They're going to feel pretty stupid when they find out... [Open!]

[rictator]

Who | Rick Grimes and anyone unfortunate enough to run across him.
What | Rick is fashionably late to the game, off doing stuff and things.
When | Week two
Where | Spaceport. Rick is working his way in, so feel free to encounter him wherever. I'm open!
Warnings/Notes | This is Rick, so violence is quite likely.


Rick had been here before. It wasn't the first time he'd been split from his family, or even the first he'd been told that he would be forced to fight for his life. When he'd woken in that hospital, met Morgan and Duane on the steps of his abandoned home, it may as well have been a space station, for how jarring and foreign it had felt. The world he'd known was gone, replaced with a broken, screwed up thing, where the dead walked and the ones who survived were more horrific than the corpses.

The difference this time around was that this wasn't new anymore. The 'Capitol' could dress it up however they wanted to; call it a game, an arena, a death sentence, it all came down to the same thing in the end. Survival was a concept Rick was intimately familiar with, and more, he knew now what he was capable of in the name of it.

It was never clear if he'd been the only one they'd taken, or if Carl, Michonne, and the others had been dragged into this mess. So far as he knew, he'd never left their sides, but there was a blank space in his memory; the time between the events at the church and waking up on the hard surface of the cot were unaccounted for, and who knew how long that had been. The men who'd greeted him had offered a bare minimum of explanation, feeding him some bullshit line about the honour of all this, and a game with one survivor. They'd ushered him to the platform with sickening ease, stripped of weapon or advantage; without his son, without knowing, his options were limited.

The impossible sprawl of alien stars overhead had left him feeling far more alone than it should have.

As soon as he was able, he'd ditched the cumbersome outer suit, dragging it to a recess in the seemingly deserted corridor. Luck hadn't been on his side, but he could hope that there would be something, anything he could salvage from it. The helmet was an obvious choice, solid and heavy - but as he patted it down, he kept a sharp eye out for the less obvious things. Nothing sharp enough to of much use. The airtight zipper was firmly attached, but the stainless steel wire that stayed the more flexible joints wasn't. That and the tubing from the oxygen feed would make a decent makeshift garrote in a bind.

The short length of cabling wrapped around his wrist was hardly enough to set him at ease. The helmet was as unwieldy as the suit itself, but the noise of breaking it would attract unwanted attention and he already felt exposed. The cling of the orange suit did nothing to alleviate those worries, painting him like a target as he crept through the maze of hallways. Daryl had imparted a thing or two on stealth, but between the sound amplification of the empty corridors and the eye-searing colour of his space-age getup, Rick wasn't sure it would be enough.

He had no idea where he was going, but with only the expanse of space outside the windows, inward seemed like the best option. If there was any hope of finding his people, it was that way.

Comments

[weaintashes]

Without Beth, Daryl was well and truly alone in this place. Her loss was written in the weariness in his eyes, the tense line of his mouth, his drawn shoulders, as though he might collapse in on himself at any moment. And a part of him maybe wanted to. But he'd been a survivor long before the apocalypse hit and possessing this lifetime of experience to draw on served him well now — he didn't have it in him to quit, not when there still existed the possibility of getting out of this shithole and finding his way back to his family. Tell them about Beth. Do something for her in lieu of burying her body, which the Capitol had already claimed.

He knew better than to presume he'd be welcome to setup base with Nick and Luke after everything that had happened, so didn't even entertain the notion, instead establishing several of his own caches of improvised weapons and supplies throughout the spaceport. But he also did what he could to help the two men while keeping his distance, out of a sense of guilt and obligation, and this mainly took the form of clearing the aliens in the area of their chosen lab to help keep it at least marginally safer. Whether they were aware of this he didn't know, didn't really care. He figured they were probably hoping they'd seen the last of him. On the off chance they ever had need of him, he was generally within shouting distance. Sounds carried far here.

Luckily for him.

The quiet footsteps reached his ears long before he was in any danger of being noticed. He was crouched just inside the doorway of an unlit room, finishing up with a pair of xenomutts he'd recently gutted. As the unknown person approached his position, he silently withdrew deeper into the room, waiting, listening. His eyes had already adjusted to the darkness and the electricity in the room was shot, so he'd have the advantage if a confrontation were to occur. Hopefully his unwelcome visitor would simply pass by.

Somewhere between glimpsing an orange suit, the dark hair, grizzled beard, and that unmistakable lean frame, Daryl forgot how to breathe. He'd done his best to get by these last few weeks, but he wasn't in the greatest condition; his first thought was that he'd slipped into some kind of fever dream without realising it. Tugging his makeshift knife free of the alien carcass, he nearly stumbled in his haste to stand up and step out into the corridor, chasing after what he dearly hoped wasn't a phantom.

"Rick," he called out softly, wiping his hands on a scrap of cloth as he moved to catch up with the other man. In stark contrast with Rick's attire, Daryl's once-yellow spacesuit was filthy, frayed and torn in places, and covered with blood stains — but aside from a few bruises, cuts, and burns, Daryl himself appeared more or less intact.

[rictator]

Rick lacked Daryl's hunting prowess, but he'd like to think that there weren't many who could completely avoid his detection. With the way sound carried, it should have been nearly impossible to completely get the drop on him; yet, his would-be assailant was already halfway across the threshold before he caught wind of him. Animal instinct had already taken over, body tensed and helmet poised to strike before his mind caught up, processing just what it was - more accurately, who it was - that he was seeing.

In truth, Daryl had been the last person he'd expected to find. When he'd taken off with Carol, it had been entirely too easy to imagine ways for it to go wrong, and far harder to bury those thoughts once they'd been realized. The world had long since proven that the worst was inevitable; they hadn't been reunited a week before circumstance divided them all over again. Glenn and Maggie had chosen DC, but Daryl and Carol... Rick still didn't know. They were both competent, skilled. When he said they'd be back, he believed it - Unfortunately, belief alone just wasn't enough anymore.

Maybe that was why it all seemed to good to be true.

Familiarity brought with it a sort of wary relief. There were still too many unknowns, the threat of the Capitol too ambiguous; if they were both there, it stood to reason that Carl was too. They could shut this place down if they so desired, kill them all without a second thought, just like Jenner had tried to do. But in the face of all of that, he had his people here. It wasn't everyone, or even a lot of them - but even just one was enough to tap into the well of his strength, dredge up his ever present need to protect.

"Daryl-"

His tone low and even, giving away far less than the subtle change in his expression. It wasn't enough for most to pick up on, but Daryl had been around him long enough; so much of their communication was non-verbal by that point, it might well have been a neon sign. There was more to be said, but he closed his mouth, gesturing toward the room he'd come from with a finger.

Is it secure?

Rick wasn't naive enough to believe that they were safe there, but the doorway was at least slightly defensible - not half as exposed as an open corridor. Even just a quick once over was enough to see that the archer hadn't had a good run of it. The dirt and blood were par for the course - it was what was between the lines that was concerning him.

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The momentary defensiveness on Rick's part was met with raised hands in the universal 'I surrender' gesture, and a blink-and-you'll-miss-it flicker of amusement in Daryl's otherwise grim expression. This had been a familiar routine for their group back before the prison, when they'd had to keep moving, scavenging their way through abandoned homes, businesses, shacks. Splitting up and making a circuit of the building, having to be careful not to shoot each other in the dark whenever their paths had intersected again.

