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Sweat pooled on your forehead, slowly making its way down your face as you stood, panting, using all your strength to press against the door, desperately trying to keep it closed despite the horde of walkers pushing against it.
A desperate cry left your lips as you felt the door push open enough so that a few hands manage to slip through the crack and your eyes darted around the cabin you had found yourself in and a huff of relief left you as you saw a walker free exit, thankfully they hadn’t made there way around to it yet. The only problem was that you knew the moment you took your back off the door a swarm of walkers were going to flood into the room, you as their only target.
It was times like this you really wished you’d listened to Daryl.
Still you knew you couldn’t stay there and had to take a chance before the walkers started to block both exits, leaving you trapped in the cabin with nothing but your knife. You let your head fall back against the moving door, scrunching your eyes shut as you took a deep breath, knife gripped tightly in your hands before you pushed off the door.
You were halfway across the room when the first wave of walkers pushed their way in, most of them tripping over each other and falling to the floor but some were quick, moving forward to make grabs at you. You stabbed your knife into the skull of one who got too close for comfort before you pulled it out and struggled a few times to open the exit door.
It took a few attempts but eventually you were out of the door and running down the steps, walkers following you out as you looked around seeing nothing but trees and cursed yourself for never letting Daryl teach you the basics of tracking so you could find your way back to somewhere familiar.
Still, despite no clear destination in mind you took off running as more and more walkers made their way out of the cabin and over towards you.
You didn’t stop until you were forced to by the burning in your sides, panting as you slumped against a tree in an attempt to slow your racing heart. Looking up you grimaced as you saw the sun was beginning to set, the air turning cooler, a relief for your sweat stained skin, but you knew it wouldn’t be long until night, the walkers even more active as darkness fell.
You knew you had to find Daryl, you knew he would be looking for you, no way would that man ever leave you behind.
You heard a groan from behind you and quickly took off running again, feeling like you were getting nowhere as the scenery stayed the same and it wasn’t long before you were stopping again, though this time not on your own accord.
You barely even registered what had happened, only feeling the sharp pain against your forehead and a stinging in your hands as suddenly you were looking down at the forest floor. Your head shot up as you felt a tight grip on your ankle and the sound of snarling and teeth gnashing together but had to paused when a wave of dizziness spread through your head.
You pushed through it and turned to look at the walker who was hidden in the bushes, lower body missing as it tried to take a chunk out of your lower leg. You thrashed against its hold, a cry leaving your lips as you tried to pull your ankle away from it, eventually pushing yourself up and piercing its skull with your knife.
With a tired huff you let yourself fall back down, wincing as twigs and stones poked into your back but all the energy you had was drained from your body as you looked up at the darkening sky. You winced again and lifted your hand to your forehead only to frown at the blood that stained your fingers before your gaze shifted to the cuts littered across the palm of your hands from where you’d tried to stop the fall.
Your eyes fell shut as you once again cursed yourself for not listening to Daryl earlier that morning.
You had been sitting on one of the car bonnets, listening as Daryl and Rick spoke about supplies that were running low. Daryl had offered to go on a run, a building a few miles out that they hadn’t checked yet could give them what they needed.
You’d perked up from your position as you grabbed the chance to leave the prison but Daryl was shaking his head at you before you even opened your mouth, leaving you pouting over at him.
“Y’not coming, we don’t know anythin’ about this place.” He had told you but you’d just shaken your head right back at him, giving him your best pleading expression and watched as his stern expression crumbled. “It’s dangerous, Y/N/N.” He’d warned you but you didn’t back down, anything to have a few hours away from the prison and who better to spend them hours with than Daryl. “Fine,” He finally relented and you grinned over at him as no words were needed to persuade the man, “but you stay with me the whole time, no wanderin’ off.”
You’d agreed to his rules, not planning on going anywhere without him anyway. Though you had been a member of the group from pretty much the beginning you rarely went on supply runs because whilst you could deal with walkers it wasn’t your forte.
