Title: Showdown
Author: GageWhitney
Rating: T
Pairing: Daryl/Andrea
Disclaimer: Very much not mine.
Summary: In the end, it's Rick who asks Shane to go, but it's Daryl who makes him leave.
Note: Don't know how I feel about this one, since I never write action-y sort of fics. I thought I'd give it a shot, though, so here we go. LillianMW asked for Daryl beating the shit out of Shane. Your wish is granted.
Heads-up that this fic mentions Shane's incident with Lori in the CDC.
(Also, there's another, smaller X-Files reference in this one, because I can't help myself sometimes.)
In the end, it's Rick who asks Shane to go, but it's Daryl who makes him leave.
The showdown starts out quietly, Rick pulling Shane aside to confront him without the presence of the others, but like any good schoolyard fight, their words soon grow heated and loud, attracting the attention of everyone else. In no time at all, there's a crowd forming, whispering and watching and wondering what the hell is going on.
"Just go," Rick's saying as they gather around. "Don't make more of a scene than you already have. Just get in the car and leave."
There's silence for a few moments as Shane takes it all in, watching Rick's face and listening to the growing conversations around him. No one seems to know what to make of the situation unfolding before them.
"It's nothing," Shane drawls, addressing the group. "I ain't going anywhere. Y'all need me here, and I'm going to stay. Someone's got be a real fucking leader."
Rick's voice is steady when he says, "Why don't you tell everyone what really happened to Otis, Shane?"
It's obvious that Rick's trying to stay in control, trying to continue being a good leader to the group and a good example for his son. He's angrier than any of them have ever seen him, though, and there's more than a little hurt in his face as he confronts a man he long considered a brother more than a friend.
Shane shakes his head, an obnoxious little smirk on his face. "You know what, man? None of y'all where there. You don't understand. I had to do it."
"You had to shoot him? You had to leave another man for dead?" There's a few gasps, mostly from Hershel's people. Rick takes a step forward, but otherwise stands his ground. "We don't kill the living. Remember?"
Shane scoffs. "Survival, Rick. Only thing that matters in this world anymore. You're just too soft to see it, man. I've been telling you –"
"You want to get into this?" Rick interjects, attempting to talk over him. "You want to talk about what kind of people you and I are?"
"—You had to risk lives going back into the city for Merle fucking Dixon," Shane says.
Hanging back from the group a bit, Daryl's ears perk up at the mention of his brother. He stalks forward a few feet, clenching his fists when Shane continues with, "You wasted everyone's time looking for a little girl that you lost in the first place –"
"You tried to rape my wife," Rick growls.
A hush falls over the group with his words.
"Is that what she said?" Shane asks, like he can't understand the accusation. "That's what she's trying to say happened that night?"
"It's the truth," Lori says, finally separating from the crowd. She stands at her husband's side and takes his hand. "Don't try to make it seem like any less than that, Shane."
A few heads turn to look at Andrea, who's standing cattycorner to Shane and looking suddenly horrified and disgusted. She'd been standing her ground, readying to take his side, but anything she'd been prepared to say died on her lips with Rick and Lori's revelation.
"Oh my God," Andrea chokes out, breaking the silence. Her hand clutches at her shirt, pulling it away from her skin in an effort to breathe easier. Dale stands beside her, looking like he's not sure if he should help her stay calm or attempt to take on Shane.
Daryl's not stupid. He may not be a member of the group coffee klatch, as it were, but he knows what's going on in camp, and he knows something happened between Andrea and Shane the day the went out to the housing development. There's a reason she looks like she wants to throw up, like she's been punched in the gut, and he starts pacing like a chained dog, feeling himself get angrier by the second.
Shane notices her reaction, too. He smirks and shakes his head. "Ask Andrea if I'm some damn rapist. She didn't seem to have a problem fucking me," he snarls. "Hell, she made the first move. I didn't even touch her. Ain't that right?"
Something clicks in Daryl, then. "You son of a bitch!" he yells, striding toward Shane. Taking him by surprise, Daryl slugs him hard in the jaw, ignoring the searing pain in his hand as he watches the larger man stumble to the ground.
Shane recovers quickly and lunges after him, getting in a punch to Daryl's eye as he takes him down. There's screaming and yelling from the group as the two struggle, and Daryl manages to land a blow that stops Shane long enough for him to get the upper hand.
"That's the kind of man you are?" he yells as he pins Shane to the ground with his body. "Killing people who try to help you? Trying to rape your buddy's wife?" He punches him square in the face once, twice, three times, before he feels hands pulling him up and off the other man. Daryl kicks his legs and spits at him as he gets hauled away. "Piece of shit! You fucking better leave!"