In response to the unvoiced question he simply shook his head, tossed the makeshift shrapnel knife to Rick and backtracked down the corridor he'd just come from, passing by the darkened doorway. The room was a quite literal death trap, since that was what he'd set it up to be; there were piles of dead aliens in it, and they were starting to reek by this point.

He led the way through several more corridors and down narrow, winding passages with the ease of someone working from memory, never pausing but occasionally casting a glance over his shoulder to ensure Rick was keeping up. He moved as quickly as he dared to, a pace that kept their steps from echoing too loudly. Moving in complete silence was impossible.

They reached what he'd dubbed the 'water lab', for the simple fact it was one of the only labs he'd found with a shower that provided actual water rather than blood, vinegar, or any of the other various substances the showers were likely to spit out here. There was an impassable gap between the doorway and where they presently stood, with a drop deep enough that it appeared bottomless. Colour coded switches lined the wall, just within reach, and as he flipped certain ones they produced assorted beams of light within the gap, eventually culminating in what could best be described as a light bridge to the other side.

"Gotta be quick," he instructed as he took off at a full run across the bridge that was, somehow, completely solid beneath their feet. It was already disappearing at the far end by the time they'd reached the lab's open doorway, and he promptly closed the reinforced door once Rick was clear of it. This was about the safest place he knew of to hunker down in for a while, formulate some kind of plan. It was easily defensible and he'd already amassed a few scavenged weapons here, some dehydrated food, and miscellaneous other items that he'd thought might prove useful.

Most importantly: "There's water there," Daryl pointed out with a nod toward the safety shower in a corner. He'd been left oddly winded by the journey, and had a hand pressed to his abdomen as he leaned heavily against the door, shoulders drawn in as though he was in pain. He was watching Rick expectantly. "Food's shit here," he said with a grunt. "But there ain't nothin' else to eat. Beats starving. When'd you get here, anyway? You remember anything, how they brought you in?"

[rictator]

If there was anyone who could scrape together an arsenal out of freeze-dried provisions and debris, it was Daryl Dixon. Next to Glenn, he'd always been one of the better scavengers of their group; that he could pull together this much where Rick had turned up nothing didn't surprise him in the least. The shrapnel was a welcomed step up from the helmet, which he promptly discarded before falling into step with the other man, shadowing him down the hallway.

Between the impossible light bridges and sleek, science fiction laboratories, Rick felt as though he'd strayed onto a movie set. Unbelievable wasn't a word he used often anymore - it wasn't long ago that he'd believed the dead stayed dead - but the more he saw of the station, the more it was edging into that territory. He assumed the entire purpose was to throw them off balance, force them outside their usual, as though adaptability hadn't always been intrinsic to their surviving.

This was just like old times... in spirit, anyway.

Daryl had managed to find a decent setup amidst it all, the heavy door helping to ease some of the tension from Rick's shoulders; it wasn't a permanent solution, but it would suit their needs for the moment. Tempting as the water was, they had other matters to attend to. It wouldn't have been the first time he'd gone without, and with the brief security afforded by the room, physical needs would wait a few minutes longer.

Rick's gaze wandered, taking in the room as he considered his answer. It had become a habit, trying to familiarize himself with layouts, pinpoint exits and plot escape routes. Always anticipating what they'd do if things went south, and how he'd get himself and everyone else out alive and intact. He didn't look at Daryl immediately, focusing instead on a package of the aforementioned awful food.

"I've been here a day. Two at most," he said finally, turning the packet over in his hands. It was difficult to know for sure in the artificial environment, with only the endless dark of space beyond that. He was sure that with enough time, it would be far too easy to lose track entirely.

"I was at the church, with the others. Then, I woke up. No gun, no weapons - They knew what they were doing."

An understatement. These people were organized, efficient. They had a system and they'd worked out the kinks. His time in the Capitol had been limited, as the armed men had moved him through their processing quickly. The limited time he'd had to look for chinks in the armor hadn't done him much good. They weren't the first ones they'd done this to - not by a long shot. Rick had the feeling that Daryl's experience had been similar, or he wouldn't have been asking.

"Did you run into anyone else?"

Rick met his eyes this time, concern finally breaking through the cool mask of his expression. The question was dangerous, considering. Daryl wasn't the type to leave anyone behind, and this room was empty outside of them. If he had found someone else, they were either alone, which was unlikely, or gone. Neither was appealing.

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He held the eye contact for several long moments without speaking, and that was perhaps answer enough. But Beth deserved far more than this ugly silence to acknowledge her existence, and he wasn't sure he could stomach Rick's quiet understanding with this — he had to know. Had to know exactly what Daryl had done.

"I found Beth."

The crushing weight of his failure had never left him, he'd just managed to carry it for a while, having no other choice. But he was buckling under it now. Bowing his head, he carefully slid down the door and eased himself into a seated position, knees drawn up. It helped relieve some of the bizarre pressure that had been building in his chest, though that was already far from his mind as he attempted to collect his thoughts.

"She'd already been here a month, maybe more," he said, the words coming slow. "Long enough to make some friends. She was alone when I found her, and we stayed together 'til a herd'a those things swarmed us, pinned us in a bad spot. Told her to run 'cause she had the best shot of gettin' out. She ran." It hadn't been quite so simple, with the way Beth had kept refusing to leave him, wanting to find any other solution, but he was having a difficult enough time recounting even this much for Rick. He wasn't sure he'd be capable of finding the words for everything else if he let himself dwell too long on the painful details.

"I went lookin' for her soon as I could. And I found her..." His voice had gone tight, throat suddenly constricted. He forced out a breath. The pause lengthened into silence as he tried his damnedest to not remember how warm Beth had felt, when he'd gathered her impaled body into his arms as much as he could like a frightened child clutching a ragdoll. She'd still been alive only moments before.

He hadn't even been able to bury her body. It had been gone by the time he'd returned to it.

His voice was hoarse from suppressed emotion when he eventually spoke again. "Couple friends of hers had found her first. One was makin' sure she wouldn't turn. I didn't know. All I saw— I thought he'd done it to her, torn her open like that. I didn't know," he repeated, hating the way it sounded like an excuse for what he'd done. There was no excusing that. There couldn't be. Raising his head, he sought Rick's eyes now, both needing and dreading the judgement he might find there. "Couldn't stop myself. I was... gone."

[rictator]

The silence already spoke volumes. So Rick hadn't been the first that Daryl had encountered. Whoever it had been, based on that too familiar weariness etched into every line of Daryl's face, they wouldn't be coming back either. His thoughts moved immediately to Carol. Carol, who he'd turned out before she'd come back to save his life, his baby's life. Carol, who'd been with Daryl that night he'd taken off. That they might have been captured together made sense, just as the grief that was written in the other man's features could have been her epitaph.

But it wasn't Carol he'd found.

Beth. The name struck like a knife; there was a brief moment of numb shock before the pain hit, striking quick and digging deep. He didn't have to elaborate beyond he'd found her for Rick to put the pieces together. Like he'd thought before, if Daryl had found her and she was still alive, they wouldn't be having this conversation alone.

His mouth opened as though to say something, to interject, but the words lodged in his throat. For how many deaths they'd seen, this part never got any easier. Nothing every lessened the crushing weight of it all, mourning long since become a state of being in their ravaged world. He wanted to say that Beth was different, that this was somehow different, but after Lori and Hershel, Andrea, Shane, Dale...

