Last One Standing ~ TWD Daryl Dixon

132

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Jo

Following Ezekiel's directions I made my way to the section of wall he had indicated. True to his word, I spotted a man standing at the top, looking out over the dark forests surrounding the compound. Even in the low light I recognized the set to Daryl's shoulders. His hands were hanging at his sides, tightened into fists. I wasn't surprised. He had nothing, no weapon other than a knife and he had always fiddled with his crossbow when he was restless or antsy. Now he stood like a statue.

Something was very wrong.

I climbed the ladder as silently as possible, but somehow he still managed to hear me. He whirled towards me but when he identified me he turned back towards the forest. I bit my lip, uncertain what I was going to say. I walked up to him and stood, shoulder to shoulder just shy of touching him. He didn't look at me again and he didn't say anything.

"Do you want to talk about it?" I asked in a quiet tone. I didn't want to feel as though I was nagging him. If he wasn't ready to talk, he wasn't ready to talk. Even as I said that however, I knew that I would never be able to be as patient as he had always been with me. It was a perfect example of why he was a hunter and I was...well whatever it was that I was.

He glanced at me over his shoulder and I could see in his eyes that he didn't want to talk about it. He was practically radiating tension just standing in front of me.

"Talk 'bout what?" he growled looking back off into the darkness.

I bit back the sigh I desperately wanted to heave and tightened my jaw instead. I wasn't good at this, and he was so tense I didn't want this to turn into a fight. Whatever he was dealing with clearly didn't have to do with us and our relationship if the last twelve hours had been any indication. There was however something that was keeping him out of bed in the middle of the night.

"How about the fact that there is a freaking tiger walking around here!" I said throwing an overly dramatic look of disbelief over my shoulder.

Daryl followed my gaze and would have been able to see Ezekiel out walking with Shiva. He scowled and looked back at me. He knew me, knew me well enough to know that was not what I had come out here to talk about. But it threw him, breaking his defenses down for even a moment, and I was going to use that.

"I mean, of all the things to survive and choose to have as a companion, a tiger?" I asked shaking my head as though this was really something I cared about. "I mean what ever happened to having a dog? There must be a ton of them running around. Can you imagine the resources he spends to feed it?" I chatted.

I wasn't much for chatting, not anymore at least. That was something I had been good at before, it was one of those societal things you don't realize you do until you don't have to anymore. I was so happy to let so many of those things go. And yet, I would happily do whatever it took to help Daryl.

"Not to mention the inherent danger it poses to the community itself, I mean it's pretty obvious she has definitive likes and dislikes, what happens if it attacks someone? Is everyone just supposed to accept it and move on because their king said so? And what-"

Daryl moved then, fast and silent. He grabbed my shoulders, spinning me to face him and mashed his lips against mine to silence me. He kissed me soundly and I was gasping for breath when he pulled back. "Jo-" he started to say as he stared down at me. His face was shadowed in the dim light and I had trouble reading his expression, but I clearly saw him shake his head in disbelief. "What-?" he started to asked and then stopped and snorted shaking his head. "What the hell are ya talking about?"