AN: So this is the sequel to What Future Is There? You're going to need to have read that one to understand most of what's happening in this story. Otherwise you're going to be lost and you're not going to know many of the characters that are present and the situations alluded to.

There's a long author's note at the end of the chapter that I urge you to read if you're not sure if you want to read this story or you want to know what to expect.

It will be a Dixonne story primarily, but whole group involvement will be strongly present in the story and many other characters will be important.

If it needs to be said, I don't the Walking Dead or any of its characters. All I own are the original characters and the plot lines original to the story.

I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!

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The motel hadn't been that difficult to clear out. They'd certainly had more difficult locations to secure.

This one had drawn their attention, though, because it offered a nice gated in area…something they had to look for regularly, otherwise at least three people needed to be up and on their toes at all times during the night to make sure that the Walkers didn't smell and kill their livestock.

They were all moving at crawling paces tonight, even more so than the past few nights, and Michonne knew that they had to rest some tonight or else people were going to start getting sick just from the strain.

Even she could feel it. She was dragging her feet more than usual and she'd almost tripped over her own feet more than once in the past few hours while they were trying to find a place to stop that wasn't too far off their chosen roadway and close to the water.

When they got the place cleared of Walkers, which surprisingly they'd only found three in the whole of the thing and they looked to have all been employees of the motel at some point, Carol collected all the children out of the wagon and began to herd them inside to get them out from under foot while everyone else went about their assigned duties of unhitching the animals, going for water for everyone, and unloading what they'd need for the night.

Michonne heaved up as many of the bags as she could carry in one trip, reminding herself of when she used to buy groceries and refuse to make two trips no matter how much she had to carry, and followed Carol into the little room that was something like a lobby where she was trying to keep the kids occupied and out the way.

Every one of the children was whiny, clingy, and demanding. In short, they were almost as bad as the adults.

Michonne dropped the bags on the floor in front of where Carol was standing, looking as exhausted as Michonne felt, with the children asking her questions that she wasn't even bothering to answer about food.

"We've cleaned out enough rooms," Michonne offered, "so that everyone…everyone that wants one…can have their own for the night."

Michonne could hear the exhaustion in her own voice.

Carol nodded at her.

"I'll send Ty to bed with Isaac," she said. "I've got to wash clothes…"

Michonne shook her head at her.

"No, you've got to sleep," Michonne said. "We all do…"

"Michonne, we're almost out of diapers…the kids clothes are all dirty. We can deal with it, but they can't. If we're moving on in the morning I've got to wash them tonight," Carol said.

Michonne sighed and chewed her lip, working on getting up the energy to go back and help with whatever else anyone needed, while they all dragged about doing what needed to be done, and thought about the situation.

Carol was right. The children were exhausted and they were dirty. They were all dirty and exhausted. Michonne hadn't bothered to keep track of how long they'd been on the road, but she knew it had been a while…that was evidenced by Isaac growing if nothing else. And they'd been keeping a pretty steady and strenuous speed. They'd gone just as fast and as long each day as the animals could handle, paying attention to them far more than they were paying attention to themselves or the other humans.

And they were going to have to rest…really rest…if they were going to keep going.

"I'm going to talk to Daryl," Michonne said. "We'll stay at least two nights here…tomorrow I'll help with the clothes. We all will."

Carol nodded at her.

"I'll start getting something ready to eat," Carol said. "Do you think it's safe enough for a fire here?"

Michonne stuck her head out the door of the motel building and looked around. The place seemed to be secure and even with all their moving about they hadn't attracted any Walkers into the courtyard space…she imagined that they'd probably struck gold as far as temporary camps went.

"I think a fire's fine," Michonne said. "We could use a hot meal…just keep it low…dig it out if you can."

Carol nodded at her again and started then to go through some of the supplies that Michonne had brought in, a few more bags and boxes having appeared close by thanks to the actions of someone who had passed through quietly, probably lacking the energy or the care to speak.

Michonne stepped out into the slowly fading light and found Daryl near the wagons checking a wheel from what she could tell.

He looked like he was dragging just as much as the rest of them and she wasn't surprised. He was the one doing most of the driving of the group, and from time to time that meant he had some griping and complaining tossed in his direction, but she knew that he was driving them on like he was because he wanted the best for them all…and he thought the best was going to be covering as much ground as possible in the shortest amount of time.

"Daryl…Daryl…I need to talk to you a second," Michonne said.

He straightened up from what he was doing and turned to her, furrowing his brows.

"You OK?" He asked.

Michonne nodded her head. She knew that her face might make her, like everyone else, appear much more sullen and serious than she actually was.

"I'm fine, Daryl," Michonne said. It was true at least as far as he was asking. "We've got to stay here a few nights…at least two, but three would be better."

