When I saw the preview, I got it in my head that Daryl's ear necklace was hanging from a peg in the barn or stable when Carol saw it and this idea just took root. I've watched the preview in frame by frame motion and know that it's hanging in the middle of the camp, but we're all just gonna ignore that because my idea is so much better. :-P

Burn, by MissMishka

DISCLAIMER: The usual warnings, I claim no ownership of these characters, they are simply borrowed with love and adoration from the original creators to have their stories embellished on a little more than the show may do. Not for any profit.

Fuck.

Daryl knew he'd spoken the thought aloud when Carol's hand flinched guiltily away from the ears and she turned to face him. He cussed again without care of her hearing the harsh words as he stomped across the space between them to yank the necklace down.

"What are you doing in here?"

He stuffed the trophies into his pocket with a little guilt of his own, never having meant for her to see the damned thing. She was silent for long enough that he was forced to look at her, but he hated to think of the fear and disgust she'd surely have on her face.

In those expressive eyes.

That crystal blue gaze was on him, but there was no fear or disgust and he was reminded painfully of how inexpressive those eyes had been of late. If there was anything in the frozen wasteland of her soul showing in that stare, he supposed he could see some curiosity if he really reached for it.

"Rick was looking for you," she finally answered his question, that faintness of spirit also in her voice as she whispered. "Dale said you'd probably be in here," a frown knit her brow as she looked around as if just realizing where they were. "Why are you in here?"

Not feeling a need or desire to explain to her, he turned back to the task he'd assigned himself to. He could only be thankful she hadn't stumbled in there a few days ago, before he had started, as he took up the pitchfork to begin mucking out the last corner of the barn. Her gaze was like a weight on his back. He still couldn't sense a damned thing from her, but he felt those eyes like a pressure in the center of his back, bearing on his shoulders till he ached from fighting to stay upright.

"What?" he finally flung the tool aside and whipped around to face her.

"Why are you in here?" she rephrased her question with the same confusion on her face.

Damned good question, he mused, knowing that those were just the kind best left unanswered or dissected.

"What?" he scoffed, hoping more than seeing an answer in her expression. "You worried about me?"

A faint frown pinched her lips at his attitude. It faded to blankness as he began to stalk towards her. Then confusion returned as she began to instinctively back away from him when he showed no signs of stopping.

"You cut off those ears," she observed belatedly, as if changing to that particular subject would cool him down.

As it was a statement of fact that they both knew, he didn't give her any response as her back ran up against the post he'd had the necklace hanging from. He had her pinned and they both froze there, each wondering what the hell he was going to do.

"How…" her voice cracked as she found a new question and turned her head to the side to ask it of the otherwise empty barn. "How many would you have, if you'd always taken the ears to show?"

Too many, he thought, dropping his head to rest against the wooden beam, face hovering dangerously close to the warm rest of her shoulder.

He felt her gulp and knew his throat moved on a similar convulsive swallow immediately afterward. This was a different proximity than they'd shared before and he knew how thin the ice was he ventured out on.

"Why did you come looking for me?" he asked, voice quiet and tense as the cleanliness of her scent filled his nostrils, introducing the new topic.

"I…" her head turned and her face was right fucking there, "I don't know."

His eyes didn't lift to meet hers, they stayed locked on the lips that moved so softly over the hesitant words. When some opportunities presented themselves, he knew to just reach out and take them if it was anything he had the slightest hankering for. The timing was all wrong, but that was the story of his life. Dixon luck, like the men of the bloodline, always ran to the bad and there would never be a "right" time for this, so he just twisted his head around the fraction of an inch it took to press him mouth to hers.

He felt the freeze of her body-lungs and muscles seizing in surprise at his action. The sharp, shocked inhalation of breath through her nose tickled the hairs of his moustache. His hands curled into the post behind them as the softness of the whole of her reminded him vividly of how long it had been since he'd had a woman.

How long it had been since he felt any kind of softness.

That stray reminder of pain and loss hardened his lips and he pulled his left hand forward to grip the back of her head. The action unfroze her and, with a startled noise which he quickly swallowed, her hands fluttered up in the breath of space between their bodies. His fingers tightened in reflexive anticipation of her pushing at his chest for freedom, but her lips just got softer while her fingers settled lightly on his shoulders.

The surprise was his at that moment, momentarily stilling his lips when his body froze. She reacted to his pause with a desperation that shouldn't have shocked him, given the shellshock she was pulling out of. Or at least, he hoped, she may be pulling through.

Those tentative fingers turned into claws that climbed over the rise of his shoulders to pull at his back for closer contact. Her mouth opened with intent, lips firming as they twisted against his own for a response. His body gave it automatically, tongue rushing out to spear into the opening she gave while his chest pressed her hard against the post. His mind, though…his mind was gone. Lost in this moment he had no explanation for and racing ahead to images of their bodies rolling on the dirt floor of the building.

Or just staying like this.

Standing.

Clawing.