Losing Daryl hadn’t been your fault, not when the building you were in had caved in on itself and you searched everywhere for the man without success. You figured he’d be looking for you and when he couldn’t find you he’d make his way back to the bike you’d left a few miles back, the place he’d told you to go if things went south.
Too bad you weren’t half as good as he was at navigating yourself through the woods, you swore you knew exactly which way you’d come in from but somehow you’d ended up in the middle of a herd, finding the cabin before one of them bit you.
You knew you had to pull yourself up, knew you had to find Daryl and if not him then at least find somewhere safe to hole up whilst you waited for the man to use those tracking skills of his to find you.
With a groan you finally stood up, steadying yourself against a tree as you blinked away the pain in your head before picking a direction and sticking to it, knowing you were well and truly lost with only less than an hour of light left to find something.
Your knife was gripped in your fist as you walked for another half an hour, two walkers dead somewhere behind you as you kept moving, knowing that if you stopped the exhaustion would take over and you’d be done for.
You heard a rustle somewhere to your left, twigs snapped under shoes as they made their way closer to you and you could have cried at the thought of fighting another walker, tiredness flooding your system but you still gripped your knife tighter, not prepared to go down without somewhat of a fight.
Just as you stepped forward with your arm raised to bring the knife down into the skull of another walker you felt your wrist get grabbed in a soft grip before it was pulled down and the knife was taken out of your hand.
“Ya alright, s’just me,” your eyes widened as you let out a huff of laughter as relief ran through you at Daryl’s soft voice, letting your head lean forward to rest against his chest with a slight wince.
Daryl frowned down at you, somehow more concerned now that he had found you than he had been whilst searching the woods. He let go of your wrist and wrapped his arm around your waist, the other coming up to rest against the back of your neck as he held you close, letting you hold onto him tightly as you assured yourself that he was there.
He pulled away soon after though, not going far just far enough so that he could see your face. One hand stayed around your waist as the other came up to gently hold your chin as he tilted your head to the side so he could get a better look at the cut on your head, grimacing when you winced as his thumb moved to brush gently below it.
“Y’alright,” He told you again, forcing his grimace into a smile. “We’ll get ya patched up back at the prison, yeah?” He said, watching as your eyes squinted against the tiredness you felt before you nodded.
“C’mon, let’s get ya home.” He said keeping his voice soft as he tucked your knife away before taking one of your hands in his, ready to lead you back to the bike before a wince from you stopped him. “What’s wrong?” He asked, eyes darting across your body, trying to identify what had caused the wince.
“I’m fine, I just hurt my hands when I fell.” You told him, watching as he gently took a hold of your wrists and turned them so your palms were upwards. He winced down at the various cuts and let his thumb brush against your wrist.
“Let’s get ya home.” He repeated, moving so that his arm was around your shoulder and you didn’t stop yourself from leaning into him. Daryl looked down at you and couldn’t stop the soft smile that spread across his lips as he watched you turn your head into his chest, trusting him to guide you back to the bike.
And he did without failure, his grip secure on you and it wasn’t long before he took a helmet he had found months ago for you from the bike and lifted it as carefully as he could over your head.
“Does that hurt?” He asked, sure that he had positioned it so it wasn’t brushing against your cut but wanting to make sure you weren’t in pain.
“No,” You said, smiling tiredly up at him.
Daryl smiled back at you before he was helping you onto the bike and climbing on himself. The roar of the engine was the only sound to be heard for the next few miles, sometimes Daryl’s voice, slightly raised to be heard above the bike, cut through making sure you were still awake, assuring you that you were almost home.
It took just over an hour and a half before the gates to the prison were being opened for the two of you, the sky had long since gone dark and Daryl had felt your grip loosening repeatedly as your eyes drifted closed.
The sound of the bike’s engine being shut off had you blinking your eyes open, you hadn’t fallen asleep but your eyes had eventually become too tired to keep open. You felt Daryl move from in front of you before he pulled you from the bike and gently pulled the helmet off your head and looked at the cut.
