Rick runs like he's never run before, heart pounding in his chest. The woman hanging between him and Shane is limp, head lolling with every stride they make, and Carl runs behind them, her backpack hanging from his shoulders.

"Come on, shithead!" Shane shouts over his shoulder. He readjusts his grip on Hope. "How far?!"

An overweight man dressed head to toe in camo and carrying a hunting rifle tries to keep up, but he's already huffing and puffing with effort. "Another half mile that way!" he calls, shaking his hand in the right direction. "Get Hershel! Talk to Hershel. He'll help her!"

"You better keep up!" Shane snaps.

They run across a large field. Already, Hope's shirt is soaked with blood and she's getting paler by the minute despite the belt tourniquet around her middle, but a farmhouse comes into view, as promised. Someone stands on the porch.

They get over the fence encasing the field and more people run from the farmhouse: an older man in suspenders, a middle-aged blonde woman, a young brunette woman, and two teenagers (a boy and a girl).

"Was she bit?" the older man calls.

"Shot," Rick answers, "by your man."

"Otis?" the middle-aged woman asks.

"He said find Hershel. Is that you?" Rick demands. "Please, you've got to help us!"

"Get her inside."

Hershel goes in, already rolling up his sleeves, shouting orders as people split off. Rick and Shane keep going, hauling Hope after the man.

"Patricia, I need my full kit. Maggie, painkillers, coagulates—grab everything. Clean towels, sheets, alcohol. In here."

He leads them into a small room with a bed inside, flipping up the blankets, and the men set Hope down. Shane backs off and Rick moves to Carl's side as the boy stares at Hope with wide, terrified eyes.

"Pillowcase," Hershel continues. He removes Hope's knife and machete from her belt and pushes her shirt up. "Pillowcase, quick."

"Is she alive?" Rick asks. When he doesn't get an immediate response, he repeats, firmer, "Is she alive?"

"Fold it. Make a pad," Hershel directs as the other women come into the room. He hands the pillowcase to Rick and he does as he's ordered. "Put pressure on the wound."

"Dad?" Carl asks. Shane grips Carl's shoulder.

"It'll be okay," Rick tells him as he presses the pad to her wound. "It's okay."

Hershel puts on a stethoscope and rests it on Hope's chest, pausing for a second. "I've got a heartbeat," he says. "It's faint."

"I got it, step back," the older woman, Patricia, says as she nudges Rick out of the way.

"Maggie, I.V."

"We need some space," Maggie, the young woman with short brown hair, says.

Carl whimpers and Rick comes back to his side, embracing him. Hershel looks up at him. "Your name?" he asks.

"Rick Grimes."

"Rick, we're going to do everything we can to help your wife."

Rick blinks a few times. "What? No, she's not my wife." Again, Hershel looks at him, then his gaze briefly moves to Shane, waiting by the window. "She's the medic in our group. A friend."

He nods. "Well, we're going to do everything we can," he repeats. "You need to take your boy and give us some room."

"Come on, man," Shane murmurs.

The three of them leave the room and Carl sniffles, eyes watery. "Dad, is she gonna die?"

Rick lowers himself to his knees, gripping Carl's shoulders. "No, they're...they're gonna help her," he says. "It'll be okay."

The front door opens and the hunter, Otis, stumbles in, panting. He stops short when he sees them and Carl huddles closer to his dad.

"Is she alive? She's still alive, right?" Otis asks.

"Yeah, for now," Rick answers. He wipes his forehead, then seems to notice the blood coating his hands. "Ah..."

"Here, I've got you," Shane says.

He digs into his backpack, pulling out a rag and helping to wipe off his face, then lets Rick wipe off his hands. Rick shakes his head as he cleans himself up and Carl keeps looking between him and Shane.

"Rick?" Hershel calls. They go back into the bedroom, where Hershel still has the bloody pillowcase pressed to Hope's wound. She's got an I.V. in her arm. "Do you know her blood type?"

"No."

Hershel purses his lips. "That's unfortunate. Without blood, she won't make it long and I can't attempt to remove the bullet."

