The air in the dim cell was thick; like a warm fog that had seeped in through the doorway. It hung dead in the small space, and the stale air filled your lungs with a heavy breath.

Gripping tightly to an old and slightly torn rag, you dip it into the small bowl of cool water. The metal bowl laying on the mattress beside you. You watch as the fabric soaks up the water like a sponge, and pulling it out of the bowl, you listen to the extra water drip and drop back into it. Squeezing the thin fabric of the excess liquid, you raise your hand with the rag. Pressing the cool wet cloth to your bruised cheek, closing your eyes at the feel.

It rushed over your skin, a cooling sensation that instantly calmed the screaming pain that resided inside the left side of your face.

The cell was quiet, as though the sound of the world was lost as soon as you passed by the sheet hung in the doorway. And you relished in the silence, for your thoughts could finally be heard. You could fade away into the serenity that the calm quiet brought. The escape being exactly what you needed. Especially today.

"How ye holdin up?"

Daryl Dixon's low and gravelly yet surprisingly soft voice startles you. His sudden presence in the doorway and words that echo in the small space cause your leg to bump into the bowl of water beside you. Sloshing a little bit of it onto the sheets.

"The door might be just a sheet, but you could still try and knock you know." You mutter under your breath, looking down at your lap.

Daryl snorts lowly, almost as though he's fighting back a small laugh.

"I'll remember that for next time." He comments, and you listen to the patter of his heavy boots carrying him further into the small cell. It isn't many steps that he takes, but his footsteps are slow and seem to echo off the walls that enclose the two of you.

For a moment, you question if he'll take a seat beside you on the bed. But instead, Daryl leans his back flat against the wall across from you. Answering you with his easy movement.

"Is it a bad one?"

His question sounds off of the cold cement walls around you, and radiates straight through you. His words heavy but his tone light and cautious.

"Is there any other type?"

Daryl hums under his breath as your comment falls into the empty air, and his blue eyes break their gaze on you. Looking down at his boots that are caked in now dry mud.

Silence fills the cell once again, but this time it isn't as comfortable as it once was. For a burden hung in the air, and made it hard for you to breathe deeply. The situation was clear to Daryl but it was something you had wanted to keep hidden for as long as possible.

Removing your eyes from looking to the much older redneck leaning against the far wall, you look to your lap. And as the silence and anxiety of the moment continues to magnify, the searing pain in your cheek returns. It was never quite gone, but you were distracted long enough to forget the pain for a short time.

"It ain't your fault," Daryl says suddenly, his low voice breaking through the thick quiet void. "Ye know that, don't 'cha?"

Slowly, your eyes raise. Hesitation evident in your every movement. But soon, your eyes land on him. His shadow falls over the floor in a dark pool, but his eyes look at you with a certain softness. One you wouldn't expect from a man like Daryl Dixon. With his rough and calloused exterior and lone wolf attitude that was slowly beginning to fade. He looked too masculine or perhaps too rugged to have a softness hidden inside of him. But everyone had secrets, you thought. And maybe his slightly tender interior was Daryl's.

Shrugging your shoulders as you look up at him through your lashes, you respond quietly. "I tend to make him upset, I should know not to do some things by now."

Daryl grunts at your answer, and with a shake of his head, he walks towards you. His boots echoing in the cell as he approaches the low mattress, and you feel as it dips under the newly added weight of another.

"We both know that's bullshit." Daryl says boldly, and you look up and over to your right. And you feel as his eyes quickly run over the obvious mark marring the left side of your face.

"Its not," You mumble lowly. "Its been me and my father for a long time now, ever since my mother passed. And the things that make him angry or aggressive haven't changed."

Daryl runs a hand through his dark hair, "Ain't no excuse to put your hands on your own kid though."

Looking away from Daryl's heavy scrutiny, you look to your lap. And feel as your eyes burn with the tears you pushed deep down inside every single night.

"How would you know? We haven't been with y'all long enough for you to really know us."

Daryl grunts lowly under his breath, "Don't gotta know you to know that no man should ever lay a hand on his kid. On his own daughter. Don't matter who the hell you are or think you are, you don't hit your kid."

A single tear runs down your face, trailing a burning sensation behind it. And hiding your face away from Daryl even further, you speak up softly.

"You don't get what it's like. Look at you, you turned out just fine."

This time it isnt a grunt or a sigh of frustration, instead it's an all honest chuckle. One that escapes from deep within the man's chest, and one that makes your head snap up to look in his direction.

"You and me kid," Daryl shakes his head. "we ain't that different."

And as the redneck slowly stands to his feet, your eyes follow suit. Latching onto the broad man as he stands straight up before you. And as he turns around, your gaze is locked on his back.

You question for a moment, as the silence and uncomfortableness begins to settle over the cell once again, what it is he's doing as he begins to pull his shirt up over his head. But the moment your eyes spot the raised and jagged scars peeking out from beneath the bottom fabric, you get it.

"Had me an old man jus like yours." Daryl's voice is clear and it rings through the small space, but there's a rawness in his words you had never heard from the tough ole redneck before. "Always believing the only way I'd learn was by the sting of his belt. Or the palm of his hand."

Swallowing down the thick lump growing in the pit of your throat, you blink away the tears burning your eyes.

"We ain't different in the way that we both got shit in the father department." Daryl says, and slowly he rolls his shirt back down over his scarred back. Once again covering up and concealing his past from anyone. Even himself.

"But the one difference we do have," Daryl pauses as he turns around slowly. His blue eyes locking with your awaiting gaze.

"Is that you ain't alone."

Blinking quickly, you wipe the tears away with the back of your hand. Feeling the warm and salty water soak into your flesh.

"You got a whole damn family here now, ain't jus you and your old man anymore. You got people who want the best for ya. You got people who are gonna look out for you now, you ain't gotta fend for yourself anymore."

Daryl's footsteps sound once again as he steps closer to you, and it isn't long before he's kneeling in front of you on the cold prison floor.

"Ye got me now kid." Your eyes flicker up slowly, and his eyes are the softest shade of blue you had ever seen. Softer than the sky on a clear spring day or the water in a rippling creak.

"And I ain't gonna let him put his hands on your ever 'gain." Daryl assures you sternly as you look to him through your tear soaked lashes. "Okay?"

You know you can't speak, so you don't even try. Instead, you bound forward and wrap your arms around the redneck's neck. Clinging to his broad being with every bit of strength inside of you.

You feel as Daryl tenses beneath your sudden touch, but he doesn't pull away and after while, you feel him press his palms softly against your back. Comforting you in the only way he knew how. But what he didn't know, was that he didn't need to hug you back to let you know he cared. His words had said it all.

You had someone who cared for you. Someone that saw your scars and didn't judge them, but instead shared them with you. You finally had someone in your life you could trust and feel safe with. And that's all you ever wanted in your life.

"Thank you Daryl." You whisper breathlessly into his ear.

Daryl hums lowly, and with another soft squeeze from his large arms, he responds just as softly as you had. "Always gonna be here for you kid."

And it was in the single silent cell, that Daryl innocently wondered if there was a small chance that helping you heal from your wounds and your tainted past, would in some way help him heal from his own too.

A/N: Finally I'm back with an update for you all!! This one shot came as a request from @HeyyOli I hope you liked it and that it met what you were hoping for!! And I hope you all liked it! Kind of a different direction than some of my other ones but I'm actually quite proud of it!❤