Move together

Chapter 1: Meeting the group

A/N: I own nothing except my mistakes. Slight warning: I used sentences from the show, just to give conversations a little more meaning instead of having to summarize all of it. But, since it's from beginning season 2, I doubt it's really annoying. It, after all, has been a while since most of us have watched that season, most likely. But if it does bother you, you have a chance to leave now. If not, welcome on board!

Ava cursed silently as she tried to outrun the walker behind her. Not that she got very far. The only thing she could do was crouch low so it couldn't easily get a hold on her and run in circles around it to confuse it a bit.

It was at times like these that she really hated herself for not getting into one of the abandoned houses to grab herself a knife from one of the kitchen's. Or anything sharp enough to defend herself with.

Most of the times she would just try to outrun them, or grab a rock or anything in the hope that would be enough to kill them. More often than not she'd usually miss when she'd throw it, though. But right now there was nothing she had to defend herself with, and even though from the looks of it he seemed to have fed not long ago, the walker still looked really hungry as he desperately tried to bite out to her.

The sudden appearance of a man in a white shirt and curly brown hair got her attention, taking her by surprise and causing her to trip over her own feet. Cursing profusely, she watched in fear as the walker was about to crouch down, ready to take a bite out of her.

The man whistled, catching the attention from the walker who roared loudly at the man. Then a sudden arrow shot through its head, and Ava wheeled around to find a man lowering his crossbow. Hearing the crushing of leaves, she turned to look back at the man approaching her, outstretching a hand as he pulled her up.

"Thank you." She breathed out as she turned a bit so she could have a look at both men. "What's your name?" The curly haired man asked and Ava hesitated, wondering if she should tell him. Then she lightly chuckled at herself. Was she honestly going to worry about giving him her name? What was he going to do? Look her up on Facebook?

"I'm Ava. Ava Carter." Her British accent slipped out, obviously taking the two men by surprise as the curly haired man raised his eyebrows. "I'm Rick, this is Daryl." He introduced himself, pointing at the man besides him as he introduced the other. Ava inclined her head at the man with the crossbow, acknowledging his presence.

"You're not from around here, are you?" Rick asked and Ava shook his head, "Came here as an exchange student a year ago. I'm originally from England, as you might have guessed." Rick nodded in acknowledgment.

"You don't happen to have seen a little girl wanderin' around, have ya?" The man named Daryl spoke up and Ava shook her head, not having seen any human being since the apocalypse broke out. Daryl sighed in frustration and pulled the arrow out of the walkers head. "Sophia!" He yelled, but it remained completely silent.

Ava watched as Rick pulled out a set of gloves and crouched down next to the walker, searching for something near his hands. "What are you looking for?" Daryl asked, taking her words right out of her mouth as she was wondering the exact same thing.

"Skin under the fingernails." Rick replied and Daryl leaned forward, looking with the man for any traces of what she assumed the girl Sophia they were talking about. "When did you lose her?" Ava piped up, watching as Rick turned the walker's head and cracked its mouth open.

"Not long ago." Rick replied and Ava, too, leaned slightly forward to get a better look at the walker. "It fed recently." Rick said, taking a piece of flesh out of the walker's mouth. "There's flesh caught in its teeth." Ava scrunched her nose in disgust, watching the slightly chewed on piece of flesh.

"Yeah, what kind of flesh?" Daryl asked and Ava observed the man, watching his sleeveless blouse at which he seemed to have cut the sleeves off himself. His face was covered in a mixture of dirt and sweat, and his overall look stood out greatly compared to Rick.

Yet, it somehow really appealed to her. Not that it surprised her much, after all, she had always kinda been a sucker for the bad boy kind of look, where they dressed so careless yet carried themselves with such authority. Yeah, Daryl absolutely didn't seem like the guy to mess with. But that's what she liked the most about him.

That was just appearance wise, though. For all she knew his character would be trashy and bad. Perhaps he was all full of himself – his authority vibe he gave off having turned into confidence. Yeah, that could honestly be such a turn off when boys would be too confident and too full of themselves.

Sure, confidence was great, but too much of a good thing never came out well. "Only one way to know for sure." Rick's voice brought her back to the present moment, and she watched as he ribbed the walker's shirt open and pulled out a knife.

"Here, I'll do it." Daryl laid his hand on Rick's shoulder and then positioned himself above the walker, taking his own knife from his belt. "How many kills you skin and gut in your life? Anyway, mine is sharper."

Ava groaned as Daryl grabbed the knife with two hands. "Wait, you're not actually going to do what I think you will do, right?" Daryl looked at her, his eyes looking her over once before shaking his head with a scoff. "You don't have to watch, ya know." And with that he slammed his knife into the stomach of the walker with a loud grunt, tearing the skin slowly as he moved the knife downwards.

Feeling herself getting sick as she watched the organs slowly coming into display with every cut he made, she took up his advice as she looked up at the sky, trying to control the sickness she felt. Hearing his heavy panting die out, she figured he must be done and so she looked down again, only to have him go at it once more to cut through another layer of skin.

