Chapter Text
"Thank you for the offer but I'll have to decline." Stacie rubbed the back of their neck, it wasn't that they didn't want to go, they just couldn't convince themself too.
"It'll only be a day delay, I mean you're already pretty far off and you can get a good nights sleep and be on your way fresh in the morning with new supplies." Michonne spat her last bit of convincing words.
Stacie shook their head.
"Thank you really, but I can't accept." with those words they turned away and headed for the hole in the back fence.
Michonne grabbed the strangers satchel strap, jerking them to a stop.
"I'll mark your map for the prison, just in case you need anything. If you truly are alone things can become overwhelming. They're good folks just tell them that I sent you." she was handed the map for the last time, she marked the prison's location on the map and handed it back.
"Thank you, really I appreciate it. Not everyone is so nice nowadays." Stacie closed the satchel and headed on their way.
Michonne watched the stranger move through the hole and disappear behind the gate. She was hesitant but moved back into the house, she was cautious with her movements incase of any unwanted house guests. Michonne was swift to move up the stairs, before she entered any rooms she peaked out the window and into the neighbor's backyard where Stacie was.
The stranger was kneeling on the ground in the middle of the backyard. Michonne laughed to herself.
"What are they doing?" Michonne leaned up against the wall next to the window.
Michonne watched Stacie as they scavenged, she was reminded of the times before she met Andrea. She looked around the hall and decided she would keep up with her newly founded acquaintance.
After she made it back down to the backyard she peeked through the hole into the neighbor's backyard, she didn't want to ruffle Stacie's feathers or anything so she decided to stay hidden as she kept up with them.
Michonne shuffled through her messenger bag as she waited for Stacie to move into the house. As she looked over a small list of things that Rick and the others asked for, she heard the groans of their unwanted friends. Michonne shoved the list back in her bag and set her hands on her katana, ready to deal with the undead.
She looked around and realized that they weren't coming for her, she peaked into the neighbors back yard and saw three walkers surrounding Stacie. Michonne unsheathed her sword and prepared to attack but she stopped herself. She might be able to see what the stranger could do, if worse came to worse she would step in.
Stacie took turns pushing each walker away until they had time to pull out what looked like a large knife, Michonne narrowed her gaze and realized it was actually a dagger.
Stacie stepped back so that the walkers weren't surrounding them, they shot a swift kick to a tall walker that was closest to them causing it to fall to it's knees. They took the opportunity to drive the dagger right through it's head several time. Of course Stacy didn't have time to make sure if it was down for good because they was already being tackled by the two other walkers that accompanied the fallen walker.
As the two walkers tackled Stacie to the ground, they used the dagger to block the nearest ones mouth from biting a chunk out of their neck. If only Stacie could get to their bag, they could pull out their handgun and deal with this problem.
The snarls were causing blood and other bodily fluids to rain down on the canadians face. Stacie slammed their eyes shut trying to think of a solution as quick as possible. Mid-thought a loud slicing noise interrupted Stacie.
Stacie opened their eyes to see Michonne and her bloodied sword standing over them. Michonne smirked and held out her hand, Stacie took her hands and pulled themself up. As Stacie stood up, the pair watched each other's eyes closely waiting for someone to say something.
"I suppose I should thank you." Stacie pulled their hand away and shoved their dagger in the satchel.
"And I suppose I should say your welcome." Michonne joked, she wiped the blood off on her pants and sheathed her sword.
"Were you planning on following me for long?" Stacie narrowed their eyes at Michonne.
"I mean not that I mind but I'm not helpless like you think. I've traveled a long way on my own and shit like that happens alot. I can get out of a few sticky situations." their voice was bitter.
Michonne didn't say anything, she could understand why they'd say that. That was the exact reason she wanted to keep hidden when following Stacie.
"Well I was just a bystander who could lend a hand, had nothing to do with whether I thought you could do it or not." Michonne scanned the other's shirt and chuckled because it was covered in blood and slime.
"That shirt looks a little helpless though." she attempted to lighten the mood.
Stacie looked down and sighed, they hated when their clothing got ruined. Luckily the houses around probably had clothing they could wear.
