol, that he realised he needed to reel this in. He was painfully aware of how on edge he was, and how much he was longing to have a minute to be little. He knew that his defences were weak, his walls starting to crumble, too much was happening in such a short amount of time.

He watched as Rick hugged Carol. He knew they weren’t always on the same page, but they were still family too, and Daryl was overwhelmed with the amount of love he felt, seeing his two favourite people reunite.

After seeing Carol again after Terminus, Daryl had spent very little time away from her, sticking to her side as closely as possible.

Which is why he immediately notices when Carol tries to disappear from the church.

She tells him that she doesn’t know what she’s doing. He doesn’t think it matters, not when she would have taken that car and left, had he not been there. He was not losing her, not so fast after only just seeing her again, hell, he didn’t care if it had been a year since they’d reunited, didn’t care if they hadn’t been separated in the first place. He was not letting her just leave like that. He was not losing her.

But then they’d seen the car, with the white cross, and anything and everything that Daryl had been planning to say to Carol was thrown out the window because fuck. He was not losing Beth either.

 “So, it was just you and Beth, after?” Carol asks, somehow already sounding like she knew exactly how it had gone, exactly how it had played out. She didn’t.

The mention of her name, out loud, was certainly harder to swallow than he’d anticipated.

“Yeah.” He says plainly, ignorantly hoping that he won’t have to say much more about this, even though he knows that that’s not how it works. It isn’t that he doesn’t want to tell her, exactly.

Well, he doesn’t want to tell her some of the things that happened. Some of the things that were said.

Generally, he just doesn’t want to risk having another breakdown in front of another person.

“You save her?” Carol asks instantly, and Daryl has to stop himself from defensively throwing her a nasty look. Maybe he was as overprotective as people liked to joke he was.

“She’s tough,” He says, sounding a lot calmer than he thought he would. “She saved herself.” There’s that glimmer of proudness again. He knew that no matter where she was now, she would have put up a fight.

“We were out there for a while,” He starts explaining. “We got cornered, she got out in front of me and…” He bites his lip, thinking back to when he had been explaining this to Rick. “I don’t know, she was just gone.” He says, voice quiet.

“I came out and a car’s pulling out with a white cross on the window.” He says. He doesn’t mention anything about any of the talks Beth and him had had. None of them. He doesn’t mention that in a number of days she’d managed to flip his world upside down, or maybe right side up. He doesn’t mention that he’d honestly, genuinely, considered staying in that damn house with Beth.

He doesn’t think he’s going to mention it to anyone. Not now, maybe not ever.

Maybe this was just another one of those little, too personal, too vulnerable, secrets that he kept close to his chest. Maybe for the rest of his life.

“Just like that one.” Carol says, voice having a determined edge to it.

“Yup.” He says, wondering if he really was going to get away with only giving away that surface level information about this whole thing. Carol doesn’t say anything more about the topic after that, but Daryl isn’t sure if that’s because she actually has decided to drop it, or if she’s just thinking through what to ask and when to strike.

She’d always been a little too good at knowing both of those things when it came to Daryl, catching him off guard when she wanted to.

After following the car in silence for a little while, Daryl speaks up, with the one thing that’s been on his mind since they left.

“Rick’s gonna wonder where we went,” The archer says, barely hiding the anxiousness he felt. “Tank’s running low.” He follows up, trying to get some of the focus away from his separation anxiety.

Carol looks slightly annoyed, and with a voice full of confidence says, “We can end this quick, just run him off the road.” Like the solution was clear, like she shouldn’t have needed to spell it out for him.

“Nah, we’re good for a bit.” He responds, more than a little hesitant to take action with this, not yet. He wanted to be certain when he made a move with this, he wasn’t risking Beth.

“If they’re holding her somewhere, we can get it out of the driver.” Carol says, in an attempt to convince him.

Daryl nods, trying to deescalate this before it got to an argument. “Yeah, but if he don’t talk, we’re back to square one. Right now we got the advantage.” He says, looking over at Carol to check her expression. “We’ll see who they are, if they’re a group, see what they can do. Then we’ll do what we gotta do to get her back.” He finishes confidently.

He wonders if this is more of a headstrong approach, that makes him seem stubborn and determined, or if he sounds petulant, committed to making a plan work that’s based on childish hope.

No matter what, he was getting Beth out of there, no matter what it takes.

Carol still seems to disagree with his methods, but then again, it seemed they’d both changed somewhat, on the way to Terminus.

“They’re heading north, I85.” She tells him, before a silence settles over them.

The silence carries them into the city of Atlanta, which somehow fills him with familiar memories of a certain sheriff, who at that point had still been playing sheriff, running around the city trying to find his one handed brother, but it also feels so unexplainably different at night. Unrecognisable.

He supposed he could probably chalk that up to his limited experience going into the city, though.

On the other hand, a lot of things had changed since their last trip to Atlanta. It’d be easier to ask what hadn’t changed, at this point.

Not for the first time, Daryl’s silent wondering leads him back to Rick. Rick, who Daryl was sure must be worrying about them, which hadn’t been Daryl’s intention at all, but he couldn’t pass up this opportunity to find Beth.

Rick, who was different now. He could understand why, Daryl was overwhelmed by all the why, and he admired Rick for still standing up and leading them, even more so than before.

Rick’s worry might be presented differently now, overprotective in a way that was naturally accusatory. He had become quick to anger and maybe if they followed him down that path they’d be safer but also maybe they wouldn’t.

All Daryl could hear was the voice of a blonde girl who some would describe as an optimist and others might call unprepared for this world, that she wasn’t strong, or that she was more than a bit of a spoilt brat. All of which, Daryl had been guilty of, whether in his head or out loud, but all of which were wrong, at least to some degree.

That blonde girl had stood up to Daryl, and she’d fought for her own survival, and she’d believed that there were still good people out there, and that they didn’t get to give up.

And Daryl was slightly surprised to find himself thinking that this might be something he wouldn’t follow Rick on, which made an ache form in the centre of his chest, something he couldn’t get rid of, no matter how hard he tried to ignore it.

Even though he didn’t think Rick was completely in the right mindset, just the idea of disagreeing with the man made his heart ache with anxiety.

It’s not over till they’re all dead.

Still, there had to be good people out there. Not everyone was bad.

That didn’t mean he was suddenly letting his guard down; nothing was that black and white.

They’d followed the car into the city streets, but it was dark, and it was just the two of them, and they weren’t stupid. Carol had said there was a place she knew, where they could hold up for the night, and Daryl hadn’t given it much thought, not until they’d gotten inside the building.

“You used to work here or something?” He asks, though it’s hard to even remember what Carol was like, before. So hard, he feels more than a little dizzy trying to picture it all, with how the world used to be.

“Something.” Carol murmurs, so quietly he wouldn’t have heard, if it wasn’t the middle of the night, and if Daryl wasn’t so experienced in saying things under his own breath.