This wasn't the first time he'd considered the possibility of her bring gone; when the prison fell, there had been no way of knowing who'd made it out. Between the deep, visceral need to protect his son and the raw wound left by the loss of Judith, everything else had been white noise, too indistinct and overwhelming to pick out the smaller details. He hadn't had the presence of mind to recognize the gravity of individual loss, or think about everything she'd done for him and his family.

Christ, he was tired of burying people.

"You didn't know." When he'd finally found his voice again, it sounded weak in his own ears. He'd already started to reconstruct the wall between himself and the heartache, refusing to allow himself to fall victim to it.

When Rick had fallen into his own self-destructive spiral, he'd lashed out. Plagued by guilt and misery, he'd carved a bloody path through the tombs, as though hatred and carnage might somehow fill the void she'd left, prove to the world and whatever higher power laughing at him that he'd truly meant to make things right. It was a crime without a real perpetrator, and he'd taken it out on anyone who stood too close.

What Daryl had seen... Rick would have thought the same thing. He understood how it was, and knowing that, there was no judgement in his gaze. Had he been there, he'd have done the same damned thing.

The step he took was hesitant, and he aborted just as quickly, not quite prepared to close the physical distance between them. Instead, he turned back toward the steel tabletop, hands braced and head lowered as he struggled to digest the information. The faster he forced it through his system and locked it away, the sooner they could press forward; they needed to keep moving, keep surviving, and so long as Daryl was grieving, Rick wouldn't allow himself the time to.

"... There's nothin' you could've done."

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In that moment he couldn't say which was worse. The refusal of judgement and anticipated quiet understanding that Rick showed him — had nearly always shown him since accepting him as an integral part of their group — or if he would have been repulsed by Daryl's actions, regardless of how hypocritical it might be. But Rick still didn't know the full extent of what had occurred.

"There was," he replied in a low voice, and there was anger bleeding into it, self-loathing, like a gathering storm growing in intensity. "Maybe not for Beth. But that guy was just tryin' to help her. Could'a talked first, or tried to. Instead of... I nearly beat him to death. Rick. That is on me."

The very behaviour that he'd been attempting to safeguard Rick from falling into himself, for fear that he could lose himself again, could lose himself for the last time, and it was such a goddamn precarious line to walk sometimes. The same cruelty his own brother had inflicted on Glenn, and part of the reason why Rick had initially refused to even consider the possibility of Merle staying with them at the prison. That slow erosion of one's humanity was to be expected in the world they lived in, but why should Rick excuse it in him, when he didn't excuse it in himself? In Merle? In Carol?

Did he have even an inkling of how willing Daryl was to get his hands dirty, if it might spare Rick from having even more blood staining his own? He could live with the most terrible things on his conscience, and sacrifice more fragments of his own humanity if it meant that Rick — or Carol, or Beth, or any of his family — wouldn't have to. Had done as much already, and would do it again. Simply giving up his life for them would be damned easy in comparison. There'd be no struggling to live with the consequences if he were dead and gone.

"But that's not— it..." He was stumbling over his words and faltered, not knowing how to say what it was that he needed to. "It ain't even that I beat him 'til I felt his bones crack, then kept goin'. I've done worse." His eyes had drifted during his rumination but he was back looking at Rick now, and a lesser man wouldn't have been capable of bearing the weight of his gaze as the words came to him, as he forced them out. "It's how much part of me liked it. That wasn't just for Beth."

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'Nearly to death' was just that: nearly. Had it been Rick in his place, could he make that same claim? Were it Carl on the ground, soaked through with his own blood, would he have stopped sort of tearing him apart? History dictated otherwise, and lying to himself was pointless when he already knew the truth of it.

The heat of Daryl's eyes drew Rick's gaze back like a magnet, and he searched the other man's face for the answer to a question he still couldn't quite articulate. Why wasn't he angrier? Disgusted? That he'd enjoyed any of it... It was something he'd have expected of the elder Dixon brother, but Daryl?

"... Maybe it wasn't."

The night at Gabriel's church was still vivid in his mind, the adrenaline barely run its course when he'd been taken in by the Capitol. There hadn't been a second's hesitation when he'd drawn his weapon on Gareth. No pity, no regret - Only a warped relief in knowing that they were dead, the threat they'd posed gone along with them. Rick had embraced the violence of the act, enacting ruthless justice on behalf of those who'd arrive at Terminus before. Innocent people, whose only crime had been believing there were still safe places left.

His weight shifted forward against the edge of the exam table, dragging fingers through his unruly hair as he attempted to collect his turbulent thoughts into some semblance of order; he had yet to fully recover from Daryl's earlier bombshell about Beth before he'd dropped his second one. He knew facing him now, the archer would see right through him, and realistically, would anyway; the other man read him more accurately than even his own wife had at times.

"You said-" he said finally, pausing as he reconsidered what he wanted to say, the words sounding more confident, more sure the second time round. "You said you saw him standing over Beth."

The statement had left little room for interpretation, and Daryl knew what he'd felt in those moments better than Rick did. Regardless of whether he agreed, disagreed, or even supported his actions, it was something he'd have to square away with his own conscience. God knew Rick had more than enough experience with that.

"I'm not sayin' what you did was the right thing... But you had a reason. It wasn't unprovoked."

That was what mattered. At the end of the world, motivation had become the dividing line, separating the survivors from the monsters. What you did, what you could do - When it came down to it, the only part that really mattered was the why. It was no coincidence that it had been the most significant of his three questions.

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Maybe it had been unfair of him to burden Rick with even more oppressive worries, especially at present, when it was essential they both stayed sharp, but at the same time it would have felt dishonest keeping something of that magnitude from him. And again the memory of Carol's banishment was at the forefront of Daryl's thoughts, even though he understood things were different now, and the man before him was unlikely to make such a decision. They'd all been forced to adapt to the changing world they lived in, and that meant all of those previously defined boundaries had been getting muddled, the distinctions increasingly fine between what was and was not acceptable.

There was a reason he'd never felt a pressing need to unload his more distant past on Rick — the past couldn't be what defined them anymore. But Rick had to be aware of what Daryl was capable of now, those new shifts in his own boundaries, if his counsel was to be of any use to Rick going forward. If they were going to maintain their bond with each other.

He'd wanted to kill Luke and Nick until he'd realised his error. Even if part of him had enjoyed what he'd done, he'd still stopped himself, independent of Nick's restraint. And while it hadn't been the first time he'd experienced that sense of losing himself in the violence, it was one of the more unsettling instances of it, warranting his need to inform Rick.

He'd said his piece on the matter, Rick had said his. That was enough.

Nodding to himself, he looked back down at his hands in his lap, digesting the conversation. It was still and quiet within the lab, the sort of atmosphere that lent itself to the loosening of thoughts, inviting them to drift where they might. Several minutes passed this way.

"Guess I'm afraid my judgement may be slippin'," he admitted after a time, without looking up. "Back with Joe's group, too... What they were capable of. I should have known. But I didn't." He'd obviously known they weren't exactly good people, but the fact he'd been traveling with a merry band of unrepentant rapists and murderers — how could he have been that blind? His instincts were normally far more keen when it came to reading people, even strangers. But, and this was what worried him most, maybe a part of him had sensed exactly what they'd been capable of, and he'd failed to act on it.

What Joe's group had done wasn't on him, and he'd believed Rick there, but he felt responsible for not preventing it. That he'd offered himself in lieu of Rick, Michonne, and Carl, was just another way in which he'd sorely misjudged Joe's group. He should have known better, not committed one mistake after another.