"Is there any way we can guess what it is?" Shane asks.

"If we guess wrong, it'll kill her. Her blood will attack the donor blood and she'll suffocate to death," Hershel says. "The only one we can rely on is O-negative, the universal donor, but it's rare."

"I'm A-positive, so is Carl," Rick says. "Shane?"

"I'm AB," Shane says, shaking his head.

Rick holds back a cuss, running his hand over his hair. "Are any of your people...?" Hershel shakes his head. Patricia and Maggie mimic him. "Maybe...maybe someone in our group?"

"She'll hold for now, but we need blood," Hershel says. "I can't do anything until we get some."

"Dad," Carl pipes up. He pulls Hope's backpack off his shoulders, stooping to unzip it. "Hope...she said she got a blood list from Dr. Jenner, in case of emergencies. It could be in here."

Rick hurries to kneel by his son. They dig through her bag; clothes, water bottles, a wallet, keys on a lanyard and then, her med kit. He throws it open and immediately sees a slightly crumpled, folded piece of paper.

Rick pulls it out, unfolding it to find a list of everyone's names and their blood types. There are little handwritten notes all over the page, marking who can donate to who, and Rick exhales heavily with relief. He scans the list.

"O-negative, right?" he asks. Hershel nods. Rick keeps reading, then sees it. His shoulders slump. "We've got one guy. Daryl Dixon. He and Hope are both O-negative."

"Do you think you can find him and ask for help?" Hershel asks.

"He'll help her," Carl insists. "He's her friend."

For the first time, Hershel seems to notice Otis lingering by the doorway. "Otis, what happened?" he asks.

Otis swallows hard. "I was...tracking a buck," he says. "Bullet went through it. Went clean through."

"The deer slowed the bullet down, which certainly saved her life," Hershel explains. He keeps checking the wound, examining it as he goes. "But it did not go through clean. It broke up into pieces. If I can get the bullet fragments out...and I'm counting six..."

Otis moves to Patricia. "I never saw her...not until she was on the ground," he says to her. She brings him into a hug.

"She thought she saw something," Carl whispers. "She...she pulled me out of the way. Dad—"

Again, Rick brings Carl close to him, rubbing his shoulder. The thought hadn't crossed his mind that Carl was directly in its path only a second or two before the shot went off, and it could have hit something far more vital on him, considering the height difference between him and Hope; it could have struck his heart, his lungs. Gratitude floods him and he looks back at the woman on the bed.

"We have to get Daryl. He's her only chance," Rick says. She may not have meant to save Carl's life, but she did, and he won't let her die.

"Maggie, take some of the horses," Hershel says. A nod to Rick. "You can lead her back to your group, then she can bring Daryl back."

"I want to stay here," Carl says. "We can't leave her alone. What if she dies and there's none of us here to say goodbye?"

"Carl..." Rick starts.

"She needs someone here with her. I can do it," Carl insists. "She doesn't have anyone left except for us, right?"

"Rick, man," Shane says, jerking his head to the side. The two men move away, talking to one another quietly. "If Daryl gets dragged here, then the search for Sophia's all thrown off."

"So you go back, help them, and I'll stay with Carl," Rick says. Shane purses his lips and Rick grasps his shoulder. "They'll listen to you."

"I don't think they will," Shane retorts. "Rick, they look to you now."

"But, Carl—"

"I can stay here with Carl. You know you can trust me with him."

Rick glances back at his son, then slowly nods. "Okay. I lead Maggie back, get Daryl, and I stay with the group to explain what happened and keep things calm."

He knows Lori won't be happy, but she'll know that their boy is safe with Shane. He's safest with Shane out of anyone in the group and Rick trusts him with his life.

"Alright," he says. He walks back to Carl, squatting down in front of him. "Shane's gonna stay here with you, but I'm trusting you to keep an eye out on things, okay?"

Carl nods, not smiling, all seriousness. "I will."

Rick pauses, then removes his sheriff hat and sets it on Carl's head. Then, he hands Carl his pistol, and Carl gawks at it. "Keep things in line, okay, Sheriff?" he asks. He taps the gun. "And this isn't a toy. It's...just in case."