Bodies twisting and writing together to find purchase and just the right position for satisfaction.

He'd never done it standing, but had seen it in enough movies to let the image work him up. And he could so easily see them that way. Could practically feel it already.

Carol was doing this panting thing that ghosted the exhalations from her nose over his ear and the shudder that went through him was intense enough he wouldn't have been surprised to find his pants growing wet when the tremor ended. The twinge of discomfort he felt when her leg hitched up around his waist and her crotch rubbed against his erection told him he hadn't come yet, though.

The realization of how close he was and, more so, how badly he wanted to climax with her…in her…was the slap in the face she should have given him. He froze against her again, this time with every intention of stopping their madness. Her whimper as his lips pulled from hers twisted his gut and threatened to destroy what resolve he had, but the flash of reality he saw as his eyes slitted opened was all he needed.

A wheelbarrow shouldn't symbolize nightmares, but that red one did.

The clench of her leg and grip of her hands did nothing to pull him from the memory of countless trips made filling that cart with the horrific refuse from inside this place that had been the last shelter for Sophia's desecrated body.

"Hell, woman," he huffed out, channeling Merle with the rough way he grabbed her thigh to hitch her higher so the notch between her legs ground against his still shamefully hard flesh. "I am all up for a roll in the hay."

With feigned ignorance to the impact of his words, he nuzzled into her neck, enjoying one last breath of her before her clawing to get closer became a frantic grapple to get free of him. He let her break away gladly, not even flinching as her knee caught his groin in passing, accidental or deliberate neither of them really knew. It pained something in him to watch her stumble away into the open area of the barn, but he viciously squashed that part, knowing it would be the death of him in this new world. Her chest heaved with the deep, panicked breaths she took in as she pivoted in circles to let her eyes wildly scan the interior of the place.

Finally, he saw something back in those eyes of hers and his fingernails bit into the palms of his hands to keep from going to her and do something, anything, to banish the horror he saw relived in her gaze. Her hands twisted together against her heart and his somehow managed to curl into even tighter fists that he barely managed to keep from pounding on the post behind him until it collapsed and took the whole bedamned structure with it. She looked both haunted and hunted by the memory of her dead daughter having been in this place just days ago.

"Oh, God in Heaven, what have I done," she asked of the ground as her body abruptly stopped moving and her head dropped forward.

That she still spoke to a God angered him.

That she felt any guilt for what he had done just pissed him off.

That she was crying again for the first time since the tears had eerily ceased with the burial of Sophia made something in him snap.

His hand was on her shoulder, whipping her around to face him before he even felt his feet move.

The crack from her belated slap rang out in a sudden stillness in the air before either of them even felt the blow.

Again, they froze in the position of that exact moment to insure it would remain vividly etched in their memories, just so, along with every other of their painful experiences. He broke the spell of shock with an unconscious flexing of facial muscles as his body finally realized it had been touched with none of the softness from moments before. In fact, he realized with the stinging of her hand shaped mark on his cheek, the woman packed a whallop.

"It was nothing you did," he tried to assure her quietly.

"I kissed you," she argued, misunderstanding his meaning, cradling her hand to her breast and making him wonder distractedly how bad her palm stung. "I wanted to…"

Remembering what he'd wanted to do and how close they had come to it made him ache with more than just a physical pain, but he focused on the hurt he had to cause her now for them both to get on by.

"It was only natural. All the death we've seen, a body craves to feel life. It's only natural-" he wasn't entirely sure he deserved the second slap just then.

He kept his head turned to the right as the force of her blow had turned it and was a little surprised to feel a split in his lip. Damned fool that he was, he could only hope she hadn't cut herself on his tooth as his lip had.

"Nothing about this was natural," she declared emphatically. "Nothing."

His eyes twisted shut as he sensed her leaving.

It would have been easier and a great deal kinder to have just ripped his guts out rather than leave them in their current tangle, but he'd never had any kindness in life to expect it now. He kicked the damned wheelbarrow over, picked the pitchfork up and stabbed the tines violently into that damned wooden beam until some of the intensity of emotion wore off.

It was then that he too looked around the interior with haunted eyes, chest heaving from exertion. There was no ridding it of what had been inside, no matter how many trips he or anyone else made to take out the old filth and lay down new straw. Nothing would erase the taint of what had happened here and he knew the applied to more than just the Walkers that had been housed and fed inside like exotic pets then shot down like rabid animals outside the structure. Whether they stayed or went from this place, this structure was condemned.

They'd both maybe figure out some time later what the hell had just happened, but for now he only knew one thing.

As he pulled the string from his pocket, threw the damned ears off into the shadows and stomped out of the barn, he knew where to find matches.

And no matter what Rick and Hershel may have discussed and decided, that building was gonna fucking burn.

A/N: *Not* the idea I started with, but I like where it went & hope you all did, too. I love the emotional tangle I sense these two in and the theme inspires a thousand story ideas in me. So many ways it all could go...