"That first night they bedded down," he began, his expression distant with recollection, and no small amount of regret, "I gave serious thought to slittin' their throats while they slept. Didn't wanna risk them trackin' me when I left." His gaze flickered up to Rick's face again, watching for any emotion he'd allow him to be privy to. "Now 'm only sorry I didn't."

[rictator]

Rick couldn't say that he was wrong. Had Daryl trusted that instinct and killed Joe, things wouldn't have gone down the way they had. What had nearly been inflicted on Carl, what Daryl himself had suffered... That brief moment of helpless desperation as Carl squirmed under Dan's weight, the sound of his cries burned forever in Rick's memory - Had Daryl ended them when he'd had that chance, none of it would have happened.

But in the end, it had served as a wake-up call.

Joe, despicable as he was, had forced him to realize his own limits. In that split second decision, Rick finally understood the extent of what he was capable of; he knew then, just how far he was willing to go to protect his son, his family, and it had taken that extreme push to make him embrace it. He didn't regret what he'd done that night, and guilty as Daryl may have felt, Rick didn't hold him responsible for his err in judgement.

"... Worrying about it now isn't gonna change what happened."

Had Daryl followed through and left the Claimers that night, there was a good chance they wouldn't have found each other again, if at all. It was by their efforts to track Rick down for killing Lou that they'd been reunited in the first place. Nowadays, it was harder to look for the silver lining, and in some ways, Rick couldn't say that it had been worth the cost. Not with the burden that Carl now no doubt shouldered in the wake of it all. But having Daryl back... It meant more to Rick than he could properly express.

It was only then that he allowed the barest hint of concern to slip through, the memories still too heavy to allow for anything resembling a smile. It was something genuine, all the hurt and more dangerous feelings tangled up in that night long since locked down in his own emotional Pandora's Box. Eventually, he'd take the time to actually deal with it all and begin that healing process - but until that day, it was better left untouched.

Somehow, it never felt like words were enough. 'I trust you and your judgement' should have long been implied between them; he couldn't quite pinpoint why it bothered him to see him faltering now.

"We all make mistakes. We learn from it and keep going," he concluded, finally taking a step to close the distance between them. "I told you before - What matters now is that they're gone and you're back with us."

[weaintashes]

Beth's death and the events surrounding it were a catalyst for this inexorable unraveling of Daryl's already shaken faith in himself. And though what Rick was telling him wasn't anything he didn't already know, just hearing the words from him and the surety with which he spoke them — his voice like a lifeline hauling Daryl out of the expanding void of his doubts — it was enough to keep him from surrendering to these thoughts. It was enough. He carefully collected himself and reined in his emotions, drawing strength from Rick's unvoiced confidence in him.

Outwardly, the effect the reassurance had on him was subtle, but there. A certain focus returning to his eyes, shoulders straightening as some of the weight was lifted from them. Relief filtered through his expression, easing the haunted look into something resembling gratitude.

"And I won't leave you." The admission sounded uncomfortably intimate hanging there between them, and he glanced downward as he amended a safer, "Any of you."

If he had any choice in the matter, that was.

During the fall of the prison he'd deliberately stayed behind to finish off what he could of 'Brian's' army and saw to it that everyone else had been evacuated, and Beth had had similar thoughts regarding the latter, resulting in them setting out together from their decimated home. Then much later after most of the group had reunited, and Carol had slipped away on her own, possibly intending to leave, he'd followed her to ensure that it wouldn't be a permanent departure. He'd never planned to abandon the group himself. It occurred to him, now, that Rick might not have known. Might have questioned whether he'd return.

"Back at the church... Carol needed some time, I went lookin' for her. We saw a car like the one that took Beth, speedin' away, so we had to leave then. Was our best bet of findin' Beth," he explained and directed a grimace at the floor. "I never left, you know. Was comin' back."

Merle was waiting on the other side for him, and with him had gone the only ties that could divide Daryl's loyalties. If Carol truly wanted to leave for good, he had his doubts that he'd figure into her plans. And it hurt, thinking that, but the sort of hurt he'd learned to live with. Because he had to. But after everything that had happened... he was certain Carol wasn't going to bail on them.

"I'll always come back," he murmured, much quieter, almost as though he were talking to himself. His words were becoming slurred, consonants softening. Breathing deepening, head gradually nodding in a way that only occurred when he was well and truly beyond the point of exhaustion. Sleeping left him too vulnerable when on his own and he hadn't allowed himself much, but since he'd found Rick, his body had seemingly decided of its own accord that he'd be safe enough now.

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"I know," he said, the statement punctuated with a small, sure nod.

It wasn't something that needed to be said; Daryl's return had never been a question to Rick. He hadn't needed to know the details or reasoning behind his disappearance; regardless of the circumstances, he'd been more than willing to stake his life and the safety of the group - of his family - on that fact. Moving on from the church might have spared them a fight, but at a cost far higher than Rick was willing to pay - Clean hands meant nothing if they were leaving behind one of their own, and after everything that had happened at the prison, with Merle, Woodbury, and the Claimers, there wasn't a chance in hell he'd have budged before Daryl was back.

Because he would be back.

Daryl's story had piqued his interest, however - in particular, the point about Beth and the car that had taken her. Daryl had mentioned prior that Beth had been there far longer than either of them; it was a strange coincidence that he happened to see the same vehicle the night they'd disappeared. Rick wasn't sure how the sighting was related, or even if it was - The entire situation was already testing the limits of his already lax standards of plausibility. In the end, they didn't have a hell of a lot to go on.

For now, it would wait - It would have to. Rick could see the way that Daryl had begun to fade, weighed down by what was likely days' worth of exhaustion, finally taking its toll. It was little wonder; with Beth gone, he'd have been forced to press on alone. Heavy doors and makeshift shelters only afforded so much protection, and with the threat of death looming, sleep never came easy. At least having a second set of eyes to watch his back, the other man might be able to scrape out a few hours sleep - and were he being honest, Rick could use the extra time to regroup and gather his scattered thoughts.

"Best you rest up," he added quietly, reaching down to gently squeeze the archer's shoulder.

It wasn't as though Daryl needed his permission, and that wasn't at all what he'd meant by it. The thing was, if Rick said it, the burden of consequence was shifted back squarely on his shoulders. Waiting it out became his call, and if things went to hell, it was on his head. Perhaps Carl and the others were out there, perhaps they weren't. In the end, Rick couldn't justify risking Daryl's life on a maybe - His survival meant so much more than that.

"I'm not goin' anywhere."

[burningdaylight]

Back home - if that sad, twisted reality where the dead outnumbered the living could be called so much, - he remembers looking into the haggard faces of strangers around him, people with all the life and light leeched from their eyes and thinking, that ain’t me. He remembers thinking he could never let himself sink so far that he’d wake up one day, unable to will himself to get up. But he understands better now how easy it could be to give up struggling to find some way to push on. Because, sometimes, that one is still breathing and alive just isn’t enough.

He has lost Nick and Jane. Again and again he’s doubled back from supply runs to their rendezvous point, searching the darkness restlessly, desperately hopeful. Some part of him still expecting Clem to be there each time, bruised and battered but waiting for him, leaning into the embrace he never had the chance to pull her into and hearing the apology he’s never had the chance to give.

Life doesn’t care that she’s gone. It doesn’t care that he’s spent the days that came after feeling like a toy wound up too tight and moving in circles and that he’s petering out at last, slowing down between the angry throbbing of his wounds and long hours spent awake and listening dazedly to distant screams sounding all too much like Carlos and Sarah after a while. Like mom and dad. But he keeps moving, almost convincing himself that he can outpace the grief that’s snapping at his heels if he does. He’d find Nick and Jane because he had to. There’s never the time to rest long, no time to cry.

