On the Man who Made Malice

Chapter One

"Allie-"

A finger went up to her lips to silence her idiot partner. Bootsteps went by as they crouched in a cramped crawlspace, surrounded by cobwebs and spiders, breathing stale air. Funny how she would have screamed at the sight of spiders a few years ago - dumb ass fears didn't really exist now, not when the dead were eating the living. A tiny smile cracked her cheeks as the heavy thudding steps faded away. Before the end of the world, she'd gotten her kicks by stealing whatever she could grab; small, meaningless tat that owners had never noticed was even gone. They'd take their possessions for granted and by the time they did see what was missing, she had absconded with her loot and added to her personal collection of trophies. When she stole before – she could only call that time 'before' – her heartbeat would thrum, her palms would sweat and yet she'd feel so fucking alive that not even the shame of getting caught would deter from taking what was her property by right of finders' keepers. Hiding now, packed into a space tight, she felt something stir in her victory. Just maybe they'd win another round against the real monsters.

Looting during the apocalypse didn't give her the same easy high, not that she had sought out to outright steal from the living. People now coveted what they owned; anyone still alive cherished what little things they had and guarded every piece with a cocked rifle ready to defend their only possessions to their end. She hadn't felt that high, the rush of being almost-caught for a long time before the beginning of the end, only chasing it when it helped her stay alert, stay alive. And now, as she was crouching in some infested crawl space with Peter by her side (looking like he was either ready to strike a death blow or throw up on her feet), there was finally, blessedly, that familiar rush of victory. It was so rare to feel like she'd won these days that even something small as a can of beans was worth celebrating in her mind. Anything now was a fucking trophy, worth its weight in gold – if gold still held any type of value.

Beside her in the crawl space and still as taut as a wire, Peter let out a shaky breath and peered through a crack of light between the wood panels, trying to get a gauge on whether the coast had cleared. She would have done it herself but there was always a risk that their potential assailants would jab a knife in between the gap and she'd be down an eye at the least; if he wanted to volunteer, she wouldn't stop him. Three of theirs in the last two months (she thought it was two months) had been killed, so only her and Peter were left from their original half dozen. Since his sister had died on a routine scavenger hunt, Peter had been ironically more focussed on surviving and had saved them both more times in the last three weeks than he'd ever done. She had quickly learned that death would always come to those who walked alone and that survival, instead, thrived with trust in the right people. She wasn't so stupid to think she'd be able to survive long alone.

Leaning back from the gap he'd been peering through, Peter opened his mouth as if he was about to say something. Quickly, she clamped her fingers over his lips and could feel his frustration from his hot, angry gaze. If they had anything, it was time to spare and those literal jack-booted thugs weren't going to give up without a fight. Her and Peter had raided the kitchen, the bathroom, anywhere they could find, snatching up anything and everything worth carrying in two large rucksacks. When they discovered that place, a farmhouse set back amongst the trees, covered in vines and woodland shit, it had been a beautiful untouched goldmine so very ripe for the taking. It hadn't even occurred to her that other people had seen it until she saw a glimpse of movement through a dirty window pane, their goldmine suddenly turned into a baited trap. While safety came in stacking your decks, there were plenty of assholes would slice your throat open for a half pack of Raisin Bran. Releasing her fingers from Peter's mouth, she sat back into the crawlspace as far as she could go and motioned for him to do the same, wary of the risks they were taking.

"Boss ain't gonna be happy," one deep voice came, just barely loud enough for them both to hear. Peter's frustration at waiting seemed to dissipate as she was proved right. "Damn near picked clean over."

"Rick?" asked a second voice.

"Doubt it. We'd have heard before, if it was him. And he's too much of a pussy to try again. Scout round the woods, they can't have got far. Didn't take as much as they could have so it's either one person or a few who got interrupted. Bet my ass on the first option."

"Yeah, it will be your ass…" the second one replied again, but the gruff sound faded before she could hear the rest of the threat. The thugs and their jack boots were heading out, away into the open. She could taste the freedom on the tip of her tongue. With the world giving them a break, they could be back at base within a couple of hours and safe from human threat again.