Shane lies on the ground, his face bloody and already beginning to swell in places. He struggles to sit up and squints at the group, sees them watching him with disgust from the sidelines. He looks at Lori and Rick with their arms around each other, at Andrea's tear-stained face, at Daryl being restrained by Glenn and T-Dog.
"Fuck you all," he mutters. He wipes blood away from his mouth and rises shakily to his feet. "I don't need any of you. Shit, I'm probably better off on my own."
Rick gives his former best friend one last look before leading his wife away. He calls for Carl, who slips away from Carol to join them.
As if Rick's leaving gave them permission, the rest of the group disperses, leaving Shane to stumble off to his vehicle without another word. The engine turns over, and Daryl's somewhat satisfied that Shane didn't see fit to stick around for one minute longer.
He watches as Carol and Maggie lead Andrea away before turning to head back to his tent, ignoring the protests from Glenn and T-Dog about his injuries. His eye is already starting to bruise and his hand is throbbing with pain, and he just wants to lie down, not be fussed over.
Before he can get very far, though, Dale stops him with a hand on his arm. "I know why you did what you did," he says.
"Oh, yeah?"
"I tried to warn her about him, but…" He trails off and shakes his head. "You're a good man, Daryl. If I was thirty years younger, I would've hit the son of a bitch myself."
There's a ghost of a smile on Daryl's lips as the older man pats his arm and walks off.
Later, Andrea shows up at his tent with a small first aid kit and a bottle of water.
"Hi," she says quietly.
"Hey." He's leaning back on his sleeping bag, trying to ignore the pain radiating through his body.
She enters the tent and zips the flap up behind her. "I wanted to see how you were."
"I'm fine," he says tiredly. He pushes himself up into a sitting position, and she winces when she gets a good look at him.
"Oh, look at your face," she sighs. She moves to touch him, but he flinches away. She's not sure if it's because he's in pain or because he's Daryl.
"You should see the other guy," he jokes weakly.
The corners of her mouth quirk up involuntarily. "Looks like it's just bruising, though. Can I see your hand?" He shrugs, and holds his hand up for her inspection. "God, Daryl," she murmurs, taking in the shredded, bloodied skin.
"It's fine," he insists, trying and failing to remove it from her grasp.
"It's not fine," she says. She prods gently, trying to feel for any obvious breaks. "You're hurt."
"Yeah, if you keep pulling it around like that," he mutters. She touches a particularly sensitive spot, and he hisses in pain, scrunching up his eyes.
She grimaces, and lays his hand gently on her knee. "Sorry." She hands him two pain pills from the first aid kit along with the bottle of water. "Take these."
He swallows them both down in one gulp. "Thanks."
Next, she removes a small bottle of rubbing alcohol and soaks a few cotton balls. "This part is going to hurt."
As gently as possible, she swipes the cotton ball over the cuts on his hand. "Fuck," he says through gritted teeth.
"Almost done." She finishes cleaning the wounds and starts wrapping his hand with gauze. Eyes on the task at hand, she asks, "Why'd you do it?"
"Huh?"
"Shane. Why'd you go after him?"
Daryl shrugs. "He's dangerous," he says. "And he's fucking unstable. Couldn't have him sticking around, hurting more people."
"You're right." She finishes up with his hand and pats it gently before locking eyes with him. "Thank you for standing up to him."
He takes his hand back and winces as he slowly flexes it. "Rick had it under control. Asshole just pissed me off."
"I don't know if he would've left if it was just Rick and Lori going up against him," she says. "Shane's an alpha. Rick… He's a good man, but he's not built of the same kind of stuff. He's not as… hard, I guess."
Daryl grunts. "Sounds like a good thing to me."
"It is. But it can also be a disadvantage." She shrugs, and puts the first aid kit back together. "Rick wanted to talk it out with him, and you see how well that went. But you challenged Shane the only way he was going to understand, and he walked away with his tail between his legs."
"Wasn't really thinking straight," he confesses with a shrug. "Good thing it worked."
"You're lucky you weren't hurt worse," she admonishes.
"Probably," he acknowledges. "Couldn't let him just say all that shit, though."
Andrea stares at him for a beat before rising up on her knees. She grips his shoulders for balance and leans forward to kiss his undamaged cheek. Her lips linger for longer than they probably should before she moves to speak softly into his ear.
"Good thing chicks dig scars."