He finds neither of his people when he rounds the corner. But there’s someone else facing him now. A grizzled, wary-looking stranger who doesn't seem like he had seen a fight, if his bloodlessness and untorn suit were anything to go by. Luke, by comparison, is every bit a mess: his suit and skin are slathered with blood and his hair matted with it, angry bruises in the shape of Daryl’s knuckles patterning his face. A length of cloth is wound about his ribs, more scavenged and knotted together to form a rudimentary sling. And even though he draws himself up in the man's presence there’s no hiding the pain in every stiffened line of his body while he stands there, taking measure of the stranger.

“We don’ have to do this,” Luke husks, watching him cooly, carefully. His jaw aches something fierce and it’s hard to talk. But it's harder to sneak breaths in through his blood-clogged nostrils and past the knifing pain in his side.

[rictator]

Rick had no problem being on his own, but while he'd agreed to splitting up with Daryl, he hadn't been keen on it. In the end, it had proven the best way to cover more ground, and with the way sound carried, they were never more than a whistle away from one another. They were both more than capable, particularly now that he was armed with something more wieldy than his helmet. Regardless, the idea that the archer didn't have someone watching his back wasn't one he liked, with everything from little green men to the normal violent variety wandering the station with them.

Thus far, he didn't have much to show for his efforts. The freeze-dried food wasn't exactly in short supply, but outside of that, he wasn't turning up anything useful. More importantly, he hadn't managed to track down any of the others of his fractured group. He still wasn't even sure if they were there, but even with all signs pointing to no, he couldn't seem to drive the thought from his mind.

When he'd first heard the echo of footsteps, it had been his son that he thought of. Some small, broken part of him still clung fiercely to the hope he would find Carl; more than being alone back home, Rick feared the idea of him being alone here. Alone, unarmed. Unprepared. At least back home, he knew what to expect.

Regardless of faith or hope, he knew the chances of it being him were astronomically low. Even if it was, Carl would have understood the way Rick had his weapon raised as he rounded the corner, lean frame poised and ready to strike. He wasn't taking chances, not the entire point of this farce was to force them to kill each other. Humans were inherently dangerous creatures, and should the one approaching be looking for a fight, the razor tip of shrapnel would be looking for their throat.

This man, however, seemed to have already found that fight.

Rick would never have denied that his world had changed him. It had done its damnedest to tear him down, reshaping him from a man to a survivor - but there was still a line he didn't cross. It was narrow and he found himself toeing it more and more frequently, but it was still there. He was a lot of things, but he was not a coldblooded killer; so long as recognized the difference between the things he did and murder, the things the Capitol wanted from him, he could hold on to what was left of his humanity. Keep his hands clean - or as clean as they could be anymore.

They didn't have to do this.

"... You're right. We don't."

His eyes narrowed as he looked him up and down one final time, suspicion lingering even as he slowly lowered the weapon; that in itself should have been answer enough. His stance relaxed slightly, though the wary alertness never faded; he'd seen the wrong end of betrayal one too many times.

For a man to take a beating like that, he must have fought like hell to escape with his life - or he was incredibly lucky. Someone like that was the sort of person that made a better friend than foe; whatever he turned out to be, he wasn't going to be taking Rick down in that shape. Or anyone else, from the looks of him.

"Are you with anyone?" he asked at length, keeping his voice low.

[burningdaylight]

Luke straightens a little more under scrutiny, his stance unaggressive but giving no ground either. A man with some fight left in him for when it mattered. Some people can’t be reached, can’t be reasoned with -- and he’s grateful that the stranger doesn’t seem to be of the sort even if none of that cautious relief shows. His expression is a flat, stiffened mask, emotions harder to read on a swollen mess of a face.

He notes the slow shift in Rick’s posture to something a little less wary and is reminded of the sharp piece of shrapnel he keeps tucked in his sling. Not something he hoped he’d have to use on anything living, aliens aside. But if it ever came down to it --

“Two people, ‘s’far’s I can tell. Might be others out there.” He glances over one shoulder before looking back to Rick and tilting his head consideringly. “Maybe you seen ‘em…?“

He tells himself that the worst thing the man can say is ‘no’ – but that’s not true. It’s never true. He refuses to let himself entertain the possibility, for even the briefest moment, that they’re anything other than alive.

“A tall, skinny guy in purple with blue eyes an’ dark, shaggy hair – an’ a woman. Thin, shorter than me, an’ in green. Sandy-brown hair in a pixie cut.”

[rictator]

The connection wasn't immediate, but for Rick, this could have been looking in a mirror. In the wake of the prison's fall, he'd looked every bit as rough, and he'd been doing the same damned thing - pressing on. The limitations of his injuries ignored, clinging to the faint, desperate hope that he wasn't the only one to make it out... More importantly, protecting the precious few he knew he still had left.

It was a goal he could respect. While it wasn't enough to pierce the iron guard he'd built, it certainly got them off on the right foot. If he'd learned nothing else, it was that he needed to trust his gut - it was the times that he didn't, the times that he'd compromised that things had started to fall apart. So far, this one wasn't setting off any alarm bells.

Unfortunately, that didn't mean he could help him. His encounters with the other tributes had been both limited and brief, and none had matched up with either description. True, it was often said that 'no news was good news', but Rick knew better than that; often, it was not knowing that haunted him.

"No one like that," he admitted, the hint of a frown tugging at his lips, the first real hint of emotion he'd let slip. "... But I can keep an eye out."

At one point in his life, he might have thrown himself headlong into a search, ever ready to solve everyone else's problems... But things were different now. Had Carl been there, he might have urged his father to help, reminded him that their strength had better uses; it looked like for the moment, he'd have to keep a firm grip on his own humanity.

He let his weight shift back to his other leg, the hand with the shrapnel resting against his hip. It was hardly a casual meeting, but it seemed safe to say it wasn't going to be coming to blows just yet.

"Who should I say is lookin' for them?"

[burningdaylight]

A part of him waits for a bomb to drop while he searches Rick’s expression, breath unconsciously bitten back and a restlessness crackling though his sinews that his body can’t unlearn. But it never does. Surprise – and the smallest flicker of pained hope – widens his eyes, flitting across his face before his features settle back into a look of guarded blankness. He had never been very good at poker.

‘No’ doesn’t mean dead.

It means there's still a chance. And he owed it to the living and the dead to keep moving, to keep searching every corner of the spaceport because he has risked more and fought harder for slimmer chances to protect those he cared for and knows they would do the same.

His mouth skews, blood-crusted lips pressing thin as he weighs the pros and cons of volunteering further information. As he considers the placement of Rick’s hands.

“It's Luke.” Nick and Jane would figure as much – but offering his name also doubles as an informal introduction. “…Mind if I know who’s askin’?”

He’s not ungrateful for the offer to help whether Rick intends to make good on it or not; he’d simply feel better knowing at least something about him other than what he looked like.

[rictator]

Over the years, Rick had picked up a thing or two about reading people. In his line of work, observation often served better than conversation; after all, if someone had something to hide, they weren't likely to come out and say it. Sure, he'd worked in a pretty small county and their troubles were mundane and insignificant by comparison to the bigger places - but it had served him well enough. Even more so after the world ended.

Besides that, the brief slip of emotion hit far too close to home for him not to recognize it.