“What is this place?” He hears himself asking, and he isn’t sure if it’s to let Carol call the shots, or if it’s to make her feel like he hasn’t caught on yet, like it isn’t obvious, because it isn’t. Or if he’s asking to mask his own recognition, of a different building and a long ago time.

“It’s temporary housing.” She replies, voice sounding further away than it really is. Daryl’s eyes are glued to a book on top of a small desk.

Treating Survivors of Childhood Abuse

He bites his lip, trying to keep himself grounded in reality. He was here, with Carol, in some long abandoned building in Atlanta. Not in a stuffy, closed off room with some child psychologist who was probably at her wits end, and probably not paid nearly enough, especially to be dealing with someone like Daryl, who had been impatiently waiting for Merle to show up and save him.

He desperately tries to blink the memory away, swallowing thickly.

“You came here?” He asks, though it’s less for confirmation and more to give Carol the opportunity to open up about it, if she wanted. If not, that was fine too. He certainly wasn’t rushing to share his own childhood stories of the few times he’d been taken away from his dad. Not that that had ever lasted long.

He’d always been safer just going into the forests, away from everyone, quietly. It was a lot easier.

“We didn’t stay.” She says but leaves it at that, which Daryl is almost thankful for. This place was proving to be opening many old wounds for the both of them.

They walk into a room with a bunk bed and Daryl takes it that this is where they’re staying until morning. He’s too busy getting lost in thought, accidentally staring and zoning out. Maybe this was that dissociation thing again. Now that he’s here, the word feels all too familiar. In fact, everything feels all too familiar and he kind of wants to turn around and run away until his legs are too tired to keep going, and then fold himself into a tight little ball and hide. That was a stupid thing to think though, childish.

He hears Carol say something about taking the top bunk, that it didn’t seem his style, and he barely registers the words at all, let alone what they meant, until he turns around to look at the beds and he sees a few small stuffed animals resting on the top bunk. Talk about childish.

He swallows over the lump in his throat again, childish urge to run becoming a million times stronger. If only she knew. The irony to it all. The desperate childish want that was breaking Daryl from the inside out.

He can’t find the words to reply to her, so he doesn’t say anything, and distantly wonders if that seems in or out of character for him. He hadn’t realised it until now, because for a split second everything had seemed perfect, but somewhere along the way he didn’t know what was expected of him anymore.

Daryl sits on the edge of the bottom bunk.

Maybe because he was so comfortable with their group, and because it generally didn’t matter if he had differing opinions to the others. It didn’t mean they no longer cared for him, it didn’t mean he was worthless, or stupid. He’d thought for a while that nothing was expected of him.

And then he’d lost sight of everything, because Beth was right, he was scared. Now he doesn’t know what’s expected of him, especially not with Rick shifting completely to a shoot first attitude.

“You said we get to start over.” Carol says, and it’s almost like she can see right into the shitstorm going on inside his head right now, though he knows the question must have more to do with her than him.

“Yeah.” He answers, trusting his voice not to betray his emotions.

“Did you?” She asks, and what a question that was. It’s almost as hard to picture what he had been like, at the start, or even before. He says the only thing that feels true.

“I’m trying.”

He expects her to say something more. Maybe about the way he’s been reacting to this place, which he’s sure she must have caught onto. Or maybe this is the time she’ll use to strike, and ask some inescapable question about Beth.

She doesn’t do any of that, not saying another word, though looking like she’s one moment from blurting it out.

He sighs. “Why don’t you say what’s really on your mind?” He asks.

“I don’t think we get to save people anymore.” She says, and he bristles a little at the complete contrast to what Beth had told him, not all that long ago.

There are still good people out there.

His defensiveness comes back, and he only just manages to tone down the aggression in his voice when he asks, “Why are you here?”

“I’m trying.” Carol says, and it’s enough, because it has to be.

So you do think there are still good people around. What changed your mind?

Daryl covers his face with his hands, then shifts his hands to cover his ears, staring at the ground, lost. He quickly lowers his hands again. There was no point in making it more obvious that he wanted to hide.

Maybe if it was obvious, there was no point in hiding at all. If there was one person who understood him more than others, it would be Carol, and she’d listen to him, she wouldn’t judge him.

Whispers of stupid ideas enter his head, and he tries to shake himself of them entirely – They were here to help Beth, not take pity on him – when he feels the mattress dip as Carol sits next to him.

He looks down at Carol as she lies down on the bed.

“When we were out by the car, what if I didn’t show up?” He asks, not sure if he wants the answer.

Carol shakes her head. “I still don’t know.” She says, and Daryl isn’t sure if he hates the answer or not.

Daryl leans back, until he’s lying down next to Carol, both of them staring above, lost in their own thoughts.

He honest to God almost says it. Almost.

Almost tells her about his secret, almost tells her about everything, despite the fear and reluctance. Last time he’d talked about any of that, it didn’t exactly end well, and even though they now had something of a lead on Beth, he didn’t want to lose someone else right after exposing himself.

And he still almost says it all. He would have, if a loud bang hadn’t rung out through the building and swiftly pulled both Carol and Daryl out of their thoughts with it.

Bitterly, he thinks as they scout the building, it was for the better.

They round the corner just in time to see a walker crash against the closed door, only visible as a silhouette. Daryl takes in a relieved breath before he can stop himself.

Then a much smaller, child walker, bangs against the door, right next to the other.

Daryl could actually feel the cracks forming. He wasn’t sure what a breaking point was supposed to feel like, but he was scared he was nearing it at an alarming speed.

Carol’s expression doesn’t change, something which is more telling to her emotions than one might think. She moves closer, about to open the door.

He makes a split second decision and tries to block the doorknob. “You don’t have to.” He says, just this side of desperate.

She ignores him, about to go through with it.

He blocks her completely, grabbing her hand and stopping her short. “You don’t.” He presses and for a second he thinks she’s going to argue. For a second, he stupidly thinks that she might yell, and she might ignore him, and she might do it anyway. For a second, he has to beg every single one of the muscles in his body to not let him flinch.

She doesn’t do any of that, but she does look like she was considering it, before she leaves it alone and storms back off to the room they’d picked.

And that’s enough to make him bite on his lip hard enough to draw blood.

He hadn’t slept that night. He couldn’t.

Closing his eyes without being asleep was already a nightmare in itself, he wasn’t putting himself in that position. Not here.

He’s not risking having a nightmare, he’s not risking having a breakdown, he’s not risking falling into headspace because of it, and he definitely isn’t risking having an accident.

Instead, he paces, and zones out, and thinks. Mostly about Rick, but that’s neither here nor there. Or maybe it is, because Daryl isn’t sure how long he can keep going with pretending like he’s fine in front of the other man. He’s inching closer to that breaking point and he needs Rick, sometimes so badly that it feels like it’s hurting him.

