Hope's POV

Everyone else wakes up, and we remain silent as we go about doing little things. Daryl cleans and fidgets with his crossbow, and others just sit around.

"Hey," Maggie says, opening the barn doors. We all look up. "Everyone, this is Aaron."

Instantly, everyone has their guns and knives out. Daryl races to the door, checking outside for any other people. I remain on the ground, feeling lightheaded and weak.

"We met him outside. He's by himself. We took his weapons and we took his gear," Maggie continues as Daryl pats him down roughly.

He finishes, shutting the doors and locking it. The man, Aaron, looks at all of us nervously.

"Hi," he says, a small smile appearing briefly.

We just stare at him. Judith starts to cry and Carl takes her from Rick, shushing her softly as Rick keeps shooting daggers at this guy.

"It's nice to meet you," Aaron tries, taking a step forwards.

Our weapons click, and he stops, stepping back again.

"You said he had a weapon?" Rick asks. Maggie moves forwards and hands him a small pistol. He examines it briefly before putting it in his own belt. "There's something you need?"

"He has a camp, nearby," Sasha explains with a skeptical tone. "He wants us to audition for membership."

"I wish there was another word. Audition makes it sound like we're some kind of a dance troupe. That's only on Friday nights." Aaron stops and waits for our laughter, but we all remain stone faced. He smiles awkwardly. "Um, and it's not a camp. It's a community. I think you all would make valuable additions. But it's not my call. My job is to convince you all to follow me back home." We still don't reply, and he bites his lip briefly. "I know. If I were you, I wouldn't go either. Not until I knew exactly what I was getting into." He looks to Sasha. "Sasha, can you hand Rick my pack?"

I raise an eyebrow. How does he know Rick's name?

She sighs and grabs it, moving towards Rick and handing the backpack to him.

"Front pocket, there's an envelope. There's no way I could convince you to come with me just by talking about our community," Aaron starts as Rick pulls out some photos from the package. "That's why I brought those. I apologize in advance for the picture quality. We just found an old camera store last-"

"Nobody gives a shit," Daryl growls.

Aaron lets out a breathy laugh, fiddling with his hands as Daryl's icy glare remains fixed on him. "You're absolutely 100% right." He turns back to Rick, who looks at the first picture. "That's the first picture I wanted to show you because nothing I say about our community will matter unless you know you'll be safe. If you join us, you will be. Each panel in that wall is a 15-foot-high, 12-foot-wide slab of solid steel, framed by cold-rolled steel beams and square tubing. Nothing alive or dead gets through that without our say-so. Like I said, security is obviously important. In fact, there's only one resource more critical to our community's survival." He looks around at all of us fleetingly. "The people. Together we're strong. You can make us even stronger." He pats his thighs a little, preparing to deliver the next piece of info. "The next picture, you'll see inside the gates. Our community was first construc-"

Rick silences him with a hard punch to the jaw, and I jump a little. Aaron crumples to the ground, prompting Maggie and Sasha to check on him.

"So we're clear, that look wasn't a 'let's attack that man' look. It was a 'he seems like an okay guy to me' look," Michonne says to Rick in a hushed tone.

"We got to secure him. Dump his pack. Let's see what this guy really is," Rick commands.

"Rick," Michonne says.

"Everybody else, we need eyes in every direction. They're coming for us. We might not know how or when, but they are," he continues.

"Me and Sasha, we didn't see him," Maggie mentions as they tie Aaron's hands behind his back. "If he had wanted to hurt us, he could've."

"Anybody see anything?" Rick asks.

"Just a lot of places to hide," Glenn reports.

"All right, keep looking." He moves over to Carl. "What did you find?"

Carl holds up an orange gun with a wide round nozzle.

"Never seen a gun like that before," the teen comments.

Aaron groans as he wakes up, holding his jaw. "That's a hell of a right cross there, Rick."

"Sit him up," Rick commands.

"I think it's better if-" Maggie starts.

