GIVEN TO FLY [Daryl Dixon]

XVI.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN
[ the prison ]

It is a hard winter. Nearly impossible to get through. And yet, they do. They get through it. They move from house to house, taking what they can find and moving on as soon as they have to.

They get better at surviving. Smarter. And, they grow closer as a group. After the winter and everything they go through to survive, each one of them would die for all the others.

After vacating yet another house they'd found, a few of them stand out on the road around a map of the area, while the others stand guard around the cars. They study the map, where they've circled where all of the nearby herds are. "We've got no place left to go," T-Dog says.

Maggie points at a few of the herds on the map. "When this herd meets up with this one, we'll be cut off, we'll never make it south."

"What do you say, s'about 150 head?" Daryl asks.

"That was last week," Glenn answers. "Could be twice that now."

Hershel points out a river on the map. "This river could have delayed them. If we move fast, we might have a shot to tear right through this."

"Yeah, but if this group joins with that one, they could spill out this way," T-Dog says.

"So we're blocked," Maggie concludes.

"Only thing to do is double back at 27th and swing towards Greenville," Rick tells them.

"We picked through that already," T-Dog says. "It's like we spent the winter going in circles."

"We did," Misty replies, shaking her head.

Rick nods. "Yeah, I know. I know. At Newnan we'll push west. Haven't been through the area. We can't keep going house to house. We need to find some place to hold up for a few weeks."

They all split up, with a few of them going down to the creek to fill up on water and others just going back to the cars. Before Misty can go off with the others, Daryl gets her attention. "Hey."

"Yeah?"

"While the others wash their panties, let's go hunt. That owl didn't exactly hit the spot."

She sighs, nodding. She'd been trying to forget eating that owl since they left that last house. "Yeah, alright."

Daryl tells Rick where they're going, and Misty tells Addie, both promising they'll be back soon. Then they head off into the woods, searching for a half-decent meal.