Carter turned to look at Ryan, the first man he and Clover had run into earlier that day. When compared to the rest of their patch work group, he was just behind Nero and Shawn in terms of trust. He'd proven that he wasn't a threat and although some of his advice might have been out of place, Carter was still happy to have a third man in the area. From where they were, they couldn't see the stand off between Nero and the would be thief and to make things worse, the rain was drowning out their chatter. However a gunshot would cut right through the noise and the five of them would respond within seconds. It would make things easier to have another person he could depend on not to mention a women who seemed to be able to handle herself. Katrina had in fact come to investigate the noise herself despite how dangerous doing so alone was. Luckily she hadn't been alone for long.

[b]"You should probably put away the flashlight... That'll be the flare to go along with the call to kill us..."[/b]

Carter shook his head slowly, panning his light at the ground again to highlight the two sets of footprints in the mud. [b]"Only one guy and there's too much noise from the rain to attract a lot of attention... at least I hope."[/b] He looked on toward the treeline, trying to see through the dark that surrounded their campsite. If anything had been attracted by the noise, their movements would be covered well by the rainfall and the pitch black around them. It'd be a repeat of that night from nine months ago and that was one thing he didn't need to live through again.

----

Clover had been trying to ignore Shawn since he'd stepped outside, her head still reeling from the fact that she'd embarrassed the both of them and the fact that he brought something else entirely into her life. Most of the men she'd come across had either been simply friends or a threat. It was easy for her to deal with them. They were all older and had goals in life that she could understand, even the ones that were trying to kill her. However Shawn was different. The way he had been staring at her and the fact that he was nearly the same age as herself were all the signs she needed. It was obvious: he'd found her at least somewhat attractive.

She stole a glance back at him and then quickly turned away. He was slightly taller than her, pale white skin and blonde hair that was only slightly dirty. The clothes he wore, although not as worn down as those she and Carter had on still looked as though it had a few weeks of mileage on them. All in all he looked as though he'd been sheltered during most of the world's fall as was evident earlier by how skittish he'd been. Not an entirely impressive kid and it took a lot to catch Clover's attention. In fact, in school she'd never had a boyfriend of her own, not because she couldn't snag one but because the bar she set had been too high. She never found those crawling to her all the interesting and the ones that did turn her head gave up when she played hard to get. She was a tough sell and she knew it. Now with a year of the apocalypse under her belt, the bar she set in grade school had been moved up quite a few notches. This was a whole new world and cute smile and good grades weren't enough to cut it. She needed someone she could depend on and Shawn didn't fit the bill... at least not yet.