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Regan really likes Daryl. He's quiet, in a way that isn't off-putting. He's quiet because he's used to being quiet, because he doesn't feel the need to make noise at all times. It's comforting, in its own weird way. So, when she's not spending her free time with Richie or Greta and Saoirse, she tries to make it out to visit him. The result is at least once a week, Regan finds herself either at his apartment, or following him through the woods, learning what things will make too much noise if she steps on them, even if she can't hear it, learning how to track.

Today, she's learning how to fire a crossbow. She's not quite to where she wants to learn how to hunt living creatures, but at least if she knows how to use a weapon, she can protect herself and her loved ones the next time Darrow does something crazy and dangerous.

And she's a lot less likely to accidentally shoot herself with a crossbow than she is with a handgun, so she doubts Greta would have a problem with it if she found out. (Not that she thinks Greta would think she'd be irresponsible with any sort of weapon, but still. Better to have her bases covered.)

It's not especially warm out anymore, but it isn't freezing, either, so Regan's wearing fingerless gloves, a long sleeved shirt with a thin fleece jacket over top, and skinny jeans tucked into a pair of warm, calf-length boots when she meets up with Daryl for her first lesson.

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While it was second nature for Daryl to move lightly through the trees, every step designed to make as little noise as possible, he wasn't quite so careful as he strolled into the clearing. They weren't planning to hunt, that morning, and despite being on guard since he'd arrived, he hadn't come across a single walker in Darrow.

Making sure to step into her line of sight, Daryl waved and said, "Hey, kid. You ready?"

She smiles when she sees him. "Ready," she assures. "Thanks again, for doing this," she adds as she moves closer. "My dad would never—" She stops, letting her hands hover in the air before rolling her eyes. "He'd just think I couldn't even do it. He wouldn't even let me try."

"You think I guy like me's got anything better to do?" He teased. No matter what he'd had going, he would've made time to teach her whatever she wanted to know.

"Yeah. Dad's can be like that," Daryl said, thinking of how reluctant Rick had been, at first, to let Carl handle a gun. "I can't speak for him, and, uh." He stumbled over the signing, for a moment. "I ain't a dad, but... I think it can be scary, teaching your kids stuff you know can get 'em into trouble."

"What about teaching stuff you know can keep them safe?" Regan points out. She's not trying to challenge him, or argue — he's doing exactly that, of course, teaching her something that'll keep her safe, because her own dad never did — but it does rankle, just a little bit, that he's sort of defending her father.

"Hey," he said, holding his palms out briefly in surrender. "Didn't say he was right, but I don't think it was about you. Not about what he thought you could or couldn't do. It was his own bullshit. His own fear. You're capable as hell, and you're a good kid. Either he saw that and was too chickenshit to let you be what you are, or he was an idiot."

It was a surprising number of words for a man like Daryl Dixon, and with the signing, he stumbled a bit, slowing down to spell out the words he needed to, but he said it with full conviction.

It's hard not to believe what Daryl's saying when he says it like that. Sure, he'd stumbled over his Sign, and filled it in with verbal words and fingerspelling, but the way he says it is the important part. She blushes a little when he calls her capable, and a good kid.

"Thanks," she says after a bashful hesitation. She isn't ready to admit it, yet, but he's given her plenty to think about, actually. Then she takes a deep breath. "Anyway, we totally didn't come here to talk about my daddy issues." She says it glibly, with a wrinkle to her nose, but she's smiling, now.

"We can talk about mine, if you want," he said with a smirk, having no real intention of actually doing so.

"Come on, let's get with the shooting."

Regan's never actually learned much about Daryl's life before this — not beyond what he's been willing to share, at least, and his 'daddy issues' has definitely never been one of them. But his smirk makes her roll her eyes and she moves to where he directs her, facing the designated target.

"Okay, what do I do first?"

"You're gonna learn how to load it first. How to handle it," he said, pausing to slide his pack off and unhooking his crossbow from it. Reaching inside the bag, he pulled out a cocking rope.

"I don't use one of these, but you're gonna have to," he explained, gesturing for her to come closer. "I'll show you why."

Turning the bow down and showing her the stirrup where she could fit her foot, he motioned for her to put her hands on the string. "Now, try and pull it back," he instructed, so she could see just how hard it was to pull the string all the way back to the latch without some sort of aid. He kept a hand on the weapon, to keep her from losing her grip and hurting herself.

She moves closer and puts her foot in the stirrup like he shows her. When she curls her fingers around the bowstring, though, she finds a lot more resistance than she'd expected. Her eyes widen and she looks at him, then tries again; her face gets pink with effort and her arms start shaking before she decides she really can't do it, and she lets go with a frustrated huff.

Regan shakes out her hands and fingers.

"Why is that so hard?" she asks.

"You want that arrow to get any distance, to stick into something with enough force to do any damage, you gotta have a shitton of tension on that string," he said, taking the bow back from her so that he could show her how to set the rope into the notch on the back. Slipping the hooks over the string, he pulled back on the rope's grips, sliding the string into the latch until it clicked.

"You're not gonna hear that, but you're gonna be able to feel it, when it clicks. That's important. You want that little click on the string, to tell you it's latched proper," he explained to her, pulling the trigger to release the string and then handing over the weapon so that she could have a try.

Regan pays close attention, and when he mentions feeling the click on the string, she nods. Then he hands it over to let her try, and she bites her lip. She slides her foot back into the stirrup, then mimics the way he'd hooked the rope into the notch and over the string.

It's a lot easier, though still a lot of resistance. This isn't something she'd be able to do in a situation like the past summer with those things. She stops when she feels the click, and tentatively relaxes her grip on the rope tool. When the string doesn't spring forward, she looks at him.

"Like that?"

"Just like that," he said, leaning in to slide the safety on. "After you get the string latched, you gotta make sure the safety's on," he showed her.

He often didn't bother with that step, but only because he'd been handling a bow since he was near her age, and was comfortable with the trigger.

It makes sense it has a safety. Regan's never been allowed to use a gun, but she still has a basic concept of how they work, thanks to her interest in engineering and pulling things apart and putting them back together. (Not that she'd ever done that to a gun, but she'd still studied them.)

She clicks the safety off, then back on, so she knows what it feels like. Then she looks at him hopefully.

"I read that big guns with stocks like these have kick-back," she says, clarifying where she needs to with fingerspelling and pantomime. "Is this like that?"

"Nah," he said, shaking his head. "It's gonna have a little, but know where near what a gun this size'd have."

Taking the crossbow from her, he brought it to his own shoulder, demonstrating for her how to rest the stock and look down the mounted sights.

Passing it back to her, he helped guide her hands to the grips, keeping her finger away from the trigger for the moment.

She tilts her head so she can see where he's keeping her finger, so she can see how he's having her hold the grips. There's so much to this that she hadn't expected — little things that she would never have considered, if she'd been the one to just pick up a crossbow and give it a try. But then, Daryl's been doing this for years. He'd know exactly how to do this safely.

And he's not treating her like a kid while he's doing it. It's nice.

Once her grip feels firm on the crossbow, she lifts it to her shoulder the way he had, and since her hands are full, she raises her eyebrows at him questioningly.