He longs so badly for a hug, at least. Some sort of physical contact, something he could hold onto and cling to, because recently he’s been feeling like he’s stuck, and alone, and he’s scared.

And if Beth Greene could see that then why can’t he? Why can’t the ex-cop trained in reading body language and noticing the subtle things that others probably couldn’t, why can’t he see that?

Why couldn’t adults see what was really happening when he was a kid? Though that was an entirely different situation. They could see, they just couldn’t or wouldn’t do anything about it because they didn’t know how. Which Daryl always thought was a stupid excuse.

He doesn’t want those questions to overlap, because toying with the idea that Rick could see it, and was choosing to ignore it all, made Daryl feel sick. Made him want to run, again.

Anxiety was clouding his thoughts, but he heard pleading, childish whispers over the top of it all too.

He was still trying.

There are still good people out there.

And every time his thoughts drifted back to Rick. Back to the possibility of him purposefully ignoring Daryl, and of purposefully making Daryl anxious. Scared. One thought always remained, louder than the rest, and in his own voice.

That doesn’t sound like Rick.

Which was true. That didn’t sound like Rick at all.

As soon as there was enough light to properly see outside, Daryl had killed the walkers.

Carol had come out just as Daryl gently lowered the child walker into the flames. He walked over to her, both silent for a while, watching. He hopes she hasn’t seen how teary his eyes are.

“Thankyou.” He hears her whisper. He bites his lip, sounding somewhere between defensive and honest.

“It ain’t just for you.”

He hopes she doesn’t see a few of the tears roll down his face.

Problems started after they leave. When some kid steals their weapons.

Carol almost shoots him, and Daryl quickly stops her. It makes her annoyed, but he doesn’t care. He was just some kid.

There are still good people.

“Did you think I was going to kill him?” Carol asks, sounding like he’s being the unreasonable one.

“I was aiming for his leg. Could that have killed him? Maybe, I don’t know, but he was stealing our weapons.” She says, exasperated.

“He was just a damn kid.” Daryl says, trying to get this stupid door to open.

“Without weapons, we could die. Beth could die.” She says, which isn’t fair because she knows that using that is the easiest way to change Daryl’s mind, because he’d do anything to keep their family safe.

But he’s still trying. “Well, we’ll find more weapons.” It didn’t matter if they had to steal weapons off of people, after murdering them. They’d find something, and they were going to get Beth back.

“I don’t want you to die. I don’t want Beth to die. I don’t want anybody back at the church to die, but I can’t stand around and watch it happen either. I can’t.” She sounds desperate. The fucking door still won’t open, and he’s a minute away from punching it in frustration.

“That’s why I left. I just had to be somewhere else.” She says.

“You ain’t somewhere else. You’re right here. Trying.” He yells. How was it that he seemed to be the only one who wasn’t thinking about the worst outcome.

“You’re not who you were, and neither am I.” Carol says. “I don’t know if I believe in god anymore or heaven, but if I’m going to hell, I’m making damn sure I’m holding off as long as I can.”

She reaches down to pick Daryl’s bag up off the floor, when the book falls out. No hiding anything anymore.

Treating Survivors of Childhood Abuse

He frantically grabs it off of her, and they stare at each other for a moment. She’s not surprised, not by any means, and the look of recognition, of understanding, makes Daryl almost feel sick.

Fuck her, and fuck the book, and fuck this stupid fucking door.

He turns around to try again, and the door opens with little fuss.

Later, when they’re watching Grady Memorial from a building not too far away, when he’s calmed down a little. Less likely to lash out, or run away, he asks her.

“You said I ain’t like how I was before.”

“Yeah.” Is all he gets back.

“How was I?” He asks, half hesitant.

Carol’s quiet for a moment, before she shrugs and looks out the window.

“It’s like you were a kid. Now you’re a man.”

She shouldn’t be able to say things like that. It shouldn’t affect him so damn much. He feels another crack forming in his walls. Can feel himself one step closer to breaking down.

“What about you?” He asks quietly, though it’s mostly just to take the attention off of him. Especially when he was being compared to a child.

She talks briefly about Sophia, Ed. It’s been so long since he’s heard either of their names, and he knows that obviously everything that had happened was real, but sometimes it felt like it was all from another life. Like he imagined it or something.

He hears her as she talks about her and Sophia staying in that building they went to, hears her talk about how much she’d changed since then. He hears, he listens, which is ultimately more important. He can’t help that his thoughts get distracted from what she’s saying though. He tries to keep his focus here and now, but a voice in the back of his head just keeps repeating what she’d said before.

It’s like you were a kid.

Yes, he’s changed a lot since back then too, but it’s ironic that she thinks he’s any less of a child now. Like he isn’t so close to his breaking point that she may very well see him in the headspace of a kid. Not that he wants that.

Well, not that he doesn’t want that, either. It’s complicated.

It isn’t that he doesn’t want them to know, it’s that he doesn’t want them to judge him, and hate him, and push him away.

Daryl does that last one pretty well himself though.

Then they run into that kid again. Daryl tried. Daryl gave him a chance. He did that because there are good people out there. That’s all he gets though. One chance. After that, it isn’t on Daryl.

Or at least he tries to only give him one chance. Carol tells him not to leave the kid to die. Daryl tries to ignore that, she’d been the one wanting to shoot him, so what was the problem?

He can’t live with it though. He can’t.

So they help the kid up, and he starts blabbering about people coming to find him.

And then they find out that he knows Beth. That Beth was the one to help him get out.

They need to leave, right now, they need to get out. Maybe listen to this kid, ask him about what Grady looks like on the inside, ask about how many people there are. Maybe even go back to the Church first, get Rick and the others, to be safe.

Carol’s walking ahead of them, Daryl helping the kid to walk. Carol gets just outside when the cop car comes.

It doesn’t slow down, and it hits her. Carol falls to the ground, cops getting out of the car and taking her.

It all happens so fast that Daryl doesn’t even realise what the hell is happening before the car is speeding off again. He can hear the kid from behind him, telling him that they can help her, the hospital, the medicine, they’ll save her.

There’s only one thought going through Daryl’s head.

He needs Rick right now.

They barely spoke the entire drive back to the church. Noah, the kid, had tried starting conversations at different points but nothing had been all that successful. Beside telling him that they were going to meet back up with Daryl’s group, (Which left a bad taste in his mouth to think about because yes, that is his family but no, that is not his group.) and that they were holed up in a church, he hadn’t spoken really at all.

He parked the truck in the same spot that he and Carol had left with the car, only yesterday. Noah asked some question about why they were stopping here and not getting closer. Daryl made some comment about being cautious, or smart, or something like that.

Maybe it was really out of paranoia, but not only was he never going to say that to some random kid he just met, but he was so sure that they were being watched earlier. He didn’t want to think about something bad happening to everyone at the church, but it was something he needed to consider. It was safer to sneak around in the dark, on foot, than to alert anything and anyone to their presence.

