Spoilers: Season 6 Finale.
Warning: This fic… got dark. It just got kinda dark kinda fast. So, it may be triggering, but I'm not even sure what kind of trigger warning to put on it, so just be aware.
Princess, pt. 1
"Careful!" Rosita hissed, pulling the arrow that had just whizzed past her out of the bark of the tree it had stuck fast into.
"Ya shouldnta come." Daryl snatched the arrow out of her hands and jammed a finger into your face. "Especially you. Go back, Y/N. All of you." He started to walk away.
"What do you even think you're doing out here?" Glenn and the rest of your small party followed.
"He killed her, man." Daryl didn't stop moving.
"We'll square it." Michonne said, and Daryl stopped walking. "I will. I promise." There was silence. "Just come back. We'll talk about it from home. Our home."
"Michonne is right. Whatever you're doing out here isn't safe." Glenn said, "Just come home." He reached out to try to pull Daryl's arm, but as soon as he touched the other man, Daryl yanked himself out of reach and started walking again.
"I can't. I just can't." Daryl was walking faster now.
"HEY!" You yell out, running up and shoving Daryl in the back as hard as you dared.
He turned around to face you. "Go. Home. Y/N!" He snarled in your face.
You shove him again. "I lost my dad in a renegade revenge mission. Did you forget that?" You got up into his face. You were definitely a Dixon; when your namesake fought, they fought hard. "Now are you telling me I'm gonna lose my uncle the same way?" It was quiet in the forest. "HUH?" You practically scream in his face.
There was whistling echoing all around you in the trees, and suddenly all arguments were forgotten. Men—no, Saviors—were stepping out from behind trees, guns trained on you. How they managed to get so close without anyone noticing, you weren't sure.
The whistling had stopped, but the clicks of gun safeties switching off and chambers being loaded took their place in the still air. For a moment, no one moved. Then, Rosita slowly raised her hands in surrender, and you, Glenn, and Michonne followed suit. Daryl was the only one who hadn't dropped his weapon yet.
A lanky, blond haired man with a scar on the side of his face stepped out from a tree directly behind your uncle. "Hi Daryl." He said, and as Daryl turned to face him, his gun went off.
There was blood in your eyes and you screamed in shock before someone hit you over the head and you blacked out.
"HEY!" You banged on the back door of the van they were keeping you in one more time. "If you don't give us some water or something, you're going to have 5 dead prisoners before you can even do whatever you're planning." You bang on the van door again.
Daryl was still breathing, but only barely as he lay feverish and shivering in your lap. You'd managed to stop the bleeding, but if he didn't get medical attention soon, he would die. He'd already thrown up twice from pain and shock, and the whole back of the van smelled of vomit, blood, sweat, and terror. It was miserable.
And all you were asking for was a glass of fucking water.
"HELLO?" You yell, banging again. "I know you assholes can hear me!"
The van door flew open, and the minimal sunlight that was left in the day streamed in to blind you. "Will you shut up, you little bitch?" The man that shot Daryl snarled in through the open door. "Pipe down, or I'll put a matching bullet hole in you." He waved his gun absently in your face.
"Now, Dwight, that's no way to talk to our guests." A smooth, unfamiliar voice chided from somewhere out of your line of sight. "Why don't you get them some water?" Dwight grumbled a little, but went to comply. A new face with a salt and pepper beard and slicked-back hair appeared in the doorway now. The man was wearing a tight leather jacket and was smiling at you in a way that made you angry. "Hi. I'm Negan." You didn't say anything, you just clutched your uncle's sweaty face closer to you. "I like you. You've got a lot of spunk in you for just a little girl."
You narrow your eyes at him. You were twenty, dammit. "I'm twenty, ass-hat."
"You got a name, twenty?"
You say nothing, and the silence stretches on for minutes. So long in fact, that Dwight returns with the water before Negan speaks again, "You can either tell me your name, or I can drag it out of you on your dying breath."
You glare at him before saying evenly, "Y/N."
"I like that."