Ava wheeled around as she nearly threw up, controlling her body just in time as she listened to the disgusting sound of flesh ripping open, the smell of a dead body hitting her nostrils stronger than when the walker was still alive, worsening the nausea she felt.

Daryl panted heavily as the cutting stopped, letting out a deep breath. "Now comes the bad part." Ava whimpered as she shut her eyes, which was highly unnecessary for she was already facing the other way, but for some reason it made her believe that if she couldn't see anything, it wouldn't be so bad.

A lot of groaning and panting came from Daryl, wet sounds of organs being pushed to all kind of sides joining in. Even Rick seemed to have serious trouble controlling himself as he groaned loudly in disgust, a soft snapping sound of whatever organ he was pulling out hitting her ears.

"Yeah, Hoss had a big meal not long ago." Ava heard Daryl say, his voice sounding breathless from all the cutting and fumbling around he had to do. "I feel it in there." A gagging sound escaped her lips as she brought a hand to her mouth, willing herself not to throw up.

"Here's the gut bag. I got this." Rick said and Ava opened her eyes, figuring the worst part must be over by now. But just out of precaution, she remained rooted to where she stood, not wanting to turn around to watch whatever might come out of the gut bag.

A few cutting sounds filled her ears again, but it didn't sound as bad as when the entire body got cut open. A lot of groaning filled her ears, however. The most from Rick, which she could more than understand.

"This gross bastard had himself a woodchuck for lunch." Daryl said and Ava wondered how he knew, figuring it must look rather undetectable after it had digested. But she wasn't really feeling like checking it out for herself, and so she just decided to take his word for it.

"At least we know." Rick said and as she heard some moving sounds behind her, she took it as a sign they went to stand back up. Taking this as her cue to turn around, she went to face the men again but regretted her choice immediately upon seeing the organs of the walkers spread all out over the ground.

Turning her head to the right side, she leaned forward and unable to help herself, she threw up whatever kind of empty contents where in her stomach. No kidding, there truly wasn't anything in there. It therefore wasn't that much of a surprise that she mainly threw up some saliva.

"At least we know." Daryl agreed and Ava wiped her mouth clean with the back of her hand as she looked into Daryl's already staring eyes, not seeming much affected by her throwing up. Not that she really expected him to. After all, having cut open a dead body must have outweighed the sight of some saliva coming out of another person's body.

"Are you on your own?" Rick asked as he made to stand up again, and Ava gladly adverted her eyes from the ground to the man's eyes. "Yeah, it's been just me since the beginning." The man looked her over once, his eyes searching, but seeming to fail whatever he tried to find. "No weapons?" He asked and Ava nodded with a sigh. "How did you survive out here so long, woman?" Daryl asked, and only now did she really notice his Southern accent. Sure, she heard the dialect slipping in between words, but she had been a little preoccupied by the dead walker getting cut open to take notice of it.

Ava shrugged, "Guess I've been lucky." She said honestly, truly having been lucky indeed. It had been a close call a couple of times. After all, there's only so many times you can successfully outrun a group of walkers. At some point you'll walk into a dead end or get into any other obstacles.

"We have a group up the highway, if you're willing you can join. It's not safe out here on your own." Rick proposed but Daryl immediately jumped in. "Are you crazy? We don't even know this girl." Ava chuckled, "What do you think I'll do? Slit your throats with my imaginary knife?" Daryl shook his head, clearly unamused. "Can always disarm one of us, take first chance you get to put us down."

"And then what? Rick's right. It isn't safe out here, especially not on your own. I've been lucky so far, but my luck is bound to run out some time. And so is my energy, might I add. I barely sleep. Last I slept was two days ago, only took a few minutes nap to keep me going." Ava stopped talking as she realized she was letting out too much unnecessary details.

"Anyway, my point is, there's no use for me to see you all dead." Ava concluded and tightened the dark green jacket that was wrapped around her waist. "It's up to you to believe that or not." She watched as Daryl held up his hands, looking at Rick. "It's your call, man."

Rick nodded and then let a minor smile tug on his lips. "Welcome, then." Ava returned the smile, a bit brighter than his as she was glad to finally not have to take these walkers on on her own any longer.

With that, they got on the move again and Ava trailed behind, letting the two men walk in front of her and lead her to wherever they were staying at, quietly talking to each other about God knows what. They mentioned a highway before, but she wasn't familiar enough with the area to exactly know where she'd have to go to find it.

Then slowly the forest thinned out, and in the slight distance she could make out the highway. It shocked her momentarily to see the long line of cars. Some were turned upside down, others were just ripped open. Not in a long while had she seen something that looked so dead. Hell, it even caused shivers to run down her spine.

Rick was indeed telling the truth as she watched a couple of people gathered around each other, seeming to be in a conversation before they got spotted. "You didn't find her?" A woman with short grey hair asked, tears welling up in her eyes. Taking this as Sophia's mother, she lowered her gaze to the ground as her heart went out for the woman. She couldn't even begin to imagine what it must be like to lose your child in the messed up world they were living in now.