If it was a trick, though, her and Peter were fucked and royally fucked. If it was real, then that was their shot to escape before whoever those guys were came back and raided the whole place, looking for where they were hiding. Peter jostled her a little, reaching up to the handle on the door and waiting for her go-ahead. She swallowed her tongue and put her faith in his instinct and her own new-found vigour. One or two, maybe three men they could handle together but if it was more? It would be over before it began. Still, the idea of cracking open that tin can and feasting back home was driving her to distraction and rash decisions. Drawing her knife from her belt, she looked over at Peter and gave a short, sharp nod.

The creak of that door slowly swinging out was deafening as they both waited for an attack. Nothing. Not a breath, not a shadow, not a damn sound. After another second, she took a solid step and released a breath that she didn't know was held in. There was a sweet rush of fresh air in her lungs and she looked back at Peter with that spark of victory mirrored in both of their eyes. Grabbing his free hand, she pulled him out and took another step. Razor-sharp pain stabbed into her shins, piercing through thick layers of her jeans and she fell, face first, onto solid oak flooring, her backpack snapping open at the jarring impact. Sweet breath was knocked from her as the world was thrown back into chaos from eerie silence, her own greasy red hair swimming in front of her face as she turned and looked up, crying out as the wire dug deeper into her skin. Standing over her – over them both – was some guy with a receding hairline and a gun in his hand casually trained on them. She was vaguely aware of another man to her partner's side with his boot on Peter's back, pushing him down into the floor. They were both royally fucked.

"Gotcha," muttered the thug on Peter's side smugly. Angry at not seeing the razor wire sooner, she spotted her knife just barely in reach instead and made a lunge for it with a grunt, gripping the rubber handle, life depending on it. She swiped at the legs of the asshole closest to her, barbs of wire digging and twisting deeper and deeper into her skin. The asshole dodged the swipe but couldn't move back, blocked by the wall behind him.

"Fucking bitch," he swore as she carved her mark in his calf with the end of her knife just as he kicked her wrist. "You're lucky he doesn't own a red head yet," he said almost calmly as he brought the butt of his gun down over her. There was a sickeningly hard crack as her head bounced off the wooden floor, pain exploding across her. The stolen goods, every last can, were scattered around them so far out of her reach now.

"Allie, no…" Peter cried out next to her, his voice strangled as the foot pressed in deeper; she couldn't hear anymore anyway. Her head felt heavy and light all at once, vision swam, already dazed from hunger, shock and waning adrenaline seeping out of her. Blood gushed from her scalp and pooled on the floor before she lost the battle to stay awake at the second blow.

The first things that registered were how oddly warm she was, and the strange position she was in, considering how she was lying face down on something vaguely comfy. Either she was hallucinating or they had put her on a couch and not some cold, dark ground awaiting her death. Pain soon flooded her body, pooling around her forehead, vision blurry. She couldn't understand why they would give a shit about her comfort, why she was still alive and breathing. Out of the corner of her eye, there was a slim figure stalking up and down by a window, trying to see outside. As she struggled a little to move, hands bound behind her back with what felt like zip ties, waves of nausea started to hit her. She wasn't expecting that tug to her shoulder, an arm helping her sit up straight as the nausea abated. The balding thug had pulled her up from her prone position on some moth-eaten couch, the other gun-dog nowhere to be seen. There was no sign of Peter, either, she realised and her gut sank in remorse. She should have been smarter about their escape. Should have seen the trip wire before they pulled it taut. Hell, he didn't even want to go raid the house in the first place.

"Come on, honey, wake the fuck up," the man's gruff voice barked, "I didn't hit you that hard, and you need all your faculties for the next part."

Blinking away the headache, she wiped her mouth on the shoulder of her t-shirt, tasting blood. "What's next then?" Her voice was more than a little hoarse from under-use but, God, she didn't fucking waiver a bit. "You taking our shit? Leaving us for dead?"