Carl smiles a little bit, nodding profusely. The hat is a little too big on him, but it fills Rick with pride to see him wearing it. They'll pad it the first chance they get, make it sit better. As for the pistol...that's just another thing Lori won't be too happy about.

Maggie enters the room. "Are we going?" she asks.

Rick nods. "Just me. I'll show you where to go."

The two of them leave the house and Shane and Carl move to the window, watching as Rick gets on the horse behind Maggie and, with a snap of the reins, they gallop off into the woods. Shane reaches down, patting Carl's shoulder, and Carl tries his best to smile a little.

----------

"How much farther?" Lori asks.

The rest of the group traipses through the woods, Daryl at the head. He keeps his crossbow at the ready.

"Not much. Maybe a hundred yards as the crow flies," he answers.

"Too bad we're not crows," Andrea grumbles.

The sun keeps moving across the sky and Daryl tries not to think about the singular gunshot they heard only a short while ago. Lori was the most visibly agitated by it, confused as to why there was only one. Rick and Shane wouldn't waste a bullet on a single walker. She said so herself.

Still, she's being twitchy. Sure, one kid's gone missing and now she's worried about her own, but damn. Carl's with three grown-ass adults. What are the chances something bad happens to him the second he walks out from under his mom's watch? Daryl wishes she'd untwist her panties and relax a little.

Although, he's not much better because no matter what he does, Hope sticks in his head. He keeps half-expecting her to be walking behind him, but no, she's off with the others, desperate to keep searching for Sophia. That girl is way too nice, he thinks, but he doesn't blame her for continuing on. He hates the idea of that little girl out here on her own and the sooner he finds her, the better.

Screams for help pierce the air and Daryl snaps out of his thoughts as the group spins towards the noise. Daryl looks at the others—Glenn, Carol, Lori...

"Andrea?!" Lori cries.

Daryl curses under his breath as they rush off after her. They had one damn rule: stick together! He can already hear the loud snarls of a hungry walker and see Andrea on the ground as she kicks and screams at the approaching enemy.

Then, he hears something else, and it almost stops him in his tracks—hoofbeats pounding the earth. A horse bursts from the trees, galloping at top speed, but what's far more interesting are its riders. There's a girl that Daryl has never seen before and, seated behind her, Rick.

The girl gallops straight at the walker and smacks it over the head with a baseball bat. It collapses, Andrea's screams stop, and the horse slows to a halt.

"Daryl? Daryl Dixon?" the girl asks.

"Rick?" Lori gawks, stumbling forward. "Oh, god, where's Carl? Is he—"

Rick slides off the back of the horse and meets his wife halfway, cupping her shoulders. "Carl's fine. He's with Shane, but Hope's been shot."

"Shot?" Carol gasps.

"Daryl, Hope had a list that said you're blood type O-negative," Rick continues, looking at Daryl. "She needs you."

Daryl doesn't move for a second, stunned. So much information has come to him in such a short time, but he registers what's important. Hope is in trouble and he's the only one who can help.

He's never donated blood, not really. He's only ever sold it, something that Merle spearheaded from the moment he found out what Daryl's blood type was and how valuable it could be when money was tight. Daryl never saw it as a good thing, but now...

He can't just stand by and let his only friend in this group die. He can't believe he's thinking of her and the word friend in the same sentence, but here he is. The world really has gone mad.

"You need to come with me," the girl says. Daryl throws his crossbow onto his shoulder, starting towards the horse. She grips the reins. "Rick, when you get back to the highway, backtrack to Fairburn Road. Two miles down is our farm. You'll see the mailbox. Name is Greene." She snaps the reins. "HYAH!"

Daryl holds onto her as she whips the horse around and kicks it into a breakneck gallop. They ride like the wind until a farmhouse comes into view, and Daryl hops off the horse when she's barely brought it to a stop. Shane stands on the porch holding his shotgun.

"Where the hell is she?" Daryl demands, heading up the stairs.

"Inside with Hershel," Shane answers.