"Might as well come in with me, you look like you have more you want to talk about." Stacie pointed to Michonne.
It took them about five minutes to clear out the house of its two walkers and make it up the stairs to the bedrooms. The previous owners was a married couple, what looked like from the clothing to be a husky man and petite woman.
"Best of luck with these clothes." Michonne chuckled pulling out several of the women's clothing.
Stacie only watched, inspecting each piece of clothing. They felt the material to see which would be better on the go and more durable. After a few more pieces of clothing Michonne pulled out a sleeveless running polyester tank.
It was a sickeningly bright blue color with pink trim and two pink stripes going straight from the armpit to the bottom.
Stacie picked it up and sighed, it was the best of a really bad clothing situation, and man was it going to be tight on them. Michonne was distracted by the closet so she didn't notice Stacie strip their shirt.
She finally paused and looked back to see a bare chest struggling to pull the tight shirt on.
"Well isn't that interesting." Michonne watched Stacie struggle.
With a name like Stacie and that pretty face, she hadn't said it out loud but Michonne was betting that Stacie was a woman but she was satisfied to learn she was wrong.
"What you've never seen a man's bare chest or something?" Stacie finally managed to get the shirt on and he was correct, it was tight.
"I haven't seen a man like you since before the world went to hell, keeping pretty isn't what a lot of men are interested in nowadays." Michonne sat on the king sized bed next to them.
Stacie laughed her comment off, he wasn't interested in that either but he wasn't unlucky enough to have over bearing body hair and big muscles. His gene's were a little more forgiving than most.
"But don't let what I said put you off, I love a man in tight clothing." Michonne laughed, her laugh brought a smile to Stacie's face.
He sat next to her and took a few deep breathes. He was getting used to this and that was a bad thing. He kept to himself for his reasons and he couldn't get distracted.
"Since you caught me following you at least stay with me for the night and protect me with that neon blue tank top." Michonne broke Stacie from his thoughts.
"You owe me because I saved your ass, even if it was unwanted.".
Stacie looked out the window and saw the falling sun, it was already pretty dim outside because of the cloudy skies so it would be hard to move on at night.
"Tonight." His voice was low but Michonne heard him.
"Well let me go get my flying bison and we'll be all good for the night." Michonne stood up and started for the hallway.
"Flying bison?" Stacie tilted his head.
"How am I supposed to get along with someone who hasn't seen Avatar." she chuckled as she made her way down the stairs.
About twenty minutes passed before Stacie heard a huge ruckus downstairs. He jolted to the staircase and looked down. He didn't see Michonne so he quietly moved down the stairs and peaked into the front room. Coming face to face with a horse for the first time in months almost gave the canadian a heart attack.
"Huh?" Stacie peaked around and saw Michonne.
"The flying bison you mentioned?" he asked.
"More or less, the windows are already boarded up pretty good and have blankets. Lets just deal with the doors and we'll be good for the night." Michonne calmed the animal down as Stacie moved into the kitchen.
Stacie looked around the kitchen for something that would be good for boarding up the backdoor attached to it. Right next to it was the refrigerator, he shrugged and figured there was no use for it to stay in one place anymore. He called Michonne into the kitchen and they moved the refrigerator in front of the door.
They tied up the knob of the front door and set the couch in front of it. It barricaded them pretty well and gave more space in the livingroom for the horse.
"Always a bunch of work just to survive a night, make me miss the prison." Michonne sat on the loveseat in the livingroom.
"Is it really that safe, if so why aren't their broadcasts or more shit advertising your safe haven." Stacie crossed his arms.
"Don't get us wrong, I mean we want to be some great safe haven but there has to be rules and not everyone can follow them anymore and we have a council now but it wasn't always like that. It used to be bad but it's better, more welcoming than before." Michonne closed her eyes, she was tired.
"There are always rules…" Stacie sat on the floor in the corner of the living room, back facing the wall and front towards Michonne.
"You really travel all the way across the country by yourself?" Michonne asked, her eye's still closed.
Stacie didn't say anything, he leaned his head back against the wall and laughed.