"No… well, you could be half right," he replied simply and went back to his watch by the window. Her eyes caught some flash of black and red as she followed her captor's gaze. "Boss might take some pity on you though, make yourself look pretty and he might keep you."

"Do me a favour and fuck off," she spat weakly, fear tingling through her spine nonetheless. Cretin. They'd stripped her of her weapons and her jacket. Nothing she owned was left except jeans and a shirt, both dirty and sweaty and cracking with dried blood. They'd even taken her shoes off her so she couldn't run far, if at all.

A thudding on the door caught her attention and Thug Two walked in, frog marching Peter behind him. Though she was relieved that her friend didn't seem to be hurt, she couldn't help but notice he had zip ties around both his wrists too, and patches of blood on his own shins. Behind them, there were more faraway voices in the hallway, one commanding and louder than the rest, and a couple of quieter ones. Thug One and Thug Two looked at each other knowingly while Peter stood next to the couch, looking like he was more nauseated than she was.

"On your knees," Thug Two commanded of them both quickly, shoving her and Peter to the floor. "And keep your mouths shut until spoken to."

It was then that her fogged-up brain clicked into place and realised where they were. Instead of dragging them out into the open as delicious Biter bait, they'd just brought them down the fucking stairs and into the living room of the farmhouse they'd raided. Some sweet irony, no doubt. Her shins stung as they made her kneel on the carpet, head forced into a bow at the barrel of a gun trained on her. Her hair hung limply on either side of her face, one half of it thickened by her own blood. Peter was by her side, his head bowed the same way and his body tense; she had to be thankful she hadn't broken her promise, that he was still alive and breathing.

"I don't take too fucking kindly to raiders, you know," came yet another voice. A richer, deeper voice with a twang that she knew all too damn well. "I had a lot riding on this fucking place when you two come along and fucked it all up."

Her eyes snapped wider in recognition the more he spoke to them. The vile taste of vomit started to curl into her throat in shock. She was going to be sick if she looked up, she knew it. There was jingling of belt buckles and crinkle of leather, and, fuck, he even had the same swagger. Her skin had already broken into goose bumps at the sound of his voice, what the hell would his face do to her? God, this was some Karmic joke that was playing out. Either that or she was dead with Lucifer himself taunting her. Keeping her head down, face shielded by her hair, she wondered how long it'd take him to realise who she was. Did he even remember her face? It had been a long damn time since... before.

"We were just hungry," Peter said next to her and she wanted to make him shut up again, to stop drawing attention to elicit sympathy that was never going to come. "Please, just… just hungry."

Her chest heaved as she dared to move her eyes up from the floor and over him, hoping that she was wrong. What caught her attention was the bat dangling by his side, the shaft wrapped in a blanket of crusted barbed wire. The man's attentions were fixed on her partner and she snapped her head back down before he could see her face.

"Hungry, huh?" he chuckled, "Fuck me, they're hungry. My heart goddamn bleeds," he laughed and Thugs One and Two chuckled too. "Heard you caught Simon good in the leg. Nearly made him piss his pants."

"She did, actually, with a Bowie knife. We took it." Thug One – Simon, she guessed – answered stoically. Shifting from knee to knee, trying to focus on the pain in her head and her legs instead of remembering the pain she got looking at his face, her head stayed down. Keep quiet, she told herself; don't rise to his bait when he sees.

"Bowie knife?" he said, interest clearly piqued. "Now where'd you get a fucking Bowie knife from, doll?" She didn't say a word, yet, trying to keep her head down low. She didn't answer. "You fucking speak when you're fucking spoken to or I'll do something you're gonna regret…" he growled threateningly. "Want your boy here to keep his ears?"

"Guy I knew," she replied quietly and quickly. "He collected them. I stole one once."