Daryl follows Shane into the house and into a small bedroom, where Daryl sees an old man (Hershel, he guesses) sitting next to the bed with Carl and an older blonde lady lingering nearby, but his attention locks on Hope the second she's in his sights. She's pale, sweaty, stripped down to her bra, and there's a bloody cloth of some kind pressed to her side just beneath her right breast.

"Daryl?" the old man asks. Daryl nods. "I have to start getting the fragments out. Patricia?"

"Give me your arm," the blonde woman, Patricia, says, holding a needle and reaching for Daryl's arm. He holds it out. He knows the drill.

"Carl, step back and give 'em space," Shane warns, ushering the boy to him.

There's a small sting as the needle goes in. "The hell happened?" Daryl asks.

"We can explain once she's been stabilized," Hershel answers. He pulls the pad off, revealing a gaping wound, and readies a silver tool Daryl can't name. "You," Hershel says to Shane. "Hold her down."

Daryl frowns. "The hell you holding her down for?"

Hershel doesn't answer, but Daryl gets one. The second the tool digs into Hope's side, her eyes snap open and she lets out a horrifying, painful scream. She thrashes, but Shane keeps her down, his forearm on her collarbone and the other on her arm.

"Mom!" she screams, tears rolling down her face. "Dad!"

The tool gets deeper and she screams again.

"Carl, get out of here now," Shane orders, still holding her down with everything he's got. "You don't need to see this!"

Carl rushes from the room without arguing, pale as a ghost.

"Almost there," Hershel murmurs as Hope keeps sobbing.

Another scream, louder and more guttural than the next, and Daryl snaps. "The hell are you doing?!" He moves towards her but Patricia grips his arm harder.

"If you want her to live, you need to let me do this," Hershel responds without turning away from his task. "Patricia!"

"I've almost got it," she replies, still keeping an eye on the needle in Daryl's arm.

Hope grunts and sobs, still crying out for her parents, when suddenly her eyes roll back and she goes limp and deathly silent. Shane slowly releases her, eyes wide as he looks at Hershel.

"Hey, hey!" Daryl starts, his voice getting sharper. "What—"

"She just passed out," Hershel says. He removes the tool from her side, a tiny piece of metal clamped between the metal tongs. He sets it on his medical tray with a soft clink. "One down. Five to go."

Patricia removes the needle from Daryl's arm, puts a cotton ball and some medical tape over the tiny wound, and they get to work on setting up the transfusion. Daryl stays, watching as they put a gauze patch over the wound and hook her up to a transfusion kit, sending much-needed blood into her body. After a few minutes, Hershel moves to the other side of the bed with a pressure cuff and attaches it to her arm.

Daryl sits down by her side, hands folded in front of him, mouth pressed to his intertwined fists. She's asleep, silent, but it's like her screams are still ringing in his head. Carl peeks back into the room, eyes wide, and he shuffles to Shane's side.

"Pressure's stable," Hershel says, removing his stethoscope from his ears and draping it around his neck.

"Anyone wanna tell me what happened here?" Daryl asks, eyes narrowed. He looks at Shane. "Huh?"

"I'll tell you out there, okay?" Shane says. "Let's give them some space."

Daryl looks back at Hope, but slowly gets to his feet. He shrugs off Patricia's well-meaning hand before following Shane and Carl to the living room. Daryl sits down on the chair right next to the bedroom.

The brunette girl from the horse and a larger man are also in the living room and they look up when they enter. Shane closes the bedroom door behind them.

"She's stable for now," he tells the other two.

Daryl eyes them both, scowling. "So?"

Shane purses his lips. "Otis here accidentally shot her," he says, jerking his head towards the large man. Daryl's glare focuses back on him and he swallows hard. "There was a deer. The shot went clean through it and into her."

"What, you didn't see her?" Daryl snaps.

Otis bows his head. "Not until she was already on the ground..."

"Dumbass," he spits. Otis shrinks further into himself.

"Hey," the girl retorts. "We're helping you. The least you can do is be respectful."

"Well, respectively, he's a dumbass," Daryl retorts.