"Yeah and it's been a real blast."
The silence was comforting to Stacie, he could feel himself drifting off to sleep. Although it was never a restful sleep, it was still sleep. He chuckled to himself as he thought how far away he was from Washington D.C.
They both slipped in and out of sleep the entire night, neither of them said one word. The only noises that filled the house was muffled moans from the lurking walkers outside and the soft breathing from Michonne and Stacie.
Their night went uneventful, and as the sky brightened Michonne would wake up. She sat up and stretched her arms above her. She looked around the room as she stood up.
"Stacie?" Michonne called out, she didn't see him anywhere.
She began to panic a little, she knew that they would go their separate ways but he didn't even say goodbye. Michonne moved up the stairs to check the rooms, he wasn't had just met but she had formed a connection with the stranger. Michonne understood him and he could understand her now and the choices she made back then.
This was unusual for Michonne but she knew the value of people like Stacie. He was neutral, someone who would give up what he needs because he knows how to survive on almost nothing.
Michonne looked out a bedroom window into the backyard and saw Stacie's back hunched over the ground.
"Stacie…" Michonne whispered.
She moved slowly to the back and stood behind him. He was looking through a bush for something.
"Did you think I slipped away in the night while you were asleep?"Stacie's voice startled Michonne, it was almost like he could hear what she was thinking.
"Hmm seems like something you'd do." Michonne crouched down besides him and inspected the plant he was looking through.
"What are you doing? It's like every time I see you, you're digging around the ground."
"See this plant? It's mint and these leaves can be used for several things from food to medicine. It's an amazing plant, I noticed some was growing around the neighborhood and I decided to check the backyard to see if I could gather some." Stacie held up some leaves and sniffed it, he then held it out to Michonne.
"It attracts really good bugs for your garden but with that comes bad bugs that destroys plants, so a lot of the mint is unusable but after two days of looking I've finally found some usable mint."
Michonne smells the leaves and pocketed the leaves..
"So you've spent two days looking for a few leaves?" Michonne laughed.
"Don't misjudge the greatness of mint." Stacie smirked as he went back to picking the plant.
"Besides I was looking for some mint that was undamaged and then I could plant more later one."
Silence fell between the pair, Michonne watched Stacie pick the mint and smell each leave before setting it in some kind of protected bin.
"How many walkers have you killed?" Michonne finally spoke.
"Hmm? That's hard to answer, I don't really keep track. Probably several dozen." Stacie looked up curiously.
"Ok. How many living people have you killed?" was Michonne's next question.
Stacie narrowed his eyes and sighed.
"I've only killed one living person…"
Michonne stood up but her eyes stayed attached to Stacie's.
"Why?" her voice was low.
Stacie looked back at the mint, it was obvious that he was bothered by the question. It was silent for a few moments, Michonne wasn't going to force him to answer or rush him. She moved back into the house and brought the horse back with her. When she returned Stacie was standing, his back was towards Michonne.
Stacie angled his head just enough to see her without having to move his whole body.
"I was her friend, she saved my life and taught me how to survive this world so I had no choice." his voice was low but Michone could hear him clearly.
Michonne pet the horse as she fed it some grass and forage from the backyard. Michonne didn't plan on probing for more information and Stacie had no intention of giving more information.
Silence filled the yard, Michonne hoisted herself on the horse and watched Stacie's back. She had gotten a few of the items she needed from the list but she was going to go back, she needed to see them. Neither one of them were going to say goodbye.
Michonne directed the horse to start moving, it's pace was slow. She gripped the leather rein as the horse moved through the gate opening and out into the front yard. Whatever walkers were around last night were now gone and the neighborhood was quiet.
"You never gave me your name!" Michonne jumped at the sound of Stacie's voice, he had ran out of the backyard to catch Michonne.
"My name is Michonne." she stopped the horse and looked back.
"Michonne." Stacie smiled as he said her name.
"Is it too late to take you up on your offer to come with you for one night? You saved my butt and I still owe you one." his breathing was ridged from running.
Michonne laughed and scooted up on the horse.
"Hurry up before I change my mind."