It didn’t look too bad, not bad enough to require stitches but he’d still feel better getting Hershel to clean it before he finally took you to bed.
He grabbed the bag of supplies and wrapped his arm around you again, guiding you through the prison and into cell block C with the intention of sitting you down in front of Hershel but before he could Rick looked up and was over to the pair of you in a few strides.
You smiled as he copied Daryl’s actions from earlier, taking your chin in his fingers before he tilted your head up to examine the cut on your forehead before wincing.
“What happened?” He asked in concern.
“I’m fine.” You told him, smile still in place as you swiped his hand away.
“You two have been gone for hours?” Rick questioned, following the two of you over to the table where Hershel sat, supplies already being brought over to him as you were placed onto the chair next to him, Daryl taking a seat next to you.
“Ran into a herd of walkers and got separated, took me a while t’find her.” Daryl explained, rubbing a hand up and down your back as you winced from Hershel’s touch.
“You’re both ok?” Rick asked looking from your head to Daryl, checking him for injuries.
“We’re fine, she just needs patchin’ up and some sleep.” Daryl assured, looking away from you to glance up at Rick, showing that his words were true, short of the cut on your head and a few scratches on your hands you were both fine.
“You make sure you get some sleep too.” Rick said, patting Daryl’s shoulder before he did the same to you.
“Don’t worry,” You said, exhaustion clear in your voice, “I’ll make sure he sleeps.”
Daryl and Rick smiled over at you before Rick turned to head back to Carl and it wasn’t long before Hershel had given you the all clear, nothing serious, just a bump and some dizziness for the next few days.
You took Daryl’s hand gently in yours, mindful of the cuts that stung if you brushed them, and led him up the stairs and into your cell. It was the first cell on the landing and you’d picked it purely because on the first night at the prison Daryl had refused to sleep in a cell, refused to be caged up, so you took the cell as close to him as you could get.
It hadn’t taken you long to convince him into your cell, a tight squeeze on the single bed but the two of you made it work, mostly with you laying most of you body on him, on nights were he needed to be held he’d often find himself lay between your legs, head on your chest and your fingers in his hair.
Tonight, however, it was you who needed him and you lay with your back against the wall, Daryl’s arm wrapped tightly around you as he drew you closer, laying you so half of your body rested atop of his.
Your eyes felt heavy with exhaustion, felt even heavier than they had before now that you were in a bed, in Daryl’s arms. You felt him lean down until his lips touched your head, he felt you smile into his chest and enough of a silence stretched that you thought he’d gone to sleep when his voice broke it.
“You knew I’d find ya, right?” The words were barely there, whispered so softly that they were nearly lost in the silence, if you hadn’t been laying on top of him there was a chance you would have missed those words.
But you didn’t, you heard them as loudly and as clearly as if he’d shouted them. A smile stretched across your face without you meaning for it to as you registered his question and sure you’d been scared alone in those woods, scared that you couldn’t handle your own against the walkers or whatever else lurked in the trees but never for a second had it crossed your mind that Daryl wouldn’t come looking for you.
“I never doubted it.” You told him honestly, your words just as soft as his and you heard the smile in his voice at his next words.
“Good, cause I’ll always look for ya.” He promised and you knew his words were truthful, knew that Daryl would hold himself to that promise for the rest of his life.
And that gave you hope, hope that even if the world didn’t get better, even if things stayed like this, it gave you hope that you could continue living and not just living but it gave you hope for a future.
A future with you and Daryl, the two of you getting to live your lives together no matter how and no matter what. You knew that whatever was to come that you’d be fine because you had something nobody else had.
You had Daryl Dixon.
“I’ll try not to lose you again.” You told him and felt the chuckle rumble through his chest as he kissed your head again.
“Never have to worry about that.” He assured you and you couldn’t help but smile wider, “Go t’sleep, Y/N/N.” He whispered and you nodded against him, shuffling in his arms so you were looking up at him and leaned up to press your lips together in a soft kiss, not lasting for more than a few seconds but somehow managing to leave you both breathless.