Suddenly, there was a calloused hand around her chin, yanking her face up painfully. A split second and then she saw it; it was pure recognition on his face, through the ache in her head and her blurry vision. She must have looked the same way at him. Of course it was him. She'd never forgotten the sound of his laughter and how he commanded a room no matter where it was, how he would reduce her arguments to nothing and break her defences down in a moment. She smiled in a tiny victory, glaring with pale blue eyes and trying not to laugh at the astounded expression on his face. Someone had thrown ice water over his fire but he looked like he wanted to draw blood all the same.

"Well fuck me sideways…" he muttered to himself, a slow grin appearing on his wretched face.

"Hello to you too, Negan," she replied hoarsely, trying to catch her breath. Nonchalance, indifference. He'd hate them both, wanting fire and rage. "How you been?"

"Oh I'm peachy keen, doll," he stepped back and threw her chin out of his grasp, as if touching her hurt him. "What's it now? Two years?"

"Three, I think, maybe four but who's counting winters these days?"

He laughed richly and nodded in agreement, crouching down for a moment. "Why'd this shit-streak call you Allie?"

"Because I told him to. It's my name, isn't it?" Peter's sharp gaze turned on her, shocked and confused. He was promptly ignored. "Or you forget that too?"

Negan laughed and poked the bat in her face as he stood again, using that thing to make his damn point. "Oh no, sweetheart, I fucking remember. I remember fucking everything." There was a lull and she was acutely aware of everyone's eyes on her. "I almost missed you, Mallory. Air just got a little sweeter."

She hated hearing him say her full name again. It had been years since she'd heard it spoken aloud – Allie was an easy nickname she went by now, when hearing her real name turned her back into the person she'd been before the end of the world. "What are you gonna do?" she asked, shoulders beginning to ache from where her wrists were bound together, "Just… just let Peter go. It doesn't have to be like this. Come on, Negan."

Those were the wrong words to pick; Peter was grabbed by the scruff, his head under Negan's boot before she could blink, neck threatening to snap. "Oh they don't? How fucking magnanimous of you," he spat. "Are you sure I can't turn your little boyfriend's head into a skidmark on the fucking carpet?" The bat rose up to rest on his shoulder. "You seem worried about him more than you are yourself, that's a fucking new development for you."

He towered over her and her stomach tumbled. Peter pleaded with his eyes. "What do you want from us? You already took everything," Mallory pleaded, looking up at him.

"Let us go!"

"Y'see if someone took what fucking belonged to me, I'd usually give them a choice. After, y'know, killing one of them. Still, it'd be a shame to ruin this lovely carpet..." he looked at Peter's head under his boot and smiled. "Lucky for you both, there's only two of you. And fifty of me. You ain't getting a choice to go free, no, no, no, Princess. You – and everything you own – is mine now. Either that or the aforementioned skidmark on the floor." He hovered the bat above Peter's head threateningly.

Her jaw set, teeth gritting, she gave a single nod. Her soul to the devil for their lives, for Peter's life. For his sister.

"Well then," Negan grinned and hopped over Peter's prone form to grab Mallory's arm and yank her up to her feet. "You can ride in the fucking front with me. We got a lot to catch up on, after all. I know you missed me," he winked lasciviously at her before turning to the man called Simon. "Throw the other one in the back with the rest of the shit, standard drill."

Before she could blink, the room was empty and cold. The only two were her and Negan. She didn't want to give him anymore of herself than she could but… if it meant her neck, she'd have no choice. "Negan," Mallory kept her voice to a mutter, not wanting to rile him up further. "It's just me and him. No group, no bunker. What you caught us with is all we have in the world."

"Like I said, my heart bleeds for you, Princess," Negan replied, running his hand down her arm in a tender gesture, making her skin tingle. "But I can't have you running around out around here, taking what's mine, spilling your guts out. You'll see what we got, back at The Sanctuary. Might even like it when you loosen up and look round."

She leaned away just a bit from him, needing her space from his overwhelming presence. He hadn't changed much, she'd noticed; maybe got a bit thinner, a bit leaner but just as fucking dangerous as ever. It scared her shitless. "So," she said after a moment. "You're alive, then."