Of course, this Noah kid wasn’t the best at quietly stalking through the trees, (Though he was somehow still better at it than the stupidly heavy footed Rick Grimes.) but Daryl didn’t think there would be any problems. The church wasn’t far anyway.

They’re about to break through the trees, able to clearly see the church, when Daryl sees Michonne outside, sitting on the stairs.

He can’t help it, his footsteps becoming heavy and careless, filling the silence with crackling leaves and twigs, as he starts walking faster toward the church. The sound puts Michonne on alert, and she’s grabbing her sword and walking toward them almost immediately.

Instead of making himself known, like he probably should have, he stands there, staring at her sword, confused. Because that was definitely her sword. She hadn’t had that when he left.

When he hears quiet, anxious shuffling next to him, he starts walking forwards again, until he’s properly standing in front of Michonne. The desperate urge to fall into her arms and cry is very sudden and very overwhelming and he’s realising that this breaking point is on the very soon side of ‘sooner or later’.

She doesn’t catch on to his impending meltdown straight away, instead she starts grinning at him. Bigger than he’s seen in a long time, hell maybe ever.

He doesn’t think he’s ever had someone smile so much just because of his presence. Ever. He doesn’t think he’s ever had anyone smile at all just because of his presence, except maybe Rick, and even then, that’s never been like this. She’s smiling at him so big that he can hear another crack forming inside him, he can feel himself getting one step closer to breaking down.

It makes him feel worried about what must have happened since him and Carol left.

(But it also makes him feel loved, and it kind of makes him want to cry more.)

That’s when Michonne catches on, frowning in confusion, and probably dread.

“Where’s Carol?” She asks, and Daryl can feel another crack forming.

Noah is shuffling his feet again, and Daryl turns back to him. “Come on out.” He says, already so tired, knowing he’s going to have to fill them in, tell them what happened, what’s going to happen. About Beth and Atlanta, Grady Memorial, and Carol. He’s going to have to tell them all. He’s going to have to tell Rick.

And with the topic and with Rick and with his approaching breakdown, Daryl isn’t sure if he can even do this. Not when he’s so tired.

Noah steps forward and Michonne stares at him for all of three seconds before moving just her eyes back to him, questioning him silently.

Daryl takes an almost not shaky breath in, subconsciously bringing his thumb up to his mouth and biting his nail. He doesn’t know what he thinks that’s going to achieve, it’s not like he’s going to get away with not saying anything, especially around Michonne.

Rick might have let it slide. Though that was a trait of Rick’s that was around at the prison, and he seemed determined to show the group that he wasn’t who he had been then. Not now.

When the silent questioning doesn’t get her anywhere, and Noah starts awkwardly looking between the two of them, like he wasn’t sure if he should say something instead, Michonne starts actually questioning the archer.

“Daryl.” She says slowly, seriously, “Where’s Carol?”, and it’s in that one specific tone, like she might be talking to someone who’s panicking out of their mind, or someone who isn’t listening to anything being said, or to someone who’s age is younger than double digits.

“We need to go to Atlanta.” He rushes out, desperate to get her to stop talking like that. His own voice is much weaker in comparison to hers, strained.

Michonne looks him up and down, concerned frown on her face, but she nods. She moves to stand on the other side of Daryl, effectively putting him between her and Noah. “Come on, let’s go inside.” She says, and Daryl can’t find it in himself to reply. He keeps his gaze down as they start walking.

Michonne must give a look toward Noah, because the kid awkwardly introduces himself.

“I’m, uh.” He stutters. “I’m Noah. They saved me.” He says in explanation. There’s a beat of silence. “Even after I stole their weapons.”

He hears Michonne give a small chuckle. “Yeah, well, that’s him.” She says and Daryl knows that she’s thinking about countless times the two of them had gone out, looking for people to bring back, at the prison.

“Michonne.” She says, before they leave it at that.

Or at least, he thinks they leave it at that, but then Michonne goes and says,

“You know, Rick’s been real worried. About both of you.” He tenses. “Especially you though, you know you drive him crazy when you just disappear like that.” She says, not like she’s telling him off for it, just stating facts.

Which was a trait of hers that Daryl usually loved, because he could understand it, but right now Michonne was adding so many cracks to Daryl’s long standing walls, that he couldn’t help but hate it.

They’ve reached the doors to the church, and that, along with Michonne’s comment, seem to snap him out of whatever trance he’d been in. He takes a step back from the two of them, and they both look back at him with different expressions.

Noah’s being a look of confusion, while Michonne looks at him with a mix of concern and ‘don’t be difficult.’

The thought of dealing with everything he’d already been dreading, on top of now realising he actually needed to go inside and see everyone, was a lot to ask. He didn’t know if he could deal with everyone’s eyes on him, even if they were all his family, all people he trusted completely.

He shakes his head, panic masked by frustration. “We need to go to Atlanta.” He says, like Michonne hadn’t put the pieces together, like she couldn’t grasp how important it was.

“And we will.” She says in that same tone as before. “Tomorrow.”

“No.” He hears himself say, and it’s petulant, and stupid, and he doesn’t even know why he’s saying it, because it sure as hell isn’t what his own plan had even been.

Noah looks uncomfortable, standing on the first step.

“You know that that’s a bad idea. We’re going to go.” She tells him, “Tomorrow.” Like there’s no room for any argument, and there isn’t, not really. She’s completely right, and if Daryl was anywhere more put together than he is now, she would have never needed to tell him that.

But here they are.

“Come on.” Michonne repeats from earlier, motioning towards the church doors, and Daryl hears the unspoken ‘You know what else is a bad idea, you’re not hiding.’.

He begrudgingly makes his way up the stairs, before Michonne opens one of the doors, and Daryl holds his breath.

Almost everyone turns their head when they hear the door, beside Sasha, who’s sitting and staring at the ground. The place is a bit of a mess, and there’s blood in various places.

Daryl is still holding his breath.

He tries not to look, tries to ignore it, but it doesn’t take long before his eyes meet Rick’s, and the man immediately stands up from where he’d been sitting next to Carl, handing Judith to the boy as he does so.

Still, no one has said anything, and it hasn’t escaped Daryl’s notice that people are missing. Pairing that with the blood on the floor of the church, Daryl’s getting more and more anxious about what the hell has happened while he’s been gone.

He’s already feeling the guilt of it all. Whatever happened, he should have been here. He should have been here. This is his fault. His fault for not looking after the people that were here. His fault for leaving to look for a dead girl because now everything is wrong and it’s all his fault.

And still, no one has said a single fucking thing, even though they’re all looking at him, and Rick is coming closer, and Rick hasn’t said anything. This is all his fault.

He assumes that Rick is going to come and beat the living shit out of him and tell him as such.

But no, that doesn’t sound like Rick.

And Rick’s quick strides towards him are relieved, and almost desperate.