The girl starts to get up, but Otis reaches a hand to her. "Maggie, it's fine. He's right." He looks at Daryl again. "I am sorry. I truly didn't mean to hurt her."

"Hey, give him a break, okay?" Shane asks, fixing Daryl with a somewhat parental glare. "We're all having a hard day."

"I think Hope's having it the hardest, don't'cha think?"

The door to the bedroom opens and, immediately, all attention is on Hershel as he walks in, wiping off his hands. Daryl gets to his feet, crossing his arms over his chest, waiting.

"She's out of danger for the moment," Hershel says, "but I need to remove those remaining fragments."

"And how're you gonna do that? You nearly killed her last time," Daryl says.

"That was the shallowest one, too," Hershel says. "I need to go deeper to get the others, but...there's more."

"Yeah?"

"Her belly's distended, her pressure is dropping, which means there's internal bleeding. A fragment must have nicked one of the blood vessels. I have to open her up, find the bleeder, and stitch it." He purses his lips. "And she can't move while I'm there—I mean, at all. If she reacts the same as before, I'll sever an artery and she'll be dead in minutes."

Daryl doesn't say anything, but he swallows a bit. The idea of her dead from some freak hunting accident leaves more than a bad taste in his mouth.

"To even try this, I have to put her under, but if I do, she won't be able to breathe on her own," Hershel continues. "Same bad results."

"So what'll it take?"

"You need a respirator," Otis cuts in. "What else?"

"The tube that goes with it," Hershel says. "Extra surgical supplies, drapes, sutures."

"If you had all that, you could save her?" Daryl asks.

"If I had all that, I could try."

"Nearest hospital went up in flames a month ago," Otis says. His eyes widen a bit. "The high school."

"That's what I was thinking," Hershel says. "They set up a FEMA shelter there. They would have everything we need."

"Place was overrun last time I saw it. You couldn't get near it. Maybe it's better now," Otis adds.

"A'ight," Daryl says. "Draw me a map and I'll get going."

"You can't leave," Hershel retorts, putting his hand up as Daryl takes a step. "She'll need blood again. You can't go fifty feet from her bed."

"Then what?" Daryl demands. "Someone's gotta get that stuff."

"Shane, could you get it?" Carl speaks up.

Daryl honestly forgot the kid was there, he's been so quiet. Now, Carl gets to his feet from where he's been sitting near the window, his attention on Shane.

"Carl, your dad asked me to stay and look out for you," Shane says.

"But Daryl's here now," Carl replies. "You can get that stuff, right? Please, Shane?"

Shane purses his lips. His gaze darts to Daryl, Hershel, and back to Carl. "Guess I'm the only option, huh?" He looks at Carl's big, pleading blue eyes and sighs, running his hand through his hair. "Guess I'll go. Doc, how about that map?"

"You won't need that. I'll take you there," Otis says. "Ain't but five miles."

Patricia comes up behind Hershel, frowning. "Otis, no."

"Honey, we don't have time for guesswork and I'm responsible. I ain't gonna sit here while this fella takes this on alone," Otis insists, gesturing at Shane. "I'll be alright."

"You sure about this?" Shane asks, eyeing the man up and down.

"Do you even know what any of the stuff he's talking about looks like?" Otis asks.

"Come to think, no."

"I've been a volunteer E.M.T. I do. Now we can talk about this 'til next Sunday or we could just go do it real quick."

"I'll take real quick."

"Almost oughta thank you," Daryl says.

"Wait until your friend is up and around," Otis replies. "Then we'll talk. I'll gather some things."

Otis heads off to pack and Shane sighs. Carl looks up at him with something akin to admiration.

"Thank you," he says.

"Ah, kid, you don't need to thank me," Shane retorts. He ruffles Carl's hair and dons a tiny smile. "Gotta look out for each other, right?"

Daryl huffs a bit. He shoves past Hershel and goes back into the bedroom, taking up watch by Hope's side. She's still pale and sweaty, but at least she's breathing. Daryl leans closer to her, brushing a loose curl from her face.

"Don't die on us yet, angel face," he murmurs. "Hate to lose you so soon."