"Her trail went cold." Rick said, his voice determined as he went on. "We'll pick it up again at first light." The woman shook her head, bringing her arms up in front of her, as if trying to hold herself together. "You can't leave my daughter out there on her own to spend the night alone in the woods."

The rest of the group came walking forwards, joining their conversation. Ava, however, remained slightly behind, at least a foot behind Daryl as she allowed the rest to have a conversation without her interrupting it. "Out in the dark's no good." Daryl said.

"We'd just be tripping over ourselves. More people get lost." Ava watched him clutch to his crossbow, but averted her eyes to the woman once more as she hopelessly spoke. "But she's 12. She can't be out there on her own."

"You didn't find anything?" The woman tried again, and Rick was trying his hardest to calm her down. "I know this is hard. But I'm asking you not to panic. We know she was out there." Her eyes glided over to Daryl's back as he spoke. "And we tracked her for a while." Both were trying to stay calm and get the woman to calm down as well, but it didn't seem to really pay off.

A woman with brown hair that reached to around shoulder length let her hands fall on the grey haired woman's shoulders as in a comforting manner. "We have to make this an organized effort." Rick spoke to the group. "Daryl knows the woods better than anybody. I've asked him to oversee this." So that was what they had been talking about on their way back.

"Is that blood?" The grey haired woman suddenly asked as she turned to look at Daryl, panic rising in her voice. "We took down a walker." Rick said, which seemed to make the woman ever more worried. "Walker? Oh my God."

"There was no sign it was ever anywhere near Sophia." Rick went on and a woman with blonde hair spoke up, seeming highly distrustful of his words. "How can you know that?"

The two men looked at each other hesitantly, and if it wasn't for the serious circumstances, Ava would have totally laughed as Daryl's words left his mouth and the entire group cringed in disgust. They had no idea how bad it actually was. "We cut the son of a bitch open, made sure." He had explained.

"Oh God." The grey haired woman went to sit down on the guardrail as she processed all that had been said. The brown haired woman sat down besides her, laying a hand on her back. "How could you just leave her out there to begin with?" The grey haired woman accused, looking at Rick.

Ava raised her eyebrows, taken aback by the comment. Now, she didn't know exactly how the girl got lost, but judging the way Rick had so desperately been trying to find the girl, she knew it mustn't have been his fault.

"How could you just leave her?" The woman started to tear up once more, and Ava turned to Rick as he began to explain. Wanting to hear the story herself, to try and make sense of the tiny pieces of information she had heard so far, she focused all her attention on him. "Those two walkers were on us. I had to draw them off. It was her best chance."

Another man joined in, slightly taller than Rick but had the same brown hair. "Sounds like he didn't have a choice, Carol." The brown haired woman laid her hands on the grey haired woman's shoulder in support as she began to breathe heavily. "How was she supposed to find her way back on her own?"

"She's just a child. She's just a child." The woman hopelessly cried. Rick went down to his knees, seeming seriously honest about his concern for both the mother and the child. "It was my only option. The only choice I could make."

"I'm sure nobody doubts that." The other man from before spoke up, having seated himself on the guardrail besides the rest. "My little girl got left in the woods." The grey haired woman cried. Rick nodded sadly and then turned to walk away.

Ava felt unsure of what to do as Daryl, too, left her side. Watching the blonde haired woman move forward to comfort the crying woman as well, she just kind of stood there trying to make as less sound as possible as to not give her presence away.

Yet, even though she kept as quiet as she could, she finally seemed to get noticed by an older man with a fishing hat. "And who are you?" All heads suddenly turned to her, and she awkwardly cleared her throat. Normally she wasn't the socially awkward type, but she wasn't all that great with emotional situations, and hated to interrupt them as well.

"I'm Ava. I came across your men in the woods. They saved my life." She spoke loud enough for them to hear, but also slightly mumbled in the process, making it more difficult for the rest to hear her with her British accent.

"I'm sorry about your girl." Ava said, turning to the crying woman who nodded in response. "Rick let you tag along?" The brown haired woman spoke and Ava nodded, slightly stepping forward so she could have a better conversation with them. "I see an introduction is in order, then." The man with the fishing hat said with a slight smile and pointed at the man sitting on the guardrail. "That's Shane," he then pointed at the three women next to Shane. The blonde one, the grey one and the brown haired one. "Andrea, Carol and Lori."

Then he turned to a younger boy, "Carl." He said and pointed at the last two men: a dark skinned one and an Asian guy. "T-Dog and Glenn." Then the man focused his eyes back on her, "And I'm Dale." The rest of the group remained silent, watching her a little mistrustfully. "Come on, I'll show you around in the RV."

Ava nodded, glad to get out of the rather awkward situation. Stepping over the guardrail, she followed him inside the RV and watched as he closed the door. He pointed her the location of the bathroom, and told her she could take a seat at the bench near a window.

With that he left the RV again, and she allowed to let herself fall down on the seat. Knowing she was finally safe since months, she felt the tiredness kick into her body pretty bad, causing her eyes to flutter close against her own will. Resting her head against the glass, sleep took over her body without any single hesitation.