"It's okay," Aaron interrupts. He groans a little.

"He's fine. Sit him up," Rick repeats.

"You're being cautious. I completely understand."

"How many of your people are out there? You have a flare gun. You have it to signal your people. How many of them are there?"

Aaron sighs. "Does it matter?"

"Yes. Yes, it does."

"I mean, of course, it matters how many people are actually out there, but does it matter how many people I tell you are out there? Because I'm pretty sure no matter what number I say; eight, thirty-six, four hundred forty-four, zero...No matter what I say, you're not going to trust me."

Daryl moves towards me, crossbow raised as he stands in front of me protectively.

"Well, it's hard to trust anyone who smiles after getting punched in the face," Rick snaps.

"How about a guy who leaves bottles of water for you in the road?"

We all look to the water, and Daryl growls.

"How long you people been followin' us?" he demands.

"Long enough to see that you practically ignore a pack of roamers on your trail," Aaron replies immediately. "Long enough to see that you've got a pregnant woman here who isn't gonna last long if you don't get help..." Daryl looks to me, as does everyone else. I wrap my arms around my stomach. "And long enough to see that despite a lack of food and water, you never turned on each other. You're survivors and you're people. Like I said, and I hope you won't punch me for saying it again, that is the most important resource in the world."

"How many others are out there?" Rick demands slowly after a tense silence.

"One." Rick shakes his head minimally, and Aaron does that breathy laugh again. "I knew you wouldn't believe me. If it's not words, if it's not pictures, what would it take to convince you that this is for real? What if I drove you to the community? All of you? We leave now, we'll get there by lunch."

"I'm not sure how the fifteen of us are going to fit in the car you and your one friend drove down here in," Rick says.

"We drove separately. If we found a group, we wanted to be able to bring them all home. There's enough room for all of us."

"And you're parked just a couple miles away, right?" Carol asks.

"East on Ridge Road, just after you hit Route 16. We wanted to get them closer, but then the storm came, blocked the road. We couldn't clear it."

"Yeah, you've really thought this through," Rick grumbles.

"Rick, if I wanted to ambush you, I'd do it here. You know, light the barn on fire while you slept, pick you off as you ran out the only exit. You can trust me."

We all look at each other, and Aaron's expression becomes even more desperate as the seconds tick by.

"I'll check out the cars," Michonne says.

"There aren't any cars," Rick replies in a low tone.

"There's only one way to find out."

"We don't need to find out."

"We do. You know what you know and you're sure of it, but I'm not."

"Me neither," Maggie agrees.

"Your way is dangerous, mine isn't," Rick insists.

"Passing up someplace where we can live? Where Judith can live? Where Hope could have her baby somewhere comfortable?" Michonne asks. "That's pretty dangerous. We need to find out what this is. We can handle ourselves. So that's what we're gonna do."

"Then I will too," Glenn says. "I'll go."

"Abraham," Rick calls.

"Yeah. I'll walk with them," Abraham says, adjusting his grip on his rifle.

"Rosita?"

"Okay," she replies.

"If there's trouble, you got enough firepower?" Rick asks Glenn.

"We got what we got," he answers.

Rick hands him the flare gun, and he takes it. Daryl pulls Aaron to his feet and ties him to one of the poles.

"The walkies are out of juice. If you're not back in sixty minutes, we'll come. Which might be just what they want." The car group leaves, and Rick continues. "If we're all in here, we're a target."

"I've got the area covered," Daryl says.

"All right, groups of two, find somewhere safe within eyeshot."

Daryl moves to my side, kneeling down. I stand up, and he shakes his head.

"Stay here, a'ight?" he asks.

"But-"

"Please. Rest up, watch Little Ass-Kicker, ok?"

I nod. "Fine."

He presses a kiss to my lips and leaves the barn. Rick makes sure everyone's out and shuts the door again. Aaron stares at me, and I pick up Judith and bounce her gently on my hip as Rick looks back at us.