Darker Skies *The Walking Dead*

Notes/Look into Cowboy Hat

Hello, four years after starting this thing.  I don't know what happened but something sparked me into rewriting this?  I don't know why but I thought, hey I should take this chance to write.  I made a new account because I couldn't remember the password to this account but then I got into this one after posting the sequel to this story.  It's called Cowboy Hat and it continues onto Alexandria and the Hilltop.  Lots of spoilers.  I don't even watch the show anymore, but I keep up with the comics so I'm following the comics in Cowboy hat.  It's gonna start slow, but it'll get there.  Thank you to whoever is here, I enjoy the attention :P  Love ya'll

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**Profanity and Violence**

Cowboy Hat

Skylar loved the summer time.  It was pleasantly warm and only a few puffy clouds crossed over the sun.  There was no breeze so her red curls weren't flying all over her face and she could read while eating outside.  She was sat underneath a large tree that gave her enough shade and got her out of the midst of the growing community.  She had two hours between her job at the daycare and her apprenticeship as a security guard so she spent it usually at this tree with a book and a sandwich for dinner.  She was halfway through her peanut butter sandwich when movement out of the corner of her eye made her look up.  

Jessie and Andrew, two boys Skylar loathed.  Andrew was the bigger of the two but more a follower than a leader.  He wouldn't dare spit crude remarks and curses at her.  The three of them had met while practicing shooting.  Skylar had noticed Jessie's awful shot and tried helping him out, but that was a bad decision.  Now she's known to them as the-know-it-all-slut.  As if that's bad.   

"Hey, cunt,"  Andrew towered over her and spit at her feet.  That was a new one for her and it made her shake her head as if she had been hit by an annoying bug.  "What do you think you're doing calling us bitch heads?"  Skylar wanted to laugh; she had called Andrew a bitch head on her way to work because he almost ran into her with his bike.  

"Andrew was going to run into me."

"You deserved it," Andrew snarled.  Skylar squinted in a scowl, her green eyes flashing a warning.  

"For what, being better at shooting a gun than you?"  Skylar stood up so she could get in their faces.  "As long as it means I'm not as stupid as you, I'm fine with that."  

"We aren't stupid!" Jessie yelled and brandished a knife from his pocket.  Skylar put her hands up and took a step back, trying to take deep breaths so she could think- something an old friend had taught her.  

"Hey, okay, I'm sorry,"  she couldn't think of anything else to say.  Of course, she wasn't actually sorry but maybe it wasn't too late to calm them down.

"Not so smart now, huh?" Jessie took a step towards her.  "What happened to you living on the outside and being a hunter?  Isn't that why you're so important to everyone?"  Skylar winced.  She wasn't important, she was just like everyone else trying to pull her weight and step in when she needs to.  But she had become softer living in the Hilltop community instead of being in the thick of it all.  

"Jessie, you'll get in trouble," even as she said it she knew it was useless.  

"I'll give you ten seconds to decide what you're going to do."  Skylar didn't listen to what Andrew was telling her.  She stood looking over Jessie's shoulder to see another boy; one with very long raven black hair, standing tall in his boots, jeans, and a dirty white tank top, and staring with his one good eye.  Everything stopped around Skylar- the birds weren't chirping and the boys weren't threatening her, it was just her and him.  

"Carl," Skylar whispered.