As soon as he’s close enough, Rick is pulling Daryl toward him, hugging him quickly, before pulling away and checking Daryl over. Which is great because Daryl is tense with worry, and he doesn’t think he’d be able to hold back from falling into the man’s arms and crying, like he was longing to do earlier.

“Are you okay?” Rick speaks, and it’s one of those questions that had changed meaning quite some time ago. More of a ‘Are you injured? Where? How bad?’ or a ‘Have you slept? Eaten? Had water? Do you need something right now or can you keep going? How long?’.

Daryl gives a hum, nodding his head jerkily. “What happened?” He asks, and his voice sounds just as strained as earlier, maybe worse.

Rick tilts his head a little, giving him that look. The one where he’d really prefer if Daryl gave him an explanation first, but if Daryl was willingly speaking up, and asking something, Rick wouldn’t usually get in the way of that.

Big softie, Rick Grimes.

To his slight surprise, Rick does give in, and starts to fill Daryl in on what happened. Maybe not everything had changed after the prison.

“You were right.” Rick says, eyes following the new kid, as Michonne led Noah further into the church, toward everyone else.

“We were being watched.” He looks back toward Daryl, then outside. Rick takes a step outside, half heartedly curling his finger to signal that Daryl come outside with him. The archer does, closing the door behind himself.

Rick lowers himself to the ground, sitting with his back to one of the support beams on the top step. He rests his arms on top on his knees and gestures with one hand for Daryl to sit down.

The archer does so, sitting facing forward, looking out into the trees, while Rick has a too good view of Daryl’s face, and therefore his emotions.

“Guys from Terminus, ones that were left, they came after us.” He says, then looks out to the trees too. “They got Bob, ate his leg, brought him back to us.”

Daryl feels himself tense up even more. “Is he dead?” He asks, and he hates that it’s the natural next question to ask.

In his peripheral, (because he can’t look at Rick right now, not properly.) he sees Rick shake his head.

“He got bit, before that. He wasn’t gonna make it.”

Daryl ducks his head, nodding. He was the one who brought Bob in. He also threatened to kill Bob himself. Neither of those things even matter anymore, whether he liked the guy or not, because he didn’t get to say goodbye to the man, and he can’t ever talk with him again.

Once again, he doesn’t know what to fucking say, so he doesn’t say anything at all, and waits for Rick to continue.

Rick sighs. “Abraham wanted to leave.” He fiddles with his watch. “Wanted all of us to leave.”

Daryl wasn’t here for it, hasn’t heard anyone’s point of view of the whole thing, and yet he can already hear in Rick’s voice, ‘Nobody’s leavin’, they’re coming back.’

The thought would almost make him want to smile if he weren’t so overwhelmed with guilt.

He can feel Rick’s eyes back on him now. Can almost feel the smirk too, and the position, with Rick’s damn half amused, half concerned look, makes him think of a very different time, a time before Judith had even been born. It almost makes him want to throw up. Almost makes him want to run away and hide.

And where the hell had the tough, cold, stubborn bullshit gone, huh? He could use some of that right about now.

“If he wanted all of us to leave, he was gonna have to wait for all of us.”

Daryl brings his gaze further down, watching as he picks at the skin around his nails.

“Glenn made a deal with him. So after we lured Gareth and his group into the church, came in and killed them all, and it was done, Glenn, Maggie, and Tara went with the three of them.”

Daryl bit his lip. “They gone?” He asked quietly. There go more of his family, all disappearing, one by one.

Rick nodded. “On their way to Washington now.” He nudges Daryl with his foot. “Said we’d follow them after you two came back.” Which is a nicer way of demanding what the hell Daryl had been up to than he was expecting.

Daryl closes his eyes, taking a too shallow breath. When he opens his eyes again, briefly glancing towards Rick, only to find the man looking right at him with that patient look, he almost starts crying.

Rick’s quietly studying him, still with that half amused, half concerned look. Even when so much shit had happened recently.

Although the longer that Daryl sits there with his leg bouncing up and down, it becomes more of a 20% amused, 80% concerned, look.

Daryl keeps his eyeline down toward his hands, not daring to look at Rick again.

“We got a car working, earlier.” He starts, knowing that Rick will follow along. He doesn’t need to explain who ‘we’ means, or when ‘earlier’ was. He decides to leave out the part where Carol almost drove away from them all, but he feels like Rick might figure it out anyway.

“This other car drives past, don’t see us, ‘s got this white cross on the back of it. Jus’ like the one that took-” He cuts himself off, shaking his head a little. Saying her name out loud was something so small and so silly to be so fucking hard to do.

“Like the one that took Beth.” Rick says, softly, and it gets on Daryl’s nerves instantly. He couldn’t afford to break down right now.

Daryl tries not to let any aggression show when he nods his head. “We followed it into Atlanta, there’s a group of ‘em in this hospital, Grady Memorial.” He swallows thickly, there was that proudness coming out again. “That kid, Noah, he was there too, Beth helped him get out.”

He sees Rick nod in his peripheral. “Was leaving this buildin’, Carol was ahead of us, this car came and ran into her. They got her and drove off to the hospital. Didn’t see either of us.” He says.

“Was she-” Rick starts, before cutting himself off and looking back out to the trees. “Did she look like she was gonna be okay?” He asks, looking like even he thinks it’s a weak question.

Daryl shrugs one shoulder, not looking up. “Kid says they can help her.” He says, trying not to think too hard about it.

Rick sighs. “Did you see them, their group.” Daryl shakes his head.

The silence he’s met with makes him uneasy, and for the first time in literal days, Daryl turns his head to look at Rick, making proper eye contact.

“We gotta go.” He says, firmly.

Rick bites his lip, looking back at him. “I want to.” He says, and it’s one of the worst things that Daryl’s ever heard.

Dread fills the archer, and his body language turns defensive. “Rick.” He says, disbelieving.

Rick tilts his head, looking genuinely upset. “Nah, we gotta do this. It don’t matter how many there are.” Daryl says angrily.

Rick raises a hand in surrender, like he’s trying to soothe an animal that’s lashing out. “I’m not saying that. I’m not saying that.” He says. “I’m sayin’ we need to figure this out, all of us. Who’s goin’, who’s stayin’ here.”

He waits for Daryl to say something, expectantly, and when nothing comes out of the archer’s mouth, Rick speaks again. “I don’t know if I can do it, me.” He says, halfway between vulnerability and confidence, that it throws Daryl for a second.

He shakes his head, willing the tears starting to cloud his vision to leave, and digs his nail as hard as he can into his thumb’s cuticle. “You have to.” He says quietly, and then the anger returns, and he’s looking back to Rick before he can think it through.

“Nah, they need you, Rick.” He doesn’t know if he’s talking about Carol and Beth or if he’s talking about the group of people that will go into Atlanta, but either way, it’s true.