Negan smiles again. It was creepy. Like a politician you may have voted for pre-apocalypse with no real reason other than the fact that everything he said sounded like it was good. Charismatic. Your brain reminded you. The word is charismatic.
You didn't like it.
"Y/N." He tries your name out. "I like that, and I like you." He steps back from the door. "Out of the van, Y/N."
You don't move. Daryl's hand tightens around your arm. Negan doesn't ask again, instead he grabs you by the ponytail and physically drags you out of the van and you land on the forest floor with a bruising thump. "No!" Daryl croaked out weakly and tried to lunge after you.
Negan knocked him back into the van by pushing on his injured shoulder, and Daryl collapsed once more in a groaning heap onto the floor. "Down boy." He turned to you. "Your guard dog sure is quick. Too bad we may have to put him down." He slammed the door of the van closed. "On your feet." You stood and let him push and lead you in the direction of a campfire, which he shooed everyone else away from. "Sit." You sat.
You took a water bottle from him and allowed him to press a wrapped sandwich of some sorts into your hands. "I will kill you." You threaten in a whisper.
Negan laughed. "No you won't. Because I'm not going to try to kill you. Like I said before, I like you."
"That's nice." You shoot him what Daryl called your 'Merle glare' and say, "Cause I fucking hate you."
Negan sighed. He sighed this long, bored sigh, as if you had started explaining organic chemistry in response to his question about what was for dinner. It only pissed you off more. "Lighten up. I'm not going to hurt you. I want you to work for me."
"And why would I do that?"
"Well, everyone in your little community is going to work for me, but I want you specifically to work as a liaison between our people." Negan pronounced 'liaison' like 'lie-ay-zon' and it pissed you off. "You're going to make sure the leader over there at that little gated shithole keeps his end of the bargains, and you will report any positives or negatives back to me."
"What's in it for me?" You put the sandwich down next to you, but open the bottle of water and take a drink. "Because that just sounds like a shit deal on my part."
"You," Negan smiled widely, "Get to be my girlfriend. And I also don't murder you if shit goes south with your group. I spare you if, and most likely when, they all fuck up."
You made a face, which you hoped looked like a mixture of horror and disgust, because that was exactly how you felt. "No deal." You put the water down and stand in the falling darkness to go back to the van. "I don't want to be involved with you. As a girlfriend or an employee."
"See, you don't have a choice in working for me. That I will force you to do. As for the sex, I'm not going to force you," Negan said, "But I think you will eventually come around to the idea."
You balled up your fists in anger and tried not to shout. "I will n—"
"Sir!" Dwight came over and pointed to a spot on the other side of the clearing where the RV from Alexandria was pulling up and being parked between two trees. "They got the RV and the one guy inside." As he spoke, two burly men were dragging a bloody and terrified Eugene out of the vehicle. "The rest will be here soon."
"Then get to it. You know what to do." Negan said, and Saviors grabbed weapons and disappeared into the woods.
"Showtime, Princess." Negan grabbed you by the arm, then used his knife to make a long, ragged gash down the front of your shirt, tearing it in two.
"What the—!" You shoved him hard, and received a slap to the face. The button on his jacket cuff caught your cheek and you could feel a little blood trickling down the side of your face. But you stood your ground.
"Never touch me like that again." Negan said coldly as he grabbed you again and lead you into the RV. You were told to sit on the couch, then the door shut and you were shrouded in darkness.
There were muffled voices outside the RV. Occasional shouting. Negan hadn't spoken to you since he'd shut the door, and that had been probably close to a half an hour ago. "What will you do to them?" You whisper.
"Collect on their debt."
You were about to ask what that meant when you heard someone outside of the door to the RV say, "Let's meet the man of the hour" and bang on the door.
"Stay here until I tell you to." Negan flung open the door and jumped out into the light of headlamps. "We pissing our pants yet?"