"Rick. Rick Grimes."

He left it at that, keeping it brief so far as introductions went. He could hardly be considered a cop anymore; the title meant even less here than it had back home. Frivolities like 'nice to meet you' or anything along those lines had long since been outdated, and in a place like this, were a pretty far cry from the truth anyway. They'd already established the important parts.

"You see anyone else, aside from these friends of yours?"

His tone was measured, betraying nothing of the worry he'd opened himself to with the question. Inflating his own hope was only going to bring him down harder, should the worse come to pass - but he couldn't leave it alone. He needed to know, and so long as the opportunity was there... He couldn't and wouldn't turn it down.

[burningdaylight]

Luke nods, his gratitude subdued. Between the unspent wellspring of grief building behind his eyes, darkening them, and the creases etched around them, he looks so much older that he ought to for someone who has yet to see his thirtieth year.

“Plenty a’ survivors still spread out across the station – hard to get a sense of their numbers when most are keepin’ on the move.” He shrugs a shoulder faintly. “Don’ know how much help I can be if you’re lookin’ for your own, but I might a’ seen ‘em these last couple weeks.”

A beat passes and then he’s motioning to a set of mechanical doors to Rick’s right with a nudge of his chin.

“We shouldn’t be out in the open like this. There’s more than jus’ people to worry ‘bout out here.”

His suit’s been shredded to ribbons in places by frantic claws and he’s bled heavily at one point, red on red, the wounds now crudely bandaged by the material of his stripped-down sleeves. The last time he had loitered in a hallway, a sudden electric shock through the floor had wrenched Nick around like a ragdoll and a xenomutt had burst out through the vents almost simultaneously, nearly getting its drooling, steel-trap jaws around him.

“There’s a storage room that way –-" He suggests, having most of the spaceport mapped out in his head after many supply runs and so many close shaves with pursuers. It's the direction he means to head in anyway. “Ain’t nothin’ too useful in there, last I checked. But there’s another set a’ doors leadin’ out so we won’t be trapped inside if somethin’ comes in the way we do. No vents, either.”

[rictator]

It wasn't a real answer one way or another, but Rick wasn't about to rejoice just yet. Even if Luke had seen them, with this much space to cover, tracking them down would take precious time they may not have had - The fact he'd found any of his people as quickly as he had was an uncharacteristic stroke of luck.

But Luke wasn't wrong. Until he'd met up with Daryl, Rick hadn't stopped moving, unable to find any place secure enough to bunker down. The weight of that exhaustion wasn't unnoticed, but he didn't have the time to let himself feel it; it was a familiar burden at least, despite the less than familiar environment.

"Yeah."

The conversation could wait. He'd seen the remains of the aliens Daryl had dispensed with before they'd moved on, but thus far, he'd been fortunate enough to avoid many real confrontations. It had been a long while since he'd felt so out of his element, but aliens, walkers - Regardless of where the threat came from, the other tributes weren't the only hazard he needed to be considering. Luke made a strong point about the vents as well, and he wasn't quite able to stop the brief glance toward the ceiling.

The storage room would be moving in the wrong direction, farther away from where Daryl had gone on to investigate. So far, there hadn't been any indication that things had gone sour on his end, but in case he came looking... Rick whistled a shrill note, followed by a lower one - He was breaking plan, moving the other way.

"One of my people is close. So long as this place isn't far, I'll cover you. We talk there and after that, we can go our separate ways."

[burningdaylight]

The whistle cuts through him and he snaps from low-grade wariness into razor-sharp alertness, throwing Rick a look the equivalent of “are you nuts?” before his brows settle low over his eyes.

Later – when the dangers surrounding him weren’t as immediate and he’d have the room to mull things over – he’d recognize the usefulness of non-verbal communication between allies and remind himself to bring the idea to their attention. If they had a system of cues and symbols hashed out, they’d be stronger as a group. Something as simple as a cryptic mark scratched into a wall could guide them and inspire a flicker of hope even if they were all scattered across the far reaches of the arena. The Gamemakers would send creatures after them and tributes could come for their heads, but no one could rob them of their hope unless they let them rip it out of their hands first.

“That sound’s gonna attract more than jus’ your friend here.” Or maybe it wouldn’t. But the risk is always there. He lets out a breath though his nose, willing calm he doesn’t feel. Flattening out his voice. “We need to get movin’.”

It’s as strong a suggestion as suggestions go and he begins to close the distance between them, meaning to head back the way Rick came and round the corner.

“It’s around the corner, first set a' doors to the right.” Rick’s offer to cover him is not unappreciated – though he remains as vigilant as ever as if he’s alone, hoping against hope that the short trip’s an uneventful one.

[rictator]

If Rick was at all concerned about the repercussions, he didn't show it. A whistle was far better than shouting back and forth, the sound brief and its intent private to its recipient. While it was true that it could have alerted others in the vicinity, the same could be said of any method of communication they had on hand; far better than the alternative, where he dropped off the grid to leave Daryl guessing at what had gone down in his absence.

"If it does, we'll handle it," he replied gruffly, his stance already shifting back to one of preparedness, always anticipating the worst possible scenario. They had enough space to manoeuvre, and between the two of them, injured though Luke was, Rick believed they'd be an even match for whatever the station threw their way.

At the very least, they'd hold out until reinforcements arrived.

Suggestion was enough to earn his cooperation; this wasn't a group so much as a temporary partnership, leaving Rick unconcerned about who was making the calls. The fact that Luke had respect enough not to try and assume that role did a lot, and he fell into step behind him, makeshift blade at the ready.

Fortunately for them, their trip went largely without incident, outside of the distant sound of a scuffle taking place, one which Rick had no interest in further investigating. Wrong direction for Daryl, and it sounded far enough that they should have been able to slip into the storage room before they crossed paths with either combatant, so long as they didn't waste any time.

"We close?"

[celebrityskinned]

Venus didn't look for weapons at the Cornucopia; she looked for allies. Now, a week and a half later and with nothing on her person but the contents of her makeshift purse around her waist, she's starting to wonder if that was the best idea. The helmet, tied upended to her hip with some of the rope from the pedestals outside, jingles a little as she walks, and so she keeps a fist inside it to keep the scrap metal and duct tape and morsels of food she's collected from alerting other people to her presence. Her own suit is royal purple, a little easier to slip into dark spaces with but no less eyesearing.

She's coming the other way from Rick when they catch sight of each other in the hallway. She doesn't run off, nor duck behind a wall, but her eyes do flash immediately to Rick's, and she hopes that dark winding shadow she sees is a cable and not a strangely-concealed firearm. She puts her hands up, although she looks more cooperative than she does scared.

She isn't scared.

"I'm unarmed!" she says, and then, because sometimes her reputation for snapping necks and kicking in knees precedes her, she adds, "I'm not looking for a fight."

[rictator]

The emptiness of the corridor did nothing to mask the sounds of their approach - he'd heard her long before he saw her. Along this stretch, there was no avoiding confrontation; there were no real doorways or alcoves, likely by design. Without knowing the layout, it had been a risk he'd run by pressing deeper into the station. He'd thus far managed to avoid any real confrontation, but it would seem that now, crossing paths with the advancing figure was inevitable.

Fortunately, he was as scared of her as she was him.

Rick came to a halt with a healthy distance still stretched between them, watching her with the wariness of a cornered predator. He took note of the helmet, his own still gripped in his left hand, but didn't immediately see anything else; unarmed meant about as much as the word of a stranger, as she seemed to have guessed, and Rick was long past taking those sorts of chances.