Before Rick can get another word in, Daryl’s speaking again. “I need you.” He says, aggressively and honest, and it’s just about the stupidest thing he’s ever said. Hasn’t he been trying to avoid breaking down?

Rick stares at him, mouth slightly open, like he should say something, but he doesn’t know where to start.

The silence stretches longer than a second, and it makes Daryl realise that there isn’t going to be a back and forth argument anymore. There isn’t a whole conversation, where he can say something on the cusp of too honest and too vulnerable and be able to conveniently hide it in the middle of them talking, like he had in the past, on occasion.

No, this was out in the open, and the air was thick, and Daryl’s vision was ever so slightly too blurry.

And Carol and Beth could both be dead by now, and Bob was dead, and Maggie and Glenn and Tara, and Abraham and Rosita and Eugene had all left, and everything was falling apart.

He’s awkwardly rushing to stand up, making Rick say something to him, but Daryl can’t hear what exactly it is, because he’s too lost in his head. He quickly storms off, frustration evident.

God he was such an idiot.

He only makes it four or five steps away from the church when he hears a quiet, warning, “Hey.”, behind him, and Rick’s hand is grabbing hold of his arm. Daryl immediately recoils, yanking his arm away before Rick can get a proper grip, stumbling just a little in his haste to get further away.

“Hey!” Rick says in a lower tone, exasperated. Before he knows it, Rick has run out in front of him, stopping only a step away from Daryl, facing him. He has his hand raised in Daryl’s direction, as if to block him from walking anymore.

“You’re not staying out here. ‘specially not with what’s been happening. You know that.”

Daryl does know that, logically. Logically, he knew a lot of things, but he’s far past the point of logically thinking.

“I’m not gonna let you.” Rick says, voice almost comforting. It almost makes Daryl want to stop all this and follow him back inside. Maybe even hug Rick, god knows he wants to. The voice at the back of his head wants him to say ‘I trust you’.

“Can’t make me do shit.” Is what he says instead.

Rick takes a deep breath, shaking his head in an irritated manner. “What are you trying to do?” He asks, somehow still having some patience left in him. (Only for Daryl.)

Daryl tries to side step Rick, who just pushes his hand closer until it’s touching Daryl’s chest, which just makes the archer push past him faster than he was originally going.

He stalks off, hearing Rick’s (deliberately) heavy footsteps following him. From behind him, Rick starts talking.

“Hey! We wouldn’t’ve left them, I wouldn’t’ve left them. You say this is what we gotta do, then this is what we gotta do, but we gotta be smart about it.” Daryl ignores him.

“Runnin’ off and throwin’ tantrums isn’t gonna do anything for anyone.” Daryl can’t ignore him.

He stops mid step, body going stiff. Neither of them say anything for a minute, and Daryl can taste blood from where he’s been biting his lip.

“Daryl.” Rick calls, and it isn’t exactly a comforting tone, but it’s clear that he’s trying to be convincing. Rick only says his name and Daryl can hear the countless other things he’s being told.

Daryl slowly turns around to face Rick. “First thing.” He hears himself say, and his voice is still just as strained as it had been earlier.

Rick looks Daryl over, fuck knows what he’s searching for, but Daryl really fucking hopes he doesn’t find it, because he’s already far too close to breaking down right at this second. He doesn’t need something else to worry about hiding.

He repeats himself, more clearly. “First thing, tomorrow.”

Rick shakes his head. “No. Not first thing, I told you we’re doing this the smart way, we’re not doing it with no plan. No preparation. That won’t help anyone, Daryl.”

Daryl bristles, half a second away from shouting something. It’s probably better that Rick interrupts him before he gets the chance, at least while Daryl isn’t thinking before he’s speaking.

“I mean it, what are you trying to do right now?” Rick asks, head tilted in exasperation. “What do you think you’re achieving here?”

In all honesty, Rick probably has more of an idea as to what and why Daryl is doing right now. More than Daryl, at least, because Daryl has no fucking idea what he’s doing.

By all accounts, Rick could be right, saying that Daryl is running off and throwing a tantrum. Which should be a situation to never actually happen.

He’s being petulant, moody, selfish, at the end of it all. Yelling and storming off because he isn’t getting his way.

But it wasn’t fair, because ‘his way’ had only been him wanting all of his family to be safe and happy and in the same place. It wasn’t fair that that was just too much to ask for.

At Daryl’s complete silence, which could either be coming off as a vulnerable, lost stance, or childish retaliation (and Daryl has no idea which one Rick’s taking it as, mostly because he, himself, doesn’t know which one it is.), Rick pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Daryl.” Rick sighs out, dropping his hands and tapping his fingers on his leg. “I get that this is hard, you know I do, but jesus Daryl. I mean.” Rick shakes his head, shrugging one shoulder.

“I mean it’s like talking to a child.”

Daryl stops breathing. His bottom lip quivers.

Rick’s eyebrows furrow in concern at him, and Daryl hates to even think about how he must look right now.

He needed to keep it together. Tough, cold, stubborn, and all that. But wasn’t that what had gotten him into this mess in the first place? Hadn’t he learned that it was better to be open? Hadn’t Rick been the one to cement that fact for him?

He starts moving, feet unsteady but quick paced, hoping to move right past Rick.

He’s only just past Rick when he hears the man softly call, “Daryl.”

It was all so much easier when they were both arguing, when Daryl could keep himself distracted, angry. It was all so much harder when Rick had that soft, gentle, concerned, tone. When there was nothing to distract Daryl from how much he was hurting.

“Fuck you, man.” Daryl mumbles under his breath.

He doesn’t make it much further before Rick is grabbing both of Daryl’s arms, turning him until they were facing each other again. The position means they’re much closer to one another, and it makes Daryl feel claustrophobic.

Rick goes to say something but Daryl speaks over him. “Said we can’t stay out here, didn’t you?” He asks Rick, aggressively, and pulls himself out of Rick’s hold.

He can’t hear footsteps, and realises that Rick’s staying behind him, giving him space, as Daryl takes the church stairs two at a time. He pulls the door open a little harsher than necessary and walks inside.

Once more, everyone turns to look at him, some of them smiling. Carl looked like he was going to say something to him but stops when he looks Daryl over more. It seems everyone could sense his need for space right now.

He stalks off to a corner of the church that no one was sitting in and pushes his back against the wall.

Half a minute later he hears the door open, and Rick walks in.

He hears Rick talk to the group, listens as he fills them in on what Daryl had told him, about where Carol was, about Beth being there. Daryl stays in his spot, sitting in the corner, keeping his eyes pressed shut.

At least he didn’t have to tell everyone about what happened in Atlanta.

The morning comes quick, and even though Daryl hadn’t slept all that much, he at least felt a little more in control. His thoughts a little clearer.

Only Michonne, Gabriel, Carl, and Judith were staying at the church while the rest of the group would go into Atlanta. They had tried to secure the church as much as they could before leaving, which consisted of Daryl avoiding the areas Rick was working, and not acknowledging each other unless necessary. Which really was stupid, and definitely not helping his childish streak, but Daryl couldn’t get himself to care.