"Yeah. You know, I did miss you too. Got real broken up about how we left it and everything. Should have known you'd come running back to me eventually," Negan grinned so wide and came so close again she could see the flecks of green in his eyes and sun spots behind his beard. His body was threatening to press into hers. One of his thumbs hovered over her bottom lip, in a dare. "And if you want your little boyfriend to be nice and safe in The Sanctuary you're going to do what I fucking say. Simon didn't hit you that hard, did he?" He said, his hand drifting up into her hair. Those calloused fingers pulled tenderly at her scalp, trying to see the gash through the blood. Her head swam again as pain pricked at her.

"I'm not yours anymore, I'm not your mistress anymore," Mallory finally replied, breathless. "We're not having an affair. You can take all my shit but I am not going to be your property again."

He didn't react much; not that she saw. Instead, he huffed and pulled her along by the arm, out of the living room. "I can do whatever the fuck I want."

Steered outside, the goose bumps refused to abate. Peter – sitting in the back of a pickup truck – looked back to her with weariness and anger. Negan swung his bat onto his shoulder and Mallory turned her gaze back ahead. It figured, she thought; someone was having some fun at her expense now that the one person she could truly never trust was the one she had to. They came to a dirty car in the head of a line of them, its black paint chipped and chrome rusting and splattered with dried flesh. Negan reached ahead and opened the passenger side door for her, her hands still bound behind her back.

"Fuck, Princess, was your ass always so fucking perfect?" he whispered into her ear as she managed to bundle herself into seat. "God fucking damn, I shoulda paid closer attention."

Mallory just rolled her eyes and tried not to think about those days.

It hadn't been an innocent relationship – she wasn't an innocent woman and she wasn't stupid either. Mallory had always known what kind of men she was hitching her wagon to, especially when it came to Negan. The thing was, when he looked at her – a starving man looking at a meal – she felt powerful and desired, valued for her own worth. She hadn't stolen anything since she was 21 years old and high as a kite at Georgetown; there were no more thrills as she got older and realised what an idiot she'd been to act out the fantasies of a kleptomaniac freak. Still, that craving for a rush had been lying dormant in her for years. She even thought it had died a whimpering death until Negan sauntered into her life, wearing a white t-shirt and grass-stained jeans, back in the before.

Another scrawl on some downloaded worksheets, another attempt at filling her time, another try at finding something she could love. Mallory tucked her hair back behind her ear as she sat on a bench seat. The entire place was empty and quiet, the last cheers coming from some practice session outside ten minutes ago. She was thankful for the emptiness.

"Hey, fuck, whatever your name is – new girl," someone said from behind her. Mallory turned her head instantly, a red pen clamped between her lips. In the doorway of her classroom lingered a guy who was leaning casually on the jamb of the door. He wore the most imperceptible of looks, somewhere between a smile and a frown behind the scruff. His lean arms were folded across his chest, the slight sweat stains under his arms just noticeable. How long had he been there watching her, exactly? "Make sure you keep the fucking noise down, and you and me won't have a problem being nice next-door neighbours, okay?"

"Neighbours?" Mallory parroted, having pulled the pen from between her lips. "Ah…" a description clicked in her brain. "You must be Negan, huh?" She punctuated his name with a jab of her pen.

He raised his arms up in defence for a second before he wrapped them both back round his chest. "My reputation precedes me."

"That, and the cursing." Turning around, she motioned for him to come inside, annoyed at the way he lingered. She went about fixing the papers strewn across her work surface. His reputation did indeed precede him and she'd heard nothing good. Things about him being a bully, about how he worked the kids to death and how his adult education class was a front for illegal gambling. Those were the rumours. "I'm Mallory, or you can keep calling me new girl if you want."

"I fucking might. And you… do what, exactly?" he asked, eyeing her up and down as she rose from her seat. She got the feeling that he wasn't used to having someone occupy his space.

"Uh… I teach people to play this thing…" she said, pointing to the old, creaking piano behind her, still littered with sheet music and her own scribbled notes. "I'll take a wild stab in the dark and say you teach something sports-related?"