He looked like he might protest and she cut him off quickly.

"Daryl, everyone is so tired they're going to drop. We need to sleep…we need to eat hot meals. We need baths and clean clothes and the animals need to rest. This place looks pretty good, the best we've seen in days. The kids need to be out of the wagon…Daryl, we've got to stop and rest for a couple of days or we're going to be too tired to defend ourselves. A herd of ten good Walkers could take three of us out right now just from exhaustion, starvation, and dehydration," Michonne said making sure that there was enough urgency in her voice to keep him from ignoring her words.

The road was hard and they were really doing well. They'd lost no one so far and they were working together even better than they had in the community, but people were just worn down. Michonne could feel exhaustion in every muscle of her body and she knew that if she could, then everyone else could feel it too.

And they were following Daryl. Whether or not he wanted to be a leader and whether or not he considered himself to be a leader, he was who everyone was looking to. If he said get up and go after five hours of rest, they got up and they trudged on. They were all accustomed, at times, to going forty eight hours or better without sleep because they'd gotten night watch.

They were giving it all they had, but eventually everyone was simply just going to run out.

Daryl looked a little conflicted as he glanced around at the comings and goings of his companions, everyone moving with even less enthusiasm than Walkers in the winter.

Michonne could see, though, that he knew she was right and he was on the verge of agreeing with her, just as soon as he sorted through whatever he was thinking.

"Yeah," he said finally. He nodded his head and Michonne heard that in his voice there was the dragging drawl of exhaustion that was evident whenever anyone else spoke as well. "You right…we'll stop for a couple nights…three or four if we're safe and they ain't no trouble. I'll tell everyone tonight that tomorrow they get as much rest as they can…motel oughta be good for that."

Michonne sighed in relief that he'd given into the idea so easily.

"Real beds," she said. "First time in…"

She stopped talking because honestly she didn't know how long it had been since she'd slept in a bed and she knew that Daryl didn't either. They'd stopped in a few farmhouses and there had been beds there, but they'd piled all the kids in them to sleep like sardines since often the poor things slept more or less on top of their parents on the floor or either on pallets that they made out of whatever they could spare.

Daryl still looked conflicted, though, and Michonne was a little concerned.

"Something wrong?" She asked, her voice croaking out of her body at the moment.

Daryl looked at her and shook his head.

"No…ain't nothin' wrong, 'Chonne," he said.

She wasn't convinced. She knew, though, that sometimes with Daryl, especially if he was working on something that was particularly "big" in his mind, required a little time to think it over before he was ready to present it to her so that they could discuss it and decide if they needed to bring whatever it was up to the whole group.

"Something to talk about later?" She asked.

Daryl looked at her a moment and then he finally nodded his head without much conviction behind it.

"Yeah…maybe," he said. "Let's just get everythin' done…I'm beat," he responded.

Michonne laughed low in her throat.

"Sounds like a plan," she said. "I'm already asleep in my head."

He offered her something of the same kind of laugh that she'd given him and he reached a hand out, patting her on the arm, a gesture she was sure was all he had to offer at the moment since anything more familiar might result in both of them getting stuck that way and falling asleep leaning against one another.

Whatever he had to discuss with her would keep until after they'd had some rest. It would be easier then, at any rate, to make heads or tails of anything that required more thought that the mechanical repetition of setting up camp, something that had become such a second nature to all of them that they could literally do it while sleep walking.

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AN: So I couldn't stay away. I am starting on this story now. I am sure that it's going to be quite long, since that's my style overall.

I wanted to say for those of you who will be joining me here that what I have planned here is a little bit different than What Future Is There? In that I will be allowing for more POVs here.

I plan for this story to be a good deal about character development and such. I'm not going to try to rush it. I'm literally writing it for my own enjoyment and for simply enjoying playing with the world that I'm building and the characters.

As a result, if there's a particular character/couple/etc. that you're particularly interested in or a dynamic between characters that you're particularly interested in (or something you'd like to see), then don't be afraid to let me know. I may not be able to incorporate everything you'd like to see for one reason or another, but if it's something that I feel I can work with, I will try to put in a little "extra" for you here and there.

That being said, it's not going to be a fast paced, super exciting fic at all times. There will be a lot of the somewhat "laid back" style that we saw in different places in WFIT. If you're not interested in that, you might not enjoy this. I just wanted to let you know ahead of time.

If you are interested, though, then I'd like to welcome you aboard and thank you for deciding to take this trip with me! I'm excited about it and I hope you are too!

I will update when I can, but I don't imagine that the updates will be constant.

As always, I don't get paid for this with anything beyond your reviews and such, so I always appreciate your feedback! Welcome and let me know what you think!