It feels like no time has passed at all, and all of a sudden, they’re leaving.

They’ve only just shut the doors of the church, and Judith’s already screaming, her cries audible as they walk away.

“Missing her Daddy already.” Noah hesitantly speaks up, trying to lighten the mood.

Rick smiles at him. “She’s alright.”

“She’s just clingy. Has separation anxiety.” Tyreese says, before nudging Daryl’s shoulder. “Bit like someone else I know.” He jokes. Daryl pushes him away harder than necessary.

“Piss off.” Daryl mumbles under his breath, no trace of humour.

By now, most of them had seemed to notice the tension between him and Rick, considering that they weren’t glued to each other, despite Daryl having been missing for over a day.

The drive to Atlanta is quiet. Daryl’s head is not.

He’s overwhelmed with conflicting thoughts. On the one hand, who the fuck cared what Rick thought, right? Who the fuck cared if Rick thought he was acting childish or throwing tantrums. Who fucking cared.

Not him.

Not him.

And especially who fucking cared about the others taking notice of the tension between them. Who the fuck were they to think they knew him well enough. To be able to notice that him and Rick weren’t on the best of terms, all because Daryl was putting space between them.

It hadn’t been like that when they’d been at the camp outside Atlanta. Hadn’t been like that at the farm. No one would have batted a fucking eye, but now.

Now.

He stares out of the window, watching their surroundings blend together as they pass by.

On the other hand, he was someone who was trying.

He wasn’t going to give that up because he threw a fit to Rick, and then got called out for it. He knew what he was doing right now, and he was going to stop it because these people, his family, they didn’t deserve that, and maybe, just maybe, he was learning that he didn’t deserve that either.

He didn’t need to push himself away every time he got scared.

He was someone who was trying. He was someone who still thought that there were good people.

That’s why, after they’d gotten into the city, and after they’d started making plans, Daryl sided with Tyreese over Rick. (And maybe also because he was still mad, which he knew was only because he was scared, but he couldn’t help it. Rick would understand.)

“If we get a couple of her cops alive out here, we do an even trade. Theirs for ours, everybody goes home.”

Daryl watches Rick. He has that face again. The one used for trying to politely tell a young child that their idea is shit.

“Yeah, I get it, and it might work.” He even sounds genuine. “This will work.” Rick says, with such finality that Daryl almost doesn’t question it at all.

But he was someone who knew there were still good people, and regardless, he wasn’t overly keen on slitting someone’s throat if he didn’t need to. Unlike it may seem, Daryl was affected by every shitty thing he had to do. He didn’t like it.

So, it’s a lot of ‘I’m trying’ and a lot of ‘Beth Greene changed my mind’ and a little bit of ‘Fuck Rick Grimes’ that prompts Daryl into saying something.

‘Nah, that’ll work too.” He nods, watching as Rick looks at him with a mixed expression of being pissed off, confused, and concerned. He pretends not to notice Tyreese’s confusion. Sure, he wasn’t afraid of fighting, and he almost always agreed with Rick, but seriously?

God forbid that Daryl Dixon wanted to get through this without anyone dying, right?

He pushes through, trying to look unaffected by both reactions.

“You say this Dawn, she’s just trying to keep it together, right?” Daryl says, looking back at Rick every few seconds.

“Trying and doing are two different things.” Noah says.

“We take two of her cops away, what choices does she have? Everybody goes home, like he said.” Daryl points to Tyreese.

He can feel Rick staring at him, and when he looks back, he can see just how confused Rick looks. Sceptical. Like he’s trying to figure out what Daryl’s playing at. What changed.

Actually capturing the cops turns out to be a hell of a lot harder when a third one shows up out of fuck knows where, and then almost kills him.

There’s blood and ash coating him, and as much as he tries, he can’t really shake the fear he felt. The familiar sound of Rick’s gun clicking was enough to calm his nerves down, but there was some unsettled feeling that wasn’t leaving him.

“Okay, you win asshole.” The other guy says, as Daryl’s scrambling to get further away from the guy.

The unsettled feeling grows more when Rick doesn’t lower his gun. Hell, doesn’t even start to lower it, and for a moment Daryl thought Rick was going to pull the trigger without thinking any of it through.

It comforts him just as much as it scares him.

Because yeah, he was trying and they were getting to a stage where Rick really needed to start trying too, but…

But there was no denying that that look, the way he wasn’t even considering not shooting that guy. That protectiveness wasn’t just because he was threatening someone in Rick’s group, or Rick’s family.

No, that was because he was threatening Daryl. That was because he had almost killed Daryl.

Daryl would be lying if he said that it didn’t make him feel good. Just a little.

“Rick.” He says, getting no acknowledgement. “Rick!” Still nothing.

“Rick. Three’s better than two.” He tries to reason, which in itself was an odd concept because on the rare occasions that Daryl had expressed an opinion on shit like this, usually Rick took it as a sign to change things up.

Rick finally breaks the glare he had on the cop, turning his head toward Daryl and looking almost annoyed. Like he was pissed off that Daryl wasn’t letting him die for trying to kill him. Reluctantly as ever, Rick slowly lowers his gun.

They drag all three of the cops back to where they were holding up, Rick being less than pleasant with them all the while.

Despite the tension between the two of them, Rick still found time to come over to Daryl, asking about injuries, handing him water. It was kind of nice, in an awkward, half mad at you, way.

Nothing ever seems to go to plan for them though, so of course one of the cops knocks Sasha out and tries to run away.

Rick had immediately gone after Lamson, which left Daryl here. Sitting and waiting for their return.

Tyreese and him had looked Sasha over, and the worst part seemed to be how stupid she felt after the whole thing. Not that it was her fault.

Daryl’s head shoots up when he hears the door open, and he’s next to Rick in an instant when he sees him alone.

“He wouldn’t stop.” Is all Rick offers.

“This change things.” Daryl half asks, half states.

“It has to.” Rick says, and he looks like he had when they were originally going over their plan. Finality, like there was no other option.

“Maybe not.” He says, hoping Rick will give it a chance.

Rick raises an eyebrow at him, and it seems they’re still not on great terms.

“Well, she said the plan won’t work, the guy who did is dead. Maybe we gotta rethink this.” Rick says with that head tilt of his. Daryl doesn’t mention that Rick didn’t actually need to kill Lamson.

“They also said the cop in charge didn’t have any love for him. Maybe you did her a favour.” Daryl shrugs. He didn’t want to turn this into a massacre.

“I don’t know if they’ll play ball.” Rick tells him, still sounding like it was stupid to even try to do this without killing people.

“Lets find out.” Daryl says. He’d kill anyone to save his family, but it wasn’t always the only option, and he was a little worried about where this was going to lead them.