"Fantasy football," he said, tilting his head as he walked in the room. "I coach during the day with the kids, weekends I get the Dads playing fantasy fucking football. And ping pong," he added as an afterthought, "When the season's over, it's ping pong."

Mallory swallowed a laugh and instead bit her lip, setting the papers on one of the desks. "Ping pong and fantasy football. Hence the whistle?" she asked, pointing to the one dangling from his neck.

"Just finished training with the brats," Negan said, tilting his wrist and looking at his watch. "Didn't think anyone would be around from the Adult Ed classes yet."

Nodding softly, she looked back at her papers, "Just getting a head start before tomorrow. There's only a few people taking part, but it's a lot to pack in, teaching piano to people who don't know what treble clef is." He smiled at that, his eyes crinkling at the edges. "Might end up being noisier than you want, at least at first."

"I don't mind a bit of fucking noise, new girl. I just prefer something other than morons thinking they can play a piano after a single lesson."

Negan was checking her out now. He wasn't even subtle, dragging his eyes up and down her body so much so that Mallory felt naked. She wasn't an idiot; there was an attractive youth about her, maybe a spark that he even saw as innocence in his eyes. Her experience with men tended to go one of two ways, and he had chosen option one: flirting. Negan had to be in his forties at least, she thought. He owned maybe a decade and a half on her, possibly more. Even if he wasn't older than her, and wasn't her co-worker – because, fuck, he was fucking hot and no, she wasn't blind – there was one giant and glaring problem currently perched on his left hand. Even wearing the most basic of clothes, with those bright grass stains, he might as well have worn gold robes. Mallory felt underdressed as she did in knee-length shorts and a sweater, even though he wasn't much better.

"Uh huh. I can't really help you there. Mine's a beginner class so there'll be more than a few bum notes." Her hands slipped into her back pockets, trying to stand straighter. Something told her that the next six months were going to be Hell, working next to him. "It was nice to meet you anyway, Mr Negan, so-"

"Just Negan," he had corrected instantly. "You look like you could use a cup of shitty coffee if you're planning on being fucking trapped in here after dark. Did Jackson show you the good teacher's lounge or let you think the only one was that shithole next to the auditorium?"

Mallory's brow knit in confusion, "There's another teacher's lounge?"

He laughed again, creasing his eyes, and put a guiding hand on the small of her back. "Oh doll, you shouldn't listen to what that piss-stain says. Let me have the pleasure of showing you round instead."

A jolt from the crapped-out shocks of his car shifted her body painfully. It was useless thinking about who he was before the apocalypse, since the very real Negan was sitting next to her, having zip-tied her hands behind her back and taken everything she owned. How Mallory hadn't thought about the possibility that he'd be alive still, she didn't know. He wasn't even just surviving, he was thriving from what she could see. He wasn't starving or dirty like she was, he had no injuries and was singing along to whatever 80s rock was playing in the car. He'd won an unwinnable situation because of course he had; he was Negan.

"I fucking love that air, don't you, Mal?" he grinned, the window wide open on his side. "Sweet peaches, never smelled em before the Biters come along. It's all I fucking smell now." She didn't say anything but simply sighed an exhausted sigh and let her head fall back. "Awww don't pout on me. You're lucky I got to you first. You think your boyfriend could scare off some of the nastier elements out there? Jesus fucking Christ, he couldn't scare the dust off a moth."

"He can handle the Biters, Negan, you don't know him."

"Not talking about the dead, Princess. You stick with me and my boys, I'll make sure nobody ever lays a fucking finger on you again." He spared her a long, luxurious glance.

"I bet," she bit back. Her mouth had always got her in trouble with him. Neither of them had changed that much. "How far away is this place?"

"About an hour. Then I'll get that head of yours checked out by the doc. Don't go falling asleep on me yet. Who knows what kind of trouble you got yourself into."

A/N: Thank you for reading. A review or comment is much appreciated (x-posted on AO3)