You couldn't hear what was being said, but you could see your family lined up execution style on the ground. Daryl was paler than earlier and looked as if he could pass out at any moment. Maggie looked the same. Rick had terror in his eyes, and Michonne was staring at you through the darkness. There was no way she could see you, but you knew she knew you were there. Negan pointed his bat at Maggie, said something, and Glenn lunged forward, only to be beaten back into place again.
There was more talk you couldn't quite hear, then Negan moved back closer to the RV and said, "Princess, you might wanna join us now. I don't think you'll want to miss this."
You figured that was your cue. Shaking, tears streaming down your face, and your eyes downcast, you stepped down into the light of the ring of terror. You stood, frozen and terrified, in front of your family. Upon seeing your shirt in shambles and the large cut across your cheek, Daryl and Rick both started shouting.
Rick suddenly had Negan's horrific baseball bat shoved in his face. "I told you not to do that shit again." Negan punched him square in the nose. "You," He pointed at Daryl. "You're not worth much soaking wet right now, are you? Jesus, you look like shit." He kicked Daryl in the chest and he fell to the ground with a wheezing cry.
"Stop it!" You cried out.
Negan turned to face you. "On your knees, Princess. You're not to talk right now. Let your man do all the talking." You open your mouth to protest and remind him that he is NOT your man, but the casually swinging Bat of Death convinced you to close it and slowly drop to your knees. "You may answer this one question, though, sweetie." Negan squatted next to you, surveying the group. "Which one should I kill? I mean, someone's gotta die, right? To pay for all the deaths your people have inflicted on my people." Negan looked pointedly at you. "No? If you're going to be a Savior, you'll have to make these tough decisions."
"Then kill me." You stare him down and out of the corner of your eye you see Rick and Daryl shift again. "Because I will not be a Savior."
Negan gave that same bored sigh again, and stood back up. "Except you already are. So killing you would defeat the purpose." He turned to face Rick again. "See, that's part of the life debt that you owe me. I'm going to kill one of you, and take another for my group. I've already chosen my live person," He pointed the bat at you again, "And now I'll chose my dead person. Oh! I have an idea." He walked over to where Glenn was kneeling and pointed the bat in his face. "Eeny." He moved to Daryl. "Meeney." Michonne. "Miney." Rick. "Moe."
This went on for what felt like eternity. After several agonizing minutes of listening to the child's nursery rhyme, Negan stuck the bat in Abraham's face and said, "It." The ex-military man was glaring at Negan now. "Anybody moves, anybody says anything, cut the boy's other eye out and feed it to his father. You can breathe, you can blink, you can cry. Hell, you're all going to be doing that." He reared back and brought the bat down hard onto the top of Abraham's head. Abraham, blood streaming down his face, straightened back up almost immediately. "Whoa! Ho ho! Look at that! Takin it like a champ!" Negan laughed, then continued to beat Abraham with the baseball bat until there was nothing recognizable left of his face. Then he stopped and it was quiet again.
You threw up into the grass in front of you.
"You OK, there Princess?" Negan came over and lifted your chin to look into your eyes. "Get OK fast." He turned to face the group. "So here's what the rest of your night will look like." You could no longer see any of your family members through your tears. Bile was burning the back of your throat and you thought you were going to pass out. "You are all going to get in your little RV, and get the two Exorcist characters here," He waved his bat at Daryl and Maggie, "To some medical care. Then, you will go home. You will go to sleep. Or not, considering the events that have just transpired. Then tomorrow morning, my men and I are going to show up outside of your community, and you will give us half of everything you have and I will give you the rules of working for me. Then we will drive away and see you again shortly. Princess here," The bat was back in your face, "Is coming with us, because as I stated before, I've chosen my live person." There was silence. "Questions?"
"Yeah." You spoke up, looking Negan right in the eye. "How soon can you go fuck yourself?"
Negan pulled his pistol and swung it at your head. Everyone in the group yelled out and then there was nothing but black.
A/N: First, I'm sorry, but I had to pick a character to die, and I'm personally convinced that it was Abraham, so there's that. Second, I take requests, so just send me a message or an ask!