These games, or whatever they wanted to call them, only functioned so long as those in them participated. Rick found it hard to believe they worked at all if everyone in them threw up their hands every time they crossed someone else. True, she could very well be one of the few who rebelled, but until she gave him reason to, Rick wasn't leaping to that conclusion.

"What are you lookin' for?" he asked finally as he straightened up, tension evident in his frame.

[celebrityskinned]

"Supplies. My allies." She raises her chin slightly. The light drips over the traitor brand on half her face, a scar ugly enough to be on par with an open wound. "Maybe some chocolate and the meaning of life, but I ain't holding my breath on the last two."

He has an accent like the one she papers over with Hollywood affectations, like the accent some of the new guys she met before this Arena do. She wonders if he's one of them, if he knows them.

She decides to gamble on it. They could both keep walking, but she doesn't know he wouldn't follow her, and the same goes for him.

"Where you from, stranger? I'm from Savannah."

[rictator]

The significance of the brand was lost on him, but he'd have to have been blind not to notice it. Whether it was the handiwork of another tribute or something older, he could appreciate the pain associated with a mark like that - and the implied strength of the person bearing it. His gaze didn't linger too long, instead keeping a closer watch on her posture, her body language. Searching for any signs of threat.

"Just outside Atlanta."

It was vague, but then, so was his current address. With the prison gone and Terminus a sham, they stayed where there was shelter and moved on just as quickly.

It struck him then, just how few people he'd spoken to from outside his own small backyard. Eugene and Abraham, Dave and Tony... It was accepted fact that things had gone to hell all over, but the details of it tended to get glossed over. Too much time had passed to believe Savannah would fare any better than Atlanta or Nebraska or Fort Benning; no one liked to dwell on the grisly details, but Rick stubbornly refused to believe that there were no safe places left.

Unfortunately, this was hardly the place or time for reminiscing and catching up on the world at large. That, and there was something else that was bothering him.

"Your allies know you're here?"

The question had him tense all over again, casting a quick look over his shoulder; the last thing he needed was to get blindsided by someone with the wrong idea.

[celebrityskinned]

"Some of them do. Some of them I haven't found yet, and that's why I'm looking. Why, you seen a teenage boy with grey skin run past here?"

There's a keening upwards tone to her voice, like the prow of a boat lifting over a wave, a note tossed upwards to hope above. She hasn't been able to find Kankri this entire time and has no way of knowing if he's alive or dead. She fears the worse but pushes forward, animated by a feverish wish for the best.

It's the only break in her unflappable facade, but she makes no effort to hide her earnestness about it. There's no point pretending the kid doesn't matter to her.

She, too, looks over her shoulder and ignores a stabbing pain in her breast, where she was stabbed with scissors earlier in the week. Compared to injuries in earlier Arenas, it's looking downright pleasant, healing up without swelling or infection. It's a Christmas fucking miracle.

"You here on your own or you got allies too?"

[rictator]

Grey skin. The first word that came to mind was walker; Rick narrowed his eyes, head tilting slightly as he sized her up all over again. That couldn't be right - No one would consider a single walker an asset, much less an ally. A herd was dangerous to be sure, but they weren't people anymore. Too many of them, they were an uncontrollable force; just one, they were mindless and easily picked off.

Then again, they were in what appeared to be a spaceport - Who knew what was considered normal in this equation? Rick wasn't naive enough to believe he'd seen it all, and if this was the strangest he encountered, he'd consider himself unfeasibly lucky.

"I haven't."

He could see the same dangerous flicker of hope that guttered within his own chest mirrored in her then, the cold, quiet anger he'd felt toward his captors creeping back in with the realization. This wasn't a game. These were real people, some of them his, some of them strangers - but they were real. That they were being forced into this situation for entertainment... His jaw set in a hard line, his gaze dropping for a moment.

Did he have allies here? If he didn't, did he want her knowing that? There weren't a hell of a lot of advantages to be had given the circumstances and he'd never been much of a liar.

"There's no one back this way," he replied finally, a meager offer of temporary truce. It wasn't an answer, but it was something - his allies weren't that way, and neither were hers. If they were going to keep at this, they needed to keep moving; staying in one place too long, especially one as exposed as this one, did not sit well with him.

"It's a dead end."

[celebrityskinned]

She has no reason to trust what he says, aside from the fact that he looks like he hasn't had too long to get his bearings and that he hasn't attacked her yet, hasn't been anything but useful to her. For all she knows he's found a stash of food down that way and wants to keep it safe, but she doubts it.

It's not that she's a trusting person - she had a career in Hollywood, after all - but sometimes it's easy to believe the better of her peers here in the Arena. Maybe the fact that she hasn't been actually betrayed in seven Arenas has lent her open-heartedness a certain gravitas.

"You need someone to watch your back for a bit? There's nothing back this way that I ain't examined either except some eggs that I'm pretty sure are housing some ugly monsters." She tilts her head to the side, gesturing towards a side hall. "We go down that way and split, that work for you?"

[rictator]

There was a tense moment before Rick finally nodded, his gaze both scrutinizing and unflinching.

In the end, it was better to work together than to turn his back on her. He had no definitive proof that he wasn't alone in the arena, that he'd ever find his people in the maze of sterile hallways, and if he didn't... Well, he knew too well what came next. You couldn't survive on your own, be it here, Atlanta, or anywhere else. When shit inevitably hit the fan, it always went better when you had someone backing you up.

At least then, you could see the knife coming before it was buried in your back.

"Yeah." There was a pause, and he scratched his bearded chin as he considered just how far he wanted to take this. "... If we're gonna be working together, might be best if we knew what to call each other."

He figured she'd understand if he skipped out on the handshake, all things considered.

"Rick."

[celebrityskinned]

"Venus." She cocks her smile to one side, as if amused by how his name is so much more simple than the one her agent graced her with, but there's no way in hell she'd offer her given name to a stranger. She hardly offers it to the people who know her best.

She doesn't mind that he doesn't reach for a handshake. It doesn't matter if she knows five ways to bring a man to the ground once you have his wrist if you have no intention of showing those skills off.

She heads down the hall first, assuming the risk that he doesn't mean what he says because she knows she can't expect a stranger to take it on.

"Anything you've seen in these places I should know about? Monsters or mutts or whatever?"

[rictator]

It was rare that Rick didn't take point. Outside of Daryl, who would always be the superior tracker (in no small part due to the fact Rick wasn't much good at it, even now), Rick had always prescribed to the 'first to enter, last to leave' policy. That said, this wasn't his group. He wasn't the one making the calls here, and from the looks of her, she had a fair bit more experience with the terrain than he did.

"Nothing you prob'ly haven't already seen for yourself," he admitted.

And it was true. She was the first real contact he'd had since his arrival. 'Monsters' weren't so out of the ordinary anymore. Rick had his fair share of experience with them, both living and dead. They'd pressed themselves up against the fences of the prison in droves and governed towns. Whatever the Gamemakers had to throw at them, could it really be any worse than watching your loved ones devolve into something else, hungry for your blood?

"I heard something moving around one of the vents earlier."

That he'd moved on before facing off against the aforementioned 'something' was left unsaid. Tribute or otherwise, it wasn't an encounter he'd been keen to have - And, based on what sounded distinctly like claws on metal, he'd been betting on the latter.

"You said something about eggs. You run into anything else?"