Rick looks at him sceptically again. Maybe after they do all this, get Carol and Beth back. Maybe then Daryl will talk with Rick. Not about everything. Not about that but about some things. They couldn’t keep having this back and forth they had going right now. Daryl didn’t want that.

And he didn’t really think fuck Rick Grimes. Not even a little bit.

The plan is to make a trade. They go through the motions of it all, Rick talks with some other cops. Everything is going so smoothly that before Daryl realises what’s happening, they’re already walking through the halls of Grady Memorial.

Doors open, and then Daryl can see them again.

Carol’s in a wheelchair, looking exhausted, but Daryl knows her well. She’s injured, but she seems to be okay. Okay enough.

And then there’s Beth.

She has cuts on her face, her wrist in a cast. Daryl doesn’t know what it is, how it is, that she looks so drastically different, but so completely the same, simultaneously. He almost calls out to her, before he thinks better of it.

They swap one person at a time, Carol getting wheeled over to their side of the hall. Then the second cop goes, and Daryl feels a little light headed at the idea that this is actually working.

As soon as Beth is close enough, Rick is reaching his hand out, gently holding her face. No doubt checking over every single cut, every detail. He pulls her into his side, and she leans into the brief hug easily.

Daryl doesn’t say anything to her, not yet. Not until they get the hell out of here.

Everything was so almost perfect. It so almost worked.

Until that Dawn bitch said she needed Noah to stay.

Daryl wasn’t letting that happen, no way. Rick sure as hell wasn’t letting that happen. It didn’t matter that they didn’t know Noah well, he was part of their group now, that’s how it went.

He also knows that Beth probably wouldn’t let that happen either, and the thought fills him with a deep, awful anxiety.

“He ain’t staying.” He hears himself say, and everything feels wrong.

Daryl doesn’t think he’s understanding any of the words anyone is saying, everything sounding like a blur, mixed with his too fast heartbeat in his ears. He didn’t go through all of it for this, he isn’t letting anything bad happen, not to any of them.

He does hear Dawn say the words, “Then we don’t have a deal.”

And he does hear Rick shout. “The deal is done!”

“It-It’s okay.” Noah stutters, small, not at all reassuring, smile on his face. This wasn’t right. This wasn’t fair.

“No! No.” Rick says but Noah is already walking back toward Dawn and the others.

“Wait!” Beth calls, and Daryl felt like he hadn’t heard her voice in so long. Watching her run over to Noah, further away from their family, it made him feel anxious. It made him feel afraid.

Beth wraps her arms around Noah’s neck, hugging him tight.

“It’s okay.” He hears Noah say, in the silence that has filled the hall.

“I knew you’d be back.” Dawn tells him. Daryl can see the change in Beth, and he hates it.

He hates it, he hates it, he hates it. This is wrong. She should be back over here, behind the rest of them. She should be as far away from this place as possible.

“I get it now.” Beth says, and he can hear the tears she has, through her voice. She moves closer to Dawn, until she’s right in front of her.

And then Beth stabs Dawn.

And then Dawn shoots Beth

Straight through her head. Almost everyone looks away on impact, the loud noise of the bullet making them flinch.

Rick has blood on his face. Rick has her blood on him.

There’s about half a second where nobody moves, just trying to understand what happened.

Daryl moves. He knows he does, because he has his gun up, and is firing before he can even think a single coherent sentence about any of it. He shoots Dawn. He kills her.

He can hear voices. First from one of the cops, he doesn’t bother to make sense of what they’re saying. Then he hears Rick’s voice, shaky, and wrong in every way.

He still has his arm up, still pointing his gun, trained on a spot that Dawn no longer stood. Tears are covering his vision, but when he looks down, he can see her blonde hair, and her red blood, crystal clear.

He knows he’s a mess, tears and whimpers, and he can’t bring himself to care about any of it. Not when two fucking minutes ago Beth was standing right fucking next to him.

They need to leave. They need to take her.

He needs to.

He follows everyone else, no one saying a single word between them. He’s carrying her body, and he can’t even look down at her, and it makes him feel awful. He’s awful.

But what was a million times worse, was walking out and seeing Maggie waiting for them.

She starts screaming, sobbing, crying. This is all his fault.

His body starts shaking before he can try and stop it. He opens his mouth and nothing but a sob comes out. He tries again, but breathing is much more difficult than normal, and he’s shaking, his legs feel like they might collapse under him, and he’s holding her fucking body.

“I’m sorry.” He says, strained, weak, barely comprehensible. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” He whispers.

It’s only when Maggie stands up, to come closer to him, closer to her, that he tries to say anything again.

“I’m sorry Maggie. ‘M sorry.” He knows it’s never going to be enough, god, this is all his fault.

The ten minutes they take to load everyone up, to go back (back where? They had no where left to go), are the longest and shortest ten minutes of Daryl’s life.

He’d stayed standing, staring at his feet, while the others got into the cars. Someone, a few people, had taken Beth off of him. He can’t remember if he’d said anything to them or not. Can’t remember if he’d let them take her, or if he’d tried to hold on. He guesses it doesn’t matter.

He knows he needs to move soon, that everyone else is probably waiting on him.

He flinches when he feels a hand on his shoulder, and looks up to see Rick right next to him. Daryl’s first thought is that he must look like a fucking mess right now, like he was more vulnerable than ever, which could be true.

The reason he knows this is because Rick has cleaned her blood off of his face. In the middle of all this shit, when they really needed to just get out of here, Rick had made sure to wipe her blood away before talking to Daryl.

As if her blood isn’t on his arm right now, on his hands, as if he hadn’t picked her up and carried her dead body.

Rick looks Daryl over for a minute. “I’m sorry.” He says, voice barely above a whisper, and he tugs Daryl into a hug. Daryl’s breath hitches.

Daryl’s shaking his head, crying, while Rick holds him.

“My fault.” Daryl’s murmuring before he can think better of it. “My fault, this is all my fault, this is all my fault.” He says, all hurried out, strung together, under his breath.

Rick pulls back from him, and despite his efforts, Rick looks like a mess too.

“No.” He says. “No, it isn’t.” There’s that finality again. Maybe Rick was right about everything they should have done, maybe she’d still be alive if they did what Rick said. Maybe Rick had been right the last time he had said something with that finality.

Daryl knows that he’s wrong about this.

Daryl takes another step back from Rick, he can’t be here anymore. He can’t be here, and he definitely can’t talk about it. He can’t talk about anything.

Daryl doesn’t say anything, the whole trip out of Atlanta.

It’s not okay. Nothing right now was okay. But finally, finally, Rick doesn’t need to be told, to be able to understand.

They weren’t okay, but in time they would be.

And Rick thinks he knows what’s going on here. He thinks he knows what’s going on with Daryl, and he’s confident that he’s right.

And he wasn’t going to let Daryl not look after himself. Not ever. Not when it was Daryl.

So, Rick knows that he needs to talk to Daryl.