[celebrityskinned]

"Dollars to doughnuts that it wasn't rats," Venus says, glancing back at him over her shoulder with a nearly irreverent grin, as if there's something absurdly funny about this entire conversation. About this entire situation, with them dumped into a space station like the toys at the bottom of a playchest. And then, returning to business, she faces the front again, tilting her head this way and that as she tries to listen for anything over the sound of their own footsteps and breathing and conversation.

"There's some kind of alien breed in here that's kind of like a cheetah, but way uglier and with really long head. One chased me down earlier, but I'm guessing they're not super hardy, because I killed it with two hits." She pats her thigh. "Roundhouse and an axe kick. I honestly never thought an axe kick would come in handy."

There's a cockiness she carries herself with that's half extreme self-confidence and half ambivalence as to her fate. It's easier to greet the world arms-open when you don't really care if it bites you. That isn't the impression she gets from Rick - if he's got any swagger at all it's earned.

[rictator]

Rats, he could deal with. Walkers, he could deal with. Cheetah-like-

"Aliens," he repeated, not sounding entirely convinced. True, they were in what appeared to be a space station, and before that, he'd seen the dead up and walking, feasting on the living. The realms of plausibility were ever expanding, and in the end, aliens weren't that far-fetched. It wasn't a threat he'd faced before, but fear of the unknown had barely broken his stride in the past. If that was what stood between him and finding his family, then he already knew what he had to do.

Rick had never been one to be won over by boasting, but all things considered, he wasn't taking his new companion lightly. He'd yet to see her in action - and with any luck, wouldn't need to - but in this environment, attitudes like hers were a liability more than an asset. They'd claimed that this was a death match, and with that sort of confidence, one usually had the means to back it up, or they didn't tend to last long.

The boots they'd given him didn't afford much stealth, but they hadn't been particularly careful about their earlier conversation either. The unfortunate acoustics of the halls were working against them, and normally, he'd have left the conversation at that - However, if they were to be parting ways, he needed whatever information she was willing to give up.

"How long've you been here?" His voice was lower, but not near quiet enough for his liking.

[celebrityskinned]

When she keeps her voice down, it's really only to avoid upsetting Rick. She trusts her abilities but more than that, isn't terribly invested in what becomes of her. With her superpowers, she doesn't doubt her ability to quickly defend them both.

"Here, like the Arena, or here, like Panem? Because this is my eighth Arena, and I've been in it about three weeks now."

She raises an eyebrow, unsure if he's received the schpiel about the way they cheat death. Some people don't believe it. Some people assume that if she's done seven, she must have won all of them, and she tenses slightly, preparing to defend herself if Rick makes the snap judgment to eliminate a perceived threat. It's more out of habit than it is about survival; she doesn't want to be taken from behind, looking like a fool. She cares less about if she dies than about how she dies.

[rictator]

Panem hadn't crossed his mind, the answer catching him off guard. These arenas were meant to leave only one survivor, and if Venus had survived seven of them, it would imply that she'd been that victor...

It wasn't that she didn't seem like she could defend herself, but her attitude, her eyes... Rick had seen how people changed, watched it happen to too many people. Constant death took its toll, and killing worse still; someone who'd cut their way through who knew how many people in the name of survival didn't look like her. It just didn't add up. Perhaps he was being ignorant, disregarding what should have been obvious... but he just didn't see it.

He had yet to hear about death and its impermanence, and in truth, he wouldn't have believed it if he had. He'd seen what became of those who came back, and they weren't human. Bodies could be reanimated, but the soul stayed dead - It would take a lot more seeing to change his mind on that than blindly believing.

"How'd you last this long?" His tone was warier, but his stance unchanged. She hadn't attacked him so far, but he wasn't going to be leaving her any openings. More than anything, he just needed to understand what the hell was going on - Attacking her now wasn't going to help that.

[celebrityskinned]

"By being entertaining." She knows what he's asking, but she can't resist that answer, because it's a truth deeper than mere resurrection. They return from the dead by the grace of the Gamemakers, by begging for that tablescrap with their photogenic beauty, their quotable wits, their iconic personalities and visages. She has to remind herself, because with her face so scarred her longevity in the Arenas is her only token of the celebrity she used to be.

But she continues, because that's not what he was asking. "We don't die in the Arena for real. We wake up after we die. It makes death, and killing, a little cheaper."

She almost adds in for him that she has a body count higher than anyone else in the Arenas, but she doesn't, not yet. Instead she watches him over her shoulder, one eyebrow quirked slightly as if prepared for a reaction she already expects.

[rictator]

The dead coming back wasn't anything unusual to him, but that wasn't how it worked. Rick had seen people turn, seen the empty shells that came back - they weren't themselves anymore. Jenner had showed them the scans, how the neuropaths had stayed dark; they were barely considered alive, let alone human. The idea that anyone had harnessed that sort of power was unsettling to say the least, but to believe that they'd managed to bring people back entirely, to salvage the person they were before? He wasn't buying it.

"Yeah, I've seen it happen," he replied sharply, a muscle twitching in his jaw from how tightly he clenched it. "They're not people anymore. When they come back, they're something else."

What was it that he was missing? There had to be more to it, something he wasn't understanding. But... what she'd said hadn't left a lot of room for interpretation. She sure as hell wasn't a walker, and if she'd actually made it through that many arenas without winning, she'd have been dead.

Or she was lying.

"If they wanted a show, they should've picked someone else. All I care about right now is finding my people."

[celebrityskinned]

"Well, I'm a people, right? And I've been dead so many times you couldn't shake a stick at it. Burned to death, shot in the head, cut in half...got trampled by a bull once..."

She trails off, lips going tight for a moment as he states his mode of operation. She actually rolls her eyes and curls her lip upwards, the kindness seeping out of her and being replaced with a sort of exasperation that clearly has less to do with Rick than the length of time she's been here. "Some of you people have no survival instincts when you get indignant."

How many people came into these Arenas insistent on railing against the powers that be, tempting fate, refusing to do even the most basic things to get an advantage without having to kill or be killed? How many times are people going to take a pointless moral stance, she thinks, out of spite? It makes her feel crazy, as if she's out of step with everyone else, the only one who understands that manipulating the audience is the best weapon in the arsenal.

"Seeing as I don't know where your people are, we should probably split here." She puts her hands on her hips. "Take my advice, though. The audience isn't your enemy here."

The audience is just the placid lab rats.

[rictator]

The look he fixed her with was somewhere between aggravated and incredulous, his lips set in a grim line. The idea that he lacked survival instinct... It had been a long time since he'd been accused of that, and longer still since it had been anywhere near the truth. Shane had believed it until the very end, had insisted that Rick wasn't built to withstand the world as it was now. That he wasn't prepared to protect his boy.

He'd been wrong.

The things Rick had done in the name of survival were a burden heavier than anyone was ever meant to carry, but he wasn't shying away from it. When it came down to keeping his family safe, nothing was out of bounds - Had he honestly believed that playing to the audience would have done him a damned bit of hood, he'd have swallowed his pride and done it. He couldn't help but notice, however, that if the audience was on their side, why bring them there to begin with? If they had the power to take them out of this, why was Venus still there?

"That's your call," he replied stiffly, slowing to a halt, his eyes automatically flickering to the end of the hall and back. There was no guaranteeing this wasn't some sort of trap still, and regardless of his own distrust, he wasn't so naive as to believe that going it alone would end any better for either of them.

"But I wouldn't be puttin' my fate in their hands, if I were you. They're not here - We are."